South Africa: Gauteng and Limpopo officially exit the third wave

Gauteng and Limpopo have officially exited the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Addressing a media briefing on Friday, Health Minister Dr Joe Phaahla said Gauteng has gone down to below 5% -- at 4.4% -- positivity rate.

Phaahla said he hopes other provinces will follow suit, as there is no room for complacency.

The Minister said the country is steadily getting out of the grip of the third wave, which is driven by the Delta variant.

Nationally, there has been a 24% drop in new cases, compared to seven days before. Over this period, the highest case incidence has been in the Northern Cape province, followed by the Free State and then KwaZulu-Natal, in terms of cases per 100 000 population, Phaahla said.

The Minister said that over this period of seven days, hospitalisation has also gone down by 10%, with the Western Cape still the highest per population, followed by Free State and Gauteng.

In the last 24 hours, South Africa recorded 6 270 new cases, which is consistent with a downward trend of new infections but surprisingly, the highest number of cases were recorded in the Western Cape at 23.6%, KZN 19.5% and the Eastern Cape 17.8%, the Minister said.

The Minister said the positivity rate has come down from the highest level of 35% in mid-July to 12% on Thursday.

We are encouraged that the positivity rate is steadily going down every day. As of yesterday, Gauteng was down, making it the only province that reached the recommended World Health Organisation (WHO) level, below 5%. It came out at 4.4%, Phaahla said.

Extending his gratitude to health care workers, Phaahla said: We must again thank our health workers for keeping up the gallant task of saving lives on the front line, not only from COVID-19 but from other diseases as well. Sadly, we continue to lose many more South Africans daily, Phaahla said.

As of yesterday, South Africa recorded 175 new deaths, bringing the total number of deaths to 84 327.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-09-10. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
South Africa: Public urged to participate in pre-Budget consultations

National Treasury has invited the public to participate in pre-Budget consultations.

South Africa is one of the five pilot countries that are participating in the Fiscal Openness Accelerator (FOA) project that was launched in 2019 by the International Budget Partnership (IBP) and the Global Initiative for Fiscal Transparency (GIFT), Treasury said in a statement on Friday.

The projects overall objective is to build the technical capacity of selected governments, enhance fiscal transparency and to support the implementation of a public participation pilot in the national budget cycle, it said.

The purpose of the initiative is to, among other things, enrich the national budget process and/or policy/ies with inputs from non-government stakeholders, and other relevant sectors towards better alignment of national government fiscal policies with citizens needs and concerns.

The department said the initiative is also aimed at improving government practice and policy/ies on public participation and closing the feedback loop on the budget process and increased government responsiveness and public accountability.

Budget 2021, said Treasury, confirmed governments fiscal strategy of returning public finances to a sustainable position through ongoing restraint in expenditure growth and implementation of structural reforms to support economic growth.

In this context, the fiscal strategy aims to narrow the deficit and stabilise the debttoGDP ratio, primarily by controlling non-interest expenditure growth.

The strategy also seeks to provide continued support to the economy and public health services in the short-term without adding to longterm spending pressures.

[It also seeks to] improve the composition of spending, by reducing growth in compensation while protecting capital investment, Treasury said.

The 2021 Medium Term Budget Policy Statement, Treasury said, allows for the opportunity to review this policy position.

National Treasury said it is soliciting the publics views on South Africas Fiscal Policy on what improvements can be made to the Budget to deal with the challenge of long-term fiscal sustainability, and in light of limited resources, how should South Africa finance key priorities.

Written submissions, of not more than three pages, may be made on line.

The Treasury will also host a one-day virtual public consultation meeting to discuss the ideas put forward.

The online format for making submissions may be found on: https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=jzRFGrQCmk-nqHeG9t0yRTqZ86WzI7JHvRvFVz0vJUhUMDZERUtNMVgyVDI3S0VYQkdYVlJGOE40Ny4u

The department said while it is its wish to respond to each submission in writing, this is not practically possible, and a summary report will be published. All submissions will be published via the Vulekamali online portal, where they may be viewed.

The outcomes from the public consultation meeting are intended to inform National Treasurys proposed budget strategy to be considered by Cabinet in the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement, which is an important step in the planning phase of the budget process.

The deadline for written submissions is 17 September 2021. The registration for the online public consultation will be opened prior to the meeting, which will be held in the fourth week of September 2021.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-09-10. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
RTHK: Russia summons US envoy over 'election interference'

Russia said on Friday it summoned the US ambassador in Moscow over interference of US tech giants in parliamentary polls due later this month.

Moscow has ramped up control of the internet and is taking legal action against foreign tech companies for not deleting content banned by authorities.

The foreign ministry said Ambassador John Sullivan was presented with "irrefutable proof" of US tech giants violating Russian laws in connection with the September 17-19 elections to the lower house State Duma.

It said deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov expressed the "categorical inadmissibility of interference in the domestic affairs of our country" during the meeting.

A US State Department spokeswoman, Jalina Porter, said the meeting covered a "range of bilateral matters" in support of US President Joe Biden's "desire for a stable and predictable relationship with Russia".

She declined to weigh in on Russian complaints about US tech companies.

The question of election interference, however, was not mentioned, prompting a riposte from the foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova.

"There is one reason - interference in Russian elections. We hope this is how American diplomats will report it to Washington," Zakharova said on Telegram.

US-based internet companies, including Facebook, Twitter and Google, have recently faced a series of fines for failing to delete content requested by Russia's media watchdog and for not storing the data of Russian users on domestic servers.

Following protests in support of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny in January, authorities accused internet platforms of interfering in domestic affairs by not deleting posts calling for minors to join the rallies.

President Vladimir Putin that month complained about the growing influence of large technology companies, which he said were competing with states.

Nearly all vocal Kremlin critics, including Navalny's allies, are barred from contesting this month's parliamentary polls.

Navalny, 45, who is behind bars on old fraud charges, has this year seen his organisations banned and his top aides have fled the country.

Russian media regulator Roskomnadzor said on Monday it blocked a website of Navalny which instructed Russians how to vote out politicians of the ruling United Russia party.

The media regulator has also urged Google and Apple to remove an app dedicated to Navalny's "Smart Voting" campaign from their app stores, but they have yet to respond.

The "Smart Voting" tactic has led the increasingly unpopular United Russia party, currently polling at less than 30 percent, to lose a number of seats in recent local elections.

Many Western leaders, including Biden, have demanded freedom for Navalny, who spent months in Germany recovering from a near-fatal poisoning attack that he blames on the Kremlin.

The United States has also held Russia responsible for meddling in its elections and for large-scale cyberattacks, further straining bilateral ties.

In response, Moscow has accused the West of interference in its domestic affairs and of discriminating against its media.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Friday said the West has "practically declared war" on Russian media, citing examples of journalists being denied visas or accreditation abroad. (AFP)

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RTHK: Prince Andrew served with sexual assault lawsuit

Britain's Prince Andrew has been served with a lawsuit by a woman accusing him of sexually assaulting and battering her two decades ago, when she asserts she was also being abused by the financier Jeffrey Epstein, according to a Friday court filing.

In an affidavit filed with the US District Court in Manhattan, Cesar Sepulveda, identifying himself as a "corporate investigator/process server," said he left a copy of Virginia Giuffre's lawsuit on August 27 with a police officer guarding the Royal Lodge in Windsor, England, a property Andrew occupies.

The London-based Sepulveda said police had told him a day earlier they were instructed not to accept court documents on Andrew's behalf, but upon his return was told documents would be forwarded to the prince's "Legal Team."

Police refused to let him see Andrew or to say where the prince was, he added.

Spokespeople for Andrew said on Friday that his lawyers had no comment. A source close to Andrew's legal team said the prince had not been personally served.

Andrew, 61, is one of the most prominent people linked to Epstein, charged by Manhattan federal prosecutors in July 2019 with sexually exploiting dozens of girls and women.

Epstein, a registered sex offender, killed himself on August 10, 2019, at the age of 66 in a Manhattan jail.

In her lawsuit dated August 9 this year, Giuffre said Andrew forced her to have unwanted sexual intercourse at the London home of Ghislaine Maxwell, the British socialite and Epstein's longtime associate.

She also said Andrew abused her at Epstein's mansion on Manhattan's Upper East Side, and on a private island that Epstein owned in the US Virgin Islands.

In a November 2019 BBC interview, Andrew, who had been a friend of Epstein, denied Giuffre's claims of sexual abuse, and said he did not recall meeting her.

"I can absolutely, categorically tell you it never happened," Andrew said.

An initial conference is scheduled for Monday afternoon before US District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan. Maxwell faces a scheduled November 29 trial before a different Manhattan judge on charges she aided Epstein's sexual abuses. She has pleaded not guilty.

In 2017, Maxwell settled a US$50 million civil defamation lawsuit against her by Giuffre for an unspecified amount. Maxwell is not a defendant in Giuffre's lawsuit against Andrew. (Reuters0

This story has been published on: 2021-09-11. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
Hong Kong: Govt focused on seniors jabs

The Government will make every effort to facilitate the elderly to get COVID-19 jabs in the coming months, Secretary for the Civil Service Patrick Nip said today.

Meeting the media after attending a radio programme, Mr Nip explained the Governments latest vaccination strategy.

Our focus in the coming months is to boost up the vaccination rate for the elderly because they are the vulnerable group that we have to protect, and to build a strong protective shield in the community.

We will try every possible channel to facilitate the elderly to get the jabs including arranging outreach service at shopping malls, in housing estates, or arranging talks, medical consultation and vaccination service on site in different districts.

Mr Nip pointed out that apart from easy booking, the elderly can receive walk-in jabs at community vaccination centres via same-day tickets.

He said whether to expand the coverage of the ticket arrangement, currently open to five groups including seniors, will depend on the centres capacity and other factors.

If possible, we will of course consider expanding the coverage of the same-day tickets to facilitate more people including the elderly to get the jabs easily.

This story has been published on: 2021-09-11. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
RTHK: Israel captures four of six Palestinian jailbreakers

Israel has recaptured four of the six Palestinian militants who escaped from a high-security prison earlier this week in one of the most spectacular breakouts in the country's history, police said on Saturday.

Since Monday's breakout, the army has poured troops into the occupied West Bank for a massive manhunt.

But the two latest fugitives to be recaptured, who include a prominent former militant leader, were found hiding in a lorry park just outside Nazareth in northern Israel, police said.

Zakaria Zubeidi, 45, is a former militant leader of the Fatah movement of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas in the West Bank town of Jenin.

Mohammad Ardah, 39, was sentenced to life in prison in 2002 for his role in Islamic Jihad's armed wing.

"Two more prisoners who escaped were captured a short time ago... while they were hiding in a parking lot for trucks," the police said.

"The hunt for the other two fugitives continues."

On Friday evening, police recaptured Yaqoub Qadri, 48, and Mahmud Abdullah Ardah, 45, both members of Islamic Jihad. Ardah was the alleged mastermind of the escape.

"Police located (the two fugitives) and chased them in a helicopter," the police statement said.

Israeli media said police were alerted by residents who reported seeing two men searching litter bins for food.

Israeli police and troops had conducted a huge search operation for the six prisoners since they broke out of the high-security Gilboa prison through a tunnel dug beneath a sink in a cell.

The army closed all the checkpoints connecting Israel and annexed east Jerusalem with the West Bank in a bid to prevent them escaping into Palestinian population centres.

Nazareth, where the four were found, has a large Arab population.

The six fugitives were all members of Palestinian militant groups who had been convicted by Israeli courts of plotting or carrying out attacks against Israelis. (AFP)

This story has been published on: 2021-09-11. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
Update: 11-09-2021 | 15:00:24

A Vietnamese delegation led by Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Tran Quoc Khanh attended the virtual 13th Cambodia - Laos - Myanmar - Vietnam Economic Ministers' Meeting (CLMV EMM 13) on September 10.

A Vietnamese delegation led by Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Tran Quoc Khanh attended the virtual 13th Cambodia - Laos - Myanmar - Vietnam Economic Ministers' Meeting (CLMV EMM 13) on September 10.

The event was held within the framework of the 53rd ASEAN Economic Ministers Meeting and related meetings in Hanoi from September 6-15.

Participants highlighted the need to promote trade, investment and connectivity among the countries to implement the post-pandemic economic recovery plan.

The Vietnamese delegation suggested the nations continue with cooperation activities in the 2021-2022 CLMV Action Plan in combination with realising goals in the Initiative for ASEAN Integration and the Master Plan on ASEAN Economic Community till 2025.

It also proposed facilitating export-import among the countries, especially customs clearance at border gates, encouraging linkages among firms in the region in the fields of farm produce processing and export to form supply chains.

Concluding the event, Khanh wished that the CLMV countries and the ASEAN Secretariat would continue assisting Vietnam in fulfilling its role as the host of the CLMV economic cooperation mechanism in 2022./.

VNA
Update: 11-09-2021 | 18:04:00

The Covid-19 pandemic is wreaking havoc on a global scale and continues to evolve unpredictably as Binh Duong has unfortunately become the epicenter of this 4th outbreak wave. Upholding the tradition of medical doctors, the provincial staff, doctors and nurses pack up to become pioneers at the frontline against the epidemic to fight the enemy named the SARS-CoV-2.



Medical staff is side by side with patients at Phu Chanh treatment zone in Tan Uyen town under Binh Duong provincial General Hospital

The stronghold within the epidemic

Like many wars in the heroic history of the nation, every Binh Duong resident is always ready to sacrifice himself for the great cause. In the gun-free battle, many officials, doctors and nurses put aside their daily lives to temporarily leave their families and loved ones to enter the epidemic center. It is the spirit of volunteering and the enthusiastic hearts to serve in field hospitals and treatment areas irrespective of pouring rain or the sunshine on every street to investigate, trace, and take samples for testing in a bid to reduce the risk of infection and protect people's health. Many doctors and medical staff are not allowed to go home to visit their children for months; and they cannot even be with their elderly parents who are seriously ill. They are heroes without names on a gun-free battlefield fighting an invisible but dangerous enemy.

Experiencing disease prevention and control with wide eyes due to many sleepless nights, Dr. Nguyen Hong Chuong, Director of Department of Health, said that in the past few days, the whole country has turned to Binh Duong and other provinces and cities. In the South, following up every information on disease developments and very patient infected with Covid-19 that recovers from the disease and is discharged from the hospital are really an invaluable spiritual gifts that the medical sector gives to the people. After nearly 4 months of anti-epidemic, especially from June 14 when the Delta variant appeared in many companies intertwined with dormitories crowded with workers to deeply infect the residential community, it was somewhat paramount difficulties for the extraction of infected ones (F0) from the community.

For several months now, medical staff have not had a moment to rest. Regardless of day, night or sun or rain, wherever we are, when there is information about the epidemic, we are immediately present in teams to investigate, take samples for testing, and spin continuously in the working from morning to noon in sweat-soaked protective suits that make the whole body exhausted and hands wrinkled from dehydration and glove wearing. It was hard and dangerous, but we still hold on to the areas. Whether in the laboratory or in the epidemic center, our work is always full of risks - the high risk of infection, especially for the doctors in the intensive care rooms as they have to change each diaper and feed each spoonful of porridge and water for the patient and keep an eye on each vital indicator so that the patient would not change into life-threatening situations," Dr. Nguyen Hong Chuong added.

Being present to witness the messy work of the "soldiers in white", we can fully understand their hardships, sacrifices and dedication. It is wordless for us to describe all the difficulties that the epidemic prevention and control officials have gone through. Working in a high-risk environment, many frontline staff, doctors and volunteers have been infected and even sacrificed themselves, like the case of midwife Duong Nguyen Thuy Trinh. Reading the condolence letter from the Director of Binh Duong Department of Health to the family of the midwife who died from Covid-19, we are but filled with tears: "Death for each person is inherently a lonely journey that cannot be shared with anyone else. Now, the most terrible thing of the Covid-19 pandemic is not only separating relatives and cutting off communication from the society but also pushing infected and dead people into lonely situations to the end. The departure of the infected midwife Thuy Trinh to the other world is the spiritual strength for each medical officer and staff in the province to turn grief into actions and overcome difficulties and resolve to fight and win the pandemic.



Medical staff on mobile at Thai Hoa ward in Tan Uyen town is preparing supporting oxygen canisters for Covid-19 patients

Volunteer to the danger

Promoting the spirit of medical staff in the battle and after the call for support from Director of Department of Health, hundreds of applications from the retired medical teams have been sent to join the frontline forces. Some old doctors having diseases in their bodies still volunteer to participate in emergency resuscitation and treatment of severe cases. Doctor Tu Tan Thu, former Chief of Office of Department of Health, said: As a retired doctor, I regularly monitor the situation and developments of the Covid-19 epidemic. When the 4th wave of epidemics appeared in Binh Duong, the image of "white suit soldiers" on the front lines who did not mind hardships touched me very much. Realizing that my health is secure, my mind is clear, and I have experience in medical examination and treatment, I want to join to contribute some of my strength to the prevention and control of the epidemic. I myself am just a small fighter in the fight against this pandemic, but I think that there will be many more like me that will bring victory in this war."

Looking at the list of thousands of volunteers participating in Covid-19 prevention and control in Binh Duong, we are especially impressed and touched by Mr. Nguyen The Hung, 30 years old, from Thanh Chuong district of Nghe An province. Hung is a distributor of Vinacacao Vietnam Company. He shared on his personal Facebook page: "Binh Duong is facing many challenges from the epidemic, the medical staff is short due to the increasing pressure of F0 cases. The days of relaxing at home, watching movies and surfing social networks make my life so boring. Outside, the forces are still on 24/7 duties, medical staff and officersf have to work all night long and through the days. There are doctors and nurses whose children are only 6 months old, but they have to leave them to their grandparents and family and roll themselves into the heart of the epidemic. The image of that resilient white-shirted soldier prompted Hung to apply to contribute to serve in the field hospital.

How can we tell to the end about love of the white-shirted soldiers of the province as well those as from all over the nation to support Binh Duong. They always accompany and stand side by side with the provincial health sector to the hot spots of the epidemic center. Nurse Nguyen Thi Thao, a volunteer of Thanh Hoa province's medical union, heard that her mother-in-law had died in her hometown, but because of the task, Thao suppressed her pain and said goodbye to her mother from afar. Thao's image of mourning her mother at the frontline of disease prevention and control has become a symbol of the noble sacrifice of a white-robed female soldier who put aside her own pain to stay on the front lines of Binh Duong.

The fight against the epidemic is still on with many difficulties and challenges, the white-shirted soldiers on the front lines have spent many nights without sleep to monitor the survival indicators so that life can be revived.

Reported by Kim Ha - Translated by Vi Bao
Investments in aviation taking off

A new policy offers abundant opportunities for equity investors to step into aviation under the public-private partnership (PPP) model or by securing the right to exploit airports under the management of state-owned Airports Corporation of Vietnam.



PPP projects at airports are generally regarded as safe investment







In late August, the Ministry of Transport sent documents seeking comments from 28 centrally-governed cities and provinces about the plan to raise private capital resources for aviation infrastructure investment (the August scheme), after nearly two years of studies and drafting.



Two days earlier, the plan was also sent by the authority (MoT) to local airlines, as well as Sung Group and IPP, two major businesses that have made successful ventures into aviation infrastructure investment.



The plan was jumpstarted by the MoT in 2019 and first submitted to the prime minister for consideration this March. In June, through Dispatch No.4023/VPCP-CN, Deputy Prime Minister Le Van Thanh asked the MoT to consolidate the project to iron out solutions on decentralising airport management and raising resources from localities and assorted economic sectors to spur investment into aviation infrastructure development.



Compared to the scheme submitted in March, the August scheme was considered by industry experts to bring enormous opportunities for private businesses to join aviation infrastructure investment.



Accordingly, instead of exercising tight control as they do now, the MoT would gradually decentralise airport management for the local government with a view to diversifying investment sources as well as easing pressure on the state budget and state-owned enterprises in respect to aviation infrastructure investment development.



In light of the August scheme, the MoT proposes decentralising airport management into three groups based on each airports level of importance.



For group 1 airports (international airports of national significance including Noi Bai, Danang, Cam Ranh, Tan Son Nhat, Phu Quoc and Long Thanh), the government continues to retain ownership right through the MoT and the Committee for State Capital Management at Enterprises and assigns ACV to manage and operate Vietnams airport system to take on the management and exploitation of these airports as well as raise capital for investment.



For group 2 airports that perform mixed civil and military aviation functions, including Tho Xuan, Chu Lai, Phu Cat and Tuy Hoa, the government continues to hold ownership through the MoT, the Committee for State Capital Management at Enterprises, and the Ministry of Defense. It also assigned ACV to manage, exploit, and raise capital for investment.



For group 3 airports (the remaining airports), the MoT contemplates gradually decentralising the management of these airports to local governments. This will be exercised through the transfer of land use rights and the ownership of facilities at the airports from central bodies to provincial-level Peoples Committees in order to maximise their reliance and responsibility while helping to avail of local potential and advantages for airport investment development.



The remaining airports such as Dien Bien, Na San, Cat Bi, Vinh, Dong Hoi, Ca Mau, and Con Dao are located in diverse locations throughout the country.



Le Anh Tuan, Deputy Minister of Transport, said that the Vietnam Civil Aviation Law has no content on decentralising airport management yet.



The MoT, however, has proposed decentralising the management of Cat Bi International Airport to Haiphong Peoples Committee in the spirit of learning by doing to gradually expand the model.



While Cat Bi airport has yet to generate profit, it has good potential for development. Besides, Haiphong, with sound economic potential and experience, can support the construction of runways and other facilities, said Tuan.



Besides this, via the August scheme, the MoT has proposed the government to greenlight the engagement of equity investors at several airports that are still exclusively exploited by ACV.



Accordingly, at group 1 and 2 airports, the ACV would reserve the right to manage, exploit, and raise resources for essential works. Private capital would only be mobilised for service facilities under the direct investment format. Investors would be selected right after the MoT enacts the related circular on bidding procedures.



For group 3 airports, the MoT recommends raising capital from assorted sources through franchising and exploitation rights.



According to Dinh Viet Thang, head of the Civil Aviation Administration of Vietnam, the current laws on the use and management of public assets, PPP investment, and other related regulations would need to be revised to support franchise investment in the sector.



After regulations are brought up to speed, the MoT proposes the trial of franchise investment at Can Tho International Airport.



Can Tho airport has been chosen for the trial because it has fairly good infrastructure in place that would allow the investor to focus on improving management and upgrading service facilities to better service quality as well as other works of high added value, an MoT source said.



Local investors were reported to be keen on overhauling airports. For instance, budget carrier Vietjet wants to invest in Chu Lai, Cat Bi, Tuy Hoa, and Dien Bien airports, while IPP Group wishes to ventures into Phu Quoc and Tuy Hoa airports, and Vingroup intends to invest in Chu Lai airport.



According to Mai The Vinh from the Centre for Transportation Public-Private Partnership Policy of the US George Mason University, PPP investment in airport terminals is the prevailing trend in global infrastructure investment due to its high financial security.



Besides fresh money streams like passenger service fees or landing fees, airport operators also have other stable income sources from non-aviation services such as from leasing out terminal space or selling duty-free goods, said Vinh.
Vietnam sees positive signs in pandemic battle

Vietnam reported an additional 11,932 Covid-19 infections on Saturday and 12,541 patients recovered from the disease the same day, according to the Ministry of Health.



According to the ministry's report, 11,927 of the new patients are locally-transmitted cases confirmed in 35 localities such as HCM City (5,629), Binh Duong (3,971), Dong Nai (960), Long An (337), Kien Giang (165), Tien Giang (147), Tay Ninh (137), and An Giang (107). There were five imported patients confirmed today.



The infection number showed a decrease of 1,379 infections compared to yesterday's figure. There were 5,169 infections found in the community.



As of Saturday evening, 596,980 infections have been reported since the new outbreak occurred in the country in late April, with some southern localities recording high infections such as HCM City (291,871), Binh Duong (153,830), Dong Nai (33,842), Long An (27,874), and Tien Giang (11,577). The outbreak has so far spread to 62 out of 63 cities and provinces nationwide.

With these new infection cases, the number of Covid-19 patients in Vietnam has increased to 601,349. The country now stands 49th among 222 countries and territories worldwide in the number of infections.



On September 11, an additional 12,541 more patients recovered from the disease, raising the number of recoveries in the country to 363,462.



On Saturday evening, a further 273 deaths related to Covid-19 were announced, bringing the total number of fatalities in Vietnam to 15,018. The deaths were reported in some localities including HCM City (188), Dong Nai (60), Binh Duong (10), Tien Giang (2), Kien Giang (3), Binh Thuan (2), Danang (2), Gia Lai (1), Can Tho (1), Ninh Thuan (1), Khanh Hoa (1), Nghe An (1), and Vinh Long (1).



The country has so far conducted over 27.10 million Covid-19 vaccine shots, with over 4.74 million people having received two doses.
Vietnam, China hold 13th meeting of steering committee for bilateral cooperation

Politburo member and Standing Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh and Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi on September 10 co-chaired the 13th meeting of the the Steering Committee for VietnamChina Bilateral Cooperation.













Politburo member and Standing Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh (R) and Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi (Photo: VNA)

The two sides agreed that, since the 12th meeting in July last year, the Vietnam-China relations has maintained a positive development trend.



The two sides also discussed issues such as imbalanced trade, disrupted trade activities, especially Vietnam's import-export through border gates, the delay of several economic cooperation and non-refundable assistance projects.



Deputy PM Minh suggested promoting win-win cooperation fields to meet the set progress in accordance with the spirit of common perceptions of senior leaders, and effectively using existing cooperation mechanisms between ministries, sectors and localities of the two countries.



The two sides agreed to promote high-level visits, effectively implement cooperation between the two Parties, uphold the role of the two foreign ministries in coordinating and boosting the bilateral relations; well implement mechanisms of exchange and cooperation in defence, security and law enforcement; and increase experience sharing in COVID-19 prevention and control, including cooperation on vaccines.



Wang Yi announced that his country will donate an additional 3 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine to Vietnam this year.



For his part, Deputy PM Minh thanked and highly appreciated China's support.



They agreed to resume commercial flights when conditions permit; continue taking measures to promote economic - trade cooperation, investment and development; soon complete procedures to open the market for Vietnamese agricultural products; accelerate upgrading or opening new pairs of border gates; encourage Chinese enterprises to expand investment in Vietnam using avanced and environmentally friendly technologies; and actively coordinate in solving difficulties in a number of cooperation projects.



Vietnam and China will also beef up cooperation in science and technology, environment, transportation, agriculture, health care, culture, education, tourism and people-to-people exchange, and coordination at multilateral forums.



The two sides also discussed border and territorial issues, and agreed to cooperate in land border management on the basis of strictly complying with agreements and legal documents on border.



Regarding issues at sea, the two sides agreed to continue to strictly adhere to high-level common perceptions, well control disagreements, not take actions to complicate the situation and expand disputes, and jointly maintain peace and stability in the East Sea.



The two countries will also promote negotiation and cooperation mechanisms, including cooperation in less sensitive areas, delimiting the waters outside the Gulf of Tonkin as well as completing negotiations towards the signing of a new agreement on fisheries cooperation in the Gulf of Tonkin.



Deputy PM Minh emphasised the importance of respecting each other's legitimate rights and interests, in line with international law, including the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).



The two officials witnessed the signing of an economic-technical cooperation agreement between the two governments on the provision of non-refundable aid, the announcement on the completion of a series of bilateral memorandums of understanding, and the launch of a cooperation project on research in the Hong River Delta of Vietnam and the Yangtze River Delta of China.
Storm Conson heads to central Vietnam

Storm Conson is heading to the central provinces of Quang Tri and Quang Nam on September 11.







Storm Conson heads to central Vietnam







According to the National Centre for Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting, as of 4 am on September 11, the eye of the storm was 230km away from Quang Tri-Quang Nam beaches. The wind speed was 90-100km/h. In the following 24 hours, the storm will move to the west at the speed of 5km/h. On September 12, the eye of the storm will enter Vietnam at latitude 15.8N, longitude 109.4E. The wind speed will be 75-90km/h.



The storm will continue to move to the west in the following 24-48 hours at the speed of 5-10km/h. After landing in central Vietnam on September 13, it will weaken into a tropical depression. The wind speed at this time will be 40-50km/h.



It will start moving west-northwest in the following 48-72 hours at 10km/h and keep weakening into a low-pressure area. On September 14, it will be at latitude 16.8N, longitude 105.5E and with a wind speed under 40km/h.



Strong winds, high waves of 4-7 metres and tornados were warned for all ships and boats on the East Sea, especially near the Paracel Islands, Ly Son and Con Co islands.



From now to September 13, provinces from Quang Tri to Quang Ngai will have heavy rains with an average of 200-300mm rainfall. Rainfall in some places will be over 350mm. Provinces from Quang Binh to Thanh Hoa will have heavy rains from September 12-14. The average rainfall will be around 100-200mm. Quang Binh and Ha Tinh will have over 250mm of rainfall.



Binh Dinh, Kon Tum and Gia Lai will have rain from now to September 12. The average rainfall will be around 50-80mm.



Strong winds and high waves were forecasted for ships and boats working from Binh Thuan to Ca Mau provinces due to the southwest monsoon on the East Sea.
South Australian Chinese community host charity events to protect giant pandas residing in Adelaide Zoo

17:13, September 10, 2021 By Yuwenqian Zhang ( People's Daily Online

Adelaide, Sept. 10 (Peoples Daily Online)  The year 2021 marks the 12th year after Wang Wang and Funis arrival in Adelaide, South Australia. These two giant Chinese pandas, born in August 2006, celebrated their 15th birthday in Adelaide Zoo on Aug 29. On the same day, the opening ceremony for the Harmonious Co-existence between Human and Nature Painting & Calligraphy Exhibition was held together with the birthday celebration.

The opening ceremony (Photo courtesy of Chinese Consulate General in Adelaide)

Since last year, the outbreak of Covid-19 has had a continuous impact on Adelaide Zoo. Since June, the Shandong Chamber of Commerce in South Australia, the Hebei Chamber of Commerce in South Australia and the Australia-China Cultural Exchange Promotion Association (ACCEPA) have provided much support and sponsored a series of charity activities to protect these two giant pandas. These activities have included the Painting & Calligraphy Exhibition that has since attracted many warm-hearted participants from the local Chinese community.

At the ceremony, He Lanjing, Consul-General of the Peoples Republic of China in Adelaide, said that the Adelaide Zoo and the giant pandas play a unique role in promoting mutual understanding between Chinese and Australian peoples. She also praised the high sense of social responsibility shown by the Chinese community in SA.

A giant panda in Adelaide Zoo. (Photo courtesy of Chinese Consulate General in Adelaide)

Elaine Benstead, CEO of the Adelaide Zoo, also showed her sincere gratitude to the Chinese community in South Australia. She talked about the importance of Wang Wang and Funi to Adelaide Zoo and hoped that this would continue to help deepen the connections between China and Australia.

The paintings on the Painting & Calligraphy Exhibition, made in various styles, were mostly done by children and families from the Chinese community living in South Australia. The non-profit selling of the exhibits will last until the end of September and all the income will be donated to the Adelaide Zoo as charitable funds.

(Web editor: Hongyu, Bianji)
Xi, Merkel talk over phone on ties, multilateral cooperation

Xinhua) 08:57, September 11, 2021

Visitors tour the Germany exhibition booth during the 2021 China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS) in Beijing, capital of China, Sept. 5, 2021. (Xinhua/Wang Tiancong)

BEIJING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The China-Germany relationship will continue to make new progress, as long as both sides hold on to consolidating and deepening mutual trust, treating each other as equals and focusing on cooperation, Chinese President Xi Jinping said Friday in a phone conversation with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Xi noted that he and Merkel have maintained highly frequent and efficient exchanges since last year, which has played an important leading role in the development of China-Germany and China-European Union (EU) relations, and also demonstrated the high-level mutual trust between the two countries.

Xi said he highly appreciates the fact that Merkel has been actively committed to promoting Germany's and the EU's practical cooperation and friendly exchanges with China.

Aerial photo shows a China-Europe freight train bound for Duisburg of Germany departing from Tuanjiecun Railway Station in southwest China's Chongqing, Jan. 1, 2021. (Xinhua/Tang Yi)

Over recent years, China-Germany relations have generally maintained smooth development, with cooperation in various fields showing strong resilience amid the COVID-19 pandemic, which has brought a genuine sense of fulfillment to the people in both countries, he said.

The two countries, he added, have helped China and the EU to complete their investment agreement negotiations on schedule, and worked together to uphold multilateralism, safeguard free trade, and actively tackle climate change, jointly making positive contributions to maintaining world peace and stability.

The fundamental reason for the great achievements of China-Germany relations, he said, lies in the fact that the two countries respect each other, seek common ground while reserving differences, focus on win-win cooperation and pursue complementation of their respective advantages.

Xi expressed his hope that Germany will encourage the EU to adhere to the right policy on China, treat differences objectively and address them rationally, so as to promote the sustained and sound development of China-EU relations.

Visitors look at a giant panda cub at Zoo Berlin in Berlin, capital of Germany, May 28, 2020. (Photo by Binh Truong/Xinhua)

For her part, Merkel said that over recent years there are many aspects in the development of Germany-China and EU-China relations that are worth summing up.

She said she is willing to maintain close communication with the Chinese side and make joint efforts to push Germany and China as well as the EU and China to bridge gaps through dialogue and properly handle their differences.

The EU-China investment agreement is beneficial for both sides, she said, adding that she hopes it can be smoothly ratified and put into effect as soon as possible.

Germany hopes to strengthen vaccine cooperation with China, she added.

Merkel shared her view on the current situation in Afghanistan, and expressed her hope to work with China to strengthen communication and coordination within the United Nations and other multilateral frameworks.

Xi stressed that China advocates coexistence and mutual learning among different civilizations, opposes interference in other countries' internal affairs, and stands ready to make constructive efforts with the international community, including Germany, to truly realize peace and stability in Afghanistan.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
How BRICS cooperation strengthens multilateralism

Xinhua) 09:17, September 11, 2021

BEIJING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Leaders of the BRICS countries reaffirmed on Thursday their commitment to multilateralism as the world grapples with a raging pandemic and tortuous global economic recovery.

Since the inception of BRICS, the organization has forged a "BRICS model" for multilateralism with extensive and in-depth cooperation, which shows the world a "BRICS path" towards building a community with a shared future for mankind.

To overcome the compounding challenges facing the global community, it is key to uphold true multilateralism. The BRICS countries can do more to boost multilateralism by setting an example of stronger pragmatic cooperation.

China has all along been determined to promote quality BRICS cooperation. Four years ago, the BRICS Xiamen Summit saw the start of the second "Golden Decade" of BRICS cooperation. Over the past few years, China has made unremitting efforts to strengthen the unity among BRICS countries and actively expand the "BRICS Plus" cooperation model, among other things.

The international community has also witnessed China's steadfast actions in working with the rest of the world to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. To date, China has provided more than 1 billion doses of finished and bulk vaccines to over 100 countries and international organizations, and will strive to provide a total of 2 billion doses by the end of this year.

In order to enhance global vaccine cooperation and realize the equitable access of vaccines for all, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced at Thursday's virtual summit that on top of the 100 million U.S. dollars donated to COVAX, China will donate an additional 100 million doses of vaccines to fellow developing countries by the end of the year.

The BRICS countries have also achieved substantial progress in their economic cooperation. The BRICS Partnership on New Industrial Revolution Innovation Center has been officially launched in Xiamen. The center has hosted talent training, think tank seminars and industrial innovation competitions, and will hold a forum on the development of industrial Internet and digital manufacturing next year.

At the people-to-people level, China this year hosted the BRICS Women Innovation Contest. In the future, China also plans to hold the BRICS governance seminar and people-to-people exchange forums, and open an online training course for media outlets from the five member countries.

Calling BRICS cooperation "a fine example of multilateralism," B.R. Deepak, professor and sinologist at New Delhi-based Jawaharlal Nehru University, said it is also "an antidote to unilateralism, de-globalization and anti-globalism."

Looking ahead, with strong conviction and solidarity, the "BRICS model" of multilateral cooperation will shine brighter and make even greater contributions to the building of a community with a shared future for mankind.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
China expects Afghan Taliban to make clean break with ETIM terrorist group

Xinhua) 09:20, September 11, 2021

BEIJING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- China hopes the Afghan Taliban will make a clean break with the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) and other terrorist groups, and take effective measures to resolutely crack down on them, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said Friday.

Spokesperson Zhao Lijian made the remarks in response to a recent interview of Taliban spokesperson Suhail Shaheen with the Global Times, in which he said many ETIM members have left Afghanistan because the Taliban has categorically told them there is no place for anyone to use Afghan soil against other countries, including its neighboring countries.

The ETIM is an international terrorist organization listed by the UN Security Council, Zhao said, adding that it poses a direct threat to China's national security and territorial integrity and affects regional security and stability.

"Afghanistan and the rest of the international community share the responsibility to firmly reject, curb, crack down on and eradicate the ETIM," Zhao said.

Noting that China has repeatedly expressed its concerns to the Taliban over the ETIM, Zhao said the Taliban attaches importance to China's concerns and made solemn promises.

"We hope they will honor their words, make a clean break with the ETIM and other terrorist groups, take effective measures to resolutely crack down on these terrorist organizations, and strengthen coordination and cooperation with neighboring countries to forestall spillover effects and prevent Afganistan from becoming a hotbed, harbor or source of terrorist forces," he added.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
World Internet Conference to open in China's Wuzhen on Sept. 26

Xinhua) 09:21, September 11, 2021

BEIJING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The 2021 World Internet Conference Wuzhen Summit is scheduled to take place from Sept. 26 to 28 in Wuzhen, east China's Zhejiang Province, according to a press conference Friday.

Themed "Towards a New Era of Digital Civilization -- Building a Community with a Shared Future in Cyberspace," the summit will be held both online and offline this year, according to Zhao Zeliang, deputy head of the Cyberspace Administration of China.

Nearly 2,000 representatives from governments, international organizations, industry associations, leading global enterprises, universities and research institutes from over 80 countries and regions, will attend the conference in-person or virtually, Zhao said.

This year's event will feature 20 sub-forums to discuss new digital-technology trends such as 5G, artificial intelligence and open-source ecology, as well as major topics of cyberspace governance and development, including data management, internet-enabled charity, poverty alleviation and global anti-pandemic efforts.

The three-day event will also feature a global internet competition, an internet expo and a ceremony to announce this year's leading internet scientific and technological achievements, along with a section showcasing excellent projects on jointly building a community with a shared future in cyberspace.

Two reports, namely "World Internet Development Report 2021" and "China Internet Development Report 2021," will also be released during the event.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
Beijing speeds up building of digital trade demonstration zone

09:45, September 11, 2021 By Zhu Jingruo, He Yong ( People's Daily

A staff member of Postal Savings Bank of China introduces digital RMB wallet to a visitor at the 2021 China International Fair for Trade in Services held in Beijing, Sept. 6, 2021. (Photo by Du Jianpo/Peoples Daily Online)

In recent years, Beijing has ramped up efforts to build a digital trade demonstration zone, attracting an array of major projects, including the Beijing International Big Data Exchange, China Beijing Environment Exchange (now China Beijing Green Exchange), Ueda Yagi Money Broking (China) Co., Ltd., the first wholly foreign-owned money broker in China, as well as Allianz Insurance Asset Management Co., Ltd., Chinas first wholly foreign-owned insurance asset management company.

The move serves as a follow-up to the citys vigorous efforts to build a national integrated demonstration zone for greater openness in the services sector and a pilot free trade zone (FTZ).

Since last September, Beijing has accomplished 80 percent of the tasks set for three to five years in the construction of the two zones, promoted 10 of its best-practice cases in the country, and put into practice 34 policies that were introduced into the country for the first time.

The pilot FTZ, which covers 0.7 percent of the citys area, has contributed 7 percent of Beijings economic growth and 28 percent of the increase in the number of foreign-funded companies in the city, providing strong support for Beijing in gathering production factors from across the world and developing itself into an international highland of openness and innovation.

As the only city in China that has been encouraged to build the two zones, Beijing has rolled out multiple policies and systems to broaden market access for foreign investors and facilitate capital flow, said Liu Meiying, deputy head of the leading group office for the two zones work in Beijing, at the recently concluded 2021 China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS) held in Beijing.

In pursuit of a bright future through digital technologies, we are going to take advantage of the platform of the CIFTIS, give full play to Beijings role as a capital city, align domestic rules with high-standard international economic and trade rules to improve service trade levels in key fields including digital trade, finance, culture, professional services, education, and health care, and further liberalize and facilitate the cross-border flow of production factors, so as to form an efficient and safe service trade governance system, pointed out Yan Ligang, head of the Beijing Municipal Commerce Bureau.

To advance the construction of a digital trade demonstration zone and further facilitate the flow of data, Beijing has established the Beijing International Big Data Exchange, piloted cross-border flow of data, and explored a regulatory sandbox mechanism for data market out of concerns for safety in digital economy.

Beijing has also pushed ahead international cooperation on digital trade, striving to build a world-class digital trade port and foster mechanisms for collaboration in the aspect.

Driven by policies on the construction of the two zones, 1,035 foreign-invested enterprises put down roots in Beijing from January to July, a year-on-year increase of 55.2 percent. During the same period, the citys actual use of foreign capital reached $10.33 billion, 19.1 percent more than that of the same period last year.

While high-end technological industries that accord with Beijings development orientation have raced to take a bite of the citys opportunities, new business forms, models and technologies represented by digital economy are emerging as new drivers of the citys economic development.

Beijing has taken the lead in China in implementing a policy on recognizing securities and futures occupational qualifications acquired overseas, making it easier for international talents to work in the city. Thanks to the policy, talents who already obtained qualifications and job experience overseas dont have to take relevant examinations in China again before engaging in certain fields in the city.

The Chinese capital city has also taken measures to simplify work-related formalities for foreign talents. It is the first Chinese city to pilot a project that enables foreign nationals to apply for and receive work permits and residence permits for working at a single service window, which is much more convenient compared with the procedures required in the past.

Beijing has also allowed foreign talents with permanent residence permits to establish sci-tech companies and guaranteed that they are equally treated in the market as Chinese entrepreneurs, making it easier for them to start their own businesses.

Besides 19 international schools under construction and increasing the number of international hospitals, the city has also built eight communities for foreign talents to create a warm and friendly atmosphere for them.

Digital trade is regarded as an important part in the construction of the two zones. In fact, it also enjoys exciting prospects in health care. We are on the front foot and have great potential to integrate it into online and offline health care services before, during, and after consultations, said Zhu Hailuan, vice president of the China branch of Sanofi, a French multinational pharmaceutical company that established a production base in Beijing as early as 1995.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
Nation vows proactive contribution to progress

China Daily) 10:08, September 11, 2021

Aerial photo taken on Aug 23, 2021 shows the scenery of Saihanba forest farm in North China's Hebei province. [Photo/Xinhua]

China continues to support cooperation on green development, vice-premier says

Chinese Vice-Premier Han Zheng reaffirmed the country's commitment to multilateralism in global environmental progress on Thursday, vowing proactive contributions to global sustainable development.

The country will also make endeavors to promote full, effective and continuous implementation of the landmark 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change, as well as to host a successful COP 15 United Nations Biodiversity Conference, he said, addressing the closing ceremony of the annual general meeting of the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development.

The world's biggest biodiversity meeting in a decade, the COP 15 UN Biodiversity Conference will be held in Kunming, Yunnan province, from Oct 11 to 15 and in the first half of next year.

"I hope the council members and experts continue to offer opinions and recommendations and make new, even greater contributions to promote the comprehensive green transition in China's economic and social development, as well as the construction of a clean and beautiful world," he continued.

Established in 1992, the council is a high-level international advisory body that provides policy advice to the Chinese government.

Addressing the closing ceremony via a video link, leaders of international organizations said China plays a critical role in providing the leadership and contributing solutions for the world's endeavor to a sustainable future.

"The decisions of our generation in Kunming and Glasgow as well as in China's 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-25) require innovative transforming approaches towards inclusive, green development," said Achim Steiner, CCICED vice-chairman and also administrator of the United Nations Development Programme.

From Oct 31 to Nov 12, the COP 26 UN Climate Change Conference will be held in Glasgow in the United Kingdom.

"We are now discussing how to reestablish the old system and how to create a new normal. A new normal that is (UN Sustainable Development Goals) compatible, nature positive and climate responsible and inclusive," he continued.

He said the Kunming and Glasgow summits offer unique opportunities to increase ambition to address many of the threats to people, the planet and prosperity.

"Each country will have to make its own decisions, but collectively we will define the world's ambitions," he said, adding many countries look to China to see how they can contribute to raising global ambitions to the greatest extent possible.

"The China leadership will be critical for building the sustainable future for all among the community of nations," he said.

Besides decarbonizing its economy in years ahead as it has committed, China also needs to adopt sustainability standards of pricing and set out a roadmap of financing a green future, in which the country has already pioneered, he said.

Kristin Halvorsen, CCICED vice-chairwoman, said she has found China a completely different country compared with 1985 when she first visited.

"I'm also very impressed by all your achievements during the last decades, especially your fight against poverty.

"To go into a broad range of challenges, climate change, threats against biodiversity and the need for just transition to the sustainable economy. I'm impressed by the expertise that CCICED can mobilize to contribute to solve these tasks," said Halvorsen, also director of the CICERO Center for International Climate Research.

"I also appreciate how the experts try to focus on solutions," she added.

Andrew Steer, president and CEO of the Bezos Earth Fund, said COP 15 is "a wonderful opportunity to reverse the tragic loss of nature".

"We all agree that we stand at a crucial time in history. Massive risks and huge opportunities," he said.

"We all agree that China's role in finding solutions is obviously crucial. China has demonstrated it can drive down the cost of technology and can implement it at unprecedented scale."

Stephen Heintz, president and CEO of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, said the Chinese leadership is committed to building an ecological civilization and it is clear China has reliable allies in the diverse international leaders and organizations represented at this annual general meeting.

"I think CCICED can be seen as a model of global trust-building, cooperation and effective partnership," he said.

He said this model will help China reach it ambitious goals of peaking carbon dioxide emissions and going carbon neutral. They are helping the world community to a future of net zero emissions.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
China on 9/11 anniversary: Double standards in fighting terrorism should be abandoned

CGTN) 10:11, September 11, 2021

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said on Friday that there should be no double standards in fighting terrorism and terrorists should not be defined on the basis of political self-interest or ideologies.

"Terrorists are terrorists. Defining terrorists based on political self-interest is essentially condoning terrorist activities, which seriously undermines the international counter-terrorism cooperation," said Zhao.

China opposes any country using the guise of protecting ethnic minority groups or freedom of religion to attack others' legitimate anti-terrorism and de-extremism measures, or to condone or even use terrorist organizations to seek geopolitical self-interest, he added.

Zhao made the remarks when asked to comment on the 20th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks in the United States at a daily briefing in Beijing.

The U.S. went to war in Afghanistan after the 9/11 attacks. It completed a withdrawal from the country last month.

Zhao said, instead of being eradicated, the number of terrorist organizations and foreign terrorist fighters on Afghan soil had increased during America's 20-year war in the country.

Calling the U.S. the culprit of the Afghan issue, Zhao said the end of its military intervention should be the beginning of its assumption of responsibilities.

The U.S. should help Afghanistan realize stability and prevent chaos, contain the threat of terrorism and move toward sound development, said the spokesman.

Zhao also said that important progress has been made in international cooperation on counter-terrorism over the past 20 years.

He warned, however, that the situation is still complicated and grave, with terrorists' abuse of new technologies or their possible use of the COVID-19 pandemic to incite terrorist activities.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
9/11 20 years on: What US 'anti-terrorism' wars left behind

Chinadaily.com.cn) 10:18, September 11, 2021

Editor's note: 9/11 was one of the most consequential events in the world since this century. Two decades ago, terrorists flew two hijacked aircraft into the North and South Towers of the World Trade Center and another into the Pentagon, causing huge damage to the US and the world.

Nearly 3,000 people were killed, and the economic loss to the US amounted to $200 billion while the loss to the global economy was $1 trillion, according a report issued by the UN.

After 9/11, the US launched the war in Afghanistan on the grounds of anti-terrorism, forcing them to adopt US-style democratic governance, which resulted in local social unrest and people living in misery. Taking anti-terrorism as an excuse, the US also started wars in places such as Iraq, Syria, and Yemen.

In the past 20 years of US' anti-terrorism war, neither terrorism has been eliminated, nor have the people been protected from suffering from wars. The war has broken the regional strategic balance, exacerbated the deterioration of the regional situation, and harmed the world.

According to the data released by the Costs of War project of Brown University, since 2001, the US has spent $8 trillion in wars and military operations in 85 countries around the world in the name of anti-terrorism, killing more than 929,000 people, among which 387,000 are civilians. As many as 38 million people have been displaced in the war.

US-exported wars disturb world order, harm regional political situations

The world order is "no better off" and the United States is "certainly much poorer off -- reputationally and fiscally" 20 years after it initiated post-9/11 wars on terror, Sourabh Gupta, a senior fellow at the Institute for China-America Studies, has said.

"I would submit that the past 20 years, and more broadly the years since the end of the Cold War, will rank as being among the most disastrous eras in the history of US foreign policy," he said.

After the Cold War, the United States "could have chosen global leadership by consensus," Gupta said. However, it chose to "impose on the world an America-dictated vision of order."

Political experts pointed out that ever since the US launched an international war on terrorism following the Sept 11 attacks, its policy has been defined mainly by military interventions to reshape the Middle East in accordance with its own vision and agenda, not for the benefit of the people in these countries.

As Edward Lozansky pointed out in his article in The Washington Times on Aug 31, the US destroyed the previously stable states of Iraq, Syria and Libya, unleashing in those countries unprecedented levels of anarchy, chaos and violence.

"The US is a democracy where the administration changes every four years-and with it, war strategy," Torek Farhadi, who served as an adviser to former Afghan president Hamid Karzai, said. "The result is a mishmash. The US tolerated corruption in Afghanistan. The American public was too remote from this to really know what is going on."

'Wars on terror' lead to tremendous humanitarian disasters

The Costs of War data shows that more than 38 million people have been displaced in the war zones in countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Libya and Syria where the US has been involved.

The Afghanistan War (2001 - 2021):

Due to the lack of authoritative statistical data, there is no established opinion about the number of civilian casualties during the Afghanistan War, but it is generally agreed that since entering Afghanistan, the US troops caused the deaths of more than 30,000 civilians, injured more than 60,000 civilians, and created about 11 million refugees.

The website of The New York Times reported on July 30, 2019, that in the first half of 2019, there were 363 confirmed deaths due to the US bombs in Afghanistan, including 89 children. Scholars at Kabul University estimated that since its beginning, the Afghanistan War has caused about 250 casualties and the loss of $60 million daily.

According to the annual report released by the UN, 8,820 Afghan civilians were killed and injured in violent conflict in 2020. In the first half of 2021, the number of civilian casualties in Afghanistan was 1,659 and 3,254 were injured, a 47 percent rise compared to the same period of last year. What's more, 6 million people, including 3 million children, in Afghanistan need humanitarian assistance.

The Iraq War (2003 - 2011):

It is hard to find precise statistics about the civilian casualties inflicted by the war, but the number is estimated to be around 200,000 to 250,000, including 16,000 civilian deaths directly caused by US forces.

According to the estimate of the United Nations, today in Iraq, there are still 25 million mines and other explosive remnants that need to be removed.

The Syrian War (2014 - present):

From 2016 to 2019, the confirmed war-related civilian deaths amounted to 33,584 in Syria, and the number of Syrian civilians directly killed by the airstrikes reached 3,833, with half of them being women and children. The website of the Public Broadcasting Service reported on Nov 9, 2018, that the so-called "most accurate air strike in history" launched by the United States on Raqqa killed 1,600 civilians.

According to a survey conducted by the World Food Programme in April 2020, about one-third of Syrians were faced with a food shortage crisis, and 87 percent of Syrians had no deposits in their accounts.

Doctors of the World (Medecins du Monde/MdM) estimated that since the beginning of the Syrian War, about 15,000 Syrian doctors (about half of the country's total) had fled the country, 6.5 million Syrian people had run away from their homes, and about five million Syrian people had wandered homeless around the world.

Psychological shadow of terrorism remains

According to the US Department of Homeland Security, as the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks approaches, there have been concerns of triggering extremist attacks.

The specter of the attacks in 2001 lingers, serving as a constant reminder. In Washington, for example, the unofficial slogan of the post-9/11 US-"If you see something, say something"-can still be seen on billboards and public transportation. At airports, tightened security measures have made travel more stressful than ever for passengers and reduced their privacy.

About 50 percent of US citizens said they are "extremely concerned" or "very concerned" about the threat to the country posed by extremist groups based outside the US, according to a poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

However, about two-thirds of respondents said they are "extremely concerned" or "very concerned" about the threat of extremist groups based in the US.

People's worries are not unreasonable. There have been terror attacks since 9/11 such as the London terrorist attack on July 7, 2005, leading to 52 deaths and over 700 injuries; the Mumbai bomb attack on July 11, 2006, leading to 209 deaths and over 800 injuries; 2011 Norway attacks leading to 77 deaths; the Nov 13 Paris terrorist attack in 2015 leading to 137 deaths and over 300 injuries; and the New Zealand mosque shooting incident on March 15, 2019, leading to 51 deaths and 50 injuries, etc.

Situation of Muslims in the US worsens

Mistrust of Muslims didn't start on 9/11, but it dramatically intensified with the attacks. After 9/11, hate crime cases targeting to Muslims in the US have been rapidly increasing. Many American Muslims have grown up under the shadow of 9/11, facing hostility, suspicion, questions about their faith, doubts over their Americanness.

There is "this sense of being Muslim as a kind of important identity marker, regardless of your relationship with Islam as a faith," says Eman Abdelhadi, a University of Chicago sociologist.

In a survey launched by the Pew Research Center in March 2021, Americans said they believe Muslims are facing "a lot" of discrimination than to say the same about the other religious groups. In 2017, about half of Muslim American adults (48 percent) said they had personally experienced some form of discrimination because of their religion in the previous year.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
China, Vietnam pledge to further enhance comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership

Xinhua) 11:03, September 11, 2021

Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi (L) and Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh co-chair the 13th meeting of the China-Vietnam Steering Committee for Bilateral Cooperation in Hanoi, Vietnam, on Sept. 10, 2021. (Xinhua/Jiang Shengxiong)

HANOI, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The 13th meeting of the China-Vietnam Steering Committee for Bilateral Cooperation was held in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi on Friday, with both sides pledging to further enhance the China-Vietnam comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership.

The meeting was co-chaired by Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh.

At the meeting, the two sides agreed to continue supporting each other in the socialist cause and strengthen bilateral coordination and cooperation in international affairs.

Wang said facing the tremendous changes in the world and the COVID-19 pandemic, working together to overcome the difficulties is a natural strategic choice for China and Vietnam, two socialist neighbors, and has given the bilateral ties more profound meaning.

Wang stressed that the two countries should strive for more breakthroughs in bilateral trade in 2021, enhance the mutual trust between the two peoples, jointly safeguard international justice and the common strategic interests, and make efforts to bring the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership into effect as soon as possible.

China will continue to provide support for Vietnam on COVID-19 response as its capacity allows, Wang said.

In terms of maritime issues, Wang noted that the two sides should avoid any unilateral action that may complicate the situation and escalate disputes, and should jointly guard against the interference from forces outside the region, and show the international community that the peoples of China and Vietnam are able to properly manage their differences and expand their cooperation.

Extending thanks to China for support in Vietnam's fight against the pandemic, Minh said Vietnam is willing to maintain bilateral exchanges at multiple levels, and strengthen COVID-19 vaccine cooperation with China.

Vietnam is also willing to work with China to carry on with the current cooperation mechanisms, and enhance pragmatic maritime cooperation, Minh said.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
China's new yuan loans rise in August

Xinhua) 11:23, September 11, 2021

File photo shows the headquarters of the People's Bank of China in Beijing, capital of China. (Xinhua/Cai Yang)

BEIJING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- China's new yuan-denominated loans totaled 1.22 trillion yuan (about 189 billion U.S. dollars) last month, down 63.1 billion yuan from the same period last year, central bank data showed Friday.

The M2, a broad measure of money supply that covers cash in circulation and all deposits, increased 8.2 percent year on year to 231.23 trillion yuan at the end of August, according to the People's Bank of China.

The growth rate was 0.1 percentage points lower than the figure seen at the end of July, and was 2.2 percentage points lower than that during the same period last year.

The M1, which covers cash in circulation plus demand deposits, stood at 62.67 trillion yuan at the end of August. It was up by 4.2 percent year on year.

The M0, the amount of cash in circulation, went up by 6.3 percent from a year ago to 8.51 trillion yuan at the end of last month.

The central bank injected a total of 34.2 billion yuan of net cash into the market in August.

Newly added social financing, a measurement of funds that individuals and non-financial firms receive from the financial system, came in at 2.96 trillion yuan in August, down 629.5 billion yuan from the same period last year.

Friday's data also showed China's new yuan deposits in August reached 1.37 trillion yuan, down 567.2 billion yuan from a year earlier.

By the end of last month, total outstanding yuan deposits stood at 226.85 trillion yuan, up 8.3 percent year on year.

In August, RMB settlements for cross-border trade amounted to 666.9 billion yuan.

China's central bank has pledged to make its prudent monetary policy more targeted and flexible to better adapt to the needs of high-quality development and put more focus on the efficiency of financial services to support the real economy.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
Ecuadorian president thanks China for helping achieve COVID-19 vaccination goal

Xinhua) 11:24, September 11, 2021

People wait to inoculate COVID-19 vaccine at a vaccination site in Quito, Ecuador, July 12, 2021. (Photo by Santiago Armas/Xinhua)

"We must especially thank China, its president, the government and the Chinese people, who understood our urgency and provided us with over 65 percent of the vaccines that we applied in the first phase of our vaccination plan," Lasso said during a celebration marking the milestone, calling the plan a "success."

QUITO, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- Ecuadorian President Guillermo Lasso on Thursday thanked China for providing the South American country with COVID-19 vaccines to help his government achieve the goal of immunizing 9 million people in 100 days.

"We must especially thank China, its president, the government and the Chinese people, who understood our urgency and provided us with over 65 percent of the vaccines that we applied in the first phase of our vaccination plan," Lasso said during a celebration marking the milestone, calling the plan a "success."

"The world did not let us down," said Lasso, who has been in office since May 24. "There was solidarity, and we reached our goal at an accelerated pace."

On Sept. 1, the government reported that it had fully vaccinated 9 million people, representing 52 percent of the total population and 75 percent of those aged over 16.

According to the Ecuadorian Ministry of Health, most of the vaccines administered in the country were developed by Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac Biotech, and the country's vaccination drive is also being reinforced with vaccines made by Chinese pharmaceutical firm CanSino.

Noting that Ecuador now has sufficient vaccines, Lasso said in order to fully reactivate the country, the focus will now be on herd immunity, or getting 85 percent of the total population vaccinated, which is expected to be reached by the end of the year.

During the event, Adrian Diaz, acting representative of the Pan American Health Organization in Ecuador, also recognized the successful achievement of the Ecuadorian government in meeting its vaccination goal.

As of Wednesday, Ecuador had accumulated 504,781 COVID-19 cases and 22,881 deaths.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
World Internet Conference to kick off on Sept 26

11:49, September 11, 2021 By Chen Liubing ( Chinadaily.com.cn

A news conference on the 2021 World Internet Conference is held in Beijing, on Sept 10, 2021. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

The 2021 World Internet Conference Wuzhen Summit is scheduled to take place from Sept 26 to 28 in Wuzhen, Zhejiang province, said Zhao Zeliang, deputy head of the Cyberspace Administration of China, during a news conference in Beijing on Friday.

Themed as "Towards a New Era of Digital Civilization  Building a Community with a Shared Future in Cyberspace," the Wuzhen Summit will be held both online and offline this year.

Nearly 2,000 representatives from domestic and foreign governments, international organizations, industry associations, global leading enterprises, universities and research institutes from over 80 countries and regions, will attend the conference both online and offline, Zhao said.

The event this year will invite over 1,000 online attendees to watch the conference real-time for the first time through the Online Conference Video System, according to the Cyberspace Administration. The summit this year will also set up 20 sub-forums with the focal points and hotspots of global cyberspace.

The Light of Internet Expo 2021 attended by over 300 Chinese and foreign companies will put a spotlight on the latest and cutting-edge advances in cyberspace, launch new technologies and products in the fields such as artificial intelligence, cloud computing, big data, blockchain and cybersecurity, and unveil applications for digital reform in economic, social and governance areas.

The 2021 WIC will also release the blue books of the World Internet Conference, namely the China Internet Development Report 2021 and the World Internet Development Report 2021.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
China's Beidou system offers 7 different user services

Chinadaily.com.cn) 11:51, September 11, 2021

China's Beidou Navigation Satellite System, the BDS-3, can provide up to seven different services to users, a senior official said at a news conference on Wednesday.

BDS-3's constellation network consists of 55 satellites deployed into three different orbital heights, a megaproject that spanned over two decades.

"Since its formal commission in July 2020, BDS-3 has maintained steady operation and top-class service performance," said Chen Gucang, deputy director of the China Satellite Navigation Office.

Aside from standard navigation, positioning and timing service, the system also offers global and regional short message communication, international search-and-rescue, precise point positioning, satellite based augmentation and ground-based augmentation services, Chen said.

Three GEO satellites are deployed with PPP signal broadcasting functions, enabling real-time PPP accuracy within 20 centimeters horizontal and 35 centimeters vertical, he said.

With the expanding coverage of the National BDS-3 Augmentation System, BDS-3 has achieved millimeter-level positioning accuracy with post-processing across the country, he said.

In addition, search and rescue transponders are installed on six Medium Earth Orbit satellites, offering help to international commercial and civilian users, he said.

In terms of global and regional SMS services, Chen said trials for global SMS service are underway, adding that there are plans to roll out smartphones with built-in regional SMS functions by the end of 2021.

China will continue to promote the international development and application of BDS-3, Chen said.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
U.S. military intervention bolsters, not quells, terrorism in Iraq -- expert

Xinhua) 13:05, September 11, 2021

BAGHDAD, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- U.S. military intervention policies under the pretext of fighting terrorism following the 9/11 attacks have instead provoked terrorism and rooted it in Iraq, the Middle East, as well as across the world, a political researcher has said.

The chaos caused by the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq not only encouraged terrorism to continue in the country, but also forced it to cross borders and become a regional issue, Hashim al-Shamma, a political researcher at the Iraqi Center for Legal Development, a non-governmental organization, said in a recent interview with Xinhua.

"We see what is happening in Syria and other countries of the region," he said.

The U.S.-led coalition invaded Iraq in March 2003 with allegations that the Saddam Hussein government harbored and supported al-Qaeda, the Islamist militant group that launched the 9/11 attacks, and that the country possessed weapons of mass destruction, although Washington failed to provide any concrete evidence of its allegations.

The years-long war has left hundreds of thousands of Iraqis dead, millions displaced and towns and cities destroyed. The occupation and ensuing chaos and insecurity have provided a significant chance for the growth of terrorist groups, including the Islamic State.

The United States created "a failed and conflicting state, and its democracy banner did not achieve any positive results," al-Shamma said, noting that a decade after the U.S. troops withdrawal from Iraq, Iraqis still yearn for stability and a chance for real democracy.

The real democracy the Iraqi people are trying to build is unlike the one brought by the United States, one that produced a weak government, a divided country and growing sectarian strife among Iraqis, the expert said.

"Under the slogan of combating terrorism, the United States is trying to extend its control all over the world," he added.

Al-Shamma noted that the United States and its allies did not understand Iraq's social composition and characteristics.

"The United States focused on the military side and neglected other aspects such as soft power and psychological interaction," al-Shamma said.

"The chaos will be open-ended if there is no real action to correct this great American mistake," the researcher added.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
US needs to work with China in COVID-19 fight

Chinadaily.com.cn) 13:11, September 11, 2021

The United States must work with China to find a global solution to end the raging COVID-19 pandemic, said renowned US economist Jeffrey Sachs in an interview with Malaysian media published on Sept 5.

In an email interview with Malaysian newspaper the Star, Sachs said the global response to the pandemic has been wholly inadequate and one of the main geopolitical problems might have been the failure of the US to work with China for global solutions.

"This is tragic, since China has done an excellent job of suppressing the pandemic, and the world could and should have learned a lot more from China's response," said the US economist, who heads the Lancet COVID-19 Commission, which has been created to help speed up global, equitable, and lasting solutions to the pandemic.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
Chinatown left behind in Manhattan renewal as residents struggle after 9/11

China Daily) 13:13, September 11, 2021

Steven Wong was one of the volunteers to enter the World Trade Center site after terrorists attacked it 20 years ago.

Nine years later, the New Yorker was diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis, an incurable scarring of the lungs, one of the diseases that has been connected to Ground Zero exposure. He also has asthma.

Wong received $90,000 in compensation for his illness. But "that was nothing", he said.

Wong said that, because of his lung disease, he was in a weakened state when he became infected with the coronavirus in early March 2020.

"My lungs are too fragile to fight against any virus. I'm 66 years old this year. How many years are there left for me?" Wong said.

When American Airlines Flight 11 struck the North Tower of the New York landmark, Wong was on Baxter Street in Chinatown.

"People were screaming, and I heard someone say the World Trade Center exploded, and someone asked, 'Are they filming a movie?' It was such a bright sunny day. I saw steel flakes flying in the air everywhere like snowflakes. Those steel flakes were so bright under the sun, they blurred my eyes."

He said he called his wife as soon as possible and told her "we need to pick up our kids from school, now".

Then they walked the streets of Chinatown for three hours. "Nothing was there, no cars, nothing," Wong said.

He remembered that even Confucius Plaza, a building more than a kilometer from the World Trade Center, was covered with a thick layer of black dust. So were the plants outside, and they were dead, he said.

Wong is now the president of the Hotel Chinese American Association and one of the co-founders of a New York-based Asian-American advocacy group, the Coalition of Asian Americans for Civil Rights.

Much of Lower Manhattan has seen a dramatic revival post Sept 11, but Wong said Chinatown hasn't.

In the first six months, Chinatown's major businesses lost 60 to 100 percent in their revenue, according to a study by the Asian American Federation of New York.

In the first two weeks after the attacks, three-quarters of Chinatown's workforce, about 25,000 workers, became unemployed, according to the study, and three months later, nearly 8,000 workers remained unemployed.

While millions of dollars in federal grants and assistance poured into Lower Manhattan for businesses, small businesses in Chinatown received almost one-third less funding than those in other communities, John Wang, the president of the Asian American Business Development Center, told China Daily.

"Many Chinatown businesses trade with cash; they could not show the government good business data to apply for loans or grants," said Wang.

Wong said a continuing problem in Chinatown since the terror attacks has been a stretch of Park Row. It has historically been a major four-lane artery linking the city's financial district to Chinatown.

It also hugs the length of the New York Police Department's headquarters, but it has been closed to civilian traffic since the Sept 11 attacks. The police department asserts that it is necessary to protect its headquarters from a truck bomb attack.

"Before the terrorist attacks, tourist buses could drive into Chinatown from Park Row and parked in the nearby area to wait for their passengers," Wong said. "There is no parking lot in Chinatown now, nor can the tourist buses come in. The tourism industry in Chinatown has never recovered after the attacks. But Lower Manhattan is full of vigor."

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
Elephants return from epic journey

China Daily) 13:19, September 11, 2021

Aerial photo taken on Aug 13, 2021 shows a herd of wild Asian elephants in Mojiang county of Pu'er city, Southwest China's Yunnan province. [Photo/Xinhua]

The herd of 14 wild Asian elephants roaming around in southwestern China's Yunnan province successfully went through the last natural barrier on its way home and returned to its traditional habitat in Pu'er city on Friday.

At 1 am, the elephants, which had left their habitat in Xishuangbanna National Nature Reserve, crossed the Babian River and entered Ning'er county in Pu'er city, one of the three major habitats of Asian elephants in Yunnan.

The northbound trip, lasting about 18 months, finally ended without any harm to either the elephants or local residents, the provincial headquarters in charge of protecting the herd announced on Friday.

The headquarters has withdrawn the provincial surveillance group and passed the monitoring work to city and county-level forestry departments.

The herd departed from its traditional habitat in Xishuangbanna Dai autonomous prefecture last year and started traveling north in April.

It passed through eight counties in the province during the journey. In June, it eventually reached the outskirts of Kunming, the provincial capital, which has about 8 million residents.

The herd started its journey with 16 members, but three of them dropped out, while two calves were born en route. In June, a bull elephant broke away from the group and wandered off on his own.

In July, the bull elephant was sedated with a tranquilizer dart, lifted into a cage on the back of a truck and returned to Xishuangbanna.

To safeguard their journey, local authorities deployed trucks, workers and drones to monitor the elephants 24 hours a day, evacuated roads for them to pass safely and lured them away from populated areas with food.

The herd's safe return from its journey is "very meaningful", said a notice released by the headquarters on Friday. "It provides us with a chance to know more about the elephants and also shows China's resolve in building an environmentally friendly country."

The Asian elephant is listed as an endangered species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The animal, which can be found in the areas of Yunnan bordering Myanmar and Laos, is also under first-class State protection in China.

Due to ongoing wildlife protection efforts, the number of wild Asian elephants in the province has increased from 170 in 1980 to 300 today. Their major habitats are in Yunnan's Pu'er city, Mojiang city and the Xishuangbanna Dai autonomous prefecture.

Shen Qingzhong, a senior engineer from the Xishuangbanna National Nature Reserve, said it's inevitable that the elephants will make another journey in the future as migration is a normal activity for elephants.

"Historically, Asian elephants used to live in many parts of the country. Migration is in their nature. It helps the species expand its territory and have more chances to improve its gene pool by mating with different groups," he said.

The forestry department and the provincial government plan to develop a national park, which aims to provide habitat protection for the elephants and a balanced relationship with residents.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
Chinese FM Wang Yi starts tour in Southeast Asia to boost ties

13:47, September 11, 2021 By Liu Caiyu ( Global Times

Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi commenced week-long official tour in four neighboring countries on Friday with the first stop in Vietnam, aiming to boost bilateral ties and cooperation in a wide range of areas, as the US continues efforts to destabilize the region.

Coming just around two weeks after US Vice President Kamala Harris' trip in the region that sought to pit countries against China, Wang's trip showed that China and the neighboring countries are determined to enhance diplomatic relations, despite external interference, Chinese analysts said.

During his visit to Vietnam from Friday to Saturday, Wang is expected to co-chair the meeting of the 13th Steering Committee for Vietnam-China Bilateral Cooperation with Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh and hold bilateral talks, Vietnam News reported citing a spokesperson for the Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Thursday.

After Vietnam, Wang is scheduled to visit Cambodia, Singapore and South Korea.

Wang's visit to Vietnam, upon invitation of Vietnam's Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, comes after Harris's visit to Vietnam and Singapore last month, during which she sought to persuade the countries to step up pressure on China.

Xu Liping, director of the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times on Friday that Vietnamese leaders recognize the uniqueness of the China-Vietnam relationship and Vietnam's special relationship with China is irreplaceable and not comparable to its relationship with the US.

Just before Harris' visit, Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh met with Chinese Ambassador to Vietnam Xiong Bo in his office and stressed that developing Vietnam-China relations is a top priority in Vietnam's foreign policy.

Xu noted that China and Vietnam, as socialist countries, share a similar political system, and that Wang's visit will further boost political mutual trust between the two countries, while continuing to devote efforts to manage differences and strengthen consensus on the South China Sea.

Bilateral communication and cooperation have also gained great momentum during the COVID-19 epidemic, as the two countries cooperated on epidemic control, vaccines and trade. Wang's visit will not only improve already-established cooperation but also prompt more cooperation following the COVID-19 pandemic, Xu said.

Commenting on Wang's visits to the four neighboring countries, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday that those countries are close neighbors and important partners and China will focus on cooperation in epidemic prevention, economic development, implementation of the Belt and Road Initiative and the construction of a community with a shared future for mankind.

The countries will also talk about defending multilateralism and maintaining global fairness, as well as regional peace and stability, the ministry said.

Gu Xiaosong, director of the ASEAN Institute of Hainan Tropical Ocean University in South China's Hainan Province, told the Global Times that despite the US' continuous containment efforts to pit neighboring countries against China, the friendly relationships between China and its neighbors will not be disrupted, as the countries know how to maintain a balance and are unwilling to choose sides between China and the US.

China and Southeast Asian countries have maintained robust economic and trade cooperation in a wide range of areas based on shared interests and such cooperation does not target any third party, Gu said, adding that the US' ill attempt to shake this kind of consensus and mutual trust is doomed to fail.

While global trade is at a low level due to the COVID-19 pandemic, China's trade with ASEAN continues to grow. According to the Chinese General Administration of Customs, China and ASEAN have become each other's largest trading partners. In 2020, ASEAN surpassed the EU to become China's top trading partner for the first time, showing strong resilience amid the sudden onslaught of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Also highlighting growing ties between China and Southeast Asian countries, prior to his week-long journey, Wang on Thursday met with Lao Foreign Minister Saleumxay Kommasith via video link, during which Wang stressed the need to boost China-Laos relations.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
20 years of counterterrorism proves holistic approach, global cooperation as true solution

Xinhua) 14:09, September 11, 2021

BEIJING, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Saturday marks the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks, which ushered in a global war on terror. Despite the progress made in international efforts to fight terrorism, the world remains beset with its tangible threats.

If history is any guide, military predominance and hegemony cannot eliminate terrorism. Nor are double standards and selective counterterrorism conducive to the global fight against terrorism.

Mankind has entered a new era of interconnectedness, with countries sharing intertwined interests and their future interwoven together. As a result, the pressing global threat of terrorism requires holistic global responses, said experts.

"International terrorism is a global threat that no country acting alone can defeat it. The world needs a collective action to counter this threat," Rommel Banlaoi, chairman of the Philippine Institute for Peace, Violence and Terrorism Research, told Xinhua.

"The world needs a collective action to counter this threat. China has exemplary practices in countering terrorism that need to be shared with the whole world," Banlaoi said.

While the root causes of terrorism are complex and profound, involving political, economic, social and cultural factors, the blatant interference in a state's internal affairs and hegemonic actions to protect one's own security at the cost of others' stability are undoubtedly among the key factors.

Five days after the 9/11 terror attacks, then U.S. President George W. Bush announced U.S. "War on Terror," a blanket term for all preemptive military strikes meant to reduce the threat terrorism posed to the U.S. homeland. The first U.S. move was the invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001, which began a war that only comes to its end recently.

In the following two decades, Washington and its allies have launched invasion into Iraq based on deplorable lies, as well as military interference in countries including Libya and Syria, all under the guise of counter-terrorism.

Though wars launched by the United States and its allies may have yielded immediate success, such outcomes have proved to be short-lived at best. Lamentable injustice and civilian casualties brought about by western interference and hegemonism have created a breeding ground for radicalisation and violent extremism.

Take U.S.-Britain invasion of Iraq as an example. Throughout the year 2002, Washington claimed that then Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was allied with terrorists and developing "weapons of mass destruction."

Despite strong opposition from the international community and scant evidence that Iraq was developing nuclear or chemical weapons, the United States and Britain went ahead with the invasion and toppled the Iraqi government.

What followed were years of insurgency and sectarian violence, and according to The Atlantic, "most historians of the Islamic State agree that the group emerged out of al-Qaida in Iraq as a response to the U.S. invasion in 2003."

"I believe that the military occupation and the devastation, destruction, economic and social effects it leaves behind, and the targeting of the central power of countries, creates a suitable environment for terrorist organizations to exist and grow in these countries," Muhammad Omari, a Syrian political expert, told Xinhua.

The two-decade-long war on terror has taught the world that security should be universal and embrace all countries. It is impossible to maintain the security of one or some countries while leaving the rest insecure. What is more, no country should seek the so-called absolute security of itself at the expense of the security of other countries.

Some observers of the global security status have also voiced concern about how double standards and selective counterterrorism can hinder global cooperation on fighting terrorism.

Although the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) is an internationally recognized terrorist group listed by the United Nations Security Council, Washington flip-flopped on the UN designation in November 2020 by removing the ETIM from its list of terrorist organizations, and brazenly whitewashed the terror group.

The employment of double standards has shown that actions taken by the United States are not credible, said Syed Hasan Javed, director of the Chinese Studies Center at Pakistan's National University of Sciences and Technology.

"It also sends a message to the world that they are grading terrorist organizations in the view of their own interests. It shows that the terrorist groups are being banned on the basis of religions and ethnicities, but not on the actual terrorism they are involved in," he said.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
Xi's remarks on global anti-terrorism cooperation

Xinhua) 14:23, September 11, 2021

BEIJING, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Though a global war on terror has been going on for the past two decades since the 9/11 terrorist attacks, terrorism is still looming large in today's world.

In the face of this common enemy of mankind, Chinese President Xi Jinping has on various occasions called for strengthening global counter-terrorism cooperation and safeguarding global peace and security.

The following are some highlights of his remarks in this regard.

Aug. 27-28, 2021

When addressing the central conference on ethnic affairs, Xi said ethnic separatism and religious extremism should be continuously eliminated, and international anti-terrorism cooperation needs to be strengthened.

July 6, 2021

Addressing the CPC and World Political Parties Summit via video link in Beijing, Xi called on political parties to shoulder their responsibility for the pursuit of people's wellbeing and progress of mankind, strengthening cooperation to tackle global risks and challenges including the COVID-19 pandemic, terrorism, and climate change.

"In the face of terrorism and other common enemies of mankind, we need to pursue security and stability through cooperation so as to tighten the security fences together," Xi said.

Xi said the Communist Party of China (CPC) will actively improve global governance to make new contributions to humanity's joint response to common challenges.

Nov. 12, 2020

Xi delivered a speech via video at the third Paris Peace Forum, stressing that peace and development are the theme of the times, as well as the unstoppable trend of history.

"We need to uphold multilateralism, oppose unilateralism, hegemony and power politics, and reject all forms of terrorism and acts of extreme violence," Xi said, stressing joint efforts to safeguard equity, justice, peace and security in the world.

China follows an independent foreign policy of peace and is committed to the path of peaceful development, Xi noted.

Xi called on all countries to uphold international law and the basic norms governing international relations, determine their position on the merits of each matter, and rise above ideological bias and confrontation.

China is willing to step up communication and coordination with France and other countries and play a positive part in efforts to secure political settlement of international and regional issues and uphold world peace and stability, he said.

June 15, 2019

Addressing the fifth summit of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA), Xi said building a safe and stable Asia is a common goal of regional countries.

Xi called for dialogue rather than confrontation, and partnership instead of alliance among CICA members.

To properly address various traditional and non-traditional security problems, Asian countries should stand firm in cracking down on terrorism of all forms, take all kinds of effective precaution measures and extinguish extremism from its roots, Xi said, urging CICA members to explore a regional security structure with Asian features to realize collective security and common security for Asia.

May 21, 2014

In his keynote speech at the fourth summit of the CICA, Xi pledged "zero tolerance" for terrorism, separatism and extremism and called for a common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security strategy for Asia.

"We need to innovate in our security concept, establish a new regional security cooperation architecture, and jointly build a shared, win-win road for Asian security," Xi said.

Xi stressed the importance of safeguarding the comprehensive security of the region, which means upholding security in both traditional and non-traditional fields.

"We should strengthen international and regional cooperation, and step up the fight against the 'three forces,' in order to bring a life of happiness and tranquility to the people of this region," Xi said.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
China refutes Australian defense chief's negative remarks

Xinhua) 14:24, September 11, 2021

BEIJING, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- China's Ministry of National Defense has expressed strong opposition to Australian Defence Minister Peter Dutton's negative remarks about China.

It is extremely dangerous and irresponsible to hype up the so-called "China threat" and make groundless accusations against China, said Wu Qian, a spokesperson for the Ministry of National Defense, in response to a query on Friday.

Wu said Dutton's recent provocative remarks fully revealed his Cold War mentality and ideological biases, which not only go against the current trend of world peace, development and cooperation, but also harm the regional peace and stability as well as Australia's own interests.

Wu reiterated that China adheres to the path of peaceful development and firmly pursues the national defense policy that is defensive in nature.

China is not posing a threat to any country, and its military development is not targeted at any country, the spokesperson added.

As for issues concerning the South China Sea, Wu emphasized that China has indisputable sovereignty over the islands in the South China Sea and their adjacent waters.

Wu urged some Australian politicians to respect facts and immediately stop making irresponsible remarks against China.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
Communist Party of Cuba slams attempts to politicize, stigmatize COVID-19 origins

Xinhua) 14:35, September 11, 2021

HAVANA, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The Communist Party of Cuba (PCC) has condemned attempts by the United States to manipulate the origins tracing of COVID-19 for political gains, according to a statement published Friday on the PCC's website.

The so-called report on the origins of COVID-19 compiled by the U.S. intelligence community recently politicizes, stigmatizes, and singularizes COVID-19 origins, Juan Carlos Marsan Aguilera, deputy head of the International Relations Department of the PCC Central Committee, was quoted as saying.

During an online meeting of the Sao Paulo Forum (FSP) held Thursday, the official said, "the U.S. intention to blame the People's Republic of China for the origins of the virus is another attempt by the North American nation to manipulate the COVID-19 crisis to benefit their political interests."

He said the U.S. report lacks scientific evidence and clarity, adding the joint report on origins tracing done by the World Health Organization and Chinese scientists in early 2021 has laid out scientific, professional and authorized conclusions.

A declaration issued on Thursday after the meeting highlighted "China's efforts to provide vaccines to various countries, including Latin America, as an important contribution to global cooperation in the fight against pandemics."

"The virus knows no borders or nations. Only with the solidarity of the entire international community can we be victorious against the virus," the declaration said.

"The union of all countries, respecting international solidarity and cooperation, is fundamental at this time to be victorious in the face of the pandemic and overcome this difficult moment in our history, laying the foundations for a better future for all humanity," it added.

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
Chinese VP attends 18th China-ASEAN Expo, calls for building community with shared future

Xinhua) 14:51, September 11, 2021

Chinese Vice President Wang Qishan attends the opening ceremony of the 18th China-ASEAN Expo and China-ASEAN Business and Investment Summit in Nanning, capital of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, on Sept. 10, 2021. (Xinhua/Ding Haitao)





NANNING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Vice President Wang Qishan attended the opening ceremony of the 18th China-ASEAN Expo and China-ASEAN Business and Investment Summit on Friday in Nanning, capital of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

Speaking at the event, he called for using the platform to deepen pragmatic cooperation and advance the building of the China-ASEAN community with a shared future.

Since the establishment of dialogue relations between China and the ASEAN 30 years ago, the two sides have been promoting regional peace, stability, development and prosperity, setting an example of cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region, he said.

The ASEAN enjoys a priority position within China's neighborhood diplomacy and is a key area in jointly building the Belt and Road with high quality, Wang said.

At the new starting point, "China is committed to promoting better development of bilateral ties in the next 30 years," Wang said.

He said China is willing to work the ASEAN to align the Belt and Road Initiative with ASEAN countries' development strategies to jointly foster strategic partnership of higher level, and expand economic and trade cooperation, and promote regional connectivity and economic integration, to improve the well-being of the people.

Wang also expressed China's willingness to deepen anti-pandemic cooperation, nurture new driving forces for development, and strengthen cooperation in such areas as digital economy and sustainable development, so as to promote economic recovery in the region.

China is also ready to strengthen people-to-people and cultural exchanges and cooperation with the ASEAN to deepen mutual understanding and friendship between their peoples, he said.

China is committed to mutual opening-up that features shared benefits, shared responsibilities and shared governance, which will forge a wider market and bring more opportunities to all the countries, including the ASEAN, the vice president said.

This year's expo, scheduled until Sept. 13, is themed "sharing opportunities created by the new land-sea corridor, building the China-ASEAN community with a shared future."

(Web editor: Zhang Wenjie, Bianji)
CHRONEXT has invited a seasoned finance and compliance executive, Kristiina Leppanen, to join its Board of Directors.

With over 25 years experience of international finance and leadership for companies in and outside Switzerland, Kristiina Leppanen is in an excellent position to help CHRONEXT build out its finance and compliance functions. Todays announcement complements the recent nominations to the CHRONEXT Board of former Facebook CMO, Gary Briggs, and former Tiffany & Co. Chief Brand Officer, Daniella Vitale.

I am excited to be nominated to CHRONEXTs Board at such an important stage in the companys development," said Kristiina Leppanen. "I know that establishing best-in class financial reporting capabilities and compliance procedures is challenging for all young, thriving and ambitious companies, especially in Switzerland, and I will be glad to bring my expertise to CHRONEXT and its team.

Kristiina Leppanens skills are absolutely essential for CHRONEXT, so I am delighted that she has agreed to join the Board," said Jacob Fonnesbech Aqraou, Chairman of the Board of Directors of CHRONEXT. "Her nomination comes at just the right time in CHRONEXTs journey as it matures and expands rapidly.

Working in senior financial positions throughout her career, Kristiina Leppanen has an extensive CFO background in global industrial companies. Since November 2020, she is Group CFO of Enics, a leading global service provider in electronics manufacturing headquartered in Zurich/Switzerland, where she is responsible for Finance and Controlling, Treasury, Risk Management, Legal Affairs and Corporate Development. Prior to joining Enic, Kristiina spent over four years in charge of Finance and Investor Relations as Cavotec CFO in Switzerland, and almost 5 years as Group CFO of GS Hydro Group in Finland. She holds an MBA in International Finance from the Helsinki School of Economics.

Kristiina Leppanen has a proven track record of running a tight ship in international organisations inside and outside Switzerland," said Philipp Man, Co-Founder and CEO of CHRONEXT. "Her appointment would be a real asset in our goal to becoming the premier luxury watch destination.
Photo by Jiao Guanghui

By Huang Panyue, Xu Bo, Li Chen

ZHENGZHOU, Sept. 10 -- Troops from Mongolia, Pakistan and Thailand to participate in the Shared Destiny-2021 UN peacekeeping field training exercise carried out adaptive training at the exercise venue in Queshan, Henan Province on September 9.

The above three countries all have rich experiences in performing UN peacekeeping operations.

To provide comprehensive support to the foreign participating troops, the Chinese side has established a specialized support team consisting of interpreters, cooks, medical personnel, training instructors and guards.

Multinational coordination is one of the defining features of this exercise. Proceeding on the principle of being international, professional and realistic, we set up a joint command post composed of commanders of the participating contingents from the four countries, said Senior Colonel Li Xiaoguang, the executive directing officer of the Shared Destiny-2021 exercise.

According to the schedule of the exercise, from September 12 to 14, all the participating units will be regrouped to carry out joint and multi-subject field training on disposition of forces, organizing and commanding of peacekeeping operations, as well as operation procedures based on their mission functions.
The growing craze for CCTV cameras is leading to growing strife among neighbors who can now spy on each other around the clock.

Private surveillance cameras have become all the rage partly because more people live alone and feel insecure or because people want to keep an eye on delivery services.

One private security company charges around W20,000 a month to install a CCTV in front of a home and dispatch personnel in emergencies (US$1=W1,167). A company staffer said, "Demand for the service is doubling every year."

A basic security camera that links to an app can be bought for just W50,000-60,000 online.
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This areas top four first responders remembered the Sept. 11, 2001 attack on America as the day that changed many methods of fire and police 
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Angela Shade, a drag queen, strutted across the stage, igniting the crowd by swinging her legs in the air.

Her message to the audience? Embrace your true self.

The lawn outside of Krach Leadership Center brimmed with cheers, joy and rainbow flags for two hours on Thursday afternoon. The LGBTQ Center returned to hosting the rainbow callout in-person, in line with its 10-year anniversary and the Purdue LGBTQ+ Student Alliances 50th year anniversary.

The event saw a huge turnout and featured over a hundred student and professional organizations, distinguished local guest speakers and a drag show entertaining guest throughout.

No matter where you come from or what you've been through, how you identify, you're beautiful, Shade, a fifth-year senior in the College of Engineering said. We're all beautiful, we're all different, and we need to embrace that.

She danced her way into the crowd amidst raucous applause.

In spite of people saying or doing things that would suggest the contrary, we're all beautiful, and we all have so much to give to this.

Director of the Purdue LGBTQ Center Lowell Kane said was happy with the turnout.

This is more exciting than we could have ever imagined, Kane said.

Kane said the center wanted to make this callout the biggest, best possible.

When we first started 10 years ago (the crowd) could fit into one room in Stewart center, he said. Today were close to 150 resource tables, and it pulls in well over 2000 people.

It is one of the largest welcome-back events at Purdue University. 

Andromeda, a Purdue alumnus with a Master of Health and a Master of Science in Applied Anthropology, was one of the four queens to perform.

I love having a space to create affirming art for myself, and hopefully for those around me, they said. It's been a really beautiful way to understand myself and explore my own gender, as well as having a space to continue performing.

Andromeda said seeing how much the community has grown makes them proud of their alumni.

Support Local Journalism Now, more than ever, the world needs trustworthy reportingbut good journalism isnt free. Please support us by making a contribution. Contribute

Even if it doesn't always feel like it, you always have a space on this campus, Andromeda said. You might have to fight for it sometimes but there are people here who will fight for you.

Don't be afraid to lean on the people here who want to love you and help you, because this is a place for everyone.

The crowd poured into the venue at around 6 p.m., filing through lines of tables for various student and professional organizations.

Elliot Bissman, sophomore in the College of Engineering and president of LGBTQ+ Student Alliance, was among the organizers setting up a table.

It's really cool to see how many people are here, and I'm excited for the drag show portion of it, Bissman said.

Elizabeth Nelson, a senior in the College of Science was tabling for the God is Queer organization, said its important for Christian LGBTQ members to have a safe space to support each other.

Part of God is Queer is that God made each and every one of us, including our queer selves, Nelson said. So, being queer also means that God is queer."

State Sen. J.D. Ford, the first and only openly gay person elected to Indiana state legislature and a Purdue alunmus, was invited to speak at the event. The Democratic senator represents the 29th District of Indiana that includes parts of Boone, Hamilton and Marion counties.

Being the first out serving member of the LGBTQ+ community for our entire state (legislature), and then (the LGBTQ Center) celebrating their 10th anniversary, I feel that we're trailblazing in our own independent ways, Ford said. I'm so excited to be here to see the crowd, to see the enthusiasm, and there's just the love that we have. It's really inspiring.

Bissman said the Alliance does a mix of social, educational and activism events for LGBTQ community, such as hosting queer professionals speakers and representatives from grassroot campaign against anti-transgender bills.

The LGBTQ center, of course, is amazing, and there's a real sense of community there, especially because of them, Bissman said. We're hoping to add to that.

Ford envisioned a future where being a gay legislator is no longer a novelty, and coming out no longer a struggle.

I would love for us to get to a place where in the media, I'm not labeled as J.D. Ford, the first openly gay senator. I feel I'd rather be labeled as J.D. Ford, the senator working for the people.

I'm so proud to see this crowd tonight. I'm so proud that people are living their true and authentic self.
Press Release

September 11, 2021 Largest Cooperative Party List Endorses Zubiri as Number One Senator for 2022 The COOP NATCCO Party List (CNPL), headed by President Alexander B. Raquepo, has formally adopted a resolution supporting Senate Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri for his Senatorial candidacy in the 2022 national elections. Zubiri is the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Cooperatives, first assuming the position in 2007, and then again in 2016. As Chairman of the committee, he has spearheaded the passage of the Philippine Cooperative Code, the Cooperative Development Authority Charter, the Cooperatives Development Officer Act, and the National Cooperative Month Act, to name a few. Throughout the pandemic, he has also advocated for legislative support for the sector, through key provisions in the Bayanihan to Recover as One Act (Bayanihan 2). CNPL was organized by the Board of the NATCCO Network in 1996, and their first election into Congress was in 1998. They represent over 800 primary member-cooperatives across the country. The resolution, adopted during the 6th CNPL National Party Congress held on Friday, calls Zubiri "our Coop Champion in the Senate." "The COOP NATCCO Party List believes that the presence of Coop Champions in the Senate would further recognize the important role of cooperatives in poverty reduction and inclusive growth through policy reforms and support in legislation," the resolution reads. "Maraming salamat po. I really need the support of your sector," Zubiri said. "This endorsement from CNPL carries more weight, bilang independent candidate." "I really believe in the power and potential of our cooperative movement. I think the work that coops do, the work of helping the Filipino help themselves, is so vital to our country and our people. And so I'm very glad and honored to enjoy the sector's continued trust, and in return I am fully committed to continue advocating for the sector."
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Home > 2021 > Did Netaji Live, Die in India Post 1947? | M.R. Narayan Swamy

Conundrum: Subhas Boses Life After Death

by Chandrachur Ghose & Anuj Dhar

Vitasta

Pages: 834

Price: 995

Incredible, shocking, stunning! There is no other way to describe this monumental work of history which goes to extreme depths to tell the world what happened to Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, whose 1945 death in a plane crash remains wrapped in mystery. Casting their net of research all across India and even parts of the globe, writer Chandrachur Ghose and author-journalist Anuj Dhar tell us that Bose did not die in Formosa (Taiwan) as is widely believed but entered India after independence as a mendicant, lived in various places in north India in secrecy and breathed his last in September 1985 in Faizabad town in Uttar Pradesh.

You dont believe it? Most people too would dismiss this as a figment of fertile imagination by two Netaji fans. But a reading of this 834-page book is sure to make one either believe what the authors say or at least doubt all that you have known thus far about the Bose saga. Such is the meticulous research in unraveling the persona called Gumnami Baba or Bhagwanji who lived constantly behind the curtains, unseen by most people wherever he took up residence over three long decades, revealing his past and sharing his innermost secrets with a select few, one being an intelligence officer from the Indian National Army (INA).

It was modern Indias longest running mystery.

According to the book, Bhagwanji was first seen in Uttar Pradesh in 1953 living in the house of a police officer in Mainpuri town. He moved to Rijor in Etah district, then to Umarpur and returned to Sakit village in Etah. After two years, he shifted to Shikohabad, then to Lucknow (where he spent some time on the banks of the Gomti river), further on to Neemsar (an important symbol of Indias mythological past), then to Ayodhya, then Basti, and finally to Faizabad where he passed away.

For someone who had the guts to rebel against Mahatma Gandhi, who slipped away from India despite being watched and eventually used his magnetic charm to raise the INA, Bhagwanji led a harsh life in Uttar Pradesh as he struggled for basic necessities. There were days when he had nothing to eat. Or there would be just boiled potatoes. With mo money to buy tea, Bose satisfied himself with leaves of a local plant called latora boiled in water. Poor health was a recurring issue. One place he stayed was dark, damp and had a foul smell. To overcome the extreme money shortage, he tried his luck with lottery tickets.

The situation improved once he got connected to his earlier supporters from Calcutta, many of them from erstwhile revolutionary groups who knew how to keep secrets. Several Netaji admirers had never believed that he died in the plane crash; they were convinced the accident was faked so that he could move on. The first to make contact in Neemsar was Prabitra Mohan Roy, a former INA secret service operative; Roy immediately recognized the stentorian voice. Boses family mostly doubted claims about Bhagwanji, the exception being his brother Suresh Bose. Over time, Bhagwanji told everyone to keep their lips sealed; if asked about his identity, they were to plead ignorance.

With the help of select loyalists, Bhagwanji erected a system of double filtering to keep away unwanted visitors. This was not foolproof and it prevented many from meeting him despite their eagerness. There were tense moments when crowds flocked to his place after hearing that he was the dead Netaji. On more than one occasion, the police checked his identity. The secretive monk barred people from photographing him or recording his voice.

What was the need for all this secrecy? Was he really Subhas Bose in disguise? Bhagwanji was convinced there was a secret pact to hand him over to the Allied forces (read Britain) as a war criminal if he was ever traced. A MI5 Security Liaison Officer stationed in New Delhi after independence was kept informed about Bose by the Intelligence Bureau. Bhagwanji told Leela Roy, a former associate, that it would not be in his or the countrys interest to emerge publicly. He never recovered from a deep sense of hurt from the lack of response from Bengal when the INA entered India. He hated Nehru besides the Congress and the Communists. He did admire Indira Gandhis vision of national security. Bhagwanji was clear that no political party would support him if he came out.

Many had no doubts as to who Bhagwanji was. Pushpa Banerjee, who saw Bose in 1933 and 1939, was not mistaken about the man in mendicants robes. Brother Suresh Bose told the Khosla Commission in 1971 that his brother was alive. Santosh Bhattacharya, who served Bose in the 1930s, identified Bhagwanji as Bose. In 2002, B. Lal, a former Additional Director of the National Institute of Criminology and Forensic Sciences in the Home Ministry, gave two definitive reports after studying the handwriting of Bose and Bhagwanji that both were one person. Prabitra Roy, formerly of INA, in his final years addressed Bhagwanji as Netaji. Vikram Singh, a former Director General of Police of Uttar Pradesh, said at IIT Kanpur on January 23, 2014: Gumnami Baba was Netaji, let me tell you as a police officer!

Was the Indian government in the dark about Bhagwanji? Although successive regimes maintained that Bose died in 1945, a Joint Secretary in the External Affairs Ministry, R.L. Narayan, suggested on January 12, 1996 that Indias Ambassador in Moscow must be asked to issue a demarche to the Russians to search the KGB archives for any evidence of Boses stay in the Soviet Union. Foreign Secretary Salman Haider had a quick meeting with Narayan, who, within a month, changed his tune: It would not be appropriate for Government of India to make a formal request to the Russian Government to open their KGB archives (as it) would amount to our disbelieving (Moscows) categorical and official statement on the subject.

Contrary to its public stance that Netaji was dead, the government kept a close watch on Bhagwanji and those in touch with him. Declassified documents show that Subhas nephew was snooped on for over two decades. So were a barrister and a doctor. Also intercepted were letters written to Sisir Bose, a nephew, by Emilie Schenkl, Netajis wife. INA veterans and journalists were not spared. The results of the snooping were shared with the British intelligence. The authors argue the ruling establishment wanted to prevent Bose from showing up or at least be prepared for it. There is much more information in the custody of our intelligence agencies than is given out either by them or by the government The most secret records of them all are held directly by the Prime Minister of India who is not answerable to any court of law.

According to Bhagwanji, he (Bose) never went to Taiwan where the plane reportedly crashed. He escaped from Saigon. He claimed to have spent time in the Soviet Union and China before sneaking into India via Nepal. He claimed his identity was known to many top-level personalities who used to meet him secretly. Indeed, for someone living in seclusion, the monk was unusually well informed about the goings on in the Indian government and also in Bangladesh.

Only one person stayed with Bhagwanji till the end. It was Saraswati Devi Shukla, who protected him from unwanted interference of outsiders besides taking care of his stay and the disciples who visited. Over the decades, the authors kept up a determined search to know the truth about Netaji. Their actions led to the release of over 1,000 previously secret files, amounting to around 10,000 pages. Mamata Banerjee released 64 intelligence files in the West Bengal government custody.

Bhagwanji was indeed an enigma. He was into astrology, numerology and tantra. His favorite deity was Goddess Kali. There were things he said which sounded gibberish. It was also impossible to establish the veracity of some of the claims he made vis-a-vis the global situation.

Bhagwanji was none other than Subhas Chandra Bose. The imposter angle is neither impossible nor unthinkable, the authors insist in finality. They admit there are several questions to which they do not have answers. They are honest enough to admit that certain claims by Bhagwanji did not ring true. Was the monk at times intoxicated? The authors add there is much to be uncovered. When his belongings were collected after his death, there was a photograph of Netajis brother Suresh Bose, carefully wrapped in Bengali silk, a sign of reverence. Other than his identity, Bhagwanjis life remains a conundrum.

All students of Indian history must go through this remarkable book. I wish it had a bibliography and an index.
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Visible from space, a smoke plume rises from the Manhattan area after two planes crashed into the towers of the World Trade Center. This photo was taken of metropolitan New York City (and other parts of New York as well as New Jersey) the morning of September 11, 2001. Credit: NASA Larger image

On 6 September 2001, on one of those stunningly crisp, cool days Washingtonians crave, a hearing was held at the Russell Senate Office building on shuttle safety.

At the time NASA felt that it was on a secure path to upgrading the shuttle fleet such that, in the words of Bill Readdy, then Deputy Associate Administrator for the Office of Space Flight, who testified at the hearing "it will enable the Space Shuttle to fly safely well into the second decade of the 21st century." Meanwhile, Richard Blomberg, chair of the Aerospace Safety Advisor Panel warned, "The long-term situation has deteriorated." Yet he also felt, "NASA needs a reliable human-rated space vehicle to reap the full benefits of the International Space Station (ISS), and the Panel believes that, with adequate planning and investment, that vehicle can be the Space Shuttle."

The Senators present were concerned about the situation, and pressed Readdy as to why certain upgrades were being deferred or why more funds had not been focused on dealing with shuttle upgrade and safety issues. But no one was waving their arms about suggesting that any imminent threat existed.

Upon leaving the hearing Readdy, noticing the stunningly blue cool sky, decided to walk back to his office. That walk ended up becoming an hour long chat with a reporter on the status of the space program.

At that time Readdy saw that the ISS, while somewhat strained to meet the interest of a wide variety of users, could easily be tweaked such that it served as a test bed for the flight qualification of humans for long duration voyages. The tweaks would involve picking the research. No significant costs were envisioned.

On that day Readdy was optimistic about where things could go, but like everyone else in the agency, was tired of what NASA had been put through over the past decade. Cost overruns on the ISS certainly did not help matters.

As he excused himself and headed back to his office for a meeting, little did Readdy, or anyone else, know what would happen 5 days later on a cool, sunny September day. Readdy's home was a few blocks away from the Pentagon.

Some 250 miles above the Earth, the International Space Station sped along as September 11th arrived. Onboard, Expedition Three Commander Frank Culbertson, Pilot Vladimir Dezhurov and Flight Engineer Mikhail Tyurin were in the fifth week of a four-month stay aboard the station.

Preparations were under-way for the arrival of the Russian PIRS docking compartment due for launch in 3 days and arrival at ISS several days later. Otherwise, all things had been moving along at a normal pace.

In Washington, and all along the east coast, it was another one of those classic clear September days Readdy had stopped to admire the previous week. While many were still on the commute into work, the attacks began. At NASA Headquarters, as with the rest of Washington DC, no one quite knew what was going on. Soon people were watching news footage of the Twin towers on fire in New York. Then came word of an explosion at the Pentagon and rumors (which later proved to be false) of another one at the State Department.

Anyone looking to the west from Washington could clearly see a plume of dark smoke rising from across the Potomac. Meanwhile, rumors of another plane flying up the Potomac toward Washington made the rounds. Other rumors spread of an odd plane seen circling above the Mall.

People quickly left their desks and, in the hours ahead, managed to find their way home. Soon the entire agency would either be shut down or shut off from the rest of the world. Shuttles were secured, and gates were locked.

Bad news from home

The news from Earth that morning wasn't good. Frank Culbertson would soon find that some of the day's pre-planned routine would be altered. As soon as he was told of the attacks, Culbertson checked to see when they would be passing over the east coast of the U.S. Discovering that this was only some minutes away, Culbertson grabbed a camera. The window in Mikhail Tyurin's cabin turned out to be the one with the best view.

Over the next several days Culbertson would shoot still and video imagery out of the station's windows as it passed over New York City. Space Imaging would follow with high resolution imagery of the damage in New York and Virginia taken by its IKONOS satellite. Both the close-up and distant views from space were haunting. Culbertson would later radio back to Earth, "Our prayers and thoughts go out to all the people there, and everywhere else. Here I am looking up and down the East Coast to see if I can see anything else, and to the people in Washington."

Later, Culbertson would learn of his own tragic connection to 9-11. The captain of the jet which was crashed into the Pentagon was Charles 'Chic' Burlingame, a former Navy pilot and a classmate of Culbertson's. Culbertson would later reflect back and note how isolated he felt to be the only American off the planet.

Excerpt from "New Moon Rising: The Making Of America's New Space Vision And The Remaking Of NASA", by Frank Sietzen, Jr. and Keith L. Cowing, 2004

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Trot Insider takes a look back on past editions of the North America Cup through the eyes of this year's drivers, who recalled the first Cup they remember watching.

Ten drivers competing in the $1 million Pepsi North America Cup on Saturday, Sept. 11 at Woodbine Mohawk Park have all taken different paths in their careers to get to the 38th edition. The Canadian classic has produced many memorable moments over the years, including the following races which served as their introduction to the event.

What was the first North America Cup you remember watching and what was memorable to you about that race and/or your experience watching it?

Doug McNair: "Probably when I watched my dad's horse Run To The Bank finish third in '98 (won by Straight Path). I was only nine I think and that was the first horse I ever jogged so it was definitely exciting for me to see him race in such a big race," he said, adding, "The one that sticks out the most was Somebeachsomewhere. I remember being in the grandstand, it was full, watching the best horse to ever live."

McNair will be searching for his first North America Cup victory with inside starter Jimmy Connor B, who is one of two horses in the field trained by his father Gregg. The 31-year-old Guelph, Ont. reinsman, who has driven in four of the last five editions, made his first start in 2016 and posted his best result in 2018 aboard fourth-place finisher Stay Hungry. Jody and Carl Jamieson are the only father-son, trainer-driver combination to win the Cup to date with Up The Credit in 2011.

James MacDonald: "I dont think it was the first one I watched but the first one I saw live was Tell All (in 2007). It was a gigantic crowd and it was electric at the track. I was there with a lot of family and friends and we were cheering Jody on. It was a really fun night!"

MacDonald, 35, picks up the drive on the Gregg McNair-trained Bettor Sun, who drew post two. The Guelph, Ont. resident, who watched his brother Mark win the coveted Cup in 2010 with Sportswriter, made his debut in the race last year with seventh-place finisher Captain Barbossa.

David Miller: "I drove a horse called Falcons Future in 1994 in the North America Cup and that was my first drive ever in the race. There was no simulcasting back then so before that I had never really watched the North America Cup. I had heard of the race, but I never watched it. It was in the old paddock there at Woodbine and I can remember going through the tunnel."

Two-time North America Cup champion Miller, 56, will drive elimination winner Perfect Sting from post three for trainer Joe Holloway in his 20th Cup appearance. Miller earned his previous victories in back-to-back years courtesy of the Casie Coleman-trained Betting Line (2016) and Fear The Dragon (2017) from the Brian Brown stable. Based in New Jersey, the Hall of Fame reinsman boasts the most career driving wins in the field with 13,449. The oldest driver to win the Cup was William Bud Fritz, who was 54 years old when he guided Apaches Fame to victory in the 1990 edition.

Jody Jamieson: "Jate Lobell and Frugal Gourmet in a photo (1987). 'Jate' had won almost everything and 'Frugal' gave him all he could handle."

Two-time North America Cup champion Jamieson will drive 9-5 favourite Bulldog Hanover, who will leave from post four after winning the faster elimination for trainer Jack Darling. The 44-year-old Guelph, Ont. resident made his first appearance in the Cup in 2006 and earned his first victory the following year with Tell All for trainer Blair Burgess. He also won the 2011 edition with Up The Credit, trained by his father Carl.

Sylvain Filion: "The first N.A. Cup that I watched was live at Greenwood in 1988. Runnymede Lobell, with my dad in the bike, won by open lengths. What a thrill it was. The entire family and a bunch of friends were there. We celebrated until the sunrise."

Filion will drive Whichwaytothebeach from post five for trainer Brett Pelling. The 52-year-old Milton, Ont. resident made his first of six appearances in the North America Cup in 1999 driving runner-up Goliath Bayama for his father Yves to a runner-up finish, 1-1/2 lengths behind favourite The Panderosa.

Trevor Henry: "I watched Apaches Fame win the (1990) Cup from Hanover Raceway when I was a kid and just thought it was great to see Bud Fritz from a small town win a big race like that. Anything is possible."

Henry will drive Desperate Man from post six, the winningest post position in Cup history on a seven-eighths-mile track, for trainer Kathy Cecchin. From three prior starts in the Cup, the Arthur, Ont. reinsman's best finish was fourth in the 2017 edition with Classic Pro. Henry, 50, made his first Cup start in 2016.

Scott Zeron: "It was 2000 and Gallo Blue Chip. I was 11 years old so my memory isnt great but I just remember his dominance as a horse. Living in Canada, it was always cool seeing these high caliber horses travel north for the big races."

Zeron will drive post seven starter Simon Says Hanover, one of three Tony Alagna trainees in the field. He made his Cup debut a decade ago as the youngest driver at the time to compete in the final at age 22, finishing 10th with 77-1 longshot Dutch Richman. The Ontario native, now residing in New York, has made six starts since, winning his latest in 2019 with Captain Crunch in a stakes record 1:47.2.

Andrew McCarthy: "Somebeachsomewhere (2008). I remember hearing the roar of the crowd the whole mile. Literally from start to finish. An epic horse winning an epic race. Goosebumps!"

McCarthy will drive the Alagna-trained Abuckabett Hanover from post eight. The 35-year-old Australian native, who is now based in New Jersey, will be making just his second start in the North America Cup. He finished fourth with 135-1 longshot Aflame Hanover in the 2019 edition.

Dexter Dunn: "It probably would have been a replay of Somebeachsomewhere, that would be the first one I can remember. I was pretty young at the time, but he was such a great horse."

Dunn, 32, will drive the third Alagna trainee, Rockyroad Hanover, who will leave from post position nine. The New Zealand native relocated to the U.S. midway through the 2018 season and drove in his first North America Cup the following year, finishing second with Bettors Wish, three-quarters of a length behind Captain Crunch.

Yannick Gingras: "I never really watched it and I don't know why. I'd say winning with Tall Dark Stranger (2020) is my first memory. I forgot all the rest of them!" he said with a laugh.

Gingras, the reigning North America Cup champion, will drive Southwind Gendry from the outside post 10 for trainer Ron Burke. The 42-year-old Quebec native, who is based in New Jersey, won his ninth Cup appearance last year with Tall Dark Stranger, a decade after making his debut in the race and ending a streak of out-of-the-money results including three consecutive 10th place finishes. Post 10 has not produced a winner in the last 27 editions that the race has been contested on a seven-eighths mile track.

To view complete entries for Saturday's stakes-packed North America Cup card at Woodbine Mohawk Park and complimentary past performance pages, click on the following links: Saturday Entries -- Program Pages (courtesy TrackIT).
Eat Well Investment Group, a Canadian listed firm focused on high-growth companies in the agribusiness and foodtech sector, has signed up Prince Khaled bin Alwaleed bin Talal Al Saud of Saudi Arabia, as its strategic advisor.

A known pioneer in plant-based food investing and venture-backed future food startups, Prince Khaled is among those driving solutions at scale related to food security, human and animal welfare, and climate change.

In addition to being the CEO of KBW Ventures, Prince Khaled also serves in various key appointments in Saudi Arabia and globally.

"We are incredibly honored to have Prince Khaled join Eat Well Group as a key strategic advisor, shareholder, and genuine supporter of our long-term ambitions," remarked Marc Aneed, President of Eat Well Group.

Eat Well Groups Barry Didato too echoed Aneeds appreciation. "Prince Khaled is that rare visionary dedicated to truly making the world a better place, and we are thrilled to have him as a key advisor and shareholder," he noted.

Through his various business entities, Prince Khaled maintains holdings across three continents. Honing in on sustainable ventures, the KBW portfolio includes investments in plant-based initiatives, alternative proteins, green technologies, and more.

As an early adopter of plant-based foods and alternative protein, Prince Khaled is at the forefront of global plant-based investing, initiatives, and advocacy. He has developed a deep network of international industry specific contacts, across both private and public sectors.

Prince Khaled noted the scale at which Eat Well Groups portfolio companies are transforming food systems, demonstrating the groups significant positive impact.

"This past year, Eat Well Groups portfolio companies sold over 26,000 tons of pure plant-based protein to over 35 countries worldwide, offering better nutrition, and greater food security," he stated.

The environmental benefits alone save more than 89,000 MT of methane which is a leading contributor towards global warming. Im delighted to be a part of the mission to put healthier living in reach of more people, he added.

Nutrition is a key driver of both human health and wellness, and an enormous business opportunity to meet global demand. Eat Well is aggressively planning to transform entire industries including meat, dairy, and more.

Having taken part in financing rounds of some of the biggest names in alternative protein and plant-based products, Prince Khaled brings a wealth of hands-on industry experience that will be put to use advising the Company on its global investment strategy.

Additionally, he will be joining Agri-Tech industry experts on the virtual leg of the World Agri-Tech Innovation Summit on September 27 to discuss new market opportunities and promoting food security through agri-food innovation during the Middle East Agri-Food Briefing.
Three of the GCC countries' capitals - Abu Dhabi (UAE); Riyadh (Saudi Arabia) and Manama (Bahrain) have been ranked among the world's best capital cities to visit on vacation by travel experts at Bounce based on factors such as the average cost of a hotel and transport, number of attractions and restaurants and average temperatures and rainfall.

Explaining the concept behind the rating, travel experts at Bounce said often one of the most popular areas of a country to visit is the capital city, due to it being a hub for tourist activities, sightseeing, and amenities within a nation.

To determine which of the worlds capital cities is the best to visit for a holiday, numerous different factors have been taken into consideration to create a ranking for 69 of the most developed capitals in the world.

As borders open up and travel becomes ever more accessible, capital cities are ready to welcome back tourists from all over the world. The better equipped the capital is the more popular it could be as a result.

On top of man-made features and amenities, the weather and climate of these cities have been taken into consideration when identifying the best capital cities.

The Bounce list for best capital cities to visit is topped by Valetta, the capital city of the small Mediterranean island nation of Malta with an overall score of 6.74 out of 10.

The major reason for this is the number of attractions and restaurants per sq km. In fact, there are over 311 attractions per sq km which is 237.5 more than the second-highest scoring capital.

As Valetta is a tiny city (just 0.61 sq km), there is a higher attraction density than the actual number of attractions, in total, there are 190 per square kilometer.

UAE capital Abu Dhabi ranks second with a score 6.24 out of 10 missing out on the top spot by just 0.5. The city has one of the lowest annual rainfall totals with only 42mm dropping in the desert locale.

Moreover, the year-round average temperature in the city is 27.92 degrees celsius which is the fourth highest of all cities studied. This makes it a great destination for sun seekers.

Indian capital New Delhi ranks third with an average score of 6.06 out of 10, with average temperatures topping 25 degrees and 12,409 restaurants to choose from.

It is the only other city to achieve a total score of more than 6/10, and consequently the third highest-ranking capital.

The average nightly cost of a hotel in the city is $101.87, which is around $35 less than the average of all the cities studied. In New Delhi, there are 290.61 restaurants per sq km and this is the second-highest of any capital.

Bahrain's capital city Manama is the fourth-best for a holiday in the world with a score of 5.77/10, just over 1 higher than the average score of 4.76/10. Manama has a very low crime rate score of just 17.28/100, on top of this, it scored well for average temperatures and annual rainfall due to its geographical location.

Saudi Arabia's capital city Riyadh was ranked fifth with a score of 5.74/10. Riyadh has slightly less rainfall than Manama but also slightly lower temperatures, therefore the Saudi capital ranks just below their neighbors. There are over 17.1 million hashtag mentions for Riyadh on Instagram and a low level of crime at 21.38/100.

According to Bounce, Oman's capital Muscat came sixth with a score of 5.59/10 and ranked high on best temperature at 28C, while another GCC country Kuwait was ranked eighth in the list with a score of 5.56/10.

Ankara (Turkey) is the best capital city for hotel prices, with an average price of $45.74 per night, while Luxembourg was crowned best capital city for transport in the world for its free public transport services.

Bangkok (Thailand) is the best capital city for temperature with an average of 26.6 degrees, while Cairo, Egypt has the least rainfall with only 18mm of average rainfall per year, it added.-TradeArabia News Service
by Vladimir Rozanskij

Tajikistan is among the most concerned and is preparing itself militarily, asking the international community to intervene. Uzbekistan is more open to dialogue, but has the best armed army in the region. The Taliban speak of good relations with Tashkent.

Moscow (AsiaNews) - The President of Tajikistan, Emomali Rakhmon, this week launched an appeal to his compatriots and to the international community to take appropriate measures to deal with the crisis in Afghanistan. The new government in Kabul is stocked exclsively with Taliban already thrashing orevious promises to open up to the various ethnic and social components of the country (in which ethnic Tajiks are significant), proving to be unreliable. All Central Asian countries share Rakhmon's concerns, in which the Kremlin's thinking can also be perceived.

Tajikistan has just celebrated 30 years of post-Soviet independence. On September 9, Tajik authorities held a substantial military parade through the streets of Dushanbe. In front of soldiers and deployed weapons, Rakhmon warned that "the situation in Afghanistan affects the entire region, putting our security at risk." The day before, during the main ceremony of the 30th anniversary, the Tajik president had stressed the need to form a government in Afghanistan with the participation of all ethnic groups. "I am shocked that the world's human rights institutions remain silent and do not react in any way to defend the rights of Afghans," said Rakhmon.

The message sent to the Taliban by the government of Uzbekistan was quite different. A note from the foreign ministry in Tashkent states "the hope that the decisions taken by the new executive may be the beginning of a great national agreement for the re-establishment of a stable peace throughout the country". Uzbek diplomats said they are ready to "develop a constructive dialogue and activate effective cooperation with the new Afghan government."

Tajik political scientist Parviz Mullodzanov notes in Nezavisimaja Gazeta that "Uzbekistan's dialogic approach does not seem more productive than Tajikistan's diffident one. In the 1990s, Dushanbe maintained good relations with the Taliban, but this did not prevent incursions by their accomplices, the Salafist guerrillas of Afghan-Uzbek Juma Namangani." According to Mullodzanov, the Taliban is incapable of maintaining an agreement. It is precisely their past experience that is causing the Tajiks' perplexity, not to mention their historical hostility towards the Pashtun ethnic group.

More than 30 jihadist organizations operate under the control of the Taliban, including the Salafists, who are widespread in other Central Asian countries. On September 10, a raid was carried out in Tashkent against one of these organizations. Many bloggers are working to spread radical Islamist ideology of Taliban influence on social networks. The precarious economic condition of the Central Asian nations increases the likelihood of new conflicts, in which jihadists would be in their element.

Uzbekistan's more dialogic stance would be dictated by Tashkent's greater confidence about its own forces on the ground. According to many experts, the local army is the most powerful in all of Central Asia. To date, the Uzbek Armed Forces count on 70 thousand soldiers, many of them with field experience accumulated in recent clashes: especially in the mining city of Yangiabad and in the Kyrgyz city of Bakten. Also the equipment of weapons and war technology would have been completed and modernized during the last five years, since Savkat Mirziyoyev replaced the first historical president Islam Karimov.

After the start of Taliban attacks in August, the Uzbek army was placed in a high state of alert. It is known that after the capture of Kabul several members and collaborators of the deposed government moved to neighboring countries. Many Afghan soldiers repaired in Uzbekistan and took with them weapons and military equipment, including planes and helicopters.

Certainly the soldiers and weapons passed into the service of Tashkent are many more, beyond official reports. The Uzbeks do not clarify what their fate will be, although on August 20 it was stated that after some negotiations with the Taliban "150 Afghans who illegally entered Uzbekistan have been repatriated."

On the Uzbek border, which runs along the river Amu Darya, the Taliban have installed special equipment for the collection of biometric data: now it is impossible to cross it in both directions without special permits. Afghan fundamentalists claim that with Uzbekistan "there are relations of mutual interest".
The new facility, which aims to boost Israel's presence in maritime trade, has been operational since September 1. A .7 billion investment managed by the Shanghai International Port Group. The aim is to become a regional hub, counting on growing ties with Arab nations. Washington against the Beijing-Jerusalem axis.

Haifa (AsiaNews) - Israel has inaugurated a new commercial port dedicated to trade in the Mediterranean, in a move aimed at boosting competitiveness and strengthen its presence in a sector plagued by delays and non-deliveries also due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Israel wants to become a regional hub, through a structure built in the Bay of Haifa, which will be managed by the Chinese giant Shanghai International Port Group (Sipg), the result of a renewed axis between Jerusalem and Beijing that is a source of growing concern for Washington.

The first private commercial port of call in the Jewish State cost .7 billion and has been operational since September 1. It will allow large cargo ships of 18,000 containers and more to dock on Israeli shores. The government has started selling state-owned ports to encourage the construction of new ones with the aim of cutting costs and cutting waiting times in loading and unloading operations.

Approximately 99% of goods entering and leaving Israel arrive by sea, and an upgrade of the infrastructure is both necessary and fundamental to sustain economic growth. Improved relations with Arab countries in the region, from the UAE to Bahrain, will create additional business opportunities and Haifa has all the necessary characteristics to become a regional hub. In addition, a port in Ashdod, operated by Swiss Terminal Investment Limited, is scheduled to open by the end of the year.

Chinese control of the commercial port of Haifa and Beijing's growing investment in Israel are a source of tension with the United States, which opposes a link that has been strengthening over the past decade. Washington fears that the US Navy's Sixth Fleet, which docks at the port of Haifa from time to time, could be vulnerable to the Dragon's intelligence and surveillance systems, which would then acquire a dominant position in the planetary cyber war.

Despite its ties with the White House, in recent years the Israeli government led by former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has strengthened its strategic and commercial partnership with China. Netanyahu himself met Chinese President XI Jinping in Beijing in 2017 and hosted Vice President Wang Qishan in Jerusalem in 2018.

Doron Ella, an expert on Chinese affairs at the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University, told al-Monitor that Beijing's investments in the Jewish state barely reach 10%, far less than those of the US and Europe. The US concern, however, concerns Chinese investments in "sensitive" technological sectors.

Beijing responded promptly through the spokesman of the Chinese embassy in Israel, Wang Yongjun, who wrote in an article in the Jerusalem Post that the Jewish State "must not take sides" in the dispute. China," he added, "is against the Cold War mentality" and respects the "independence" of individual states "in all fields", denying any involvement in the cyber attacks.
Indians and Australians want to increase military cooperation. Both countries have open disputes with Beijing. Exercises also in the Quad. Indian expert: Dialogue between India, Australia, the US and Japan goes beyond responding to the Chinese threat. China is India's biggest trading partner.

Delhi (AsiaNews) - Yesterday the navies of India and Australia concluded AUSINDEX 2021, four days of naval exercises off the Australian port of Darwin. At the same time, the defence and foreign ministers of the two countries opened their first strategic dialogue in the Indian capital.

Concerned by China's growing military activism in the Indo-Pacific, the two governments have intensified security relations. Peter Dutton, head of Australia's defence department, and his Indian counterpart Rajnath Singh stressed that the strategic partnership between Canberra and Delhi is based on a shared vision for an Indo-Pacific that is 'free, open, inclusive and governed by [international] law'. The same approach used by the US to counter China's rise in the region.

Dutton and Singh explained that their governments will work to strengthen military cooperation in areas such as information sharing, joint technology development and logistics. Canberra then invited the Indians to participate in 2023 in Talisman Sabre, the largest war simulation organised by the Australians.

In late August, Australia and India also conducted joint naval operations with the US and Japan off Guam in the Western Pacific. This was the first phase of the annual Malabar programme. For most analysts, the Quad (Quadrilateral Security Dialogue) exercises between the four nations, which have become increasingly complex over the years, clearly target China, which has various conflicts with Washington, Tokyo, Canberra and Delhi. For Beijing, the Quad is a potential 'Asian NATO'.

According to Swaran Singh, professor of international studies at the Jawaharlal Nehru University of Delhi, it is improper to associate the Quad only with security aspects linked to the Chinese threat. The Indian academic tells AsiaNews, "The QUAD is a much broader framework that includes three working groups on climate change, critical technologies and for rollout of vaccines." Singh goes on to note that the much-hyped naval exercises of the Quad countries focus on humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, as much as on China's growing influence.

Of the Quad nations, India is the one with the most nuanced approach to Beijing's advance. Delhi is very critical when it comes to border disputes with the Chinese along the Himalayan chain, much less so when it comes to China's naval activities in the South China Sea, the East China Sea and the Taiwan Strait. Even in times of pandemic, Beijing remains Delhi's leading trading partner: in 2020 the two countries exchanged goods worth just under 68 billion euros; the Indians, however, recorded a deficit of 34.8 billion euros.
Another plane crashed into the Pentagon building in Northern Virginia and the last crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania It is believed that the hijackers on the last plane crashed in that location, rather than their unknown target, after the passengers and crew attempted to retake control of the flight deck.
Still, youth empowerment programs and initiatives are also more readily available now to help Muslim children take on bigotry in constructive ways and develop their own authentic identity. And a growing number of young adult Muslims are pursuing leadership roles on school boards of education, volunteering for election campaigns, and even running for public office. Issues such as climate change, gun violence and Eid equality are inspiring their generation to become politically and civically engaged by launching petitions, organizing public actions and lobbying lawmakers to seek change on issues they care about.
On the anniversary of the attacks of 9/11, it is time for us to reflect and remember. We must remember the victims of the attacks and their families. We must remember the thousands of troops who have fallen and their families since the global war on terrorism began. There have been many improvements in intelligence gathering and sharing among our law enforcement and intelligence agencies. We learned a lot in our war against terrorism but we can never let up. Those who wish us harm have the patience of saints and will strike when we let our guard down. We must continue to do all we can to make sure nothing like this happens again.
In the aftermath of Sept. 11, countless brave men and women stepped up to serve their country. Among those called to action are the post-9/11 veterans we are honored to serve today at the VA Maryland Health Care System. Its important that we do more than remember them today. Its important that we continue to partner with them, advocate for them and provide them with the tools they need to reintegrate back into the very community that they so nobly served and sacrificed for.
Many of my students were first generation Americans who came to our country to escape poverty and violence unknown to me. Much like my Italian, Irish and Polish grandparents and great-grandparents  who also once sat in classrooms as first generation Americans  they understood American freedom in a way that I took for granted. My students knew corrupt elections, dictators and hunger. They knew terrorist attacks on their own land such that Sept. 11 invoked a different kind of fear in them than it did in me. They fled their homelands for a better life, as so many of our ancestors have done. They fled for new lives, new opportunities, new freedoms. And because of this, their patriotism ran deep. Our daily Pledge of Allegiance had a different meaning to my students than it did for me; they recognized the symbolism of our flag, which I naively took for granted.
Today

Sunny to partly cloudy. High 83F. ESE winds shifting to N at 10 to 15 mph.

Tonight

Clear skies. Low 51F. Winds WNW at 10 to 15 mph.

Tomorrow

Except for a few afternoon clouds, mainly sunny. High 71F. Winds N at 15 to 25 mph.
Patient volumes in the emergency room rapidly declined during the first surge of the coronavirus pandemic when much about the disease was unknown. Elective surgeries were halted in Maryland and elsewhere in the country from March to May 2020 in anticipation of demands COVID-19 would place on the health care system, a decision that hurt the financial health of hospitals that often operate on thin margins.
She was great as a navigator. She did not have a cellphone and she used a traditional map book. She spent the evening before working out where we would be going, said Susan Milukas, a friend. She was not a morning person and knew she had to do these things. She was not the kind of person who grabbed something out of another buyers hand.
To qualify for the grants, businesses must be located in Harford County and have been established before March 9, 2020, the administration said. Because of state requirements, priority will be given to businesses that have not received previous COVID-relief grants from the Maryland Department of Commerce, the Maryland Department of Labor or Harford County. Those with 20 or fewer employees, excluding the owner, will also get priority.
Detectives are investigating the death as a homicide and ask anyone with information to contact Annapolis detectives at 410-260-3439. People can also call Metro Crime Stoppers at 1-866-7LOCKUP and submit an anonymous tip. If a tip leads to an arrest or indictment the caller may be eligible for a cash reward of up to $2,000.
India and Australia shared views on the challenges of the East and South China Seas, of Myanmar and Afghanistan during the inaugural 2+2 Ministerial Meeting, Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne informed on Saturday.

"We have talked today about many things but including the strong and enduring India and Australia relationships in trade, in community links, in cyber, climate and defence," said Payne after holding the India-Australia 2+2 Ministerial Meeting with the Indian counterparts.

"We have shared views of the challenges of the East and South China Seas, of Mynamar and Afghanistan." She further said that both countries share a positive vision of a free, open and secure Indo-Pacific.

Indo-Pacific region is largely viewed as an area comprising the Indian Ocean and the western and central Pacific Ocean, including the South China Sea. China's territorial claims in the South China Sea and its efforts to advance into the Indian Ocean are seen to have challenged the established rules-based system.

Noting the concern on Afghanistan, the Australian minister said, "Last month saw fall of Kabul, future of Afghanistan remains a central concern. Along with the ongoing fight of terrorism, the future of Afghanistan remains the central concern for both of our countries."

Following the Taliban's takeover of Kabul in August, the situation in Afghanistan has been dominating the international agenda, with global stakeholders trying to find ways to ensure stability in the region.

On the issues of Afghanistan, Payne said India and Australia share strong interests in ensuring that Afghan, never again becomes safe haven for breeding and training terrorists.

"We're also very focused on seeking safe passage for citizens, foreign nationals, visa holders of other countries who seek to leave Afghanistan," said the Australian Foreign Minister.

This is the inaugural India-Australia 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue between the nations' foreign and defense ministers. The agenda included bilateral, regional and global issues of mutual interest.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, Australian Foreign Minister Payne and Australia Defence Minister Peter Dutton participated in the meeting.

(ANI)
Welcome to Sophi Knows. September 11 has come and gone but should stay in our minds every day. We came together as a nation and should strive for that again.
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Ford continues to strongly encourage all employees who are eligible to get vaccinated, Felker said in an emailed statement Friday. We believe the vaccine plays a critical role in combating the virus and have already designated some roles where we require the vaccine. We will be assessing the new executive actions to determine what adjustments need to be taken to our current vaccination policy as we continue to prioritize the safety of our employees.
Great expectations faced the reunited Fiery Furnaces, an indie rock band on Jack Whites Third Man Records fronted by brother and sister Matthew and Eleanor Friedberger. The siblings from Oak Park put the band on hiatus to enjoy solo careers, but returned in 2020 with their first song in 11 years. As the band supposedly used a Soviet drum machine on the tune, the Russian influence didnt appear to have stopped there. Kooky, cabaret-inspired melodies on fuzzed-out keyboards were prevalent through much of their live set.The band, featuring two drummers, two keyboards, bass and vocals, broke up their cooly indifferent stage demeanor by closing with the fun Tropical Ice-Land.
Biden was a senator when hijackers commandeered four planes and carried out the attack. He was Obamas vice president in 2011 when the United States observed the 10th anniversary of the strikes. Saturdays commemoration was his first as commander in chief, culminating with a stop late afternoon at the Pentagon, where the worlds mightiest military suffered an unthinkable blow to its very home.
Kaden Ingram, 12, who lived in the 8000 block of South Bennett Avenue  the same block where investigators said he was found with multiple gunshot wounds to the head around 10:30 a.m. Saturday  was pronounced dead at 10:51 a.m. at University of Chicago Medical Center. Information about his identity was released Sunday by the Cook County medical examiners office, which ruled his death a homicide caused by the gunshot wounds.
In our city, we simply cannot have any hate toward anyone and call ourselves Americans, call ourselves exceptional, Lightfoot said. That ideal will never be true and strong if we allow ourselves to be torn apart by hatred. We must stand together as a country, as a city, united together, recognizing the beauty of who we are.
Police said the victim was near the sidewalk when he heard shots and felt pain in the arm pit and a hand. He was taken to the University of Chicago Medical Center where he was pronounced dead, according to police.
Etters tried a semester at the American Academy of Art in Chicago, his wife said, but specializing in hyper-realistic drawings, was told there was no market for his art. He had already sold his first painting in seventh grade and started his own painting business, so he dropped out of school and started his own studio in 1985.
Minutes later in the Austin neighborhood, a 27-year-old man was in front of a residence in the 5500 block of West Adams Street at approximately 12:58 p.m. when he heard gunshots and felt pain. He was struck in the head and shoulder, according to a police notification. He was taken to Stroger Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
(People say) Theres just no good. Theyre all evil. Theyre all corrupt. It doesnt matter what color it is, doesnt matter what their backgrounds is, doesnt matter what things they do to save our residents, theres no good there, Lightfoot said. (A) police officer who tried to resuscitate that young girl, who had her blood all over him, who tried desperately to save her life  you want to tell me that guys evil? And theres lots of examples of that that happen every single day, where our officers are doing heroic, heroic work.
Inside painting, or inner painting, is a traditional Chinese art form. It originally involves tiny snuff bottles which have pictures and calligraphy painted on the inside surface of the bottle. Snuff bottle paintings are produced by manipulating a specialized brush through the neck of the bottle. The process of painting, which is totally reversed inside the bottle, requires absolute precision from the artist.

Wang Ziyong, 52, an inside painting craftsman, studied inside painting with his father Wang Ruicheng since childhood. After graduating from college, Wang returned to Hengshui City and devoted himself to the artwork. Thanks to years of practice, he quickly developed his own style.

In order to better paint the color highlights and handle details, Wang developed a new type of brush, which improved the drawing efficiency. He also developed different styles to create inside painting, not only inside snuff bottles, but also inside pencil vases, crystal balls, tea sets and folding screens.

In 1995, he gave up the traditional workshop-style production mode of inside painting and established a modern enterprise, integrating development, design, production, processing and sales of the artwork. In 2003, with the help of his father, Wang founded a museum in Hebei themed on inside paintings, showing the historical development and creative process of the art. In 2006, inside painting was added to the list of national intangible cultural heritages. In 2012, Wang Ziyong was named the inheritor of provincial intangible cultural heritage projects. During all these years, Wang has won many prizes with his innovative artwork, and offered training to 38 apprentices, trying to make this traditional skill shine a new light.

"I hope more people can feel the charm of Hengshui inside painting in the future," Wang said.
The International Conference on Food Loss and Waste opened on Friday afternoon in Jinan, capital of east China's Shandong Province.

Set around the theme of reducing food loss and food waste, and promoting global food security, the conference aims to establish a platform for multi-party dialogue on food loss.

A total of 150 representatives of 49 countries, international organizations, enterprises and non-governmental organizations around the world attended the conference and passed an initiative on food loss and waste.

Qu Dongyu, director-general of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, gave a speech via video link at the conference, pointing out that up to 14 percent of food produced globally went to waste between harvest and retail.

Co-organized by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, the National Development and Reform Commission, the National Food and Strategic Reserves Administration and the Shandong provincial government, the three-day event is being held both online and offline.
Trade between China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) rose from 8.36 billion U.S. dollars in 1991 to 685.28 billion U.S. dollars in 2020, with an average annual growth rate of 16.5 percent, data from the Chinese customs shows.

The growth rate is 3.4 percentage points higher than the overall average annual growth rate of China's foreign trade in the same period, according to the General Administration of Customs (GAC).

The proportion of China's exports of mechanical and electrical products to ASEAN increased from 28.9 percent in 1993 to 53.3 percent in 2020, while the exports of mobile phones, ships and automobiles to ASEAN also increased.

The proportion of China's imports of mechanical and electrical products from ASEAN rose from 11.1 percent in 1993 to 52.7 percent in 2020, while its imports of agricultural products, rubber, petroleum and other products from ASEAN also grew rapidly.

Since China and ASEAN established dialogue relations in 1991, the improving business climate has facilitated bilateral trade.

GAC spokesperson Li Kuiwen said that, since the establishment of the China-ASEAN Free Trade Area, China's customs has taken the lead in completing negotiations with ASEAN to upgrade the rules of origin and has smoothly implemented them, as well as helping foreign-trade enterprises to fully enjoy the policy of tariff reduction.

China and ASEAN are complementary to each other in trade and thus have remarkable cooperation potentials, he said.
Hong Kong's role as a global financial hub will be consolidated by the widely-anticipated wealth management connect in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Carrie Lam said Friday.

Chief Executive of China's Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Carrie Lam (C) speaks at the launch ceremony of the cross-boundary wealth management connect in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area in Hong Kong, south China, Sept. 10, 2021. (Xinhua/Wang Shen)

"Wealth management connect is a milestone in the financial development of the Greater Bay Area and an important measure that deepens and widens mutual access between the financial markets of the mainland and Hong Kong," Lam said in an online ceremony of the launch of the program.

The program underlines Hong Kong's unique financial advantages under "one country, two systems," contributes to the high-quality development of the Greater Bay Area and facilitates the financial development and further opening-up of the country, Lam said.

The wealth management connect will allow investors in Hong Kong and Macao to invest in the mainland markets, and vice versa. The quota cap will be placed at 150 billion yuan (about 23.29 billion U.S. dollars) for southbound and northbound trading, respectively. For individual investors, the limit is 1 million yuan (about 155,279 U.S. dollars).

Paul Chan, Financial Secretary of the HKSAR government, said the program will expand the cross-boundary investment channel and asset allocation choices for residents in the area and open up a broader market for the financial and relevant professional sectors, bringing enormous business opportunities.

"It will also attract more international financial institutions to have a foothold in Hong Kong to expand their mainland businesses, reinforcing further Hong Kong's role as an important gateway for capital flowing into and out of the mainland, as well as its position as the global offshore renminbi business hub and an international asset management center," he said.

Edmond Lau, Deputy Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, expects residents in the Greater Bay Area will be able to make cross-boundary investment via the program next month or so at the earliest, after banks have completed relevant preparatory and reporting work.
The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government on Friday held an oath-taking ceremony for the first group of district councilors.

Secretary for Home Affairs of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government Caspar Tsui (R), authorized by the HKSAR chief executive as the oath administrator, administers an oath-taking ceremony for the first group of district council members, at the North Point Community Hall in Hong Kong, south China, Sept. 10, 2021. (Xinhua)

During the ceremony held at the North Point Community Hall, the district council members from several districts of Hong Kong Island took oaths individually, pledging to uphold the HKSAR Basic Law and bear allegiance to the HKSAR.

The oath-taking was administered by Secretary for Home Affairs of the HKSAR government Caspar Tsui, who was authorized by the HKSAR chief executive as the oath administrator.

The Public Offices (Candidacy and Taking Up Offices) (Miscellaneous Amendments) Ordinance 2021 was gazetted and came into effect on May 21 this year, which stipulates that district councilors are required to take an oath to uphold the HKSAR Basic Law and bear allegiance to the HKSAR.

According to the interpretation of Article 104 of the HKSAR Basic Law by the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, the person administering the oath determines whether an oath is valid or not. If the oath taken is determined as invalid, no arrangement shall be made for retaking the oath.

The oath administrator determined Friday that the oaths taken by 17 district councilors were valid.

Secretary for Home Affairs of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government Caspar Tsui, addresses an oath-taking ceremony for the first group of district council members, at the North Point Community Hall in Hong Kong, south China, Sept. 10, 2021. (Xinhua)

One member of the Eastern District Council was absent and regarded as declining or neglecting to take the oath under section 20A of the Oaths and Declarations Ordinance. Accordingly, this member will vacate his office immediately.

As the oath administrator had doubts on the validity of the oaths taken by seven district council members, they were required to provide additional information for the oath administrator to decide the validity of their oaths.
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Deng Huilin, former deputy mayor and police chief of southwest China's Chongqing Municipality, stood trial Friday at the Intermediate People's Court of Baoding City in north China's Hebei Province, accused of taking bribes.

Deng was charged with taking advantage of his various former positions between 1999 and 2020 to offer assistance to others in their business operations, acquiring license plates and job promotions.

In return, he illegally accepted money and gifts worth 42.67 million yuan (about 6.63 million U.S. dollars), according to prosecutors.

The prosecutors, the defendant and his lawyers cross-examined evidence and gave their respective accounts.

In his final statement, Deng pleaded guilty and expressed remorse.

The trial was attended by more than 30 people, including legislators, political advisors, the press and the public.

The verdict will be announced in due course.










The herd of 14 wild Asian elephants roaming around in southwestern China's Yunnan province successfully went through the last natural barrier on its way home and returned to its traditional habitat in Pu'er city on Friday.

At 1 am, the elephants, which had left their habitat in Xishuangbanna National Nature Reserve, crossed the Babian River and entered Ning'er county in Pu'er city, one of the three major habitats of Asian elephants in Yunnan.

The northbound trip, lasting about 18 months, finally ended without any harm to either the elephants or local residents, the provincial headquarters in charge of protecting the herd announced on Friday.

The headquarters has withdrawn the provincial surveillance group and passed the monitoring work to city and county-level forestry departments.

The herd departed from its traditional habitat in Xishuangbanna Dai autonomous prefecture last year and started traveling north in April.

It passed through eight counties in the province during the journey. In June, it eventually reached the outskirts of Kunming, the provincial capital, which has about 8 million residents.

The herd started its journey with 16 members, but three of them dropped out, while two calves were born en route. In June, a bull elephant broke away from the group and wandered off on his own.

In July, the bull elephant was sedated with a tranquilizer dart, lifted into a cage on the back of a truck and returned to Xishuangbanna.

To safeguard their journey, local authorities deployed trucks, workers and drones to monitor the elephants 24 hours a day, evacuated roads for them to pass safely and lured them away from populated areas with food.

The herd's safe return from its journey is "very meaningful", said a notice released by the headquarters on Friday. "It provides us with a chance to know more about the elephants and also shows China's resolve in building an environmentally friendly country."

The Asian elephant is listed as an endangered species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The animal, which can be found in the areas of Yunnan bordering Myanmar and Laos, is also under first-class State protection in China.

Due to ongoing wildlife protection efforts, the number of wild Asian elephants in the province has increased from 170 in 1980 to 300 today. Their major habitats are in Yunnan's Pu'er city, Mojiang city and the Xishuangbanna Dai autonomous prefecture.

Shen Qingzhong, a senior engineer from the Xishuangbanna National Nature Reserve, said it's inevitable that the elephants will make another journey in the future as migration is a normal activity for elephants.

"Historically, Asian elephants used to live in many parts of the country. Migration is in their nature. It helps the species expand its territory and have more chances to improve its gene pool by mating with different groups," he said.

The forestry department and the provincial government plan to develop a national park, which aims to provide habitat protection for the elephants and a balanced relationship with residents.
 Flash

The 13th meeting of the China-Vietnam Steering Committee for Bilateral Cooperation was held in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi on Friday, with both sides pledging to further enhance the China-Vietnam comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership.



The meeting was co-chaired by Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh.

At the meeting, the two sides agreed to continue supporting each other in the socialist cause and strengthen bilateral coordination and cooperation in international affairs.

Wang said facing the tremendous changes in the world and the COVID-19 pandemic, working together to overcome the difficulties is a natural strategic choice for China and Vietnam, two socialist neighbors, and has given the bilateral ties more profound meaning.

Wang stressed that the two countries should strive for more breakthroughs in bilateral trade in 2021, enhance the mutual trust between the two peoples, jointly safeguard international justice and the common strategic interests, and make efforts to bring the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership into effect as soon as possible.

China will continue to provide support for Vietnam on COVID-19 response as its capacity allows, Wang said.

In terms of maritime issues, Wang noted that the two sides should avoid any unilateral action that may complicate the situation and escalate disputes, and should jointly guard against the interference from forces outside the region, and show the international community that the peoples of China and Vietnam are able to properly manage their differences and expand their cooperation.

Extending thanks to China for support in Vietnam's fight against the pandemic, Minh said Vietnam is willing to maintain bilateral exchanges at multiple levels, and strengthen COVID-19 vaccine cooperation with China.

Vietnam is also willing to work with China to carry on with the current cooperation mechanisms, and enhance pragmatic maritime cooperation, Minh said.
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United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Friday launched Our Common Agenda, a landmark new report, setting out his vision for the future of global cooperation and ushering in UN 2.0 era featuring "multilateralism with teeth."



"On almost every front, our world is under enormous stress. We are not at ease with each other, or our planet. COVID-19 is a wake-up call - and we are oversleeping," the top UN official told a meeting of the General Assembly to hear his briefing on his recommendations to advance the common agenda and to respond to current and future challenges.

"We need a UN 2.0 that can offer more relevant, systemwide, multilateral and multi-stakeholder solutions to the challenges of the 21st century," the secretary-general said, adding that "this transformation will be based on a quintet of cross-cutting issues: data; digital innovation; strategic foresight; behavioral science; and performance and results orientation."

Celebrating its 75th anniversary of founding last year, the United Nations prompted major internal discussions about its future, and a new direction away from the post-World War Two consensus of its early days. These reflections have resulted in Our Common Agenda.

The secretary-general launched this report, prefacing his remarks with a scathing overview of the parlous state of the world.

"From the climate crisis to our suicidal war on nature and the collapse of biodiversity, our global response is too little, too late," declared the secretary-general. "Unchecked inequality is undermining social cohesion, creating fragilities that affect us all. Technology is moving ahead without guard rails to protect us from its unforeseen consequences."

The UN chief went on to describe the extensive consultations that fed into the world body's development, a listening exercise that led the UN to the conclusion that enhanced multilateralism is seen as the way to deal with the world's crises.



Two contrasting futures are laid out in the report: one of breakdown and perpetual crisis, and another in which there is a breakthrough, to a greener, safer future.

The doomsday scenario describes a world in which COVID-19 is endlessly mutating, because rich countries hoard vaccines, and health systems are overwhelmed.

In that future, the planet becomes "uninhabitable" due to rising temperatures and extreme weather events, and a million species are on the brink of extinction.

This is coupled with a continuous erosion of human rights, a massive loss of jobs and income, and growing protests and unrest, which are met by violent repression.

"Or, we could go the other way, sharing vaccines equitably, and sparking a sustainable recovery in which the global economy is retooled to be more sustainable, resilient, and inclusive," according to the report.

By decarbonizing the economy, global temperature rises would be limited, countries heavily affected by climate change would be supported, and ecosystems would be preserved for future generations, the report says.

This approach will herald a new era for multilateralism, in which countries work together to solve global problems; the international system works fast to protect everyone in emergencies; and the United Nations is universally recognized as a trusted platform for collaboration.

"To ensure that we get to live in a world in which the breakthrough scenario dominates," the report makes a series of key proposals.

The importance of protecting vulnerable groups is recognized in commitments to gender equality and leaving no-one behind, which include reinforcing social protections and promoting gender parity.

Ensuring a more sustainable global economy is identified as a goal, with support for the poorest, and a fairer international trading system.

Climate action gets a special mention, with commitments to the goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels, and net zero carbon emissions by 2050, and end to fossil fuel subsidies, a transformation of food systems, and a package of support for developing countries.



The perennial issues of peace and security are addressed, with the report calling for a "new agenda for peace," involving more investment for peacebuilding, support for regional conflict prevention, a reduction of strategic risks such as nuclear weapons and cyberwarfare - and a dialogue on outer space to ensure that it is used peacefully and sustainably.

Linked to the security issue are commitments to international justice; the application of human rights online, as part of a Global Digital Compact, and a step up in the fight against corruption, in a bid to build trust in institutions.

One of those institutions is, of course, the UN itself, which, says the report, is due an upgrade, with a more participatory and consultative approach, gender parity by 2028, the re-establishment of the secretary-general's Scientific Advisory Board, and a policy that puts people at the center of the UN system, taking into account age, gender and diversity.

Other proposals concern the improved participation of youth in the political process and efforts to cut youth unemployment; better partnerships between governments, multilateral organizations, the private sector, and civil society; and an emergency platform to better prepare for global crises, with stronger global health security.

As the United Nations embarks on the Decade of Action - 10 years to make real progress to deliver the promise of a sustainable, fairer future by 2030 - there is an opportunity to reshape the world for the better, with multilateralism at the heart of the process.

However, as the "breakdown scenario" shows, failure to work effectively together risks significant, irreversible damage to the planet and even, life itself. In his speech to the General Assembly, Guterres underlined that Our Common Agenda is driven by solidarity, "the principle of working together, recognizing that we are bound to each other and that no community or country, however powerful, can solve its challenges alone."

At a press conference held after the General Assembly meeting, Guterres told reporters that "we need multilateralism with teeth."

"We need immediate action to protect our most precious global assets, from the oceans to outer space, and to deliver on our common aspirations: peace, global health, a livable planet," said the secretary-general.
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China hopes the Afghan Taliban will make a clean break with the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) and other terrorist groups, and take effective measures to resolutely crack down on them, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said Friday.

Spokesperson Zhao Lijian made the remarks in response to a recent interview of Taliban spokesperson Suhail Shaheen with the Global Times, in which he said many ETIM members have left Afghanistan because the Taliban has categorically told them there is no place for anyone to use Afghan soil against other countries, including its neighboring countries.

The ETIM is an international terrorist organization listed by the UN Security Council, Zhao said, adding that it poses a direct threat to China's national security and territorial integrity and affects regional security and stability.

"Afghanistan and the rest of the international community share the responsibility to firmly reject, curb, crack down on and eradicate the ETIM," Zhao said.

Noting that China has repeatedly expressed its concerns to the Taliban over the ETIM, Zhao said the Taliban attaches importance to China's concerns and made solemn promises.

"We hope they will honor their words, make a clean break with the ETIM and other terrorist groups, take effective measures to resolutely crack down on these terrorist organizations, and strengthen coordination and cooperation with neighboring countries to forestall spillover effects and prevent Afganistan from becoming a hotbed, harbor or source of terrorist forces," he added.
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Visitors tour the Germany exhibition booth during the 2021 China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS) in Beijing, capital of China, Sept. 5, 2021. [Photo/Xinhua]

The China-Germany relationship will continue to make new progress, as long as both sides hold on to consolidating and deepening mutual trust, treating each other as equals and focusing on cooperation, Chinese President Xi Jinping said Friday in a phone conversation with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Xi noted that he and Merkel have maintained highly frequent and efficient exchanges since last year, which has played an important leading role in the development of China-Germany and China-European Union (EU) relations, and also demonstrated the high-level mutual trust between the two countries.

Xi said he highly appreciates the fact that Merkel has been actively committed to promoting Germany's and the EU's practical cooperation and friendly exchanges with China.

Aerial photo shows a China-Europe freight train bound for Duisburg of Germany departing from Tuanjiecun Railway Station in southwest China's Chongqing, Jan. 1, 2021. [Photo/Xinhua]

Over recent years, China-Germany relations have generally maintained smooth development, with cooperation in various fields showing strong resilience amid the COVID-19 pandemic, which has brought a genuine sense of fulfillment to the people in both countries, he said.

The two countries, he added, have helped China and the EU to complete their investment agreement negotiations on schedule, and worked together to uphold multilateralism, safeguard free trade, and actively tackle climate change, jointly making positive contributions to maintaining world peace and stability.

The fundamental reason for the great achievements of China-Germany relations, he said, lies in the fact that the two countries respect each other, seek common ground while reserving differences, focus on win-win cooperation and pursue complementation of their respective advantages.

Xi expressed his hope that Germany will encourage the EU to adhere to the right policy on China, treat differences objectively and address them rationally, so as to promote the sustained and sound development of China-EU relations.

Visitors look at a giant panda cub at Zoo Berlin in Berlin, capital of Germany, May 28, 2020. [Photo/Xinhua]

For her part, Merkel said that over recent years there are many aspects in the development of Germany-China and EU-China relations that are worth summing up.

She said she is willing to maintain close communication with the Chinese side and make joint efforts to push Germany and China as well as the EU and China to bridge gaps through dialogue and properly handle their differences.

The EU-China investment agreement is beneficial for both sides, she said, adding that she hopes it can be smoothly ratified and put into effect as soon as possible.

Germany hopes to strengthen vaccine cooperation with China, she added.

Merkel shared her view on the current situation in Afghanistan, and expressed her hope to work with China to strengthen communication and coordination within the United Nations and other multilateral frameworks.

Xi stressed that China advocates coexistence and mutual learning among different civilizations, opposes interference in other countries' internal affairs, and stands ready to make constructive efforts with the international community, including Germany, to truly realize peace and stability in Afghanistan.
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Three Chinese human rights experts attended the United Nations Asia-Pacific Regional Forum on Minority Issues from Tuesday to Wednesday via video conference.

The experts, all with the China Society for Human Rights Studies, delivered keynote speeches on China's experience in the governance of ethnic minority groups, protection of ethnic minority women's rights and interests, and border areas development.

Zhao Xiaojing, from the Northwest University of Political Science and Law, said that through the regional ethnic autonomy system, China effectively protects the rights of ethnic minority groups. It also supports all ethnic groups in developing economies and improving people's livelihoods to achieve common development and prosperity.

Zhao noted that equal protection of political, economic, and cultural rights of all ethnic groups has been achieved through promoting balanced regional development.

Xia Jianghao, from the Institute for Human Rights of the China University of Political Science and Law, expounded on China's achievements in safeguarding the rights of ethnic minority women.

Professor Wu Xi with the Southwest University of Political Science and Law delivered a keynote speech on leveraging the location advantages of border areas and maintaining long-term security and stability there.

The forum, themed "conflict prevention and the protection of the human rights of minorities," was convened by the UN Special Rapporteur on minority issues. Discussions will inform the work and recommendations of the 14th session of the global UN Forum on Minority Issues.

UN officials and government representatives, experts, and scholars from China, the United Kingdom, Malaysia, the Philippines, and other countries attended the forum.
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Over 2,600 Chinese peacekeeping police officers have been sent to 11 mission areas in four continents to date, according to an official with the Ministry of Public Security.

China has always supported and participated in the United Nations peacekeeping missions and has made contributions in safeguarding the world's peace and stability, said Wang Xiaohong, vice minister of public security, at an international seminar held on Wednesday and Thursday.

Wang called for deepened cooperation between police forces, establishing a better-coordinated peacekeeping partnership, and promoting the building of a community with a shared future for mankind with universal security.
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The Russian Foreign Ministry said Friday it summoned U.S. Ambassador to Russia John Sullivan over the U.S. meddling in the upcoming Russian parliamentary elections.

According to the statement published by the ministry, Sullivan was summoned for a meeting with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov.

During the meeting, the Russian side said it has irrefutable proof that U.S. "digital giants" violated Russian legislation with regard to the preparation for Russian State Duma elections.

The ministry further said it is inadmissible to interfere in Russia's internal affairs.
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All Chinese troops participating in the "Peace Mission 2021," a counter-terrorism military exercise for Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) member states, arrived at the training range in Orenburg, Russia on Friday.

The drill is set to be held in Orenburg from Sept. 11 to 25. The participants are from eight SCO member states, including China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, India, Pakistan, and Uzbekistan.

The participating troops consist of around 4,000 military personnel, among which 558 are from China.

The first Chinese group transported by rail arrived on Monday. The journey is the longest one of its kind, covering a distance of 6,300 kilometers.
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China's Ministry of National Defense has expressed strong opposition to Australian Defence Minister Peter Dutton's negative remarks about China.

It is extremely dangerous and irresponsible to hype up the so-called "China threat" and make groundless accusations against China, said Wu Qian, a spokesperson for the Ministry of National Defense, in response to a query on Friday.

Wu said Dutton's recent provocative remarks fully revealed his Cold War mentality and ideological biases, which not only go against the current trend of world peace, development and cooperation, but also harm the regional peace and stability as well as Australia's own interests.

Wu reiterated that China adheres to the path of peaceful development and firmly pursues the national defense policy that is defensive in nature.

China is not posing a threat to any country, and its military development is not targeted at any country, the spokesperson added.

As for issues concerning the South China Sea, Wu emphasized that China has indisputable sovereignty over the islands in the South China Sea and their adjacent waters.

Wu urged some Australian politicians to respect facts and immediately stop making irresponsible remarks against China.
Bharat Book Bureau Provides the Trending Industry Research Report on "Speech and Voice Recognition Market with COVID-19 Impact Analysis by Delivery Method, Deployment Mode (On Cloud, On-Premises / Embedded), Technology (Speech Recognition, Voice Recognition), Vertical and Geography - Global Forecast to 2026  under Services Market Research Reports Category. The report offers a collection of superior Industry research, Industry analysis, competitive intelligence and Industry reports.

The speech and voice recognition market is expected to grow from USD 8.3 billion in 2021 to USD 22.0 billion by 2026; it is expected to grow at a CAGR of 21.6% during the forecast period. The major driving factors for the growth of the speech and voice recognition market include increase in use of smart appliance and use of artificial intelligence technology to boost accuracy of speech and voice recognition system.

In terms of deployment mode on-premises to grow with the highest CAGR from 2021 to 2026

The on-premises / embedded segment is expected to witness high growth owing to the recent advancement of speech and voice recognition as a multifactor authentication system in BFSI and other enterprise applications, where on-premises voice recognition is used for a high degree of consumer data security. On-premises speech and voice recognition systems can be easily deployed with company data management and CRM software. An on-premises / embedded speech and voice recognition system has no formatting or coding issues while accessing databases.

Consumer vertical of Speech and Voice Recognition Market is expected to have the largest market share during the forecast period.

Mobile device authentication and control of wearable devices using voice commands are expected to drive the speech and voice recognition market. Alphabet (US), Apple (US), and Microsoft (US) are leveraging their huge customer base and neural networks to process, understand and take decisive actions based on real-time voice inputs from the user. The introduction of voice based smart devices in the consumer sector has led to the launch of many innovative products in the market. The continuous decline in the cost of voice and speech devices, software developments, and relevant content developments are also driving the market for speech and voice recognition. The increasing demand for intelligent virtual assistant smart speakers with voice capabilities is expected to be a prominent driver for the speech and voice recognition market for the consumer vertical during the forecast period.

APAC to grow at highest CAGR during the forecast period

The market in APAC is expected to grow during the forecast period. The growing focus on artificial intelligence (AI) in industries and enterprises is also expected to contribute toward the growth of the voice recognition market in Asia Pacific during the forecast period. Increasing digitalization and government policies favoring digitalization and technological innovations are also expected to drive the growth of market in APAC region.

In the process of determining and verifying the market size for several segments and subsegments gathered through secondary research, extensive primary interviews have been conducted with key officials in the speech and voice recognition market. Following is the breakup of the profiles of primary participants for the report.



By Company Type: Tier 1  27 %, Tier 2  41%, and Tier 3  32%

By Designation: C-Level Executives  26%, Managers  40%, and Others  34%

By Region: North America 47%, Europe  28%, APAC  19%, and RoW  6%

The report profiles key players in the speech and voice recognition market and analyzes their market shares. Players profiled in this report are Apple (US), Microsoft (US), Amazon (US), Alphabet (US), IBM(US), CANTAB Research (UK), Sensory (US), Baidu (China), iFLYTEK (China) and SESTEK (Turkey), Raytheon BBN Technologies (US), Speak2web (US), M2SYS(US), M*Modal (US), VoiceVault(US), ValidSoft(UK), LumenVox(US), Acapela Group (Belgium), VocalZoom (Israel), BioTrust ID (Netherlands), Uniphore Software (India), iSpeech (US), GoVivace (US), Advance Voice Recognition System (US) and Dolbey (US).

Research Coverage

This report segments the speech and voice recognition market based on delivery method, technology, deployment mode, vertical, and region. It also describes major drivers, restraints, challenges, and opportunities about this market, as well as includes market share analysis, value chain analysis, porter's five forces analysis, trade analysis, ecosystem, technological trends, pricing analysis, key patents, standards and frameworks , and case studies / use cases.

Reasons to Buy This Report

The report will help leaders / new entrants in the speech and voice recognition market in the following ways:

1.The report segments the speech and voice recognition market comprehensively and provides the closest market size estimation for all subsegments across regions.

2.The report will help stakeholders understand the pulse of the market and provide them with information on key drivers, restraints, challenges, and opportunities about the speech and voice recognition market.

3. The report will help stakeholders understand their competitors better and gain insights to improve their position in the speech and voice recognition market. The competitive landscape section describes the competitor ecosystem.

Browse our full report with Table of Content:

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Gene Expression Analysis Market Research Report: Information by Product (Consumables & Instruments), Service (Gene Expression Profiling & Others), Application (Drug Discovery & Others), End User (Academic, Research Institutes & Others) - Forecast till 2027

Market Highlights

It is estimated that the global gene expression analysis market is expected to hold a market value of USD 3,250 million and register a CAGR ~ 9.1% during the forecast period of 20182023. Gene expression analysis is research dedicated towards functional genomics extending the application purview of studying genes and gene transcripts. Gene expression analysis is the method used for extraction of data from a gene which is used for the production of a practical gene product. The method can be used calculating the genetic code which is reserved in the DNA. This kind of research can be used for classifying diseases, which leads to a wide range of applications such as pharmacogenomics, diagnostics, biomarkers, and toxicology. Growing developments in personalized medicine and technological developments are driving market growth. According to a data published by the Foley & Lardner LLP, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved 16 new personalized medicines in 2017. Additionally, the development of genomic databases and rising government funding for genomics is fueling market growth.

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Gene Expression Analysis Market Dynamics

Personalized medicine is becoming more popular, with an increasing number of genetic disorders. In addition, increasing awareness of personalized medicine is expected to drive growth over the forecast period. As per the data published by Foley & Lardner LLP, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved 16 new personalized medicinal products in 2017. Moreover, the advancement of genomic databases increased government support for genomics, and growth in personalized medicine is likely to drive the market.

However, the shortage of skilled labor and the high cost of instruments may inhibit market growth during the forecast period.

Gene Expression Analysis Market Segmentation

The global market for gene expression analysis has been segmented into product, consumables, instruments, services, application, and end-user.

Based on the product, the global market for gene expression analysis has been segmented into consumables and instruments.

Based on consumables, the global market for gene expression analysis has been further segmented into reagents and DNA chips.

Based on instruments, the global market for gene expression analysis has been further segmented into next-generation sequencing (NGS), polymerase chain reaction (PCR), microarray, Sanger sequencing, and others.

Based on services, the global market for gene expression analysis segmented into gene expression profiling services, sequencing services, bioinformatics solutions, and others.

Based on the application, the global market for gene expression analysis has been segmented into drug discovery, diagnosis, research, and others.

Based on end-user, the global market for gene expression analysis has been segmented into academic & research institutes, pharmaceutical & biotechnology companies, contract research organizations, and others.

Gene Expression Analysis Market Regional Analysis

Regionally, the global gene expression analysis market has been segmented into the Americas, Europe, Asia Pacific, and the Middle East & Africa.

The Americas are predicted to dominate the global market for gene expression analysis due to increasing research activities and the increasing popularity of gene expression tests. In addition, the well-developed healthcare sector is predicted to improve the American market for gene expression analysis.

Europe is predicted to hold the second-largest position in the global market for gene expression analysis. Market growth in this region is due to the availability of research funding.

The Asia Pacific is projected to be the fastest-growing region on the market due to rising investment by governments in genomics and continuously developing economies. As stated in the report published by the International Journal of Social and Developmental Concerns in October 2017, the growth of public primary and secondary care facilities in Malaysia has decreased over the last few years and has not kept pace with modern urbanization. These factors, therefore, restrict the growth of the market in this region.

The Middle East and Africa are estimated to have the least market share.

Gene Expression Analysis Market Key Players

Some of the significant participants in the global gene expression analysis market are GENERAL ELECTRIC COMPANY, Illumina, Inc., Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc., F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Pacific Biosciences of California, Inc., Oxford Gene Technology, BGI, PerkinElmer Inc., Agilent Technologies, Inc., QIAGEN, Eurofins Scientific, Genotypic Technology Pvt Ltd, Danaher, Macrogen Inc.

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At Market Research Future (MRFR), we enable our customers to unravel the complexity of various industries through our Cooked Research Report (CRR), Half-Cooked Research Reports (HCRR), & Consulting Services. MRFR team have supreme objective to provide the optimum quality market research and intelligence services to our clients.
Global Two-Piece Empty Hard Capsule Market Research Report: Information by Raw Material (Gelatin, HPMC (Hydroxypropyl Methylcellulose) and Starch & Pullulan), End Use (Pharmaceuticals, Health & Nutrition and others) and Region (Americas, Europe, Asia-Pacific and the Middle East & Africa) - Forecast till 2027

Overview

The Global Two-Piece Empty Hard Capsule Market is expected to register 7.23% CAGR and is projected to reach USD 2,585.7 million by 2023. Two-piece empty hard capsules are a dosage format created by pharmaceutical companies to ensure the consumption of medicines. This is beneficial for consumers unable to intake medicines or drugs in tablet form.

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Healthcare sector is observing an upswing which has intensified the demand for medical facilities across the world. It is anticipated to have a positive impact on the growth pattern of the two-piece empty hard capsule market in the years to come. In addition, the changes in food pattern in conjunction with the adoption of a sedentary lifestyle has been prognosticated to boost the market growth across the assessment period.

Capsule suppliers are focusing on increasing its production capacity which is poised to favor the proliferation of the two-piece empty hard capsule market in the foreseeable future. On the contrary, the stringent regulations pose a challenge to market expansion pace in the forthcoming years.

Competitive Dashboard:

Suheung Co., Ltd. (South Korea), Capsugel (U.S.), ACG Worldwide (India), Hunan ER-KANG Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. (China), CapsCanada Corporation (Canada), Shanxi Guangsheng Medicinal Capsule Co., Ltd. (China), andQualicaps, Inc. (U.S.).

Market Segmentation:

The report covers a segmental analysis of the Two-Piece Empty Hard Capsule Market Report based on raw material and end-user. By raw material, the global market has been segmented into gelatin, hydroxypropyl methylcellulose (HPMC), starch, and pullulan.The gelatin segment has gained the maximum popularity owing to its low cost coupled with protein content. At present, it accounts for the largest market share of 45.5% and is presumed to hold its position through the forecast period. In addition, the hydroxypropyl methylcellulose (HPMC) is projected to gain popularity in the forthcoming years and exhibit a relatively higher CAGR over the assessment period.

The two-piece empty hard capsule market, by end-user, has been segmented into pharmaceuticals, health & nutrition and others.Among these, the pharmaceuticals segment is currently leading the growth of the market and accounts for 48.90% share of the market. It is forecasted to maintain its position in the upcoming years.

Regional Analysis:

The geographical assessment of the global two-piece empty hard capsule market covers Americas, Asia, Europe, and the RestoftheWorld (RoW). The market is dominated by North America owing to the availability of advanced healthcare facilities in conjunction with the presence of major pharmaceutical companies. Also, the region is technologically advanced which is anticipated to reflect on the growth trajectory of the two-piece empty hard capsule market in the region.

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Europe houses a considerable proportion of pharmaceuticals and nutraceutical companies which is projected to favor the growth of the regional two-piece empty hard capsule market. Increasing healthcare expenditure in the region is also forecasted to lead the expansion of the market.

Asia Pacific is prognosticated to scale the highest CAGR during the forecast period. The consolidation of fast-developing nations in the region is poised to aid the growth of the two-piece empty hard capsule market.

Industry News:

In February 2019, researchers at M.I.T., Harvard have collaborated with a multinational pharmaceutical company, Novo Nordisk A/S (Denmark),announced the launch of Soma,a tiny robotic capsule that injects when it lands in the stomach.
However, when law enforcement has effectively exhausted all efforts to arrest and prosecute a suspect, and when the statistical data show that the probability of a prosecution resulting from long-unsolved cases approaches zero, it is difficult to understand how denying public access to criminal investigation files in perpetuity serves the public interest in solving crimes and bringing perpetrators to justice. The old adage about a fresh pair of eyes is particularly apt. Moreover, allowing the public access to cold case files after an appropriate period of time is far more likely to improve the odds of an arrest and successful prosecution than it it is to prejudice that outcome.
The health insurance plans he administers for municipal and other public employees are not experiencing any of the insurers cited claims of cost increases and rates are not dramatically rising, he said. He also criticized the rate review process as not sufficiently protecting consumers and said it needs to be completely rewritten.
Educators are professionals, and when they arent treated as professionals or they are not allowed to have input on critical issues that affect students and public education policy, including health and safety concerns, they are going to look for work elsewhere, where stress levels are lower, pay is higher, and they receive the respect they deserve, said Dias. We have to seriously examine long-term impacts to the teaching pool and look at the shortage of students entering teacher preparation programs.
I have told some of these stories many times, she writes, but some stories are demanding. The stories tap you on the shoulder, pull at your shirt, begging for attention again. The father who abandoned her, the stepfather who abused her, the mother who inspired her, the Native friends at school with whom she discovered activism and built community, the mentors and teachers who nurtured her spirit  they gather again in these pages, their long shadows shifting across the road of her life.
This is what I foresee that we probably need to do, the commander said, according to tape recordings from that day. We need to talk to FAA. We need to tell em if this stuff is gonna keep on going, we need to take those fighters, put em over Manhattan. Thats best thing, thats the best play right now. So coordinate with the FAA. Tell em if theres more out there, which we dont know, lets get em over Manhattan. At least we got some kind of play.
Even as we mourn the dead, we should celebrate that bravery  those who gave their lives to save others. We cannot know how many are alive today because of their sacrifice, but they challenge us every day to show a similar concern for our neighbor and emulate that remarkable service to others in our own lives.
Farmers during their sit-in protest continuing from yesterday after their Kisan Mahapanchayat, outside the Mini Secretariat in Karnal, Sept. 8, 2021. (PTI Photo)

Chandigarh: The Haryana government on Saturday ordered a probe into last month's clash between farmers and police and sent the IAS officer at the centre of a row between the two sides on leave. Following this, the farmers said they would call off their protest outside the Karnal district headquarters.

The probe will be conducted by a retired judge, Haryana Additional Chief Secretary Devender Singh told the media in Karnal. The probe will be completed within a month and former SDM Ayush Sinha will remain on leave during the time, Singh added.

Farmer leader Gurnam Singh Chaduni, who was also part of the press conference, said they would now call off their sit-in outside the Karnal district headquarters. The farmers had been demanding the suspension of Sinha, who was caught on tape allegedly telling policemen to "break the heads" of farmers if they cross the line.

About 10 protesters were hurt in the clash with police in Karnal on August 28 when they tried to march towards the venue of a BJP meeting. Devender Singh also announced that jobs would be given to two family members of a farmer, who the protesters claimed had died after he was injured during the lathicharge. This allegation was earlier by the administration.
Health workers collect blood samples in the neighborhood for testing after a 12-year-old boy died of the Nipah virus in Kozhikode, Kerala state, India. (File Image/AP)

Kozhikode: A team of health officials from the National Institute of Virology (NIV), Pune on Saturday collected samples from fruit-eating bats to find the source of the Nipah Virus in Kozhikode, informed the Public relation department of the state government.

The team of NIV arrived on Friday and visited the Nipah epicentre.

There has been widespread panic caused by the emergence of cases testing positive for the viral infection.

Earlier, on September 8, Kerala Health Minister, Veena George had informed that a total of 68 people are in isolation for the Nipah Virus in Government Medical College in Kozhikode district of Kerala.

Nipah virus is a zoonotic virus but it can also be transmitted from person to person and through contaminated food.

Earlier, on September 5, the Central government had rushed a medical team to the Kozhikode district of Kerala as the state reported the first death due to the Nipah virus.
Vikarabad district was selected for the launch of Medicine from the Sky project because it has public health centres in far-flung areas. (DC Image)

Hyderabad: In a historic first, a drone carried a box weighing 12 kgs of medicines and 20 vials of vaccines over six kilometres in five minutes in Vikarabad district, marking the launch of the Medicines from the Sky project. Present on the occasion were union civil aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia, who called it a revolutionary day not only for Telangana but for the whole country, and state ministers K.T. Rama Rao and P. Sabitha Indra Reddy.

The drone flight was a line-of-sight operation, meaning it was visible to operators throughout the flight, and took its cargo to a primary health centre.

In earlier trials, drones flew to distances between 500 metres and 1 kilometre. The medicine boxes they carried were empty. On Saturday, a drone made its first delivery of medicines and vaccines to a primary health centre.

Scindia said the Medicines from the Sky would be taken up on a pilot basis in 16 green zones in the state and scaled up to the national level after analysing the data for three months. He said eight other states would take up the drone delivery tests.

Scindia said the civil aviation ministrys new drone rules, drawn up under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, had unlocked the drone industry and the focus was on innovation on the principles of trust, self-certification, and non-intrusive monitoring.

Drones are a frontier technology that can be used to access otherwise inaccessible areas. India is all set to become the drone hub of the world by 2030," Scindia said.

He said interactive airspace maps with green, yellow and red zones will be displayed on digital sky platforms soon. No permission is required to operate in green zones, up to a vertical distance of 400 feet.

Speaking on the occasion, Rama Rao said, "Telangana is the youngest state and we are looking at innovative solutions which will help the common man. During the pandemic, healthcare supply chains can be further strengthened with drones.

He said the enthusiasm and support from all the partners was appreciated. We also appeal to use the airport space at Begumpet for developing an aviation university or a centre of excellence for aerospace."

Saturdays initiative was done in partnership with the World Economic Forum, Niti Aayog, and HealthNet Global (Apollo Hospitals). There are eight consortium operators and two of them will carry out trails per week for a month.

Also on Saturday, two other drones were tested in Vikarabad district. They carried 5 kgs, flew 5 km and were brought back. They had a thermometer to measure the temperature inside the box as maintaining low temperatures are vital for vaccines and medicines.

Vikarabad district was selected for the launch of Medicine from the Sky project because it has public health centres in far-flung areas. This would give operators the experience to extend the operations to other districts.

The trials were focused on laying the groundwork for the drone delivery network that will improve access to vital healthcare supplies for remote and vulnerable communities. The project is a first-of-its-kind as it lies in the overlap of two of the most regulated sectors in the world  aviation and healthcare.

The project has eight participating consortiums comprising drone operators, experts in healthcare and airspace management among others. It will demonstrate short and long-range drone-based deliveries to assess the efficacy of low altitude aerial logistics in healthcare.
FILE - In this July 8, 2021 file photo, suspects in the assassination of Haiti's President Jovenel Moise are shown to the media, along with the weapons and equipment they allegedly used in the attack, at police headquarters in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Former Colombian soldiers arrested in Haiti in the assassination have accused local authorities of torture, saying theyve been burned, stabbed and hit in the head with a hammer, among other things, in a Wednesday, Sept. 6 letter, addressed to Colombias president and other high-ranking officials as well as the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and the International Committee of the Red Cross. It was signed by the 18 former soldiers arrested in the slaying.
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China says it won't fire its nuclear arms when NATO Secretary, General Jens Stoltenberg, questioned it over the lack of transparency. Concern over its military might and how far its nuclear arsenal is progressing has NATO concerned, but Beijing shot back.

General Jens Stoltenberg expressed concerns last Monday that the Chinese nuclear stockpile is increasing and has no limitations with a lack of transparency. Nuclear capable countries are engaged in treaties to keep a cap on their nuclear arsenal like the Salt treaty.

China intends not to use nuclear weapons first

Statements said that the comments of the NATO chief were attributed to the comments noted by Washington. Accusing China that intends to keep its transparency concerns the state of its total number of arsenals, reported the Express UK.

One of the declarations of China is the only nuclear-capable nation that has sworn to no first use of nuclear weapons. To the US and NATO, This oath is one layer of security that it has against the CCP.

After the comment from NATO, the English-Language Chinese newspaper issued a response that no transparency issue is irrelevant. Citing that even if CCP's stockpile is not announced, it is not needed to be. Retorting the US warhead are far more in number, noted the Global Times.

Beijing made sure that if a shooting war happens with the US, China says it won't fire its nuclear arms in most circumstances. Next, it was posed what assurance the Chinese leadership has that the United States will do the first strike.

Read Also: China's Most Advanced Stealth J-20 Jet: Is This "Mighty Dragon" Better Compared to the French Rafale and Indian F-35 Fighter Jets?

They made the question about the perception if launching a nuke attack will be an option if the US forces losses are significant in a non-nuclear conflict. China asked Stoltenberg to swear that NATO and the US will not use nukes under any circumstance at any time, said officials. Stating that restraint will be practiced at all times even if the People's Liberation Army(PLA) is winning, noted News Chant.

The concession comes after the NATO official made the statement, adding that if Allies cannot stop the US from using nukes, how can any fault China for not revealing everything, citing that fact. According to the news source, Beijing has kept its self-restraint and holds the least number of nuclear warheads.

Convention military expansion

The PLA has strived to improve its military technology to keep it on the same level as the US and be less under American pressure. The US has begun showing more military activity in the Indo-Pacific, which allies like the UK and NATO have not taken up.

All this military pushback by western powers headed by the US is getting more focused on Chinese forces very evidently. Everything done in the South China Sea is similar to starting a new Cold War to keep China in check, like with the USSR. Now, China is forced to be on a defensive mode to prepare for a code red scenario.

Whatever happens, Beijing stresses it will need more nuclear deterrence from the US and Allies. China says it won't fire its nuclear arms as a promise but will keep other options, as it does not fully trust if the US will use the same restraint.

Related Article: China Not Pleased With Japan, Taiwan Talks; Tries to Coerce Both Countries to Silence

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Authorities revealed that a Maryland judge was found dead on Friday morning in an apparent suicide just as federal officials approached his home in Henderson to arrest the man for alleged child abuse.

Officials identified the suspect as 50-year-old Caroline County Circuit Judge Jonathan Newell who has been on a leave of absence since July. At the time, he was involved in an investigation over accusations of child abuse where he hid a camera that recorded naked photographs of young boys inside his bathroom.

Maryland Judge Suspected of Child Abuse

Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents traveled to Newell's home on Friday morning with an arrest warrant under a federal criminal complaint to take the judge into custody. However, officers found the suspect's dead body after he suffered from "an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound," said the Maryland U.S. Attorney's Office on Friday, who noted that the man was pronounced dead at 6:43 a.m.

In a news release on Friday afternoon, prosecutors noted that investigation of Newell's apparent suicide will be the responsibility of the Maryland State Police. Kimberly Keith, Newell's neighbor, on Friday posted pictures on Facebook that appeared to show FBI agents outside of the suspect's home, calling him and demanding to come out. The witness said she later heard gunshots followed quickly by sirens of an ambulance, The Daily Beast reported.

Read Also: Georgia Court Refuses To Indict Teen, 15, Who Shot Abusive, Alcoholic Father Dead

Before the suicide, officials decided to file federal charges against Newell, including sexual exploitation of a child, said prosecutors. Maryland State Police responded to a report that a minor discovered a hidden video camera in the suspect's bathroom inside his cabin in Fishing Creek.

Two boys, who were both minors, were interviewed by investigators, where they claimed that they had "spent the night" with Newell on July 22, the day that they discovered the hidden camera. One of the victims said that he was undressing in the bathroom when he found the device, which was turned on and facing the shower, inside a small black crate on a shelf in the corner of the room, Yahoo News reported.

Hiding Evidence

He then told his friend about the camera and they promptly left the home by using Newell's boat and told their parents about the incident. The two boys' parents immediately contacted law enforcement personnel to report the issue.

On the same day, investigators interviewed Newell at his cabin, who waived his Miranda rights and agreed to be questioned. The suspect told police that there were 10 "members" who had access to his cabin who came and went as they pleased. The affidavit said that Newell denied having a hidden camera inside his cabin's bathroom.

Documents noted that the suspect entered his bedroom after the interview to charge his mobile phone and make calls. He was observed by investigators and saw him reach under his bed and place his fist up to his mouth. Investigators suspected that Newell had swallowed evidence because they found a missing memory card from a box with camera equipment. Officials later took him to a hospital for CT scans where it was found that he had ingested a small, metallic object, the Associated Press reported.



Related Article: Tiananmen Square Museum Raided by Hong Kong Police, 4 Arrested as Officers Haul Exhibits Away

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Distraught Vladimir Putin sobbed at the funeral of a close friend who died trying to save a man's life in an Arctic drill. Putin was visibly distressed as he paid his respects today to the open coffin of his emergencies minister - and former personal bodyguard - who died on Tuesday.

Russian President Vladimir Putin placed his head twice on the open coffin of Yevgeny Zinichev, 55, wrapped in the country's flag. At the minister's burial, Putin sat alongside widow Natalya and son Denis. He approached the open coffin twice, lowering his head each time, and went away distressed.

Putin mourns the death of his long-time friend Minister Yevgeny Zinichev

Putin has described Zinichev, a former FSB deputy director, as a man of tremendous inner strength, tenacity, and bravery. He has given Zinichev the country's highest accolade, the Hero of Russia title, deceased. Some speculate that Putin was grooming Zinichev, a former KGB officer like him, to be his ultimate successor. He'd risen quickly under Putin and was lately slated for a new prominent position on the Kremlin's security council, as per Daily Mail.

In 2018, Zinichev was appointed as the Minister of Emergency Situations of Russia. His predecessor resigned shortly after a huge fire in a Siberian retail mall killed more than 60 people, sending shockwaves across the country.

Zinichev served as interim governor of Russia's westernmost Kaliningrad region for two months in 2016. He had been a member of President Vladimir Putin's security detail for a long time before then.

Per MIRROR, Putin was also in Siberia and was notified of the death of a high-ranking member of his ministry. Zinichev served as deputy director of the Federal Security Service counterintelligence department and was a former KGB and FSB officer.

He was formerly the governor of the Kaliningrad area, and he was born in Leningrad, now St. Petersburg, like Putin. Dudinka Arctic Search and Rescue team took part in the training. Zinichev served as Putin's adjutant from 2006 to 2015.

Read Also: North Korea's Kim Jong Un Shocks Experts with Dramatic Slim Appearance as Weight Loss Continue in the Wake of Rumored Health Scares

Zinichev is speculated as Putin's successor

Some speculated that the Kremlin leader was grooming him as a future presidential successor after his remarkable career. In Russia, the job of the emergencies minister is viewed as a high-profile action man role. Putin sent Zinichev's wife and family his heartfelt sympathies.

On Wednesday, Russia's Emergency Situations Minister and former long-time bodyguard, Yevgeny Zinichev, was conducting emergency exercises in the Arctic town of Norilsk with a press pool. In a brief statement, his ministry stated the 55-year-old officer died tragically while attempting to save a person's life during emergency exercises in the Arctic.

The other victim was eventually identified as Alexander Melnik, a Russian filmmaker known for his environmental movies. President Putin characterized Zinichev's death as an "irreparable personal loss" in an unusually emotional message to Zinichev's family posted by the Kremlin, The Daily Telegraph reported.

Zinichev perished along with the man who was filming the exercises when he went down a cliff, according to Margarita Simonyan, editor-in-chief of Russia's RT TV station. Official accounts did not specify where the men died, leaving onlookers perplexed by the depiction of the cameraman plunging over a cliff into the ocean although Norilsk has neither hills nor mountains.

According to the Siberian news website Tayga.info, Putin's former bodyguard and the director were out of town in the scenic Putorana Mountains east of Norilsk when they slid over a cliff into the lake below, according to an unidentified source.

Related Article: Russia's Vladimir Putin Reportedly Rebuffs US President Joe Biden's Plan to Keep US Troops in Central Asia

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President Joe Biden is under pressure to automate any future stimulus payments six months after Americans got their third economic stimulus check. Members of Congress and millions of Americans support the request for "automatic stabilizers," as the payments are known.

Biden is being urged to automate both unemployment insurance bolsters and direct stimulus payments, according to a joint statement from seven members of Congress who all work on the Ways and Means Committee. Financial factors such as growing unemployment rates would trigger the stimulus payments.

Do Americans need more stimulus payments?

Payments would be made without the need for a vote. The scheme would avoid the political squabbles that have stymied President Biden's ability to issue a fourth stimulus check.

The members of Congress say that citizens should not be at the mercy of continually shifting legislative deadlines and ad hoc solutions, referring to the months of discussion that preceded the first three stimulus payments. As a result of the lack of increased federal assistance, many Americans are turning to their states for aid, The Sun reported.

Citizens in certain states have received extra stimulus checks, while residents in other areas of the country are calling their local unclaimed property agencies in search of unclaimed funds. Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Americans have gotten three stimulus checks.

Before leaving office, former President Donald Trump signed two stimulus packages totaling $1200 and $600 into law. In March, the third wave of $1400 stimulus checks arrived at homes.

The number of petitions for extra stimulus payments is increasing. Some petitions ask for further assistance for older residents while others beg for assistance as towns are overwhelmed by the Delta variant's impact.

Is there a fourth round of stimulus checks?

On-site employment was assigned to a considerable number of individuals. However, due to the imposed lockdown, they were unable to continue working. This resulted in a huge number of unemployed persons. During the closure, the number of jobless Americans increased. Others who choose to work from home struggled as well. The majority of businesses did not pay their employees the wages they expected.

As a result, virtually the whole United States failed to fulfill basic needs. Most households were able to pay off their rentals and other basic bills owing to the stimulus money. A recent statement has sparked speculation that the fourth stimulus check would be approved. Let's see whether the rumor has enough merit below.

The IRS just mailed out the third round of stimulus checks. The $1400 checks appeared to be the final batch. The people of the United States adamantly requested more funding from the government, as per Digital Market News.

The administration was bombarded with petitions and letters. The desires of the people were also echoed by certain politicians. One of the petitions has nearly three million signatures. It requested that the citizens get a $2000 payment per month.

Americans will be pleased to hear some positive news from the President. He has claimed that his compatriots do not need to be concerned about meeting their necessities. Biden alluded to a stimulus check rollout that would be automated.

If specific economic requirements are met, these checks would be made automatically. Stimulus checks would be issued, for example, if the unemployment rate exceeds the average forecasts. The stimulus check would end once the numbers were lower.

Read Also: Food Stamps or SNAP Benefits May Provide Relief to Residents Affected by Hurricane Ida; Here's What to Know!

Democrats plan to extend $300 monthly stimulus checks

According to a Senate Democratic official familiar with the continuing negotiations, Senate Democrats are considering a three-year extension of President Joe Biden's revised Child Tax Credit in the $3.5 trillion social-spending packages. However, given the program's cost and the possibility of Democratic moderates requesting cutbacks to the package's size, it may be scaled back.

The aide spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss details of private discussions and to emphasize that the situation remained dynamic. The Child Tax Credit would be extended until 2024, but in a presidential election year, the amount would be reduced to $2,000 again. Families that owe little or no taxes, on the other hand, would get the entire amount of the benefit indefinitely, known as "full refundability."

Democrats in the upper chamber haven't ruled out eliminating full refundability for the remainder of the decade to save $35 billion. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, both Democrats, are pushing to keep it.

Per Business Insider, the social-spending measure is now being drafted by congressional committees. Democrats want to push it through a reconciliation procedure that just requires a simple majority, avoiding what is sure to be unified Republican opposition.

According to a source familiar with the situation, the Senate Finance Committee has been given $385 billion to prolong the Child Tax Credit, as well as a couple of other programs including the earned-income tax credit and the child and dependent care tax credit.

Joint Committee on Taxation said a three-year extension of the Child Tax Credit would cost $330 billion, illustrating the limited financing that certain projects would receive as Democrats scramble to secure funds for their broad economic objectives.

Related Article: Still Got No $1,600 Unemployment Tax Refund? Here's How To Read IRS Transcript For Clues



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French prosecutors revealed that the country's former health minister was being formally investigated in relation to her alleged failed response to the coronavirus pandemic due to leaving her position in February 2020 to pursue the role of Paris mayor.

It was announced that a special government misconduct court will be responsible for deciding whether or not Agnes Buzyn will be prosecuted. The incident is one of the world's first cases where a minister is held legally accountable for their response to the pandemic.

Former French Health Minister Charged

The suspect could face a count of "failing to fight a disaster" as the 58-year-old welcomed the opportunity to explain her position during a Friday court hearing. At the time, Buzyn said she had to "establish the truth."

The suspect noted that she would not allow her French government's actions or her own to be discredited when she claims to have done so much for the country during the global health crisis. Buzyn was the health minister of France in May 2017 until a few weeks after the confirmation of the first coronavirus cases in the country, BBC reported.

Read Also: Fauci Believes "It's Not Smart" To Reopen Sports Stadiums Amid Delta Variant, Urges Residents To Get Vaccinated

Last year, the official lost the mayoral election and later joined the cabinet of World Health Organization (WHO) head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in January 2021. France's Court of Justice of the Republic is a controversial institution due to giving judges and parliamentarians the authority to investigate and convict ministers for crimes related to their government work.

Buzyn is the first member of the administration of French President Emmanuel Macron to be charged in an investigation that has been in the run for seven months. The leader is set to face re-election in April. Macron's opposition has made the government's pandemic response the center of their campaign. The country has recorded more than 115,000 people died due to the coronavirus infection, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Failed Response to the Pandemic

In late January 2020, Buzyn, a hematologist, downplayed the threat of the coronavirus even after three cases of the infection were confirmed. She said that the possibility of the virus spreading in France was "very low" due to Wuhan's strict lockdown procedures.

Widespread criticism also condemned Buzyn for the shortage of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), especially face masks, which were intended for healthcare workers. The official previously claimed in January 2020 that the country had "tens of millions of masks in stock in case of an epidemic."

But when she lost the Paris mayoral elections, she claimed that she warned the Macron administration of the threat of the coronavirus pandemic. "I think I was the first to see what was going on in China," the official said.

Buzyn said that when she left the ministry, she was in tears of the knowledge that the tsunami wave of infections was coming. She said that the coronavirus pandemic was the only thing on her mind at the time.

Thousands of complaints have been filed and sent to authorities regarding the alleged failed handling of the pandemic. The commission of requests of the CJR deemed about a dozen of the complaints admissible, EuroNews reported.



Related Article: WHO Asks Rich Countries Not To Give Booster or Third Shots; Poor Nations Are Still About To Receive Their First Shot

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The ongoing pandemic raised the cost of living in the U.S.A. to new heights. This is the reason why people continue to ask for financial aid programs and a fourth stimulus check--in any way or form.

The Social Security cost of living, officially referred to as Cost-Of-Living Adjustments (COLA), for 2022 is predicted to be the highest in decades. The consumer price index spiked by 5.4 percent in July and is estimated to reach 6.2 percent by next year. For reference, this year was just 1.3 percent.

With the expenses snowballing to dangerous levels, two proposals are made and one stimulus check program was launched.

Fourth Stimulus Check Online Petition for $2000 Monthly Payments

Stephanie Bonin launched on online petition in Change.org asking for a fourth stimulus check to aid eligible Americans.

She wrote, "I'm calling on Congress to support families with a $2,000 payment for adults and a $1,000 payment for kids immediately, and continuing regular checks for the duration of the crisis. We need immediate checks and recurring payments so that we can keep our heads above water."

Many Americans shared her sentiment and signed their support to the proposal. At the time of writing, the online petition has reached 2,874,800 signatures out of its 3 million goal. The online petition has even been recognized as "one of the top signed on Change.org"

The US House of Representatives and US Senate, however, have yet to acknowledge the amazing feat this online petition reached.

Read Also: Child Tax Credit 2021: What to Do If You're Part of the August IRS Glitch, Schedule of September Payment

$1400 Stimulus Check for Seniors

According to CNBC, next year's prospective increase might manifest through higher Medicare Part B premiums and higher taxes on senior benefits. To prevent this, the Senior Citizens League brainstormed and came up with a proposal for non-taxable stimulus checks.

When the organization emailed its plans to other related agencies last week, it received more than 100 replies and support.

More than 50 seniors shared their issues. Inflated grocery prices led some of them to cut their food to one meal per day. Other seniors also lack budget for their prescription drugs.

The Senior Citizens League plans to contact Congress "soon." The organization did not elaborate on the timeline and schedule for the program.

Golden State Stimulus Check: $600 for Californians

By now, some residents in California who filed and submitted their 2020 tax return should see the second Golden State Stimulus checks hit their bank accounts. Others might have their payment sent by paper mail, which should be delivered before the end of the year. Some important things to note about the payment are as follows:

Payments range between $500 to $1,100, depending on eligibility.

The Second wave of Golden State Stimulus Checks adjusted its gross income bracket from $30,000 to 75,000.

Some people who qualified in the first check could also receive the second payment.

Californians who do not have a Social Security number could still receive their payment through their individual taxpayer-identification number (ITIN).

It is worth noting that a survey from CNBC found most of the stimulus checks were used to pay food expenses, bills, and Medicare or pharmacy assistance programs. Many Americans are hoping for favorable developments on these fourth stimulus check payments.



Related Article: Fourth Stimulus Check Update: $2000 Online Petition, $600 Golden State Payments Release Schedule
Bitcoin value took its third dip of the week when a Sweden central bank governor warned of the eventual collapse of its market. Bitcoin price tumbled to $45,000 with a 3.12 percent downward trend afterward.

The biggest cryptocurrency in the world had a very rough week. According to CoinDesk graphs, Bitcoin started with a $49,851 trading value on Sunday. Investors had their hopes up when Bitcoin rose to $51,676 by Monday and peaked at $52,722 by Tuesday. But the gains tumbled to $46,666 on Wednesday, barely recovering to $47,014 on Thursday.

As of Friday, Bitcoin dropped to $45,020.

The steep decline between Tuesday and Wednesday caused investors to lose thousands in the market. With the current Bitcoin performance, the risk of dropping even further down the market is very high.

Bitcoin Price Prediction: Experts Warns Potential Collapse of Market

On Friday, Riksbank Governor Stefan Ingves questioned the stability of Bitcoin markets.

At a banking conference in Stockholm, he said, "Private money usually collapses sooner or later. And sure, you can get rich by trading in bitcoin, but it's comparable to trading in stamps," per Bloomberg.

To emphasize, the governor associated Bitcoins as tokens. Investors could collect them by saving Bitcoins or spend them by trading in the market. The critical factor to note is Bitcoin's market values, which were implied to be highly dependent on fan support. Consequently, losing support or acknowledgment of Bitcoin could render it useless tokens.

Ingves also warned that Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies would unlikely escape regulatory oversight with its growing popularity. Government restrictions and tax implementation could directly affect market value.

Read Also: Dogecoin Price Prediction Hints at Big Surge Soon; Wifedoge Also Gets Massive Boost

Another senior market strategist from Exness, Wael Makarem, told Yahoo! Finance, "investors are cautious about the current fluctuations in bitcoin and ethereum, especially as these benchmarks failed to trim earlier losses, which is usually considered a sign of weakness in the crypto market."

He also said European officials have begun implementing new regulations, anti-money laundering rules, and tax reporting requirements for Bitcoin. Such restrictive laws and regulations would directly limit the use or adaptation of cryptocurrencies.

Cryptocurrency regulations also have their advantages. It brings stability and protection to industries that try to adopt the digital coin as a payment option. However, it also resulted in lousy trading performance for short-term investors.

BTC and Other Cryptocurrency Markets

Other cryptocurrency markets will possibly be affected by Bitcoin's unfortunate development.

Ethereum was recently reported with optimistic price predictions for 2022 up to 2024. However, it also emphasized that success would greatly depend on Bitcoin markets. According to CoinDesk, Ethereum also dropped to $3.240 Friday, on the same timeframe that Bitcoin lost its market cap.

Meanwhile, the third biggest cryptocurrency, Cardano, was predicted to reach new highs sometime soon, according to Yahoo! Finance. Its trade value might even reach $4 before 2022. Nigel Green, CEO of financial advisory firm deVere Group, said: "its price has increased by around 1668% during the year so far. This impressive momentum is set to gain further pace as we move towards the end of the year."



Related Article: Wifedoge Price, Prediction, and Potential: Should You Invest in Dogecoin's Wife?
09/10/2021





by Buffy Lockette

The JSU Department of Political Science is bringing back its grant-funded lecture series focused on American democracy, the Tocqueville Lecture Series.

Funded by a grant from the Jack Miller Center for Teaching Americas Founding Principles and History, with support from the American Democracy Project, the series invites scholars, professionals and civic leaders to share ideas about liberty, equality and other concepts important in the founding and continuation of American government.

The first installment in the series for 2021-2022 will take place on Sept. 16, 5:30 p.m., virtually on Microsoft Teams, when Dr. Michael Zuckert from the University of Notre Dame will present A Pro-Slavery Constitution? Upon registering online for the free event, guests will receive the Teams link to attend.

Other lectures planned for this year include:

Oct. 7 : Dr. Donald Prudlo, University of Tulsa, Thomas Aquinas and the Medieval Roots of the American Order

: Dr. Donald Prudlo, University of Tulsa, Thomas Aquinas and the Medieval Roots of the American Order Oct. 21 : Brandon Fleming, Harvard University, Critical Thinking for Critical Times

: Brandon Fleming, Harvard University, Critical Thinking for Critical Times Feb. 10 : Dr. Lucy Williams, Brigham Young University, Civil Rights Exceptionism

: Dr. Lucy Williams, Brigham Young University, Civil Rights Exceptionism March 31: Dr. Joseph Knippenberg, Oglethorpe University, The Good, the True and the Beautiful: The Precarious Place of Liberal Education in the Contemporary University

The Tocqueville Lecture Series is named in honor of French sociologist and political theorist Alexis de Tocqueville who, according to History.com, traveled to the United States in 1831 to study its prisons and returned with a wealth of broader observations that he codified in Democracy in America (1835), one of the most influential books of the 19th century.

For more information, visit facebook.com/ToquevilleLectureSeries.
U.S. special envoy for North Korea Sung Kim / Yonhap





U.S. special envoy for North Korea Sung Kim will visit Japan next week to meet with his South Korean and Japanese counterparts and discuss various issues that will include ways to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula, the State Department said Friday.







Kim's trip to Tokyo follows his meetings with South Korea's Noh Kyu-duk in Seoul and Washington last month. The department said Kim will again be joined by Noh in Tokyo.







"U.S. Special Representative for the DPRK Ambassador Sung Kim will travel to Tokyo, Japan from September 1315, 2021," it said in a press release, referring to North Korea by its official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.







"Special Representative Kim will join a trilateral meeting with Japanese Director-General for Asian and Oceanian Affairs Funakoshi Takehiro and Republic of Korea (ROK) Special Representative for Korean Peninsula Peace and Security Affairs Noh Kyu-duk," it added.







The three envoys last held a three-way meeting in Seoul in June. Kim again visited Seoul in August, followed by Noh's trip to Washington later that month.







Kim's upcoming trip, as well as his recent visit to Seoul, comes amid a long hiatus in dialogue with the recalcitrant North.







The Joe Biden administration has made several overtures to Pyongyang for dialogue since taking office in January, while the U.S. special envoy has also repeatedly offered to meet his North Korean counterparts "anywhere, anytime without preconditions."







A State Department spokeswoman reaffirmed the U.S.'s commitment to addressing the North Korea nuclear issue through diplomacy and dialogue.







"I can say we are aware of the report that the DPRK staged a military parade on Sept. 9," Jalina Porter, principal deputy spokeswoman, said in a telephone press briefing, referring to the military parade held this week to mark the 73rd founding anniversary of the North's government.







"Of course, our goal remains ... the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. It is what we are striving for. The United States is prepared to engage in diplomacy toward that objective," she added.







North Korea remains unresponsive to U.S. outreaches.







"Special Representative Kim's travel to Tokyo for trilateral and bilateral meetings underscores ongoing U.S. coordination with and commitment to our allies on DPRK issues," the State Department said.







"Special Representative Kim will also meet with other senior Japanese officials to discuss cooperation on a broad range of issues, including the U.S. commitment to the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and the immediate resolution of the abductions issue," it added. (Yonhap)


A woman gets tested for COVID-19 at a temporary center in Seoul Station, Sept. 10. Yonhap









Daily new COVID-19 cases stayed in the 1,800s here for the second straight day Friday despite infections continuing to spread in the greater Seoul area.







The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) reported 1,865 more coronavirus cases, including 1,816 local ones, raising the total caseload to 271,227.







The number was down 27 from Thursday but still 62 more than Friday last week. In the past week, the number of new infections has ranged from 1,375 to 2,049, for an average of 1,759 a day.







The daily caseload has stayed in the four-digits since July 7 amid the fast spread of the more transmissible Delta variant nationwide.







The country added 10 more deaths from COVID-19, raising the toll to 2,358.







The capital area has seen a resurgence in infections, with 74.2 percent of the new cases being counted in Seoul, Gyeonggi Province and Incheon.







The KDCA has expressed particular concern about the potential spread of the virus during the Sept. 20 to 22 Chuseok fall harvest holiday, when millions of South Koreans typically travel nationwide for family gatherings.







Social distancing measures have been extended for another four weeks through Oct. 3, with the greater Seoul area under Level 4, the highest in the four-tier system, and other regions under Level 3.







More than 32.8 million people, or 63.9 percent of the country's population of 51.3 million, have received at least one shot of a COVID-19 vaccine, the health authorities said, with the number of fully vaccinated people rising to over 19.8 million, or 38.6 percent.







The government has said its aim is to give at least one shot to 70 percent of the population before the Chuseok holiday and reach herd immunity by October.







The total number of people released from quarantine after making a recovery was 242,960, up 2,227 from the previous day. (Yonhap)






September has reported the highest number of bicycle accident deaths over the past decade, authorities said Saturday, calling for an improvement in riders' safety awareness.







According to the National Police Agency and the Korea Road Traffic Authority, a total of 51,240 bicycle accidents were reported from 2011 to 2020, and 971 people died from them.







By month, September had the biggest number of deaths at 119, followed by August with 112, June with 106 and July with 103.







Accidents seem to have occurred more frequently during summer and early autumn, when more people tend to go on outdoor bicycle rides, authorities said.







By contrast, January, February and December  the less active winter season  reported only 48, 34 and 51 deaths, respectively, in the 10-year period.







"Bicycles are the same as cars under the Road Traffic Act. Riders should always wear helmets and comply with traffic rules," the traffic authority said. (Yonhap)






The main opposition People Power Party (PPP) filed a complaint Saturday with the prosecution over what it called an illegal raid against one of its lawmakers in a snowballing political meddling scandal.







The complaint accuses Kim Jin-wook, chief of the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials (CIO), and five investigators of abuse of power and an illegal raid on the office of PPP Rep. Kim Woong, Friday.







Rep. Jun Joo-hyae, a PPP spokeswoman, delivered the complaint to the Supreme Prosecutors Office, along with a party legal adviser, Kwon Oh-hyeon.







The scandal centers on allegations that the state prosecution service asked the PPP to file criminal complaints against several ruling party figures ahead of the April 2020 general election, when Yoon Seok-youl was then prosecutor general.







Yoon has since stepped down as chief prosecutor and become a leading opposition contender in the March 2022 presidential race.







Kim, a prosecutor-turned-opposition lawmaker, is suspected of receiving the complaint letters against the ruling party figures.







The PPP claimed in its complaint against the CIO that Friday's raid on Kim's office did not follow due procedure as Kim is currently a reference, not a suspect, in the investigative body's probe into the scandal.







It also said investigators did not properly present a warrant to conduct the raid when they arrived at Kim's office in his absence and that they tried to seize some of his aides' personal documents, which did not fall under the scope of the raid. (Yonhap)


Courtesy of Chris Christian



By David A. Tizzard




gettyimagesbank



This article is the 15th in a series about Koreans adopted abroad. Apparently, many Koreans never expected that the children who were sent away via adoption would return as adults demanding answers to questions. However, thousands of adoptees visit Korea each year. Once they rediscover this country, it becomes a turning point in their lives. We should embrace dialogue with adoptees to discover the path to recovering our collective humanity.  ED.



By Ross Oke




Korean women do laundry in the early 1900s / Robert Neff Collection



By Robert Neff



When Isabella Bird Bishop, an intrepid British travel writer, visited Korea in the mid-1890s, she declared that Korean women were slaves to laundry and that it was to be their "manifest destiny" as long as their husbands wore white. According to George Gilmore  one of the first American English teachers here in the late 1880s  the "most wearing and incessant labor" for a Korean woman was doing laundry.



Before the clothing could be washed, it often had to be taken apart and allowed to seep in lye, or water that had been used to wash rice or beans or boiled with barley. After the clothes had soaked for a while, the real labor began  rinsing and washing in clean water. In the countryside, finding a place to do laundry was relatively easy in the spring and summer and may have even been somewhat pleasurable to be away from the eyes of their husbands or the sharp tongues of their mothers-in-law.



Bishop, who traveled extensively around the Korean Peninsula, claimed that "every brookside has its laundresses squatting on flat stones, dipping the soiled clothes in the water, laying them on flat stones in tightly rolled bundles and beating them with flat paddles"





Women wash clothes in the frozen Han River in the early 1900s. / Courtesy of Diane Nars Collection



During winter, however, the task became much more difficult as the ice had to be broken so that the women could complete their cold and disagreeable work.









In the early 1890s, Gilmore recalled seeing women, in the early mornings, making their way slowly through the streets  their faces carefully concealed and their laundry in bundles upon their heads  to their favorite streams located just outside the city walls.



"Here, in a hollow in the brook's bed, they dip the clothes, and then, laying them on the stone, proceed to beat out the marks of wear, turning the clothing now and again to bring uncleansed spots under the paddle. They beat in time, as though to a tune and dexterously change the paddle from one hand to the other without losing a stroke."



Gilbert's description of laundry in Seoul was almost poetic, but Bishop's observations were a little more negative  she acknowledged that women washed in the streams outside the city walls, but they also did laundry in the Han River (which she denounced as being a "foul river"), in the pond of one of the deserted palaces and "in every wet ditch."



Many of the Western visitors  including Bishop  grudgingly admired how brilliantly white the clothes were after they had been laundered.





Clothing are left to on walls and rocks during the winter of 1883/84 / Robert Neff Collection



Gilmore added: "It might be supposed that this method of washing would be hard on the fabric. But though Korean clothes are often of thin texture, the paddle seems less destructive than our own way of rubbing. Against its effectiveness nothing can be said, for nowhere is there a more glowing whiteness produced in the laundry."



Once the clothes were soundly beat and clean, they were laid out on flat stones or on grassy slopes to dry. Once dry, they were gathered up and taken home where the next phase of the laundering process  ironing  was done later that night and will be the subject of tomorrow's article.



As for many of the Western families living in Korea in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, they had their laundry done by Korean or Chinese servants. The bachelors at Jemulpo (modern Incheon) and the other ports sent their clothes to one of the many Chinese laundry shops that dominated the local market. However, in 1902, their dominance was challenged when the Korean Laundry Company was established in Seoul.



In 1924, Agnes Campell, an American teacher in Korea, included an amusing anecdote in a letter to her friends back home. According to her, there was a man found sitting upon a wall wailing in a loud voice his grief because his wife had left him. A passerby opined to the crying man that he must have really loved his wife. The man looked up and replied, "No, I never loved her. But who will now wash and iron my clothes for me?"



Perhaps we know why she left  it wasn't her "manifest destiny."





Chinese women wash clothes in the early 1900s. / Robert Neff Collection


Chip expert says now is the time to invest in foundry biz



By Kim Bo-eun





Korea University professor of semiconductor engineering Yu Hyun-yong / Courtesy of Yu
Students and parents walk after attending a private after-school education class in the Haidan District of Beijing, in this July 29 photo. AFP-Yonhap





Chinese parents, worried their children will lose out as a result of education reforms that have led to a reduction in the amount of time spent teaching English, are looking for ways to make up the gap.







Although their options are further limited after a crackdown on private tutoring, they will not be easily deterred.



?



"Many parents  those who deem English as an important tool to help you connect with the world  are figuring out solutions to offset the impact," says Stella Zou who runs a 500-member social media group for those who share her concerns.







Last year, she said her daughter took four English classes a week, supplemented by four further online sessions with U.S.-based teachers through a private educational platform.







But when the new semester began last week, she found that the number of English classes had been cut to just three a week at her daughter's public school in Beijing, while the online English sessions had fallen victim to a government crackdown on tuition companies.







"English seems to be the subject hit the hardest by the education reforms," she sighed.







Over the summer, the 41-year-old business owner bought a bookshelf worth of English language textbooks  ranging from the Reading Explorer series by National Geographic Learning to Wonders by McGraw-Hill Education. She now plans to teach her eight-year-old daughter herself.







The reforms did not explicitly target English, and were intended to lighten students' workloads and allow them to develop their sporting and artistic skills.







However, they also come amid a growing debate about whether most Chinese people need to spend so much time studying the language  fuelled in part by a rising tide of nationalism that has seen some prominent figures warning against exposing people to foreign ideas.







There was no national order to cut the number of school hours spent learning English, but many did so as schools across the country adjusted their curriculums to comply with the order.







For example, many schools in Beijing and Shanghai, and Sichuan and other provinces have cut back on language teaching in favor of more time spent on sporting and artistic activities.







Shanghai, the most international city on the mainland, even said last month that pupils would no longer be taking final English proficiency examinations to ease the academic burden placed on students.







It follows a decision in February by the northeastern province of Liaoning to lower the maximum number of marks available from English in the university entrance exam, thereby reducing its importance in achieving a good overall grade.







But for Zou and other concerned parents, the impact of the crackdown on private tuition is much more severe.







In July, new rules were introduced that ordered tutoring and education services firms to convert to non-profit status, banned them from offering classes in the core curriculum subjects  Chinese, maths and English  during weekends and school holidays, and prohibited the use of foreign curricula or classes held with foreigners based outside the country.







Online sessions with tutors outside China  once a regular feature of Zou's daughter's life  are now banned.







The Beijing-based start-up VIPKid, which has now said it will stop offering such services, said it had employed almost 90,000 teachers in the US and Canada and almost a million Chinese students had signed up for its classes.







"The government seems to have decided that English is not so important," Zou said, "I was so surprised by the moves. When I was a student, English was widely regarded as an essential subject in China's opening up to the world."







Students wearing protective face masks wait to enter a school to attend the first day of China's annual National College Entrance Examination, Beijing, June 7. EPA-Yonhap





China has been encouraging its people to learn English since its opening-up policy began in the late 1970s and two decades later the subject formed part of the primary school curriculum.







In 2001, the Ministry of Education issued guidelines, urging primary schools in all but the most remote parts of the country to ensure English classes were offered no later than the third grade to "modernize education to face the world and meet the demands of the future."







But this trend appears to have peaked with the 2008 Beijing Olympics, which offered China the opportunity to showcase the dramatic changes of the previous decades.







In recent years, however, growing tensions with the United States and other Western countries as well as the rise of nationalist sentiment within China have seen more people questioning the merits of studying the subject.







?In March 2019, Hua Qianfang, an influential "patriotic" blogger who was once invited to attend an arts and culture meeting with President Xi Jinping, sparked a heated debate online ?with a social media post that argued that studying the language was "a trash skill for most Chinese" and warned "a Western language will lead to a Western way of thinking".







In March this year, Xu Jin, a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the main national political advisory body, suggested that English should be removed as a core subject in primary and junior secondary schools and should not be compulsory in the university entrance exam, or Gaokao.







He argued that making the whole population learn English was a waste of time and resources, saying it took up about 10 per cent of class time but official figures showed it was useful for less than 10 per cent of working graduates.







The proposal triggered a national debate. A poll for China Youth Daily highlighted the divisions with the majority  more than 110,000 respondents  opposing the idea and saying it should be taught from an early age to enable China to compete with other countries.







However, around 100,000 people supported the proposal and said it would be better to spend more time studying Chinese language and culture.







Sun Ning, 34, a railway engineer in Beijing, said he welcomed the move to cut the number of hours spent learning English. "Many people don't use English much at work. When we need it, we can resort to smart AI-enabled devices for translation. It's very convenient," Sun said.







In Beijing, Zou said she was going to hoard textbooks for fear they would be removed from the open market if the authorities further tightened their ideological controls.







"I've spent tens of thousands of yuan on these books," she said. "It's not only about language. More importantly, by learning a foreign language, we can understand the Western mindset and develop the skill of critical thinking, which you never learn on mainland campuses."







But not everyone has the time or the skills to teach their children themselves.







Yuan Jie, 36, a mother from a remote part of Sichuan, said cutting back on English would put her 10-year-old son at a disadvantage.







"We live in a fourth-tier county, where children's education depends heavily on the public school system," she said.







"My son's English classes have been cut from three a week to two this semester. I'm so worried that he will lose the edge in future competition with his peers in big cities, but I don't know what to do."


A 2019 Ig Nobel award is displayed at the 29th annual Ig Nobel Prizes ceremony at Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass., in this September 2019 file photo. AP-Yonhap





The recipients of the 2021 Ig Nobel Prizes include researchers who experimented with upside-down rhinos, analyzed the bacteria in discarded gum and studied the ways cats communicate with humans.







The prizes, awarded by science magazine Annals of Improbable Research, were announced Thursday at the 31st annual Ig Nobel Prizes ceremony.







The Biology Prize went to Swedish researcher Susanne Schotz, who analyzed the variations in cat vocalizations while communicating with humans.







The Ecology Prize was awarded to a team of Spanish and Iranian researchers who used genetic analysis to compare the different species of bacteria found on discarded chewing gum recovered from paved surfaces in various countries.







The Chemistry Prize went to a team of researchers from Germany, Britain, New Zealand, Greece, Cyprus and Austria who used chemical analysis to test whether bodily odors created by a movie theater audience could be used to track incidents of violence, sexuality, drug use and profanity in films.







The Economics Prize was presented to Pavlo Blavatskyy, who led a study that suggests the obesity of a country's politicians can be used to indicate the level of corruption in the country.







The Medicine Prize was awarded to Olcay Cem Bulut, Dare Oladokun, Burkard Lippert and Ralph Hohenberger for their study demonstrating that sexual orgasms are as effective as decongestant medicines at improving nasal breathing.







The Peace Prize was given to a team of U.S. researchers who tested the hypothesis that humans evolved beards to protect themselves from punches to the face.







The Physics Prize went to a team of researchers who conducted experiments to learn why pedestrians do not constantly collide with other pedestrians, while the Kinetics Prize went to a different team of researchers who looked into why pedestrians sometimes do collide with other pedestrians.







The Entomology Prize was awarded to John Mulrennan Jr., Roger Grothaus, Charles Hammond and Jay Lamdin, the authors of research study "A New Method of Cockroach Control on Submarines."







The Transportation Prize was given to a team of Namibia, South Africa, Tanzania, Zimbabwe, Brazil, Britain and U.S. researchers who conducted experiments to determine whether it was safer to airlift a rhinoceros with the animal upside-down. (UPI)


Magnolia, AR (71754)

Today

Mostly cloudy skies early, then partly cloudy this afternoon. Slight chance of a rain shower. High 86F. Winds ENE at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

A few passing clouds. Low 68F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph.
Twenty years ago today, the United States witnessed the biggest and bloodiest attack on its soil in modern history. At least 2,977 men and women died and at least 25,000 were injured after a gang of terrorists crashed a series of commercial aircraft into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York, leaving the American people in a state of shock and disbelief. Across the world, millions of people looked on in horror at devastating scenes of desperate people trapped in the upper floors of the towers, some of whom jumped to their deaths rather than face being burnt alive, shortly before the towers collapsed, leaving thousands buried under the rubble.

But what followed this tragedy was a disgrace to the memory of all those innocent people who lost their lives that day. The dust had barely settled and the blood of the victims had barely dried before the vultures started circling. Taking advantage of the mood of national grief, they launched a blitz of lies and war propaganda in order to stampede the US population into accepting the US going to war, supposedly to avenge the attack. The Patriot Act and other laws were rushed through Congress, severely curtailing civil rights and dramatically expanding the surveillance powers of the state. All this in the name of a supposed War on Terror and the defence of democracy.

Of the 19 hijackers, 15 were Saudi citizens, as was the leader of Al Qaeda, Osama Bin Laden. However, the US government deliberately protected the reactionary Saudi regime and chose to pick other targets to demonstrate the brutal strength of US imperialism / Image: Hamid Mir

One after another, for days on end, people like then President George W Bush, Dick Cheney, and a never-ending stream of other officials, military commanders and pundits appeared on television decrying the attack on freedom by the evil forces of Islam. Former Secretary of Education William Bennett and a host of other neocons urged the government to declare war on militant Islam, stating that, the United States should proceed as if in war, because it is war. Bennett and his gang called for war on Iraq, Iran, Syria and Libya, despite the fact that none of these countries had any ties whatsoever with the attack or the reactionary Al Qaeda organisation behind it.

Of the nineteen hijackers that carried out the attacks, fifteen were citizens of Saudi Arabia, yet any mention of Saudi Arabia was conspicuously absent from these public declarations. In fact, every effort was made to protect Saudi interests, up to the point of allowing eight chartered planes to safely spirit away high level Saudis from the country, starting on 13 September, despite the fact that American airspace was still under lockdown. Among those on the flights, was the late Prince Ahmed Salman, who was linked to Al Qaeda and who was later discovered to have had advance knowledge of a coming attack. While a racist and frenzied campaign of harassment against people from Middle Eastern backgrounds was being whipped up, these dark figures linked to one of the most reactionary regimes in the world were being given veritable get out of jail free cards.

All evidence as to the source of the attacks pointed towards Saudi Arabia, which has long been the worlds foremost sponsor of Islamic fundamentalism. In fact, it was the Saudi monarchy, in collaboration with the CIA, which had originally nurtured Al Qaeda as a part of the Islamist insurgency against the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s. Now imperialisms Frankensteins monster had escaped control and had become a serious problem for the US and the West. Not a single TV channel made mention of this fact, despite banging the drum about the War on Terror, day in and day out. The US ruling class was looking to reassert itself around the globe and make an example of some of its enemies. That it had fostered such enemies to begin with was a minor detail.

Hubris

It is often believed by some superficial minds on the left, that the ruling class is infallible, and that all of its decisions correspond to some grand plan devised to the last detail in the drawing rooms of power. But that is not at all the case. Mistakes and accidents play a role in history. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, the US emerged as the sole superpower on the world stage. Now it was being shown up by a small gang of reactionary religious fanatics. This was not something it would tolerate.

Appearing on Fox News in the evening of 11 September, an amped-up Colonel David Hunt succinctly expressed this attitude when he told Bill OReilly that it was time for the US to unleash the dogs of war. Frothing at the mouth, the dogs at the top of the military establishment were dying to be let loose in order to restore their pride. With Saudi Arabia, the real source of the attack, being too close to the heart of their interests, the headbangers settled on Afghanistan, imagining it to be an easy target for a brutal display of US imperialisms vengeance. But as the Bible says, pride cometh before a fall.

Once taken, the decision proved fateful. The war on Afghanistan was an adventure which was doomed to fail. On the eve of the fall of Kabul to American troops in November 2001, Alan Woods wrote:

Yet again, we see how the Americans have thought nothing out to the end. They imagined that once they had pushed the Taliban out of Kabul, the problem would be solved. But this is not at all the case. (...) The Taliban have lost their grip on power, but not their potential for making war. They are very used to fighting a guerrilla war in the mountains. They did it before and can do it again. (...) The prospect opens up of a protracted guerrilla campaign which can go on for years. The first part of the allied war campaign was the easy bit. The second part will not be so easy. (...) If the aim of this exercise was to combat terrorism, they will find they have achieved the opposite. Before these events, the imperialists could afford to maintain a relatively safe distance from the convulsions and wars of this part of the world, but now they are completely entangled in it. By their actions since September 11, the USA and Britain have got themselves dragged into a quagmire, from which it will be difficult to extricate themselves.

How true these words read today. Not content with the results in Afghanistan, Bush, Cheney and their gang, followed by their loyal British lapdogs, decided to double down and open a new front in Iraq, claiming that the latter was harbouring Islamic fundamentalists and weapons of mass destruction. Of course, these were blatant lies. There was no significant presence of Islamic fundamentalism in Iraq until after the arrival of the imperialists. Neither did the Saddam regime possess any weapons of mass destruction. The true aim of the war was to access Iraqi oil, increase pressure on the Iranian regime, and push deeper into areas which had previously fallen under the Soviet sphere of influence.

The Bush administration, and its lapdog, the Blair government in Britain, churned out all manner of lies about Iraq possessing weapons of mass destruction and harbouring Al Qaeda terrorists. The irony is that the intervention of imperialism created the conditions for brutal groups like Islamic State to grow in Iraq / Image: White House

The Americans thought this would be a swift affair. Again, they miscalculated. By destroying the Iraqi army, which had been used to keep Iran in check for two decades, they not only destabilised Iraq, but the whole region. On the one hand, the invasion strengthened the Iranians who built a strong base of support amongst the Shia majority in Iraq. On the other hand it created the basis for the rise of Sunni Islamic fundamentalism, which the US itself leaned on to a certain extent in order to counter Iranian influence, the graphic result of which we saw with the rise of ISIS in 2014.

Nowadays, politicians and so-called experts are queuing up in front of the western media to decry the situation faced by Afghan women following the Talibans takeover. These are hypocritical crocodile tears. There is no outcry for the rights of women in Saudi Arabia. Afghanistan under US occupation was far from the heaven on Earth that it is made out to have been. According to Airwars, US drone strikes since 9/11 have killed at least 22,000 civilians  and perhaps as many as 48,000. A 2015 report by Physicians For Social Responsibility, estimates the campaigns in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan to have led to 1.3 million deaths! The report concludes that this is only a conservative estimate. The total number of deaths ... could also be in excess of 2 million, whereas a figure below 1 million is extremely unlikely.

In Iraq, the same freedom loving people who raised a hue and cry over supposed weapons of mass destruction did not hesitate to use chemical weapons such as white phosphorus in civilian neighbourhoods in Fallujah. Meanwhile, in both Iraq and Afghanistan, the states set up by the United States were packed with the most corrupt and reactionary gangsters and sectarians. US imperialism did not bring democracy and human rights to these countries. It brought sectarianism, corruption, death and destruction at unprecedented levels.

The mood turns

While there were big anti-war protests in the US at the beginning, as a whole, the American masses were initially pushed into accepting the wars after the shock of the 9/11 attacks. Very soon however, this mood changed. According to Gallup, at its height in 2002, support for the Afghanistan war stood at 93 percent. From here however, the figures only went downhill. By 2019, after 18 years of fighting at the cost of thousands of American lives and more than a trillion dollars, 6 in 10 Americans said that fighting Afghanistan wasnt worth it. American workers today are far more interested in improving their own conditions than footing the bill for never-ending wars abroad. This change in mood has had important political consequences.

In 2012, the Obama administrations proposal to bomb Syria fell flat on its face after congress refused to support it, with only 9 percent of the US population being in favour. In 2016, when Donald Trump was elected president, one of his most popular campaign promises was to pull the US out of the wars in the Middle East. The opposition to war severely hampered the ability of US imperialism to manoeuvre in the manner it was used to. Any major military campaign involving ground troops would come at a big political cost for any administration, and as such was ruled out. Added to this was the economic cost of military interventions. By 2019, the total cost of US interventions in the Middle East was estimated at $6.4 trillion  a further drag on the willingness to embark on new military adventures.

Crisis of imperialism

The outcome of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan was clear from the beginning, but both the Obama and Trump administrations kept postponing the final decision, unwilling as they were to accept the humiliation of defeat. Sooner or later however, something had to give in. Joe Biden has been rightly criticised for the execution of the withdrawal from Afghanistan in the past month. The rapid advance of the Taliban and the chaotic evacuation of Kabul was a direct result of his incompetence and that of his colleagues at the top of the army. But however it was executed, the defeat of the US had been certain for many years. The withdrawal was only the final admission of this fact. This will have important consequences.

Despite the hubris of US imperialism, the invasion of Afghanistan proved a stupid mistake. Defeat was inevitable. Biden has correctly been criticised for the incompetence of the US withdrawal, but the fact is that such a withdrawal was inevitable at a certain point because of the changed mood at home and the high price, both in terms of money and life, that this war was costing the US / Image: US Army

Iraq is next in line. Whether through a chaotic withdrawal as in Afghanistan or as a part of a deal with Iran, the US presence in Iraq on the present basis is untenable. But matters will not stop there. Seeing the US military machine being ground down by a bunch of Taliban fanatics with Kalashnikovs will embolden other countries to challenge US domination, such as China, Russia and even weaker regimes such as Iran. The result is the opposite of what the gung-ho generals were aiming at when they set out to display their might after 9/11. Rather than a display of US military might, the incompetence, limitations and weaknesses of US imperialism have been put on display for the whole world to see. US allies around the world will now have serious doubts about how much they can rely on Washington for support.

US imperialism is still the most powerful military and economic force on the planet. However, as we have explained, its ability to maneuver has been severely curtailed. As a result, any major US military campaigns are ruled out for now. Instead, it will be more inclined to resort to economic warfare, limited special operations and proxy campaigns. Far from making the world a safer place, this will increase instability and tensions in world relations. Like a drunk on the day after a binge, the US ruling class is now forced to reckon with the processes it has set in motion.

Crisis of the US regime

The consequences of these events are not limited to world relations, but also to the relationship between the classes inside the United States. Almost 800,000 US soldiers participated in the war in Afghanistan. The majority of these returned home with deep physical and mental scars  that is, if they returned home at all. In an interview with Vice a former marine who fought in some of the toughest battles of Afghanistan gave an interesting glimpse into the mood amongst many within this layer. When the interviewer asked if he thinks the war was in vain, he responds:

Yeah, I do. You know as somebody that bled in that war as all of us have... the guys that didnt come home why? Why did they not come home? These are 19-20 year-old kids that never got to come home. Never got to start their lives and we abandoned them. We abandoned those guys. And thats hurtful.

The feeling of betrayal runs through every word of this statement. It is not difficult to imagine the anger that must pervade many of those ordinary Americans who supported the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq as they come to realise that they have been deceived. After twenty years of war, none of the promises made to them have come to fruition. Rather than a safer, more democratic world, the rampage of US imperialism has left behind it a trail of barbarism and misery.

Islamic fundamentalism has not been defeated  rather, with US aid, it has found safe havens that it never had before in Iraq, Syria and Libya. Iraq and Afghanistan are not one step closer to democracy than they were before. All talk of a new world order based on so-called democratic, American values; nation building; the War on Terror, and American exceptionalism has been shown to be nothing but hot air. These are serious problems for the establishment, which is increasingly seen by Americans as an incompetent pack of liars, opportunists and charlatans. Speaking on the Net Assessment podcast, Christopher Preble of the conservative Cato institute sounded the alarm:

We have this pattern of misleading, false or in a few cases outright lies [in the] statements pertaining to the effectiveness of Afghan security forces. ...The credibility gap was the problem from the Vietnam era of US government officials saying things about the progress of that war, for example about the durability of the government of south Vietnam or the fighting effectiveness of the army of the republic of Vietnam, which turned out not to be true. That was a credibility gap. And thus US officials werent trusted to tell the truth.  My point is that this credibility problem is not confined to foreign wars. We have a collapse in trust in the institutions of this country right now. And millions of Americans are unable to differentiate fact from fiction  There is a credibility problem and it is getting worse. The American people do not believe government officials.

These are sobering words of warning coming from one of the more intelligent strategists of US capitalism. While the tragedy on 11 September 2001 and the subsequent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan initially strengthened the mood of patriotism and national unity, defeats in those wars have added to the mood of hate and suspicion towards the ruling class. The crisis of US imperialism abroad is also a crisis of US capitalism at home. Together with factors such as the criminal handling of the Covid-19 pandemic, falling living standards, widespread economic uncertainty, and the scourge of racism, it has fed into the molecular process of revolution which is taking place beneath the surface. The chickens are coming home to the roost for US imperialism. The conditions are being prepared for the American capitalist class to face punishment for its crimes  not by the Islamist madmen it itself nurtured, but by the revolutionary masses.
On the twentieth anniversary of the 9/11 attack, we republish the following article, written in 2011 by Alan Woods on the tenth anniversary of that atrocity. It was already clear that the so-called "War on Terror" was a complete failure. Meanwhile, the recent eruption of the Arab Spring had provided a stunning illustration of the power of the masses to sweep aside reaction and imperialism from the region.

On the tenth anniversary of the attack on the Twin Towers millions of people will relive the horrors of that fateful day. The television screens are filled with shocking images of death and destruction.

Once again we see the flames of blazing fuel as the planes struck the tall buildings; the desperate people throwing themselves into empty space; the collapsing edifices that filled the New York air with choking dust and turned day into night, and the men and women covered in gray dust looking like creatures from another planet.

The events of September 11th 2001 undoubtedly represented a turning-point in history. The tenth anniversary of the attacks on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon provides us with an opportunity to make a balance sheet of the past decade, a decade that has reshaped the history of the world.

The past decade was dominated by the so-called war on terror. Its imagery has been burned on the collective psyche. Everybody remembers the burning towers, followed by the battle on the slopes of Tora Bora, the invasion of Iraq, the horrific pictures of hooded prisoners in Abu Ghraib, the caged prisoners in Guantanamo Bay, the assassination of bin Laden.

However, the war on terror is a blatant misnomer. A war presupposes the existence of two armies of more or less comparable strength, and two governments that can declare the start of a war and also end it. It also presupposes definite war aims on both sides. None of these things are applicable in this case. Al Qaeda is not a state but a terrorist organization. It has no standing army. Its war aims are vague and its supporters are dispersed among the populations of different lands. They operate in the shadows, not on the battlefield.

The idea that such an enemy could be taken on by a conventional army with tanks, guns and airplanes was always ludicrous. Terrorism is not fought on a battlefield, but by a combination of intelligence, police methods and politics. The use of conventional military means in this context was the equivalent of a surgeon wielding a battle axe instead of a scalpel, or a man using a machine gun to swat a mosquito.

Were we told the truth?

In an article that we wrote on the same day as the attack we said the following:

This terrorist act has a completely insane and criminal character and must be condemned - but not for the hypocritical reasons given by Bush and Blair. Marxists oppose individual terrorism because it is counterproductive and plays into the hands of the most reactionary sections of the ruling class. This is clearly the case here: this bloody outrage will play into the hands of US Big Business and imperialism. It will give Bush a free hand to do anything he wants in the Middle East and on a world scale. US public opinion will be softened up for any reactionary policies at home and abroad. It will have a similar effect on US public opinion to Pearl Harbour, which Roosevelt publicly condemned but secretly welcomed. The American public will now be prepared to accept the atrocities of so-called counter-insurgency and counter-terrorist actions abroad, and also reactionary and anti-democratic legislation at home. (US Suicide Bombing - Terrorism Aids Reaction, written by Ted Grant and Alan Woods Tuesday, 11 September 2001)

There were many unanswered questions about what happened that day. Ten years later these questions remain unanswered. It seemed impossible that the Intelligence Services of the USA were unable to detect this existence of a plot of such vast dimensions. In the same article we expressed a tentative opinion:

How is it possible that the CIA was so ignorant and inept as to permit such a devastating attack on the nerve-centres of the nation? One possibility has not been mentioned - namely that it was the result of a provocation that went badly wrong. In the shadowy world of intrigue, provocation and counter-provocation that characterises the activities of the secret services, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that a section of the US military Establishment decided to allow the terrorists to launch an attack inside America as a means of boosting public support for an aggressive policy and rearmament. This would explain the surprising failure of US intelligence, although the devastating nature of the attack would suggest that the provocation got out of hand.

I am no friend of conspiracy theories, but it is true that the official reports raise more questions than they answer. Ten years later, I think that the explanation we put forward at the time probably comes fairly close to the truth. We may never know. But if the facts of the action are unclear, its results are very clear indeed.

The events of 9/11 suited the imperialists very well. What GW Bush did when he declared his war on terror had nothing to do with fighting terrorism. It was intended to whip up a bellicose atmosphere in order to justify setting in motion the vast military machine of the USA for the sake of foreign adventures.

The imperialists are always in need of some external threat  real or imaginary  to justify aggressive foreign wars. In the past they shouted: remember the Maine! or remember Pearl Harbour! Now every sign of dissent was immediately drowned out by a deafening chorus of; remember 9/11!

Why Iraq?

September 11th provided the excuse for the American invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. A case could at least be made for taking action against al Qaeda in Afghanistan, where they had their main base, protected by the Taliban regime. But why attack Iraq? Immediately after 9/11, Rumsfeld was beating the drum for this line of action, which surprised even elements in the White House.

Everyone now knows that Iraq had nothing whatsoever to do with the attack on the Twin Towers, and whatever you may think of Saddam Hussein, he was not an ally of al Qaeda but a bitter foe. Yet the reactionary clique of Bush-Rumsfeld-Cheney launched the criminal invasion of Iraq under the banner of the war on terror. This was based on the most blatant lies, which have now been exposed, in particular, the monstrous falsehood about weapons of mass destruction.

Robert Fisk, a highly intelligent and honest observer says we have avoided the real question for ten years: the one thing which any cop looks for after a street crime: the motive. How many died on 9/11? Almost 3,000. How many died in the Iraq war? Who cares?

Soldiers on patrol in Bagdad, 2007. Photo: US Army/ Bronco Suzuki The invasion of Iraq was not at all related to the events of 9/11. It had been decided long before that by a right-wing Republican clique, hell bent on extending the US sphere of influence in the Middle East after the fall of the USSR. The problem with Saddam Hussein was not that he was a dictator (the USA has supported many dictatorial regimes in the Middle East: the Shah of Iran, Mubarak in Egypt, Ben Ali in Tunisia, the Sheikh of Bahrain, the Saudi monarchy, the Algerian generals etc., etc.). The problem was that he was not sufficiently obedient to commands from Washington.

It is true that the regime of Saddam Hussein was a brutal and bloody dictatorship, which was hated by the majority of the Iraqi people. But the task of overthrowing that oppressive regime was the task of the Iraqi people themselves. When America toppled Saddam Hussein it only replaced one dictatorship with another oppressive and corrupt dictatorship, masquerading under a false democratic facade.

The idea that the Bush-Rumsfeld-Cheney clique was remotely interested in bringing democracy to Iraq is a joke in very bad taste. They conveniently ignored the fact that the USA had previously backed Saddam Hussein, and armed him in a criminal war of aggression against Iran. They turned a blind eye to all his crimes and even provided him with poison gas to murder the Kurds. Donald Rumsfeld personally went to Baghdad to express his firm support for Saddam Hussein in his war of unprovoked aggression against Iran.

The people of Iraq have been forced to endure the humiliation of foreign occupation and the torment of sectarian slaughter that engulfed it immediately after the American invasion. This criminal act, far from damaging al Qaeda, enormously boosted it. Previously, al Qaeda had no base in Iraq, now it has plenty of them, and an army of recruits helpfully provided by GW Bush, and its other two chief recruiting sergeants, Rumsfeld and Cheney.

Recently al-Qaeda was able to launch 42 attacks across the country on a single day. And when the last American troops depart at the end of this year, what will they leave behind them? If they hoped to install a friendly government in Baghdad, they have failed. Nuri al-Maliki stands far closer to Teheran than to Washington. Nor is Iraq a democracy in any meaningful sense.

Has the war on terror succeeded?

Over the past decade the military assault on al-Qaeda has been both relentless and, from a narrow military point of view, successful. Leon Panetta, a former director of the CIA and now US defence secretary, said during a recent visit to Afghanistan that America was within reach of inflicting a strategic defeat on al-Qaeda.

Is this true? A large number of jihadis have been captured and killed and for ten years the organization has been unable to repeat anything on the scale of 9/11. Osama bin Laden was assassinated in May, and his new second-in-command was killed only a month ago. The organizations command structure has been seriously disrupted and it has clearly lost a significant part of its operational capabilities.

It is true that al Qaeda still has a presence in Yemen and some other places and may still be able to stage terrorist atrocities. Terrorist acts do not necessarily require big forces. It took only 19 men armed with cardboard cutters to mount the attacks on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon ten years ago. Small terrorist groups were able to organize large-scale atrocities in Madrid and London.

However, after a decade of intelligence-gathering, ferocious attacks and mass arrests and detentions in Guantanamo, al Qaeda has been severely weakened. This was the case even before American SEALs killed bin Laden. Yet the myth of al Qaeda, a supposedly omnipresent and ever-present terrorist threat, is still maintained and carefully nurtured in the media. Why?

Every year the USA spends huge amounts on arms. There are powerful vested interests in justifying this vast expenditure, especially at a time of economic crisis and concerns about the colossal US deficit. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the Military-Industrial Complex needed another external threat in order to defend its economic interests. The right-wing clique around Bush also represented powerful oil interests that had an eye on the vast oil reserves of Iraq. These were the real interests behind the so-called war on terror.

The war on terror was allegedly fought in defence of American democracy. But the latter has been one of the first casualties. The Economist writes:

To secure the homeland, America did not just wage foreign wars. It also created a colossal security and intelligence bureaucracy at home. The Washington Post reported last year that more than 1,200 government organizations and almost 2,000 companies were working on programmes related to counter-terrorism, homeland security and intelligence. Some might say that America has paid a big price in the loss of freedoms great and small. It has become normal to remove your shoes before boarding an aircraft. America did not intern Muslim citizens after September 11th, as it did Japanese-Americans after Pearl Harbour, but the Bush administration rode roughshod over cherished liberties. Congress, the courts and a new president eventually pushed back, but not all the way. Though America no longer subjects suspected terrorists to waterboarding, Guantanamo is still open, an emblem of everything America is supposed not to stand for. Many of its inmates could spend the rest of their lives in captivity without ever having a proper trial.

These lines are sufficient to expose the reactionary consequences of terrorism in general and 9/11 in particular. For a time it strengthened the hand of imperialism and the most reactionary circles of the US ruling class. But now all that is beginning to unravel. Ten years after 9/11 the winds of revolution are blowing everywhere.

The Arab Revolution

January 29, Cairo. Photo: 3arabawy The only way to bring about a genuinely democratic regime in Iraq and the rest of the Arab world is by revolutionary means  as shown by the events in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya. This marks a complete repudiation of al-Qaedas authoritarian and fundamentalist doctrine. The jihadists and Islamic fundamentalists played little or no role in these revolutionary movements, although in some countries they may still succeed in hijacking them if the workers do not take power into their own hands.

The West can claim no credit for this awakening. It was not inspired by the invasion of Iraq, to which the Arabs were fundamentally opposed. The Arab street understood very well that Iraqs new government is a puppet regime. They knew that George Bushs freedom agenda meant only the freedom of the imperialists to loot Iraq and rob it of its oil and other resources. They do not trust the democracy preached by governments that for decades have propped up the most vicious Arab regimes.

When the revolutionary wave finally swept over Tunisia, Egypt and the whole of the Arab world almost a decade later, it was not the result of Americas display of shock and awe tactics but a spontaneous eruption of rage and frustration at intolerable conditions. Its sole motor force was the revolutionary people, especially the workers and the revolutionary youth, for whom the USA is not a model, but rather an enemy who backed the hated old regime till the eleventh hour and after.

In Libya, too, the Gaddafi regime was overthrown by the armed people. NATO, hiding behind the fig-leaf of the so-called United Nations, intervened when it became clear that Gaddafi was in difficulties. Their bombing campaign was intended to tip the balance in favour of the rebels, and thus to safeguard the interests of the Americans and Europeans after his overthrow. But the imperialists were not prepared to arm the rebels, who they distrusted, and still distrust.

The people of Libya are not so stupid that they cannot see through the intrigues and lies of the imperialists who supported Gaddafi and his regime up to the last moment, when they conveniently switched sides. It is public knowledge that both the Europeans and the USA had close links with the Gaddafi regime, that they sent arms to Gaddafi and that their secret services collaborated actively with the old regime.

The victory of the rebels has meant the opening of the archives of Gaddafis secret police and military intelligence. This proves beyond any doubt that the CIA and British Intelligence (MI5 and MI6) provided intelligence to the Gaddafi regime to combat the Libyan opposition, and handed over oppositionists to the torture chambers, including the present leader of the Libyan armed forces. All this was done in the name of the war on terror. These facts show the repulsive hypocrisy of the imperialists and their false attachment to democracy.

Afghanistan and Pakistan

In Afghanistan, America succeeded in chasing out al-Qaeda and its Taliban protectors. But al-Qaeda and the Taliban, with the aid of the Pakistan Military Intelligence (IS), merely shifted their operations to new bases over the border in Pakistan, from whence they proceeded to launch attacks on the US forces.

In retaliation, the CIA sent unmanned drones to bomb them inside Pakistan. But since most of the victims of these drone attacks are civilian Pushtoons, this bombing campaign has stoked the fires of hatred towards America and provided the Taliban insurgency with a new influx of recruits eager to continue the bloody war of attrition in Afghanistan.

Years of savage war have reduced large areas of Afghanistan to rubble. Nobody knows how many people have been killed. And there is no end in sight. Despite all the brave talk of Obama, the Americans are preparing to pull out of Afghanistan in what will be a humiliating and ignominious retreat. It remains an open question how long the corrupt Karzai regime that the West is propping up in Kabul will survive after NATOs planned departure in 2014.

They talk about victory, about inflicting a military defeat on al-Qaeda, taking out bin Laden etc. But these are hollow boasts. The price of this alleged victory has been to create new dangers everywhere. By carrying the war into Pakistan, America has further destabilized what was already a very fragile and unstable country. With a population of 190million Muslims, and a nuclear arsenal, Pakistan represents potentially a far bigger threat to America than either Iraq or Afghanistan.

Obama in the quagmire of Afghanistan All along Pakistan has been playing its own game in Afghanistan. For decades the Pakistan military and especially the ISI have been manoeuvring for control in Kabul. The Taliban were  and remain  their allies. The government in Islamabad has been kept afloat by American money, but key sections of the Pakistan state are secretly supporting the Taliban and their jihadist allies. The ISI obviously knew where bin Laden was hiding, which is why the Americans decided not to inform Islamabad of their raid on bin Ladens house.

Since the murder of bin Laden, relations between Pakistan and America have become even more envenomed. The Economist (3 September) concludes: Americas homeland may be safer than it was ten years ago, but its strategic posture has deteriorated in a swathe of the Middle East and South Asia, and will worsen further if Iraq falls under the spell of the mullahs Iran, or Pakistan implodes.

Nowhere is the hypocrisy and double-dealing of the imperialists clearer than on the Palestinian question. In an attempt to woo Arab public opinion, Washington held out the prospect of an American-brokered peace in Palestine, but GW Bush was far more interested in friendly relations with Israel than peace and, for all his fine words, Obama has done no better. Netanyahu continues his encroachment on Palestinian lands and terrorizing of the Palestinians with total impunity.

Worldwide jihad?

Has this strengthened or weakened Americas position in the world? Let us consider the human and economic costs. Some 6,000 US soldiers, and many of its allies soldiers, have lost their lives in these bloody wars of attrition. As for Iraqi and Afghan losses, nobody knows for sure. But according to one very conservative estimate about 137,000 civilians have been killed in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan.

These wars have created more than 7.8million refugees. The wars ultimate cost, including interest payments and veterans care, to the United States will amount to up to $4 trillion. To put this in its economic context, this figure is approximately equivalent to the USAs cumulative budget deficits for the six years from 2005 to 2010.

This represents a colossal drain on Americas resources. And what have they got to show for all this sacrifice apart from the disruption of al-Qaeda  something that could have been better achieved by police methods and counter terrorist units? But there have been wider and potentially even more dangerous consequences. A recent poll for the Arab American Institute reported that Americas standing across the Arab world is now lower than it was at the end of the Bush presidency. The hatred of America has become deep and embittered.

These constant wars and upheavals have unsettled the minds of Muslim youth in the West. The fumes of jihadism have spread like poisonous a cloud to western countries, as when British Muslims set off bombs on the London Underground in 2005. Similar tendencies can be observed in the USA. In 2009 an American Muslim gunned down his fellow soldiers at Fort Hood in Texas and last year a new immigrant from Pakistan tried to set off a car bomb in New Yorks Times Square.

It may be doubted whether these and other plots were directly organized by al-Qaeda. More likely they were merely inspired by the vague feeling of a need to lash out, copying the methods of the jihadis. But the question that must be asked is what feeds the feelings of frustration and rage that is the main motor force for such desperate actions. It is far more convenient to avoid this awkward question by sweeping references to al Qaeda  as if the latter really represented an all-powerful and ever-present force, instead of a small and beleaguered movement.

Unemployment, poverty, racism and a growing intolerance in the host societies have combined to create an alienated layer among the youth that is not confined to the Muslim population. Unfortunately for the bourgeois it is impossible to declare war on unemployment or to solve the problem of poverty by sending a drone to drop bombs. And in the absence of a strong Marxist party, sections of disaffected youth begin to sympathize with the jihadis.

This is a blind alley that only provides ammunition to the right wing and the racists, while presenting no real threat to the state. While constantly harping on the threat of Islamic fundamentalism, the media ignores the threat posed by right-wing and fascist terrorism, which was revealed by Anders Behring Breiviks murder of 77 Young Socialists in Norway in July. The racist poison is being echoed by the respectable bourgeois politicians. Newt Gingrich, a possible Republican candidate for the US presidency, joined a campaign with clear racist undertones to stop the construction of an Islamic centre and mosque in lower Manhattan.

The tactics of al Qaeda, which seem to be anti-imperialist in fact serve the interests of imperialism. The two feed off each other and are necessary to each other, like Siamese twins tied together by a fatal umbilical cord.

Splits in the West

The war on terror has also produced severe strains in the Western Alliance. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the USA became the sole world super-power. Along with supreme power came supreme arrogance. Now the Europeans are tired of being dragged into Americas wars. On the other hand, America is exasperated by Europes unwillingness to pull its weight. At every turn the stresses and strains come to the surface.

Invoking collective defence, NATO joined the war in Afghanistan, although that country is very far from the North Atlantic. Britain, which had long ago lost its leading role in the world, has become reduced to the humiliating role of a satellite of Washington. Tony Blair, anxious to please Big Brother across the Atlantic was prepared to prostrate himself on all fours, fawning like a pet poodle to the Man in the White House, while all the time maintaining the ridiculous pretence of a Special Relationship between London and Washington.

The only thing special about it was its especially nauseating character of Blairs subservience. It goes without saying that the Americans soon got tired of this ridiculous charade, which lasted only as long as they needed it to create the illusion of a Coalition of the Willing. The problem was that not many were willing. Only a few others who aspired to the position of Special Friends of Washington, such as Poland and Ukraine, rushed to volunteer for duty in Iraq and Afghanistan.

But the really important counties in Europe, Germany, and especially France, kept a safe distance. And for most public opinion in Europe, including Britain, the war in Iraq was deeply unpopular. And after a decade of body bags the appetite of the American people for foreign wars has been sharply reduced. The economic crisis that began in 2008 and is still continuing means that ten years after 9/11, the attention of the people is focused elsewhere.

The splits in the Western alliance have coincided with the growing economic difficulties on both sides of the Atlantic. There is less money for foreign adventures, and therefore increased tension as to who should pay for them. This was exposed by the Libyan affair. America, having burned its fingers in Iraq and Afghanistan, was not keen to get involved in a war in Libya. The Germans decided to stay out of it altogether. The British and French governments were in the first ranks of those baying for military action.

It suited the Americans to present the Libyan campaign as a NATO operation. But it only served to expose the weaknesses of NATO. Its European members keep some 2million men in uniform but they only managed to send between 25,000 and 40,000 to Afghanistan. And after only 11 weeks of the Libyan campaign, they had run short of munitions and needed American help. Even such a limited campaign exposed serious weaknesses in both the French and British armed forces.

After 9/11 the Bush doctrine was meant to show the world the power of imperialism, which was supposed to sweep all before it. Ten years later what is being exposed are the limits of the power of imperialism. It is compelled to intervene everywhere, but this constant pressure is undermining its very foundations.

Changed mood

On 11th of September 2001 we wrote the following:

Overnight, the greatest super power the world has ever seen turns out to be a colossus with feet of clay. The most powerful military state the world has ever seen has shown its powerlessness in the face of terrorism. Before the Second World War, Trotsky predicted that America would emerge as the victor and establish world hegemony, but he added that it would have dynamite built into its foundations. These prophetic words have now turned out to be literally true. Ten years ago, after the fall of the Soviet Union, President Bush's father promised a New World Order. Now the reality has struck home with a vengeance. The rape of the planet by Big Business has created a world fraught with misery, war and chaos, which has now impacted on the heart of world imperialism. This is the real cause of the present atrocity. The terrorism of world-wide hunger, disease, misery, exploitation and oppression which torments millions of men, women and children each and every day of their lives, is the root cause of the turmoil and instability which is sweeping the planet in the dawn of the 21st century.

Subsequent events have confirmed this prognosis. One war follows another. One shock after another has shaken the foundations of society and in the process has also shaken up the consciousness of millions of people.

To most ordinary Americans today the events of 9/11 must already seem like ancient history. Sure the shocking images of the collapse of the Twin Towers still arouse powerful feelings. But there is no longer any appetite for flag waving chauvinism. As time passes the intoxicating fumes of chauvinism wear off, leaving people with a bad headache and no desire to repeat the experience.

Even some Republicans have been forced to recognize the new mood. In Iowa last month, Ron Paul, a Republican presidential candidate, was cheered to the rafters when he called for the troops to come home. The 2012 election will focus not on the global war on terror but on unemployment and falling living standards. The people of America want to hear less about foreign adventures and more about the problems they face in America itself.

Instead of talking about nation-building abroad, most Americans want to hear more about nation-building at home. This new mood can easily revert to old-style isolationism. The problem is that this option is no longer available. The USA is now inextricably bound up in world affairs and cannot avoid getting involved. The whole world is now one single, indissoluble whole. There is no escaping the fact of globalization. But globalization now manifests itself as a global crisis of capitalism.

The USA has accepted the role of world policeman that in the past was held by Britain. But whereas Britain derived vast profits from its imperial role, for the USA it has become a colossal drain. The difference is that British power was at its height in a period of capitalist upswing, whereas the USAs world role coincides with a period of capitalist downswing.

The crisis of capitalism affects all countries, big and small. But America is affected most of all. The crisis of American capitalism is graphically expressed in its colossal deficit, which the ruling class is attempting to solve by placing the burden on the shoulders of the working class and the middle class. Sooner or later this will have revolutionary consequences, as we have already seen in Wisconsin. The 21st century was born in the shadow of war. But the decisive war of the 21st century will be the class war.

London, 9th September 2011

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HR Cafe was launched in August 2021. It is managed by Talent Lab, one of the leading HR Management companies in Mauritius. Our aim is to provide a forum for employers, business owners and HR enthusiasts to meet, debate and hold discussions over pertinent and contemporary people related topics.

Our next session is on the 18th of September 2021 and it coincides with the International Equal Pay Day 2021. This burning theme evolves around the inequality of pay on grounds of gender. The United Nations (UN) declared it as a representation of Womens longstanding efforts towards the achievement of equal pay for work of equal value.

Equal pay applies to all contractual terms. This includes basic pay, overtime, performance-related benefits, and access to pension schemes. As professionals in the field, we recognise the importance of this day, the work and effort of various organisations and communities in the battle towards eradicating discrimination at work based on gender.

Our choice of panelists promises to lead to powerful debate with three brilliant minded, experienced and on-the-ground speakers; Dr Sheila Bunwaree, Mr. Radhakrisna Sadien and Ms. Diksha Lumbini Beeharry.

This second edition of HR Cafe will take place at 10 30 on Saturday 18th September 2021 at the seat of Talent Lab, 3rd floor, The Core Building, Ebene. As usual networking and refreshments will also follow. HR cafe members and the public will be able to attend and contribute to the debate. However, due to sanitary protocols in place, seats are limited and shall be allocated on a first come first served basis.

To become a member of HR cafe and therefore be invited to our monthly discussions, business owners, employers and HR enthusiasts are invited to apply for membership on the following link: https://forms.gle/TzeEwY7SB8Yu7t4q9 . We are also active on social media: HR CAFE on Facebook, hr.cafe on Instagram and HR Cafe Mauritius on LinkedIn.

For any queries that you may have or to confirm attendance, kindly contact Adilla at adilla@talentlab.mu or 5497 1978 and Remena at hrcafe@talentlab.mu or 468 1541/465 5777. You may also drop us a whatsapp message on 54971978.

Dr Sheila Bunwaree (PhD,LLB) is a socio-economist by training. She has taught Development Studies/Economics and Sociology at the University of Mauritius for more than 25 years. She has also served as Director of Research at the Council for Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) and the Centre for Conflict Resolution (CCR), Cape Town for a few years. She has also been the first Chair of African studies at the University of Mauritius from 2015-2017. Her research interests include: Socio economics, Gender and Poverty, Inequality, Gender and development, Governance, politics and Gender amongst a range of other themes. She is also an independent consultant/resource person for various bodies such as the UNDP, UNRISD, World Bank, UNESCO, African Union amongst others. She has authored several scholarly articles and author of a few books. She is also a regular columnist on key development issues

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Mr. Radhakrisna Sadien a human rights defender is in the field for over 40 years. Mr. Sadien is the President of the Conseil des Syndicats, Confederation of Free Trade Unions, State Employees Federation and GSEA. Mr. Radhakrisna Sadien has a long history of activism and was involved in many campaigns fighting for human rights and a member of various Human Rights institutions. Mr. Radhakrisna Sadien has both local and international exposure based on the several international events, congresses, symposiums, workshops and seminars he has attended, including the Annual Conference of the International Labour Organisation. He worked on the project Good Governancefunde

Ms. Diksha Lumbini Beeharry is a forward thinking barrister who fully embraces the digital era in her profession. She is also a human rights activist. Diksha firmly believes in the power of technology in turning possibilities into opportunities, especially in making legal services accessible to all. She is also the founder of Mafubo Mauritius, an NGO that militates for human rights, with a special focus on womens rights. She was awarded the Mandela Washington Fellowship and completed an intensive training in leadership skills in the United States. As part of the new generation of young professionals and with her experience on the ground, Diksha is eager to bring forth her reflections on the topic of the day  Gender Pay Gap in Mauritius: Myth or fact?
The travel ban between South Africa and Mauritius has been lifted today (10 September). South Africans can now travel to Mauritius on authorised commercial flights without first having to spend fifteen (15) days outside the country.

We welcome the decision by the Mauritian government. South Africa remains a proximity and priority market for tourism on the island. We are delighted that we will be able to restart our long-standing relationship after an 18-month ban on travel, says Arvind Bundhun, Director of the Mauritius Tourism Promotion Authority (MTPA).

Authorised commercial flights from South Africa to Mauritius will commence on 01 October 2021 namely Air Mauritius, Comair South Africa, SAA and Fly Safair.

From 01 October 2021, fully vaccinated travellers from South Africa, will be allowed to stay at any hotel, resort or accommodation of their choice and move freely around the island.

Unvaccinated travellers will have to undergo 14 days quarantine in a state designated quarantine facility.

Mauritius has worked hard to develop and implement protocols that will keep both travellers and citizens as safe as possible from Covid-19 and the effects of the pandemic. Travellers can be assured of Governments commitment to the health and safety of all travellers, says Arvind Bundhun.

South Africans have been longing for the Mauritius they know and love, from white sandy beaches and clear blue seas and skies, to our warm and friendly people, and so much more. Mauritius is ready and we cant wait to welcome South Africans back to our beautiful country, says Arvind Bundhun.
We are there to give a helping hand, we are there to help our neighbor, help our community, she said. I truly believe taking from that unspeakable loss that we experienced the resilience of the American people, how everyone on Sept. 12, 2001, seemed to be unified and stronger together.
If you were in early adulthood on 9/11, youre in middle age now, or getting close. The Bush era, the Obama era, the Trump era have come and gone. The Biden era is under way. It is haunted, like the end of Trumps presidency, by pandemic. Vast groups of Americans seem to despise each other, though that phenomenon may well be exaggerated by social media, which itself qualifies in some way as a pandemic  one of bad faith and the unseemly glee of schadenfreude as some poor sap gets steamrolled by the self-righteous for one sin or another.
While I believe shutdowns helped reduce the damage from the first wave of the virus, Pennsylvanias shutdown wasnt done fairly and lasted too long. And more than a year later, the state and federal government havent done enough to get those businesses thriving again, and to get the owners and employees back on their feet.
National

Rajnath holds talks with Australian counterpart

Rajnath Singh with his Australian counterpart Peter Dutton during a joint press statement in New Delhi. (PTI)

NEW DELHI, SEP 10 (PTI) | Publish Date: 9/10/2021 2:13:58 PM IST

Partnership between India and Australia is based on our shared vision of free, open, inclusive and rule-based Indo-Pacific region, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said on Friday after holding wide-ranging talks with his Australian counterpart Peter Dutton.

Describing the discussions as fruitful, Singh said bilateral defence cooperation as well as regional issues figured in the deliberations.

I have had a very fruitful and wide-ranging discussion with Minister Dutton on our bilateral defence cooperation as well as regional issues, Singh said in a media statement.

Both of us are keen to work jointly to realise the full potential of the India-Australia Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, he said.

The talks took place a day ahead of the inaugural two-plus-two dialogue between foreign and defence ministers of India and Australia. Dutton and Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne arrived here on Friday.

Singh said the partnership between the two countries is based on our shared vision of free, open, inclusive and rule-based Indo-Pacific region.

Both, Australia and India have tremendous stakes in peace, development and free flow of trade, rules-based order and economic growth in the region, he said.

Our discussions today focused on our bilateral defence cooperation and expanding military engagements across services, enhancing defence information sharing, cooperation in emerging defence technologies and mutual logistics support, he added.

Singh said both sides also noted with happiness that Australia joined the Malabar Exercise in 2020.

In this context we also expressed satisfaction in the continued participation of Australia in Malabar Exercise this year, he added.

The Australian Navy was part of the recent Malabar naval exercise that also featured navies of India, the US and Japan.

Singh said both sides discussed opportunities to work together in defence science and technology areas.

I invited Australian industry to take advantage of Indias liberalised foreign direct investment policies in the defence sector. We both agreed that there are opportunities of bilateral collaboration for co-development and co production, he said.

According to diplomatic sources, at the two-plus-two dialogue, both sides are expected to deliberate on further solidifying bilateral defence and strategic ties besides exchanging views on the situation in Afghanistan.

The two sides are also expected to discuss ways to boost cooperation in the Indo-Pacific in the face of Chinas growing military assertiveness in the region, they said. Both Australia and India are part of Quad or Quadrilateral coalition that resolved to work towards ensuring a free, open and inclusive Indo-Pacific. The other two members of the Quad are the US and Japan.

The sources said expanding bilateral cooperation in areas of maritime security is expected to be another area of focus at the two-plus-two dialogue.

The dialogue between the foreign and defence ministers was instituted as part of an overall goal to expand strategic cooperation between the two countries.

India has such a framework for talks with a very few countries including the US and Japan.

Defence and military cooperation between India and Australia is on an upswing in the last few years.

In June last year, India and Australia elevated their ties to a comprehensive strategic partnership and signed a landmark deal for reciprocal access to military bases for logistics support during an online summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Australian counterpart Scott Morrison.
FCDO Permanent Under-Secretary Sir Philip Barton, foreign secretary Masud Bin Momen, Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon, FCDO Minister of State for South Asia and the Commonwealth, Bangladesh High Commissioner to UK Saida Muna Tasneem pose for photos at the venue of the 4th strategic dialogue held in London on Thursday.  PID photo

The United Kingdom on Thursday repeated its concerns on the shrinking political space, continuation of extrajudicial killings and enforcement of the Digital Security Act against dissenting people in Bangladesh, diplomatic sources said.

The concerns were expressed in the 4th strategic dialogue between Bangladesh and the United Kingdom held at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office in London.

Bangladesh foreign secretary Masud Bin Momen and FCDO permanent under-secretary Philip Barton led their respective side in the talks.

The UK raised concerns reflected in the FCDO Annual Human Rights Report, including the impact of the Digital Security Act, political space, and extra-judicial killings, a British press release issued on Friday said.

Both countries, the release went on, agreed in the talks on the importance of free and fair elections, on a vibrant civil society to promote accountable governance and institutions and on freedom of expression and religion.

The UK recognised Bangladeshs role as a critical actor in ensuring stability in the region and its particular relevance to the UKs integrated review of its foreign policy, trade, development and security issues with the focus on the Indo-Pacific, according to a Bangladesh foreign ministry press release.

Both sides agreed to remain engaged toward a durable solution to the Rohingya crisis, together with relevant regional and international actors, the release said.

The delegations also exchanged views on the evolving situation in Afghanistan.

The Bangladesh foreign secretary urged the UK to review the current travel restrictions on Bangladesh as a matter of priority, considering its steady improvement in the Covid infection and vaccination rates.

Dhaka and London decided to build on the bilateral climate partnership agreed earlier in the year to help mobilise finances and technologies to support Bangladeshs efforts at pursuing a low-carbon development pathway.

The two sides also agreed to further scale up cooperation in genome-sequencing of test samples, involving relevant Bangladesh agencies.

Besides, both sides agreed in principle to initiate a comprehensive dialogue toward building a sound migration and mobility partnership.

The UK explained its new immigration policy whereby overseas students would have the opportunity to work for two to three years following the completion of their studies in that country.

The Bangladesh delegation urged the UK to consider continued trade preferential measures for it following its LDC graduation.

The two countries agreed to facilitate further business-to-business connectivity, including through the leading chambers of commerce and industry.

Both sides welcomed the launch of the bilateral trade and investment dialogue in February 2021.

Bangladesh high commissioner to the UK Saida Muna Tasneem and her British counterpart Robert Chatterton Dickson were present in the talks.

Prior to the talks, the Bangladesh foreign secretary called on FCDO state minister for South Asia Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon.

The foreign secretary also had a meeting later with British MP Rushnara Ali, chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Bangladesh and the UK Trade Envoy for Bangladesh.

The meetings touched upon issues concerning pandemic response, climate change, trade cooperation and diaspora linkages.

The 5th strategic dialogue will take place in Dhaka in 2022.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-10 20:28:26|Editor: huaxia

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Workers process beef at Namibia's meat processing and marketing entity Meatco in Windhoek, Namibia, Sept. 9, 2021. Namibia's meat processing and marketing entity Meatco stated that it is still exporting beef to the Chinese market, an executive confirmed to Xinhua. (Photo by Musa C Kaseke/Xinhua)



WINDHOEK, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Namibia's meat processing and marketing entity Meatco is still exporting beef to the Chinese market, a spokesperson confirmed to Xinhua.

Meatco spokesperson Rosa Hamukuaja-Thobias told Xinhua that while in the last financial year the company was forced to stop exporting due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the entity resumed exporting, with the last export of 22 tons being shipped to China on Aug. 19.

"The Chinese market continues to be a strategic market for us and as Meatco we see ourselves continuing with this market in the long run," she added.

Since 2019, a total of 6,217 tons have been delivered to date, she added.

Beef products including bone-in and boneless meat products are exported to China, according to the spokesperson.

"This is good business for us," she said. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-10 21:11:12|Editor: huaxia

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Wang Yang, a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) National Committee, presides over a biweekly consultation session held by the CPPCC National Committee, in Beijing, capital of China, Sept. 10, 2021. (Xinhua/Liu Weibing)

BEIJING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Chinese political advisors on Friday discussed measures to promote the quality and efficiency of sewage treatment in urban areas at a consultation session in Beijing.

The biweekly session was held by the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), China's top political advisory body. Wang Yang, a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the CPPCC National Committee, presided over the session.

Wang called for systematic, problem-targeted, adaptable, and precise approaches to further promote the quality and efficiency of sewage treatment, as well as suggestions on cities' high-quality development.

Eleven political advisors and experts offered their proposals at the session, and over 60 political advisors voiced their opinions via a mobile platform.

They acknowledged China's progress in the treatment of black and malodorous water bodies in urban areas, adding that arduous tasks are yet to be accomplished in this regard.

They called for efforts to locate and remove hazards in sewage pipe networks, formulate scientific standards on sewage treatment and discharge, and promote sewage and sludge utilization, among others. Enditem


Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-10 22:57:42|Editor: huaxia

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Photo taken on Sept. 24, 2015 shows the national flags of China (R) and the United States as well as the flag of Washington D.C. on the Constitution Avenue in Washington, capital of the United States. (Xinhua/Bao Dandan)

The two countries both stand to gain from cooperation and lose from confrontation. And the world will reap so much good if the biggest developing country and the biggest developed one can join their hands.

BEIJING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Getting the China-U.S. relationship right is not optional, but something the two sides must do and must do well.

That is a point Chinese President Xi Jinping stressed in a phone conversation on Friday with his U.S. counterpart, Joe Biden, and also a premise both sides need to bear in mind when managing their relations.

It is true that China and the United States differ in ideology, social system, history and culture. However, if history is any guide, differences are not necessarily hindrances to the development of China-U.S. relations.

The two countries both stand to gain from cooperation and lose from confrontation. And the world will reap so much good if the biggest developing country and the biggest developed one can join their hands.

Unfortunately, the China-U.S. relationship has over the past several years run into serious difficulties due to Washington's misguided China policy. And it seems that the current U.S. administration has yet to dispel various deep-seated misperceptions of China, and is still taking its cue from its predecessor on handling interaction with Beijing.

China has always been clear and consistent on which direction bilateral relations should take. As Xi said on Friday, the two sides should look ahead and press forward, demonstrate strategic courage and political resolve, and bring China-U.S. relations back to the right track of stable development as soon as possible.

To that end, relevant departments of the two countries, on the basis of respecting each other's core concerns and properly managing differences, may continue their engagement and dialogue, and advance coordination and cooperation on climate change, COVID-19 response and economic recovery as well as on major international and regional issues.

It is high time that Washington started to view China's development in an objective and rational way, and take concrete actions to create favorable conditions for the healthy development of bilateral relations.

In this age of expanding global interdependence, whether China and the United States can handle their relationship well is a question of the century. To that, Washington must join Beijing in providing a good answer. 
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 09:11:46|Editor: huaxia

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People walk among the Waves of Flags at Pepperdine University in Malibu, the United States, on Sept. 10, 2021. Each September, the university stages the Waves of Flags display to honor the victims of the 9/11 attacks. (Xinhua)
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 19:56:43|Editor: huaxia

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Lanterns are placed at the Wall of Names during a candlelight memorial to the passengers and crew of United Airlines Flight 93 in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, the United States, Sept. 10, 2021. Memorials were held at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Pennsylvania to mark the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. (Xinhua/Liu Jie)
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 21:05:24|Editor: huaxia

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Visitors try out coffee products from ASEAN countries at the 18th China-ASEAN Expo in Nanning, capital of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Sept. 10, 2021. (Xinhua/Lu Boan)

NANNING, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- This is the eighth straight year that Malaysian entrepreneur Chai Kean King has attended the annual China-ASEAN Expo to expand his business in China.

For this year's expo, which opened Friday in the southern Chinese city of Nanning, Chai has brought edible bird's nests, coffee and other Malaysian specialty products made by his food company, hoping to captivate expo visitors and find more business partners.

Enterprises from over 40 countries and regions are participating in this year's China-ASEAN Expo, which is held both online and offline and boasts a total exhibition area of 102,000 square meters.

For Chai, attending the expo for eight years in a row has not always been easy. Last year, he traveled from Malaysia to China to take part in the event despite COVID-19-induced travel restrictions and quarantine measures.

"We spared no effort to attend last year's expo because we had found many of our business partners at the event," he said. "We have sold a lot of our products at previous editions of the expo and have further tapped into the Chinese market through this platform."

Chai's growing business in China mirrors the booming trade and strong bilateral ties between China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) over the past decades.

Since China and ASEAN established dialogue relations in 1991, the two sides have seen bilateral trade skyrocket from 8.36 billion U.S. dollars to 685.28 billion U.S. dollars in 2020, an increase of over 80 times, according to Chinese customs data.

The two sides have bucked the global downward trend, and last year they became each other's largest trading partners. Such robust trade expansion has continued in 2021, with bilateral trade volume registering a 38.2 percent year-on-year growth in the first half of this year, according to official Chinese data.

Besides trade and economic cooperation, China and ASEAN have been committed to extensive cooperation in various other fields, including security, education and tourism, to safeguard regional stability and promote common development and prosperity.

China's official data shows that personnel exchanges between the two sides exceeded 65 million in 2019 before the onslaught of COVID-19. They have exchanged over 200,000 students and formed more than 200 pairs of sister cities.

Aerial photo taken on April 15, 2020 shows Qinzhou Port in south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. (Xinhua/Lei Jiaxing)

China-ASEAN dialogue relations have "evolved into a multifaceted strategic partnership and shown tremendous progress on all fronts," said Dato Lim Jock Hoi, the secretary-general of ASEAN, via video at the opening ceremony of the 18th China-ASEAN Expo on Friday.

Amid the still-raging pandemic and rising protectionism and unilateralism around the globe, China-ASEAN ties have grown even stronger with all-round cooperation on COVID-19 prevention and control, trade and other fields.

ASEAN countries donated medical supplies to support China when it was experiencing peak epidemic conditions last year, and China returned the favor by dispatching medical teams, providing medical supplies, sharing prevention and treatment experience and enhancing vaccine cooperation.

As China and ASEAN mark the 30th anniversary of their dialogue relations this year, both sides are eyeing closer ties and comprehensive collaboration in more fields.

Chinese Vice President Wang Qishan said Friday, when addressing the opening ceremony of the China-ASEAN Expo, that "China is committed to promoting better development of bilateral ties in the next 30 years."

China is willing to work with ASEAN to align the Belt and Road Initiative with ASEAN countries' development strategies to jointly foster strategic partnership at a higher level, and expand economic and trade cooperation, while promoting regional connectivity and economic integration, to improve the well-being of the people, Wang said.

In a video speech at the ceremony, Malaysian Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob said that he expected the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) to "serve as an integral tool to navigate our region to a path of recovery and growth in the near future."

The RCEP, the world's largest free-trade deal, was signed last year by 15 Asia-Pacific countries, including ASEAN's 10 member states and China. It is widely deemed a massive move for regional economic integration, multilateralism and free trade.

"This agreement (RCEP) provides immense opportunities to bolster regional supply chains and businesses to diversify production networks that are imperative for seamless integration into the global economy," said Ismail Sabri. 
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 21:52:40|Editor: huaxia

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-- Twenty years after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, widely seen as a turning point in U.S. history, the world's sole superpower has largely failed in its fight against terrorism and extremism.

-- Under the banner of a global "war on terror," Washington has plunged itself into a costly and frustrating quagmire of conflicts and strategic misjudgments, most recently marked by the chaotic and bloody withdrawal from Afghanistan.

-- As global security threats remain, the need for cooperation among major powers has become more urgent in order to effectively address such challenges as climate change and communicable disease.





by Yang Shilong, Matthew Rusling, Xu Yuan

WASHINGTON, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Twenty years after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, widely seen as a turning point in U.S. history, the world's sole superpower has largely failed in its fight against terrorism and extremism.

Under the banner of a global "war on terror," experts have said, Washington has plunged itself into a costly, frustrating quagmire of conflicts and strategic misjudgments, most recently marked by the chaotic and bloody withdrawal from Afghanistan.

Photo taken on Aug. 31, 2021 shows a military plane at Kabul airport in Kabul, capital of Afghanistan. The U.S. Central Command announced on Aug. 30 that the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan has completed. (Photo by Saifurahman Safi/Xinhua)

"ENDLESS WARS" COST U.S. MUCH MORE

"The damage done by Al-Qaeda pales compared to the damage we did to ourselves," Joseph S. Nye, dean emeritus of Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government, told Xinhua in a recent interview.

By some estimates, nearly 15,000 American military members and contractors were killed, and the economic cost of the wars following 9/11 was more than 6 trillion U.S. dollars. "Adding to this, the numbers of foreign civilians killed, and refugees created, and the costs were enormous," Nye said.

"The opportunity costs were also large. When (then) President Barack Obama tried to pivot to Asia -- the fastest growing part of the world economy -- the legacy of the global war on terror kept the U.S. mired in the Middle East," Nye said.

"It is a mixed bag and our approaches initially were very costly, and the Middle East remains a mess. But the homeland has been fairly safe. On balance I'd say the glass is so slightly more than half full," Brookings Institution Senior Fellow Michael O'Hanlon told Xinhua.

During the 20 years since 9/11, other endless "wars of choice" besides Afghanistan were also initiated by the United States. Many of them are "illegal under international law" and "have rained death and destruction on hundreds of thousands of human beings in Southwest Asia, Middle East and the Arab world," said Sourabh Gupta, a senior fellow at the Institute for China-America Studies.

In 2003, then U.S. President George W. Bush launched a war in Iraq though there was no evidence that the country's Saddam Hussein government had been involved in the 9/11 attacks.

Iraqi protesters take part in a demonstration against the presence of U.S. troops in the country in Baghdad, capital of Iraq, Jan. 24, 2020. (Xinhua/Khalil Dawood)

With Washington later turning its head toward other issues, such as the 2007-2008 financial collapse, which led to a major U.S. recession, Bush's successor, Obama, officially ended the Iraq War in 2011.

According to the U.S. Department of Defense casualty website, the U.S. military registered a total of 4,431 deaths as a result of the Iraq War, with 31,994 wounded in action. The Iraqi casualties are far higher.

Apart from its tragic human toll, the Iraq War was shockingly expensive in financial terms. The true cost of the war is estimated at 3 trillion U.S. dollars, rather than the 50 billion dollars projected by the White House, according to a book co-authored by Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz and Harvard professor Linda Bilmes.

"Terrorism still persists in Iraq, and it has crossed borders and become regional in the Middle East. We see what is happening in Syria and the countries of the region," said Hashim al-Shamma, a researcher in politics at the Iraqi Center for Legal Development, a non-governmental organization.

"The United States uses its counter-terrorism policy as an excuse to justify the failure of some of its policies," said the expert.

In addition to the two full-scale wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, Bush also waged a vast, global intelligence operation in a bid to hunt down and kill terrorists, as well as protect the United States from future attacks.

On May 2, 2011, Osama bin Laden, the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 terror attacks, was killed in a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, in a raid by a U.S. Navy special forces team.

But terrorism, as U.S. President Joe Biden conceded, has "metastasized across the world" despite U.S. efforts to stop it.

Many of the U.S. assessments on the Middle East are "highly incorrect," said Mostafa Amin, an Egyptian researcher on terrorism and also a columnist at Egypt's Rosa El Youssef newspaper.

"The United States greatly contributes to fueling the conflicts, internal crises and wars in the Middle East region," he said.

"U.S. counter-terror efforts have achieved their main goal of preventing a large-scale foreign terrorism attack on the U.S. homeland," William Courtney, a retired U.S. ambassador and now an adjunct senior fellow at U.S. think tank RAND Corporation, told Xinhua.

However, concerns remain, especially over a potential terrorist attack involving a weapon of mass destruction, Courtney said.

"On the U.S. side, the U.S. failed to recognize that historically, for a great power, invading Afghanistan has always cost far more than (what) the country is worth to hold, and that was America's 20-year mistake," Clay Ramsay, a researcher at the center for international and security studies at the University of Maryland, told Xinhua.





MOST DISASTROUS ERA OF U.S. FOREIGN POLICY

While the initial intent of the Afghanistan invasion was to kill or capture bin Laden, its mission developed gradually, experts said. Over the years, the United States had tried to set up U.S.-style democratic institutions in the country. And it failed.

Taliban members are seen on a military vehicle on the street in Kandahar city, southern Afghanistan, Sept. 1, 2021. (Photo by Sanaullah Seaim/Xinhua)

One part of the U.S. anti-terror strategy was founded on the supposedly "enlightened" idea that "if certain Muslim majority states could be converted into Western-style democracies, then the spawning ground of Islamic fanaticism would be subsumed by a modern Islam and in this way terrorism would be greatly reduced," Robert Lawrence Kuhn, chairman of the Kuhn Foundation told Xinhua.

This strategy was flawed partly because "the Western-style democracy was not suited to the cultural and religious traditions of these countries. Much American blood was spilled and treasure spent in failed missions in Iraq and Afghanistan that caused much suffering," Kuhn said.

He added that one geopolitical theme a historian of the future might characterize the past 20 years is "the end of the American vision of democratizing the world."

Gupta branded the last 20 years as "the ending of an age when America sought to remake the world to its image on the cheap."

"I would submit that the past 20 years, and more broadly the years since the end of the Cold War, will rank among the most disastrous eras in the history of U.S. foreign policy," he said.

Two decades after 9/11, "the world order is no better off and America certainly much poorer off -- reputationally and fiscally," Gupta said.

"The faith that America can naturally go from strength to strength economically, and that every successive generation of Americans can aspire to a better life, has taken a cold shower," Gupta said.

According to the expert, U.S. annual GDP growth registered an average of 3.9 percent over the last six decades of the 20th century.

"During the past two decades, it has struggled to break the 2-percent mark. And this is in spite of the federal government's debt-to-GDP ratio tripling in just 15 years and breaching the problematic 100-percent threshold," he said.

After the Cold War, the United States "could have chosen global leadership by consensus," but it chose to "impose on the world an America-dictated vision of order," Gupta said.

America had the world's sympathy and support after it was attacked, he said. "Yet, the U.S. pressed ahead into Afghanistan with its 'my way or the highway' style and has now departed Afghanistan again in its 'my way or the highway' style."





LESSONS TO BE DRAWN

"Looking ahead, when the next terrorist attacks come, will presidents be able to channel public demand for revenge by precise targeting, explaining the trap that terrorists set for us, and focusing on creating resilience in American responses?" Nye said.

"Twenty years after 9/11, these are the lessons we should be learning and the plans we should be making," he stressed.

As a counterfactual history of the past 20 years, imagine what the world would be like if (former) President Bush had avoided the tempting rallying cry of a global war on terror and responded to 9/11 by carefully selected military strikes combined with good intelligence and diplomacy, he suggested.

U.S. intelligence had failed to prevent the 9/11 attacks, analysts and historians said, because the U.S. intelligence community had failed to share information between various agencies.

As global security threats remain, the need for cooperation among major powers has become more urgent in order to effectively address such challenges as climate change and communicable disease, Courtney said.

According to Gupta, "two fundamental lessons" need to be drawn from the last two decades for better global governance.

First, "the age when America's shoulders were broad enough to carry the world economy and maintain global order single-handedly is decisively over," Gupta said.

"This requires all parties to rededicate themselves once again to a UN-centered global system," with more responsibility on major countries to make cooperation a success, he explained.

A COVID-19 disaster morgue made up of refrigerated trailers stands at the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal during the COVID-19 pandemic in the Brooklyn borough of New York, United States, Dec. 14, 2020. (Photo by Michael Nagle/Xinhua)

Second, global challenges like climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic require global solutions, he added. "At a time of flux in the international system, it is difficult to muster this cooperation -- given disagreements about the distribution of benefits and burdens."

"Yet, lacking this cooperation, all parties will decidedly be far worse off," he said. "And hence the systemic order must find ways to avoid the 'Kindleburger Trap' and instead ensure that the major incumbent powers and the major emerging powers, in concert and individually, provide their fair share of global public goods."

(Xinhua reporters Zhang Miao in Baghdad and Wu Danni in Cairo also contributed to the story.) (Video reporters: Hu Yousong, Tan Yixiao, Liu Pinran, Li Xiaopeng, Pan Geping, Shi Zhongyu, Zheng Yihan, Zhang Miao, Jiang Chao, Shi Xiantao, Wu Danni, Li Binian, Yang Yiran, Yu Fuqing; video editors: Liu Xiaorui, Chen Sihong, Zhang Yucheng, Yang Zhixiang)
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 20:40:40|Editor: huaxia

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ADDIS ABABA, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF)/Doctors Without Borders, an international medical humanitarian organization, has suspended its activities in parts of Ethiopia following an order by Ethiopian authorities.

The MSF said it has suspended all activities in the Amhara, Gambella and Somali regions of Ethiopia, as well as in the west and northwest of conflict-hit Tigray region, to comply with a three-month suspension order from the Ethiopian Agency for Civil Society Organizations (ACSO) on July 30.

On receipt of the order, MSF undertook all required action to comply with ACSO's request while their investigation is ongoing, including putting all medical and humanitarian programs into full suspension for a period of three months, the MSF said in a statement sent to Xinhua Saturday.

"At short-notice, patients have been discharged from MSF clinics, leaving people in these locations with even further limited access to healthcare," the organization said.

According to the MSF, in the first six months of 2021, its teams provided 212,000 men, women and children with outpatient consultations, admitted 3,900 individuals for specialized care, provided 3,300 people with mental health consultations and assisted 1,500 women in the delivery of their babies across the four regions where MSF has now suspended its activities.

"The order to suspend our medical and humanitarian assistance comes at a time when the humanitarian needs in Ethiopia are enormous, with millions of people in need of food, water, shelter and access to healthcare across the country," the statement read.

While MSF was asked to suspend its activities in specific locations, it continues to run medical and humanitarian services in the capital of Addis Ababa, Guji area in the Oromia region, Southern Nations, Nationalities and People's Region (SNNPR), and southeast Tigray, it was noted. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 21:00:28|Editor: huaxia

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NAIROBI, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- When white-fluffy balls held by shrubby plants started to disappear from farms in Kenya's eastern lowlands almost three decades ago, so did processors, cooperatives alongside other key value chain actors who had kept the wheels of the cotton industry turning.

As time progressed, the scenario would extend to the rest of the 24 cotton-growing regions in the country, rendering farmers destitute amid lost income.

Fortunately, despite the previous sorry state of affairs, the white cash crop is looking to reclaim its position among Kenya's top foreign exchange earners thanks to sustained efforts to scale up the adoption of improved varieties.

"I am currently growing the new hybrid seed made available by the government last year. It is high yielding and fast-maturing, better than the conventional HART 89 variety," said Milton Katia, a veteran cotton farmer.

Farmers hailed the rollout of new certified seeds to replace the long-standing conventional seed in the past year even as they anticipate the end of misfortunes that had bedeviled the cotton sub-sector for decades.

The government in 2019 approved the commercial cultivation of genetically modified cotton, after recording positive results from field trials carried out within five years.

Subsequently, last year, an initial one metric tonne of Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis) seed and 16 metric tons of hybrid variety imported from India were distributed to farmers in traditional cotton growing zones.

The new varieties are envisioned to stimulate the dormant textile and apparel industry in addition to contributing to growth of the local manufacturing sector. The average production of cotton is also forecast to climb up from 20,000 bales (about 4,340 metric tons) per year to around 200,000 bales.

The improved seeds are costing farmers like Katia less in terms of farm inputs, making the trade attractive again. "With the old seed, I would need to spray more than ten times to protect the plant but the hybrid cuts that down to just 3-4 sprays saving me on farm inputs," said Katia.

During his last harvest around August, Katia attained 30 bags of cotton each weighing 35 kg on a tract of 0.41 hectare on his farm. He affirmed that the yield was a great improvement from what he normally received from the non-Bt hybrid.

The farmer said that the crop is indispensable to farmers in the region due to its ecological ability to endure hot weather conditions.

Peter King'oo, manager of a ginnery in southeastern Kenyan county of Makueni, said the new cotton varieties will steer the sector toward a profitable path. He commended the government's efforts geared toward reviving cotton growth but noted that more needs to be done to realize the full potential of the industry.

"To ensure the industry remains robust, the government needs to guarantee farmers favorable prices, in addition to engaging farmers on good pesticide practices. For instance, some cotton Bt farmers assume the plant should not be sprayed at all," said Kingo'oo.

The genetically modified seed has been improved with BT (Bacillus thuringiensis) gene to provide inherent resistance to a damaging caterpillar pest popularly known as bollworm. African bollworm has been unanimously identified as the biggest headache for cotton farmers.

Kenya joins South Africa, Eswatini, Malawi, Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Sudan in allowing for the commercial cultivation of genetically modified cotton.

The cotton supply chain started experiencing difficulties around 1990 when trade was liberalized rendering the agency tasked with cotton management ineffective. Since then, farmers have been grappling with poor seeds, low prices, and chronic pest attacks, while ginneries have been running with obsolete machines and insufficient material to match operation capacity.

Meanwhile, Kenya has announced its intention to start producing Bt cotton seeds to meet soaring local demands. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 21:17:21|Editor: huaxia

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ADDIS ABABA, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Ethiopians on Saturday marked the first day of the Ethiopian New Year, as the East African country welcomed the year 2014 with hope for national harmony and peaceful coexistence.

The Ethiopian New Year, or Enkutatash in Amharic language, falls on Sept. 11 (or Sept. 12 during a leap year).

The East African nation uses a unique calendar, which counts its year seven to eight years behind the Gregorian calendar. Presently, the country is celebrating the arrival of the year of 2014.

As the just concluded Ethiopian 2013 witnessed a deadly conflict that erupted in the country's Northernmost Tigray regional state between government and rebel forces which is now expanded to neighboring Afar and Amhara regions, Ethiopians are now welcoming the New Year relatively in a feeble mood than ever.

In addition to hoping to see an end for the recently expanding conflict, Ethiopians are anticipating the just started 2014 to bring about better market conditions exacerbated by the socioeconomic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In the capital of Addis Ababa, the disruptions and price hikes are highly visible across markets, with soaring prices for festive commodities across holiday markets witnessed by Xinhua journalists.

Often, a community or a village will pool money to slaughter a cow (worth about 1,000 U.S. dollars) in groups, while each household can choose to slaughter a less expensive sheep (about 130 U.S. dollars).

Abraham Alehegn, 39, who was out at the Shola live animal market in Addis Ababa along with his neighbors on the eve of the holiday, complained that the market is rising "beyond our expectation and financial capabilities."

"I was here yesterday hoping to buy a sheep or goat. Unfortunately, the price range was not something close to my financial capabilities," he told Xinhua Friday. "We thought the price would somehow normalize today, yet, as you see, it's not getting any lower."

Alehegn, along with his neighbors, is now looking for a cow to share in a group at a cheaper price instead.

Meaza Molalet, who was at the market to purchase hen and other poultry products, stressed that the market disruption would normalize if the country comes to harmony with an end to the ongoing conflict in parts of the country.

"I believe the current condition is attributed to the challenges we are facing, mainly the conflict and the Coronavirus. I hope both market and other socioeconomic conditions will improve once the country becomes peaceful," she stressed.

The Ethiopian Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed, who is celebrating the New Year with members of the Ethiopian National Defense Forces traveling to the frontline, assured Ethiopians that the just-started Ethiopian 2014 will mark better conditions, with an end to the ongoing conflict.

Since the early hours of Nov. 4, the Ethiopian government has been undertaking military operations against forces loyal to the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) after the TPLF forces attacked the Northern Command of the Ethiopian army stationed in the Tigray region.

ETHIOPIAN NEW YEAR

Ethiopian New Year brings an extended family together to attend a series of events, including the slaughtering of livestock, either a sheep, goat, or cow, depending on a household's financial condition.

Ethiopia has its own calendar with 13 months, and each of the 12 months has 30 days, while the 13th month called Pagumen has five days, which becomes six in each leap year.

Enkutatash is literally translated as "gift of jewels," a name that derives from the story of the Queen of Sheba, the ancient queen of Ethiopia.

Ethiopian New Year comes at the time when the heavy rainfall starts to cease, and the bright sun comes to shine over the green land, which is also covered by the golden flower, known in Amharic language as "Adey Abeba."

As it comes with change of season, the New Year in Ethiopia is celebrated with new hope, and the people are making special preparations.

Enkutatash marks the end of the three-month rainy season, when bright autumn days return to the vastly highland nation. On the night of the eve, each household or neighbors light wooden torches in groups called "chibo" to symbolize the coming of the new season of sunshine.

Steeped in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church traditions, Enkutatash celebrations usually begin with church activities. New Year church programs start some time after midnight on the eve and last into the next morning.

Coffee ceremony is an integral part of the celebration. The ritual of coffee serving and drinking, which can last for hours, is an important social occasion offering reunion for relatives and friends and a chance to discuss community matters while enjoying top-notch coffee.

To be invited to a coffee ceremony in an Ethiopian family is a sign of great respect.

Enkutatash is also a special day for children. They gather in groups and go from house to house -- girls play the Amharic song "Abebaye Hoy," meaning "I have seen flowers," with hand drums, while boys often present pictures painted by themselves -- with expectations of praise and gifts.

For children, the new attire from parents and gifts from community members are undoubtedly the most expected thing of Enkutatash. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 12:09:31|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Saturday marks the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks, which ushered in a global war on terror. Despite the progress made in international efforts to fight terrorism, the world remains beset with its tangible threats.

If history is any guide, military predominance and hegemony cannot eliminate terrorism. Nor are double standards and selective counterterrorism conducive to the global fight against terrorism.

Mankind has entered a new era of interconnectedness, with countries sharing intertwined interests and their future interwoven together. As a result, the pressing global threat of terrorism requires holistic global responses, said experts.

"International terrorism is a global threat that no country acting alone can defeat it. The world needs a collective action to counter this threat," Rommel Banlaoi, chairman of the Philippine Institute for Peace, Violence and Terrorism Research, told Xinhua.

"The world needs a collective action to counter this threat. China has exemplary practices in countering terrorism that need to be shared with the whole world," Banlaoi said.

While the root causes of terrorism are complex and profound, involving political, economic, social and cultural factors, the blatant interference in a state's internal affairs and hegemonic actions to protect one's own security at the cost of others' stability are undoubtedly among the key factors.

Five days after the 9/11 terror attacks, then U.S. President George W. Bush announced U.S. "War on Terror," a blanket term for all preemptive military strikes meant to reduce the threat terrorism posed to the U.S. homeland. The first U.S. move was the invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001, which began a war that only comes to its end recently.

In the following two decades, Washington and its allies have launched invasion into Iraq based on deplorable lies, as well as military interference in countries including Libya and Syria, all under the guise of counter-terrorism.

Though wars launched by the United States and its allies may have yielded immediate success, such outcomes have proved to be short-lived at best. Lamentable injustice and civilian casualties brought about by western interference and hegemonism have created a breeding ground for radicalisation and violent extremism.

Take U.S.-Britain invasion of Iraq as an example. Throughout the year 2002, Washington claimed that then Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was allied with terrorists and developing "weapons of mass destruction."

Despite strong opposition from the international community and scant evidence that Iraq was developing nuclear or chemical weapons, the United States and Britain went ahead with the invasion and toppled the Iraqi government.

What followed were years of insurgency and sectarian violence, and according to The Atlantic, "most historians of the Islamic State agree that the group emerged out of al-Qaida in Iraq as a response to the U.S. invasion in 2003."

"I believe that the military occupation and the devastation, destruction, economic and social effects it leaves behind, and the targeting of the central power of countries, creates a suitable environment for terrorist organizations to exist and grow in these countries," Muhammad Omari, a Syrian political expert, told Xinhua.

The two-decade-long war on terror has taught the world that security should be universal and embrace all countries. It is impossible to maintain the security of one or some countries while leaving the rest insecure. What is more, no country should seek the so-called absolute security of itself at the expense of the security of other countries.

Some observers of the global security status have also voiced concern about how double standards and selective counterterrorism can hinder global cooperation on fighting terrorism.

Although the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) is an internationally recognized terrorist group listed by the United Nations Security Council, Washington flip-flopped on the UN designation in November 2020 by removing the ETIM from its list of terrorist organizations, and brazenly whitewashed the terror group.

The employment of double standards has shown that actions taken by the United States are not credible, said Syed Hasan Javed, director of the Chinese Studies Center at Pakistan's National University of Sciences and Technology.

"It also sends a message to the world that they are grading terrorist organizations in the view of their own interests. It shows that the terrorist groups are being banned on the basis of religions and ethnicities, but not on the actual terrorism they are involved in," he said. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 12:16:50|Editor: huaxia

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UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Saturday issued a statement to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States.

"Today we mark a somber day seared in the minds of millions of people around the world -- a day when nearly 3,000 lives from over 90 countries were taken by terrorists in cowardly and heinous attacks in the United States of America. Thousands more were injured," Guterres said in the statement.

"On this day, my thoughts are with the victims and their families. We pay tribute to the survivors, who have had to overcome physical and emotional scars to get on with their lives. We honor the first responders who put themselves in harm's way, with many making the ultimate sacrifice, exemplifying the very humanity and compassion that terrorism seeks to erase," he said. "And we remember the solidarity, unity and resolve expressed 20 years ago by the international community, aiming for a future without terrorism."

"Today, we stand in solidarity with the people of New York City, the United States of America, as well as all victims of terrorism everywhere around the world. We recommit ourselves to work together to uphold their rights and needs," said Guterres. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 13:09:05|Editor: huaxia

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HAVANA, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The Communist Party of Cuba (PCC) has condemned attempts by the United States to manipulate the origins tracing of COVID-19 for political gains, according to a statement published Friday on the PCC's website.

The so-called report on the origins of COVID-19 compiled by the U.S. intelligence community recently politicizes, stigmatizes, and singularizes COVID-19 origins, Juan Carlos Marsan Aguilera, deputy head of the International Relations Department of the PCC Central Committee, was quoted as saying.

During an online meeting of the Sao Paulo Forum (FSP) held Thursday, the official said, "the U.S. intention to blame the People's Republic of China for the origins of the virus is another attempt by the North American nation to manipulate the COVID-19 crisis to benefit their political interests."

He said the U.S. report lacks scientific evidence and clarity, adding the joint report on origins tracing done by the World Health Organization and Chinese scientists in early 2021 has laid out scientific, professional and authorized conclusions.

A declaration issued on Thursday after the meeting highlighted "China's efforts to provide vaccines to various countries, including Latin America, as an important contribution to global cooperation in the fight against pandemics."

"The virus knows no borders or nations. Only with the solidarity of the entire international community can we be victorious against the virus," the declaration said.

"The union of all countries, respecting international solidarity and cooperation, is fundamental at this time to be victorious in the face of the pandemic and overcome this difficult moment in our history, laying the foundations for a better future for all humanity," it added. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 22:07:31|Editor: huaxia

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by Xinhua writer Liu Pinran

WASHINGTON, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- "I didn't feel safe really until I got onto the main highway to drive home," recalled Alexander Neill, who was working in a U.S. Department of Defense building when a hijacked passenger plane smashed into a corner of the Pentagon nearby just outside Washington, D.C. exactly 20 years ago.

The incident Neill, then a British analyst on a secondment to the U.S. government, was speaking of during a Zoom interview with Xinhua this week was one of the terror attacks that more than a dozen militants associated with the Islamic extremist group al-Qaida perpetrated that morning against the United States.

Neill said he and his colleagues felt first "an utter shock" seeing footage from a television in their office that two planes were flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in downtown Manhattan, New York City. Then, it turned "scary" after "all of the phone lines lit up" and they "heard immediately" that the Pentagon, considered a symbol of America's powerful military apparatus, had also been struck by a plane.

It quickly came to their understanding that their office, along with other U.S. government buildings, including the White House and the Capitol, might have also been targeted. "We suddenly felt very exposed as well," Neill remembered. "It was probably the most vulnerable I've ever felt in terms of a physical threat."

After given an instruction to leaving the building, non-essential staff swarmed to the Pentagon's enormous, open-air parking lot, where cars lined up to evacuate and caused a traffic jam. Neill said there was "a sense of panic" because nobody knew at the time whether there were going to be further attacks.

A young analyst then aged 26, Neill didn't start to "breathe and exhale" until he was driving on the highway heading to his residence in Maryland, an eastern state neighboring the U.S. capital, at which he switched on the television and watched news coverage, while trying to make contact with his families and friends.

Neill's girlfriend then and now his wife, Hanna, was in New York City for the first day of a new job at the press office of the United Nations (UN) headquarters on the eastern side of Manhattan, before the deadliest terror attacks on the U.S. soil in its history, during which almost 3,000 people were killed, unfolded.

Initially, Neill had no way contacting Hanna due to a temporary stoppage of phone service between Washington, D.C. and New York City, but he managed to find out that she was safe by reaching out to her father, who was in central European country Poland for a business trip, because Hanna also called her father. Neill directly connected with Hanna the next day and learned that her experience was "actually pretty crazy."

According to Neill's account, Hanna was probably traveling past the World Trade Center on a subway around the moment the skyscrapers were hit. After the UN headquarters was evacuated, she and her colleagues took shelter in an apartment in Manhattan, from which they could see a cloud of black smoke rising from the other end of the densely populated island.

At the end of the day, Hanna decided to go back to her flat in Brooklyn, which is separated from Manhattan by the East River. With no public transportation in service, she had to spend hours walking home, like many others did that day, amid the unpleasant smell of toxic dust and fume spreading from what has been called "Ground Zero."

"The smoke was blowing over the river and blowing over Brooklyn," Neill said. "It's awful because it was not just like a normal wood fire or something. It was a chemical fire with all kinds of toxins in it, as well as the dust from the concrete, from the buildings... The smoke was a sort of awful cocktail of horrid ingredients."

In a speech addressing Congress on Sept. 20, 2001, then U.S. President George W. Bush announced the "War on Terror." U.S.-led coalition forces began military operations in Afghanistan that October and swiftly toppled the Taliban but failed to capture al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, who remained at large until May 2011, when he was tracked down and killed by U.S. forces at a hideout in Pakistan.

The warfare was "mixed with a wave of intense patriotism in the United States" and "many people just simply wanted revenge against bin Laden and the Taliban at the time," observed Neill, who has been a Shangri-La Dialogue Senior Fellow for Asia Pacific security at the Singapore branch of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a British research institute, since 2013.

"There was the frustration and revenge kicked in within the U.S. system," he noted.

The military undertaking under the banner of counterterrorism expanded into Iraq in 2003 after the United States and its allies invaded the oil-rich country based on what later proved to be flawed intelligence that Saddam Hussein's government had possessed or were developing weapons of mass destruction. The West also accused the regime of having ties to al-Qaida.

Neill said he thinks "probably the most difficult or the turning points" in the retribution against al-Qaida was when the United States "got sucked into a very drawn-out counter-insurgency campaign" in both Afghanistan and Iraq.

"I was rather perplexed by the decision to go into Iraq on what appeared to be very thin evidence," he argued. "The United States opening a conflict on two fronts really muddied the waters. It really kind of perhaps diverted strategic attention when the attention should have been towards bin Laden and his organization."

A major consequence of the military quagmire is that the Islamic State (IS) emerged from the remnants of al-Qaida in Iraq. At its height, the extremist militant group, also known as ISIS, ISIL, or Daesh, held about a third of Syria and 40 percent of Iraq.

In 2015, the IS expanded into a network of affiliates in at least eight other countries and its branches and supporters increasingly carried out attacks beyond the borders of its so-called caliphate, an article published by U.S. think tank The Wilson Center in 2019 showed.

Years of military actions against the IS, including airstrikes conducted by U.S.-led coalition since 2014, have substantially reduced the group's territory but its affiliates and militants are still active in various countries and regions to this day.

"Launching a big war of intervention and consequently Iraq becoming an ungoverned space, eventually offered sanctuary for al-Qaida. And that, you could argue, eventually gave rise to the Islamic State," Neill pointed out, adding that he's upset to see what has happened and "the suffering that's continued in places like Syria and Iraq as well."

Other problems of the "War on Terror," which reportedly has cost the United States at least 8 trillion U.S. dollars and resulted in approximately 900,000 deaths, included that it had deviated from the original course and been used by America as a tool to export its values, according to Neill.

The "War on Terror," he said, had been driven by the intention to "perpetuate the values that the United States imbues in its society," and had become conflated with Washington's pursuit of remodeling other countries at its will. Those egocentric efforts turned out to be futile and led to a rise of anti-America sentiments in countries it had invaded or implicated.

While stressing that terrorism would not be defeated easily, Neill, who's running an advisory consultancy in Singapore, urged efforts to understand what has nurtured the breeding ground for the problem both at home and abroad.

"For every extremist who is killed, there'll be somebody to replace them... This problem is not going to go away," he warned. "Terrorism is rather like a virus, and it will find ways to beat its adversary in very creative ways, and we have to be ready for that." Enditem

(Xinhua reporters Sun Ding and Ma Qian in Beijing also contributed to the story.)
TWO poachers from Binga have appeared in court for allegedly killing a lion before attempting to sell the skin.

Wankie Sibanda (65) and Dickson Mumpande (48) both from Binga under Chief Siabuwa were arrested by alert police detectives who had gotten wind that the duo was selling the lions skin.

They were not asked to plead when they appeared before Gokwe Magistrate Mr Hillary Ndlovu facing charges of contravening the Parks and Wildlife Act. They were remanded out of custody to October 5 as they await a Tonga interpreter.

Representing the State, Mr Tinashe Wazvaremhaka told the court that sometime between June 6 and September 9, the two accused persons hunted a lion near a dam in Binga and killed it.

They then tried to sell the skin as well as the teeth of the lion.

Police detectives got wind that the two accused were in possession of a lion skin and contacted them purporting to be buyers. The police detectives in the company of Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Authority (Zimparks) rangers, then proceeded to Chitekete where they met with the Sibanda and Mumpande, said Mr Wazvaremhaka.

After agreeing a fee of US$2 800, Sibanda unknowingly led the detectives and Zimparks rangers to where Mumpande was waiting with a 90kg sack containing the lion skin and teeth.

The two accused people were subsequently arrested after they failed to produce the required documents.

A lion skin weighing 4,6 kilogrammes, its fat weighing 1,025kg and 7 teeth were recovered and kept as exhibit. Chronicle
ZANU PF has reiterated its commitment to work with Zambias ruling party, the United Party for National Development (UNPD), to help foster close cooperation on matters of mutual interest.

Since UPND took over power in Zambia last month, there have been attempts by some quarters to drive a wedge between the two parties.

In a statement, ZANU PF secretary for administration Dr Obert Mpofu said the revolutionary party respects Zambias sovereignty.

From the outset, His Excellency, President Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa, gave outright support to an absolute constitutional execution of the recent Zambian election. To this end, the First Secretary and President of ZANU PF, Cde ED Mnangagwa, was an instrumental arbiter in influencing the then incumbent Cde Edgar Lungu to concede to the winds of change, said Dr Mpofu.

Guided by our Presidents symbolic gestures in endorsing the will of the people in Zambia, it would be remiss for anyone to think that ZANU PF has an unexpressed sense of resentment about the outcome of Zambias recent plebiscite.

It must be underscored that ZANU PF is a pro-democracy adherent party. Also worth underscoring is our total respect for the sovereignty of other fellow African nations.

The ruling party said it has no business in attacking neighbouring states. ZANU PF, Dr Mpofu added, had deep-rooted connections to Zambia.

Our consistency in this respect has a clear historical track record anchored on the diplomatic relations, which Zimbabwe has enjoyed between the interval political epochs of Father Kenneth Kaunda and Edgar Lungus reign.

We have been consistent in meeting all our diplomatic obligations with the Republic of Zambia with no bias exertions on any of Zambias Heads of State over the years.

Our seasoned political experience would never permit us to be drawn to the narrow preferential sentimentalism on whoever is the President of Zambia or not. Sunday Mail
My hero and my guardian angel, she said. Although I never got the privilege to meet you, so many people tell me I remind them of you in so many ways. And Im so honored to have your name as my middle name. We love you and miss you.
A. If you divorce your husband before he gets permanent residence, he cant get a green card based on your petition. However, if he has asylum, he can apply for permanent residence as an asylee. If he wasnt granted asylum but has been in the United States since March 8, 2021 he may qualify for Temporary Protected Status for Venezuelans. That will protect him from deportation and allow him to work here.
DOB enforcement is of critical importance in promoting safety at construction sites, but the reality is we cant be in all places at all times, she said. To protect the lives of the working men and women who are building this city, we need our partners in the construction industry to step up and join us in pushing for enhanced round-the-clock supervision and greater accountability.
As the scooter was in the midst of its U-turn, it was struck by a 2014 Chevrolet sedan heading north on 43rd St., cops and sources said.
The bill signing was welcome news to the citys 1,400 dispatchers and operators, a group made up primarily of women of color who have often felt overlooked even though they are the first voices New Yorkers hear when they call 911 and are key in relaying critical information to cops, firefighters and EMS.
The two men  possibly cousins  were riding together on the bicycle at the intersection of Amsterdam Ave. and W. 99th St. just before 1:30 a.m. when they were struck by a dark-colored sedan that fled the scene.
The pair was riding west on the Long Island Expressway near Woodhaven Blvd. in Elmhurst about 5:15 a.m. when cops said they were both rear-ended by the driver of a silver sedan, which took off.
A 42-year-old man, who police believe was not the shooters intended target, was shot in the buttocks and taken to Kings County Hospital where he is expected to survive.
In recent weeks, The News has reported on a range of problems in the jail, including unstaffed units, lack of a broad range of services, five-day stretches in crowded cells before detainees are provided a bed, overlong periods in quarantine and the failure to produce detainees for court appearances. On Tuesday, Esias Johnson, 24, died in the Anna M. Kross Center, the 10th death in the jails since December.
NYPD data shows the number of major crimes reported in Transit District 4 this year through Aug. 16 fell slightly from the same period of 2020, from 125 to 115. But felony assaults in the district have shot up 56%, from 23 to 36, and two rapes were recorded in the district this year, compared with none at this point in 2020.
Granting these frontline heroes the designation of First Responders in Communications will demonstrate New York States respect for these workers while serving to boost morale, open training opportunities, and increase access to mental health treatment options, all of which have been proven effective in reducing attrition and turnover, according to the state Senate version of the bill.
Biden shouldnt come here. He doesnt belong here, Giuliani said during the event at WABC Radios studio in Midtown. Biden made a decision that was reckless to the point of almost insanity ... I mean, President Biden did probably one of the most reckless acts in American history, and then he continues it with more and more, and hes putting us through hell.
Criminal records unsealed this week said that when authorities questioned Newell at his cabin in July, he allegedly ingested a memory card he removed from the camera used in the alleged recordings, according to the outlet.
Surveillance footage showed a man approaching the woman from behind and pulling something from his pocket before pushing it against her, according to WJZ. The man could also be seen in the footage as he lunged at two other females.
He said that he was humiliated when he learned that Kuhnhausen was transgender, and after telling her to get out of his car, he was afraid she would reach out for his gun, which he said he always kept loaded.
Authorities did not publicly identify the man, who they said was nude and acting erratically, with Cole saying the man was handcuffed after authorities tried and failed to get him off the road, according to the paper.
I get a call yesterday, it was like, if every one of these videos are not taken offline you will be suspended, and then I texted them and Im like how long am I suspended for? They said till everything is removed online. I have no ability to do that, Sotelo said, adding that her employer is no longer returning her calls.
Malign forces at work in our common life that turn every disagreement into an argument and every argument into a clash of cultures. So much of our politics has become a naked appeal to anger, fear and resentment. That leaves us worried about our nation and our future together.
Our response to the attacks on 9/11 has taught us that there is no leadership without hope, and no hope without action. So today, we look to a new generation of ordinary heroes and leaders to inspire us to unify efforts to solve complex problems in the face of great tragedy, whether terrorism, violent extremism, climate change, natural disaster, pandemics, cyberattacks or other significant events. Only by coming together as we did on and after 9/11 can we deal with the next big challenge. Such heroism is what we should remember on the anniversary of 9/11 because sooner or later, each of us will be presented with a moment to be an ordinary hero.
The Hollywood stars reunion is no secret to paparazzi that have chased them down in recent weeks, snapping photos and sharing gossip all over the map. On Friday, she rocked Cartier, he dazzled in Dolce & Gabbana and they both lit up the night with ear-to-ear grins.
She continued: But yeah, I didnt want to change who she was. And again, when you really start blending your personal self with your character self, its even harder. Like, Im stereotyped for the rest of my life, lets just keep it 100. If you ever see me in another character, you see Raven Baxter and thats just what the deal is. And I think the one thing that differentiates me from her is now a lot more.
Corvallis, OR (97331)

Today

Sunshine and clouds mixed. High 76F. Winds N at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 44F. Winds NNW at 10 to 15 mph.
We look forward to reviewing the details related to todays (Thursdays) announcement of these new policies in regard to implementation, timing and the need for appropriate exceptions to accommodate medical and religious concerns, American Hospital Association President and CEO Rick Pollack said in the statement. As a practical matter, this policy may result in exacerbating the severe workforce shortage problems that currently exist. Consequently, given the critical challenges that we are facing in maintaining the resiliency of our workforce, and dealing with severe shortages, which the American Nurses Association has called a national crisis, we call on the administration to work with us as partners in developing aggressive and creative strategies to address this matter to ensure that hospitals and health systems on the front lines of fighting the battle against COVID-19 have the necessary human resources to both win this battle and maintain essential health services for the patients and communities we serve.
Country Thunder Florida opened at Osceola Heritage Park Sept. 10 with thousands of country fans gathered, many wearing cowboy hats and boots with drinks in hand. After a shower and lightning delayed Dallas Smith's set, the show went on with Lonestar, Lee Brice and Old Dominion kicking off the three-day festival in Kissimmee.

(Patrick Connolly)
But protecting the rights of those unmasked children could mean some children with disabilities are prevented from attending from school, the letter said. If they are, that would violate federal laws that protect against discrimination based on disability and guarantee children with disabilities the right to be educated in a regular education environment as much as possible, Goldberg wrote.
For many of us, thats our cemetery, he said. ... But you dont need a piece of the [World Trade Center] steel to look at a particular area and say that its sacred ground. Look at your firehouses, your police stations throughout this country. Those buildings were made sacred when sons and daughters raised their hands and swore to do for all of us today, if necessary, what my son did for his country and the people of the city of New York.
The theme here is Never Forget, Chevalier said. Most of these kids in high school werent even born, so they think its normal to go to the airport and take your belt and your shoes off. So we want them to know that theres been a marker in time that changed the way you and I operate, how our country looks at things  its all different because of that day.
Oswego, NY (13126)

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Cloudy with periods of rain. High 68F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

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Cloudy skies this evening will become partly cloudy after midnight. Low 57F. Winds light and variable.
News and commentary on organized crime, street crime, white collar crime, cyber crime, sex crime, crime fiction, crime prevention, espionage and terrorism.
If you were looking for the Charlestown Democratic Town Committee website and ended up here, try this





Got news tips, gossip, suggestions, complaints?E-mail us: progressivecharlestown@gmail.com We strive to avoid errors in our articles. Our correction policy can be found here
Starkville, MS (39762)

Today

Cloudy skies. High 77F. Winds ESE at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Cloudy skies early, then off and on rain showers overnight. Low 68F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 40%.
A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind.
By SA Commercial Prop News

In his budget speech, finance minister Pravin Gordhan lashed out, asking why the commercial property sector wasnt honest in negotiating rentals with government.



The department of public works spends over R3bn/year leasing office space in privately owned buildings on behalf of national government departments.

A review of these leases confirms government is being fleeced. Cabinet is outraged but shouldnt be because irregular leases are the main reason the departments audit opinions have got steadily worse over eight years and are now in the disclaimer zone.

The Department of Public Works (DPW) and National Treasury wont give figures on how much government is losing on leases; some officials believe the cost could be cut by 50% with better management.



The lease review flags how government is paying for accommodation thats unoccupied or thats occupied by non-governmental organisations. In other cases its paying rentals that exceed the going rate per square metre. Leases are also being entered into without adherence to the required procurement system or valid lease agreements.



In his budget speech, finance minister Pravin Gordhan lashed out, asking why the commercial property sector wasnt honest in negotiating rentals with government.



But the SA Property Owners Association (SAPOA) says Gordhans comment was unjustified because the real problem is governments own inefficiency and mismanagement.

Sapoa says this is made worse by public works property management strategy, a black economic empowerment job creation and poverty alleviation policy which has limited fair market competition.

It has not helped that the department, which should have strong negotiating power, has been unwilling to engage with listed and institutional property owners.
By SA Commercial Prop News

More than 600 poor households in Limpopo's Mutale area will receive RDP houses by April next year.

Mutale local municipality mayor Tshitereke Matibe made the announcement during a public participation meeting in Makuya-Domboni village, outside Mutale at the weekend.

"The 620 RDP houses will be built this financial year... We urge our ward councillors in our 13 wards to help identify the needy, poor and homeless people so that we can speed up the delivery of houses. We want our poor communities to own and live in decent houses that we will build," said Matibe.

The community members clapped enthusiastically in response to the announcement.

The meeting also included officials from Home Affairs, the South African Social Security Agency, Government Communication and Information System and the Vhembe district municipality as well as the regional Education Department.

Local companies were encouraged to register on the municipality's database.

Vhembe district mayor Lucas Manyuha announced that the district would spend R373 million on water and sanitation projects this financial year.

"We are a water services authority district municipality and we want to speedily deliver...water and sanitation services," said Manyuha.

The mayor added that the municipality will refurbish the Makuya Thusong Services Centre in Mutale and appoint cleaners to maintain it.

Regional Education Department representative Mukondeleli Makhari advised parents whose children walk more than 5km to school to inform the department.

"This will help them benefit from the department's scholar transport system," said Makhari.

Community member Calvin Likhithwa told the delegates that water shortages were a serious problem in rural villages.

"We are forced to share water with animals," said Likhithwa.
"Bhoot Police" director Pavan Kirpalani has heaped praises on the actors of his film Saif Ali Khan and Arjun Kapoor. He says that the two were a perfect cast to portray Vibhooti and Chiraunji and that it's almost like a dream come true to get these brilliant actors to play the characters.

Kirpalani said: "Saif Ali Khan and Arjun Kapoor are the perfect cast to portray Vibhooti and Chiraunji, it's almost like a dream come true to get these two brilliant actors to play these characters. Vibhooti is tailor-made for Saif, everything about Vibhooti fits Saif like a glove, he's owned and took the character to the next level.

He shared: "In my books Vibhooti is Saif's one of best performances, he owns the character."

Kirpalani added that Arjun brought such gravitas and heart to Chiraunji and has elevated the character beyond what was written.

He added: "Together both Saif-Arjun are a formidable pair, they literally have made each other's performance a lot better because of their interplay, their friction, and the love that they have for each other, it played out really well. It's really amazing to have these two talented actors in the film, they brought life to the reel brothers".

'Bhoot Police' also stars Jacqueline Fernandez, Yami Gautam, Jaaved Jaafri, and Jamie Lever in pivotal roles.

The movie released on September 10 on Disney+ Hotstar.


Drawing a parallel with how the global footprint of Hollywood had impacted the French, German and Italian film industries, Bollywood actress Kangana Ranaut said at a recent media conference here that it must not be allowed to grow in India at the expense of regional cinema. Kangana was in the national capital to promote the movie 'Thalaivii', which was released this Friday in Hindi, Tamil and Telugu. The movie is about the life of the late J. Jayalalithaa, who served as the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister for more than 14 years. Kangana urged film exhibitors not to be impacted by Hollywood to such an extent that they start moving away from regional cinema. She said: "Like Hollywood has destroyed other industries, it is trying to overtake us. We must encourage regional cinema and promote dubbed versions of films in Malayalam or Tamil or Punjabi or other languages, than just showing the dubbed versions of 'Jungle Book' or 'Lion King'. This will be our contribution to the making of 'Atmanirbhar Bharat'." When asked about that one quality of the late leader she would like to imbibe, Kangana said: "Her foremost trait was her strong determination, which enabled her to accept challenges and became the chief minister of Tamil Nadu."




UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Saturday issued a statement to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the US which claimed the lives of almost 3,000 people.

"Today we mark a somber day seared in the minds of millions of people around the world, a day when nearly 3,000 lives from over 90 countries were taken by terrorists in cowardly and heinous attacks in the United States of America. Thousands more were injured," Guterres said in the statement.

"On this day, my thoughts are with the victims and their families. We pay tribute to the survivors, who have had to overcome physical and emotional scars to get on with their lives. We honour the first responders who put themselves in harm's way, with many making the ultimate sacrifice, exemplifying the very humanity and compassion that terrorism seeks to erase.

"And we remember the solidarity, unity and resolve expressed 20 years ago by the international community, aiming for a future without terrorism.

"Today, we stand in solidarity with the people of New York City, the United States of America, as well as all victims of terrorism everywhere around the world.

"We recommit ourselves to work together to uphold their rights and needs," Guterres added.

The September 11, 2001, attacks were a series of four coordinated terrorist attacks carried out by the Al Qaeda terror group.

Four commercial planes were hijacked by 19 Al Qaeda terrorists.

The first plane to hit its target was American Airlines Flight 11. It was flown into the North Tower of the World Trade Center complex in Lower Manhattan.

Seventeen minutes later, the World Trade Center's South Tower was hit by United Airlines Flight 175.

Both 110-storey towers collapsed within an hour and 42 minutes, leading to the collapse of the other World Trade Center structures and damaging surrounding buildings.

The third plane, American Airlines Flight 77, crashed into the west side of the Pentagon causing a partial collapse of the building's side.

The fourth jet, United Airlines Flight 93 which was flown in the direction of Washington, D.C., was the only onenot to hit its intended target, instead crashing in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

It was later determined that Flight 93's target was either the White House or the Capitol.

A total of 2,996 people were killed in the attacks, which were the deadliest in human history, with more than 25,000 others injured.
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Radio ham receives distress call from vessel Kahoku News reports on August 21 a Japanese radio amateur received a distress call from a vessel off the the coast of Niigata prefecture



A translation of the post reads:



In late August, Amateur Radio enthusiast Yukio Sakurai, 59, of Matsuyama, Osaki City, Miyagi prefecture, received a distress call from a small ship drifting off the coast of Niigata prefecture, and worked with other enthusiasts to gather information, leading to the rescue of two crew members by the Niigata coast guard (Niigata city).



Around 8:45 p.m. on August 21, Sakurai caught a noise-mixed voice called "SOS, SOS" at the Hokotaki Trailhead Parking Lot (Hokkaho City) on Mt. Toriumi, which straddles Akita and Yamagata prefectures. I thought about the possibility of mischief, but when I checked, it turned out to be received from a drifting ship, and I immediately called 110.



The report reached Niigata Kaiho via the 2nd District Coast Guard Headquarters (Shiogama City), but the small ship lost power and could not use the ship radio, and the crew's mobile phone did not pass. Niigata Kaiho also does not have amateur radio facilities.



Mr. Sakurai asked for the name of the crew and the status of the ship on Amateur Radio, which became the only means of communication, and conveyed information to the Marine Insurance through Amateur radio enthusiasts in Niigata Prefecture.



Based on the information, Niigata Kaiho searched the site area and found a small ship around 2:30 a.m. on The 22nd the following day. The other day, Sakurai continued to have communication with the crew and encouraged them to "do their best because we are going to rescue them from now on." Two men on the crew were not injured.



According to Niigata Kaiho, the ship is "The Seventh Shoryu Maru" (9.9 tons). A man from Okinawa prefecture broke down on his way back to Okinawa after purchasing in Hokkaido, drifting about 55 kilometers north-northeast of Sado City. A maritime security official said, "We were able to save lives by reporting appropriate information to the people concerned as soon as possible. We are very grateful."



Mr. Sakurai says, "I'm glad I happened to be in a place where radio waves in the Niigata area are easy to enter. I want you to know that Ama Radio is also useful for saving lives."



Source Kahoku News

https://kahoku.news/articles/20210906khn000028.html
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Dr. Marion Pepper, an associate professor of immunology at the University of Washington, studies immune memory and said vaccinated people are fighting off disease from coronavirus just as well as they did months ago. Even if antibodies levels drop, the bodys other cells are ramped up by the vaccine and kick in when they recognize a new virus attacking, she said while also participating in the Annenberg Center webinar.
Boynton Beach fire chief Jim Stables said the anniversary has widespread appeal because of how many lives were affected among first responders and civilians. Stables, who was a battalion chief of operations in Palm Bay, Fla., at the time, said the anniversary serves as a reminder that were upholding our promise to never forget. He also said the anniversary reminds him of the resilience of the United States citizens.
Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards said that 95,000 customers were still without electricity more than two weeks after Ida hit. And he said the new storm could mean some who had regained power might lose it again. Homes already badly damaged by Ida were not yet repaired to the extent that they could withstand heavy rain, Edwards added.
Living in another country is a dream, but also a struggle. It is important to stay optimistic even in the ongoing pandemic situation. Positive thinking and networking have helped British expat Martin Minor in his search for jobs and new businesses on the Costa del Sol.

Martin Minor moved to Spain 13 years ago and immediately fell in love with the cheerful coastline of Benalmadena. He remembers how he could hardly believe (after living in England) that the sun was "able" to shine almost all year round. The weather improved his mood and motivation.

This new environment kick-started Martin into trying something new professionally, after previously working in construction. Considering himself as a very open person he didn't mind knocking on any door, even expecting to hear 'no' to his suggestions. His communication skills helped him acquire new contacts leading to new experiences and job opportunities.

"Living in a very new and even totally foreign place needs much more effort than in your own country. My first house in Benalmadena was in Bonanza. It is a very British spot because there are lots of places to eat, to drink and to entertain in a very British way. I started helping to arrange tribute shows in one of the clubs in the area. Later, I became a manager and brought quite well-known British tribute artists to local hotels along the Costa and to the Rock. Besides welcoming 'stars', we were also scouting talents to produce and promote," he told SUR in English.

Britons in Spain often seem to dare only to start a real estate agency, a cleaning company or a restaurant business. And following that pattern, Martin also opened a cleaning company along with his Ukrainian partner.

"Cleaning services are something in demand in any tourist resort. My existing network was also useful, because word of mouth is the best ally in terms of advertising and can lead to the success of any business. Knowing this, I didn't hesitate later to open a bar in La Carihuela, Torremolinos. It was a socialising place for expats. In Torremolinos there are lots of bars for consumers to choose from.

"Despite this competition, I was still able to make my bar successful but later I felt that I was spending too much time there which more and more limited my time and affected my flexibility," he said.

Having got rid of the bar, Martin and his partner suddenly decided to make a sharp turn towards industry, though Martin had his doubts.

"Sincerely, like other expats I also thought it is really impossible to carry out an industrial project in Spain because of the bureaucratic procedures and 'mananas'," he said.

"But as I said, I am an optimist. Additionally, my Ukrainian partner reminded me that Britain had become 'Great' based upon skills related to being the first industrial country to establish manufacturing. In the end I was convinced and we set up a workshop to start window production in Malaga," he continued.

But why windows? "Living in different apartments on the Costa del Sol, I soon realised that the construction of some houses is a disaster. Moreover, it's a common thing not to have heating here. So in winters it literally feels warmer outside your apartment than indoors. Spanish houses are indeed built to be cool but we, northern residents, suffer from this 'coolness' in winter, he said.

Martin went on to point out that the locals on the Costa del Sol say that the cool weather only lasts a couple of week and advise you to use a "brasero", a typical heater placed under a table covered with a cloth.

"At the same time gaps in window and door frames are not 'covered', or rather 'sealed' at all as Andalusians in general don't pay much attention to insulation like we do. However, with proper insulation it is possible to keep cool in summer and warm in winter and save energy and thereby money. That's why we started producing insulating windows," he added.

It wasn't just the lack of insulation and the use of braseros that confused Martin when he came to Spain. The Spanish work routine in general first shocked him and then made him eventually understand.

"In the very beginning lunch breaks that can stretch up to two to three hours were annoying for me. Now I can also relax for an hour in the afternoon, although being in permanent movement is more natural to me. I cannot stay passive-like or idle. I must move and it doesn't matter in which direction as long as I'm doing something," he said.

Perhaps it is in those long lunch breaks that Martin finds time to think up new projects.

"I allow myself to dream a little and strive hard to fulfil [those dreams]. You know, I am an optimistic person who is sure that opportunity is all around us," he concluded.
After several months of work by the Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda, traffic on the Cancelada junction on the A-7 motorway in Estepona has been flowing again. The central government delegate in Andalucia, Pedro Fernandez, attended the inauguration ceremony of the recently renovated infrastructure, commenting that the works had been completed two months early. "A 33% reduction in the planned work time, with the importance that this implies for the 50,000 users who use this point of the A-7 motorway every day," he said.

The Cancelada junction allows access to several population centers on both sides of the road and to a series of surrounding beaches.

This measure forced users to make the U-turn three kilometres later, at the Benahavis junction, "a situation that complicated traffic in an area with high mobility, hence the government decided to carry out an emergency complete repair of the overpass, amounting to 774,773 euros and 6 months of execution".
Economist Milton Freidman was right about 'temporary' government spending. In 1803, the UK government devised income tax as a temporary measure to pay for the Napoleonic Wars. It's still here! In 1971, President Nixon removed the physical gold backing of the US dollar. He promised in his speech to the nation that it would be temporary and that the move would stabilize the currency. Fifty years later, the US dollar is not only unstable, but it has lost around 95% of its value against gold since Nixon made the announcement!

Meanwhile, since 1971, gold has returned to the investor a gain of approximately 4,457% or an 8% compound annual growth on capital, outperforming the S&P 500 Index of large US businesses over the same period. Gold is a proven hedge against the destruction of the USD's purchasing power. Since 1971, the history of gold and the case for gold ownership has not been taught in economics classes nor included in MBA or FCA curriculum. It's as if gold has disappeared from the financial system, when in fact it has never gone away. Whilst he was Chair of the Federal Reserve Bank, Alan Greenspan disparaged gold, but in his book The Map and the Territory 2.0, he admits that gold is the real asset underpinning the international monetary system.

The gold price moves on fear and uncertainty, and since the financial crash of 2009, central banks around the world have been aggressive buyers of gold. China is the world's largest producer and importer of gold to hedge their position in US Treasuries and the USD. Because they do not file with the World Gold Council, we can only guess at their current reserves, guarded by the People's Liberation Army under a mountain somewhere in China. Meanwhile the US holds around 11,000 metric tons, which are stored at Fort Knox and West Point. Recently Brazil, Thailand and Russia, along with EU countries like Hungary and Poland, have increased their reserves of gold. Do they know something we don't?

Investors should own gold as insurance in a long-term investment strategy. If an allocation of 10% to gold declines by 20%, this results in an overall loss of 2%, which is hardly a catastrophe. But if this 10% allocation gains 500%, it will go a long way to protect other risk assets. Since 1971, we have experienced two bull markets (rising prices), during which the gold price gained 2,000% and 700%. Both cycles lasted about ten or eleven years. Currently, we are four years into a third bull market in gold with some six years left to run, if history 'rhymes'.

Sensible investors own physical gold, avoid any counterparty risk and allocate 10% of their net worth to avoid instability caused by our governments.

The author is a member of the Society of Trustees and Estate Practitioners and an investment counsellor. The comments and observations by the author are a reflection of his opinion and do not constitute an offer to buy and hold securities, nor does he receive any remuneration of any kind from names referred to
if the people of Biafra want Republic of Biafra, it will be a reality during my administration. ----Donald Trump Donald Trump I wi...
The Dubai Gold and Commodities Exchange (DGCX), the regions leading derivatives exchange, has signed an agreement with Victoria Falls Stock Exchange (VFEX)  a subsidiary of the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange  to strengthen bilateral cooperation as well as exchange knowledge around commodities trading.

As part of the agreement, the DGCX will extend technical support, knowledge, and skills to VFEX, with the ultimate aim of establishing an international commodities exchange in Zimbabwe.

Additionally, VFEX will seek support from the Dubai derivatives exchange in setting a framework for a clearing and settlement commodities exchange.

The one-year agreement was signed by the CEO Les Male and the VFEX CEO Justin Bgoni, during the visit of a high-level Zimbabwean ministerial delegation.

Male said the agreement was part of DGCX's wider strategy to strengthen commodities trading across Africa.

"We are confident that our deep knowledge and expertise will help bring value to VFEX as they kickstart the Offshore Financial Services Centre (OFSC) for the special economic zone in Victoria Falls. The partnership also builds on our expanding international footprint and represents another opportunity for us to build stronger inroads into Africa, a rapidly growing market with enormous potential, he added.

Bgoni said VFEX was looking forward to a fruitful exchange of ideas and technical know-how that would help it to replicate the success of the Dubai Gold and Commodities Exchange in its own country and under the proposed Victoria Falls Stock Exchange-driven commodities exchange.

The regions leading derivatives exchange, DGCX has played a pioneering role in developing the regional market for derivatives trading, clearing and settlement.-TradeArabia News Service
Malaysian authorities announced that leading energy company Petronas has joined as the premier partner for the country's pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai that will run from October 1 to March 31, 2022.

During the event, Petronas will be showcasing its sustainability aspirations and roadmap to achieve Net Zero Carbon Emissions by 2050.

Malaysia's participation in Expo 2020 Dubai is led by the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation with Malaysian Green Technology and Climate Change Centre (MGTC) as implementing agency.

With its aspiration to be a progressive energy and solutions partner, the national energy company's participation aligns perfectly with the pavilion's "Energising Sustainability" theme.

Malaysia Pavilion is designed as a "Rainforest Canopy." The various segments of the pavilion house permanent displays and exhibits that reflect the country's unique and steadfast commitment to sustainable development.

As climate change becomes one of the most important priorities for the global community, Expo 2020 Dubai is a good platform for Petronas to showcase its sustainability aspirations and roadmap to achieve Net Zero Carbon Emissions by 2050, said the statement from MGTC.

"The growing momentum for us at MGTC to transition to low carbon is imperative and we are proud to have one of Malaysia's most successful homegrown brands, Petronas, to be part of Malaysia's representation at the World Expo," said its CEO Shamsul Bahar Mohd Nor.

Petronas' accomplishments throughout the years and its commitment to help shape climate action beyond its immediate sphere of influence bolsters the nation's credibility in sustainability, he noted.

Corporations are needed to go further to help build a carbon neutral future for everyone and that he was optimistic that strong partnerships would help move the world closer to a more energy efficient future for all, he added.

Petronas President and Group CEO Tengku Muhammad Taufik said: "Our partnership with Malaysia Pavilion gives us the opportunity to showcase Petronas' commitment and holistic approach to sustainability."

"We are embracing the need to chart a more sustainable path forward, and drive the maturity of our Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) practices as well as realising our Net Zero Carbon Emissions by 2050 aspiration," noted Taufik.

"We will continue our efforts in our operational excellence and through innovative partnerships to create cleaner energy solutions towards building a carbon neutral future for all," he added.

Petronas will have a dedicated exhibition area for a period of six months inside the pavilion featuring a 3D animated effect presentation on its sustainability journey, ventures into new energy and innovative solutions.

"The visually stunning animation in a giant suspended cube will be a permanent feature throughout the entire Expo 2020 Dubai. This exhibit aims to inspire visitors with the energy company's vision of a better future through its innovative technologies to provide access to cleaner, affordable, secure, and sustainable energy for all," he noted.

The company is also expected to take part in panel discussions and business meetings with foreign dignitaries and business leaders at the Pavilion, while also participating in thought leadership forums, he added.

The pavilion will host weekly thematic trade and business programmes which will encompass over 10 industry verticals.

They include education, youth & technopreneurship, trade, Industry 4.0 & smart manufacturing, science, technology and innovation, environment & water, sustainable agriculture & agricommodities, healthcare, tourism & culture, energy, e-commerce & ICT, halal industry and Islamic finance.

"Petronas' participation as premier partner catalyses our efforts to encourage other Malaysian businesses to leverage Expo 2020 to build their brands' visibility at a global platform," stated Shamsul Bahar.

"While providing an avenue for corporations to join in on the conversation, our objective is also to position Malaysia as a sustainable and future-ready investment hub that is committed to improving how we do business on the day to day," he added.-TradeArabia News Service
Africa Finance Corporation (AFC), a leading infrastructure solutions provider, has welcomed Egypt as its newest member state.

Egypts accession expands AFCs footprint in North Africa, after Morocco joined in June this year.

As a member, Egypt will enjoy benefits including increased investment allocation, preferred access to AFCs structuring and lending solutions, reduced debt costs for projects, and access to advisory and project development services.

Egypts Prime Minister Dr Mostafa Madbouly, said the North Africas most populous nation was committed to become the 32nd member of the regions leading infrastructure solutions provider, opening up a potential $1 billion of investments.

"With the increasing importance of public-private partnerships in advancing the African continent and Egypt in particular, we are pleased to accede to membership of a renowned and trusted pan-African institution like AFC," remarked Dr Madbouly.

"We are already in discussions with AFC on pipeline projects, some of which includes supporting Covid-19 vaccine manufacture, working closely with the Ministry of Transportation to fund the high speed train and the Cairo Monorail projects, as well as a collaboration with The Sovereign Fund of Egypt (TSFE) to fund renewable projects, and we look forward to executing these projects in line with the countrys Vision 2030," he added.

AFC has already invested over $100 million in infrastructure projects in Egypt, including the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation and Carbon Holdings, a petrochemicals conglomerate.

The corporation has identified a further $600 million worth of projects across the renewables, natural gas, as well as the transport and logistics sectors and expects to invest over $1 billion in total.

AFCs President & CEO Samaila Zubairu, led a delegation of senior AFC executives for meetings in Cairo in July with senior government officials, including Prime Minister Madbouly and Minister of Finance Dr. Mohamed Maait, who signed the instrument of adherence to AFC membership.

"We had several meetings with key government stakeholders in Cairo and their urgency in driving the next phase of development is consistent with AFCs support for resilient and sustainable infrastructure that will benefit not only Egypt but the entire continent," said Zubairu.

"I look forward to working with our partners to strengthen manufacturing on the continent, in particular, the production of Covid-19 vaccines," he added.-TradeArabia News Service
The Arkansas volleyball team battled through two thrilling five-set victories on its way to being crowned champions of the Bobcat Classic over the weekend.
TMC Rajya Sabha member Arpita Ghosh resigns 15 Sep 2021 | 10:29 PM (Rpt correcting error in headline)

New Delhi, Sep 15 (UNI) Trinamool Congress MP Arpita Ghosh resigned as Rajya Sabha member, and her resignation has been accepted by the Chairman of the House, a bulletin of Rajya Sabha said. see more..

India as a civilisational state re-emerging on the world stage will create its own imprint: Jaishankar 15 Sep 2021 | 10:28 PM New Delhi, Sep 15 (UNI) As India rises and its capacities and capabilities grow, it will naturally contribute more to the world, and India as a civilizational state re-emerging on the world stage and drawing on its heritage, will obviously create its own imprint, and in a truly democratic world, such an India will be more India than more West, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar said on Wednesday. see more..

TMC Rajya Sabha member resigns 15 Sep 2021 | 10:26 PM New Delhi, Sep 15 (UNI) Trinamool Congress MP Arpita Ghosh resigned as Rajya Sabha member, and her resignation has been accepted by the Chairman of the House, a bulletin of Rajya Sabha said. see more..

Future looks bleak for women in Afghanistan, their gains have been taken away under Taliban rule, say Afghan women 15 Sep 2021 | 10:06 PM New Delhi, Sep 15 (UNI) The future looks bleak for women in Afghanistan under the Taliban rule. They have worked very hard over the past 20 years to secure their rights, and now with the Talibans return to the country, they find all their gains taken away, said some women from Afghanistan. see more..
Jammu, Sep 10 (UNI) Former Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Friday made a scathing attack at the BJP led union government and accused it of destroying the 'composite culture' in Jammu and Kashmir as he spoke to party workers in Jammu, and reached out to the Kshmiri Pandit community saying he is one of them.

The Congress leader started his address with 'Jai Mata Di', which is a salutation to the mother goddess, and accused the BJP-RSS of dividing Jammu and Kashmir. He also assured help to the Kashmiri Pandit community, stating that he himself belonged to a Kashmiri Pandit family.

Rahul Gandhi said he felt at home in Jammu and Kashmir, and at the Vaishno Devi temple, and said he will visit Ladakh soon.


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NNO Board Discusses Proposals to Increase Resilience at Port and Frontier

A meeting of the No Negotiated Outcome (NNO) Board chaired jointly by the Minister for the European Neighbourhood Wendy Morton MP and the Deputy Chief Minister Dr Joseph Garcia MP took place in Gibraltar on Thursday.

The role of the Board is to plan for the eventuality of no agreement on the future relationship of Gibraltar with the European Union.

The Chief Minister dropped in at the start of the meeting to welcome the Minister and the work of the Board.

Minister Morton was received at the airport by the Deputy Chief Minister and was shown around the air terminal, the land frontier area and later the container terminal at the port.

A series of infrastructure works in both places are under discussion. The proposal is for an extension to be constructed to the pedestrian entry building at the border in order to accommodate a number of automatic border control gates which could be used if there is no agreement. This is similar to what has happened on the Spanish side. In addition to this, the Customs Outfield section could be potentially relocated from its present site into this expanded building in order to make way for road works designed to improve incoming traffic flow towards the new tunnel under the runway.

This runs in parallel with discussions to upgrade and refurbish the container terminal at the port in order to accommodate the higher volume of imports expected by sea in the event of a no deal scenario. The proposal includes the resurfacing of a part of the terminal as well as electrical works designed to provide connection points for a greater number of containers carrying frozen and chilled products.

The NNO Board was briefed in detail on these two projects, the overall objective of which is to strengthen further the resilience of Gibraltar going forward. A number of mitigation options in other areas were also examined and the submissions from the NNO Working Group were reviewed.

The Government of Gibraltar, and the UK Government, remain firmly committed to the negotiation of a UK-EU treaty on the future relationship of Gibraltar based on the New Years Eve Agreement. However, it is sensible and prudent to plan for the eventuality of no agreement at the same time and to mitigate in those areas that are within the control of the Government.

The Minister for the European Neighbourhood invited the Deputy Chief Minister to attend a future meeting of the NNO Board in person in London.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 10:46:17|Editor: huaxia

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BISHKEK, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- The U.S.-NATO counterterrorism operation in Afghanistan has completely failed, a Kyrgyz security expert has said, urging the fight against terrorism to be continued at the highest level.

In an exclusive interview with Xinhua, Artur Medetbekov, former deputy chairman of the State Committee for National Security of Kyrgyzstan, noted that at present international terrorism is dangerous for the entire planet.

Twenty years ago, the U.S. and NATO troops launched a counterterrorism operation in Afghanistan following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, at a huge cost but to no avail, Medetbekov said.

"Yes, they succeeded in something: to destroy the leader of al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden, to conduct large tactical military operations somewhere, but today the entire world recognizes that the U.S. and NATO troops did not win the victory against terrorism in Afghanistan," Medetbekov said.

Moreover, tens of billions of dollars had been spent only on the rearmament of the Afghan army, not to mention other expenses, he said.

The former deputy head of the Kyrgyz special services added that the program for the construction of a new Afghan state has not been worked out.

Meanwhile, some religious fundamental organizations were actively engaged in ideological work among the population by recruiting an increasing number of supporters to their side.

The failed attempt by the U.S. and NATO troops to counter terrorism in Afghanistan have instead created in the Asian country a gap and an opportunity for terrorist organizations to grow, making it possible that new bases and camps for international extremist or terrorist organizations could be formed in Afghanistan, he noted.

The United States has used counterterrorism operations for its political and economic ends in countries including Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, and has got other countries involved, he said.

The expert believed that such actions have complicated the situation, and further disrupted stability and security in those regions.

"There are a lot of things here. I think it is impossible to approach the fight against terrorism with double standards," he said, calling for more reflection and vigilance. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 16:34:50|Editor: huaxia

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NEW DELHI, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- The farmers protesting outside the main government office in the northern Indian state of Haryana Saturday called off their strike after the local government accepted most of their demands, officials said.

The farmers were on protest outside the mini-secretariat (government building housing major offices) in Karnal district.

Senior official from the Haryana government Devender Singh and farmer leader Gurnam Singh Charuni held a joint press conference.

Singh said the government would hold an inquiry into last month's baton charging by a retired high court judge.

"Following a meeting between government officials and farmer leaders, Haryana government orders a probe in August 28 Bastara toll incident, which will be done by a retired high court judge," Singh told media. "Probe will be completed in a month and the sub-district magistrate (the officer whose behaviour was questioned) will be on leave."

The farmers alleged police action left one farmer dead and injured 10 others. A officer had ordered policemen to "smash heads of farmers", the video of which went viral on social media.

High drama unfolded in Karnal on Tuesday after a large gathering of farmers sat on a protest outside the mini-secretariat defying police deployment and climbing over barricades. The protesters erected tents outside the office to get their demands met. Authorities had suspended mobile internet services in the area.

"After discussions, we have collectively decided to call off the protest here," Gurnam Singh Charuni, a farmer leader told media after meeting with officials.

Charuni said the government has also accepted their demand of giving two jobs to the family members of the deceased farmer.

Separately thousands of farmers have been on strike since Nov. 26 last year, demanding the repeal of three controversial farm laws that they say will badly affect farmers. Though the federal government has been strongly defending the laws, farmers fear the new laws will weaken their position and make them dependent on corporates.

The protesting farmers are camping on the borders of the national capital demanding revocation of the three laws.

The farmers have held 11 rounds of talks with the federal government. However, they remained inconclusive and no breakthrough was achieved. Both the government and the farmers are adamant on their respective positions. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 22:05:07|Editor: huaxia

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KABUL, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- An Afghan expert has described the so-called U.S.-led war on terror in Afghanistan as a total failure that has plunged the war-torn country into turmoil.

"No doubt, the U.S.-led war on terror in Afghanistan has utterly failed and the American forces have been defeated, of course (it's) a humiliating defeat," Abu Muslim Khorasani, a professor of Rana University in Afghanistan said Saturday.

The professor made the comments as the United States is marking the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks in the country.

"The current situation in Afghanistan -- uncertainty, poverty, unemployment and thousands of Afghans rushing to fled their country along with the U.S. and allied forces in August -- clearly demonstrated the outcome of the so-called U.S. war on terror as nothing but turmoil," Khorasani told Xinhua.

According to the United States, more than 120,000 foreigners and Afghans who cooperated with U.S. forces and foreign companies over the past 20 years in Afghanistan were evacuated by the U.S. and its allies from Aug. 15 to Aug. 31 via Kabul international airport, and countless more have missed their flights.

Khorasani listed reasons for the failure of the U.S.-led war on terror, and explained that what's important is "the disharmony among the Pentagon, the Department of State and intelligence services" since the early days of its invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

Another reason is the lack of a comprehensive policy and U.S. double standards towards Afghanistan, the expert added.

Khorasani continued to say that the legacy of the 20-year presence of the United States in Afghanistan is nothing more than an uncertain future for Afghans.

While commenting on the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, the expert noted that "when Washington decided to invade Afghanistan out of its own national interests, it did so in late 2001; when its interests required it to leave Afghanistan, it left the country behind as well."

"The U.S. invasion of Afghanistan was not meant to ensure Afghanistan's interests. Under the pretext of destroying terrorists, it invaded Afghanistan. Obviously, Washington attacked Afghanistan to seek its own interests in the region," Khorasani said.

"If the U.S. objective were to ensure Afghanistan's interests and bring peace and prosperity to Afghans, Washington would never have pulled out irresponsibly," the expert observed.

The Afghan scholar believed that the U.S. intervention in terms of military, political and culture in the internal affairs of Islamic countries could be the main reason for emerging anti-U.S. extremists and in general anti-West groups. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-11 22:24:34|Editor: huaxia

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DHAKA, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Bangladesh on Saturday received a new batch of China's Sinopharm vaccines against COVID-19 as the country continued to fight the pandemic.

A plane of Biman Bangladesh Airlines carrying the Chinese vaccine doses arrived at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport at around noon Saturday, Md. Shamsul Haque, a senior health ministry official, told journalists.

Bangladesh's vaccination drive is now running smoothly in the capital Dhaka and elsewhere in the country thanks largely to China's continued support for vaccines.

To fight against the alarming spike in COVID-19 cases, Bangladesh has signed an agreement on the co-production of the Chinese COVID-19 vaccines locally.

The Memorandum of Understanding was signed between China's Sinopharm Group, Bangladesh's Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and Incepta Vaccine Ltd., a local vaccine manufacturing company last month.

Bangladesh began the COVID-19 vaccination drive in January to contain the pandemic that has spread across the country.

Amid uncertainty over the timely arrival of vaccine shipment from India, the Bangladeshi government later halted administering the first doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine in the country.

In June, the vaccination drive resumed in parts of the country with the China-donated Sinopharm vaccines. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-12 00:28:18|Editor: huaxia

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by Benedictus Robert Yota

JAKARTA, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- A number of tourist destinations in Indonesia on Friday reopened their doors in regions that have relaxed their COVID-19 public activity restrictions, locally known as PPKM, earlier this week.

Among the reopened tourist sites is the Mount Ijen National Park in East Java province's district of Banyuwangi, which has resumed operation since Thursday, after being closed for two months during the early stages of the pandemic restrictions.

According to Purwantono, the Banyuwangi Natural Resources Conservation Agency (BKSDA)'s section head, the national park was visited by around 600 visitors daily on average during pre-pandemic times.

Following Banyuwangi's pandemic restrictions being lowered to level 2 this week, the national park will limit daily visits to approximately 150 people, in accordance with the 25-percent capacity limit for national parks during the PPKM Level 2 implementation.

Mount Ijen's latest opening hours are from 3:00 a.m. local time to 12 p.m. local time for all days. Hikers are required to be vaccinated at least with the first doses and bring vaccination certificates as proof.

Similarly, the Dieng Volcanic Complex, also called the Dieng Plateau, located both in Wonosobo and Banjarnegara districts in Central Java province has also reopened since Friday, following the two districts' restrictions being lowered to level 2 this week.

The complex is also implementing a 25-percent capacity limit in compliance with level 2 restrictions.

"We're ready to open. We've already done health protocol simulations," the Banjarnegara Cultural and Tourism Agency's Head Agung Yusianto said on Thursday.

Just like Mount Ijen, the Dieng recreational area requires visitors to be vaccinated with the first shots at minimum.

Furthermore, state-owned Ancol Dreamland Park in North Jakarta has also reopened two of its attractions, Ancol Beach and Allianz Ecopark, for visitors who want to do outdoor vacations starting on Friday.

Meanwhile, other attraction sites inside the park such as the famous Fantasy Land (Dufan) amusement park, Sea World, Ocean Dream Samudra, Atlantis Water Adventures and the Art Market had remained closed as of Saturday.

However, PT Taman Wisata Candi, the operator of Borobudur Temple in Magelang district in Central Java province, Prambanan and Ratu Boko Temples in Yogyakarta, and Taman Mini Indonesia Indah (TMII) cultural park in Jakarta, confirmed that it has received the green light to reopen and operate whilst implementing screening using contact tracing mobile application.

The Taman Wisata Candi's Corporate Secretary Emilia Eny Utari has said that the decision on the operating permit was made for the tourist sites by the Coordinating Ministry for Maritime and Investment Affairs on Sept. 7.

The reopening of the four destinations was because they have all obtained the Cleanliness, Health, Safety, and Environment Sustainability (CHSE) certificates from the Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry, Utari said, adding that another reason is that they are located outdoor.

"We still haven't decided when the trial reopening will start, because we are still preparing the implementation process of the PeduliLindungi app. Right now, we're still awaiting the QR codes for the destinations. Once the codes are ready, trial reopening will be held," Utari said.

As of this week, Yogyakarta's (Prambanan temple) pandemic restrictions stay at level 3, the same with Magelang district (Borobudur and Ratu Boko temples), and Jakarta (Taman Mini Indonesia Indah).

In addition, popular tourist destinations Kawah Putih (White Crater) and Glamping Rancabali camping site in Bandung district in West Java province were also expected to reopen immediately, according to Bandung district head Dadang Supriatna.

"We still don't have the detail, but we will announce it soon," Supriatna said on Thursday in Bandung which has been implementing level 3 restrictions since the start of this week.

On Sept. 6, the Indonesian government decided to extend its public activity restrictions on the country's most populated island of Java and famous tourist destination of Bali for another week, and as for some regions outside the two islands, the restrictions are extended until Sept. 20.

The PPKM policy has been imposed by the government in response to the surge in COVID-19 cases from late June to July, driven by the highly transmissible Delta variant.

On Saturday, Indonesia reported 5,001 newly-confirmed COVID-19 cases with 270 more deaths, according to the Health Ministry. In total, there have been 4.16 million COVID-19 cases reported and 138,701 deaths in the country since March last year. Enditem
Source: Xinhua| 2021-09-12 01:34:31|Editor: huaxia

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General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam Central Committee Nguyen Phu Trong (R) meets with visiting Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Hanoi, Vietnam, Sept. 11, 2021. (Xinhua/Jiang Shengxiong)

HANOI, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Vietnam and China pledged here Saturday to joint hands to strengthen unity and boost cooperation for further development of the bilateral relations between the two countries.

While meeting with visiting Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) Central Committee Nguyen Phu Trong said Vietnam and China have enjoyed comradely and brotherly friendship and established a comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership.

Facing a complex and changing international situation, the two sides should join hands to overcome difficulties as so to realize their respective goals of socialist construction, Trong said, noting that no one can undermine the unity and cooperation between the two countries.

The two sides should push forward diversified exchanges and cooperation between the two parties, governments and localities in a flexible manner, educate younger generations to promote the traditional sincerity between the two parties and the two countries, and strive for the enduring, healthy and stable development of the bilateral ties, Trong said.

For his part, Wang noted that the China-Vietnam relations are of particular strategic importance. The two sides should deepen mutual political trust, strengthen unity and cooperation, and consolidate their political and system security.

As long as both sides stick to their common ideals and beliefs, as well as the orientation for developing socialism, they can overcome any difficulties and solve any problems they may face, Wang said.

China and Vietnam should strengthen their overall cooperation in all fields, so as to add new dimensions to the comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership between the two countries, Wang said.

Also on Saturday, Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh held talks with Wang, stressing that Vietnam takes its relations with China as a top priority in its foreign policy.

Vietnam is willing to learn from China's experience in fighting COVID-19, keep up the momentum of growth in trade and investment cooperation between the two countries, and provide more convenience for Chinese investment in Vietnam, Chinh said.

Wang said that China is willing to work hard to provide COVID-19 vaccines for Vietnam to help it contain the pandemic and restore normalcy in its socio-economic development.

The two sides should also jointly push for the international community's cooperation in fighting the pandemic, work together to resist the slanderous attacks on socialist countries by external forces, and preserve an international system with the United Nations at its core and an international order based on international law, Wang said. Enditem
The Federal Government has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Arab Chamber of Commerce to ramp up trade and advance the upcoming Expo 2020 Dubai.

The expo, originally scheduled to run between October 20, 2020 and April 10, 2021, has been rescheduled to hold October 1, 2021 to March 31, 2022 due to the disruptions of COVID-19 pandemic across the world.

This was disclosed in a statement released by the Director of Press and Public Relations department of the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment, Ibrahim Haruna yesterday.

The statement indicated that the Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Niyi Adebayo, said that the MoU will be beneficial to the two countries.

The Minister, who was represented by the Director of Legal, Danjuma Alhassan, said the agreement would strengthen business relationships and promote enhanced trade relations between Nigeria and Gulf countries.

"To boost business opportunities and funding of the upcoming Expo 2020 Dubai, the agreement would formalise a collaborative business relationship between the ministry and Nigerian Arabian Gulf Chamber of Commerce," Adebayo said.

The Minister said the cultural and socio-economic forum between Nigeria and all the Gulf Cooperation Council Countries (GCCC) was aimed at the promotion and facilitation of the economic relationship between Nigeria and Arabian Gulf Countries especially in the area of trade information and financial and technical support.
opinion

Resident Doctors make up the largest medical manpower in our tertiary health institutions. They undergo rigorous training in various specialties of medicine in an intensive program that encompasses robust research and effective state-of-art specialist health services delivery. These patriots are the only source of specialist medical care to teeming Nigerians who can't afford care abroad and can't access care in our expensive private facilities.

The current strike by the Nigerian Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) has been as a result of the government's insincerity in implementing agreed actionable series of memoranda. Therefore, out of sheer passion to ensure the right things are done so that Nigerians attain effective healthcare, the Resident Doctors speak to the people in authority with the only language they understand; Strike. One clear fact is the Resident Doctors were forced to embark on this action by those in government. Naturally, doctors hate embarking on strike!

Let me shed light on just a few reasons for the action.

Firstly, is the dearth of medical manpower due to unnecessary bureaucratic bottlenecks. Despite the few available doctors, we have in the country with a doctor to population ratio at 1: 7000, many hospitals find it difficult to recruit or replace doctors. This has made the work burden on the available doctors to be unbearably high resulting in physician burnout and limited care to a limited number of people needing care. Many doctors are leaving the country to other climes where they can do their job with satisfaction. As a result, the hospitals are depleted but find it difficult to employ new staff because of bureaucratic processes that involve the Budget Office of the Federation, Office of the Head of Civil Service of the Federation, the Federal Character Commission as well as the Federal Ministry of Health. These MDAs, I dare say, deliberately create delays, which result in administrative lethargy, malpractices and corruption. It takes an average of 8-12 months for a lucky hospital to finally obtain a waiver for recruitment or replacement of medical staff. In some cases, the hospitals would be forced to consider candidates from some directors and politicians if at all they want the processes to be expedited, otherwise, it would be outrightly rejected or at best delayed and the required number slashed. In their efforts to keep services running, the hospitals resort to employing young doctors on a month-to-month basis without regular monthly salaries and any certainty for regularisation. Thus, casualising the medical profession and rendering the young doctors frustrated and dejected. In some instances, the Resident Doctors were recruited but the process of migration to IPPIS would take eternity due to other deliberately created bottlenecks of revalidation of already acquired recruitment waivers. These Residents Doctors would spend several months working without salaries and no hopes of arrears.

Secondly, the Medical Residency Training Programme is cost-intensive and requires a lot of updates and revision courses at various levels. Therefore, the Medical Residency Training Fund (MRTF) was created to be paid annually to each eligible Resident Doctor. For the year 2021, it was discovered that the fund was not even captured in the budget. It took the earlier strike by NARD for the fund to be captured in the supplementary budget. It took the second strike for the FG to realise that the fund was not captured in the 2022 budget. Therefore, if NARD had not gone on strike, many agencies of government wouldn't have done their duties because the beneficiaries are the Resident Doctors and there is no 10 per cent kickback! So, the strike is key in keeping the government to implement the funds for the MRT programme. What a shame!

Another reason for the strike is the non-payment of arrears of salaries for 2014, 2015, and 2016. Also, there is the non-payment of minimum wage consequential adjustment and COVID-19 hazard allowances to some medical and healthcare workers. Similarly, is the non-payment of death in service compensation for healthcare workers who contracted various deadly infectious diseases and died in service. The FG claimed to have deposited billions to insurance companies, but the health workers are yet to benefit from such monies. It must have been consumed by some family, friends and fans of those in the corridors of power.

Why has the strike lingered for so long? That is the bone of contention. Ordinarily, the Resident doctor's strike doesn't take more than days because they are conscious of the sufferings Nigerians go through. They comfortably enter agreement and understanding to resolve the impasse. This strike is unfortunately long because the Minister of Labour who is constitutionally responsible for mediation and conciliation during industrial disputes took it upon himself to make this the longest NARD strike. In the very first week of the strike, Mr. Ngige rushed to the media and told Nigerians that he would not negotiate with the Resident Doctors because they were unreasonable. He then went to the Medical Elders the following week and finally ended up in the Industrial Court. The court gave one month for hearing. All these could have been sorted out in the very first week of the strike if Mr. Ngige was up and about in his responsibility. If he wasn't ready to do the job he was appointed to do, he should have quietly resigned rather than toy with the health and lives of Nigerians. The President of NMA waded in at this point with the good intention to bring the impasse to an end. With the kind interventions of the NMA President, Mr. Ngige agreed to fix a day for the first conciliation meeting when the strike had entered the third week with many Nigerians already suffering the devastating effects of the strike. Though the matter was in court, out of respect to the NMA President and care for the sufferings of innocent Nigerians, the NARD leadership attended the conciliation meeting that lasted for two days. Mr. Ngige told the meeting that President Buhari had directed the removal of all technicalities to expedite resolution. That statement made both NMA and NARD leaderships to open a new leaf of trust and enter another discussion. After all the issues were discussed, the NARD leaders reluctantly agreed on some of the new timelines out of respect for President Buhari and the NMA president. However, at the time of signing the new MoU, Mr. Ngige told them, behind closed doors, that the August salary would not be paid to them. That was the point when the NARD president rightly told them it would be difficult for him to use the new MoU to convince his members if they would not receive their August salary under any disguise. It was very instructive to note that the president, who had directed for the removal of all negative technicalities would not also invoke genuine clemency for the patriotic Resident Doctors that have obliged the first conciliation meeting. This is happening at a time when the government is willing to give amnesty, rehabilitate and reintegrate the so-called repentant terrorists! Why is it so difficult to be considerate with the patriotic Resident Doctors?

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This action of insincerity triggered the NMA NEC to give the government 21 days' notice to solve all issues of dispute with all her affiliates. The deadline is September 18, 2021.

So which way forward?

As for the current NARD strike, the government has to come out clean with a respectable representative that the doctors would trust to enter a genuine conciliation. The Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo is a good option. However, all their entitlements including their August salary must be paid without further delay. A country that gives amnesty to terrorists and bandits should not have any difficulty in giving clemency to patriotic doctors who chose to serve Nigerians in Nigeria rather than travel out for greener pastures. Honestly, those that deserve the 'no work no pay' are those in the MDAs that reneged on the April MoA and Mr. Ngige who abandoned his constitutional responsibilities, certainly not the patriotic Resident Doctors!!!

The Nigerian health sector requires a deliberate and sincere overhaul with all the stakeholders involved. The process of recruitment of health care workers must be a seamless one devoid of unnecessary bottlenecks. We need to have a robust and truly working health system with state-of-art facilities. The conditions of service for the health workers must be reviewed upwards with an attractive and competitive package. Health, education and security are the three most important bedrock for a sustainable economy. Any government that is not palpably fixing these three sectors has no business in our democratic economy.

Dr Askira is a former NARD president.
A Nigerian youth, who went through severe depression, has narrated how he contemplated ending his life.

The youth said life had no meaning after almost everyone, including his fiancee, abandoned him.

He said after losing his job at a company that paid him well, self-doubt crept in and everything turned dark.

He said, "In 2013, I was working with a company that paid me well apart from the side hustles I engaged in. Everything was going well; life was sweet.

"I was planning my wedding when the management of company said it couldn't maintain all the employees. Unfortunately, many were later sacked and I was among them.

"Life became hard. I barely ate and my landlord was harassing me because I couldn't pay my rent."

The youth said he was later evicted and a friend he was squatting with turned against him.

He stated, "It was very difficult to get something to eat. I was devastated when I learnt that my fiancee was planning to marry a former neighbour.

"Life became very hard and everything was dark. Even my friends deserted me. I become an object of ridicule as people talked about me everywhere.

"Since life was hard, I decided to end it and I bought a bottle of sniper."

The youth said he did not know what happened next as he woke to realised that he was in a hospital and was badly sick.

<a target="_blank" href="https://dailytrust.com/suicide-on-the-rise-as-nigeria-records-51-cases-in-12-months">Daily Trust investigation shows</a> that there has been an upsurge in suicide, especially among young people, in the last 12 months.
Seven years after his death, British tycoon Richard Ingram Crawford's spirit cannot rest quietly in his grave, with his friends, former allies and workers battling for his property.

Crawford, who settled in Kenya in 1950, died a bachelor in Nakuru, leaving behind property valued at over Sh74 million.

He is said to have enjoyed a cordial relationship with many people as he made successful exploits in business and agriculture.

His predicaments began in 2008 when he was attacked by armed robbers at his house at Mwariki, Lanet, leaving him with injuries that led to memory loss and Parkinson's disease, which he fought until his death in 2014.

Even before the flowers on his grave withered after his burial, the fight for control of his wealth among his friends, business allies and workers began.

Being the closest person to Crawford by virtue of her work, Sarah Joslyn, his personal secretary, took the opportunity to embark on acquiring the rights to control the estate.

She allegedly forged a will that she used to successfully petition for letters of administration of Crawford's estate.

Documents in the High Court in Nakuru show that she conspired to do this with her lawyer Henry Aminga.

However, before the grant could be confirmed by the court, another person identified as Stephen Ngatia, who claimed to be the son of Crawford's former business partner John Maina, learnt of the succession proceedings and lodged a complaint with the police.

Mr Ngatia secured court orders to revoke the grant. He claimed Crawford had adopted his family and had promised to leave his properties to them.

He told the court that Crawford and his late father were close friends and business partners who had ventured into the fuel business in Nakuru and enterprises in Lanet.

New discoveries

The new development saw Ms Joslyn arrested and charged with forgery, a case that is still pending.

It was also discovered that Ms Joslyn had also conspired with Mr Aminga to defraud Crawford of his land in 2011.

Mr Aminga was also charged with seven counts relating to forgery and making and uttering false documents.

He denied the charges and challenged them at the High Court.

As the case was going on, a group of squatters living on part of Crawford's land sought to be allocated their share of the land.

Members of the group said they had worked for Crawford for a long time and claimed he had promised to settle them on the land. They complained that Ms Joslyn was trying to kick them out of the property.

One of the workers, James Njogu, who claimed to have worked for Crawford for 30 years, said Ms Joselyn took over control of the property and became hostile.

"When we demanded our benefits, she told us to vacate the houses first. We felt it was unfair because Crawford had promised to give us the house and benefits," he said.

Read: The place that Crawford called home

And before the court matter could be resolved, another man identified as Wycliff Winston Waita, brought to the attention of the court new allegations against the parties in the case.

He, in 2019, presented to the court a letter he had written to the Commission on Administrative Justice, accusing Ms Joslyn of cremating Crawford's body without valid documents.

In the letter, filed before Justice Teresia Matheka, Mr waita claimed that Ms Joslyn, though she was allegedly a stranger to the tycoon, oversaw the cremation on February 1, 2014 alongside her estranged husband Roger Joslyn.

"Joslyn had neither court orders nor authority from the Department of Registrar of Persons and National Police Service. She did the cremation without death and burial certificates from the department of Civil Registry," the letter said.

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Mr Waita, who claimed to be a former employee of Crawford, accused Ms Joslyn of attempting to kill Crawford by using thugs to attack him in 2007.

And now he has written another letter to the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) seeking information on a police inquiry into Crawford's property.

"I seek the intervention of the DCI to be issued with a note that I can present to the Ministry of Land and Physical Planning in order to get the hard copies of (the) valuation and compensation report in respect to a road which was constructed from LR No 9950/1 Nakuru County," the letter said.

Crawford owned about 45 acres of prime land in Mwariki, on the Nakuru-Nairobi highway, as well as Blue Cross Kennels.

The Nation has learnt that the parties are thinking about resolving the matter out of court.

Mr Ngatia's lawyer, Mwangi Waiganjo, revealed that negotiations were underway.
Security agencies in Rift Valley are now pointing an accusing finger at the Judiciary for what they term as frustration of government efforts to end violent attacks.

Rift Valley regional commissioner George Natembeya yesterday accused courts of sabotaging efforts by issuing decisions that favour perpetrators.

He alleged that the criminal justice system has led to some perpetrators of violence getting off scot-free despite being linked to crimes.

Mr Natembeya noted that Baringo and Laikipia counties are particularly affected, saying political leaders have taken advantage of the courts.

"While the police try their best to use their intelligence to get hold of the criminals, their efforts have been neutralised by courts giving suspects favourable rulings at the expense of the public's safety," he said.

He cited the example of two leaders who have been arrested several times over the years but were freed by the courts.

According to Mr Natembeya, the duo has been implicated in fueling violence.

He explained that one leader has been arrested several times since 2018 in relation to his alleged involvement in Laikipia's violence but has never been convicted after the courts demanded a higher threshold of evidence.

As for the other leader, he said, he has been linked by the government's intelligence to banditry attacks in Laikipia, Baringo and Turkana counties.

"It has become a vicious cycle that once a leader is arrested he is taken to court, released on bond and goes back to causing mayhem," lamented Mr Natembeya.

"Our hands are not only tied, but everybody around feels helpless. How do you free the suspects and expect witnesses who are his constituents to appear in court to testify against them? Our efforts have simply turned to academic exercises with no meaningful results," he added.

The administrator has also expressed his fears that the leaders may never be convicted.
LABOUR, Economy and Investment Minister Mudrik Ramadhan Soraga has decried skill deficiency in various sectors, including tourism industry that employs over 60 per cent of the entire workforce.

He was responding to a question by Kiembesamaki Legislator Suleiman Haroub who sought to know why many youths remain jobless despite many investments in his constituency.

During a question and answer session in the house, the minister said the government has been taking different measures to address unemployment but lack of skills among them excarbates the problem.

"Unfortunately, the tourism industry, the largest employer, recruits mostly from outside Zanzibar because our youth lack the requisite skills especially at the mid-level management. Let us train our youths so that they can participate in the upcoming job search," the minister said.

He said that there are over 50 investment projects worth 200 million US dollars (about 500bn/-), with potential of creating about 1,500 job sites.
PRIME Minister, Kassim Majaliwa, is expected to grace the launch of a brewery plant in Moshi, Kilimanjaro which will boost employment opportunities and revenue collections.

The new plant is owned by the beer company, Serengeti Breweries Limited (SBL).

The Kilimanjaro Regional Commissioner (RC) Mr Stephen Kagaigai revealed this during his tour of the SBL plant in Moshi.

"This new plant is owned by Serengeti Breweries Limited and is the extension of the beer manufacturing plant; the move is a great economic achievement by the investor," he said.

Mr Kagaigai noted that the launch, which he said is scheduled for September 21 this year, would be a major economic boost for the Kilimanjaro Region and that it would prove the great performance by the SBL since its launch in 2011.

"The expansion of the SBL factory apart from boosting the economy of Kilimanjaro region, it will also contribute to the creation of new job opportunities, as well as increase the government revenues through various taxes," he noted further.

Mr Kagaigai commended SBL for the investments in Kilimanjaro region, whereby he assured the management of the regional's administrations support in the company's daily activities.

Earlier, the Head of Operations of the SBL in Moshi, Ms Alice Kilembe, said the company was expecting to increase the number of SBL job opportunities in Moshi to 500 employees.

"We hope to produce a variety of spirits whereby to begin we have started producing a spirit known as Bongo Don", she said.

She said the establishment of the spirit plant was the continuation of the SBL in contributing to the Tanzania's economy through various fields.

"Since the inception of the SBL in 2011 of which its launch was officiated by the fourth phase Prime Minister , Mr Mizengo Pinda.

Apart from providing employment to Tanzanians and government revenues through taxes, we also use most of the raw materials produced by local farmers" added Ms Kilembe.
THE government is taking measures, including establishment of a permanent national committee to address challenges of cyber bullying, controlling fraud and cyber theft through mobile phones in the country.

This was stated by the Deputy Minister for Communications and Information Technology Engineer Andrew Kundo before the National Assembly here yesterday while answering a question from Emmanuel Mwakasaka (Tabora Urban-CCM)

In his question, the Member of Parliament (MP) wanted to know the government's extra strategy to address the problem of fraud and cyber theft through mobile phones.

Responding, the deputy minister told the House that the government had already taken steps to create a safe environment for citizens, especially on the internet.

He said that in 2015 the government enacted the Cyber Crime Act aimed at legally recognising the offences committed on the networks in order to take appropriate action when such offences are identified and the Electronic Transactions Act with a view to identify online transactions.

At the same time, Engineer Kundo said, the government has established a Cyber Crime Unit under the Police Force to investigate cybercrime including any form of cyber theft and to prepare case files in collaboration with the National Prosecution Office.

According to the deputy minister, suspects arrested for misuse of networks are subject to appropriate action.

"In February 2021 the government has formed a National Committee to oversee the misuse of telecommunication services and products which involves all Ministries and institutions involved in dealing with cybercrime," he said.

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The Deputy Minister also noted that the Committee is a permanent committee, which advises the government on how to address network challenges.

"The government in collaboration with mobile phone service providers has introduced a system through the number" 15040 "to receive and lock the numbers that have been reported and confirmed to send messages or make fraudulent calls," he noted.

According to Eng. Kundo, after confirming the numbers to have been involved in such acts, the relevant number is locked, the National Identification Authority (NIDA) identity card used to register, the relevant number is closed to register and the device used (phone) is also locked so that it does not work.

He said that the Government would continue to intensify efforts to educate the public on the effective and efficient use of Information and Communication Technology for social and economic development.
THE East African Business Council (EABC) has joined forces with Afrieximbank in rolling out the African Customer Due Diligence Platform.

Such a partnership is set to boost East African companies and Small Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to take advantage of African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) through accessing a centralised source of due diligence information.

Also known as the Mansa digital, the platform will provide a single primary source of Know-Your-Customer (KYC) data required to conduct customer due diligence checks on counterparties in Africa with a special focus on African Corporates, SMEs and financial institutions.

Speaking at the virtual launch ceremony of the Africa Customer Due Diligence Platform last week, EABC Chief Executive Officer John Bosco Kalisa was upbeat that the platform would enable African financial institutions and corporate entities to meet customer and business partners' expectations while ensuring regulatory compliance.

"The platform will provide critical information for credit assessments geared to promote financial inclusion," he said.

According to Mr Kalisa, the EAC region was the fastest economic bloc on the continent, accounting approximately 16 per cent of Africa's Gross Domestic Product.

Mr Kalisa was further optimistic that the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) will boost investment and consumer to 4 trillion US dollars, generate jobs, strengthen value chains, industrialisation and SMEs expansion.

"The Mansa digital platform is set to facilitate smooth on-boarding of customers and business relationships as well as ensure availability of due diligence information plus mitigate perceived risk of trading with African counterparties," added the EABC boss.

Ms Maureen Mba, Head of Mansa Business, Afreximbank described the platform as a game changer for intra-Africa trade.

Ms Mba emphasized that the Mansa platform enables SMEs to diversify and find new partners to scale up their industries across the continent.

The Mansa digital platform is also expected to reduce risks to intra-African trade such as increased financial crime and high-cost acquisition of Customer Due Diligence.

Through EABC, companies can subscribe to the Mansa digital platform free of charge; this is set to reposition the EAC bloc to tap into the AFCFTA market of 1.3 billion consumers.
THE government is implementing a programme of building 26 secondary schools for girls in each region and 1,000 others in wards that have no secondary schools in the country to reduce classroom congestions, the National Assembly was told here yesterday.

Deputy Minister of State in the President's Office (Local Government and Regional Administration) Mr David Silinde also pointed out that the construction of such schools would further address some barriers especially for girls walking long distances.

Responding to a question from Miraji Mtaturu (Singida East-CCM), the deputy minister also told the House that the government was making expansion of 100 secondary schools to accommodate more Form Five and Six students under the programme in question which would be implemented in phases.

"Construction of all new secondary schools and expansion of Form Five Secondary Schools will be done in phases and the first phase will start in the 2021/22 financial year where the government has allocated a total of 220bn/-," said the Deputy Minister.

In his question, the lawmaker had wanted to know when the government will build the Mungaa Form Five and Six Secondary School, saying it was a promise made by President Samia Suluhu Hassan during the 2020 election campaign.

The deputy minister said that before starting construction, the government will assess the areas earmarked for the construction of new secondary schools and the need for expansion of Form Five and Form Six Secondary Schools including the Mungaa Secondary School.
10:00 | Lima, Sep. 11.

Afterwards, the corresponding protocol was activated, which implies issuing a communication for the Public Ministry to corroborate the death and then send the corpse to the respective morgue.





"At this moment, we find ourselves in that stage," Silva said in remarks to RPP radio and TV station.





After referring that the causes of death will be determined by the morgue in its report, she recalled that the inmate's health had been deteriorating since July 13.





Said condition motivated the INPE to transfer him to a hospital, which was completed on July 20 to receive geriatric care.





Silva also indicated that Guzman had received the medical discharge on August 5 and since then he was being monitored at the Reclusion Center of the Callao Naval Base.





Last Thursday, he was reported to be feeling weak, and the day before he received care from a Health Ministry doctor.
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 11, ARMENPRESS. US President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden arrived to New York City for the remembrance events honoring the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on its 20th anniversary, the White House said.

The September 11 attacks, often referred to as 9/11, were a series of four coordinated terrorist attacks by the militant Islamist terrorist group al-Qaeda against the United States of America on the morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001.

On that morning, four commercial airliners traveling from the northeastern United States to California were hijacked mid-flight by 19 al-Qaeda terrorists. Their explicit goal was to crash each plane into a prominent American building, causing mass casualties and partial or complete destruction of the targeted buildings.

The first plane to hit its target was American Airlines Flight 11. It was flown into the North Tower of the World Trade Center complex in Lower Manhattan at 8:46 am. Minutes later, the World Trade Center's South Tower was hit by United Airlines Flight 175. Both 110-story towers collapsed within an hour and forty-two minutes, leading to the collapse of the other World Trade Center structures including 7 World Trade Center, and significantly damaging surrounding buildings.

A third flight, American Airlines Flight 77, flown from Dulles International Airport, was hijacked over Ohio. At 9:37 am, it crashed into the west side of the Pentagon in Arlington County, Virginia, causing a partial collapse of the building's side. The fourth, and final flight, United Airlines Flight 93, was flown in the direction of Washington, D.C. The plane's passengers attempted to regain control of the aircraft away from the hijackers and ultimately diverted the flight from its intended target; it crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania at 10:03 am. Investigators determined that Flight 93's target was either the White House or the U.S. Capitol.

2977 people were killed and more than 6000 wounded in the 9/11 attacks.

In the immediate aftermath of the attacks, suspicion quickly fell onto al-Qaeda. The United States formally responded by launching the War on Terror and invading Afghanistan to depose the Taliban, which had not complied with U.S. demands to expel al-Qaeda from Afghanistan and extradite al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

Editing by Stepan Kocharyan
Australia Post has been spoofed in a new scam. (Source: Getty, MailGuard)

Australians expecting a parcel from Australia Post should watch out for a fake email notification designed to harvest personal and banking details.

Email security software MailGuard said it had intercepted a phishing scam spoofing the Australian delivery service and advising Australians they have a package waiting for delivery.

Its on hold, the email reads. Please note that your package is waiting for delivery.

Also read:

Australians are then asked to confirm payment of $2.49 within three days.

But recipients of this email should be wary, as its a fake, MailGuard warned.

Its important that email users remain extra cautious before opening any emails pertaining to deliveries, particularly ones that you are not expecting, MailGuard said in a blog post.

Australians are being particularly targeted right now because of the high volume of parcel deliveries due to lockdowns across NSW, the ACT and Victoria at the moment.

Read more: The huge change to Australia Post that will affect online shoppers

Cybercriminals are taking advantage of expectant recipients by using email phishing scams from commonly used delivery services, such as DHL and Australia Post to secure sensitive details for credential harvesting purposes.

The scam email has been sent from a deceptively legitimate-looking sender, titled support[[at]auspost.net.au. But this isnt a sender address used by the real Australia Post.

Email spoofing Australia Post intercepted by MailGuard. (Source: MailGuard)

The email features a big blue button asking recipients to Check Order.

Clicking through, it should become apparent that the entire email is a scam, given the presence of the Cyrillic characters on a compromised WordPress site.

Cyrillic text gives away that it's a scam. (Source: MailGuard)

The owner of the site has since realised the content on the page is a scam and has removed it, meaning users are currently not being directed to a webpage that can collect banking details.

However it is likely that they will edit their campaign by pointing to a new page, MailGuard stated.

Story continues

What to do if you've received this scam email

Australia Post will never email, call or text you asking for personal or financial information or a payment, the parcel service states on its website.

If youve received any emails spoofing Australia Post, forward it on to scams@auspost.com.au and then delete it straight away, it advises.

Australians should also keep their eye out for previous scams involving Australia Post.

Other scam variations may involve recipients being told that a package has been sent to the wrong shipping address, and then asking for banking details.

Another scam involving Australia Post branding appears to be sent from parcelmonitor, urging users to pay a $1 shipping cost.

Follow Yahoo Finance on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and Twitter, and subscribe to the free Fully Briefed daily newsletter.
After court on Friday, Cayuga County Chief Assistant District Attorney Chris Valdina expressed skepticism over Spagnola's remorse.

"I think definitely the tenor of Mr. Spagnola's guilty plea is not that he wants (to) accept responsibility for murdering this person, but that he wants to save his own skin at the 11th hour," Valdina said.

Valdina and Deputy Chief Assistant District Attorney Brittany Grome Antonacci both said they are ready for the trial against Ashley.

Ben Susman, one of Spagnola's court-appointed defense attorneys along with Norman Chirco, said after court that he believes Spagnola "took responsibility" and he admitted to the charges.

"Hopefully the victim's family gets some solace that someone admitted to the act," Susman said.

In addition to Spagnola and Ashley, two other people were charged with murdering Poole. Tyree Anglin pleaded guilty in June to first-degree manslaughter, with an expected sentence of 10 years in state prison and five years of post-release supervision.

The other defendant, Christian Rivera, was indicted in 2020 on charges that included second-degree murder, first-degree attempted robbery, fourth-degree conspiracy and fourth-degree criminal possession of a weapon. Authorities said Rivera was not at the shooting but planned the robbery that resulted in Poole's death, alleging he provided money for the masks and gloves to be used during the robbery and provided the 20-gauge shotgun and 9-millimeter handgun used in the robbery. A jury trial date for Rivera has not been set.

Staff writer Kelly Rocheleau can be reached at (315) 282-2243 or kelly.rocheleau@lee.net. Follow him on Twitter @KellyRocheleau.

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"The Auburn City Council respectfully asks Governor Kathy Hochul to review and respond to the Citys recommendations for the State review process," the resolution said. The resolution also said certified copies of the document would be sent to various agencies such as the New York State Commissioner of Health and The New York State Commissioner of the Department of Environmental Conservation and "all of our State representatives."

Before the council voted Thursday night, Councilor Terry Cuddy said both Auburn and Owasco passed the updated edicts last year "in the hopes the Owasco Lake Watershed Inspection and Protection Division could enforce these newly-developed rules as soon as possible."

"But we have been given lukewarm excuses from state officials that threaten to stall and railroad our efforts. The resolution before us redoubles our efforts and appeals to the new governor, the honorable Kathy Hochul, to give us the help we need in the urgent passing of these rules and regulations through the state agencies that are sitting on them," Cuddy continued.

Owasco Town Supervisor Ed Wagner said Friday the town approved its resolution Thursday, with language similar to the Auburn document, in a 4-1 vote, with the sole dissenting vote from board member Fred Cornelius.
On the eve of the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, U.S. Rep. John Katko and nearly 40 members of Congress were hoping to provide a financial boost to the 9/11 Memorial & Museum in New York City.

A bill has been introduced in the House of Representatives that would direct the homeland security secretary to provide a one-time grant to the 9/11 Memorial & Museum. The grant, according to the legislation, would be up to $10 million but no less than $5 million.

The 9/11 memorial opened in September 2011 on the 10th anniversary of the attacks. The museum opened three years later. The memorial is at the site where the World Trade Center towers once stood. The museum is nearby.

Like so many institutions across the country, the COVID-19 pandemic has taken a toll on the 9/11 Memorial & Museum. The site had to close for six months during the pandemic. When it reopened, it had to limit the number of visitors due to health and safety protocols.

Because of the pandemic's effects, Katko, R-Camillus, explained on Friday that the 9/11 Memorial & Museum is facing a "significant shortfall in funding." If the museum is awarded the grant, it could be used for maintenance, operation and security expenses.
Delivering Bud Light and appreciation to the Shanksville Volunteer Fire Department, which responded to the crash of United Flight 93, Biden praised Bush's comments in his only public remarks of the day, saying the Republican made a really good speech today  genuinely," and wondered aloud what those who died that day would think of today's rancor.

Gesturing to a cross-shaped memorial made of steel from the twin towers adjacent to the firehouse, Biden reflected: Im thinking what, what what would the people who died, what would they be thinking. Would they think this makes sense for us to be doing this kind of thing where you ride down the street and someone has a sign saying f- so-and-so?

It was a reference to an explicit sign attacking Biden last week in New Jersey as he toured storm damage that was displayed by supporters of former President Donald Trump. Biden expressed incredulity at recent comments by Trump, whom he accused of abandoning the nation's ideals during his time in office.

Everyone says, Biden, why do you keep insisting on trying to bring the country together? the president told reporters. Thats the thing thats going to affect our well-being more than anything else.
Also Friday, the U.S. Department of Educations Office for Civil Rights sent a letter to Florida Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran to inform him that the federal agency would be investigating whether the states ban on mask mandates violates federal civil rights laws that protect students with disabilities.

DeSantis has argued that the new Parents Bill of Rights law reserves solely for parents the authority to determine whether their children should wear a mask to school. School districts with mandatory mask rules allow an opt-out only for medical reasons, not parental discretion.

The governor, who had predicted a victory at the appeals court, said in a tweet there is no surprise here and added: I will continue to fight for parents rights.

Charles Gallagher, attorney for parents challenging the DeSantis ban, said he is disappointed by the appeals court decision.

With a stay in place, students, parents and teachers are back in harms way, Gallagher said in a tweet.

The back-and-forth legal battles stem from a lawsuit filed by parents represented by Gallagher and other lawyers contending that DeSantis does not have authority to order local school boards to ban mask mandates.
Three of the nation's largest food delivery companies are suing New York City over a limit on fees it put in place during the pandemic to protect restaurants devastated by the forced closure of their dining rooms.

The city has continued to extend those caps even as vaccinations allow more indoor dining which, according to the companies, cost them millions of dollars over the summer.

In the suit filed late Thursday the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, DoorDash, Grubhub and Uber Eats call the fee caps government overreach. The companies say they were instrumental in keeping restaurants afloat and food industry workers employed after investing millions of dollars in relief for those businesses.

They are filing for an injunction that would prevent the city from enforcing an extension on the fee caps adopted in August.

The companies are seeking unspecified monetary damages as well as a jury trial.

New York Law Department spokesman Nicholas Paolucci said in an email that the citys initiative is legally sound and will be defended in court.
Fruman was also charged with, but did not plead guilty to, arranging hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal donations to Republicans and political action committees while trying to get Americans interested in investigating Bidens son in Ukraine during the Democrat's successful run for president.

Fruman apologized in court. He said he was not aware of laws prohibiting foreign campaign contributions at the time he engaged in the donation scheme.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Nicolas Roos said in court Friday that Fruman sent text messages to the foreign national and that persons agent seeking $1 million in political contributions and that the foreign national wired two $500,000 installments for that purpose.

In court Friday, Fruman said the donation scheme was part of an effort to encourage support for a fledgling marijuana distribution business that he and others were starting in states where the drug was being legalized.

Giuliani, 77, has said he had no knowledge of illegal campaign contributions, but has acknowledged working extensively with Fruman and Parnas as he sought communications with Ukrainian figures.
KABUL, Afghanistan -- A Taliban official said that the group raised their flag over the Afghan presidential palace in a brief ceremony on Saturday  the same day the U.S. and the world marked the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

The milestone anniversary takes place just weeks after the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the return to power of the Taliban, the faction that sheltered the al-Qaida terror network founded by Osama bin Laden that carried out the attacks.

The Taliban's new Prime Minister Mohammad Hasan Akhund raised the flag in a ceremony at 11 a.m. local time to mark the official start of work by the Talibans 33-member caretaker government, said Ahmadullahh Muttaqi, multimedia chief of the group's cultural commission.

Earlier, another Taliban official said the religious militia's black and white flag was first raised at the palace on Friday. The militant group has also painted their banner on the entry gate to the U.S. Embassy building.

The U.S. is marking the 9/11 anniversary with commemorations at New Yorks World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.


After a few weeks of falling metrics, Coconino County saw an increase in both of its community transmission benchmarks for COVID-19 this week.

The case rate increased more sharply, to 257.3 cases per 100,000 as compared to 189.4 per 100,000 last week. Percent positivity stayed at a moderate level of 7.1%, 1.3 points higher than last weeks rate and only .8% below the substantial transmission category.

The incidence of COVID-like illness in county hospitals continued to fall and is now at 4.6%. Hospitalizations of COVID patients also stayed down, with only 15 reported this week.

Flagstaff Medical Center (FMC) listed 31 in-house COVID patients as of Friday morning.

The county schools report listed FMC as having 2% of its adult ICU beds, 11% of its emergency department beds and none of its medical/surgical beds available as of Sep. 10.

According to the dashboard data report, 89 more cases were reported in the county than last week, a total of 364.

The report said that Flagstaff experienced the largest increase in cases from the previous week with a 47 percent increase.
I was just standing there in shock. People are starting to come and surround me. I walked back inside to figure out what was going on, and thats when the second plane went into the building.  It was a little far away, but I could see people jumping. Very small, but I knew what they were. I have goosebumps thinking about it. So Im standing there and go all the way to the edge of the water on these cinder hills, and what I remember most is people all around me dialing and redialing. They were trying to get in touch with loved ones. Dialing and redialing. Over and over. Im standing there just absorbing all of this. While its happening, you are just absorbing. You dont know really what you are seeing. Im seeing these figures jump and Im understanding now whats happening.

It was like just everything changed in that moment. Everything. Nothing was the same any more. You dont really grasp mentally what youre seeing and whats happening, but energetically, spiritually, emotionally, unconsciously, I knew that I was looking at mass death. Period. New York suddenly turned into this place where love mattered. The whole city changed. Everybody, everybody, wanted to be around loved ones. Everybody. It was like it never had been important before but then in that minute, thats all that mattered.
Toyotas renewed focus on hybrid-electric vehicles may be attributable their forward-looking hydrogen-fueled automobiles having been a bust as to marketplace success. These zero-emission cars contain hydrogen tanks and fuel cells that can convert hydrogen into electricity, unlike other electric vehicles that are battery-powered. Toyotas hydrogen models can travel hundreds of miles on a tank, and emit only water vapor. But the expense of hydrogen fuel and the lack of refueling infrastructure has kept the technology from going mainstream. Given these setbacks, Toyota has advocated for their hybrid technology as a logical transition to greener transportation when hydrogen becomes more accessible.

Over the past few years, the company has also sued the Mexican government in an attempt to block fuel efficiency standards there. Toyota has also supported the former Trump administrations court battle with California over revamping Clean Air Act emissions standards. Also, Toyota is rumored to be part of a collaborative lobbying effort with the Washington, D.C.-based Alliance for Automobile Innovation to fight new regulations calling for zero-emissions vehicles. Moreover, Toyotas Political Action Committee was the top donor to Republicans in Congress who opposed the results of the 2020 presidential election.

While Toyota continues its opposition to true EVs, major markets like China have begun an aggressive shift towards EV production and can ultimately force the companys hand. Environmentalists and economists agree that in order for Toyota to increase its profit margins and remain viable into the future, it needs to rethink its vision  and prepare for a battery-electric future.

EarthTalk is produced by Roddy Scheer and Doug Moss for the 501(c)3 nonprofit EarthTalk. See more at https://emagazine.com. To donate, visit https://earthtalk.org. Send questions to: question@earthtalk.org.

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More than 70 percent of students at a Shanghai school for the children of businesspeople from Taiwan who are eligible for free COVID-19 vaccination had received their first shot by the time the new semester started last week.

They are the beneficiaries of a city policy that has included residents between 12 and 17 who are from Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan in the voluntary vaccination drive since the start of this month.

The students received the inoculations for free, the same as their local peers. They received domestic vaccines made by either Sinopharm or Sinovac Biotech, with each vaccination involving two shots.

The Shanghai Taiwan Children School said it has 614 students aged between 12 and 17, and 436 had been vaccinated by the end of the weekend, the first in the new semester.

"After the Shanghai municipal government announced that teenagers from Taiwan would be included in the vaccination program, we forwarded the message to our students and their parents," the school's student affairs director said. "Many showed strong willingness."

Most students got inoculated at a vaccination site near the school, accompanied by their parents and teachers, while others opted to go to a vaccination site close to their homes, the director, surnamed Zhang, said.

He said more students will get their first inoculation this weekend, which was a development the school welcomed because the higher the rate of vaccination, the better protected they will be.

Many parents had repeatedly inquired about the possibility of their children being vaccinated, Zhang said.

"They expressed the need to have their children vaccinated in Shanghai," he said, adding that the school had forwarded the requests to the authorities.

Students said they felt relaxed during the vaccination procedure. Some said they had already booked their second shot, which will be administered three to eight weeks after the first.

Liang Pei'en, a 10th grader at the school, got inoculated on Sunday. She said she did not feel any pain when getting the shot.

"My parents received the vaccination in Shanghai and didn't suffer from any side effects," she told China News Service.
Brian Daake was on duty with Beatrice Fire and Rescues B shift 20 years ago on Sept. 11.

He was cleaning the exercise room of the fire station when news broke that the first tower was hit.

Like many Americans, he didnt initially realize the magnitude of the events unfolding in New York.

We saw the tower burning and were transfixed watching that and then we witnessed the second airliner crash into the second tower, he recalled. I can still vividly see that in my mind as I did that day. I also remember the shocked looks on our faces. We knew that life would fundamentally never be the same.

Daake, who is now the Beatrice Fire and Rescue chief, gave the Patriot Day address during a ceremony at Veterans Memorial Park. Around 50 people attended the event Saturday morning to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Daake recalled that his daughters were 2 and 4 years old at the time, and the uncertainty he felt for their future.

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Now, Daake is asking those who remember Sept. 11 to help teach the younger generation how live changed in 2001.
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP)  Gov. Doug Burgum said Friday that Joe Bidens directive that large companies require COVID-19 vaccinations is overreach, and he said he's asked North Dakota's attorney general to look at legal options to challenge it.

Burgum, a Republican, said the mandate steers our country down a dangerous path away from states rights and the freedom of private businesses to make their own decisions on vaccinations.

Biden immediately pushed back at Republican governors on the issue, calling them cavalier with the health of children and communities.

Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem said he met by teleconference with fellow GOP attorneys general Friday to look at legal options.

I'm adamantly pro-vaccination, but I'm also pro-federalism, Stenehjem said. This is federal overreach.

Biden's directive would mandate that employers with more than 100 workers require them to be vaccinated or be tested for the virus weekly, affecting about 80 million Americans. And the roughly 17 million workers at health facilities that receive federal Medicare or Medicaid also will have to be fully vaccinated.
Vice President Kamala Harris began her remarks at the Flight 93 memorial with words for those who lost loved ones on Sept. 11.

So many in our nation -- too many in our nation -- have deeply felt the passage of time these past 20 years, she said. Please know your nation sees you and we stand with you and we support you.



SHANKSVILLE, Pa.  The victims and heroes of Flight 93 are being commemorated at a ceremony at the site where the plane crashed in a field on Sept. 11, 2001.

President Joe Biden was making an appearance, and Vice President Kamala Harris, former President George W. Bush and Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf were also speaking.

Wolf said the passengers and crew of Flight 93, whose actions are believed to have led the hijackers to abandon their mission of targeting the U.S. Capitol, offered a lasting lesson of courage and hope.

This story and this place remind us each day what it means to be an American, said Wolf, a Democrat. In times of strife, we Americans, we come together. We comfort each other. We protect each other and we stand up for each other. This memorial is a powerful reminder of what we have lost. But its also a powerful reminder of the strength of the American spirit.
With Ryan Moore at Leopardstown and the Curragh this weekend, Frankie Dettori comes in for the rides on Aidan O'Brien's runners on Arc trial day at Longchamp.

First up is the Prix Niel at 13:33, with Frankie on Bolshoi Ballet, the beaten favourite in the Derby. Prior to finishing in midfield at Epsom, he had won the two main trials in Ireland at Leopardstown. Since Epsom, he has won the Belmont Derby and come fourth in the Saratoga Derby. All those four races were over 10 furlongs, this weekend he reverts to 12. Bolshoi Ballet is the best colt in the race, for sure, over a mile and a quarter. The question is whether he stays a mile and a half?

He appeared not to at Epsom but the racecourse vet noted that he had been struck into in the early part of the Classic and that may have caused him to underperform on the day.

Bubble looks an each-way gift

The opposition in the Niel isn't strong, though. Baby Rider finished half a length in front of Bubble Gift in the Grand Prix de Paris over course and distance on heavy ground. Prior to that, Bubble Gift had won the Prix Hoquart over 11 furlongs with Media Stream five lengths back.

Pretty Tiger is having his first stab at 12 furlongs, having won the Prix Francois Mathet over an extended 10 with Media Stream seven lengths adrift.

Bolshoi Ballet may last home but Bubble Gift and Baby Rider will make sure he has had a race. At 8/1 Bubble Gift has definite each-way appeal.

Snowfall looks a cert for her Arc trial

The Dettori banker is Snowfall in the Prix Vermeille at 14:55.

The winner of the Oaks, the Irish Oaks and the Yorkshire Oaks, Snowfall is the best filly of her age over 12 furlongs in Europe, if not the world.

Her stablemate Joan Of Arc is next in the betting at 12/1. She was caught on the line and beaten a short-head in the Irish 1,000 Guineas. She then won the French Oaks by three-quarters of a length from the Andre Fabre pair Philomene and Burgarita. with Incarville two lengths further back in seventh.

All three were going on well at the finish - not weakening - and can be expected to follow Snowfall home.

Joan Of Arc was a beaten favourite in the Nassau at Glorious Goodwood on her only start since.

Roger Varian runs his Windsor Listed winner, Teona. She had finished behind Snowfall on her two previous starts at Epsom and York. and looks out of depth here.

La Jaconde is in the race to ensure a fast pace for Snowfall.

Broome could sweep Skalleti away

The longest price of Dettori's three rides in the Arc trials is Broome in the Prix Foy at 15:30. He was a 13/2 shot on the Sportsbook despite having won a Group 1 over 12 furlongs on soft this season.

The favourite, Skalleti, has won all his four starts this year - and 16 of his 21 races - but he has yet to race over 12 furlongs. Interestingly he is not in the Arc; at this stage his target is the Champion Stakes at Ascot two weeks later. Although he has the best form of the six that line up it is over 10 furlongs. He has to be vulnerable over 12.

The Japanese challenger Deep Bond has yet to win a Group 1 in his own country and is used to racing over further. He is 40/1 for the Arc, whereas Broome is 50s, but I'd sooner be with Broome on this occasion given his recent win in the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud.

Iresine, Opasan and Sublimis need to improve considerably on their recent form in Listed company to figure.

The race is more open than the overnight odds suggest and Broome is still a good bet despite being backed into 11/4, three points shorter than on Saturday morning.

Lady likely to make first three again in her sprint

There are two British runners in the Prix du Petit Couvert at 16:05, the key to which is the trip.

Hollie Doyle's mount, Mo Celita is rated 97 following her recent career-best Listed win at Deauville over six furlongs. Dettori's mount, Lady In France has a rating of 103 and a CV that includes a third to Air De Valse in this sprint last year.

Looking beyond the English challenge, you have a number of sprinters that keep running into each other.

Pradaro, Berneuil, Batwan and Air De Valse finished in that order when the first four home in the Prix du Gros-Chene over five on soft at Chantilly in June. Back in April over the same track and trip, Berneuil beat Pradaro and Wild Majesty

More recently Ocean won the Prix de Ris-Orangis over six at Deauville where Stormbringer, Pradaro and Collinsbay filled three of the last four spaces.

In a tangled web of a race, Kevin Ryan's Lady In France is as good an each-way bet as anything.

Pin lands on Sagamiyra on return to seven furlongs

The two at the head of the market for the Prix du Pin at 16:40, unsurprisingly, are the fillies that finished second in Group 1 contests last time out.

Dettori rides Tropbeau for Lady Bamford and trainer Andre Fabre. Christophe Soumillon is on Sagamiyra owned by his paymaster the Aga Khan.

There doesn't seem much between them on this summer's form but, back in May, Sagamiyra won the Prix Maurice Zilber over course and distance with Tropbeau four lengths back in third.

Sagamiyra has since run second to Ecrivain in a Group 3 and been beaten in a photo by Mother Earth in the Group 1 Prix Rothschild over a mile at Deauville.

That, to me, makes her - and the third at Deauville Speak Of The Devil more appealing than Dettori's mount which has not won for over a year but was a close second in this race 12 months ago.

You can't rule her out, as she split Marianafoot and Starman in the Prix Maurice de Gheest at Deauville last month, but Sagamiyra will be suited by the drop back from a mile and is the Pin pick.


I was convinced I wasnt going to cry.

A visit to the 9/11 Memorial Museum in New York's Financial District would be a refresher lesson  a look at history from a distance  I told myself.

Standing in line with hundreds of other people over Memorial Day weekend, I was ready to eye the artifacts, hear the stories and, hopefully, come to some kind of conclusion that helped me understand what happened.

And, then, I saw the two pools that went so far down you couldnt see their bottoms. I touched the names  of people who died during the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the 1993 World Trade Center bombing  and it got to me. This wasnt just another memorial, another museum. It was the final resting place for thousands.

Inside, the first glimpse you get of the horror is of the steel beams that remain from one of the buildings. They pull you down into the exhibition area and lead you on a trail that gets deeper and deeper into the story.
KABUL, Afghanistan  Afghanistans first 2001 post-Taliban president Hamid Karzai marked the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on America with a meeting of tribal elders at his high-walled compound in the Afghan capital where he has remained with his family since the August return of the Taliban to Kabul.
The growth in the American Indian and Alaska Native population in the last decade contributes to the country being much more multi-racial and more diverse, according to recently released 2020 Census data. The demographic data will be used to redraw the nation's political maps, including in Montana which regained a second congressional seat.

The American Indian and Alaska Native population, alone and in combination, increased from 5.2 million in 2010 to 9.7 million in 2020, an 86.5% increase.

This makes the American Indian and Alaska Native people represent 2.9% of the U.S. population.

Among the findings: At least 3.7 million people self-identified as American Indian and Alaska Native alone; 5.9 million in combination of one race or more; 9.7 million alone or in combination.

The number of people who identified as white and American Indian and Alaska Native grew from 1.4 million in 2010 to 4 million in 2020. Native Hawaiians, alone and in combination, count for 1.6 million.

Native Americans were not counted in the U.S. Census until 1860, but have been counted every census since. Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islanders were not counted until 1960. And Hispanic or Latino people were counted once in 1930 but not again until 1970.
I was also able to find a spot in a parking garage much closer to work than usual. I dont remember seeing anyone on the street and I must not have, because if I had, its likely something would have been said. Finally, about a block from our building, a guy I worked with came walking toward me. I didnt know him well, but it seemed odd that he was going in the opposite direction, so I asked him what was going on, and his answer made no sense. He said something about safety or security, but he was in a hurry, so I didnt follow up. I would later realize that he just assumed I knew what happened three hours earlier on the other side of the country.

Walking into the building to a large cluster of my co-workers gathered in front of a television was my first indication that something was seriously wrong. I made some joke about them trying to avoid work and seeing the look from that group of people finally made me realize that this was going to be no ordinary day.

Heather McDiarmid, Gillette, Wyoming
A 25-year U.S. Army veteran who served in Vietnam, Edmunds remembers how two officers knocked on his door on the outskirts of Cheyenne before sunrise on Oct. 20, 2001, bringing word of his sons death.

I looked out the window, I saw them standing there and all I could think was Oh my God, I know what theyre here for. Ive done notifications so I knew, said Edmunds, who as a military police officer participated in telling relatives of loved ones' deaths. He got choked up and quiet while looking at a display of his sons medals and the folded American flag presented to him and other families of fallen soldiers.

They came in and gave us the Regret to inform you speech. My wife had been up by then, and I watched her melt into this carpet right here on the floor," Edmunds recalled. "And they asked, Is there anything we can do? and we said, No, just let us absorb this, and we have to be able to accept this.

Wyoming is the least populated state and one that values tradition: rodeo and county fairs in summer, elk hunting in fall, calving season in spring and military service.

Jonn Edmunds and his friends grew up playing with water guns, then laser tag in the familys big yard. Eventually the honors student moved up to paintball, Donn Edmunds recalled.
Two of the five North Dakota animals in which West Nile virus was confirmed or suspected last month have died, according to the State Department of Agriculture.

The department was notified of one infected sheep, and four confirmed cases and one suspected case in horses. All the animals showed neurologic signs and none was vaccinated, the department said.

Although were headed toward fall, mosquito season is still here, Agriculture Commissioner Doug Goehring said. Horse owners should take extra care to protect their animals.

The virus typically infects birds, horses and people but any animal can be infected. Vaccines are available to prevent infection in horses but no vaccines are approved for humans. Any horse showing incoordination, muscle tremors or fever should receive immediate veterinary care, the department said.

In addition to annual vaccines, the department recommends owners keep horses indoors during peak periods of mosquito activity; install and maintain screens in stall openings; use fans in barns to dispel mosquitoes; apply species-appropriate insect repellent; keep areas around stables and barns free of weeds and manure, and drain areas of standing water; clean water tanks and buckets frequently; remove debris and containers that can hold water where mosquitoes could breed.

For more information about West Nile virus or other reportable animal diseases, visit www.nd.gov/ndda/animal-health-division or contact a local veterinarian.

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We just celebrated Labor Day.

No, we didnt.

Labor was forgotten while most of us only noticed that we had a holiday and spent it lounging, fishing, swimming, sunning, camping, playing -- everything but recognizing the reason for the holiday. One thing for sure, we took no time to honor labor.

Modern unions first appeared in the 1870s when working people had to fight, starve and die to organize.

The idea of unions was repulsive to the growing corporate community when no fringe benefits were provided, 10-year-old kids worked for pennies, and 12-hour days were common. The road to unions was splattered with blood and violence.

Workers lose body count

More often than not, whenever working people tried to organize they were assailed by strikebreakers, hired guns and, ultimately, state militias and federal troops requested by governors. And in the body count, working people lost more lives than company owners.

In the great railroad strike of 1877, the Maryland militia killed 10 and injured 25; in the Pennsylvania "Reading Railroad Massacre the state militia shot 16. In 1892, governors of five states used the National Guard and/or the Army against miners in Tennessee and Idaho.
I went to my house to visit my mother and I explained the story to her. She said, Amir Shah, you have no brother, no father, theres no other branch of the family. Dont go out. I said, I will do my job, my work.

ON THE FIRST NIGHT OF THE AIR WAR BY U.S.-LED FORCES AGAINST THE TALIBAN

My satellite telephone was on the second floor of our old AP compound, and the window was near to the street. I put a blanket on top of me to hide the sound of my talking and giving updates. I was passing all the information to Kathy Gannon in Pakistan.

When the bombarding started the first night, I was talking very quietly. It was so quiet outside. I was telling the story through the phone slowly, very slowly. I was afraid because three days before, the Arabs across the street had been looking at all the houses and seeing who was suspicious to them. I was working alone. I was so afraid. I gave Kathy all of the information from under the blanket, and all through the night I reported.
More than 100 people gathered in Bismarck on Saturday to remember the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and to honor North Dakotans who have died in the war on terror.

Gov. Doug Burgum, U.S. Sens. John Hoeven and Kevin Cramer, North Dakota National Guard Adjutant General Al Dohrmann and others reflected on the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks at an event hosted by the National Guard at the Memorial to the Fallen in the Global War on Terrorism outside of Fraine Barracks.

Burgum said that while people may reflect on those "unthinkable acts" and how they changed the world, the attacks brought Americans together.

The former software executive said that when he had gone to the Twin Towers in New York in the late 1990s for work, it was the most security he'd ever gone through and among the most secure buildings in the city.

The governor also spoke about Robert Rasmussen, who was three years behind Burgum in high school in Arthur, who died in the attack on the World Trade Center. Burgum said one of the last things Rasmussen did was help guide people down the stairs of the south tower.

"One can only imagine the courage and selflessness that it must have taken to stay in that building and try to help others to safety," he said.
But you dont think about it at the time, he said.

Derrig, of West Fargo, described the first couple of hours in the air the same way Haugen did: chaotic. They were called to battle stations when the first tower was hit, and scrambled when a plane struck the second tower. They were diverted west when a plane crashed into the Pentagon.

Pilots could see smoke as soon as they turned west. The full picture of the attack didnt become clear until later that day.

We didnt know an airplane hit the Pentagon until that night, he said. We pieced some stuff together and knew it was a plane.

The possibility of someone using commercial aircraft to carry out an attack was at that time unthinkable, Derrig said.

Unfortunately, the country has been at war since that day, he said. A lot of people in the U.S. military have been at war their whole career.

The North Dakota Guard members did their jobs professionally at all levels and played a big part in the response to 9/11 and safety and security since then, Haugen said. Hes concerned that the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan alienated some of our strongest allies and left them out to dry.
JUNEAU, Alaska  Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy said President Joe Bidens effort to require millions of U.S. workers to get vaccinated against COVID-19 is ill conceived, divisive, and un-American.

At a time in which we are called to work together, forced medical procedures run counter to our collective sense of fairness and liberty, the Republican said in a statement. My administration is aggressively identifying every tool at our disposal to protect the inherent individual rights of all Alaskans.

The statement did not describe what that might entail.

Dunleavy has butted heads with the Biden administration on resource development issues. Dunleavy has faced some criticism in Alaska for not mandating masks or for not implementing a new disaster declaration to deal with a recent surge in COVID-19 cases. He has instead asked lawmakers to act on legislation aimed at addressing staffing concerns raised by health care facilities.

In his statement Friday, Dunleavy said that it is clear from the data and empirical evidence over the last year that the vaccine is the most effective way to fight COVID-19. From what we are seeing in our hospitals, the very ill are mostly those who are unvaccinated.
The Democratic Party is rolling out its left-wing big guns to go to California to support Gov. Gavin Newsom in the recall election scheduled for Sept. 14.

In California, the bluest of blue states, where, in 2020, challenger Joe Biden defeated incumbent President Donald Trump by a margin of almost 2-1, the polls are within the margin of error showing Newsom holding on in the recall.

Why are Vice President Kamala Harris and Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar putting it on the line to campaign for Newsom?

They know that what is going on in California is a laboratory for what is going on in the nation and in the Democratic Party.

The beginning of Newsom's fall from grace was discovery of his dining at a party at a fancy French restaurant in California wine country, where dinners start at $450 per person, keeping no COVID-19 restrictions while he had his whole state on strict lockdown.

This was more than an embarrassing moment for the governor. And it was more than a graphic picture of political hypocrisy and double standards. It was a portrayal of very different takes on how America works that is now being driven home by radio talk show host Larry Elder, who is leading the pack of candidates challenging Newsom.
Ann Nicole Nelson of Stanley would be 50 today if she hadnt been killed on Sept. 11, 2001. By all accounts she was on an upward track with her career and life.

We can only speculate what a young woman with a passion for knowledge, love of travel and a desire to succeed would have achieved. Whats certain is what our nation lost on that day is unfathomable.

There were 2,977 people killed when four airliners were hijacked with two flying into the Twin Towers, one into the Pentagon and the fourth crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, after passengers and crew attempted to retake the plane. They died preventing another attack on Washington, D.C.

Add to that the deaths of first responders attributed to their recovery efforts at Ground Zero. All that promise wasted. Children who never had a chance to grow up, people in the midst of flourishing careers that were never fully realized and families torn apart.

Theres no way to calculate our losses from the numbers. We will never know how many potentially great achievements never occurred because of the attacks. We do know that 9/11 forever reshaped our nation and world.
Freedom, as indispensable as it is, is not sufficient for constructing the quality of society and culture appropriate to man, his dignity, and his capacity. It must be a freedom oriented to something beyond itself, as we have said so many times, oriented to truth: the truth of mans origin, the truth of mans nature, and the truth of mans destiny. []

It feels strange to type that its been 20 years since 9/11. What happened 20 years ago forced us all to reckon with the expansive scope and seemingly endless depth of evil. In the midst of something so heinous, so diabolical, can the hand of the One whose finger is said to write straight with crooked lines be detected?

As the stories of the orphans and their grief stricken have been told and retold, whether in our national media or in our kitchens, there remains an uncomfortable question: Why?

It is not that a simple and straightforward explanation from heaven itself would heal the wounds that we bear. Yet the question of why evil exists is one that weighs heavily on many hearts always and once again on this sad anniversary.

No full answer, in the form of a sentence or a proposition could ever satisfy the question of why evil exists, even if it were to drop from the sky. The ultimate answer, which does come to us from heaven itself, comes not in the form of words, but a Word, and more specifically, the Word that was made flesh (cf. John 1:14). That final answer is not a proposition, but a Person, and the embrace of One whose comfort is beyond our present understanding. The ultimate answer then, is a mystery: the mystery of encounter and embrace.

That the ultimate answer is a mystery does not mean that there are no proximate answers: Among the proximate answers is the fact that human freedom, so highly prized by all people, is also at the heart of evil. In a world whose history is so frequently acquainted with totalitarian experiments, one would be tempted to think that freedom, standing alone, was its own good. Yet, to see the heart of darkness as the world saw two decades ago is to understand that mere men, for certain twisted reasons, chose to exercise their free will to destroy the freedom and lives of others.

Thus, freedom, as indispensable as it is, is not sufficient for constructing the quality of society and culture appropriate to man, his dignity, and his capacity. It must be a freedom oriented to something beyond itself, as we have said so many times, oriented to Truth: the truth of mans origin, the truth of mans nature, and the truth of mans destiny.

That is why the Acton Institute was founded, and why its mission is to study and promote both the transcendental reality of man, and his necessary freedom; or, as we state it, religion and liberty and the free and virtuous society. A clear understanding of the proper relation between religion and society has never been so needed in our world as it is today.

9/11 revealed a dimension of American society that some have attempted to shield from our view, and that in the intervening years seems faded from our memory. We discovered then that, at its core, America was a profoundly religious nation, and that faith in the American experience need not be a source of division between Americans but can be the foundation of our unity on shared principles. To lose sight of that truth will be the ruin of the great contribution America can make to the world.

Additionally, we know that when all of us, including political leaders, speak openly about our faith, it need not violate anyones conscience, much less shred the Constitution, as so many pressure groups argue. Rather, it gives rise to reflection on Americas highest and noblest aspirations and what ought to be the noblest and highest aspirations of any people. We have found that love of freedom and the embrace of faith are not incompatible; instead, they are bound up with one another, each reinforcing the other in perfect harmony.

Twenty years ago, I had hope that the events of that horrific day would represent a sea-change in the way our society views the place of religion. Back then, there wasnt a public figure who addressed the attack on the nation without a plea for prayer for the victims. Many referred to the religious roots of the Western idea of human rights, one of the things so antithetical to the terrorists conception. Many public spokesmen then, including the president, sought Gods blessing on our people and the aspirations of our nation. Prayer vigils had been continuous. Indeed, it is difficult to even imagine dealing with that a crisis on that scale without our faith.

At the time, in a moving meditation, President George W. Bush expressed a vigorous faith by quoting St. Paul:

As weve been assured: Neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, or height, nor depth can separate us from Gods love. May he bless the souls of the departed, may he comfort our own, and may he always guide our country.

But I sometimes wonder: Had the president made these remarks one week earlier, would there have been an outcry, as there was during the election, when he shared his faith experience with some prayer groups? Might he have been called a theocrat and worse? As it is, his unabashed faith, relentless during the presidential campaign, was seen has a great sign of leadership. Indeed, it is.

But today is another story, where we find ourselves severely divided as a nation, to the extent that the mere citation of a Scripture passage or earnest expression of faith would deepen the divide. It fills me with sadness.

How tragic that it took a calamity on the scale of what we saw on Sept. 11, 2001, to impart this message and reveal the religious truth beneath the secular pretensions. But there is even more going on here. As a nation, we have always grounded our belief in human rights in a fundamentally religious idea: Human life is sacred because it has an origin in the eternity of Gods grace and possesses a destiny in His love. It is because human beings are created in the Image of God that we know that heinous actions of diabolical fanatics are crimes of such magnitude.

From the Declaration of Independence through the movement to abolish slavery to the Civil Rights Movement, faith has been at the core of every event of any magnitude. Usually, that faith is invoked in defense of the sanctity and dignity of the human person, and against those who would violate it. This is as it should be.

As for those who hate modern life, made possible by this vision of the human person, the choice of the World Trade Center, symbol of global free markets, was no accident. If one hates human life, one also hates the products of human creativity, and hence what better target could have been selected?

These are the irrational cries of the forces of repression and bondage that hate and fear liberty, human enterprise, modernity, and ultimately, human life itself, and are mimicked by some even today. Thankfully, such forces are doomed to failure because the logic of their culture of death leads to self-immolation and destruction, whereas the logic of a rich and healthy culture of life leads to replenishment, creativity, and growth.

This, then, becomes the challenge for those of us living in the post-Sept. 11 world: Will we come to see our success, prosperity, creativity, and liberty as all being a means to a higher end? Will the awareness of our transcendent reality form our day-to-day decisions and our path as a nation? And from the perspective of the Acton Institute, so concerned as we are about cultivating a religious leadership that comprehends the moral potential of human liberty and enterprise, the critical question becomes: Are our clergy prepared to speak, in so intelligent, bold, and confident a manner, so as to invite the spiritual and moral renaissance for our society so desperately yearns?

It is a commonly held view that faith is somehow less necessary in times of peace, prosperity, and security  that living in a society of plenty diminishes the longing for spiritual solace.

We know from our own experience that we are more likely to turn to God in difficult times than easy ones. God speaks to us with a megaphone in our pain, C.S. Lewis said, because it is when we reach the end of the rope, not when we feel ourselves to be Masters of the Universe, that we are most likely to fall on knees in supplication. My pastoral experience suggests that personal trial is a prime motivating source to seek spiritual comfort and the forgiveness of sins.

At the same time, it is an error  perhaps the fundamental error  of the terrorists to believe that faith and prosperity are always inversely related. Part of the challenge of living a life of faith is to maintain a certain spiritual equilibrium in good times and bad, not to be tossed about by the winds of circumstance, flitting between bouts of depravity and sanctity, but rather seeking devotion as a daily practice.

One can hope that in this somber reflection we can retrieve a tolerance for open expressions of faith. Let us hope that the abiding smirk will be permanently wiped off the faces of the cynics of faith and freedom, who have too long occupied a central place in our culture.

Let us regard faith as a source of strength, comfort, and blessing to us as individuals and as a nation, the source and summit of our freedom, its barometer and compass.
Its important that we dont assume that every company is like a Theranos, we just need to ask the right questions, said Ruby Gadelrab, founder and CEO of MDisrupt, a medical diligence company for the health-tech industry, which aims to avoid making similar mistakes in the future.

Health care, as a whole, is complex, Gadelrab said. Its probably the hardest area to invest in.

To help investors vet health-technology companies, Gadelrab suggests first establishing if the product is clinically and commercially viable.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/09/10/the-lessons-for-investors-from-the-trial-of-theranos-founder-elizabeth-holmes.html

Investors do technical and financial diligence using experts, in health care we need to do medical diligence using health-care experts.

Then, determine if theres evidence to back up the founders scientific claims. The technology should be validated, Gadelrab said. Show me the data. For example, does it actually pick up a disease or biomarker when its present and doesnt pick it up when its not? Not all data is created equal, she added. Good data is done externally with scientists and research labs, great data is published in peer-reviewed journals and excellent data is published and replicated. Finally, look at the team structure. Do they have clinical experts in senior positions? On their boards, as their investors, in their C-suite? Make sure health experts have a seat at the table and a voice in the process, Gadelrab said. The secrecy surrounding the Theranos technology and the intense attention given to its CEO was part of the mystique but also a major red flag, according to Sherman. I hope the next time that kind of stuff happens, someone says wait a sec.

Lessons learned
A New York State trooper who was run over in 2020 during racial justice protests on Buffalo's East Side has filed a lawsuit in state court against the Buffalo Police Department and the driver who struck him.

Trooper Ronald L. Ensminger Jr., who was seriously injured in the early morning hours of June 1, alleged that city leaders should have taken steps to ensure that peaceful protests over the murder of George Floyd did not devolve into chaotic rioting.

Chaos outside E District police station: 'Somebody ran over them. Oh my god!' The female driver of an SUV has been charged with striking two state troopers and a police officer but questions remain about the

"It didn't have to get to the point that it eventually ended up at," said Ensminger's attorney, Thomas J. Grillo Jr. "Theres certain standards, procedures and tactics that could have essentially curtailed the whole thing."

That night, a nonviolent march from downtown ended in front of the Buffalo Police Department's Northeast District Station on Bailey Avenue. Other people drawn to the protest stayed after the formal protest. People threw rocks toward heavily armed police who surrounded the police station, police said. Nearby, trash cans were set on fire and several stores were looted. Buffalo police and State Police in riot gear fired tear gas and formed a line across Bailey Avenue.
One model Winkelstein shared Friday demonstrates the narrow edge on which Western New York currently sits. Even before the return of winter weather, regional hospitalizations have risen sharply with the continued spread of the more infectious Delta variant, to 158 on Sept. 9.

Under some projections, hospitalizations may continue to rise through at least the end of October to nearly 300 in Erie County alone. But even a partial return to masking and social-distancing could cut the number of future hospitalizations by nearly two-thirds, the model shows.

+2 Hochul's announcement of new Covid measures showcases new style of leadership "I will not be micromanaging," Hochul said. "But I'll be giving guidance based on your input. I'll be giving you the cover you need. I'll be an ally, but I will not be imposing state people and locations on you without consultation.

Such an outcome would require even vaccinated people to readopt behavioral precautions, such as wearing masks in public places, which both local officials and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention strongly recommend. Since late July, the CDC has urged vaccinated people to wear masks indoors in all but a handful of U.S. counties, and to wear masks outdoors in crowded areas.

Whenever you're indoors in a public space  or even outdoors in a crowded area where you're not really sure what everybody's vaccine status is, like the Billy Joel concert or a Bills game  you should mask and protect yourself and protect the people around you, Burstein said.
A grandfather was arrested after he reportedly became abusive to three staff members at Roosevelt Academy School 65, according to a spokeswoman for Buffalo Public Schools.

According to statement released by spokeswoman Elena Cala, an order of protection was filed against the assailant, who also is barred from entering the school building or being on school property.

Meanwhile, Buffalo Teachers Federation President Philip Rumore on Friday issued a statement that said an assistant principal was "seriously injured" by a grandfather of a student who became irate over what he perceived as the lack of safety protocols for Covid-19 in place at the school.

The suspect's name was not released.

Afterward, Rumore issued a statement calling for calm and understanding in the midst of many challenges facing the school employees, parents and students as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

"A life-threatening virus, the severe shortage of school personnel, school bus drivers, and critical life-saving protocols are but a few challenges," Rumore said.
"I told the flight attendant, don't come near the cockpit door ... because if anyone comes through this cockpit door, they're going to get hurt. She said, 'I understand,' " Kozak said. "That's why I had to say, it could be us. I'm not going to let us be the next flying bomb."

He immediately made an arrangement with his copilot to unfasten the fire ax and the fire extinguisher. He put the plane on autopilot in case they had to let go of the controls during a physical confrontation.

"If somebody comes through that door, I said to him, 'do you want to use the fire extinguisher or the ax? We can use the fire extinguisher first, followed by a hatchet in the head. What would you rather do?' I gave him his option, and that was our plan. One of us would use the fire extinguisher to hit him in the face, and the other one was going to start swinging the ax,' " Kozak said.

Drent took the ax.

"I had the crash ax on my lap as we went into Boston and we had the flight attendant blocking the door," Drent said. Together, they were ready for "whatever we needed to do."

Their plane was among the last in the Northeast to land. Kozak recalled eerie radio silence.

"Usually there is a lot of radio chatter, and there was no one but us. It was very weird."
Today, he sees the combination of losing Laura Lee  followed by his extended ordeal with heart disease  as a daily reminder of how finite everything can be, and that whatever time you casually use up cannot be recovered. His daughter left this week to start her first day of eighth grade, that pivot year between childhood and high school, and he intends to enjoy every minute as she makes a transition her dad said "goes too fast."

It is all part of what Morabito believes is the greatest tribute he can offer, the nuance all too easy to lose in raw footage of overwhelming violence. He said the real magnitude of Sept. 11  the point he does not allow himself to forget and a revelation he said also applies to those lost in the pandemic  is the way every innocent life that came to an end, whether a worker or passenger or a selfless first responder, had a power and trajectory much like Laura Lees.

He attempts to think of all the thousands, one by one, and he brings the same reverence to every member of the military who died in Afghanistan. He tries to make his focus hinge on gratitude for everything they were  a shift from the years when he was driven by sheer fury.
But we cannot let these harrowing memories, and the manipulation of new fears, goad us into furthering the terrorists' cause of bringing this nation down. Unity and resolve must triumph over the scare tactics and lies that our adversaries  foreign and domestic  weaponize to divide us.

Shortly after Sept. 11, a classic American battle came to the fore, as our better angels grappled with our inner demons.

"In fighting against bad things, we can't forget what we're fighting for," said Mary Bauer, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia.

For Jason Mollica, a professor in the School of Communication at American University in Washington, the impact of the attack hit close: He lost two cousins at the World Trade Center. A family friend  a Port Authority officer  rushed into a twin tower to help people and never came out.

"Obviously, it brought people together," he said of the attack, which took place months after the contentious outcome of the presidential contest between George W. Bush and Al Gore. Unfortunately, I think were more divided than we were, even prior to 9/11.

"Im not sure if well ever get back to that point of feeling that pride in coming together  of making sure that as a nation we are one."
Here, Floyds murder also instigated protests and controversy, some of it self-inflicted by police. Since late 2020, two Buffalo police officers, an Erie County sheriffs deputy and a Southtowns police officer have died by what is believed to be suicide.

It wont change substantially unless the forces that instigate or promote that desperation also do. Police need help and it can come from a number of sources.

Internally, officers  and, critically, their families  need to know when they need help and be willing to seek it. In an armed, military-style organization, that can be a big leap. Its a long-standing problem that becomes only more urgent when public doubts about police add to the stress levels.

One former police officer who learned that lesson will speak to Western New York police in November. Chris Prochut, a former police officer from the Chicago area, was only days away from the suicide he planned. Fortunately, his wife noticed his changed behavior and alerted his department. The intervention saved his life. Its a lesson that should reverberate.
They set out rods and one of them was using a Church Stern Planer in the prop wash of the boat. The lure was 45 feet down over 150 feet of water using a Moonshine spoon.

It was very exciting to reel in this fish, Mang said. It came out of the water three times, and it took me 20 minutes to bring it in. It was the only fish she caught for the day, and she earned a check for $3,000 with her first-place win and big fish of the day with one-day carryover.

Second place was also caught off the shores of Niagara County when Mike Leising, of East Amherst, fishing with his father, Roy, of East Amherst, were trolling off Wilson in their Sport Craft 232. They discovered the inside water was cold after a northeast blow, so the duo decided to run offshore to 300 feet of water. As they headed toward the Niagara River, using 10 colors of lead core line with a Warrior Magnum Steelhead Candy spoon attached, they had their first hit  an 11-pound, 14-ounce steelhead that Roy reeled in. It would eventually place eighth.

Back the lure went into the water and almost immediately the rod went off again and this time it was Mikes turn to reel it in. Twenty minutes later, he had a personal best 15-pound, 5-ounce steelhead.
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - September 9, 2021) - First Light Capital Corp. (TSXV: XYZ.P) ("First Light") and New Oroperu Resources Inc. (TSXV: ORO) ("New Oroperu") are pleased to announce that the shareholders of both companies have overwhelmingly approved the business combination transaction between them (the "Transaction").

At the First Light Annual and General Special Meeting, the shareholders:

received the audited annual financial statements of First Light for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2020, together with the accompanying auditors' report,





approved an increase in the number of Directors from three to five,





elected James ("Jim") Currie, Andrew Carstensen, Barry Hildred, Brian Storseth and K. Wayne Livingstone as directors, all to take office effective upon completion of the Transaction,





confirmed that the current members of the Board of Directors of First Light will continue to serve as directors until completion of the Transaction,





appointed First Light's current auditors - Manning Elliott LLP - as the auditors for First Light for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2021,





approved the proposed omnibus equity incentive compensation plan,





approved the consolidation of all of the issued and outstanding common shares in the capital of First Light (including all common shares to be issued at closing of the Transaction) on the basis of one (1) post-consolidation share for every six (6) pre-consolidation shares, and





approved the change of the First Light's name to Anacortes Mining Corporation.

At the New Oroperu Special Meeting, the New Oroperu securityholders approved a special resolution authorizing and approving the execution and delivery of the Arrangement Agreement among First Light, New Oroperu, 1310612 B.C. Ltd. and 1310620 B.C. Ltd. dated June 16, 2021 (the "Arrangement Agreement") and the performance by New Oroperu of its obligations thereunder, and they approved the plan of arrangement attached as a schedule to the Arrangement Agreement (the "Arrangement"). New Oroperu has applied for a final order of the Supreme Court of British Columbia to approve the Arrangement.

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The completion of the Transaction remains subject to conditions set forth in the Arrangement Agreement, including TSX Venture Exchange approval. The parties anticipate completing the Transaction within the next few weeks.

Upon completion of the Transaction, the resulting issuer, Anacortes Mining Corp. ("Anacortes") will be the 100% owner of the Tres Cruces Gold Project located in Northern Peru. The Tres Cruces project is located in north central Peru and accessible via a paved road 127 km from the city of Trujillo, located on the Pacific coast. Infrastructure near the project includes an airstrip a few kilometres to the north, a deep-water port near the city of Trujillo, and Boroo Ptd Ltd (Singapore)'s Lagunas Norte operations within 10 km, which were recently acquired from Barrick Gold Corporation. Tres Cruces currently hosts a mineral resource estimate of 2.474 million ounces of gold at 1.65 g/t in the Indicated category, which includes 630,000 ounces of leachable gold resources.

Upon the completion of the Transaction, Anacortes will be well-financed as a result of the recently completed $22,038,500 private placement of subscription receipts which closed on July 21, 2021, with the proceeds being held in escrow until the close of the Transaction.

Led by seasoned mining executive Jim Currie as CEO, Anacortes intends to advance Tres Cruces to Feasibility Study beginning after the close of the Transaction as the first step in building an Americas-based mid-tier gold producer. Anacortes intends to work towards expanding the resource base at Tres Cruces with an aggressive drilling program and to evaluate additional strategic opportunities as they become available.

About First Light

First Light is a capital pool company pursuant to Policy 2.4 of the TSXV. Except as specifically contemplated in such policy, until the completion of its Qualifying Transaction (as defined in the policy), First Light will not carry on business, other than the identification and evaluation of companies, businesses or assets with a view to completing a proposed QT. Investors are cautioned that trading in the securities of a capital pool company is considered highly speculative.

For further information, please contact Jim Currie, President and Chief Executive Officer of First Light, at (604) 764-7108.

About New Oroperu

New Oroperu is a junior exploration company based in Vancouver, B.C., which owns the Tres Cruces gold project in Peru. The Tres Cruces gold project currently hosts a mineral resource estimate of 2.474 million ounces of gold at 1.65 g/t in the Indicated category, which includes 630,000 ounces of leachable gold resources. This mineral resource is described in a NI 43-101 Technical Report & Resource Update for the Tres Cruces project, North-Central Peru, prepared for New Oroperu by Jeffrey D. Rowe, James N. Gray and Ruperto Castro Ocampo with an effective date of March 16, 2021, which has been filed on New Oroperu's profile on SEDAR and can be viewed at www.sedar.com.

Jeffrey D. Rowe, P.Geo., a Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101 - Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects, has reviewed and approved the scientific and technical information contained in this news release.

For further information, please contact Christina McCarthy, V.P. Corporate Development of New Oroperu, at (416) 712-6151, email christina@oroperu.com or K. Wayne Livingstone, President and Chief Executive Officer of New Oroperu, at (604) 638-1408, email kwl@oroperu.com.

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Information

This news release contains forward-looking statements which constitute "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation ("Forward-looking Statements"). All statements included herein, other than statements of historical fact, are Forward-looking Statements and are subject to a variety of known and unknown risks and uncertainties which could cause actual events or results to differ materially from those reflected in the Forward-looking Statements.

The Forward-looking Statements in this news release may include, without limitation, statements about the Company and New Oroperu's current expectations, estimates and projections for the pro forma company, the structure and estimated value of the Transaction, the anticipated timing of the respective shareholders meetings and the closing of the Transaction, the timing and anticipated receipt of required shareholder, court and stock exchange approvals and the ability of the parties to satisfy the other conditions to, and to complete, the Private Placement and the Transaction; the anticipated benefits of the Transaction to shareholders and the combined company, including corporate, operational and other synergies; the anticipated uses of the net proceeds of the Private Placement; and the expected management team of the combined company. Often, but not always, these Forward-looking Statements can be identified by the use of words such as "anticipated", "estimated", "potential", "open", "future", "assumed", "projected", "used", "detailed", "has been", "gain", "planned", "reflecting", "will", "anticipated", "estimated" "containing", "remaining", "to be", or statements that events, "could" or "should" occur or be achieved and similar expressions, including negative variations.

Forward-looking Statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, many of which are beyond the ability of the Company and New Oroperu to control or predict and which may cause actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the Forward-looking Statements. Such risks, uncertainties and factors include, among others, the completion and timing of the Transaction, the ability of the Company and New Oroperu to receive, in a timely manner, the necessary approvals to satisfy the conditions to closing of the Transaction; the ability to complete the Transaction on terms contemplated by the Company and New Oroperu, or at all; the ability of the combined company to realize the anticipated benefits of, and synergies and savings from, the Transaction and the timing thereof; the consequences of not completing the Transaction; the accuracy of the pro forma financial information of the combined company; changes in general economic conditions and financial markets; political risks; risks relating to the current and potential adverse impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the economy, financial markets and the parties' operations; and risks inherent in mineral exploration. Although Forward-looking Statements contained in this news release are based upon what each of the parties believe are reasonable assumptions at the time they were made, such statements are made as of the date hereof and the Company and New Oroperu disclaim any obligation to update any Forward-looking Statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or results or otherwise, except as required by law. There can be no assurance that these Forward-looking Statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Accordingly, investors should not place undue reliance on Forward-looking Statements.

Completion of the Transaction is subject to a number of conditions, including but not limited to, TSXV acceptance. 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 filing statement to be 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. Trading in the securities of a capital pool company should be considered highly speculative.

The TSXV has in no way passed upon the merits of the Transaction and has neither approved nor disapproved of the contents of this press release.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/96027
On October 7, 2001 the United States began operations in Afghanistan, which would lead to the longest war in the history of the United States. That war allowed for the spread of the conflict to flow over into Iraq. Again I ask what and where would we have been, as a country, if the cry of Bush is an illegitimate president abounded and massive demonstrations were held against the Afghanistan and Iraq military invasions?

What would have happened if President Bush had implemented a draft instead of relying on a volunteer army? I believe that hell no we wont go would have been the rallying cry. What if Bush was deemed to have stolen the election.

The above scenarios did not happen. The country as a whole joined together. Our democracy held and we worked as a unified country to find Osama Bin Laden and kill him. It was more than former Present Trump stated as one hit, it was the Pearl Harbor of our generation.

What scares me are the rumblings I am beginning to hear about our failures in Afghanistan. Small but insistent voices are being heard that we lost Afghanistan. Those of us that remember the Vietnam war are hearing that old refrain was it worth it. Shame, enough already.
I had just started working second shift, so the TV morning news became my new norm. On 9/11 when the early broadcast cut to video of the first plane boring into the trade center, I was like many people, dumbfounded.

Did a pilot or traffic controller make a grievous error? Moments later the second plane erased all questions. My incredulity changed to fear of the unknown.

If the government couldnt prevent this, could it protect us going forward? During this time of uncertainty, the Psalms were a source of comfort. God is our refuge and strength, (Psalm 46.)

We prayed for the New Yorkers, and asked ourselves why it takes a tragedy to generate solidarity with people you havent met even though were all Americans? While our hearts grieved for the families stricken in the attack, more questions surfaced about our own family.

Our eldest son, Josh, was already in the military and our second son, a senior, would soon enlist. Watching the evening news that night, Joel, our third child and a sophomore at West Salem High, was furious over the images. He decided that after graduation, he too would enlist.
I was the Mayor of La Crosse on September 11.

I started the day by going to Our Savior's Lutheran Church to donate a pint of blood to the Red Cross. About this time I heard that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center Building. I thought "this is awful" but I also remembered hearing about a plane decades earlier that accidentally hit the Empire State Building.

As I finished giving blood, I heard of a second plane and knew this was no accident. I rushed to my office in City Hall to watch the horror on television and find out what information was available.

I quickly set up a meeting of all the department heads to talk about what we could possibly prepare for. We reviewed our emergency preparedness plans for various departments such as police, fire, streets, airport, etc. and reviewed the emergency powers of the Mayor's office. Later, after talking with a few leaders of the City Council, we canceled the regular monthly City Council meeting. This was no time for business as usual.

Soon President Bush ordered all airplanes out of the sky and our small airport quickly filled up. The full extent of this terror continued to unfold before our eyes!
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 11)  The Commission on Elections said Filipinos do not need to show proof of COVID-19 vaccination or negative RT-PCR test results to cast their votes.

"We're not going to require [vaccination] cards, RT-PCR test results," Comelec director and spokesperson James Jimenez said during an online briefing with CNN Philippines on Saturday.

Since the vaccination drive started in March, more than 15 million are now fully protected against the coronavirus  still far from the government's 50 to 70 million target.

As of July, Jimenez said 60.46 million Filipinos are already registered for the 2022 general elections. He said the poll body is on track to record 62 million registered voters.

READ: Young Filipinos comprise 52% of total registered voters for 2022 polls so far - Comelec

Jimenez also said every voting center will have a health screening. Comelec will also cooperate with the Inter-Agency Task Force for contact tracing, he added.

Asked if the poll body will tap digital tools for contact tracing forms, Jimenez said while it is ideal in an urban setting, this is not possible in provinces as not every Filipino has a smartphone.

Jimenez also hopes the IATF would consider election as essential activity so Filipinos could smoothly go to their polling precinct regardless of quarantine status.

Will teachers be tested for COVID-19?

Jimenez said Comelec and the Department of Education are still discussing the testing of teachers who will man voting precincts.

The official acknowledged that polling personnel should be tested for COVID-19. However, he said funds for that remain an issue.

"Inaalam pa kung kakayanin natin (We're still studying if we can handle that)...Who will shoulder the cost? That's something we're discussing with the DepEd," he said.

Jimenez also said Comelec will increase the poll honoraria of teachers. "Medyo ang kaya lang ma-guarantee ay mandated increase in their honoraria," he noted.

[Translation: The only thing that can be guaranteed is a mandated increase in their honoraria.]
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 11)  Young Filipino voters may make a difference in next year's national elections as they now comprise 52% of the total registered voters, Commission on Elections (Comelec) director James Jimenez believes.

"That's how significant the youth vote is in the coming election," Jimenez said during an online briefing with CNN Philippines on Saturday.

In his presentation, the official said that as of July, 60.46 million Filipinos are already registered for the 2022 general electionshigher than Comelec's target of 59 million.

Out of that total, 31.41 million voters are in the age group of 18-40 years old, classified as the youth vote.

Despite the pandemic, Jimenez said the poll body expects to record more registered voters for the coming elections. In 2019, the number of registered voters stood at 61,843,771.

"We are closer to 62 million, the numbers keep growing. We have massive registration going on right now," he said, adding that Comelec has been processing over 25,000 registrants per day.

Jimenez hopes the pandemic task force would consider election as essential activity so Filipinos could smoothly go to their polling precinct regardless of quarantine status.

The Comelec official also reiterated they are considering adopting the system set for persons deprived of liberty (PDLs) for Filipinos in quarantine facilities due to COVID-19.

RELATED: Risks flagged as Comelec studies voting for patients in quarantine centers
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 11)  Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon, who has been questioning the government's use of COVID-19 funds, became the latest subject of President Rodrigo Duterte's ire.

Duterte asked Drilon to explain what he said were his alleged ties to businesswoman Janet Lim-Napoles, who has been convicted of graft and malversation of public funds in connection with the pork barrel scam, ex-police general Marcelo Garbo and former Iloilo Mayor Jed Mabilog.

"He might want to explain his relationship with Janet Lim-Napoles since you want to discuss corruption and use of people's money," Duterte said in a taped address that aired on Saturday.

He added: "Can you explain to the Filipinos your connection with former mayor Mabilog and Gen. Garbo?"

Duterte earlier accused Garbo and Mabilog of being involved in illegal drugs. Both have denied the accusations.

Duterte also asked Drilon who brokered the sale of the old Iloilo city airport to real-estate company Megaworld.

Drilon was quick to respond to Duterte, saying "if all these malicious attacks are the price we have to pay for exposing the truth, then be it."

He said Mabilog is his second cousin. He added he cannot "comprehend" why he was being asked to explain his connection with some personalities.

He added, the old Iloilo city airport "was sold through public bidding at P1.2 billion set by the Privatization Council then headed by the late Justice Sec. Raul Gonzales in 2007."

Before Duterte launched his fresh tirades, Drilon and other senators have conducted hearings on the government's purchase of COVID-19 supplies. Some senators earlier claimed the government bought "overpriced" items from a small company with "questionable" qualifications and links to Michael Yang, the President's former economic adviser.

The legislative probe stemmed from an audit report that flagged the Department of Health's "deficiencies" in its management of over 67 billion pandemic response funds. These include the transfer of 42.4 billion to procuring agencies due to the lack of "required memorandum of agreement and other supporting documents," according to the Commission on Audit.

Of the number, around 41 billion was given to the Procurement Service-Department of Budget and Management, a portion of which was used to buy the allegedly overpriced supplies. Officials in charge of procuring supplies for the pandemic response have repeatedly denied the overpricing allegations, saying the items were bought at reasonable prices. They earlier said they purchased the items at a time when prices skyrocketed due to the scarcity of supply and sudden increase in demand.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 11)  President Rodrigo Duterte has again come to the defense of the country's top medical supplier amid the pandemic.

Senators earlier questioned how Pharmally Pharmaceutical Corp. won several contracts worth over 8 billion, including those awarded for the supply of alleged "overpriced" face masks and face shields, even though the company only had a paid-up capital of 625,000.

"The senators keep looking for the technical and financial requirements of Pharmally. Wala ka nang pakielam diyan (You have no say in the matter)," Duterte said in a taped address aired by the state broadcast network on Saturday.

Duterte also again defended his former economic adviser Michael Yang, who helped Pharmally supply items to the Philippine government.

Duterte said about Yang: "Eh siyempre may negosyo nakikisali, negosyante eh. Anong magawa mo?"

[Translation: Of course, he has a business and wants to be involved. He is a businessman after all. What can you do?]

During the Senate hearing on Friday, Pharmally chairman Huang Tzu Yen admitted their company borrowed money from Yang as they were awarded contracts beyond their financial capacity. But he cannot recall how much. In the same hearing, Yang said he introduced Pharmally to suppliers of medical goods from China. Pharmally director Linconn Ong, meanwhile, said Yang acted as the company's guarantor to Chinese suppliers.

READ: Ex-Duterte adviser Michael Yang lent money to pay for COVID-19 supplies, says Pharmally chief

READ: Pharmally exec detained at home, cites bout with COVID-19

The President maintained, "no crime" was involved in the procurement of face masks, and other items needed by health workers amid the pandemic, adding he is "willing to resign" if there is corruption in the transactions.

"Iyong Pharmally, what is clear is that there was this contract, there was delivery, kumpleto lahat (everything is complete), specifications at (and) quality, quantity, and all. Tapos after delivery bago pa nagbayad ang Pilipinas (And the Philippines only made payments after the delivery)," he said.

Duterte said the senators just "want exposure" since elections are near. He then threatened to "find what's wrong" with senators looking into the government's deals with Pharmally.

"Ganito na lang ang laro natin (Let this be our game). You find fault with us and we will find what's wrong with you," he said.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 11) The top defense officials of the Philippines and the United States are pushing for stronger cooperation in the maritime sector as they tackled recent developments in the South China Sea.

During their bilateral meeting at the Pentagon on Friday (Saturday in Manila), Secretary Delfin Lorenzana and his American counterpart Lloyd Austin "agreed to work on a bilateral maritime framework that advances cooperation in the maritime domain," the Philippines' Department of Defense (DND) said in a statement.

"Aside from boosting security ties and defense cooperation between the two countries, the defense secretaries discussed developments in the South China Sea, with Secretary Austin reaffirming the US' commitments to the Philippines under the Mutual Defense Treaty," the DND added.

For his part, Austin called the Philippines a "vital treaty ally," and vowed to continue discussions on priority areas  including modernizing the Armed Forces of the Philippines, interoperability, information sharing, and investments.

Earlier this week, Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin, Jr. also met with US' top diplomat Antony Blinken in Washington, with the latter reiterating the call for China to comply with the 2016 arbitral ruling on the disputed waters.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 11)  The Commission on Higher Education (CHED) has asked President Rodrigo Duterte to expand the limited face-to-face classes to more degree programs.

These are engineering, hotel and restaurant management, and maritime programs.

"Ang aming hiling, Mr. President, baka pwedeng iexpand na natin ito sa ibang programa na kailangan din talaga ng face-to-face," CHED Chairman Prospero De Vera said in a Cabinet meeting recorded on Friday but aired Saturday morning.

[Translation: Our request, Mr. President, is to expand this to other programs that really require face-to-face classes.]

He said the Inter-Agency Task Force has endorsed this proposal to the President three weeks ago.

Currently, 13,188 students taking up medicine and allied health courses in 118 schools nationwide are allowed to hold limited in-person classes, de Vera said.

He said of the total, close to 10,000 students have been vaccinated. Of all the learners attending in-person classes, only 41 of them got infected with the coronavirus, he said, adding they only developed mild symptoms.

He also said around 1,048 faculty members are authorized to teach in person, of whom 1,003 have been inoculated. Of all the educators doing in-person lectures, 15 caught mild COVID-19.

"Ligtas naman po. Mahigpit ang ating guidelines," he said.

[Translation: Holding in-person classes is safe. Our guidelines are strict.]

Of the close to 2,000 universities and colleges, about a third have already opened the school year, de Vera said. Others are planning to start classes in September or October, he added.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 11)  The Commission on Elections sees no need yet to step in to resolve the dispute among officials of the ruling PDP-Laban party, according to a poll official.

"The first thing really is to declare that there is an inter-party dispute. Right now we are not quite at that point yet," Comelec director James Jimenez said during an online briefing with CNN Philippines on Saturday.

Earlier this week, the PDP-Laban faction led by Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi confirmed it has filed a petition urging Comelec to declare Senator Manny Pacquiao and his allies, including Senator Aquilino "Koko" Pimentel III, as "illegitimate officers and/or unauthorized representatives" of the party.

The petition demanded that only those elected during the July 17 national assembly presided over by President Rodrigo Duterte should be considered national officers of PDP-Laban. In the event, Pacquiao was ousted as party president, with Cusi replacing him.

READ: Cusi-led PDP-Laban urges Comelec to declare Pacquiao group 'illegitimate'

RELATED: Pacquiao-led PDP Laban group ousts Duterte as party chairman

The petition  which will be tackled by the Comelec en banc  came after the faction led by Pacquiao named Pimentel as party chairman, replacing Duterte.

In July, Pacquiao's group submitted its own Sworn Information Update Statement, containing the list of party officers  which the Cusi group wanted expunged from Comelec records.

Last August 4, the Cusi-led faction submitted its own version of PDP-Laban officers.

"Pag yan palang ang nangyayari, may kanya kanyang set sila ng officers hindi pa tayo makakaintervene diyan because as far as the Comelec is concerned, this has no impact on who we will deal with as a representative of that party," Jimenez said.

[Translation: If that's the situation, they have a set of officers, we cannot yet intervene there because as far as the Comelec is concerned, this has no impact on who we will deal with as a representative of that party.]

"The conflict comes to a head when these two different slates of officers submit two different signatories," he added.

Sept. 30 is the deadline for the submission of authorized signatories.

"It is still conceivable that on the 29th that these two competing slates would merge again  everything's fine," Jimenez said.

Former Comelec Commissioner Gregorio Larrazabal earlier urged the poll body to sort our the issue within the PDP-Laban before Oct. 8, the last day for the filing of candidacies for next year's elections.

"More than resolving other matters, this is important because you are talking about a political party of the administration, and you assume there will be thousands of candidates who will be filing under PDP-Laban and you have to know who is authorized to sign the CONA (certificate of nomination and acceptance) for the political party," Larrazabal said.

READ: Comelec urged to resolve PDP-Laban factions prior to filing of candidacies
Beginning at 2 p.m., the action will be at the Higgins Memorial in Pawnee Park. The festivities will kick off with the presentations of colors, singing of the national anthem and "God Bless America." Later, U.S. Rep. Jeff Fortenberry will provide remarks. Meyer will speak around this time as well.

Following the speeches, the Heartland Band of America will perform and then there will be a 21-gun salute and a flyover with the Missing Man Formation. The program will conclude with the retirement of the colors and the singing of "Star and Stripes Forever."

An evening reception will close out the festivities at the Ramada.

The 20th anniversary of both the re-dedication of the Higgins memorial and 9/11 is a little bit serendipitous. The memorial is the site of a sculpture that includes the steel beams from the World Trade Center.

Andrew Jackson Higgins Memorial Foundation member Dennis Hirschbrunner said hell never forget where he was when he learned of the attacks on 9/11. Hirschbrunner said that day he was flying to Southern California for business with HDR, an engineering and architecture firm.
The Columbus Telegram asked its readers to summit their memories of where they were during the 9/11 terrorist attacks. From recovering from heart surgery to enjoying a normal day one second to hearing the unbelievable news the next, readers recounted the shock they felt as the day unfolded and how they feel now, 20 years later.

Marilyn Zehring said in her reader-submitted memory that her and her family were eating breakfast at her sons home in Gypsum, Colorado, on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. Zehring said her then 9-year-old grandson ran into the kitchen to tell them a plane hit a building in New York City.

We got to the living room just as the second plane hit the South Building of the World Trade Center, Zehring wrote. We were stunned.

Zehring said her son and his family left for work and school while she and her husband drove from Colorado to Cody, Wyoming.
"For a basic amount of $9,000, they would basically come up with the director subdivisions for us," Suess said at a July 27 Loup Board meeting. "... If we wanted to make changes we would pay on an hourly basis. Under the standard (package) it's $9,600 but we would get four hours of changes, and under enhanced it's $11,100 and we would be able to do a one-on-one consultation."

At the time, Suess indicated that Loup would be able to do its own redistricting unless the census population districts, called census "blocks," were not grouped to follow city and township boundaries.

"The good news is that I was able to get the census data in a form that was pretty similar to what we had 10 years ago," Suess said at the Aug. 24 meeting. "I was able to get township information and city information so we're not going to have to utilize a consultant."

Molly Hunter is a reporter for The Columbus Telegram. Reach her via email at molly.hunter@lee.net.

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The 9/11 attacks were carried out by 19 militants associated with the Islamic extremist group al-Qaida, which was being sheltered in Afghanistan by the Taliban regime. Operation Enduring Freedom was launched on Oct. 7, 2001, to oust the regime and destroy the terrorist network led by Osama bin Laden.

The fact that they were in Afghanistan drove many of the choices of what we could do to disarm them, said Edward Kaplan, current dean of the school of strategic land power at the Army War College.

Their dispersed nature meant that certain kinds of weapons and techniques would work against them and others would not, Kaplan said. Conventional forces may not necessarily be a solution.

Initially, the footprint of ground forces was very small, McCausland said. The first Americans in Afghanistan were intelligence operatives carrying bags of money to leverage support from tribal groups fighting the Taliban, he said. They were quickly followed by special forces and by Air Force personnel tasked with coordinating air strikes in support of Northern Alliance forces.

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Structure change

Operations in Afghanistan and later Iraq had a profound impact on the U.S. military.
They were extraordinary.

Looking out over the classroom, Edward Kaplan saw raw emotion on the faces of the cadets.

They didnt understand what was going on any more than anybody else, said Kaplan, current dean of the school of strategic land power at the Army War College, Carlisle Barracks.

They were in a military that was going to go to war, he said. They came to grips with it very quickly. They just needed to figure out what it meant. What was going to be asked of them.

Twenty years ago, on Sept. 11, 2001, Kaplan was an Air Force captain teaching at the service academy in Colorado Springs. The shock of the terrorist attacks that morning lingered in his mind as he tried to focus on the days lesson in the core military history class.

It was all about the Civil War, Kaplan said. We were talking about the end of the war, 1864 to 1865, about the hard hand of war. How Sherman and Grant were grimly determined to finish the conflict to the very end. There was something particularly powerful to me about talking about absolute dedication to winning the conflict on a day when a new conflict was starting.

Kaplan had no doubts the cadets in the room were up to the task ahead of them.
We had intelligence that said that something was up, but they didnt do anything about it, McCausland said. Thats a failure of critical thinking.

This same mindset was present in the federal government in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq during the first term of George W. Bush, he said. In that case, senior military and civilian leaders developed a form of tunnel vision. They were convinced that Saddam Hussein had ties to the 9/11 attacks and was developing weapons of mass destruction.

While intelligence supporting that conclusion was moved up the chain of command, any information contrary to it was discounted by leaders who only had part of the picture, McCausland said. As for Afghanistan, there was a lack of humility, he said.

Too much to chew

The original mission was to take down the Taliban to dismantle al-Qaida, McCausland said. But once that goal was achieved, the U.S. tried to convert Afghanistan into a democracy with a market economy without fully understanding the culture and religion of that country.

McCausland was interviewed for this story before the Taliban took control of Kabul. He drew a comparison between the troops fighting on both sides of this most recent conflict.
The situation likely would be untenable were it not for the assistance of Youth Advocate Programs, a national nonprofit agency that helps families connect with community resources and develop skills to manage households. Torres was referred to the agency by Northampton County Children and Youth.

Basically we meet with families and determine what they need, said Cheryl Hopkins, a family support specialist with YAP in Northampton and Lehigh counties. We were able to help with things like diapers and detergent. The big need the family had was to get a vehicle so they can transport the children together. What we came up with was the (GoFundMe online fundraiser), but the vehicle hasnt come through yet.

It may, in time. The GoFundMe effort has raised just over $1,800 of its $5,000 goal. But other good things have happened, thanks to the generosity of friends and strangers who have learned of the situation through social media or word of mouth  clothes, shoes, baby wipes, toys, a stroller.

Its a lot of people coming together to help the best they can, said Torres, recalling how a woman showed up at the front door recently with boxes of wipes and a big tray of stuffed shells.

Someone I never met in my life, she marveled. The shells were delicious.
A true American patriot embraces the values of our nation, which are based on unalienable rights of individuals, irrespective of their origins. A patriot seeks justice in accord with the rule of law and strives for the general welfare of those who pursue life, liberty and happiness in our society.

As I contemplated events of this year, from January through August, I have seen and heard of many who claim to be patriots. With the pandemic and the still unfolding consequences of COVID-19 and its variants on the American population, the U.S. military has been there from the beginning to facilitate the development, production and distribution of the medical response. In August, U.S. service members, when called, rushed towards the sound of chaos for the non-combatant evacuation operations (NEO) of over 120,000 people from Afghanistan. A look at the names and the faces of the 13 service members who fell performing a duty our nation asked of them, reminds us of the diversity of those who serve at home and in foreign lands.
I remember it fondly since I was ten and I loved Manhattan. It was around September 8th we went there and our plans were to go for a week, we had the opportunity to go to the top of the World Trade Center on 9/9/01 and it felt like I was flying like a bird in the air from the wind. We were in our hotel early in the morning until we heard a loud bang sound we thought it was a crane since construction was going on in the area so we went back to sleep until we heard another one then being concerned we went to the receptionist to figure out what was on until we seen the lobbys television and then we realized something was not quite right. We got to the top of our building and watched The World Trade Center towers smolder until they collapsed we didnt know it was a plane until we seen the replays on tv, we planned to go to windows on the world that night too. The day after the whole city was covered in dust and we could nearly breathe, it was a terrible experience for us but we checked out the pile of rubble at the site and went to Central Park and other cites which George enjoyed.
Rudolph Giuliani was always somewhat off-center, even in his glory days as New York City mayor. But people who recall him then were stunned by his decline into a conspiracy-mongering swamp creature of Trump world. The 20th anniversary of Sept. 11 lets us remember that on that day of horror, Giuliani was on the chaotic scene, passing out courage and hope.

At 10 a.m. on 9/11, I was in New York on a train being kept underground in Penn Station. The two planes had just hit the World Trade Center.

The conductor came on the loudspeaker telling us repeatedly that this is the safest place you can be right now. We didnt all have cellphones then, but a guy in the back of the car did and informed us that the Pentagon had been hit and the first tower, and then the second, had come down. The conductor asked us to pray for the people in the World Trade Center.

We were scared, and we shuddered imagining the terror downtown. We didnt know at that point who did it, why or whether they had stopped. We wanted to get out of town, but the train wasnt going anywhere because the tunnels were being searched for bombs.

The conductor came on one last time and told us to stay calm, take our bags and leave the train. We ascended into the light and a totally transformed city, country and world.
The trial for a Beaverton man accused of first-degree robbery is set to start in Linn County Circuit Court Tuesday.

Adam Chervin, 29, will be on trial for an incident that occurred on Interstate 5 on May 5. He is charged with one count of unauthorized use of a vehicle, first-degree robbery, recklessly endangering another person, reckless driving and fourth-degree assault. The trial is set for two days with a 12-person jury. Linn County Circuit Court Judge Brendan Kane will preside over proceedings.

On the night of the incident, a witness told an Oregon State Police trooper that he saw a man being drug by a car and eventually flung from it.

According to a probable cause affidavit, the victim said he picked up Chervin on Highway 20. He did not know the defendant. At Chervins request, the driver pulled over to fix the vehicles sound system. At this point, the defendant got behind the wheel and started driving away.

The victim held onto the car as Chervin drove north down I-5. When he could no longer hold on, the victims feet and legs made contact with the road and he was thrown from the vehicle. He struck his head and saw a semi-truck coming towards him. He told an Oregon State Police trooper that he had to crawl with all of his strength towards the right fog line before he blacked out.
Linn County officials dont take the virus seriously.

On Aug. 31, just shortly after 7 a.m., a deputy from the Linn County Sheriffs Office appeared at our door. He was not wearing a mask. This was his second visit with no mask. His purpose was to serve a witness subpoena.

I contacted the sheriffs office to express my concern. I was told it was not their office, I should contact the location at the courthouse.

I contacted the Linn County district attorneys office to inform them of the situation and how their subpoena service was being handled. The women I spoke to expressed little concern; her only response was saying Noted.

Linn Countys COVID numbers are much higher than Benton Countys. On Sept. 1, Linn County reported 141 new COVID cases, while our neighbors in Benton County recorded 21. The current status for COVID in Oregon is not good. Hospitals are overwhelmed, and the age of patients admitted is getting younger.

Perhaps if our local officials followed the current mask mandate, we could get to a better place. The community and health care workers would appreciate that.

Cory Bjerke

Albany

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DENVER  With the chaotic evacuations over, Afghan refugees lucky enough to catch a flight out of Kabul were heading to new homes. Some of the
A Medina Alert was issued Friday afternoon for a vehicle suspected of hitting a scooter rider and fleeing.

Authorities are asking the public to be on the lookout for a white 2021 Buick Encore with Colorado license BQU154. The vehicle may have damage on the right passenger front.

Police said the Buick struck a person riding a scooter in the 1200 block of Pennsylvania Street in the Capitol Hill neighborhood around 3 p.m. The unidentified victim was transported to the hospital with serious injuries, said Kurt Barnes, a spokesman for the Denver Police Department.

Multiple witnesses described the vehicle and provided the license plate number to investigators, which resulted in the Medina Alert, Barnes said.

Police did not release information regarding what led to the crash.

Anyone who sees the vehicle is urged to call 911 or the Metro Denver Crime Stoppers at 720-913-7867.
Is there an absolute law to war? Are there rules that American soldiers need to follow regardless of how ruthless the enemy is, or should our soldiers be allowed to bend those rules so they can do whatever it takes to win?
How many games will the Broncos win during the 2021 season?

You voted:
Statement by Ambassador Kelly at the UN Security Council on Libya

Statement

I thank Special Envoy Kubis for his briefing and Ambassador Tirumurti for his Report.

Let me also thank Ms Asma Khalifa for her powerful contribution. Asma, your insights and testimony have informed and enriched our discussion and your personal commitment to inclusive and enduring peace in Libya will inspire this Council. Your eloquent words on the need for depoliticised reconciliation resonate strongly with us on the island of Ireland.

This is a pivotal moment for Libya and its people. The Independent Strategic Review of UNSMIL paints a sobering picture of its challenges and constraints. Meeting these challenges will require leadership on the ground, and therefore, we support the Reviews recommendation to relocate the Head of Mission to Tripoli.

The holding of national Parliamentary and Presidential elections on 24 December is vital to a successful, Libyan-led and Libyan-owned political transition. We note that the House of Representatives recently passed a law allowing for Presidential elections, and we call on the relevant authorities to urgently resolve outstanding disagreements to ensure that parliamentary elections also take place on schedule.

Asmas words to the Council today underline the indispensable role played by women, youth and broader civil society in building inclusive and peaceful communities. Seventeen members of the LPDF are women, and Ireland warmly welcomes their important contribution. We also welcome UNSMILs efforts to empower women further, including through assisting the Libyan Ministry of Womens Affairs in the development of a National Action Plan for Women, Peace and Security.

However, we are appalled at reports of violence targeted at politically active women, including human rights defenders, and we strongly condemn all such incidents. The Strategic Reviews recommendation to implement a surge capacity in UNSMILs gender advisory and human rights units must be implemented urgently  in particular the swift deployment of Women Protection Advisers.

Reports of Conflict Related Sexual Violence against women, including migrants in detention, are deeply disturbing. More must be done to combat these most heinous crimes. UNSMIL Human Rights officers must be able to carry out their critical work in safety and security, and have the resources necessary to combat all forms of sexual violence.

Ireland welcomed the opening of the Coastal Road on 30 July, and we look forward to the forthcoming deployment of the first UN ceasefire monitors to Libya, important steps in implementation of the Ceasefire Monitoring Mechanism. The withdrawal of all foreign forces and mercenaries, as stipulated by Resolution 2570, must be completed as soon as possible and in consultation with all stakeholders.

We are very concerned that the number of people in need of humanitarian assistance has increased this year, compounded by Covid 19. We are also concerned by reported visa backlogs for aid workers, whose work is crucial to providing humanitarian relief.

We call on the House of Representatives and the GNU to prioritise agreement of a national budget. This is vital for the provision of services, hampered further by fuel shortages and disruptions in water and electricity supply.

Finally, we continue to call for the upholding of International Human Rights Law, Refugee law, and International Humanitarian Law. Rule of law institutions and transitional justice mechanisms must be strengthened and human rights officers must not be constrained in their ability to move freely across the country and adequately monitor human rights violations.

Ireland unequivocally condemns the smuggling, trafficking and arbitrary detention in inhumane conditions of migrants and refugees, where they are at heightened risk of sexual violence and exploitation. We support the renewal of Resolution 2546 and commend Operation IRINI for its important work.

Thank you.

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NEW YORK (AP)  A Florida businessman who gained notoriety for helping Rudy Giuliani seek damaging information on Joe Biden in Ukraine pleaded guilty Friday to a charge alleging he facilitated illegal foreign campaign contributions in an effort to build a marijuana business in the U.S.

Igor Fruman, 56, entered the plea in federal court in Manhattan after reaching a deal with prosecutors. Fruman's plea agreement does not require him to cooperate in other cases, U.S. District Judge J. Paul Oetken said.

Initially charged in a wide-ranging indictment, Fruman pleaded guilty to a single count of solicitation of a contribution by a foreign national. The plea resolves the case against him.

Federal sentencing guidelines call for a punishment of 37 to 46 months in prison, though Fruman could get up to five years, the judge said. Sentencing is scheduled for Jan. 21.

The plea leaves two men  Lev Parnas, another Soviet-born Florida businessman and Giuliani associate, and Ukraine-born investor Andrey Kukushkin  to face trial next month. A fourth person, David Correia, was sentenced in February to a year in prison for fraud involving a company he ran that brought Giuliani on as a consultant.
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP)  Alabama's rapid rise in the number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 appears to have stabilized, yet the state still faces the "real crisis of an overwhelming number of patients needing intensive care, nearly all of whom aren't vaccinated, the chief health officer said Friday.

After threatening to reach an all-time high for hospitalizations during the coronavirus pandemic, state hospitals have seen a slight decline in recent days, said Dr. Scott Harris, head of the Alabama Department of Public Health.

Overall hospitalizations dropped below 2,700 on Thursday for the first time in more than a week, he told a news briefing.

We have had a little bit of a plateau over the last week. Im very thankful for that. The numbers arent great. But the numbers at least have not continued to go up, he said.

Still, unvaccinated people sick with COVID-19 and a relatively small number of vaccinated people who contracted the illness continue to need more intensive care beds than the state has, he said. Patients who normally would be treated in ICU wards are instead being cared for in emergency rooms, normal beds or even gurneys left in hallways, he said.
At this time last year, Georgia College & State University in Milledgeville, Georgia Southern University in Statesboro and UGA in Athens were battling some of the highest per-capita COVID-19 outbreaks in the nation. State public health data show infection rates among residents 18-22 in those communities are not as high as last year, but remain high.

MacCartney said the university system continues to be in alignment with Kemp, who appoints all the regents but is not supposed to dictate their decisions.

Gov. Kemp said last week at the Capitol that he believes mandates calls division on campuses and does not support them, she said. He further stated he believes those who want to wear a mask should weather wear them to protect themselves and others. He expects the university system to continue to focus on getting everyone whos eligible vaccinated into educate an advocate about why its so important.

She also said that while the university system will accept robust debate," people should be respectful.

Attacking our presidents and campus administrators is not productive, and does not and will not drive how we make decisions within the University System of Georgia, MacCartney said.
VALDOSTA, Ga. (AP)  Tropical depression Mindy dumped rain along the Georgia and South Carolina seacoasts Thursday during a trek across land before moving well out over the Atlantic Ocean.

Mindy was a brief-lived tropical storm that had formed Wednesday in the northeastern Gulf of Mexico. The storm made landfall Wednesday night in St. Vincent Island, Florida and then was downgraded to a depression that dumped rain across the Florida Panhandle and into south Georgia and South Carolina.

The storm was in the Atlantic on Thursday evening about 110 miles (175 kilometers) east-southeast of Charleston, South Carolina, and moving east-northeast at 23 mph (37 kph) with top sustained winds of 35 mph (55 kph), forecasters said.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami said gradual weakening was expected and Mindy is forecast to become a remnant low sometime Friday.

Florida's Big Bend area was already saturated from rain dumped by Hurricanes Elsa and Ida. Some residents in low-lying Dixie County have had to move out of their homes, which were flooded before Mindy brought more rain.

Diane Van Hook has been living at a hotel for weeks because her property is flooded and theres no electricity in her home.
After a couple of hours the senior leader arrived and told all of us to go home and make contact with our supervisors, Bischoff said. Was my supervisor even still alive? Did he go to the supply office in my stead? I didnt know.

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He went home and tried making phone calls to his parents and other family members to let them know he was still alive, but the phone lines were jammed.

For 12 hours he sat there and watched television, waiting to be able to make contact. He finally reached his supervisor, who told him he needed to be at the Pentagon the next morning.

When he arrived, the Pentagon was still on fire. He walked in, got his ID checked, and found his supervisor.

The first thing he asked me is, have you contacted your family? I said no, sir, I couldnt get out, Bischoff said. His supervisor told him to find a dedicated line and call them now.

When he got ahold of his sister-in-law he said Ive only got a minute, Im OK, let everybody know.

Then he walked out into the Pentagons five-acre courtyard, where he looked over something he never expected to see in his life.
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Students 12 and older are eligible for the Pfizer vaccine, and Harris said as many students as possible should be vaccinated as soon as possible. The full benefits of vaccination are not seen until about six weeks after the initial shot.

If you want to have a normal school semester, or as close as we can; if you want to have a good holiday season with Thanksgiving and Christmas coming up  this is the way that we do it, Harris said. We get people vaccinated now so that two to three months from now we can try to get back more or less to normal, which is somewhere we all very much want to be.

As of Friday, there were 2,620 people hospitalized with COVID-19 in Alabama. And while hospitalizations have dropped below 2,700 for the first time in weeks, Harris said hospitals are still overwhelmed, especially when it comes to ICU bed capacity.

A federal team sent to a Baldwin County hospital has departed for another state, but Harris said a team sent to Southeast Health in Dothan has been extended for several more weeks, and a team that arrived at Dale County Medical Center in Ozark this week has been approved for an extended stay.
The state of Alabama on Thursday asked to dismiss its lawsuit challenging the U.S. Census Bureau's use of a controversial statistical method aimed at keeping peoples data private in the numbers used for redrawing congressional and legislative districts.

Alabama and three Alabama politicians had sued the Commerce Department, which oversees the Census Bureau, in an effort to stop the statistical agency from using the method known as differential privacy." They also wanted to force the bureau to release the redistricting numbers earlier than planned. Normally, the data are released at the end of March, but the Census Bureau pushed the deadline to August because of delays caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

A three-judge panel agreed to dismiss the lawsuit late Thursday.

Alabama originally claimed the delay was caused by the bureaus attempt to implement differential privacy, which the states attorneys said would result in inaccurate redistricting numbers. A three-judge panel in June refused to stop the Census Bureau from using the statistical method. In July, Alabama and the Commerce Department asked that the lawsuit be put on hold so that the state could decide how to proceed after the redistricting data was released in mid-August.
Every person in America should be scared to death of what this President is trying to do, he continued. You know, every tyrant in history has said that what they were trying to do was because it was in the best interest of the people.

He said he expects the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down the requirement and said Mississippi will join other states in filing a lawsuit. He called it an attack on hard-working Americans.

In essence, what the president saying is... hard-working Americans  many of whom work here and live here in Mississippi  hard-working Mississippians have to choose between either injecting themselves with something and potentially having the ability to earn a living to produce food for their family, he said. Thats a ridiculous choice.

Reeves said he made the decision to get the shot and encourages Mississippi residents to do the same.

But if he has the ability to unilaterally do this, then there is no limit on the powers of the presidency, he said. Thats not called a true democracy. That is tyranny  and we do not want that in America.
I know where you and your family lives. You will be ended, he wrote, referring to the congressman as an animal that needs to be tortured and skinned alive.

Mathur submitted the message using contact information and an address for a former neighbor and classmate, but investigators traced the threat to the internet service at Mathurs home, prosecutors said.

About two minutes after he sent the webmail message, Mathur called the congressman's district office and left a voicemail message in which he threatened to slit his throat and kill his family if you even mess with my vote, according to prosecutors. Mathur also mentioned the Republicans who supported the Texas election lawsuit. Investigators traced the call to a phone number registered in Mathur's name.

When U.S. Capitol Police investigators questioned him at his home on Dec. 11, Mathur said he left the threatening voicemail message out of anger and wouldnt hurt anybody, according to prosecutors. But he falsely denied making the webmail threat, prosecutors said.

Mathur didnt have a criminal record before this case.
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP)  An Ohio woman pleaded guilty Friday to helping plan the killings of eight members of a family, becoming the second member of her own family to admit to a role in a shocking crime prosecutors say stemmed from a dispute over custody of her granddaughter.

Angela Wagner, 50, pleaded guilty in southern Ohios Pike County to conspiracy to commit aggravated murder, along with burglary, evidence tampering and other charges.

In exchange for the plea, prosecutors dropped aggravated murder charges against her and recommended that she serve a 30-year prison sentence. Her agreement to testify against other remaining defendants was also part of the deal, they said.

She didn't make any statements during the hearing.

Her husband and their two adult sons also were charged in the 2016 slayings of seven adults and a teenage boy from the Rhoden family. Wagners plea comes nearly five months after her son Edward Jake Wagner pleaded guilty to aggravated murder and other charges and agreed to testify against the other three in a deal that would help all four avoid potential death sentences.

George Billy Wagner III and George Wagner IV have pleaded not guilty.
The governors lawyers have argued that the law continues to allow peaceful protest but is an effort to draw a sharp distinction between that and a violent riot. Walker found that argument unpersuasive.

Because it is unclear whether a person must share an intent to do violence and because it is unclear what it means to participate, the statute can plausibly be read to criminalize continuing to protest after violence occurs, even if the protestors are not involved in, and do not support, the violence, Walker wrote. The statute can also be read to criminalize other expressive activity, like remaining at the scene of a protest turned violent to film the police reaction.

The law, also known as HB1, stiffens penalties for crimes committed during a riot or violent protest. It allows authorities to detain arrested protesters until a first court appearance and establishes new felonies for organizing or participating in a violent demonstration.

It also makes it a second-degree felony, punishable by up to 10 years in prison, to destroy or demolish a memorial, plaque, flag, painting, structure or other object that commemorates historical people or events.

In addition, the measure requires that local governments justify any reductions in law enforcement budgets.

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey has a direct message to President Joe Biden over new COVID mandates: Bring it on.

Iveys blunt words come in response to Bidens statement regarding elected officials and states undermining COVID relief efforts.

My plan also takes on elected officials and states that are undermining you and these life-saving actions, Biden said during a Thursday press conference. If these governors wont help us beat the pandemic, I will use my power as president to get them out of the way.

Ivey, who is running for reelection, shot back via her campaigns social media channels.

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You bet Im standing in the way. And if he thinks hes going to move me out of the way, hes got another thing coming. Im standing as strong as a bull for Alabama against this outrageous Washington overreach. Bring it on, Ivey said.

She later added, A call with Republican (governors) just wrapped up. (The president) has overreached with these new mandates, and were united in fighting back. Im partnering alongside my conservative colleagues in this fight. This is a fight for businesses, our hardworking men and women, and our American liberties, Ivey said.
Were led by sheep

One of Napoleons lesser-known maxims is An army of sheep led by a lion will always defeat an army of lions led by sheep. This insightful mantra was never more evidenced than the latest failure of our Imbecile-in-Chief. The greatest military in the history of the world is led by an incoherent, mumbling, bumbling fool.

President Joe Biden tells us his withdrawal was a tremendous success and it couldnt have been done in a more orderly manner. Obamas own Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, said a decade ago that Biden has been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades. Thank you, Democrats, for your wonderful selection for president.

A frequent writer on these pages chastised Trump over and over again for insulting a Gold Star family after the 2016 Democratic Convention. Thanks to Biden, and Biden alone, we now have 13 more Gold Star families. How has he insulted every veteran of the Afghanistan War with this complete rout out of Afghanistan? What respect did he show while watching the 13 coffins being carried off the airplane looking at his watch as each one passed by? Maybe he was checking to see if their blood was still on his hands?
People shop in a Homefarm store in Hanoi. Photo courtesy of Homefarm

An Alibaba-backed fund has invested an undisclosed amount in Vietnamese retail chain Homefarm.

The investment by eWTP Technology and Innovation Fund is a "seven-digit figure," the company's CEO Tran Van Truong told DealStreetAsia.

Homefarm, which has around 150 stores that sell meat, fish and groceries imported from several countries including the U.S., Australia and South Korea, plans to have 1,000 by 2025, he said.

The funding was through ReDefine Capital Fund, a Singapore-registered investment entity controlled by eWTP.

The $600-million eWTP Technology and Innovation Fund was set up in 2018 with Chinese billionaire Jack Ma's Alibaba and Ant Group as cornerstone investors.

It reportedly invested recently in Vietnamese retail company Ficus Asia Investment and ed-tech firm Educa Corporation.
A military personnel provides food support for residents in Binh Thanh District in Ho Chi Minh City on September 2, 2021. Photo by VnExpress/Quynh Tran

HCMC should only reopen its economy when vaccination and infection figures signal improvement to avoid causing more damage to struggling businesses, experts say.

Tran Hoang Ngan, head of Ho Chi Minh City Institute for Development Studies, said vaccinating the majority of HCMCs population is key to determine when to reopen the economy.

The city has given the first dose to around 85 percent of its population as of Sep. 8. The figure is set to reach 90 percent by Sep. 15.

By then, around 20-30 percent of the HCMC population are set to receive two doses.

These figures signal the city should consider reopening, Ngan said.

But other indicators that need to be taken into account include the reduction in number of new patients and deaths, he said.

To bring these figures down the city needs to increase the distribution of medicines in hospitals and in pharmacies so Covid-19 patients could buy them, he added.

Officials in HCMC, where over 286,200 Covid-19 cases have been recorded since the end of April, recently said people will have to gradually learn to live with the disease as the lockdown strategy cannot go on forever.

The city, which contributes around 20 percent of Vietnams GDP, has suspended the activities of most companies in the last two months, while experts have feared Vietnams position in the supply chain might be rocked by mobility restrictions.

With 5,000-7,000 confirmed cases each day in the last five days, experts say apart from pushing vaccination and reducing deaths, the country needs to plan a safe process for reopening.

Dang Hoang Hai Anh, a lecturer at Vietnam National University International School, said dividing the city into zones depending on the level of Covid-contagion risks is a smart strategy.

He said companies in the green zone, where risks are lowest, could operate normally, while those in the orange zone (average risks) will operate under restrictions, and in the red zone (highest risks), prioritize the Covid-19 fight over business.

Chairman of HCMC Union of Business Association (HUBA) Chu Tien Dung said businesses should not consider this period a time for hibernation.

They need to prepare to operate in a new state where masks and social distancing are the new normal, he added.

He proposed that manufacturing zones and foreign direct invested companies are allowed to operate normally to ensure the supply chain is not disrupted.

Although most companies expect a reopening soon, some experts advise immature resumption would only hurt business.

Nguyen Khac Quoc Bao, head of Fintech Institute under the University of Economics Ho Chi Minh City, said every economic activity relates to another and resumption needs to take this into account.

Reopening only HCMC while southern localities remain closed would not be effective, he said.

An early reopening that results in a surge in new cases would only cause more damage to businesses who will have to once again face uncertainty, he added.
Coffee beans are seen at a Hanoi exhibition. Photo by Reuters

Vietnams coffee exports to the U.K. have declined in H1 after its products failed to meet quality requirements and consumer preferences.

The fourth wave of Covid-19 that hit the country also affected export activities.

Coffee exports to Britain fell by 48.4 percent in volume terms and 49.3 percent in value to 16,400 tons and $29 million.

Vietnams share of that coffee market decreased from 27.32 percent to 16.35 percent.

The U.K.s coffee imports from most of its suppliers increased during the period, except from Vietnam and Honduras.

Vietnam's exports to the country are in the form of raw or semi-processed coffee, while the British mainly consume instant coffee.

Experts said the Vietnamese coffee industry should strive to meet its increasingly stringent requirements and British consumers tastes to boost exports.

Vietnam is the second biggest coffee producer globally behind Brazil. Last year, its exports fell marginally and were worth $2.74 billion.
A foreigner gets a Covid-19 vaccine shot in HCMC's Phu Nhuan District, August 27, 2021. Photo by VnExpress/Quynh Tran

The Belgian government has handed 100,000 AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine doses to Vietnams National Assembly (NA) chairman Vuong Dinh Hue.

Hue received the vaccines at the Vietnamese Embassy in Belgium on Thursday while paying an official visit to the European nation.

Aside from the vaccines gifted by Belgium, Vietnam also received medical equipment worth VND536.6 billion ($23.57 million) donated by organizations and Vietnamese in Europe.

The equipment includes face masks, ventilators, and test kits, according to a statement by the NA, Vietnams legislative unit.

In a meeting with Belgian Deputy Prime Minister Pierre-Yves Dermagne on Thursday, Hue thanked the Belgian government for its vaccine aid, and asked it to continue supporting Vietnam via the Covax mechanism, according to the government portal.

Dermagne in return said he wished Vietnam would support large infrastructure projects invested by Belgium and boost cooperation for support in the field of agriculture.

Hue affirmed Vietnam attached great importance to developing cooperation with Belgium and wished to strengthen its relationship in all fields, highly appreciating Belgium's coordination in multilateral cooperation and promoting ASEAN-EU relations.

From Sept. 5 to 11, Hue led a high-ranking Vietnamese delegation to attend the fifth World Conference of Speakers of Parliament (WCSP5) in Austria, work with the European Parliament (EP), and pay official visits to Belgium and Finland.

Vietnam aims to receive 150 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines to inoculate 70 percent of its 96-million population in order to achieve herd immunity by April next year.

So far, almost 26 million people have been vaccinated, with over 4.46 million getting two doses.
General Phung Quang Thanh, former Minister of National Defense. Photo by VnExpress/Vo Van Thanh

General Phung Quang Thanh, former Minister of National Defense, died Saturday at his home in Hanoi after suffering from a serious illness.

The Central Committee for Protection and Health Care said Thanh died at 3:45 a.m. Saturday, and information on his funeral will be announced later.

Thanh was Vietnam's Minister of National Defense from 2006 to 2016.

He was member of the Party Central Committee and the Politburo of the Communist Party of Vietnam.

Born in 1949 in Hanoi, he enlisted in 1967 and fought in the Vietnam War (1955-1975) and the Sino-Vietnamese War in 1979.

He was sent to study in the Soviet Union twice, between January and December 1983 and later for around a year between 1989 and 1990.

Between 1983 and 1989, he was head of different divisions under the Vietnamese People's Army.

After returning to Vietnam in 1990, he served as deputy head and later head of the Combat Operations Department of the General Staff under the Ministry of National Defense and then Commander of the 1st Military Region, which is in charge of northeast Vietnam.

From June 2001 to April 2006, he was Deputy Defense Minister, Chief of the General Staff of the Vietnamese People's Army.

In April 2006, he was elected to the Politburo and appointed as Minister of National Defense by the legislative National Assembly.

He was promoted to the rank of Major General in 1994, Lieutenant General in 1999, and Colonel General in 2003.

On July 6, 2007, he was awarded the rank of General by President Nguyen Minh Triet.

General Phung Quang Thanh (R) speaks at a national conference on Vietnamese army in December, 2014. Photo by VnExpress/Vo Van Thanh

In 2015, as sitting minister, he had to travel to France for his health problem.

Back then, Pham Gia Khai, a member of the Central Committee for Protection and Health Care, said Thanh had suffered lung damage from a traffic accident during the Vietnam War.

Later, he had been diagnosed with lung fibrosis.

In July, 2015, Thanh returned from France and was announced to be in stable condition.

Three months later, at a panel discussion at the NA, he spent an hour giving a speech on the situation of national defense and security.

He affirmed that Vietnam maintains an independent and self-reliant relationship, and does not go with "this powerful country to fight another powerful country."

"We only defend and protect our country and we never invade or attack anyone. But we must have the strength to protect our own nation," he said.
At the conclusion of a meeting that lasted over three hours last Saturday afternoon, one of the proposals that Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh agreed with related to green movement.

Vu Tu Thanh

"Task the Ministry of Health with issuing nationwide uniform guidelines on allowing workers, experts, foreigners entering Vietnam who have been vaccinated and quarantined for seven days to travel ... around the whole country," he said.

"This is called safe movement, green movement."

This was one of the six contents that the PM decided on at a meeting with U.S. business executives that lasted twice as long as scheduled.

Top officials from ministries and other government agencies, Ho Chi Minh City and Binh Duong and Dong Nai provinces patiently listened to nearly 15 demands from the U.S. side.

The meeting took place in the same room where the PM had received U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris a week earlier.

After listening to executives from all seven businesses on the official list, the PM invited all the other delegates to express their opinions until no one had anything else to say. Throughout the process, he listened attentively and constantly took notes.

In his concluding speech, he was already issuing specific instructions related to many of the proposals, including the U.S. Business Council's on green movement.

Firstly, I believe we need to clarify the concept of movement. Human movement by itself is not the cause of disease transmission. It is unsafe movement that causes the spread of a virus.

To achieve this, authorities need to do two things: clearly define what is safe and what is unsafe and find ways to minimize unsafe movement while increasing safe movement.

In fact, due to the fear of Covid-19 spread, many localities have been restricting both types of movement, which is unfeasible and results in an increase in infections.

Secondly, due to a lack of consensus on how to approach it, localities are currently at a loss on how to handle people's movement.

The "matrix" presented by government leaders at various levels to the public and businesses, which has disrupted supply chains, also originated from the overly simplistic and theoretical notion that the spread of a disease is due to human movement. However, science and reality have shown that human movement by itself is not the culprit, and the true cause is unsafe movement.

The most easily observed example of safe movement and contact is that of the government's task forces and anti-epidemic teams, who have been entering the heart of HCMC's red zone and are still well.

Thirdly, the notion of green movement is inconsistent across consulting and policy-making agencies, which has caused much confusion. For example, Hanoi last week issued an almost complete ban on all types of movement, both safe and unsafe. The city then added requirements for travel permits earlier this week, causing difficulties to people's daily life and to businesses and even putting it at risk of becoming another HCMC.

A police officer questions a man over his travel paper in Hanoi, July 28, 2021. Photo by VnExpress/Giang Huy

Green movement can be imagined as consisting of three components: green people, green means and green processes.

Green people are those who already have the necessary amount of antibodies, either because they have received two doses of a vaccine or were earlier infected, and are well trained in epidemic prevention.

The government can mobilize them for social works that require movement to compensate for those who cannot move safely and are still restricted.

Green means are the equipment necessary to ensure that carrying out epidemic prevention tasks, social security services and business will not threaten a spread of the disease to the community or green people.

Green processes are designed to meet the safety standards of epidemic prevention, and some fields already have them.

If the authorities can soon clarify the principles of green movement for it to be consistent from central to local levels, we can quickly resolve the inconsistencies in the anti-epidemic policies at different levels and the rigid, arbitrary behavior of law enforcers.

If the barriers that have been causing stress to the public and businesses are removed, it will also send a positive message about Vietnam's epidemic control efforts to the international community.

A "living" society must be operating, must have a certain amount of movement instead of bringing everything to a halt.

*Vu Tu Thanh is Deputy Regional Managing Director and Vietnam Representative for the U.S.-ASEAN Business Council. The opinions expressed are his own.
The "Italian Routes - Mountains, Mountaineering, Climate Change" and "Landscapes of Vietnam" exhibit underlines the plight of global climate change.

The dual exhibition, held by the Italian Embassy in Hanoi and Vietnam Museum of Ethnology in August, delivers a strong message on the effects of climate change and the interconnectedness and exchange between cultures despite global pandemics.

The "Italian Routes - Mountains, Mountaineering, Climate Change" and "Landscapes of Vietnam" exhibition. Photo by Embassy of Italy in Vietnam.

Vietnam is the first country in the world to host the "Italian Routes" exhibition, which demonstrates the strong bilateral cooperation between Italy and Vietnam, particularly in the field of the protection of the environment. It also aims to promote online cultural activities, allowing the public to enjoy valuable moments of relaxation from the comfort of their homes. Throughout the duration of the exhibition, the audience had indeed the opportunity to engage with it via a wide range of online activities.

Based on the work of photographer and environmentalist Fabiano Ventura, the exhibition showcases the great mountaineering tradition of the "boot-shaped country". The photo sets compare landscapes past and present, visualizing the impact of climate change on ecosystems and biodiversity.

The exhibition is also an opportunity for three Vietnamese photographers (Hoang The Nhiem, Hoang Giang Hai and Tran Dang Dang Khoa) to display their impressive photos of Vietnams natural landscape, equally affected by the climate crisis. All photos tell their own stories, but together, all ring the bell of a harsh new era.

The central part of the exhibition, "Montagne Italiane" (Italian Mountains), is an ideal journey from the Gran Paradiso group that explores the entire Alpine arc from west to east, crossing the massifs of Mont Blanc, Mount Rosa and Cervino, Bernina, Ortles-Cevedale and Adamello, moving on to the east, reaching the Dolomites and Julian Alps.

The Italian Routes ends with a ninth stage dedicated to the main Apennine mountain group, the Gran Sasso. Each of the nine mountain groups is represented by large-format photographs that highlight their evocative landscape aspects and by comparative historical and contemporary images that underscore the evolution of the glacial masses, along with the impacts of climate change.

Each group is accompanied by an introduction panel illustrating its geographical, historical and geo-glaciological characteristics, together with a suggested itinerary. Finally, each mountain section is enriched by reproductions of documents and historical material on the first alpine explorations.

The comparison photo sets highlight the impact of climate change. Photo by Embassy of Italy in Vietnam.

Within the project framework, interesting online activities have also been organized on the Facebook page of the Embassy, attracting a great number of mountains lovers, including an online workshop on landscape photography, guided by photographer Hoang Giang Hai; a climbing workshop, guided by Thanh Tran (Rope Team Vietnam); a livestream talk with the first Vietnamese climbers to set the national flag on Mount Everest; and a science webinar about climate change "From Glacier to Delta", raising awareness of this pressing environmental issue.

"I would like to invite each and every one of you to include climate change issues in your agenda, respect the land and territories in which you live and appreciate the mountain culture and brave people who live and work in such beautiful yet fragile natural environments," Antonio Alessandro, Ambassador of Italy to Vietnam, said.

He also emphasized the impacts of melting ice in the Italian Alps on the Mekong Delta, affirming the importance of preventing climate change at global level.

The exhibition Italian Routes is based on the project "On the Trails of the Glaciers", promoted and organized by non-profit Macromicro. "On the Trails of the Glaciers" is a scientific project that combines photographic comparison and research data to show the effects of climate change through the observation of glacier mass variations over the last 150 years.

The exhibition is a prominent contribution in raising people's awareness about major impacts of climate change heading to the COP-26 conference co-chaired by the United Kingdom and Italy at the end of 2021 in Glasgow.

Italian-Vietnamese photo exhibit sheds virtual light on global climate change Italian-Vietnamese mountain landscape exhibition offers virtual trip about climate change The Italian-Vietnamese mountain landscape exhibition offers virtual trip about climate change.

Watch the full video of Italian Routes virtual tour here
Harold Wilken is a steadfast believer in letting nature take its course. Under his watch, Janies Farm Organics in Danforth, Illinois, has transitioned from conventional farming practices  such as the use of pesticides and GMOs  into a 100% organic operation growing yellow and white hybrid corn, soybeans, wheat and rye, and he couldnt be prouder.

Down on the farm

Raised in a farming family that dates back several generations, Wilken was riding tractors with his dad at the tender age of 2 years old.

His great-grandfather founded what would today be considered an organic, biodiverse farm on Illinois land in 1882. After learning the industry through years of working in the fields, Wilken decided it was time to break away and start his own farming operation in 1982; he would pursue traditional growing methods for the 23 years that followed.

I rented a piece of land from an older lady who was willing to give a young farmer like me a chance, he says. When I took my first herbicide bill to her, she looked at it and told me that if I could just figure out how to do things the natural way, she wouldn't have to pay it. Her words were very prophetic, and theyve stuck with me through the years.

Opting to go organic

Wilkens decision to take the farm in an organic direction came about as a result of several life-changing events that occurred in quick succession. Already disillusioned with GMOs and losing faith in conventional farming practices, he was directly sprayed with dangerous pesticide chemicals when a hose broke in 1990, leading to health issues.

Then, in 2001, Wilkens beloved daughter Janie passed away in a tragic car accident at age 15.

When Wilkens neighbor Herman Brockman sent a condolence letter and offered him the opportunity to transition his adjacent acreage into an organic farm, it seemed like a sign.

Thereve been lots of unexplained coincidences that I credit to Janie putting together for me on the other side, Wilken says. I think back on the things that have happened in the 20 years since shes been gone and the people whove helped us get through it, and it really all started because of Hermans letter.

Wilkens initial move toward organic farming was met with skepticism from some of his peers and even within his own family due to concerns about reduced yields, increased weeds and other worries.

My father started using pesticides back in the 1960s, and he thought they were the saving grace of agriculture, Wilken says. He passed before I completed my first transition crop, but he definitely did not approve of my decision.

Feeling there had to be a better, more natural way to go, Wilken attempted non-GMO crop rotation for a few years, but it wasnt until he went fully organic in 2005 that he finally began to feel a true sense of peace.

The soil was just dead, he says.

It takes 36 months from the last application of herbicide to cycle out enough for the land to be considered organic, but I think it takes more like 60 months to really restore the soil to good health through crop rotation and cover cropping. These practices are what add nutrients; increase water absorption; prevent erosion; and suppress weeds, insects and soil-borne plant diseases.

Ready, set, grow

Since 2005, Janies Farm has flourished from its original 700-acre footprint into 3,200 acres of land co-owned by a group of farmers who work collaboratively to support the organic movement. Together with his son, Ross Wilken; nephew, Tim Vaske; and neighbor, Ryan Wolfe, Wilken currently owns a 450-acre spread on which he grows his organic crops.

Janies Farms growing season continues nearly year-round, starting with putting in cover crops as early as January and planting corn in mid-May through wheat harvest beginning in July until the last corn is picked in November. The organic products ultimately find their way to distributors, large and small food companies, breweries and distilleries, often personally delivered in a truck driven by Wilken himself.

For the mill, we service a customer radius in an area about four and a half hours out from the farm, going as far as Ann Arbor, Detroit, Cincinnati, Indianapolis and a bit into Louisville, he says.

Through a recent partnership with Tom Luhrs Family Farm in Imperial, Nebraska, Wilken and his team hope to expand the selection of heirloom variety grains Janies Farm can offer to its customers even farther.

Run of the mill

While loading a semitruck with wheat for a trip to New York in 2016, Wilkens own wheels started turning as he contemplated his next move. The following year, a broker contacted him looking for someone to mill flour, which planted more seeds of inspiration.

After installing custom, Danish-made Engsko machinery, Janies Mill started stone-grinding whole-kernel flours in 2017.

In another serendipitous twist, Herman Brockmans daughter, Jill, came on board to manage the mill; and his other Chicago-based daughter introduced Wilken to Hewn Bakery in Evanston to do some product testing and development, laying the foundation for a productive business relationship that continues to this day.

When we started out, we were doing 3 or 4,000 pounds of flour a week, Wilken says. Now, were producing between 5,000 to 7,000 per day. Our wholesale efforts are growing, and we did a booming retail package business during the pandemic. Were so proud that were able to provide jobs on the farm and in our mill that help keep our rural community healthy economically, environmentally and socially.

What lies ahead

Looking toward the future, Wilken is aiming to double the Janies Mill production capacity and keep looking for markets that allow the farm to work directly with customers. As the demand for transparency increases and savvy consumers want to know more about the origins of the food theyre eating, he hopes that more farmers will join the organic movement.

The landowners have got to be the ones who change the landscape, he says. As some are now taking over family farms, theyre coming to the realization that they want to work with people who are conscious of land stewardship and reflect their values.

Wilken would also like to see leaders within the farming community devote more time and attention to the bigger picture of transitioning soil from conventionally treated to organic.

I think well do the environment more good by getting land transitioned from conventional to organic than by taking organic acres to the next level, like in regenerative agriculture, he says. Then well really start to see a benefit to the environment.

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It took months and months of waiting to get the steel to Elko because of high demand. The section of I-beam finally arrived and the board set to work.

One member of our board, Joan Anderson, and her partner Jacques Errecart designed the sculpture that we (now) see, Wines said. The sculpture was based on the design of the World Trade Center. That building was designed around box columns. It was really revolutionary at the time because it made the outside skin the structure. The structure is based on that two-foot square box column. That column transforms as it goes up and ends up as a dove, which is the sign for peace.

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Everything about the (memorial) is pretty much symbolism, said Anderson in an earlier story. We, as a country, are strong and can overcome anything no matter what.

The City paid to transport the steel and the community donated other funds to complete the project, which is situated on a cement pad lined with boxwood. The sculpture is lit in the evenings and has a fountain running beneath it.

Four medallions in the corners of the steel base are dedicated to New Yorks emergency responders, 9/11 victims, local police officers and firefighters, and Americas freedom.
"The events of September 11, 2001 marked the end of innocence for the American public. A sobering and awakening exposure to the face of evil in the form of jihadist extremism. Our visceral reaction that day has been numbed only by the passage of time. The anniversary date will reopen dormant memories as the newsreels will replay the human disaster that befell NYC, the Pentagon and that hallowed crash site in Pennsylvania. Lives were changed forever on that day, as the course of history was arced.

"Forever faithful was a new generation of eager recruits into the US Armed Forces, firefighting, law enforcement and first responders that all wanted to dedicate themselves to a patriotic calling.

"One score henceforth, we will all remember where we were and what we were doing when we turned on the television to witness the devastation and ensuing confusion. Thanks be to God that weve avoided other massive-scale homeland terror attacks. May we be ever vigilant against an enemy that never sleeps, intent on our destruction.

"This somber day is for reverence to the innocents and loved ones that were wantonly destroyed. The grieving families and co-workers. The firefighters that rushed into collapsing buildings. The first responders that never came home. Our fallen service members. The Gold Star families that are painfully reminded of their immeasurable loss.
Disney's strategies are especially closely watched because of its enormous sway in the industry as the largest Hollywood studio. Disney accounted for 38% of domestic moviegoing in 2019. But its commitment to theatrical releases was sure to be a huge relief for cinema owners and a sign of some normality returning to moviegoing this fall.

Day-and-date releases proliferated during the pandemic while studios turned to boosting their in-home streaming services and compensating for diminished ticket sales. Theater owners have said that sacrifices many millions in box office and may deter from a movie's cultural impact.

And, lately, the box-office returns  even during the recent coronavirus surge  have been promising. Disney's Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings smashed the record for Labor Day openings last weekend, earning $90 million over the four-day weekend. Many in the industry have taken that as proof of the power of a theater-only release, and a positive sign for the fall movie season. Sony Pictures immediately after moved up the release of its Marvel sequel, Venom: Let There Be Carnage.

Following the tremendous box office success of our summer films which included five of the top eight domestic releases of the year, we are excited to update our theatrical plans for the remainder of 2021, said Kareem Daniel, chairman of Disney Media & Entertainment Distribution, in a statement. As confidence in moviegoing continues to improve, we look forward to entertaining audiences in theaters, while maintaining the flexibility to give our Disney+ subscribers the gift of Encanto this holiday season.

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Most Americans alive 20 years ago remember where they were on September 11, 2001. They remember the airplane hijackings, the attacks, and the collapse of the Twin Towers. They remember the nearly 3,000 who perished.

As our nation refocuses on that searing event, it will be tempting to pay attention to the lessons weve learned in the decades since when it comes to dealing with foreign threats and to homeland security. These are, of course, crucial. But in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, we also learned some important lessons about Congress and how it works, and about the benefits to the country of a truly bipartisan approach to difficult issues.

I say this because I was honored to serve as the vice chair of the 9/11 Commission, along with former New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean. Over 18 months, we reviewed more than 2.5 million pages of documents and conducted 1200 interviews. We sought to be independent, impartial, thorough, and non-partisan, and joined our Commission colleagues, equal in number from both sides of the aisle, in issuing a bipartisan, unanimous report.
The US has used drones to carry out numerous attacks against terrorists around the world as part of its global war on terror resulting in much controversy. The practice has resulted in civilian casualties, including possibly over 450 children since 2004 according to The Bureau of Investigative Journalism.

The last known US drone strike in Afghanistan on 29 August was claimed as righteous to prevent an imminent attack on US troops at the Kabul airport wrapping up the evacuation of civilians. The airport had been attacked just three days before by ISIS-K, killing 169 Afghan civilians and 13 US service members and more attacks were anticipated by the terrorist group. However, the target of the strike and the number of civilians killed are reportedly not what the US military said.

Aid worker mistaken for ISIS-K militant

The identity of the person who was driving the car that the US military officials allege was transporting explosives is unknown to them according to reporting from the New York Times. They considered him suspicious because of his activities that day driving around picking people up and dropping them off. Officials also said that he possibly visited an ISIS-K safe house and loaded what they deemed to be explosives into his car.

The New York Times reports that after investigating video footage and interviewing colleagues they can identify the driver as Zemari Ahmadi, an aid worker for a US group. What the military interpreted as suspicious activity was him performing his daily routine, ferrying co-workers to and from work. During one of his stops, he loaded canisters into the trunk of his car which passengers told the Times were water that he was taking home.

The car he was using was a Toyota Corolla similar to one that would be used in a rocket attack on the airport the next day.

Civilians caught in the blast

One of the most controversial parts of any war are civilian casualties, which increase when combat actions take place in urban areas. The drone strike that allegedly killed Mr. Ahmadi took place in a dense residential block.

Drone strikes have been especially controversial due to a lack of transparency in the past and later for undercounting the number of non-combatants killed in the strikes according to watchdog groups. One such group based in the UK, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, estimates that between 300 to 909 civilians have been killed in Afghanistan, including 66 to 184 children, since 2004.

The most recent drone strike according to relatives of Mr Ahmadi speaking to the Times killed 10 members of their family, including seven children. The US military has only acknowledged three civilians were killed in the drone strike. The drone operator assessed that with "reasonable certainty" no children, women or civilians were present before the missile was fired according to military officials.
2,750 people killed in New York, 184 at the Pentagon, and 44 in Pennsylvania. 20 years after the 9/11 attacks, the unanswered questions, rage and anger still remain for many Americans.

All nineteen suicidal terrorists died in the plane crashes, as well as citizens from 78 different nations, leaving a death toll of over 3,000.

Al Qaeda militants behind the attack

The terrorist hijackers, who were originally from Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries, had been in the US way before the events of September 11 took place. Those who are known to have lived in the states for more than a year took flying lessons at American commercial flight schools, while several others, who managed to get into the country a couple of months before the set date, served as the muscle for the deadly operation.

A total of nineteen terrorists managed to hijack four planes without raising suspicions. They carefully chose the flights which were loaded with jet fuel and used the knives and box-cutters, which they easily smuggled on board to take control of the four planes once in the air.

Osama bin Laden's role in 9/11

Most-wanted terrorist Osama bin Laden was the leader of the Islamic extremist group al Qaeda when 9/11 happened. He claimed responsibility for the attacks, alleging his group was acting in retaliation after the US supported Israel, and got involved in the Persian Gulf war, as well as the constantly being present in their territory, the Middle East.

Full screen New York police stand near a wanted poster printed on a full page of a New York newspaper for Saudi-born militant Osama bin Laden, in the financial district of New York, U.S., September 18, 2001. RUSSELL BOYCE (REUTERS)

They understood America was a threat.

Multiple people argue bin Laden left multiple hints on the way that could have avoided the unexpected events of September 11. Among those warnings was the small boat full of explosives that smashed the US naval destroyer the USS Cole as it refueled on the Yemeni coast in 2000. The attack ended the lives of seventeen sailors.

Bin Laden took credit for the attack, as well as the American embassy bombings in Kenya in 1998.

A federal grand jury in the US accused bin Laden on charges related to the East Africa embassy bombings, but as there was no defendant, there could be no trial.

In the meantime, al Qaeda operatives were busy working on what was about to be the greatest attack of all: the 9/11/2001 attacks on the World Trade Center twin towers and the Pentagon, the US military symbol.

Mohammed, the mastermind behind the horror

The principal architect of the 9/11 attacks. 9/11 Comission report

The so-called 9/11 Commission, in charge of investigating the events, released a report in 2004 naming Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as the mastermind behind the September 11 tragedy.

Mohammed led propaganda operations for al Qaeda from 1999-2001. He was captured on March 1, 2003 by the CIA and Pakistans Inter-Services Intelligence to be later incarcerated in Guantanamo Bay, charged with 9/11-related war crimes.
Headlines

- New details emerge over a fourth stimulus check and the reconciliation bill. (Full story)

- Conservative Democrats hinder chances that the Child Tax Credit be extended. (Full story)

- Many unemployed look for other federal aid available to the jobless. (Full story)

- Senator Manchin proposes work requirement for Child Tax Credit.

- Will the expanded Child Tax Credit be extended through to 2025? (Full story)

- Ways and Means Committee releases details of credits, benefits in $3.5tn reconciliation bill (Full story)

- Some states are distributing their own stimulus payments (Find out more)

Useful information / links

California Golden State Stimulus checks:

- How you can track your Golden State Stimulus payment

Unemployment:

- What state schemes are there for Americans who have lost unemployment benefits? (Find out more)

Child Tax Credit:

- IRS due to send out next Child Tax Credit payment on Wednesday 15 September (How to opt out of monthly CTC)

Take a look at some of our related news articles:
Hiding out in the small Pakistani city of Abbottabad, Osama bin Laden was on the run from the US. A ten-year manhunt had taken place. Many countries had been searched, prisoners tortured, and intelligence gathered.

After 'interrogating' captured al-Qaeda members in Guantanamo Bay, the US identified who they believed to be bin Laden's courier, tracking him to Abbottabad. After reconnaissance on a compound, it was suspected that bin Laden was hiding inside. With everything in place by 2011, the US made their strike on bin Laden's compound in one of the most famous historical events of the 2010s.

Operation Neptune Spear

On May 1, 2011, Navy SEALs of DevGru assaulted the compound where they believed bin Laden to be hiding. 79 soldiers and a dog were used in the operation. The US had not asked for permission from Pakistan, and preparations were made if Pakistani soldiers or guards were killed in the confrontation.

The first Black Hawk helicopter made a crash landing after damaging its tail rotor, but none of the crew were seriously injured. At once, its occupants disembarked and made their assault on the compound.

There are conflicting reports of what happened in the compound. Some tell of a firefight inside, while others say that there was no return fire and bin Laden and others were killed without reply.

Bin Laden was shot in his bedroom, another part of the story which is difficult to verify. SEAL celebrity Rob O'Neill claims in his book that he muscled to the front of the group before shooting bin laden twice in the head. He has made a successful career out of his claims during the operation. Other members of the team give different versions of events, and it is difficult to verify who did what when the SEALs were inside.

The leader of the team radioed command and said, "For God and countryGeronimo, Geronimo, Geronimo" and then, after being prompted for confirmation, "Geronimo EKIA". Geronimo was the code-name for bin laden.

In the White House Situation Room, Obama simply said, "We got him." The situation room is pictured at the top of the article.

24 hours later, bin Laden was buried at sea, as is Islamic custom.
NA Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue said with delight that it is the first Finland visit by a top Vietnamese legislator after 28 years of promoting the comprehensive partnership between the two countries. He congratulated the European country on its all-around achievements, especially in digital transformation, innovation and social welfare.



NA Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue (L) and Finnish President Sauli Niinisto (Photo: VNA)



As Vietnam is one of the countries hardest hit by climate change, he wished Finland would share its experience and partner with the country in digital transformation, innnovation, sustainable development and climate change response.



According to him, there are about 2,500 Vietnamese students and over 8,000 overseas Vietnamese living and working in Finland so that they could learn from the host countrys experience in building a start-up ecological system.



He expressed his hope that Finland will create favourable conditions for the Vietnamese community in the European country, thus fostering bilateral ties.



NA Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue suggested the President push forward the Finnish parliaments ratification of the European Union  Vietnam Investment Protection Agreement (EVIPA), and the two countries should take specific steps to make full use of opportunities brought about by the deal.



At the meeting (Photo: VNA)



President Niinisto, for his part, expressed his belief that Vietnam will continue with rapid and sustainable development.

He also shared Finlands experience in sustainable development with human as the most important factor, adding that its current social welfare system is attributable to peoples continuous efforts.



He pledged to assist Vietnam in the field as well as bolster bilateral links across environment and global issues.



Both sides shared the view that Vietnam and Finland hold the potential of further developing their ties and agreed to hold practical activities towards the 50th anniversary of bilateral diplomatic ties (January 25, 1973 - 2023).



They highlighted the stance on maintaining peace, stability, security, maritime and aviation safety and freedom, settling disputes by peaceful means in line with international law, the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea./.
Foreign Minister Bui Thanh Son speaks at the event (Photo: VNA)

The event was co-organised by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and the International Organisation of La Francophonie (OIF).

Speaking at the seminar, Foreign Minister Bui Thanh Son underscored that Vietnam values its traditional ties with African nations and that the Vietnam-Africa engagements are continuously being consolidated and expanded.

He stated room for the sides cooperation in agriculture remains extensive.

Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Le Quoc Doanh recommended the sides promote their South-South cooperation models, technological transfer, and farming encouragement measures, adding that Vietnam is willing to send experts and technicians to support Africa.

Doanh noted there is a need for the building of a pilot public-private partnership (PPP) model regarding investment in the production and processing of farm produce in some African nations, prioritising sectors of Vietnams strengths and demand for consumption.

Abu Bakarr Karim, Minister of Agriculture & Forestry of Sierra Leone, said his countrys agricultural sector will follow the successful development path of its Vietnamese counterpart.

Participants reviewed opportunities and challenges facing farming cooperation between Vietnam and Africa and discussed measures to bolster and expand the trade of the sides key farm produce.

Major orientations for joint agricultural production collaboration and financial solutions in aid of the ties were also tabled for discussion./.
Vietnamese Cambodians receive the support (Photo: VNA)

According to the Vietnam News Agency correspondent in Cambodia, the Community Support Fund of the Vietnamese Embassy and the Khmer-Vietnam Association in Phnom Penh distributed gifts including rice, mosquito nets and cash to 50 Vietnamese origin households among 1,171 disadvantaged households in 12 districts of the capital Phnom Penh.

Of them, 538 households used to live on floating houses on Tonle Sap and had to be relocated ashore.

Talking to a the Vietnam News Agency correspondent, Chairman of the Khmer-Vietnamese Association in Phnom Penh city Huynh Minh Phu said that during this period, people face difficulty due to the COVID-19 pandemic, especially those who had to relocate from Tonle Sap.

There are many support activities but Vietnamese Cambodian households still face various difficulties.

Leaders of the Embassy, the Khmer-Vietnamese Association in Cambodia and its branches in general, especially the branch in Phnom Penh, have paid attention and continued to mobilize timely support for the people.

On this occasion, the Khmer-Vietnamese Association in Phnom Penh city sprayed insecticides to kill mosquitoes and insects for households living in riverside areas.

Apart from Phnom Penh, the Embassy's Community Support Fund also supported rice and medical supplies for over 650 households in the provinces of Kampong Thom, Kampong Chhnang, Stung Treng, Prey Veng, and Kampong Cham, bringing the total number of households receiving support to 1,821 households.

Over the past 2 months, the Community Support Fund has provided food, foodstuff, medical supplies and essential goods to more than 800 households in some isolated areas and places affected by the pandemic in the provinces of Kandal, Siem Reap, Kampong Chhnang and Prey Veng./.




Poland hands over the medical equipment and supplies to Vietnam (Photo: Vietnamese Embassy in Poland)



The shipment includes 70 ventilators, 50 heart monitors, 267 Biolight volumetric pumps, protective clothing, gloves, medical masks and others.

This is an additional shipment of aid following the batch of 501,600 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine against COVID-19 that the Polish Government committed to give to Vietnam amid the very stressful pandemic situation in Vietnam, especially in Ho Chi Minh City and the southern provinces. Vietnam is the first Asian country to which Poland has donated medical equipment and vaccines against the COVID-19 pandemic.

Speaking at the reception ceremony, Counselor Nguyen Minh Que congratulated Poland on controlling the COVID-19 pandemic and quickly recovering the economy; expressed his thanks for the sharing, timely and meaningful help of the Government and people of Poland to the Government and people of Vietnam amid the most difficult period of the current pandemic.

He also hoped that after the pandemic is controlled, the two countries would continue to increase the exchange of delegations at all levels, as well as promote cooperation in the fields of trade, investment, tourism, education and defense.

Representatives of Polish authorities said that Poland is always ready to share difficulties with Vietnam in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic; affirming Poland's solidarity with Vietnam and the international community to overcome the pandemic together.

The Polish side believes that, with international solidarity and sharing, Vietnam in general and Ho Chi Minh City in particular will soon control the pandemic, minimize damage and soon stabilize the situation for socio-economic development.

The mutual assistance between Vietnam and Poland amid the pandemic demonstrates the solidarity and multifaceted friendship and cooperation between the two countries over the past 70 years, and which has been continuously cultivated and developed./.
The mission of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Ukraine on the first revision of the stand-by arrangements may start work on September 21 to September 23, 2021, representative of Ukraine in the Fund Vladyslav Rashkovan said.

"The mission could start work in 10-12 days," he said at the YES Brainstorming conference in Kyiv on Saturday.

Rashkovan said that, most likely, this mission will again be "virtual," that is, the work will be performed remotely.

He also said, there is still a chance that Chief of the mission Ivanna Vladkova Hollar will arrive in Kyiv, but this depends on the development of the epidemiological situation in Ukraine due to coronavirus (COVID-19).
One serviceman of the Armed Forces of Ukraine was killed, three more received shrapnel wounds as a result of shelling by Russian-occupation forces in Donbas. Over the past day, eight violations of the easefire were recorded; since the beginning of this Saturday, the enemy has opened fire twice, the press center of the JFO headquarters said.

"As a result of enemy fire, one soldier of the Joint Forces received a gunshot wound incompatible with life, three more servicemen received shrapnel wounds. After providing first aid, the soldier was transported to a hospital," the JFO said on Facebook on Saturday.

As of 07:00 on Saturday, September 11, two ceasefire violations were recorded. In particular, in the Novohnativka area, the enemy used 122-mm artillery systems prohibited by the Minsk agreements. Near Zolote-4, Russian-occupation forces fired from hand-held anti-tank grenade launchers, grenade launchers and small arms.

Over the past day, September 10, eight violations of the ceasefire regime were recorded.

In the Popasna area, the enemy fired three times from automatic heavy grenade launchers and 120-caliber mortars. The Ukrainian positions at Zolote-4 were also fired from large-caliber machine guns and small arms. Near Shyrokyne and Vodiane, Russian-occupation forces used grenade launchers of various systems.

In addition, in Luhansk and Donetsk regions, two hostile drones of the Orlan-10 type flew by crossing the contact line.

The headquarters said that Ukrainian defenders opened fire on enemy shelling.
United States calls on sides to come together on refreshing Naftogaz board, its CEO  Nuland

The United States calls on the sides to come together on refreshing the Supervisory Board of Naftogaz Ukrainy and its CEO, U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland said.

"We spoke out yesterday about our concern with regard to the ongoing leadership crisis in Naftogaz, including the fact that some of the international supervisors have just resigned. So, here we call on the sides to come together on refreshing the board, refreshing the CEO and doing it in a manner that meets OECD governance principles," Nuland said at the YES Brainstorming conference in Kyiv on Friday.

The U.S. Under Secretary of State said it was a success story for Ukraine to establish a professional international supervisory board that selects world-class CEOs.

She said that especially when Ukraine wants to move on the course of more privatizations, it is necessary that the management of the main 100 Ukrainian companies meet international standards. Therefore, the structures that have been established are very good, but when the rules and legislation that have been introduced are not followed, Ukraine and Ukrainians suffer.

Nuland said this applies not only to Naftogaz, but to the general investment climate in Ukraine.

"If you, like all of us, want more American, European companies to come to Ukraine, then the more they see the international standards of the OECD, the more confidence they will have," she said.

At the same time, Nuland said that many U.S. companies want to do more in Ukraine.

The Under Secretary of State said that Ukraine has taken important steps, including last year, regarding land reform, anti-corruption aspects, and the promotion of important reform legislation through the Verkhovna Rada.

"As you say, the stronger, cleaner, more democratic and more transparent Ukraine can be, the more it will be able to give to its citizens, the more it will be able to integrate with Europe, the more it will be ready on the way to NATO and the EU," she said.

The United States has seen some very good progress, Nuland said.

"However, there is still work to be done," she said.

YES Brainstorming is organized by the Yalta European Strategy (YES) and the Victor Pinchuk Foundation.
Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Dmytro Razumkov submitted bill No. 5599 on the prevention of threats to national security associated with the excessive influence of persons with significant economic or political weight in public life (oligarchs) for the conclusion to the Venice Commission.

"Taking into account the proposals of the authorized person of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine for human rights as a subject who, in accordance with Article 101 of the Constitution of Ukraine, exercises parliamentary control over the observance of constitutional human and civil rights and freedoms, and the appeal of four opposition parliamentary factions in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, I would like to ask you assist in obtaining from the Commission an expert opinion on this bill," Razumkov said in a letter to President of the commission Gianni Buquicchio.

In his request, the chairman of the Ukrainian parliament refers to the position of the Verkhovna Rada Human Rights Commissioner Liudmyla Denisova.

"I received a letter from the Human Rights Commissioner of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, which provided warnings about possible violations of human rights as a result of the adoption of this bill as a law of Ukraine, as well as a proposal to send the said bill to obtain the opinion of the European Commission for Democracy through Law (Venice Commission.) A similar position on this bill was expressed by all opposition parliamentary factions of the Ukrainian parliament," the chairman said.
President of Estonia Kersti Kaljulaid supports Ukraine's membership in the European Union, but the condition is that the Ukrainian side fulfills the Copenhagen criteria.

At the YES Brainstorming conference in Kyiv on Saturday, Kaljulaid said he is sorry, because he deeply wants Ukraine to become part of the EU one day. He said that he really hopes when the window of opportunity opens in the future, Ukraine will be ready go through that window. But the Copenhagen criteria are a prerequisite. Ukraine cannot start fulfilling them when the window of opportunity opens, it will be too late. If it opens at 09:00, it closes at 10:15. This is what our history has taught us, according to Kaljulaid.

The president said that in the five years she was in power, Ukraine has not advanced in accordance with the Copenhagen criteria.

Kaljulaid said that all future assumptions are based on past experiences. As the President of Estonia, she had to solve the problems of Estonian business in Ukraine. For example, an Estonian company had even gone through international arbitration to return the business to its rightful owners. It went on for five years while she was President of Estonia and there was no progress.

She said that she wants full EU membership for Ukraine.

However, she said that she knows this can only happen with conditions. She said that under no circumstances she is not one of those who says "it will never happen, just make an interim decision."

Kaljulaid also expressed regret that even when the conditions were met, the EU held back the start of accession discussions with some countries.

She said it means that it makes Ukraine's position stronger in negotiations with the EU, not meeting these criteria, which are the basis of the EU.

YES Brainstorming is organized by the Yalta European Strategy (YES) and Victor Pinchuk Foundation.
Russian President Vladimir Putin shakes hands with the new U.S. Ambassador to Russia John Sullivan during a ceremony for newly appointed foreign ambassadors to Russia (Photo : Alexander Zemlianichenko/Pool via REUTERS)

Russia's foreign ministry said on Friday it had summoned U.S. Ambassador John Sullivan to meet Russian Deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov over alleged interference in the September parliamentary election.



Russia has "undeniable proof" that tech giants, based in the United States, violated Russian laws ahead of the coming election, the foreign ministry said in a statement.



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It did not specify what companies and violations it referred to.



"In this regard it was stated that interference in the internal affairs of our country was absolutely unacceptable," the statement said.



The U.S. Embassy in Russia and the State Department did not immediately reply for a request for comments.



Russia said earlier this month that it may treat as election meddling refusals by Apple and Google to remove Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny's app from their online stores.



Navalny and his allies promote a tactical voting plan, which requires followers to support candidates who are judged to have the best chance of defeating the ruling United Russia party in local elections campaigns.


A Myanmar's soldier stands guard near the congress compound in Naypyitaw, Myanmar, (Photo : REUTERS/Stringer)

At least 20 people have been killed in fighting between militias and Myanmar's ruling military, a witness and local media said on Friday, in the worst violence since opponents of the junta called this week for a "people's defensive war".



The National Unity Government (NUG) formed to resist the army's Feb. 1 takeover called on Tuesday for a revolt https://reut.rs/3zWzZY7 against military rule, in an apparent effort to coordinate groups fighting the army and convince soldiers and state officials to switch sides.



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Myanmar has been in turmoil since the overthrow of Aung San Suu Kyi's government, which ended a decade of tentative democracy and sparked nationwide anger, strikes and protests, and saw the emergence of militia groups that have attacked security forces.



Fighting since Thursday between the military and defence volunteers allied with the unity government in Myin Thar village resulted in casualties among local militias and villagers, after troops used heavy artillery, according to media and a witness.



"They fired artillery, they burned down houses in our village," said a resident, 42, who added that three children as well as his 17-year-old son, a member of the militia, were among 20 people killed.



"I lost all I have... I will not forgive them until the end of the world," he told Reuters by phone, adding he struggled to recognise his son among the dead bodies.



BBC Burmese said 10 people were killed in Myin Thar in the Magway region of central Myanmar, while the Irrawaddy news website reported 17 casualties, among them minors.



Military spokesman Zaw Min Tun confirmed fighting took place in Magway, according to Irrawaddy. The spokesman did not answer Reuters calls seeking comment.



Myanmar's neighbours urged restraint https://reut.rs/3z19Ar5 from all sides following Tuesday's call for nationwide retaliation by the shadow government. Some analysts have warned the move could backfire and complicate the opposition's efforts to win international support.



Irrawaddy also reported the killing of three soldiers in the biggest city, Yangon, on Thursday.



Clashes erupted on Thursday and were continuing late on Friday in Thantlang in Chin state, bordering India, news reports said.



Radio Free Asia and Mizzima news service said the military conducted air strikes. There were no immediate reports of casualties.



The NUG's defence minister did not immediately respond for a request for confirmation of the incidents on Thursday and Friday.



Reuters could not verify the reports of clashes, which state-run MRTV made no mention of in its nightly news bulletin.



The military tightly controls information and its media outlets have been selective in reporting of unrest.


U.S. FDA may authorize COVID-19 vaccine for kids based on two months of safety data

Signage is seen outside of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) headquarters in White Oak, Maryland, U.S. (Photo : REUTERS/Andrew Kelly)

U.S. heath regulators said children in clinical trials testing COVID-19 vaccines should be monitored for at least two months for side effects, suggesting that the agency is considering a quicker path to authorize the shot for emergency use than full approval.



The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said on Friday it was looking to complete the data review as quickly as possible, likely in a matter of weeks rather than months.



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The FDA granted full approval last month for the use of Pfizer Inc's vaccine in people over the age of 16 based on a six-month follow-up from the trial. The shot was authorized in December for emergency use based on a shorter, two-month follow up.



The agency is under pressure to approve a vaccine for children below 12 years of age amid a surge in infections fueled by the spread of the Delta coronavirus variant, which has disrupted the reopening of schools.



Pfizer and partner BioNTech SE as well as Moderna Inc are racing to submit clinical data seeking regulatory approval for their vaccines in children below 12 years of age.



Pfizer/BioNTech's vaccine has been currently authorized for children aged 12 to 15 in the United States.



Pfizer said it expects to report data needed for approval in five and 11 year olds sometime this month and could potentially submit an application for emergency use shortly after. The drugmaker said data for kids aged two and under five could arrive soon after.



For children between six months and two years, Pfizer has said it could have a safety and immunogenicity data as early as October or November.



Moderna on Thursday said it has fully enrolled participants in a trial testing its shot in children between six and 11 years and that it was still conducting dose selection studies for younger age groups.


Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny takes part in a rally to mark the 5th anniversary of opposition politician Boris Nemtsov's murder and to protest against proposed amendments to the country's constitution, in Moscow, (Photo : REUTERS/Shamil Zhumatov)

The Kremlin's crackdown on websites linked to jailed opposition politician Alexei Navalny and on technology used to evade online bans are causing major internet outages for the Russian public, say web monitors, online gaming firms and government critics.



The disruption shows how new tools that state communications regulator Roskomnadzor is deploying to exert greater control over the internet are causing unintended collateral damage.



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GlobalCheck, a group that monitors websites' accessibility in Russia, said there had been widespread disruption after Roskomnadzor blocked widely-used internet services in its bid to prevent access to a banned app backed by Navalny's allies.



They hope to use the app to organise a tactical voting campaign to deal a blow to the ruling party at next week's parliamentary elections. The government wants the app banned from online stores.



Between 5.23 p.m. (1423 GMT) and 10.13 p.m. on Wednesday, Roskomnadzor blocked Google and cybersecurity firm Cloudflare's domain name system (DNS) services, which computers use to match website addresses with the correct servers, according to GlobalCheck.



As a result, swathes of the internet were down for Russians for about an hour on Wednesday evening, said IT expert Mikhail Klimarev, as did allies of Navalny on Twitter.



"There is no doubt that the blocking is happening as part of the fight with the Navalny app," GlobalCheck said. Navalny's app uses the same kind of DNS services that were targeted, it said.



Roskomnadzor did not respond to requests to comment.



The regulator has told Apple, Alphabet's Google, Cisco and Cloudflare to stop providing Navalny's app with the means to bypass its blocking efforts, Interfax news agency reported.



It has also threatened Apple and Google with fines.



Apple, Google, Cisco and Cloudflare did not immediately respond to requests for comment.



'GROWING HYSTERIA'



Allies of Navalny, whose movement was banned as extremist this summer, said on Thursday the mobile functionality of their app had fallen to around 80%, but that what they described as temporary malfunctions would not derail their tactical voting plan.



The campaign urges followers to sign up to be allocated a candidate judged to have the best chance of defeating United Russia in their election district.



It is one of the last levers that Navalny, President Vladimir Putin's fiercest domestic critic, has left to influence politics. He was jailed for 2-1/2 years earlier this year for parole violations on a conviction he calls trumped up.



Klimarev, the internet analyst, said he thought efforts to block the app would likely peak next week ahead of the election on Sept. 17-19.



"With elections coming up there is growing hysteria about smart voting and everything is being done to block it. All the glitches in networks are related to this," he said.



VPN BLOCKS



Russia has passed an array of legislation in recent years to boost what it calls its internet "sovereignty" and invested in digital tools to make its internet policing more sophisticated.



In the latest front in that campaign, Moscow has started blocking virtual private networks (VPN), arguing they enable internet users in Russia to access prohibited content, and banned six VPN providers earlier this month.



Mart, a communications operator, said it had received customer complaints over the last few days about the poor performance of e-commerce site Avito and online virtual games World of Tanks and World of Warships.



"The problems our subscribers were facing are, by all accounts, linked to attempts by Roskomnadzor to block several VPN services," Mart said.



On Monday, World of Warships said Roskomnadzor's blocking of VPNs had disrupted many users' gaming experience. It said it was working to resolve the issue.


Explainer: How bad is the crisis in Lebanon?

A man shields from the sun with an umbrella as he waits to get fuel from a gas station in Jal el-Dib, Lebanon (Photo : REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir)

Lebanon's financial meltdown has swiftly worsened in the last month, with much of the country crippled by fuel shortages that have ignited country-wide security incidents.



Exacerbated by political deadlock, Lebanon's rapid deterioration has prompted Western concern https://www.reuters.com/world/lebanon-free-fall-must-not-become-horror-story-us-senator-warns-2021-09-01. Some senior Lebanese officials have sounded the alarm https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/lebanese-security-chief-warns-crisis-could-be-prolonged-2021-08-27 about a country that has spent 30 years slowly recovering from a 1975-90 civil war.



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On Friday, Prime Minister Najib Mikati agreed a new cabinet https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/lebanons-pm-designate-mikati-visiting-president-about-cabinet-source-2021-09-10 with President Michel Aoun, raising hopes the state may finally take measures to arrest the collapse and to re-engage in talks with the International Monetary Fund, though all of its forerunners have failed to enact the necessary reforms.



Here is an overview of the different aspects of the crisis.



THE ECONOMIC MELTDOWN



Over two years, around 78% of the Lebanese population has fallen into poverty. The World Bank says it is one of the sharpest depressions of modern times https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/world-bank-sees-lebanon-gdp-shrinking-95-further-one-historys-worst-depressions-2021-06-01.



Early in the crisis, Lebanon defaulted on its massive pile of public debt, including $31 billion of Eurobonds that remain outstanding to creditors.



The currency has fallen by more than 90%, demolishing purchasing power in a country dependent on imports.



The banking system is paralysed. With depositors locked out of foreign currency savings or forced to withdraw cash in the collapsing local currency, this currently equates to a de facto slump in the value of deposits of 80%.



Food prices have jumped by 557% since Oct. 2019 according to the World Food Programme, and the economy has contracted by 30% since 2017 https://www.imf.org/en/Countries/LBN/faq.



Fuel shortages have crippled normal life, affecting essential services including hospitals and bakeries.



Vital medicines have also run out https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/clock-ticking-lebanese-cancer-patients-shortages-bite-2021-08-27.



Many of Lebanon's most qualified have left the country in a steady brain drain.



SECURITY



The fuel shortages have led to confrontations at petrol stations, where motorists have to wait for hours and weapons have been drawn in melees over fuel. Fuel tankers have been hijacked https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/leaderless-lebanon-slippery-slope-mayhem-2021-08-23. One dispute over gasoline in southern Lebanon spiralled into a sectarian standoff https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/fuel-dispute-triggers-sectarian-clash-lebanons-south-2021-08-30 between neighbouring Shi'ite Muslim and Christian villages.



In parts of Lebanon, the state's diminished standing is encouraging lawlessness. Heavy machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades were used in a recent battle between rival Sunni Muslim clans https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/lebanese-army-deploys-area-north-after-deadly-violence-2021-08-26 in northern Lebanon.



This all adds to the strain on state security forces. Security chiefs have warned of the impact the crisis is having on state institutions including the army, with the value of soldiers' wages crashing along with the pound.



Major General Abbas Ibrahim, a senior security chief, has urged his officers to stand firm https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/lebanese-security-chief-warns-crisis-could-be-prolonged-2021-08-27 in the face of the crisis, warning of the chaos that would ensue if the state collapsed.



THE POLITICAL LANDSCAPE



The recipe for fixing the situation is well-known.



Donors have repeatedly promised funds if Lebanon embarks on reforms to address the root causes of the collapse https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/lebanons-financial-meltdown-how-it-happened-2021-06-17, including steps to combat corruption in government.



But instead of doing the necessary, Lebanon's sectarian politicians, many of whom fought in the civil war, remained at loggerheads over seats in a new government for over a year before Friday's breakthrough.



Adversaries of President Michel Aoun, a Maronite Christian, accused him and his faction, the Free Patriotic Movement, of obstructing the process by demanding effective veto power in the new government. Aoun repeatedly denied making this demand.



The row had sectarian dimensions, with Sunni politicians including former prime minister Saad al-Hariri accusing Aoun of trying to undermine the post of prime minister, reserved for a Sunni. Aoun, a Maronite Christian, is an ally of the heavily armed, Iran-backed Shi'ite group Hezbollah.



Mikati on Friday assured Lebanese that the cabinet would put aside political bickering and focus on the task ahead.



Elections next spring, which Mikati pledged on Friday would take place on time, further complicate the process, political sources say, with factions more focused on preserving their seats than rescuing Lebanon.



A decision by Hezbollah, which repeatedly called for the urgent formation of a new cabinet, to import fuel from Iran https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/hezbollah-organised-fuel-lebanon-set-sail-group-says-2021-08-19 added another layer of complexity to the political scene.



The group's opponents accuse it of further undermining the state and exposing Lebanon to the risk of U.S. sanctions.



Gulf monarchies, who have traditionally channelled funds into Lebanon, have so far been relucant to do so, alarmed by the rising influence of the Iran-backed group.



On Friday, Mikati said Lebanon needed the Arab world and that he would not leave out any opportunities to open doors with Arab neighbours.


FILE PHOTO: The Facebook app is seen on a phone screen (Photo : REUTERS/Thomas White/File Photo/File Photo)

Italy's data protection authority said on Friday it has asked Facebook to provide clarifications over the social media giant's newly launched smart glasses to assess whether the product is compliant with privacy laws.



Facebook smart glasses https://www.reuters.com/technology/facebook-unveils-its-first-smart-glasses-2021-09-09, which were created in partnership with Ray-Ban maker EssilorLuxottica, allow wearers to listen to music, take calls or capture photos and short videos and share them across Facebook's services using a companion app.



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The Italian watchdog, Garante, said it has called on the Irish data protection commissioner, which leads oversight of Facebook because the social-media company's European headquarters are based in Ireland, to ask Facebook for clarifications.



The Italian authority said it wanted to be informed on measures Facebook has put in place to protect people occasionally filmed, in particular children, as well as on systems adopted to make data collected anonymous and features of the voice assistant connected to the glasses.



"We know people have questions about new technologies, so before the launch of Ray-Ban Stories we engaged with the Irish DPC to share how we've built privacy into the product design and functionality of the glasses to give both device owners and people around them peace of mind," a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement.



"We'll answer questions from Garante through the Irish DPC and we look forward to our continued collaboration with regulators in Europe," the spokesperson added.


Biden commemorates 9/11 anniversary with stops at all three attack sites (Photo : Chip Somodevilla/Pool via REUTERS)

NEW YORK (Reuters) -President Joe Biden will commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States on Saturday by visiting each of the sites where hijacked planes crashed in 2001, seeking to honor the victims of the devastating assault.



Biden began the day in New York, where he attended a ceremony at the site where the World Trade Center's twin towers once stood before planes struck the buildings and caused them to collapse.



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The New York Police Department pipes and drums band played "Hard Times Come Again No More" a U.S. folk song from the 1850s. Across the Hudson River in New Jersey at another ceremony Bruce Springsteen, playing an acoustic guitar, sang "I'll See You in My Dreams".



Biden and former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama and the crowd held a moment of silence at 8:46 to mark the time that the first plane hit. Biden, head bowed, did not make remarks.



Nearly 3,000 people died in the attacks in New York, at the Pentagon and in Pennsylvania, where passengers on United Flight 93 overtook the hijackers and the plane crashed in a field, preventing another target from being hit.



In New York, relatives read a list of the people who died at the towers. Rudy Giuliani, who was the mayor of New York at the time of the attacks, attended the ceremony. Former President Donald Trump, a New York native, did not.



Biden will travel to Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where former President George W. Bush, who led the country at the time, will make a rare public appearance.



Finally Biden will return to the Washington area to visit the Pentagon, the symbol of U.S. military might that was pierced by another of the planes that were used as missiles that day.



The anniversary comes shortly after the end of the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan, launched some 20 years ago to root out al Qaeda, which carried out the 9/11 attacks.



Biden's withdrawal of U.S. troops in August, months after a deadline set by his Republican predecessor, Donald Trump, and the resulting rapid fall of the country to the Taliban has drawn criticism from members of both political parties.



Biden is not scheduled to deliver remarks at any of the sites. He released a video on Friday to express his condolences to the loved ones of the victims and highlight the national unity that resulted, at least initially, after 9/11.



"It's so hard. Whether it's the first year or the 20th, children have grown up without parents and parents have suffered without children," Biden said.



The president noted the heroism that was seen in the days following the attacks.



"We also saw something all too rare: a true sense of national unity," Biden said.



Biden, a Democrat, pledged to build up such unity after he came into office earlier this year, but the country remains deeply divided politically.



U.S. presidents often travel to one of the three attack sites on the 9/11 anniversary but it is unusual to go to all three on the same day.



"The president felt it was important to visit each of these three sites to commemorate the lives lost, the sacrifices made on a day that has impacted millions of people across the country but certainly many people in those communities," White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said on Friday.



Biden is comfortable in the role of consoler-in-chief after suffering tragic family losses himself.



"No matter how much time has passed, and these commemorations bring everything painfully back, as if you just got the news a few seconds ago. And so on this day, Jill and I hold you close in our hearts and send you our love," he said in the video remarks, referencing his wife, Jill Biden.



Last month, many families of 9/11 victims asked Biden to skip 20-year memorial events unless he declassified documents they contend will show Saudi Arabian leaders supported the attacks. Last week the president ordered https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-orders-declassification-reviews-documents-related-sept-11-2021-09-03 the Department of Justice to review documents from the FBI probe into the attacks for declassification and release.



(Reporting by Jeff Mason, additional reporting by Timothy Gardner in WashingtonEditing by Chizu Nomiyama)


Parliaments Human Rights Committee praised the role of the Supreme Standing Committee for Human Rights in formulating a national draft strategy for the protection of human rights.

MP Tarek Radwan, head of the parliamentary committee, called for coordination between the two committees on matters that require legislative amendments.

Radwan's statements came during a meeting on Sunday held between his committee and the technical secretariat of the Supreme Standing Committee for Human Rights to discuss the outcomes of the draft strategy.

Radwan stressed the importance of promoting Egypts accomplishments through accessible media outlets, especially with the media seeing a change in form and content to make it more capable of delivering information via various means.

The MP underscored the necessity of activating direct and indirect media platforms in delivering key messages, including social media and influencers.

MP Mohamed Abdel-Aziz, the deputy head of the parliamentary committee, described the strategy as a major shift, adding that it represents a clear governmental commitment towards an action plan on an integrated strategy in the field of human rights.

On Saturday, the Supreme Standing Committee for Human Rights held a meeting with several civil society representatives and public figures to discuss a national draft strategy for human rights. The meeting included an open dialogue on the observations and proposals of the participants.

The session also saw discussions on challenges to bolstering human rights and how best to overcome them.

The timeframe for implementing the strategy extends to up to five years starting mid-2021, Abdel-Aziz said.

He added that the four-pronged strategy focuses on: political and civil rights; economic, social, and cultural rights; women, children, and youth; and the elderly and people with special needs.

The meeting was part of the second stage of consultations over the formulation of the strategy. The first stage saw six meetings in December and January.

The meetings held since last year were attended by representatives from the National Council for Human Rights, civil society groups, trade unions, research centres, universities, the Federation of the Chambers of Commerce, businessmen associations, and public figures.

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The fears of students and parents are mounting following Education Minister Tarek Shawki's decision to allow Egypt's international school to pursue classroom learning in the new academic year that starts on Sunday amid the fourth wave of COVID-19.

Although students' parents are relieved the troubles due to online learning last year are over, they are also "worried the physical attendance of school on a daily basis will spread the virus among the students and in their homes," said Farah Saafan, a journalist a mother of a student in an international school, told Ahram Online.

Adding to the parents' anxiety is the fact that Egypt has been seeing a steady rise in coronavirus infections of late, while the government said the peak of the wave will take place between late September and early October.

Moreover, officials had earlier stated that the Delta variant was recorded in Egypt in July and that the children are not spared from its wrath.

Sara Adel, a teacher at a renowned international school, told Ahram Online that making matters worse is that the vaccines available in Egypt are not allowed to be administered to children below 18 years of age.

We are going in full capacity, students and teachers, while following the preventative measures, such as wearing face masks, Adel said, adding that the teachers, administrators, and staff have been fully vaccinated the week before as per the Ministry of Educations directives.

Preparing for the new academic year, the Ministry of Education, in coordination with the Ministry of Health, has been ramping up the vaccination campaign for teachers, administration staff, and employees.

Last week, Minister of Health Hala Zayed said that 600,000 employees in the Ministry of Education, including teachers, have been vaccinated against the coronavirus in the past two weeks.

Based on the health ministrys estimations, 3.2 million people from the education sector, in schools and universities, would be vaccinated by the end of September 2021.

The ministry had earlier set 7 September as the deadline for school staffers to complete their COVID-19 vaccine registration but decided to extend the deadline till the end of the month.

According to the World Health Organisation, as of 5 September 2021, a total of 10.4 million doses have been administered in Egypt, including more than 3.5 million fully vaccinated citizens.

Adel, the teacher in an IGCSE section and a mother of two students in another international school, wonders how the preventative measures like social distancing will be applied if the school will start with full capacity.

Last year before going online, we had two periods in the school to reduce the capacity in the class and it was easier to apply social distancing and distance between desks in classrooms and recess, but now going full capacity with one period only, I do not know how to do it, she said.

In March 2020, schools and universities suspended in-person classes in the wake of the rising daily infections of the coronavirus. Most students have remained at home since, with assignments given online, although pupils taking their final high school exams  the Thanaweya Amma  did so in-person in June and July.

Shawky has recently explained that the regularity of the educational process in schools is a state decision and came based on the recommendations of the Crisis Management Committee headed by the prime minister. We seek a full-fledged academic year and avoid [the repercussions of] the coronavirus, and we will not cancel in-class education except in the worst circumstances, he added.

The minister also noted that the digital resources would be a complement to the educational process and not an alternative.

We had to be keen on reducing losses for students," Shawky said, explaining that online learning had a negative impact on the assimilation of students, especially younger generations who do not have the ability to deal with the Internet.

Despite the shared concern of parents and even teachers over the health of the students, the need to give students a proper education through in-person attendance at schools is also a shared wish.

We are worried about the children's academic abilities because online learning is a failure, said Saafan, believing that the childrens mental health has been affected from prolonged home stays.

While Adel believes that it was important for the children to return back to the classroom to have direct connection with teachers to get real benefits, online teaching does not offer this benefit for the younger pupils.

Despite hopes that the new school year will continue in-class, Adel assumes the procedures to follow if the fourth coronavirus wave reaches its peak in the upcoming weeks will be suspending in-class study for certain classes, replacing them with online learning.

During the last decade there has been a leap in the number of international schools in Egypt, going up from 57 schools in 2011 to 785 in 2020, according to official figures.

Some of these schools are separate sections in the private schools following the national system.

The British and American education systems have mostly predominated in international schools followed by the French and German systems.

The official 2021/22 academic year in Egyptian public schools that have national curricula will start on Saturday 17 October, according to a statement by the education minister in July.

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Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi announced 2022 Year of Civil Society as he launched on Saturday the National Strategy for Human Rights

In a speech at the launch of the strategy from the New Administrative Capital, El-Sisi urged the civil society to "continue working hard side by side with the state institutions to achieve sustainable development in all fields."

He also urged the civil society sector to cooperate with the state institutions to "spread awareness of the human rights culture and to contribute to achieving the aspirations of the Egyptian people."

El-Sisi hailed the role of the civil society as "key and important in enhancing and protecting human rights at the political, economic and social levels."

He added that the civil society organisations contribute to "spreading awareness of human rights in society and the culture of volunteer work and efforts to combat extremism and trends against the values of our Egyptian society."

"There is no doubt that the contributions and achievements of the civil society are clear, and its partnership with the state is indispensable," El-Sisi said.

He added that he, hence, had directed the government to reconsider the earlier civil society law, and therefore, a new law was issued.

El-Sisi said the new law, which came into force earlier this year, has included facilitations and guarantees that enhance civil work after a societal dialogue involving 1,300 Egyptian and foreign NGOs was conducted.

Personal and political freedoms

El-Sisi said the Egyptian state is committed to respecting and protecting personal freedoms, the right of political participation, the freedom of expression and the right of the formation of civil society organizations.

He added that Egypt welcomes differences in opinions as long as they respect the freedoms of others and aim, through constructive criticism, to achieve the better for the country and people.

During a roundtable discussion on the new strategy at the event, the President cautioned against the consequences of people imposing their opinions on others.

"We respect diversity and difference, but if someone seeks to impose their opinion on the rest of society then that leads to a dictatorial path," the President said.

Constitutional accomplishments

El-Sisi said the state has attached special importance to the right of participation in the political and public life as an "important component to advance human rights fields and contribute to establishing the pillars of democracy and the rule of law."

He noted that many legislations have been issued and many independent entities have been formed in support of these rights.

"The political and public life in Egypt has witnessed intense activity during the past period, which culminated in the achievement of all the constitutional entitlements," the president said.

He added that these entitlements "ensured the people's expression of their free will through presidential and legislative elections."

The President said the formation of legislative institutions have also been completed through reinstating the Senate and conducting its elections.

Freedom of thought and creativity

"Egypt has always adopted freedom of thought, creativity and expression, which resulted in a fruitful Egyptian contribution to its regional surrounding in art, literature and culture," El-Sisi said.

The President affirmed that the field of culture has received direct support from the state's leadership to encourage creators.

Religious freedom and equality

El-Sisi affirmed that the Egyptian state will continue to exert "tireless" efforts at the level of the freedom of religion and belief.

"Egypt, the country with a rich religious heritage, continues to make unremitting efforts to emphasize the values of citizenship, tolerance and dialogue, and to combat incitement to violence and discrimination," El-Sisi said.

The state has achieved "remarkable progress to ensure equality among the children of one nation in rights and duties," he said, citing the issuance of a law on the construction and restoration of churches as an example.

The President said this law has resulted in the legalization of the status of 1,800 unlicensed churches and adjacent structures.

"Standing side by side in the New Administrative Capital, the Al-Fattah Al-Aleem Mosque and the Nativity of Christ Cathedral harmonized as witnesses to those achievements," El-Sisi stated.

During the roundtable, El-Sisi stressed on Saturday his support for the right to freedom of belief and religion as "a right that God has granted us."

"If somebody told me I'm not a Muslim, Christian, Jewish or from any other faith, I will tell them you are free to not be. Because I am protective of my own religion, I respect others' freedom," El-Sisi said.

Religious affiliation in National ID cards stands

During the roundtable discussion, Egypt's Minister of Justice Omar Marwan explained why the state has opted not to remove the field of religious affiliation of citizens in the national ID card system.

Marwan said the inclusion of religious affiliation in the national IDs is a necessary measure to preserve the rights of Egyptians to be governed in their personal status matters by the jurisprudence of their religions.

The Egyptian constitution stipulates Muslims, Christians and Jews have the right to be governed in personal status matters by their own religious laws, and, therefore, an official proof of each citizen's religion in the ID system is required for the government to protect this right, Marwan said.

"We need the religion affiliation field for marriage, divorce and inheritance because there is no single law that applies to all Egyptians in personal status," the minister explained.

Egypts mandatory national IDs, which every citizen must carry at all times, contain basic information about individuals including age, occupation, place of residence, marital status and religious affiliation.

"Disdain of religion" cases?

During the roundtable discussion, well-known Egyptian writer and media figure Ibrahim Eissa called for a revision of the two-year pretrial detention periods for those accused of crimes, saying the measure "was associated with very specific, complicated circumstances [especially] the threat of terrorism in Egypt, but now the state has become strong and solid."

Eissa also called for the abolition of prison penalties for "disdain of religion", in order for such cases not to be used as "a sword hanging over writers' heads and pens," adding that such penalties restrict the freedom of interpretation of religious texts.

Comprehensive approach

The new National Strategy for Human Rights aims to develop a comprehensive approach to human rights as an integral part of implementing the country's national development project.

The strategy is the "first comprehensive and long-term homegrown-strategy in the human rights field in Egypt," presidential spokesman Bassam Rady said in a statement on Saturday morning.

At the start of the event, the president viewed a documentary film which discusses highlights of current efforts to bolster human rights in Egypt.

The event was attended by a number of ministers, state officilals and representatives of human rights and civil society groups.

Foreign ministry led effort

Speaking at the event, Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry explained that the Supreme Permanent Committee for Human Rights, which is chaired by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, prepared the new strategy.

The permanent committee was established in 2018 as per a decree by Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly to manage the human rights file in Egypt under the foreign ministry.

The establishment of the committee constituted an "important addition to the institutional structure supporting human rights," Shoukry stressed.

The committee's establishment also "reflected the firm political determination to translate all constitutional obligations and regional and international conventions' commitments into a tangible reality."

It also confirms the governments keenness to implement human rights as a pivotal component in line with the country's 2030 Vision strategy, Shoukry added.

Shoukry said the state has prepared the National Strategy for Human Rights through a scientific and consultative approaches.

Over the course of a year, the state has studied human rights recommendations put forth by Egypt's National Council for Human Rights and coordinated with more than 30 ministries and bodies to assess the requirements of their implementation, Shoukry said.

Shoukry said Egypt has assessed the final recommendations issued by regional and international human rights mechanisms and studied the human rights strategies of more than 30 countries.

The consultative approach included expanded community dialogue and hearings involving the National Council for Human Rights, the parliament's human rights committee, civil society groups, NGOs and others, Shoukry added.

The strategy spans five years and is based on four main axes: the civilian and political rights; economic, social and cultural rights; rights of women, children, disabled people, youth and the elderly; and education and capacity building in the human rights field.

Shoukry added that the state aims to achieve progress in these four axes in a balanced way through the legislative and institutional development.

"Human rights represent universal, integrated and interdependent values, and therefore must be dealt with comprehensively, and in a fair and equal manner," Shoukry said.

Shoukry noted that human rights should also not ignore national and regional particularities as well as religious and cultural backgrounds.

"What is reasonable and prevalent in one society is not necessarily acceptable in other societies," Shoukry said, affirming that "recognizing and respecting this diversity and specificity is an added value and an activation of human rights."

The country's top diplomat said developing the human rights situation is a "continuous and cumulative process that begins with the commitment of state institutions to their duties towards their citizens to uphold their dignity and safeguard their rights."

"We have a sincere determination to uphold the dignity of the Egyptian citizens and guarantee equal opportunities," Shoukry stated.

He also explained that the protection of human rights constitutes a governmental policy and goal and is backed by an "independent and impartial judiciary that acts as a guarantor of the rule of law and the protection of rights."

Political rights and religious freedoms

In his speech at the event, Ahmed Ihab Gamal El-Din, Egypt's permanent representative to the United Nations Office at Geneva, said the new National Strategy for Human Rights highlights the right of citizens to participation in the political life and formation of political parties.

This right, which has been enshrined in various legislations issued since 2014, guarantees civilian and political rights and leads to the building of a state of law that befits Egypt and the people, Gamal El-Din stressed.

He noted that the strategy also aims to continue efforts exerted by religious institutions to renew the religious discourse.

The strategy also contributes to the promotion and development of public awareness of the culture of practicing all forms of peaceful assembly, Gamal El-Din added.

The strategy seeks to consolidate the values of citizenship and create societal awareness of the importance of respecting religious freedoms, he said.

It also works on ensuring the continuation of the work of the committee tasked with legalizing the status of churches, Gamal El-Din said.

The strategy aims to build skills and capabilities of political parties' cadres for leadership, he added.

Gamal El-Din said that Egypt's draft new labour law, set to be discussed by the parliament in October, could represent a beginning for a strong partnership between the state and the civil society.

The new labour law reflects the state's commitment to the enhancement and protection of the work of civil society organizations as a key partner in protecting human rights, he said.

UNHRC president hails Egypt on new strategy

The President of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHCR) Nazhat Shameem Khan praised Egypt's launching of the first National Strategy for Human Rights.

In a recorded video message screened at the ceremony, Shameem Khan said the new strategy aims to boost and protect human rights for all in Egypt and is a "significant" step for implementing international human rights criteria and guaranteeing human rights,

The new human rights strategy in Egypt is a key tool to protect and promote human rights, a pillar of the work of the UNHRC, she noted.

It targets translating the commitments into concrete steps on the ground, with the aim of strengthening the civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights as well as protecting the human rights of vulnerable segments, atop of which are women, children, challenged people and seniors, she added.

She also praised Egypt for taking into consideration during the preparation of the new strategy previous recommendations of the UNHRC on the human rights file in Egypt.

The UNHRC has several useful resources that can be used by Egypt to support the strategy, she stressed, adding the UN council's agenda will ensure the implementation of the strategy effectively.

Economic and social rights

"The integrated development vision of the state, Egypt 2030, is based on the concepts of comprehensive, sustainable and balanced growth, allowing a fair distribution of the benefits of development, achieving the highest levels of societal integration for all groups, and guaranteeing the rights of current and future generations to use the resources," El-Sisi said.

These concepts also reflect the achievements made during the past seven years through the establishment of mega national projects nationwide, according to El-Sisi.

"This has been directly reflects on the level of enforcing the economic, social and cultural rights, especially regarding the right to proper housing and health care, regular work, healthy food, pure drinking water, developed sanitation and good education," the president added.

El-Sisi said the state has taken into account the social protection measures while implementing the economic reform program to ease its effect on the low-income people.

These came through the implementation of many initiatives, the most prominent of which are "Takaful w Karama" and "Decent Life" that seeks to develop the countryside inhabited by more than half of the Egyptian population, El-Sisi said.

"This first national strategy stems from an Egyptian will that believes in achieving integration to advance the society," El-Sisi said.

Human rights: 7 presidential directives

During his speech, El-Sisi called on the Supreme Permanent Committee for Human Rights, which prepared the new strategy, to continue implementing the mandates entrusted to it.

The president also urged the government to take all measures to enhance the strategy as follows:

- First, continuing efforts to integrate human rights goals and principles into the states public policies and within the framework of implementing the sustainable development strategy, Egypt Vision 2030.

- Second, inviting political entities and civil society groups to care for enriching the Egyptian political experience and building trained cadres through expanding participation and expression within a climate of creative interaction and objective dialogue.

- Third, ensuring equal distribution of the benefits of development and the right of every person to enjoy a proper standard of living for themselves and their family to meet their basic needs.

- Fourth, enhancing communication with various civil society institutions and providing all facilitations for the effective implementation of the law organising the civil society work and its executive regulations.

This comes to secure an adequate climate for the civil society organisations to work as a main development partner and spread the culture of human rights in society.

- Fifth, ensuring, while implementing an integrated vision of administrative reform, to build an efficient administrative apparatus that follows the mechanisms of good governance and is subject to accountability.

It also has to enjoy the approval of citizens regarding the level of services provided to them and should be characterised by efficiency, justice and non-discrimination.

- Sixth, developing the system of receiving and following up on complaints regarding human rights to achieve quick and effective response to any complaints.

- Seventh, intensifying national efforts for capacity building and training in the field of human rights.

Human rights and development

The new strategy "includes the main axes of the comprehensive concept of human rights in the state, which is to be integrated with Egypt's national developmental path that consolidates the principles of the establishment of the New Republic and achieves the goals of Egypt's vision 2030," Rady said in the statement.

The strategy will build on the progress achieved during the past years in the field of maximising freedoms and rights and overcoming the challenges in this regard, Rady added.

This comes with the aim of enhancing and respecting all civilian, political, social, economic and cultural rights, the spokesman added.

The strategy strengthens the state's policies in backing the rights of women, youth, the elderly, the disabled and all stratas of society, Rady concluded.

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*Mohamed Soliman and Amr Ramadan contributed to this report.

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Health Minister Hala Zayed ordered the formation of a committee to probe into a video showing a doctor insulting a male nurse at Ain Shams University Specialized Hospital.

In a statement, Spokesman for the Health Ministry Khaled Megahed said the doctor was suspended from work and the clinic, where the incident took place, was temporarily closed until completing ongoing investigations.

A four-minute video, which went viral on social media platforms, showed the doctor hurling insults at an elderly nurse and forcing him to prostrate to his dog.

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Ahmed Ihab Gamal El-Din, Egypt's permanent representative to the United Nations Office at Geneva, said the new National Strategy for Human Rights highlights the right of citizens to participation in the political life and formation of political parties.

This right, which has been enshrined in various legislations issued since 2014, guarantees civilian and political rights and leads to the building of a state of law that befits Egypt and the people, he stressed.

Gamal El-Din made his remarks during the launch by President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi of Egypt's National Strategy for Human Rights at an event in the New Administrative Capital.

He noted that the strategy also aims to continue efforts exerted by religious institutions to renew the religious discourse.

The strategy also contributes to the promotion and development of public awareness of the culture of practicing all forms of peaceful assembly, Gamal El-Din added.

The strategy seeks to consolidate the values of citizenship and create societal awareness of the importance of respecting religious freedoms, he said.

It also works on ensuring the continuation of the work of the committee tasked with legalizing the status of churches, Gamal El-Din said.

The strategy aims to build skills and capabilities of political parties' cadres for leadership, he added.

Gamal El-Din said that Egypt's draft new labour law, set to be discussed by the parliament in October, could represent a beginning for a strong partnership between the state and the civil society.

The new labour law reflects the state's commitment to the enhancement and protection of the work of civil society organizations as a key partner in protecting human rights, he said.

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Egypt on Friday welcomed the formation of a new Lebanese government headed by Najuib Mikati.

In a statement released on Friday, spokesman for the Foreign Ministry Ahmed Hafez praised this important step, as it was expected to contribute to ending the prolonged political crisis, restoring the country's security and stability, and achieving the desired economic reform, as well as distancing Lebanon from all regional conflicts and narrow and private interests.

The spokesman stressed the need to pave the way for the new government to bring about these goals and get Lebanon out of its crisis in accordance with constitutional powers.

He explained that Egypt would work in the coming phase to support the new government, with a view to realizing the Lebanese people's aspirations for a better future.

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The Egyptian and Indian naval forces have carried out a joint naval drill in the Northern Fleets operations zone in the Mediterranean Sea, Egypts Armed Forces Spokesman Gharib Abdel-Hafez said in a statement on Saturday.

India's INS Tabar frigate and Egypt's Alexandria frigate have taken part in the naval drill, the statement said.

In addition to holding a pre-sailing conference in order to coordinate the activities, the drill has included a set of different naval combat activities, including exercises to confront atypical maritime threats, joint protection exercises for a vital target at sea, as well as training on maritime security measures in the areas of operations in the Mediterranean, according to Abdel-Hafez.

The military spokesperson noted that it was second exercise of its kind conducted by the Indian frigate (INS Tabar) with units from the Egyptian Navy's Northern Fleet, reflecting the mutual efforts to exchange experience between the Egyptian and Indian navies.

It also affirms the capabilities of the Egyptian Naval Forces in working and coordinating with global naval forces to secure international navigation and transportation lines and support maritime security efforts in the region, he noted.

The drill with Indias navy is a continuation of the joint exercises conducted by the Egyptian Naval Forces with world navies, which aim to enhance the combat capabilities of the naval units and their crews, making them able to face challenges in a manner that contributes to supporting maritime security and stability in the region, Abdel-Hafez said.

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Mired in what the World Bank calls one of the worst economic crises since the mid-19th century, Lebanon finally got a new government Friday after 13 months of deadlock.

Here is a recap of the country's escalating crisis:

- Dollar shortages -

Protesters take to the streets of central Beirut against economic hardship on September 29, 2019.

Among the worst hit are petrol station owners who need dollars to pay their suppliers. But media reports say banks and exchange offices are limiting dollar sales for fear of running out of the US currency on which the country relies.

- Last straw -

Mass protests follow a government announcement on October 17 of a planned tax on voice calls made over messaging services such as WhatsApp.

Many see the tax as the last straw, with some demanding "the fall of the regime".

The government of prime minister Saad Hariri scraps the tax the same day.

But protests continue over the ensuing weeks, culminating in huge demonstrations calling for the overhaul of a ruling class in place for decades and accused of systematic corruption.

Hariri's government resigns in late October.

- Eurobond default -

Lebanon, with a $92 billion debt burden equivalent to nearly 170 percent of its gross domestic product, announces in March 2020 that it will default on a payment for the first time in its history.

In April, after three nights of violent clashes, then-prime minister Hassan Diab says Lebanon will seek International Monetary Fund help after the government approves an economic rescue plan.

But talks with the IMF quickly go off the rails.

- Catastrophic explosion -

A massive explosion on August 4 at Beirut port devastates entire neighbourhoods of the capital, kills more than 200 people, injures at least 6,500 and leaves hundreds of thousands homeless.

The government says the blast appears to have been caused by a fire that ignited tonnes of ammonium nitrate left unsecured in a warehouse for six years.

Popular anger -- kept on hold by the Covid pandemic -- erupts.

Top officials are investigated over the explosion, but no politicians are arrested.

- Political impasse -

Diab's government resigns in August after just over seven months in office.

Diplomat Mustapha Adib is named new premier but bows out after less than a month, and Hariri, already prime minister three times, is named in October.

- One of worst crises -

Authorities announce in February 2021 that bread prices will rise by around a fifth.

In June, the World Bank says Lebanon's economic collapse is likely to rank among the world's worst financial crises since the mid-19th century.

Later that month protesters try to storm central bank offices in the northern city of Tripoli and Sidon in the south after the Lebanese pound plunges to a new record low on the black market.

As the currency has lost 90 percent of its value, entire sections of society have sunk into poverty.

Days later the government hikes fuel prices by more than 30 percent.

Medicine importers say in July they have run out of key drugs.

- New government -

After nine months of horse-trading, Hariri steps aside on July 15, saying he is unable to form a government.

Billionaire Najib Mikati, Lebanon's richest man and already twice prime minister, is tasked with forming a new cabinet on July 26, sparking both protests and scepticism.

A new government is announced Friday ending a 13-month vacuum.

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The smell of death lingered for days after the killings. The bodies, more than a dozen in the uniforms of fighters, others in civilian clothing, were still scattered on the muddy ground.

In a nearby churchyard, many more were already buried _ at least 59 people killed by forces from Ethiopia's northern Tigray region, residents alleged. Six bodies of priests were laid to rest inside the church itself. In their rush to flee to safer areas of the Amhara region, residents said at times they placed multiple bodies in single graves.

At the scene of one of the deadliest battles of Ethiopia's 10-month Tigray conflict, witness accounts reflected the increasingly blurred line between combatant and civilian after the federal government weeks ago urged all capable citizens to stop the Tigray forces once and for all.

When the Tigray fighters captured the village of Chenna Teklehaymanot in the Amhara region on Aug. 31, shortly after a military division defending the area left for unknown reasons, our (local) defense forces confronted them. Ordinary people here also joined with whatever they could, said 66-year-old Dagnew Hune. He told The Associated Press he witnessed the ensuing killings and helped to bury the dead.

About 100 people are still missing, Dagnew said on Thursday, walking past what he said were fresh graves in the churchyard covered with tree branches and stones.

Local officials have said as many as 200 people in all may have been killed over several days of fighting, with the worst of it on Sept. 4 in Chenna Teklehaymanot after Ethiopian forces reportedly blocked an attempt by Tigray fighters to seize the city of Gondar.

The Tigray forces have since retreated north, residents said, leaving survivors to check the pockets of dead fighters for clues to their identities. And some questioned why the division of Ethiopian soldiers had left them alone, with only local militia and residents to defend them.

Since retaking much of their embattled home region from Ethiopian forces in June, the Tigray fighters have brought the war into the country's neighboring regions of Afar and Amhara, where Chenna Teklehaymanot is located. The Tigray forces say they are pressuring Ethiopia's government to lift a blockade on Tigray that has left millions of people without telecommunications, electricity, banking services and almost all humanitarian aid.

Now a massive humanitarian crisis that already affects millions inside Tigray is spreading as hundreds of thousands of people flee the Tigray fighters, fearing their retaliatory attacks. The Tigray forces have said they are not attacking civilians.

But grieving witnesses and survivors in Chenna Teklehaymanot said the Tigray forces arrived demanding food, then killed people who tried to resist when the fighters killed their animals or looted their properties.

Many of the innocent civilians here have lost their lives, said local priest Yared Adamu. Holding a cross, he walked inside the damaged church, where bullet casings were scattered on the ground.

Spokesman for the Tigray forces Getachew Reda, speaking with the AP on Friday, called allegations that Tigray fighters had targeted civilians in the village absolutely, absolutely false. He accused Amhara regional special forces of forcing civilians to fight, and of course they will be caught in the crossfire.

Told that residents had not reported being forced to fight, Getachew replied, Whatever they told you was staged drama. He also denied allegations that the Tigray forces were retreating.

Ethiopia's widening war, with atrocities reported on all sides, has led to urgent calls by the United Nations, United States and others for an immediate cease-fire and a path to dialogue. But there is little peace in sight.

Ethiopia's government this year declared the Tigray People's Liberation Front, which long dominated the national government before Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed took office, a terrorist group. That designation can't be lifted until a new federal government is formed, likely in early October, his spokeswoman told reporters on Thursday.

What began as a political dispute has killed thousands since November. Now in the Amhara region, as in Tigray, some outraged civilians have joined the fight.

Resident Kibret Bidere described himself as a member of the Amhara militia called the Fano. He told the AP his sister and her 1-year-old son had been killed, and his father was missing.

Even today we are looking for the lost ones from morning to evening, but we haven't found any, he said, nursing an injured arm from previous fighting.

The village's traditional homes of grass and mud were emptying as residents departed through the mist, searching for safety elsewhere. Many had bundles on their backs. One, a gun propped on his shoulder.

Our home was attacked by heavy artillery, said Senait Ambaw, who was leaving with her husband, clutching a chicken. All the people of Chenna have no home now. It's over.

In the nearby town of Dabat, Amhara militia riding by on a truck fired their guns skyward in victory. Children ran after them, collecting the bullet casings from the ground.

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Israeli police on Saturday said they have arrested four of the six Palestinians who broke out of a maximum-security prison this week - including a famed militant leader whose exploits over the years have made him a well-known figure in Israel.

The arrests moved Israel closer to closing an embarrassing episode that exposed deep flaws in its prison system and turned the fugitive prisoners into Palestinian heroes.

Late on Friday, Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip fired a rocket into Israel in an apparent sign of solidarity, drawing Israeli airstrikes in reprisal.

The four wanted men were caught in a pair of arrests in northern Israel.

Early on Saturday, police said they had caught two men, including Zakaria Zubeidi, in the Arab town of Umm al-Ghanam. Zubeidi was a militant leader during the second Palestinian uprising in the early 2000s.

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Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Abul Gheit welcomed on Friday the formation of the new Lebanese government after 13 months of political standoff, an official source at the AL General Secretariat said.The source added that Lebanese people are setting great hopes on the new government to take reform steps to overcome the economic and humanitarian crisis facing the Lebanese people.The AL will continue to support Lebanon until it manages to get through the current difficult situation and bring greater stability to the country, the source stressed.
Hundreds of Hazara worshippers overflowed from a mosque on the outskirts of the Afghan capital on Friday, touching their foreheads to the ground as they took part in the most important prayer of the week.

Long persecuted by both the Taliban and Islamic State for their Shiite faith, members of the ethnic minority group say they feel less threatened since the Taliban seized power on August 15.

"Previously, during Friday prayers we'd be afraid of attacks from terrorist groups, especially IS," Mahdi Hassanzadah told AFP.

"For now the threat is reduced."

But after holding top positions in previous US-backed governments, they fear the future consequences of being shut out of the Taliban's new acting administration -- made up of hardline militants of the group's old guard.

"It is largely made up of a single ethnicity," Hassanzadah said, referring to the Pashtuns who dominate the Taliban and are Afghanistan's biggest group.

"We don't see any participation of the Hazaras, which is a huge concern," he told AFP.

'Anxiety and worry'

The Hazara make up the bulk of the country's Shiite minority, and it is feared the Taliban -- hardliners from the Sunni branch of Islam -- may again turn on them, just as they did during their last regime in the late 1990s.

They have suffered some of Afghanistan's most violent assaults, with rallies bombed, hospitals targeted and commuters ambushed.

In May, Islamic State suicide bombers targeted a school just 1.6 kilometres (one mile) away from the mosque, killing more than 80 girl students.

In the Hazara neighbourhood, there were visibly fewer Taliban fighters on the streets and manning checkpoints, AFP journalists saw.

But like many others in the capital, taking home a salary was their most pressing concern, as food prices soar.

"The people who used to work for the government have all become unemployed. There's a lot of anxiety and worry," worshipper Suleiman told AFP outside the mosque.

"It's not like the Taliban are killing us, but it is better to die than to live suffocated like this."

Many government services are no longer functioning, while the international community, which has long propped up the aid-dependent economy, hesitates over funding Afghanistan.

"We haven't seen anything bad from the Taliban but there is no work for people, what are we supposed to do about our hunger?" Suleiman said.

Comprising between 10 and 20 percent of the country's 38 million people, Hazaras have been marginalised for their faith in a country riven by deep divisions.

By some estimates, nearly half of their population was massacred in the late 19th century, with many later enslaved during the conquest of their traditional homeland by Pashtuns.

After leading the prayers, Imam Abdul Qadir Alemi told AFP inside the mosque he still hoped the Taliban's acting government would later become representative of the people in the country.

"There is no doubt that the people of Afghanistan want an inclusive government in which all ethnicities, followers of all faiths and different segments of society are represented."

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Related Two Turkish soldiers killed in Syria attack

The UN's Syria envoy said he held "very good discussions" in Damascus Saturday, and expressed hopes that a committee to discuss a post-war constitution for the country could soon reconvene.

"We had very substantial, very good discussions," Norwegian diplomat Geir Pedersen said after meeting Syria's Foreign Minister Faisal al-Meqdad.

"We discussed... the economic and humanitarian challenges here in Syria, the challenges when it comes to livelihoods, and what we all can do the help to improve that situation."

The envoy said he hoped "to move forward also on the constitutional committee" working towards a post-war constitution, and that it would be "possible to call for a sixth round" of talks between its members.

The UN-backed committee made up of 45 people -- 15 delegates each representing the Damascus regime, the opposition and civil society -- was created in September 2019 but has since made little headway.

Pedersen said a fifth session in January had been "a missed opportunity and disappointment".

Since then, Bashar al-Assad in July took the oath of office for a fourth term as Syria's president, after officially winning 95 percent of the vote in an election dismissed abroad.

After clawing back large parts of the country from rebels and jihadists with key Russian backing over the years, he vowed to make "liberating those parts of the homeland that still need to be" one of his top priorities.

Endless rounds of UN-backed peace talks have failed to stem Syria's war, which has killed around 500,000 people and displaced millions since it started with the brutal suppression of anti-government protests in 2011.

In recent years UN efforts have instead focused around the work of the constitutional committee.

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Four people, including members of Iraq's security forces, were killed on Saturday in an attack by Islamic State group jihadists near the northern city of Mosul, officials said.

The attack occurred at night in the Makhmur region south of Mosul, the former stronghold of the IS jihadists, a security official said on condition of anonymity.

It left dead four people, including the mayor of the hamlet, at least one police officer and a member of the pro-Iran Hashed al-Shaabi militia, the official added.

Jihadists from "Daesh" had targeted a Hashed position at around 2:00 am (2300 GMT), Salih al-Jiburi, an official from a nearby village, said, using the Arabic acronym for IS.

They shelled and fired small arms during the attack, said Jiburi, who put the toll at four dead, including the mayor and militia fighter.

The attack comes less than a week after an IS assault near the northern city of Kirkuk killed 13 members of the Iraqi federal police.

The jihadists also claimed responsibility for a major attack in July that killed more than 30 people at a market in Baghdad's Shiite district of Sadr City.

IS overran Mosul in a lightning offensive in 2014, and for three years the mainly Sunni city was the heart of the jihadists' self-proclaimed "caliphate".

The city was retaken by the Iraqi army and a US-led coalition after intense bombardment and fighting that left it in ruins.

International coalition troops in Iraq currently number around 3,500, of which 2,500 are US troops.

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The International Atomic Energy Agency's director-general plans to visit Iran on Sunday to try to defuse tension over what the nuclear watchdog says is Tehran's lack of cooperation.

Rafael Grossi will meet the Iranian vice president and the head of the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran, Mohammad Eslami, the IAEA said in a statement on Saturday.

Grossi is expected to hold a press conference on his return to Vienna airport at around 8:30 pm (18:30 GMT), it added.

The visit comes after the agency issued a particularly harsh report earlier this week and ahead of a meeting of the IAEA board next week.

Since February 2021, verification and monitoring activities have been seriously hampered by Iran's restrictions on inspections, the document, seen by AFP, said.

President Ebrahim Raissi insisted that Iran was being "transparent".

Major powers, however, are losing patience, more than two months after the suspension of negotiations begun in April in Vienna under the aegis of the European Union to try to resurrect the international agreement of 2015.

The United States is close to abandoning its efforts, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned on Wednesday.

The Islamic Republic has been gradually freeing itself from its nuclear obligations since 2019, in response to Donald Trump's reinstatement of US sanctions.

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Two Turkish soldiers were killed on Saturday and three others injured in an attack in the northwestern Syrian region of Idlib, the Turkish defence ministry said.

"Our companions were killed in a vile and infamous attack," said Turkish Defence Minister Hulusi Akar, while the presidency vowed to avenge the killings.

The attackers targeted "a unit returning from a patrol", the ministry said, without giving details on the type of assault.

An AFP reporter on the scene said it was a bomb blast on the Idlib-Bennish road.

Idlib is home to the last major jihadist and rebel stronghold in northwest Syria.

Offering his condolences to the families of the dead soldiers, Turkish presidency spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said on Twitter that "none of our martyrs will go unavenged".

Echoing that sentiment Akra said that, "The blood shed by our martyrs has never gone unpunished and will not go unpunished this time."

Akar, accompanied by military generals, visited the injured soldiers who were transferred to a hospital in the southern Turkish town of Hatay.

After several successive offensives by government forces, a ceasefire was negotiated with the Syrian regime, but some groups have rejected this agreement.

The truce, brokered by neighbouring Turkey -- which backs some rebel groups -- and Syrian regime ally Russia, has largely been in force since March 2020, despite sporadic clashes.

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Now that the Taliban have reportedly taken full control of Afghanistan and begun forming a government, a looming challenge awaits: How will they keep their country and economy afloat financially?

For the past 20 years, the U.S. government and other countries have financed the vast majority of the Afghan government's non-military budget - and every cent of the fighting force that melted to the Taliban so quickly in August 2021. Now, with American aid likely out of the question and billions in central bank foreign reserves frozen, the Taliban will have to find other means to pay for salaries and support citizens and infrastructure.

I've been studying the finances of the Taliban and American-backed government for many years as an economic policy analyst at the Center for Afghanistan Studies. Understanding how the Taliban will pay for their government begins with the last time they were in power over 20 years ago.

Afghanistan has changed a lot

In the 1990s, Afghanistan was a very different country.

The population was under 20 million and relied on international aid groups for the few services they could provide. In 1997, for example, the Taliban government had a budget of just US$100,000, which was barely enough for the salaries of government officials, let alone the entire country's administrative and development needs.

Today, Afghanistan has changed markedly. The population has grown significantly, and its citizens increasingly came to expect services such as health care, education and basic utilities. In 2020, for example, Afghanistan had a non-military budget of $5.6 billion.

As a result, Kabul has been transformed from a war-ravaged city into a modern capital, with a growing number of high rises, internet cafes, restaurants and universities.

Most of the developmental and infrastructure spending that has taken place since 2001 has come from other countries. The U.S. and other international donors covered about 75% of the government's non-military spending during those years. In addition, the U.S. spent $5.8 billion since 2001 on economic and infrastructure development.

Still, government revenue was beginning to cover a growing share of domestic spending in recent years. Sources included customs duties, taxes, income from fees on services like passports, telecommunications and roads, as well as revenue from its vast but mostly untapped mineral wealth.

Revenue would have been a lot higher were it not for the government's endemic corruption, which some experts and officials cite as a [key reason for its downfall](https://www.economist.com/asia/2021/08/28/the-afghan-government-was-undone-by-its-own-corruption). A report from May 2021 suggested that $8 million was being embezzled out of the country every day, which would add up to about $3 billion a year.

Where the Taliban gets its money

Meanwhile, the Taliban had their own significant revenue streams to finance their insurgency as it gained control of the country.

In the 2019-2020 fiscal year alone, the Taliban raked in $1.6 billion from a wide variety of sources. Most notably, the Taliban earned $416 million that year from selling opium, over $400 million from mining minerals like iron ore, marble and gold, and $240 million from donations from private donors and groups.

U.S. intelligence agencies and others believe that various countries, including Russia, Iran, Pakistan and China, have helped finance the Taliban.

With those resources, the Taliban were able to buy plenty of weapons and grow their military ranks as they took advantage of the U.S. withdrawal and conquered Afghanistan in a matter of weeks.

Afghanistan's challenges

But winning the war may be easier than running the county, which faces many problems.

Afghanistan is currently enduring severe drought that threatens over 12 million people - a third of the population - with "crisis" or "emergency" levels of food insecurity. Prices for food and other essentials have soared, while most banks started to reopen with limited cash availability.

And like many countries, its economy has been hurt by COVID-19 - and some fear a resurgence in cases as vaccination rates plunge. Many public health facilities face severe funding shortages.

The Taliban also face daunting financial challenges. Roughly $9.4 billion in Afghanistan international reserves were frozen immediately after the Taliban took over Kabul. The International Monetary Fund suspended more than $400 million in emergency reserves, and the European Union halted plans to disperse $1.4 billion in aid to Afghanistan through 2025.

5 potential funding sources for new government

Still, as they finish making their government and plotting a future course, the Taliban have a few sources they might be able to tap to generate enough money to run their reclaimed country:

Customs and taxation

Now that the Taliban are in full control of Afghanistan's border crossings and government offices, they can begin collecting all import and other taxes.

Drugs

The Taliban have said it won't permit Afghan farmers to grow opium poppies as they seek international recognition for their rule. But they may change their mind if that recognition doesn't come, in which case they may be able to continue to generate a significant source of revenue from drug smuggling. Afghanistan is said to be responsible for about 80% of global opium and heroin supplies.

Mining

Afghanistan is estimated to have $1 trillion worth of minerals in its mountains and other parts of the country. China in particular has been eager to mine for these metals, which include ones that are critical to the modern supply chain, such as lithium, iron, copper and cobalt. This may not be possible in the short run, though.

Non-Western countries

Several governments have been reportedly helping the Taliban financially, including Russia, Qatar, Iran and Pakistan, and these countries may continue to do so. After the previous Afghan government collapsed in August, I was told by ex-central bank officials that a country in the region, likely Qatar, injected millions of dollars to support the Afghan economy. China in particular stands out for its potential ties to the new government, as the Taliban have recently declared the country their "principal partner." Besides mining minerals, China is also interested in extending its Belt and Road Initiative - a global infrastructure development project - into Afghanistan.

Western aid

Even with these other sources of income, I believe the Taliban will still be keen to restore aid from the U.S. and other Western countries and get rid of United Nations sanctions that have been in place since 1999. The Taliban have said they intend to behave differently than in the 1990s, including by respecting the rights of women and not permitting terrorists to operate from Afghanistan. And the EU, U.S. and other governments may want to use aid and frozen reserves as leverage to hold the Taliban to these promises.

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Afghanistan risks backsliding on nearly two decades of schooling gains for children, especially girls, as the prospect of violence looms with the return of Taliban rule, the UN's education agency said on Friday.

"The number of internally displaced persons is projected to increase, heightening the risk of learning losses among children and generational catastrophe," the Paris-based UNESCO said in a statement.

The loss will "negatively affect the sustainable development of the country for years to come", it added.

Since 2001, when US forces ousted the first Taliban regime after the September 11 terror attacks, the number of girls in primary school jumped from "almost zero" to 2.5 million in 2018, according to the agency's latest report.

Female literacy nearly doubled to 30 percent, and currently four of 10 students in primary classes are girls.

Overall, some 10 million children and young people are enrolled, up from just one million in 2001.

But the new Taliban administration has already decreed that women attending private universities, which have flourished in recent years, must be separated from men.

Female students must also be covered with a long abaya robe and a niqab, a face veil with a small window to see through.

Further hard-line education rules for public institutions are expected as well, such as forbidding men to teach women -- a huge problem in a country already facing a shortfall of female teachers.

"This will deal a huge blow to women's participation in higher education and to girls' education more broadly, negatively impacting their lives, work and citizenship," UNESCO said.

A withdrawal of international aid poses another threat, since it makes up half of Afghanistan's education expenditures.

And even with those funds, teacher salaries are routinely paid late, discouraging more people from taking up the profession.

The report added that before the Taliban's return to power, Afghanistan's education challenges were already "colossal".

"Half of primary school-aged children are not enrolled in school while 93 percent of children at late primary are not proficient in reading," the report found.

It urged efforts to "clear barriers" to getting girls into schools, by hiring more female teachers, especially in rural areas.

"What is at stake in Afghanistan is the absolute necessity of preserving the gains made in education, especially for girls and women," UNESCO director general Audrey Azoulay said.

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Two months after the cabinet approved the executive regulations of Law 149/2019, ratified by President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi in August, the regulations have been published. The law replaces legislation issued in 2017 which was heavily criticised by civil society locally and internationally for restricting the work of NGOs.

The new law and its executive regulations are a result of a process of consultation between different stakeholders, including the ministries of justice, solidarity and interior, the General Federation of Non-governmental Organisations in Egypt, the National Council of Human Rights, public figures, research centres and representatives from 1,164 local NGOs.

The consultations were based on a study of international best practice, with an eye on broadening the role and activities of NGOs in Egypt. The dialogue concluded that the relationship between state and civil society needed redrawing based on the basis of partnership and greater mutual trust.

While the regulations require NGOs to provide extensive data to register with the authorities, including information on founders and planned activities, the new law removed obstacles to the establishment of NGOs contained in the earlier law 70/2017. Section one of the new law allows NGOs to be established following notification, dispensing with the 60-day delay that previously applied, and exempts the newly established entity from registration fees, customs and real estate taxes.

The law places a 25 per cent cap on the number of non-Egyptian directors on the board of NGOs, up from 10 per cent in its predecessor, allowing for greater foreign involvement in civil society.

Licensing a foreign NGO requires Foreign Ministry approval. Egyptian NGOs, however, are allowed to open offices in other countries and receive donor funds. Such funds are restricted to a single bank account, making it easier to track the funding and its sources, except in the case of NGOs with annual revenues and expenses of more than LE5 million, when multiple accounts can be used.

It is estimated that 700 NGOs in Egypt receive external funding from non-governmental institutions such as the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). In order to receive foreign funds NGOs must notify the Ministry of Social Solidarity and demonstrate compliance with combating terrorism and money laundering legislation. The new law mandates a 60-day period, down from 90, for any approval decision on foreign funding, and considers non-response within 60 days as implicit approval.

Existing NGOs have been granted a year to comply with the new regulations.

Between 2014 and 2016 there were several crackdowns on foreign-funded NGOs working in Egypt due to lack of information about their sources of funding.

A number of NGOs were closed, their assets frozen, and some personnel jailed. The new act includes provisions to dissolve associations and prosecute those found in breach of the relevant laws, though custodial sentences have been replaced by financial penalties.

There are likely to be structural impediments to implementing the new law. The requirement that all donations be in the form of bank transfers is expected to cause problems given the deficiencies in local Fintech infrastructure.

On the whole, though the new executive regulations of civil society act dealt with deficiencies and shortcoming in the previous act of 2017 and highlight the importance of organising NGOs activities in Egypt and paving the way before them to carry out in a healthy partnership with the state their needed efforts for the social and political good of the whole society.

NGOs working in Egypt are banned by the new law from engaging in political activities.

*The writer is a researcher at the Egyptian Centre for Strategic Studies.

*A version of this article appears in print in the 21 January, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly.

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The Permanent High Committee for Human Rights (PHCHR) held the last of its planned hearing sessions to discuss a draft integrated, long-term national strategy for human rights on 12 January. The session was attended by representatives from human rights and civil society organisations.

Ahmed Ehab Gamaleddin, secretary-general of the PHCHR and deputy minister of foreign affairs for human rights, hailed the progress the committee had made. He praised the wide-ranging representation at last weeks hearing session and the opportunity it afforded to listen to the ideas of civil society on how to boost human rights in Egypt.

The meeting reflected the importance of partnerships between the state and civil society organisations, he said in a press conference following the meeting, adding that remarks and suggestions from the session will be assessed for possible incorporation in the final draft.

The outcome of the sessions will now be discussed by the advisory board before being presented to the cabinet ahead of a final draft.

The three-day session was held by video-conference. Representatives from syndicates, human rights organisations, research centres, the General Federation of NGOs and regional unions attended the meeting.

Nine hearings were originally planned, in venues from Alexandria to Luxor, to allow as many people as possible to participate. As a result of the coronavirus pandemic, all the sessions convened virtually.

Asked about the timeline or the date for issuing the national strategy, Gamaleddin said the process will take time.

The strategy reflects Egypts vision of itself, and how it wants to present itself to the world. The priority is to dedicate enough time to every step and discuss all elements thoroughly before producing a final document. There is no rush, he said.

The national strategy is linked to Egypts 2030 Vision and other related strategies prepared by ministries and human rights bodies and care must be taken to ensure it can be effectively implemented on the ground.

In October 2020 the PHCHR advisory board produced a first draft of the strategy following a series of meetings addressing civil and political rights in four broad areas: civil and political rights; economic, social and cultural rights; the rights of women, children, the young, elderly and differently abled, and the provision of training in the field of human rights.

The advisory board comprises 25 experts including the legal and media specialists, MPs, former ministers, university professors and representatives from human rights, differently abled and womens advocacy organisations.

The preparation of Egypts first integrated, long-term national strategy for human rights is an example of the firm political will behind efforts to boost basic rights and freedoms, Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukri said following the conclusion of the first meetings last year. He stressed that human rights are an essential component of any modern civil state.

The PHCHR, established in November 2018 to formulate a comprehensive strategy on human rights, began work in January last year. It is headed by Shoukri and includes representatives from the ministries of defence, justice, interior, social solidarity, parliamentary affairs, the General Intelligence Service, the Administrative Control Authority and the National Council for Women.

Last year the committees focus was on preparing preliminary reports, responding to complaints, capacity building, studying relevant legislative amendments, analysing objections raised against Egypt in terms of human rights and responding with transparency and credibility while highlighting Egypts progress.

Since beginning our mission we have orchestrated efforts from all involved parties to produce a strategy that can be applied in practice. This is our motivation and our goal, said Gamaleddin.

*A version of this article appears in print in the 21 January, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly.

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We are not saying the human rights situation in Egypt is rosy, we still have problems, but at least there are signs the political will exists to improve the human rights situation in Egypt, Essam Shiha, the head of the Egyptian Organisation for Human Rights, said on 8 April during a one-day conference Human Rights: Building the Post Pandemic World organised by the Egyptian Centre for Strategic Studies (ECSS) and held in Cairo.

Human rights are fully integrated and do not just cover political rights, Shiha said, responding to a question about the statement issued by 31 countries at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in March criticising the state of human rights in Egypt.

We have to realise that some rights, including the right to life, trump others, he said while highlighting state efforts to combat terrorism.

The issue of pretrial detention was raised during the conference.

We have to find alternatives to pretrial detention, Shiha told the conference. The conference recommended that legislative and judicial authorities review the situation and develop mechanisms to avoid lengthy detention without trial.

Tarek Radwan, chair of the Human Rights Committee in the House of Representatives, stressed that attempts to assess the human rights situation in Egypt necessitated recourse to established communication channels.

If [foreign states and organisations] want to listen to the opinions [of untrustworthy sources] they should also listen to the legislative authority entrusted with overseeing the executive authority, Radwan said.

Alaa Roshdi, assistant to the foreign minister, told the conference that launching Egypts Supreme Standing Committee for Human Rights reflects a paradigm shift in Egypts vision on how to deal with the human rights file.

To help with communication, the ECSS has invited regional offices of international organisations in Egypt to contribute to a more dynamic framework for communication, cooperation and joint work in the field of human rights.

The idea behind the conference, which will be an annual event, according to the head of the ECSS Khaled Okasha, was to envision the post-Covid world through the prism of the International Agenda on Human Rights, issued by the UN last December, which identified ending discrimination and racism, addressing inequality, promoting participation and solidarity, and supporting sustainable development as fundamental rights.

Five ministers attended the conference and briefed participants about state efforts to alleviate the impact of the pandemic.

During a session discussing Challenges to Equality and Promoting Sustainable Development, Education Minister Tarek Shawki said the most vital foundation for development was equal access to quality education.

Had it not been for the states investment in infrastructure and content before the pandemic we would not have been able to provide access to education for all during the course of the pandemic, Shawki said.

The states achievements in developing education prior to the pandemic helped it overcome the challenges posed by Covid-19. The state, stressed Shawki, had already invested in the infrastructure needed to allow every student in Egypt access to the Internet.

The education minister noted that international organisations classified education in Egypt among the three best experiences in the world during the coronavirus pandemic and added that the ministry conducted 50 million electronic exams for students at a time when many countries simply suspended education.

The Minister of Social Solidarity Nevine Al-Kabbaj said that to confront the challenges posed by the pandemic the ministry had pushed forward with digitisation and by December 2021 all its services will be automated.

The pandemic, according to Al-Kabbaj, had been a learning experience.

It taught us about mechanisation and to break down the barriers between us, to work online and judge our work on the basis of results. It helped us think about irregular employment and the importance of social and insurance protection, and to pay greater attention to risk analysis.

Minister of Health Hala Zayed highlighted the states efforts in the health sector before the pandemic and how they helped alleviate its severity. She pointed to the 100 Million Health initiative and reductions in the waiting time for treatment. The 100 Million Health initiative included mass screenings for all citizens over the age of 18 for Hepatitis C, and non-communicable diseases including diabetes, hypertension, and obesity. Sixty million Egyptians received check-ups and were treated between October 2018 and April 2019.

Reducing waiting lists for treatment allowed us to perform 11,000 surgical interventions for free, said Zayed.

The minister of health said the state was keen to integrate immigrants into ongoing health projects and initiatives.

Laurent De Boeck, head of the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) in Egypt, thanked Zayed for highlighting the importance of integrating immigrants into health projects, stressing that no one will be safe until everyone is safe.

That six million immigrants live in Egypt shows that the country welcomes people from brotherly states just as it has been welcoming people for centuries, De Boeck said.

Though a large number of immigrants live in Egypt, such is their integration in the community they are more or less invisible, said De Boeck.

The closing statement of the conference noted that the pandemic had exposed deeply-rooted imbalances in human rights, and that the world will enter the period of recovery poorer and more exhausted, and with a set of global arrangements, in place since World War II, that appear less fit for that purpose than ever.

Among its recommendations, the conference urged the role of the World Health Organisation to be expanded to allow it to earlier detect crises and encourage countries to cooperate and share information more quickly, and stressed that the universal right to health required fair access to vaccines and other treatments.

The need for more flexible, inclusive and dynamic educational systems to avoid disruption in times of crisis was also highlighted in the recommendations of the conference.

*A version of this article appears in print in the 15 April, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly

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World Suicide Prevention Day (WSPD) is observed on 10 September to provide worldwide commitment and action to prevent suicides, with various activities held around the world since 2003.

The International Association for Suicide Prevention (IASP) collaborates with the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the World Federation for Mental Health (WFMH) to host World Suicide Prevention Day.

Although not widely celebrated or heard about, every year countries around the world hold awareness events to mark the occasion.

According to a WHO fact sheet published in June, more than 700,000 people take their lives every year, making suicide the fourth cause of death in the 15-29 age bracket.

The numbers are decreasing, however. A 2018 WHO report stated that approximately one million people worldwide committed suicide, recording almost one death every 40 seconds. The report indicated that suicide incidents in Egypt reached 3.799 or 0.68% of the total deaths, a ratio of three suicides per 100,000 people.

Depression is one of the leading reasons behind suicide. Others include financial hardships and failure to score high grades in exams or find a job.

In May, unable to bear the loss of his mother, a 21-year-old Egyptian man committed suicide by throwing himself in front of a train. The mother passed away a month prior to the incident after suffering from Covid-19. The young man didn't only lose his mother. A few days earlier, one of his best friends died. The two deaths left him with depression.

"If you dont hear anything about me, then just pray for me and forgive me," the man wrote on his social media accounts.

"It is a state of low mood and aversion of activities that have a negative effect on one's feelings, thought and physical well-being that may lead to one's contemplating or attempting to commit suicide," explained therapist Sherine Abdel-Khalik.

However, "Egyptian society has come a long way from considering suicide as a taboo to accepting it as a mental illness that needs to be treated," Abdel-Khalik added.

Figures released in March 2017 by the General Secretariat of Mental Health showed that 516,000 people were admitted to mental hospitals across the country in 2016.

"However, religion maybe a restrain for many of those who are experiencing suicidal tendencies," noted Abdel-Khalik. Both Islam and Christianity categorically forbid suicide.

"And since suicide is generally regarded as sinful, both socially and religiously in our community, most of the cases are dismissed as accidental deaths by the deceased's relatives," she said, "because families don't want to live with the shame that usually comes with the idea that one of them took their own life."

This means that suicides and suicide attempts in Egypt are under-reported, according to Abdel-Khalik.

"The statistics available dont reflect the reality or the magnitude of the massive problem."

According to a report issued by the Ministry of Health and Population, 30 percent of baccalaureate student suffer from psychological problems and 21.5 percent of them consider suicide.

"Suicide among young adults and high school students is a common thing," explained Kenzy Atef, a sociologist and behaviour therapist.

"Over the past months we have witnessed many suicide cases following the release of high school results," explained Atef.

"They are often attributed to pressures to achieve high academic results in their final exams," she added.

Suicide is a serious public health problem, but it is preventable with timely, evidence-based and often low-cost interventions, according to the WHO. For national responses to be effective, however, a comprehensive suicide prevention strategy is needed.

"In the past few years, the government has been focusing on suicide and mental health issues," noted Atef.

Many online campaigns and hot numbers, both private and government-sponsored, have been attempting to address the problem, but the one number that stands out is that of the Ministry of Health and Population.

Upon dialling 02 2081 6831 or 080 0888 0700, an employee asks the caller about the mental health issue and directs them to the nearest mental health facility that is most suitable for the case.

"The most important thing when it comes to mental illness is that the patients feel they are not alone and that they are getting the help and support they need," said Atef.

There are also many online initiatives of varying costs and types, such as Takestep and Shezlong. The two websites enable users to book and pay for their online or phone sessions anonymously.

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Belgrade is gearing up for the 60th anniversary celebrations of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), which held its first summit meeting there in 1961. According to Serbian Foreign Minister Nikola Selakovic, the Serbian capital will be hosting 35 heads of state and 130 foreign ministers for the upcoming event on 11-12 October. But is this movement still important today given the sweeping international changes that have taken place over the past 60 years?

Selakovic visited most of the countries on the guest list and found great enthusiasm for the forthcoming summit, the movements 20th. This, he said, was a clear sign that Third World countries still saw value in the movement, regardless of those that say its time has come.

But do these countries still find in their membership of the movement some affirmation of their independence given the polarisations in an international order that is no longer characterised by the bipolar superpower rivalry of the Cold War? Does the movement still have a role to play in a multilateral world in which Chinas star is rising in the international arena, the EU is gradually differentiating itself from the US, and other emergent poles, such as Japan, are staking out their ground?

The peoples of the 120 nations and 20 observer states that are members of the Non-Aligned Movement attached high hopes to the movement when it was formed to advance their national hopes and aspirations. It was founded to promote such principles and causes as self-determination, national autonomy and sovereignty, regional peace, the end of apartheid, the rejection of subordination to imperialist military alliances, the anti-colonialist struggle, resistance to foreign occupation, nuclear disarmament, the rejection of the recourse to force or coercion in international relations, the democratisation of the international order and a more equitable international economic order supportive of the social and economic development of the movements member states.

The NAM emerged from the 1955 Afro-Asian Conference, or Bandung Conference, which was attended by the movements founding fathers, Egyptian president Gamal Abdel-Nasser, Indian prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru and Yugoslav president Josip Broz Tito. The Bandung Principles defined the goals of the movement and the commitment to their realisation as the chief eligibility criterion for membership.

The NAM received a powerful boost during the UNs 15th general conference in 1960 when 17 newly independent nations from Africa and Asia became members of the movement. The following year, the first summit of the Non-Aligned Nations was held in what was then the Yugoslav capital Belgrade. The preparatory conference for the summit was held in Cairo.

Perhaps the most significant change that has occurred since the NAM was founded is the disappearance of the East-West ideological conflict that drove the Cold War and that the movement was founded to confront. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the worlds economies have become increasingly intertwined as the world has shifted to the free-market system. Perhaps the best example of this is the trade relationship between China and the US.

However, that said, great power conflict continues despite the end of this ideological dimension, and part of that conflict involves the attempts by rival powers to assert their hegemony over Third World countries. Particularly worrisome in this regard has been the rise of the military factor over recent decades, a factor that had been largely removed from equations during the Cold War era.

The result has been some very hot wars, sometimes by proxy as in the case of Afghanistan, Syria and Libya, and at other times directly, as was the case with the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. The world powers are racing to expand their military presence abroad by building bases and sometimes by flexing their military muscle, and the global environment has become tenser and more violent. It thus seems more urgent than ever that the NAM and its outlooks and activities opposed to such trends should be activated.

Two-thirds of the worlds nations are members of the NAM. Egypt, which played a pioneering role in founding the movement, hosted the last summit meeting in Sharm El-Sheikh in 2009. In the light of the stability it enjoys in a region teeming with anarchy and turmoil, Egypt could also play a pioneering role in steering the movement to new horizons shaped by the developing worlds contemporary needs and aspirations.

Belgrade is looking forward to resuming its leading role in the Non-Aligned Movement by hosting the summit meeting next month. India, the second member of the movements founding triumvirate, is enjoying an increasingly influential international profile. Surely it is time for Egypt to regain the international role it is best suited to perform by resuming its leading position within the Non-Aligned Movement, the largest international bloc after the UN.

The Belgrade summit meeting next month presents Egypt with an opportunity to resume a role we have neglected for decades, for which we have paid a price both in Africa and Asia.

*A version of this article appears in print in the 9 September, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly.

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Egypt welcomes formation of new Lebanese government



MENA, , Saturday 11 Sep 2021



The spokesman stressed the need to pave the way for the new government to bring about these goals and get Lebanon out of its crisis in accordance with constitutional powers



Egypt on Friday welcomed the formation of a new Lebanese government headed by Najuib Mikati.



In a statement released on Friday, spokesman for the Foreign Ministry Ahmed Hafez praised this important step, as it was expected to contribute to ending the prolonged political crisis, restoring the country's security and stability, and achieving the desired economic reform, as well as distancing Lebanon from all regional conflicts and narrow and private interests.



The spokesman stressed the need to pave the way for the new government to bring about these goals and get Lebanon out of its crisis in accordance with constitutional powers.



He explained that Egypt would work in the coming phase to support the new government, with a view to realizing the Lebanese people's aspirations for a better future.



https://english.ahram.org.eg/News/422841.aspx
Two Turkish soldiers killed in Syria attack



AFP, , Saturday 11 Sep 2021



Two Turkish soldiers were killed Saturday and three others injured in an attack in the northwestern Syrian region of Idlib



Two Turkish soldiers were killed Saturday and three others injured in an attack in the northwestern Syrian region of Idlib, the Turkish defence ministry said.



The attackers targeted "a unit returning from a patrol", the ministry said, without giving details on the type of assault.



An AFP reporter on the scene said it was a bomb blast on the Idlib-Bennish road.



Idlib is home to the last major jihadist and rebel stronghold in northwest Syria.



After several successive offensives by government forces, a ceasefire was negotiated with the Syrian regime, but some groups have rejected this agreement.



The truce, brokered by neighbouring Turkey -- which backs some rebel groups -- and Syrian regime ally Russia, has largely been in force since March 2020, despite sporadic clashes.



https://english.ahram.org.eg/News/422844.aspx
Four dead in north Iraq attack blamed on IS jihadists



AFP, , Saturday 11 Sep 2021



Four people, including members of Iraq's security forces, were killed on Saturday in an attack by Islamic State group jihadists near the northern city of Mosul



Four people, including members of Iraq's security forces, were killed on Saturday in an attack by Islamic State group jihadists near the northern city of Mosul, officials said.



The attack occurred at night in the Makhmur region south of Mosul, the former stronghold of the IS jihadists, a security official said on condition of anonymity.



It left dead four people, including the mayor of the hamlet, at least one police officer and a member of the pro-Iran Hashed al-Shaabi militia, the official added.



Jihadists from "Daesh" had targeted a Hashed position at around 2:00 am (2300 GMT), Salih al-Jiburi, an official from a nearby village, said, using the Arabic acronym for IS.



They shelled and fired small arms during the attack, said Jiburi, who put the toll at four dead, including the mayor and militia fighter.



The attack comes less than a week after an IS assault near the northern city of Kirkuk killed 13 members of the Iraqi federal police.



The jihadists also claimed responsibility for a major attack in July that killed more than 30 people at a market in Baghdad's Shiite district of Sadr City.



IS overran Mosul in a lightning offensive in 2014, and for three years the mainly Sunni city was the heart of the jihadists' self-proclaimed "caliphate".



The city was retaken by the Iraqi army and a US-led coalition after intense bombardment and fighting that left it in ruins.



International coalition troops in Iraq currently number around 3,500, of which 2,500 are US troops.



https://english.ahram.org.eg/News/422847.aspx
5 defendants held for 19 days pending investigation into Banque Misr phishing incident



El-Sayed Gamal El-Din, , Saturday 11 Sep 2021



The victims accounts were accessed after receiving phone calls from fraudsters



Egypts Prosecutor-General Hamada El-Sawy ordered the detention of five defendants for four days pending investigation for stealing funds from 14 clients of the state-owned Banque Misr, a statement read on Saturday.



The detention was renewed for 15 days for further investigations, the statement added.



The case dates back to mid-August when a number of Banque Misr clients reported that large sums of their deposited money had been illegally withdrawn. The victims accounts were accessed after receiving phone calls from fraudsters claiming to be bank employees asking them about certain codes and passwords.



Shortly after the reports emerged, Banque Misr confirmed the incident and halted electronic transactions from bank accounts to prepaid Meeza cards, stressing it is adopting all precautionary measures to protect its clients from fraud and claiming full responsibility for any stolen funds.



Police investigations led to the identification of five defendants who committed the crime, one of whom is an employee in the company contracted by the bank to provide communication services to its customers. Two of the defendants had previously worked in the company, the prosecution said.



When arrested, the five defendants were found in possession of EGP 2,153,505 million out of the stolen funds totalling EGP 2.71 million, the statement added.



The prosecution concluded its statement by warning people to protect their digital information to avoid similar incidents.



Since the emergence of the coronavirus pandemic, Egypt has witnessed a sharp increase in the number of electronic transactions and payment operations.



The National Telecoms Regulatory Authority (NTRA) said in a report late last year that Egypt saw a 156 per cent increase in the number of electronic transactions in October 2020 compared to March of the same year, while the number of electronic payment operations increased by 155 per cent.



https://english.ahram.org.eg/News/422860.aspx
Yemen rebels attack aid port with missiles: gov't



AFP, , Saturday 11 Sep 2021



Three missiles and Houthi drones targeted the port of Mokha near Bab al-Mandab," a government military official said, adding that no casualties were reported



A missile attack blamed by the government on Houthi rebels in Yemen on Saturday targeted a key port used to bring humanitarian aid into the war-ravaged country.



The Red Sea port of Mokha in southwest Yemen is the headquarters of government forces in the region.



"Three missiles and Houthi drones targeted the port of Mokha near Bab al-Mandab," a government military official told AFP, adding that no casualties were reported.



The Bab al-Mandab strait separates Yemen from Djibouti and is a key passage for international trade, trafficking and illegal migration.



Yemen, the Arabian Peninsula's poorest country, has been devastated by a seven-year conflict pitting the Iran-backed Houthis against the government which is supported by a Saudi-led military coalition.



The southwest is vital for the import and delivery of humanitarian supplies.



Mokha port reopened for business a month ago after reconstruction and renovation work, the government official said.



Southwest Yemen has been relatively free of such attacks since the signing in 2018 of the Stockholm Accord on demilitarising the strategic port of Hodeida north of Mokha.



Sporadic clashes have taken place in the region, sparking appeals for calm from the United Nations which has been unable to secure similar deals elsewhere in Yemen.



Some 80 percent of Yemenis are now dependent on aid, in what the UN calls the world's worst humanitarian crisis. The war has displaced millions of people.



The UN has issued regular warnings that Yemen could see major famine in 2021, after it raised just $1.7 billion of the $3.85 billion it says the country needs.



The conflict flared in 2014 when Houthi insurgents seized the capital Sanaa, prompting a Saudi-led military intervention to prop up the government the following year.



https://english.ahram.org.eg/News/422866.aspx
Zacarias Moussaoui remains the only person ever convicted in a U.S. court in connection with the Sept. 11 attacks. A behind-the-scenes look at the trial Thursday from its lead participants demonstrated how hard it was to bring it to justice.

This undated file photo provided by the Sherburne County Sheriff Office shows Zacarias Moussaoui. A prosecutor, defense attorney and the presiding judge on the trial of Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person convicted in a U.S. court of a role in the Sept. 11 attacks, revisit the case during an online panel. [File Photo: Sherburne County, Minn., Sheriff's Office via AP]

Rob Spencer, the lead prosecutor on the Moussaoui case, recalled the battles he and others in the Justice Department fought to keep Moussaoui in civilian courts at a time when military prosecutors and others wanted him to face a tribunal at Guantanamo Bay.

When things werent looking rosy for us on the prosecution, we would joke to each other that you could hear the Black Hawk helicopter coming to pick him up and take him to Gitmo, Spencer recalled Thursday during an online panel hosted by federal prosecutors in Virginia. The forum was part of a commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema, who presided over the case, said there were points during the trial that she and her clerks believed prosecutors wouldn't even clear the first hurdle with the jury and be able to prove that Moussaoui was legally eligible for the death penalty.

And then Moussaoui took the stand, Brinkema said.

He claimed that he was supposed to have hijacked a fifth plane and flown it into the White House, a claim he later recanted. And on cross-examination, he reveled in the deaths, mocking victims and family members.

He basically just blew their defense out of the water, Brinkema said. "Once he started talking, I thought, He just lost them (the jury)."

Moussaoui was arrested in August 2001, before the attacks, when his efforts to obtain advanced flight training drew suspicion. He was charged in December as being a member of the al-Qaida conspiracy that carried out the attacks that killed 3,000 people.

It took years to work through various pretrial procedural issues, including a period where Moussaoui served as his own lawyer and filed handwritten screeds against the judge and others under the guise of legal motions. Appellate courts weighed in several times on how to handle classified evidence, including statements from al-Qaida leaders like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, which were obtained under enhanced interrogation techniques that many said were equivalent to torture.

Moussaoui actually pleaded guilty to the charges against him, so the 2006 trial was simply to determine whether his sentence would be life in prison or death. In the first phase of the trial, prosecutors had to prove that Moussaoui's role in the conspiracy led to the deaths of Sept. 11 victims, making him eligible for the death penalty.

Once he was determined to be eligible, the jury then considered whether he deserved the death penalty.

The jury found him eligible for execution, but one of 12 jurors voted for life in prison rather than execution. That was enough to keep Moussaoui off death row; he's serving a life sentence in Colorado.

Ed MacMahon, one of Moussaoui's court-appointed lawyers, recalled that the only viable strategy was to tell the jury that Moussaoui was embellishing his role within al-Qaida, and that executing him would only give him the martyrdom he craved.

Moussaoui's exact role in the Sept. 11 conspiracy remains imprecise. In broad strokes, Spencer said, Moussaoui's guilt was obvious: He was receiving flight training that he had no rational reason to be taking, and he received $10,000 from Ramzi bin al-Shibh, a key member of the Sept. 11 plot, a month before the attack.

Spencer said prosecutors believed Moussaoui was to serve as a backup pilot to Ziad Jarrah, the Flight 93 pilot who left the U.S. in the summer of 2001 to visit his girlfriend and may have been having second thoughts about participating.

I dont know what role, if any, he would have served on 9/11 or perhaps a follow-on plot, Spencer said. We never had to answer that question.

Despite the difficulties in bringing Moussaoui to trial, Brinkema, Spencer and MacMahon all agreed that the case ultimately demonstrates the ability of the judicial system to bring the cases to conclusion, something that has yet to happen with bin al-Shibh or Mohammed, who remain at Guantanamo.

Its amazing to me that the rest of the culprits in this case have not been brought to justice, Brinkema said.

Acting U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia Raj Parekh, who moderated Thursday's panel, called the Moussaoui prosecution "one of the most significant in our nations history.

We are holding this event not only to share the lessons of the Moussaoui case, but also to recognize and reflect upon the role of the justice system in responding to the tragic events of Sept. 11, he said.
US President Joe Biden has urged Americans to show unity, "our greatest strength," in a video posted Friday, on the eve of the 20th anniversary of 9/11.

US President Joe Biden speaks about coronavirus protections in schools during a visit to Brookland Middle School in Washington, DC, September 10, 2021. [Photo: AFP]

"To me, that's the central lesson of September 11th. It's that at our most vulnerable, in the push and pull of all that makes us human, in the battle for the soul of America, unity is our greatest strength," Biden says in a six- minute message from the White House.

On Saturday he and First Lady Jill Biden will go to the three locations of the September 11, 2001 attacks: New York, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania.

But Biden, much criticized for his management of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and struggling to contain the Covid-19 pandemic, is not expected to speak in public during the ceremonies.

"Unity doesn't mean we have to believe the same thing, but we must have a fundamental respect and faith in each other and in this nation," Biden says in his video remarks.
Two penguins, named Kang Kang and Ning Ning respectively, visit the historical Zijin Mountain in the city of Nanjing, Jiangsu Province on September 10, 2021. The pair, who are from Nanjing Marine World, showed strong curiosity and were accompanied by their breeders. [Photo: CNSPHOTO]

Two penguins, named Kang Kang and Ning Ning respectively, visit the historical Zijin Mountain in the city of Nanjing, Jiangsu Province on September 10, 2021. The pair, who are from Nanjing Marine World, showed strong curiosity and were accompanied by their breeders. [Photo: CNSPHOTO]

Two penguins, named Kang Kang and Ning Ning respectively, visit the historical Zijin Mountain in the city of Nanjing, Jiangsu Province on September 10, 2021. The pair, who are from Nanjing Marine World, showed strong curiosity and were accompanied by their breeders. [Photo: CNSPHOTO]

Two penguins, named Kang Kang and Ning Ning respectively, visit the historical Zijin Mountain in the city of Nanjing, Jiangsu Province on September 10, 2021. The pair, who are from Nanjing Marine World, showed strong curiosity and were accompanied by their breeders. [Photo: CNSPHOTO]
President Joe Bidens sweeping new vaccine requirements have Republican governors threatening lawsuits. His unapologetic response: Have at it.

President Joe Biden walks along the Colonnade towards the Oval Office as he returns to the White House after visiting Brookland Middle School in northeast Washington, Friday, Sept. 10, 2021. [Photo: AP]

The administration is gearing up for another major clash between federal and state rule. But while many details about the rules remain unknown, Biden appears to be on firm legal ground to issue the directive in the name of protecting employee safety, according to several experts interviewed by The Associated Press.

My bet is that with respect to that statutory authority, theyre on pretty strong footing given the evidence strongly suggesting  the degree of risk that (unvaccinated individuals) pose, not only to themselves but also unto others, said University of Connecticut law professor Sachin Pandya.

Republicans swiftly denounced the mandate that could impact 100 million Americans as government overreach and vowed to sue, and private employers who resist the requirements may do so as well. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott called it an assault on private businesses" while Gov. Henry McMaster promised to "fight them to the gates of hell to protect the liberty and livelihood of every South Carolinian. The Republican National Committee has also said it will sue the administration to protect Americans and their liberties.

Such cases could present another clash between state and federal authority at a time when Biden's Justice Department is already suing Texas over its new state law that bans most abortions, arguing that it was enacted in open defiance of the Constitution.

The White House is gearing up for legal challenges and believes that even if some of the mandates are tossed out, millions of Americans will get a shot because of the new requirements  saving lives and preventing the spread of the virus.

Biden is putting enforcement in the hands of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which is drafting a rule over the coming weeks, Jeffrey Zients, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, said Friday. He warned that if a workplace refuses to follow the standard, the OSHA fines could be quite significant.

Courts have upheld vaccination requirements as a condition of employment, both before the pandemic  in challenges brought by health care workers  and since the coronavirus outbreak, said Lindsay Wiley, director of the Health Law and Policy Program at American University Washington College of Law.

Where Biden's vaccine requirements could be more open to attack is over questions of whether the administration followed the proper process to implement them, she said.

The argument that mandatory vaccination impermissibly infringes on bodily autonomy or medical decision making, those arguments have not been successful and I dont expect that to change, Wiley said. I think the challenges that are harder to predict the outcome of are going to be the ones that are really sort of the boring challenges about whether they followed the right process.

Emergency temporary standards  under which the rules are being implemented on a fast track  have been particularly vulnerable to challenges, Wiley said. But the risks presented by the coronavirus and the existence of a declared public health emergency could put this one on stronger footing than any other ones past administrations have tried to impose that have been challenged in court, she said.

Indeed, the question of whether the mandate is legally sound is separate from whether it will be upheld by judges, including by a conservative-majority Supreme Court which has trended toward generous interpretations of religious freedom and may be looking to ensure that any mandate sufficiently takes faith-based objections into account.
A video analysis shows the United States may have mistakenly targeted an aid worker rather than Islamic State fighters in its final strike in Afghanistan which killed 10 civilians, The New York Times said Friday.

In this Sunday, Aug. 29, 2021 file photo, Afghans inspect damage of Ahmadi family house after U.S. drone strike in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Aug. 29, 2021. [File Photo: AP]

The Pentagon has said it disrupted a new attack planned by the Islamic State extremist group through a Reaper drone strike on August 29 -- the day before US troops ended their 20-year mission and following a devastating attack outside the airport where vast crowds rushed to leave the victorious Taliban.

But Kabul resident Aimal Ahmadi earlier told AFP that the strike killed 10 civilians including his small daughter, nephews, nieces and his brother Ezmarai Ahmadi, who was driving the car that was struck after he parked.

The New York Times, analyzing security camera footage, said the US military may have been seeing the slain Ahmadi and a colleague loading canisters of water, which was in short supply after the collapse of the Western-backed government, and picking up a laptop for his boss.

Ezmarai Ahmadi was an electrical engineer for the California-based aid and lobbying group Nutrition and Education International and himself was among thousands of Afghans who had applied for resettlement in the United States, relatives said.

US officials say that a larger blast took place after the drone strike, showing that there were explosives in the vehicle.

But the New York Times investigation said there was no evidence of a second explosion, with only one dent on a nearby gate and no clear signs of an additional blast such as blown-out walls.

Aimal Ahmadi earlier told AFP that 10 civilians were killed. US officials have acknowledged three civilian deaths but argued that the hit prevented another deadly attack.

Commenting on the report, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said that US Central Command "continues to assess" the strike but that "no other military works harder than we do to prevent civilian casualties."

"As Chairman (Mark) Milley said, the strike was based on good intelligence, and we still believe that it prevented an imminent threat to the airport and to our men and women that were still serving at the airport," Kirby said, referring to the top US general.

The New York Times noted that a rocket attack the following morning, claimed by the Islamic State group, was carried out from a Toyota Corolla similar to Ahmadi's.

More than 71,000 Afghan and Pakistani civilians have died directly from the war launched by the United States after the September 11, 2001 attacks, with casualties rising dramatically after then president Donald Trump relaxed rules of engagement in 2017, according to a Brown University study in April.
KYODO NEWS - Sep 12, 2021 - 07:06 | All, World

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency visited Iran on Saturday ahead of scheduled meetings with the country's vice president and the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, state-run media said.

The visit by Director General Rafael Grossi became his first since President Ebrahim Raisi assumed office in Iran in August. Raisi leads a conservative anti-U.S. administration.

Grossi is expected to discuss such issues as nuclear inspections and mutual cooperation with senior Iranian officials during the visit.

The IAEA is tasked with verifying Iran's commitments under its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers. But Iran has restricted its inspections, while enriching uranium to 60 percent purity, which is close to nuclear weapons-grade.

Several senior Iranian government officials had said Grossi was making final adjustments to visit Iran over the weekend.

The Grossi visit is being arranged as the IAEA plans to hold a regular board meeting in Vienna from Monday that might result in a resolution against Iran's nuclear activities.

The visit is seen by many as Iran wishing to show its willingness to cooperate in a bid to alleviate opposition from some countries toward Iran at the board meeting.

"It's clear that a strong response is needed" at the IAEA board, one source said, adding Iran has not constructively engaged with the nuclear watchdog.

Grossi visited Tehran in February during the administration of Raisi's predecessor, President Hassan Rouhani.

Under the 2015 pact struck with six major powers -- Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States -- Iran agreed to curb its nuclear activities in exchange for the lifting of sanctions.

But U.S. President Joe Biden's predecessor Donald Trump criticized the deal as flawed and pulled the United States out of it in May 2018. Iran countered the U.S. move by increasing its nuclear activities beyond the limits set in the deal.
By Keita Nakamura, KYODO NEWS - Sep 11, 2021 - 09:51 | All, Japan

Nearly 10 percent of Japanese firms said they will hire more regular workers, over three times as many as those that will slash them, to cope with upcoming sharp hikes across the country in the minimum wage, a recent survey by a credit research company showed.

The survey by Tokyo Shoko Research apparently reflected that more employers are judging it better to shift their labor force to nonfixed-term regular workers, given that it would be more costly for them to employ fixed-term, hourly-paid nonregular staff.

The online survey found that 914, or 9.8 percent, of 9,278 firms responding said they will hire more regular staff, while 287, or 3.0 percent, will reduce such workers, when asked about the impact of the wage floor rise scheduled for October.

Meanwhile, 7,745, or 83.4 percent, said the minimum pay increase will not affect their employment strategy, according to the survey conducted from Aug. 2 to 11. The trend was more notable among big companies, as the percentage in large-firms was 89.7 percent, compared to 82.3 percent in small and medium-sized businesses.

The results came after a Japanese government panel proposed in July raising the average hourly minimum wage in fiscal 2021 by 28 yen to 930 yen ($8.5), the highest since fiscal 2002, when it began using an hourly wage to propose a rough target for hikes.

The proposal was concluded after intense debate between the management and labor sides, with management fearing the wage hike could deal a further blow to businesses already hurt by the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic.

The sharp wage hikes came after the average minimum wage inched up by just 1 yen in fiscal 2020 amid concerns that wage hikes could worsen business conditions with the emergence of the pandemic.

Taking account of the proposal and local economic situations, each of the labor ministry's regional bureaus in the 47 prefectures finalized the hike individually by mid-August.

Tokyo Shoko Research said companies with strong business performances may "shift to hiring more regular employees" instead of per-hour-basis workers such as temps and part-timers, citing Japan's longtime labor shortage accompanied with its rapidly graying population.

"The result suggests more firms are changing their mind and trying to improve productivity per worker under long-term and stable regular employment, inspired by the minimum wage hike," said Hisashi Yamada, vice chairman of think tank Japan Research Institute.

Yamada said the possible negative impact of the minimum wage hike on corporative management seems "not that big on the whole since over 80 percent expect no impact," but warned that small and mid-size firms, which generally hire more nonregular workers, would suffer from higher labor costs in addition to the virus fallout.

"Basically, many mid-size and small businesses are financially unstable and more vulnerable to pay hike, so some sort of supportive measures will be required when taking into account the current virus situation," Yamada said, proposing to introduce exemptions from the wage hike for pandemic-hit sectors such as service providers.

The wage floor increase came as Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has vowed to achieve an average hourly rate of at least 1,000 yen "as soon as possible" to help nonregular employees earn more and correct wage disparities between them and regular workers.

Japan's minimum wage ranks fifth among the Group of Seven industrialized nations except for Italy which has no legal minimum wage, after France's $12.2, Germany's $12.0, Britain's $11.1 and Canada's $10.5, according to Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development data for 2020. The United States is the lowest at $7.3.
By Reito Kaneko, KYODO NEWS - Sep 11, 2021 - 21:11 | World, All, Japan

Japan and Vietnam signed a deal Saturday enabling exports of Japanese-made defense equipment and technology to the Southeast Asian country to boost cooperation amid China's rising assertiveness in regional waters.

The accord was inked in Hanoi during Japanese Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi's first trip overseas after assuming the post last year. Japan will speed up talks with Vietnam to sell Self-Defense Forces' vessels, Kishi said in an online press conference, following a meeting with his Vietnamese counterpart Phan Van Giang.

Vietnam, as one of the key members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, is the 11th country to sign such an agreement with Japan, at a time when China is asserting its claims in parts of the East and South China seas.

A ministry official said the accord comes as "Vietnam is diversifying its sources of defense equipment."

Vietnam has strong defense ties with Russia and relies on it for most of its equipment, including submarines and fighter jets, as it was part of the former Communist bloc during the Cold War.

The accord will "strengthen Japan's defense industrial base and is expected to contribute to the country's security," Kishi said.

He added they agreed to work together for a rules-based order and reaffirmed the importance of freedom of navigation and overflight, as well as to abide by international law, in a veiled counter against Beijing.

Vietnam has territorial disputes with China over the Spratly and Paracel island groups in the South China Sea, with Beijing accused of militarizing the outposts it has built.

During the meeting, Kishi told Giang he wants to send a message to the international community to express his strong opposition to "any unilateral attempts to change the status quo," as Beijing lays claim to the Japanese-administered Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea.

Kishi conveyed his view to maintain and strengthen a free and open Indo-Pacific and raised concerns regarding a Chinese law implemented in February, allowing its coast guard to use weapons against foreign ships it views as having illegally entered its waters.

Kishi said he told Giang that "the stability of the situation over Taiwan is important" for the security of Japan and the rest of the world, while agreeing to step up bilateral cooperation, such as through port calls in Vietnam by SDF vessels and aircraft, and in the area of cybersecurity.

He also said Japan will work with Vietnam to achieve North Korea's "complete, verifiable and irreversible dismantlement of all weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles of all ranges."
Lucknow:

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Sunday said whenever Ram temple is constructed at Ayodhya it would be only by "us" and no one else and termed Hindu culture as India's only culture.

In an apparent reference to the issue, Adityanath said: "Some people here were speaking about Ram Janmabhoomi. Friends, whosoever does this job or whenever this job is done, this job will be done by us, no one else will be able to do so".

He, however, did not elaborate who would undertake the work.

Addressing a gathering in Lucknow on the occasion of Yuva Kumbh, Adityanath said, "India is a nation, and it has only one culture. India has a thought (soch). Here languages, castes, regions, eating habits, dialects may be different.

Also read | At massive Delhi rally, VHP demands bill on Ram Temple in winter session of Parliament

From a political point of view there can be differences in India, but the country has one culture, which is known as "Hindu culture. And, all of us should feel proud about it," he said.

Pointing towards Congress president Rahul Gandhi, the UP Chief Minister said, "Those who used to consider Ram and Krishna as myth, are making attempts to flash their janeu (sacred thread) and tell their gotra to mislead people (Jo log Ram aur Krsihna ko mithak maante rahe hai, unn logo dwaraa janeu dikhaakar aur gotra bataakar?bharmaane kaa prayaas kiyaa jaa raha hai)."

Without naming anyone, Adityanath said, "We have the opportunity of understanding these conspiracies, which represent the negativities in the country and making an effort to push the country towards disintegration. Preparations will be made to hatch this conspiracy at every level, but it is important that we have to remain alert".

On employment generation in the state, the Chief Minister process is on to recruit 69,000 teachers and 50,000 policemen in the state, which will be completed in the initial month of 2019.

Also Read | Is Ram going to come from heaven and give farmers something better?: Farooq Abdullah

He said the One District, One Product scheme will generate jobs for 20 lakh youth in the next 5 years and that an investment climate was being created.

Adityanath along with UP Governor Ram Naik participated in the inaugural session of the Yuva Kumbh.

Adityanath also said, "Kumbh is the symbol of India's unity and integrity, and its spirit is that youth power should be used for nation building. The state government will make efforts to provide all possible facilities to pilgrims at the Kumbh. The state government will also establish grand statue of Bharadwaj Muni and Goddess Saraswati in Prayagraj."

Speaking on the occasion Ram Naik said, "The world has now started to realise the strength of India. The 2019 Kumbh in Praygraj will introduce the world with India's cultural greatness."

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New Delhi:

The national capital on Monday woke up to witness dense smog as 'severe' air quality was recorded. The unfavourable meteorological conditions are likely to keep the air quality in the 'severe' category for the next couple of days, authorities said. The major pollutants PM 2.5 were recorded at 373 and PM 10 at 282 (very poor category) in the RK Puram area. In the Anand Vihar area, the Air Quality Index (AQI) PM 2.5 was at 717 and PM 10 at 999. At the Major Dhyan Chand National Stadium area, PM 2.5 was at 323 and PM 10 at 335. AQI at Punjabi Bagh Delhi was recorded poor, PM 2.5 was at 510 while the PM 10 was at 519. This is a fourth time this season that the air quality here has worsened to severe category. The first time it dipped to the severe category this year was just two days before Diwali.



ALSO READ | Delhi shivers at 3.7 degrees Celsius, coldest December in 12 years



On Sunday, Delhi recorded its second highest pollution level of the year. While the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) data showed the overall air quality index (AQI) at 'severe' level of 446, the Centre-run System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting (SAFAR) showed a higher level at 471. This is the second highest pollution level of this year. The highest was recorded on November 8, a day after Diwali, when the AQI touched 571. Several areas like Ashok Vihar, Anand Vihar and Wazirpur, among others, inched towards the 'severe plus emergency' category, the data showed.



Officials said they are closely monitoring the situation and if these conditions persist for 48 hours, then stringent action would be taken.



A Central Pollution Control Board-led task force has advised people to minimise outdoor exposure for the next three to five days and avoid using private vehicles.



ALSO READ | Delhi: Cars to get costlier as one-time parking charges hiked



Earlier, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had said that greater usage of public transport facilities will be a "major step" towards curbing air pollution. Addressing a stakeholders' consultation on the proposed draft electric vehicles policy for Delhi, Kejriwal also reiterated his government has the "political will" to take "tough decisions" to cut down pollution.



Delhi is reeling under the menace of air pollution for the past couple of years. The region faced a major air quality crisis last year when severe pollution level forced the shutdown of schools and colleges. In 2016, the government tried to explore the possibility of cloud seeding for artificial rain but the plan never worked out.



An AQI between 100 to 200 comes under moderate category, 201 and 300 is considered poor, 301 and 400 very poor while between 401 and 500 severe. The overall PM2.5 (fine particulate matter in the air with a diameter of less than 2.5 micrometre) level was recorded at 143 and the PM10 (fine particulate matter in the air with a diameter of less than 10 micrometre) level at 253, according to SAFAR.
New Delhi:

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) announced its seat-sharing arrangements for 2019 Lok Sabha elections on Sunday. BJP president Amit Shah has announced that Janata Dal (United) and BJP will contest on an equal number of seats  17 each while six seats to the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) will contest on 6 seats. Amit Shah also announced that LJP chief and Union minister Ram Vilas Paswan will get a Rajya Sabha berth in the upcoming elections to the Upper House. Shah made the announcement here in the presence of JD(U) president and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and LJP chief and Union minister Ram Vilas Paswan. The discussions over seat sharing between the allies had been underway for months now. Bihar sends 40 MPs to the Lok Sabha.



ALSO READ | Jasdan, Kolebira bypoll results 2018: BJP finally hits a century in Gujarat, Kunvarji Bavaliya defeats Congress by 19,985 votes

BJP President Amit Shah: BJP will fight at 17 seats, Janata Dal (United) at 17 and Lok Janshakti Party at 6 seats in Bihar in upcoming 2019 Lok Sabha elections pic.twitter.com/58hBFvCABr  ANI (@ANI) December 23, 2018

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar after announcing seat sharing for 2019 general elections said, "We are committed to development in Bihar. We are of the opinion that the Ram Mandir matter should be solved through a court decision." Keeping in mind the stature and seniority of LJP supremo, he would be nominated to the Rajya Sabha at availability of first vacancy, said Nitish Kumar.

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar after announcing seat sharing for 2019 general elections: We are committed to development in Bihar. We are of the opinion that the Ram Mandir matter should be solved through a court decision. pic.twitter.com/bOvRDLhz1z  ANI (@ANI) December 23, 2018

The decision was finalised after LJP chief and Union minister Ram Vilas Paswan, along with his son Chirag Paswan, held a series of discussions with the BJP president. Amit Shah had earlier also said that his party and its key ally JD(U) will be contesting on an equal number of seats.



Earlier, Upendra Kushwaha, the Rashtriya Lok Samta Party (RLSP) chief, quit as a Union minister and pulled out his support from the BJP-led led alliance, accusing Prime Minister Narendra Modi of reducing the Cabinet to a "rubber stamp". Kushwaha had also warned smaller NDA allies that they will also face the same arrogance as he did.



ALSO READ | Sabarimala Temple: Police detain devotees protesting against entry of women devotees into Kerala shrine



Upendra Kushwaha joined the Congress-RJD-led Grand Alliance in Bihar. Speaking to the media, Kushwaha had said, "We had said that we have many options and UPA was one of them. The wholeheartedness shown by Rahul Gandhi and Lalu Prasad is one of the reasons I joined but the biggest reason I'm here is the people of Bihar". In the 2014 general elections, the JD(U) had contested elections independently while the BJP allied with the LJP and RLSP.







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Washington:

The order to withdraw American troops from Syria has been signed, the US military said Sunday, after President Donald Trump and his Turkish counterpart agreed to prevent a power vacuum in the wake of the controversial move. The announcement that US troops would leave the civil war-racked country -- where they have been deployed to assist in the multinational fight against the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group -- shocked global partners and American politicians alike. "The execute order for Syria has been signed," a US military spokesperson told AFP when asked about the withdrawal order, without providing further details.



ALSO READ | 'Highly coordinated' Syria withdrawal with Tayyip Erdogan, says Trump

Turkey was a rare ally that lauded Trump's momentous decision on Syria, a country where it will now have a freer rein to target US-allied Kurdish fighters who have played a key role in the war against IS but are deemed terrorists by Ankara.

Trump and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke by telephone on Sunday and "agreed to ensure coordination between their countries' military, diplomatic and other officials to avoid a power vacuum which could result following any abuse of the withdrawal and transition phase in Syria," the Turkish presidency said in a statement.

Hours earlier, Trump had tweeted that he and Erdogan "discussed (IS), our mutual involvement in Syria, & the slow & highly coordinated pullout of US troops from the area." Both US politicians and international allies fear the withdrawal is premature and would further destabilise the already devastated region.

A US withdrawal, said Mutlu Civiroglu, a Kurdish affairs analyst, will open the way "for Turkey to start its operations against the Kurds, and a bloody war will begin." French President Emmanuel Macron on Sunday said he "deeply regretted" Trump's decision, and that "an ally must be reliable."

US troops will leave under the auspices of a new Pentagon chief set to start next month, after Jim Mattis resigned from the post citing key differences, including on Syria, with the often-impulsive Trump.

Several US politicians from both parties rejected Trump's claim that IS had been defeated, and the decision also caused alarm and dismay in the US military over the prospect of suddenly abandoning Washington's Kurdish partners.

And Trump's sudden decision sparked turmoil within his administration, prompting the resignation of Brett McGurk, the special envoy to the anti-IS coalition, as well as Mattis.

Plans for the troop withdrawal will now be overseen by Deputy Secretary of Defence Patrick Shanahan, who Trump on Sunday said would replace Mattis starting January 1.

Mattis, 68, had said he would leave at the end of February to allow a smooth transition for the next chief of the world's top military power -- but a reportedly angry Trump accelerated his departure by two months.

Defence spokeswoman Dana White tweeted that Mattis would still assist in the handover, working with Shanahan to ensure the department "remains focused on the defense of our nation during this transition."

According to US media, the Republican leader voiced resentment over news coverage of Mattis' stinging resignation letter that laid bare his fundamental disagreements with the president.

Days later, special envoy McGurk made a similar move, saying he could not support Trump's Syria decision that he said "left our coalition partners confused and our fighting partners bewildered."



ALSO READ | Trump says Mattis to leave two months before planned departure

Unlike Mattis, Shanahan has never served in the military and has spent most of his career in the private sector. He spent over three decades working for aircraft giant Boeing, including as vice president and general manager of Boeing Missile Defense Systems, before moving to the Pentagon as deputy in 2017.

Until Trump finds a permanent defence leader, Shanahan will lead plans for US troops to leave Syria along with a significant drawdown in Afghanistan, both of which critics worry will leave war-torn regions at risk of continued and potentially heightened bloodshed.

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New Delhi :

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday launched a scathing attacked on the Opposition parties and termed their proposed anti-BJP Mahagatbandhan (Grand Alliance) an incoherent alliance of rich dynasties. Interacting with the booth workers from Chennai, Madurai, Tiruchirappalli and Tiruvallur constituencies in Tamil Nadu through video conference, Modi said that various political parties were trying to form an unholy alliance for their personal survival. He said that people will see through it. The prime minister said that one of the key constituents of the mega-alliance - the Telugu Desam Party (TDP)  which had recently snapped its ties with the BJP, was formed against the high-handedness of the Congress by N T Rama Rao. But, Modi said, the TDP under the leadership of Chandrababu Naidu is now keen to join hands with the same Congress.

Today several leaders are talking about a grand alliance or Mahagathbandhan. This alliance is for personal survival and is not ideology-based support. This alliance is for power, not for the people. This alliance for personal ambitions, not peoples aspirations, Modi said.

Also Read | Upendra Kushwaha joins RJD-led grand alliance in Bihar, Ahmed Patel expresses happiness

Modi said that some of the coalition partners claimed to be inspired by the socialist leader Ram Manohar Lohia, but the veteran leader himself, he claimed, opposed the Congress and its ideologies.

Without referring to anyone, Modi said that many leaders part of the Congress-led Grand Alliance were arrested and tortured by during the Emergency imposed by former prime minister Indira Gandhi in 1975.

The ecosystem of the Congress party spared no one, Modi said pointing out at the dismissal of the MG Ramachandran-led AIADMK government in Tamil Nadu in 1980.

Opposition parties led by the Congress have proposed to form a Grand Alliance to defeat the fascist Narendra Modi-led BJP for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, TDP chief and Andhra Pradesh CM Chandrababu Naidu, NCP chief Sharad Pawar, RJD leader Tajashwi and other regional parties have proposed an anti-BJP federal front.

Read More | Leave NDA or face same arrogance: RLSP leader Upendra Kushwaha's warning to BJP allies before 2019 elections

Although the alliance is facing initial hurdles over the prime ministerial face, the Opposition parties are firmed to put up a coordinated, joint fight against the BJP in 2019. The Oppositions alliance which also has few NDA rebel constituents has faced severe criticism from the BJP. Recently, BJP chief Amit Shah had termed the Grand Alliance a myth.

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New Delhi:

The Uttar Pradesh Police sparked a row by issuing a controversial order where offices and establishments were asked to direct their Muslim employees to stop offering Friday prayers in open areas such as parks. According to a notice issued last week by police stations in Noida, including at the Sector 58 industrial hub, companies will be held liable if their employees are found violating the directive. The companies in the Sector 58 industrial hub have sought a meeting with the top Noida Police officers for a better understanding of the order, particularly on the clause that threatens to hold them liable for violations of the order by employees, the Indian Express reported.

As published by the daily, the police notice stated: aWe want to inform you that there is no permission from the administration to conduct any kind of religious activity including Namaz offered on Friday in the Authority park in Sector 58. It has been often seen that the Muslim workers of your company assemble in the park to offer Namaz and I, the SHO, have told the group to not hold prayers in the park. Also, their plea to the city magistrate has not received any permission to do so.a

aThus, it is expected from you that you at your level inform your Muslim employees to not come to the park to offer Namaz. If employees of your company come to the park, it will be assumed that you have not informed your employees and your company will be held liable.a

aYes, we have sent notices to many companies in our area after several complaints regarding a large number of people offering Namaz in the afternoon especially on Fridays. Since most people offering prayers are employees in companies nearby, we have sent notices to those companies to ask their employees to either offer Namaz in a Masjid, Eidgah or within the office compound on the roof etc,a said Pankaj Rai, SHO of the Sector 58 police station, from where the initial round of notices were issued.

Defending the move, the Noida Police said that communal harmony could be disturbed, especially in the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections in 2019 and on Tuesday issued a clarification on the matter and said that the order is not specific to any religion. Senior Superintendent of Police, Noida Ajay Pal said that a few people had asked for permission for religious prayers in a park in Sector 58, but were denied permission from the city magistrateas office. But they still congregated and the companies in the area were informed about the same.

Ajay Pal,SSP,Noida: Few people had asked for permission for religious prayers in a park in Sec 58. In spite of no permission granted from city magistrate office people congregated.The companies in the area were informed about it.The info is not specific to any particular religion pic.twitter.com/qxv2ryoyqs a ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) December 25, 2018

Sector 58 is predominantly an IT and services hub. The companies that have office include Alstom Systems, HCL Technologies, TCS, Samsung, Polaris, Xansa, Interra, R Systems, RMSI, Cadence, Adobe international, ST Microelectronics and Minda Huf.

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New Delhi :

At least three people were killed and scores others were injured after a portion of an under-construction building collapsed in Mumbai Goregaon on Sunday, news agency ANI reported. Teams of Mumbai police and fire department rushed to the spot as soon as they received the information about the incident. The bodies of three persons have been recovered while eight injured were shifted to a nearby hospital. The deceased and most of the injured are believed to be the manual labourers who were working there. The identity of the man who lost his life and those who injured could not be ascertained immediately.

A team of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) was present at the spot to search and rescue people trapped under the debris. Meanwhile, police have started their investigation to find out whether there was any negligence on the builderas part.

#Visuals #Maharashtra: 1 person dead, 8 injured in the collapse of a portion of an under-construction building near Azad Maidan in Goregaon; NDRF present at the spot pic.twitter.com/o97s8whGfj a ANI (@ANI) December 23, 2018

This is a breaking news story. More details will be added soon. Please refresh the page for the latest version.
New Delhi:

The six-month-old HD Kumaraswamy-led coalition cabinet in Karnataka was expanded in Bengaluru on Saturday, withA eight ministers being inducted. Two ministers -- Ramesh Jarkiholi (Municipal Administration) and R Shankar (Forest and Environment) -- were dropped. The new ministers were administered the oath of office and secrecy at the Glass House at Raj Bhavan by Governor Vajubhai Vala amid tight security. The new inductees are Satish Jarkiholi, MB Patil, CS Shivalli, MTB Nagaraj, E Tukaram, PT Parameshwar Naik, Rahim Khan and RB Thimmapur, with seven of them hailing from north Karnataka.

Congress president Rahul Gandhi, after meeting party General Secretary in charge of Karnataka KC Venugopal, CLP leader Siddarmaiah, Pradesh Congress Chief Dinesh Gundu Rao and Deputy Chief Minister G Parameshwara gave the go-ahead on Friday night.

Karnataka Governor Vajubhai Vala administers oath to new State cabinet ministers at Raj Bhavan in Bengaluru



Y: ANI pic.twitter.com/6BUqch4qQe a News Nation (@NewsNationTV) December 22, 2018

However, Congress's coalition partner JD(S) was not part of the round of cabinet expansion.

According to the agreement reached between the two partners at the time of formation of the coalition government in May, there are now six vacant ministerial positions left for the Congress and two for the JD(S).

"The cabinet expansion-cum-reshuffle decision was taken in view of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, so there is proper caste and regional representation from across the state," news agency IANS quoted an official as saying.

Ramesh Jarkiholi, who has allegedly been hobnobbing with BJP leaders and not attending cabinet and party meetings, has been replaced by his brother Satish Jarkiholi.

Shankar is an Independent lawmaker who faced the axe over his reported reluctance to be an associate member of the Congress.

(With PTI inputs)

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New Delhi:

The ongoing controversy over veteran Bollywood actor Naseeruddin Shah's recent remarks on mob violence in India has reached Pakistan, with its Prime Minister Imran Khan asserting that his government will "show" the Narendra Modi government "how to treat minorities". The actor found himself at the centre of a major controversy over his remarks in reference to the killing of a policeman in Uttar Pradeshs Bulandshahr district on December 3. Inspector Subodh Kumar Singh and a student, Sumit Kumar, were killed in the mob violence after cow carcasses were found strewn around. The main accused in the case is a local Bajrang Dal leader, Yogesh Raj, who is still absconding.

Addressing an event to highlight the 100-day achievements of the Punjab government in Lahore, Khan asserted that his government is taking steps to ensure that religious minorities in Pakistan get their due rights, which was also a vision of the country's founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah.

The Pakistani prime minister added thaa his government will make it sure that the minorities feel safe, protected and have equal rights in 'New Pakistan'."We will show the Modi government how to treat minorities...Even in India, people are saying that minorities are not being treated as equal citizens," he said referring to Shah's statement.

In a video interview with Karwan-e-Mohabbat India, the veteran actor said the death of a cow was being given importance over killing of a policeman in India. He said the "poison has already spread" and it will be now difficult to contain it."It will be very difficult to capture this djinn back into the bottle again. There is complete impunity for those who take law into their own hands...I feel anxious for my children because tomorrow if a mob surrounds them and asks, 'Are you a Hindu or a Muslim?' they will have no answer. It worries me that I don't see the situation improving anytime soon," Shah added.

Khan also said if justice was not given to the weak then it will only lead to uprising. "The people of East Pakistan were not given their rights which was the main reason behind the creation of Bangladesh," he said.

Khans statement came days after the US government added Pakistan, China and Saudi Arabia along with a few other countries to a blacklist of nations where violating religious freedom and the rights of minorities is on the rise. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said he had designated Pakistan among countries of particular concern in a congressionally mandated annual report, meaning the US government is obliged to exert pressure to end freedom violations.

According to a Human Rights Watch report, at least 19 people were put on death row in 2017 after being convicted of Pakistans blasphemy law, and hundreds awaited trial. Most of the people facing these blasphemy charges are members of minority groups.

Meanwhile, eminent intellectuals on Saturday said it was a matter of grave concern the way the organisers of the Ajmer Literature Festival called off an event, set to be addressed by Shah, after protests by right-wing groups over the actor's remarks.

In a statement issued here legendary actor Soumitra Chatterjee, Bengali actors Sabyasachi Chakraborty, Paran Bandyopadhyay, theatre personality Kaushik Sen, director Kamaleswar Mukherjee, director Anik Dutta, and others said, "The way an actor of Naseeruddin Shah's stature was being humiliated and institute was deplorable."

(With PTI inputs)

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Guwahati:

Assam is all set to get Indias longest rail-cum-road bridge on December 25, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi lays open the 4.94-km-long strategically important project over the mighty Brahmaputra at Bogibeel. The Bogibeel Bridge, which was a part of the Assam Accord and sanctioned in 1997-98, is likely to play a crucial role in defence movement along the India-China border in Arunachal Pradesh. The foundation stone of the project was laid by former prime minister HD Deve Gouda on January 22, 1997, while work commenced on April 21, 2002, under the Atal Bihari Vajpayee-led government. December 25 happens to be Vajpayees birth anniversary.

Because of the inordinate delay in implementation, the cost of the project escalated by 85 per cent to Rs 5,960 crore from the sanctioned estimated cost of Rs 3,230.02 crore. The total length of the bridge was also revised to 4.94 km from the earlier 4.31 km.

Realising its strategic importance, the central government had declared the construction of the bridge as a National Project in 2007, thereby assuring the availability of fund for speedy construction.

Although it will ease out inconvenience caused to people living on the northern side of Brahmaputra to a great extent, officials said the defence requirement played an important role while sanctioning the structure and its design.

Also Read | Signature Bridge inaugurated by Kejriwal; five interesting facts about the 575-metre suspension structure

The bridge will enhance the national security of the eastern region by facilitating swift movement of defence forces and their equipment. It was constructed in such a way that even a fighter jet can land on it in case of emergency, a defence source said.

Moreover, because of the technology used, the Air Force will have three landing strips, he said. The biggest advantage of the bridge will be easy movement of troops from southern to northern bank. This means travelling to the farthest most point of Indias border with China will be shortened by several hundred kilometres.

First, the Dhola-Sadiya bridge and now Bogibeel these two are going to enhance Indias defence prowess, a senior Army official said.

Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) Chief Public Relations Officer Pranav Jyoti Sharma said almost 75 per cent of the 4,000-km long border that India shares with China is in Arunachal Pradesh, and the bridge will help in logistical support for the Indian Army manning the border.

The Bogibeel Bridge over river Brahmaputra is situated 17 km downstream of Dibrugarh city in Assam, and it has been constructed for double-line broad gauge track along with three-lane roads, he said.

This bridge will be the lifeline of the north eastern part of the country and will facilitate connectivity between north and south banks of river Brahmaputra in the eastern region of Assam and Arunachal Pradesh.

The remote districts of Anjaw, Changlang, Lohit, Lower Dibang Valley, Dibang Valley and Tirap of Arunachal Pradesh will be greatly benefited, Sharma said.

The road distance from Dibrugarh to Itanagar will be reduced by 150 km and the railway travel distance between these two points will shorten by 705 km, while this bridge will provide an alternate and shorter route from Dibrugarh through north bank of Brahmaputra to Delhi and Kolkata via Rangiya, he added.

Also Read | World's longest sea bridge connecting Hong Kong and China opens

The distance from Dibrugarh to Rangiya will be reduced by 170 km... Upper Assam and Eastern Arunachal Pradesh will see massive socio-economic development, the CPRO said.

Lakhimpur and Dhemaji in Assam will also benefit from the bridge, as the two districts do not have any reputed educational institute or good medical service. Students and patients have to cross the river on boat to come to Dibrugarh, which houses the famed Dibrugarh University and Assam Medical College, besides a dozen other such centres.

Sharma informed that 30 lakh bags of cement, 19,250 mt reinforcement steel and 2,800 mt structural steel were used for the construction of the mammoth structure. For the superstructure of the main bridge, 77,000 mt of steel fabrication was required, he said.

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Jammu:

A leopard, believed to be a man-eater after it killed two boys recently, was shot dead in a village in Jammu and Kashmirs Reasi district, officials said on Monday. The fully-grown leopard had killed eight-year-old Rehmat Ali and three-year-old Wasim Akram in the districts Mahore belt on December 8 and 17, respectively. The authorities had declared the leopard a man-eater and constituted teams to capture or kill it, they said.

The leopard had ventured into the Sarh village in the Mahore area on Sunday evening to look for prey and one of the teams, comprising of local hunters and wildlife officials, spotted it, the officials said.

Read More | Leopard kills Buddhist monk meditating in Maharashtra forest

They said an attempt was made to capture the leopard, but it attacked the team, prompting them to open fire. It was shot dead, the officials said. We are sure that this is the same animal (leopard), which killed the two boys recently, they said.

The officials said all attempts were made to capture the leopard alive. But these failed as the animal was able to avoid traps laid at various places.

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New Delhi:

A massive fire broke out on Monday evening at the ONGCas well in Vadodara while drilling, reported by news agency ANI. Fire tenders instantly rushed to the spot and now the situation has been brought under control. However, no casualties have been reported yet.

(Further details awaited)

Gujarat: Fire broke out in an ONGC well during drilling in Padra, Vadodara today. Fire tenders were rushed to the spot. Situation under control, no casualty reported. pic.twitter.com/60HNuN14ya a ANI (@ANI) December 24, 2018

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New Delhi:

At least 43 people were killed and 20 were injured in a suicide and gun attack on a Kabul government compound where the Ministry of Public Works and other offices are located on Monday, an official said. This came after a major security shake-up in Kabul and US President Donald Trump's plan to slash troop numbers which many fear could harm efforts to end the 17-year war with the Taliban. However, no group has claimed the responsibility for the attack. Most of the victims were civilians. Afghan forces killed three of the attackers and freed more than 350 people trapped inside the compound, interior ministry spokesman Najib Danish said. A fourth attacker died in a car bomb explosion that launched the attack, he said.



ALSO READ | 'Highly coordinated' Syria withdrawal with Tayyip Erdogan, says Trump

One of the wounded civilians broke several bones after jumping from the third floor of a building to escape the attackers, an AFP correspondent at a hospital said. Plumes of black smoke could be seen rising from the compound, with at least two military helicopters circling above.

Journalists near the scene reported hearing numerous explosions in the hours after the attack began mid-afternoon. Ashraf, a witness who works at the Ministry of Public Works and who goes by one name, said earlier he had heard militants inside the compound exchanging gunfire with security forces.

"They are also firing at the NDS facility nearby," he told AFP after escaping the compound, referring to the Afghan spy agency, the National Directorate of Security.

Public works ministry spokesman Mehdi Rohani spoke to AFP as he and his colleagues were fleeing to a safe room shortly after the gunmen stormed the area. "A car bomb detonated at the entrance of the ministry's parking lot," he told AFP by mobile phone as he ran from the scene.

"I can hear some gunfire outside the building. We are fine." The attack came after an American official told last week that Trump had decided to pull out "roughly half" of the 14,000 US forces in the country.

The unexpected move stunned and dismayed foreign diplomats and Afghan officials in Kabul who are intensifying a push to end the conflict with the Taliban.

The assault also comes a day after President Ashraf Ghani appointed Amrullah Saleh and Assadullah Khaled, both former spymasters known for their anti-Taliban and Pakistan stance, to head the interior and defence ministries, respectively.

Militants have previously attacked government ministries and departments because they are often poorly defended and seen as soft targets.



ALSO READ | Order signed for US military's controversial Syria exit

Monday's attack was the biggest in Kabul since November 28 when the Taliban detonated a vehicle bomb outside the compound of British security firm G4S, killing at least 10 people and leaving a massive crater in the road.

General Scott Miller, the top US and NATO commander in Afghanistan, said Sunday he had not received orders to pull forces out of the country.

Trump's decision apparently came Tuesday as US peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad met with the Taliban in Abu Dhabi, part of efforts to bring the militants to the negotiating table with Kabul.



(With PTI inputs)

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New Delhi:

A day after a long interacting with Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik in Bhubaneswar, his Telangana counterpart K Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR) on Monday met West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata to garner her support for the proposed anti-BJP Federal Front minus Congress. Days after the landslide victory in Telangana assembly elections, TRS chief KCR met Patnaik and discussed a number of issues, including matters of national and mutual interest. The meeting lasted for more than 40 minutes.

Describing his meeting with Banerjee as a "very pleasant one", Rao said "discussions (on a Federal Front) will continue". "Discussions with didi is always there. When two political leaders meet, they definitely discuss matters of mutual interest and matters of national interest.

"We had a very pleasant discussion. We will continue our discussion. There is a dialogue which I had started yesterday. This is a unification of forces across the nation. I met Odisha's Chief Minister yesterday and today I met didi," Rao told reporters.

Banerjee, who was beside Rao at the brief media interaction, did not offer any comments about the meeting.

"A non-Congress front is my mission. I will continue my effort. This is not a small matter. Wait for the right time. The dialogue continues," said KCR after meeting Banerjee.

Telangana CM K. C Rao after meeting with West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee: Our dialogue will continue, very shortly we will come out with a concrete plan. We are discussing things. I will continue with my efforts. pic.twitter.com/cXgl84rmyz  ANI (@ANI) December 24, 2018

Holding a joint press conference with KCR, Patnaik on Sunday said: We had a general discussion on matters of national interest and how to take this forward. We discussed several issues, including a further friendship amongst the like-minded parties, Patnaik said.

Asked, if the meeting could be seen as both joining hands ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, Naveen said: We have not thought that far, lets see. He although hinted that meetings with KCR will continue in this regard.

The TRS boss was on the same page. KCR said there is a dire need for regional parties to come together against BJP and Congress and added that talks with his Odisha counterpart have just started. We will meet again soon, he said.

The TRS chief is scheduled to meet several Opposition leaders, over the next few days. His party has even hired a special chartered plane for a month to ease KCRs travel across the country.

From Kolkata, KCRs next stop will be Delhi where will meet Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati and Samajwadi Party leader Akhilesh Yadav. Both Mayawati and Akhilesh Yadav, who used to be sworn enemies of each other, have formed a pre-poll alliance in Uttar Pradesh for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

The BSP-SP alliance excluded Congress which makes both the leaders crucial for KCRs mission to bring forth the anti-BJP, Congress Federal Front.

I can say certainly that there is a dire need for unification of regional parties in the country. We strongly believe that there has to be an alternative to Congress and BJP" the TRS chief had told reporters after meeting Biju Janata Dal (BJD) president and Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik in Bhubaneswar.

Early this year, the Telangana CM had met a bunch of Opposition leaders, including DMK chief MK Stalin, former prime minister and JD(S) leader HD Deve Gowda to seek their support in stitching a Federal Front minus BJP and Congress to "bring about a qualitative change" in the national politics.

He had alleged that both the Congress and the BJP have failed the country as they could not meet peoples expectations even after 70 years of Independence.

At that time, Mamata Banerjee had expressed her reservations about keeping the Congress out of the alliance. At the swearing-in ceremony of Karnataka Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy, most of the regional leaders had shown a glimpse of unity by sharing the state with Congress chief Rahul Gandhi and his UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi.

However, things changed after DMK president MK Stalins recent proposal to project Rahul Gandhi as the Oppositions prime ministerial face. The proposal irked several Opposition leaders, including Mayawati, Akhilesh and Mamata Banerjee, and they all rejected the idea, saying it was too early to decide that.

(With PTI inputs)

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Washington:

Amid tension over the ongoing federal shutdown, looks like US President Donald Trump is in no mood to relent. Despite severe criticism over the demand of funds for the WALL, Trump took to Twitter and made his defiance very, very public. I am all alone (poor me) in the White House waiting for the Democrats to come back and make a deal on desperately needed Border Security. At some point the Democrats not wanting to make a deal will cost our Country more money than the Border Wall we are all talking about. Crazy! Trump said on the micro-blogging site. In yet another tweet, Trump claimed that he, just gave out a 115 mile long contract for another large section of the Wall in Texas. We are already building and renovating many miles of Wall, some complete. Democrats must end Shutdown and finish funding. Billions of Dollars, & lives, will be saved!

Both Republicans and the Democrats are embroiled in the long-running fight over funding President Donald Trump's US-Mexico border wall appear to have moved toward each other, but a shutdown of one-fourth of the federal government entered Christmas without a clear resolution in sight.

Also Read | National Christmas Tree goes dark, Trump fumes in Washington chaos

In fact, a top White House official warned the shutdown could stretch into January.

Acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, who is also the budget director, said he was waiting to hear from Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York about a counteroffer the White House presented Schumer over the weekend.

Mulvaney would only say the offer was between Trump's USD 5.7 billion request and USD 1.3 billion Democrats have offered.

"We moved off of the five and we hope they move up from their 1.3," Mulvaney said less than a day after a senior administration official insisted that Congress would have to cave into Trump's demand for the shutdown to end, highlighting Trump's unpredictable negotiating style.

Schumer's office said the parties remained "very far apart."

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., argued for increased use of technology along the border instead of "some medieval wall."

Asked whether he's willing to offer more money as long as it is not spent on a wall, Durbin responded: "Absolutely."

A stalemate over the wall led parts of the government to shut down Saturday after funding for numerous departments and agencies expired.

The closure affects hundreds of thousands of federal workers across the country and was expected to last at least through Thursday, when the House and Senate meet again.

Also Read | Over 8 lakh employees without pay as US government shuts down over Mexico wall row

Monday and Tuesday, Christmas Eve and Christmas, respectively, are federal holidays, meaning the government would have been closed anyway.

That means Wednesday is the first day the public could begin to feel the effects of lost government services, Mulvaney said.

He predicted the shutdown could go into January, when Democrats assume control of the House based on their midterm election gains.

"It's very possible that this shutdown will go beyond the 28th and into the new Congress," Mulvaney said.

Justin Goodman, a spokesman for Schumer, countered: "If Director Mulvaney says the Trump Shutdown will last into the New Year, believe him, because it's their shutdown."

Trump recently declared he'd be "proud" to shut down the government over border issues.

Democrats held firm Sunday in opposition to a wall, which Trump promised his political base he would build.

Mulvaney said "the president's not going to not accept money for a border wall."

Trump tweeted Sunday, the shutdown's second day, that what's needed is "a good old fashioned WALL that works," not aerial drones or other measures that "are wonderful and lots of fun" but not the answer to address drugs, gangs, human trafficking and other criminal elements entering the country.

He put off plans to spend Christmas at his Florida estate and remained in Washington.

The routines of about 800,000 federal employees, meanwhile, were about to be disrupted.

More than half of those employees are deemed essential, such as US Secret Service agents and Transportation Security Administration airport agents, must work without pay, though retroactive pay is expected.

Another 380,000 were to be furloughed, meaning they will not report to work but would be paid later.

Legislation ensuring that workers receive back pay was expected to clear Congress.

Trump had savoured the prospect of a shutdown over the wall, saying he'd be "proud" to force one over an issue that was one of his biggest campaign promises.

He had said he wouldn't blame Democrats for a shutdown but now blames them for not contributing to the 60 votes needed for such legislation to clear the closely divided Senate.

But Democrats aren't the only ones resisting Trump on the wall.

Republican Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee, who is leaving Congress in January and has criticised Trump on other issues in the past, called the border-wall fight a "made-up fight so the president can look like he's fighting."

"This is something that is unnecessary. It's a spectacle. And, candidly, it's juvenile. The whole thing is juvenile," Corker said, arguing for measures that he said would secure the border better than a wall.

Democrats said they were open to proposals that don't include a wall, which Schumer said is costly and ineffective. They have offered to keep spending at existing levels of USD 1.3 billion for border fencing and other security.

Senators have approved a bipartisan deal to keep the government open into February and provide USD 1.3 billion for border security projects, but not the wall.

But as Trump faced criticism from conservatives for "caving" on a campaign promise, he pushed the House to approve a package temporarily financing the government but also setting aside USD 5.7 billion for the border wall.

That bill lacks the votes to pass the Senate.

The stalemate blocked money for nine of 15 Cabinet-level departments and dozens of agencies, including Homeland Security, Transportation, Interior, Agriculture, State and Justice.

The Pentagon and the departments of Veterans Affairs and Health and Human Services are among those that Congress has fully funded and will operate as usual.

Mulvaney appeared on "Fox News Sunday" and ABC's "This Week."

Durbin spoke on NBC's "Meet the Press" and Corker was interviewed on "State of the Union" on CNN.

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New Delhi:

Recovering from the fresh blows in the recently held assembly elections in three states  Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh  the Bharatiya Janata Party may face a bigger challenge from Akhilesh Yadavs Samajwadi Party (SP) and Mayawatis Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. According to a series of pre-poll surveys conducted by ABP News-C Voter, the SP-BSP alliance, if it works out, in Uttar Pradesh can play a spoilsport in Prime Minister Narendra Modis dream for the second term, if the elections are held today.

According to the survey, the BJP-led NDA will be reduced to 247 seats in the 543-member Lok Sabha, 25 short of a clear majority. In the 2014 general elections, the BJP had won 282 seats on its own, while the NDA secured 336 seats. However, if the SP-BSP alliance fails to work out, the NDA will come to power with 291 seats, 19 more than required. The survey has a predicted that the SP-BSP alliance will win 50 seats in Uttar Pradesh, while the NDA could bag only 28 seats, a loss of 43 seats from the last general elections.

In another survey -- National Approval Ratings -- conducted by Republic TV and CVoter, the BJP is projected to win only 218 seats, while along with its allies, including JDU, LJP, Apna Dal and others, the NDA is projected to win 247 seats.



The Congress, on the other hand, is projected to win 105 seats, helping the UPA reach a projected seat-share tally of 171. The Rahul Gandhi-led Congress could secure 44 seats in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. The DMK could emerge as the Congress's most influential ally with 30 seats in Tamil Nadu.



According to the Republic TV and CVoter December survey, SP-BSP alliance may win 50 seats in Uttar Pradesh.



According to sources, the SP and the BSP have stitched a pre-poll alliance for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections in Uttar Pradesh. Ajit Singh's Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) will also be a part of the anti-BJP alliance which excludes the Congress party. According to the sources, the Samajwadi Party will contest 37 seats, while the Bahujan Samaj Party will fight on 38 of the 80 Lok Sabha constituencies.

Three seats - Baghpat, Mathura, Kairana - will go to Ajit Singh's RLD. Singh is likely to contest from his stronghold Baghpat while his son Jayant Choudhary will once again contest from Mathura. BJP's Hema Malini had defeated Jayant from Mathura constituency in 2014. The alliance, however, will not field its candidates on Amethi and Raebareli - the traditional seats of Congress chief Rahul Gandhi and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi.

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New Delhi :

After waiving farmers loan, Congress-led Chhattisgarh government will soon begin the process of returning Baster land acquired from tribal farmers for a Tata steel project. According to news agency ANI, Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel has directed officials to submit an action plan before the next Cabinet meeting. In 2005, the then BJP government had signed a Rs 19,500-crore deal with Tata Steel for setting up an integrated steel plant in Lohandiguda area of Bastar district. Three years after signing the MoU, the government had acquired around 1,764 hectares land from 10 villages of Lohandiguda. However, even after 13 years of signing the MoU, the project failed to see the light of the day.

The move to return the land is in line with the Congress partys promises made in their election manifesto for Chhattisgarh. In its manifesto, the Congress had promised that if elected to power, it will return the acquired land to its owners where projects fail to take off within five years of acquisition. The same promise was reiterated by Congress president Rahul Gandhi during his rallies in the Chhattisgarh.

Also Read | Who is Bhupesh Baghel - Chhattisgarh's new Chief Minister?

In 2016, Tata Steel had announced to pull out of the project citing various reasons which included farmers protests, procedural delays, and Maoist threat in the area. After this, the Congress party had demanded the government to return the land to its owners, but the demand was declined by the then Raman Singh government. The government had said that the acquired land would be used for industrial purposes and may be handed over NMDC.

Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghels media advisor Ruchir Garg was quoted by The Indian Express as saying that the move is a signal of the newly formed Congress governments pro-people policies to tackle the issue of Naxalism.

If you look at the history of land struggles in India, this has rarely happened, whether it is Singur or Bhatta Parsaul. Even in Bastar, there was strong opposition to this acquisition and reports that many youths got disenchanted with the government because of this. This shows the empathy of the Congress government towards the farmer, and will send a strong pro-farmer message, not just to Chhattisgarh but to the rest of the country, the English daily quoted a senior Congress leader as saying.

Also Read | Chhattisgarh Cabinet Formation: Umesh Patel, Anil Bhedia, 7 others take oath as ministers

According to reports, the Cabinet meeting will be held after the swearing-in of new ministers on Tuesday and officials are learned to have worked overtime to complete the modalities of the process.

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New Delhi:

Shatrughan Sinha, the actor-turned-politician from Bihar, has many times touch the wrong nerve of his party Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). He was once the star campaigner of the party and a Cabinet minister in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government. However, off late, he has had several fallouts with the current leadership after being ignored in the 2015 Bihar Assembly polls. Sinha, who has represented his native Patna Sahib as a BJP MP for two consecutive terms, said his remarks on various issues which have not been liked by some party leaders, were meant to show the mirror to the BJP and cannot be termed as anti-party. Speculations are rife that he may be denied a ticket for the Lok Sabha elections scheduled for next year.

However, Sinhas latest stance has left everyone quizzing whether he would at all contest the elections on a BJP ticket. Instead of guessing whether they (BJP leaders) will give me a ticket or not speculation should be whether I will take the ticket or not, Sinha told PTI. The actor-turned BJP leader met jailed RJD president Lalu Prasad in Ranchi on Saturday. Though he said the meeting with Prasad at the Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences was personal. However, the timing of the meeting assumes significance as it is being speculated that he may enter into the fray from Patna Sahib from Prasads party if he is denied a BJP ticket for the Lok Sabha polls.

Read More | Bihar seat-sharing formula: BJP, JDU to fight on 17 each, LJP gets 6 in 2019 Lok Sabha elections

Sinha has on several occasions made it clear that the place (constituency) will be the same, even if the situation changes. He said the loss of power in three states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh is enough to show that the situation is not good in the NDA.

Many people have left, some others are preparing to leave and others driving tough negotiations... all said and done the partys popularity and that of one leader and two-men Army have taken a beating, he said. He was referring to Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) chief and former Bihar chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi and RLSP leader Upendra Kushwaha leaving NDA and LJP of Union minister Ram Vilas Paswan bargaining hard with a weakened BJP.

(With PTI inputs)

Shatrughan Sinha, the actor-turned-politician from Bihar, has many times touch the wrong nerve of his party Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). He was once the star campaigner of the party and was also a Cabinet minister in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government. However, off late, he has had several fallouts with the current leadership after being ignored in the 2015 Bihar Assembly polls. Sinha, who has represented his native Patna Sahib as a BJP MP for two consecutive terms, said his remarks on various issues which have not been liked by some party leaders, were meant to show the mirror to the BJP and cannot be termed as anti-party. Speculations are rife that he may be denied a ticket for the Lok Sabha elections scheduled for next year. However, Sinhas latest stance has left everyone quizzing whether he would at all contest the elections on a BJP ticket. Instead of guessing whether they (BJP leaders) will give me ticket or not speculation should be whether I will take the ticket or not, Sinha told PTI. The actor-turned BJP leader met jailed RJD president Lalu Prasad in Ranchi on Saturday. Though he said the meeting with Prasad at the Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences was personal. However, the timing of the meeting assumes significance as it is being speculated that he may enter into fray from Patna Sahib from Prasads party if he is denied a BJP ticket for the Lok Sabha polls. Sinha has on several occasions made it clear that the place (constituency) will be the same, even if the situation changes. He said loss of power in three states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh is enough to show that the situation is not good in the NDA. Many people have left, some others are preparing to leave and others driving tough negotiations... all said and done the partys popularity and that of one leader and two-men Army have taken a beating, he said. He was referring to Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) chief and former Bihar chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi and RLSP leader Upendra Kushwaha leaving NDA and LJP of Union minister Ram Vilas Paswan bargaining hard with a weakened BJP.

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United Nations: The complexities of the years-long war in Yemen multiply as the conflict drags on, the countrys new UN envoy told the Security Council on Friday. He said that he was under no illusions about the difficulty of the task at hand. New UN Special Envoy for Yemen, Hans Grundberg has vowed to revitalise the peace process by engaging with the parties to conflict and regional and international players.

"By now, it should be obvious that the peace process has stalled for too long. The conflict parties have not discussed a comprehensive settlement since 2016. This has left Yemenis stuck in an indefinite state of war, with no clear way forward," he told the Security Council in his first briefing as the top UN envoy for Yemen.

It is therefore long overdue for the parties to engage in peaceful dialogue under UN facilitation to discuss the terms of an overarching settlement, in good faith and without preconditions, Grundberg said.

He pledged to spare no effort in trying to bring together actors across conflict lines, to engage Yemenis from all political perspectives and societal components and from all parts of the country, to discuss under UN auspices how they can find common ground and resolve their differences without resorting to force.

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Deepa Adhikaris life has changed in the past few months. Adhikari, who used to drive an e-rickshaw on the streets of Itahari to take care of her two children, is now capable of moving boulders, quite literally.

For someone who did not want to stay home, Adhikari is currently in Sano Thimi of Bhaktapur, learning how to operate a backhoe loader. As soon as she learns how to operate the machinery, she will also get an opportunity to become an operator of a JCB backhoe loader for construction projects in different parts of Nepal.

Before this, Adhikari had worked as an assistant driver for the backhoe loader at Itahari. The opportunity came after Itahari sub-metropolitan city acquired a loader.

That is when she heard about scholarships provided by the JCB for women who wanted to learn how to operate its machinery. The programme is taking place at UCEP Nepal Technical School in Sano Timi and has been undertaken by Morang Auto Works and JCB. In total, 10 women have been doing the course.

Different backgrounds, same aspirations

It has been a month that she has been taking both theoretical and practical classes that have made her capable of operating the vehicle.

Now, Im planning on applying for a licence and start working. Hopefully, I can inspire and teach more women this skill, says Adhikari.

Like Adhikari, Dailekhs Indira Tamang is also doing the same training. Tamang was doing okay with her tailoring shop and had never felt that she needed to learn a new skill. But, local ladies asked her to sign up for the training and now is learning how to operate heavy equipment with nine other women.

Initially, it was quite hard for Tamang as her husband, who drives tippers for a living, did not believe that she could learn how to operate such heavy equipment.

It was disheartening at first, but I didnt lose hope. Now, I can show him and others that women can and will operate these machines and make a living out of it, says Tamang.

When she put up a video of her operating a backhoe loader on Facebook, she received a lot of positive messages which has encouraged quite a bit, she says. All 10 women taking the training are confident that they will soon be a part of the infrastructure development drive that is taking place in the country.

As soon as I get the licence, Ill be off to the hills to dig roads, says Tamang.

Indira Tamang in action. Photo: Shankar Giri

Currently, the women are preparing for their final exams at the institute, after which they will try to get licences to drive backhoe loaders and excavators.

This, for Manju Rai, is huge because a few months ago, she did not even know how to ride a bicycle. Initially, she was quite scared about taking the training, but gradually instructors built-in confidence in her as now she can even operate an excavator.

I gradually started to get into it, says Rai. This training will help me even if I leave Nepal for foreign employment.

A new experience for instructors

Rasin Maharjan, the senior instructor, says he has been pleasantly surprised at how excited the women are to learn skills like these.

The success of training like these falls on how much interest candidates show. We were sceptical in the beginning, but these ladies showed us that teaching women how to operate heavy equipment was not hard, says Maharjan.

MAWs efforts

The women are being sponsored by the MAW Foundation, which works to develop skills, communities and focuses on road safety.

Generating skill in women is also one of the goals of the foundation. That is why we announced a scholarship programme to train women, on the occasion of International Womens Day, says Tulika Agrawal, the foundations executive director.

She adds that this is a pilot project and similar projects are in pipeline as the foundation found this to be very effective.

We want to start a long-term campaign to support women in Nepal, she says.
Almost every American adult remembers, in vivid detail, where they were the morning of September 11, 2001. I was on the second floor of the West Wing of the White House, at a National Economic Council Staff meeting  and I will never forget the moment the Secret Service agent abruptly entered the room, shouting: "You must leave now. Ladies, take off your high heels and go!"

Just an hour before, as the National Economic Council White House technology adviser, I was briefing the deputy chief of staff on final details of an Oval Office meeting with the president, scheduled for September 13. Finally, we were ready to get the president's sign-off to send a federal privacy bill to Capitol Hill  effectively a federal version of the California Privacy Rights Act, but stronger. The legislation would put guardrails around citizens' data  requiring opt-in consent for their information to be shared, governing how their data could be collected and how it would be used.

But that morning, the world changed. We evacuated the White House and the day unfolded with tragedy after tragedy sending shockwaves through our nation and the world. To be in D.C. that day was to witness and personally experience what felt like the entire spectrum of human emotion: grief, solidarity, disbelief, strength, resolve, urgency  hope.

Much has been written about September 11, but I want to spend a moment reflecting on the day after.

When the National Economic Council staff came back into the office on September 12, I will never forget what Larry Lindsey, our boss at the time, told us: "I would understand it if some of you don't feel comfortable being here. We are all targets. And I won't appeal to your patriotism or faith. But I will  as we are all economists in this room  appeal to your rational self-interest. If we back away now, others will follow, and who will be there to defend the pillars of our society? We are holding the line here today. Act in a way that will make this country proud. And don't abandon your commitment to freedom in the name of safety and security."

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There is so much to be proud of about how the country pulled together and how our government responded to the tragic events on September 11. First, however, as a professional in the cybersecurity and data privacy field, I reflect on Larry's advice, and many of the critical lessons learned in the years that followed  especially when it comes to defending the pillars of our society.

Even though our collective memories of that day still feel fresh, 20 years have passed, and we now understand the vital role that data played in the months leading up to the 9/11 terrorist attacks. But, unfortunately, we failed to connect the dots that could have saved thousands of lives by holding intelligence data too closely in disparate locations. These data silos obscured the patterns that would have been clear if only a framework had been in place to share information securely.

So, we told ourselves, "Never again," and government officials set out to increase the amount of intelligence they could gather  without thinking through significant consequences for not only our civil liberties but also the security of our data. So, the Patriot Act came into effect, with 20 years of surveillance requests from intelligence and law enforcement agencies crammed into the bill. Having been in the room for the Patriot Act negotiations with the Department of Justice, I can confidently say that, while the intentions may have been understandable  to prevent another terrorist attack and protect our people  the downstream negative consequences were sweeping and undeniable.

Domestic wiretapping and mass surveillance became the norm, chipping away at personal privacy, data security and public trust. This level of surveillance set a dangerous precedent for data privacy, meanwhile yielding marginal results in the fight against terrorism.

Unfortunately, the federal privacy bill that we had hoped to bring to Capitol Hill the very week of 9/11  the bill that would have solidified individual privacy protections  was mothballed.

Over the subsequent years, it became easier and cheaper to collect and store massive amounts of surveillance data. As a result, tech and cloud giants quickly scaled up and dominated the internet. As more data was collected (both by the public and the private sectors), more and more people gained visibility into individuals' private data  but no meaningful privacy protections were put in place to accompany that expanded access.

Now, 20 years later, we find ourselves with a glut of unfettered data collection and access, with behemoth tech companies and IoT devices collecting data points on our movements, conversations, friends, families and bodies. Massive and costly data leaks  whether from ransomware or simply misconfiguring a cloud bucket  have become so common that they barely make the front page. As a result, public trust has eroded. While privacy should be a human right, it's not one that's being protected  and everyone knows it.

This is evident in the humanitarian crisis we have seen in Afghanistan. Just one example: Tragically, the Taliban have seized U.S. military devices that contain biometric data on Afghan citizens who supported coalition forces  data that would make it easy for the Taliban to identify and track down those individuals and their families. This is a worst-case scenario of sensitive, private data falling into the wrong hands, and we did not do enough to protect it.

This is unacceptable. Twenty years later, we are once again telling ourselves, "Never again." 9/11 should have been a reckoning of how we manage, share and safeguard intelligence data, but we still have not gotten it right. And in both cases  in 2001 and 2021  the way we manage data has a life-or-death impact.

This is not to say we aren't making progress: The White House and U.S. Department of Defense have turned a spotlight on cybersecurity and Zero Trust data protection this year, with an executive order to spur action toward fortifying federal data systems. The good news is that we have the technology we need to safeguard this sensitive data while still making it shareable. In addition, we can put contingency plans in place to prevent data that falls into the wrong hands. But, unfortunately, we just aren't moving fast enough  and the slower we solve this problem of secure data management, the more innocent lives will be lost along the way.

Looking ahead to the next 20 years, we have an opportunity to rebuild trust and transform the way we manage data privacy. First and foremost, we have to put some guardrails in place. We need a privacy framework that gives individuals autonomy over their own data by default.

This, of course, means that public- and private-sector organizations have to do the technical, behind-the-scenes work to make this data ownership and control possible, tying identity to data and granting ownership back to the individual. This is not a quick or simple fix, but it's achievable  and necessary  to protect our people, whether U.S. citizens, residents or allies worldwide.

To accelerate the adoption of such data protection, we need an ecosystem of free, accessible and open source solutions that are interoperable and flexible. By layering data protection and privacy in with existing processes and solutions, government entities can securely collect and aggregate data in a way that reveals the big picture without compromising individuals' privacy. We have these capabilities today, and now is the time to leverage them.

Because the truth is, with the sheer volume of data that's being gathered and stored, there are far more opportunities for American data to fall into the wrong hands. The devices seized by the Taliban are just a tiny fraction of the data that's currently at stake. As we've seen so far this year, nation-state cyberattacks are escalating. This threat to human life is not going away.

Larry's words from September 12, 2001, still resonate: If we back away now, who will be there to defend the pillars of our society? It's up to us  public- and private-sector technology leaders  to protect and defend the privacy of our people without compromising their freedoms.

It's not too late for us to rebuild public trust, starting with data. But, 20 years from now, will we look back on this decade as a turning point in protecting and upholding individuals' right to privacy, or will we still be saying, "Never again," again and again?
Sept 11 Guantanamo (Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.)

It was just four months after the September 11 attacks that the first prisoners arrived at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Some 20 prisoners from the battlefields of Afghanistan were led from a cargo plane in handcuffs, their faces and eyes covered, to a new kind of detention facility.

A photograph released a week later by the US navy of those same prisoners wearing orange jumpsuits, on their knees and watched over by their captors, would endure for years after. The number of prisoners would swell and the facility would become synonymous with torture, rendition and human rights abuses  those images were a potent symbol of it all, of a changing America, one that had forgotten its own values as it set out on a quest for vengeance.

Barack Obama summed up the feeling shared by many on the campaign trail in 2007, shortly before he won the presidency. In the dark halls of Abu Ghraib and the detention cells of Guantanamo, we have compromised our most precious values, he said.

The Bush administrations decision to use torture began with the capture of a man US officials described as the first high-value detainee of the War on Terror. Abu Zubaydah, a Palestinian national captured in Pakistan in March 2002, was said to have been a senior al-Qaeda operative  an accusation that later turned out to be false. He was accused of having information about future attacks against the US and so was handed over to the CIA. He would become the first person to face the enhanced interrogation techniques deployed by the CIA.

Waterboarding, sexual harassment and abuse, physical abuse and sleep deprivation were all approved by the US government for use against detainees. Guantanamo Bay became the lightning rod for the torture programme, but most of the abuses took place at so-called CIA black sites around the world  secret jails outside the rule of law. Some 50 sites in 28 countries were thought to have been used for the programme.

Story continues

Most of the torure took place behind closed doors in these highly secretive sites, but the world was given an insight into the kind of abuses taking place in US jails overseas with the explosion of the Abu Ghraib scandal in May 2004. The jail outside Baghdad had been a notorious torture centre under Saddam Hussein, and became so again when the invading US forces reopened the facility to hold captured fighters and terror suspects.

Former prisoners first alleged serious abuses by US forces in 2003. Investigations were launched quietly and charges were filed against the perpetrators, before images of the abuses were leaked to The Washington Post the next year. They revealed US soldiers engaged in the dehumanising abuse of detainees. Prisoners were stripped naked and photographed piled on top of each other. They were covered in human excrement and set upon by dogs, while US soldiers stood alongside them and smiled for the camera.

The war on terror became synonymous with torture. The initial outpouring of sympathy for the US following the 11 September attacks began to fade as the excesses of that global campaign began to take hold. According to Pew Research, a median of 50 per cent across surveyed nations said the US torture programme against suspected terorrists was not justified, while only 35 per cent said it was.

At home in the US, it was a different story. Opinion polls found significant support among Americans for the kind of interrogation and torture used by the CIA around the world in pursuit of terror suspects. In a Pew Research poll in July 2004, 43 per cent of Americans agreed that the torture of suspected terrorists to gain important information is often or sometimes justified  that number has now grown to a slight majority.

(AP)

The 9/11 attacks also led to a shift in Americas values regarding liberty and the relationship of citizens with the state. The share of Americans who believed it was necessary for the average person to give up civil liberties in order to curb terrorism rose from 39 per cent in 1997 to 55 per cent in 2002, according to Pew Research. The attacks also changed how Americans treated each other. Islamophobia spiked across the US in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, and hate crimes against Muslims rose by 500 per cent between 2000 and 2009, according to data from Brown University.

The US torture programme was consistently justified by its defenders, inside and outside government, as a necessary evil and a strategy to balance the security of US citizens and the values that they hold dear. But it later became clear that the underlying premise of those extraordinary measures  that they provided actionable intelligence that saved American lives  was flawed.

A Senate report on the programme, released in 2014, found that it was more brutal and far less effective than the CIA had claimed. Senate intelligence committee chair Dianne Feinstein said that torture regularly resulted in fabricated information and that the CIA was often unaware the information was fabricated. In a summary of the findings, she said that the torture programme had been found to be morally, legally and administratively misguided.

As the years went by, prisoners who were held for years without charge at Guantanamo Bay were quietly released or transferred to third countries. Many of them were never convicted.

By the time of the release of the torture report, the perception that the US had abandoned its principles in the quest for revenge was no longer controversial. Addressing the findings of the report, Senator John McCain, who was tortured by the North Vietnamese after his plane was shot down during the Vietnam war, echoed the words of his former opponent, Barack Obama: But in the end, tortures failure to serve its intended purpose isnt the main reason to oppose its use. I have often said, and will always maintain, that this question isnt about our enemies: its about us. Its about who we were, who we are and who we aspire to be. Its about how we represent ourselves to the world, he told the Senate floor

We have made our way in this often dangerous and cruel world, not by just strictly pursuing our geopolitical interests, but by exemplifying our political values, and influencing other nations to embrace them. When we fight to defend our security we fight also for an idea, not for a tribe or a twisted interpretation of an ancient religion or for a king, but for an idea that all men are endowed by the Creator with inalienable rights. How much safer the world would be if all nations believed the same. How much more dangerous it can become when we forget it ourselves even momentarily.

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Court File Numbers: 450-06-000001-192 and 460-06-000002-165

MONTREAL, Sept. 11, 2021 /CNW/ - On September 2, 2021, the Superior Court approved the Settlement Agreement for class actions brought against the Congregation The Brothers of the Sacred Heart for the benefit of the following individuals:

Kugler Kandestin (CNW Group/Kugler Kandestin)

"All individuals who have been sexually assaulted in Quebec prior to July 9, 2021 by a religious member of the Brothers of the Sacred Heart in any training establishment, school, college, leisure establishment, activity center, camp, residence, parish, place of worship, or any other place in Quebec" and "All individuals who have been sexually assaulted by a religious member of the religious congregation of the Brothers of the Sacred Heart while they were students, boarders or candidates for admission to Mont Sacre-Coeur de Granby (including the College Mont-Sacre-Cur, the boarding schools and the juniorate) between 1932 and 2008"

Summary of the terms of the Settlement Agreement

In order to benefit from the Settlement Agreement, members must submit a claim no later than July 30, 2022, by filing the Claim Form provided in Annex 2.

An aggregate amount of $60 million will be paid to settle the class actions and member claims.

Retired judges will act as arbitrators and decide on members' claims and their category of compensation. Defendants and their attorneys will have no right to challenge, review or intervene in the claims process.

The amount of compensation for each category can only be known after all claims have been decided by the arbitrators. Only then will the arbitrators know the number of members in each category and will be able to distribute the settlement amount in accordance with the claims process set out in Annex 1.

You can view the Settlement Agreement and its Schedules by visiting the website www.kklex.com

Please contact Class Counsel below:

Me Robert Kugler, rkugler@kklex.com /Me Pierre Boivin, pboivin@kklex.com

Me Olivera Pajani, opajani@kklex.com /Me Jeremie Longpre, jlongpre@kklex.com /Me Melissa Des Groseilliers mdesgroseilliers@kklex.com

Kugler Kandestin LLP

1 Place Ville Marie, suite 1170

Montreal (Quebec) H3B 2A7

Telephone : 514-878-2861 ext. 129 /Fax : 514-875-8424

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THIS NOTICE HAS BEEN APPROVED BY THE HONORABLE CHRISTIAN IMMER, J.S.C.

SOURCE Kugler Kandestin

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Covington Latin Schools will host a social reception in honor of Thomas More Universitys 100th Year of Service and Education.

Covington Latin School is a co-educational, Roman Catholic, accelerated, college preparatory middle and high school that offers a classical education for gifted students. www.CovingtonLatin.org | #CovingtonLatin

Covington Latin School is a co-educational, Roman Catholic, accelerated, college preparatory middle and high school that offers a classical education for gifted students. www.CovingtonLatin.org | #CovingtonLatin

Thomas More University - 100th Anniversary 1921  2021 - Centennial Celebration. Thomas More Universitys Centennial Celebration aimed at advancing the University physically, academically, and spiritually. With the goal of establishing the University as the regions premier Catholic education institution. Its time for More. | #ThomasMore #ThomasMore100 #SaintsServe

Thomas More University - 100th Anniversary 1921  2021 - Centennial Celebration. Thomas More Universitys Centennial Celebration aimed at advancing the University physically, academically, and spiritually. With the goal of establishing the University as the regions premier Catholic education institution. Its time for More. | #ThomasMore #ThomasMore100 #SaintsServe

Covington, Kentucky, Sept. 11, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Covington Latin School (CLS) is a co-educational Catholic college-preparatory high school, specializing in advanced and accelerated instruction in Covington, Kentucky. Covington Latin School is considered a sister school to Thomas More University with shared diocesan leadership. On Sunday, September 12th, 2021 the Covington Latin School will open their hall to host a Founders Day reception in honor of the Universitys 100th anniversary upon the conclusion of 10:00 AM mass at the Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption, celebrated by Bishop Foys.

The mass will include acknowledgement by Bishop Foys of the Thomas More University Centennial Celebration and honor the administration, board, leaders, staff and students of the University. Bishop Foys will furthermore recognize September 12th, 2021 as Founders Day of Thomas More University.

We are grateful to Covington Latin Headmaster, Dr. John Kennedy, and the Latin School staff for their generous hospitality and willingness to help host our Founders Day reception, said Dr. Joseph Chillo, Thomas More University President, Covington Latins connection with Thomas More University goes as far back as the early 1920s when Villa Madonna College began admitting men. It is truly fitting that we would celebrate our centennial anniversary alongside them.

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Immediately following the conclusion of mass, all parties are invited to a reception in honor of Founders Day and in celebration of Thomas More Universitys Centennial at the Covington Latin School. There Thomas More University President Chillo will welcome guests and share brief remarks on the importance of this anniversary, the Universitys Covington roots and the connections with Covington Latin School. Dr. Judith A. Marlowe 69 Thomas More University graduate and Chair of the Universitys Board of Trustees will lead those gathered in a toast to the first 100 years for Thomas More University and the second century to come.

On behalf of the staff, faculty and students of Covington Latin School, we are honored to host this reception in celebration of Thomas More Universitys Centennial, said Amy Darpel, Director of Advancement at Covington Latin Schools and 94 graduate of Thomas More University, The ties between our two institutions stem from both of our very beginnings, they are everlasting and incredibly important to the advancement of our entire community.

###

About Covington Latin School: www.CovingtonLatin.org | #CovingtonLatin

Covington Latin School is a co-educational, Roman Catholic, accelerated, college preparatory middle and high school that offers 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 accredited by both the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (S.A.C.S.) and Cognia Global Educational Accreditation Commission, and is certified by the US Department of Education as a Blue Ribbon School. Covington Latin School ranked as the #1 private school in Northern Kentucky by Cincinnati Magazine, and was named as a Top 3 school in the state of Kentucky.

Learn more and access enrollment at www.CovingtonLatin.org.

Attachments

CONTACT: Amy Darpel Covington Latin School 859.391.1699 amy.darpel@covingtonlatin.org




Misinformation researchers who've been relying on the data Facebook provides them may have lost months or even years of work. That's because the social network has been giving them flawed and incomplete information on how users interact with posts and links on the website, according to The New York Times.

Facebook has been giving academics access to its data over the past couple of years to track the spread of misinformation on its platform. It promised researchers transparency and access to all user interaction, but the data the company has been giving them reportedly only includes interactions for about half of its users in the US. Further, most of the users whose interactions were included in the reports are the ones who engage with political posts enough to make their leanings clear.

In an email to researchers The Times saw, Facebook apologized for the "inconvenience [it] may have caused." The company also told them that it's fixing the issue, but that it could take weeks due to the sheer volume of data it has to process. Facebook told the researchers, though, that the data they received for users outside the US isn't inaccurate.

Facebook spokesperson Mavis Jones blamed the data inaccuracy to a "technical error," which the company is apparently "working swiftly to resolve." As The Times notes, it was University of Urbino associate professor Fabio Giglietto who first discovered the inaccuracy. Giglietto compared the data handed over to researchers with the "Widely Viewed Content Report" the social network published publicly in August and found that the results didn't match.

Other researchers raised concerns after that report was published. Alice Marwick, a researcher from the University of North Carolina, told Engadget that they couldn't verify those results, because they had no access to the data Facebook used. The company reportedly held a call with researchers on Friday to apologize. Megan Squire, one of those researchers, told The Times: "From a human point of view, there were 47 people on that call today and every single one of those projects is at risk, and some are completely destroyed."

Some researchers have been using their own tools to gather information for their research, but in at least one instance, Facebook cut off their access. In August, Facebook disabled the accounts associated with the NYU Ad Observatory project. The team used a browser extension to collect information on political ads, but the social network said it was "unauthorized scraping." At the time, Laura Edelson, the project's lead researcher, told Engadget that Facebook is silencing the team because its "work often calls attention to problems on its platform." Edelson added: "If this episode demonstrates anything it is that Facebook should not have veto power over who is allowed to study them."
TOKYO (Reuters) - A plan to release radioactive water from the Fukushima nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean will be examined in December by international experts sent by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Japan's industry ministry said on Thursday.

In a move that angered local fishermen as well as China and South Korea, Japan said in April that it would release into the sea more than 1 million tonnes of contaminated water from the Fukushima plant, which was wrecked by an earthquake and tsunami a decade ago.

To gain trust and ensure transparency from the fishermen and neighbouring countries, Japan has sought IAEA officials to conduct a review to assess and advise on the handling of the water from the perspective of a nuclear expert organisation.

The latest plan was set by the Japanese government and Lydie Evrard, deputy director general of the IAEA, who visited Japan this week to kick off discussions about their collaboration over the safety review of the planned water release.

International experts will assess the condition of the water to be released, the safety of the disposal procedure and the effects of radiation in accordance with IAEA safety standards, the ministry said.

"The main objective of our review is to be objective ... and transparent with a scientific-based approach," Evrard told reporters.

International experts will be selected by IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi and will likely include experts from neighbouring nations such as China and South Korea, she said.

Japan sought the IAEA's cooperation to ensure transparency of the water release for local fishermen and the international community, especially neighbouring countries which are opposed to oceanic discharge.

"The agency will listen to different concerns from various stakeholders," Evrard said.

Last month, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power outlined plans to discharge the water, after treatment and dilution, from a point about 1 km (0.6 miles) offshore from the Fukushima station. The release could begin as early as spring in 2023.

The IAEA will issue a report on the review before spring 2023 and continue safety reviews after the water release, Evrard said.

(Reporting by Yuka Obayashi; editing by David Evans)
WASHINGTON, Sept 10 (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund on Friday said it would begin a virtual mission to Belarus, amid concerns raised about the global lender's disbursement of new emergency reserves to the government of president Alexander Lukashenko.

The staff mission is part of the IMF's economic surveillance and monitoring mandate and aims to gather more information about the economic developments in Belarus and its response to the COVID-19 pandemic, an IMF spokesperson said.

The mission will begin Monday, said a source familiar with the plans who was not authorized to speak publicly.

It comes days after the leaders of Russia and Belarus agreed to set up a unified oil and gas market and to deepen economic integration https://www.reuters.com/world/russia-belarus-agree-closer-energy-economic-integration-2021-09-09 in the face of what they regard as unjustified Western sanctions on both their economies.

Western governments have imposed sanctions to escalate pressure on Lukashenko, who is accused of rigging elections in August 2020 and cracking down on opposition to prolong his now 27 years in power. Lukashenko has denied rigging the vote.

Russia is also under Western sanctions for its treatment of Ukraine.

The IMF last month said it was keeping a close watch https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/imf-keeping-close-watch-belarus-after-calls-limit-reserve-funds-country-2021-08-13 on Belarus but proceeded to give Lukashenko's hardline government access to nearly $1 billion in new Special Drawing Rights (SDRs), the IMF's own reserve currency, as part of a broader $650 billion allocation to all IMF members.

Some U.S. lawmakers had urged the IMF to restrict the government's access to the funds.

The mission, which will conduct interviews online, will lay the groundwork for a comprehensive 'Article IV' economic surveillance mission in December. Such reviews are carried out on a regular basis by the global lender. (Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Edwina Gibbs)
BeInCrypto 

Startup Madagascar Time Limited has launched a cryptocurrency to help fund global clarity work.

Madagascar Time Limited, a newly launched startup, has announced the launch of a new for-charity cryptocurrency. $TIME was created to help fight climate change and poverty on a global scale. The team at Madagascar is comprised of co-founders Raymond Mullens, Armand Iancu, Ryan Bishop, and Corey Blanchette. Along with a squad of volunteers and interns around the globe, they are putting crypto to good use and to affect positive change.

According to Madagascar Times website, their name was decided upon due to Madagascars climate vulnerability and using a lemur as its logo to represent their declining population. The name $TIME given to the coin was done to underscore the immediate need for action to save our planet and safeguard the lives of future generations.

This story was seen first on BeInCrypto Join our Telegram Group and get trading signals, a free trading course and more stories like this on BeInCrypto
PenFed presents $50,000 in donations to salute today's heroes serving in defense of our nation and communities

TYSONS, Va., September 10, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Tonight, in honor of those who were impacted by and responded to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, PenFed Credit Union hosted an evening of remembrance and saluted today's heroes serving in defense of our nation and communities at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Washington D.C.

PenFed honored todays heroes by presenting $50,000 in donations, $10,000 each to five organizations. Right to left: Phyllis J. Wilson, R.N. CW5, US Army (Ret.), president, Military Womens Memorial; Kara C. Dallman USN (Ret.), executive director, Our Military Kids; Besa Pinchotti, executive director,National Military Family Association; Ed Cody, Chairmen of the Board of Directors, PenFed Credit Union; James Schenck, President/CEO PenFed Credit Union and CEO, PenFed Foundation; Battalion Chief Brian Edmonston and Lieutenant Melanie Jenkins, Firefighters Fund of Fairfax County; and Lisa Reiter, special agent, FBI Agents Association.

The remembrance dinner was attended by leaders in the military, intelligence, law enforcement, veteran service organization and first responder communities. PenFed honored today's heroes by presenting $50,000 in donations, $10,000 each, to National Military Family Association, Our Military Kids, Military Women's Memorial, FBI Agents Association and Firefighters Fund of Fairfax County.

James Schenck, President/CEO of PenFed Credit Union and CEO of PenFed Foundation, was working at a PenFed facility in Alexandria when he saw the news of the attacks on 9/11/2001. Schenck and several volunteers walked six miles to the PenFed financial center at the Pentagon to see how they could help the team and others who were immediately impacted.

"As we ran toward the Pentagon, I'll never forget what we saw: In the aftermath of the attacks, we saw the best of America  the selflessness and courage of the American people, moving toward the burning Pentagon building to help others survive," said Schenck during his remarks. "These brave Americans were not only first responders and military personnel; they were everyday civilians who were in the area, coming out of the Pentagon City Mall, stopping their cars on South Hayes Street and heading toward the burning Pentagon to assist in any way they could."

All PenFed financial center employees at the Pentagon on 9/11 were able to evacuate safely, and the credit union reopened for business the next day to provide continuous service and support to the Pentagon community.

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"That morning we were on a one-way mission and if successful, we wouldn't be coming back. We were mission failure. The passengers on Flight 93 are the true heroes," said keynote speaker, Heather "Lucky" Penney, an American hero and renowned speaker most widely recognized for her service as an F-16 fighter pilot on 9/11. "I've come to learn that heroism isn't something unique or possessed only by a chosen few. The passengers on Flight 93 proved that and so did the people that helped each other moments before the towers fell."

Retired Army General John W. Nicholson Jr., President of the PenFed Foundation, was moving into a new house that day. His desk in the Pentagon was 100 feet from where the nose of the plane hit the building. "Everyone between my desk and the plane perished. You don't forget something like this. It stays with you forever. What I do every day, I do now in honor of those people we lost," he said during his remarks.

This year in honor of the 20th anniversary, PenFed is partnering with the Military Women's Memorial to support the 9/11 Remembrance Relay. This week the 9/11 Remembrance Relay is paying tribute to the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the 177 servicewomen who died in combat zones since, with a 177-mile walk from the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, to the Military Women's Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery.

Founded in 1935 as the War Department Credit Union, PenFed's core membership is comprised of members of the national defense communities and all who support them. Following the attacks of 2001, PenFed launched the PenFed Foundation to support service members, veterans and their families. The PenFed Foundation has delivered over $40 million in support to over 150,000 members of the military community through programs providing financial education, credit-building, homeownership, short-term assistance and veteran entrepreneurial support services. To learn more about PenFed's history, visit penfed.org/about-penfed. To learn more about the work of the PenFed Foundation, visit penfedfoundation.org.

About PenFed Credit Union

Established in 1935, Pentagon Federal Credit Union (PenFed) is America's second-largest federal credit union, serving 2.4 million members worldwide with over $28 billion in assets as of July 31, 2021. PenFed Credit Union offers market-leading certificates, checking, credit cards, personal loans, mortgages, auto loans, student loans, and a wide range of other financial services. Our mission is to empower members of our community to achieve their financial well-being. PenFed Credit Union is federally insured by the NCUA and is an Equal Housing Lender. To learn more about PenFed Credit Union, visit PenFed.org , like us on Facebook and follow us @PenFed on Twitter . Interested in working for PenFed? Check us out on LinkedIn . We are proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer.

PENFED logo (PRNewsfoto/PenFed Credit Union)

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SOURCE PenFed Credit Union
Stefan Ingves, the governor of Swedens central bank, has given Bitcoin the short shrift.

Speaking at a banking conference in Stockholm, Ingves said that private money usually collapses sooner or later. He added that, although it was possible to get rich by trading in Bitcoin, it was comparable to trading in stamps.

Ingves  governor of Sveriges Riksbank  also recently stated that Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies were unlikely to escape regulatory oversight as their popularity grows.

Wael Makarem, senior market strategist at Swedish trading broker Exness, believes the Scandinavian nation largely viewed cryptocurrencys volatility with trepidation.

Investors are cautious about the current fluctuations in Bitcoin and Ethereum, especially as these benchmarks failed to trim earlier losses, which is usually considered a sign of weakness in the crypto market, he said.

On the other hand, the headlines from EU regulators coming closer to implementing new regulations for cryptocurrencies, new anti-money laundering rules and tax reporting requirements adds downside pressure.

Makarem added that he also thinks investors were afraid of tough rules and regulations that could limit the adoption or use of digital assets.

Europe still suspicious of crypto

Ingvess comments are generally in line with what other central bankers have said about cryptocurrencies. In February, Gabriel Makhlouf  governor of the Central Bank of Ireland  said Bitcoin investors should be prepared to lose all their money.

Personally, I wouldnt put my money into it, but clearly, some people think its a good bet, he said.

People put money into tulips because they thought it was an investment.

Also, in May, Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey commented that cryptocurrencies had no intrinsic value and could crash to zero.
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Weve always had a strong respect for one another as well as an excellent peer relationship, he said. The time was right for Two Rivers Bank to sell and they reached out to us.

Jen Barrow, marketing officer for Two Rivers, said the two banks had always seen each other as a good fit.

We have really complemented each other, and weve worked closely together too, she said. And so I think its kind of a natural progression for us to join forces.

First State Bank plans to acquire Two Rivers in Q4 2021, pending regulatory approval.

There shouldnt be any hoops to jump through, Barrow said. Were a strong, stable institution, so there wont be any red flags. It should be a smooth process.

Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}}

Johannsen said the plan is for both banks to have business as usual and evaluate the best practices for them both to blend them together.

Both banks have strongly rooted personal and business relationships with our customer bases that make up our respective communities and we intend for that to be the case for years to come, he said.

Barrow said the transition will be a smooth one for customers as changes wont just be made overnight.
Individuals exposed through an epi-link contact  meaning three or more positive cases in the same cohort  who are fully vaccinated, have had COVID-19 in the past 90 day, or are wearing a mask while in school and engaged in activities, will no longer be required to stay home from school as long as they do not have COVID-19 symptomsloss of taste and smell; sudden onset of persistent cough or shortness of breath  and wear a mask for the 14 days following exposure.

More detailed information regarding these guidelines are on the FPS website, under the Return to School 2021 page. Visit https://fremonttigers.org/return-to-school-2021/

A reminder: When at away sporting events, visitors must follow that host schools protocols. For example, Omaha Public Schools and schools in Lancaster County are requiring masks for all indoor events. Lincoln Public Schools is using an online ticket system for admittance and will have a cash option at the door.

Another reminder: Bond issue ballots were mailed on Aug. 26. This is a mail-in/carry-in only election.

Ballots are due back to the County Clerk by 5 p.m. Sept. 14 in each respective county by mail or hand delivery.

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Experts say the buildings did what they were designed to do  stand up if an airplane hit them.

But with the large amount of fuel on the jets  and when the explosions occurred  the steel couldnt withstand such a heavy fire load, Meyer said.

Meyer said the first-responders who died were heroes.

But he added heart-wrenching perspective.

He believes if those first-responders could be asked: Would you rather be called a hero or be home with your family, they would choose to be with their loved ones.

I dont want to take away from their actions or any other firefighter who dies in the line of duty, but nobody wants to die in the line of duty, Meyer said. Nobody wants to be gone from their family. Their family doesnt want to lose them.

Christensen recalled the heart-rending loss of life, but also found amazing how the country came together at that time.

Through the years, however, Christensen said he noticed how soon the politicians forgot about the sacrifices of the first-responders and the people who died.
If I can be a little bit of a guidepost and give them a sense, in general, of what to expect, I think that makes people feel supported, she said.

Wells speaks of the teamwork she sees at NCS.

We have a great team and people learn quickly that they can call 24/7 and get a really supportive, compassionate, intelligent ear from the nurse that works on the team, from the other doctors who are covering in the middle of the night, or whoever might be around on the weekend. Theres always somebody there for them. People learn that fast and I think it makes them feel really good, she said.

Wells said shes part of an incredible team of people who work hard to provide a compassionate and supportive culture.

What we want is that from the very first person you see when you walk through the door - that if youre a patient in our clinic - you feel supported and like you are empowered to ask about what you need and talk about what youre going through, she said.

Wells talks about the positive feedback that patients provide.
The Biden administration has reached an agreement with Uzbekistan to transfer a group of Afghan military pilots to a U.S. military base, a U.S. newspaper says.

The Taliban-led Afghan government is pressuring Uzbekistan to turn the pilots and their equipment over to Kabul, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The pilots flew their families to Uzbekistan aboard Afghan military aircraft to escape the Taliban, who quickly overran government forces last month as the United States pulled its troops out of Afghanistan.

The United States fears the pilots could be killed if they were returned to their country.

Military pilots are believed to be among the members of the Afghan forces most despised by the Taliban for the carnage they wrought from the air, the paper said.

At the same time, Uzbekistan doesn't want tense relations with its militant neighbor and has asked the United States to resolve the problem quickly.

According to the paper, the pilots and their families -- a total of 585 people -- will first be flown to the U.S. military base in Doha, Qatar, on the weekend of September 11-12 for processing.

They will then be sent to live permanently in other countries. It was still not clear how many, if any at all, would be sent to the United Staets, the newspaper said.

The State Department declined to comment, the paper said.

The Wall Street Journal said the fate of the 46 aircraft flown by the pilots to Uzbekistan -- including U.S.-supplied Black Hawks, PC-12 surveillance aircraft, and Soviet-era MI-17s -- still remains unclear.

Based on reporting by The Wall Street Journal
KABUL -- A young Afghan woman has quit her job at a private foreign-language center in Kabul after what she described as intimidation and harassment by Taliban fighters stationed outside her workplace.

The 24-year-old English teacher -- whose name is being withheld for her protection -- returned to her office this week when it reopened for the first time since the Taliban took control of the Afghan capital on August 15.

"I was excited to go to work after staying home for three weeks," she said. "I put on Islamic clothing and went to work, but the moment I arrived there I faced insults and shouting from Taliban fighters standing at the entrance."

The teacher said armed Taliban militants were guarding the commercial building that houses several companies and offices in a crowded neighborhood in downtown Kabul.

"When I tried to enter my office, one of them asked me, 'Where are you going?' I told them that I work here. He said: 'Who told you to come? Go back home, fast,'" the woman told RFE/RL on September 10.

The language instructor said she was particularly concerned when the fighters called her an "infidel."

"One of them said, 'Look, she works at the place which teaches the language of infidels, so she is an infidel.' Yes, they called me an infidel even though I was wearing the Islamic hijab," the woman said.

Terrified by the comments from the gun-wielding men, she decided to immediately leave work.

Further harassment and insults came from several other Taliban fighters standing outside public buildings and along the roads in central Kabul. As she walked past they scolded her for being "out on the streets" on her own.

In some provinces, the Taliban has reportedly banned women from leaving home unless accompanied by a male relative.

No such demand was made publicly yet for women in Kabul. But the English teacher said Taliban fighters shouted at her, "What the hell are you doing walking alone outside your home?"

'Within Islamic Norms, But Not Yet'

Two days after taking Kabul, the Taliban said women were allowed to return to work "within Islamic norms." However, a Taliban spokesman said women should stay at home for now, as the Taliban fighters were "not trained" to respect women.

The Taliban's interim government doesn't include any women. But senior Taliban officials have said women employees at the ministries would be allowed to continue their work.

But the former Kabul English teacher said the Taliban promises were a sham. She doesn't believe the Taliban government genuinely wants women to have careers.

"Taliban statements about letting women work are just a fake show for the international community to get aid. Once the Taliban gets what it wants from the outside world, it will end everything," she said.

The teacher said three other women in her circle experienced similar assaults by Taliban fighters when they tried to go to work. They all quit their jobs rather than face the harassment, she said.

Speaking from her home in Kabul, the teacher told RFE/RL she was "too scared" to return to work.

"I used to work hard, sometimes I would stay in the office until 8 p.m. or work on the weekends, too," the teacher said. "All my efforts, all my hard work, my education became nothing at the end."

The teacher fears she might never be able to work or even freely walk alone on the streets as long as the Taliban remains in power in Afghanistan.

Written by Farangis Najibullah based on reporting by RFE/RL's Radio Azadi
A spokesman for Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) says the airline plans to resume special charter flights to and from Kabul next week in order to help evacuate people who want to leave Afghanistan.

PIA spokesman Abdullah Hafeez Khan told the AFP news agency on September 11 that the airline had received "all technical clearances for flight operations" to resume.

He said PIA's first special charter flight to Kabul would be an Airbus A320 flying from Islamabad on September 13.

However, PIA said it remained unclear when regular commercial service to and from Kabul would resume.

Even the limited charter service would make it one of the few airlines operating in Afghanistan after the Taliban's takeover.

Khan told the German news agency dpa that the flights should not be seen as a "regular scheduled operation," but rather an "as and when hired" service.

He said PIA had been approached by foreign missions and agencies -- including the United Nations, the European Union, and the and World Bank -- as well as humanitarian and news organizations.

"We are eager to start commercial flight operations to Kabul but it might take some more time," Khan said.

PIA had been one of the only services which operated in the immediate aftermath of the Taliban's takeover of Kabul on August 15.

PIA officials say at least 1,460 people of different nationalities were evacuated by PIA from August 15 to August 22.

But PIA announced on August 22 that it had "temporarily suspended" flights between Kabul and Islamabad due to lack of facilities and "heaps of garbage" on the airstrip.

Pakistani media reports quoted authorities in Islamabad as saying they were concerned that garbage piling up at the Kabul airport could lead to a tragic accident.

A chartered flight by a Qatar Airways jet that carried 200 people from Kabul on September 9 was the first passenger plane to fly out of the Kabul airport since the Taliban took over the facility following the departure of the last U.S. troops there on August 31.

With reporting by AFP, dpa, Reuters, and Geo News
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Colorado Springs, CO (80903)

Today

Mostly sunny. High near 85F. Winds SSE at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Mostly clear. Low near 55F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph.
Reporter

Stephanie Earls is a news reporter and columnist at The Gazette. Before moving to Colorado Springs in 2012, she worked for newspapers in upstate NY, WA, OR and at her hometown weekly in Berkeley Springs, WV, where she got her start in journalism.
FILE PHOTO: Signage is seen outside of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) headquarters in White Oak, Maryland, U.S., August 29, 2020. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly
Colorado Springs police arrested and cited two after over a dozen protesters, many of them parents with their students by their side, gathered at a Colorado Springs high school Friday morning.

Roughly fifteen protesters, brandishing hot-pink posters citing local COVID-19 death statistics, gathered at around 10 a.m. at Cheyenne Mountain High School in protest of the district's sweeping mask mandate announced in August.

Shortly after, police arrested two women who were protesting near the schools front doors.

Mary Louise Fiddler, a parent of three students enrolled at Cheyenne Mountain High, said she was one of the women arrested and cited.

Both were released after police issued Fiddler a citation for city trespassing and Kimberly Fuchs, the other woman arrested, a citation for trespassing and obstructing a police officer.

Police said they made the arrests after school administration called and asked them to get the protesters off school property and onto a nearby sidewalk. School security had already asked the throng to move, but they had refused.

When police arrived and made the same request, this time threatening the protesters with trespassing charges if they didnt leave, most of them dispersed. Fiddler and Fuchs were the only ones arrested.

Im here because our students are being forced into masks that are ineffective, Fiddler, who's running for Cheyenne Mountain District 12's school board, said. Wearing a mask is like wearing a tissue-paper seat belt thats lined with itching powder. It really does nothing to keep you safe, but it has a negative impact.

Among those negative impacts, parents and students said that masks affected the way kids played sports, socialized with others, and even the way they learned new languages in class, because the masks affected the way people pronounced words.

Parents also complained of school staff pushing vaccines on students, even organizing vaccination clinics to promote inoculations for students.

"They lie to these kids, and they intimidate them to getting these vaccines, and it's wrong," said Akena Mitchell, who protested at the event with three of her children. "These kids are standing behind their parents, with their parents, so that they don't get vaccinated, and they don't suffocate and have their lungs damaged wearing these stupid, pointless masks."

Sophomore Josh Fiddler, Marys son, said that before a recent school board meeting, he interviewed around 75 middle and high school students on how they felt about the mask mandate.

Some were indifferent to the rule, and four said they were in favor of masking up. But around 50, Josh said, wanted to see the mask mandate tossed.

People said they sweat, it causes more acne, you cant exercise, Josh said, reading from interview notes from dozens of students. Its counterintuitive to the vaccine, you cant breathe, it causes headaches, others said.

It makes no sense for them, Mary said about students now being required to mask up. Zero kids died in El Paso County from COVID.

Since the start of the pandemic, three people between 10 and 19 have died from the virus, and no children under 10 have died.

At Coronado High School, 20-30 students also walked out of class at around 10 a.m. on Friday, citing issues they had with District 11's recent mask mandate.

School staff said the students walked out of class into a courtyard area, but ultimately went back inside without any commotion. They were supervised by campus security.

But as anger has flared up surrounding a recent wave of school district mask mandates, Colorado Springs-area schools and districts have seen new COVID-19 outbreaks and cases among their communities.

Since the start of classes Aug. 18, Lewis-Palmer School District 38 measured 30 cases of COVID-19 among its students and staff.

Six 6th-grade students were isolated as of Friday in a current outbreak, Mark Belcher said.

"We're fairly confident that the protocols are working to contain our spread," Belcher said.

Lewis-Palmer School District does not require students to wear masks but is "mask supportive" and encourages the use of masks, Belcher said.

Belcher said classes, nor extracurricular activities such as sports, were cancelled due to outbreaks of the virus.

Vista Ridge High School tallied 15 cases and Skyview Middle School counted eight cases of COVID-19 during the month of August in District 49, El Paso County Public Health data showed.

Several other school districts throughout El Paso County also declared outbreaks to the health department including a five-person outbreak at Sierra High School in Harrison District 2 Aug. 31, a seven-person outbreak at Mann Middle School Aug. 31, and a six-person outbreak at Legacy Peak Elementary School in District 20 Aug. 27  all among outbreaks at other schools in the county.

The largest outbreak over the past two weeks was detected at Sand Creek International Elementary School, with 19 cases declared on Aug. 31.

District 20 did not provide comments about the outbreak and District 49 and District 11 did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

O'Dell Isaac contributed to this report.
People gathered Saturday at the three sites where terrorists killed nearly 3,000 people on Sept. 11, 2001, with leaders, survivors, and more paying tribute and mourning the fallen 20 years later.
Sweeping federal vaccination mandates announced earlier this week could help slow the coronavirus Delta variant in Colorado, but the vague details and unknown timeline have left questions about when the communities could see the benefits of more immunity.

The expansive rules mandate that all employers with more than 100 workers require them to be vaccinated or test for the virus weekly, affecting about 80 million Americans. And the roughly 17 million workers at health facilities that receive federal Medicare or Medicaid also will have to be fully vaccinated. But it's unknown when employers will have to implement the mandates or if the rules will stand up in court, and public health officials are urging residents to take action as hospital capacity diminishes.

"We need people to get that first vaccine now so we can start making progress. ...There is no time to wait," Colorado College microbiology professor Phoebe Lostroh said.

Critics say the vaccination mandates infringe on individual rights and residents should have the right to choose for themselves.

El Paso County Commission Chairman Stan VanderWerf called the federal vaccine mandates "disappointing," saying he supported the rights of individuals and private businesses to enact COVID-19 restrictions such as vaccine or mask requirements, but argued it wasn't the government's place to do so.

"I think they've completely lost focus of what's important, and that's a family of protective measures," he said. "Continued education is the right answer, and that's what we're doing locally."

El Paso County has not enacted COVID-19 restrictions since the spring, when the state ceded to counties much of its authority to institute health measures. It focused on education measures instead. At the same time, the Delta variant has spread rapidly in the county since July. County public health data show nearly 2,000 people have tested positive for the virus in the last week, or 274 people per 100,000 residents over seven days. In July, the community had about 60 people testing positive per 100,000 residents on average.

The number of people testing positive each day has fallen slightly since Sept. 5, but it's too early to say why, said Michelle Hewitt, spokeswoman for El Paso County Public Health.

The number of people needing hospital care is also rising, with 154 patients in area hospitals on Thursday with COVID or suspected of it, on par with the number of patients local hospitals were caring for in January.

Hospital capacity was dwindling statewide with only 197 intensive care unit beds available on Friday, even though the total number of people needing hospital care was far below the winter peak. Most of the patients in Colorado hospitals are unvaccinated.

Other patients needing care for accidents associated with summer activities and respiratory viruses are driving some of the demand for care, said Julie Lonborg, spokeswoman for the Colorado Hospital Association. Hospitals have also lost staff who are traveling to other states where COVID-19 is surging. In some cases, staff are also taking time for themselves, she said.

An increase in vaccination rates across the state could help slow the spread of the virus and protect hospital capacity, experts said.

The higher our vaccination rates are, the less the severity of illness, hospitalizations, deaths and community spread residents of El Paso County will experience, Hewitt said.

El Paso County has one of the lowest rates of vaccination among the states 10 largest counties, with 66.8% of residents 12 and older vaccinated with at least one dose, data from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment on Friday showed. El Paso County trails behind other large counties such as Adams, Arapahoe, Boulder, Denver, Douglas, Jefferson and Larimer, all of which have more than 70% of the eligible population vaccinated with at least one shot, according to state data.

The pace of vaccinations in El Paso County has picked up recently, Hewitt said, crediting the uptick to additional research showing vaccine effectiveness, the U.S. Food and Drug Administrations recent full approval of the Pfizer vaccine, and concerns about the surging Delta variant.

County data show El Paso County administered about 8,400 vaccine doses on average each week in August, compared to about 34,000 does administered on average each week in April, when the state opened COVID-19 vaccine eligibility to all Coloradans 12 and older.

On the national stage, the mandates have stirred up more political controversy surrounding the coronavirus.

U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn, R-Colorado Springs, accused Biden in a statement Thursday of "abusing the power of the executive branch."

"The American people should be given the scientific information they need to asses the risk to themselves and their families and then they can freely make their choice," he said.

In a statement provided to The Gazette Friday, U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., said he wished the vaccine mandate wasn't necessary.

"There is no reason why we should be seeing the elevated levels of cases that we're seeing today," Bennet said. "Nobody is asking anyone to scale the cliffs of Normandy  what we're being asked to do is to get vaccinated and wear a mask to keep our schools and local businesses open and help each other move past this pandemic."

As the political and possibly legal fights rage, larger employers should take proactive steps to plan for the new rules, but may want to wait to implement a mandate until the specifics are known, said Glenn Pelster with the Employers Council, a group that provides human resources advice.

The Department of Labor has been slow to release coronavirus rules in the past, but with pressure from the administration, its impossible to predict, he said.

This could be something that happens next week, it could be something that takes months, Pelster said.

He also expects the new rules will face legal challenges and a judge could order a stay that could pause implementation while the legality of the new rules are decided by the court system, he said.

I would be absolutely shocked if that rule goes into play without a court somewhere entering a stay, Pelster said.

Some employers are hesitant to issue mandates on their own because they have a large percentage of their workforce opposed to the shots at a time when hiring is tough, he said. For example, the employer may not want to lose 20% of its workforce over a mandate.

However, if an employer chooses to implement testing that is a cost that could function as a fine, Pelster said.

Employees who do not want to get a vaccine can ask for an exemption or accommodation based on their religion or disability, he said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Today marks the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks that claimed the lives of nearly 3,000 people. Here, we revisit Globe Gazette coverage from that day to remember how it impacted North Iowa.

The immediate reactions

On Sept. 12, 2001, the front page of the Globe Gazette read Terror Strikes as it reported the news of the terrorist attacks from the day prior.

In the days immediately after the attack, North Iowans who were in New York City at the time spoke with the Globe Gazette about what they saw.

I watched for about five minutes and then to my horror I saw the whole building collapse, said Kevin Dear, a Clear Lake resident working for Kingland Systems at the time. You could see the glass shimmering in the light as it collapsed.

A former Mason City resident, Kendra Shorten, was also in New York City at the time and spoke about the devastation she witnessed.

Im looking out my kitchen window right now and I can usually see the World Trade Center, but now its gone, Shorten said. Its really hard for me to talk about it without crying.
Morgan Pranger, a seventh grade social studies teacher at John Adams Middle School, said she pulls different sources when teaching about 9/11 to her students.

I usually start out with a video, sometimes its CNN 10. Sometimes its something else that I try and find on YouTube that shows both sides of what happened. Not just the American side, but why they did what they did, said Pranger.

Pranger, who is in her second year of teaching, was only six years old when the towers were hit. Talking to her fellow teachers and parents has helped her tell stories about what happened that day.

Clear Lake Middle School teacher Tom Hartwig shares both his perspectives of living through that day and as a firefighter.

Hartwig has been a part of the fire service for over 20 years and is currently a captain for the Clear Lake Fire Department. He said that having the personal experience as a fireman has helped teach his students about the mindset of emergency response on 9/11.
If you were to ask Mason City resident Gary Wattnem about what it was like working for the Pentagon at the time of Sept. 11, 2001, he would tell you about the people who went to work immediately to protect others against terrorist threats.

Wattnem, a retired major general in the Army, spent 35 years in the military and served in Vietnam for about a year in 1970-1971. Both his time in Vietnam and experiencing the aftermath of Sept. 11 were learning experiences, he said.

Wattnem was assigned to work for the Pentagon from June 1999 until he retired in November 2003. There he served as deputy chief of staff for logistics for the Army.

On the day that the Twin Towers were hit, Wattnem was scheduled to leave Mason City to go serve at the Pentagon.

I saw it on the television and then I got lots of calls wondering if I was at the Pentagon that day, said Wattnem.

Wattnems boss, a three-star general, told him to come to the Pentagon when he could. Wattnem would arrive a week later and stay for a few months.
It all came into sharp focus for Steve Howell on Sept. 11, 2001.

The Mason City resident and staff sergeant of the Army Reserves' 4249th MPs out of Pocahontas was on his way to the store to pick up a part needed to install satellite television at his home when he heard on the radio that a plane had struck the World Trade Center in New York.

And just like that he knew. His life was about to change.

LOOKING FOR A JOB

It was 1983. Farming and marriage were hard, and both had come to an end for Howell. Jobs were scarce and Howell needed money, so at age 29, he decided to enlist.

It wasn't an entirely foreign concept to Howell  his dad was a corporal in the Army during Vietnam  so he ended up in the Army as an infantryman. Turns out Howell was a pretty good soldier; he was recruited for officer school, but turned it down because he wanted to serve his time, get out and be with his kids.

Instead, he went into the Army Reserves in the 410th Arctic Rescue Unit out of Cedar Falls. When the National Guard came calling a couple of years later, he made the switch, while at the same time working as a private security guard.
This is now the third year that Iowas students have been affected by the pandemic, Langholz said, noting that strong opinions on the law were not a basis for a restraining order against it.

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Langholz said the law, House File 847, includes a saving clause. If a federal law required students to wear masks in schools, that would override the state law prohibiting mask mandates. However, he said, there was no such federal law.

I want to be absolutely clear that these defendants do not agree that any federal law that theyre aware of  mandates, as a matter of law, that universal mask mandates for an entire school district [exist], Langholz said.

Senior Judge Robert W. Pratt presided over the hearing. He did not say when he would decide whether to issue an injunction.

If he does issue a temporary restraining order against the law, Iowa school districts would be allowed to once again require universal masking at their buildings. But even that doesnt necessarily mean that mask mandates will click immediately into place: school districts would need to decide whether to require face coverings, a process that has been contentious in other states.
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP)  Federal and state lawyers will meet in North Dakota next week to negotiate a settlement for money that the state claims it spent on policing protests against the Dakota Access oil pipeline.

North Dakota filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 2019, seeking to recover more than $38 million in damages from the monthslong pipeline protests almost five years ago.

State Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem and other state lawyers will meet with attorneys from the Corps and Justice Department at the federal courthouse in Bismarck on Sept. 16. U.S. Magistrate Judge Alice Senechal will preside over the negotiations, which are closed to the public.

We will know on the 16th if they are serious in settling, Stenehjem said.

Its the first sit-down meeting with state and federal lawyers to work out a settlement, Stenehjem said. Federal judges handling the case have strongly suggested the negotiations, he said.

If no settlement can be reached, a trial is set for May 1, 2023.
She then gave him an assignment: Write a story about his first day in New York.

Thinking back, Jones said he was puzzled at the time about why he would be made to journal about his experience given the gravity of the situation.

I look back on it now, Im glad that she did, Jones explained Saturday morning.

For the first time, he read aloud that paper he wrote 20 years ago.

While he had never met any of the fellow firefighting brothers in New York, he felt he knew them. He would soon be in the front seat of a minivan heading to Ground Zero.

From my front seat, the view, which is now a movie screen to Ground Zero, my senses intensify, he said reading his 20-year-old class assignment.

All is silent in the minivan as they draw closer and closer to the ruins. Reality starts to sink in.

This is a not a movie set, he said. The destroyed buildings and everything was real.

Not even his years in the fire department  or his vast movie knowledge  could have prepared him for what he was about to see.
DALLAS (AP)  The CEO of Salesforce said the company will help employees leave Texas, and he did so while retweeting a story linking the offer to concern about Texas new anti-abortion law.

Salesforce, which sells customer-management software, joins a small number of companies that have reacted against the Texas law.

CNBC reported that the San Francisco-based company told employees in a Slack message it will help them move if you have concerns about access to reproductive healthcare in your state.

On Friday night, CEO Marc Benioff retweeted a post about the story, adding, Ohana if you want to move well help you exit TX. Your choice. Ohana is a Hawaiian term for family.

The company did not return messages for comment.

The Texas law passed the Republican-controlled state Legislature and was signed by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in May but didnt go into effect until this month. It bans most abortions after six weeks, before many women know whether they are pregnant, and lets private residents sue anyone who helps a woman get an abortion.
Why cant we even get people to come together and get a new George Wythe built now, that students needed yesterday? asked former Richmond School Board member Donald Coleman.

Chalk it up to the unfinished business that permeated Wednesdays proceedings.

Its an incredible moment, said Richmond City Councilman Andreas Addison. But I think its more of a symbol of the work to do now. Its the hard steps now that are going to be taken to remove the systemic racism that these have embodied for so long. Its going to take a lot of hard work.

That last sentence was the punctuation mark on a morning of celebration to a backbeat of hip-hop music from onlookers outside The 1805 apartment building.

Robert E. Lee! You was late on your rent! Youre evicted! one person shouted.

Soon, a statue that had been a towering fixture was humbly reduced by an unwillingness to abide Lost Cause idolatry any longer.

Were ecstatic, said Lawrence West, founder of Black Lives Matter RVA and a regular around the circle, which was reclaimed and informally renamed for Marcus-David Peters, a Black high school teacher who was shot and killed by a Richmond police officer during a mental health crisis in May 2018.
Krause had found another chance to call his wife while walking, but it was nonetheless an emotional moment when he and his wife finally met at home.

Krauses son, who was 8, came home from school but hadnt heard what had happened. The school he attended had many children of Defense Department parents, and school officials had kept the news from the children so they could hear it from their parents.

Krause is a 1981 graduate of Wake Forest University. After graduation, he spent nine years in the U.S. Army working in intelligence, a job that took him to work in the Pentagon. In 1990 he became a civilian Defense Department employee, continuing to work in the Pentagon and specializing in Latin America.

Defense Department employees are a dedicated bunch: Told by then-secretary Donald Rumsfeld to report to work the next day, the Pentagon employees dutifully arrived for work.

Krauses office was among one of the very closest ones to the boundary between parts of the Pentagon that were usable and areas that received extensive water damage; further in, fire damage and destruction.
Walking up Market Street, toward the setting sun, a few words of Sam Cookes A Change is Going to Come could be made out over the hum of food truck generators. The source of the singing was just up ahead, at the Old Courthouse Stage.

There, multiple performers collaborated to present Songs of Hope & Justice.

At the Lee Wrangler Stage, UNCG Old Time Ensemble led a community jam session to get the festival going. One fiddler played potatoes: a series of warm up notes that set the tempo, then the others joined in.

As the UNCG group played, other members of the community showed up with their instruments, swelling the group to more than 50 people. Most were string players, but there was also one person playing old time bassoon, as someone else jokingly referred to it.

Old Time Ensemble member Laurel Meitrodt said she is classically trained on the violin and that playing with the UNCG Old Time group has opened up a whole new world for her.

Meitrodt said shes attended the festival before, but she never imagined she would be there as a performer.

Its surreal, she said. I cant quite believe it yet.

Contact Jessie Pounds at 336-373-7002 and follow @JessiePounds on Twitter.

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So how did Bennett get on their radar? The schools alumnae look to be one likely culprit.

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Beyonce and Jay-Z have a history of being involved with some other scholarship gifts to HBCUs. That included Beyonce partnering with Googles charitable arm to provide the Homecoming Scholars Award program at eight other HBCUs for the 2018-19 school year.

Walsh said that alumnae of Bennett wrote to the couple to suggest they also consider Bennett Colleges students. The Carters teams, she said, indicated they had heard from the Bennett community.

I know thats one of the ways that called attention to Bennett, Walsh said.

Walsh said she learned about the gift a week ago. She said the college is set to receive $100,000 per year in scholarships for the next four years. Applications will be accepted through 11:59 p.m. on Sept. 26 and will be awarded based on financial need, with priority for students who need emergency financial assistance.

For many colleges, that wouldnt be all that much money. But Walsh said at Bennett, this scholarship grant is a big deal, and not so common, though she expects to announce another similarly sized gift soon.
That doesnt mean children can drink from water fountains worry-free, Graham said. For one, because kids under 12 are still ineligible to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.

If those kids become infected, theyre susceptible to higher viral loads in their mucosal surfaces, so in their noses, perhaps in their mouths as well, Graham said. If they then come in contact with a water fountain, with especially little kids, who tend to stick their mouths on water fountains, that becomes a potential increased vector transmission state.

Spread of other diseases

Its also important to consider the spread of other infectious diseases, Graham said.

COVID-19 may not be as transmissible through surfaces like a water fountain, but other infectious diseases like influenza and the common cold are, she said. And getting sick with the flu or a cold could make a child more susceptible to a COVID-19 infection too.

Thats because a healthy immune system is the primary barrier against any kind of infection, so if the immune system is already compromised, your chances of getting sick with other things increases as well, Graham said.

At the end of the day, its better to be cautious, Graham said.

Even though the data doesnt necessarily show a high risk of COVID-19 transmission through water fountains, she said she supports Chapel Hill-Carrboro schools keeping them shut for now and giving students access to bottle fillers instead.
DURHAM  Parents want to protect their children. Nida Allams parents did.

Allam, a Durham County commissioner and the first Muslim woman to hold elected office in North Carolina, was in third grade when the World Trade Center was attacked by Islamic extremists. Her parents tried to insulate their daughters from the aftermath, but they werent at school with their children.

At school, Allams teacher asked her to stand up and tell the class about her faith. At first, she didnt mind it.

When youre a kid, when youre getting that type of attention, youre like, Oh, this is something cool, Allam says. But then they started getting into questions about 9/11 and I was like, I have no idea what this is. I dont know whats going on. And what does this have to do with me or Muslims?

The Sept. 11 plane attacks were horrific. The subsequent treatment of Muslims in the United States also has been horrific. Both of these things can be true.

As we contemplate the 20th anniversary of the attacks, we must also consider the consequences. For young adults, these consequences have shaped our worldviews. For young Muslim adults, these consequences have shaped everything.
First and foremost, pregnant women frequently put their developing fetus ahead of the concerns for themselves or their own health, she said. What we really try to do is talk to pregnant women and their families about the fact that in order to have a healthy baby we really need to make sure we have a healthy mother.

In addition, until recently the message about vaccination was less clear for pregnant women than the population as a whole. Because pregnant women were not enrolled in clinical trials for the vaccines, public health officials sent mixed messages about their safety that led to confusion, Swamy said.

Now, after months of use, including by many pregnant women, researchers have data to show that the vaccine works just as well in pregnant women and is just as safe. Last month, the CDC and other federal health officials issued their clearest guidance yet in support of vaccination for pregnant women.

The best way to reduce your risk, to take care of yourself during pregnancy, is to get vaccinated, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said during a press conference last month. Thats why were working hard to get that message out.
Alternate history  a genre of fiction that asks what if of crucial historic events  can produce thought-provoking questions and insights.

Many have wondered over the last couple of decades: What if then-President George W. Bush had paid better attention to the memo titled Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US, delivered to him in August 2001? Or what if Osama bin Laden had been captured in Afghanistan, where he was hiding, in December 2001? For that matter, what if then-President Bill Clinton had ordered the assassination of bin Laden in 1998? Any of those decisions would have dramatically changed the course of these last 20 years.

But theyre still just questions with no definitive answers. Averting one disaster may have led to another, even worse. We just dont know. We dont get to travel down that timeline.

But we still ask.

The one that sticks with us: What if, rather than invest some $2.261 trillion (an estimate from Brown University) in a futile war, wed invested that money in the U.S. (America first!): in education, affordable and attainable health care, infrastructure, and battling the rising effects of climate change?
Shahana Hanif, a community organizer strongly favored to win a seat on the New York City Council in the upcoming municipal election, stands in front of her home in the Kensington neighborhood of the Brooklyn borough of New York, on Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2021. In 2001, mere weeks after the twin towers at the World Trade Center fell, car passed, the drivers window rolled down and the man spat an epithet at two little girls wearing their hijabs: Terrorist! as a 10-year-old Shahana and her younger sister were walking to the local mosque from their Brooklyn home. Unsure, afraid, the girls ran.
Letters to the Editor: Stop the COVID madness; Time to start working to solve our problems
When they finally made it out through the tunnel under Corridor 5 to South Parking, there were thousands of people already out and away from the building, and cars were stopped bumper to bumper on all the freeways in every direction.

We were told by our section leader to make our way home as quickly as possible, and establish telephone communications with him at his house, recounted Driscoll, who chose to walk due to the intense traffic jams the attack created. My Army black beret was still in my office, and so I was self conscious about being outside and 'out of uniform.'

As he continued along the river, he passed people who were obviously seriously injured and were waiting for a way to the hospital. But it was doubtful that any ambulances could get through because of the traffic jams that ringed the Pentagon.

If someone ever makes a movie

The memory that stays with me is of piles of odds and ends, the kinds of personal things we all have in (our vehicles) ... that people had just emptied the contents of their cars onto the ground, to make way for injured bodies that needed to be at the hospital, he wrote.

Driscoll bypassed his normal route across the Memorial Bridge, kept moving up the Potomac's shoreline, and hand-climbed up onto the Roosevelt Bridge.
John Metzger said he wanted to write a simple letter to Osama bin Laden shortly after a jetliner hit the Pentagon where Metzger was working on Sept. 11, 2001 and changed the world forever:

You missed me, you SOB.

And 20 years later, Metzger, who is now retired and now lives in Helena, offered his memories of the terrorist attacks masterminded by bin Laden in which the Pentagon was hit, the Twin Towers in New York City tumbled to the ground and a field in Pennsylvania served as a crash site.

In all, nearly 3,000 people were killed.

Metzger was working as a defense analyst for the Office of the Secretary of Defense and remembered hearing a pop. It was followed by a blast of air and then a wall of heat that Tuesday morning.

He said he thought he was caught up in a Tom Clancy novel or in a version of The War of the Worlds.

Everything had to click in pretty quickly after that, Metzger said.

American Airlines Flight 77, a Boeing 757 passenger jet with 64 people on board and carrying 11,400 gallons of fuel slammed into the building at 535 mph at 9:37 a.m.

There were 125 military personnel and civilians who were killed in the Pentagon, along with all 64 people aboard the airliner.

The windows in Metzgers office shattered and the heat was so intense it melted concrete. Metzger tells of a coworker on the third floor of the four-story building who was crawling on the floor when it gave out from under her and she tumbled onto the second floor, suffering broken ribs.

And the fire was so hot that safes melted, he recalled. And portions of the building, which had decades-old horse hair insulation, then burned for days as firefighters could not extinguish the blaze.

He also recalls the smell of the fuel was overwhelming. He said evacuation plans had to change in order to avoid dangerous areas. They had to reevaluate the evacuation plan and came up with an alternative plan.

There were some sad ironies that day as well. Metzger had a friend aboard the flight that was headed for Los Angeles. He also said that about a year earlier he had moved his office and avoided a direct hit.

His previous office had been in the heliport area where the plane crashed.

Had I not moved I would not be talking to you today, he said.

Metzger also recalled a friend who was a first-responder who had found a body at the crash site in which the face had been shredded off.

The Pentagon had evacuation plans in case and fire and he and others were able to get out to the parking lot.

It was chaotic, Metzger, now 64, recalls. But he said those in Pentagon had been notified shortly prior that the Twin Towers had fallen.

There was no doubt in our mind that it was a terrorist attack, he said.

He said cellphone traffic was so bad that his phone would have done him more good on the bottom of the Potomac River. Two hours later he found a payphone and was able to call his wife and tell her he was OK.

They were very glad to hear my voice on the phone, he said.

Children had been sent home from school. And he had rode his bike to work, which turned out to be a fortuitous decision as vehicular traffic clogged roadways.

By Thursday Metzger was back inside the Pentagon. We werent told to come back, we knew we had to come back, he said, recalling there was a general feeling it was time to focus on bin Laden.

Its payback time, he said. It galvanized the entire building.

Metzger said it also prompted the high-power agencies of the National Security Administration, the CIA and FBI to work together.

We were able to bury the differences we had in the Pentagon and were able to work together, he said.

Metzger said there were four or five evacuations on that Thursday and Friday, because the fire was so close to offices.

Much of the coverage was focused on the Twin Towers and the field in Pennsylvania where the airliner crashed where passengers boldly tried to commandeer the plane from the terrorists.

I think the Pentagon wanted to be the lesser story, Metzger said,

It was on the bike ride home that Thursday that the gravity of the previous few days caught up with him. He could see floodlights on the building and there were still flames. It was then that he wept.

"It was just a rough day," Metzger said.

Years later, when it was announced that bin Laden had been killed, Metzger said he cheered.

It was a great day, he said.

Metzger has photos of the Pentagon after it was hit and a diagram that shows what areas burned.

"(It's) a reminder, always a reminder," he said.

Metzger said 9/11 is now a day of quiet contemplation, and he says he wonders why it took a disaster like this to bring the country together. Its something he said he thinks about as the nation slinks into divisiveness. He said there are today just as serious threats to our lives.

On 9/11, the country rallied to fight a common foe, he said.

We were Americans and this was in the United States of America and that is all we needed to know.

Assistant editor Phil Drake can be reached at 406-231-9021.

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DECATUR  Moundford Free Methodist Church, 1803 E. Mound Rd, will be hosting a guest speaker, Sonja Jones at the church on Sunday, Sept. 12, at 10 a.m. She was a contestant on Season 16 of the Biggest Loser and an author. She is also a Greenville University graduate, which is affiliated with our church.

***

DECATUR  Westminster Presbyterian Church will host a rummage sale on Friday, Sept. 10, from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. and Saturday, Sept. 11, from 8 a.m. to noon at 1360 W. Main St., Decatur.

For more information contact Diana Rinchiuso at 217-425-9529 or 217-855-1976.

***

Deadline for items in Faith Notes is noon Monday for publication in Saturdays section. Send information to: Herald & Review, 601 E. William St., Decatur, IL 62523, lmargerum@herald-review.com, or fax (217) 421-7965. Please include a contact phone number for verification.

Lynda Margerum at 217-421-7969. Follow on Twitter: LMargerumHR

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DECATUR  Heroes can be made right in our own backyard.

On Friday, Dove, Inc. and their Retired and Senior Volunteer Program, or RSVP, and the Senior Companion Program, or SCP, organized a blood drive under the title Meet a Hero, Be a Hero.

The event, set up in the parking lot of the First Evangelical Lutheran Church on West Decatur Street, was designed to encourage the community to donate blood during a time of remembrance.

Its been 20 years of 9/11, said Kathy Walters, program coordinator for Dove. We as well have two people that actually did service at 9/11.

Blue Mound resident Amy Patient and Roger Troxel from Bloomington swapped stories about their experiences while waiting for donors to stop by on Friday. Both Illinois residents traveled to New York City after the September 11 attacks to provide services needed during the tragic time 20 years ago.

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According to Walters, the Doves senior programs host an annual Day of Service. Local heroes were invited to this years event, including Macon County sheriffs deputies, Decatur police officers, and representatives from the Decatur Ambulance Service.

Were here to thank them for their service as well, Walters said.

Donors were given the opportunity to give blood and speak with the first responders and volunteers.

Twenty years ago, Troxel was a member of the Associated Fire Fighters of Illinois. As an honor guard, he had a special mission during that time.

Thats what we do. We train for funerals, he said.

The New York City ceremonies included bagpipes and drums. The experience encouraged Troxel to learn how to play bagpipes, which he brought to Fridays blood drive. Throughout the event, he performed for volunteers and donors.

For her work during the 9/11 aftermath, Patient volunteered for the Red Cross handing out money to New York residents surrounding Ground Zero.

People lost their homes, they lost their places to live, their jobs, she said.

The Red Cross donations were given for rent, groceries, internet and other utilities. We made sure they could live comfortably, Patient said. We went door to door to make sure their needs were met.

The area consisted of a 12-mile area that makes up Manhattan, according to Patient.

It impacted pretty much everybody there, she said.

Patient also assisted serving meals, organizing a shelter, hosting therapy dog sessions, and planning funerals. People from other countries were also affected by the disaster, including Brazil, Colombia, Chile, China and Argentina. Patient assisted with their families care as well.

Throughout the years, the volunteers often attend events similar to Doves blood drive ready to talk about their experiences.

September 11 is hard to remember, Patient said. But September 12 is what people need to remember.

The country united after the attacks 20 years ago, according to Patient.

We didnt know color, we didn't know politics, we didnt know one country from another, she said. We knew our world hurt. We cared about everybody. Unfortunately thats what brings us together.

Contact Donnette Beckett at (217) 421-6983. Follow her on Twitter: @donnettebHR

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DECATUR  The Rev. Rob Goodwin watched the second plane hit the World Trade Center from his office window in Manhattan on Sept. 11, 2001.

Goodwin was not a pastor then; he was a businessman, working in what he thought was his dream job, with a corner office and managing hundreds of employees. Now senior pastor at St. Paul's Lutheran Church, he said that day started him on the journey that brought him to the ministry and to Decatur.

It was a weird morning, he said. I got into the office and we were closed in to one of my bosses' offices and we were talking and we got a call from the secretary saying 'A plane just went into the World Trade Center.' Right away, if you worked in New York City, you knew that that's not normal. Planes don't fly around the World Trade Center.

Goodwin's parents were at home with his wife, Sherrill, in New Jersey, and were due to fly home that day. He called home and told them all to stay put. He knew something was going on and that it was likely airports would be shut down.

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Right then, the (phone) lines cut off, he said. We couldn't communicate. Cell phones didn't work. Nothing really worked. So we turned on the TV in the conference room and looked out (the window) and you could see the World Trade Center from our conference room and we were sort of watching the TV and the World Trade Center.

People from throughout the office gathered in the conference room to watch, also, and that's when they all saw the second plane hit.

Not long after, the building was evacuated, because it was one of the tallest buildings at the edge of Central Park. Rumors were flying, but nobody knew what was actually happening yet. Subways shut down. There was no traffic on the streets of one of the busiest cities in the world. Goodwin and his co-workers left the building, using the stairs because the elevators were shut down, and went to a neighborhood pub. They had been warned to avoid places that attracted tourists, just in case. They spent several hours there watching unfolding events on TV.

Goodwin was an elder in his church, and people approached him, asking for prayer and counsel.

It was an opportunity for me to minister to people I never thought I'd minister to, he said.

With public transportation shut down, and most bridges leading out of Manhattan closed, people had to walk and try to find ways to leave the island. Some of his co-workers heard the Brooklyn Bridge was open and decided to try to cross that way, while he and some of the others went back to the office to see if they could get on the internet and find out what was happening. From the office, they could see people crossing the George Washington Bridge, and decided to head that way.

It was an eerie feeling, he said. Seventh Avenue, Broadway, it's always packed with people. There was not a car anywhere on the street. It was just desolate. People were walking, and some of them were covered in soot because they'd been down there close to it. They were sort of out of it and in shock at what was happening.

A subway line was open and they took that to the bridge, but when they arrived, there had just been a bomb threat against the bridge and it was shut down. Goodwin flagged down a truck and asked for a ride. Streets were shut down even in New Jersey. It was almost 11 p.m. before Goodwin reached his home.

Decatur native Jennifer Thomas was in her second year of teaching high school in Central Florida and had just called her father to have her class sing Happy Birthday to him when the teacher in the next classroom rushed in to tell her to turn on the TV.

She left the sound off and was standing in front of the class when she saw a student's jaw drop. She looked at the TV just in time to see the first tower's collapse.

I decided at that point to turn the TV off, Thomas said. It was upsetting, and I just didn't know what was appropriate. We had no directions (from administration).

Her school was right across the river from Cape Canaveral in Florida, and because no one knew what might be the next target, things shut down there, too.

Now a teacher at Richland Community College and Millikin University, she's teaching students who weren't yet born on that day, and trying to bring home to them how significant the event was and how it still has an impact on everyday life. She talks about the cleanup efforts and how little was left after the towers collapsed. One thing she found especially poignant was a table filled with credit cards that had belonged to people who were now deceased.

That always stopped me in my tracks, she said.

Another was the account of a man whose wife had perished in the Twin Towers. When he got her car back, there was a bagel inside with one bite taken out of it. A window washer at the Twin Towers that day used his squeegee to pry open an elevator door so people could get out and escape down the stairs. Helping her students visualize the chaos and terror makes it more real for them, she said.

I look back and think about how America rallied around and (former President) George Bush on the pile of debris with the bullhorn, she said. We were together and we were America. It makes me wonder, if something like Sept. 11 happened again, would we see the same kind of coming together? I don't know. I don't have the same confidence I used to have in our ability to unify.

Amy Yusko, now a teacher at Lutheran School Association, was a senior in high school that day and it wasn't until her third hour class that she realized what was happening in New York. As her grandparents remembered Pearl Harbor, and her parents remember the assassination of John F. Kennedy, she said, her where were you when ? moment is 9/11.

I have to admit that when I heard about the World Trade Center buildings being hit by planes, I didnt even know what those buildings were or where they were, Yusko said. I had never heard of them. It seems strange today to think there was a time I didnt know what those buildings were, because now they are etched forever in my mind and in my heart.

As I found my seat with my classmates in that class, I remember my teacher saying, 'We wont be doing anything I had planned today. This is something we need to watch. This is something we wont ever forget.' Her words didnt resonate with me at the time, but as the years have gone by, I have come to realize that she was right  we wouldnt forget, and we never should.

She said she shows her students videos taken that day and has them research the event, and that while she understands they won't have the same emotional reaction that she does, she wants them to respect it the way she does Pearl Harbor Day. She planned an assembly at LSA on Sept. 10 to mark the 20th anniversary of Sept. 11 and students have written letters to first responders asking them for a photo of themselves and to answer a few questions for a planned Hallway of Heroes display at the school to mark First Responders Day on Oct. 28.

Contact Valerie Wells at (217) 421-7982. Follow her on Twitter: @modgirlreporter

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DECATUR  The Macon County Health Department reported 72 new COVID-19 cases on Friday.

This brings the total number of COVID-19 cases to 13,817 since the start of the pandemic, said county health educator Krystle Tempel.

The most recent statistics show there have been 220 COVID-related deaths in Macon County since the pandemic began, and 34 residents were hospitalized with the virus as of Friday.

The health department and the the Illinois Department of Public Health also announced Friday there have been 324 variant COVID-19 cases in Macon County.

The most prevalent is the UK variant, with 143 cases. There also have been 87 cases of the Brazil/Gamma variants, 81 cases of the Delta variant, six cases of the California variant (B.1.429), four cases of the South Africa variant, two cases of the Mu variant and one case of the California variant (B.1.427).

The health department is offering the first doses of the Pfizer vaccine next week at the following times and locations:

Richland Community College (Enter at the flag poles), 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 15. Must return to Richland Community College Wednesday, Oct. 6, to receive the second dose.

Macon County Health Department, 1221 E. Condit St., Decatur, 1 p.m. to 3:15 p.m., Wednesday, Sept. 15. Must return to MCHD Wednesday, Oct. 6, to receive the second dose.

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Bring insurance card and photo ID if possible. Minors must be accompanied by an adult parent or guardian. If someone other than a parent or legal guardian is planning to bring a child, the permission and proxy form will need to be filled out and signed by the parent or legal guardian ahead of time. Forms are available on the health department's website.

Individuals who are pregnant or nursing should not attend unless they have a doctors note or if they have previously received a COVID-19 vaccine of any kind.

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SHELBYVILLE  Two people died Friday when an oncoming vehicle pulled into the path of the motorcycle they were riding in Shelby County, authorities said.

Illinois State Police said in a news release that the collision occurred around 9:36 p.m. Friday along County Road 2100 North between County Road 800 East and 900 East. The names of the deceased are being withheld pending notification of family.

According to a preliminary investigation, State Police said a vehicle driven by a 36-year-old Westervelt woman was traveling eastbound on 2100 North Road when she attempted to pass an unknown vehicle in a no-passing zone and collided with the westbound motorcycle.

The Westervelt woman was transported to an area hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.

State Police said the Westervelt woman was ticketed for aggravated driving under the influence causing death to another, aggravated driving under the influence, operating an uninsured motor vehicle, passing in a no-passing zone, and operating an uninsured motor vehicle causing injury.

The investigation is ongoing.

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DECATUR  They came from all over, but they were united in their mission.

We ride to remember our first responders, the people who put their life on the line day-in and day-out, Greg Sullivan, a Navy veteran who this year's 9/11 Remembrance Ride hosted by Coziahr Harley-Davidson in Forsyth on Friday.

We take the time every year to set some time aside and go out to show them our appreciation."

This was the sixth year for the event, which always coincides with the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and honors those who lost their live on that day.

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We feel very passionate about making our first responders and military members feel supported, said Loren McGinnis, Coziahr's marketing manager. Its important to make the community know that we havent forgotten and that were still going to make it known that we all stand together.

Participants left the dealership, riding under a large American flag flown by both the Mount Zion and Hickory Point fire departments on their way to the 9/11 memorial along Lake Decatur where they paid their respects and prayed together.

Dennis Downing, retired fire chief and current member of the Hickory Point Fire Department, said he still remembers watching the television in the firehouse 20 years ago when the attacks happened and being glued to it as updates were being reported.

You cant suppress your memories and wherever somebody was at that time, this helps lighten those memories and keep them alive, Downing said.

Others like John Grussing, a retired firefighter from Normal, said he tries to make it out to Coziahr every year for the ride and believes other people should take the opportunity as well.

Having been a firefighter for 27 years, Grussing said he went to New York after the attacks to help with the recovery effort and did not really grasp what had happened until he arrived there.

It was mind boggling but it reaffirmed our commitment to the job, Grussing said. We all have hectic schedules but tomorrow it just takes a few minutes to reflect and remember those guys because we can never forget.

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Note: Michael Paul Williams is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist at the Richmond Times-Dispatch in Virginia. This column was written for the 9/11 commemorative section published in this weekend's newspaper.

On this day 20 years ago, Democrats and Republicans gathered in grief and resolve on the steps of the U.S. Capitol.

"When people perpetrate acts against this country, we as a Congress and as a government stand united, and we stand together," said House Speaker Dennis Hastert, moments before the group burst into a spontaneous singing of "God Bless America."

It was a show of unity for a traumatized nation, desperate for solace in the aftermath of an unimaginable attack.

Now, were splintered in ways we never would have predicted. The terrorism we feared from outside our nation is being birthed, bred and fed from within. Our country, which withstood a multi-pronged assault plotted by Osama bin Laden, staggers today from self-inflicted wounds.

As we pause today to reflect upon the loss of life and our sense of impregnability, it's time to re-establish our sense of collective purpose.

We will never forget the nightmare of airplanes flying into the World Trade Center, or those towers disintegrating before our eyes; the scorched Pentagon; the passenger heroism on Flight 93, which crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, before its hijackers could plow the plane into the U.S. Capitol; or the grounding of passenger planes throughout the United States, even as President George W. Bush, en route to Washington from Florida, remained airborne on Air Force One during the uncertain hours after the attack.

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But we cannot let these harrowing memories, and the manipulation of new fears, goad us into furthering the terrorists' cause of bringing this nation down. Unity and resolve must triumph over the scare tactics and lies that our adversaries  foreign and domestic  weaponize to divide us.

Shortly after Sept. 11, a classic American battle came to the fore, as our better angels grappled with our inner demons.

"In fighting against bad things, we can't forget what we're fighting for," said Mary Bauer, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia.

For Jason Mollica, a professor in the School of Communication at American University in Washington, the impact of the attack hit close: He lost two cousins at the World Trade Center. A family friend  a Port Authority officer  rushed into a twin tower to help people and never came out.

"Obviously, it brought people together," he said of the attack, which took place months after the contentious outcome of the presidential contest between George W. Bush and Al Gore. Unfortunately, I think were more divided than we were, even prior to 9/11.

"Im not sure if well ever get back to that point of feeling that pride in coming together  of making sure that as a nation we are one."

A common refrain about the people who'd terrorized our nation from without was, They hate our freedom. And then we proceeded to chisel away at those freedoms from within.

We embraced policies  such as the mass surveillance of U.S. citizens under the Patriot Act and the torture of mostly Muslim and Arab detainees at Guantanamo Bay  that are anathema to what our nation professes to stand for.

"We have a history as a nation of reacting to tragedy and bad things that happen by cracking down on civil liberties in really terrible ways," Bauer said, citing the Palmer Raids to capture and deport suspected leftists, anarchists and communists after World War I; the incarceration of people of Japanese descent, including U.S. citizens, in internment camps during World War II; and government spying on U.S. citizens during the Red Scare of the 1950s. "And I see 9/11 in that same way," she said, citing a "huge surge" in discrimination against American Muslims.

In the aftermath of the attack, we launched wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Iraqi invasion, in search of illusory weapons of mass destruction, destabilized the region, bolstered Iran and gave rise to the Islamic State. And Afghanistan, with the withdrawal of U.S. military support, has again fallen under the control of the Taliban, leaving our Afghan allies and that nation's women mired in uncertainty.

The failure of those protracted wars is a defining aspect of the post-9/11 era, said Angus Kress Gillespie, a professor in the American Studies Department at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J.

"We got used to the idea of a forever war," Gillespie said. "And as it turns out, I believe both were not winnable. The real victor in Iraq was Iran. And apparently, the real victor in Afghanistan is the Taliban. And so the takeaway I see is we cannot be the policeman of the world; that we have to give up on imperialism and militarism.

Meanwhile, our lives changed in ways big and small.

Mollica cites the acceleration of a cultural shift: the dominance of the 24-hour news cycle on television. News cameras remained trained on ground zero. Mollica, who lived in South Jersey at the time, left his TV on all night after the attack.

Our nation created a huge new bureaucracy, the Department of Homeland Security, and its offshoot, the Transportation Security Administration. Air travel would never be the same, with longer lines and more inconvenience. The heightened vigilance at airport checkpoints  down to the 3.4 ounce limit on liquid containers we are allowed to carry  is a constant reminder of the day those planes were hijacked and crashed.

Gillespie supports TSA efforts to keep weapons off airplanes as "common-sense reform." But he laments the more negative impulses stemming from 9/11.

"I think there is this hostility toward all Arab Muslims, and thats not a good thing," he said. "Another bad thing is theres this crackdown on immigration, with the suspicion that anybody whos coming to the United States is a potential terrorist."

Indeed, other than the victims, survivors and first responders of 9/11, no one has borne the brunt of 9/11 more heavily than American Muslims.

"We went through some challenging times," said Imad Damaj, outreach chair for the Islamic Center of Virginia. But he has also experienced support and interfaith relationship building. So while I acknowledge it was a challenging 20 years  and still is to a certain extent  Im also very hopeful that we as a nation are going to think of ourselves as one community, connected to each other."

Damaj, a native of Lebanon, sees this day as a time for the survivors to remember loved ones; for community and national remembrance; and to recapture the unity we felt after the attack. "We need to bring back that spirit, together."

That's no easy task in a nation that can't find the capacity to unite against a deadly virus.

The once all-encompassing threat of Islamist terror is now overshadowed by the homegrown terror of white supremacists. Democracy is reeling from a toxic brew of rage, paranoia and pandemic-induced isolation. On the same steps where congresspersons consoled a nation in shock, a violent mob stormed the U.S. Capitol, intent on overturning the results of a presidential election.

During times of adversity, we discover who we are. This is that moment.

Ultimately, I believe optimism will triumph over cynicism, and that our nation's eloquent blueprint will someday be realized. Striving to make America's grandest aspirations real is the highest expression of patriotism.

We can't make America great if we lack a consensus on what it means to be an American. We must rally against the enemy within that has turned us against each other.

What better time for us to start than now?

On this solemn day, we honor the victims by teaching our children how we were attacked, how we answered, and the lessons we should draw from our response. We recapture the compassion and valor in that response, but cast the hate and bigotry aside. We create a fairer, more equitable America  a nation whose ideals are worth protecting and perfecting.

We are only as great as the least of us. And we stand tallest when we stand together.

Michael Paul Williams is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist from Lee Enterprises' Richmond Times-Dispatch in Virginia. He can be reached at mwilliams@timesdispatch.com.

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If you are in a neighborhood, as a young Black or brown man, and you do not see any hope ... you dont see opportunity, that is the breeding ground for the kind of violent outbursts that were seeing.
CHICAGO  Dozens of employees of the Art Institute of Chicago rallied this week in support of a move to start a union at one of the country's largest art museums.

Organizers hope the museum will voluntarily recognize the union if enough employees sign signature cards in support, avoiding a formal vote. They declined to say this week how many employees have signed so far.

The Chicago Tribune reports that about 200 employees of the museum and the associated School of the Art Institute marched down Michigan Avenue on Thursday evening before holding a rally outside the museum.

The union would be part of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. Employees of other prominent art museums have successfully formed unions with AFSCME in recent years, including the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles.

A spokesman for AFSCME Anders Lindall said the Art Institute union would represent about 340 non-management employees including curators, custodians, librarians and retail workers.

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There are about 600 employees at the museum.

Sheila Majumdar, a member of the union organizing committee, said staff need more input in the museum's operations.

Majumdar, who is an editor in the museum's publication department, said they will push for higher wages and better working conditions after more than 200 layoffs and furloughs during the COVID-19 pandemic.

"The disconnect between what is reality in our day-to-day work and what leadership thinks is going on is just baffling," Majumdar said.

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Another Tuesday in Americus, Georgia. Sunny and pleasant. I head off to the campus of Georgia Southwestern State University, where I teach in the School of Education. The kids are safely at school and my wife is already on campus. She has a course to teach today. I am enjoying the prospect of a teaching and meeting free day. Of course, I need to prepare for the classes I will teach the next day.

As I am preparing lessons in my office, a colleague shows up and sticks her head in my door. She says, Did you hear about the plane crash in New York? I had not. She said a plane had slammed into one of the World Trade Center buildings. Recalling the bombing attack of the Trade Center eight years earlier, I immediately asked her if it was an act of terrorism. She said the reports were mixed. Some say it was a small plane and others say it was a passenger airliner. Neither of those situations sounded like terrorism to me. More like pilot error. I returned to my work.

My colleague was a bit more worried about the circumstance. She decided to continue to monitor the news. Her instincts were correct as she returned 15 minutes later and said it was a passenger airliner that had been highjacked and that the Pentagon had been struck also. I knew I would never be able to concentrate on my lesson plans. Instead, I jumped in the car and hurried home.

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Americus is such a small town it only took me about eight minutes to drive home. I switched on our only radio station. It was affiliated with CBS, so CBS news was broadcasting live from near the Pentagon. They described a massive explosion that took out a huge section of one of the walls. Eyewitnesses said a plane had flown into it. Other buildings around the District were being hastily evacuated, including the White House and the Capitol building. Now I was not worried, but instead I was mortified. What was happening to America? I sped up some.

When I arrived home, I switched on CNN on the TV. There was Aaron Brown, on a building a ways away from the World Trade Center, updating viewers as the two towers burned in the background. Debris seemed to be falling from the towers. A report came in that said people were jumping from the buildings to escape the fires. My heart sank with this news. Reports of an airliner crashing in a field in Pennsylvania filtered into the broadcast. As I continued watching the program the second tower seemed to shiver and then peel back like a banana. The obvious implications of what had just happened caused my stomach to turn. People were dying in New York City and elsewhere. I was filled with worry and dread for my wifes cousin who worked for the EPA in D.C. Would she be okay? Was the Metro still running and also the Manassas rail line? She needed those to get to her home in Virginia.

When the second tower collapsed, it was almost too much for me. I was old enough to remember the day President Kennedy was assassinated. This felt much worse. I felt helpless sitting in a family room in our home in Georgia. I felt incredible sadness with a dose of anger. Who would do all of this? To what end?

I was hollowed out by the afternoon but could not stop watching the news. I knew that my day would not get better. Our three children were 10, 9 and 5. All three are intelligent and inquisitive. They would want answers. I wanted some too. It would be a long evening attempting to explain how some people are evil and desperate. It is why we all need to be kind, even when it is difficult. I hope no one will experience another day like 9/11 in their lifetimes. God bless all the heroes from 9/11 and the ensuing days. Oh, how my heart still aches thinking about the passengers on those jets and the people who just went to work like every Tuesday, until it wasnt. I cannot forget that day. What about you?

Doug Hatch is an associate professor in the Illinois State University College of Education. He moved to Normal in August 2002.

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President Joe Bidens bid to placate far-left members of his party by extending a moratorium on evictions has, predictably, crumbled following last weeks U.S. Supreme Court ruling declaring the moratorium unconstitutional. St. Louis-area courts quickly followed with orders for sheriffs to resume evictions of tenants who are long overdue paying their rent. That means the nation is back to square one when it comes to protecting families whose principal breadwinners became financially strapped because of the pandemic.

Biden had declared his unwillingness to extend a previous eviction moratorium because Supreme Court justices made clear they would not uphold any future moratoriums without specific congressional approval. The House failed to act as their summer recess approached, which prompted progressive protesters to stage a round-the-clock vigil on the Capitol steps to draw attention to the millions of people at the brink of homelessness.

It was Congress, not Biden, who failed to respond once the Supreme Court issued its warning. Now, no amount of protests can stop the coming tsunami of evictions. Landlords across the country have been forced for months simply to eat the billions of dollars in costs rung up by their non-paying tenants, and they have justifiably reached the limits of their tolerance.

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At the same time, family breadwinners are well justified in fearing the dangers of returning to potentially crowded workplaces. Consider the paltry attendance figures at recent Cardinals games: The public, regardless of financial means, remains highly skeptical about the safety of any close-quarters mingling.

Congress has approved $46 billion for rental assistance to help tenants and landlords make it through the pandemics first wave. But by mid-August, only $4.2 billion had reached households, the National Low Income Housing Coalition reports. Most states have distributed less than 10% of the funds they were allotted. Missouri has distributed 10.5%. Which means lots of money sat undisbursed while landlord frustrations grew and tenants inched closer to the inevitable day when deputies armed with eviction orders would come pounding at the door.

The first order of business, then, is for Missouri and other states to distribute the aid and avert a national homelessness crisis.

Since coronavirus infections are now rising sharply again, employee fears of returning to their jobs are only going to grow. The members of Congress who led the pressure campaign to make Biden extend the moratorium now must go the traditional route: writing legislation, negotiating compromises with skeptics, and using their best powers of persuasion on the floors of Congress to convince members that a new moratorium is urgently needed.

Winning over Congress promises to be a lot harder than doing TV interviews while camping out on the Capitol steps. But if this is the only option likely to pass Supreme Court muster, it sure seems worth a try.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch

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In the past two weeks, weve seen reports about the harm Americas withdrawal from Afghanistan is bound to bring for women, girls, journalists and allies. But one group that hasnt received much attention is American veterans whose tours of duty have long since ended. Experts say the news coming out of Afghanistan is likely to reopen emotional wounds for many of them.

Matthew Cassady, a program manager with the Veterans Affairs Chaplain Service, said recent events have brought difficult memories to the front burner for many veterans.

I think we certainly are seeing some things amplify, specifically in the mental health realm, Cassady said. The images that weve seen on television and different news networks have been absolutely heartbreaking for many of us. We know the people. We know the customs. We know the culture. And we know how difficult this is for them right now just seeing this happen. It hurts.

Nancy Ramsay is director of the Soul Repair Center, a clinic at Brite Divinity School at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth that offers training for chaplains and religious leaders caring for veterans. The Soul Repair Center is a leading voice highlighting something called moral injury, a wound of conscience that results when those in a dire situation like war violate their core moral beliefs. Ramsay said veterans may feel that the withdrawal has violated a moral code.

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What Im hearing is that theres great anxiety on the part of vets who know that they were protected by these persons and feel an obligation, understandably, to make sure our commitments to them were fulfilled, Ramsay said.

She said theres a link between moral injury and high suicide rates among veterans. We need to pay attention to the ways in which these events could trigger really painful emotions and memories, she said.

And Ramsay said this phenomenon will not just be limited to those who served in Afghanistan.

Everything I can see suggests that there are a number of folks who served in Afghanistan and possibly also Vietnam for whom these days are very challenging, Ramsay said.

Military leaders are aware of those challenges. Last week, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley both spoke out about the emotional dynamics for veterans.

All of this is very personal for me. This is a war that I fought in and led. I know the country, I know the people, and I know those who fought alongside me, said Austin, a retired four-star Army general who served as a commander in Afghanistan. We have a moral obligation to help those who helped us. And I feel the urgency deeply.

Ramsay and Cassady said its important for all Americans to know that veterans may be affected by recent news, even if they didnt serve in Afghanistan, and that each veterans moral wounds will heal differently. For veterans in our neighborhoods, workplaces and social networks, we should take the emotional toll seriously. We shouldnt make assumptions about how theyre processing the news. We shouldnt try to elicit political opinions or war stories from them. We should be quick to listen and slow to speak. And, Cassady reminded, it never hurts to thank them for their service.

Dallas Morning News Editorial

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Democrats in the General Assembly seem to think a swatch of ethics reform is better than none at all.

They pushed through a bill that nips at the edges of Springfields decades-old culture of corruption, while leaving out measures that would have cleaned up Illinois politics in a much more comprehensive, enduring way.

A sandblasting was called for. Instead, they opted to feather-dust.

Republicans opposed this lip-service approach to the ethics overhaul thats desperately needed in the state capital. But Democrats control both chambers and the Governors Mansion, and had more than enough votes to get SB 539 passed Thursday.

Still, Democrats say theyre shocked, shocked! at GOP opposition. Why, they ask, would Republicans try to derail any kind of ethics reform?

The answers simple. When it comes to corruption in Springfield, half measures wont cut it.

So whats the bill that Democrats passed? It demands that officials disclose more about their personal financial interests. It also keeps legislators from lobbying their former colleagues after leaving office, and permits the General Assemblys watchdog, the legislative inspector general, to begin probes of alleged wrongdoing without the go-ahead from a commission made up of the very lawmakers the IG is supposed to police.

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But given the scale of corruption tainting Illinois politics, thats not nearly enough.

We have said before what Illinois needs when it comes to ethics reform.

Give the inspector general power to issue subpoenas and release reports on lawmakers without the ethics commissions blessing. Broaden the scope of the inspector generals mission to include alleged wrongdoing outside of lawmakers public duties. Add nonpartisan citizen representation to the ethics commission, so that the 4-4 partisan deadlock that stymies investigations can be broken.

Those measures are nowhere to be found in the version of ethics reform Democrats backed. Without them, the legislative inspector general lacks the requisite teeth to do the job right. Which is why, when she announced her resignation effective on Dec. 15, current IG Carol Pope said she regards her office as a paper tiger.

Backers of SB 539 are trying to convince Illinoisans that the measure doesnt mean an end to ethics reform. They claim theyll come back to it sometime down the road.

Is there more work to be done? For sure. And I think that was something that we reiterated in the debate back in the spring, that this wasnt going to be the last time we were ever going to look at ethics, state Rep. Kelly Burke, D-Evergreen Park, recently told the Tribune. So I guess its just surprising to me that this strategy was employed by the Republicans to stop the bill from becoming law.

Why not do it right, and do it now?

I cant think of anything more cynical, or that would cause the public to lose faith in us more, than passing a bill that is supposed to solve an ethics problem that has plagued the state for years  and then at the end of the day it changes nothing, state Rep. Mike Marron, a Downstate Republican, said this week.

Marron is correct. Restoring Illinoisans faith in government requires both sides to set aside partisan politics and craft an ethics reform package that genuinely puts up a bulwark against corruption.

Illinoisans have grown weary of politicians who pledge their souls to strong ethics reform while on the campaign trail, and then conveniently forget what theyve promised once theyre ensconced in Springfield. Trust in government easily fades when citizens view their elected officials as guided solely by greed and self-interest.

Regaining that trust is far trickier  but its not impossible. In Illinois, the solution begins with real, lasting ethics reform  not just the veneer of reform.

 CHICAGO TRIBUNE

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This weekend, on the 20th anniversary of the largest terror attack to ever be carried out on American soil, we will repeatedly hear how we are not as united as we were on Sept. 11, 2001.

That is true. The carefully orchestrated attack on innocent people who went to their jobs that beautiful late summer Tuesday morning only to find themselves the victims of a terrorist group filled with hate for our way of life, united us as only a handful of events have over our 245-year history.

Democrats and Republicans sang God Bless America on the steps of the U.S. Capitol. The Queens Guard at Buckingham Palace replaced God Save The Queen with the Star Spangled Banner during the changing of the guard. It was a unique time in our history when an outside force did something so heinous, it drew the loosely tied bonds of the nation together tighter than at any time since World War II.

But its important to remember we were not anywhere close to being united on Sept. 10, 2001. We had just had an election decided by the U.S. Supreme Court. President George W. Bush only had an approval rating of 51% before the 9/11 attacks.
Physicians are sworn by their Hippocratic Oath to do no harm. Physicians who spread misinformation or disinformation, especially during a raging pandemic, have the potential to do a great deal of harm. When the public turns to physicians as trusted sources of medical advice, it is essential that the advice is based on scientific research alone, not political fantasy.

Those physicians who spread misinformation or disinformation on television, radio or other media platforms must understand that their words matter because a certain percentage of the population will act on what they hear.

The nonsensical assertions by so-called medical experts about the animal parasite medication ivermectin are a case in point. People are following this advice and are putting their lives in danger as a result.

The Federation of State Medical Boards recently warned that doctors who generate and spread COVID-19 vaccine misinformation or disinformation are risking disciplinary action by state medical boards, including the suspension or revocation of their medical license.
The charitable foundation partners with Feeding America, the nation's largest hunger-relief agency, in addition to local food agencies serving the 10 Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic states in which Food Lion operates. For more information, visit www.foodlion.com/in-our-community .

Food Lion, based in Salisbury since 1957, has more than 1,100 stores in 10 Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic states and employs more than 82,000 associates. 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 billion more meals by 2025. Food Lion is a company of Ahold Delhaize USA, the U.S. division of Zaandam-based Ahold Delhaize.

HICKORY  The Food Lion Feeds Charitable Foundation has awarded a $3,000 grant to The Salvation Army Shelter of Hope. This grant will be used to help purchase items that are needed in the kitchen to help serve 85,000 nutritious meals to hungry individuals and families.

Food Lion has been a generous supporter of The Armys efforts to meet the needs of those seeking help in our community for many years. We are very thankful for their continued support, said Major Matt Trayler, corps officer.

The Food Lion Feeds Charitable Foundation is committed to supporting families facing food insecurity across its 10-state footprint. Established in 2001, the foundation provides financial support for programs and organizations dedicated to feeding local neighbors in the communities it serves. Since its inception, the foundation has awarded more than $15 million in grants.

The Food Lion Feeds Charitable Foundation is the philanthropic arm of Food Lion, based in Salisbury. Established in 2001, the Food Lion Feeds Charitable Foundation provides financial support for programs and organizations dedicated to eliminating hunger. The charitable foundation has provided more than $15 million in grant funding helping to nourish communities with fresh food for backpack programs, Kids Cafe's, and other hunger-relief programs as well as funding for long-term programs to help shorten the lines at food banks.

The charitable foundation partners with Feeding America, the nation's largest hunger-relief agency, in addition to local food agencies serving the 10 Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic states in which Food Lion operates. For more information, visit www.foodlion.com/in-our-community.

Food Lion, based in Salisbury since 1957, has more than 1,100 stores in 10 Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic states and employs more than 82,000 associates. Food Lion is a company of Ahold Delhaize USA, the U.S. division of Zaandam-based Ahold Delhaize.
It was the grace of God and an old friend connection, Moritz said.

A small delegation from the city went to retrieve the piece: a chunk of concrete and steel that formed part of the foundation of the North Tower, the first building struck in the attacks.

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Duncan was part of that group that made the trip shortly before the 10th anniversary of 9/11, as was then-Conover Police Chief Steve Brewer.

For Brewer, it was a bittersweet experience.

I was glad that we were going to get a part to bring back for our citizens, but then to think that that day 3,000 people died in that building, Brewer said. And you think back about it, how could this happen?

Even though the backdrop for the trip was solemn, Duncan said there was also an element of joy.

Its odd to say that you were having a good time about something that was so tragic  about the nation as a whole, Duncan said. You didnt want to be morose about it. You wanted to say, Hey, you know, Americas still here. Were still going, and were better than we were.
HICKORY  The Catawba County Guardian ad Litem program welcomed four new volunteer child advocates during July. Barry Horton and Brittany Grooms were sworn in July 12. Sarah Sakatos and Angela Beard were sworn in July 26.

District Administrator Sydney Smith expressed her appreciation for each of the new volunteer child advocates. Smith said the new volunteers mean more children in our district will have someone advocating for them.

Once sworn in, Guardian ad Litem volunteer child advocates become officers of the court and serve as the eyes and ears of the judge. Volunteer child advocates are appointed to represent vulnerable children in court matters involving abuse or neglect.

The role of a child advocate is to investigate and monitor their childs cases which involves seeing their children regularly to be able to make recommendations to the court in the best interest of the child, Smith said.

Guardian ad Litem volunteer child advocates serve an important role. Having a volunteer child advocate means the voice of children will be heard in court and permanency will be established more quickly for these children, Smith said.
This is Peter Hitchenss Mail on Sunday column

Well, now you know I was right. The Conservative Party is not just drenched in political correctness, useless at practical matters from law and crime to schools and transport and led by ignorant ninnies who are no better than they ought to be.

It is also a ferocious raiser of taxes and spendthrift with your money. It is in fact New Labour, Blairism but without the Blair creature.

It even resorts to wild pseudo-popular policy initiatives, such as the latest pretence at getting tough with illegal migration on the high seas, to try to distract your attention from what it is really up to, namely gobbling up more of your income than at any time in modern history.

Nobody will stop it because the opposition is made up of people who are more or less exactly the same, except that some of Keir Starmers lot understand the ultimate point of all this, which I promise you is not very nice.

The Tories just do it because it worked for Blair. So they think it is popular and will keep them in office. And if anyone complains, brutal party discipline, modelled on Michael Corleones Mafia clan in The Godfather, descends on the offender. Total loyalty is the only acceptable attitude.

I just thought Id mention this because, when I first started warning that the Tories were not your friends, many years ago, I got some pretty cool responses.

I know some of you think that leaving the EU is enough by itself, but I am still puzzled as to what the Government thinks our recovered independence is for. I havent noticed us becoming more British in laws and customs.

The British state is as Napoleonic and haughty as anything on the Continent. The presumption of innocence, partly thanks to gendarmes such as Dame Cressida Dick, is a thing of the past.

We have not even yet got rid of the promotion of the stupid, crude, toe-counting metric system, but are still weighed down with kilograms, litres and kilometres. I would have thought that would have been a good symbolic start for a new era.

But theres no heart or soul in these Tories. They neither think nor feel.

When they get a moment to relax, they use it to permit yet more hideous skyscrapers and decree the concreting over of the countryside. The more they deck their offices with Union Jacks and portraits of the Queen, the more convinced I am that they believe neither in patriotism nor in constitutional monarchy.

No wonder they cannot counter the endless exit propaganda of the Scottish Nationalists. They do not themselves much like the Union or the unique British experiment in freedom and prosperity which began at the end of the 17th Century (thats the 1600s, for those of you who went to comprehensive schools).

And it is precisely because they believe in nothing that they allowed their worst enemies to impose their policies and aims on them.

I have been watching the truth dawning in the eyes of many over the past few days. But has the realisation come too late?

*********

I have said from the start that Covid facemasks are a badge of political allegiance, not a medical measure. Now that Parliament is back and the Labour benches are masked while the Tories are largely unmasked, I think the truth of this is obvious.

20 years on  and we are still living in fear

Here we are 20 years after the terrible mass murder in New York City in 2001. And do we ever consider who won? Terrorism goes by that name because it paralyses and maddens its victims with fear. It makes them do things they otherwise wouldnt and shouldnt.

And look at us, long after we took sensible precautions to make a similar attack on Manhattan or anywhere else much less likely, such as keeping a closer eye on students at flying schools and never, ever unlocking the door to the flight deck of an airborne passenger jet.

Even before the Covid panic shut down the world, we were still shuffling like convicts through irrational security procedures, just to fly away on holiday; dismantling laws that keep us free and engaging in wild hunts for extremists, most of whom turn out to be lunatics who have fried their brains with drugs.

Perhaps, most bananas of all, our various wars on terror and wars for democracy (all failed) have brought about an alliance between the West, Saudi Arabia and an Al Qaeda affiliate in Syria. Yes, our allies in our inexplicable, horrible, failed Syrian intervention were for a considerable time the Nusra Front, itself an Al Qaeda franchise.

We are still pretty thoroughly terrorised. It makes me laugh when I hear politicians congratulating themselves for standing up to terror when it is normal human beings  firefighters, soldiers and police  who do the standing up. Because the politicians are so keen to do what the terrorists want, they have made our societies less free and open and made us live in an irreversible constant state of fear.

I have no doubt there will be more terror outrages. By their nature they are surprise attacks and we cannot foresee them all, let alone stop them. But we can stop wrecking our own society in response to such murders. And we can also stop lashing out by starting foolish wars and invasions, often with dubious allies.

These conflicts cause the great waves of migration which are now transforming Europe, and to which we have no civilised response.

Dogma will drag us into power cuts

Last Monday, a warm September day, Britains power grid asked one of our few remaining coal-fired power stations, West Burton A in Lincolnshire, to fire up and provide electricity.

There wasnt enough wind, and gas has become incredibly expensive. A year from now, West Burton A will be shut. Soon afterwards, like so many other coal stations, it will be demolished in an act of dogmatic self-harm. So what will happen after that if we run into trouble? Meanwhile China builds new coal-fired power stations all the time. So what good does this do?

Harsh times for a gentle man

After the double killer Colin Pitchfork was allowed by the Ministry of Justice to wander the streets, I asked Stella Moris, fiancee of the brave journalist Julian Assange, to describe the conditions in which the wholly non-violent father of her children is being held, while he awaits yet another US demand for his extradition.

She replied: Belmarsh is the harshest prison in England. Julian wasnt able to hold his children for over a year. Since June, he has been able to see his children. Since August, Julian is also able to hug immediate family who have taken the antigen test before entering the prison. The prison is harsh but it gets harsher for every day that passes. He has been there since he was arrested on a US warrant on April 11, 2019.

Julian is surrounded by violent criminals, and 30 per cent of the people on his wing are convicted for murder. It is a harsh environment.

On September 22, it will be two years since he finished serving his sentence over the bail violation, so it will be two years of being held solely on remand.

*******

Why I'd rather live in 1962 than now

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-9980737/Why-Id-living-1962-smoking-ghastly-PETER-HITCHENS-revels-youth.html
CONCORD  Cadets with the Air Force Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps at Jay M. Robinson High School ensured the events of 9/11 and those who lost their lives in the attacks and after were remembered Friday as cadets ran the school track for the entire school day.

They opened the memorial at 7:30 a.m. Sept. 10 with the raising of the flag and then laid a wreath at the flag pole. After a moment of silence, the first cadet began to run with the flag, and the rest of the cadets ran in formation behind. Those who opted to walk went next.

Amoiree Faggart, a senior and member of AFJROTC, was one of the cadets excused from classes for the entire day to run around the track in honor of Sept. 11, 2001, a devastating event that took place about three years before Faggart was born.

But while he, fellow students and cadets have only read about or watched footage of the terror attacks, they wanted to honor those who lost their lives.

With everything that is going on in the news and in Afghanistan right now, we felt like it would be a pretty good idea because it brings out the community and shows we support the community and still care and show that it is not just a regular day, Faggart said.
CRCHC  a clinic that offers care to people regardless of insurance status or ability to pay  served over 40,000 people last year through its eight clinics during the pandemic. It also already operates a homeless clinic in partnership with Rowan Helping Ministries.

The Salvation Army to host land dedication for new Center of Hope The Salvation Army in Concord will break ground this fall on a anew Center of Hope that will increase bed capacity and serve both Cabarrus and Rowan Counties.

Henderson said the shelter will also work with Cabarrus Partnership for Children to provide health, early education and family support services and information to families with children ages 0-5 who come through the shelter.

Henderson stressed that families struggling with homelessness are a major concern for the community and the reason for the new shelter. She said that if the shelter had been open during the pandemic, more families would have had a safer place to shelter during the Stay at Home Order.

One of the biggest benefits of this shelter is that we have private living spaces for families, Henderson explained. Families would have had a private place to shelter.

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During the pandemic, the shelter saw an increase in people seeking shelter. Around August 2020, it started to see about a 25% uptick in calls from people needing shelter. Of the calls, about 40-50% were families.

The current Salvation Army shelter doesnt have enough space for multiple families, and people are often turned away.
CONCORD The United Parcel Service (UPS) gave a $20,000 grant to Barber Scotia College on Friday to go toward renovations, technology and student recruitment.

At the grant presentation Friday Sept. 10, Henry Beards, UPS director of health and safety, said there is a lot of opportunity in Historically Black Colleges and Universities in the community.

I know this is a university that has a lot of history and this is a university, from our standpoint, that needed help, not only from a community but from a corporation, Beards said. Our goal is to do what ever we can do to jumpstart them and support them.

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This isnt the first time Barber Scotia and UPS have partnered. In 2020, UPS met with Barber Scotias board of directors and asked how the college needed to be supported. UPS gave the college a $7,500 grant for beautification of the college grounds and brought volunteers to the college to help with repairs and ground maintenance. In 2020, the volunteers participated in a total of over 1,000 community service hours as part of a Neighbor to Neighbor program.

Beards said community service is the most important part and confirmed the volunteers will be back this year.
In the immediate aftermath of the terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, a striking television commercial was created.

The commercial started with a shot of a regular neighborhood. The view was so typically American that it could have been filmed anywhere, from California to Maine, from Illinois to Louisiana. The narration discussed how things had changed since the attacks. A dissolve changed the image into the same street, only this time, U.S. flags flew outside every house.

The dramatic effect touched even the most cynical of viewers. In spite of all our differences, we were united in spirit against those whose efforts had taken down four domestic flights and taken the lives of thousands of our fellow citizens.

Divisions among Americans had begun to fire in 2000 as the presidential contest between Al Gore and George W. Bush was concluded with a Supreme Court decision. But for whats eventually and sadly turned into a brief moment, we were united in spirit.

In the 20 years since, weve long forgotten that feeling of kinship. We identify ourselves more by our differences than by our similarities. We look for ways to dismiss and disregard one another. We refuse to ponder whether others have ideas of value. We openly mock those with whom we disagree.

Commodore Stephen Decatur chiseled his name in history books when he said, at a dinner celebrating his accomplishments at sea, Our country! In her intercourse with foreign nations may she always be in the right; but our country, right or wrong!

Weve continued to take Decaturs words to heart, but our prevailing attitude has changed to My absolute way of running this country, because those who disagree are ruining it. Weve lost a considerable amount of our compassion. We still want to win, but our winning now has to come at the expense of someone else losing, and that loser being taunted mercilessly.

The United States has never been a genteel country, so lets not try to use that as a reason for being disappointed in our divisions. But weve been much better about listening to one another than we are now. Instead, were grouping based on politics, sexuality, race, age and any other way we can clearly divide from one another.

Did the airport attack in Afghanistan that cost the lives of 11 American servicemen and other refugees unite us? Not at all. Thoughts immediately turned to blame.

The same situation might have been the case 20 years ago if social media had been as widely in use as it is now. But for all the negative power of that tool, it also has positive possibilities. Any tool capable of dividing can also be a tool of unification.

Sometimes it is. Americans regularly show they can about one another, and about the world. Daily, people leave their safe American abodes and go to disaster sites to help people recover. We do food drives, make charitable donations, and even do things as simple as shovel our neighbors walks or opening a door for someone.

The best way we can honor the sacrifices of those on 9/11 and its military aftermath is to try to remember the degree to which we were humbled and found ways to care for one another 20 years ago.

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I received a question about religion and spirituality. Even though they are connected in important ways, there are differences. I consider the topic to be important, but difficult because there are different definitions and interpretations. I will share my thoughts, and encourage readers to reach their own conclusions.

Most people who are affiliated with a religion are spiritual, but people can be spiritual without being religious or affiliated with a religion. For a general view, religion can be viewed as a system of beliefs in a god or gods with followers who worship in a specific way and place.

I have mentioned several times in columns that there are 4,600 different world religions; therefore, there are many different ways to worship. One of the Latin origins of the word religion comes from the word religio, which means to bind anew, suggesting that there are binding oaths in religions. (https://av1611.com/kjbp/kjv-dictionary/religion.html). The word spirit comes from the Latin word for breath. The word spiritual can be used to talk about many things that are beyond physical existence including religious feelings, supernatural beings and singing hymns.(https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/spiritual)
Republican House Speaker Tim Moore, the bills primary sponsor, called Coopers veto of the rioting bill Friday a slap in the face to the small business owners and residents of cities and towns across this state that were damaged by lawless riots.

Moore said that Cooper was pandering to the far left by vetoing what he called a common sense bill.

Moore pushed the bill that was a legislative response to rioting and looting that took place in Raleigh last year amid frustration over the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis police custody.

Moore and other Republicans said that the bill would have more forcefully held criminals accountable for their actions.

Critics said that the legislation would have targeted the Black Lives Matter movement and would have impeded the rights of free speech and peaceful assembly of state residents.

In the N.C. General Assembly, Republicans have majorities in both chambers but not the three-fifths supermajorities needed to override Coopers veto, unless they have support from some Democrats.

Last week, the N.C. Senate voted 25-19, and the N.C. House voted 88-25, to give final legislative approval of the bill that was sent it to Cooper.
I told my colleague that, We are going to wind up going up there in some capacity in some time to help out, Shelton said. Our thoughts were we were getting attacked.

We felt the sense of unification that all Americans did, Shelton said. God was telling us to go up there. I had never been to New York before that.

Sgt. Kevin Bowers, a member of the citys Downtown Bike Patrol, was a patrol officer on Sept. 11, 2001, he said.

Bowers saw local police officers helping out in the New Yorks recovery effort as another example of police performing their duties in dangerous moments and locations.

We as police officers go to calls when people are having their worst days, Bowers said. That was a worst time for a lot of people.

Just as in the early 2000s and this year, the police department has many officers who are from New York and New Jersey, Bowers said.

In 2001 and 2002, many Winston-Salem police officers stayed at Mount Manresa, a Jesuit Catholic retreat on Staten Island, which was operated by Father Jack Ryan, Bowers said.
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COLUMBIA, S.C.  Republicans in the South Carolina House plan to meet as soon as they can to figure out how to fight back against President Joe Bidens order that all larger businesses require their employees be vaccinated against COVID-19.

The letter Friday to his Republican colleagues, House Speaker Jay Lucas said the presidents order goes against every notion of privacy and promises to give Gov. Henry McMaster and state Attorney General Alan Wilson whatever help they need to fight it with state executive orders or lawsuits.

Republicans McMaster and Wilson also have also vowed action against the order and Lucas said they may have to lead for now because the General Assembly is not in session and can only come back into special session for only a few items like the budget and redistricting without a two-thirds vote. Republicans hold 81 of the chambers 124 seats  just under that threshold.

It serves no purpose for the majority caucus in the House to coalesce around an unenforceable, unconstitutional, improper solution to an unenforceable, unconstitutional, improper problem, Lucas wrote. More succinctly, two wrongs do not make a right.

The Republican from Hartsville said he would try to get the House Republican caucus to meet as soon as possible.
Two dogs that fatally attacked a 7-year-old girl and injured her mother earlier this year at their neighbors Garner home will be euthanized on Monday morning, Garner Police Chief Joe Binns said.

Wake County personnel will conduct the euthanasia, and an animal control officer from Garner police will be present, Binns told The News & Observer in an email Friday.

The decision to move forward with euthanizing the dogs came after a Wake County judge ruled earlier on Friday that the Town of Garner could determine what happens to them.

The dogs owners, Joseph and Amanda White, previously asked Garner to grant them a dangerous dog permit, which would have allowed them to keep the dogs.

Wake County Superior Court Judge Vince Rozier rejected the owners request that the dogs be returned to them.

What Garner decides to do with the dogs at this point in time, I dont have any discretion over, Rozier said. But there is a common-sense solution for the town of Garner as well.

Heather Trevaskis and her daughter, Jayden Belle Henderson, were taking care of their neighbors pit bulls on April 27 while the owners were out of town, when the dogs attacked them.
I had a meeting scheduled for the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, at Naval Air Station North Island on Coronado, the island across the bay from San Diego. The topic was rules of engagement for force protection  in other words, when a sailor or Marine could shoot at threats to American forces.

I was an active-duty Navy JAG officer. The USS Cole had been bombed the year before in a harbor in Yemen. My ship was scheduled to deploy to the Middle East at the end of January. Force protection was a high priority.

I have never gotten over the irony of the topic that day.

The air station was a few blocks from my apartment. I got up about 6:45 a.m. As I woke, my youngest brother, who lived in Greensboro, called and told me to turn on the television. I did and was stunned. Both planes had already hit the World Trade Center. I knew what was happening. I quickly showered, put on my uniform and drove to base.

When I got there, sailors had surrounded the gates and shut down traffic to all but essential personnel. They were wearing tactical gear and carrying M-16 rifles, and that was unusual then. A Humvee with a .50-caliber machine gun mounted on the top was parked in front, and that was a first. Military police were putting up all kinds of barriers, anticipating an attack.
On Sept. 11, 2001, on the way to my studio workspace on the 92nd floor of Tower One of the World Trade Center, I witnessed a defining national tragedy. Since that day 20 years ago, I have thought a lot about those events and the subsequent fallout from our national reaction.

There was a tidal wave of sadness that engulfed New York City in the days and weeks after the towers fell, as the colossal hole in the ground smoldered on the southern tip of Manhattan. Memorials sprung up in parks and along fences all across the city, with people posting or wearing pictures of their dead and missing loved ones. Every firehouse was shrouded in black, memorials to lost members posted at each door. There were so many funerals that the New York Fire Department asked the public to attend so their widows wouldnt be alone.

The artists in our group gathered to absorb and commiserate as we were coming to understand what happened. The body of one of our colleagues, Michael Richards, had been found, identified by the wallet in his pocket. We were dumbstruck by all that might imply.

Yet in the midst of all the chaos and trauma, people came together to grieve and to help. Volunteers of all sorts assembled to assist in the herculean task of cleaning up ground zero.
But in the years since 9/11 the fabric of our society has been worn thin by bitter partisanship that has infected every facet of American life, from the halls of Congress to meetings of county commissioners and school boards across the country.

Were all in this together rang hollow from the beginning.

Incredibly, writes columnist Michael Gerson, COVID has become the latest front in our culture wars. In August, Donald Trump spoke at a rally in Alabama attended by more than 30,000 supporters, most of whom flaunted their freedom not to wear masks.

Trump told his followers that he had been vaccinated and encouraged them to do so as well. OK, encourage is a bit strong. He said the right words, but without the requisite sense of urgency. Still, some people in the otherwise adoring crowd booed him. Back-pedaling, he assured them that he respected their right to remain among the unvaccinated.

Radical individualism trumps patriotism and the greater good.

This weekend videos of airliners exploding into the Twin Towers, the buildings crumbling to the ground, and terrified, dust-covered people desperately running away from the tragedy billowing behind them, will be shown again and again. Some of us will refuse to watch, so painful are the memories.

I suggest that you set aside seven minutes and 17 seconds to watch the video of the gathering of an unlikely impromptu chorus on the steps of the Capitol and remember the day when national tragedy did not rip us apart but brought us together, reminding us, wistfully perhaps, that beneath all the rancor we are yet one nation.

Richard Groves is a writer who lives in Winston-Salem.
Could we have been as cool and as purposeful as she and her fellow crew members and passengers, knowing that these were very likely their last breaths and heartbeats?

Many called spouses and family members and told them they loved them. And then they took on the terrorists.

Lets roll, one of their leaders, Todd Beamer, famously said.

The passenger manifest for Flight 93 had had an almost mystical quality.

William Cashman was an iron worker who had helped to build the World Trade Center. One of Bradshaws fellow flight attendants, CeeCee Lyles, had been a policewoman in a previous career. Donald Peterson and his wife, Joan Hadley Peterson, were crisis counselors. Several other passengers were emergency medical technicians. Yet another had his pilots license.

But if every act of heroism on 9/11 got the movie it deserved, wed have hundreds of them: The police officers and firefighters who ran toward the burning towers. The many Americans who left their jobs and families and enlisted as soldiers, almost immediately.

And so many more ordinary people who did extraordinary things, cradling strangers in their arms in an eerie shower of toxic dust as the unspeakable unfolded around them.
One of the first startup companies to call the Haymarket home is moving to another downtown spot.

Don't Panic Labs, which provides software and engineering development services to other companies, will move from its longtime home in the former Salvation Army building at Eighth and P streets to a larger space in the Larson Building at 13th and Q streets sometime next month.

Weve been in the Haymarket since 2010, back when the tech presence was essentially us, Hudl, and MacPractice. And weve witnessed a lot of growth since then, said Doug Durham, CEO and co-founder of Dont Panic Labs.

That growth has included a new Hudl headquarters building in the new West Haymarket area, the move of Fuse Coworking to the former Salvation Army building and the location of numerous startup companies in the Haymarket

Don't Panic Labs was created out of Nebraska Global, which started out as a venture capital fund and morphed into a tech incubator that now is the parent company of Don't Panic Labs and three other firms.

Nebraska Global also will be moving to the new location, which was home to a bank branch for Mutual of Omaha Bank and then CIT Bank.
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My dad didnt hesitate  After Pentagon attack, Lincoln doc went to work

Courtesy photo Col. Craig Urbauer meets with President George W. Bush the day after the attack on the Pentagon. ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTO A military helicopter takes off after dropping off personnel at the Pentagon on Sept. 12, 2001, one day after a hijacker crashed into the building. Craig Urbauer of Lincoln was a 58-year-old Army doctor working at the Pentagon on 9/11. "The dead very likely never knew what had happened. ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTO In this Sept. 11, 2001, file photo, a helicopter flies over the Pentagon as smoke billows.

Col. Craig Urbauer was at his office in the Pentagon, preparing to brief the surgeon general that afternoon, when the ceiling rained down.

The 58-year-old Army doctor had heard about that mornings attack on the World Trade Center, nearly 250 miles to the northeast. His supervisors secretary had asked for his help turning on the office TV, and they watched the immediate aftermath together.

But the upcoming briefing was important. Urbauer and his wife, Joyce, had returned from visiting his mother in Lincoln the night before, and he needed to squeeze in a haircut before he met the surgeon general.

So he left the secretary and the TV, walked down the hall to the barbershop and returned to his office to work on the briefing.

Craig Urbauer

About 15 minutes later, I heard this really loud Boom, he wrote later. All the lights went out, the building shook, and the ceiling fell in on me.

His first thought? Damn, I cant finish my briefing. His second? To grab his briefcase and get out.

He stumbled through the ceiling debris and out into the pitch-black hallway. From memory, he fumbled toward the nearest exit and onto the Pentagons west lawn.

He saw black and white smoke billowing from a growing fire. He saw people pouring out of the exits, some of them collapsing onto the grass.

Many with smudges and shocked faces, he wrote, many crying.

And then the doctor got to work.

* * *

Joyce Urbauer, a nurse, was in her own office in the health unit of the federal Bureau of Prisons, a few blocks from the U.S. Capitol.

Her supervisor stepped in, told her about a plane striking the World Trade Center.

We went to her office next door, where there was a TV set, she said this week from her home in Lincoln. And we watched the second plane hit the second tower.

Before the hour was over, they learned the Pentagon had been hit, too

ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTO The south side of the Pentagon burns after it took a direct hit from an aircraft Tuesday morning, Sept. 11, 2001.

Two decades later, she cant pinpoint a single, overriding emotion from that moment. She felt, deep down, that her husband would be OK. She also felt shock, like her country was being assaulted, sucker-punched.

The people who were flying the planes, they didnt care. They just wanted to destroy.

And later, in the weeks that followed, shed lay in bed and listen to all the aircraft above Washington, circling, observing, protecting, maybe taking troops and supplies to fight the new War on Terror.

I had a hard time sleeping, because I was so angry they had disturbed our safety.

But that was later. That morning, after the Pentagon was hit, they learned a fourth jet had been hijacked, and Joyce Urbauer was ordered to evacuate.

* * *

Outside the Pentagon, Craig Urbauer did what he could.

I didn't have anything to work with, he wrote. I put my briefcase down where I thought I might find it later, and tried to console as many people as I could.

But he also watched a series of impromptu, but effective, life-saving measures play out. South Washington Boulevard skirts the west side of the Pentagon, and uninjured employees were stopping traffic, telling drivers to carry injured employees to the hospital.

Amazingly, they all did. I never heard of a problem raised, but it took the authorities five days to find out where everyone was taken.

U.S. COAST GUARD PHOTO An aerial view of Pentagon after a hijacked airliner crashed into it Sept. 11, 2001.

The first time he served in the Army, the Thayer County native earned a Bronze Star as a battalion surgeon in Vietnam. He then spent more than 20 years as a urologist in Lincoln before reenlisting in 1987.

He would hold multiple positions, but on Sept. 11, 2001, he was assistant deputy for medical policy in the office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army. He was more of an administrator, working at his desk and not at bedside.

But the senior nurse in his department, Lt. Col. Patty Horoho, had a masters degree in mass trauma. She worked with Arlington County rescue crews to administer aid. And later, personnel from the nearby Navy annex set up a triage point beneath an overpass.

So Urbauer focused on logistics and support. He helped commandeer the highways commuter lane, setting up tents and using a borrowed cellphone to request medicine, resources and supplies from Walter Reed Medical Center.

The roads around Washington were impassable. They were able to send some people and supplies by helicopter throughout the day, although not much medicine was needed after the first hour.

By then, there were few patients to treat. Most had already been taken to the hospital, by private cars on South Washington Boulevard or by ambulances that showed up later.

Soldiers from Fort Myer showed up in protective gear to search the building for survivors. But only bodies were found and recovered, Urbauer wrote. Everyone who survived the crash got out early. The dead very likely never knew what had happened.

* * *

Joyce Urbauer needed to get to their home in Falls Church, Virginia, about 10 miles from Washington.

The subways were stalled, and traffic was gridlocked, so she and another nurse simply started walking west.

She was trying not to worry about her husband, and the destruction at the Pentagon. I think rationality kicked in, and Im not one to panic, she said. I decided he was doing what he needed to do and when he had time, he would get to me.

But the other nurse was getting blisters, and they knew they couldnt walk all the way. It was time to hitchhike.

I told her, Well walk up to the first car that comes by and well ask if theyre going to Virginia.

Doug Bereuter recalls 9/11 attack in Washington On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, Nebraska Rep. Doug Bereuter was scheduled to go the Pentagon. Instead, after he evacuated his office, he drove by the iconic building and saw smoke and flames pouring out of it.

At a red light, an aide from Sen. Ted Kennedys office, a stranger, opened her car door to them. Joyce Urbauer made it home and, at about 8 p.m., finally heard from her husband, on the highway along the Pentagon.

He was safe.

On his way to get his haircut that morning, Col. Urbauer had visited with Chaplain Lindsey Arnold, who was conducting a conference of senior military chaplains.

They were close, Arnold said this week from his home in Maryland. They were among the older officers in their department, and they knew what it was like to take fire. To many of the others in their office, war was abstract, a thing that had happened in the past.

After the attack, the two found each other on the lawn, and spent the rest of the day, and most of the night, doing their jobs. While Urbauer helped meet medical demands, Arnold tried to fill emotional and spiritual needs.

My center of gravity were the military personnel who had immediately realized they suffered the loss of friends, or in some cases spouses and significant others, Arnold said.

When Walter Reed staff took over the medical tents at 11 p.m., Urbauer convinced Arnold -- who lived 35 miles west of Washington and didnt know how he was getting home  to stay with him and Joyce, who was able to drive within a half-mile of the Pentagon to pick them up.

ASSOCAITED PRESS FILE PHOTO The early morning sun lights the sky behind the damaged section of the Pentagon, in this Sept. 13, 2001, file photo.

He and I spent two hours decompressing with a big bottle of Jack Daniels, and watching news replays of the day (we hadn't seen any TV), then going to bed, he wrote.

Arnold, who retired in 2004, remembers sharing the whiskey with his friend.

It was just a hard day, and two comrades-in-arms sitting at the end of it.

But he doesnt remember this: As Joyce Urbauer was showing Arnold to the guest room, she stopped at a bookshelf, and asked the chaplain if he wanted anything to read before bed.

He chose the Bible, and a Calvin and Hobbes collection.

That would make sense, he said this week. Hed lost his own Bible outside of the Pentagon, and hed raised his children on Calvin and Hobbes.

* * *

They returned to work the next morning. The Pentagon Clinic had taken over medical duties, so the colonel and chaplain reported to the Survivor and Family Center set up in nearby Crystal City, helping worried family and friends of Pentagon employees.

Later that day, Urbauer met President George W. Bush; a photo from that moment hangs in their home in southeast Lincoln.

Urbauer lost five colleagues from his second-floor office on the buildings outer ring, about a football field away from where the airliner struck, Joyce Urbauer said.

The five that were killed were in meetings in the area of the Pentagon that was hit, she said. If Craig had been walking down that hallway or was in that meeting, he would have been killed.

But his preparation for his briefing with the surgeon general -- and the visit to the barbershop -- had kept him away from the brunt of the blast.

And that was her husband, she said. He was very conscious of being a proper military officer. Shoes shined, hair cut, medals or whatever insignia all in line. He was so focused on presenting that report he ignored what was going on in the world around him until it finally hit.

But she wasnt surprised by what he did after it hit. I was used to him taking over and doing what needed to be done.

FRANCIS GARDLER, Journal Star Joyce Urbauer, who now lives in Lincoln, was working in Washington on Sept. 11, 2001, when her husband, Col. Craig Urbauer, was a doctor at the Pentagon. He helped with the medical efforts outside the building following the 9/11 attack.

He and Arnold, the chaplain, and Horoho -- the trauma-trained nurse -- each would receive Meritorious Service Medals for their efforts after the attack.

He spent the days that followed consoling others. He spent the months and years after that overseeing the military medical policies that made it possible for a country to go to war.

He helped get soldiers ready to go over, Joyce Urbauer said. Making sure their immunizations and medical records were in order.

Craig Urbauer retired from the Army in 2007, and he and Joyce moved back to Lincoln in 2011. He died the last day of 2020. He was 78.

He didnt share much about the attack, said his son, Steve Urbauer.

If asked direct questions, hed give direct answers, he said. My dad didnt talk about Vietnam, except to be really, really furious at Jane Fonda, and he did not talk about 9/11.

But a couple of years ago, he wrote a short book about his military service for his family. And his son wasnt surprised to read his fathers account of that day. Shaking off the ceiling debris, feeling his way down a dark hallway until he found daylight and helping others.

He knew his father as an obsessive, meticulous and methodical planner. But all that was in preparation for moments like the morning of Sept. 11.

My dad didnt hesitate for a second to get into that situation and find solutions.
Bauer-Kahan took offense when Assemblyman Jim Cooper, a fellow Democrat and former Sacramento County sheriff's captain, said officers should be allowed to presume that women who are provocatively dressed like that and carrying a purse full of condoms are street walkers.

Its not rocket science, Cooper said. "You know who the players are and who they arent.

I know I'm probably not the only woman on the floor that was triggered when one of our colleagues said, Well, theyre dressed that way,' Bauer-Kahan responded. Being dressed that way is not a crime, and it will never be OK to be victimized because you were dressed in any manner."

The bill had support from both a former public defender, Assemblyman Ash Kalra, and a former prosecutor, Assemblyman Al Muratsuchi, both Democrats.

Law enforcement can help people without threatening to arrest them," Kalra said.

This simply eliminates this vague provision in the penal code that allows for abuses for people that they simply be profiled for the wrong reasons," Muratsuchi said.

Wiener's bill has support from the American Civil Liberties Union as well as groups representing LGTBQ individuals and sex workers.
Nearly 2,000 children in southeast Nebraska leave school each Friday with more than homework in their backpacks. Through Food Bank of Lincolns child hunger programs, these bags also carry easy-to-prepare meals and snacks such as canned soups, fresh fruits, cereals and boxed dinners.

Designed to nourish children and families through the weekend when school meals are unavailable, Food Bank of Lincolns BackPack program provides food-filled backpacks to participating students every Friday during the school year. The program began in 2004 by serving 50 students and families at Clinton Elementary School in Lincoln and has grown to serving 1,984 students and families from 55 different schools each week this school year.

In addition to the BackPack program, Food Bank of Lincoln aims to alleviate child hunger for the estimated 16,980 kids in southeast Nebraska who may experience food insecurity this year, according to data from Feeding America, by operating food markets and pantries at 34 schools, the Lincoln Public Schools emergency pantry and the student-parent voucher program. Combined, Food Bank of Lincolns child hunger programs will serve an estimated 6,500 students and their families each month during the 2021-22 school year.
Tom, this is Liz, Elizabeth Young, our features editor, said at the other end of the line. You have to get down here.

What are you talking about? I replied, not entirely awake yet.

Oh! she said in realization. Turn on your TV.

Ive been a professional journalist since 1990. For all but 7 of those years, Ive been an editor. Reporters frequently have to drop what theyre doing and go cover something, but editors work is almost always scheduled.

The one exception for me was Sept. 11, 2001.

On that day, I was The Journal Times news editor, overseeing the editing of the daily news pages. We had made the Tuesday paper, the one dated Sept. 11, the night before.

Because I worked nights, as did Terry, and because our 5-year-old was in the second or third week of afternoon kindergarten at Jefferson Lighthouse Elementary School, everyone in our house was asleep when the phone rang just after 9 a.m.

I turned the TV on, and saw one of the images that no one who remembers that day can ever forget: Black smoke billowing from the towers of the World Trade Center, and the on-screen graphics indicating that commercial airliners had struck each of the towers.
When they dropped below cloud level, Janet Lowe could see planes dotting the sky out the windows of her US Airways flight. The terror attacks of 9/11 had just happened. Everything seemingly was changing by the instant.

Take advantage of this limited-time offer Stay connected with local news, sports and politics. Unlock six months of unlimited access for only $1.

That morning, Lowe  who then lived in Tampa Bay, but now lives in Kenosha  had planned to fly to Pittsburgh to be with her mother before Mom went into surgery. It was a Tuesday.

Shed packed her 2-year-old son Donald Anthony into a stroller, kissed her husband Donald goodbye, and boarded. It was supposed to be a routine travel day.

While in the air, Lowe was standing in the bulkhead bouncing her baby in her arms when a stewardess walked up, clearly frazzled.

I need to tell somebody something, the stewardess said to Lowe. In the days before smartphones and ubiquitous Wi-Fi, none of the passengers had any reason to know the most audacious attack on American territory since Pearl Harbor had just happened.

The flight staff had been told about the terrorist attacks. The stewardess told Lowe, who was then 38 years old, that planes had flown into each of the World Trade Center towers. The stewardess was shaken, but Lowe didnt realize how quickly her week was being derailed, and how drastically her flight, air travel, American culture and her countrys status were about to change.

Were being rerouted

Soon after, the plane began to descend. The pilot spoke, likely too drastically and exaggerated, over the speakers: America is under siege and were being rerouted  Ill come back on the announcement once I know something more.

Passengers started to panic. Lowe tried to calm them, telling those around her that there wasnt a full-blown invasion, just a terrorist attack  the death toll of which would end up being nearly 3,000; if you include those who died later because of exposure to toxins at Ground Zero, the toll is likely more than 4,200. The other air travelers didnt believe her at first until she confessed a stewardess had confided in her what she knew.

Moments later, the plane dropped below cloud level. Thats when the passengers saw what appeared to be dozens of planes dotting the calm Tuesday morning sky, circling above an airport hundreds of miles south of Pittsburgh.

You never see planes circling, Lowe noted. It was then she realized the severity of the situation. Were declaring ATC (Air Traffic Control) zero, Bruce Barrett, then a senior manager at the New York Center, famously had said after the World Trade Centers South Tower was hit, the start of the grounding of virtually all air travel in the nation that day.

After landing, the pilot gave the OK for passengers to stand up and reactivate electronic devices. Its going to be a long time before we reach the gate, the pilot admitted.

Lowe opened her turn-of-the-century era cellphone  It was a brick, Lowe said recently with a laugh  and saw she had more than a dozen messages. All of them were from Donald, her husband.

Hed heard about Flight 93, the plane that hijackers intended to crash into the Capitol or White House before it went down in a field southeast of Pittsburgh. Knowing his wife and son were headed to Pittsburgh, he was terrified their plane was the one that had crashed after the terrorists were heroically overpowered by passengers.

She got Donald on the phone and calmed him down, that she and Donald Anthony were OK. When he asked where they were, she realized she had no idea. She didnt even know what state they landed in.

Where are we?

After getting into the now-crowded airport, with the baby in the stroller munching on Skittles, she asked a worker at a newspaper stand: Where are we?

Charlotte, the woman replied.

Which one? Lowe asked again; theres Charlottes up and down the eastern seaboard: in New York, Tennessee, Vermont, Maine.

They were in North Carolina, the most populous Charlotte in the country and biggest city in North Carolina.

She then called her boss at Abbott Labs. She didnt have a credit card on her  it was 2001, after all  and had maybe $100 in cash. She asked if the company could get her a hotel room somewhere near the airport; she had no idea when planes would be cleared for takeoff again so she could either get home or get to her mom in Pennsylvania.

Her boss found a hotel and booked it  Lowe thinks it was a Quality Inn, but cant remember for sure. Had she not been able to make this call, Lowe and her baby likely wouldve ended up sleeping on a cot set up by the Red Cross in one of the local schools with most of the other stranded air passengers.

During the conversation with her boss, the airport began being evacuated. A similar situation was in place in airports across the country.

Lowe was able to avoid the mob rush to the doors and slowly pushed the stroller out, trying to figure out who to get to the hotel. She ran into a flight crew. One of them asked her where she was headed, and by happenstance they were booked into the same hotel.

They packed the babys stroller into a limo and were all dropped off at the hotel. She described the crew as complete strangers, never to be seen again. Her next few days would be filled with people like that.

Do you need a ride?

The hotel experience felt surreal, Lowe said. Everyone in the hotel was from all over. There was a truck driver waiting for his load. There was a couple on their honeymoon trying to get to Jamaica. There was another couple going back to California that was stuck there. People from all over the country that got pushed out of the airport like we did.

Lowe spent her next couple days wearing the same set of clothes shed flown in  they werent able to get their luggage until Thursday, she recalled  spending time in the pool with the baby and walking the stroller a couple miles down the road daily to a store to buy the cheapest meals she could with the cash she had.

With my 100 dollars, Im buying diapers, potted meat and sausages, she laughed, thinking about her now full-grown son, who is due to graduate college this year and remembers nothing of 9/11. Even today, he still loves potted meat, and Vienna sausages and wieners.

By Thursday, the trucker stuck in the hotel told Lowe, Maam, Ive watched you walk down this street every day for the last three days. She recalled him speaking with a thick Carolina drawl. Do you need a ride?

She agreed, climbing into the strangers big rig with her baby to go to the store and back.

US Airways had been saying each day it was rebooking flights for all the other stranded passengers, but nothing was definite. Even though most U.S. airports reopened on Thursday the 13th, Lowes flights kept getting canceled.

Lowe got help from a stranger once again. Her boss recruited an employee who lived in South Carolina to drive up to Charlotte, pick up Lowe and the baby, then drive them back to South Carolina. Lowes boss then got them down to Atlanta. Her husband picked them up in Georgia and drove home to Tampa.

They were home by Friday.

Life quickly got back to normal. Lowes sister had to cancel a vacation. Their mom had her surgery. A hurricane had been bearing down on Florida that whole week; Lowes husband and a friend had sandbagged the house, but no flooding occurred. People got back to work. Two years later, the Lowes moved to Kenosha; she now works for a medical supply company.

One of the things that has stuck with Lowe, now 20 years later, was an old man who she sat next to on the plane. He was flying to Pennsylvania for his mothers funeral. Lowe figured his mother must have been really old, since the man appeared to be pushing 80.

When they landed in Charlotte, she had tried taking care of both the man and her baby. But during the mad rush of the airport evacuation, they got separated. Lowe figures he ended up on a cot in a gym of a school, but has no idea. She doesnt even remember his name.

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The petition argues Frost has wrongly adopted an appearance of bias standard rejected by the Supreme Court majority that could have breathtaking implications for adjudicators of all kind(s).

All it would take for a party to flout a courts final decision would be to make speculative allegations of connections between chambers and interested law firms, businesses, or other entities, Walsh wrote. Maybe even the judges extracurricular involvement with law clerks, industry, or working groups would similarly raise due-process concerns. And if a judge left the bench and pursued employment at a company or firm that had a matter before it previously, perhaps that would even be grounds for vacating the judges previous decisions.

The plaintiffs say Huebschs petition lacks legal standing and accuse him of trying to delay the case even as the utilities seek to begin building the line.

Hes acting as a stalking horse for the transmission companies, said Howard Learner, lead attorney for the Driftless Area Land Conservancy and Wisconsin Wildlife Federation. In the meantime the transmission companies say they want to start building the line in October. They cant have it both ways.
1. Yes. COVID-19 can only be stopped through vaccinations. A mandate is needed.

2. Yes. This is a major step, but were facing a national emergency. It is a justifiable move.

3. No. The government is right to promote vaccinations, but not to require them.

4. No. This is government overreach and legally questionable. A mandate is wrong.

5. Unsure. Its in the publics interest, but mandates infringe on individuals rights.

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"If the worry is intrusive beyond the stressor, that's anxiety," said Ackrill, who was not involved in the study. "If the sadness is a mood that you can't shift beyond the situation, that's depression."

The researchers also found women were more likely than men to report higher psychological distress during the pandemic  especially anxiety.

Women tend to be the household caretakers, even when gender roles are more balanced than they were in the past, said John Duffy, a clinical psychologist and family therapist in Chicago, who was not involved in the study.

"They take on not only their fears, concerns and anxieties, but also those around them," Duffy said.

Higher psychological distress before the pandemic was associated with higher levels of distress during the pandemic.

They found that for men, elevated psychological distress before the pandemic was associated with an 11-fold increase in depression. That compared to a 6-fold increase in depression for women who had elevated psychological distress before the pandemic.
Statements earlier this week from two of Nebraskas elected leaders baffle us. Gov. Pete Ricketts and U.S. Sen. Ben Sasse both issued statements with biting criticism of President Joe Bidens announcement he plans to issue executive orders mandating coronavirus vaccinations for health care workers and companies with 100 or more employers.

Ricketts called Bidens announcement a federal overreach and violation of personal freedom. Sasse chimed in by claiming the executive orders are constitutionally dubious.

If requiring Americans to be vaccinated against a deadly virus is against the U.S. Constitution, perhaps Sasse should explain how, for decades, American schools have been able to require children to be vaccinated against a list contagious and crippling diseases.

Ricketts said, Americans  not the federal government  are responsible for taking charge of their personal health. It is not the role of the federal government to mandate their choices.

He promised Nebraska will stand up to President Bidens overreach, and we will be working with the attorney general to explore all our options.
The Vernon County Sheriffs Office hosted the eighth and ninth annual 5-K-9 Run/Walk & Kids Fun Run in memory of K-9 Myk, Saturday morning. The event supported the sheriffs office K-9 unit.

Before the run/walk started, there was a moment of silence at 9:46 a.m. in remembrance of first responders and others who lost their lives on 9/11.

The race, which started and ended at the sheriffs office in Viroqua, had 44 participants. The quarter mile kids fun run was held following the moment of silence. Runners and walkers headed out once the children returned.

Once the winners were announced and the medals distributed, Sheriffs Deputy Mark Bellacero, K-9 Dax and Brandon Lamere of Mid-West Working Dogs LLC of Viroqua gave an officer protection demonstration. Members of the public also had an opportunity to ask questions about Dax and K-9 units in general.

Lamere said dogs used as K-9 units must have dominate personalities because officers dont know what they and their canine partners will be experiencing. We pick dogs with dominate personalities. They have to own the place. Thats the temperament we look for in these guys.
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La Crosse Common Council

La Crosse Common Council approves nearly $60 million in projects for 2022

Peter Thomson, La Crosse Tribune Extending La Crosse Street from Second Street to Front Street is among the items on the 2022 Capital Improvements Project Budget.

The La Crosse Common Council has unanimously approved spending nearly $60 million in projects and equipment next year, one of the biggest pieces of the citys overall annual budget.

The 2022 Capital Improvement Project Budget maps out spending $59,879,075 on a variety of things, from parks to trails, library improvements and maintenance projects, studies and investments in neighborhoods, new fire equipment and more.

Some of the largest pieces of the budget this year are streets projects, including some major overhauls in-part supported by the state and federal government.

Of those projects is the much-anticipated reconstruction of La Crosse Street. The pothole-ridden thoroughfare has long been troublesome for drivers in the community, but fixing it has been put off for some years since it is also a state highway.

But next year, the road will finally get its makeover with the approval of this budget.

The total cost will be $4,490,800, more than half of which will be covered by a federal grant. The remaining will be funded by the city.

From West Avenue through Losey Boulevard will be repaved with concrete, and the infrastructure to withstand flooding events will be updated, as well as other needs.

The other end of La Crosse Street will also see some attention next year through this budget, and the city will spend $500,000 to extend the street to connect to Front Street, part of a reimagining of the alignment of downtown that city officials have been working toward for some years.

'Mega' Kwik Trip convenience store project in La Crosse pushed back to 2022 The project, which would be the largest Kwik Trip store to date, should now break ground in March 2022, rather than this year.

This project would require purchasing property for the new road, which would likely split the gap between the Oktoberfest Grounds and Landmark by the Rivers.

The city and Wisconsin Department of Transportation will also begin its work on South Avenue next year. The $11.8 million project will expand and revamp the street between Green Bay and Ward Avenue, and replace several of the intersections with roundabouts.

A $7,521,200 state grant is helping the city with the funding for this project.

Some other key projects on the budget include money to continue the citys fire station remodels, money to build a new, long-awaited shelter in Weigent Park, and two studies to evaluate a possible new La Crosse County Historical Society museum and the viability of the La Crosse River Marsh.

The city has also now approved $1.3 million to redo parts of the La Crosse Police Department station, largely to address inequities in the locker rooms for female officers and expand some workspace.

This project is in lieu of a controversial public safety center the city was eyeing and put $1 million toward in last years budget. It would have held police, fire and inspection departments in largely Black neighborhoods of the city, prompting pushback on whether it was the right home for the facility.

South Avenue project in La Crosse to begin spring 2022, includes 3 roundabouts Three, two-lane roundabouts are part of the plans for the South Ave. construction project, that is slated to finish in November 2022.

This years project budget is noticeably smaller than the $119 million 2021 CIP Budget, one of the largest in recent years. The big bill was largely due to the citys update to its wastewater treatment plant facility, a project the city broke ground on this year.

The budget will be bundled into the overall 2022 Operating Budget, which is under review now. It will go through a number of public hearings and reviews from officials before it gets a final vote in November.

+14 +14 In Photos: The Great River Road in Wisconsin and Minnesota Scenes from Great River Road; Wisconsin's segment has been officially deemed an All-American Road by the U.S. Department of Transportation and
On its website, CCP says it has applied to the IRS for nonprofit status, but that status is still pending. Hence, all donations to it are not tax-exempt. Incidentally, CCP announced a public event Sept. 10 in Chicago listing Altman as a featured speaker.

Altmans controversial profile exploded on the national scene in August 2020. In a slickly produced You Tube video, he railed against Democrats, slurred migrants, dismissed climate change as a hoax, and attacked Archbishop Wilton Gregory of Washington. Since then, his parish bulletins and interviews have spread misinformation about COVID and vaccines. He once described racial lynching in the Jim Crow-era in the South as capital punishment.

On May 23, Altman said he had retained a canon (church) lawyer to defend his case. The canon lawyers interviewed by NCR unanimously say that Altman should be toning it down if he wants his case to have a chance in Rome.

Robert Flummerfelt, a Las Vegas-based canon lawyer says, If anything, Altmans behavior strengthens the bishops case. Flummerfelt adds that Altman is setting it up for the bishop and Rome saying they have no choice but to uphold [the decree]. Altman continues to commit acts which have negative impact on church communion, not only in the diocese but the wider church.
Pandoras box

Liberal Madison attorney Lester Pines said U.S. Supreme Court justices could be gearing up to overturn the past 50 years of abortion precedent. He said the courts inaction in the Texas case indicates its likely in the cases before it to limit or eliminate the right to privacy behind the right to an abortion.

Pines said the Texas law has already limited abortion access in Texas because most providers are unwilling to perform abortions with the threat of fines assessed against them.

Beyond the Texas case, the court announced earlier this summer it will hear a Mississippi case about whether states can ban abortions before a fetus can survive outside the womb. Abortion rights advocates say banning such pre-viability abortions would be in direct contradiction to one of the key holdings in the courts Roe decision and subsequent cases that states cannot ban abortion before a fetus can survive outside of the womb, generally viewed as between 24 and 28 weeks.

Pines speculated that the U.S. Supreme Court wont overturn the right to abortion outright but instead apply a less stringent standard of legal review. Under such a scheme, the right to abortion would remain but enforcing the right in the face of restrictive laws would become nearly impossible.
According to Van Horn, a gentleman wanted to sell him a Colby truck which included the engine and transmission. However, Van Horn insisted that the brainchild of William Colby never actually produced trucks and that what the gentleman had was a homemade rig of sorts. Eventually, Van Horn said the gentleman conceded.

He said, I wont sell you just the engine, Van Horn relayed.

Once he got it, Van Horn refurbished the engine himself and Barron said that it looks like it wouldve the day it went into a Colby car.

When Barron got the call, he said Van Horn asked him plainly: Ive got the engine, would you like to have it?

The local historian said yes and now the museum has a new piece on display that Barron said can serve as a tie-in with the Colby car.

People can see things up close and personal. As it sits on a frame. They can see how it started. Its kind of a tie-in for people to see an industry in Mason City and that particular engine in its entirety, Barron said.

Along with the engine and the transmission, Barron said that Van Horn provided a framed photo of some industrious men working. Men who may well have had a hand in crafting a Colby or one of its engines.
Like most everyone in America on Sept. 11, 2001, Jeremy Stoddard remembers exactly where he was on that sunny Tuesday morning.

Part of the UW-Madison education professors research over the past 19 years has been understanding and improving how the tragedy is taught in schools, work that has become increasingly important as the years pass and more students come into classrooms with no memory of that somber day to shape their views.

With every student in a K-12 classroom this school year born after the attacks, todays teachers are up against a host of challenges. Engaging students who are distanced from that day. An already crammed curriculum with too much history to teach in nine months. A sea of misinformation and conspiracy theories that continue to prevail.

Educators most frequently teach about 9/11 around the anniversary or tack it on at the end of the school year. They talk about their own recollections and play clips from the broadcast networks to show the shock of that day and how the nation witnessed it through TV screens.

Stoddard has found in his research that the overall narrative students learn hasnt changed. The attacks are framed as an unprecedented event, with the heroism of firefighters and first responders highlighted and the country coming together to fight terrorism.
The court is persuaded by the state's argument that this purported evidence does connect him to the scene of the murder, the judge said.

Gooch attended the hearing virtually from jail.

Gooch's attorney, Bruce Griffen, had argued that the text message exchanges were among thousands that Gooch sent and received, and were the only two that mentioned Mennonites. Gooch didn't initiate the exchange with the brother who was a state trooper in Virginia, he said. He simply responded in a boisterous, pile-on fashion, well after Krause's death, Griffen argued.

Gooch used words like surveillance in the exchange with another brother because he has a military background, Griffen said. And Gooch's text that the older people he saw weren't like the Mennonites he grew up with means Gooch is a young guy, and that's not his crowd, Griffen said.

The state is reading so much more into that, Griffen argued.

Gooch told authorities he drove to the churches because he was looking for fellowship, according to public records. But the prosecutor, Ammon Barker, said neither of the text exchanges suggest Gooch was looking for a nice, Mennonite church.
20 years. 20 years is a long time no matter how old you are. For some people 20 years encompasses an entire life time. Others, half a life time and still others a third of a lifetime or less. My parents generation remembers where they were on December 7, 1941. I clearly remember where I was on September 11, 2001.

I was a State of Wisconsin Fire Prevention Coordinator and on that bright Tuesday morning I had an appointment with Bloomer Fire Chief Rod Schmidt. We were doing an early morning inspection. We completed the inspection and Rod went back to work; I headed back to the office. State cars in that day did not have Sirius Satellite radio so I tuned to Wisconsin Public Radio to catch the hourly news.

After a few remarks and with some confusion, WPR was reporting that an airplane had hit one of the World Trade Center Towers and emergency service units were enroute. I had never been in that area of New York City but having departed Newark Airport, I knew where they were and had a fair idea as to the layout of what would be later termed ground zero.
On the morning of September 11, 2001, I arrived at my; office at the Trempealeau County Health Care Center Annex in Independence, Wisconsin, curious as to why several staff members were gathered in the usually vacant office next to mine. I joined them to see what was going on.

What was going on was the horror happening to the Twin Towers. My immediate thought was that it was a movie, but then I realized it was real and I remember thinking to myself, "nothing is ever going to be the same again."

I went back to my office and broke one of my steadfast rules of not using my work computer for anything personal. I contacted my daughter who at the time was working in a New York City office, near Grand Central Station.

I was more than relieved when she immediately responded! They had been instructed to leave the office, so she would walk 72 blocks to her apartment. I remember she told me she had felt two thousand souls leave this world that day. Tragically, we would later learn that it was far more than that . . . .

As she walked through Central Park, she said, it was like two different worlds, as many there did not seem to know yet about the vast destruction that had occurred.
Nearly two-thirds of people working in Lancaster County are employed at businesses covered by President Joe Bidens new plan to fight the spread of COVID-19, especially the highly contagious delta variant.

That means the unvaccinated among an estimated 144,000 people working here, or 63% of all people in the county with jobs, will have to either get vaccinated or get tested for COVID-19 at least once a week, per the policy Biden unveiled Thursday.

The number of unvaccinated workers here who will face the shots-or-tests dilemma is not known. But based on the percentage of countians age 18 and older who aren't vaccinated (a figure that includes retirees and others outside the labor force), the number of affected workers to be confronted with that choice surely is in the tens of thousands.

The long reach of the new mandate, approximated by the Economic Development Company of Lancaster Countys Center for Regional Analysis, comes despite the short list of companies that fall under its scope.

Bidens policy applies only to businesses with 100 or more employees. In Lancaster County, a mere 380 employers meet that test, according to the center. That translates as 3% of the roughly 13,000 employers here. But many employers in that small group have workforces in the thousands.

Almost none of the 20 or so businesses or business leaders approached by LNP | LancasterOnline on Friday voiced opinions about Bidens plan, saying they lacked details or they will need to comply regardless of their opinions.

The exception was Tom Baldrige, president and CEO of the Lancaster Chamber, whos been publicly urging anyone who can get vaccinated to do so. But he drew a line at the federal government requiring a shot or a test. About 185 chamber members fall into the size category thats affected.

Baldrige called the policy an overreach that will cause both disruption and confusion for business at a time when they least need it. Fact is, most businesses of all sizes have been leading the way since the start of the crisis with mitigation efforts that work best for them, their workers and their customers.

This one-size-fits-all mandate simply upends that hard work and creates, at least for now, more questions than answers, said Baldrige.

However, in an effort to provide whatever answers it can, the chamber is hosting a free virtual seminar about Bidens mandate on Wednesday from 11 a.m. to noon, as part of its Ask an Attorney series. To register for the Zoom presentation, visit lancasterchamber.com/events.

One major employer here indicated that Bidens mandate was irrelevant because the company has already taken a stricter stance.

Tyson Foods, which operates poultry processing facilities in New Holland with over 800 employees, already requires its workforce to be vaccinated. Tyson sweetens the mandate by providing the vaccine at work and rewarding participating workers with $200.

We believe that getting vaccinated is the single most effective thing our team members can do to protect themselves, their families and the communities where we operate, the company said.

The Arkansas-based firm announced Aug. 3 that office workers must be fully vaccinated by Oct. 1 and all other employees must be fully vaccinated by Nov. 1. So far, more than 90,000 of its U.S. employees, or more than 75%, have received at least one dose of the vaccine. Before its campaign began, only 45% had.

Nearly all officials at other companies were reluctant to take a position on the new policy, although the president of a business on the brink of being impacted  Bank of Bird-in-Hand  wondered how it would implement the mandated testing.

We are awaiting guidance from our corporate counsel as to how we would proceed if we meet the requirements, said Lori Maley of Bank of Bird-in-Hand, which employs 96, a figure that will rise. It would be difficult to manage trying to get unvaccinated employees tested weekly.

More common was the comment from a spokeswoman for ceilings manufacturer Armstrong World Industries, with 1,200 employees in the county. She said the Lancaster-based firm focuses on following the rules, not whether it agrees with them.

We continue to take the safety and health and well-being of our employees very seriously, and that includes abiding by the decisions that governing and regulatory bodies make, said Jennifer Johnson. Its not really a matter of opinion.

A spokeswoman for Pittsburgh-based Arconic, which has about 840 employees at its aluminum rolling mill and cast mill on Manheim Pike, took a similar stance. She said simply that Arconic will follow the new rules, stopping short of voicing a point of view on the wisdom of them.

Arconic is committed to keeping employees safe and will continue to follow recommendations and requirements from relevant health authorities and government officials to stop the spread of COVID-19. We will evaluate President Bidens mandate accordingly once implementation details and guidelines are provided by the relevant agencies, she said.

Lancaster-based Fulton Financial, owner of Fulton Bank, the countys biggest, also is waiting for more information before drawing a conclusion about the new mandate.

Its a bit early for Fulton to comment, said Steve Trapnell, spokesman for the employer of 1,300 people in the county. We will review the requirements on vaccinations and testing that the Department of Labor establishes and develop a plan to follow them.

In a similar vein, Chief Marketing Officer Brian Rutter of Willow Valley Living, which operates Willow Valley Communities with 1,400 employees, said the organization is assessing the new measures.

Ditto for Masonic Villages Katie Roof, vice president of clinical care and quality. She said  we would not yet fully understand the additional labor/financial burden of extending testing from the 726 staff in health care and personal care as now required to the entire 1,680-employee workforce.

Executives at Four Seasons Produce, Armstrong Flooring, Weis Markets and the Webstaurant Store declined to comment.

--Staff Writer Tom Lisi contributed to this story.
Ken Yoder Reed has a message for fellow Christians: Jews are Gods chosen people.

The authors distress over history repeating itself with a rise in antisemitism in the U.S. and Europe led Reed to write a new piece of fiction, The Prize-Winning Story.

Im grieved by 1,600 years of persecution of the Jews, often led by Christian leaders, which reached its horrible climax with the Holocaust, Reed says.

And now, he says, its happening again.

Reed is a Lancaster Mennonite School graduate who lived in the area before moving to California. He describes the shameful behavior used by Christian leaders to justify the Crusades, pogroms and other types of force aimed at converting or destroying Jews as replacement theology.

For the author, proof of antisemitism supported by Christian leaders for decades is on the walls of Yad Vashem, Israels memorial to Holocaust victims in Jerusalem.

Reed is prepared for pushback to his book. He anticipates those who believe God rejected the Jews and replaced them with followers of Jesus as His chosen messengers will respond negatively to his latest release.

But Christians who believe God loves the Jews and whove visited the Holy Land are Reeds primary audience. Reeds two visits to the Holy Land, along with extensive scholarly research, provided the inspiration and background for the story.

I love Israel ... and believe Jews will always be Gods chosen messengers, which doesnt take away from the fact they need the Messiah as much as any of us, Reed says.

Creatively written with colorful characters, the book takes readers on an adventuresome journey to the Holy Land. The satirical story chronicles a tour sponsored by a popular Christian radio show led by host Vladdy. Major Eli, a Jews Jew and Israels top expert on terrorism, serves as tour guide.

The tour group includes zealous Christian Zionist partisans, serious Bible students, sober-minded scientists, end-times enthusiasts and saved sinners. Traveling the path where Jesus, Jeremiah, Peter and the apostles once walked leads to new truths about Israeli life. Though the book is fictional, all of the characters are based on people Reed met on his travels to the Holy Land.

BookLife Publishers Weekly, which selected the book as an Editors Pick, shared this blurb about the release: Inspired by the Canterbury Tales, this satire finds American Christians facing the reality of the Holy Land. Reeds approach is smart and sensitive, even as he gleefully satirizes the relationship between American evangelicals and Israeli hardliners.

Reed calls himself a refugee Mennonite born in Lancaster County and having resided in Fetterville. He attended Goodville Elementary School in East Earl. When he was 9 years old, his Mennonite family moved to a farm in Fredericksburg, Lebanon County. He graduated from Lancaster Mennonite School. After graduation, he worked for seven years as a freelance journalist in Paradise.

He met his wife, Kathy, a teacher in Coatesville School District, at the eatery now known as Bird-in-Hand Family Restaurant and Smorgasbord. The couple married and moved to San Francisco in 1977 to work in Mennonite Voluntary Service. For 22 years, Reed owned a temp-recruiting firm for engineers in the semiconductor industry. Kathy died in 1997 from cancer. Reed married again in 2000; he and his wife Patricia live in Fremont, California. They have a blended family of six children and six grandchildren.

Reed retired in 2019 and is a full-time writer.

Reeds next book will be a biography of Salva Kiir, president of South Sudan.

There will be an online Zoom launch party for the book at 9 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 12. It will feature a Jewish artist, a Christian Zionist historian and an interview between Reed and Gidon Ariel, publisher of Root Source, a website that works to bring Jews and Christians together. Ariel is an Orthodox Jew.

For more information visit root-source.com/prize-winning-zoom-launch. The book is available for purchase on Amazon in paperback or Kindle eBook forms. Theres a 12% discount if purchased during the launch party.

Other books written by Reed are: Both My Sons (2016) and Mennonite Soldier (1975, reprinted 2016), both published by Masthof Press, Morgantown; and He Flew Too High (2009), self-published.

If you have ever traveled to Israel, you will delight in remembering the scenes and sites visited in this book, writes Lois Ann Mast, publisher of Masthof Press. But if you have never traveled to Israel, this book is for you, too; but beware, you will really want to go in person after reading this book!
The Torah commands Jews to abstain from working during Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. The holiest day in the Jewish religion starts at sundown Wednesday and lasts for 24 hours. Jews should spend that time praying to God for forgiveness for sins committed during the year.

One married couple, however, will do both.

East Petersburg residents Rami Pavolotzky and Daniela Szuster, originally from Argentina, live together, pray together and share rabbinical duties at Temple Beth El, a Lancaster conservative synagogue. In addition to work, the couple share household and childcare tasks and bring son Uriel, 15, and daughters Meital, 13, and Yael, 10, to religious services and social events as often as they can.

We enjoy working together and leading services, Szuster says.

Its a beautiful thing to do, Pavolotzky adds. We approach Judaism and marriage the same way, with love, care and respect.

This is unique, says Steven Gordon, temple president. They came to us as a family.

Settling in

Beth El relocated Pavolotzky, Szuster and their children from Costa Rica. The process took a year to complete, and the new rabbis started work in November 2015.

The congregation has totally accepted them, Gordon says. It is moving to see the family together.

We like the quiet (of Lancaster) and the congregation, Szuster says. Its a nice place to raise our kids. The family could do without cold weather, though.

We felt welcomed, Pavolotzky says. All the people seemed very open.

Pavolotzky and Szuster split duties at Temple Beth El most of the time. If Pavolotzky attends a temple board meeting at night, Szuster takes care of their kids. One will give a Shabbat sermon Friday night; the other will talk Saturday morning. They take turns writing the messages.

On Yom Kippur and other major holidays, though, the couple will work and pray together. They bring an enthusiasm for what theyre doing, says congregant Dolly Shuster. Its an absolute delight to watch them interact when they share the bimah (pulpit). She also relishes watching the couples children grow up. Rarely do Jews get to watch their spiritual leaders interact in this manner. They share prayers and divide everything.

Jewish theological seminaries and rabbinical associations say they rarely keep track of how many married rabbis share a synagogue.

A shared passion

Pavolotzky met Szuster in rabbinical school in Buenos Aires, and the couple married in 2002 in the same building where they studied, Seminario Rabbinico Latinoamericano Marshal T. Meyer. They received their rabbinical degrees a year later.

Its very nice to find someone to share your love and your passion, Szuster says.

It was natural, Pavolotzky adds. We spent so much time together. I wasnt looking for someone who was a rabbi. It just happened. The pair then went to Israel for a year to obtain masters degrees.

Being married and a conservative rabbi presents some problems, though. For instance, the couple follow a Jewish rule that says they cant drive or ride in vehicles on the Sabbath or any holiday. This means they walk to temple, and it can be difficult to find two conservative congregations within walking distance of one home, Pavolotzky says.

The pair first worked together at a temple in Costa Rica in 2004. It was a learning process, Pavolotzky says. It makes a difference to have someone to talk to, someone to get ideas from.

After 10 years with Bnai Israel, the congregation in Costa Rica, the couple looked for a larger Jewish population either in North America or Israel. They searched for a safer place with more educational opportunities for their children. We were in Costa Rica for many years, Szuster says. It was enough.

The couple also needed a congregation willing to support them in applying for a religious visa while having tolerance for rabbis who originally spoke a different language. Our English wasnt as good as it is today, Pavolotzky says.

Lancaster proved a good fit.

We were looking to hire for a single position, Gordon says. The previous rabbi retired, and congregants liked that Pavolotzky and Szuster offered different views.

Some 200 Temple Beth El families know Szuster as Rabbi Daniela and Pavolotzky as Rabbi Rami. We have different styles, Szuster says, explaining that some congregants feel more comfortable with her while others reach out to her husband.

Gordon agrees. They have different perspectives, he says. Congregants may identify with one or the other.

Congregants and the administrative staff also work hard to refrain from taking advantage of Pavolotzky and Szuster simply because each is a conservative rabbi.

They are lovely people, Gordon says.
In a year that included releasing not only one of the most critically acclaimed albums, but also a bona fide New York Times bestseller, one of Michelle Zauners top personal highlights of 2021 thus far involved a coat check room.

It wasnt just any coat check room, though: One of Zauners previous gigs, before releasing music as Japanese Breakfast, was in the coat check room at Philadelphias famed Union Transfer music venue. At the end of an unprecedented five-night run of sold-out shows at the venue in honor of Zauners new album, Jubilee, the Michelle Zauner Coat Check made its official debut, emblazoned with a plaque reading May everyone who works in this room go on to sell out five nights at Union Transfer.

Japanese Breakfast will return to the area on Sunday, Sept. 12, for a performance at HMAC in Harrisburg. Between promo tours for her new memoir, Crying in H Mart, and the announcement that she will be writing the screenplay for the forthcoming film adaptation, Zauner spoke with LNP | LancasterOnline about new elements of touring after two years off, a love of Dolly Parton and Randy Newman and reclaiming the gong.

Can you describe the moment when you found out that you were getting a coat check named in your honor?

It was one of those moments where nothing could get better, and that was the grand finale. I think (Union Transfer owner) Sean Agnew is one of those few people that exists in the world that is able to do stuff like that, which was so thoughtful and fun, just creating a moment. I had my own plans for him in that moment, but it was very unexpected. To have that end it all was very emotional. It was a top career highlight; I dont know how anyone can top that.

If you go What: Japanese Breakfast at HMAC, 1110 N. 3rd St., Harrisburg When: Sunday, Sept. 12, 6:30 p.m. Price: $25 More info: facebook.com/harrisburgarts

Now that youve done your first leg of the Jubilee tours, have the new songs started to transform and evolve in a live setting?

Yeah, definitely, Ive started to feel that way. Like, Slide Tackle is one of those songs. ... It wasnt coming together, and I didnt get the song for a really long time. Now, hearing that live, especially with Adam Schatz who plays saxophone on that, its such a musicians-one-upping-each-other song, you know? The sax comes in and plays this solo, and then theres this very complicated guitar part that has a solo and then a big synth moment and a big drum fill. Its one of those songs that works super well live and took on a life of its own.

Your song Tactics opens with a beautiful string quartet that I was so happy to see you say was directly inspired by the works of Randy Newman. As he is perpetually underrated, can you speak on that influence?

Im a huge Randy Newman fan, since high school. I think it is on Something New Under the Sun or sometimes its self-titled, but I love that song Living Without You. I remember that I had a boyfriend who played that song for me, and I was so in love with it and became such a huge fan. I love particularly his real softy ballads like Marie that always have these incredibly sweeping string parts with piano in the center.

I just wrote more songs on the piano this time around, and Tactics in particular I knew was such a ballad. It was weirdly a song that I had written two piano intros to, and Craig Hendrix, our drummer who also produced the album with me, suggested that we change the first intro into a string quartet. Unfortunately, well start right at the first verse since well only have one string player for the Harrisburg show. But yeah, Randy Newman has always been a really big influence on me. I feel like he has a beautiful, classic sound, so hes definitely a musician that I aspire to emulate. And (Tactics) is a sleeper favorite for me on the album.

Ill include a spoiler alert here, but I saw that youve recently been covering Dolly Partons Here You Come Again at a lot of shows recently. Do you feel like that song shares some DNA with the songs on Jubilee?

I certainly hope so! I feel like that song is scientifically created to be the greatest song. Especially since Dolly Parton is fully capable of writing incredible hits for herself, so to sing someone elses composition, you know that that person brought it really hard. There are so many key changes in that song, I think its an underrated Dolly Parton song that makes me so happy to hear. Its impossible to sing and play that song or listen to it without smiling. In a lot of ways, thats what I was chasing with this album. The one thing that I gained from the lockdown was that I practiced a lot of piano and it took me many months to master that song, because its so hard and Im not the most competent piano player. Its just so much fun to play with a bigger band.

As a former high school auxiliary percussionist, it warms my heart to see you bring out a gong onstage when you perform Paprika. For an instrument that is sometimes seen as somewhat simple to play, have you encountered any specific nuances since playing one so regularly?

Its funny  on the record, we didnt use a gong, we used probably eight different layered cymbals to create the crash sound. It was an Ableton monster, everything was in plug-ins, so I knew Id have to recreate these crashes and Craig helped me create them. We thought it would be really great to get a gong to encompass that. It is surprising how different the sound is depending on where you hit it. You have to hit it in the center. It takes a lot of focus because when I hit it, its in the climaxes in the song, so Im sustaining a note and contorting my body away from the gong so you cant pick it up on the vocal mic. So, it is trickier than it looks a little bit.

I had a friend of mine who is half-Japanese tell me that it was exciting for him to see me reclaim the gong as an Asian woman, because its so associated with orientalist stereotypes. That was something I didnt even think about, I was just like, I need a big cymbal. I thought that was kind of a nice thing, that it can be interpreted as reclaiming the gong. Its nice that it was something that I didnt even think about.
The Pennsylvania Department of State is investigating a complaint about a Lebanon County doctor who offered a free-to-download, signed, no-questions-asked medical exemption for children to opt out of the states new mask mandate.

Filed with the Department of State by Jason Fritz on Sept. 6, the complaint alleges Dr. Joel E. Yeager issued physician orders for individuals who are not his patients and for whom he has no medical history.

This physician is offering, essentially, a doctors excuse for patients that are not under his care; for patients he doesnt even know, Fritz, of Penn Township, told LNP | LancasterOnline.

Fritz is a respiratory therapist who has treated COVID-19 patients. He is also an administrator of the Manheim Central - Voice of Reason Facebook page, which supports science-based COVID-19 mitigation strategies in Lancaster Countys Manheim Central School District, including the mask mandate.

Wanda Murren, a Department of State spokesperson, declined to confirm or deny whether any particular licensee is under investigation, or even whether a complaint has been filed.

But Murren also said the department investigates all complaints.

Yeager said he received a copy of the complaint on Wednesday. The link for Yeagers signed exemption form was taken down sometime Friday.

He defended the pre-signed blanket exemption, saying a medical examination was unnecessary and indicative of what he called the overmedicalization of American culture.

It doesnt really take a doctor to certify that a child has an asthma or an anxiety or an allergic diagnosis, for example! Yeager said in an email to LNP | LancasterOnline. Parents  who know their kids far better than their doctors  are certainly the most capable of making that determination in this case.

Doctors are refusing to write valid medical exemptions

That doesnt jibe with federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidance.

Individuals with intermittent respiratory distress issues  such as asthma  would not likely qualify for an exemption because they generally can wear a mask safely, the CDC said when issuing its mask order on public transportation in January.

The CDC guidance says face masks should not be worn by children under the age of 2, those who have trouble breathing or who are unconscious, incapacitated or unable to remove a mask without assistance.

According to the CDC, only a narrow subset of persons with disabilities will be exempt from the mask requirement.

It appears there is widespread compliance with that policy.

Many (if not most) doctors are refusing to write valid medical exemptions for their own patients, Yeager said.

The Pennsylvania Department of State is charged with protecting the public by licensing business and health professionals. It is the state Board of Medicine that regulates medical practices in Pennsylvania and has the authority to take disciplinary or corrective action against licensees.

Yeager has no disciplinary actions.

He is a family physician who operates Heritage Family Health in Newmanstown with his wife. Heritage Family Health was incorporated in 2011, state records show.

State health officials declined to address the emergence in Pennsylvania of blanket medical exemptions that have cropped up elsewhere in California, Florida and Missouri, among others.

Schools should follow the same protocols or established processes for determining a student eligibility for an exemption, including any medical documentation, as they would when implementing other directives concerning the health and safety of students in the classroom, Mark O'Neil, a state health department spokesperson, said in an email.

Many online forms do not meet these conditions

Yeagers controversial exemption form was spurred by the Wolf administrations new face mask order, issued by Acting Health Secretary Alison Beam on Aug. 31. The order, which went into effect on Tuesday, requires masks in school buildings, early learning programs and child care facilities. The order was put in place as COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths have surged across the state.

For example, over the past week, Lancaster Countys three hospitals have had an average of 75 COVID-19 inpatients, up from 61 the previous week. On Wednesday, the patient count stood at 85, the most since late April.

From Aug. 25 to Sept. 5, the county had 19 COVID-19 deaths, up from just six in the preceding 12 days. At this pace, Lancaster County could be on track for 40 to 50 COVID-19 deaths in September. Thats more than the last three months combined.

It is unclear how many parents in Lancaster Countys 16 school districts have downloaded and used Yeagers signed medical exemption to skirt the mask mandate.

Officials at a number of Lancaster County school districts are aware of the Heritage Family Health mask exemption and indicated they will not accept it.

For example, a mass email message Thursday from Superintendent Peter Aiken to parents in the Manheim Central School District said documentation of a medical or mental health disability is required before approving an exemption.

Unfortunately, many online forms do not meet these conditions, Aiken said in an email obtained by LNP | LancasterOnline. Specifically the Heritage form, Certification of Need form, religious requests, or notes without details surrounding a medical or mental health condition or disability do not meet this requirement.

The following Lancaster County school districts have also indicated they will not accept the Heritage form: Donegal, School District of Lancaster, Eastern Lancaster County, Pequea Valley, Cocalico, Ephrata Area, Penn Manor, Columbia Borough, Elizabethtown Area and Lampeter-Strasburg.

Fritz, who filed a complaint against Yeager, took it a step further.

Yeagers exemption form, he said, was an extremely unethical, political stunt.

The board chair of the Pennsylvania Medical Society, Dr. Ed Balaban, cautioned members  regardless of their personal feelings on the matter  to stay above board in an Aug. 24 communication.

Physicians can be subject to professional discipline for engaging in unprofessional or immoral conduct, Balaban said. Such conduct can include failure to maintain medical records for patients which accurately and completely reflect the evaluation and treatment of the patient as well as potentially violating standards of care.

Staff writer Alex Geli contributed to this report.
In late 2020, NPR political reporter Scott Detrow was driving to cover a rally for former President Donald Trump in Latrobe, PA, when he made an impromptu trip to a spot he hadnt visited in years  the newly completed Flight 93 Memorial. In taking a break from what he calls the hellscape of the 2020 election, Detrow, called up an old friend and coworker, Tim Lambert, with an idea to tell the story of Flight 93 once again for the 20th anniversary of the attacks of 9/11.

When did you first meet Tim, and was his 9/11 connection something you were aware of at the time?

I probably met Tim in the fall of 2007, I was just out of school and WITF was my first reporting job out of college. I showed up and Tim was this, you know, older co-worker who's kind of a 'show you the ropes' type. Everything from stop rolling your eyes in meetings to you need to shut up more - an older friend that is really important in that phase in your life. I think one of our very first conversations was, because he had just gotten a national award for a story he had done for the 5th anniversary of 9/11. It was right when I showed up - the plane crashed on his property, that's crazy.

And then I think it was a year later, the spring of 2008, driving back from Pittsburgh, he said, do you want to see the site? It was still his property at that point`, there wasn't much going on there at that point. He gave me a tour and it's something I'll never forget. And it's funny, at the time, six or seven years after 9/11, it seemed like so long ago. And the idea that we could still see wires on the ground, it was just so shocking. Like, how is that still there? And now that day seems like ancient history as well.

As a journalist, how did it change the assignment to have Tim there sort of straddling the line between journalist and subject?

At each interview, there was a moment where I realized that I needed to shut up. We would both be there, and I would ask a question - and these were really long conversations, so I think it changed as it went on - but at the beginning, I'd ask a question and I'd see the, 'You're just another reporter, I've talked to hundreds of reporters, I've been doing this for 20 years' look and get a sincere, but guarded answer. And then Tim would ask them something and they would open up to him like the friend that he is. Like, there was such a clear difference here.

In several interviews, I asked some of them about that because, yes, he's a reporter, and he's also someone that has been at these quiet, private gatherings with you, someone you've gotten to know. But a lot of them said yes, he's a reporter, but we view him as once of us, part of our community. It was so clear watching that that's the case. I'm so fortunate that it was, because it led people to take their guard down and be honest about some of the real challenges of the past 20 years.

What was the scope of the project at the onset, and how many interviews did you think you'd need to do to get what you were trying to get?

One of the challenges of the piece is that we're trying to tell several stories at once. Tim has this unique experience, and I think truly one of the most unique experiences of any journalist in America covering 9/11. It lands on his property, and he's suddenly in the middle of it. And there are scenes in the story, where Tim has to clarify, at this point, I wasn't there as a reporter, I was there as somebody's friend, and I wasn't recording or taking notes, but now 20 years later, we've talked about it and I'm reporting on it. So at times, Tim was co-reporter and almost subject of the piece, it was tricky. With the broader story, we obviously needed to tell the story about what happened on Flight 93, because I'm really mindful that 20 years is a long time and there's people who are probably only vaguely familiar with it.

One thing I love about the NPR Politics podcast is that our audience trends on the younger side, usually people in their 20s, so I was mindful that we needed to tell the story of what actually happened. And the third layer is, this is about 20 years of living without a brother, 20 years of living without a husband, and it's been so hard trying to explain that outside of the usual memorial service or the annual opportunities to pop up and tell their stories.

Do you see this as a national story, a local story or a combination of both?

I think it's a story about people from all over America, all over the world, suddenly finding this community in this place they've never heard of. It's so strange when you think of it, that the site where your family members died in a horrific way, to be the site where you find peace and solace and know exactly what you're going through? It's very weird that that's what happened. By and large, people found themselves drawn to Somerset County, being out in those woods being with each other and making sense of it all.

Obviously, a thing that is top of mind for a lot of people right now is Afghanistan again. As a political reporter in Washington D.C., how has it been juggling this story with somewhat overlapping current news?

It's...very strange. Take Friday - I'm working at the White House for NPR, Tim and I are recording final tracks for this piece, it took us two hours. Thinking about September 11th itself. And then I go upstairs and I'm at this press conference with Joe Biden, asking questions about the fact that the United States is still in Afghanistan and how chaotic the withdrawal has been. It has been incredibly strange to pull my brain back and forth between 2001 and 2021 multiple times a day over the past few weeks. It's an obvious part of the story, but it's really made it so clear to me that this isn't something that Joe Biden is doing, he is the last in 20 years of decision making that led to this point.

As you said, there's people out there who aren't as familiar with this story. It's been boiled down to something of a catch phrase, but what do you think are the actual mechanics of making sure people "never forget?"

I did a piece on 9/11 a few years ago, as well. I did the math on events that happened 17 years before I was born, and it came out to the assassination of MLK Jr. And I'm like, that always felt like ancient history. Especially for me, being a political reporter in Washington D.C., it's this feeling that Flight 93, understandably, has become this sidebar part of 9/11. It's a sidebar because these 40 people succeeded at what they tried to do. They stopped an attack that probably would have destroyed the United States capitol. And that would have been horrific on so many fronts.

In a span of 20 minutes, they come up with this plan and they succeed, and because of that, there's this remote field nobody has heard of and no one can really visualize, and that's the scene of the attack instead of another looping image of a tower collapsing or a plane flying into a landmark. I understand it, but I hope this piece can remind people of what they did, and the people that are alive and the buildings that are still there because of what they did.
CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP)  When news came that a 20-year-old Wyoming soldier was one of the last casualties of the two-decade-long U.S. war in Afghanistan, it arrived as a tragic bookend: A 20-year-old soldier from Wyoming was among the first to die in the same war.

Army Ranger Spc. Jonn Edmunds, of Cheyenne, was one of the war's first two casualties when a Black Hawk helicopter on a search-and-rescue mission crashed in Pakistan on Oct. 19, 2001.

Last month, the family of Marine Lance Cpl. Rylee McCollum, of Bondurant just outside Jackson, got word he was among 13 U.S. soldiers killed in a suicide bombing Aug. 26 at the Kabul airport.

Edmunds and McCollum were both killed on their first deployments. In between, almost 2,500 U.S. troops died in the Afghanistan war, most with far less attention than the two Wyoming men got.

As with Edmunds death in the chaotic aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, McCollums strikes an especially sad chord as Americans struggle to process what good  if any  has come from their nations longest war.

That was a totally senseless death," Edmunds father, Donn Edmunds, said of McCollum. Seeing the other people losing their loved ones, all that does is bring back bad memories for my family."

A 25-year U.S. Army veteran who served in Vietnam, Edmunds remembers how two officers knocked on his door on the outskirts of Cheyenne before sunrise on Oct. 20, 2001, bringing word of his sons death.

I looked out the window, I saw them standing there and all I could think was Oh my God, I know what theyre here for. Ive done notifications so I knew, said Edmunds, who as a military police officer participated in telling relatives of loved ones' deaths. He got choked up and quiet while looking at a display of his sons medals and the folded American flag presented to him and other families of fallen soldiers.

They came in and gave us the Regret to inform you speech. My wife had been up by then, and I watched her melt into this carpet right here on the floor," Edmunds recalled. "And they asked, Is there anything we can do? and we said, No, just let us absorb this, and we have to be able to accept this.

Wyoming is the least populated state and one that values tradition: rodeo and county fairs in summer, elk hunting in fall, calving season in spring and military service.

Jonn Edmunds and his friends grew up playing with water guns, then laser tag in the familys big yard. Eventually the honors student moved up to paintball, Donn Edmunds recalled.

We used to have the guys from the Air Force come out here. And theyd knock on the door and say, Can Jonn come out and play paintball with us? he said.

On the opposite side of Cheyenne, F.E. Warren Air Force Base has overseen nuclear missiles in silos beneath the Wyoming, Colorado and Nebraska plains since the 1960s. Each July, the city hosts its massive Cheyenne Frontier Days rodeo festival but Cheyenne has always been a military town at heart.

Like Edmunds, McCollum seemed born with soldiering in his blood.

He grew up in the Jackson Hole area, a region of rugged, forested mountains and big-time outdoors culture on the other side of Wyoming from Cheyenne. Even as a toddler, McCollum played with toy rifles, pretending he was a soldier or hunter, relatives said.

As a high school wrestler, he distinguished himself by training intensely. At school, in 2017, he and his father spoke out publicly when a multiple-choice quiz for a reading assignment facetiously offered shooting at Trump as an answer.

On Friday, hundreds of people lined the streets of Jackson to honor McCollum as his remains returned home from Afghanistan. Many people drove from surrounding towns, some multiple hours away, to pay their respects, and law enforcement saluted as the hearse passed by.

I wrestled with him all my life. He was a senior when I was a freshman, said Colter Dawson of Jackson. He died for our country. Theres not that many people who get to make that kind of honorable sacrifice, and thats something this town and this country need to recognize more.

Jackson, where McCollum graduated from high school, is a wealthy ski and summer tourism enclave near Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks that many in Wyoming view as socioeconomically out of step and politically more moderate than the rest of the state.

Yet the town of 10,000 has shown no less respect for veterans and military service, especially over the past 20 years, said Joseph Burke, commander of the local American Legion post.

It was around 9/11 that people started to recognize veterans, the sacrifices they and their families really made, Burke said. We've got kids who go in the service from here all the time.

McCollums widow, Jiennah Crayton, is due to deliver a baby in a couple of weeks and the family plans a memorial service sometime after. Meanwhile, three online fundraising efforts have brought in over $900,000 for Crayton and the childs education.

After Jonn Edmunds death, television trucks lined up outside the family's home. Reporters gathered at their daughters school, Donn Edmunds recalled, and the family lived like hermits for a few weeks.

At a memorial service that filled a 4,500-seat gym, Jonn Edmunds commanding officer remembered him as a gritty soldier who still had that intense look on his face even after other soldiers looked tired.

Such crowds wouldnt always show up, however, at services for soldiers killed in Afghanistan and Iraq over the next two decades.

Yeah, people got numb. But the families that were affected never got numb, Edmunds said.

The Edmunds family received about $24,000 in donations which they gave away to causes including the Wounded Warrior Project, a charity for troops wounded since 2001, Edmunds said.

He has spent the years since his sons death riding his Harley-Davidson with the Patriot Guard Riders, a biker group that helps maintain decorum at military funerals, running unsuccessfully for the Wyoming Legislature and trying to raise interest in establishing a veterans memorial park. Now hes thinking about suing the U.S. government over its withdrawal from Afghanistan, which he criticized as poorly organized.

All of these peoples sons were great. Every one of them was a traumatic loss for their family. And the thing about it is, what for? Edmunds said. We have abandoned their mission.

The work of consoling and counseling grief-stricken relatives, however, was therapeutic both for him and for relatives, said Edmunds, 72, who runs a security business.

A woman once asked at an event held by the Armys Survivor Outreach Services family support group whether losing a loved one ever got easier, Edmunds recalled.

I said Maam, it will never get easier. The only thing that will happen to you is time will separate you from the event, Edmunds said.

AP journalist Amy Beth Hanson in Helena, Montana and photographer Amber Baesler in Jackson, Wyoming contributed to this report.

Follow Mead Gruver at https://twitter.com/meadgruver
HANOI, Vietnam (AP)  China plans to donate 3 million doses of its coronavirus vaccine to Vietnam, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Saturday as he wrapped up a visit to Hanoi.

Yi's pledge comes amid a virus lockdown in Vietnam to contain a COVID-19 surge. About 23 million Vietnamese students started a new school year earlier this week, most of them in virtual classrooms.

Vietnam's Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh said Saturday that the two countries should use dialogue to work out any differences, state broadcaster VTV reported.

Vietnam has previously accused China of obstructing its gas exploration activities in the South China Sea, where Beijing has constructed several islands equipped with airstrips and military installations.

Japans Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi was also in Hanoi on Saturday, where he signed a deal allowing Japan to give Vietnam defense equipment and technology.

Japan and Vietnam are stepping up military cooperation amid worries about Chinas growing military influence. Tokyo regularly protests the Chinas presence near the Japanese-controlled Senkaku islands, which China also claims and calls Diaoyu.

The Japanese defense ministers visit comes two weeks after U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris travelled to Vietnam to strengthen ties. During the tour, Harris urged countries to stand up against bullying by China in the South China Sea.

Vietnam's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Yi and Chinh co-chaired the 13th meeting of the Steering Committee for VietnamChina Bilateral Cooperation.

During the visit, Wang also held talks with Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh and met with Communist Party chief Nguyen Phu Trong.
KABUL, Afghanistan -- A Taliban official said that the group raised their flag over the Afghan presidential palace in a brief ceremony on Saturday  the same day the U.S. and the world marked the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

The milestone anniversary takes place just weeks after the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the return to power of the Taliban, the faction that sheltered the al-Qaida terror network founded by Osama bin Laden that carried out the attacks.

The Taliban's new Prime Minister Mohammad Hasan Akhund raised the flag in a ceremony at 11 a.m. local time to mark the official start of work by the Talibans 33-member caretaker government, said Ahmadullahh Muttaqi, multimedia chief of the group's cultural commission.

Earlier, another Taliban official said the religious militia's black and white flag was first raised at the palace on Friday. The militant group has also painted their banner on the entry gate to the U.S. Embassy building.

The U.S. is marking the 9/11 anniversary with commemorations at New Yorks World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.



KABUL, Afghanistan  The Taliban shot dead the brother of Amrullah Saleh, the former vice president of Afghanistan, and his driver in northern Panjshir province, Salehs nephew said Saturday.

Shuresh Saleh said his uncle Rohullah Azizi was going somewhere in a car Thursday when Taliban fighters stopped him at a checkpoint. As we hear at the moment Taliban shot him and his driver at the checkpoint. he said.

A message left with a Taliban spokesman Saturday was not immediately returned.

Shuresh Saleh said it was unclear where his uncle, an anti-Taliban fighter, was headed when the Taliban caught him. He said phones were not working in the area.

Amrullah Saleh led forces resisting the Taliban in Panjshir, which was the last holdout province to be overrun by Afghanistan's new rulers.

Videos circulating on social media purportedly show Taliban opening fire on anti-Taliban fighters in Panjshir whom they have arrested.



MORE ON AFGHANISTAN:

 US gives 1st public look inside base housing Afghans

 UN raises alarm on Taliban crackdown on dissent, journalists

 Pentagon chief: al-Qaida may seek comeback in Afghanistan

 Analysis: Taliban hard-line path worsens Afghanistan dilemma



 Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/afghanistan



KABUL, Afghanistan  More than 250 foreign nationals have left Afghanistan in the past three days, says Zalmay Khalilzad, Washingtons special envoy and the architect of an often criticized deal with the Taliban.

The deal signed last year provided for the safe withdrawal of U.S and NATO troops but say his critics was heavily weighted in favor of the hardline-Islamic movement.

In a series of tweets Khalilzad praised both the Middle Eastern State of Qatar, whose national airline carried out the flights and the Talibans cooperation in this important effort, for the recent departure of foreign nationals from Afghanistan.

We will continue to engage the government of Qatar, the Taliban, and others to ensure the safe passage of our citizens, other foreign nationals, and Afghans that want to leave, Khalilzad tweeted.

However, hundreds of Afghans, including U.S. citizens and green card holders, remain stranded in northern Afghanistans Mazar-e-Sharif waiting to be evacuated but stopped by Taliban rulers demanding travel documents.
LAUSD Board Votes To Require COVID-19 Vaccination for Students Over 12

All eligible Los Angeles Unified students aged 12 and over will be required to get vaccinated against COVID-19 to attend in- person classes under a policy unanimously approved by the districts Board of Education today, making it the largest district in the nation to impose such a mandate.

LAUSD Medical Director Dr. Smita Malhotra said during a specially called meeting Thursday afternoon that based on infection and hospitalization data for children, the district  the second-largest in the nation with 600,000 students, about 220,000 of whom are eligible for the vaccine  could prevent 110 children from being hospitalized with the virus through a vaccination mandate.

So why wouldnt we? Thats 110 children that mean the world to their families, Malhotra said. The mandate requires COVID-19 vaccinations for all students who access in-person instructional programs operated on district facilities, who are 12 years of age and older.

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Students age 12 and older who take part in in-person extracurricular programs will have to receive their first vaccine dose by Oct. 3, and their second no later than Oct. 31. All other students aged 12 and up must receive their first dose by Nov. 21, and their second by Dec. 19. Younger students will have to receive their first dose no later than 30 days after their 12th birthday, and their second dose no later than eight weeks after turning 12.

The mandate applies to all district students, along with charter school students on co-located district school facilities. Students with qualified and approved exemptions under LAUSDs existing immunization policies will be exempt. Board member Scott Schmerelson recused himself from the vote because

he holds stock in Pfizer, which is the only pharmaceutical company to have a vaccine approved under emergency authorization for children 12 and over. After

the vote, he announced his support for the mandate. Board Member Jackie Goldberg, who has seven relatives in LAUSD

schools, said she does not see this as your choice or my choice  I see this as a community necessity to protect the children under 12 who cannot be

vaccinated. Board member Nick Melvoin noted that requiring vaccines for students is nothing new.

In fact, for decades and generations, public schools have required immunizations for polio, measles, mumps, rubella, and consequently most parents

dont have to worry about their kids contracting those illnesses and their kids may not have ever heard of it, Melvoin said.

Board member George McKenna said it would be a mistake not to trust the medical science at this point, because the alternative is to do nothing. Several board members highlighted the importance of keeping schools open for students to receive the best education.

In order to keep our schools safe and open for our kids to learn, we must use the strongest tool in our toolbox, and thats the vaccine, said

Board President Kelly Gonez. Interim Superintendent Megan K. Reilly said, We know that children learn and thrive best with in-person instruction when they can interact with teachers and friends, participate in extracurricular activities, and more that we offer in our campuses.

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The boards student member Parishi Kanuga also spoke in support of the vaccination mandate, but she urged the district to combat misinformation

and develop an understanding of vaccine hesitancy. I would like everyone to remember the fact that we do live in a nation where communities of color have been affected by our countrys medical decisions, leading to mistrust  students and families may be vaccine-hesitant for many reasons, so we will need to prioritize strategically combating misinformation and developing an understanding of the reasons for vaccine mistrust, she said.

The board heard public comment before the vote from both supporters and opponents of the vaccine mandate. Jenna Schwartz, who has two middle school

students in the district, said she believes the vaccine mandate is a step in the right direction but urged the board to accompany it with an education

campaign about vaccine safety. Others called in saying that a vaccine mandate takes control away from

the parents.

This decision should be made by parents, we know if our children need a vaccine or not, its like youre taking away our rights to care for our

children, said Diana Guillen, who noted that the vaccine was still under emergency approval for children between 12 and 15 years old. A small but vocal group of mandate opponents rallied outside LAUSD headquarters during and after the meeting, waving anti-vaccination signs.

Sen. Richard Pan, a pediatrician and chair of the California Senate Health Committee, called in to urge the board to adopt the mandate. Our students are vulnerable to COVID-19 and mandating vaccines is a positive step to make sure more communities are protected and ensuring their schools are safe. Because vaccines are safe, and they work, theyre effective.

Malhotra cited a July 2021 study of public health records in Los Angeles that found unvaccinated people account for five times more infections

and 29 times more hospitalizations than those who are fully vaccinated.

According to the county Department of Public Health, 62% of residents aged 12-15 in Los Angeles County had received at least one dose of vaccine as

of Sept. 5, and 51% are fully vaccinated. In the 16-17 age group, 69% have had at least one dose, and 59% are fully vaccinated. United Teachers Los Angeles, the union representing LAUSD teachers, also supported the vaccine mandate for students. All district employees must be fully vaccinated by Oct. 15. The district already required weekly COVID testing for students and employees, regardless of their vaccination status.

UTLA is in full support of the decision by the school board and Interim Superintendent Megan Reilly to require full COVID-19 vaccination for all eligible students, according to a statement from the union. UTLA made this demand at the bargaining table, publicly called for this action, and take pride in continuing to lead on issues of safety in our schools. We urge the district to continue providing greater access, education, and outreach to facilitate increased vaccination numbers in our school communities.

Now more than ever, we must work together to keep our schools safer and help protect the most vulnerable among us, including children too young to

be vaccinated. Health and safety continue to be top of mind for our entire educational community. County Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer has repeatedly called

increased vaccination rates the only way to end the COVID pandemic, and she backed the LAUSD student vaccine mandate.

We do support the actions that theyre taking to add an additional layer of protection at schools through a sensible school vaccine requirement for eligible students, Ferrer said Thursday. Vaccination remains one of the quickest and most powerful ways to decrease community transmission and prevent serious illness, which helps keep students, teachers and staff in school. And the COVID-19 vaccines have proven to be safe and effective.

We applaud all of our districts for doing everything that they can to protect their school community and we want to thank LAUSD for really elevating the importance of using vaccinations as one of the most powerful tools (to reduce virus spread). Ferrer noted that while the Pfizer vaccine is only being offered on an

emergency-use basis to children aged 12-15, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is widely expected to give it full approval by this fall, before

the LAUSD mandate takes full effect.

The Culver City Unified School District has also approved a vaccine mandate for students, although it will not take effect until November in anticipation of a vaccine receiving full FDA authorization for use in those age

12-15.
The tragic events of September 11, 2001, took place in just under 102 minutes. On that day, 2,996 people died in the worst terrorist attack in modern history.

What followed was nearly 20 years of war in Afghanistan. The U.S. Department of Defense says there were at least 2,325 American military deaths. No one knows exactly how many civilians were killed.

The Global War on Terror, as it was called, stretched beyond Afghanistan into Iraq and places as far away as Africa. In Iraq, the conflict killed nearly 4,500 U.S. service members and many thousands of civilians.

On September 11, 2021, President Joe Biden is expected to try to mark the end of that period and Americas longest war.

Since withdrawing all troops from Afghanistan at the end of August, the Biden administration has sought to put the events of 20 years behind it. It has released many formerly-secret documents about the September 11 attacks. It appears to have accepted the return of Taliban militants, the Afghan leaders pushed out by the U.S. invasion nearly 20 years ago.

Three places

On Saturday, Biden will visit the three places that were attacked.

New York City is where American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center. Seventeen minutes later, United Airlines Flight 175 hit the south tower.

Biden will also visit the Pentagon, the headquarters of the U.S. defense department, outside Washington, D.C. That is where American Airlines Flight 77 crashed 34 minutes later.

Separately, Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris will pay their respects at a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. That is where United Airlines Flight 93 crashed.

Jeremi Suri is a history professor at the University of Texas in Austin.

"The president is drawing a line under the last 20 years," he told VOA. "And he's acting as a historian and saying we've ended an era, just like the end of the World War II era, and it's now time to make new decisions in the ways in which Harry Truman made new decisions after the World War II era."

Harry Truman was the president of the United States from 1945 to 1953.

Suri said historians understand why Biden is asking Americans to look forward and not back.

"I think we are in a different moment after the 2020 election, and we are in a different moment with the rise of China, he said.

A different challenge

"Twenty years on, our challenge is different," said deputy national security adviser Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall.

"We have learned since 9/11 how to protect Americans from terrorism, she said, adding that those measures probably prevented another 9/11-style terrorist attack.

Vanderbilt University historian Thomas Schwartz, however, does not believe we can easily call an end to the era.

Pointing out that it takes two sides to have a conflict, one side cannot decide alone to end it, he said.

I think the words of President Biden  and the deeds  of a fixed time for withdrawal from Afghanistan were a mistake and were an error in judgment that I think could affect the United States over the coming years," he said.

Lebanon in 1983

Norman Ornstein is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative public policy research group in Washington.

He believes that Americans should look to history to understand our position. In 1983, President Ronald Reagan decided to withdraw American forces from Lebanon months after a bombing killed 241 U.S. service members. That decision, Ornstein said, shows the difference between the America of today and the America of past decades.

"We did not have calls for Ronald Reagan to resign, or moves to impeach him," he said. Republican lawmakers have strongly criticized the U.S. evacuation from Afghanistan and President Biden.

Ornstein said Reagans actions in 1983 were not considered for political reasons as almost everything is today.

"And that is a disturbing element here that actually is at least as unsettling in terms of where the country goes in the future as some of these other threats that we face," he said.

Im Bryan Lynn.

VOAs Anita Powell reported this story. Susan Shand adapted it for Learning English. Mario Ritter, Jr. was the editor.

______________________________________________

Words in This Story

deed  n. something that is done; an act

era n. a period of time that is associated with a quality, event or persons

challenge n. a difficult task or problem; something that is hard to do

impeach v. (law) to charge a public official with a crime done while in office

disturbing adj. something that is worrying or upsetting

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Nagla Bedir did not talk about the September 11 terrorist attacks with her high school students last year. The New Jersey teacher was holding classes online because of the pandemic, and it was a discussion she only wanted to have in person.

This year, on the 20th anniversary and with the Afghanistan war ending, September 11  or 9/11  is an issue she cannot avoid.

She has questions she plans to ask students in her international diplomacy class: What do you know about 9/11, why it happened, and what happened afterwards? And how is it connected to Afghanistan?

I think its really important that teachers dont shy away from teaching about these things, Bedir said. She is a co-founder of the organization Teaching While Muslim.

Many educators worry about teaching anything that is considered political, she said. I think its really unfortunate, Bedir added, because there is so much misinformation and disinformation in the world.

Todays students do not remember September 11, but they have heard about it all their lives.

Jennifer Grygiel is a professor at Syracuse University in New York. She researches social media and the internet. She said that if students are not given factual information that helps them understand what happened and why, students could start to believe conspiracies  theories that claim an event was a secret plan carried out by usually powerful people or groups.

In the absence of information, people go online, Grygiel said.

Kathy Durham is a history teacher in the state of Nevada. She uses 9/11 to teach her high school students about primary sources. She shows her students documentary films and old news coverage. She also requires them to talk to adults who remember that day.

Sometimes students claim the attacks were a government conspiracy. Durham said she pushes them to examine the truthfulness of sources and evidence.

Its really, really a delicate thing, because my job is to teach kids to think and not tell them what to think, Durham said.

Some schools teach about 9/11 around the anniversary or briefly discuss it in history classes. But the way the attacks are taught are often up to the teacher, even in states where 9/11 lessons are required.

Teaching 9/11 has largely been memorializing the events versus really digging into the context of 9/11 and the ongoing sort of results of 9/11, said Jeremy Stoddard. He is a University of Wisconsin professor who has researched the subject.

In the years immediately after the attacks, 9/11 was a very emotional subject for students. But with students now distanced from it, it can be difficult keeping students interested, said Anthony Gardner. He is the founder of the September 11th Education Trust.

The organization recently released a plan to help teachers use 9/11-related lessons on the anniversary as well as throughout the year. Gardner, who lost his brother on 9/11, said it is important that students hear about people who died that day, related deaths that came later, and the lessons learned.

Corey Winchester is a high school history teacher in Illinois. He tries to teach about 9/11 not just as a single event, but something that were still interacting with.

For some teachers, telling personal stories helps students learn the wide effects of 9/11. Liz Prince is having her fifth graders in Mississippi record a discussion with someone they know about a September 11 experience.

Back in New Jersey, Bedir plans to teach what happened and then have students explore the U.S. involvement in Afghanistan before 2001. She will also share her own experience, when she was a student herself.

Bedir was 11 at the time and attending school. The World Trade Centers Twin Towers were visible from the school grounds.

Her parents feared for her safety as anti-Muslim opinions grew after the attacks. She said her parents stopped her from starting to wear a hijab. She ended up waiting 10 more years before she covered her hair.

Im Dan Novak.

Kantele Franco and David Klepper reported this story for The Associated Press. Dan Novak adapted it for VOA Learning English. Ashley Thompson was the editor.

Quiz- Many Issues Make September 11 a Difficult Subject to Teach Start the Quiz to find out Start Quiz

________________________________________________

Words in This Story

shy from  phrasal verb. to try to avoid (something) because of nervousness, fear, dislike, etc.

unfortunate  n. not fortunate; having bad luck

absence  n. a state or condition in which something expected, wanted, or looked for is not present or does not exist : a state or condition in which something is absent

primary sources  n. a document or story created at the time of an historic event

delicate  adj. easily broken or damaged

memorialize  v. to do or create something that causes people to remember (a person, thing, or event)

context  n. the words that are used with a certain word or phrase and that help to explain its meaning

interact  v. to talk or do things with other people

visible  adj. able to be seen

hijab  n. a head covering worn in public by some Muslim women
During the Harvest section, it was explained to the students how a combine equipped with a corn head works.

The head of the combine pushes through the corn field and grabs the stalks from the ground. The stalk is then forced through a small area where the corn cob pops off, along with much of the husks. Chains then push those cobs into the combine.

When the corn enters the combine, its fed up into a cylinder, turning the piece of corn and forcing the kernels loose. The kernels are then filtered through a sieve.

The combine on display was a John Deere S600, provided by Landmark Implement.

At the Bees and Pollination station, the students were told about all the different types of food people eat, how they grow, if they need to be pollinated, etc.

In one case, the presenter held a piece of lettuce up and told the students it grows right out of the ground and doesnt need pollinators. He said if let grown long enough, it will eventually

resource.

At the Agronomy station, there were several different items laid out and one of them was soybeans. The students were told that while corn is the most produced crop in the state, soybeans are second most and are important in their own right.
LEXINGTON  A Lexington man, charged with first degree murder in the July 6 drive-by shooting of Marcus Keyser, has had his case bound over to district court after a two day preliminary hearing.

Francisco Hernandez-Corona, 19, is also charged with use of a firearm to commit a felony.

Hernandez-Corona appeared in Dawson County Court before Judge Jeffrey Wightman for a preliminary hearing on Wednesday, Sept. 8 and Thursday, Sept. 9.

The only witness called by the Dawson County Attorney, Elizabeth Waterman, was Investigator Michael Baker, with the Lexington Police Department.

After the hearing, Judge Wightman said the case would be bound over to the Dawson County District Court and an arraignment would take place on Monday, Oct. 25, at 9:30 a.m.

Hernandez-Coronas bond was continued and he remains lodged in the Dawson County Jail.

About 2 a.m. July 6, Lexington police officers, Dawson County Sheriffs deputies and Nebraska State Patrol troopers responded to an anonymous report of possible gun shots in the 800 block of West Ninth Street in Lexington, but did not find anything at that time, according to the Lexington Police Department.
Lewiston, ID (83501)

Today

Clouds and some sun this morning with more clouds for this afternoon. High 78F. Winds WNW at 10 to 20 mph..

Tonight

Considerable clouds this evening. Some decrease in clouds late. Low 48F. Winds W at 10 to 15 mph.
If Reclaim Idaho was looking for a pair of foils to help promote its education funding initiative, the group could hardly do any better than the Republicans heading up education committees in the House and Senate.
The lead police investigator in the September 2019 Lompoc shooting death of an active-duty Army soldier testified in court Friday, recalling an interview in which he said a suspect pointed to the co-defendant as the triggerman in the case.

Officer Michael Miller, a detective with the Lompoc Police Department, recalled interviews with Francisco Gutierrez-Ortega, of Santa Maria, after he turned himself in more than a week after the shooting death of 22-year-old Marlon Brumfield on Sept. 8, 2019. who was home on leave from Germany.

Gutierrez-Ortega was the driver in the getaway vehicle in the incident and named his passenger, 27-year-old Walter Morales, as the person who shot at Brumfield before both suspects fled the scene, according to Miller.

Morales was charged with Brumfield's murder and also faces four sentencing enhancements, including causing great bodily injury and committing the shooting for the benefit of a gang.

+3 Santa Maria man accused of killing Army soldier pleads no contest to manslaughter A Santa Maria man has pleaded no contest to voluntary manslaughter in connection with the shooting death of Army soldier Marlon Brumfield in September 2019.

Morales received three additional charges, including attempted murder, shooting at a dwelling, assault with a deadly weapon and an enhancement of using a firearm from a separate incident in which he allegedly shot at an occupied vehicle in the 1000 block of West Olive Street July 11, 2020.

Morales had allegedly fled to Mexico following Brumfield's death and was arrested by SWAT officers July 17, 2020 in the 1500 block of South Thornburg Street in Santa Maria after nearly a year on the run.

Morales preliminary hearing began Thursday in Lompoc Superior Court and continued for a second day on Friday. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.

The hearing is tentatively expected to last until Oct. 8, according to Deputy District Attorney Scott Donahue, who is prosecuting the case.

Both the families for Brumfield and Morales were in attendance during the hearing, but sat on opposite sides of the court.

Co-defendant Gutierrez-Ortega pleaded no contest on Oct. 9, 2020, to the charge in the killing of Brumfield, 22, of Lompoc, according to Santa Barbara County Superior Court records.

Miller testified that he and Lompoc Police Sgt. Agustin Arias interviewed Gutierrez-Ortega at the local jail after picking him up from the Santa Maria Police Department, where he turned himself in to detectives.

At first, Gutierrez-Ortega refused to talk to police, but changed his mind, according to Miller.

Miller said that during the interviews on Sept. 17, 2019, and Oct. 7, 2019, Gutierrez-Ortega told detectives how he met Morales and what he allegedly witnessed when Brumfield was killed.

Through his brother, Gutierrez-Ortega became acquainted with Morales, who drove up to Santa Maria and the two went back to Lompoc, according to Miller.

After knowing him for awhile, Morales allegedly told his co-defendant that he was Smiley from the VLP gang in Lompoc while Gutierrez-Ortega admitted to being an inactive West Park gang member but in good standing, Miller added.

+3 Judge sets no bail for Lompoc man who fled to Mexico after death of soldier A Santa Barbara County Superior Court judge on Tuesday ordered no bail and continued the arraignment for a Lompoc man suspected in the shooting death of a U.S. Army soldier in September 2019.

They went to Morales relatives house and drank beer before going to DJs Saloon and drank more before leaving when the bar closed.

As the two got back into their vehicle, Morales allegedly heard someone say suwohoop, believing that it was a call-out from two individuals walking nearby that he believed were associated with the Bloods street gang, according to Miller.

Morales instructed Gutierrez-Ortega to pull up next to the two people walking, and the car drove into the oncoming traffic lane and next to the curb near the intersection of A Street and Ocean Avenue, where Brumfield was walking with his friend at about 2 a.m.

After noticing that the two men did not appear to be in a gang, Gutierrez-Ortega attempted to convey that information to Morales, who almost immediately pulled out a .357 revolver and fired four shots through the window across the drivers face towards Brumfield before the Mustang sped away, according to Miller.

Brumfield told his friend that he was shot and stumbled into the street, where he collapsed, Miller testified.

When Gutierrez-Ortega asked why Morales shot at Brumfield, Morales allegedly said I dont care, Im a killer, Miller testified.

[Gutierrez-Ortega] felt bad about what happened, Miller said.

Gretchen Gaspari and Darren Ritchie, Morales defense attorneys, questioned Miller over his experience handling a female confidential witness who provided information about the shooting while she was intoxicated and his experience as a lead investigator in homicide cases.

During Gaspari's questioning, Miller said that the confidential witness maintained her story multiple times that Gutierrez-Ortega was the shooter until May of this year.

Miller, a Lompoc Police detective who investigates crimes against children, said this is his first time as a lead investigator in a homicide and was assigned to the Brumfield case due to his departments heavy caseload investigating other killings that year.

Unfortunately weve all had to become the primary [investigator] on a homicide case, Miller said.

The preliminary hearing continues Monday morning in Superior Court.
In November 2002, the sense of a shared brotherhood prompted a group of firefighters to travel from Santa Barbara County to New York City for the first memorial ceremony to honor those who perished Sept. 11, 2001, when terrorists used four hijacked airliners to attack the United States.

That same sense of being part of one huge family drew local firefighters back to the city in 2006, 2011, 2016 and again this year to pay their respects to their fallen comrades.

Its just the brotherhood of the fire service, Santa Maria Fire Department Battalion Chief Tony Clayburg explained by phone Friday as he sat in a New York City bar waiting to meet up with the other four members of this years contingent. Losing 343 FDNY firefighters in one fell swoop was unprecedented.

Clayburgs companions on this years journey are retired SMFD firefighter Dennis Szczepanski and retired SMFD engineer Greg Welch, who have been on previous trips to the 9/11 memorial.

Retired Santa Barbara County Fire Department engineer Ron Vasquez and retired American Medical Response paramedic Ed Mulder are also part of this years pilgrimage to honor the 343 firefighters and paramedics who died trying to rescue people trapped in the Twin Towers.

Its all about brotherhood and remembering their bravery and sacrifice, Clayburg said.

Clayburg recalled he had just joined the Santa Maria Fire Department when terrorists flew two airliners into the World Trade Center towers and a third into the Pentagon.

Before hijackers aboard the fourth airliner could attack their target, which to this day is unknown, they were assaulted by outraged passengers and crashed the aircraft into a field.

In all, 2,996 people died that day.

I was just on the job, he said. We all saw it and felt it at work. It definitely made our hearts sink.

A year later, a group of local firefighters traveled to New York City for the memorial service, carrying with them $17,000 in relief funds donated by the community through a barbecue and car wash sponsored by the Santa Maria Fire Department.

We were directed to a fire station in Brooklyn where they treated us like family, Clayburg said. They were very gracious and very appreciative of the donation.

Firefighters flooded New York City for that first memorial service at Ground Zero  the site where the two World Trade Center towers once stood.

There were thousands of firefighters from all over the world, Clayburg said. You really felt that brotherhood.

Central Coast firefighters who attended that first event decided they should make it a regular journey.

We obviously couldnt go every year, but we could go every five years, Clayburg said, adding, This is all on our own finances, on our own time.

He said although the first- and five-year memorials were held at Ground Zero, the 10- and 15-year events were held at the Riverside Park Firemens Memorial in Upper Manhattan, as will the 20-year anniversary memorial this year.

But Clayburg said hes visited the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, which opened Sept. 11, 2011, at Ground Zero and found it a very moving experience.

Its very somber, he said of the twin memorial pools and the names engraved in the stone surrounding them. Theres not a lot of words being said.

But he noted local firefighters have met a lot of people there who were in New York City at the time of the attacks and have heard their stories of what it was like that day.

Theres a [fire] station right down the street that everyone walks by on the way there, Clayburg said. There are usually firefighters out front talking to people. They invite you in for coffee and sometimes lunch.

He added, The museum itself  its hard, its very hard. Theres one room thats only phone messages from people who were trapped that they left for their loved ones. I could only listen for about three minutes. I couldnt take it. I had to leave.

Firefighting and rescue equipment pulled from the rubble of the Twin Towers and fire engines smashed by the collapsing structures are also on display, he said.

Clayburg said he would recommend everyone visit the memorial and museum at least once.

Everyone says well never forget, he said. We cant forget. This is something that changed our world and changed our lives.  We do our part to remember their sacrifices.
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Former ACSO lieutenant honored with Star of Texas Award

The Lufkin Daily News Angelina County Sheriffs Office Sgt. Stacy Seymore is pinned by Alton Lenderman for his promotion to lieutenant in this June 17, 2013, file photo. Seymore was critically injured in a car wreck on U.S. Highway 69 south in 2019 as he was making a traffic stop.

Gov. Greg Abbott presented former Angelina County Sheriffs Office Lt. Stacy Seymore  who was injured in the line of duty in 2019  with the Star of Texas Award Friday in Austin.

Seymore was critically injured in July of 2019 after being involved in a head-on collision with an oncoming vehicle that was making an illegal pass, said Pct. 1 Constable Tom Selman, who nominated Seymore for the award.

The Star of Texas is awarded to law enforcement officers who are severely injured or die in the line of duty. More than 600 Texans have been honored in this way since the awards were first started in 2003, according to Texas Public Safety Office.

The Star of Texas Award is aptly named because it honors those whose self-sacrifice serves as a shining example of the very best of the Lone Star State, Abbott said. I am proud to humbly recognize 46 remarkable individuals who have demonstrated incredible heroism in the line of duty.

State Rep. Trent Ashby said he was honored to be on stage to witness Abbott presenting the award to Seymore.

I have known Lt. Seymore for years and I can emphatically state that he represents the best of what it means to be both a law enforcement officer, as well as a Texan, Ashby said. He is so deserving of this recognition, and I wasnt going to miss being there in person to show my support for him and everything hes been through since his incident on Highway 69 south in 2019. Lt. Seymore is a modern-day hero, and I hope everyone will take the time to show their support for him as well as all of our first responders who demonstrate on a daily basis the character and courage to repeatedly put their lives on the line for all of us.

Seymore said he felt bad for the families who attended the ceremony on behalf of individuals who lost their lives in the line of duty.

So many that had died were so young, he said. You had family members walking out because their husband, or son, or brother were killed in the line of duty. My heart goes out to them.

Seymore said he was humbled to learn he would be receiving the award. It has been a rough few years since his accident, and he said he didnt really feel worthy of it.

I was just doing my job and I got hurt, he said.

He was flown to a Beaumont hospital with severe injuries to both feet and legs. He is still recovering and has undergone several surgeries since the incident. He will have another nerve study to see if he needs another procedure.

One foot is still numb. I can walk, but it feels like walking on Jell-O because it has no feeling, he said.

His health was the source of some controversy in the county as Sheriff Greg Sanches asked the court to allow him to terminate Seymores employment at the end of 2020. At the time, he was another eight months to a year away from full recovery.

On Dec. 8, 2020, commissioners and Seymore agreed that Seymore would retire and, in return, the county would pay for his COBRA Insurance for one year and pay him directly for 129 hours of vacation and 523 hours of sick time he accrued during his tenure.

Seymore does not believe he will ever fully recover and expects to be in pain the rest of his life.

Ive just come to the realization that I will probably have pain for the rest of my life and Ive got to deal with it as best I can, he said.

He said he was grateful to Selman nominating him for the award.
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They were so covered, you couldn't tell what color people were anymore, she said. To me, that marked that were all one people.

Roman, who was then just in her second year as a first responder, said she and her husband, a police officer whos since retired, were both enjoying their day off of work. As news of the attacks broke, and as the Romans watched the Twin Towers collapse on their TV screen, their lives  along with the rest of the nations  turned upside down.

We had a conversation about whether one of us should quit our job, so that we would know that our family would be safe and taken care of and that they wouldn't lose both of us, she said. There was sort of an underlying fear about what would happen next, adding to the amount of stress that we already had going to work.

Still, Roman pushed on, feeling empowered by the countrys newfound patriotism and camaraderie.

In the following weeks and months, Americans came together, she said. We united and suddenly had this common enemy, and we could see what was the same in all of us. What we really wanted was to be safe and to be able to live our lives.

That unification is something that we haven't seen since, Roman added.
As one mom told us about navigating the pandemic, If we make it out of this, we will be unstoppable.

As Wisconsin, and America, rebuild, lets make sure parents and families will have the tools and conditions they need and deserve to be unstoppable.

Anne Mosle isvice president of the Aspen Institute and executive director of Ascend at the Aspen Institute. Marjorie Sims is managing director of Ascend at the Aspen Institute.

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.
Kaleem Caire, CEO and founder of One City Schools, an independent charter school, said he heard from people who werent happy with their position in the districts hierarchy and didnt know where they stood with the new leader.

There were three or four people who reached out to me to talk, not to dump on (Jenkins) but asking for advice, and I told them, when you got a new leader, the first thing you got to do is youve got to demonstrate youre committed to them and their agenda, because theyre there to get something done, Caire said.

Caire said he was sad to see some administrators leave because they had institutional knowledge from years of experience working within the district. He mentioned specifically former chief financial officer Kelly Ruppel, who went on to become the executive director of Ronald McDonald House Charities of Madison, and former assistant superintendent for secondary schools Mike Hernandez, who left to become the assistant superintendent of the Appleton School District.

Hes had some transition (within the administrative team) but thats normal, Caire said. Im just glad people decided to transition over the summer so theyd give him some time to get his house in order.
James Bopp Jr., general counsel for the National Right to Life Committee, said the U.S. Supreme Courts decision not to block the Texas law signals a small but meaningful shift in the way the court treats the abortion issue, one that could eventually lead to Roe v. Wade being struck down.

Bopp said courts have typically granted a number of exceptions to normal rules of procedure when addressing abortion issues and said its encouraging to see the court in the Texas case treat the issue in a normal fashion. He said the high court declined to take up the case because it failed to name defendants who could enforce the law.

Its always encouraging to me when they just apply normal rules, Bopp said. And that is what they were doing here.

If the court continues on this path, Bopp said, the consequences for Roe v. Wade could be substantial.

I hope it leads to consistently applying normal rules to abortion, and if that would occur over time, I dont see how Roe v. Wade can survive without all these exceptions that prop up the right to abortion.

Pandoras box
Does Texas Gov. Greg Abbott have special powers? Is the ultraconservative Republican a superhero sans cape? Having signed the nations most restrictive abortion law  abortions are banned after six weeks with no exceptions for rape or incest  Abbott says he will simply work to eliminate all rapists from the streets of Texas.

If thats as easy as he makes it sound, why hasnt it happened before now? Why not add a few other crimes, such as homicide, to the list? And why not tackle some of the other huge problems confronting his state, such as curbing the COVID-19 outbreak? (If he were genuinely pro-life, the governor would follow public health guidelines instead of flouting them. The pandemic has already killed nearly 60,000 Texans, according to federal data.)

But Abbott is no superhero. Hes just another right-winger intent on restricting womens reproductive choices.

Eliminating all rapists would be helpful, certainly, but even if it were possible, it would happen belatedly. A rapist can be arrested and prosecuted only after the crime, so his victim is already traumatized and possibly pregnant.
Younger teachers in particular reported different goals for their students that go beyond commemoration or a focus on the shocking nature of the events of the day. They want young people to recognize how the events and policies that followed 9/11 impacted daily life in ways they might not realize.

This reflects their own experience, which was less a vivid memory of the day of the attacks but perhaps constant reminders of the color-coded terrorism threat levels issued by the Department of Homeland Security from 2002 to 2011. They want students to understand the recent evacuation of U.S. personnel from Afghanistan in relation to both 9/11 and the U.S. role in Afghanistan in the 1980s. Or to examine provisions of the USA Patriot Act of 2001, which allowed greater surveillance of U.S. citizens.

Encourage students to explore questionsIf the goal of teaching history is to develop citizens who use knowledge of the past to understand the present and inform future decisions, educators need to help students learn from 9/11 and the war on terror, and not just about them. This means going beyond the facts of the day and the collective memory aspects to also engage in inquiry into why they happened and how the U.S. and other nations reacted.
It was a day that did not end.

It went on for days, it went on for weeks, it went on for years. But then you look up and somehow, 20 years have gone, and you realize with a start that you cant recall the last time you thought of Sept. 11, 2001. Well go forward from this moment, I wrote. And we did. And we have. So much so that maybe the events of that day begin to feel a little distant.

So its shocking how easily it all comes back.

Indeed, to review the old footage is to return to that morning with visceral urgency, two decades stripping away like varnish, like nothing. Suddenly it is once again that fateful Tuesday morning, and there is a pit in your stomach, a tension in your jaw as two iconic New York towers are impaled by jetliners, as fire blooms like some death flower, as great mountains of smoke float over the skyline, as dust-caked people stagger about like confused ghosts, as first word comes of an explosion at the Pentagon, as a plane disappears from radar over Pennsylvania, as TV news anchors struggle for words to comprehend the incomprehensible, as your heart breaks, and breaks.

All of it comes right back. Just as if it never really left.
Thankfully, that never happened, though F-16s from Truax did have to confront a stolen plane from Canada, escorting it to a safe landing in Missouri. On another occasion, they responded to a jet with a passenger breaking into the cockpit, though authorities determined the intruder wasnt a terrorist.

I certainly felt proud that we were there just in case something happened, and as a deterrent, Van Roo said last week. Its hard even for this generation in the military to understand how different the day before 9/11 was from the day after 9/11.

The world changed in so many ways.

America lost its innocence 20 years ago on Sept. 11, realizing in the most dreadful of ways that we were vulnerable to fanatical enemies who could exact a terrible toll despite limited resources and crude means of violence. Nearly 3,000 people died in the 9/11 attacks at the World Trade Center, at the Pentagon in Washington when a third plane crashed there, and in Pennsylvania where a fourth jet plunged into a field (thanks to courageous passengers who fought the hijackers, preventing what might have been the destruction of the U.S. Capitol).

Never forget became Americas rallying cry. Well never forget the lives taken nor the heroes who saved lives. First-responders ran into burning towers. Many never made it out.
BOISE  Republican Idaho Gov. Brad Little on Friday said the state is exploring legal action against Democratic President Joe Bidens plan to mandate COVID-19 vaccines or routine testing for employees of large businesses.

Biden on Thursday announced a plan to require businesses with more than 100 employees to either mandate COVID-19 vaccines or require weekly testing. Federal contractors will also be required to be vaccinated, Biden said, with no option to test out. The president has directed the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to draft the rule.

Little in a statement on Friday said he is working with his legal counsel and Attorney General Lawrence Wasden on legal options. He called Bidens plan unprecedented government overreach into the private sector.

It is wrong for President Biden to dismiss the concerns of millions of Americans and tell governors who represent Americans that he will use his powers as president to get them out of the way, Little said in a news release. This is not leadership. When President Biden took office, he promised to do his best to unify our country, and he has only driven us further apart. President Biden is out of touch, and his mandates only add to the divisiveness within our country.

The Attorney Generals Office declined to comment.
In place of the wall of mayors, which had been just outside the council chamber, Cowell promised a very good representation of our diversity and our welcoming nature.

I mean, Cowell added, this is where the people of this community come to do the peoples business. And being able to represent that ... in the most diverse manner as practical is really important.

After the mayoral portraits were removed, Roanoke officials entrusted the bare-walled corridor to the Roanoke Arts Commision, which organized an exhibit titled, Welcome to Roanoke: Images of a Compassionate, Diverse and Welcoming community.

It features colorful works by 15 artists, the youngest of whom is 15 years old, selected from a call for submissions that went out in early August. The city spent about $1,000 on a display system for the the new exhibit, which will be used for years to come.

The commission, which relies heavily on volunteers, oversees the municipal art collection and strives to present art in ways that help the community see and think about itself, said Doug Jackson, arts and culture coordinator. To beautify the city is another goal, he said.
It might be enough for the lifelong Louisiana resident to leave for good. As she finds herself trashing her storm-damaged belongings, she said she sees no way to find peace in the state.

Shes not alone. Many people have fled the state after major storms, data show. In metro New Orleans, and even in Chalmette in particular, the U.S. Census Bureau recorded signification population loss from its 2000 to 2020 counts. After Katrina, in 2006, nearly 160,000 Louisiana residents in total moved to Texas, Georgia and Mississippi. Louisiana's population rebounded as people returned to rebuild, but it's been in decline again since 2016.

For families who stay in spite of natural disasters, it seems each new generation learns new lessons of survival, said Toya Lewis of Project Hustle, a New Orleans nonprofit that organizes Black and brown street vendors who work in the informal economies.

No one was prepared to be without power in New Orleans for more than eight days, Lewis said. Were taking all of this lived experience and organizing to thrive. We must begin organizing around our survival.
President Joe Biden speaks at Brookland Middle School, Friday, Sept. 10, 2021 in Washington. Biden has encouraged every school district to promote vaccines, including with on-site clinics, to protect students as they return to school amid a resurgence of the coronavirus. Credit: AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta

Hoping to prevent another school year from being upended by the pandemic, President Joe Biden visited a Washington middle school Friday to push his new COVID plan, accusing some Republican governors of being "cavalier" with the health of children.

Biden's plan, announced a day earlier, would require vaccinations for up to 100 million Americans and seek to ramp up virus testing. With those measures in place, he said, schools should present little risk for transmission of the coronavirus.

"I want folks to know that we're going to be OK," Biden said during an appearance at Brookland Middle School, a short drive from the White House. "We know what it takes to keep our kids safe and our schools open."

But as the surging COVID-19 delta variant casts uncertainty over the start of a new school yearin some cases prompting schools to shut down after a few daysit's unclear whether Biden's plan will go far enough to prevent mass disruption. Biden has little direct authority over most schools, which are generally governed at the local level, and his plan faces sharp resistance from Republicans.

Under his expanded vaccine mandate, all employers with more than 100 workers must require them to get shots or test for the virus weekly. A separate provision requires vaccines for workers in Head Start programs and at schools operated by the federal government, affecting about 300,000 workers.

The plan does not explicitly require vaccines for teachers in locally governed schools, but some education leaders believe the employer rule will effectively amount to a teacher vaccine requirement in many states.

That part of the plan is being enacted through a forthcoming rule from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. And in states with OSHA plans, teachers will be among those required to get the vaccine or face testing, according to an interpretation by AASA, an association of school superintendents.

It's expected to apply to 26 states, including several with Republican governors who opposed Biden's plan, such as South Carolina, Tennessee and Arizona.

Biden did not address that aspect of his plan on Friday. Instead, he urged states to issue their own vaccine requirements for school workers.

"About 90% of school staff and teachers are vaccinatedwe should have that at 100%," Biden said. "I'm calling on all of the governors to require vaccination for all teachers and staff."

Brookland Middle School science teacher Michelle Taylor speaks to President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden as they tour Brookland Middle School, Friday, Sept. 10, 2021 in Washington. Biden has encouraged every school district to promote vaccines, including with on-site clinics, to protect students as they return to school amid a resurgence of the coronavirus. Credit: AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta

Governors in a few states have already ordered teachers to get vaccinated, including in California, Oregon, New Jersey and New York. But most leave it up to school districts, and some Republican-led states have barred vaccine mandates.

Biden on Friday rebuked Republican governors who vowed to fight his new rules.

"I am so disappointed that, particularly, some Republican governors have been so cavalier with the health of these kids, so cavalier with the health of their communities," he said. "We're playing for real here. This isn't a game."

But most of his remarks struck a more conciliatory tone than a Thursday speech in which Biden vented his own frustrations with those who remain unvaccinated. He returned to a message of unity on Friday, insisting that "we've got to come together" to beat the virus.

Speaking to students at Brookland, Biden applauded those who had already been vaccinated. If all of them get shots, Biden promised to invite them to a special visit at the White House.

He also held up Washington, D.C., as a model. The city has hosted vaccine clinics at its public schools, and 65% of children age 12 to 17 have gotten at least their first shot, a rate that Biden said is among the highest in the nation.

In a plea to America's families, Biden urged parents to get teenagers and other eligible children vaccinated as soon as possible. He argued that it's no different than standard vaccinations for measles, mumps, rubella and other diseases.

Among the greatest threats to his plan, however, is the large population of children who are still too young to get the shot. Most elementary and middle schools have children below age 12 who have not been approved to receive the coronavirus vaccines.

Speaking to those concerns, Biden said he supports an "independent" scientific process to review the shots but he also promised to make them available to younger children as soon as it's safe.

"I will do everything within my power to support the Food and Drug Administration in its efforts to do the science as safely and as quickly as possible," he said.

In this photo provided by the Defense Visual Information Distribution Service, U.S. Army Capt. Corrine Brown, a critical care nurse, administers an anti-viral medication to a COVID-19 positive patient at Kootenai Health regional medical center during response operations in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, on Sept. 6, 2021. Roughly 11,000 kids in Coeur d'Alene were getting ready for their first day of school when Idaho public health officials announced this week that northern hospitals were so crowded with coronavirus patients that they would be allowed to ration health care. Kootenai Health has had to move some patients into a conference room and get help from the military to deal with the flood of coronavirus patients. Credit: Michael H. Lehman/DVIDS U.S. Navy/via AP

The expanded vaccine mandate does not apply to students, but some districts have moved to require shots for students. The Los Angeles district this week became the first major district to enact a mandate for students ages 12 and up.

In addition to vaccines, Biden's plan aims to ramp up virus testing in schools.

Testing policies vary widely by school and state. Some districts regularly test all students, including in the Los Angeles district, while some forgo any testing. And for many, it's getting harder to find testing supplies amid a nationwide shortage in rapid tests.

As part of the White House plan, the government is working to increase the supply of virus tests and make them available at retailers including Walmart and Amazon. Biden said it will lead to 300 million more coronavirus tests, including some for schools.

"I want all schools setting up regular testing programs to make sure we detect and isolate cases before they can spread," Biden said.

The plan drew support from the country's two largest teachers unions, the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers. Both groups have also endorsed vaccine mandates for all teachers and school staff.

Other education groups that support the plan include the National School Boards Association, which said it comes at an "extremely critical time." The group said it welcomes Biden's support even as education leaders face "threats, abuse and harassment" over their public health measures.

Speaking alongside Biden on Friday, first lady Jill Biden praised educators as "heroes" for their work over the past year. A longtime community college professor, the first lady said Americans have a duty to protect students as they return to the classroom.

"We owe them a promise to keep their schools open as safe as possible," she said. "We owe them a commitment to follow the sciencewe owe them unity so that we can fight the virus, not each other."

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Maasai men queuing to receive the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine look over as a woman, who is not, Maasai receives a jab at a clinic in Kimana, southern Kenya Saturday, Aug. 28, 2021. Plans for COVID-19 booster shots in some Western countries are highlighting vast disparities in access to vaccines around the world. Credit: AP Photo/Brian Inganga

Several hundred people line up every morning, starting before dawn, on a grassy area outside Nairobi's largest hospital hoping to get the COVID-19 vaccine. Sometimes the line moves smoothly, while on other days, the staff tells them there's nothing available, and they should come back tomorrow.

Halfway around the world, at a church in Atlanta, two workers with plenty of vaccine doses waited hours Wednesday for anyone to show up, whiling away the time by listening to music from a laptop. Over a six-hour period, only one person came through the door.

The dramatic contrast highlights the vast disparity around the world. In richer countries, people can often pick and choose from multiple available vaccines, walk into a site near their homes and get a shot in minutes. Pop-up clinics, such as the one in Atlanta, bring vaccines into rural areas and urban neighborhoods, but it is common for them to get very few takers.

In the developing world, supply is limited and uncertain. Just over 3% of people across Africa have been fully vaccinated, and health officials and citizens often have little idea what will be available from one day to the next. More vaccines have been flowing in recent weeks, but the World Health Organization's director in Africa said Thursday that the continent will get 25% fewer doses than anticipated by the end of the year, in part because of the rollout of booster shots in wealthier counties such as the United States.

Kenya queue up to receive the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine, at Kenyatta National Hospital in Nairobi, Kenya Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. Credit: AP Photo/Brian Inganga

Bidian Okoth recalled spending more than three hours in line at a Nairobi hospital, only to be told to go home because there weren't enough doses. But a friend who traveled to the U.S. got a shot almost immediately after his arrival there with a vaccine of his choice, "like candy," he said.

"We're struggling with what time in the morning we need to wake up to get the first shot. Then you hear people choosing their vaccines. That's super, super excessive," he said.

Okoth said his uncle died from COVID-19 in June and had given up twice on getting vaccinated due to the length of the lines, even though he was eligible due to his age. The death jolted Okoth, a health advocate, into seeking a dose for himself.

He stopped at one hospital so often on his way to work that a doctor "got tired of seeing me" and told Okoth he would call him when doses were available. Late last month, after a new donation of vaccines arrived from Britain, he got his shot.

Riley Erickson poses for a photo at Springfield Missionary Baptist Church in Atlanta on Sept. 8, 2021, where the disaster relief group CORE was offering COVID-19 vaccinations. Erickson said the vaccination rate in the area was low, so he wasn't surprised by small turnout. The one person who showed up was a college student. Credit: AP Photo/Sudhin Thanawala

The disparity comes as the U.S. is moving closer to offering booster shots to large segments of the population even as it struggles to persuade Americans to get vaccinated in the first place. President Joe Biden on Thursday ordered sweeping new federal vaccine requirements for as many as 100 million Americans, including private-sector employees, as the country faces the surging COVID-19 delta variant.

About 53% of the U.S. population is vaccinated, and the country is averaging more than 150,000 new cases of COVID-19 a day, along with 1,500 deaths. Africa has had more than 7.9 million confirmed cases, including more than 200,000 deaths, and the highly infectious delta variant recently drove a surge in new cases as well.

The head of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, insisted Wednesday that rich countries with large supplies of coronavirus vaccines should hold off on offering booster shots through the end of the year and make the doses available to poorer countries.

Cody Luke sits and waits after getting his first COVID-19 vaccine shot on the last day of the mass vaccination site at the University of North Georgia Gainesville campus Friday, July 30, 2021, in Gainesville, Ga. Luke was one of only 11 people who were vaccinated that day. Credit: Ben Gray/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP

John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told reporters Thursday that "we have not seen enough science" to drive decisions on when to administer booster shots.

"Without that, we are gambling," he said, and urged countries to send doses to countries facing "vaccine famine" instead.

In the U.S., vaccines are easy to find, but many people are hesitant to get them.

At the church in northwest Atlanta, a nonprofit group offered the Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer vaccines for free without an appointment from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. But site manager Riley Erickson spent much of the day waiting in an air-conditioned room full of empty chairs, though the group had reached out to neighbors and the church had advertised the location to its large congregation.

Erickson, with the disaster relief organization CORE, said the vaccination rate in the area was low, so he wasn't surprised by small turnout. The one person who showed up was a college student.

Douglas Ruano, left, and Jim Zvikas, R.N., wait at North Springs United Methodist Church for people coming in for COVID-19 vaccinations in Sandy Springs, Ga., on Thursday, July 8, 2021. There was only one person got vaccinated today at this vaccine site, according Riley Erickson, with the disaster relief organization CORE. Credit: Hyosub Shin/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP

"When you put the effort into going into areas where there's less interest, that's kind of the result," he said. His takeaway, however, was that CORE needed to spend more time in the community.

A second vaccination site run by county officialsthis one in downtown Atlantahad a little more foot traffic around lunchtime, but not enough to cause even the slightest delay.

Margaret Herro, CORE's Georgia director, said the group has seen an uptick in vaccinations at its pop-up sites in recent weeks amid a COVID-19 surge fueled by the delta variant and the FDA's full approval of the Pfizer vaccine. It has administered more than 55,000 shots from late March through the end of August at hundreds of sites around the state, including schools and farmers' markets. It also has gone to meatpacking plants and other work locations, where turnout is better, and it plans to focus more on those places, Herro said.

Nurse Lydia Shakespeare-Edwards gives Oscar Chavero his COVID-19 vaccination shot at the Mexican consulate in Atlanta on July 16, 2021. While wealthier nations have plenty of vaccines, they are scarce in poorer countries, and citizens across Africa often have little idea if they will be available from one day to the next. Credit: Steve Schaefer/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP

Maasai men queue to receive the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine at a clinic in Kimana, southern Kenya Saturday, Aug. 28, 2021. Wealthier nations are awash in vaccines, while they are scarce in poorer countries and many people are still waiting for their first shot. Credit: AP Photo/Brian Inganga

A Kenyan woman receives the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine at Kenyatta National Hospital in Nairobi, Kenya Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. Wealthier nations are awash in vaccines, while they are scarce in poorer countries and many people are still waiting for their first shot. Credit: AP Photo/Brian Inganga

In this Friday, Aug. 20, 2021 file photo, medical workers prepare to remove the body of a coronavirus patient who had died, in the intensive care unit of a hospital in Machakos, Kenya. While wealthier nations have plenty of vaccines, they are scarce in poorer countries, and citizens across Africa often have little idea if they will be available from one day to the next.Credit: AP Photo/Brian Inganga, File

A woman uses her mobile phone to show to nurses the confirmation text message received that proves she has registered to receive the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine, at Kenyatta National Hospital in Nairobi, Kenya Thursday, Aug. 26, 2021. Wealthier nations are awash in vaccines, while they are scarce in poorer countries and many people are still waiting for their first shot. Credit: AP Photo/Brian Inganga

A Maasai woman receives the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine at a clinic in Kimana, southern Kenya Saturday, Aug. 28, 2021. Wealthier nations are awash in vaccines, while they are scarce in poorer countries and many people are still waiting for their first shot. Credit: AP Photo/Brian Inganga

"We definitely don't feel like it's time to let up yet," she said.

In Nairobi, Okoth believes there should be a global commitment to equity in the administration of vaccines so everyone has a basic level of immunity as quickly as possible.

"If everyone at least gets a first shot, I don't think anyone will care if others get even six booster shots," he said.

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

Booster shots to extend the protection of COVID-19 vaccines may be unnecessary for many people, a leading scientist behind the AstraZeneca vaccine said on Friday.

Oxford University Professor Sarah Gilbert told The Telegraph newspaper that immunity from the vaccine was holding up welleven against the delta variant. While the elderly and those who are immune-compromised may need boosters, the standard two-dose regimen is providing lasting protection for most people, she said.

"We will look at each situation; the immuno-compromised and elderly will receive boosters,'' she said. "But I don't think we need to boost everybody. Immunity is lasting well in the majority of people."

The comments come as the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunization, a panel of experts that advises the British government, is expected to make recommendations in the coming days on the scale of any booster program. Britain's medical regulator on Thursday said the Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines were safe to use as boosters.

U.K. Health Secretary Sajid Javid has said he expects a booster program to start later this month.

Gilbert said the world's priority should be to get more vaccines to countries that have received limited supplies.

"We need to get vaccines to countries where few of the population have been vaccinated so far,'' Gilbert said. "We have to do better in this regard. The first dose has the most impact."

Explore further EU regulator evaluating if COVID vaccine booster is needed

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
In this Tuesday, May 11, 2021 file photo, Dr. Peter Marks, director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research in the Food and Drug Administration, testifies during a Senate health, education, labor, and pensions hearing to examine an update from federal officials on efforts to combat COVID-19 on Capitol Hill in Washington. On Friday, Sept. 10, 2021, Marks urged parents to be patient, saying the agency will rapidly evaluate vaccines for 5- to 11-year-olds as soon as it gets the needed data. Credit: Jim Lo Scalzo/Pool via AP

The Food and Drug Administration's vaccine chief said Friday the agency will rapidly evaluate COVID-19 vaccinations for younger children as soon as it gets the needed dataand won't cut corners.

Dr. Peter Marks told The Associated Press he is "very, very hopeful" that vaccinations for 5- to 11-year-olds will be underway by year's end. Maybe sooner: One company, Pfizer, is expected to turn over its study results by the end of September, and Marks say the agency hopefully could analyze them "in a matter of weeks."

In the U.S., anyone 12 and older is eligible for COVID-19 vaccines. But with schools reopening and the delta variant causing more infections among kids, many parents are anxiously wondering when younger children can get the shots.

Pfizer's German partner BioNTech told weekly Der Spiegel Friday that it was on track "in the coming weeks" to seek approval of the companies' COVID-19 vaccine for 5- to 11-year-olds. Moderna, which makes a second U.S. vaccine, told investors this week to expect its data on that age group by year's end. Both companies also are testing their vaccines down to age 6 months, but those results will come later.

FDA's Marks spoke with the AP Friday about the steps involved in clearing pediatric vaccines. The conversation has been edited for clarity and length.

Q: Many parents had hoped for vaccines for children under 12 by the time schools reopened. Why is it taking so long?

A: Before you can actually approve something in an age range, you actually have to study in that age range. ... Children under the age of 12, they're not little adults, they're not. And so one does actually have to study this and even change perhaps the dose that's being givenand in fact, that's had to happen, change the dose.

We have to then be able to look at the data at FDA when it gets submitted to us. We'll look at it very rapidly and feel confident that when we that we've looked through the data that these are going to be safe and effective and that we can reassure parents that the benefits of their child getting one of these vaccines certainly outweighs any risks.

Q: The American Academy of Pediatrics cited delta's growing threat to children in urging a faster decision, after FDA requested expanded child studies. Why does FDA want that extra data?

A: I'm not sure that there's much disagreement. We clearly want to see children in the age range 5 to 11 vaccinated as soon as possible. But the difference between the smaller dataset and the larger dataset is not very much in terms of time, because there were enough willing participants hereparents who were very interested in having their 5- to 11-year-olds vaccinatedthat it didn't take that much longer.

We'll be able to give people I think a much better sense that these vaccines are indeed safe and effective for their children.

Q: Could 5- to 11-year-olds be vaccinated by the end of the year?

A: I am very hopeful in that regard. Very, very hopeful in that regard.

Q: How fast can FDA act once the companies submit their data?

A: Pfizer made a public statement that they intended to give us their data by the end of September. ... We're going to do a thorough job on that as quickly as we can so that at the end of the day, hopefully within a matter of weeks rather than a matter of months, we'll be able to come to some conclusionagain, barring some finding that we're not expecting.

Q: How will the trials show effectiveness for kids?

A: In the 12- to 15-year-olds, we saw an immune response that was actually as good or betterin this case, it was for the Pfizer vaccineit was actually better than in 16 and up. And so we'd want to see something similar to that.

Q: Will the trials give information about very rare side effects like the heart inflammation sometimes seen in teens and young adults?

A: We'll know at least that it's not ... happening at some much higher rate in younger children. That we can rule out. And we'll also make sure that there aren't any other side effects that we haven't seen in the older age range.

Q: Two of FDA's top vaccine reviewers recently announced they're leaving. The agency also is evaluating booster shots for adults. Is that making a child vaccination decision more difficult?

A: I'm not worried that we're going to suffer any delays because of that. ... We will be parallel processing.

Q: There are reports that some parents are seeking adult vaccines for their kids. What's your advice?

A: My strongest advice is please don't do that. Please let us do the evaluation that we need to do to ensure that when you do vaccinate your child, you vaccinate the child with the right dose and in a manner that's safe.

If you want to do something now for your child, make sure that you're vaccinated, that your household is vaccinated, that all the people that come in contact with your children are vaccinated and that your child knows how to wear a mask.

Explore further FDA warns against 'off-label' use of Pfizer vaccine in younger children

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
THE Papua LNG Project, New Porgera Mine, Wafi-Golpu Mine, Pnyang LNG, Pasca LNG and Pandora LNG are the six major resource projects the Papua New Guinea (PNG) Government is focused on, Prime Minister James Marape says.

Marape said this in response to Treasurer Ian Ling-Stuckeys ministerial statement on the 2020 Final Budget Outcomes, 2021 Mid-Year Fiscal and Economic Outlook and the Way Forward.

This is more than the previous Peter ONeill regime which had only the Papua LNG Project to its name, he said.

Papua New Guinea Government focuses on mining projects. Photo PNG Prime Minister James Marape

ONeill, in eight years, delivered only the Papua LNG (liquefied natural gas) project.

We are working very hard, and in just two years, we are discussing Papua to ensure that it takes off, Wafi-Golpu, New Porgera, Pandora, Pasca and Pnyang.

These five big projects, apart from the Papua LNG project, remain our focus, to ensure our economy is strong.

Marape said the difference between his Government and ONeills was that his Government was for a better deal for Papua New Guinea on all these projects.

He said the Papua LNG Project was not one that was supposed to have begun right away as the Opposition was claiming.

The Papua LNG Project was not supposed to have been constructed in 2019 or 2020, he said.

It would have to go into pre-Feed (front end engineering and design), then Feed, and then Fid (final investment decision).

They (Opposition) are making it (Papua LNG Project) as if it was going to be a miracle that would have brought money into the country in 2019 or 2020.

Marape said the Papua LNG Project was going into Feed in 2022, Fid by 2023, and construction to start in 2024 or 2025.

The National / Pacific Mining Watch





Next : Return Oil Fields To State, Says former PNG Prime Minister Peter ONeill
Q: Many parents had hoped for vaccines for children under 12 by the time schools reopened. Why is it taking so long?

A: Before you can actually approve something in an age range, you actually have to study in that age range. ... Children under the age of 12, theyre not little adults, theyre not. And so one does actually have to study this and even change perhaps the dose thats being given  and in fact, thats had to happen, change the dose.

We have to then be able to look at the data at FDA when it gets submitted to us. Well look at it very rapidly and feel confident that when we that weve looked through the data that these are going to be safe and effective and that we can reassure parents that the benefits of their child getting one of these vaccines certainly outweighs any risks.

Q: The American Academy of Pediatrics cited delta's growing threat to children in urging a faster decision, after FDA requested expanded child studies. Why does FDA want that extra data?
Wednesdays situation was a lot of back and forth, Dellinger said, with spells of the man talking to him rationally then switching if he got upset.

When he would see officers nearby, the man would get more upset. Eventually, Whisnant and other MDPS officers approached him and he took off running.

That was when Whisnant started talking to him.

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After about 20 minutes of talking to Whisnant, all the while holding the knife to his throat, the man agreed to throw his weapons on the ground, put on a mask and walk to a nearby ambulance. He was never touched by any of the officers at the scene.

An officer escorted him back to the hospital while another went on to the magistrates office and petitioned for an involuntary commitment, which was granted, Whisnant said.

The commitment process is a tool that we use to get people assessed and get treatment when they refuse to, Whisnant said. The criteria for that is a person whos dangerous to themselves or others, or theyre a substance abuser whose substance use has escalated to the point where they can no longer manage their day-to-day affairs and their individual tasks of living.
I was in an English Literature Class at the Riche College of Education at Appalachian State University when I first heard that the twin towers of the World Trade Center were struck by an airplane. The atmosphere for us was one of uncertainty, terror, and worry. We tried to listen to what was happening on an old radio in the building, but there was too much static to really hear what was happening. Some of my classmates requested that we break for 30 minutes and then return to class. We went to the grassy area between the buildings, gathered in a circle, and prayed for everyone involved in the tragedy. This was initiated by K. Teague who later learned that her cousin was on the plane that crashed into the Pentagon. I asked myself what would I have done if I were on the airplane that was hijacked? My heart went out to the families of those lost in the towers and the firemen that were in the towers. Sept. 11, 2001 is a day in history where the world stood still. For days the world watched as the clean-up and recovery commenced. There was little we could do but pray for the families that lost loved ones and for those working the scene. I think it is important for us to remember the events of Sept. 11, 2001, but not to dwell on them. There are some moments in history that we learn from and try not to repeat, and there are other moments that we celebrate.
Many dogs and cats are available for adoption at Burke County Animal Services.

Trinity Johnson, Animal Services shelter technician, wants all of the animals in the shelter to find a loving fur-ever home. These are the animals she chose to spotlight this week.

This weeks dog of the week is Bowie, Johnson said. He is a neutered male border collie and lab mix. Bowie is about 2 years old and does really well with all dogs and people. He also really enjoys being in a house with kids so he has someone to play with.

All animals brought to Animal Services come from different backgrounds and are in different physical condition. The BCAS staff works to ensure all animals are taken care of while theyre in the shelter and in preparation to be adopted into their forever homes.

Animal Services tries to take in as many animals as it can and with the help of foster home volunteers, it is able to care for more animals.

This weeks highlighted cat is Frances.

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The cat of the week is Frances, Johnson said. She is a female tabby and calico female cat. Frances is about 8 months old, and she does well with people, kids and other cats. She would do well in a home with other animals and even in a home as the only pet.
Senseless death of 3,000 of my fellow Americans

On September 11, 2001, I was on the Montana Tech campus, where I teach. My wife called and told me the first plane had hit the tower. Strangely, I didnt feel all that alarmed. I knew radical Islamists were planning terrorist attacks against America; I recalled when President Clinton had bombed Sudan after al-Qaeda had blown up the American embassy in Kenya. I certainly didnt expect the towers to collapse. My wife said shed called my folks in in the borough of Queens, in New York City, where I grew up, and gotten through, and they were safe. But after I heard that the second plane had hit the tower, I knew this was an unprecedented catastrophe. The television image of that second plane crashing into the building is etched eternally in my mind. It was so powerful I almost felt as if I was there. This time my wife and I werent able to get through to my parents, because all the phone lines were jammed. When I went to class, I immediately told my students that we mustnt harass the Muslim students at Tech (our college has a lot of Saudi students, because of the Petroleum Engineering program) because all Muslims werent responsible for this attack. Then I turned over the whole class to a group discussion. Like most Americans, I felt an enormous surge of patriotism and incredible rage at the terrorists whod killed innocent civilians whose only crime was showing up for work in the morning. I wanted to wring bin Ladens neck with my bare hands. But now I see the American government over-reacted to 9/11. The so-called war on terror was unwinnable, because terror is a tactic, not a group. We should have narrowed our revenge purely on al-Qaeda. The worst mistake America made was invading Iraq, because the Bush administration ignored solid intelligence that Saddam, while a brutal dictator, was uninvolved in 9/11. And now were seeing the catastrophic conclusion of Americas 20-year war in Afghanistan, with the Taliban back in control just as they were when we invaded. But I confess I saw none of this at the time, because I was so enraged by the senseless death of 3,000 of my fellow Americans.
A generational war

Now, decades later, he's watched his son and former students deploy to the same battlefields to continue the fight.

Matson is a retired Junior Reserve Officer Training Corp teacher at Davenport Central High School. His son is a captain in the 82nd Airborne Division and has deployed twice to the Middle East.

"I know people that have deployed many times," Matson said. "There's some people in the military, especially in the special operations community, with double-digit deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, wherever. ... And the families that have to deal with that? The sacrifice of certain members of the military is pretty extreme."

He noted there are 10 divisions in the Army.

"At the height of (the wars in) Iraq and Afghanistan, during the surge ... five divisions were in the fight," Matson said. "So that leaves five. Well, one or two are coming back and one or two are getting ready to go (deploy). They're just in a constant op tempo of: Go. Do your six (months) or a year. Come back. Refit and get ready to go again, right? ... There are some people I know their families hardly see each other in a decade, 'cause they're gone all the time."
LJ Montelli has served in some of the worlds most dangerous places and shed blood for his country more times than he cares to talk about.

Nobody in their right mind could say he owes America, or his hometown of St. Helena, another hour of his time. Yet here he is, the newest member of the St. Helena Police Department.

From Ramadi to Railroad Avenue, public service has been a constant for Montelli, who comes from a military family.

Growing up in St. Helena, everybody knows each other and helps each other out, he said. But when you look outside our small town, not a lot of people help each other. I felt like I could help everybody by joining the military.

The 9/11 attacks, which occurred when Montelli was 14, only solidified his plans to join the Army. He graduated from St. Helena High School in 2005 and immediately left for boot camp in Missouri.

Montelli had always been drawn to law enforcement, so the military police was an obvious choice. His first overseas posting was in South Korea, conducting joint operations with the South Korean army and training them to do police work.

'Hearts and minds'
One of the most important lessons from the global war on terrorism is that the United States should be modest about what it can achieve with military force alone. Even the worlds most powerful military failed in its war to defeat the Taliban and stabilize Afghanistan. Addressing the challenges of failed states and violent extremism also requires diplomacy, international development and education for the marginalized populations, including women and children.

And yet, the hard power of military threat will continue to be a necessary component of U.S. foreign policy; the threat posed by jihadists remains potent. Given the magnitude of the 9/11 attacks and the psychological impact on the country, the United States had no choice but to respond. But it did so on al-Qaidas terms, not Americas.

Jihadists seized upon the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan and then Iraq in 2003 as proof that bin Laden was right all along  the U.S. was at war with Islam. Several high-profile incidents  including the torture of captured al-Qaida suspects, the prison for detainees at Guantanamo Bay and the scandal at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq where Muslim prisoners were ritually degraded, abused and humiliated  sullied American soft power, the ability to lead by example.
At dawn we said goodbye to our Maine hosts, headed to Nova Scotia's Bay of Fundy, Peggy's Cove, and overnight in Halifax.

Nearing our destination, we were diverted around the city by police and found a motel on the outskirt. No cars; we were in luck!

The teary-eyed owner approached with a forced smile. No Vacancy" she advised. Shaking our heads in disbelief, she quickly added, "Youve not heard?" Heard what?

Gesturing we follow her, there on a television screen, we witnessed the unfolding horror.

Airports closed, planes grounded. Borders closed. Our return ticket, useless. The decision to drive home with New York plates came reluctantly

Throughout, Canadians were kind, expressing condolences, flying the Stars and Stripes.

We crossed with ease over the border at a remote town in the upper Midwest, the sole vehicle. The guard appeared happy to have some business.

Back home!

A stop at Mt. Rushmore tugged at the heartstrings. Along the marble pillars representing each state, coming to New York, bouquets were left by strangers with loving messages.
The three candidates who had passed the stage of evaluating the documents had come to the interview phase for the selection of the candidates for the chairman of the Anti-Corruption Committee of Armenia, 168.am reported.

Sasun Khachatryan, a candidate for the chairman of the Anti-Corruption Committee, the head of the Special Investigation Service (SIS), among other questions, answered also the questions about his propertyreal estate and movable property, money.

In general, in this part of the interview, the name and surname of Tigran Gevorgyanwho is the brother of Sasun Khachatryan's wifewas mentioned so much that it seemed that the family of Sasun Khachatryan was being taken care of by his brother-in-law.

We do not want to go into the details of family relations, but in any case, a funny incident was not left out of 168.am's attention.

The head of the "Union of Informed Citizens" NGO, Daniel Ioannisyan, who, by the way, was the most active among the questioners, asked Sasun Khachatryan about the fact that his wife received a donation in 2017.

"Your wife's bank account had a cash entry in the amount of 2.8 million drams and 1,600 dollars, then there was the same amount of cash out, but those data are not in the annual declaration. How can you explain all this? asked Daniel Ioannisyan.

Sasun Khachatryan's answer was the following:

"In May 2017, when I was out of Armenias borders, my daughter had received an invitation from the University of Sheffield in Greecewhere her friends were studyingto visit the university. And to submit [respective] documents to the [Greek] embassy [in Yerevan], it was required to have a certain amount of money in the [bank] account of one of the parentsas a guarantee that the child will be secured there. Since I was not in Armenia, my wife asked her brother Tigran Gevorgyan to transfer the mentioned amount to the account opened in her name in Ameriabank on the same day. The transfer is there. The money was transferred by Tigran Gevorgyan to the account of my wife, Lilit Khachatryan, a reference was issued, which was also provided by the bank that there is this much money in Lilit Khachatryan's account at this hour, after which only 45 minutes later that amount was withdrawn from the account again, returned to Tigran Gevorgyan, and this reference was submitted to the Greek embassy. This is the whole story. Its just that the uncle has created that guarantee for his sister's child that the child will have that opportunity to go to a Greek university."

The issue is not that Sasun Khachatryan's family is the only family that does such a thing. In fact, they deceive in this or that embassy. Probably everyone does that. But when it is announced by a high-ranking official, the head of the SIS, a representative of the law enforcement body who aspires to become the chairman of the Anti-Corruption Committee, it is a message that such behavior be considered normal for the society.

Sasun Khachatryan, by the way, is not in such a ridiculous situation for the first time. When the first major scandal of these authoritiesthe criminal case on the wiretapping of the SIS chief-National Security Service (NSS) director-Prime minister Nikol Pashinyan telephone conversationwas being investigated, the investigator called the figures in this case to examine their phones in the presence of specialists and then send them for examinationafter obtaining court permission.

Artur Vanetsyan, the then director of the NSS, agreed and gave his phone, whereas Sasun Khachatryan, to avoid sending his phone for examination, gave an answer which would probably have given an ordinary juvenile offender who is miles away from law.

"The phone is not in my possession, so I cannot submit it for inspection. Considering the published wiretaps and thinking that it is possible that a wiretapping device may be installed in my phone, last night I disassembled my phone, during which it broke and I threw it in the trash. I am not a specialist, I cannot say whether there were foreign devices in it, but for security reasons I decided not to hand it in for repair anymore, and threw it away," SIS chief Sasun Khachatryan had said.
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Azerbaijan Internal Affairs Ministry confirms detention of two Iranian truck drivers

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Armenia Ararat Province ex-deputy governor appointed chief of Penitentiary Service

Armenia PM to leave for Tajikistan on working visit

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Second President Robert Kocharyan, as the leader of the opposition "Armenia" Faction, has received an official invitation from the leadership of the ruling United Russia party to visit the Russian capital Moscow to hold political meetings aimed at developing the partnership relations between the two political units. Bagrat Mikoyan, the coordinator of the office of the second president of Armenia, informed Sputnik Armenia about this.

"We have gladly accepted the invitation, and already at the end of next week Robert Kocharyan plans to leave for Moscow to take part in those meetings," Mikoyan added.

He assured that the holding of these talks is important in the context of a constructive dialogue between the two political units and the development of Armenian-Russian relations.
The situation in the South Caucasus is volatile, large-scale Turkish-Azerbaijani military exercises are being heldparticularly in Turkey, in Nakhchivan, near the Lachin corridorRussia-based analyst and Iranian studies specialist Karine Gevorgyan told Armenian News-NEWS.am.

"These military exercises have quite a lot of objectives and can easily turn into tension and a new armed conflict in the region. Judging by what military exercises are being conducted, as far as I understand, they are really preparing an operation to occupy that part of the territory adjacent to the border with Iran. This is a red line for Tehran (). In addition, the Iranian foreign ministry stated in a clear text that it is against the encroachments on the territorial integrity of Armenia. (). Nevertheless, there is a concentration of troops and an increase of the contingent in this region," the analyst said.

"[But] the Iranians are not sleeping either. They are monitoring the tense situation, as it will contribute to the growth of separatist sentiments in the Azerbaijani-populated part of Iranand which Tehran really does not like," Gevorgyan added, in particular.
Zhoghovurd daily today disseminated another false information of manipulative nature and gossip style only for the purposes known to it, this time writing that, allegedly, the head of the Special Investigation Service (SIS) of Armenia, Sasun Khachatryan, has an apartment in Moscow and "many apartments, cars and other real estate" which are registered under the names of other persons, as well as asked whether he has "paid taxes from the 43 million drams generated from the wedding of his daughter, in the case when such a number was not noted in Sasun Khachatryan's declaration, the SIS noted in a statement it issued Saturday.

Moreover, no such donation number was published in any media yesterday (AMD 4 million 300 thousand was published in connection with his daughter's marriage). And although after our warning, the daily, arguing that it is a misprint, corrected it on its website, but the misinformation was disseminated both in the print media and through the media and individual [social media] users.

As for the information published in the daily about having an apartment in Moscow, or having any other property registered under the names of other persons but in fact belonging to S. Khachatryan, we reiterate that this information is completely false, and we kindly propose to the medium to deny it, apologizing for disseminating misinformation and committing slander. Otherwise, a lawsuit with such a demand will be filed with the court, the SIS added, in particular.
Carlos Brito, who transformed a Latin American regional enterprise into the worlds largest brewing company, shared his insights on leadership in a virtual talk on Thursday with a University of Miami Patti and Allan Herbert Business School audience.

Brito, a Brazilian businessman who stepped down as CEO in July after 15 years at the helm of Anheuser-Busch InBev (ABI), attributed the firms expansion and global success to the companys culture that highlights meritocracyrecruiting and developing young employees and promoting the most talented.

In his conversation with Dean John Quelch, Brito noted that meritocracy is the accepted approach to management in sportswhere the best players play and others warm the benchand in many aspects of life, though often not in the business world.

Employees want to know that what they bring to the table, their talents and contributions, will be recognized. And they also respect candorthey want for things to be said in a civilized fashion but straightforward, said Brito, pointing out that providing frequent direct employee assessment was a mainstay of the ABI workplace culture.

In his own development as a leader, Brito said that honest, constructive feedback from his mentors proved invaluable. Ive always had mentors who were willing to tell me what I needed to hear in a constructive respective way rather than what I wanted to hear, he said.

A companys success depends on three key componentsleadership, knowledge of the business youre in, and some management systemand leadership is far and away the most prominent factor, he explained.

Leadership is about achieving consistent results better than your peers. So, it has everything to do with teambuilding, recruiting, and promoting. And its also about doing it the right way, ethically, and with no shortcuts, Brito said.

Clearly leadership is a team sport, he noted. You need a team effort to achieve your goals, and the leader has to believe in the power of the team and inspire them to believe that they can do more than they think they can.

Early in his career, the former CEO benefited from a full scholarship provided by Brazilian magnate Jorge Paulo Lemann to attend his first year at Stanford University. He later went to work for Lemanns boutique bank in Brazil and was inspired by the workplace culture his mentor had fostered thereone that he has replicated in his own career.

Lemann believed in the power of peoplethat everything in business starts and ends with people. That was 60 years ago, and he was already with that opinion, Brito said.

Principles and culture are critical to a business, he highlighted, explaining that ABI almost exclusively hired people right out of college because it was easier to mold them to the existing culture. Our culture works for us, and people came because of our valuesyou need to have a big dream, the best people, and employees who practice ownership, he said.

In terms of hiring, Brito cautioned against the tendency for leaders to hire those who are similar to them. At ABI meetings, the team practiced a bias-breaking mindset, he said. You have to check your bias or otherwise you end up with a team that looks just like you, he said. Good decisions come out of having the positive tensions and different points of view, especially with complex issues, that diverse team players can represent.

Before the merger that created AB InBev, beer-making was mostly managed locally. What supported the vision for the global transformation? In our early days we were just in one country and our biggest motivation to go to other countries was our people, he explained. To be in just one country was to keep the funnel very narrow. We realized that our culture was one that could travel and going to other countries helped develop parallel paths and allowed us to become a much more interesting company.

Brito said that ABI began considering issues of sustainability years agobefore the onset of contemporary business thinking that considers environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG)and today as a global firm it seeks to practice responsibility for its local impact.

As a globalist you have to be seen as being part of the solution, not part of the problem. Because if youre part of the problem youre going to be regulated, taxed, restricted, he said. Because we all live on this planet, you have to be there when the community needs to solve some problems.

Companies have to engagenot on every environmental or social topicbut on those where you can have a voice and an impact if youre a business, he suggested. For ABI, one of those issues is ensuring water quality.

For us, its very simple: no water, no beer, he said. Water is something we share with the communities in which we have our brewers; so, we have to work together with our brewers to keep the water sources healthy.

Brito said that he has spent the past few months after leaving ABI exploring the many opportunities that he has been offered as possible next steps. I want to continue to be busy, to be around people I can learn from, be with people who share the same values I do, he said. I want to have an impact in whatever I do next. For 32 years I knew beer, but now I am like a kid in a candy shop.
A disposable face masks is seen lying on the pavement during the coronavirus pandemic. Krakow, Poland on October 16th, 2020. Beata Zawrzel/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Charletta and Troy Green, who were unvaccinated, both contracted coronavirus in August.

The couple died within eight hours of each other as a result of the virus.

The Greens left behind seven children, ranging in age from 10 to 23-years-old.

Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.

A Detroit couple died within eight hours of each other from complications from coronavirus, leaving seven children behind, as reported by People. Neither of them was vaccinated.

Troy and Charletta Green, both 44, were high school sweethearts, as Troy's sister, Tiki Green, told Fox 2 Detroit.

"They met when they were 14 years old, got married, been married 22 years, and had seven beautiful children," Green said to the outlet.

According to People, Troy began displaying coronavirus symptoms in mid-August, and he felt too sick to go on a trip to Florida.

Charletta got sick and was hospitalized two days after she arrived in Florida, and Troy was hospitalized just one day later in Detroit, per People.

The Greens spent their anniversary in separate hospitals, and they both had to be put on ventilators, according to Fox 2 Detroit.

Tiki told Fox 2 that Troy and Charletta had been thinking about getting vaccinated, but they got sick before they could actually get a shot. The rest of the Green family got vaccinated after the couple contracted the virus.

A medical assistant administers a COVID-19 vaccine dose to a woman at a clinic in Los Angeles on March 25, 2021. Mario Tama/Getty Images

Charletta died on Monday in Florida.

"Her lungs were severely damaged," Tiki said to Fox 2 of Charletta."They just couldn't do any more for her."

Troy's condition improved during his hospital stay, as Tiki told Fox 2, but after he learned Charletta was not getting better, he deteriorated.

Troy ultimately died of a heart attack in a Detroit hospital on Tuesday, as Fox 2 reported.

"When he realized that his wife, you know, maybe not getting better, after he hears she's on a ventilator and she's on it 100 percent constantly, he just basically couldn't take that," Tiki told Fox 2. "He just started having chest pains and eventually a couple of hours later he passed."

Story continues

The couple died just hours apart.

The Green children range in age from 10 to 23-years-old. They are planning a double funeral for their parents, according to Fox 2.

Asha Dumas, the couple's niece, started a GoFundMe to help cover the funeral costs and support the Green children. It has raised over $26,000 at the time of writing.

Tiki is now encouraging people to get vaccinated.

"I know it doesn't prevent you from contracting it in general, but I feel like you'll have a fighting chance at least," she told Fox 2.

Read the original article on Insider
Around 3,000 people were killed on 9/11 - including more than 400 firefighters and emergency responders (Getty Images NA)

Ellen Saracinis final words to her husband  and his to her  could not have been simpler: I love you. Saracinis husband, Victor Saracini, was a pilot with United Airlines, and that morning he was in the cockpit of UA flight 175 from Boston to Los Angeles. As everyone would later reflect, it started out as a stunning, cloudless, blue-sky day.

It was September and we had a pool in the back yard and the pool wasnt closed. He was telling me All right, remember to do this, remember to do that. He travelled all the time. I did that stuff all the time, she told a CBS reporter years later. His parting words and my parting words were, I love you.

The couple did not fight often, she said. And she was very glad they did not that morning, when he called her at their home in Lower Makefield Township in Pennsylvania. Saracini and his 65 passengers did not make it to Los Angeles, or to whatever they hoped the future held for them that day. Thirty minutes into the flight from Logan international airport, al-Qaeda hijackers stormed the cockpit, killed Saracini and the first officer, and took control of the Boeing jet. At 9.03am, they flew it into the south tower of the World Trade Centre in New York City.

Of all the moments of horror and anguish that played out so publicly on 11 September 2001, first to the residents of Americas largest city and thence rapidly to the world, the attack on the south tower perhaps marked the moment people were forced to forgo any notion that this was anything other than a terror attack.

As it was, another hijacked plane, American Airlines flight 11, had already struck the north tower 17 minutes earlier. Yet amid the confusion, and in light of initial reports that the first incident had involved a much smaller plane, there was the perception  or the hope, at least  that it was an accident. When a second plane hit the south tower, any doubt disappeared. As Victors plane struck, we realised we were a nation at war, his widow tells The Independent.

Story continues

Twenty years on, seeking to trace the shuddering impacts of the attacks, which involved four hijacked planes and killed around 3,000 Americans, is a challenge on many fronts. Partly that is because they affected people differently: the experience of someone watching on television in Omaha, Nebraska will have been different from that of any of the thousands of emergency responders and firefighters who rushed to the scene, gulping in toxic dust and smoke  some of which, even now, remains embedded in their bodies.

Then there is the fact that, even a generation on, the reverberations of the day are still being felt. It has affected domestic politics as well as the way in which America engages with the world. It was striking that several of the 13 US marines killed last month in a suicide attack at Kabul airport  among the last of more than 100,000 troops first dispatched to Afghanistan a month after 9/11  were born in 2001. They are part of a generation that has no where were you on 9/11 experience to recount.

Amid the grief, the desire for revenge by some was palpable (AFP via Getty Images)

The people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon

Some of the stuff is easy enough to narrate. Grieving, vulnerable and seeking revenge, the US rapidly responded with its military might. President George W Bush, bullhorn in hand as he toured the rubble of Lower Manhattan three days after the towers fell, vowed that the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon. His vice-president, Dick Cheney, warned that in pursuing al-Qaeda, America would have to operate on the dark side.

Within days, Congress, with a solitary no vote coming from Democratic congresswoman Barbara Lee, granted Bush the war-making powers that would allow him to order the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq. Bush took these powers and ran with them, launching what became known as the war on terror: not simply a series of military operations and a demand for vassalage from nations such as Pakistan  Youre either with us or youre against us  but a green light to torture for the CIA, and a network of bases and prisons outside the US, most notoriously Guantanamo Bay, where human rights and the rule of law mattered for little.

Hundreds of thousands of civilians, in countries ranging from Iraq to Libya, as well as thousands of US and coalition troops, lost their lives.

Congress passed other laws, too, with scant or little scrutiny, including the Patriot Act, which was used by the government to spy on its own citizens, very often Muslims, with minimal oversight. (In the following years, the New York City Police Department, which on 9/11 was under the control of mayor Rudy Giuliani, would pay out many thousands of dollars to settle lawsuits brought in respect of surveillance operations against Muslims.)

At the time, the vast majority of Americans supported what Bush did: his approval rating soared to 86 per cent, and Republican strategist Karl Rove would use the war on terror to ensure Bushs re-election three years later. Yet in many ways, the country did not feel any safer. In November 2001, American Airlines flight 587 crashed in the New York borough of Queens after taking off from JFK international airport. All 260 people on board were killed. A decade later, recalling the incident, the Associated Press reported that, despite the tragedy, once terrorism had been ruled out as the cause, the country breathed a sigh of relief.

Steel Standing

Antony Whittaker saw defiance and strength in the piece of wreckage (Antony Whittaker)

Antony Whitaker was among the thousands of New Yorkers who rushed to help that day. He was not a firefighter or a medic, but a specialist sent to the still-burning ruins by the utility company Con Edison to make safe live electrical wires that were exposed and sparking. Amid scenes he still finds hard to describe, there was something in particular that caught his eye: it was part of the south tower, the one into which UA flight 175 had been flown. Somehow, around 18 storeys of the building, or at least its steel frame, still stood.

Whitaker, now aged 57, says he could see the outline of the structure lit up by the arc lights being used by emergency teams. Somehow, amid the misery and death, that piece of battered debris projected a sense of defiance and even hope. As he says, it was literally steel still standing. A week later, Whitaker, who is also an artist, had the opportunity to go back and take a photograph, using his Canon EOS 620. A week after that, the structure was pulled down.

Whitaker, who has a son and lives in Harlem, used the photograph, which he called Steel Standing, as a vehicle through which to promote a message of unity. He raised funds for a foundation, and even helped push for the wearing of masks during the pandemic. He has presented copies of the photograph to everyone from Colin Powell, Bushs secretary of state, to Ban ki-Moon.

How does Whitaker think America has most changed since he took the image? The world  and America with it, he says  has shrunk. Social media has brought the opportunity to connect, but has also forced people to think about places such as Afghanistan in a way they did not in 2001. Were not as isolated as before, and I think thats a major thing, he says. [They were places] we wouldnt pay that much attention to. Today I think people pay a lot more attention, because of the potential terrorist situation.

George Bushs ratings soared after attacks and much of media became largely unquestioning in rush to war (Getty Images)

Whitaker, who is African American, says one aspect of America that has been too resilient is racism. Another constant  a positive one  is his belief that artists have a duty to respond, whether to events such as 9/11 or, a generation later, when rioters, some decked in the confederate flag, stormed the US Capitol. Art, he says, is the alchemy that transforms peoples experiences and presents them in a way that can be processed and considered: All tragedy has to be responded to artistically, he says.

There are reminders to all Americans that they need to watch what they say

In the first anguished days and weeks following the al-Qaeda assault, America often felt feverish. In New York, people posted Missing posters containing the hopeful and unknowing faces of loved ones lost in the twin towers, who in all likelihood were dead. At the Pentagon  and in the rural town of Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where the last of the hijacked planes came down  officials sought to locate and preserve any remaining piece of debris. Much had been turned to ash.

Quickly, the drums for war sounded  and there were unlikely cheerleaders. On David Lettermans Late Show, CBS journalist Dan Rather wept with the host, saying that he himself wanted to join the military. As Rather later conceded, such unquestioning patriotism did perhaps not best serve the country  let alone the media. It would later make it much easier for Bush to push for war in Iraq on false intelligence. Yet in the weeks and months after the attacks, few journalists questioned the governments actions, and even cartoonists who dared not to pursue a pro-war line found themselves in little demand by commissioning editors.

Comedians such as Bill Maher, who suggested that, whatever else one called the hijackers, they were not cowards, received a rebuke from White House spokesperson Ari Fleischer. There are reminders to all Americans that they need to watch what they say, watch what they do, he said from the briefing room podium. This is not a time for remarks like that. There never is.

We wanted to turn some tragedy into at least something good

Some Americans sought to learn more about the region of the world from where the attack against them had been launched, and wondered whether the USs own actions in the world had played some role in triggering the terrorists. Twenty years ago, Eugene Steuerle lost his wife Norma, a clinical psychologist, when the plane on which she was traveling  the hijacked American Airlines flight 77  was flown into the Pentagon.

A generation of Afghan girls has been educated since the 9/11 attacks (AFP via Getty Images)

On the same day, Joyce Manchester and David Stapleton lost four close friends, all members of the same family, who were on the plane. All of the passengers were killed, along with 125 people who had been at work at the Department of Defence headquarters. Steuerle, Manchester and Stapleton, all of them economists from Washington DC, wanted to identify a positive way to remember those they had lost.

In time, they established the Safer World Fund, which, with the help of the online crowdfunding platform Global Giving, raised and spent more than $2m on education for girls in Afghanistan and Pakistan. In August, the trio watched open-mouthed as the Taliban swept back to power in the country, threatening the work in which they had invested so much effort.

After [my wife] died, we came into this money that came out of a 9/11 fund, and my kids and I didnt really feel like we needed it, or necessarily deserved it, Steuerle says from Alexandria, Virginia. We werent being critical of others [who took the money]. He says that in additional to establishing a foundation in Alexandria, he worked with Stapleton and Manchester, whom he knew from economics forums, to turn some tragedy into at least something good.

Like many in Afghanistan itself, the three are now anxious as to whether their work will be permitted to continue. Either way, they have no regrets. Manchester says she was very disappointed and frustrated, and upset that [the takeover] happened so quickly, having expected  like many observers  that resistance to the Taliban might have been more stubborn. She adds: I will say, I believe that women and girls are better off, because theyve had the chance to be educated, and receive health care, and be out and about in the world.

If you have a lap top, take it out of your bag

The security staff who failed to stop the 19 Al-Qaeda hijackers, 15 of the from Saudi Arabia, were privately contracted by individual airports.

When flight UA Flight 175 struck South Tower we knew we were a nation at war says pilots widow (Getty Images)

The changes have been largely successful. Once common, the hijacking of planes has dwindled in the years since 2001. There have been no such incidents in the United States, according to charity the Aviation Safety Network. Manufacturers strengthened cockpit doors to make it harder for potential hijackers to access controls. They did so under pressure from campaigners, among them Ellen Saracini.

She was hosting a meeting for volunteers at her childrens school in Pennsylvania, when word reached them as to what was happening in New York. Somebody told her a small plane had flown into the north tower. Someone else said an American Airlines passenger plane was involved. So she cancelled the meeting and went home and saw it on TV.

At around 10.30am that day, she says, it was confirmed that her husband, a former navy aviator who loved his family and also loved to drive his Corvette and his motorcycle, had been killed. A week later, Saracini and her daughters, Brielle and Kirsten, attended a memorial mass for her husband, where the 51-year-old pilot received a US navy honour guard. At its conclusion, Saracini was handed a tightly folded US flag.

She says she did not know then that she would dedicate herself to improving airline safety, or that the government, or the industry, would be so slow to act. It was only when she learned that cockpits were so vulnerable to being attacked  something she says airlines such as Israels El Al realised long ago, and acted to counter  that she launched a campaign that continues today.

Ellen Saracini, with daughters Brielle, (L), and Kirsten, (R), in 2001 says final words to husband United Airlines pilot Victor Saracini were I love you (AFP via Getty Images)

In 2019, she was permitted some small cheer when Congress passed the Saracini Aviation Safety Act, requiring all new aircraft to be fitted with a second cockpit door. Yet Saracini says her work is not done. The 2019 law only applied to new aircraft; she says given the Federal Aviation Administration has acknowledged that cockpit doors remain vulnerable, all operating planes should be required to have a second door.

She is working with her congressman, Republican Brian Fitzpatrick, to push through a new measure. We can agree that September 11 changed the world. And there are things about September 11 that havent been answered yet, havent been disclosed, havent been protected again, she says. So thats my part of standing up to right the wrongs. And I wont stop. You know, the flight crews, Victors brothers and sisters, are still in the air flying. And theyve become my brothers and sisters. We cant leave them vulnerable up there.
Alaska state Sen. Lora Reinbold stands in a hearing room before the start of a Senate Judiciary Committee meeting on Friday, March 12, 2021, in Juneau, Alaska. AP Photo/Becky Bohrer

In a Facebook post, Alaska State Sen. Reinbold said Alaska Airlines is impeding her ability to get to the capital.

Reinbold claimed Alaska Airlines preventing her from flying is a "political ban."

Because of the ban, Reinbold's commute from Eagle River to Juneau may take up to two days.

See more stories on Insider's business page.

Following her ban from Alaska Airlines for refusing to wear a mask, Republican state Sen. Lora Reinbold submitted a procedural request asking to be excused from votes for the remainder of the state legislature's regular session since she is unable to fly to Juneau, the Anchorage Daily News reported.

The excusal will run from September 11 through January 15, three days before the legislature's next regular session begins, according to the Anchorage Daily News.

"If the only airline that has flights during session to Juneau can unconstitutionally impede a legislator's ability to get to the capital in a safe and timely fashion, it could undermine our representative republic," Reinboldt said in a Facebook post on September 9.

Responding to a constituent who commented that she should have worn a mask, she claimed, "I wore a mask in TSA, waiting area, and in plane. An activist had me banned. Not a single warning on flight never a yellow card. Its a political ban!"

The ban came after a video was posted to Twitter in April showing Reinbold arguing with staff in Juneau International Airport over mask rules.

A normal round trip with Alaska Airlines from Juneau to Eagle River, the city Reinbold represents, takes around 90 minutes. Now, her commute will take up to two days as Juneau is the only US state capital inaccessible by road - only by plane or boat.

Delta Airlines is the only other large carrier that flies into Juneau and its seasonal service to the capital ends in September, according to the Anchorage Daily News.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Sep. 11JUNEAU  The Alaska Senate voted late Friday to advance a telehealth bill that, due to a series of amendments, would also allow Alaskans to opt out of vaccine requirements from businesses, hospitals and local governments.

Earlier in the day, the bill failed 9-8, two votes short of the number needed to send it to the state House, but lawmakers reconsidered that failure and four switched their votes, advancing the measure 13-3. A fifth, Sen. Lyman Hoffman, D-Bethel, was absent from the revote.

As originally written, the bill was a telehealth measure introduced by Gov. Mike Dunleavy to temporarily allow medical workers to meet patients online and write prescriptions without an in-person exam. Another section of the bill temporarily waives a state-mandated background check for newly hired medical workers.

But in a series of votes Friday morning, senators inserted three amendments that eliminate the ability of businesses, state agencies and local governments to require vaccinations from employees and clients or customers.

Sen. Gary Stevens, R-Kodiak, was one of the four senators who voted "no" but switched to "yes," allowing the bill to advance.

"The guarantee we've received is that the House is going to strip out all of the amendments and return to us the basic bill, which I really like," he said.

Senate President Peter Micciche, R-Soldotna, and Speaker of the House Louise Stutes, R-Kodiak, said there is no such guarantee or deal.

"We just don't make deals like that," Stutes said. Micciche said that he is unaware of an agreement and did not speak to any members of the House before the second vote.

Senate Minority Leader Tom Begich, D-Anchorage, also switched his vote. He said it's his belief that the House will remove many, if not all, of the controversial amendments and that it was "imperative that the other elements of that bill move forward."

If the House does remove the amendments, the revised bill would come back to the Senate for approval, and it would advance to Dunleavy's desk if the Senate agrees with the changes.

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State and federal public health officials say vaccinations, coupled with mask-wearing, are the best way to avoid spreading the virus and reduce the risk of severe illness from COVID-19. The vast majority of Alaska's virus hospitalizations and deaths involve people who aren't vaccinated.

On top of surging virus case numbers driven by the delta variant, the number of COVID-positive hospital patients in Alaska has risen to record levels this week, placing additional stress on health care facilities already contending with staffing shortages and limited capacity. And the impacts of the strain on larger hospitals are rippling through Alaska's health care system, adversely affecting the ability of outlying facilities to provide critical care to patients even in places with limited COVID-19 spread.

[Nowhere to go: Rural hospitals struggle to transfer patients as Alaska's COVID-19 hospitalizations hit new high]

But in speeches Friday, senators said they value Alaskans' ability to reject vaccination if they so choose.

Sen. Lora Reinbold, R-Eagle River, said she voted yes "to protect individual liberties in this bill."

"I guess I believe people will do the right thing if you ask them," said Sen. Josh Revak, R-Anchorage, who voted yes.

He said mandates feel like, "not enough people are doing the right thing, so we're going to cram it down the throats of the people  and maybe in this case into their arms  whether they like it or not."

Hoffman was among those who noted the overloaded condition of Alaska's hospitals and criticized the idea that a vaccine requirement violates individual rights.

"What about the rights of the people who are walking the streets of America? They're continuing to die," he said.

COVID-19 tests in place of vaccination

The first passed amendment, from Sen. Roger Holland, R-Anchorage, said that anyone who requires another person to show proof of COVID-19 vaccination must also accept a positive result on a COVID-19 test or antibody test in place of a vaccination card.

Holland said that people who have recovered from a COVID-19 infection have similar antibodies to those who have been vaccinated against it.

Dr. Anne Zink, the state's chief medical officer, said in an interview Friday that people who have had COVID-19 should still get vaccinated because the combination of antibodies offers greater protection, and the amount of natural immunity can vary from person to person.

"That's the reason that those who are immunocompromised are supposed to get three doses," she said, adding that the best immunity seems to come from people who have both recovered from COVID-19 and been vaccinated.

"People who previously were infected with COVID-19, their immune system is continuing to provide some significant degree of protection. However, it does not look nearly as robust as those who previously saw COVID-19 and are vaccinated," she said.

Sen. Jesse Kiehl, D-Juneau, argued against the amendment, saying that as currently written, a false-positive test could be accepted under the law.

The amendment passed 10-7, with eight Republicans and two Democrats in favor. Five Democrats and two Republicans voted against it.

No mandatory vaccinations

The second amendment, from Reinbold of Eagle River, says a person can object to the administration of the COVID-19 vaccine on religious, medical or philosophical grounds.

A similar version of this amendment passed the House and Senate earlier this year but lapsed when Dunleavy ended the state's COVID-19 emergency declaration in April.

[Banned from Alaska Airlines, state Sen. Lora Reinbold asks to be excused from votes at Capitol]

Some employers in Alaska require vaccination as a condition of voluntary employment, and some businesses and local governments have required it as a condition to enter particular indoor spaces. This week, the Biden administration announced new rules mandating that employers with more than 100 workers require them to be vaccinated, or tested weekly, to slow the spread of COVID-19.

The amendment passed 9-8, with eight Republicans and Sen. Bill Wielechowski, D-Anchorage, in favor. Six Democrats and two Republicans voted against it.

Services open to the unvaccinated

The third amendment, also from Reinbold, prohibits businesses, state agencies and local governments from requiring a COVID-19 vaccination "to access an area or service that is open to the public."

"Based on vaccine status, you can't be denied," Reinbold said.

Kiehl, opposing the amendment, said its adoption could allow unvaccinated people to enter hospital lobbies or hallways.

The amendment passed 9-8, with eight Republicans and Wielechowski in favor. Six Democrats and two Republicans voted against it.

The Daily News' Morgan Krakow contributed reporting.
Outgoing German Chancellor Angela Merkel used what is likely to be her last official call with Chinese President Xi Jinping to repeat support for close economic relations between the two countries, according to China.

Just over two weeks from election day, Merkel called the EU-China investment deal - which has been effectively killed by the European Parliament because of Beijing's sanctioning of officials - "mutually beneficial and win-win", according to a Chinese government readout of Friday's call.

Xi thanked Merkel for being "actively committed to promoting practical cooperation and friendly exchanges between Germany and Europe with China" and "the high level of mutual trust between China and Germany".

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The tone was starkly different from his call earlier in the day with US President Joe Biden, where Xi "pointed out that for some time, due to the US policy on China, the China-US relationship has run into serious difficulty".

A brief German readout of the meeting did not mention the controversial Comprehensive Agreement on Investment (CAI), concluded in principle last December but frozen by MEPs in May. Merkel's office said they spoke primarily about "developments in Afghanistan", economic issues and other subjects including the coronavirus pandemic and climate change.

The long-standing German leader has been the architect of close commercial ties between Germany and China during 16 years in office.

But her party's candidate in this month's election, Armin Laschet, is trailing badly in polls. With the likelihood of a new government in Berlin, it is uncertain whether the cosiness with Beijing can continue.

Senior foreign policy officials from each of the four mainstream parties called for a rethink in Germany's foreign policy in the Indo-Pacific region at the launch of the Berlin office of the security think tank International Institute for Strategic Studies on Tuesday.

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The Social Democratic Party (SPD) leads in the polls, and while candidate Olaf Scholz has said virtually nothing about China in the campaign, SPD foreign affairs spokesman Nils Schmid told the Post in Berlin this week that there can be no progress on the CAI while sanctions remain on MEPs and others.

The Greens and Free Democratic Party are predicted to be kingmakers in the election, with each tipped to join the SPD in a "traffic light coalition" - so-called because of the red, green and yellow colours of the respective party logos. Neither party will support the CAI in its current form.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel was the EU's chief sponsor on the EU-China investment deal. Photo: AFP alt=German Chancellor Angela Merkel was the EU's chief sponsor on the EU-China investment deal. Photo: AFP

At Tuesday's event, Alexander Graf Lambsdorff, foreign policy spokesman for the Free Democratic Party, a pro-business group, said that while it is generally supportive of open markets and free trade and investment, it would not support the deal until China makes improvements to its human rights and labour rights conditions.

Merkel's own Defence Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer used the event to decry the "lack of political will" to reform policy towards the Indo-Pacific region, without mentioning China by name. Kramp-Karrenbauer said she wanted the EU to establish a "permanent presence" in the region.

The EU is expected to release further details on its nascent Indo-Pacific strategy next week.

Merkel's support for the CAI is not altogether surprising: she was EU's chief sponsor on the deal and annoyed some of her European counterparts by forcing it over the line on the last day of Germany's presidency of the Council of the EU in December.

But its struggles in the European Parliament presented a second defeat on her desired China policy, after members of her own domestic party had voted against her plans to include Chinese telecoms firm Huawei Technologies Co., in the national 5G infrastructure.

The recent death of Germany's ambassador to China Jan Hecker, just days after taking the job, represented another blow for the outgoing chancellor.

Hecker was a close confidant of Merkel on foreign policy issues. In Berlin circles, his appointment was seen as both confidence that Merkel's conservative faction would remain in power and also that she had little appetite to reform the German-China relationship.

German analysts have suggested that whoever is Merkel's successor, they will struggle to maintain the status quo on China, with relations becoming increasingly fraught in recent years. A poll by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) found that 47 per cent of Germans "regard China as a rival or outright adversary that is in conflict with Europe".

Janka Oertel, director of the ECFR's Asia programme, said that while Merkel-era policies "focused on enhancing and deepening trade relations with China, while hoping that the country would slowly adapt and integrate into the rules-based international order, made sense at the time", they are out of date given the increasingly authoritarian and assertive nature of China under Xi.

"The Chinese leadership has defined its own decoupling and autonomy agenda, which is enshrined in President Xi Jinping's speeches and the party's latest five-year plan," Oertel wrote in a note.

This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP's Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright  2021 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

Copyright (c) 2021. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
ATHENS (Reuters) - Greek police fired tear gas and water canon on Saturday to break up a demonstration of thousands of people protesting against mandatory coronavirus vaccinations.

Authorities said protesters hurled flares at police in Greece's second-biggest city of Thessaloniki, who blocked them from trying to reach the area where Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis was due to deliver his annual economic address.

The annual speech typically attracts crowds of demonstrators, and police estimated more than 15,000 people, including labour unions, took part in the demonstrations on issues ranging from economic policy to COVID-19 vaccines.

Protests against COVID-19 vaccinations began in July after the government announced the mandatory inoculation of health care workers and nursing home staff. Authorities have suggested vaccines could become obligatory for other groups too, such as teachers.

"Yes to vaccines, but not mandatorily," the federation of public hospital workers, POEDYN, said in a statement.

Greece has suspended nearly 6,000 frontline health care workers from their jobs for missing a Sept. 1 deadline to get at least one vaccine shot. Earlier this month, it offered unvaccinated healthcare workers a second chance to get a shot and allow those who have been suspended to return to work.

POEDYN is worried that a total of 10,000 unvaccinated staff could be suspended, disrupting operations at understaffed hospitals at a time when infections remain high.

Demonstrations against compulsory vaccination also took place in Istanbul on Saturday, where more than 2,000 Turks protested against the government's new inoculation push.

Around 5.7 million Greeks, or 55% of the population, are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and 59% have received one dose, according to the latest official figures.

The country recorded 2,197 confirmed new infections on Saturday, and 39 deaths.

(Reporting by Alexandros Avramidis; Writing by Karolina Tagaris; Editing by Christina Fincher)
The $1,190 sweatpants have caused a stir on social media, with many critics labeling the design as a form of gentrification

Between lofty prices and notoriously unorthodox designs, Balenciaga garments have raised many an eyebrow in the past  at times for adverse reasons. Now, critics are accusing an item from its recent collection of being cultural appropriation, while some have even called it racist.

Among the U.K. fashion brands latest looks for the Fall/Winter 2021 season are sweatpants designed with an exposed boxer short built-in above the waistband, which some have deemed to be an appropriation of the sagging pant style popularized in the 90s by Black people.

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Since catching wind of the new Trompe-LOeil sweatpants, which retail for $1,190 USD, social media users have not held back their critiques, with many dismayed to witness yet another piece of Black culture land in the clutches of gentrification.

TikTok user @mr200m__, real name Josiah Hyacinth, was an early critic of the sweatpants, uploading a video on Sept. 2 inspecting the controversial design while shopping at the U.K.-based high-end department store Selfridges.

This feels racist. This feels very racist, guys Hyacinth said, probing the clothing item while another voice off-screen replies: It is.

Image via Balenciaga E-commerce Website

They have woven these boxers inside the trousers, Hyacinth continued. The video, which has been viewed over 1.6 million times, is captioned: You know when something feels racist   @Balenciaga I have questions #fyp

Theyve gentrified sagging , user @6aptiste responded in one of over 3,300 comments the video has amassed.

Twitter user @blackgirldating wrote just a reminder that there has literally been legislation to criminalize Black people for sagging, referring to laws in several southern-U.S. states disproportionately reprimanding Black people for wearing britches below the belt.

Two youths wear their pants with the underwear showing on April 23, 2009 in Riviera Beach, Florida. Recently Palm Beach Circuit Judge Paul Moyle ruled a Riviera Beach city law banning sagging pants is unconstitutional in the case of a 17-year-old who was arrested and held overnight in jail for breaking the law. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

Black men in Shreveport, Louisiana, for example, comprised 96% of the arrests from 2017 to June 2019 for wearing sagging pants. These legislations reportedly led to police chasing down and killing 31-year-old Anthony Childs in 2019.

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This is not the first time the luxury brands designs have been accused of gentrifying or appropriating melanated culture.

Balenciaga currently sells a $2,090 bag which many have pointed out resembles a well-known bag design originated in West Africa, colloquially referred to as Ghana Must Go bags.

BBC reported the bag earned the nickname in the 1980s after hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants, comprised mostly of Ghanaians, were given short notice to leave the country of Nigeria and used similar bags to carry their belongings.

Nigerians have been using this bag for decades and it sells for less than $2.5 apiece, wrote @StephenIkechuk4 on Twitter.

theGrios Kia Morgan-Smith contributed to this report.

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EXCLUSIVE: theGrios April Ryan speaks with former AP White House reporter Sonya Ross, who was part of the first-ever nuclear bunker press pool in American history

As a Black journalist with nearly 25 years at the White House, Ive witnessed many national tragedies. But every year since Sept. 11, 2001, the anniversary always brought somber to my heart and a chilling thought of what it must have been like to be with the president as the attacks on our shores occurred.

U.S. President George W. Bush speaks to Vice President Dick Cheney by phone aboard Air Force One September 11, 2001 after departing Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska. (Photo by Eric Draper/The White House/Getty Images)

Planes were used as missiles to take down symbols of the United States  the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. One plane was downed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania that was thought to have been on its way to the District of Columbia.

For those old enough to remember that day 20 years ago, it was a beautiful clear blue sky in the mid-Atlantic region. I remember being home and packing for the morning drive to the White House when the first plane hit the World Trade Center in New York. I felt instantly it was a terrorist attack, remembering years ago there was an attempt to take down the towers with a car bombing in the garage of one the buildings that towered more than 100 stories.

The second plane that flew into the World Trade Center was captured on television. I could not believe it. I hurried to work. Then President George W. Bush was in Florida and I wanted to go to the Center of Information and Decision Making. As I was trying to get into the White House, the Secret Service made my fellow reporters leave in case another attack was on its way, possibly intended for the White House.

An American flag flies above the White House in Washington, Saturday, Jan. 9, 2021. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

I could not get into work as traffic was snarled and phones were jammed. I traveled back home. The only people who could communicate were those who had at time the newest technology, BlackBerrys, that allowed for texting capabilities.

I got back home but reached out to find colleagues from other companies to see if they were safe. One of those I reached out to was then-Associated Press White House reporter Sonya Ross. She was in the presidential pool that day in Florida.

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It was a historic day. What is not as generally known about that day is that there were four Black members of the White House Press Corps. traveling with the president.

Its very important for posterity, for people to understand who those four people were, who did that nuclear bunker duty like that, God forbid, if we ever have to have another president evacuated in that way. But the assumption would be that African-Americans were notoriously missing from something like that. And thats just not true, Ross tells theGrio. Three of the four of the first ever nuclear bunker pool for the media in American history were Black people.

Ross offered details of what she describes as a rapid series of events.

After the Florida school speech, Air Force One took off. Ross said, we were circling for a while, eventually [White House Press Secretary] Ari [Fleischer] came back to talk to us  and told us things like what the president had been up to, she added. The president had spoken to world leaders and his team back in Washington.

U.S. President George W. Bush (C) makes a telephone call as White House Director Of Communications Dan Bartlett points to video footage of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center from Emma Booker Elementary School September 11, 2001 in Sarasota, Florida. (Photo by Eric Draper/White House/Getty Images)

Every year after the attack, the nation has paid tribute to those who perished through retelling of memories of that day and checking in with family members and friends of the victims.

On Saturday, the 20th anniversary, President Joe Biden is visiting all three sites of the attack in memory of those who died on September 11, 2001  the emergency responders, people on planes and those in buildings.

Since the attacks, the United States has put boots on the ground in Afghanistan and Iraq, and recently pulled troops out of Afghanistan. But during those 20 years, a new and closer threat has emerged to challenge our domestic security  our own countrymen. January 6, 2021 is another date like 9/11 that we shall never forget. It marks a shift in our focus abroad to our domestic threats.

Just a week from 9/11, insurrectionist sympathizers are planning to return to Washington, a city so strained with grief over the Pentagon deaths on the eleventh and policemen tortured on the Sixth. My years of political analysis and reporting tells me these dates will be intertwined in the years to come as bookends of terror to the nation.

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(REUTERS)

Following a wreath-laying ceremony for victims of United Airlines Flight 93, President Joe Biden greeted first responders at a firehouse in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where a memorial recognised the 40 passengers and crew members who averted untold devastation by wrestling control of the plane and crashing in a nearby field on 11 September, 2001.

It was his second of three memorials for victims of the 9/11 terror attacks on Saturday. The president travelled to New York City for a service at the site of the World Trade Center towers on Saturday morning before he visited Pennsylvania. He returned to Washington DC for a wreath-laying ceremony at the Pentagon.

These memorials are really important. But theyre also incredibly difficult for the people affected by them, because it brings back the moment they got the phone call, it brings back the instant they got the news, no matter how years go by, the president said in Pennsylvania, according to White House pool reports.

Mr Biden praised earlier remarks from Republican former president George W Bush, whose speech in Shanksville called for national unity, which Mr Bush said he observed in the aftermath of the attacks and his administrations wars but claimed is now missing from a volatile political landscape.

I think President Bush made a really good speech today. A genuinely good speech about who we are, Mr Biden said. The core of who we are is not divided.

It is an issue Mr Biden invoked throughout his campaign, promising to unite the nation after Donald Trumps antidemocratic threats, and in the White House, where he has cast the US in an existential battle to defend democracy and human rights.

Are we going to  in the next four, five, six, 10 years  demonstrate that democracies can work, or not? the president said on Saturday. We actually can, in fact, lead by the example of our power again.

Mr Biden said that a number of serious Republicans, in the past and a few who are still around, call me and tell me, What can I do to help?

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He also criticised the stuff thats coming out of Florida, where Governor Ron DeSantis has sought to ban mask mandates and politicize the response to the coronavirus pandemic, as Mr Bidens administration accelerates vaccine requirements. And the president admonished the former president, not by name, for his comments suggesting that Confederate war general Robert E Lee had been in Afghanistan, we would have won.

They think this makes sense for us to be in this kind of thing where you ride down the street and someone has a sign saying F so and so? Mr Biden said.

While Mr Trump spent the anniversary of the attacks criticising his predecessor for the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, Mr Biden defended his administrations response and pledge to end the nations longest war, as the US reflects on the first 9/11 anniversary without it.

Could al-Qaeda come back? Yeah, Mr Biden said. But guess what, its already back [in] other places. Whats the strategy? Every place where al-Qaeda is, were going to invade and have troops stay in? Cmon.

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President Joe Bidens newly issued mandate that companies with 100 or more employees must require vaccinations or weekly COVID-19 testing among their workforce may be just what the doctor ordered for a number of Chicago-area companies, including WeatherTech, the southwest suburban car floor mat manufacturer.

The company, which has 1,700 employees on its sprawling Bolingbrook campus making everything from dog bowls to cellphone holders, has no vaccine or testing mandates in place, despite having several very sick employees and one death from COVID-19, according to WeatherTech founder and CEO David MacNeil.

MacNeil, a strong proponent of COVID-19 vaccinations for his employees, said the legal landscape for imposing a company mandate was unknown  at least before Biden announced his proposed mandate Thursday.

I welcome government help in getting the job done, MacNeil said Friday.

Under Bidens plan, workers must either be vaccinated or tested weekly, with businesses providing time off for employees to do either. The proposed rules, which have yet to be drafted by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, would carry fines of up to $14,000 per violation for the businesses, and cover about 80 million private-sector workers.

Some labor experts expect the vaccine mandate, which may take weeks to roll out, to be challenged in court. But it may provide an immediate catalyst for businesses seeking guidance  and legal backing  on implementing what has proven to be a potentially divisive requirement.

I think companies have been waiting for this, said John Challenger, CEO of Chicago-based outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. Companies will flock to get this done. I think there will be a real sense of relief. Theyve been looking for cover.

Chicago-based United Airlines is among a number of large companies that have taken the lead in implementing vaccine mandates for employees as COVID-19 cases rise amid the spread of the delta variant. Other companies requiring proof of vaccination include CVS, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Delta Air Lines, Tyson Foods and Deerfield-based Walgreens.

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Bidens mandate would incorporate a much broader swath of companies, providing an incentive for moving forward and penalties for violating what would be an enforceable workplace safety violation.

Mark Denzler, president and CEO of the Illinois Manufacturers Association, said the devil is in the details of the yet-to-be released OSHA rules.

While no federal rule has been promulgated, we do have concerns about significant financial penalties that could be forced on employers who are already doing their best to navigate constantly changing rules and guidance, Denzler said in an emailed statement Friday.

Jim Sullivan, a Washington, D.C.-based labor attorney and the former chair of the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission during the Trump administration, said OSHA is expected to create an emergency standard and make the rule effective within weeks. He then expects it will be immediately challenged in court and ultimately shot down.

At this point, many questions remain about the costs to employers, the specific requirements and how the mandate might be enforced, Sullivan said.

Its just an effort by the administration to use OSHA as a mechanism to get people to require their employees be vaccinated, Sullivan said. I think what their intent is, is to have people just do it. And theyre not going to do it through enforcement.

An August survey conducted by Littler, a labor and employment law firm, found that only 9% of employers are currently mandating vaccines for some or all of their employees, but nearly two-thirds are encouraging employees to get the vaccine.

Barry Hartstein, a Chicago-based attorney for Littler, said the Biden mandate will likely encourage more companies to take their policies from voluntary to mandatory.

This is one more basis that may give those who are inclined to have mandatory vaccinations to say its time, Hartstein said. If they werent in favor of vaccinations, it may still be a wait-and-see approach.

For Chicago employers still processing the proposed vaccine mandate, reactions were generally muted, but supportive.

Fords Chicago Assembly Plant, which makes the Ford Explorer, Lincoln Aviator and Police Interceptor SUVs, has about 5,000 employees working three shifts on the citys Southeast Side.

The automaker requires every employee to wear a mask inside the plant, but its vaccination policy is mostly voluntary, Ford spokeswoman Kelli Felker said.

Ford continues to strongly encourage all employees who are eligible to get vaccinated, Felker said in an emailed statement Friday. We believe the vaccine plays a critical role in combating the virus and have already designated some roles where we require the vaccine. We will be assessing the new executive actions to determine what adjustments need to be taken to our current vaccination policy as we continue to prioritize the safety of our employees.

Schaumburg-based insurance giant Zurich North America will act once it reviews forthcoming guidance from the Safer Federal Workforce Task Force and a rule from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, spokesperson Jennifer Schneider said in an emailed statement.

Bloomington-based State Farm Insurance also does not have a vaccine mandate for employees and on Friday the company indicated its taking the same wait-and-see stance as Zurich. Right now our protocols remain the same until we learn more, State Farm spokesperson Gina Morss-Fischer said in an email.

Food service giant US Foods, which has roughly 1,000 employees at its Rosemont headquarters, does not currently require vaccinations.

The health and safety of our associates and customers remain our top priority, the company said in a statement. We will review the executive orders and related OSHA requirements to determine the appropriate next steps.

While vaccine and mask mandates have become politically polarizing, WeatherTechs MacNeil believes preventing the spread of COVID-19 is a good business practice that should cut across party lines.

A Republican megadonor who contributed $1 million to President Donald Trumps January 2017 inauguration, MacNeil said he was among the first to be vaccinated in November 2020 as a participant in the Johnson & Johnson trials. He called the results nothing less than amazing after staying COVID-free, despite repeated exposures to people who tested positive, including his own employees.

MacNeils biggest concern about the Biden vaccination mandate is that it doesnt go far enough.

Do employees in companies with 99 or less employees not deserve to work in the same level of safety as employees of larger companies? MacNeil said. The sooner all of us are vaccinated, the sooner we can all get back to normal life and business here in America.

Chicago Tribunes Lisa Donovan and Sarah Freishtat contributed.

rchannick@chicagotribune.com
Nicholas Brendon

Gilbert Carrasquillo/Getty

Nicholas Brendon has pulled out of promotional events for his new movie Wanton Want, citing medical issues he's suffered since a recent jail stint.

The Buffy the Vampire Slayer actor, 50, has suffered "deep-seated medical problems and immense pain" after he was arrested last month in Indiana and charged with felony prescription fraud, his manager Theresa Fortier told The Daily Mail.

He's experienced "paralysis in his genitals" and legs, and is awaiting scans on his back and groin areas. Fortier added that he will require major back surgery in the coming days.

Brendon suffers from Cauda equina syndrome, which is when the nerve roots in the lumbar spine are compressed, limiting movement and sensation. The condition was reportedly exacerbated by his jail stint in August.

RELATED: Buffy the Vampire Slayer Actor Nicholas Brendon Arrested for Alleged Prescription Fraud

"Right now he is concentrating on his health. He is not doing promotion for the film," Fortier said.

Brendon's manager did not respond to PEOPLE's request for comment.

He was arrested on Aug. 18 after he allegedly used false information to obtain prescription drugs. In addition to the felony charge, he was also charged with a misdemeanor for allegedly failing to properly identify himself when pulled over by police, handing them a California ID with the name Kelton Schultz. Brendon told police it was his brother's ID (he has an identical twin brother named Kelly Donovan and their family name is Schultz).

Nicholas Brendon (TERRE HAUTE CITY POLICE DEPT)

TERRE HAUTE CITY POLICE DEPT Nicholas Brendon's 2021 Mugshot

The Criminal Minds actor was held at Vigo County Jail but was released soon after on his own recognizance. Fortier said he was made to sleep on a concrete floor during his stay. "During the arrest they were not quite careful with his condition," she added.

His latest brush with the law comes after a series of arrests and struggles with his mental health, as well as drug and alcohol addiction. He was serving a three-year probation sentence at the time of last month's arrest, according to the Desert Sun.

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Brendon, who starred in Buffy as Xander Harris for the entirety of its seven-season run from 1997 to 2003, checked himself into rehab in April 2004.

RELATED VIDEO: Buffy the Vampire Slayer Actor Nicholas Brendon Arrested for Alleged 'Violent' Attack on Girlfriend

"After realizing that I had a disease that was taking control of my life, I decided that the best way for me to regain my health was to enter a treatment facility," he wrote in a statement at the time.

The Psycho Beach Party actor returned to rehab in 2010, after he was tasered by police and charged with vandalism, resisting arrest and battery against a police officer, TMZ reported at the time. After pleading no contest, Brendon was sentenced to probation and community service.

He was arrested again in October 2014 in Boise, Idaho, where he was charged with malicious injury to property and restraining or obstructing officers. Police responded to a disturbance in a hotel lobby, where Brendon "showed signs of intoxication and repeatedly refused officers commands to stay seated while officers tried to speak to witnesses."

Wanton Want

Wanton Want/Instagram

Brendon was later arrested on four separate occasions in 2015, resulting in charges including grand theft, criminal mischief, public intoxication and impairment. He was also charged with robbery in the third degree, as well as causing damages of up to $1000 in a Florida hotel. Brendon entered two treatment centers that year as well, one in June for depression, alcoholism and substance abuse, and another in October for depression.

After pleading guilty to criminal mischief for allegedly grabbing his girlfriend by the throat that October in Sarasota Springs, New York, Brendon was arrested again in October 2017 for allegedly attacking his girlfriend in a California hotel room. The girlfriend has active protective orders against him, and he was charged with domestic violence, resulting in his current three-year probation sentence.

Brendon stars in Wanton Want, premiering Sept. 28 on Amazon Prime Video.
Former President George W. Bush gave a moving speech Saturday as the country solemnly remembered the 20th anniversary of 9/11, contrasting the unity he witnessed in the days after the attacks with the division that exists in the nation today.

"Twenty years ago, we all found  in different ways, in different places, but all at the same moment  that our lives would be changed forever. The world was loud with carnage and sirens, and then quiet with missing voices that would never be heard again," he said at the Flight 93 National Memorial near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

"These lives remain precious to our country, and infinitely precious to many of you," he said. "Today we remember your loss, we share your sorrow and we honor the men and women you have loved so long and so well."

Bush said that on America's darkest day, the "actions of an enemy revealed the spirit of a people."

"We were proud of our wounded nation," he told the crowd. "In these memories, the passengers and crew of Flight 93 must always have an honored place. Here the intended targets became the instruments of rescue. And many who are now alive owe a vast, unconscious debt to the defiance displayed in the skies above this field."

The former president went on to talk about the struggles of trying to understand why America was targeted and said the "security measures incorporated into our lives are both sources of comfort and reminders of our vulnerability."

"And we have seen growing evidence that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders, but from violence that gathers within. There is little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home," Bush said, seemingly referencing the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.

"But in their disdain for pluralism, in their disregard for human life, in their determination to defile national symbols, they are children of the same foul spirit. And it is our continuing duty to confront them," he said.

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Bush, who was reading a book to Florida schoolchildren when the planes hit 20 years ago, reflected on how the country came together in the days following the terrorist attacks.

"On Americas day of trial and grief, I saw millions of people instinctively grab for a neighbors hand and rally to the cause of one another. That is the America I know. At a time when religious bigotry might have flowed freely, I saw Americans reject prejudice and embrace people of Muslim faith. That is the nation I know," he said.

"At a time when nativism could have stirred hatred and violence against people perceived as outsiders, I saw Americans reaffirm their welcome of immigrants and refugees. Thatis the nation I know," he said. "At a time when some viewed the rising generation as individualistic and decadent, I saw young people embrace an ethic of service and rise to selfless action. That is the nation I know."
Associated Press

The Minnesota Supreme Court on Wednesday reversed the third-degree murder conviction of a former Minneapolis police officer who fatally shot an Australian woman in 2017, saying the charge doesn't fit the circumstances in the case. Mohamed Noor was convicted of third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter in the death of Justine Ruszczyk Damond, a dual U.S.-Australian citizen who called 911 to report a possible sexual assault behind her home. The ruling means his murder conviction is overturned and the case will now go back to the district court, where he will be sentenced on the manslaughter count.
BOGOTA, Colombia (AP)  Former Colombian soldiers arrested in Haiti in the assassination of President Jovenel Moise have accused local authorities of torture, saying theyve been burned, stabbed and hit in the head with a hammer, among other things.

Details of the alleged torture are contained in a Sept. 6 letter addressed to Colombias president and other high-ranking officials as well as the Interamerican Court of Human Rights and the International Committee of the Red Cross. It was signed by the 18 former soldiers arrested in the slaying.

Relatives of the soldiers provided a copy of the letter to The Associated Press but asked not to be identified for their safety.

In the letter, the soldiers accuse Haitian police officers of shooting at them with powerful weapons when they tried to turn themselves in with their hands raised just hours after Moise was killed at his private home on July 7.

We were deceived by people and companies in the United States and Haiti that seek to accuse us of acts for which we are not responsible. Dont let an injustice be committed, they wrote.

Several days after the killing, Colombian President Ivan Duque said the majority of the former soldiers arrested were duped and thought they were traveling to Haiti for a legitimate mission to provide protection. He said only a small group of them knew it was a criminal operation.

In the letter, the ex-soldiers describe how police tortured and then executed one of their colleagues who was injured after being shot by Haitian officers while trying to turn himself over. He was one of three former Colombian soldiers killed. The letter also accuses police of kicking some ex-soldiers in the testicles and even burned one of them in their groin, allegedly while saying that human rights dont exist in Haiti and that they could do whatever they wanted.

The ex-soldiers alleged that other colleagues were thrown against walls, one had his foot burned with hot oil, another was kicked in the mouth and suffers from two broken teeth and that police released at least three of them to a crowd that attacked with machetes or stabbed them.

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They also accused authorities of keeping all of them handcuffed for 24 days, and that they didnt receive food or water in the first two days after their capture. They wrote that the bathrooms in the cell they were being held at in police headquarters werent working, so feces filled the area and caused their wounds to become infected.

The lack of timely medical attention also was denounced by the Colombian Ombudsmans Office, a state entity in charge of ensuring human rights, after a July 26 visit with the ex-soldiers. In its report, the office warned that three of the detainees had considerable injuries and needed specialized medical treatment.

Once they were transferred to a penitentiary, the ex-soldiers said there were no bathrooms and no potable water, which they either have to buy or wait for a good Samaritan to bring them some. They noted that they get fed only once a day and that some of the ex-soldiers have lost up to 44 pounds (20 kilograms).

The United Nations and other organizations have long denounced prison conditions in Haiti, noting that they are severely overcrowded and that inmates are often ill-treated, sometimes tortured and can spend more than a decade behind bars without going to a single court hearing or being charged with anything.

In their letter, the ex-soldiers added they dont have an attorney, dont know what charges they face and that theyre barred from calling their families: We find ourselves completely isolated.

The ex-soldiers also said that Haitian authorities already had prepared written statements before interviewing them and ordered them to sign the documents drafted in a language they didn't understand.

Torture has been employed as a way to obtain statements, they wrote.

The ex-soldiers said one of the main officials overseeing the case was responsible for the torture, calling him a professional in torturing humans. They did not identify him.

We thank you in advance for your attention and prompt response to this cry for help and complaints, they wrote.

Neither the office of Colombias president nor the foreign ministry immediately returned messages for comment. A spokeswoman for Haitis National Police did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Haitian authorities have detained more than 40 suspects in the killing of Moise during an attack in which his wife, Martine Moise, was injured. Meanwhile, court clerks investigating the case have gone into hiding after being threatened with death if they didnt change certain names and statements in their reports.

In addition, a Haitian judge assigned to oversee the investigation stepped down last month citing personal reasons. He left after one of his assistants died in unclear circumstances. A new judge has been assigned, but the former Colombian soldiers have yet to appear in court.

___

Associated Press writer Danica Coto in San Juan, Puerto Rico contributed to this report.
"Make the most of today, because who knows what tomorrow's going to bring," says Nick Marson.

It's a lesson he learned firsthand on Sept. 11, 2001. The British native, now 72, was flying from London to Houston aboard Continental Airlines flight C03 for a work trip when terrorists turned other passenger jets into weapons on U.S. soil.



With the U.S. airspace shut down as the nation went into survival mode, Nick's flight was one of 38 diverted to Gander, Newfoundland, where locals in the small town rushed to shelter and feed the 6,700 passengers who were stranded for days in the aftermath of 9/11. Little did Nick know that his future wife Diane was among those travelers.

"Neither one of us got on that plane on that day looking for a romantic engagement," Nick tells PEOPLE of Diane, who was on the same flight, returning home from a family vacation in the U.K. "That's for sure."

RELATED: George W. Bush Likens the Terrorists Who Attacked on 9/11 to Today's 'Violent Extremists at Home'

They were complete strangers until Nick went looking for a spot to sleep at the Society of United Fishermen Lodge 47 in Gambo that night.

"Is it alright if I take this bed?" Nick recalled asking Diane, pointing to the cot next to her. Both single empty-nesters with grown children from previous relationships, they bonded and decided to take walks around town together  a welcomed distraction from the heartbreaking images being replayed on television.

Nick and Diane Marson

Courtesy Nick and Diane Marson Nick and Diane Marson

Sparks were evident in those uncertain days, so much so that the master of ceremonies at a screeching event, where visitors kiss fish to become honorary Newfoundlanders, assumed they were a married couple. As Nick remembers, Diane replied, "Why not?" Though Diane has insisted she "said it in jest," they wound up married less than a year later  and on Tuesday, nearly 20 years after 9/11, the Marsons celebrated their 19th wedding anniversary.

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It's an unlikely love story that has since been immortalized in the documentary You Are Here and the hit Broadway musical Come from Away, now available on Apple+. But in the immediate years after 9/11, both felt what they describe as "survivor's guilt."

RELATED: Husband and Wife Who Met While Stranded Because of 9/11 Reveal the Lesson of Their Love Story

"We'd found something wonderful, and it did not seem appropriate that that had happened when more than 3,000 families had been devastated," Nick says. "It was something we kept to ourselves. You almost think, 'Pretend it didn't happen.' "

Nick and Diane Marson

Courtesy Nick and Diane Marson The Marsons have made several trips back to the natural beauty of Newfoundland, where they spent their honeymoon in September 2002. Its a very different place, Diane says of the friendly locals. Adds Nick: Like back in the 1950s.

"It wasn't something I was comfortable talking about or celebrating," Diane, now 80, adds.

As time passed, they began to embrace the inspiring truth at the core of their relationship: "In the darkest of circumstances, good things can still happen," Diane told PEOPLE at the couple's Houston home during a photo shoot for the magazine in 2019. "The world is in turmoil, but don't shut yourself away."

Two years after their first PEOPLE interview, as the world grapples with the deadly COVID-19 pandemic, that message rings even truer for the Marsons.

"I would say that she's a very wise woman for saying those words," Nick says now over Zoom while reflecting on the pandemic.

RELATED VIDEO: 4 Teens Who Were Not Yet Born When Their Dads Died on 9/11 Reveal Their Struggles and Triumphs

"I think we all get ahead of ourselves, especially with social media, with phones, with tablets, or whatever," adds Diane. "We're not in the moment that much anymore. We've certainly not had the social contacts in person that we used to have. It's not been easy for anyone."

The takeaway, Diane says, is that "we all need to live in the present" with an open heart.

RELATED: Where All the Presidents Will Be to Mark the 20th Anniversary of 9/11

"You get to a certain age and you realize that any chances for a relationship go out the window, but you're satisfied," she says of her years as a divorcee before meeting Nick. "You have your family, you have your grandchildren, and you think, 'Well, this is it.' You don't consider that there's going to be a romantic time."

Nick and Diane Marson

Courtesy Nick and Diane Marson Nick and Diane Marson

"But when an opportunity comes along," Diane continues, "and there are some sparks there"

"Give him a kiss," says Nick, jokingly interjecting  a regular occurrence for a couple who love to finish each other's sentences.

This time the joke is about their first smooch in Newfoundland. Five days after the attacks, when the U.S. airspace reopened, Nick and Diane boarded a school bus transporting stranded travelers back to the airport. In their final seconds together, Diane knew she had to make her move.

Nick and Diane Marson

Courtesy Nick and Diane Marson Diane and Nick Marson

"I thought, 'If you don't do it now, the opportunity [will pass],' " she recalls.

"That was your ace," says Nick. "You played your ace."

RELATED: Jill Biden Remembers the Moment That 'Changed Us All in Some Way' on 20th Anniversary of 9/11

"Yes, I played my ace card because, if I didn't do it then, we were going to shake hands at the airport, you go your way, I go my way  5,000 miles apart," Diane says.

That kiss "lit a fire under me," Nick said in 2019. "It's like, good lord  I thought those days were over."

Nick and Diane Marson

Courtesy Nick and Diane Marson Nick and Diane Marson

Thanks to his job, Nick found an excuse to return to Houston and stay with Diane, and that November, he proposed over the phone. A few months and several long-distance phone cards later, he relocated from the U.K. to Texas to begin a new life with Diane. Surrounded by friends and family, they said "I do" in their backyard on Sept. 7, 2002  almost a year to the day they met.

Though it's been two decades, they are consistently reminded of their beginnings when visiting with friends they made in Newfoundland (sometimes in person but most often during weekly "Gander Happy Hour" Zoom calls) and seeing the Come From Away musical. So far, they've sat in the audience of 118 performances as actors reenact the days when fate brought them together.

"Every time we see it," says Nick, "it's like we're renewing our vows."
He's best known to superhero fans around the world as "Doctor Strange," a leading star of the multi-billion grossing Marvel films.

But Benedict Cumberbatch relished stepping into the arthouse world of "The Power of the Dog" -- complete with a painstakingly recreated 1920s Montana cowboy ranch -- for his latest Oscar-tipped film, he told the Toronto film festival Friday.

"To play something as diverse as those two characters are, apart from each other, is fantastic," said Cumberbatch.

"I loved swapping the cloak for a horse," he added.

Doctor Strange's trademark cloak will be next seen in the Spider-Man movie "No Way Home" in December, while Cumberbatch is also starring in "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" in March.

But far away from the world of blockbuster franchises, "The Power of the Dog" -- out in theaters in November, and on Netflix from December 1 -- is already seen as an early frontrunner for next year's Academy Awards.

Based on a novel about a closeted cowboy, it earned rave reviews at the Venice and Telluride festivals before moving onto Toronto.

Its selection in multiple major festival lineups is itself an indicator of likely success -- last year's best picture "Nomadland" toured the major fall events that went ahead.

So is the presence of director Jane Campion. The New Zealander was only the second woman ever nominated for the best directing Oscar with 1993's "The Piano," and "The Power of the Dog" is her first feature in more than a decade.

"It's quite far away from my normal wheelhouse and I was just thrilled that someone as mad as Jane wanted me to do it!" said former "Sherlock" star Cumberbatch, who learnt to ride horses and rope steers, play the banjo and blow a piercing cowboy whistle for the part.

He paid tribute to Campion as "this amazingly strong woman, in a very male-dominated world -- this person who has this incredible weight of work."

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- 'Intolerance' -

The film is Campion's first to feature a male protagonist, something the director has said she felt freed up to do after the #MeToo movement paved the way for more female-centered movies elsewhere in Hollywood.

Toxic masculinity, as well as sexual repression, is a key theme of the film with Cumberbatch's sadistic, sinister ranch owner Phil Burbank disguising his own sexuality behind a constant barrage of homophobic taunts and insults toward others.

Burbank also terrorizes and pours malicious scorn on the widow (Kirsten Dunst) who has married his more congenial brother (Jesse Plemons) -- driving her to alcoholism -- and her effeminate son (Kodi Smit-McPhee.)

"Phil's tragedy is he can't be his authentic self, in the time he's in but also the culture he's in," said Cumberbatch.

"It is a tragedy of intolerance in many ways."

The second day of the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) also saw the North American premiere of time-hopping psychological horror "Last Night in Soho," from British director Edgar Wright.

After the successes of films like "Baby Driver," Wright has continued to pursue original projects including an acclaimed recent documentary on eccentric musical duo Sparks.

He co-wrote "Last Night in Soho," and has so far shown little interest in following the likes of Cumberbatch into the superhero universe.

"I wouldn't be so silly as to say I would never do that," he told AFP.

"But right now I feel very proud that, given the opportunity, I did another original movie after 'Baby Driver.'"

"I think when you have the opportunity to do that, you should take it."

TIFF, North America's biggest film festival, runs until September 18.

amz/jfx
MarketWatch

Merck & Co. Inc. said it expects the company's experimental oral antiviral treatment for COVID-19 could get emergency authorization by the end of the year. "We expect to be able to see clinical data here in the back half of the year and still have the potential for an interim analysis and potential for emergency use authorization before year end," Merck CEO Robert Davis told investors at the Morgan Stanley Global Healthcare Conference on Monday. Merck and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics Inc. have been
Organizers at Planned Parenthood of Illinois and its partners gathered downtown with nearly 100 people at Federal Plaza in Chicago Friday to protest a new law in Texas that bans most abortions at six weeks of pregnancy.

The law went into effect Sept. 1 and prohibits abortions once cardiac activity can be detected in the embryo, which is usually around the sixth week of pregnancy. The law also says that anyone who performs an abortion or helps someone get an abortion can be sued by any private citizen as a way to further enforce the new legislation.

Jennifer Welch, president and CEO of Illinois Planned Parenthood, said the groups clinics have been seeing patients from Texas every day since Sept. 3 as abortion in Illinois is legal.

People had to travel a thousand miles to get their health care because of this Texas law, so thats one reason why were out here protesting in Chicago, Welch said. The second reason is because our surrounding states that already have abortion restrictions in place are looking at similar bans, so even more patients would have to come to us, will have to travel, for this essential care.

About 20 anti-abortion protesters gathered nearby. Both crowds had a mix of younger and older participants taking part in versions of popular protest chants.

A third group of about 10 people stood along an edge of Federal Plaza dressed in red robes and white bonnets but didnt take part in any of the noise. The Illinois Handmaids, who attended to show their support of pro-abortion rights, participated by standing in silence and holding signs while dressed in the signature attire of the classic dystopian novel the group is named after, The Handmaids Tale.

Bolingbrook resident Corrine Bengtson Marsala said she took a bus to Chicago Friday to be a part of the anti-abortion protest because she wanted to take part having volunteered with the local nonprofit Pro-Life Action League for more than a decade. She said her hope, which is in line with the organizations goal, is for other states to adopt a heartbeat law.

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Im standing as the voice for the voiceless, for the babys rights to a life, she said. Lets change the word abortion and make it adoption. Its so much gentler on the baby and then they can go into a family who cant have biological children.

Barbara Ellis attended Friday to stand against the Texas law along with her husband, John Ellis. The couple has lived in Chicago for the more than 30 years theyve been married, plus some.

John Ellis said he believes the motivation behind Texas new legislation is to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1970s Supreme Court case that decided women have a constitutional right to choose whether to have an abortion.

Barbara Ellis said the abortion issue aside, she has a problem with the bounties and vigilantism within the new law.

Law enforcement belongs to law enforcement, not to just any old Joe on the street, she said. Without that weve got chaos.

sahmad@chicagotribune.com
Sep. 10As the national anthem was sung, Riverbend Elementary School students proudly raised their right hand to their heart during an honorary event hosted on Friday to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Sept. 11, 2001.

A tradition held at the elementary school every year since 2008, more than 100 students and 150 staff members were in attendance. Among the crowd, there were also members of the city council, the Sutter County sheriff, the fire department, school board members and other local dignitaries that participated in the ceremony.

"It's very important to keep the memory of the fallen in our hearts and minds and to educate the kids on this tragic event that happened back on September 11," said Jevan Bains, principal of Riverbend Elementary School. "If we don't bring awareness, if we don't talk about it and come together as Americans, this next generation will not know about it."

During the 9/11 remembrance ceremony the student body president of Riverbend Elementary School, Luke Michaelis, delivered a speech asking for a moment of silence at the end. His speech was followed by the singing of "The Star-Spangled Banner" by parent Joyce Cambell. The Pledge of Allegiance was then led by vice president of the student body and eighth-grader Nolan Carney. All students proudly clapped, raised their hands to their hearts and were joyous to see the community's first responders there.

"We're here today to help support the leadership program," said Sutter County Sheriff Brandon Barnes. "Principal Bains made us aware of the event today where they gave some speeches in regards to 9/11 and public service and we wanted to come out and really show our support to the kids because the leadership program in and of itself is developing the future leaders in our own community. And so we're very happy to see that the schools invest in the kids but we also want to invest in the kids as well."

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The leadership program at Riverbend Elementary School is an elective course for students who get elected to lead as school officers, said Bains. The yearlong class focuses on positive leadership values like self control, safety, respect and responsibility. Students in the leadership program help coordinate student-wide events and participate in activities around the campus. The leadership team also helped run the commemorative ceremony for 9/11.

Other important local dignitaries like the president of the Sikh Temple were there to show their support and represent the Sikhs and Punjabi community, some that were victims of hate crimes after the 9/11 attacks. Approximately 15,000-18,000 Punjabi Americans reside in the greater Yuba City area, according to the Pioneer Punjabis Digital Archive of UC Davis.

"When Sihks were targeted, it was these kinds of events that made awareness to let people understand who we really are and so I am happy to be here representing our Sihk community," said Sarb Thiara, president of the Sikh Temple Tierra Buena. "We're always out helping anyway we can for the next generation of the kids so they can understand that we're all Americans here and we need to go forward."

Lonetta Riley, Yuba City Unified School District board president, was also among the crowd of participants in support of the ceremony hosted by principal Bains and the students of Riverbend Elementary School. Riley expressed her gratitude toward the principal for hosting a ceremony that honors the memory of the lives lost on 9/11.

"It's important that we continue to remember because if we don't, history has a way of repeating itself when we don't remember tragedies like that," said Riley. "I think the fact that Mr. Bains is having a ceremony at an elementary middle school is a good thing, because these children don't know anything about that. And it's a part of history. It's a part of who America is and how resilient we were to come back from something as tragic as 9/11."
A woman blows a trumpet ahead a procession to mark the victory at the Battle of Adwa - March 2021, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Ethiopians are marking the start of a new year, with feasting in many homes despite the difficulties caused by rising prices and the war and hunger crisis raging in the north. Find out more about Ethiopia's unique calendar and cultural heritage.

1) The year lasts 13 months

Not only that - the Ethiopian calendar is also seven years and eight months behind the Western calendar, making Saturday the start of 2014.

This is because it calculates the birth year of Jesus Christ differently. When the Catholic Church amended its calculation in 500 AD, the Ethiopian Orthodox Church did not.

So the new year falls on 11 September in the Western calendar, or 12 September in leap years, at the start of spring.

During the Oromo community's Irreecha celebrations, freshly cut grass and flowers are placed in water to thank God for the beginning of spring

Unlike children growing up elsewhere, there is little need for Ethiopian youngsters to learn rhymes to remember how many days each month has.

In Ethiopia it is simple: 12 months each have 30 days and the 13th - the last of the year - has five or six days, depending on whether it's a leap year.

Time is also counted differently - with the day divided into two 12-hour slots starting from 06:00, which would make both midday and midnight six o'clock in Ethiopian time.

So if someone arranges to meet you in Addis Ababa at 10 o'clock for a cup of coffee - Ethiopia is after all the birthplace of the arabica bean - don't be surprised if they rock up at 16:00.

2) Only African country never colonised

Italy tried to invade Ethiopia, or Abyssinia as it was also known, in 1895, when European powers were carving up the African continent between themselves - but it went on to suffer a humiliating defeat.

Italy had managed to colonise neighbouring Eritrea after an Italian shipping company bought the Red Sea port of Assab. Confusion following the death in 1889 of Ethiopian emperor Yohannes IV then allowed Italy to occupy the highlands along the coast.

A parade is held each year to mark the Battle of Adwa - it was the 125th anniversary in March

But a few years later when Italy tried to push further into Ethiopia, it was defeated at the Battle of Adwa. Four brigades of Italian troops were overcome in a matter of hours on 1 March 1896 by Ethiopians serving under Emperor Menelik II.

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Italy was forced to sign a treaty recognising Ethiopia's independence - though decades later fascist leader Benito Mussolini violated it, occupying the country for five years.

One of Menelik's successors, Emperor Haile Selassie, capitalised on his Italian victory by pushing for the creation of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), now the African Union, which has its headquarters in Ethiopia's capital, Addis Ababa.

"Our liberty is meaningless unless all Africans are free," Selassie said at the OAU's launch in 1963, a time when much of the continent was still ruled by European powers.

The three main colours of Ethiopia's flag have come to represent pan-Africanism - several post-colonial states adopted them

He invited those leading the fight against colonialism for training - including South Africa's Nelson Mandela - who was granted an Ethiopian passport, which allowed him to travel around Africa in 1962.

Mandela later wrote about the special place Ethiopia held for him ahead of the trip: "I felt I would be visiting my own genesis, unearthing the roots of what made me an African."

3) Rastafarians worship Emperor Haile Selassie

This stems from a quote in 1920 from influential Jamaican black rights leader Marcus Garvey, who was behind the Back to Africa movement: "Look to Africa, when a black king shall be crowned, for the day of deliverance is at hand."

A decade later, when 38-year-old Ras Tafari (or Chief Tafari) was crowned Ethiopia's Haile Selassie I, many in Jamaica saw this as the prophecy coming true, and the Rastafari movement was born.

Haile Selassie (left) denied he was immortal

Reggae legend Bob Marley was instrumental in spreading the Rasta message - and the lyrics to his song, War, quote the emperor's address to the UN General Assembly in 1963 calling for world peace: "Until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned until that day, the African continent will not know peace."

The title track of Marley's Exodus, named by Time magazine as the album of the 20th Century, reflects the Rastafari desire to return to Africa, which millions of people were forced to leave during the transatlantic slave trade.

The Ethiopian emperor was greeted by tens of thousands of Rastafarians when he went to Jamaica in 1966

To this day a small Rastafarian community lives in the Ethiopian town of Shashamene, 225km (150 miles) south of Addis Ababa, on land granted by Selassie to black people from the West who had supported him against Mussolini.

Selassie, an Orthodox Christian, may not have been a Rasta believer, insisting that he was not immortal, but Rastafarians still revere him as the Lion of Judah.

This is a reference to Selassie's alleged lineage, which Rastafarians, and many Ethiopians, believe can be traced back to the biblical King Solomon.

4) Home to the Ark of the Covenant

For many Ethiopians, the sacred chest holding the two tablets with the Ten Commandments which the bible says were given to Moses by God is not lost - Hollywood's Indiana Jones need only have gone to the city of Aksum.

The Ethiopian Orthodox Church says the ark is under constant guard on the grounds of Aksum's Our Lady Mary of Zion Church, where no-one is allowed to see it.

Tradition has it that the church has this precious relic thanks to the Queen of Sheba, whose existence may be disputed by historians, but generally not by Ethiopians.

They believe she travelled from Aksum to Jerusalem to visit King Solomon to find out more about his reputed wisdom in around 950 BC.

The story of her journey and seduction by Solomon are detailed in the Kebra Nagast epic (Glory of the Kings) - an Ethiopian literary work written in the Ge'ez language in the 14th Century.

It tells how Makeda, the Queen of Sheba, gave birth to a son - Menelik (meaning Son of the Wise) - and how years later he travelled to Jerusalem to meet his father.

Solomon wanted him to stay and rule after his death, but agreed to the young man's wish to go home, sending him back with a contingent of Israelites - one of whom stole the ark, replacing the original with a forgery.

When Menelik found out he agreed to keep it, believing it to be God's will that it stay in Ethiopia - and for the country's Orthodox Christians it remains sacred and something they are still willing to protect with their lives.

This was evident last year when, during the conflict that has erupted in Ethiopia's northern region of Tigray, soldiers from Eritrea reportedly tried to loot Our Lady Mary of Zion Church in the aftermath of an horrific massacre.

A civil servant in the city told the BBC that young people ran to the site to protect the ark: "Every man and woman fought them. They fired guns and killed some, but we are happy as we did not fail to protect our treasures."

5) Home to first Muslims outside Arabia

"If you were to go to Abyssinia, you will find a king who will not tolerate injustice," the Prophet Muhammed is said to have told his followers when they first faced persecution in 7th Century Mecca, in modern-day Saudi Arabia.

One of the mausoleums at the historic al-Negashi Mosque was damaged in the ongoing Tigray conflict

This was at the time the prophet had just begun his sermons, which proved so popular that he was seen as a threat by the city's non-Muslim rulers.

Taking his advice, a small group set off to the Kingdom of Aksum, which then covered much of present-day Ethiopia and Eritrea, where they were indeed welcomed and allowed to practise their religion by the Christian monarch Armah - whose royal title in Ge'ez was Negus, or Negashi in Arabic.

The village of Negash, in what is now Tigray, is where these migrants are thought to have settled and built what is considered by some to be the oldest mosque in Africa. Last year, the al-Negashi Mosque was shelled during the fighting in Tigray.

Local Muslims believe that 15 disciples of the prophet are also buried in Negash.

In Islamic history this move to Aksum became known as the first Hijra or migration.

Today Muslims make up nearly 34% of Ethiopia's more than 115 million inhabitants.
MarketWatch

If youre on Social Security there is good news, and some not quite so good news, in the latest official inflation report out from Uncle Sam on Tuesday. The good news is that youre on track for the biggest annual cost of living adjustment next year in over a decade. Based on the U.S. Labor Departments consumer price data for August, Social Security is on track to hike benefits 5.9% for 2022 when it makes the official announcement next month.
It's only natural that many investors, especially those who are new to the game, prefer to buy shares in 'sexy' stocks with a good story, even if those businesses lose money. But as Peter Lynch said in One Up On Wall Street, 'Long shots almost never pay off.'

If, on the other hand, you like companies that have revenue, and even earn profits, then you may well be interested in REA Group (ASX:REA). While that doesn't make the shares worth buying at any price, you can't deny that successful capitalism requires profit, eventually. Conversely, a loss-making company is yet to prove itself with profit, and eventually the sweet milk of external capital may run sour.

See our latest analysis for REA Group

How Quickly Is REA Group Increasing Earnings Per Share?

If you believe that markets are even vaguely efficient, then over the long term you'd expect a company's share price to follow its earnings per share (EPS). That means EPS growth is considered a real positive by most successful long-term investors. REA Group managed to grow EPS by 8.5% per year, over three years. That's a good rate of growth, if it can be sustained.

I like to take a look at earnings before interest and (EBIT) tax margins, as well as revenue growth, to get another take on the quality of the company's growth. While we note REA Group's EBIT margins were flat over the last year, revenue grew by a solid 14% to AU$1.0b. That's progress.

You can take a look at the company's revenue and earnings growth trend, in the chart below. To see the actual numbers, click on the chart.

The trick, as an investor, is to find companies that are going to perform well in the future, not just in the past. To that end, right now and today, you can check our visualization of consensus analyst forecasts for future REA Group EPS 100% free.

Are REA Group Insiders Aligned With All Shareholders?

Since REA Group has a market capitalization of AU$21b, we wouldn't expect insiders to hold a large percentage of shares. But we are reassured by the fact they have invested in the company. Given insiders own a small fortune of shares, currently valued at AU$79m, they have plenty of motivation to push the business to succeed. That's certainly enough to make me think that management will be very focussed on long term growth.

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It's good to see that insiders are invested in the company, but are remuneration levels reasonable? Well, based on the CEO pay, I'd say they are indeed. I discovered that the median total compensation for the CEOs of companies like REA Group, with market caps over AU$11b, is about AU$4.9m.

REA Group offered total compensation worth AU$4.4m to its CEO in the year to . That seems pretty reasonable, especially given its below the median for similar sized companies. CEO remuneration levels are not the most important metric for investors, but when the pay is modest, that does support enhanced alignment between the CEO and the ordinary shareholders. It can also be a sign of good governance, more generally.

Does REA Group Deserve A Spot On Your Watchlist?

As I already mentioned, REA Group is a growing business, which is what I like to see. The fact that EPS is growing is a genuine positive for REA Group, but the pretty picture gets better than that. Boasting both modest CEO pay and considerable insider ownership, I'd argue this one is worthy of the watchlist, at least. Another important measure of business quality not discussed here, is return on equity (ROE). Click on this link to see how REA Group shapes up to industry peers, when it comes to ROE.

You can invest in any company you want. But if you prefer to focus on stocks that have demonstrated insider buying, here is a list of companies with insider buying in the last three months.

Please note the insider transactions discussed in this article refer to reportable transactions in the relevant jurisdiction.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.



Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com.
The victim claims that in addition to being sexually assaulted by Bambaataa, he was also sent to different locations to have sex with adult men while Bambaataa watched

Afrika Bambaataa, a legendary hip-hop pioneer, has been sued by a man who claims he was sexually abused and prostituted by him as a minor.

The victim, who has remained anonymous, filed the lawsuit last month in New York asserting that Bambaataa started sexually abusing him at the age of 12 from 1991 to 1995. He claims that the musician would take him to different locations where other adult men also abused him.

Bambaataa, whose real name is Lance Taylor, would have been 33 or 34 during the time of the assaults.

Hip hop pioneer Afrika Bambaataa is accused of sexually assaulting a young boy, in a fifth public allegation made since 2016. The man claims that the hip hop pioneer sexually assaulted him for four years, and trafficked him to other adult men. (Photo by Scott Gries/Getty Images 2006)

The lawsuit states that the victim, identified only as John Doe, suffered physical injury, severe and permanent emotional distress, mental anguish, depression and embarrassment due to Bambaataas alleged assault and gross negligence.

Although Bambaataa has not commented on this lawsuit, he previously stated that he never abused nobody, when similar allegations surfaced in 2016.

The victim is calling for a jury trial and for compensatory damages.

Bambaataa, who is known for founding the first hip-hop organization Zulu Nation, has been accused of sexually assaulting young boys several times over the past decade.

The first story broke in 2016 when Bronx native and political activist Ronald Savage accused the musician of molesting him when he was 15.

Savage said that he was a young kid excited to hang out with the Zulu Nation within the burgeoning hip-hop scene of the Bronx, when a 23-year-old Bambaataa started to molest him in 1980. He said he was assaulted at least five times, but never went to the police.

I want him to know how much he damaged me growing up, Savage told the NY Daily News 36 years after the alleged incident. People dont understand that you are scared. Youre scared if you tell on this person, what are they going to do to you, what youre going to do to your family.

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Bambaataa vehemently denied the allegations in an interview with Fox 5 News during that time, claiming that it just sounds crazy for people to say that.

However, Chuck Freeze, a member of the Jazzy Five who performed with Bambaataa and knew Savage, said that Savage was no liar. Ronald was the kind of guy you could trust, said Freeze.

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At least three more men also came forward around that time, alleging that Bambaataa abused them while they were teenagers. They claim that the abuse was well known in the Bronx community before the 1970s and that members of the Zulu Nation were also aware.

Another victim, Hassan Campbell, claims that he was 13 when Bambaataa began showing him pictures of nude men engaging in sexual activity. Their interactions allegedly escalated to Bambaataa touching the young boy and they eventually engaged in oral sex.

This was an ongoing thing for several years, Campbell went on to say. He eventually broke away in his late teens.

The allegations eventually led to Bambaataa stepping down as the head of the Zulu Nation. The organization also distanced itself from its founder. In a letter signed by almost three-dozen members, the organization apologized to the victims for their poor response to the situation.

The most recent John Doe came forward about the abuse when he told his mother about it in his early 30s.

The New York Child Victim Act, a law passed in 2019, extended the statue of limitations for victims of childhood sexual abuse and enabled the victim to file his lawsuit now.

According to the lawsuit, Bambaataa eventually encouraged [Doe] to watch pornographic videos while in [Bambaataa]s apartment, which progressed to mutual masturbation and sodomy.

Bambaataa would then traffick Doe to other men and watch as Doe was sexually abused by other adult men, according to the filing.

In the filings, the Zulu Nation, Universal Zulu Nation and XYZ Corp are listed as entities that provided Bambaataa with access to children, including Plaintiff, despite knowing that he would likely use their position to groom and to sexually abuse them.

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The post Hip-hop pioneer Afrika Bambaataa abused, sex trafficked 12-year-old, lawsuit alleges appeared first on TheGrio.
NEW DELHI (AP)  Top ministers from India and Australia on Saturday called for international anti-terror efforts in Afghanistan, bolstering mutual security ties and blunting China's growing regional assertiveness.

Australia's foreign and defense ministers met their Indian counterparts in New Delhi, the second stop on a four-nation tour.

Australias Foreign Minister Marise Payne said the future of Afghanistan was a central concern for both India and Pakistan. She said the gains of the past 20 years  such as women's empowerment and steps toward an inclusive society  should not be allowed to be reversed.

Australia also wants to strike a free trade deal with India to reduce its economic reliance on an increasingly hostile China.

Indias External Affairs Minister Subhramanyam Jaishankar praised the renewed vigor with which both sides are now engaging on trade issues, without providing further details. Bilateral trade between India and Australia is around $20 billion annually, his ministry says.

Australian Defense Minister Peter Dutton said the two countries want a stable, resilient and secure strategic neighborhood." He said Australia is enhancing its posture in the Indo-Pacific region by ramping up air force cooperation, maritime engagement and exercises with India.

India, a major buyer of military equipment, depended largely on the former Soviet Union during the Cold War. But it has been diversifying its purchases by choosing U.S. equipment as well.

Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh said there are opportunities for joint development and production of emerging defense technologies and mutual logistical support.

The U.S., India, Japan and Australia are part of the Quad regional alliance, established in 2007 in response to Chinas growing economic and military strength.

The Australian ministers trip  to Indonesia, India, South Korea and the U.S.  will prepare for Prime Minister Scott Morrisons visit to Washington, D.C. for a Quad meeting later this month.

U.S. President Joe Biden spoke with Chinas Xi Jinping on Thursday amid growing frustration on the American side that high-level engagement between the two leaders top advisers has been largely unfruitful in the early going of the Biden presidency.
By Rajendra Jadhav

MUMBAI (Reuters) -India has cut base import taxes on palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil, according to a government notification, as the world's biggest vegetable oil buyer tries to cool near-record price rises.

The reduction in taxes could bring down prices of the edible oils in India and boost consumption, effectively increasing overseas buying by the south Asian country.

The base import tax on crude palm oil has been slashed to 2.5% from 10%, while the tax on crude soyoil and crude sunflower oil has been reduced to 2.5% from 7.5%, the government said in a notification late on Friday. The base import tax on refined grades of palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil cut to 32.5% from 37.5%.

After the cuts, crude palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil imports will be subject to a 24.75% tax in total, including a 2.5% base import duty and other taxes, while refined grades of palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil would carry a 35.75% tax in total.

India fulfils more than two-thirds of its edible oil demand through imports and has been struggling to contain a rally in local oil prices for the last few months.

The country imports palm oil mainly from top producers Indonesia and Malaysia, while other oils, such as soy and sunflower, come from Argentina, Brazil, Ukraine and Russia.

The reduction in taxes would bring down edible oil prices ahead of key festivals, when edible oil demand rises in the country, said Govindbhai Patel, managing director of trading firm G.G. Patel & Nikhil Research Company.

New Delhi cut import taxes on palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil, but kept import duties intact on crude rapeseed oil at 38.5%, said B.V. Mehta, executive director of the Solvent Extractors' Association of India.

"There is a need to bring down import tax on rapeseed oil as well since the price has nearly doubled in a year," Mehta said.

(Reporting by Rajendra Jadhav; Editing by William Mallard and Raju Gopalakrishnan)
By Francois Murphy, Parisa Hafezi and John Irish

VIENNA (Reuters) -U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi will fly to Tehran this weekend for talks that may ease a standoff between Iran and the West just as it threatens to escalate and scupper negotiations on reviving the Iran nuclear deal.

Three diplomats who follow the International Atomic Energy Agency closely told Reuters that Grossi's trip before next week's meeting of the IAEA's 35-nation Board of Governors was confirmed. Two said he would meet the new head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, Mohammad Eslami, on Sunday.

The IAEA and Iran's envoy to the agency later confirmed the trip and the meeting.

"Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi will meet with Vice-President of the Islamic Republic of Iran and Head of the AEOI, Mohammad Eslami, in Tehran on Sunday," the IAEA said, adding that Grossi was expected to hold a news conference at Vienna airport around 8:30 p.m. (1830 GMT) on Sunday.

The IAEA informed member states this week that there had been no progress on two central issues: explaining uranium traces found at several old, undeclared sites and getting urgent access to some monitoring equipment so the agency can continue to keep track of parts of Iran's nuclear programme as provided for by the 2015 deal.

Separate, indirect talks between the United States and Iran on both returning to compliance with the deal have been halted since June. Washington and its European allies have been urging hardline President Ebrahim Raisi's administration, which took office in August, to return to the talks.

Under the 2015 deal between Iran and major powers, Tehran agreed to restrictions on its nuclear activities in exchange for the lifting of sanctions.

SANCTIONS

President Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the deal in 2018, re-introducing painful economic sanctions. Iran responded as of 2019 by breaching many of the deal's core restrictions, like enriching uranium to a higher purity, closer to that suitable for use in nuclear weapons.

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Western powers must decide whether to push for a resolution criticising Iran and raising pressure on it for stonewalling the IAEA at next week's meeting of the agency's 35-nation Board of Governors. A resolution could jeopardise the resumption of talks on the deal as Tehran bristles at such moves.

Iran's Foreign Ministry warned against any such resolution.

"I hope the Board of Governors, under the influence of certain pressures, will not take any action that would destroy the process of customary cooperation between Iran and the agency," said spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh, the Fars news agency reported.

The European parties to the 2015 deal - Britain, France and Germany - held a meeting with the United States in Paris on Friday to discuss how to react at the IAEA board and to review options if Iran continues to stall on returning to negotiations. But diplomats said no decisions had been taken as of yet.

Countries on the IAEA Board of Governors will be watching Grossi's visit to see whether Iran yields either on granting access to the monitoring equipment to service it or offers the prospect of answers on the uranium particles found at the undeclared former sites.

Moves on those issues would make it less likely that a resolution is brought against Iran, diplomats say.

(Reporting by Francois Murphy in Vienna, Parisa Hafezi in Dubai and John Irish in Paris; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne, Timothy Heritage and Gareth Jones)
Members of the 82nd Airborne Division duck away from the debris being thrown into the air as a Black Hawk helicopter prepares to extract soldiers on a mission searching remote villages in southeastern Afghanistan. (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

Never forget. That is the solemn refrain repeated often after the devastation of 9/11.

In some ways, Times staff photojournalists cannot forget. The images they made on U.S. soil and abroad following that day captured the beginning of the long progression of war. These pictures have left their mark not only on the archives of The Times but also on the memories of many readers.

Twenty years ago, 19 terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners and used them to take down New Yorks World Trade Center towers and crash into the Pentagon. The attack claimed the lives of 2,977 people, and the wars that followed in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen and beyond killed nearly 1 million people, according to a Brown University report.

On Sept. 12, 2001, the United States staggered to its feet amid the devastation of the Al Qaeda attacks. These photographers traveled to tell the stories of what eventually became two decades of war. On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the attacks, we look back at some of the indelible images that resulted from the then-budding war.

Afghan women wait in line for food aid distribution from CARE International in Kabul, Afghanistan. Many of the women lost their husbands during Afghanistan's 23 years of war. (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

U.S. Marines detain a group of Iraqis after a night raid on a former police station Aug. 21, 2004, in Iraq. Many men said they had been held hostage by Iraqi militiamen because they wouldn't cooperate with them. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)

New recruits for Afghanistan's special forces learn about laws and regulations in December 2017. The U.S. backed a plan to nearly double the size of the elite units in the country in an effort to take back territory from the militants. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

Hasiba Debagh grieves for her 8-year-old grandson who was killed while standing near U.S. troops on July 16, 2003, in the Yarmouk district of Baghdad. The boy was killed by a hand grenade thrown from a passing car. One U.S. soldier and seven Iraqi civilians also were injured. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)

Friends and relatives of inmates at Abu Ghraib prison, about 20 miles outside Baghdad, toss handfuls of Iraqi dinar into the air Oct. 20, 2002. President Saddam Hussein had granted amnesty to hundreds of thousands of prisoners, causing chaos as relatives and friends stormed the grounds. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

The Iraqi National Olympic Committee building, behind a statue of Saddam Hussein, is set ablaze by Iraqis on April 9, 2003, the day U.S. forces arrived in Baghdad. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)

"Less than a month after the terrorist attacks on America on Sept. 11, 2001, I was in Afghanistan to witness the U.S. bombing campaign that helped the Northern Alliance take control of Kabul from the Taliban," staff photojournalist Carolyn Cole said. "I returned many times to witness the changes as we poured money and military might into the country. I saw women training to be pilots and girls studying to be doctors.

"But I also saw the human toll caused by years of war. I felt it was my duty to document the impact US forces were having on the country and its people, just as I did in Baghdad before and during the bombing of Iraq, and later as the country descended into civil war.

"I spent over a decade covering the Middle East, where I was always shown generosity and hospitality. Despite anger toward the U.S. government, those I met didnt hold my nationality against me, and most wanted their stories told.

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"After witnessing so much tragedy in Afghanistan, Iraq and many other countries, I have turned my attention towards the environment. It, too, is in a state of crisis, which affects all of us, regardless of where we live, our religion or our language."

Shamina Ahmadi, center, pictured on Oct. 16, 2009, overcame her father's objections to attending a midwife school by amassing a coalition of schoolteachers, the headmaster and others to appeal directly to her village's all-male council of elders. Her father, a town cleric, opposed her going to the city of Bamian to study. (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

Gabriel Watt, center, writhes in pain after being struck in the ankle by a rock blown into the sky when members of the 82nd Airborne detonated a cache of Russian-era rockets that were found inside a cave in the remote mountains southeast of Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. One other soldier was struck by falling debris in the incident. (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

Hamed Hamid Hussein, center, clutches his brother's casket as he screams out "Is this what he deserves?" during a funeral procession for the fallen soldier. (Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times)

A stream of blood is seen pouring down an exterior wall of a classroom indicating that people escaped by the window during the deadly attack on Kabul University on Nov. 3, 2020. Three gunmen fired weapons and detonated explosives at the university, the country's largest. At least 20 were killed in the massacre, and dozens more were wounded, according to government officials. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

Afghan refugees at cook at Jalozai refugee camp near Peshawar, Pakistan on Sept. 29, 2001. (Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times)

About 150 couples gather at the Iraqi Youth Federation building in Baghdad, waiting to take buses to celebrate their marriages on Oct. 21, 2002. Most are too poor to pay for their weddings, so the state buys their suits and dresses, gives them a party and pays for two days in a hotel. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

"I peered my head up over the edge of the roof with the other Marines and saw this RPG (rocket-propelled grenade) heading straight towards us," staff photojournalist Luis Sinco said. "And I have confirmed this with other people since that it was like by some miracle, it veered away at the last second.

"After that RPG veered off, I just sat against the wall. Blake Miller, the Marlboro Marine, came from nowhere and he sat on a wall opposite from me. And I was just looking at him, and he started lighting a cigarette, so I basically just instinctively took a photo."

Marine Lance Corporal James Blake Miller of Charlie Company of the 1st Marine Division, 8th Regiment, takes a cigarette break in the heat of battle in Fallujah, Iraq. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)

Firefighters battle a fire at the Ministry of Transportation storage department that was caused by looters in Baghdad, Iraq. The debris comprised of telephone and electrical cable wires. (Wally Skalij/Los Angeles TImes)

Thousands of Shiite Muslims mourn the death of slain Ayatollah Mohammed Bakir al Hakim at the Holy Shrine of Imam Mousa al Kadum on Aug. 31, 2003, in Baghdad. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

"I was pulled into an office and they told me that I was going to go to Iraq to cover Saddam Hussein's election," staff photojournalist Robert Gauthier said. "I guess Saddam sent out invitations to news organizations to come and cover his reelection campaign.

"I was just hoping to maybe somehow draw a connection between our lives here and the things that were happening there, maybe humanize the people that were directly affected by it. To try to strip away the politics and get into a more human side of it.

"I don't know if really any of my images had any sort of deep, long effect on anybody, but I just think as part of the historical record. We were just trying to be honest and trying to tell the truth as best we could."

An Xray film shows 10-yr-old Sath Mohammad's shattered leg on Nov. 6, 2001, in Quetta, Pakistan. A missile from a U.S. warplane exploded on the footpath while he and his little sister neared their home in Kandahar, Afghanistan. His right leg was amputated here at the Sandeman Civic Hospital. (Don Bartletti/Los Angeles Times)

Children walk back to their family homes that were destroyed in the fighting between government forces and the Taliban in Arghandab District, Afghanistan on May 4, 2021. Arghandab, a district lush with fruit trees and famous for its pomegranates, peaches, mulberries and marijuana, was recently liberated when government forces managed to claw back some of the gains Taliban fighters have made around the districts surrounding Kandahar. An estimated 9,500 families displaced in the battles began to rush back. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

An Afghan National Police member, left, takes a drag on a cigarette while joined by other police before a joint operation with U.S. military police on May 22, 2010, in Kandahar, Afghanistan. The operation was the biggest by coalition forces to date in volatile District 8, where the Taliban exerted considerable autonomy. (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

Two boys peek through bullet holes in the guard station window at the former Russian Embassy on Nov. 19, 2001, in Kabul, Afghanistan. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)

On the third night of the U.S. war on Iraq, heavy bombing took place in the area of Saddam's Presidential Compound in central Baghdad, Iraq. Dozens of explosions rocked the area, as smoke and fire filled the night sky on March 3, 2003. (Carolyn Cole/Los Angeles Times)

A worker from the Medical City Hospital sweeps the floor next to a burn victim who was burned when a gasoline station exploded in Baghdad. (Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times)

"Although we were a little late [to New York] with a perimeter being set up around the collapsed towers, I managed to work my way around," staff photojournalist Wally Skalij said. "Three months later, I was assigned to cover the civilian side of the Afghanistan war and in 2003 the Iraq war. One thing I learned from these experiences is that grief and death is universal."

Marines clear a house in the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah, Iraq. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)

An Iraqi family grieves at the homecoming of three relatives killed by U.S. Marines on April 9, 2003, in Baghdad. The men did not stop their car upon a command in English from the Marines. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)

"I flew back to L.A. for the holidays or just to get a breather, and then they wanted to send me back to New York after that to cover the holidays after 9/11," former staff photojournalist Rick Loomis said. "On my way to New York, I stopped in Alabama to see my dad.

"And I got a phone call from the office and they said: 'Hey, Rick, do you think instead of going to New York, you can just keep going and go to Afghanistan?' And that was a shocker. I said yes, much to the chagrin of my dad.

"We were invading a country that that was being held at that time responsible for first sending people to create 9/11. And the story is really about the troops that I was with and  what they were facing. I went back to Afghanistan many, many times over the years. And, you know, it became more of an Afghan story. For me personally, I just got I got swept up in the story  I was literally thrust into it."

Dirt is applied for the final resting spot for Republican Guard soldier Saadi Hamid Hussein, 32, in the Jameela village near Tikrit, Iraq. (Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times)

Marine 1st Lt. Shaun Miller makes his way through a field of poppies while on patrol in June 2008 in Afghanistan's Helmand province. The Marines had spent much of May fighting in a Taliban stronghold with one of the world's major opium production areas. (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

A man is reunited with his mother as he leaves Abu Ghraib prison, about 20 miles outside Baghdad, on Oct. 20, 2002. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

A young girl shields her face while keeping a watchful eye on the happenings at Maslahk camp in Afghanistan, one of the largest internally displaced refugee camps in the world. (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

Cyclists move quickly in the downpour in Kandahar, Afghanistan on May 3, 2021. The city of Kandahar, once the Taliban's spiritual capital, had seen much fighting between government security forces and the Taliban on its outskirts. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

Police recruits are saluted as they march around the parade grounds at the training center in Kabul, Afghanistan. A multiethnic police force and army were being built in Afghanistan in hopes of promoting unity. (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

A member of Charlie Company of the 1st Marine Division, 8th Regiment, watches out for enemy snipers amid the rubble of buildings in downtown Fallujah, Iraq. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)

Life for the women of Afghanistan changed dramatically in the years after the fall of the Taliban in 2001. They were allowed to leave their homes without a male escort, attend school and find employment. Some women, like those shown here Aug. 13, 2009, in Kabul, still preferred to wear a burqa. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)

"As a young U.S. Army Infantry officer in the Vietnam War, I knew far too well what the savage act of war was like," former staff photojournalist Don Bartletti said. "As a photojournalist with the Los Angeles Times, I chose to take careful aim at the consequences of the American wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Long after military weapon investors tally their profits, the physical and mental anguish heaped upon our brothers in arms and their loved ones should haunt the rest of us forever."

A boy pirouettes in the wind between a dismembered doll and Muslim men kneeling in prayer on Nov. 2, 2001, in Quetta, Pakistan. (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

Hamid Karzai, center, sits with his supporters at home on Oct. 6, 2001, in, Quetta, Pakistan. He later became the president of Afghanistan. (Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times)

Members of Charlie Company of the 1st Marine Division, 8th Regiment, walk past a dead insurgent during a battle in Fallujah, Iraq. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)

A U.S. military transport plane flies over on Aug. 30, 2021, as relatives and neighbors of the Ahmadi family gather around the incinerated husk of a vehicle that the family says was hit by an American drone strike in Kabul, Afghanistan. The U.S. military is investigating the incident. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

More than a thousand Iraqi men and boys gather for prayer at the Umm al-Qura Mosque on Oct. 11, 2002, in Baghdad. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

A man carries a bloodied child as a woman lies wounded on the street on Aug. 17, 2021, after Taliban fighters used gunfire, whips, sticks and sharp objects to maintain crowd control over thousands of Afghans who wait outside the Kabul airport for a way out. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

After the U.S.'s withdrawal from the country, Taliban fighters in their new uniforms station themselves at a large traffic junction for a nightly security checkpoint on Sept. 5, 2021, in Kabul, Afghanistan. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

Photo editing and introduction by Jacob Moscovitch.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
The Daily Beast

Hai Shoulian/FacebookOne of Israels top anti-vaxx activists has died of COVID-19, two days after posting a final message to his followers that ordered them to keep fighting against the shot that could have saved his life.Hai Shoulian, 57, spent much of the pandemic organizing protests against coronavirus rulesincluding mask mandates and Israels vaccine-passport scheme, the Green Pass. He lost his life to COVID-19 on Monday morning after spending 10 days at Tel Avivs Wolfson Medical Center.
This article was originally published Sept. 8, 2021, by THE CITY

Scarlet Taveras was 17 when she evacuated her high school, just south of the World Trade Center, on Sept. 11, 2001.

Now, 20 years later, after a career in fashion that took her to Europe and a stint in Atlanta, Taveras is back in her childhood home in Washington Heights  this time, as the mom of two sons in public school.

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Her boys, ages 9 and 12, are preparing to go back to full-time, in-person school next week. Taveras is worried about how theyll fare during the transition after more than a year of remote learning, in which they feared going outside, saw family members die of COVID-19  and navigated the move to a new state.

The behaviors and feelings shes noticed in her sons as they live through the pandemic are similar to  but not exactly the same as  what she and her friends experienced in their teenage years in the wake of the terrorist attacks.

She credits the robust mental health support and resources she received in high school as essential to helping her cope and rebound from the trauma of 9/11  and hopes quality services will be available for her kids, too.

We were pretty bad, but the kids now are 10 times worse, Taveras said.

Scarlet Taveras, a Lower Manhattan high school student during 9/11, is getting ready to send her sons to school as in-person classes resume. (Courtesy of Scarlet Taveras)

The terror attacks taught valuable lessons about how trauma manifests in students and how schools can offer mental health support in the era of COVID-19, service providers and experts interviewed by THE CITY said.

But because no two disasters are the same, the experts say, New York City faces new challenges to provide adequate care to its nearly 1.1 million students, whose lives have been forever upended by the pandemic.

Cry at your desk

The importance of addressing mental health in New York City schools can in part be traced back to 9/11, which marked a major shift.

Kevin Dahill-Fuchel, the executive director of the nonprofit Counseling in Schools, who has been working with the New York City school system since 1993, said that before the attacks, officials thought of mental health in a narrow way, as something reserved only for those going through a particularly hard time.

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September 11 was a moment of awakening to the need for there to be a broad special availability for children and adults in a time of large-scale crisis, he said.

Theres been a huge evolution over these 20 years to the recognition of the impact of emotional needs not just on childrens academic progress, but just their growth and development in general.

After 9/11, FEMA funded Project Liberty, which allowed state and local agencies to create crisis counseling programs in schools, as well as conduct outreach to students and families. Money from the project helped schools expand their mental health programs.

Firefighters work near Ground Zero after the terror attacks. (Matt Moyer / Getty Images)

Taveras remembered the approach from her school  the Leadership and Public Services High School  was, Were happy to see you, were here to help you, whatever you need, if you cry at your desk, its OK.

She said she visited a guidance counselor frequently, taking advantage of an open-door policy.

The therapists on hand helped too, as did the out-of-school mentors who assisted with college applications and consistently checked in with the students. Hands-on activities like knitting and trust-building exercises helped her and her peers cope.

Such offerings have informed how local schools tackle mental health concerns now.

Back-to-school concerns

The Department of Education says its approaching this back-to-school season with students mental health at top of mind.

After the trauma caused by the pandemic, we are opening healing-centered schools this fall where each child will have a caring adult they can go to when in need, said Nathaniel Styer, a DOE spokesperson. The mental health of our students is at the core of our reopening plan, and that is reflected in the significant investments weve made in hiring over 500 social workers and prioritizing social-emotional learning and screenings.

Styer declined to disclose how many of the promised 500 social workers the DOE had hired at this point, only noting, Schools are well on their way to hiring the social workers for those positions.

The DOE also promised to add to the system 100 new school psychologists.

Additionally, the DOE will train mental health workers to provide care to students in groups across 350 of the systems more than 1,800 schools. The department also has trained over 75,000 school staff to recognize signs of trauma in students, respond as needed and foster community.

And schools in the 26 neighborhoods hardest hit by COVID are connecting with mental health clinics so that students can receive therapy and clinical services.

Students attend the first day of school at P.S. 188 The Island School in Manhattan, Sept. 29, 2020. (Michael Appleton / Mayors Office)

Even as the DOE strengthens and expands programs already in place, theres significant concern as to whether the efforts will be sufficient.

A 2019 report from the citys Independent Budget Office found that about 44 percent of schools lacked social workers during the 2018-19 school year. Last school year, the city employed just under 4,480 full- and part-time social workers and guidance counselors to serve over 1 million students.

Taveras said the DOEs plan to address mental health concerns has been unclear to her, despite regular emails from her kids schools that detail COVID protocols and logistics.

What will the first day of school look like? she said. Theres a lot of emphasis on the vaccine, but nothing about, Were committed to making sure your kid is OK, no list of services.

Styer said parents this week will receive communications about the citys Bridge to School Plan 2.0, which is enhancing the plan from last school year that trained school leaders in how to foster healing in the classroom.

Fear Is local

Adequately responding to the mental health issues students may be facing will be a challenge for schools, given whats known so far about how young people are coping, and remembering how 9/11 affected students, said Christina Hoven, a professor of clinical epidemiology in psychiatry at Columbia Universitys Mailman School of Public Health.

In 2002, Hoven conducted a study of more than 8,000 public school children six months after 9/11.

She found that over 10 percent of the students experienced multiple symptoms consistent with posttraumatic stress disorder and nearly 27 percent displayed mental health problems. Two-thirds of the students had previously been exposed to trauma, compounding the severity of their responses.

Hoven said she expects to see similar outcomes  including high rates of anxiety and depression  in children due to the pandemic, even though its different from 9/11.

Theres no ground zero from which the impact of the pandemic radiates, but young people are scared of losing a parent to COVID or getting sick themselves.

Theyre affected if they knew family and friends who became sick or died. And even for those whose families COVID spared, the isolation, uncertainty and disrupted routines have taken a toll.

The orders of magnitude of traumatic effects of COVID are way far greater than was the case for 9/11, said Dr. Pamela Cantor, founder and senior science adviser of Turnaround for Children and an author of a study on the impact 9/11 had on New York City schoolchildren. But nonetheless, the 9/11 message was that for children, what causes fear for them is local, its whats immediately in their environment.

Sleepless nights

Two decades ago, Taveras noticed she and her classmates often had angry outbursts.

She experienced sleepless nights, instead spending her time in the living room in front of the TV, waiting for responders to find people in the rubble. For years, if she heard a plane, shed duck. To this day, her heart palpitates and hands sweat at the sound of sirens or clanging metal.

Now, shes attuned to changes shes observed in her sons since the beginning of the pandemic, largely from the isolation and disconnect that came with remote learning. They became stressed and struggled to focus, she said.

Her older son was depressed and unmoored. When she moved the family from Atlanta to Manhattan, she sought therapeutic care for him at Mount Sinai Medical Center. Her younger son began to bite his nails, a habit that went away after he spent six weeks at summer camp.

So far, such effects seem widespread: a national poll from the University of Michigan released in March found that 46 percent of parents observed new or worsening mental health issues in their teens since the pandemic started.

Across the country, youth visits to emergency rooms for mental health issues increased, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

No script to this

Experts point to parental involvement as the key to monitoring students mental health and behaviors  and noticing internalized and less apparent symptoms of trauma. Also crucial: a community-centered approach to create stability in students lives as they go back to school.

The transition back to the classroom can be a relief to kids bogged down by the monotony and loneliness of online school, but it can be an added stressor. What can make a difference, experts say, is a culture of safety and belonging.

The beginning part of going is often the hardest, said Dr. Linda Chokroverty, a child and adolescent psychiatrist who works in the ER at Montefiore Medical Center and helped coordinate a mental health response to 9/11 after the attack.

And then once theyre there, the familiarity of the activities, the people, the kids  that really helps ground them and engage them, she added.

The DOE has promised to add over two years 100 new community schools that provide wraparound services for families to meet a variety of material and mental health needs. The number falls short of the City Councils recommendation to open 400 community schools over four years. So far, 27 new community schools have been added.

Still, experts like Cantor praise the model. Multiple problems  including hunger, housing instability and physical health conditions  can compound mental health issues.

Dominick Nigro, the director of the Office of Student Services for public schools in Staten Island until 2003, said the most important aspect of his districts response was the partnerships forged with community-based organizations.

They boosted local ties and helped enhance the schools efforts to engage and support families and students.

There was no script to this. We had a crisis plan in place, and we used that as the fundamental framework, but the magnitude was something none of us expected, said Nigro, now an adviser to the National Center for School Crisis and Bereavement at the Childrens Hospital Los Angeles.

What Is normal?

Helaina Hovitz, 32, a student at Lower Manhattans Intermediate School 89 during 9/11, thought her schools mental health response to the attack was inadequate. She said her peers only sought treatment well into their 20s.

I think the reason so many kids slipped by, and the reason that I could have slipped through the cracks, is because I continued to do well in school, I continued to want to hang out with my friends, said Hovitz, now a writer and mental health advocate.

I think theres this belief that unless a kid is really acting out or really going into themselves and their grades are dropping, or they are antisocial, they may not need help, she added.

A fire-fighter and engine in the aftermath of 9/11 (Getty Images)

The efforts, where they were concentrated, were largely successful, according to studies of how children fared.

All of that intervention after 9/11 worked. Those children actually did better, in the short-term they did better than the children in the outlying areas who had nothing, said Hoven, describing how resources poured into schools closer to Ground Zero compared to schools outside of Manhattan.

The most important lesson of that is all the children, not just those who appear to be affected, but all children are affected by a cataclysmic event, like COVID, like 9/11, like Sandy, like any disaster, she added.

In the COVID era, Hoven emphasized the need for schools and officials to pay particular attention to poorer areas. She noted that Black, Asian and Hispanic students face a particularly high need and require culturally appropriate resources and services, including in other languages.

For her part, Taveras said shes prepped her soon-to-be eighth- and fifth-graders to prioritize their well-being over grades as they go back to school.

Theres this rush to go back to normal at this point, but what is normal? she said. Theres so much pressure to be all these things, but were just trying to make it through.

THE CITY is an independent, nonprofit news outlet dedicated to hard-hitting reporting that serves the people of New York.

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A Black couple says they were racially profiled at an apple-picking farm. Miguel Villagran/Getty Images

Connors Farm employees accused Manikka Bowman and Jeff Myers, a Black couple, of stealing apples.

They called the police over the incident, and an officer said they were "playing the race card."

Connors Farm reportedly apologized to the couple after they made a blog post about the incident.

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A Massachusetts farm reportedly apologized to a couple that said it racially profiled them over Labor Day weekend.

Manikka Bowman and Jeff Myers went to Connors Farm in Danvers, Massachusetts, with their two children, aged 18 months and 7-years-old, on Monday, as they shared in a blog post. The farm features fall-themed activities, like corn mazes and apple picking.

In the blog post, Bowman and Myers, who are both Black, wrote that they paid "more than $100 on all-day admission," bought food and beverages, and donated to a scholarship fund the farm advertised throughout the day.

The family also picked apples during their visit.

When Bowman looked into her family's apple bag, she realized her daughters had picked six extra apples than they had been allotted "in their apple-picking excitement," as she wrote in her post.

Bowman and Myers' daughters picked six extra apples. Getty Images

"I assumed we'd have a chance to pay for the extras in our final checkout," Bowman said in the post. "With families being primary customers, surely, we couldn't be the first to have excitedly over-picked by a few apples - six in our case."

But as they were heading to the farm store, the family was stopped by a security guard, they wrote in the post. He and another security guard took the family to the farm store, where a third employee joined them, and reportedly searched Bowman's bag for "concealed" fruit.

Bowman and Myers asked to speak to a manager, who the third employee identified himself as. They then asked the manager for the owner's contact information, according to their blog post. The self-identified manager called the police after they pushed for the information.

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The couple said the police officer who arrived did not listen to them, instead taking the manager's word. He eventually accused Bowman and Myers of "playing the race card," as they wrote in the blog post.

"By jumping straight to an assumption of theft, Connors Farm created a scene, harassing us and causing our 7-year-old to burst into tears, anguish that lasted well into the evening," they wrote.

During the incident, the couple's bag, which they paid for, was not filled back to capacity, meaning Connors Farm actually overcharged Bowman and Myers for their apples after all the back-and-forth.

A police officer accused the couple of "playing the race card." Shutterstock.com

In the same blog post, the couple requested a written apology from Connors Farm, a refund in the form of a donation to the to the Essex County Community Foundation for their racial equity work, and additional diversity and inclusion training for Farm employees.

The company issued a public apology about the incident on its website.

"We regret the incident that happened this past weekend," the statement read. "We have extended our personal apology to the family. We do our best to train our employees to handle all customer issues with courtesy and respect at all times."

"We are taking further steps to ensure that staff will undergo diversity, equity and inclusion training," the statement went on to say. "Please know that everybody is welcome on our farm."

The apology was shared on the Connors Farm Facebook page according to The Independent, but the company's social media pages appear to have been deactivated at the time of writing.

Connors Farm did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

Read the original article on Insider
SKOPJE, North Macedonia (AP)  Hundreds of people marched Saturday in a North Macedonia town to honor the 14 people killed in a fire at a COVID-19 field hospital earlier this week.

People marched in silence through central Tetovo and kneeled in front of the destroyed hospital. They also placed a wreath and flowers at the site.

The fire broke out late Wednesday, destroying the facility within a few minutes, killing 12 patients and two visiting relatives. Twelve people were also injured. The blaze is believed to have started by accident, although an investigation is still underway.

Nineteen field hospitals, funded by a World Bank loan, have been set up across North Macedonia over the past year to tackle surging coronavirus hospitalizations and a shortage of hospital beds.

___

Follow APs pandemic coverage at:

https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic

https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine

https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak
(Matt Williams / For The Times)

The most patriotic act I have ever witnessed anyone perform was what my father did on 9/11. He was watching the morning news, as was his routine  despite his poor vision, hearing and understanding of English, the last of which he remedied somewhat through his keen observations and vast store of knowledge.

When he saw the first tower on fire, he rushed to the balcony to examine the horizon. From the fourth floor of our Queens apartment, he usually had a sliver of a view of downtown Manhattan. But instead of the two buildings he was used to seeing, he found only a plume of smoke. Instantly ashen, he began yelling to my mother in Persian  for nothing was ever real unless he narrated for her  Helen, they struck! They struck the twin towers! May God strike them dead!

For several moments, he stared into the distance, his clouded vision more clouded for the welling tears. Then, without saying a word, he grabbed his cane and headed for the street.

Since he had arrived in America in 1989, my father had sat on the same balcony looking into the same distance, composing poems, nearly every one of them about Iran. His yearning for the land he had left seemed to grow with each passing year. Everything was better there, everything. Food was tastier. The air was fresher. Even the landscape he used to stare into, he said to my mortification, beat the skyline of Manhattan.

Once a month, he and his fellow exiles gathered in one of their homes and recited the poems they had composed, mostly variations on the same theme of longing. They were no warriors. But in their ceaseless insistence to return home, they made a company of misguided Odysseuses, who had chosen to forget that their Ithaca had rejected them. Even to a daughter, this was offensive: Why not compose poems for the land that had sheltered them, instead?

It took years for me to realize that I had misread my father all along. Everyone misreads the immigrant, including the immigrant himself. It is hard to grasp the depths of the newcomers uneasiness  with the new time, the new tongue and the unfamiliar palette of the new landscape.

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A recent immigrant described to me the experience of those early months as a period of all-encompassing fog. People understand that the newcomer can be jet-lagged. What they cannot fathom is that he is also head-lagged and heart-lagged. He has landed, yes, but he is only a human shell with a spirit that lingers still in that elsewhere.

Native-born Americans especially misread the immigrant. Some expect him to be instantly grateful and delighted to be in America, when he is hardly able to feel anything but loss  of loved ones he has left behind or of the mastery he had over that bygone life. If he does not articulate gratitude or delight, it is not because he is not grateful or delighted. It is because he, himself, does not yet know what he is.

To experience delight, one must be open to seeing the boons of the present. The newcomer, however, is often in the grip of the past or too swept up in the urgencies of present to recognize anything else. If the immigrant chooses to remain within his own ethnic or religious enclave, it is not because he is refusing to integrate. It is because the enclave is the only familiar place left to him from which he can dare venture into the unfamiliar new world. Some native-born take offense at the immigrants poor English. But language, as the late Sen. John McCain keenly saw, is hardly an indicator of patriotism.

The truest measure of all is whether he embraces Americas fundamental values. But the trouble is, he could believe in those values yet not be demonstrative in the same way as the native-born. Most nations do not flaunt patriotism without good reason  a national threat, disaster or some special celebration.

America is not unique in its popular use of its flag. But such fervent and widespread displays of the flag are almost exclusively American. In most other countries, especially those living under authoritarian rule, flags are objects that are flown at government buildings or military outposts. It takes a while before the immigrant to America cultivates a fond, personal relationship to Old Glory.

It is often the moments of dire events, more than any other, that have given cause to the immigrant to demonstrate his patriotism beyond all expectations. For nearly half a century, Chinese Americans lived under exclusion. Then came the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, which gave them the chance to serve, proving to those who had suspected their loyalties, as well as to themselves, their love for this country.

The attacks of 9/11, too, helped many immigrants make a similar discovery. My father returned home that morning, carrying a plastic bag. He shuffled to the balcony, where he took out of the bag an American flag  the largest he had been able to find at the corner store. He removed the geranium pots, the only items the co-op board allowed to be displayed from the railings.

Having been a school principal and a community leader all his life before coming to the U.S., he had always taken great care to be a law-abiding role model for everyone else. But that day, he was not the man he had always been. He looped a piece of twine through the holes at each end of the flag and tied it to the railings.

I was stunned as to how he knew to do this, or why the man who had never broken any rules had found it in him to do so. For the rest of the day, he stayed on the balcony, his eyes fixed upon that smoldering horizon. It was as if all the poems and the longings had gone up with that smoke. Perhaps he, too, was discovering what he really felt. Or perhaps I was the one learning what he had always known in his heart.

The certainty with which he acted made clear that the poet was, first and foremost, a sensible man, who knew that if he was able to sit and write about his yearning for another land, it was because of the safety this land had granted him.

That day, Iran was only a dispensable muse, whereas America  a beloved reality. The moment his peace was lost, all wordplay stopped. The sinister blaze in the horizon kindled a different fire in my fathers heart.

Roya Hakakian is an Iranian American author. This essay is adapted from her book A Beginners Guide to America: For the Immigrant and the Curious.





This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
The second tower of the World Trade Center explodes into flames after being hit by an airplane in New York on Sept. 11, 2001. (Photo: Sara K. Schwittek via Reuters)

On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, two hijacked commercial planes crashed into the World Trade Center towers in New York City. Thousands of people died, and the attack helped catapult the United States into its longest war. Twenty years later, the country is still reflecting on the chaos and heartbreak of that day.

See photos of the days tragic events below. Some images may be disturbing.

Above: The second tower of the World Trade Center explodes into flames after being hit by an airplane in New York on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: Sean Adair via REUTERS)

Hijacked United Airlines Flight 175 flies toward the World Trade Center twin towers shortly before slamming into the south tower (left) as the north tower burns following an earlier attack by a hijacked airliner in New York City on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: Sean Adair/Reuters)

The World Trade Center south tower (left) bursts into flames after being struck by hijacked United Airlines Flight 175 as the north tower burns on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: Jose Jimenez/Primera Hora/Getty Images)

People run away as the north tower of the World Trade Center collapses after a hijacked airliner hit the building on Sept. 11, 2001, in New York City.

(Photo: David Surowiecki via Getty Images)

The top stories of the World Trade Center collapse after being hit by two planes during the Sept. 11 attacks in New York City.

(Photo: Amy Sancetta/AP)

The north tower of New Yorks World Trade Center shows the impact left by a hijacked Boeing 767, American Airlines Flight 11, on Sept. 11, 2001. A person is just visible, standing at the bottom of the gaping hole.

(Photo: Jose Jimenez/Primera Hora/Getty Images)

A person falls to his death from the World Trade Center after two planes hit the twin towers on Sept. 11, 2001, in New York City.

(Photo: Spencer Platt via Getty Images)

Hijacked United Airlines Flight 175 from Boston crashes into the south tower of the World Trade Center and explodes at 9:03 a.m. EST on Sept. 11, 2001, in New York City.

(Photo: SETH MCALLISTER/AFP via Getty Images)

A hijacked commercial plane crashes into the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, in New York.

(Photo: Marty Lederhandler/AP)

The twin towers of the World Trade Center burn behind the Empire State Building in New York on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: Richard Drew/AP)

The south tower of New Yorks World Trade Center collapses on Sept. 11, 2001.

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(Photo: DOUG KANTER/AFP via Getty Images)

Pedestrians run from the scene as one of the World Trade Center towers collapses on Sept. 11, 2001, in New York.

(Photo: Graham Morrison/AP)

A lone firefighter moves through piles of debris at the site of the World Trade Center in New York on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: Shannon Stapleton via REUTERS)

Rescue workers carry the fatally injured Rev. Mychal Judge, who served as the New York City Fire Department chaplain, from one of the World Trade Center towers on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: Anthony Correia via REUTERS)

A New York City firefighter carries a water hose on Vessey and Greenwich streets in lower Manhattan after the World Trade Center towers collapsed on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: Lorenzo Ciniglio/Sygma/Sygma via Getty Images)

A cloud of smoke engulfs the sky and people run for their lives as one of the twin towers collapses on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: Jose Jimenez/Primera Hora/Getty Images)

A survivor sits outside the World Trade Center after two planes hit the twin towers on Sept. 11, 2001, in New York City.

(Photo: Robert Giroux via Getty Images)

Smoke emits from the twin towers of the World Trade Center after they were hit by two hijacked airliners in an attack on Sept. 11, 2001, in New York City.

(Photo: Mario Tama via Getty Images)

People in the street watch a building burn in the area where the World Trade Center collapsed on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: DOUG KANTER/AFP via Getty Images)

An ambulance covered in debris is on fire after the collapse of the first World Trade Center tower on Sept. 11, 2001, in New York.

(Photo: Anthony Correia via REUTERS)

New York City firefighters and other emergency personnel survey the World Trade Center area near Vessey and Greenwich streets after the towers collapsed on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: DOUG KANTER/AFP via Getty Images)

A man with a fire extinguisher walks through rubble after the collapse of the first World Trade Center tower on Sept. 11, 2001, in New York. The man was shouting as he walked around, looking for survivors who needed assistance.

(Photo: DOUG KANTER/AFP via Getty Images)

Rescue workers survey damage to the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, in New York.

(Photo: Gulnara Samoilova/AP)

Deputy U.S. Marshal Dominic Guadagnoli helps a woman after she was injured in the attack on the World Trade Center in New York on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: Mark Lennihan/AP)

An American flag at ground zero on the evening of Sept. 11, 2001, after the attack on the World Trade Center in New York City.

(Photo: Alex Wong via Getty Images)

Smoke comes out from the Southwest E-Ring of the Pentagon building on Sept. 11, 2001, in Arlington, Virginia, after a hijacked plane crashed into the building and set off a huge explosion.

(Photo: U.S. Air Force Photo by TSgt Jim Varhegyi via Getty Images)

Firefighters struggle to contain a spreading fire after a highjacked commercial plane crashed into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, in Arlington, Virginia.

(Photo: U.S. Navy Photo by Journalist 1st Class Mark D. Faram ME via REUTERS)

Medical personnel and volunteers help injured people outside the Pentagon after a hijacked commercial airliner crashed into the southwest corner of the building on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: MARK D. FARAM/NAVY VISUAL NEWS SERVICE/AFP via Getty Images)

Military personnel walk down Highway I-395 on Sept. 11, 2001, after evacuating the Pentagon.

(Photo: DAVID MAXWELL/AFP via Getty Images)

A mound of dirt and charred trees mark the site of a crater created by the impact of United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed on Sept. 11, 2001.

(Photo: DAVID MAXWELL/AFP via Getty Images)

Officials examine a crater on Sept. 11, 2001, at the crash site of United Airlines Flight 93 near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

(Photo: DAVID MAXWELL/AFP via Getty Images)

Officials oversee the scene at the crash site of United Airlines Flight 93 in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, on Sept. 11, 2001.

This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.
Larry Elder is escorted by a security guard on Wednesday in Venice after a woman in the gorilla mask, at right, threw an egg at him. (Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)

As the Los Angeles police investigators try to identify a woman wearing a gorilla mask who threw an egg at Republican gubernatorial candidate Larry Elder in Venice, some of the talk show host's supporters are complaining that the Wednesday incident that forced Elder to cut his campaigning short is not generating more outrage.

The gorilla mask prompted conservative commentators to suggest that the incident was racially motivated, given the white supremacist history of dehumanizing Black people with ape imagery.

Two law enforcement sources told The Times on Friday that the department was working the case as a misdemeanor battery because the woman gave no indication she was moved by hate in a video taken at the scene. But they stressed that no decision will be made until she's identified and police get more details about what happened.

The altercation occurred when Elder, as part of his "Recall Express" campaign bus tour, was visiting homeless encampments Wednesday morning when he was angrily surrounded by a group of homeless people and advocates.

When a male aide confronted the woman who threw the egg and missed, she slapped him in the face.

According to a police statement: "As the aide and Mr. Elder continue walking to their vehicle, the aide was approached by a male, white, bald, wearing a grey t-shirt yelling profanities at him, who struck him in the back of the head. During that altercation, an unknown individual approached the aide from the side and struck him in the face.

Detectives are seeking both assailants as part of the investigation.

Elder and his team hastily parted in an SUV, 12 minutes after arriving.

Police say a more dangerous incident occurred earlier that day outside a senior center in Hollywood when someone fired a pellet gun at Elder's entourage and struck a staffer in the buttocks.

Detectives from the Robbery Homicide Division are investigating that attack and have no strong leads. "This is the more serious incident involving the candidate," Robbery Homicide Capt. Jonathan Tippet said.

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After the attacks on Wednesday, Elder tweeted: "Today I kicked off the Recall Express bus tour. Before we even left Los Angeles, my security detail was physically assaulted, shot with a pellet gun, and hit with projectiles. The intolerant left will not stop us."

The next day he blamed the hostility in Venice on Gov. Gavin Newsom's failure to curb the homelessness crisis in California. The reason that happened is because I was at the intersection of rising crime and homelessness here in California, Elder said at a campaign event Thursday afternoon in Glendale.

Elder told Fox News later that day that "racial epithets" were yelled during the fracas, elaborating only that one person said, "Larry Elder doesnt give a blank about Black people; Larry Elder only cares about white people."

He said he did not know if the egg-thrower was acting out of racism, but he complained that Democrats and the media would have hyped up the story if he were liberal.

"Im not somebody who pulls out the race card the way Barack Obama does, the way Al Sharpton does, the way CNN does, the way Black Lives Matter does," he said. "Maybe it was just an idiot. Maybe it was just a fool. Maybe it was just someone who doesnt like Larry Elder.

"All I know is: If I were a liberal, and somebody wearing a gorilla mask who was a white woman threw an egg at me, the left would be screaming about systemic racism," he continued.

Other conservatives have jumped in with similar accusations of a double standard.

"If Elder were a Democrat, the attack would have been instantly and with good reason dubbed racist," wrote Kyle Smith in the National Review. "It would not only be front-page news, it would be just about the only news you were hearing about today on CNN and MSNBC. ... We would be treated to multiple news analyses about the history of the usage of gorilla tropes against blacks."

Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva tweeted: "QUESTION: How is this not a hate crime?

"ANSWER: Because 'woke privilege' means a white woman can wear a gorilla mask and attack a black man without fear of being called a racist.

"Where is the outrage from our politicians?"

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
WARSAW (Reuters) - Thousands of Poland's healthcare workers marched through the streets of Warsaw on Saturday, demanding better pay and conditions as the country braces for a fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Many medical staff say coronavirus has laid bare failings in the country's health system and that careers in the sector are not attractive due to low wages and high levels of stress.

"We want decent jobs and wages ... I work now for about 500 hours a month, not for money, but because there is no one to work," said 41-year-old paramedic Wojciech Zdanowski.

Brandishing banners with slogans such as "Together for the good of patients" and "Sick country", nurses, doctors, physiotherapists and ambulance staff, many in uniform, gathered near the Supreme Court before marching through the centre of the capital.

Their demands include higher wages, hiring more administrative and support staff and steps to protect against physical and verbal aggression.

Poland's Health Minister Adam Niedzielski has dismissed the demands as too costly and unrealistic, involving an increase of around 105 billion zlotys ($27.31 billion) that would push health spending to over 10% of gross domestic product (GDP).

"Let's be serious, if at this moment we have a budget for health that is 120 or 130 billion zlotys and there is a demand to increase that by 100 billion... it goes completely beyond the bounds of good sense and reason," Niedzielski told private broadcaster Radio Zet on Friday.

In January 2020 a doctor with a specialisation earned on average almost 14,000 zlotys a month before tax, while nurses earned between 5,700 and 6,600 zlotys, according to health ministry data cited by daily newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza.

Poland, a country of around 38 million, has so far reported 2,893,173 cases of the coronavirus and 75,425 deaths.

($1 = 3.8441 zlotys)

(Reporting by Alicja Ptak; Writing by Alan Charlish; Editing by Mike Harrison)
The estate of Aaron "Jay" Danielson, a 39-year-old supporter of former President Donald Trump who was fatally shot by an Antifa backer in Portland, Oregon, last year, filed a $13 million federal lawsuit Friday against the city, its mayor and the county district attorney, according to a report.

A lawyer for the estate claims Danielsons death was "preventable" and the filing blames the citys and mayors "hands off" policing strategy regarding political protests for sparking a "culture of vigilante policing" between opposing groups, OregonLive.com reported.

"We are seeking justice for the preventable death of a young man, gunned down in a city with a dangerous and deadly hands-off approach to public safety," Christopher L. Cauble, the attorney for Danielsons estate, said in a statement, according to the news outlet.

"Time and time again," the lawyer continued, "City leadership and law enforcement have failed to find an effective response to clashing groups of protesters. For well over a year, they have known when and where these rallies would occur and the likelihood of escalating violence. Yet no strategy of protective intervention has been utilized to this day. This reckless dereliction of duty, cost our client, Aaron Danielson, his life."

PORTLAND MAYOR NOW SAYS POLICE HANDS OFF RIOT RESPONSE WAS NOT THE RIGHT STRATEGY

City Attorney Robert Taylor late Friday declined to comment to OregonLive.com, the outlet reported.

The lawsuit names as a defendant Multnomah County District Attorney Michael Schmidt, claiming Schmidt publicly stated in August 2020 that he would avoid pursuing prosecutions for "public order crimes," such as mischief and disorderly conduct offenses normally associated with rioting, and instead focus on more serious offenses, such as property damage, assaults or threats of assaults, OregonLive.com reported.

Schmidts office did not immediately respond to the outlets request for comment.

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PORTLAND SEES NINE SHOOTINGS IN 16-HOUR SPAN; SERVICE DOG KILLED, POLICE SAY

The lawsuit also claims that officers with the Portland Police Bureau were instructed to avoid involvement in disputes between opposing political groups  even though the city had seen violent clashes in the streets just a week before Danielsons death.

The suit claims the law enforcement policies created an atmosphere where protesters on both sides could expect "a skeletal and passive police presence" on the weekend of Danielsons death.

Danielson died Aug. 29, 2020, from a single gunshot wound to his chest after being approached by a suspect who was seen on video, appearing to be waiting for Danielson in the alcove of a downtown parking garage, the news outlet reported.

The suspect was later identified as Michael Forest Reinoehl, 48, a self-described anti-fascist who was fatally shot days later  Sept. 3, 2020  after law enforcement officers tracked him down and tried to arrest him in Washington state. The officers from multi-agencies were pursuing Reinoehl on a Multnomah County, Oregon, warrant that charged him with second-degree murder and unlawful use of a firearm in connection with Danielsons death, OregonLive.com reported.

At the time he was shot, Danielson was walking with a friend named Chandler Pappas, both of them wearing "Patriot Prayer" caps, referring to a conservative group based in Vancouver, Washington, just outside Portland.

In September 2020, Pappas appeared on Fox News "Tucker Carlson Tonight" and claimed Danielson had been killed because he supported Trump.

He claimed that apparel such as MAGA hats or "pro-patriot" gear made conservatives easy targets for Antifa activists looking to cause harm. Pappas added that neither he nor Danielson were carrying weapons on the night Danielson was killed.

On Wednesday, at a Portland City Council meeting, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler backtracked from supporting "hands off" policing after previously expressing support for it, citing the response to a more recent clash in the city, on Aug. 22 of this year.

"It is clear, based on the public outcry, on the media outcry, on the national front, that that strategy was not the right strategy," Wheeler said during a Portland City Council meeting, according to The Associated Press.

"I think we can all acknowledge that," he added. "I take full responsibility for it."

The mayors remarks came in advance of a city council vote on a $50,000 settlement relating to a womans claim that she had been injured at an Aug. 4 protest when police hurled a flash-bang munition at her with no warning, the AP reported. The council approved the settlement in a unanimous vote, the report said.
Sep. 10A Chicago company has agreed to purchase Post Falls-based Ground Force Worldwide.

Federal Signal Corporation officials said in a news release on Wednesday that it had agreed to pay $45 million to purchase Ground Force, which makes specialized-heavy equipment used in large mining operations.

Ground Force CEO and owner Ron Nilson could not immediately be reached for comment. But in the news release, Nilson, lauded the deal.

"We are excited to be joining forces with Federal Signal and believe the combination of our two teams represents a natural cultural fit, with both companies exhibiting a shared vision of developing and maintaining strong local community connections," Nilson said in the release.

According to the Federal Signal news release, the purchase will bolster the company's position as an industry-leading industrial manufacturer of specialized vehicles.

"We are thrilled to welcome Ground Force's talented team members to the Federal Signal family," said Jennifer L. Sherman, president and CEO of Federal Signal in the release.
Joe Don Rooney, the lead guitarist for country music group Rascal Flatts, was arrested Thursday on a DUI charge after the vehicle he was driving hit a line of trees outside Nashville, authorities said Saturday.

A Williamson County Sheriff's Office deputy responded to the scene in Franklin, Tennessee, shortly after 4 a.m. Thursday, sheriff's spokeswoman Sharon Puckett said by email.

She said a "driver crashed into tree line" and was subsequently arrested. Authorities identified the driver as Rooney, 45, of Nashville. The email did not specify if officials suspected he was under the influence of alcohol or something else.

It doesn't appear that the musician was injured. Rooney was booked into Williamson County Jail and released the same day after posting $2,500 bond, Puckett said.

Rascal Flatts' public relations representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The group founded in 1999 by Rooney, Gary LeVox, and Jay DeMarcus announced last year that it was disbanding. But the pandemic prompted cancellation of a farewell tour last year that would have helped mark the end.

The trio has been nominated four times for Grammy Awards and has 12 No. 1 country hits.
The Daily Beast

YouTube/KARE 11The FBI has been called in to assist local authorities in rural Wisconsin after four young friends from Minnesota were found murdered and randomly left in an abandoned SUV in a cornfield.Authorities in Dunn County, Wisconsin, where the quadruple homicide victims were discovered Sunday, have made no secret that they have been left baffled by the crime.Its highly unusual for this area. Obviously weve had homicides in the last several years, but something of this magnitude[Im]
People gathered Saturday at the three sites where terrorists killed nearly 3,000 people on Sept. 11, 2001, with leaders, survivors, and more paying tribute and mourning the fallen 20 years later.

Ground zero in New York, the Pentagon in Virginia, and Shanksville, Pennsylvania, hosted memorials with survivors and top U.S. officials in attendance. Lectors read the names of each of the 2,977 people killed in the attacks.

President Joe Biden began the day visiting the memorial in Manhattan alongside former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton and their wives, former first ladies Michelle Obama and Hillary Clinton. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York were also in attendance, surrounded by a crowd of people hoisting American flags and images of deceased loved ones.

From left, former President Bill Clinton, former first lady Hillary Clinton, former President Barack Obama, former first lady Michelle Obama, President Joe Biden, first lady Jill Biden, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Bloomberg's partner Diana Taylor, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer stand for the national anthem during the annual 9/11 Commemoration Ceremony at the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum on Saturday in New York. (Chip Somodevilla/Pool Photo via AP)



STORIES FROM INSIDE THE PENTAGON ON 9/11: 'SAW THE FIREBALL PASS OVER THE TOP OF OUR HEAD'

"As we carry these 20 years forward, I find sustenance in a continuing appreciation for all of those who rose to be more than ordinary people," said Mike Low, the father of Sarah Elizabeth Low, a flight attendant whose plane crashed into the World Trade Center.

An American flag placed along with a photo of the twin towers on the name Daniel P. Trant, a Cantor Fitzgerald bond trader who died during 9/11, before ceremonies to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on Saturday at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in New York. (Anthony Behar, Pool Photo via AP)

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Biden later visited Shanksville, where Vice President Kamala Harris, former President George W. Bush, and former first lady Laura Bush joined a memorial service remembering those whose hijacked plane crashed into an open field there. Speakers recalled the determination of passengers on United Airlines Flight 93, who charged the cockpit in hopes of regaining control of the airplane, which eventually crashed into the empty field.

A National Park Service ranger stands in front of the Wall of Names at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, before a service of remembrance on Saturday as the nation marks the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)



"The passengers and crew members joined together and decided to fight back. In a moment of terrible uncertainty, they were determined to control their fate," said Stephen Clark, the superintendent of the National Park Service's sites in western Pennsylvania.

In Shanksville, Bush delivered remarks warning of domestic extremism and "malign force" dividing the United States.

"We have seen growing evidence that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders, but from violence that gathers within," he said. "There is little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home, but in their disdain for pluralism, in their disregard for human life, in their determination to defile national symbols, they are children of the same foul spirit, and it is our continuing duty to confront them."

Bush's remarks were celebrated by Biden, who echoed the former president's calls for national unity.

Attendees listen during an observance ceremony at the Pentagon on Saturday on the morning of the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks. An American flag is draped over the site of impact at the Pentagon. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)



In northern Virginia, memorial-goers gathered outside the Pentagon, where American Airlines Flight 77 crashed on 9/11, killing 184 people.

"We must ensure that all our fellow Americans know and understand what happened here on 9/11 and in Manhattan and in Shanksville, Pennsylvania," said Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, a retired Army general who led troops during the post-9/11 invasion of Iraq. "It is our responsibility to remember, and it is our duty to defend democracy."

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

Former President Donald Trump, a New York native, said he will visit ground zero in Manhattan on Saturday to mark the 20th anniversary.

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Tags: News, New York City, Foreign Policy, 9/11, September 11 Terrorist Attacks, Terrorism, National Security, Pennsylvania, Pentagon

Original Author: Jeremy Beaman

Original Location: Sept. 11 crash sites remember the fallen 20 years on
Niya McAdoo said she hasnt been surprised by the backlash, some of it in viciously racist emails and social media, to her retweeting the phrase happy friday everybody. Death to america on Sept. 3.

I think that the phrase, Death to America, is a triggering phrase for people. Most people have seen that phrase being said by countries outside of the U.S., said McAdoo, a 23-year-old senior and KUs new student body president. In no way was that the intention... disrespect or call to violence to any specific group, veterans or military folks.

But ultimately I stand by what I said. Because, to me, the America that I live in is not an America that supports me.

Conservative social media jumped on her message. Radio host Todd Starnes wrote a story on his personal website. The Kansas City Stars Michael Ryan published a column about McAdoos retweet.

This, Jayhawk country, is your KU student body president, Ryan opined.

The Student Senate is scheduled to take up a censure resolution next week. KU Chancellor Douglas Girod said that while McAdoos sentiments were constitutionally protected speech, he strongly disagreed.

The opinions in the students post are protected by the First Amendment. In addition, KU is committed to its role as a marketplace of ideas  including ideas that some individuals find offensive, Girod said.

I understand and appreciate why many individuals have found the content of the students post offensive.

McAdoo, originally from Columbia, Missouri, grew up in a bi-racial home  her mom is white and her dad is Black. She said she chose KU because she wanted to be close to home and she knew it was a good school. Shes majoring in visual art and African and African-American Studies.

She said among the reasons she wasnt surprised by the backlash was because of this countrys history of condemning Black people and other people of color for speaking out.

Any person of color who attempts to speak out or attempts to honestly give their opinion of this country and what this country stands for and what its done to our communities has received backlash, so its nothing new, she said.

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There was no huge intention behind retweeting it....To me this country doesnt stand for inclusion, it doesnt stand for Black and Brown communities, it doesnt stand for queer and trans communities. So this America that I currently live in, yes I want to see it waste away. Yes, I want to see it die.

She added: The Chancellor can talk about being disappointed by my statement all day, but Im disappointed in the fact that Im still being called a n---er.

The Kansas Federation of College Republicans tweeted that McAdoo should resign immediately. She said she would not.

She also feels like she doesnt owe an explanation, particularly to people who arent trying to understand her reality  and the reality Black people face.

You can read about these things in books and articles, McAdoo said. Its not that these people are uneducated about racism, they know about it, theyve read about it. These people are racist because they choose to be. Nothing I say is going to change that.

University Response

Conservative columnists pointed to McAdoos social media posts as evidence the University of Kansas and other campuses are breeding hatred of America. They pushed KU to take a stronger stance against it.

But officials stopped short of condemning or punishing her.

Harrison-Lee said McAdoos post didnt demonstrate the type of productive dialogue we hope to encourage on our university campuses but that any desire for civility could not outweigh freedom of expression.

Genelle Belmas, a first amendment law professor at the University of Kansas journalism school, said KU was placed in a tough situation responding to the outrage. Do nothing, she said, and members of the public would be angry. Punish McAdoo, and theyd be accused of violating her right to free expression.

I hope against hope that they do not come down in some way against this student, Belmas said.

We have a responsibility to make sure KU has a good face but also to make sure she is protected.

Belmas said McAdoo could be censured for her speech by her fellow student senators but should not face discipline from the University unless she violated a policy related to university-affiliated social media accounts.

Every few years, Belmas said, political outrage would be directed at the University over the speech of student or faculty.

In 2018, Republican political candidates attacked the University for allowing an art exhibit of a defaced flag to fly above a building. A professor received death threats for posting on Twitter that the NRA had blood on their hands following the 2012 mass shooting at Sandy Hook elementary school.

The Universitys response to such conduct, she said, has been hit-and-miss. Following McAdoos tweet, Belmas said the university acted appropriately. But in the prior events, Belmas believed the university suppressed speech by moving the art exhibit and suspending the professor who criticized the NRA.

We have as educators but also as students and as graduate students and everyone who associates with the university a duty to make sure that ideas are challenged and its always better to challenge the idea than to simply chill the speech so the speech isnt there whatsoever, said Harrison Rosenthal a joint PHD and Law student at KU who serves as vice chair of KUs graduate student advisory board.

McAdoos said that amid all the blowback, criticism and racist insults shes also received messages of support from friends and from faculty members. She also doesnt want Black and Brown people to stop fighting and advocating for true justice.

I urge people to continue speaking up. I urge people to be their authentic selves. I urge them to keep advocating against these oppressive systems that do what they do, she said. And fight for these rights that were owed.
The Venice Film Festival roared back to life this year with a starry and feminist-tinged selection that leaves the competition wide open for who will take home the Golden Lion on Saturday.

The MeToo movement appears to be making its mark on the film industry if the Venice premieres were anything to go by.

The festival closed with "The Last Duel" (playing out of competition), a medieval jousting drama starring Matt Damon and Ben Affleck that went heavy on its message of historical injustice towards women.

Slasher pic "Last Night in Soho", starring Anya Taylor-Joy, took a similar approach to Swinging Sixties London, revealing the misogyny beneath our nostalgia.

Other films at the festival -- from French abortion drama "Happening" to Maggie Gyllenhaal's unflinching look at motherhood in "The Lost Daughter" (starring Oscar-winner Olivia Colman) -- suggested some progress in the effort to bring more female stories to the screen.

One woman who seems destined to grab the headlines in the coming months is Kristen Stewart, who wowed critics at Venice with her turn as Princess Diana in "Spencer".

Stewart is already picking up Oscar buzz, as is New Zealand director Jane Campion for her emotionally complex Western, "The Power of the Dog".

Its star Benedict Cumberbatch is also being tipped for awards for his part as the conflicted cowboy at the centre of the film.

He praised Campion and the women's movement ahead of the premiere last week, saying: "There's such rich female talent to nurture and enjoy. Jane is such a key icon in that movement."

- Golden Lion race -

The Golden Lion for best film will be chosen from 21 entries by a jury led by "Parasite" director Bong Joon-Ho and presented at a Saturday night closing ceremony.

Success at Venice has become a key launchpad for Academy Award campaigns in recent years.

The last four winners -- "Nomadland", "Joker", "Roma" and "The Shape of Water" -- have all gone on to Oscar success.

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Last year's edition was a low-key affair due to the pandemic, with even the winners (for "Nomadland") unable to attend.

The glamour was certainly back this year, with a dazzling Hollywood guest list capped by the appearance of Affleck with his old/new girlfriend Jennifer Lopez to the delight of gossip mags everywhere.

- Almodovar and Sorrentino -

Venice is also about the cream of the arthouse world, and the competition featured beloved cineastes such as Spain's Pedro Almodovar ("Parallel Mothers") and Italy's Paolo Sorrentino ("The Hand of God") -- both offering strikingly personal and heartfelt films.

There were also heavy-hitting dramas like "The Box", which delved into the harsh world of Mexican sweatshops, and "Reflection" with its brutal look at the war in Ukraine.

There was lighter fare as Spanish megastars Penelope Cruz and Antonio Banderas made a rare appearance on-screen together, mercilessly ripping into their own profession as egomaniacal filmmakers in "Official Competition".

Pandemic precautions -- including mandatory masks, vaccine passes and 50-percent capacity in the cinemas -- continued to dull some of the shine at this year's festival.

Timothee Chalamet -- in town to promote mega-blockbuster "Dune" -- had to leap up the new Covid-security wall separating the public from the red carpet to give his adoring teen fans a bit of face time.

But with "Dune" bringing an army of stars to the Lido island -- including Zendaya, Oscar Isaac and Javier Bardem -- it seemed to confirm that the festival circuit was back on glitzy form.

er/bp
Former President Donald Trump commemorated the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks by sharply criticizing President Joe Biden for his withdrawal from Afghanistan and assuring that "America will be made great again."

Trump's political action committee released a video Saturday morning in which he hailed the bravery of the police officers and firefighters who responded to the attacks before slamming an "inept" Biden administration for how it concluded the 20-year war.

"For the great people of our country, this is a very sad day. Sept. 11th represents great sorrow for our country," said Trump, a native New Yorker. "Many things were displayed that day, including, most importantly, the bravery of our police, fire, and first responders of every kind."

"It is also a sad time for the way our war on those that did such harm to our country ended last week," he continued. "The loss of 13 great warriors and the many more who were wounded should never have happened."

BIDEN SAYS UNITY IS COUNTRY'S 'GREATEST STRENGTH' IN SPEECH MARKING 20TH ANNIVERSARY OF 9/11

The former president hit Biden later again Saturday night, slamming his successor for causing the United States to suffer a "great, great embarrassment over the last week."

"A terrible thing has happened. Terrible decisions were made by this administration," he said in prerecorded marks screened on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., as part of a Let Us Worship service. "But you are brave, you are incredible, and it will be made up."

Thirteen service members were killed in a terrorist attack outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 26, for which the Islamic State claimed responsibility, as U.S. forces worked to evacuate Americans, Afghan allies, and other nationals out of the country following the Taliban's takeover. The attack exacerbated already fierce criticism by Trump and Republican lawmakers of the administration's handling of the U.S. drawdown.

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"The leader of our country was made to look like a fool, and that can never be allowed to happen," Trump said in the video.

"This is the 20th year of this war and should have been a year of victory and honor and strength. Instead, Joe Biden and his inept administration surrendered in defeat," he said. "We will live on, but sadly, our country will be wounded for a long period of time. We will struggle to recover from the embarrassment this incompetence has caused."

"Do not fear, however. America will be made great again," the former president said.

Trump has not disclosed whether he plans to run for president in 2024 but has remained vocal since leaving office in January, often hinting at another bid for the White House. Trump told Sean Hannity last month that the Fox News host and other "friends" will be "happy" about what he has decided regarding 2024.

He has been especially critical of the Biden administration's withdrawal from Afghanistan ahead of the president's Aug. 31 deadline. Though he supported a similar strategy as president, he has recently insisted the drawdown could have been handled better.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

"They never would have come anywhere near us. It wouldnt have happened. They wouldnt have taken over anything," Trump said of the Taliban in a Fox News interview published Friday. "They knew that if they did, they would be bombed into hell."

Trump said he plans to travel to New York City to mark the 20th anniversary of 9/11.

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Tags: News, Donald Trump, September 11, September 11 Terrorist Attacks, New York City, Afghanistan, Joe Biden, White House, National Security, Foreign Policy

Original Author: Jeremy Beaman

Original Location: Trump hits Biden, vows 'America will be made great again' in 9/11 remembrance
The final known U.S. missile strike of the 20-year war in Afghanistan may not have hit a vehicle ready to carry out an ISIS-K attack as evacuations from Kabul neared an end, despite what officials in the Biden administration have said, according to the newly released findings of a media investigation.

Interviews and video collected by the New York Times indicate a Reaper drone attack on a white sedan on Aug. 29, which the military said was believed to have been carrying explosives and posed an "imminent" threat to the airport, killed an aid worker who had no clear ties to the ISIS affiliate that claimed responsibility for the deadly attack that killed 13 U.S. service members and scores of others earlier that week. The strike also killed several of the man's family members.

Camera footage shows the driver filled plastic containers with a water hose in his car's trunk. The driver, identified as Zemari Ahmadi, worked as an electrical engineer for Nutrition and Education International, a U.S. aid company headquartered in California.

"We have nothing to do with terrorism or ISIS, said NEA's country director, who professed a love for the United States.

According to his relatives, Ahmadi was driving a white 1996 Corolla the same day U.S. officials said military surveillance detected a white sedan leaving a compound identified as an alleged ISIS safe house a few miles from the Kabul airport.

US AIRSTRIKE TAKES OUT TWO 'HIGH-PROFILE' ISIS TARGETS, WOUNDS ONE: PENTAGON

While U.S. officials told the outlet they picked up suspicious communications between the vehicle and the alleged ISIS safe house, Ahmadi's colleagues told the news outlet he was driving co-workers who were delivering food and picking up a laptop for his boss. His co-workers said Ahmadi was bringing water home from his office after deliveries stopped when the U.S.-backed government fell to the Taliban.

Ahmadi drove home with three passengers to drop them off.

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He liked happy music, one colleague said. That day, we couldnt play any in the car" for fear of attracting unwanted attention from the Taliban. The passengers said only two laptops and the water jugs were in the car, denying there were any explosives in the car.

A Hellfire missile was launched in the late afternoon after Ahmadi arrived home.

In this Sunday, Aug. 29, 2021 file photo, Afghans inspect damage of Ahmadi family house after U.S. drone strike in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Aug. 29, 2021. (AP Photo/Khwaja Tawfiq Sediqi, File)



Although U.S. officials said one other adult male was seen by the drone operator greeting Ahmadi as he drove into the courtyard  and determined with reasonable certainty that no women, children, or non-combatants would be killed  his relatives said several of his children and his brother's children were running out to meet him.

So far, the U.S. military has acknowledged only three civilian casualties. Ahmadi's relatives said 10 members of their family, including seven children, were killed in the strike.

Neighbors and health officials said the bodies of the children were removed from the area, according to the report, and a reporter saw other human remains strewn around the place the next day.

All of them were innocent, said Emal, Ahmadi's brother. You say he was ISIS, but he worked for the Americans."

Up until this point, U.S. military officials have defended the drone strike.

Because there were secondary explosions, there is a reasonable conclusion to be made that there was explosives in that vehicle, said Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, last week.

But the report casts doubt on that assertion, noting an investigation by the news outlet's team found no evidence of a second and more powerful explosion.

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Drone strikes remain a controversial aspect of modern warfare, partly due to the number of civilians killed.

An estimated 4,126 to 10,076 people have been killed in Afghanistan by drone strikes ordered by the U.S. since January 2004, including anywhere from 300 to 909 civilians, according to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism.

Washington Examiner Videos

Tags: News, Afghanistan, Islamic State, Foreign Policy, Biden Administration, Joe Biden, National Security

Original Author: Misty Severi

Original Location: US drone strike targeting suspected ISIS bomber likely killed aid worker and children: Report
Marking two decades since 9/11 on Saturday looked, in many ways, like the years before: Church bells ringing in lower Manhattan at the moment of the first strike. Families of the nearly 3,000 killed that day mourning at the memorial and graveside. Survivors telling their stories of living with guilt and heartache.

Conflicting with this years rituals, though, is the national reckoning with the chaotic end to Americas longest war.

Its hard because you hoped that this would just be a different time and a different world. But sometimes history starts to repeat itself, and not in the best of ways, Thea Trinidad poignantly told the Associated Press. Trinidad, whose dad died on 9/11, read some of the names of the dead at ground zero Saturday.

This years 9/11 anniversary intersects with the Taliban easily regaining control of Afghanistan after the frenetic US withdrawal this summer. It comes as Afghans who fled their home just weeks ago await their fate in airbases around the world, the images and videos of people clinging to planes leaving Kabuls airport still fresh. It comes as the US continues to botch airstrikes, as some of the last US military members killed in Afghanistan were infants when the war began, and as whats called the war on terror continues unabated. Afghans who helped the US through its longest war fear theyve been left behind. Women in Afghanistan now live under constant threat of imminent violence.

President Joe Biden posted an address to social media on Sept. 10, touching on national unity, the extraordinary losses of that day, the personal pain suffered by a friend whose son died in the south tower, and the anti-Muslim sentiment that permeated the nation after the attacks and continues in many ways to this day.

The themes Biden hit on could have applied nearly any other anniversary year  including his remarks about the war on terror.

Unity and service, the 9/11 generation stepping up to serve and protect in the face of terror, to get those terrorists who were responsible to show everyone seeking to do harm to America that we will hunt you down and we will make you pay, Biden said. That will never stop.

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In New York City, the traditional reading of the names of people killed began after chimes played, church bells rang out, and a moment of silence observed at 8:46 a.m., the time the first plane hit.

Family members tearfully read the names, stopping at the end to note their own relatives and deliver small acknowledgments and remembrances.

"There were so many events I wish you were a part of, like my wedding, one woman said after reading her fathers name.

The reading was interspersed with small breaks, one featuring Bruce Springsteen singing Ill See You in My Dreams.

You missed every single milestone in her life over the past two decades, but we continue to move on with love in our hearts, one mother said about her husband missing his daughters life  including her graduation from college.

We love you and we miss you, Uncle Peter. Thank you for being my godfather, and thank you for protecting this country, the nephew of Peter Bielfeld, a New York City firefighter, said.

Biden visited the National September 11th Memorial in New York City before heading to the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, and the Pentagon on Saturday.

As the president made his way to Shanksville, a memorial event was already underway to honor the victims of Flight 93, which crashed after passengers and crew members attempted to regain control.

The names of the 40 people who died were read aloud, some by family members, with a bell chiming for each person.

After a series of speakers, former president George W. Bush  who was president on 9/11 and led the country into the Afghanistan War decades ago  delivered a speech in which he reflected on 9/11 and how Americans responded that day.

It is hard to describe the mix of feelings that we experienced, he said. There was horror at the scale of destruction, and awe at the bravery and kindness that rose to meet it.

He also, notably, warned of domestic extremism.

We have seen growing evidence that the dangers to our country can come, not only across borders, but from violence that gathers within, Bush said. There is little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home, but in their disdain for pluralism, in their disregard for human life, in their determination to befoul national symbols, they are children of the same foul spirit, and it is our continuing duty to confront them.

Both Bush and Vice President Kamala Harris, who spoke after him, made an appeal for unity in their remarks.

After 9/11, we saw how fear could be used to sow division, Harris said. In a time of outright terror, we turned toward each other. In the face of a stranger, we saw a neighbor and a friend. That time reminded us the significance and the strength of our unity as Americans.

In Washington, DC, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Army Gen. Mark Milley presided over a ceremony. Family members placed flowers and wreaths on and near memorial benches bearing the names of those who died.

For Biden, the attacks on 9/11 have deeply defined the trajectory of his political career over the past 20 years. He served as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2001 and was deeply involved in the countrys response. On the day of the attacks, Biden foreshadowed what would eventually become one of the defining issues of his presidency.

This cannot be dealt with overnight, Biden told ABC News reporters blocks away from the Capitol. Its an incredible tragedy, but its the new threat of the 21st century.

The day after the attacks, he joined 98 other senators who voted to authorize all necessary and appropriate force to retaliate against those behind 9/11. In a speech at the University of Delaware on Sept. 19, 2001, Biden told students not to worry about a war in response to the attacks.

This is not a war in the traditional or conventional sense. Youre not going to see hundreds of thousands of military amassing, ground troops invading, and a call-up of all of you, Biden said.

Two decades later, Biden has attempted to reel in a sprawling military response thats spanned three presidential administrations. Last April, Biden announced that the US would withdraw from Afghanistan, arguing that the US had completed its mission of ousting al-Qaeda after the attacks.

We no longer had a clear purpose in an open-ended mission in Afghanistan, Biden said in a speech marking the end of the US withdrawal from the country. After 20 years of war in Afghanistan, I refuse to send another generation of Americas sons and daughters to fight a war that should have ended long ago.

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A growing number of countries are limiting entry or outright banning tourists from the United States amid the latest COVID-19 surge, but there are some destinations that are moving forward with reopening plans.

The island of Phu Quoc, in the Gulf of Thailand about 6 miles off the coast of Cambodia, could reopen to fully vaccinated international visitors next month, according to a statement from the Vietnamese government.

A six-month pilot program was announced by the Vietnamese government in July. In the first phase, the island would welcome 2,000 to 3,000 visitors a month for three months via charter flights from select locations. The second phase would ramp up monthly visitation to 5,000 to 10,000 for another three months, with passengers flying in via commercial flights.

Only visitors who have been fully vaccinated or can show proof of recovery from COVID-19 will be allowed to fly in, and travelers will need to test negative for the virus before entering.

Phu Quoc Island, Vietnam, is deemed a Special Economic Zone, so visitors dont need a visa if theyre only staying here.

Vietnam's borders have been closed to foreign travelers since March 2020, and authorities hope the program can attract up to 3 million tourists by the end of the year.

The government announced Friday that Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh had agreed to move forward with the pilot program.

American tourists to mainland Vietnam must obtain an entry visa to enter, but Phu Quoc offers a 30-day visa waiver to attract more tourists. The island, off the Mekong Delta, is accessible via a short flight from Ho Chi Minh City and offers beaches and luxury resorts.

Huynh Quang Hung, chairman of People's Committee of Phu Quoc Island, reported that no people on the island have COVID-19 and said 35% of the adult population has been vaccinated with the first COVID-19 vaccine dose.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has designated Vietnam as a country with a high risk of COVID-19 and warns travelers to make sure they are fully vaccinated before traveling to the destination.

Story continues

 Which EU countries are open?: A breakdown of EU travel restrictions by country

 Traveling to Honolulu?: Get ready to show COVID-19 vaccine or negative test at restaurants, bars

Israel opening to group travel

Israel also plans to reopen to foreign visitors, even as it battles one of the worlds highest rates of coronavirus infections.

The countrys Tourism Ministry said Sunday that it would begin allowing organized tour groups into the country beginning Sept. 19. Currently, U.S. citizens who are not Israeli citizens or residents must apply for a permit to enter the country.

Under the new protocols, tourists will have to be vaccinated against the coronavirus, present a negative PCR test before their flight and undergo both PCR and serological testing upon arrival. Visitors would have to quarantine in their hotels until the test results come back, a process expected to take no more than 24 hours.

Tourists from a handful of red countries with high infection rates  including Turkey and Brazil  will not be permitted to visit. The United States is classified by Israel as an "orange," or "at risk," country.

Israel launched a similar program in May after vaccinating most of its population early this year. But the program was suspended in August as the delta coronavirus variant spread.

Vaccinated tourists wearing masks for COVID-19 protection arrive to Israel's Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv on May 23, 2021.

In recent weeks, the country has begun administering booster shots to anyone who was vaccinated more than five months ago. The campaign has shown signs of controlling the delta outbreak, allowing the government to begin allowing tourists to return.

The CDC has labeled Israel a region with a very high risk of COVID-19 and says all travelers should avoid Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip, regardless of vaccination status.

Contributing: The Associated Press. Follow USA TODAY reporter Bailey Schulz on Twitter: @bailey_schulz.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Phu Quoc, Israel reopening for vaccinated US tourists
Greenwich Entertainment

At his death in 1984, just shy of 60, in the Bel Air home of one of Johnny Carsons ex-wives, Truman Capote was conspicuous less for his literary output than for his ubiquitous guest spots on late-night talk shows. Wallowing in performative agony, he was intoxicated by his own celebrityto say nothing of alcohol and drugsas he confided to the likes of Carson and Dick Cavett, in his trademark simpering squeal, how his apparently never-finished novel-length sendup of Manhattan high society, Answered Prayers, prompted his closest confidantes, the rich and elegant ladies he called my swans, to cut and shun him forever.

Capote was devastated most of all by his banishment by top swan Babe Paley, his closest friend in New York and the wife of CBS mogul William Paley.

The nadir of his public appearancesan enduring image of late-stage Capoteoccurred in July 1978, when the fact that he could barely speak, word-slurring and glassy-eyed after 48 hours of vodka- and chemical-addled carousing, didnt dissuade the diminutive storyteller from appearing live on New Yorks The Stanley Siegel Show.

Whats going to happen unless you lick this problem of drugs and alcohol? the local television host asked him. The obvious answer, Capote replied in a rare moment of clarity, is that eventually, I mean, Ill kill myself, without meaning to.

A new documentary, The Capote Tapeswhich premiered at the Toronto Film Festival two years ago and is finally getting a United States theatrical release Sept. 10 after several COVID-caused delaysseeks to dispel that drunken-fame-whore caricature.

You Dont Know John Mulaney

Based largely on recorded interviews conducted by the late George Plimpton for his 1997 oral biography, Truman Capote: In Which Various Friends, Enemies, Acquaintances and Detractors Recall His Turbulent Career, it accords due credit to Capotes writerly brilliance as the author of such classics as Breakfast at Tiffanys and his groundbreaking non-fiction crime novel In Cold Blood. And the film humanizes a gay man who triumphed over soul-crushing struggles as a lonely boy in rural Alabama farmed out to relatives after being abandoned by his father and rejected by his mother, who ultimately realized her own social ambitions in a second marriage on Park Avenue before succumbing to pills, alcohol, and suicide.

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Capote insistedat a time when it was professionally damaging and physically dangerouson being his authentic self.

For Plimptons tape recorder, Norman Mailer recounted a day in the early 1950s when he and Capotewho dressed and carried himself, Mailer said, like a beautiful little faggot princedecided to have a drink at an Irish bar in Brooklyn. The regular patrons in this lair of sour masculine virtue stared menacingly at Capote; Mailers adrenaline spiked and I was getting all ready for a fight. Capote, used to such reactions, took it in stride.

I was very impressed with what it cost him to live like that, Mailer recalled. (One can only imagine how Mailer, who was a massively celebrated novelist and controversialist when he died in 2007, might react on learning that Capotes pop-culture presence and literary legacy far exceed his own in 2021. Capotes works continue to be widely read and to attract eager interest from Hollywood; to date, he has been the central character of several documentaries and two feature films, 2005s Oscar-winning Capote and 2006s Infamous.)

Capote Tapes director Ebs (pronounced eebs) Burnough, a native of Tallahassee, Florida, came to his subject serendipitously, it seemstrying his hand as a first-time filmmaker after a career in corporate branding, public relations (working with, among others, Daily Beast founding editor Tina Brown), and Democratic Party politics (serving as Michelle Obamas political director during the 2008 campaign and then as deputy chief of protocol in the Obama White House).

Burnough, who majored in acting at Northwestern University (although he also studied political science there under Rahm Emanuel and David Axelrod), has a knack for befriending prominent, accomplished, and famous people. Or maybe its just fantastic luck that allowed him to be pals over the years with Marvin Hamlisch, Mike Nichols, and Plimptons widow Sarah (who gifted him the cache of Capote tapes from her husbands archives), and to meet and marry the fabulously wealthy hedge fund manager Pierre Lagrange, an executive producer on The Capote Tapes with whom Burnough lives in London and shares four children.

Im a Black gay man thats 41 years old, Burnough told The Daily Beast. Truman Capote was who he was. That doesnt mean that if Truman were alive today, he would be holding a Pride flag at a gay pride parade. But I do believe he talked about the challenges of love and he was pretty openly gaytheatrically so. He knew what he was doing. And I thought, heres a person whos actually been overlookedin part, Burnough argued, because Capote was a publicity hound and a wicked, even malicious, gossip who was never a member of the literary establishment.

When we talk about gay pride, when we talk about leaders, and people who came before us, Truman Capotes name doesnt come up, Burnough added. And for me, as a gay Black boy raised in the American South, theres something kind ofpardon my languagefucked up about that. Because he actually was out there. He pushed the envelope, he was who he was, he did it. His words aside, I think he deserves a stronger place in our LGBTQ-plus canon than he occupies.

Yes, Truman had his faults, and Im not trying to downplay those faults. He was a drug addict, and mean, in many ways. [Indeed, the documentary features audio from one of Plimptons interviews describing Capote as a candied tarantula. A clip from The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson features Capote remarking to the blankly nodding host: Marlon Brando is an absolutely marvelous actor. But hes so dumb it makes your skin crawl.] But I want people to understand that he did further our cause when so many people werent even looking at it.

Burnough said he began reading Capote as a teenager after a high school librarian in Tallahassee introduced him to such short stories as Miriam. Thats an intense, goose bump-inducing yarn about an aging, Upper East Side widow, Miriam Miller, who is terrorized, or so it seems, by an impertinent, demanding, destructive little girlalso named Miriamafter a chance encounter at a movie house.

He then devoured Capotes works, especially the thinly veiled bestselling gay coming-of-age novel Other Voices, Other Rooms. Yet, as he researched the writers life and times in preparation for the documentaryincluding Capotes militant snobbism, which reached full expression in the famous Black & White Ball he threw in 1966 for Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham and 500-odd mask-wearing celebrities and plutocrats, plus Capotes razor wit that frequently drew bloodBurnough decided that he didnt much like him.

That is, until he learned the story of Kate Harrington, whose father, a rough-hewn Bronx Irishman who was a bank vice president on Long Island, had a tumultuous affair with the writer. In the documentary, playwright Dotson Raderan especially hilarious anecdotist and one of several surviving Capote friends who talked for Burnoughs cameraclaims that during a meeting in the bankers office, the banker asked the writer if he wanted to make a deposit, and Capote said no, but he took deposits, and then proceeded to fellate him.

Truman Capote George Rose/Getty

The famous writer came to dinner with the bankers family in their modest suburban house, riding in a big black limo that fascinated the neighborhood kids; Kate had to stifle her laughter with a tea towel when she first heard Capotes high-pitched snuffle. After Kates dad left his wife and children with zero financial support, Capote took her under his wing, inviting her to live with him at his UN Plaza apartment, jump-starting her career as a model with a visit to Richard Avedons studio, encouraging her to write, and introducing her to all of his well-connected celebrity friends, such as Andy Warhol and Diana Vreeland (for both of whom she later worked).

Burnough said Harrington is the heart and soul of this story, because her relationship with Capote showed that he was capable of nurturing another human being with loving kindness. Harrington has been largely under the radar concerning her relationship with Capote. She granted only a brief interview to Plimpton, a friend of hers, but said something about Ebs persuaded her to share her memories of Capote at length on camera.

I am happy with the documentary. I was so nervous. I was afraid it was going to be mean. The tail-end of his life was so terriblelets just say what it was, and I didnt want to talk about that, Harrington, now 60, told The Daily Beast, adding that she helped care for the writer during his waning days.

Harrington, who decided during the pandemic to start work on a memoir of her life with Capote, named her 20-year-old daughter after him.

I want people to remember Truman as a serious, great writernot about his alcoholism and drug addiction and his fall from grace.

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Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf testifies before a House Financial Services Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S. Reuters

Wells Fargo was hit with a $250 million fine levied by the OCC related to its mortgage business.

The bank said that a separate 2016 consent order over sales practices has now expired.

Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf has been on a mission to reshape the bank since joining in 2019.

See more stories on Insider's business page.

Even as Wells Fargo announced the expiration of a 2016 consent order levied by federal regulators in the wake of a fraudulent account scandal, it now faces a new $250 million fine related to issues stemming from the bank's mortgage loss modification practices.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said that the civil money penalty, and a related cease-and-desist order, have been brought against the bank for "unsafe or unsound practices" related to its mortgage servicing business and for failing to address compliance and risk issues raised in a 2018 OCC consent order.

"Wells Fargo has not met the requirements of the OCC's 2018 action against the bank. This is unacceptable," Michael J. Hsu, acting comptroller of the currency, said in a statement Thursday accompanying the announcement.

"In addition to the $250 million civil money penalty that we are assessing against Wells Fargo, today's action puts limits on the bank's future activities until existing problems in mortgage servicing are adequately addressed," he continued.

The new order will require "the bank to take broad and comprehensive corrective actions to improve the execution, risk management, and oversight of the bank's loss mitigation program," the OCC said. The $250 million penalty will be paid to the US Treasury.

In a statement released Thursday, Wells Fargo simultaneously acknowledged the OCC's disciplinary action and said that a separate 2016 consent order levied by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau over Wells Fargo's sales practices had expired, effective Wednesday.

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"Building an appropriate risk and control infrastructure has been and remains Wells Fargo's top priority," Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf said in the statement. "The OCC's actions today point to work we must continue to do to address significant, longstanding deficiencies."

Scharf has been on a mission to reshape the bank since joining in 2019, overhauling its internal reporting structure to more tightly control risk and promote accountability. The bank has also sold its asset management and corporate trust businesses, in an effort to cut costs and focus on core businesses like consumer banking.

The 2016 CFPB consent order was brought against Wells Fargo after the bank was revealed to have opened millions of fraudulent accounts in a wide-ranging customer-abuse scandal. The expiration of the order, Scharf said in the statement, was "representative of progress we are making."

The bank remains under other restrictions levied by federal regulators, including a 2018 asset cap imposed by the Federal Reserve.

Insider also detailed the sweeping transformation occurring in Wells Fargo's executive ranks as Scharf looks to prove to regulators and customers that the bank has progressed beyond scandal. More than 90 top executives have joined Wells Fargo from outside the bank since 2019.

"Our management team is fundamentally different today than what it was a year and a half ago," Scharf said on a conference call in May.

Read the original article on Business Insider
A pair of Republican lawmakers in Madison are wading into the debate over online free speech.

Rep. Shae Sortwell, R-Gibson, and Sen. Roger Roth, R-Appleton, on Wednesday introduced three pieces of legislation they say will protect peoples free speech right on social media.

Big Tech has long been violating peoples free speech rights through deleting, censoring, and shadow-banning because they disagree with what is posted or who is posting it, Sortwell said. And now, Big Tech is colluding with President Biden to suppress free speech and push his agenda. Government cannot simply bypass their Constitutional restrictions by having businesses do their dirty work for them.

Sortwell and Roths plans include:

LRB 2090, which provides a civil cause of action for any Wisconsin resident against a social media company who censors, shadow-bans, or otherwise alters a users speech on social media sites.

LRB 3211, which protects the ability of journalistic outlets to publish their materials on social media by creating a cause of action for journalistic outlets to push back on social media giants censorship of their publications.

LRB 4301, which implements a penalty structure for government officials in Wisconsin who choose to engage in unethical conduct in direct violation of the First Amendments principles. Sortwell said the idea is to push back on what has become an increasingly aggressive political tone and censorship online.

We expect this kind of suppression in China, but it is disturbing that we have allowed it to occur in America, the Land of the Free, Sortwell added.

None of the plans are likely to become law.

Even if they pass the Republican-controlled legislature, its unlikely Gov. Evers would sign them. And then there are the legal challenges.

A federal judge earlier this year struck down a Florida law that aimed to do many of the same things. The judge in that case said the laws threatened Facebooks and Twitters free speech rights.

Story continues

Washington Examiner Videos

Tags: States, News, Wisconsin, Republicans, Censorship

Original Author: Benjamin Yount, The Center Square

Original Location: Wisconsin Republicans pitch online anti-censorship legislation
It was easier to talk about the events of that day early on, Loos said, when students had personal and emotional experiences tied to the day. As students who were too young or not born on Sept. 11 made their way to his classroom, Loos said it became more challenging.

How he teaches about the events of that day depends on the students he has in front of him, he said. Loos said he largely leads a discussion about the Sept. 11 attacks, relying on the students to add their perspectives and ask questions.

With his high schoolers, Harris still starts out the discussion the same way he did nearly 18 years ago: by trying to make it personal for his students. Harris said he spends time showing news footage from the attacks, as well as videos of people sharing their first-hand accounts of the days events.

It puts a face to it, he said.

***

While this generation of students have no memories associated with Sept. 11, their lives have been changed because of that event.

I always tell my kids Im sorry that they dont know a world before 9/11, DeLong said.
The division was applauded last year for efforts to educate children during the state-ordered shutdown of schools and return last fall under a system of hybrid in-person and remote instruction, Arnold said. He added that same appreciation is not felt so far into the new school year.

So I want to say publicly that all ACPS employees are appreciated and I know what job they are doing every single day. I ask this board to provide support and grace for a group of people who are doing everything in their power to educate children, Arnold said. Theres been a lot of discussion in the community about the number of teachers leaving Amherst. You need to understand teachers everywhere are leaving in record numbers because their jobs are miserable right now. We stick with it because we love children. Our people are doing everything they can do to make this year work and weve been put in a tough spot.

Wells said the delta variant strand of the coronavirus is three times more contagious with much more students in the buildings compared to last school year when many were learning remotely.
When the twin towers fell on Sept. 11, 2001 in New York City, Kimball Payne had been Lynchburgs city manager for less than a year.

He was in a reception area at the Virginia University of Lynchburg when Ralph Reavis, then president of the university, stepped out of his office and told Payne there was something he needed to see.

The Rev. Carl Hutcherson Jr. was in his first term as mayor and was in City Hall when the first plane crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center. Someone set up a television in the room, and he and the staff watched the second plane hit.

Tim Mitchell, now director of Lynchburg Water Resources, was a utility engineer. He had been working for the city for a little more than a year and was sitting at his desk when he got a call from his wife telling him to turn on the news.

"Surreal," he said. Before that, it had been a typical day.

Todd Foreman, now Bedfords police chief, was in Arlington for a training session on crime prevention when everyones pagers suddenly started beeping with word of the attack on the World Trade Center and, whatever was happening, it was not over yet. He remembers the crime prevention instructor commenting this moment would forever change the way police performed their duties.

The stories are familiar. They are told annually at the anniversary, the recitation of where they were when they learned what happened, their reaction, what they saw when they found the nearest television and turned on the news. For many Americans, such stories form a shared experience of a tragedy they will never forget.

I remember, later on that day, it was surreal to see no jet streams in the sky, no airline contrails. Empty skies," Payne said. And just a sense of, I dont know, almost anticipation. Or, like, whats next? Where are we?"

***

The morning of Sept. 11, Payne immediately excused himself from his meeting, left VUL and rushed back to City Hall.

Hutcherson said at City Hall, the phones immediately started ringing. People were asking what was going on, and what the city was going to do.

It was something that really shook everybody to the core, everybody who cares about the nation, who has a conscience," Hutcherson said. Twenty years later, he said, he can remember it almost like it was yesterday.

The city held a press conference. The News & Advance's article in the Sept. 12, 2001, newspaper shows a line of solemn officials curving in front of the bench in council chambers. Chuck Bennett, then chief of the Lynchburg Police Department, stood behind the podium.

Lynchburg city administrators "called for calm" at the Tuesday afternoon conference and assured the public "any threat to the city of Lynchburg is minimal."

"I think we all felt incredibly vulnerable at that point," Payne said. "But trying to assure the public that we could work through it. We need to be patient, see what we can learn and figure out how to move forward."

In the days that followed, as civilians and officials alike still faced plenty of terrifying unknowns, many simply wanted the sense of security felt with having officers present. Bennett said police presence at city schools was widely requested before tapering off in about a weeks time.

The immediate impacts to the city itself, beyond offering comfort and acknowledging fear, initially was unclear. Payne and staff identified areas of regional concern for further attacks  specifically the nuclear-services firm, BWX Technologies; the National D-Day Memorial, which had just been visited by former president George W. Bush two months before; and the Rev. Jerry Falwell Sr. at Liberty University.

Though Payne said city officials didn't specifically move resources in the days that followed, they directed a "higher level of attention" to areas of possible concern.

In the days and weeks that followed, Hutcherson, a reverend, said people flooded the churches "like it was Easter," turning to worship and faith as uncertainty brewed on a national scale. He and other councilmembers fielded countless calls from those who "just wanted to hear a comforting word."

Over the following year, FEMA and other agencies came up with training sessions for first responders of all stripes, Bennett said, which strengthened preparedness and communication for future emergencies. That included departments many might not think of initially because it would be all hands on deck, he said, noting finance personnel would have to handle grants and allocate funding to triage different needs, while school officials and social service workers would be charged with setting up those facilities as shelters.

Everybody was involved in this and everybody ended up having training in this, he said. And we did have a couple of natural disasters where this proved to be very efficient, and that training continues.

The most substantive changes to city services would come in the following months and years  directed towards the city's water supply, as the department now known as Lynchburg Water Resources hiked security and made lasting changes to water and sewer infrastructure.

It definitely changed the way we did business," Mitchell said. "From the day before the attacks we were very open ... Its much more controlled now than it was before that.

Soon after, Mitchell said, the department "became more vigilant" about making sure facilities were closely watched. Until then, water and sewer facilities largely were public, such as the College Hill Water Filtration Plant, which had public streets running through the property. In the years that followed, the city bought more property around the facility so it could better secure the sprawling infrastructure.

Increased security and restricted access was implemented at all water treatment plants, pump stations and water tanks throughout the city.

Federal legislation added more mandates to water systems, and the city underwent a vulnerabilities assessment to identify weaknesses, ensure redundancies, and look at areas to improve security. Employees underwent additional training related to the risk assessment, according to Mitchell, and developed an emergency plan.

It definitely wasnt temporary. Its the new normal, and even beyond that," Mitchell said.

For members of local law enforcement, the attacks led to a progression of different responses that would bolster public safety practices across the board. Emergency responders nationwide saw the consequences of lacking fully integrated communication systems at ground zero, Bennett said, and while the Lynchburg area already was working on such a system, Sept. 11 hastened that process.

Current Police Chief Ryan Zuidema had been with the Lynchburg Police Department for about four years at the time of the attacks and was part of a group within its tactical team that traveled to New Mexico for a federal training session for law enforcement on response to bombings and other terrorist acts.

With many members of the community on high alert, he said there also was an element of community education to help prevent false alarms  some of which included racist profiling, Bennett said.

Zuidema said the focus of law enforcement has since shifted on multiple levels. Where police were primarily focused on domestic threats before the attacks, local agencies started to function more as intelligence gatherers. Databases and information sharing across the local, state, and federal levels opened up, which he said are of critical use today.

Such training and lines of communication would arm officers with the tools theyd need to be the first on the ground in the event of any local attack to keep people safe while preserving evidence for an investigation before higher-level responders arrive.

Twenty years later, Payne said he's certainly thinking about the attack and the days that followed. He's been to ground zero in New York City since, including within a year of the attacks, when memorabilia still adorned the fence at the site. Humans are fairly adaptable, he said, but there's something out there now, a vulnerability that wasn't there before.

***

BWXT Chief Administrative Officer Rick Loving was the company's Director for Administration on Sept. 11, 2001 and remembers two things about that day.

One was the immediate response the nuclear company acted on to ensure its plants and government facilities were secure  including Mt. Athos and Lynchburg  and the other was making sure all employees were safe and accounted for across the country. Among other things, BWXT manufactures nuclear components for the U.S. military and manages U.S. government facilities.

As a government facility at that point in time, we were doing things that were really kind of happening all across the country, and while no one has seen an event like this, you certainly prepare, from a safety and security standpoint, for various types of emergencies, Loving said.

Loving said about 100 staff members were traveling for work that day and while communication wasnt what it is today, it was harder to reach those people and find out where they were.

Everybody immediately just wanted to know, and there was a huge need of understanding what was going on and you're working in a facility, you're only getting bits and pieces of information and trying to communicate to our workforce what was happening, he said. That communication aspect became very, very important.

Loving was at a meeting at a government facility in Ohio and said the overarching questions were: Where are our employees? Are they on a plane somewhere? How do we get them home? and How do we reach them?

For the first hour or two after the attacks, no one knew the magnitude of the events, he said.

I think that was the greatest degree of uncertainty early on, was wondering if it was over, and that really drove you to being extremely cautious and secure in what was happening, he said. But there was a decent amount of time there, which no one knew, had this ended or was this the beginning?

As a government contractor, BWXT continues to work with regulatory agencies and contractors as it has seen the overall security posture evolve.

There was obviously a tremendous amount of review by the government on what they thought was going to be the appropriate level of security at various facilities, he said. What you now take as the norm when you move through an airport or a federal building, a lot of those things used to be a lot more open. We and all the government acknowledged the heightened risks that occurred as a result of those actions and the need to ensure that you're appropriately protected.

Loving said there also was a renewed sense of mission and pride from the employees at the company.

You really understood the importance of what you do for the men and women that are in our services, and the products you provide and when something happens, you want to make sure that they have the very best equipment they've got the very best to be able to respond to whatever that is, he said. We really had this heightened sense of patriotism and importance in what we do, and in times like this, it really means something and continues to ensure you're doing the very best.

***

Andrew LaGala, director of the Lynchburg Regional Airport, was working at the Tampa International Airport that day, and said the events of Sept. 11, 2001, transformed the airline industry.

All air traffic came to a halt, basically ceased for days until the government figured out how to move forward, he said. It was about a week before they started putting planes back in the air.

Even when planes started flying again, demand for air travel plummeted  in Lynchburg, dropping more than 31% in the first five months.

The biggest thing is it caused travelers to either reduce or avoid air travel altogether just due to the perceived risk of flying, he said.

New security protocols were mandated and new restrictions implemented on what was allowed onboard the airplane.

It wasnt just the gun that wasnt allowed on a plane; now anything could be used as a weapon, he said.

Interim security protocols enacted at the airport included deployment of the National Guard at the passenger check point. The Department of Homeland Security was created out of that day, LaGala said, and passenger screening responsibilities transferred from the airlines to the federal government.

The events of Sept. 11, 2001, coupled with the introduction of low-cost carriers, triggered a wave of Chapter 11 reorganization bankruptcies throughout the 2000s among the major airlines. Lynchburg's airport benefited with the introduction of competitive, lowcost airline fares in 2008 by U.S. Airways as a response to loss of passengers to nearby airports.

Twenty years ago, Lynchburg was served by three airlines  U.S. Airlines, United Airlines and Delta Air Lines. In January 2002, United Express discontinued all service to Dulles International Airport from the Lynchburg airport, which LaGala said was a direct result of the attacks.

Airport security was enhanced with the requirement for local law enforcement officers at checkpoints and, as a result, the airport formed a dedicated Airport Police Department, which exists to this day.

LaGala said Transportation Security Administration funds most of the cost  critical for smaller commercial service airports, such as Lynchburg.

Heightened security requirements were put in place at the checkpoint, as well as additional perimeter fencing and airfield security protocols.

He said enhanced security still is evolving. Lynchburg received new CT-80 baggage screening equipment, installed in the past year to ensure 100% checked baggage screening.

There still are restrictions on what you can take with you through the checkpoint, he added.

Those remain in place and those are always evolving, depending on the new risks, and the new security threats that evolve, he said. Its ever changing so TSA is always looking at risk assessments and what can go through a checkpoint.

***

Bennett, the citys former police chief, experienced the after effects of Sept. 11, 2001 from a number of different perspectives.

September 10th, the world was one way; September 11th, the world was another way, and its been that way for the last 20 years," he said.

A leader and advisor in public safety and security with a 50-year career in law enforcement, he recalled a moment that highlighted the sudden difference while heading to a previously scheduled seminar for law enforcement in Paris.

Flying out of Dulles International Airport a little more than a week after Sept. 11, following a period when U.S. airspace was largely shut down, he recalled talking to a flight attendant about his job and why he was flying. Shortly after, the attendant handed him an unopened bottle of champagne  not for in-flight libations, but as a potential weapon to use in case the flight was hijacked. The attendant also had armed himself and a U.S. serviceman on the plane.

When the planes hit, Bennett was in a staff meeting at the Lynchburg Police Department, which had to respond swiftly to sudden widespread unease and fear in the community. Much of that response was to be a public security presence where he recalled reminding many people that first responders are trained and accustomed to running toward the danger, not away from it.

But soon after the fear came an unprecedented sense of solidarity and devotion, with people in Lynchburg mobbing the Red Cross to donate blood, he said.

I have never known the United States and its citizens to be as united as it was in 2001 and into 2002, he said.

After 14 years as chief in Lynchburg, Bennett left for more international work in 2008, in large part helping police in Pakistan with training and working with leadership. There, one major goal was to help their forces become more effective at countering overcome terrorism at home, where thereve been training cells for militant Islamic extremist groups.

We made some inroads into that, but I can only imagine what its like now, he said.

Now, 20 years since, as Taliban forces have rapidly swept in to control Pakistan's neighbor, Afghanistan, as U.S. troops withdrew from there, he said its important to understand the patience such terrorist groups will exercise in exacting revenge.

People need to understand, were in this for the long term, he said. I mean this is going to take years and years and years to hopefully deal with successfully.

Having visited Afghan refugee camps and listened to the basic hopes of security and freedom that Pakistani leaders have for their communities, Bennett said support of those citizens in challenged areas of conflict is vital.

He holds that the lessons from Sept. 11, 2001 stand  that civilians and officials should be vigilant, informed and cautious but not afraid.

I think the majority of the public has simply forgotten those lessons, he said. We have already a whole generation  or maybe two, when you think about it  that never really understood or were alive when this occurred. So all of the stuff thats happened in the past 20 years is perfectly normal to them.
I want to back up to what I said about 9/11 in my classroom, and how their lives would change," Moore said. One of the students in his classroom on Sept. 11, 2001 was a soldier in his platoon in 2007.

He remembers his former student telling him that "only in America can you go to war with your history teacher."

Moore and many of the other speakers, including Lynchburg Mayor MaryJane Dolan, delivered speeches about the importance of unity, and of remembering a day that, for many, is impossible to forget. Regardless of differences, on 9/11, Dolan said "we were all American," which earned applause and murmurs of agreement from the audience.

"Our world changed forever," said Chuck Bennett, who was Lynchburg's police chief that day. It was a day "etched in memory," he said, with blue skies and fair weather, just like the sky overhead Friday, but one that would result in the single deadliest day for firefighters and police officers in the country's history.

Steve Bozeman, with the Lynchburg Area Veterans Council, pointed out a banner hung over the terrace steps behind him.

"The sign behind me says it all," Bozeman said, pointing back: "Never forget."
For 20 years since Sept. 11, 2001, U.S. presidents have been saying their anti-terrorism policies have worked, as evidenced by no new attacks on America. While we should be grateful another attack hasnt occurred, past performance is no guarantee of future success. Fanatics are nothing but patient, as we have seen in Afghanistan.

Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley has said the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan could lead to civil war and the possible reconstitution of al Qaeda. That should come as no surprise as the goals of our enemies in the Middle East have been expressed openly for decades. Their actions have proven a commitment to killing Americans and destabilizing democracies and their economies.

Underestimating ones enemy is always a fatal error as we saw on 9/11. President Obama once dismissed al Qaeda as the JV team. In fact, they are the varsity. It is difficult to deter or destroy an ideology whose adherents are willing to die for its cause, especially when they believe they are carrying out orders from their god.
The European Union says it is removing Japan from its list of countries and regions exempt from restrictions on nonessential travel into the bloc.

The move comes after a recent surge in coronavirus infections from the highly-contagious Delta variant.

The EU said on Thursday that it is dropping Japan, along with several other nations, from the exemption list. Japan was added to the list in June ahead of the summer vacation season.

In principle, the EU restricts nonessential travel from outside the bloc due to the coronavirus pandemic, while allowing visitors from certain parts of the world that it considers are keeping the virus outbreak under control.

The EU notes that member states can lift restrictions on nonessential travel for fully vaccinated visitors.

Each EU member state can make its own rules on whether to actually ban travelers from Japan, as they have the authority to control their national borders.

Germany on Sunday added some countries, including Japan, to its list of areas for which short-term travelers, such as tourists, face tighter entry restrictions if they are not fully vaccinated.

The EU reimposed travel restrictions on the United States and Israel on August 30.
A team including Japanese researchers has been awarded an Ig Nobel Prize for studying how pedestrians distracted by smartphones can disrupt the orderly movement of crowds.

The spoof prize for "research that makes people laugh and then think" was presented on Thursday online instead of the usual venue at Harvard University, due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The Kinetics Prize was awarded to a Japanese, Swiss and Italian team for studying how "mutual anticipation can contribute to self-organization in human crowds."

The team enlisted two groups of 27 pedestrians, and watched how they spontaneously organized bidirectional flows by anticipating each other's movements.

The experiment showed that when three pedestrians in a group were distracted by mobile phones, both the distracted and non-distracted had difficulty avoiding collisions. The team says the group required nearly twice the time to form an orderly pattern.

Assistant Professor Murakami Hisashi of Kyoto Institute of Technology said he was surprised and pleased that the team won the prize. He said he wants people to turn their attention to the interesting individual interactions that shape collective human behavior.

This is the 15th straight year that Japanese researchers have won an Ig Nobel.

The Economics Prize went to a team whose study concluded that politicians' obesity may be a good indicator of their countries' corruption. The Entomology Prize was awarded to studies of a new method of cockroach control on submarines.
The number of new coronavirus cases reported in Japan on Friday continued to decline. It comes as the government is extending the state of emergency in many parts of the country, including Tokyo and Osaka.

Authorities confirmed nearly 8,900 infections on Friday. The average number of new cases over the past seven days was 64 percent that of the previous week.

But the government says the medical system is still under great strain. It has decided to extend strict anti-virus measures beyond this weekend, through the end of the month.

The vaccine rollout continues to make steady progress. The government says everyone who wants to get shots will get them by October or November.

Officials plan to ease restrictions using a system that checks vaccination certificates or negative test results. Restrictions on bars and restaurants, as well as travel across prefectural borders, would be relaxed.

But experts say measures should not be eased until the state of emergency is lifted. They note there are still more than 2,000 patients around the country in serious condition.

Toho University Professor Tateda Kazuhiro said, "People will need to continue to take various precautions when they travel or eat out. It will be important to relax restrictions on people's activities one step at a time."

He says the authorities must try to minimize the number of new cases to prevent another surge.
Japans second-biggest city, Yokohama, has officially withdrawn its bid to host a casino resort.

The city was once a big favorite to be chosen as a location for one of three integrated resorts under government legislation passed in 2018 to legalize casino gaming in Japan.

But the writing has been on the wall for Yokohama since the surprise election of its new mayor, Dr Takeharu Yamanaka, who opposed the casino process.

The data scientist and former Yokohama City University professor has no prior political experience. But his work on analysing vaccine efficacy on coronavirus variants is what sold him to voters, suggesting that casinos are not high on the list for a populace prioritizing safety during the pandemic.

Former mayor Fumiko Hayashi declared Yokohamas interest in an integrated resort in 2019. But her continued support of the casino project contributed to her downfall at the recent election.

The new mayor said at his first policy speech at a local assembly Friday that the city government would immediately halt the ongoing process of bidding for the integrated resort in response to the voices of citizens opposed to the integrated resort project.

The process itself has been halted because of the coronavirus pandemic, but the government has said it plans to pick the three locations between October and April next year.

Now that Yokohama is out of the picture, just three prospective hosts remain: the city of Osaka and Osaka Prefecture, Wakayama Prefecture, and Nagasaki Prefecture. Each has teamed up with an international casino operator on their respective bids.
Japan Airlines Co. said Friday it will raise around Y300 billion ($2.7 billion) via a combination of subordinated loans and bonds to bolster its financial standing as the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic drags on.

The funds will also be used to introduce Airbus 350s that are considered more environmentally friendly and are expected to be the airlines primary aircraft for international flights, JAL said.

The major airline will take out subordinated loans worth around 200 billion from Japanese megabanks  MUFG Bank, Mizuho Bank and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp.  along with the state-backed Development Bank of Japan. Around 100 billion will be raised by issuing subordinated bonds.

JAL can avoid share dilution by using the methods. Subordinated loans can count partially as capital.

Last November, JAL raised around Y180 billion through a public stock offering and other means to survive the crisis and cover replacement costs for its fleet.

JAL has a relatively strong financial base compared to its global peers, with a capital adequacy ratio standing at 42.4% at the end of June.
Japans Administrative Reform Minister Taro Kono is the favorite to succeed outgoing Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga as the next president of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, according to an opinion poll conducted by Nikkei and TV Tokyo on Sept. 9-11.

The LDP presidential election, scheduled for Sept. 29, will effectively pick the next prime minister. Suga on Sept. 3 said he will not seek reelection.

A total of 27% of respondents picked Kono when asked who would be "the right person" to choose as LDP president. Former LDP Secretary-General Shigeru Ishiba was second with 17% and former LDP policy chief Fumio Kishida was third with 14%. Former Interior Minister Sanae Takaichi was fifth with 7%.

Kono, Kishida and Takaichi have announced that they will run, while Ishiba is considering his options. Environment Minister Shinjiro Koizumi was in fourth place with 10%, former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was in sixth place with 6%, and Seiko Noda, the LDPs executive acting secretary-general who is eager to run, was in seventh place with 2%.

The survey asked respondents to pick one of 10 LDP politicians. Among respondents who were LDP supporters, Kishida moved up to second place and Ishiba came in third. Kono, Kishida and Takaichi were 3 to 5 percentage points higher than the overall figures, while support for Ishiba fell by 4 points lower than the overall figure.

Among the "non-partisan class" that did not support a particular political party, Kono still came in at the top at 22% and Ishiba was second with 16%. Kishida was 9% and Takaichi was 4%.

The LDP president is elected via voting by members of parliament that belong to the LDP, as well as party members and supporters. The election, which will be quickly followed by the lower house election, is an event to choose the face of the party. LDP members are expected to vote with an awareness of the candidates popularity among the public.
Whatsapp brings end-to-end encryption for your messages backups, as well

New Delhi, Sat, 11 Sep 2021 Supratik Mitra

Whatsapp for a long time, to protect the privacy of the users on the messaging app, has provided default end-to-end encryption. This means messages can only be read by the recipient and sender of the messages, and no one in between.



However, the loophole in the encryption system was that a user could not encrypt their backup messages, on their iCloud for Apple and Google Drive for Android users. This kept a back door into private messages of a user from the messaging app.



Solving this problem, Facebook the parent company of Whatsapp announced on Friday, that they would now also provide an option for the users to encrypt their backed-up messages. This would mean neither Whatsapp nor a service provider will have access to backed-up messages or the backup encryption key.



People as of now can already backup their message history via cloud-based services like Google Drive or iCloud, which the company does not have access to, said the press releases introducing the new privacy feature.



Additionally now, a user can select to enable end-to-end encrypted (E2EE) backups once available, to further protect their backed-up messages.



To enable E2EE backups, the company has developed an all-new system for storing encryption keys that work both for Android and iOS-based devices. With the new feature enabled, backups will be encrypted with a unique key, which is randomly generated. A user can then choose to secure the key manually, or through password protection, which would then store the unique encryption key in a Backup Key Vault that is built based on a component called a hardware security module (HSM)  specialized, secure hardware that can be used to securely store encryption keys.



When a user requires access to their stored backups, they can decrypt the messages with the encryption key, which can be again accessed via a password set by them, from the Backup Key Vault.



Whatsapp has also taken measures to assure that keys stored in the Backup vault cannot be accessed through brute-force attempts. The HSM-based Backup Key Vault is responsible for enforcing password verification attempts and would render the key permanently inaccessible after a limited number of unsuccessful attempts to access it. Whatsapp in its post also said, WhatsApp will know only that a key exists in the HSM. It will not know the key itself.



Whatsapps front-end service ChatD is responsible for handling client connections and client-server authentication. It shall implement a protocol that sends the key to and from Whatsapp servers. The messages exchanged between the client and HSM-based Backup key vault, will also be encrypted and not visible to ChatD itself.



The backup will be generated as a continuous stream of data that is encrypted using systematic encryption, with a generated key. With E2EE, backups can also be stored off-device.



Whatsapps clientele is of about 2 million people, spread across the globe. To make the HSM-based Backup Key Vault always readily available, for this huge user base, the company has decided to distribute the HSM-Based Backup Key Vault service geographically across multiple servers.



The process of accessing seems rather simple on paper. Users who have chosen to safeguard their encryption key in the Backup Key Vault would have to enter the password, which would then be verified by the Backup Key Vault. Once the verification is done the Backup Key Vault will send the encryption key back to the WhatsApp client. Once the client receives the key they can then use it to decrypt the backup messages. Alternatively, the users who have chosen to manually store their 64-digit key would have to manually enter the key themselves to decrypt the messages.



According to the post made by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, introducing the new feature, Whatsapp is the first global messaging service at this scale to offer end-to-end encrypted messaging and backups.



The E2EE backups are supposed to roll out by the end of the month, for both Apple and Android users.
The controversial law, passed by Congress and signed into law by President Bush, expanded the governments authority to follow suspected terrorists, keep sophisticated terrorists under surveillance, share information among government agencies, allow people whose computers got hacked to ask for law enforcements help and increase penalties for certain crimes likely to be committed by terrorists, among other things.

By a show of hands, most students indicated that they felt the sources were very informative.

Trecek said she plans to teach students about 9/11 each year.

Ever since 9/11, its something we all have to be aware of  but I think especially now, the way things are, its probably at the forefront of everybodys minds, she said.

When it happened, Trecek was only in seventh or eighth grade and didnt fully understand its significance, she said.

I knew it was sad, I knew it was a tragedy, but I didnt think about the long-term effects, she said. I just didnt think something like that would happen in the country where I live. I didnt think it would lead to a war that would last two decades. You become more aware that its not just the shock and the damage that happens at the time, its all the ripples that come after that.
All in all, the family dealt with the loss pretty well, Emmet Tinley said.

The girls really did very well, he said. I think the girls were a help to one another and to others. I was able to handle things to get people through it, and, I think for the most part, they did. There were some tears, but there was an awful lot of laughter and remembrances.

Of course, nothing makes up for the loss of a loved one.

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We sure miss him, he said. He was a lot of fun to be around. Every family has their favorite uncle, and that was Mike in our family.

Though Mike Tinley and his family had lived out of state while Kathleen Tinley was growing up in Council Bluffs, he was special to her, too. When they were visiting, it seemed like they had only been apart a couple days, she said.

He just had this big personality, she said. He made you feel like you were the center of attention  you were the focus.

After the attacks, Kathleen Tinley joined a group called Sept. 11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows.
Today, I think about all that came after. The sense of togetherness, that maybe never truly existed as fully as we remember and definitely withered away quickly. (Finding our way back to that idealized togetherness sure would be something, right?) A war to strike back at the attackers that lasted 20 years in the graveyard of empires. And another war that had nothing to do with 9/11. Uplifting stories of humanity from both, coupled with stories of the horror of war.

Today, I think about the future. And the need to remember the past. Never forget is a cliche, but its apt. We must continue to remember 9/11. What came before it, what came after.

And we must continue to think about what we want from our future.

I was late to work that day. As I walked into the office, I was relieved to see that several of the news people were just watching TV.

Then I saw a horrifying video clip of the second jetliner crashing into the south tower of the World Trade Center on the screen, and I understood why they could not tear themselves away.
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European issues also came up, including climate policy and an ongoing dispute between Warsaw and Brussels over changes to the judicial system in Poland which the EU considers to violate the rule of law.

Merkel said she hoped the issue can be solved through dialogue. Merkel, who has been chancellor since 2005, plans to step down after an election later this month.

A meeting between Merkel and President Andrzej Duda, which was originally announced by the German government, isn't taking place after all, and political observers in Warsaw interpreted that as a snub.

Dudas office said Duda would instead be in the southern Polish city of Katowice for celebrations marking the anniversary of Solidarity, the anti-communist trade union.

Relations have sometimes been strained under Poland's government because it has often said it plans to demand reparations from World War II, an issue that resonates with older Poles. Germany often voices remorse for its wartime occupation of Poland, but says the issue of reparations has already been dealt with.

Morawiecki said that despite some disagreements, the Polish-German relationship has developed well during Merkel's time at the helm, and thanked her for her cooperation.
The Nebraska State Patrol removed 55 impaired drivers from the road during this summers Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over campaign.

This summer was filled with road trips and vacations for many families across Nebraska and visitors to our state, Col. John Bolduc, superintendent of the Nebraska State Patrol, said in a press release. Our troopers also stayed busy helping motorists and working to keep the roads safe for all travelers.

During the campaign, troopers made 55 arrests for driving under the influence. Troopers also issued citations for speeding (930), driving under suspension (91), no proof of insurance (71), minor in possession (9), open alcohol container (18), no seat belt (20), and improper child restraint (8). During the two-week effort, troopers also performed 796 motorist assists.

The Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over campaign ran Aug. 20-Sept. 6. The effort was made possible in part by a grant for $25,000 from the Nebraska Department of Transportations Highway Safety Office.


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Washington, PA (15301)

Today

Mixed clouds and sun with scattered thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. High 73F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to mostly cloudy skies after midnight. Low 61F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
So will we only know what happened during the hearing if her lawyer says anything about it afterwards? Or will journalists be allowed? Sorry probably a really dumb question, but I have no idea how it works in the US and if media for example also count as the public

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Basically... another way for us to hear what they want us to hear. There was plenty of backlash when the audio from her last testimony hearing went public.







Edited at 2021-09-10 11:23 pm (UTC)

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Ah yeah I wasnt sure if that hearing was public or not, because I remember the audio stream but I dont know if the stream was available because the hearing was public or whether it was available even though the hearing wasnt public (even though the stream wasnt meant to be shared iirc but Im glad we were able to listen live). Sucks that they can make these hearings restricted to the public :/

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Omg!!! Britney driving yesterday (9/9) with new red extensions in her hair!!!  pic.twitter.com/RuGbtRsqm6  TheOriginalDoll (@DieWithoutBrit) September 10, 2021

Britney was also spotted driving with new red extensions in her hair and is rumored to make an appearance at this years VMA's... doesn't seem likely so I didn't include.



Edited at 2021-09-10 11:22 pm (UTC) Britney was also spotted driving with new red extensions in her hair and is rumored to make an appearance at this years VMA's... doesn't seem likely so I didn't include.

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OMGAWD and she's by herself!! I hope those extensions means she can finally gets her spa and pamper days!



She probably already hit up starbucks lol!

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My friend/ex Dimitri does her hair and thats like one thing shes been able to get done semi regularly at least.

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yay but i hate that she will probably never be free from the paparazzi.

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I wonder how Britney feels about that Time 100 spot.



I hope we get deets regarding the next court hearing.

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 Isolation

 Drugging

 Threats & Coercion

 Trafficking

 Forced-Sterilization

 Financial Control

 Micromanaging Access To Tech & Resources

 Intimidation + Gaslighting

 Using Children As Pawns

all approved by a CORRUPT COURT for over 13 years  #FreeBritney pic.twitter.com/dgjmYj4ZEl  ZACCY (@ZACCYTWEETS) September 9, 2021

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Poor Britney :(!!

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Bish, where's your icon??

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Yeah, idc if it makes me sound like a conspiracy nut but I don't think public access is restricted to protect Britney's privacy.

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OKAY CALIFORNIA COME THRU WITH THE NEW LAW!!!



Shows social pressure makes things happen!

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Or better yet....



"Vaccinated People" are #1 and we can all be on the cover.



I am not sure if no public access means not reporters. Just envisioning a courtroom packed with



Healthcare Workers need to be #1Or better yet...."Vaccinated People" are #1 and we can all be on the cover.I am not sure if no public access means not reporters. Just envisioning a courtroom packed with #FreeBritney protesters might be chaos.

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Yeah. Im actually okay with this. A bunch of randos (even if they are there to support Britney) dont need to be in the courtroom; it would truly become a circus and probably do more harm than good.

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It's a weird spot to be in because really the public shouldn't have access to these hearings. Morally it's fine Britney explicitly said she wants the public to hear, but it shouldn't take it being public for her to get justice. I just hope her being made an example of leads to more.

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i think it should be closed to the public and she can choose what to speak about after, either herself or through her lawyer.



there could be embarrassing or very personal information on Britney exposed that is just not appropriate for the public to hear. it wouldn't surprise me if her father used the threat of everything coming out in court to keep her in line

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We only know how horrific the c-ship is bc her testimony was public though ...

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Judge Penny, we're watching sister friend

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this is how you create a loyal fandom--by being a genuine, kind, talented queen with a heart of gold. I stan.

influential queen, your TIME is now!

sending all my positiveney to her and her lawyer <3 <3 <3

tear jamie and co. apart!

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There should absolutely be public access, especially if thats what Britney wants. Without her testimony being public in June nothing in this case would have progressed the way it has. Britney told the judge back in 2019 what was happening and nothing happened til 2 fucking years later when she got to speak publicly. Thankfully Britney finally has a competent lawyer so Im not as worried about the access being denied as I would have been if it was still Ingham representing her



When Britney is free Im worried the paparazzi is going to hound her like 2007 again. The public has to hold the tabloids accountable for the stories they start writing about her. Its going to be a circus, at least for the first couple months

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I understand the suspicion of closed hearings given everything thats gone on, but if theyre going to be talking termination they are likely going to have to discuss medical topics etc. Finally she has a lawyer who can be trusted to actually do something to request open hearings if thats what she wants, and clearly from past filings shes not here for closing them where no sensitive info is being discussed, but there may still be some things she doesnt want aired.



The other thing is that in terms of public access, when she testified there were people broadcasting it against the courts directions. As much as you can argue that was to the public good, and Britneys good (I know Im glad I and others could hear it in her own voice), courts do not fuck around with these things - if observers wont adhere to restrictions they will just close hearings.

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Sounds like there's just going to be more control in the court. Journalists and media aren't usually counted as part of the general public either so it doesn't mean the public won't know, just that fans can't be in there

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That's what I thought too, doesn't seem unusual for a case this high profile.

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After recent announcements of new developments in Iraq by several oil majors, the country appears to be rebounding strongly from the coronavirus pandemic, looking to maintain its reputation for oil as well as establish itself as a renewable energy innovator.

Last week, French supermajor Total announced it would be constructing four large energy projects in the south of Iraq in a $27 million deal, expected to commence before the end of 2021.

The deal includes investments in improved crude oil recovery, a gas processing plant, enhancing the Iraqi gas market through greater production more competitive prices, and a solar power plant project. The funding will allow Iraq to boost crude output in its Artawi oilfield from 85,000 bpd now to 210,000 bpd as well as achieving gas production levels of 300 million cubic feet of gas per day.

But this is just the latest in several optimistic achievements in Iraqs oil and gas industry in 2021, following months of developments after the worldwide oil slump in 2020. In August, Iraq announced that its oil exports had risen to 3.054 million bpd from 2.9 million bpd in July. This reflects the increase in global demand for oil experienced throughout the summer months, with Iraqs August oil revenue reaching $6.5 billion and an average barrel price of $69.

Related: 3 Bearish Catalysts For Oil This Fall

This comes after the country finally returned to production levels not seen since April 2020 in July. Iraq produced 4.18 million bpd of crude in July, demonstrating an increase of around 150,000 bpd compared to June, above the agreed-upon OPEC production cut-off point. Overall, Iraq produces the highest quantity of oil of any OPEC country apart from Saudi Arabia.

This is an important turnaround for Iraqs oil-dependent economy, which was hit particularly hard during the coronavirus pandemic, as oil demand dropped, and prices plummeted leaving Iraqs economy in tatters. After several months of OPEC+ production cuts, Iraq is finally able to return to its pre-pandemic output, helping to support both jobs and the national economy.

Also in August, BP and PetroChina announced a joint venture to operate Iraqs giant Rumaila oilfield. The oilfield will be run by state-owned Basra Energy Co. Ltd., with access to funding from BP. While the oilfield will continue to emit greenhouse gasses, BP hopes that the joint venture will provide the capital needed to invest more heavily in other low-carbon projects.

British supermajor BP has worked hard in recent months to shift public opinion of its practices, investing heavily in the development of renewable energy projects, with the aim of achieving 50 gigawatts of renewable energy in its portfolio by 2030, as well as maintaining its strong oil and gas portfolio. However, its operations in Rumaila have repeatedly caused the company to come under fire as Iraq is one of the biggest methane emitters globally.

BP has been developing the major oilfield since 2010, with new operations under the joint venture planned to run until at least 2034. Rumaila is one of the worlds biggest oilfields, producing over 1.4 million bpd.

This was positive news for Iraq, following the previous withdrawal of other international supermajors from the country due to political instability and the difficulties in foreign company terms within the countrys oil industry. Until recently, BP was expected to withdraw from Rumaila as it sought more carbon-friendly oil projects. However, the government has recently improved operating conditions for foreign oil companies in a bid to keep them in the market.

Changing regulations on foreign investment in the countrys oil sector comes as part of the oil ministrys bid to raise oil production to an 8 million bpd of oil average by 2027, almost doubling its current output.

In line with this target, the Iraqi government has already provided several foreign oil firms with operating licenses to drill new wells as well as recovering existing ones in the areas of Kirkuk, Baghdad, Basra, Maysan and Nasiriyah; BP and Eni being two of the major international firms to pick up contracts. Iraq is also in talks with Chinas CNOOC over the potential recovery of 150 wells in the Bazarkan field at an estimated cost of $160 million dollars. Several of these wells were abandoned during the pandemic due to the lack of demand. However, many are still viable and could go a long way to supporting Iraqs 2027 oil production target.

As well as investing in the future of its oil and gas industry, Iraq is also showing its openness to new renewable energy developments. This September, Iraqs finance minister made a call for OPEC to greatly consider the movement away from fossil fuels to more sustainable renewable energy projects.

Reiterating this message, deputy prime minister of Iraq, Ali Allawi, wrote to media outlet The Guardian urging oil producers to pursue an economic renewal focused on environmentally sound policies and technologies, including solar and nuclear power.

In recent months, Iraq has announced several agreements with international oil and gas players for the development of renewable projects in the coming years. As well as with Total, Iraq has also signed an agreement with PowerChina ink for the development of solar energy plants expected to produce as much as 2 GW of power. This would help the country to decrease its dependence on Iranian electricity.

While Iraq looks far from prepared to back away from its oil and gas engagements, with plans to develop the sector further over the next decade, it is also looking to lead OPEC member states on renewable energy as it works with foreign supermajors on the development of solar and other alternative energy projects.

By Felicity Bradstock for Oilprice.com

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The European electricity market is in crisis as a perfect storm is driving up prices to ever greater heights. The timing couldn't have been worse as countries across the continent are reopening and energy demand is rising. Most signs point towards the likely continuation of the current situation while there is a chance that things could get worse. There is an opportunity to balance the electricity market towards normal prices, but that means geopolitical concessions which not everyone is willing to make.

Rising costs are a consequence of bad luck when it comes to the weather, geopolitical developments, and ambitious decarbonization policies. According to Julien Hoarau, head of EnergyScan, the analytics unit of French utility Engie, the problem hasnt even started yet. Europe will face a very tight winter.

Unusually cold weather during the last heating season increased demand for natural gas that is supplied by domestic production, imports, and underground gas storage. Under normal circumstances, these storages are filled in the summer period when demand is low and prices favorable. This year's buying season is interrupted as there is less natural gas on the market. As usual, East Asia is willing to pay a premium that draws LNG cargoes to the Far East. Russia, on the other hand, doesn't seem to be willing to fill the gap this time.

Related: Why Hedge Funds Are Turning Bullish On Oil Again Furthermore, Scandinavias electricity export capacity is drastically less than usual as drought has hit the region this summer. Several submerged cables connect hydropower-rich countries such as Norway and Sweden with the Netherlands, Denmark, and Germany. However, water levels are unusually low, meaning there is less cheap electricity to export to the south.

Also, the industrialized northwest of Europe is less windy in the summer which is the main green source of electricity in this region of the continent. Solar plays a marginal role in the north compared to the south. Therefore, Europe has relied on traditional thermal sources: coal and natural gas.

Demand for coal has increased dramatically which has raised prices by 70 percent this year. Besides higher demand, the costs for carbon emission certificates have further increased the financial pressure. Speculators and higher demand are the main driving factors behind the record ETS prices. Coal, which emits twice the amount of CO2 compared to natural gas, has a higher need for these certificates.

The most interesting part, arguably, of the growing electricity bill on the continent, is the lack of sufficient volumes of natural gas. European production has been decreasing steadily over the years due to technical and political reasons. Europes single largest gas field in the north of the Netherlands is being closed after residents successfully lobbied for closure due to extraction-induced tremors in the production area. The most obvious solution would be more imports, but both LNG and piped natural gas exporters have failed to meet demand.

Related: 3 Bearish Catalysts For Oil This Fall

Of these exporters, Gazprom has the best cards to dramatically increase its sales in Europe. But so far, the Russian company has shown reluctance to meet demand. Although there are more companies active on the European market, none has the production and transport capacity to act as a swing producer such as Gazprom. The Russians, however, havent booked additional transit capacity through Ukraines pipeline system except to supply customers under regular contractual obligations.

Gazprom, meanwhile, has completed the controversial Nord Stream 2 pipeline (NS2) that will double its direct export capacity to Europes largest importer and consumer of natural gas: Germany. Some analysts explain Moscow's reluctance to send more gas as a method to pressure the EU on green-lighting NS2. The quick approval and certification could enable the flow of gas before the end of the year. Regardless of Gazproms need of finishing the pipeline, the company seems comfortable with high prices.

For years, the companys main goal was to increase its market share. Gazprom has changed track and strives for higher profits instead. The current situation can be seen as compensation for last years dramatic losses when the world economy ground to a halt.

There is no quick fix to the current situation. European customers, therefore, hope the winter will be mild and favorable windy conditions mitigate rising costs this year. When it comes to NS2, however, there is no easy solution. The current situation is a wake-up call for the European establishment which urgently needs to rethink how the continent's energy security can be improved. Climate change is increasing the number of days with extreme weather conditions. This means that large price fluctuations could happen more often as the energy system increasingly becomes dependent on the weather.

By Vanand Meliksetian for Oilprice.com

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In search of higher prices, shale oil producers have reined in upstream capex over the last couple of years. Before 2019 they were focused on ever-increasing incremental production growth, and often bragged about their year over year Compound Annual Growth Rate-CAGR, in investor publications. No more. The oil price crash of 2020, having led to near bankruptcy scenarios for some of them, has initiated a much more austere mindset in the boardrooms of many companies. Many are heavily laden with legacy debt from those free-wheeling days ofnot very long ago.

Now, thanks to a doubling of oil prices since the first of the year, and sharply reduced Capital Expenditures-Capex, these companies are producing prodigious amounts of operating cash flow-OCF. Capex is now held to what the industry calls Maintenance Capex. Enough only to maintain production at levels only sufficient to replace natural field declines, or a low, single-digit growth rate. These companies are now focused on two things. The first is repairing their balance sheets by paying down debt. The second is attracting and retaining investors by rewarding them with a good chunk of the startling amount of excess cash they are generating.



Authors research, company filings

As you can see in the table above, many of the companies listed are generating huge volumes of cash in excess of whats required to support their current dividends. This gives rise to the potential for additional capital returns to shareholders in the coming quarters. This excess cash gives a measure of security to yield and income-seeking investors that these increasingly generous programs are funded internally without resort to debt or capital raises. It further insulates them from an investors worst fear, capital loss.

In this article, we will discuss how this return of capital is taking place and the relative under-valuation of the traditional energy sector as compared with other sectors.

Under-valuation in traditional energy companies

There are two primary vehicles for these companies to distribute this wealth to shareholders. One is through increased dividends, and the other is through advantageous stock repurchases. Many of the first group, in the lightly-gray shaded rows, have been giving increased dividends and share repurchases priority due to a feeling their common stock is undervalued by the market. They have reasons for this suspicion.

If you compare the valuations for the energy sector against the valuations other industries are receiving, there is a substantial disconnect between cash flow and the earnings multiples investors are willing to pay. Valuation methods can vary. Operations Cash Flow or OCF, is one I use frequently as it tells you how much cash the companys business generated over a period of time. It also tells you about the companys ability to continue meeting Capital Expenditures-Capex, on a regular basis without resorting to credit lines, or common shareholder diluting capital raises. It also tells you the amount of cash available to meet stockholder expectations of capital returns, or dividends and share repurchases. Related: The Major Problem With EVs No One Is Talking About As an example lets compare the cash generation between Occidental Petroleum, (NYSE: OXY) and NextEra Energy, (NYSE: NEE). One company produces oil and gas primarily, and the other participates in the Green Energy sector building windmill farms for electricity generation.



Authors research/company filings

Investors in NextEra are looking past a mountain of debt to award the company a capitalization of $168 bn at the current share price of ~$85. Some of this is understandable given the figurative, wind at the back, of this industry. Windfarms could be the tulip craze of the modern era, and are endorsed and sanctioned by local, state, and the Federal government. However, if dividend security is analyzed using conventional metrics in the table above, investors in OXY should be sleeping much better at night, than those holding shares of NEE.

At some point, investors in NEE may have to come to grips with the fact that as attractive as this sector is socially, it is not generating returns sufficient to maintain generous dividends being offered.

Analysts are beginning to take note of the cash generation being seen in the American upstream oil industry. Scott Gruber of Citibank, (NYSE:CITI) recently put out a bullish note on OXY, citing the companys cash flow yield of ~13% for 2022. His short-term estimate for the stock includes growth to ~$35 per share.

When all of this is considered you can understand why execs at OXY are anxious to finish their deleveraging over the next year. Vicki Hollub, CEO at OXY commented on the coming shift in capital allocation priorities once debt targets are insight-

We have significantly de-risked our balance sheet with the successful completion of our recent debt tenders, and this marks the next stage of our deleveraging effort as we work to further reduce debt and to lower our breakeven.

While we still have work to do before transitioning to the next stage of our cash flow priorities, including returning additional capital to shareholders, we're confident that the steps we have completed to date and the strong operational performance that we continue to deliver will accelerate our progress.

OXY filings

Another company Devon Energy, (NYSE: DVN), has already begun returning capital to shareholders in the form of an innovative dividend policy and share repurchases. Jeff Ritenour, CFO of DVN commented in their recent analyst call about capital allocation-

I would say the share repurchases is certainly moving up the list of options for us, potential options for us as we move through the back half of this year. We could absolutely supplement it with some incremental variable dividends and potentially some incremental share repurchases. I think the other thing we'll look at as we get further into the year and probably into 2022 is the potential to increase the fixed dividend as well.

DVN Company filings

DVNs newly implemented dividend policy includes a modest regular dividend of $0.44 per share combined with a special dividend that constitutes a plan to return as much as 50% of excess cash to investors.



DVN Company filings

Your takeaway

Many factors have resulted in the under-valuation of the traditional energy sector. Fluctuating oil and gas prices have annihilated balance sheets in prior years. Now improved products prices have opened a window for these companies to repair-pay down debt, those balance sheets, and return capital to shareholders.

Related: Why Bitcoin Miners Are Setting Up Shop In Texas Oilfields

At present this cash generation potential is under-appreciated by the market. We dont think this will be the case for long, and investors looking for growth and income should consider if investing in traditional energy producers fits their risk profile. Attractive capital return plans and very shareholder-friendly management could set the table for a very rewarding long-term investment for shareholders in these companies.

It should be noted that these companys fortunes are directly tied to oil and gas prices which are currently in an uptrend. This trend reverses rapidly and investors should factor this into their individual decisions.

By David Messler for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
Health

Omaha health experts say COVID can leave kids with serious complications

With a second full school year during the pandemic now underway and cases of COVID-19 on the rise in Nebraska, school officials, health experts and parents are focused on how to keep kids in school  and protected from the coronavirus.

As outbreaks have occurred and some classrooms have closed, more school districts have mandated masks for students and staff. Hastings Public Schools instituted a districtwide mandate last week, and the Kearney school district first required  and then suspended pending further discussion Monday  masks for all students and staff.

Still, some metro-area districts have kept masks optional, and Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts last week repeated his opposition to mandates of any kind, including mask mandates.

Kids are no more at risk from COVID-19 than they are from influenza, Ricketts said.

He compared federal estimates for pediatric influenza deaths in the U.S.  477 and 434, respectively, during the 2018-19 and 2019-20 flu seasons  to the estimated 385 who had died from COVID-19 through Aug. 21. (By Friday, the figure was 521. Reported flu deaths for 2018-19 and 2019-20 were 144 and 199. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention gives estimates to account for underreporting of flu-related deaths.) Nebraska, Ricketts said, has recorded fewer than five pediatric deaths during the pandemic.

We dont mask up kids for the flu, he said. Theres no reason to mask them up for the coronavirus. Theyre not going to be at risk.

But a top local pediatrician and a pandemic preparedness expert say deaths arent the only measure of the toll COVID-19 can take on kids.

While hospitalizations and deaths still are more common in adults, children, too, can have serious complications, they said. COVID-related hospitalizations among kids have outpaced those for flu and have risen sharply in recent weeks. And a significant share of kids suffer lingering symptoms for weeks and months after COVID-19 infections.

Thats very rare in influenza, said Dr. Kari Simonsen, chairwoman of the University of Nebraska Medical Centers pediatrics department. We dont even talk about (lingering symptoms from flu).

REBECCA S. GRATZ/THE WORLD-HERALD Kari Simonsen

Another key difference: Anyone 6 months or older can get a flu shot, while children under 12 still arent eligible for a coronavirus vaccine.

Top federal health officials now say they dont expect a vaccine to be available for 5- to 11-year-olds until late fall or winter.

The highly contagious delta variant also is shifting the landscape.

A study by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last week found that weekly hospitalization rates for children and teens rose nearly fivefold from late June to mid-August, coinciding with the increased circulation of delta.

Hospitalization rates in that study remained slightly below Januarys peak. However, the study drew only from select counties in 14 states, a list that doesnt include recent Southern hot spots. Nationally, pediatric hospitalizations have continued to climb in the three weeks since the study closed.

Researchers also found that hospitalizations were 10 times higher in children 4 and younger since the rise of delta. Among teens, hospitalizations were 10 times higher among the unvaccinated than among those fully vaccinated. A second study indicated that pediatric hospital admissions were nearly four times as high in states with the lowest vaccination rates than in those with the highest inoculation figures.

Family of Omahan who died of COVID asks people to get vaccinated in his memory Relatives of Omahan Mike Leick have a request of people who have not yet been vaccinated against COVID-19: Please get your shots, in memory of Mike.

The major thing that were trying to have people be aware of is that the delta variant is absolutely causing more severe illness in children than the prior variants weve dealt with, said John Lowe, assistant vice chancellor for health security at UNMC.

John Lowe

Simonsen, pediatrician-in-chief with Childrens Hospital & Medical Center, said cases in Nebraska have increased, but not as dramatically as they have in some Southern states.

Nebraskas hospital admission rate for youths 17 and younger remains short of the states January peak. According to CDC data, 389 Nebraska children were admitted to hospitals related to COVID between Aug. 1, 2020, and Tuesday. Seven children were hospitalized with COVID-19 in Douglas County on Friday.

But kids are making up a larger proportion of cases in recent weeks.

Nationally, children now represent more than a quarter  26.8%  of weekly COVID-19 cases nationwide, according to data released Tuesday by the American Academy of Pediatrics. In each of the previous two weeks, children represented about 22% of the weekly reported cases.

In Douglas County, 30% of cases last week were among people 19 and younger. Thats up from 22% for the week ending Aug. 14.

Whether delta causes more severe disease in children than other versions of the virus, however, isnt yet clear, Simonsen said.

The first CDC study indicates the proportions of children with measures of severe disease  those who needed help breathing, were admitted to intensive care or died  were roughly the same before and after delta became dominant.

But because its so much more transmissible, Simonsen said, there are so many more cases that (there) are absolutely more kids with severe disease than there were earlier on.

Flu shots can protect you, hospital capacity With COVID-19 and other respiratory viruses already contributing to a crunch in local hospital capacity, the Douglas County Health Department is encouraging residents to get influenza shots this fall. The shots already are available at pharmacies and other locations, said Phil Rooney, a Health Department spokesman. Health officials begin monitoring for flu Oct. 1, marking the technical start of the flu season, he said. The usual rule of thumb calls for people to aim to get their shots by Halloween. It's particularly important for children too young for COVID-19 vaccines to get flu shots this year in order to make sure they don't contract both viruses at once, he said. Respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, also has made an unseasonable summer appearance and is circulating in the area. Flu vaccine is available for children as young as 6 months. For children who don't like needles, the nasal spray version of the vaccine is once again available. In addition, those who haven't yet been vaccinated for COVID-19 can get that shot and their flu vaccine at the same time. "It's probably more important than ever for people to get their flu shots, so hopefully we can avoid some of these issues with hospital capacity," Rooney said.

CDC data indicates children are about four times more likely to be hospitalized with COVID-19 than they are with the flu, Simonsen said. Typically, about 46,000 children a year nationwide are hospitalized with the flu. More than 200,000 were hospitalized with COVID-19 through May, before the delta surge.

In addition, one study indicates that about 24% of children hospitalized with severe COVID go on to have prolonged symptoms  weeks and months of fatigue and delays in their return to normal activities, including school.

Lowe said another study points to prolonged symptoms, lasting up to 12 weeks, in up to 8% of children who have mild cases. That data, he said, was gathered before delta dominated.

Its also important to protect the households of school-age kids, Lowe said. A recent report indicated that about 100,000 kids in the U.S. have lost a parent to COVID-19. The loss of a caregiver or parent, he noted, has lifelong impacts.

COVID cases in Nebraska up for 11th week, but not as much as last week COVID cases, hospitalizations and deaths continued to climb in Nebraska last week as the state's summer surge pushes toward fall.

Lowe said theres another important distinction between the current school year and the last academic year: A number of schools last year opened remotely or in a hybrid mode, and the vast majority had layered preventative measures in place when they did meet in person. Those included universal masking, social distancing, strict isolation and quarantine criteria and self-screening before arrival. Omaha, Lincoln and many other communities also had indoor mask mandates in place.

So we were operating as a state and a city with many more preventative measures in place last year for a (virus) that was half as infectious as the virus were competing with this year, he said.

A scientific brief on COVID-19 in kids and schools posted Aug. 9 by Lowe and Dr. James Lawler, a co-executive director of UNMCs Global Center for Health Security, stresses that maximum vaccination rates plus layered preventative measures, including universal masking, are key in keeping kids in school in the face of delta.

One other surprisingly effective measure, Lowe said, is screening kids for symptoms such as fever and cough before they head off to school.

Its masks, though, that have become the hot button at local school board meetings.

Lowe said numerous studies have found that masking, while not perfect on its own, is effective in slowing the viruss spread. A CDC science briefing five months ago cited dozens of studies supporting masks effectiveness.

Simonsen said parents should remain vigilant about the things over which they have control. That includes keeping unvaccinated kids in masks in indoor spaces outside the home. Those who are vaccinated also should wear masks in crowded, indoor venues, as both the CDC and AAP recommend, given elevated case counts in the community.

As a parent, I dont want my kids in the hospital, and I dont want them to have months worth of symptoms, Simonsen said. Id like to protect them.

World-Herald Staff Writer Martha Stoddard contributed to this report.
Harold Wilken is a steadfast believer in letting nature take its course. Under his watch, Janies Farm Organics in Danforth, Illinois, has transitioned from conventional farming practices  such as the use of pesticides and GMOs  into a 100% organic operation growing yellow and white hybrid corn, soybeans, wheat and rye, and he couldnt be prouder.

Down on the farm

Raised in a farming family that dates back several generations, Wilken was riding tractors with his dad at the tender age of 2 years old.

His great-grandfather founded what would today be considered an organic, biodiverse farm on Illinois land in 1882. After learning the industry through years of working in the fields, Wilken decided it was time to break away and start his own farming operation in 1982; he would pursue traditional growing methods for the 23 years that followed.

I rented a piece of land from an older lady who was willing to give a young farmer like me a chance, he says. When I took my first herbicide bill to her, she looked at it and told me that if I could just figure out how to do things the natural way, she wouldn't have to pay it. Her words were very prophetic, and theyve stuck with me through the years.

Opting to go organic

Wilkens decision to take the farm in an organic direction came about as a result of several life-changing events that occurred in quick succession. Already disillusioned with GMOs and losing faith in conventional farming practices, he was directly sprayed with dangerous pesticide chemicals when a hose broke in 1990, leading to health issues.

Then, in 2001, Wilkens beloved daughter Janie passed away in a tragic car accident at age 15.

When Wilkens neighbor Herman Brockman sent a condolence letter and offered him the opportunity to transition his adjacent acreage into an organic farm, it seemed like a sign.

Thereve been lots of unexplained coincidences that I credit to Janie putting together for me on the other side, Wilken says. I think back on the things that have happened in the 20 years since shes been gone and the people whove helped us get through it, and it really all started because of Hermans letter.

Wilkens initial move toward organic farming was met with skepticism from some of his peers and even within his own family due to concerns about reduced yields, increased weeds and other worries.

My father started using pesticides back in the 1960s, and he thought they were the saving grace of agriculture, Wilken says. He passed before I completed my first transition crop, but he definitely did not approve of my decision.

Feeling there had to be a better, more natural way to go, Wilken attempted non-GMO crop rotation for a few years, but it wasnt until he went fully organic in 2005 that he finally began to feel a true sense of peace.

The soil was just dead, he says.

It takes 36 months from the last application of herbicide to cycle out enough for the land to be considered organic, but I think it takes more like 60 months to really restore the soil to good health through crop rotation and cover cropping. These practices are what add nutrients; increase water absorption; prevent erosion; and suppress weeds, insects and soil-borne plant diseases.

Ready, set, grow

Since 2005, Janies Farm has flourished from its original 700-acre footprint into 3,200 acres of land co-owned by a group of farmers who work collaboratively to support the organic movement. Together with his son, Ross Wilken; nephew, Tim Vaske; and neighbor, Ryan Wolfe, Wilken currently owns a 450-acre spread on which he grows his organic crops.

Janies Farms growing season continues nearly year-round, starting with putting in cover crops as early as January and planting corn in mid-May through wheat harvest beginning in July until the last corn is picked in November. The organic products ultimately find their way to distributors, large and small food companies, breweries and distilleries, often personally delivered in a truck driven by Wilken himself.

For the mill, we service a customer radius in an area about four and a half hours out from the farm, going as far as Ann Arbor, Detroit, Cincinnati, Indianapolis and a bit into Louisville, he says.

Through a recent partnership with Tom Luhrs Family Farm in Imperial, Nebraska, Wilken and his team hope to expand the selection of heirloom variety grains Janies Farm can offer to its customers even farther.

Run of the mill

While loading a semitruck with wheat for a trip to New York in 2016, Wilkens own wheels started turning as he contemplated his next move. The following year, a broker contacted him looking for someone to mill flour, which planted more seeds of inspiration.

After installing custom, Danish-made Engsko machinery, Janies Mill started stone-grinding whole-kernel flours in 2017.

In another serendipitous twist, Herman Brockmans daughter, Jill, came on board to manage the mill; and his other Chicago-based daughter introduced Wilken to Hewn Bakery in Evanston to do some product testing and development, laying the foundation for a productive business relationship that continues to this day.

When we started out, we were doing 3 or 4,000 pounds of flour a week, Wilken says. Now, were producing between 5,000 to 7,000 per day. Our wholesale efforts are growing, and we did a booming retail package business during the pandemic. Were so proud that were able to provide jobs on the farm and in our mill that help keep our rural community healthy economically, environmentally and socially.

What lies ahead

Looking toward the future, Wilken is aiming to double the Janies Mill production capacity and keep looking for markets that allow the farm to work directly with customers. As the demand for transparency increases and savvy consumers want to know more about the origins of the food theyre eating, he hopes that more farmers will join the organic movement.

The landowners have got to be the ones who change the landscape, he says. As some are now taking over family farms, theyre coming to the realization that they want to work with people who are conscious of land stewardship and reflect their values.

Wilken would also like to see leaders within the farming community devote more time and attention to the bigger picture of transitioning soil from conventionally treated to organic.

I think well do the environment more good by getting land transitioned from conventional to organic than by taking organic acres to the next level, like in regenerative agriculture, he says. Then well really start to see a benefit to the environment.
The employees will work 40 hours, but it might not be their primary job. They might be shifted to another part of the plant to help coworkers catch up after long-awaited components arrive and they can finish work on partially built engines.

The 40-hour week also might involve cleaning and organizing workspaces. Some Blueprint employees have been painting and sprucing up parts of the plant.

Its basically putting together different ways to stay at 40 hours, said Matt Tappan, another Blueprint employee with children at home.

He said that it might be more comfortable working at your primary responsibility  his is leading a group that builds engines for irrigation pumps  but having a steady paycheck trumps those kinds of inconveniences.

Kloepping and Tappan said that in addition to the 40-hour paychecks, a key to employees positive attitudes has been communication. Management has worked hard to inform employees about the companys challenges and invite ideas from workers. Their ideas might address the current unknowns, or prepare Blueprint to emerge from the pandemic stronger than before.

Kloepping said Josh Saldivar, Blueprints director of manufacturing, has been meeting regularly with employees.
The Nebraska Department of Corrections on Saturday announced the death of two inmates.

A man in his 30s convicted in Douglas County died Friday at a Lincoln hospital after testing positive for COVID-19, according to the department. He tested positive before being hospitalized and had other medical conditions.

The man was serving time for attempted first-degree sexual assault of a child.

A man in his 60s with underlying medical conditions died Saturday at a Lincoln hospital after testing positive for COVID-19. He was serving a sentence on charges out of Platte County that included possession of a controlled substance and possession of a deadly weapon by a prohibited person.

The department is not releasing the inmates' names for the privacy of their families and to maintain the confidentiality of their medical records, according to a press release.

The exact cause of death for either inmate has not yet been determined and, as with any in-custody death, a grand jury will investigate.

On Friday, the department reported 13 active COVID-19 cases. The average daily population across the state's 10 correctional facilities was 5,322 people during fiscal year 2021.
A group of students has filed a civil lawsuit against Creighton University in response to the universitys mandate of the COVID-19 vaccine.

The lawsuit filed by four students on Wednesday alleges that Creighton refused to consider or grant religious exemptions in mandating the vaccine for all students.

The university announced July 7 that the vaccine would be required for all students attending classes or events on campus. On Aug. 23, a waiver that allowed students to opt out of the vaccine was withdrawn after the Food and Drug Administration approval of the Pfizer vaccine.

Students were required to provide proof of vaccination by Sept. 7 to be allowed on campus.

Lauren Ramaekers, a Creighton student named as a plaintiff in the suit, is the president of Creightons anti-abortion group, Students For Life. In a press release, Ramaekers said she is opposed to taking the vaccine because of the use of abortion-derived fetal cells in the research and development of the vaccines.
Cpl. Daegan Page received the kind of welcome home no warriors family wants  the kind with black limousines and flag-draped caskets, slow salutes and tears.

But on Friday afternoon, thousands of Nebraskans and Iowans made Pages mournful homecoming an occasion to remember.

Holding flags and signs saying God Bless You, Cpl. Daegan Page and Welcome Home, they lined streets from Eppley Airfield to southwest Omaha to watch the passage of a vehicle carrying the remains of the Marine to Braman Mortuary.

Few of them would have known the name of the 23-year-old Millard South High School graduate before his death Aug. 26  along with 12 other U.S. service members and at least 169 Afghans  in a terrorist bombing at the Kabul airport in Afghanistan.

But for one day, at least, Daegan Page felt like everyones son or brother.

Tim Hullett, a 43-year-old Omahan, cut short a fishing trip to come home and pay tribute, holding up a Marine Corps flag at the corner of 10th and Cass Streets. His own son, Dakota, is a Marine about the same age as Page.

This could be anybodys son, he said.

Pages homecoming represented a convergence of tragedies. His death came in the final days of Americas War in Afghanistan, while the return of his body to Omaha occurred one day before the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks that launched the U.S. into that war.

Pages casket arrived at Eppley from Dover Air Force Base in Delaware about 1:20 p.m. and was transferred from the aircraft to a hearse out of public view. His family followed in several black SUVs as the procession  escorted by Omaha motorcycle police  traversed the city.

In a statement via email, Pages family said they were touched by the warm tribute.

Omaha, you never looked better, they said. It was an amazing honor to bring Daegan home to the open arms of his hometown today.

We wish we could have stopped and thanked every person who took time out of their day to pay their respects, the family added. We saw you all.

More than an hour before the procession, crowds lined Abbott Drive south of the airport and 10th and Cass Streets near the CHI Health Center to pay their respects. Others stood on overpasses above Interstates 480 and 80. More waited along Millard Avenue and 144th Street near the mortuary.

The crowd buzzed along the parade route. People craned their necks around the curve in the road, they jogged across the street to get a better view and they held their flags a little bit higher.

Then the moment came. A brief motorcade, a glimpse of the casket and the family as the hearse rolled by and a stillness from the crowd. Hundreds of people watched silently, their eyes following the procession as it drove under one of the massive U.S. flags hoisted over Abbott Drive by two cranes.

Raegan Hain and Donna Seevers of Seward took their three children out of school so they could learn firsthand about the sacrifices of those who have served during the almost 20 years of war since 9/11.

Were heartbroken over this loss, Seevers said.

Devastated, added Hain. These 13 soldiers, who gave up their lives for our freedom. We wanted to show our support.

A Navy sailor and an Air Force airman stationed at Offutt Air Force Base stood near the arena  both in uniform  to honor a fallen Marine who is almost their age.

It sucks, said Senior Airman Jacob Counter, 23, of Los Angeles. But were here for him.

Petty Officer 2nd Class Max Staron, 25, said he was impressed that so many civilians and veterans had come out.

Its a nice sign of respect for someone who made this sacrifice so everyone can do what they do, every day, he said.

Kathy Schmitt of Council Bluffs expressed gratitude for Pages service and the fact that her own son, a Marine who served in Afghanistan, came home safely.

Its hard for a mom, Schmitt said. But you have to have faith in what they are doing. If you want freedom, you have to have people who are willing to serve.

Bill Williams watched from near the arena as the procession passed.

He caught a glimpse of the flag-draped coffin and stood among the silent crowd.

Williams and his wife, Evonne Williams, helped organize the tribute to Page. The couple have paid tribute to thousands of veterans through their Remembering Our Fallen memorial displays and veteran flights to Washington.

Its the hope of Gold Star families that their loved one isnt forgotten, Williams said.

Here we have this incident that brought out such emotion and people to stand on the curb and honor this Marine, Williams said. It was a miles-long demonstration of patriotism.

Amber Pierce, 41, of Council Bluffs wore a T-shirt that said female veteran as she watched along 10th Street with her husband, Scott.

The Air Force veteran has a special connection to 9/11. Stationed at Joint Base Andrews near Washington at the time, she was on a team of military medical personnel who rushed to the Pentagon to treat the wounded after an American Airlines jet crashed into the building.

Pierce still recalls the heat from flames. The smell of jet fuel still gives her the chills.

I guess it was organized chaos, she said.

She suffered a serious back injury that day while lifting a heavy medical bag. It ended her military career, so Pierce never deployed to a war zone. But on Friday, she wanted to honor a fellow service member who did, and who didnt come home.

It makes me feel really good, she said. Its the least we can do, for these men and women who have given their lives.

At the end of the parade route, the hearse carrying Pages casket arrived at the mortuary at 2:39 p.m.

The crowd hushed, flags raised.

Hands rose to salute. Cellphones lifted up.

A Marine honor guard in dress uniform strode forward to greet Cpl. Page upon his return.

They saluted in unison. Seven Marines led his casket inside.

As he entered, someone broke the hush of the crowd: Thank you for your service, Cpl. Page!

The crowds silence turned to cheers and claps and whistles.

Oorah! The Marine is home.

And the crowd wept.

Omaha World-Herald: Afternoon Update The latest headlines sent at 4:45 p.m. daily. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.

Jessica Wade Jessica Wade covers breaking news, crime and the Omaha zoo. Follow her on Twitter @Jess_Wade_OWH. Phone: 402-444-1067 Follow Jessica Wade 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

Steve Liewer Steve is the military affairs reporter for The World-Herald. Follow him on Twitter @SteveLiewer. Phone: 402-444-1186. Follow Steve Liewer Close Get email notifications on {{subject}} daily! Your notification has been saved. There was a problem saving your notification. {{description}} Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items. Save Manage followed notifications Close Followed notifications Please log in to use this feature Log In Don't have an account? Sign Up Today
The priority number one for my organization is to step up, scale up our humanitarian work to help those displaced... Winter is coming. It is very cold in Afghanistan during winter, Grandi said.

He said: And in order to do that, UNHCR, like other humanitarian organizations, will engage, will discuss with the Taliban. We will discuss with anybody that controls an area where there are people in need.

The UNHCR chief made the comment in the Turkish province of Gaziantep, near the border with Syria, at the end of a four-day visit to the Turkey.

Turkey, which already hosts some 3.7 Syrian refugees and some 300,000 Afghan migrants, has expressed concern over the potential of large numbers of Afghans heading its way.



ISLAMABAD  Pakistans foreign minister says the international community is not in a hurry to recognize the Taliban government, although it has a desire to engage with it.

Shah Mahmood Qureshi spoke at a joint news conference after holding talks with his Spanish counterpart Jose Manuel Albares in the capital, Islamabad.
LONDON (AP)  The Sept. 11 attackers failed in their aim of making people in open societies live in permanent fear, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said as he marked the 20th anniversary of 9/11.

In a video message due to be played at a ceremony on Saturday, Johnson said the U.S. was the worlds greatest democracy, and it was a reflection of its openness that people of almost every nationality and religion were among almost 3,000 people killed in the attacks. Sixty-seven British nationals were among those killed when hijacked planes crashed into New Yorks World Trade Centre, the Pentagon in Washington and a field in Pennsylvania.

Johnson said the attackers tried to destroy the faith of free peoples everywhere in the open societies which terrorists despise and which we cherish  and failed.

But while the terrorists imposed their burden of grief and suffering, and while the threat persists today, we can now say with the perspective of 20 years that they failed to shake our belief in freedom and democracy; they failed to drive our nations apart, or cause us to abandon our values, or to live in permanent fear, Johnson said.
Stuart Williams, Omaha

A personal decision

The Handmaids Tale may well become a reality for many women in this country if the current momentum in Texas continues beyond that states borders.

I am writing, in total despair and terror, in response to the absolutely insane abortion ban (SB 8) that Texas lawmakers recently passed. Gov. Pete Ricketts tweeted last week that he is looking forward to coordinating similar legislation here in Nebraska, and I would like to take this opportunity to sound the alarm to our residents: This law is not pro-life; it is pro-birth. There are no exceptions for rape and incest. Any women in our state could be forced to carry and deliver a child conceived out of incest or rape, against her will. Abortion is health care. Abortion is safe. Abortion is a personal decision.

I am calling on every single elected official in Nebraska to stand up for the rights of women as strongly as theyve stood up for the rights of our citizens to not wear masks.

Sarah Foley, Lincoln

Editorials history
BLOOMINGTON  A man was released from McLean County jail custody Friday on burglary, forgery and financial institution fraud charges.

Marcos S. Moore, 43, who does not have an address listed in court records, is accused of using a fraudulent check for about $2,300 at Commerce Bank, 1500 E. College Ave., Normal.

Prosecutors said Moore does not reside in McLean County.

Moore was ordered to have no contact with any Commerce Bank in McLean County.

He was released on a $25,000 personal recognizance bond.

An arraignment is scheduled for Oct. 8.

Contact Kade Heather at 309-820-3256. Follow him on Twitter: @kadeheather

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We asked Pantagraph readers about their memories of 9/11 and what's changed since then. Share yours at pantagraph.com/letters.

'The Twin Towers were hit'

My husband, Jack and I were in San Diego on 9/11. It was the annual get together of men that served on the USS Chevalier DD-805. It was a destroyer that was to save the battleships; some were called "tin can sailors."

We had not turned on our television as we were getting ready to go to breakfast as we got closer to our friends I noticed they were all standing up then I noticed the smoke lingering after the Twin Towers were hit.

It was very solemn; everyone was glued to the unbelievable pictures on the screen. A couple of people nearly whispered Oh my God.

Our motel had a great view of the harbor. Movement started very abruptly. All the ships were moved out of the harbor and the hospital ship came in. What a beautiful ship it is a glimmering white with bright red crosses.

All of the tours that had been planned for our group were canceled. People started talking about going home but that wasnt going to happen for a while. Planes quit flying, buses canceled any routes even traffic was less. One man bought a new car to drive home. Some people extended their stay at the motel. Jack and I took a couple to Kansas City that said they could get home from there. It was a day we will never forget  for many reasons.

 Shirley Wilz, Normal

'This was no accident'

The morning of the 11th of September 2001 began so beautifully. The sun was up  the skies were blue  and the clouds were floating gently by. My husband and I left our home in Valley Stream by car around 7:30 a.m. Our first stop was the Seagram Building, where I worked on Park Avenue and 52nd Street. My husband dropped me off close to 9 a.m. and up the promenade I went. My husband continued on his way to the Brooklyn Bridge en route to his office in Bedford-Stuyvesant.

After the usual good morning greetings to my co-workers, I sat at the reception desk, when the phone rang. It was my daughter, Joanie: Mom, quickly go to your television! A plane just struck the Twin Towers! So I collected my boss and a few of my co-workers. What we saw gave us chills. Those poor passengers! The people in the building! And those on the streets below! Oh, no, we all thought! What is happening? The newscasters were thinking it could be a freak accident. But on such a gorgeous day? (Years and years ago, a plane did fly into the Empire State Building and that was an accident!)

Unbeknownst to me at this time, my husband heard about this on his car radio. He tried several phone booths to call me. He finally found a working phone and called me: Joanie, I am coming to get you. I said that I had too much work to do and could not leave. He said, Joanie, I will put you on my shoulders and carry you out! Knowing this to be true, I said OK. OK. I dont want any drama! I will get ready. So, I advised the supervisor, closed my desk and down the elevator we went.

In the car, the radio was on. They began announcing the closing of bridges and tunnels and all public transportation and roads. The sounds of helicopters were overhead. I said to my husband, Oh, my! This was no accident! Oh, Ron! This is much more tragic than I thought!  As we were driving down Park Avenue, heading for the 59th Street Bridge, I was looking to see if there was anyone I knew so we could help. There was no one. And as the world soon learned, we were under attack by terrorists!

As the second tower was hit and falling, we were crossing the 59th Street Bridge. I cannot describe what an awful sight that was. I have chills, just writing this as I remember that moment in time. I still have not been able to go back to the city and visit that site. It pains me terribly to think about all those lives lost and those who grieve for their loved ones.

We continued on the drive home and they were closing the roads as we travelled. First the Long Island Expressway, then the Southern State Parkway and all roads around. As we were driving home, I remembered our visit to Rockaway Beach with our granddaughter, Meghan, only several days before. And I asked my husband if he recalled what happened as we were leaving. He said, remind me. Well, the sun was setting between the towers and I said to our granddaughter: Look at the sun setting, Meghan. Its between the towers. Thats a sight you might not ever see again. Little did I know. I am in tears once again.

The office I worked in was a New York City visitor office for our executives. They began coming to town for funerals for their lost business associates and friends. For the next month, we became the tea and sympathy office and we all shed tears and hugged one another. For months afterward, the air was laden with heaviness, as it matched the pain in our hearts, that continues to this very day.

 Joan Ann Calabrese, Bloomington

'That terrible news'

I was driving to my one year stint with The Nature Conservancy in Peoria. I heard the horrific news as I was crossing the Illinois River on I-74. I was alone, with nobody there to share the shock of that terrible news. I hurriedly drove the Commercial Bank Building, parked and took the elevator to "Nine," where my fellow "TNCers" were gathered around a TV. I recall the bond and kinship with them and all my fellow Americans, acquaintances and strangers alike, sharing the horror of that day.

I had not felt that sense of kinship between Americans since the murder of John F. Kennedy, 38 years earlier.

Now, 20 years later, we are faced with far more devastating and threatening long-term crises. Where is the unity? We are deeply divided than anytime since the Civil War! How can our beloved nation fare without that sense of unity we once knew. Can we restore it?

 Guy C. Fraker, Bloomington

'Rest of the day was a blur'

I was a school teacher at Carrollton Grade School. I was about to start class when a fellow teacher told me what happened. The rest of the day was a blur.

Three years later my family visited the site of the tragedy. Police men were walking with guard dogs close to the site. A young man was riding his bicycle and he stopped and looked up to the sky. I ask him what he knew about the hack. He said this was the first time he had been back here as it was just too much to handle. He was near the attack of the Twin Towers and actually saw people jumping from the towers. He then looked up and showed us where the planes had entered the buildings. He then started crying and said Im sorry I have to go. It was heartbreaking.

 Steven Dunn

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NORMAL  Police were justified in shooting a 66-year-old man who shot five people, killing two, last week in a Normal mobile home park, the McLean County States Attorneys Office said Friday.

Authorities also released 911 call audio and footage from officers body cameras, revealing details of the chaotic scene that one witness described as a war zone to emergency dispatchers.

States Attorney Don Knapp said he found the use of lethal force by police against the armed suspect, 66-year-old Ronald J. Reiner, was legally warranted, and that the officers engaged in a heroic course of conduct that saved several citizens lives. He made the determination after reviewing results of an investigation by the Illinois State Police, which handles officer-involved shootings as a matter of policy.

Julie Davis, 59, and Sharon Reiner, 64, were killed in the incident. Three Normal men were injured.

Normal police were dispatched at 3:44 p.m. Aug. 30 to the Landing Estates Mobile Home Park. Knapps report said the first officers on scene, Shane Bachman, Evan Easter and Cory Phillips, were aware there was an armed suspect who had shot several people.

The report identified them as the officers who fired on Ronald Reiner, whom authorities have identified as the person who shot Davis and Sharon Reiner. We are releasing their names with their knowledge and consent, Knapp said of the officers.

No other suspects or threats to the public were identified, state police said. The 10-page report from prosecutors noted that the suspect was shooting near Linden Street, a highly traveled road, and a stray bullet could have hit vehicles.

Additionally, the shooting happened in the middle of the afternoon as children were arriving home from school, the report said. A school bus was seen in the body camera footage.

The report released Friday did not disclose a possible motive in the incident. Knapp said state police are still investigating and conducting forensic testing, a process that may not be finalized for several months.

Report: Subject chose to engage officers

State police on Friday released audio from 911 calls and radio transmission between Normal police and the emergency dispatchers at Metcom. The footage totals about 40 minutes.

In the 911 audio, a caller is heard frantically describing the unfolding Lambert Drive situation as an operator walks him through a description of the subject. The caller told police a victim had been shot in the neck and was bleeding.

The caller could be heard saying hurry up as he described the subject walking down the street with a gun. Shots could be heard in the distance.

Its a war zone down here, the caller said.

Once on scene, the three officers continued into the mobile home park, following the sounds of gunfire, according to Knapps report. They knew the subject was approaching and firing into cars, it said.

The report said Ronald Reiner weaved through the buildings, furtively approached police and started firing at them.

There can be no doubt that the subject knew that police officers were on scene and prepared to use force against him to terminate his killing spree, prosecutors report said, yet he nonetheless chose to engage officers by approaching and firing at them.

Police officers then returned fire until the suspect fell, Knapp said. The report said he died instantly from several gunshot wounds, including one to the head, and was pronounced dead at the scene.

Body camera footage shows the three officers fired roughly 50 gunshots combined toward the suspect.

Easter had repeatedly yelled for the suspect to drop his gun.

In a second 911 audio recording, the caller said, Hes shooting at the cops. The cops are shooting him. Get down, get down, get down, get down. I dont know if they got him or not ... They got him. Hes in my front yard. They just shot him down.

Body camera footage released Friday also shows the officers arriving at the scene and walking toward where Ronald Reiner was seen.

Bachman is heard saying Another shot fired, another shot fired! at one point. Multiple gunshots later ring out.

The three officers ran northbound through the mobile home park until shifting eastbound and weaving through backyards bordering Linden Street. There, Phillips aided a victim who was lying in the grass.

He was going nuts, the victim told the officer.

Do you know who he is? Phillips asked.

Hes my neighbor, the victim said.

Whats going on with him? Phillips said.

I dont know, the victim said while the officer wrapped his arm.

Phillips quickly got back up, joined Easter and continued searching for the suspect.

At that point, the suspect appeared to the north of the officers in the tree line, leading Officer Phillips to discharge his firearm towards the subject, the report said.

Later, the subject can be seen looking directly towards Officer Bachman with his gun raised and pointed at officers. Bachman then fires additional shots in his direction until the subject falls to the ground, the report said.

A box cutter knife and firearm magazine were found on Ronald Reiner, the report said.

A huge loss

Knapp said he believes it's clear from the audio and video, these officers are heroes.

They are the very definition of heroes, he said. They ran toward the bullets to save citizens' lives who they did not know at their own peril, and thats the very definition of a hero in my mind.

Normal Police Chief Rick Bleichner said Friday afternoon the department is grateful for the exhaustive work of the States Attorneys Office and the continuing work of the State Police.

Citing the open internal investigation, he said it would not be appropriate to comment further.

The Rev. Billy Newell, who leads Trinity Lutheran Church, where Davis was an active member, said he appreciated that Illinois State Police would do a good job in this investigation, but whether the shooting of the suspect is justified or not isnt going to change the outcome of the loss of life that the families are dealing with.

Davis funeral service was Friday, and Newell said the number of people in attendance, which included her family as well as an extended faith family, was an illustration of the impact that she had and even continues to have after her death.

Julie was someone who had a huge impact on people and had a heart for trying to support people through challenges, he said. Her biggest desire was just to share the love of Jesus.

Its a huge loss, but we can mourn with hope that we will see her again.

In its report, the States Attorneys Office offered our sincere condolences to families of the deceased victims and our hopes for a speedy recovery for the surviving victims of these senseless acts of violence.

Contact Brendan Denison at (309) 820-3238. Follow Brendan Denison on Twitter: @BrendanDenison

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BLOOMINGTON  Like having a front-row seat to history.

That's the analogy deployed consistently by journalists when asked to describe their place in the local, state or national ecosystem of politics, culture and community.

But the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, reporters and photographers across the United States  in Lower Manhattan, rural Pennsylvania, downtown Bloomington  barely had pause to digest the moment, let alone sit down.

In Central Illinois, Pantagraph staffers mobilized to capture and attempt to convey the attacks and their ripple effects on community members.

One of those storytellers, Steve Smedley, was commuting to downtown Bloomington when American Airlines Flight 11 struck the north tower of the World Trade Center.

After reaching his destination  the former Pantagraph building, 301 W. Washington St.  Smedley, a staff photographer, stood at the counter in the newsroom with reporters, editors and other photographers as the second plane, United Airlines Flight 175, struck the center's south tower.

"People were just in shock," Smedley, now retired, said in an interview, reflecting on that day 20 years later. "It just kind of took your breath away. It was very surreal."

Within minutes, Smedley and the newsroom pivoted from disbelief to drive.

"I grabbed a reporter and we went out and started interviewing people," Smedley said, referring to Karen Hansen, who worked as a reporter at the time.

The pair first stopped at the Illinois State University campus, where more than 100 people were watching the events unfold that morning on televisions at the Bone Student Center.

As CNN broadcast footage of the burning towers, Hansen fielded reactions from students and Smedley snapped photos.

They repeated that cycle in multiple places and with multiple voices across McLean County that day.

But it was the dispatch to the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 454 in Bloomington that Smedley said he remembers the most.

As a national news channel showed footage of the collapsed buildings and piles of smoking, ashy debris at ground zero, the station's anchor described to the audience an orchestra of beeping.

"They were saying it was car alarms, but I knew exactly what it was," Smedley said, identifying the noise as a collection of triggered personal alert safety system devices, which are worn by emergency responders and go off when movement hasn't been detected after a certain amount time.

"I was like, 'Holy s---  thats a bunch of dead firefighters,'" Smedley said. "It was just horrifying to hear it, and know what that is."

Between calls with sources and dispatches to locations, Smedley said reporters, editors and photographers were mostly watching televisions in the newsroom for any real-time updates.

Pantagraph photographers shot dozens of photos on Sept. 11, and reporters drafted thousands of words. All in all, the Sept. 12, 2001, print edition featured nearly 30 different stories related to the 9/11 attacks, with almost all carrying the byline of a Pantagraph reporter.

And for the rest of that week, Pantagraph pages featured at least one story a day about Central Illinois community members' ties and responses to the attack.

Many reporters and editors worked late that Tuesday, waiting for more updates to come through the national desk before finalizing the next day's print paper.

The Pantagraph building wasn't under lockdown, but "everyone had a heightened sense of awareness of what was going on," Smedley said, adding there was a shared anxiety that "the next thing (hijackers) could do is strike the Heartland."

Initial word of the first plane's impact, more than 900 miles away, came into the newsroom via a bulletin from The Associated Press.

When it reached Lenore Sobota, who at the time was working as an editorial writer, the details were already being broadcast on television.

"I thought, 'Gee that's weird,'" Sobota said. "It wasn't until I went out to the newsroom and looked at a TV screen that I saw it was a (commercial) jet. I just thought it was a small plane."

Sobota said she spent the rest of the day watching for updates and coordinating with other editorial board members to produce a piece for the Sept. 12 paper.

One of those editorials, titled "Proudly fly your flag today to show American unity," noted how "As the horror unfolded yesterday, families and workers gathered around television sets and radios."

Sobota said that had the internet or smartphones been as ubiquitous in reporting as they are now, the journalistic response to Sept. 11 could have had a larger impact on the national level.

"But at the local level, probably not so much," Sobota said. "Reporters would have still went out and reported those stories."

Contact Timothy Eggert at (309) 820-3276. Follow him on Twitter: @TimothyMEggert

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SPRINGFIELD  The Illinois House approved an energy regulation and decarbonization bill Thursday, Sept. 9, a measure that aims to bring Illinois energy generation sector to 100 percent carbon-free by 2050 and 50 percent renewable by 2040.

It passed the House 83-33 shortly before 9:30 p.m. Thursday. Gov. JB Pritzker quickly issued a news release saying he would sign it. The bill will still need approval from the Senate, which planned to caucus Friday to discuss the measure, Senate Bill 2408, before a Monday return.

Environmental groups extolled the decarbonization language, which aims to take coal, gas and other carbon-emitting power plants off the grid between 2030 and 2045, depending on the energy source and ownership structure.

Union groups praised the bills language requiring that all major renewable construction projects must have project labor agreements in place to hire union labor, while non-residential projects, with few exceptions, would be required to pay a prevailing wage.

Republicans, meanwhile, warned of losses of downstate jobs, substantial consumer bill increases and potential grid reliability issues as fossil fuel plants are forced offline, although it passed on a bipartisan roll call.

The bill provides more than $600 million over five years to three nuclear plants owned by Exelon Corporation. A deadline for closing one of the plants was set for Monday, Sept. 13, when the Senate was set to act.

All told, negotiators believe the new bill is expected to raise residential electric bills by about 3-4 percent, commercial bills by about 5-6 percent, and industrial bills by about 7-8 percent, although the rollout for the various programs would be staggered over time and increases would vary by year.

The ratepayer money will fund equity programs for the clean energy workforce and new investment in renewable energy, among other initiatives. Included in the rate hike is $180 million in annual funding for the newly-created Energy Transition Assistance Fund, which funds various workforce initiatives.

Rep. Jay Hoffman, D-Swansea, noted in a news conference after the bills passage that it requires the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, Illinois Commerce Commission and Illinois Power Agency to conduct a study at five-year intervals to determine if there is grid reliability.

If there are not enough renewables and nuclear power available to keep the grid running, that means coal or gas plants could be kept online to meet peak demand.

Lawmakers also noted the bill tightens utility ethics laws by changing formulaic rate increases, strengthening economic disclosure requirements to include spouses employed by utilities, and creating Public Utility Ethics and Compliance Monitor to ensure utilities comply with existing and new laws.

The bill also sets a goal of putting 1 million electric vehicles on Illinois roads by 2030, aiming to do so through incentives, such as offering rebates on the installation of charging infrastructure in certain communities, provided prevailing wage is paid on the construction labor.

* * *

ETHICS BILL PASSES: The Illinois House on Thursday, Sept. 9, voted to accept changes to an ethics bill that Gov. JB Pritzker had requested, paving the way for it to become law once the governor signs it

Thursdays vote came a little more than a week after an earlier attempt fell short in the House. That happened during a late-night session Tuesday, Aug. 31, after many Democrats had left the Capitol following a one-day special session that was called mainly to reconsider a legislative redistricting plan.

But Rep. Kelly Burke, D-Evergreen Park, renewed her motion Thursday at the start of another one-day session that was called mainly to consider a comprehensive energy package. This time, with nearly all House members present, the measure passed, 74-41, largely along party lines. Reps. Amy Elik, R-Alton, and Jeff Keicher, R-Sycamore, were the only Republicans to vote yes.

Senate Bill 539 originally cleared both chambers during the spring session by overwhelming margins, 56-0 in the Senate and 113-5 in the House, even though Republicans at the time complained on the floor that it had been watered down. But it contained enough reforms, such as increased financial disclosure requirements and limits on the ability of elected officials to lobby other units of government, so that many lawmakers said they believed it was the best they could get at the time.

But a few weeks after it passed, on July 14, the General Assemblys top ethics watchdog, Legislative Inspector General Carol Pope, submitted her intent to resign by Dec. 15, saying the bill would actually weaken her office by limiting the types of investigations she could conduct.

In response, many House Republicans called on Pritzker to issue an amendatory veto by asking lawmakers to strike the language that prompted Popes resignation. Instead, though, Pritzker issued a different amendatory veto, asking lawmakers to delete language related to the executive inspector general.

When that veto came back to the General Assembly Aug. 31, the Senate accepted Pritzkers request unanimously, 58-0. But in the House, Republicans pulled their support while several Democrats had already left the building, leaving the amended bill with only 59 votes, far short of the 71 votes needed to pass.

In floor debate Thursday, Rep. Blaine Wilhour, R-Beecher City, urged rejecting the governors amendment and returning to negotiations over a stronger ethics bill.

There's a lot of talk from your (Democratic) side of the aisle about how this is just a start and we need to do more and, you know, yada, yada, yada, everything else, he said to Burke on the House floor. I don't think anybody has ever really answered, what's keeping us from doing more right now?

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President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has cut the sod for the second phase of construction works on the main University of Health and Allied Sciences (UHAS) Campus in Ho.



The 68-million-dollar China Aid Phase Two project will provide fully equipped state-of-the-art Administration Block, School of Nursing and Midwifery, classrooms, offices, libraries, and laboratories to mitigate the infrastructure challenges of the University, since its establishment in 2012.



President Akufo-Addo, who was on a working visit to the Region, said the University had persisted and continued to prove its worth with countless achievements and assured of governments readiness to help it expand.



Even though it is a young University, already, its receiving lots of laurels and accolades and rankingstherefore, there is the need for the Government to ensure the infrastructure is at the measure of the University, he said.



President Akufo-Addo said China continued to hold firm her friendship with Ghana, which would continue to grow into progressive partnerships.



It gives me the opportunity to express once again, the strong appreciation of the Government and the people of Ghana to the Government of the Peoples Republic of China. The solidarity the Chinese Government and people continue to exhibit towards us is something that, Mr Ambassador, we appreciate very much indeed, he said.



The various things that makeup Ghanas Foreign Policy to China are well known. We are not deviating and we will not deviate from the One China Policy. It continues to be an important cornerstone of the Foreign Policy of our country.



The President recognized the Universitys role in the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic, saying it was a testing centre for the region and surrounding areas.



Mr Lu Kun, the Chinese Ambassador, said the development would aid the schools advancement to provide more professionals to sustain the government's bold health delivery initiative; Agenda 111.



China and Africa will embark on a long journey of collaborations based on the One China principle, he said.



Mr Lu said the collaboration had long flourished in education and would be expanded to other areas, adding: China will always remain Ghanas ultimate friend and partner.



As a partner in the fight against the coronavirus, China would work with Ghana to secure the much-needed vaccines, he said.



Dr Yaw Osei Adutwum, the Education Minister, said the project showed government's commitment to expanding tertiary education intake to help meet the countrys educational needs.



He said the coronavirus pandemic made it more crucial to prioritize educational demands and expressed the hope that the project would be timeously delivered.



Chinese Nantong Si Jian Construction Company is executing the project within a 22-month period, and the Government of Ghana will provide road infrastructure and other inputs as part of a counterpart-funding component.

Source: GNA









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A 29-year-old blogger accused of defrauding a trader of 21,000 Euros under the pretext of securing her two Italian passports and Resident Identity Cards, has been remanded into custody by an Accra Circuit Court.



Jacklin Sarfo Gyamfua a.k.a. Ohemaa Jackie, is facing charges of defrauding by false pretences and forgery of official documents.



Gyamfua has denied the charges.



Bail application put in by her counsel, Mr Peter Sarfo before the court, was turned down.



Prosecution led by Detective Inspector Frederick Sarpong had vehemently opposed the bail application on the grounds that the case was still under investigation.



The Court presided over by Mrs Evelyn Asamoah upheld Prosecution's prayer and declined bail.



The matter has been adjourned to September 16.



Presenting the facts, Detective Inspector Sarpong said the complainant Barbara Adu Boahen, resided at Accra while Gyamfua was a dual resident of London and Accra.



Prosecution said during the month of February this year, , the complainant and a witness in the case saw the accused running adverts on social media platforms purporting to be securing travelling documents and resident ID cards for every country within the European Union (EU).



The Prosecutor said the complainant who was interested in travelling to Italy contacted the accused on her phone posted against the accused person's facebook advertisement.



Detective Inspector Sarpong said Gyamfua promised to secure two Italian passports and two Resident ID cards for the complainant and her daughter at a fee of 24,000 Euros.



Prosecution said Gyamfua then gave the complainant her Access Bank Account bearing the name Afua Serwa Dwamena and UMB account bearing the name Lord Mens Enterprise and requested the complainant to pay the 24,000 Euros into the aforementioned accounts.



According to the Prosecutor, the complainant paid 21,000 Euros into the accounts provided by the accused.



Detective Inspector said Gyamfua later provided two forged Italian passports and two Resident ID cards for the complainant and her daughter.



On March 30, this year, prosecution said the complainant presented the passports at the Kotoka International Airport but they were arrested for presenting fake passports.



Prosecution said a report was made to the Police at the National Signal Bureau/ National Security.



On September 8, this year, Gyamfua was arrested and during a search

in her house, two forged Italian passports and two Resident ID Cards were found.



Prosecution said the accused and her husband had issued a stern verbal warning to the complainant and a principal witness to stay off the case else they risked being dealt with.

Source: GNA









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Majority Leader of Parliament, Hon. Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu says the do or die comment of former President John Dramani Mahama should be condemned with all certainty without mincing words.



According to the Minister for Parliamentary Affairs, it does not speak well of a leader who has served the nation before to make such a despicable comment even though everyone is fallible to make mistakes in life.



Speaking on Okay FMs 'Ade Akye Abia' Morning Show, the Suame lawmaker noted that there cannot be any rationalization and justification for what President John Mahama said during his Thank You tour as the context in which he said the do or die is misleading the NDC followers to think that the party was robbed in the 2020 general elections.



He reiterated that President John Mahama was wrong to say that the NDC accepted defeat in the 2020 general election because of peace; thus, to him, the opposition NDC could not provide any evidence in the Supreme Court when the Court asked the NDC to provide evidence of wrongdoing in the Presidential results.



Today, you go on a Thank You tour to say that the NDC rather won the 2020 election and the EC subverted the will of the people, meanwhile, you could not provide evidence in the court and you turn around to say that in the next 2024 election, it will be a 'do or die' affair, we must be bold to tell him that he is wrong and a leader must not speak like that," he pooh-poohed Mahama.



If you say that this is a do or die issue, it means that if you dont win, then you must kill yourself for losing the election. This is what it means. There cant be any rationalization and justification for what he said because he said it in a context and the context was the NDC was robbed in the 2020 election and so the 2024 election will be a do or die," he noted.



He maintained that former President John Dramani Mahama erred with his submission that the NDC won the election, adding that the former President is rather urging his followers to position themselves for only a win-win situation at the polling stations.



What he said is not true but rather urging his followers that whether we like it or not, the NDC must win at the polling stations. A leader must not speak like that. As you said, President Akufo-Addo said something similar and Ghanaians were not happy about it and he was criticised by the same NDC members who are now supporting what former President Mahama said, he noted.



If what he has said is wrong, we should come out boldly to condemn it so that he does not repeat it . . . you bring unnecessary tension in the country. He must know that election is not about life or death, he chided.



Watch video below





Source: Daniel Adu Darko/Peacefmonline.com









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A section of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) youth base in the Ashanti Region has said the party needs a new flagbearer whose goal is to build a formidable party going into the 2024 elections.



In a press statement, a group calling itself NDC Ashanti Youth said the defeated 2020 flagbearer of the NDC, John Mahama, is no longer fit to lead the party because he neglected us when he had the power.



The group said Mahama paid little attention to the Ashanti Region while forming his cabinet and gave priority to other regions.



How come only Tamale Metropolis had three cabinet ministers yet the biggest region in the country, Ashanti was neglected?



In fact, at the start of the administration, there was only one minister from Ashanti Region - the Minister for Environment Science and Technology, Professor Oteng Agyei - who was sacked bitterly and mysteriously just some few months into the administration, a statement from the group and signed by the convenor Kweku Asare Mensah said.



Below is the full unedited statement:



The NDC Ashanti youth have descended heavily on former president Mahama on what they describe as a subtitle campaign to be re-elected as flag bearer of the NDC.



The first concern in the absolute neglect of the region between 2013 and 2016.

John Mahama is scheduled to hit the region on 13th September with his thank-you tour, but the youth of the party is sending a signal that they are fed up with him.



Between, 2013 and 2017, John Mahama neglected Ashanti Region and hence had no one from the region as part of his cabinet ministers until the appointment Hon Kweku Agyemang Manu in 2015.



How come John Mahama appointed 5 Cabinet ministers from Central Region in addition to having the Vice President from same region.

How come there were also 5 Cabinet Ministers from Eastern region in addition to the Chief Of Staff?



How come only Tamale Metropolis had 3 Cabinet Ministers yet the biggest region in the Country, Ashanti was neglected



In fact, at the start of the administration, there was only one minister from Ashanti region, The minister for Environment Science and Technology, Professor Oteng Agyei, who was sacked bitterly and mysteriously just some few months into the administration.



John Mahama, who could neglect the Ashanti Region this much now pretends to be the lover boy just to deceive us and neglect the region again.



Our message to him is simple.



He shouldnt Count on us because he neglected us when he had the power.

NDC needs new leadership direction, a leader who is in to build a more formidable party not one who is only in for his personal good.



Kweku Asare Mensah

Convener

054 807 9870

[email protected]

Source: Peacefmonline.com/ghana









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The Western Regional Secretary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Charles Bissue, has advised the former president John Mahama to retract and apologize for inciting Ghanaians ahead of the 2024 elections.



The defeated presidential candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the 2020 elections has been randomly condemned by Ghanaians for saying Election 2024 will be a do or die affair at the polling stations.



The election will be won or lost at the polling station, so at the polling station it will be do or die. I did not say All die be die, I said it will be doing or die because the right thing must be done, Mahama said on Tuesday, provoking many reactions calling on him to retract.



However, Bissue said such comments should not be coming from a statesman who has been at the helm of our political affairs before.



Describing Mahamas comment as reckless, Bissue said: He needs to come back and apologize to Ghanaians. If he hadnt been a former president then he would be forgiven.



But hes been at the helm of our political affairs before and you now see his people associating it with the coup that happened in Guinea. Its not right for him to say that. Whatever he says carries weight, Bissue said on The Asaase Breakfast Show on Friday 10 September 2021.



Speaking on the same show, Justice Abdulai, a Private legal practitioner and law lecturer, UPSA concurred with Bissue, adding its an insult to the sensibilities of Ghanaians.



Its the most reckless comment Ive ever heard coming from the former president, John Mahama. All the other comments and attempts by his party executives make it even more laughable. I think the former president should rethink his decision and calling it an idiomatic expression.



He should retract and apologize to all Ghanaians. We understand exactly what it means. He should admit that what he said was wrong, the further explanation rather makes matters worse for all of us. We should not at this point in our lives be pushing for such reckless comments. We should be making developmental comments, he said.



I wont apologize



Meanwhile, Mahama has said that, despite the huge public backlash, he still stands by his comment that Election 2024 will be a do-or-die affair at the polling station.



 They dont understand do or die. Do or die is an English idiom, Mahama explained. In Africa, we have many proverbs and we sometimes dont say things in the straight format: we use proverbs. In English, we have idiomatic expressions.



Those who left school early dont understand idiomatic expressions. Do or die means a critical assignment you have, and so you must do the needful or perish.



He added: What I mean is that the NDC should not wait and go back to the Supreme Court. Whatever has to be done at the polling stations and collation centers must be done. And so I dont retract: the next election for NDC is going to be a do-or-die affair.



Im telling all our party executives that you must be at the polling station to make sure that the right thing is done.



Dont abdicate your responsibility at that level and expect that after somebody has stolen the election well go to Supreme Court to see if they would turn the election for us, they wont do it.

Source: dailyguidenetwork.com









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Rhinos in Africa are slaughtered for their horns which are smuggled into Asia.

South African scientists are studying ways to inject radioactive material into rhino horns to make them easier to detect at border posts, a move to discourage poaching, a researcher said on Friday.

Poachers killed at least 249 rhinos in South Africa during the first six months of the year83 more than in the first half of 2020.

The animals are slaughtered for their horns, which are smuggled into Asia where they are highly prized for traditional and medicinal purposes.

Injecting rhino horns with a small amount of radioactive material might deter poachers by making smuggling easier to detect, said James Larkin, a nuclear researcher at the University of the Witwatersrand.

More than 11,000 radiation detectors are installed at ports and airports around the world, he told a webinar hosted by the World Nuclear Association.

Border agents often have handheld radiation detectors that could also detect the contraband, he added.

"We can radically increase the army of people who are capable of intercepting these horns... to push back against the smugglers," Larkin explained.

Two rhinos have already been injected with a non-radioactive isotope to ensure the material will not travel into their bodies or cause health problems for the animals or humans.

Computer modelling will then help determine what dose is appropriate for rhinos. A model rhino head will be built with a 3D printer to test the doses before the trial moves to real rhinos.

The programme, called The Rhisotope Project, has backing from Russia's state-owned nuclear company Rosatom, as well as researchers in the United States and Australia.

Explore further Rhino anti-poaching research goes nuclear

 2021 AFP
Mosquito-borne avian malaria has wiped out 80 percent of bird species in Hawaii.

In the movie Jurassic Park, reconstructing and tweaking genetic material makes it possible to bring dinosaurs back to life.

Today, a technology that manipulates animal genomes, called gene drive, has become a reality. The goal, however, is not to revive long-gone species, but to eliminate invasive ones.

Steven Spielberg's film was set on an imaginary island off the coast of Costa Rica, and it is also on an island that the first open-air experiments in programmed extinction could take place, according to experts gathered at the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Congress in Marseille.

It could happen within a decade, they told AFP.

That's because fragile island ecosystems are in crisis. Dozens of vertebrate species have vanished in the last century, and dozens more are on a glide path to extinction.

The culprits are non-native rats, snakes and mosquitoesall introduced by humans, for the most part by accidentthat eat bird eggs, infect birds with disease, or outcompete indigenous amphibians and mammals.

For more than 20 years, Island Conservation has been working to eradicate rodents and other invasive alien species, which are a major threat to biodiversity globally, the organisation's Royden Saah told AFP.

The conservation NGO has been successful on two Galapagos islandsSeymour North and Mosquerausing traps and poison-delivering drones.

But species eradication using these tools is costly and has no guarantee of success. Rat poison is effective, but poses risks to other species.

'Obvious ecological risks'

"Should we create a genetically modified rat so that its offspring is only male (or female)?", Island Conservation asks on its website.

So far, this Franken-rat does not exist.

"But if we don't do the research, we will not know what the potential of this technology is," said Royden Saah, who coordinates a team of scientists for the NGO.

At its last Congress in 2016, the IUCN's 1,400 members created a working group to evaluate the issue from every anglefeasibility, costs and benefits, possible side effects, ethics.

On Friday, following intense debate, the congress endorsed a motion for "synthetic biology"an umbrella term for genetic engineering that including gene drivethat tilts towards those in favour of continuing with research and experimentation.

How gene drive technology could be used to combat malaria. Includes factbox on malaria worldwide.

"I'm scared about the potential applications of synthetic biology," the head of the IUCN working group, Kent Redford, told AFP in Marseille before the vote.

"There are obvious ecological risks and concerns regarding genetic modification of wild species", warned Ricarda Steinbrecher, a geneticist working with Pro-Natura.

That NGO and others such as Friends of the Earth, ETC Group and the Heinrich Boll Foundation have sounded alarms on the dangers of synthetic biology and gene drive.

Scientists themselves cannot agree on the precise boundaries of synbio. Does a modified rat still belong to the same species? At what point does it become a new one?

Avian malaria

For some species, science has explored other options. Take the rhinoceros, careening towards extinction because of a demand in Asia for it's horn, thought to have medicinal properties.

Scientists can now recreate a molecular facsimile of rhino horn in the lab.

"But people want the real product," said Steinbrecher.

For some island ecosystems, the situation is no less dire than for the rhino, and that urgency is a problem for the technologies under review.

"While there is the potential, [gene drive] is not going to be here in time to save the birds," said Samuel Gon, a scientific advisor to the NGO Nature Conservancy.

Of more than 50 known endemic bird species in Hawaii, only 15 remain, and five of those are "critically endangered" on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Speciesthe last stop before "extinct in the wild".

The birds were mostly wiped out by avian malaria, brought by mosquitoes that arrived in the 19th century by boat.

Hawaii is poised to use another technology that sterilises mosquitoes by inoculating them with a bacterium, Wolbachia.

Meanwhile, the Jurassic Park scenario is still on the cards.

Researchers in the United States and Russia announced earlier this year that they have successfully sequenced the genome of a million-year-old mammoth.

But the next step remains controversialshould it be brought back to life?

 2021 AFP
Gerald Morigerato, former hazmat chief of the New York Regional Response Team, went to Ground Zero to assist with recovery and stayed there for 18 days.

Morigerato recalled how dark it was in the city from a cloud of dust that took away all the light.

Every place you looked, it almost looked like it snowed, he said.

When he arrived, he said two men in very soiled suits and wearing masks came up to him. One of them shook his hand and said, God bless you for being here.

He did not initially realize it, but his colleague told him it was then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani. Morigerato said he saw Giuliani many more times while he was there.

He usually came out either very early in the morning or very late at night  always thanking us and always concerned about our health and safety, he said.

When Morigerato got to Ground Zero, he was anxious to get started and wanted to touch base with the FDNYs hazmat team to see how he could help. He went up to the incident commander.
Days after the start of the new school year, Warren County Health Services on Friday reported five school-related cases of COVID-19, which have resulted in the quarantine of at least 16 individuals.

Glens Falls City Schools reported three individuals have tested positive for the virus. Two cases involved individuals at the districts high school and another at the middle school, according to a letter addressed to parents on the districts website.

As can be expected while Warren County remains in high community transmission, we are now seeing our first positive COVID cases since the start of the academic year, a letter reads.

A total of 16 individuals are under quarantine as a result of the positive cases. Its unclear if the individuals are students or employees as the district does not provide that information for privacy reasons.

Unvaccinated students must quarantine for 10 days after being exposed to the virus, and complete asynchronous learning. Children will have daily contact with their teachers throughout the quarantine period, according to the districts website.
Mayor Dan Hall, in a speech honoring first responders, thanked the citys emergency personnel for the commitment they make to others on a daily basis.

Let us honor the first responders. The brave firefighters, police officers, EMTs and paramedics, members of our armed forces and even civilians who put others first and risked it all to save lives, he said. These are the heroes of Sept. 11. Their courage inspires us and offers us hope that good outshines evil.

Moments later, first responders at the event would demonstrate their commitment to others when one of their own fainted during the ceremony. Smith rushed from the stage to assist. He was joined by Glens Falls Fire Chief James Schrammel and other emergency personnel in attendance.

The individual was taken by ambulance to Glens Falls Hospital.

Schrammel, in prepared remarks of his own, said that even though 20 years have passed, the feelings from 9/11 still feel fresh in his mind.

He asked the crowd to continue to honor those lost and said he struggled to find the right words to express how he feels.

I realized no matter what I say I can never do justice to the events and loss of that day, he said. I realized what truly matters is that we all came here today in solidarity to remember the events of Sept. 11, 2001.

Chad Arnold is a reporter for The Post-Star covering the city of Glens Falls and the town and village of Lake George and Washington County government. Follow him on Twitter @ChadGArnold.

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Many first responders who developed a chronic cough later had it fade, or disappear entirely, but others have shown little improvement.

About 9% of firefighters exposed to the dust still report a persistent cough, according to Fire Department research. About 22% report experiencing shortness of breath. About 40% still have chronic sinus problems or acid reflux.

On the encouraging side, doctors say their worst fears about a possible wave of deadly 9/11 cancers havent come true. Not yet, at least.

Nearly 24,000 people exposed to trade center dust have gotten cancer, but for the most part it has been at rates in line with the general public. Rates of a few specific types of cancer have been found to be modestly elevated, but researchers say that could be due to more cases being caught in medical monitoring programs.

We really dont have the tremendous elevations in cancer I was afraid of, says Dr. Michael Crane, director of the World Trade Center health clinic at Mount Sinai.

One study showed that cancer mortality rates have actually been lower among city firefighters and paramedics exposed to Trade Center dust than for most Americans, possibly because frequent medical screenings.
Editor:

In a Sept. 5, Post-Star letter, Al Scoonzarielli of Moreau suggested that we look to Colorado as an example of the benefits that legalized marijuana might bring to New York. Here is what an author of Colorados marijuana legalization law, Attorney Robert J. Corry Jr. of Denver, Colorado, has said on that subject.

The inmates are running Colorados marijuana asylum. ... This industry fouls our planet with chemicals and wasteful growing systems, harms the poor and children, and is dominated by the wealthy and privileged. ... The percentage of Colorados overall state revenue from marijuana is minuscule. Costs for treatment, lost productivity, and other externalities of increased intoxication and addiction, plus harm to children, have skyrocketed. ... Colorado is now synonymous with marijuana, and marijuana is a net loss. Connecticut Mirror, 6/20/2021.

Mr. Scoonzarielli also questioned the old gateway drug thing. There needs to be little debate about which drug is a gateway, since the gateway is more psychological than a matter of substance abuse.
+3 Widow of Sept. 11 responder describes devastation, and inspiration LOWER TOWNSHIP  Mark Leonard was proud of his service in the Middle East and in New York Ci

Saracini flew for United Airlines for 16 years, said Suzi Neustafter, who delivered a speech about the former captain. His job allowed his wife, Ellen, and daughters Kirsten and Brielle to travel the world. His love for his family helped his daughters achieve new heights in their life  Brielle Saracini-McGuire now works for the New York Yankees, and Kirsten Saracini-Franks is an English professor at Cornell University in New York.

Ellen has become an advocate for airline safety, which led to President Donald Trump signing into law the Saracini Aviation Safety Act in 2018.

Ive tried to always carry him in my heart and never forget anything about him, Renzi said. I always keep in touch with Ellen and always keep in touch with the girls, and we always reminisce and speak about him when we get together.

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Its always a void thats just never going to be filled again; youre never going to be like whole again. But you get stronger as time goes by.

ONeill also grew up in Atlantic City and graduated from Holy Spirit High School in Absecon. His widow, Christine, grew up on Nevada Avenue and knew the Saracini family, too. Renzi was maid of honor in one of Christine ONeills brothers weddings.
LOWER TOWNSHIP  Mark Leonard was proud of his service in the Middle East and in New York City in the immediate aftermath of Sept. 11.

But there was no way he could have known what was coming when he signed up for the New Jersey National Guard.

He just wanted to serve his country, his widow, Sundi Leonard, said in a recent interview. One weekend a month; that was perfect for his work schedule.

Mark Leonard died in April at 58. Sundi agreed to talk about his experiences on Sept. 11 and its aftermath.

His wife suspects his work in New York after the attacks had an effect on his health, but she said she could never be certain.

Around 2009, he started getting swellings, she said.

His face or tongue would swell for no clear reason, and he would break out in rashes. It seemed like an allergic reaction, but nothing had changed at home or in his diet. The cause remained a mystery.

A specialist diagnosed it as idiopathic angioedema, she said, describing it as swelling for which there is no known cause.
Speigel was in New York for 10 days.

Returning to Wildwood, he said, the beach resort seemed like a different world.

It was awkward, he said. After seeing the destruction up there, you came back and started readjusting. At the time, it didnt feel like normal life.

+17 At least 19 people injured in Wildwood balcony collapse, investigation underway WILDWOOD  Panic and fear struck a group of firefighters and their families Saturday night w

Some combat veterans report similar feelings when returning to their day-to-day life. Speigel said he could not compare his experiences with a veteran who may have been deployed for months or years.

The small community of the Wildwoods had been touched by the attacks, as had the entire nation. Andrew Alameno, who grew up in Wildwood Crest, worked at Cantor Fitzgerald, a financial firm with offices on multiple floors of the North Tower.

Every employee who arrived to work that day was killed.

Speigel can remember details of his work in New York over those 10 days as though they were yesterday. But his life has continued. Hes now retired from the Fire Department, living in Cape May Court House and working as the construction and fire official for North Wildwood.
Newly released 2020 Census data give us a better sense of where Americans think the best places to live are. Cities such as Phoenix, Dallas, Houston and Las Vegas continue to be popular, maintaining the strong population growth thats defined them for the last half-century. Others, such as Buffalo and Cincinnati, have reversed decades-long declines in population, leading to proud claims of urban revival. Still more, such as Detroit and St. Louis, continued to lose people as they have for the last 70 years.

Whats also clear from the data, though, is that population growth may no longer be the best way to measure the health of U.S. cities. What look like the best places to live may not, in fact, be the best places to live.

Historically, the U.S. has featured two distinct models of urban growth. The first, in place for a century or more, might be called the demand model. In this case, a variety of factors from jobs to affordable lifestyles to pleasant climates attract people to new places. The primary exemplars are the Sun Belt cities that have grown dramatically in recent decades.
This is what decentralized, collective leadership looks like, declared House Speaker Chris Welchs spokesperson Jaclyn Driscoll not long after the chamber approved the climate/energy bill on an unexpectedly lopsided 83-33 roll call on September 9.

The vote was without a doubt a spectacular victory, especially considering the Senate was not able to put together its own package that could pass both chambers and be signed into law.

Not only did all but one House Democrat vote for the bill after starting the day miles from that point, but eleven House Republicans ended up on board even though House Republican leadership had said the day before that there was nearly zero support for it and only two Senate Republicans had voted for their chambers version.

The House Black Caucus has for years specialized in blowing up important bills in order to pry concessions loose for their constituency. So, Speaker Welch put Assistant Majority Leader Marcus Evans, an African-American South Sider, into the lead negotiators role after the Senate punted the issue to his chamber. And when the Black Caucus expectedly demanded more concessions, Leader Evans was able to make some changes and then convincingly explain to the caucus how Black folks were getting a decent deal.
The one big exception was Operation Warp Speed, the public-private partnership initiated by the Trump administration to develop viable vaccines by the end of 2020. It was an unprecedented timetable for a process that normally might have taken years. The speedy delivery of the vaccines has undoubtedly saved countless lives. Trump will always deserve credit for that historic achievement and for encouraging his followers to take the vaccine  even if too tepidly and with mixed success, as was demonstrated recently when some of his own followers at a rally in Alabama booed him for it.

Perhaps that was on Trumps mind when he told The Wall Street Journal last week that he probably wont get the booster shot that doctors say may soon be necessary for the fully vaccinated (as Trump is). Two weeks prior, he dismissively told Fox News the boosters are a money-making operation for Pfizer.

After leading the extraordinary vaccine-development effort, Trump first hobbled it with his mixed messaging on the seriousness of the pandemic, and now has completely kicked the legs out from under it by giving his followers one more reason to continue putting themselves and those around them in danger. How many more of Trumps followers have to die before he finally understands the damage hes still doing, even out of office?

2021 STLtoday.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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It saddens me to realize that as Americans, we are no longer capable of pulling together to fight for health and well being, not just for our country but for our neighbors, even our children. Thousands wont get vaccinated or even wear a simple mask to help America can get back on her feet.

Even our governor, whose first duty is to keep Iowans safe, refuses to put her ego aside and let schools decide whats best for our children, teachers and staff.

Such a bunch of unpatriotic, selfish cowards.

Jane Arnould Bettendorf

Get vaccinated

As the coronavirus continues to mutate and spread rapidly, medical experts warn that new variants are likely to evolve that will be even more dangerous and may even be resistant to current vaccines. They counsel that the only way to stop this progression and mutation of the disease is to fully vaccinate the population of our country and the world.
Early morning on Tuesday September 11, 2001, I was the chief of police for the city of East Moline. I was in my office reviewing Mondays September 10, 2001 activity. I clearly remember hearing my records clerk located just outside my door, talking in a frantic manner.

She advised me a plane had crashed into the Twin Towers in New York. We quickly went back to the booking room, to bring up the news on television.

The first thing I noticed was the heavy black smoke exiting the top of one of the New York Twin Towers. A short time later, there was a second crash into the second Twin Tower. I was in disbelief not knowing what was really occurring. As I stayed glued to the television and listening to the reporters, there was a third attack at the United States Pentagon.

As I watched the activity back at the Twin Towers, I also noticed people on the ground covered in soot and running around in frantic manner. I saw emergency responders arriving and putting themselves in harms way to try to rescue the people that were trapped and the ones that were exiting the buildings.
And on Palczynski's last day in the city, he was finally able to pay respects to his friend.

"They found his company the week that we were there, so the last visitation we went to was his. That was the first time I met his wife and his little boys ... That was probably the hardest thing was meeting his wife, because she knew all of our names. The guys we were with  there were eight of us that went to his visitation  she knew us by name, but had never met us.

"Same with my wife, she knows a lot of these guys names that I work with or have been with but she doesn't know who they are. And that's something else that changed for me. Any time any of my acquaintances come to town to teach, to do whatever, we stop and have a drink or go out to eat because I don't want the first time she meets them to be under those same circumstances."

Palczynski said that now, 20 years later, he is still affected by the memory of that week of funerals in New York City.
Mansor Diagne was asleep in his Harlem home when an airplane crashed into the twin towers.

The then-20-year-old had been working third shift at a grocery store since he moved to New York earlier in 2001, so instead of seeing or hearing the crash in-person, he got woken up by a call from his father's friend, telling him to turn on the news.

"It was not real to me," Diagne said. "I was like, this is a movie or something else is going on."

It all became very real when he walked outside and saw the smoke in the sky.

Feelings of disbelief and grief were shared among many people in the Muslim community, throughout the U.S. and in the Quad-Cities, after the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. Those who attend the Islamic Center of Quad Cities in Moline were able to share those feelings with others, as they came out to offer support and solidarity.

Tauseef Ahmed, a manager at John Deere and member of the Islamic Center, was devastated to hear that the Sept. 11 attacks were orchestrated by Muslims and knew that would cast a negative light on the Muslim community as a whole.
The department's anti-terror tools also are being used to solve more run-of-the-mill crimes.

"The systems that were built with Homeland Security funding in the years after 9/11 are for protecting New York City from the threat of terrorism," Miller said. "We would be remiss, and the federal government fully agrees with this, if we did not use those same tools to fight crime. Our job is to protect life and property and dual use for these tools is a legal and accepted practice."

Suspects tracked from 'beginning to the end'

NYPD officials were notified of a heist at a luxury retail store in Manhattan on Aug. 20 where $20,000 worth of handbags were stolen. Five men hopped into a stolen Range Rover and fled with the high priced handbags. Investigators used their plate readers to find them hours later on their way to New Jersey using the Lincoln Tunnel.

The NYPD also used license plate readers to catch Grafton Thomas after federal prosecutors said he entered into a rabbi's home in Monsey and attacked five people with an 18-inch machete. Thomas was arrested an hour after the attack when license plate readers identified his vehicle crossing the George Washington Bridge into New York City, authorities said at the time.
He said everyone was pushed back to the sidewalk and everything got quiet.

Somebody called out and everybody snapped to attention and saluted, Seder said. As soon as that happened, I came out from the sidewalk and had my Fuji camera and took that one frame.  (The officer) turned around and looked at me. My one shot, I liked it.

Seder said he went into his own world when he was taking pictures of the recovery.

It still bothers me every time I go through the photos, not just on the website, but I come across prints that I made or negatives, he said. It still affects me quite a bit, especially after meeting so many of these people.

Seder said he did his last photo show about 9/11 in 2016 in Illinois. He said he spoke with junior and high school students who werent born yet. He said it was akin to when he was growing up learning about World War II.

Yep, it was there, everybodys father was in it, but it doesnt have much to do with me, but its never over, he said. I worry about my grandkids. Its been going on for 10,000 years, I guess, it certainly isnt becoming better.

Those kids that were high school kids five years ago and are now in college, some of them I know have actually graduated, hopefully theyll be the ones doing things to try and mitigate it and prevent it, Seder said.

 Contact Siandhara Bonnet at siandhara.bonnet@rapidcityjournal.com 

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The South Dakota Mines volleyball team keeps rolling and made a little history in the meantime, knocking of No. 19 Northern State in four games and then defeated New Mexico Highlands in five sets Friday at the Northern State Tournament in Aberdeen.

It was the first time the Hardrockers beat a Top 20 squad in the Division II era.

Mines toppled the Wolves 25-23, 25-20, 19-25 and 25-23 and then just got past the Cowgirls 25-19, 25-22, 17-25, 21-25 and 14-4.

Against Northern, the first set was a battle with each team countering each other, not allowing any big runs, and going point for point. The Hardrockers trailed 11-8 but rallied for an 18-17 lead as Victoria Zagorski had two kills. The two teams would continue to battle before the Hardrockers held on for the two-point win.

The second set saw the Hardrockers get off to a fast start, leading 10-6 as Emma Grimm had two kills and an ace. South Dakota Mines would keep its foot on the gas pedal, however expanding the lead to 17-6 for a run of 12-1 before holding on for the five-point victory.

After dropping the third set, the Hardrockers held on for the close win that gave them the match.
The American people are somewhat conflicted about what they have seen out of Afghanistan the last couple of weeks, Gibbs said. For Biden, its a moment to try to reset some of that. Remind people of what it is to be commander in chief and what it means to be the leader of the country at a moment of such significance.

The president will commemorate the solemn anniversary on Saturday by paying his respects at the trio of sites where the hijacked planes struck, puncturing the United States air of invincibility and resulting in the deaths of 3,000 Americans.

While the ceremonies dont call for him to make public remarks, Biden released a video Friday to remember those who lost their lives, comfort their families and honor the courage and sacrifice of first responders and servicemembers over the last 20 years. He delivered an impassioned appeal for the nation to set aside its differences and reclaim the spirit of cooperation that sprung up in the days following the attacks.

Unity is what makes us who we are  America at its best, Biden said. "To me thats the central lesson of September 11, he added. Unity is our greatest strength.
Having a trained Buddhist teacher for the group takes the Sanghas practice of Zen Buddhism and meditation to a whole new level, Nolan said. The retreat is best suited for those who have some experience meditating and are ready to delve more deeply into the practice.

Meditation is the practice of bringing a quiet mind into daily life, Green said. The quiet mind is achieved by committing to the practice of meditation.

(Meditation) is an inward reflection, and it does take concentration and it takes determination and focus, Green said. A big part of the Zen practice are extended retreats. A practitioner sits every day on their own and a couple of times per day with the community.

Probably the most important aspect is a daily meditation practice. You become more peaceful. The mind is quieter, he said. The other aspect of this is we can see ourselves and what we do. It becomes more clear what we do and what our motivations are and why we do what we do in life. And that is a big part of the practice because this will change your life, and it is has changed mine in extremely positive ways.

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Tuesday, September 11, 2001. It was like every other day working for then-Congressman John Thune on Capitol Hill. I was a staff assistant at the time and our office, the Longworth House Office Building, was located adjacent to the Capitol.

A few minutes past nine the phone rang  it was our Chief of Staff  he was in South Dakota and the first thing he said was turn on the TV and get me John. I could tell right away something was not right. I rushed to the Congressmans office and turned on the TV  the first tower had been hit. As the staff gathered around the TV, like the rest of the world, we thought it was a pilot that lost his way or had a heart attack mid-air  an accident. Then the second plane hit  this was no coincidence.

There was no game plan for a situation like this. Most of us didnt have cell phones, and there was no social media. We all assembled in the Congressmans office and determined we should hunker down at the office. But soon enough, one of the legislative aides came rushing in. Her husband had called her frantically. While waiting at the mechanic he saw a plane hit the Pentagon. You guys need to evacuate, he said. At this point it had not made the news that a third plane had hit the Pentagon. Immediately, reality hit home that Washington was under attack and there could be more planes.
Our doors should be open

I am writing this letter as a response to the Rapid City School Board's recent decision not to apply for a grant that would have been used to teach English to immigrant students. There are "Help Wanted" signs in nearly every business in nearly every town in South Dakota. One of the ways to correct this situation is to reform our immigration laws so that immigrants can help fill the job vacancies that exist. The U.S. was founded by immigrants, it was expanded by immigrants, and immigrants are the backbone of many businesses today. The dairies in our state and the meat processing plants of our state could not operate without immigrant labor. The State of SD has provided monetary incentives to these businesses to expand their footprint in our state and this would not have been possible without the employment of immigrant labor. What message is the Rapid City School Board sending to immigrants? Is our "Door Open" or is our "Door Closed"? English is our national language and students from other countries need to be taught English so that they can become an integral part of our society. I want our "doors to be open."
Rabid bats often act aggressively.

Trust me, youll know when one isn't acting right, Webber said. I had one that landed on the ground near me. Ill never forget the sound it was making  the hissing and posturing. I left that area immediately.

Szymanski said animals like horses infected with rabies can either become aggressive or docile. In this case, the horses owners found it lying down and unable to get back up.

As a result of the diagnosis, four people were treated for post-exposure rabies and 15 horses are being monitored for potential exposure.

Rabies is a fatal viral disease that is spread through the saliva of an infected animal. The virus can infect any mammal, including people. It is virtually 100% preventable in domestic animals through the administration of the rabies vaccine.

While rabies diagnoses involving horses are not common in Montana, this case is a reminder that they can occur, especially in unvaccinated animals, said Dr. Anna Forseth of the Montana Department of Livestock. The rabies vaccine is a core vaccine for horses, as defined by the American Association of Equine Practitioners. Horse owners should work with the veterinarians to ensure that their animals are appropriately vaccinated.
City officials said they could not take down the statue without first determining what to do with his remains.

Stoney said last week that a relocation ordinance would be introduced to the City Council on Monday, but administration officials later said it needed to be delayed to give the citys lawyers more time to review and finalize agreements with the family under a process that involves the citys circuit court.

I think its a difficult timeline to predict given the collaboration not just with the family, but the courts and the council, said Lincoln Saunders, the citys chief administrative officer. Weve been moving as expeditiously as we can. ... Its hard to underestimate the complications of it being a gravesite.

It remains unclear what the city plans to do with the rest of the statues it took down last year, which were initially transported to a sewage treatment plant.

It is up to City Council to determine their fate  to whom and where the bronze sculptures and stone pedestals will be relocated, said Jim Nolan, the mayors spokesperson. The costs of removal and transport will be the responsibility of the recipients unless the council allocates funding.
On the morning of the attacks and the days afterward, she did not allow her two young daughters, an infant and a 2-year-old, to see any of the news coverage about it. But it was impossible to insulate them from how other people might react to a Muslim person in public.

I remember very clearly being at the Dulles Worldgate Center in Herndon. I was driving a station wagon at the time. As I was getting into my car, a man in the adjacent parking space started to yell and point his middle finger at me, she said, recalling an incident that happened just a few months later in 2001. I tried to get my girls into the car quickly so that I could shield them.

Alison Kysia, a Muslim American artist and activist based in Fairfax, is working on a storytelling project centered around Muslim women who experienced anti-Islamic bigotry after Sept. 11. The project, 99 Clay Vessels, is visualized through a series of 99 handmade pinch pots that are symbolic to Islam and figuratively hold the stories of Muslim women from around the country.

Growing up with an Arab American father, she was proud of her cultural heritage, but grade school classmates still stereotyped him as a terrorist even before 2001. She said that bigotry and misunderstanding only grew in the 9/11 era.
Hurrying out at the next station I ran into people looking up in the sky. Curious, I looked up, too. Then I saw it, first one fiery tower came into view, then the other tower aflame, black smoke billowing.

With a sick feeling in the gut, I turned toward the Brooklyn Bridge like many did that day. About halfway over the bridge a sound like a prolonged whoosh and a thump was heard. The whole line of pedestrians halted and turned around. From Manhattan, there was a swirling tan-colored cloud; one of the towers had fallen.

I wont forget the miracles of that day: My delay which probably saved my life; the experience of my supervisor, who kept getting sicker every time she attempted to go to work; my co-workers iron stopped working, delaying her; and other stories from that day.

In crisis, New York became the home of the brave as they helped and comforted one another.

James Grizzle, 52

Dinwiddie

***

Trying to find a way home
... Ive met around 200 autism grandparents, many via online support groups and some via the Richmond-based Autism Society of Central Virginia and the Faison Center where Angelina is enrolled. The grandparents range from live-in guardians to thousand-mile-distant occasional visitors. Their relationships with their children range from perfect to bad, with the large majority leaning toward the positive side. And the arcs of their personal and professional lives are all over the place.

But all of us have three things in common: the never-ending autism learning curve, a desire to help our grandchildren and a combination of hope and concern for their future.

Whoops  Angelina has disappeared. Angelina, I call out. I hear her signature pitty-pat steps down the hall, and she arrives with a broad smile. Angelina! Your hair looks so pretty! She beams as she twirls. Did MeMe do those braids? I ask. She nods. (JCs skills are far better than mine; I cant get Angelina to tolerate even one swipe of a hairbrush.)

Sunday, Sept. 12, is National Grandparents Day. President Jimmy Carter signed the legislation in 1978 for the purpose of recognizing and embracing the expertise and wisdom of grandparents. Angelinas schools and therapists and medical workers all have welcomed my and JCs involvement.
Scores of the Virginia Standards of Learning tests recently were released, and the results were, well, dreadful. When nearly every news report includes the verb plummet, you know things are bad.

This should have surprised exactly no one. Online learning, which was the reality for nearly all Virginia students last school year, proved to be an enormous challenge for most families. Last years statewide SOL pass rates, according to the Virginia Department of Education, fell from 78% to 69% in reading, 82% to 54% in math and 81% to 59% in science.

New national data confirms the SOL results. A report from Curriculum Associates found that many fewer students are on grade level in reading and math compared with previous years. For Black students, the declines are roughly double (a decrease of 12% vs. 5% for white students.)

The same researchers found that more first- and second-graders ended the year two or more grade levels below expectations than in any previous year. In other words, a growing number of second-graders have not yet mastered kindergarten skills.
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Blacksburg Deputy Town Manager Chris Lawrence said the partnership will involve the provision of technical assistance via architects who will come from the Virginia chapter of the American Institute of Architects. The architects will over an expected six-month period craft a plan and design for the building, he said.

This is a service project for them. Theyre using this to advance the interest of good practice, the value of architecture, said Lawrence, adding it will come at virtually no cost for the town.

The plan to be developed will include details such as approximately how many different businesses will be able to operate in the building itself, which is just under 6,000 square feet.

An incubator provides space and other services to a number of small businesses that provide promising products but arent quite ready to sign a lease for a brick and mortar location.

With a retail incubator, the public should expect businesses such as food vendors and ones that specialize in items such as jewelry and candles, Lawrence said.
In August 2016, about a year after losing her husband to cancer, a Chesapeake woman decided to join a dating website dedicated to people over 50.

Soon after, she made a connection with a man named Jerry Linus, listed in his OurTime profile as a resident of Virginia Beach. Linus reportedly was a widower, a native of Norway, and a jeweler who traveled the world for work.

The two began communicating daily, through texts, phone calls and email. Linus sent the woman pictures from his travels and told her he loved her. The woman said she loved him, too.

Then, just weeks after their online romance began, Linus began asking for things.

First, it was a new computer. Next, $200,000 to purchase gold bars in Ghana, where he said hed gone because prices were better. Later, it was nice clothes to travel to London. A few months after that, he needed another $100,000. All along, he assured her hed repay her when he returned to Virginia to be with her.
BEDFORD  In hopes of determining how competitive the divisions salaries and wages are, Bedford County Public Schools is moving forward with a salary study.

At its Thursday-night meeting, the Bedford County School Board unanimously approved awarding the projects contract to Management Advisory Group International, Inc., a Fairfax-based management consulting firm.

The compensation and classification study is not to exceed the $50,000 previously budgeted for the project.

LeeAnn Calvert, executive director of human resources and talent development for the school division, said the study would be comprehensive and fully encompass all of the divisions positions  from administrators to teachers to bus drivers.

The study will assess the divisions competitiveness in comparison to other school divisions in the area, as well as its competitiveness with the local labor market for non-teaching positions, she said.

According to Randy Hagler, chief financial officer for schools, the divisions last salary study was conducted about five years ago but wasnt fully implemented due to funding concerns. Hagler said reevaluating compensation every five years or so is typical.
By shifting a precinct here and another there, Sen. George Barker said, map drawers working with Virginias redistricting commission could avoid upending his political career and leaving his Fairfax County constituents without their 14-year incumbent.

Barker  whose residence had been incidentally drawn out of his district in a proposed map and instead included in the district of a fellow Democrat  proposed his own version of the Senate map Thursday during a meeting of the commission. This one, he said, would still comply with the commissions guidelines and avoid his departure from the Senate.

The display of self-interest by one of the redistricting commissions elected officials quickly drew criticism from some Democrats and Republicans in and out of the commission, who challenged the lawmakers effort to adjust the map to his benefit as the newly formed commission tries to cement itself as the cure to gerrymandering.

But other observers say the spectacle of Barkers proposal to protect his seat is a sign that the commission is working as intended: He made his pitch in full view of the public  in person and on a livestream  and it would not pass unless commission members hailing from both parties voted to allow it.
Harris called investment in HBCUs necessary as an investment in national security to remain competitive, particularly with STEM field occupations growing twice the rate of others, especially for women in the workforce.

For women of color, in particular for Black woman, STEM careers will help narrow the pay gap, Harris said. When we talk about the role of HBCUs ... lets be very clear that HBCUs are not only competing, HBCUs are leading.

Harris chatted with the students about their interest in STEM, about the necessity of developing expertise and touched upon topics in machine learning, climate change, defense, projects at NASA Langley Research Center, to name a few, while learning about their research in these areas.

The world is not going to work if we dont continue our research, whether its with weather, whether its with ocean, said Schyler Turner, 20, a biochemistry major. The fact that she took time out of her day to come and hear my opinions and what I think, thats important to do. Thats the kind of leader I want to be.

Aaron Jones, 21, who is majoring in physics and interested in nuclear physics and renewable energy projects, said the visit impacted him because 2020 was his first year voting in an election and now, hes meeting the vice president.
A longtime Virginia Beach charter boat captain pleaded guilty Thursday to taking part in the U.S. Capitol riots earlier this year.

Jacob Jake Hiles, 42, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Washington to a single misdemeanor count of parading, demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building. Hell be sentenced later this year.

Mr. Hiles wanted to accept responsibility and put this behind him, said his attorney, Washington lawyer Charles Haskell. The defense attorney declined to comment further.

Hiles entered his plea before U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson, who presided over the trials of Trump loyalists Paul Manafort and Roger Stone.

On the day of the riot, Hiles posted multiple times on social media about his role.

One post included a photo of a man identified as Hiles wearing a cap, sunglasses, and gaiter with the caption: Feelin cute  might start a revolution later, IDK  in Capitol Hill. Another screenshot showed a man  also reported to be Hiles  wearing goggles and a gaiter inside the Capitol.
Twenty years ago today, the world witnessed a series of convulsive events, the impact of which on global travel and international relations endures.

Ironically, on this same date, another cataclysmic event another historic 9/11 rocked the 18th century in its closing years.

In 1796 Catherine II  already hailed by some admirers as Catherine the Great  was 67 and in her 35th year on the Russian throne. Political genius and naked ambition catapulted her from minor German royalty to Empress of Russia by 32. She wielded greater power than any female monarch in history, exceeding even that of Elizabeth I in England, even that of Cleopatra.

Catherine (1729-96) was the preeminent royal personage in the world. Her health was robust; she expected to live into her 70s or well beyond.

Her mind was sharp and focused on securing her legacy. The oldest of Catherines granddaughters, Alexandra Pavlovna, had just turned 13. Catherine decided she was ready to marry. She wanted a marriage to Prince Gustavus Adolphus, soon to be crowned king of Sweden. The union would moderate the long-standing hostility between Russia and Sweden, giving her a useful ally in northern Europe.
The psychological trauma this unconventional attack is designed to inflict shows in the most dramatic way the need to reorder the nations security priorities.

The mightiest nation in the world can try to put a missile-defense shield in space. But it will remain vulnerable to the makeshift, relatively primitive instruments of assault used Tuesday by determined enemies of the United States.

 The Roanoke Times (Sept. 12, 2001) ***

Today marks the 20th anniversary of one of the most shocking days in U.S. history. Shortly after the attack, President George W. Bush spoke to the nation and set forth a course of action that was passed on to three of his successors.

The attack took place on American soil, but it was an attack on the heart and soul of the civilized world, Bush said. And the world has come together to fight a new and different war  the first, and we hope the only one, of the 21st century. A war against all those who seek to export terror, and a war against those governments that support or shelter them.

Twenty years later, we are seemingly less vulnerable to terrorist attacks than we were in 2001. Yet the threat of a major cyberattack is increasing.
By far the most dreadful consequence of this cascade of errors is the death of 13 young service members placed in harms way by Joe Biden and his inept administration.

President Biden addressed the country just three weeks ago and quoted Harry Truman saying the buck stops with me. Again, hollow words.

He has since shown pure indifference to the cost of his actions, and I can assure you  the Congress notices. Ive heard from hundreds of constituents over the past few weeks. As a member of Congress, I took an oath to defend this nation, even if our President wont. His negligence and ineptitude cost these lives and the peril of our citizens and allies left behind.

The Biden administration has embarrassed America on the international stage and set the stabilization of the region back decades. Our allies around the world are shocked. Russia, China and Iran are quite happy to take advantage.

All of this led me to call for President Bidens resignation as well as the resignations of his three senior administration officials who advised and executed this disastrous withdrawal. As a member of Congress, I will continue to work to hold accountable those within the administration who perpetrated this tragedy. If President Biden wont accept the buck as he promised, Ill work to hand it to him.
I went into first responder mode for the next few hours, he said. It was terrible.

Jones said he knew many people at the Pentagon, if not by name at least by face recognition. He said each department had a lead person who sent someone to his office with paperwork when trying to secure an access badge for someone. He came in contact with lots of people working at the Pentagon.

Of the approximately 125 people lost that day, I knew about 90 of them from my day-to-day work, he said. That made it particularly hard.

Jones said he had to help folks getting out of the building. He said there were close to 30,000 people there on any given day. Once the people were out, they had to secure the building. Then it turned into a rescue and recovery, Jones said.

Rumors were flying that a second plane was coming, he said. I didnt know anything about the New York attack for about two hours after we cleared the building.

After that day, and for at least a month or so, the building was shut down, except for key personnel; security was extremely tight, Jones said. He said the building is about a mile around and the military surrounded it.

They were on high alert, he said.
FLORENCE, S.C.  The English and language arts curriculum of Florence One Schools has been revamped.

Alyssa Leibman, curriculum coordinator of the subject for the district, provided an overview of the changes made to the Florence One Schools Board of Trustees Thursday evening.

She began her presentation by providing a reason for those attending Thursdays meeting to see what, if any, action the board planned to take regarding the districts mask mandate to care about the districts curriculum changes.

I know when people talk about curriculum thats not usually the most thrilling thing on the agenda that people get excited about but it really should be, Leibman said. It is the most personal thing a school district can do for children in any building. Its the way we connect with how children learn, its the way we respect teachers professionalism and for a parent its the way we can guarantee that when a child leaves our district they are truly college, career and life ready.

She said that she had been in the district for four weeks and that every English and language arts course had been changed.

Why was the change necessary?
Richard OMalley, Florence One Schools superintendent, told the board during his report that the mask mandate wasnt about politics  OMalley typically steers very clear of politics  so much as it was about keeping students in school.

He told the board at the Aug. 19 meeting that virtual learning was not working for the district, thus, the primary aim of the district is to keep as many children in school as possible.

The desire to keep children in school is complicated by regulations promogulated by the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control regarding when students must quarantine.

OMalley said the regulations say that a student who comes into close contact with a person who tested positive for COVID-19 must quarantine if the student is either not wearing a mask or remains unvaccinated.

Stewart also made specific reference to case numbers provided by OMalley during his report.

OMalley said that the district reported 252 total positive cases during the last week without a mask mandate compared to 244 total cases the week after the mandate was implemented and 157 this week.
Winning asymmetrical warfare is very, very difficult, and its not just the United States.

American exceptionalism causes the U.S. to look at the rest of the world and think they want our form of government and our lifestyle to go with it.

They may want to wear Nikes, watch our movies and listen to our music, but it doesnt mean they want our form of government, Kaufman said.

Only twice since WWII has the United States been successful at installing democracies abroad  Japan and West Germany. Both countries, though, had previous experience with democracy, Kaufman said.

In the Philippines and South Korea, it took 50 years for democracy to take root, he said. Kaufman said now that the United States is out of Afghanistan, there are several ways the country could go.

The first is that we end up with a relationship with them much like we have now with Vietnam.

The second is that Afghanistan could descend into a second civil war.

A third scenario is that it returns to what it was before the United States invaded, a haven for terrorists.
I very distinctly remember a girl in class very nervous and upset, Baker said. She had family there.

After about 10 or 15 minutes in class, Baker said, they were told that the Pentagon had been breached, to get their stuff together and walk out of the library where the class was being held in the basement.

Baker said no one seemed to know what was going on or what to do. She said someone said you could see the smoke from the fifth floor of the student center. Baker said she and a bunch of students went over to see.

I was just 18 and still a little fearless, she said.

She said the anxiety came later.

We couldnt go back to our freshman dorm, we couldnt make any phone calls out, she said. Before school officials came out and told them to go back to their dorms, Baker said they just walked around campus.

Baker said a good friend from Florence who had attended Trinity Collegiate School (then Trinity-Byrnes Collegiate School) with her was also at GW. She said their parents, guidance counselor and principal from Trinity were all calling, trying to contact them.

Classes were canceled. Baker said she went back to her dorm and watched what had and was unfolding on the news.
Even with the enormous risk they took, many of the people helping out at Ground Zero said they would do it all over again, Hill said.

They tend to be a very patriotic group, she said. Many are angry at the government that lied and said it was safe to get back to work.

Some have also suffered mentally from what they saw and what they had to do.

Hill said people worked knowing they had relatives who were buried in the rubble. She recalled an iron worker who went there to help knowing his brother died there.

Hill said she also worked with people known as the bucket brigade. She said these were the ones who sifted through the debris and often found body parts among it. Most were volunteers who were not adequately prepared for the toll this would take on them mentally as well as physically, she added.

Twenty years later, Hill has her own vivid memory of that day in September 2001.

I got a cab to my internship, and while in the cab, they reported a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. By the time I got to the internship, the second plane had hit, Hill said.

Hill said she worked a block and a half from Macys.
FLORENCE, S.C.  Frankie Welch remembers picking her brother up from the airport upon his return from Vietnam, like it was yesterday.

We got a flat tire on the way back to Turbeville and no one would even stop to help us, Welch said. Thats the way it was back then. People didnt treat our servicemen and veterans like they deserved to be treated. It was sad. It still makes me sad to think about it.

But its that experience and her brother, Welch said, that now prompt her to celebrate veterans and being American every chance she gets  the latest being Saturday, the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2011, terrorist attack.

Welch and people from across the Pee Dee gathered Saturday morning at the Veterans Park in Florence to commemorate that somber day in American history and remember the lives lost.

Barry Jones, a civilian employee who was in the Pentagon when American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the western side of the Pentagon at approximately 9:45 a.m. that day, was the keynote speaker for Saturdays event. Welch said listening to Jones recall the horrors of that day gave her chills.
In Afghanistan in August, the Taliban seized control with menacing swiftness as the Afghan government and security forces that the U.S. and its allies had spent two decades trying to build collapsed. No steady hand was evident from the U.S. in the disorganized evacuation of Afghans desperately trying to flee the country.

In the United States, the 2001 attacks had set loose a bloodlust cry for revenge. A swath of American society embraced the binary outlook articulated by Bush  "Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists"  and has never let go of it.

Factionalism hardened, in school board fights, on Facebook posts, and in national politics, so that opposing views were treated as propaganda from mortal enemies. The concept of enemy also evolved, to include immigrants as well as terrorists.

The patriot under threat became a personal and political identity. Trump would harness it to help him win the presidency.

For the U.S., the presidencies since Bush's wars have been marked by an effort to pull back the military from the conflicts of the Middle East and Central Asia.
After alerting my higher headquarters that we were going to cancel the conference and get everyone back to the units, we learned that commercial airlines were grounded, affecting about a dozen soldiers. Others had driven to Columbia or were able to rent cars after flights were canceled.

Everything was fast paced, a little surreal at times, but things worked out. Members of my staff drove the soldiers from Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands and Germany to Charleston AFB in hopes of a flight on military aircraft. It took a few days, but all of the soldiers returned safely to their duty stations.

Then there is family. I called my stepdaughter, a brand-new student at George Washington University. She went to D.C. a few days before 9/11, and now she was hearing sirens and seeing smoke rising from the Pentagon. I remember giving her the only advice I knew to give, Do what the GW officials tell you to do. Its going to be OK. I called my kids, one in Columbia and one in Florida, and my wife in Florence.

Late the next day, Sept. 12, my 54th birthday, I drove to Florence. As I left Interstate 20, I experienced my first positive feelings on a while when I saw U.S. flags on police cars and other vehicles.
Sunday, Sept. 9, 2001, was a perfect fall day. I was returning to New Jersey from a wonderful weekend of air shows on Long Island, New York, with my friend John Ray.

As we approached the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge tollbooths, I looked over my right shoulder at the Manhattan skyline. Never before have I seen it so beautiful! The afternoon sun was reflecting off the windows of the buildings. The two World Trade Center buildings just sparkled!

Sunday traffic at the tollbooths was slower than usual. I noticed extra people in each tollbooth scrutinizing each cars passengers. I never found out why. We returned to my hometown of Ocean City, New Jersey.

On Tuesday morning, the 11th, I was closing my summer condo and returning to my winter home in Darlington. I was packing the car when my wife, Bert, came out to tell me that a plane had just flown into the World Trade Center.

Thats not possible on a beautiful and clear day like this! I said. Thats no accident!

She reminded me of the B-25 that flew into the Empire State Building back in the 40s.

That was an accident that happened in thick fog before we had radar, I said.
I reported early to work that Tuesday morning in September. I handle media relations for Florence-Darlington Technical College, and we were hosting a 9 a.m. video conference call with our president and the president of our sister college in Germany. It was an announcement of a new partnership between our two schools, and we thought it was going to be a major local story. I had already invited the media, but I wanted to remind them that morning with a personal phone call.

I was on the phone with an assignments manager with one of our local TV news station when he suddenly said, You need to turn on a TV. Something terrible just happened to a large building in New York (City)! He added, I think it was an airplane crash!

I remember reading about a fog-bound military plane hitting the Empire State Building in the 1940s and thought it might be an accident.

Instead of seeking out a television, I used the internet connection on my computer to watch and saw a second plane hit a tower of the World Trade Center beneath blue skies.

Looking at the ball of fire, I instantly remembered how I had visited those buildings as a young sailor two decades before, and I remembered thinking as I stared at my computer, How could this be an accident?
Rome: tributes paid to Afghan leader Ahmed Shah Massoud on his 20th death anniversary

Rome [Italy], September 11 (ANI): A high-level symposium was organised to commemorate the 20th death anniversary of Afghanistan's guerrilla commander Ahmed Shah Massoud in Rome, Italy. The event was organised on Friday by the Embassy of Afghanistan in Rome, in collaboration with several other groups.

The event titled "Afghanistan, Taliban and the Future" was attended by several people including Yara Ehm, Member of the Italian Parliament and Commission on Foreign Affairs, Gabriela Colarusso, La Repubblica's foreign affairs correspondent, Gaja Pellegrini, Margherita Stancati from the Wall Street Journal and other representatives of the international and local media.

The Diplomatic Missions of Ireland and the Czech Republic were represented by their Deputy Heads of Mission.

Khalid Zekriya, Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan to Italy spoke about the need for the International community to recognise that Afghanistan today is in the hands of a government of terrorists who did not represent the Afghan hopes and dreams which were sown by the blood of "martyrs like Ahmad Shah Massoud."

"Massoud's sacrifice was important because it laid the basis for the modern state of Afghanistan; something that Pakistan backed Taliban government will try and destroy in the days to come. Afghans, however, are resilient people and the scenes today of women protesting will be more common in the coming days and months," said Khalid Zekriya.

Honouring the sacrifice of the Italian soldiers he also remembers that thousands of Afghan soldiers have laid down their lives for defending their homeland. Khalid Zekriya said, "The narrative that the Afghan defence forces just collapsed was a terrible propaganda, as since 2012 most of the fighting was being done by Afghan soldiers."

Zakariya even mentioned that there is more to what meets the eye. Without direct orders from above, the Afghan defence forces would not have folded, he added.

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Laura Harth, the human rights activist, spoke of the importance of a global alliance to protect freedom and democracy. She recounted their recent battles to assist democracy in Hong Kong against Chinese oppression and feared that the violence would be much more in Afghanistan against women, journalists and minorities.

Emilio Ciarlo of the Italian Agency for cooperation and development, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, spoke of the need for national building. He underlined the risks of an unstable Afghanistan for the world. "The failure of the West to assist democracy will reverberate in the Balkans as well as North Africa and will be a danger to Europe, with the increase in the flow of narcotics as well as weapons and a more militant Islam."

Fausto Biloslavo, a veteran journalist, who just returned from Panjshir to Kabul joined virtually. He underlined the suspension of rights of journalists and the fear of the local population currently. Biloslavo stated that the people are gathering to vent out their disaffection with the Taliban and their morale is high and the resistance will expand its support and reach.

"It was all like a castle of sand which collapsed in a few days," said FawziaKoofi, Parliamentarian in the previous government, describing the fall of Kabul. She requested the world community to support the rights and freedom for women and children and check the transgression of the Taliban towards the minorities and weaker sections.

Ahmed Wali Massoud, the brother of the slain leader 20 years ago, who joined virtually summarised the evening, paying tribute to his brother and his vision for Afghanistan.

He stated that it is important that the world carefully follow the alleged Pakistani involvement in the country as this will only lead to further destabilisation. Afghanistan needs to be inclusive and a country for all, beyond ethnic and religious lines. (ANI)
TOKYO (AP)  Japan's defense minister on Monday welcomed the British aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth as it made its first Japanese port call, saying the involvement of European nations in the Indo-Pacific region is key to peace and stability as China's military strength and influence grow.

Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi met the strike group's commander, Commodore Steve Moorhouse, on board the carrier.

The ship arrived at the U.S. Navy base in Yokosuka near Tokyo on Saturday. Japan is seeking to expand its military cooperation beyond its traditional alliance with the United States as China's navy expands and increasingly presses its territorial claims.

The Queen Elizabeth participated in a joint exercise with warships from the United States, the Netherlands, Canada and Japan before arriving in Yokosuka. The exercise was part of efforts to achieve a free and open Indo-Pacific vision led by Washington and Tokyo.

European countries' interest in (China's) unilateral attempts to change the status quo in the East and South China Seas ... contributes to the peace and stability in this region," Kishi told reporters. I expect the port call will contribute to a further development of Japan-British defense cooperation."

Japan has become increasingly worried about Chinas growing military influence in the region as well as Beijings escalating tensions with Taiwan and rivalry with the United States. Japan has repeatedly protested to China over its increased activity near the Japanese-controlled Senkaku Islands, which are also claimed by China, which calls them Diaoyu.

After arriving in Yokosuka, Moorhouse tweeted that the strike group's interaction is part of Britain's commitment to strengthen our diplomatic, economic and security ties in the Indo-Pacific. He said it will take ties between Japan and Britain to a whole new level.

The Carrier Strike Groups presence embodies the United Kingdoms support for the freedom and security of the regions vital trading routes, and for an international system that benefits all countries, Moorhead said.

The strike group departed from Britain in May. Commissioned in 2017, the HMS Queen Elizabeth is Britains largest and most powerful warship. It is capable of carrying up to 40 aircraft such as F-35 stealth fighters, according to the Royal Navy.
US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin met with Philippine Secretary of National Defense Delfin Lorenzana.

Washington DC [US], September 11 (ANI): US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin met with Philippines Secretary of National Defense Delfin Lorenzana and reiterated their commitment to supporting the security, stability, and prosperity of a free and open Indo-Pacific, Pentagon informed on Saturday.

Indo-Pacific region is largely viewed as an area comprising the Indian Ocean and the western and central Pacific Ocean, including the South China Sea. China's territorial claims in the South China Sea and its efforts to advance into the Indian Ocean are seen to have challenged the established rules-based system.

Amid China's growing assertiveness, the two secretaries affirmed the enduring nature of the US-Philippines alliance, as well as their shared commitment to building an even stronger foundation for future alliance cooperation.

Austin reiterated that the US commitment to Philippine security is ironclad, and that US treaty commitments extend to Philippine armed forces, public vessels, or aircraft in the South China Sea, Pentagon readout said.

He expressed his appreciation for the Philippine decision to restore the US-Philippines Visiting Forces Agreement, which signals a commitment by both sides to enhance the scale and scope of alliance cooperation.

Both the defence secretaries also discussed the importance of increased military and security cooperation to support Philippine defense modernization efforts and build alliance interoperability.

The Secretaries agreed to undertake a number of new initiatives that will ensure the bilateral alliance is postured to address new and emerging challenges.

"These include: developing a joint vision statement on shared priorities for the next phase of our alliance cooperation; concluding a bilateral maritime framework that advances military activities and cooperation in the maritime space; resuming infrastructure improvement projects at Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement agreed locations in the Philippines; and Re-convening the Bilateral Strategic Dialogue later this year," the readout said.

Last month, the Philippines government had restored the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) with the US military, which shows that Beijing has failed to deliver enough to the Southeast Asian archipelago.

Philippines had scrapped this agreement with the US 18 months back, but China had not delivered enough to sustain a friendship with Manila which pulled back Manila to restore the agreement. (ANI)
Emergency temporary standards  under which the rules are being implemented on a fast track  have been particularly vulnerable to challenges, Wiley said. But the risks presented by the coronavirus and the existence of declared public health emergency could put this one "on stronger footing than any other ones past administrations have tried to impose that have been challenged in court," she said.

Meanwhile, new U.S. studies released Friday show the COVID-19 vaccines remain highly effective against hospitalizations and death even as the extra-contagious delta variant swept the country.

One study tracked more than 600,000 COVID-19 cases in 13 states from April through mid-July. As delta surged in early summer, those who were unvaccinated were 4.5 times more likely than the fully vaccinated to get infected, over 10 times more likely to be hospitalized and 11 times more likely to die, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"Vaccination works," Dr. Rochelle Walensky, CDC's director, told a White House briefing Friday. "The bottom line is this: We have the scientific tools we need to turn the corner on this pandemic."

Walensky said Friday that well over 90% of people in U.S. hospitals with COVID-19 are unvaccinated.
CHICAGO (AP)  Dozens of employees of the Art Institute of Chicago rallied this week in support of a move to start a union at one of the country's largest art museums.

Organizers hope the museum will voluntarily recognize the union if enough employees sign signature cards in support, avoiding a formal vote. They declined to say this week how many employees have signed so far.

The Chicago Tribune reports that about 200 employees of the museum and the associated School of the Art Institute marched down Michigan Avenue on Thursday evening before holding a rally outside the museum.

The union would be part of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. Employees of other prominent art museums have successfully formed unions with AFSCME in recent years, including the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles.

A spokesman for AFSCME Anders Lindall said the Art Institute union would represent about 340 non-management employees including curators, custodians, librarians and retail workers.
SIOUX CITY -- Sarah C. Rutherford loves mural work because it brings art to the people.

The first week in September, as the Rochester, New York-based artist worked on a mural on the side of a building at 214 W. Seventh St. in Sioux City, she said a number of people stopped to talk to her and express how excited they were about the large photorealistic Northern Harrier that was taking shape on the wall amongst corn and a prairie scene.

"I've had some great reactions. I think it's cool for people to see the process," Rutherford said as she sat on a boom lift parked in front of the nearly finished mural, which is visible from Wesley Parkway and the downtown area. "I think often you just see these final works, but being in a public space, people could really see it evolve and come into life."

Millions of dollars have been invested on West Seventh Street, between Wesley Parkway and Hamilton Boulevard, through a complete street reconstruction and the facade improvement program. Rutherford's mural, a partnership between Rutherford, the building's owner and the city, is the first of several to be installed throughout the West Seventh Street Corridor by international, national and local artists.
SIOUX CITY -- Brent Hoffman described 9/11 as one of those "touchstone experiences" that compels one to reflect.

"Everyone has a story of where they were, with whom, the shock of it all," said Hoffman, an Anthon, Iowa, native and former military officer.

Twenty years ago on Sept. 11, 2001, Hoffman was a 38-year-old Air Force major stationed in the Pentagon.

The headquarters for the U.S. Department of Defense, Hoffman explained, has five floors and five interconnected pentagons or rings, with only the out "E" ring visible from ground level.

At 9:45 a.m., hijacked American Airlines Flight 77 struck the Pentagon. Hoffman said the plane exploded through the westside "E," "D" and "C" rings. He was on the fourth floor of the inner "A" ring, roughly 500 feet away.

"People are often surprised to learn my friends and I were doing the same thing as most everyone else in the country -- watching TV. We were puzzled when the first plane hit and horrified by the second, with no idea a third was about to hit our own building," recalled Hoffman, who escaped injury.

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The attack on the Pentagon killed 125 military personnel and civilians and all of the 64 people on the plane.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  California lawmakers moved Friday to extend and streamline an assisted death law, reducing the time until terminal patients can acquire the fatal drugs.

The current minimum 15-day waiting period required between the time patients make separate oral requests for medication would be reduced to 48 hours. The bill would also eliminate a requirement that a patient make a final written attestation within 48 hours of taking the medication.

It became clear that some well-intentioned aspects of the law serve as barriers for terminally ill patients who seek aid in dying, Democratic Assemblyman Jim Wood said.

Plenty of safeguards remain in the bill, he and other proponents said.

The law that took effect in June 2016 had been set to expire in another five years, but the bill would keep it in place until 2031.

More than 2,800 people have received a prescription since the law took effect, Wood said, of which more than 1,800 died from the drugs.

There have been no reported cases or instances of abuse or coercion, he said.
FORT BLISS, Texas (AP)  The Biden administration on Friday provided the first public look inside a U.S. military base where Afghans airlifted out of Afghanistan are being screened, amid questions about how the government is caring for the refugees and vetting them.
NEW YORK (AP)  The world solemnly marked the 20th anniversary of 9/11 on Saturday, grieving lost lives and shattered American unity in commemorations that unfolded just weeks after the bloody end of the Afghanistan war that was launched in response to the terror attacks.
SKOPJE, North Macedonia (AP)  Hundreds of people marched Saturday in a North Macedonia town to honor the 14 people killed in a fire at a COVID-19 field hospital earlier this week.
WELLINGTON, New Zealand  New Zealand is buying an extra 500,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine from Denmark as it tries to keep its coronavirus vaccination program running at full speed, the government said.
Conservatives have collectively gone wild with rage and indignation over President Joe Bidens new vaccine mandate for private businesses, which will require large employers to make sure their workers have either been inoculated or get tested weekly. In the rights telling, the coming rule is a paternalisticeven tyrannicalimposition on American freedoms, a step down the road to biomedical serfdom that calls for mass civil disobedience, and an offense that has some of Congress leading nutters bellowing on Twitter that unvaccinated lives matter.

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So it seems like a good moment to point out the very simple reasons why Bidens move is in fact entirely sensible, especially since parts of the media seem intent on framing the whole thing as just another round in Americas culture war rather than an actual matter of life and death. (Heres looking at you, Mike Allen.)

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Lets start with the most obvious and work from there.

Reason No. 1: People Are Dying

You really cant emphasize this one enough. The United States has experienced a staggering 650,000 casualties from COVID-19, with about 1,500 Americans still succumbing to the disease every day. Thanks to the vaccines, we have the power in our hands to mostly end these needless deaths, yet whether out of misguided fear over the shots side effects or sheer pig-headed stubbornness, 19 percent of Americans say they will still refuse to get vaxxed, according to the latest survey from NPR, PBS, and Marist. (The Kaiser Family Foundations polling pegs the hard noes at 17 percent.) At some point, for the sake of public health and our collective psychological well-being, someone has to force these Americans hand.

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If the pandemic were only impacting the unvaccinated population, there might be some slim argument for just throwing up our hands and saying go with God (or Joe Rogan). But thats just not the case. While the vast majority of people getting critically ill and dying from COVID are unvaccinated, about 14 percent of hospitalizations and 16 percent of deaths in late June and early July were among those who suffered breakthrough infections. Meanwhile, hospitals in the hardest hit areas are canceling procedures and running out of beds in their intensive care units, putting other, non-COVID patients at risk. Pediatric cases are also rising while kids still arent eligible for shots. Because having the shot reduces the chances that youll catch or spread COVID, deciding whether to get vaccinated is simply not just a matter of personal well-being.

Reason No. 2: The Economy Is Still Struggling

In August, Americas economic recovery appeared to hit a wall, with employers adding a piddly 235,000 jobs. The badly battered leisure and hospitality industry added precisely zero, according to the government. This screeching halt occurred despite the fact that many states had already cut off the extra unemployment benefits that many business owners were convinced had kept Americans from looking for work. At this point, pretty much everyone acknowledges that the delta wave is whats holding back the economy, as Americans have once again cut down on activities outside their home, and many workers remain hesitant to go back to service-industry jobs. The situation is not nearly so bad as the devastation we witnessed last year. But once cases go down again, the economy can return to an improving course. There is simply no reason to sacrifice prosperity in order to humor the deeply misguided medical beliefs of a minority of American adults.

Reason No. 3: Weve Given People Enough Time

Its possible that, over time, more unvaccinated Americans will decide that, actually, they arent worried about being microchipped by Bill Gates. Moreover, deltawhich already seems to be cresting in some statescould wane on its own thanks to a combo of vaccinations and natural immunity. But at some point, having patience for the holdouts means trading away others health, lives, and their simple ability to live a normal day-to-day existence without having to worry about, say, whether the heavy-breathing guy watching Assassins Creed, of all random movies, near you on the plane is exhaling a fog of COVID (speaking from personal experience here). Its been long enough. Theres a fully FDA-approved shot. The fact that people can at least in theory opt for testing instead of a vaccine is enough of a concession. (In fact, one could argue that this isnt a vaccine mandate at all, but a testing mandate with an exemption for those whove gotten a jab. Such tyranny.)

Reason No. 4: Businesses Want Their Employees Vaccinated but Have Been Too Scared to Mandate It

Big businesses have clearly wanted their workers to get vaccinated, both because nobody likes it when employees get sick and cant show up for work, but also because severe COVID cases drive up the cost of health insurance. Delta Air Lines, which has announced it will start charging employees a surcharge on their premiums if they dont get vaccinated, recently shared that the average hospital stay cost them $50,000. But while some major companies have gone ahead with mandates, others have been scared due to fears that employees will quit at a time that its very difficult to hire. Their fears might be exaggerated, but they are not irrational: According to the Washington Posts polling, 42 percent of unvaccinated workers say theyd quit if their employer attempted to force them to get a shot. Its a dumb collective-action problem, where one business wont act because others havent. A federal mandate is an obvious way to solve a collective-action problem.

Reason No. 5: Most Americans Support Vaccine Mandates

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Bidens move makes sense on the merits. But for all the caterwauling on the right, it may make sense politically. Multiple polls have found that a majority of Americans support requiring people be vaccinated if they want to be in certain public spaces. In a survey by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, about half of Americans backed mandates for people working in-person at their office, while only 23 percent were opposed. This is not exactly shocking since 75 percent of Americans have already had at least one dose. The anti-vaxxers are just a loud, obnoxious minority. Yes, the politics of this could get more complicated, since Bidens move will likely polarize the issue more along partisan lines. Americans also dont seem to have entirely coherent views on this issueone poll by Ipsos found that 62 percent of Americans supported businesses requiring workers to get vaccinated, but 62 percent also opposed workers losing their jobs over the issue. But it fundamentally would have been cowardly for Biden not to act, and instead wait around while anti-vaxxers and a conservative misinformation machine undermined the country and his presidency when most Americans appeared to be with him. The big question is whether the media will focus on the enraged minority or the quieter majority thats mostly seething at their neighbors who refuse to get a shot.
Ossama Bahloul, an imam and religious scholar, moved to Tennessee in 2008, at a time when more Muslims were settling there than ever before. In a phone conversation recently, he could barely contain his enthusiasm for the state, extolling the very loving community and the beauty of the Smoky Mountains.

His sweetness belied much of what he spent our call telling me. Over the past decade, he said, his mosque has repeatedly been vandalized and spray-painted with obscenities like Fuck Allah. Raw bacon was left on the mosques doorstep, and again on the front doors handle, a strange but persistent tactic of anti-Muslim bigots. Once, Bahloul said, the security camera caught a group of men attempting to destroy the mosque by arson.

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This all began in earnest around 2010, when his thriving community sought to do what had become the most radioactive thing an American Muslim could do post-9/11: build a new mosque.

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On 9/11, there were only about 1,200 mosques across the U.S. That would rise to nearly 3,000 by last year.

American Muslims lived with dueling realities in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks. They faced surging hate crimes and vast, illegal surveillance from their own government, leading to contemporary surveys that showed the majority viewed the U.S. as hostile to them. At the same time, their communities and civic life expanded at a rapid pace. The American Muslim population is now nearing 4 million, roughly twice the size it was on 9/11. And with that came a need for more mosques.

On 9/11, there were only about 1,200 mosques across the U.S. That would nearly double by 2010, and rise to nearly 3,000 by last year. This clash between the growing Muslim population and a public primed to accept ominous messages about them set up a battle over houses of worship in America. Vandalism and threats against mosques became so commonplace that the ACLU created an interactive map to keep track of them all. Armed protests in front of mosques became an ordinary occurrence. At one point, a church in Phoenix had to hang a banner declaring itself Christian to fend off protestors after anti-Muslim activists mistook its domed building for a mosque.

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But the real flashpoint was efforts to expand and open new mosques. One in Basking Ridge, New Jersey was only cleared to expand after five years and no fewer than 39 public hearings. Another in Sterling Heights, Michigan, was also hotly contested, and only allowed to continue after years of litigation. Perhaps most famously of all, the Cordoba House, which many now only recognize as the Ground Zero Mosque, became a national political issue when opportunistic politicians likened the project to a victory mosque for terrorists. The center was never built, but that battle elevated previously fringe figures and conspiracies about Muslims enough that some have argued it set the stage for the Trump presidency.

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In some ways, however, the regional fights that tore local communities apart were the worst battlegrounds.

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In Murfreesboro, Tennessee, outside Nashville, Bahlouls mosque had been first established in 1982. He said there were never any problems between the Muslims who worshiped there and their neighborsuntil 2010, when the community outgrew the facility, and raised enough money for a needed upgrade.

For Imam Bahloul, the anger toward him and his community came out of nowhere.

We applied for the permit, and nothing happened then. The masjid got approval. And after this, we started dealing with this very heavy opposition, he said. I thought that the community at large would be excited and happy for us. Instead, it would grow into one of the worst barrages of threats and violence on an American Muslim community since 9/11.

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At first that summer, as Bahloul walked past a crowd of anti-Muslim protesters to get inside the Murfreesboro Islamic Center, he welcomed them. Though protesters held signs like Keep Tennessee Terror Free and Mosque Leaders Support Killing Converts, Bahloul left the door open. He let the protesters know that the mosque was for anyone, and he was eager to answer their questions.

Bahloul tried to engage with the myths turning his neighbors against him. I received hundreds of emails a day, and we did reply to each one of them, he told me. We did not ignore a single email or invitation or any calls from anyone. We thought people have the right to ask, and we should answer.

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That didnt last long. We realized that some people are not seeking answers, Bahloul said. They repeat talking points over and over. And when we share with them our answers, they dont believe the answers, but rather continue to behave like a wall.

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I was frustrated to be very honest, because I couldnt understand why, he said. We never had any bad history. One might say some Muslims are radical, but the Muslims in this area never did anything wrong. Never.

I remember really well a young boy at the age of seven asking me Why do they hate us?  Ossama Bahloul

The sustained attacks took a toll: I remember really well a young boy at the age of seven asking me Why do they hate us? It was really sad. Bahloul described one particular instance when a Christian protester shouted toward a child, Youre going to hellfire! As a spiritual leader, that disturbed him the most.

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The controversy spread. Among those who spoke out against the mosque was the Tennessee Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey. He justified his opposition by suggesting Islam is a cult and a violent political philosophy. Republican Congressional candidate Lou Ann Zelenik used her platform to accuse the expansion project of being a militant training facility. The Tennesseans who crowded into public County Commission meetings to argue against Bahlouls mosque repeated what they heard.

There was also a distinctly Christian effort to block construction. Protests outside the mosque often featured prayers. Televangelist Pat Robertson warned his enormous congregation that Muslims were moving into rural areas for taking over the city council. Much of this controversy can be traced directly to Proclaiming Justice to the Nations, a local nonprofit. It was founded by Laurie Cardoza-Moore, a home-schooling mother who was drawn to punditry after she thought her childrens textbooks were both anti-Christian and anti-Semitic. Invited onto CNN for some reason, she accused the leaders of the mosque of pursuing a radical agenda. She and her organization were instrumental in astroturfing discontent with the mosques planned expansion.

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The real challenge to the mosques expansion came when Proclaiming Justice crowd-sourced funding for a lawsuit that alleged that the mosque was linked with terrorism and that the planning commission sinisterly rushed the mosques expansion permit application. It sought a restraining order against construction, alleging that the mosque would increase the risk of terrorism generated by proselytizing for Islam.

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Bahloul was caught off guard by the legal challenge. He recalled that at the time he was sure that the religious freedom conscribed in the Constitution would protect them, but now says that was naive.

We had a meeting in Nashville, and someone in the meeting said to me, You dont know what youre up against, he recalled. He had no emergency funds reserved for a legal battle. Eventually, the Becket Fund, a non-profit that specializes in religious freedom battles, offered to represent his mosque pro-bono.

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Luke Goodrich was one of the attorneys representing the Islamic Center of Murfreesburo. Hed done many other cases with houses of worship facing land-use-related legal challenges. But this one stood out.

This case, the Murfreesboro case, seemed to be a particularly transparent and egregious example of anti-Muslim decision making at the local level, he said.

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Local governments have so much discretion. They can always say Well, your house of worship is not in keeping with the character of the neighborhood. And those types of explanations can easily be used to mask what could be anti-religious or anti-Muslim hostility or anti-immigrant hostility, or what they say in land-use cases, the not in my backyard phenomenon, Goodrich explained. Its really easy in the land-use process to mask hostility to houses of worship under discretionary zoning criteria.

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In the Murfreesboro case, there was no such masking. The battle over the mosque in court became a full-on religious inquisition. Islam is suddenly on trial in a booming Nashville suburb, the Associated Press reported in a dispatch, describing the puzzling leeway groups were given to call experts as witnesses about the Islamic threat to the area. They argued that Islam should not be considered a religion and afforded related protections.

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After a six-day trial that was lamented around the world, the bid failed, and the mosque was allowed to go ahead.

Still, more legal challenges would follow. Herman Cain, then a presidential candidate, would go on Fox News and claim the Islamic center was not a mosque for religious purposes. There would be a disturbing bomb threat. But the new Islamic Center of Murfreesburo eventually opened in August 2012 during Ramadan. At the time, Bahloul told worshippers, This day is a day of forgiveness. We want to say that we have nothing bad in our heart against anyone.

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That hasnt been entirely true of the neighbors. There continued to be hate incidents. When the mosque sought to establish a new cemetery, it was dragged back into court.

Even so, Bahloul told me his hope in America was renewed by the resolution of the conflict, and he refused to condemn the people who fought against the mosque. We dont give up principles when we express sympathy, he said. Someone asked me if I see myself as winning. I said, No, we won together. The America Constitution won.

Im sorry for anyone who went to a tough time over this building, because its just a building, after all, he added.

Local battles over mosques continue, but I wondered if, 20 years after 9/11, we had finally passed the darkest days of these fights. Goodrich, the lawyer, said one way to measure that is the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, passed by Congress in 2000 to enshrine protections for religious minorities in land use cases from discrimination.

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Obviously they didnt have 9/11 in mind at the time, but in many ways, it was prophetic because it erected these very powerful protections of religious organizations. And those ended up getting fleshed out in the wake of 9/11 in ways that protected not only Muslims, but other faiths across the country, Goodrich said. Last year, the Department of Justice released a study of its own enforcement of RLUIPA, which found that religious minorities continue to be discriminated against because they are disproportionately required to legally challenge and reverse objections to building houses of worship. A majority of cases in 2020 involved Muslim houses of worship.

But to Goodrich, that means the law is working. Mainly because of that law, RLUIPA, and the precedence set not only in the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro case, but in other land-use cases across the country, theres a growing number of precedents that protects houses of worship.

Legally, Im very optimistic, he told me. Culturally, Im not a sociologist, but in some ways, the law is a teacher.
Former president George W. Bush warned of the threat posed by homegrown violent extremism during his speech at the Flight 93 memorial to mark the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. We have seen growing evidence that the dangers to our country can come, not only across borders, but from violence that gathers within, Bush said at the memorial site in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Former President George W. Bush: "We have seen growing evidence that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders but from violence that gathers within. There is little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home..." pic.twitter.com/qIoGV9fzsw  CSPAN (@cspan) September 11, 2021

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There is little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home, Bush continued. But in their disdain for pluralism, in their disregard for human life, in their determination to defile national symbols, they are children of the same foul spirit, and it is our continuing duty to confront them. By referring to the determination to defile national symbols, Bush appeared to reference the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, which he had already denounced. At the time, Bush said he was appalled by the reckless behavior of some political leaders since the election. Now the former president warned about domestic extremism amid fears of potential unrest in a right-wing rally planned for Sept. 18 in Washington, D.C. to express support for those who took part in the Jan. 6 riot.

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Bush made an effort to contrast how Americans were united after the Sept. 11 attacks and the increasing divisions that exist in the country today. When it comes to the unity of America, those days seems distant from our own, Bush said. A malign force seems at work in our common life that turns every disagreement into an argument, and every argument into a clash of cultures. So much of our politics has become a naked appeal to anger, fear, and resentment. That leaves us worried about our nation and our future together.

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The former president, his wife, Laura, and Vice President Kamala Harris took part in a ceremony at the site where United Airlines Flight 93 crashed after passengers overpowered the hijackers. Many who are now alive owe a vast, unconscious debt to the defiance displayed in the skies above this field, Bush said.

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President Joe Biden praised Bushs words, telling reporters in Pennsylvania that the former president made a really good speech today. Genuinely. Biden marked the two-decade anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks by visiting all the sites where hijacked planes crashed that fateful day. He started the day out in New York, where he stood alongside former presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton at the site where the World Trade Center towers once stood. Biden, who was a senator when the attacks took place, then went to Shanksville, Pennsylvania and planned to end the day at the Pentagon.
Republicans are angry with President Joe Biden for abandoning the people of Afghanistan. At a briefing two weeks ago, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy accused Biden of ditching Afghans who had assisted U.S. forces in that country. McCarthy recalled with horror the images of Afghans clinging to our planes and falling off as we left Kabul. But when he was asked about welcoming Afghan refugees to the United States, McCarthy flinched. He warned that the refugees need to go to a third country, and they have to be screened, because ISIS, al-Qaida, and the Taliban probably put some people in there.

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McCarthys ambivalence reflects an underlying tension in the GOP. Many Republicans want to criticize Biden for doing too little to help the Afghans, but they also dont want to let the Afghans come to America. They want to sermonize as though theyre the idealistic, world-policing party of George W. Bush, when in reality theyve become the isolationist, anti-immigrant party of Donald Trump. And this isnt just an equivocation by the partys leaders. Its a deep division among rank-and-file Republicans.

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In polls taken since early August, when the Afghan army and government began to collapse, Democrats have said consistently and decisively that the United States should accept Afghan refugees. But fewer than half of Republicanson average, about 35 percenthave agreed. A week ago, in a Yahoo News survey, nearly two-thirds of Republicans said the United States wasnt doing enough to get at-risk Afghans out of Afghanistan safely, but only one-third said the refugees should be allowed to come to the United States.

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The closer to home these questions get, the more Republicans squirm. Two weeks ago, in a Politico/Morning Consult survey, more than 70 percent of Republicans said the United States should help Afghan civilians with evacuation from Afghanistan and relocation to countries other than the U.S. When the poll asked about helping these civilians with relocation to the U.S., Democrats overwhelmingly supported the idea, but Republicans narrowly opposed it. And when Republicans were asked about helping the Afghans with relocation to my state, their opposition increased.

Another poll, taken by YouGov for CBS News, captured the GOPs internal conflict. The poll asked whether the United States was doing too much, not enough, or about the right amount to help Afghans leave their country. By 7 percentage points, Republicans were more likely than Democrats to say that the United States wasnt doing enough. But on the same question, by 10 points, Republicans were also more likely than Democrats to say that the United States was doing too much. Republicans agreed with one another that Biden was wrong. But they couldnt agree about whether he was too soft on the Taliban or too soft on the refugees.

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McCarthy, like other politicians, says his wariness of the refugees is just a matter of vetting. But a week ago, when a Washington Post/ABC News survey asked about taking in refugees from Afghanistan after screening them for security, nearly 40 percent of Republicans opposed that idea. (Nearly 80 percent of Democrats supported it.) When the Yahoo News poll specified innocuous categories of refugeesjournalists, humanitarian workers, and women63 percent of Democrats said the refugees should be admitted. But only 30 percent of Republicans agreed.

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Republicans are much more willing to welcome Afghans who helped the U.S. military than to welcome Afghans who didnt. But even this select group of refugees gets less support from Republicans than from Democrats, by about 15 percentage points. And when Republicans are reminded of our obligations to these Afghans, most are unpersuaded. A Navigator poll in late August asked voters to choose between an anti-immigrant positionletting in mass numbers of Afghan refugees will only make our country less safe and divide us even moreand the argument that we had a moral duty to take in Afghan refugees because they risked their lives to help keep us safe. Only 44 percent of Republicans chose the moral argument. Thirty-five percent chose the anti-immigration argument.

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Why do so many Republicans reject Afghan refugees, even if the refugees are vetted and even if they risked their lives to help our armed forces? One reason is that these Republicans dont think morality should guide our treatment of other peoples or countries. In an Economist/YouGov poll conducted a week ago, Democrats overwhelmingly agreed that the United States has a special responsibility to provide humanitarian assistance when people in other countries need help. But Republicans rejected that idea, 47 percent to 35 percent. In a Suffolk/USA Today poll, 30 percent of Republicans, compared to 20 percent of Democrats, said that helping other countries build democracies should not be an important goal of American foreign policy.

But a second, more direct explanation is hostility to immigration, particularly nonwhite immigration. In an Economist/YouGov survey taken last month, 57 percent of Republicans said that immigration had made America worse; only 16 percent said it had made America better. The numbers among Democrats were almost exactly the opposite. More than 70 percent of Democrats said the United States should offer asylum to people fleeing violence or political persecution; only 36 percent of Republicans agreed. In another Economist/YouGov survey, 59 percent of Republicans said, correctly, that the number of people in the United States who identify as white was declining. Among white Republicans who gave that answer, most said the decline was a bad thing. Only one percent said it was a good thing.

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Theres plenty to criticize about our pullout from Afghanistan. You can say that Biden misjudged how long the Afghan government would hold out, that he misled Americans about the risk of collapse, that he failed to prepare adequately for that scenario, and that he should have delayed our final exiteven at the risk of more military casualtiesin order to evacuate more of our Afghan partners. But if, while saying these things, you also refuse to let vetted Afghan refugees into the United States, thats pretty clear evidence that youre not really motivated by whats good for the Afghans. Youre motivated by something else.
In 1994, Nihad Awad and other American Muslims sought to start Americas first organization for challenging common misconceptions about Islam and the people who practice it. The Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, initially pushed back on Hollywood depictions of Muslims and fought discrimination against women who wear hijabs to work, among other causes. The group snapped more into focus and public attention following the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, when Muslims were the victims of dozens of hate crimes in the immediate aftermath on the mistaken belief the attack was Islamist terrorism.

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That experience loomed on 9/11, when the organizations mission truly transformed. Awad was in Washington that day, and later in the same week, he was meeting with President George W. Bush amid a wave of anti-Muslim violence. CAIRs story came to mirror the experiences of so many Muslim Americans in the years afterward: It would be revealed in an Edward Snowden leak that Awad and other Muslim activists were the subject of a massive government surveillance program. CAIR would often be forced to appear in court to defend itself against anti-Muslim activists and face claims it had ties to funding terrorism. The organization itself would become a boogeyman in the right-wing press.

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But what Awad still remembers most vividly is that Tuesday. As the 20th anniversary approached, I called Awad to discuss his experiences then, how CAIR survived in the years after, and whats changed for American Muslims now. Our conversation has been condensed and edited.

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Aymann Ismail: Can you start by walking me through what you remember on Sept. 11, 2001?

Nihad Awad: It was a regular summer day in terms of routine, getting up and getting ready for work. I listen to the radio as I get ready to leave the house. I was listening to NPR as I was ironing my shirt when I heard the first news about an airplane slamming into one of the Twin Towers in New York. I thought it must have been an unfortunate tragedy, and I was anxious to hear more, but there were no details. Then minutes after that, just as I was ready to leave, I heard the second piece on the radio. Another plane hit the second Twin Tower. I turned on the TV and watched people begin to speculate on whats happened. I just had a gut feeling when I started to hear the word terrorism.

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Do you remember your first thought when you learned of the attack?

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Unfortunately, I learned after the Oklahoma City Bombing on April 19, 1995, what happens after any massive terrorist attack. Immediately, media outlets will blame Muslims and Arabs. There is no restraint on making statements, no discipline for people to withhold judgment. The finger pointing starts right then. As the executive director for an emerging Muslim civil rights advocacy group, I knew that things were going to get tough.

What did you do?

I hit the road immediately. I was thinking about my family, because my wife was dropping my children at school about 20 miles away from home, and I could not get a hold of her. I was on my way to Washington, D.C. I heard somethingI dont know if it was the attack itself or what else was happening, I dont know. When I got probably two miles away from the Pentagon, I saw a big black cloud over it. The highway became completely jammed. I had to back up on the ramp. I decided that there was no way for me to get to Washington D.C. this way. I drove for two and a half hours to get to my office, going past roadblocks and emergency vehicles. It was like being in a horror movie.

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I eventually arrived at the CAIR office. The Muslim community leadership were already gathered in our office. That same day, on Tuesday, we were supposed to meet with President Bush at the White House in the afternoon. We started to monitor the news and get to work. And by 11:30, we came up with a statement to condemn the attack, praying for the victims, and wishing for those who have been injured to recover. We sent it to probably 40,000 media outlets that were in our database then. Then we went to the nearby Red Cross to see if they needed any donated blood.

What were you hearing from Muslims right after the attack?

We started to report on the hate crimes and attacks on innocent Muslimsthe frenzy. We were receiving reports on both our office phones and personal phones. It was just non-stop ringing. The six years that preceded 9/11 made us aware that we would be doing this work for the rest of our lives. But when 9/11 happened, it was like a volcano. All of a sudden, it erupted. It was a macro-scale of the Oklahoma City Bombing, where we documented more than 220 incidents. Right after 9/11, it was in the thousands.

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A few days after the attacks, we bought a full-page ad in the Washington Post for a statement of solidarity with the nation, praying for the victims, and thanking the hero first responders. Every single moment of that day is still in our minds. For us, this was a terrorist attack against all of us as Americans regardless of our background, regardless of our faith, but we have been doubly hurt by this tragedy. First as Americans, and second as Muslims, because the finger-pointing and guilt by association ensued immediately. We stayed in touch with the White House, and eventually we met with the president a few days later.

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Tell me about your meeting with President Bush.

The White House did stay in touch with us, and when the president heard about the hate crimes, and when the media started to report on the attacks on the Muslim community, the White House probably realized that it is important for him to meet with our leadership. So we met with him a few days later in the morning in the Islamic Center on Massachusetts Avenue in Washington D.C. We received the president in the library. I sat across the table from him after he greeted us, and then he told us that he has been contacted by leaders from around the Muslim world, who called him to condemn the attack and to also voice concern about the safety of American Muslims.

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We had a long conversation with him, for almost one hour. I was the first to address him about our perspective and the need for him to remind Americans that any attack on any innocent person, regardless of their faith, will not be tolerated, especially attacks on Muslim women who wear hijab, or Sikh people who might look like theyre Muslim. They were prime targets for these attacks. We told the president that its important for him to state that. After that, he invited us to stand with him as he delivered a statement to the public through the media. I did have some private conversation with him also.

What did you talk about in private?

I told him that there is no room for anyone to justify the murder of innocent people in Islam. Its a crime punishable in this life and the hereafter, and the sanctity of human life in Islam for one person is equivalent to the sanctity of all humanity. I told him that Al-Qaeda leaders have exploited suffering, primarily the oppression of the Palestinian people, because we saw the many statements by Osama Bin Laden on TV. He always talked about how the U.S. is supporting the state of Israel unconditionally without any consideration to the human rights of Palestinians. Emotions were very high. Ariel Sharon, the Israeli prime minister, invaded several Palestinian towns. President Bush himself appealed to Sharon to withdraw from the West Bank towns and cities they invaded. I told him the Muslim world was boiling in agony for Palestinians, and Osama Bin Laden exploited the feelings that many people have on the issue. I said Al-Qaeda wanted to create a wider gap between America and the Muslim world.

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Unfortunately, they succeeded in dragging American leadership and the West from their homes and into a war that we now look back at as a total lossin human lives, materially, politically, and morally. We at CAIR voiced our opposition to invading Afghanistan. But we did support U.S. action against Al-Qaeda, because they are an aberration and they deserve a just retaliation. But the innocent Afghans, the destruction of Afghanistan, 20 years of crazy war and drone attacks, for what? Blind anger without visionary or strategic approach to conflicts with terrorists. That fact that there are millions of Afghan and Iraqi refugees scattered around the world with no accountability for the leadership for what happenedIts been one tragedy after the other.

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There was also a betrayal by the leadership and by the media. It was very, very unfortunate. So many values and principles were just thrown out the window. We called on politicians to work as leaders, to speak as leaders, and to protect all Americans, and to recognize that the evil-doers who did this horrific crime did it to all of us. You should not play into their hands and elevate their claims because murder is a murder. A terrorist attack is a terrorist attack, regardless of the identity of the perpetrators or the victims. But unfortunately, we were not fully ready for the backlash.

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When did you first encounter Islamophobia after the attack?

My wife is an American convert. She wears hijab. When we purchased a house and moved into a new neighborhood, the neighbor across the street saw my wife and kids moving stuff inside. I wasnt there, I was at work. And he walked into our property and asked my wife to take off her hijab. He told her it was required in the neighborhood. She asked him, Who are you to talk to us like this? He said, Im a veteran. She told him, Well, my father is a veteran. Who are you to tell us what to do? That was just the beginning of 16 years, 17 years of daily harassment and bullying against my family, including hate crimes. After a mass shooting in Florida, this guy came and put a statue of a pig on my property, knowing that were Muslim. He stalked me, following me all the way to my office, and he was arrested. On a daily basis, he would flip us off. He used to throw nails on our driveway. And whenever he sees us outside in the front yard, he would videotape us giving us the finger. For 16 years, Aymann. Eventually he gave up and moved out. He was trying to drive us from the neighborhood because were Muslim. I was always worried about what could happen to my family, because this guy and others who knew where I lived.

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Did you ever reach a breaking point? I reminded myself of the Quranic verse     (with hardship comes ease) when I experienced hateful Islamophobia. But Id be lying if I told you I always handled it well.

Look, I was born in a refugee camp. My family was forced from their home in 1948. They ended up in no mans land in Jordan, where the U.N. built a refugee camp, like what you see now in Turkey or Jordan for Syrian refugees. I lived in a refugee camp with no running water, no electricity, almost living a primitive life, until I was 18. Then I traveled to Italy to pursue a college education. And eventually I came to the U.S. So, with Allahs help, I learned how to be resilient and patient, and to channel my emotions into something positive.

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As you said,     . With not afterwith hardship comes ease. Although it is hard in difficult times to hold such values when the reality seems always against you. For us, to start an organization in 1994, when there was no civil rights organization that proceeded us in the history of Islam in America, to fight discrimination against Muslims and to win was unheard of. So, we started something not from zero, but negative.

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Once-fringe extremists like Pamela Geller and David Yerushalmi were mainstreamed by national television programs around this time. Theyve made public claims that CAIR is allied with international terrorist organizations, and have done some work in convincing the right that CAIR seeks to infiltrate the United States government. Yerushalmi has faced off with CAIR several times in court, a tactic he admits is intent on draining CAIR of its resources. Were they effective?

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The bigger issue is that the government, not just the likes of David Yerushalmi, but the government turned against its own Muslim community, similar to what they did to Japanese Americans during World War II. They started a massive domestic surveillance program targeting activists, including myself and CAIRs leadership. Every major Muslim activist in the country became a crime suspect for them. They put us on their watchlist and they cut ties with us, instead of working with us against the terrorists. They put us in the same category. They monitored our communications, our finances, our phones, our offices, our homes, when we traveled, we were stopped and harassed and searched. We were dealt as terror suspects because we are American Muslims who challenged the governments misguided policies.

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We received word from Edward Snowden confirming that many of us were under surveillance through the FISA court. And that really gave the green light for the likes of Yerushalmi to target the Muslim community and Islam in America, to try to de-legitimize our existence and to try to de-Americanize. And that was a diabolical strategy.

The Islamophobia network has become a profitable industry. These people made a lot of money by just being anti-Muslim bigots and spreading fear and paranoia about American Muslims and about CAIR as deemed the leading voice in the American Muslim community. So we receiving the brunt of anti-CAIR propaganda on Fox News, and many other organizations, and dealing with the Muslim communitys challenges of hate crimes and discrimination and the isolation that they were experiencing. And not only that, but trying to give the Muslim community reasons to be optimistic and to pursue the fields of journalism and law, and succeed in their lives. We are not only a legal defense organization, but we also help young American Muslims and Muslim families to break the fear cycle and live and fulfill their lives like other Americans without any sense of inferiority because we are here to protect them and the constitution is on our side.

What reason did the Muslim community have for optimism? What does it have now?

Unfortunately, knowing the history of our nation, almost every minority suffered oppression. Its as American as apple pie. Its a sad reality that no minority was given its rights. It struggles to gain its rights. And American Muslims are no different. To see a combination of intellectuals, politicians, and media lined up not only against your community

Having said that, I think the Muslim community has started to prove itself. It did not run away from politics or allow other people to sideline it. We worked hard, we were proactive, we stood up to bigots, and we started to tell our own story. Through decades and generations, people who know nothing about Islam have spoken about us as experts, and today, American Muslims speak for themselves. And they also speak for America as elected officials, and I think the human face of the Muslim community is starting to pop up. There are many Americans now who say Enough is enough. You are entitled to your bigotry, but America stands for all of us.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has filed lawsuits against six school districts to get them to nix mask mandates that are in place for students, teachers, and staff. Paxton criticized the school districts for what he called unlawful political maneuvering in requiring that everyone wear face masks while on school grounds. If districts choose to spend their money on legal fees, they must do so knowing that my office is ready and willing to litigate these cases, Paxton said in a statement. I have full confidence that the courts will side with the lawnot acts of political defiance. The lawsuits target the Richardson, Round Rock, Galveston, Elgin, Spring, and Sherman independent school districts and come after warnings that those who defied Gov. Greg Abbotts ban on local mask mandates would face legal repercussions.

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It isnt clear why Paxton chose these six school districts when dozens have defied Abbotts ban on local mask mandates. But he warned others should be ready to defend themselves in court if they do not get rid of existing mandates. At least 85 school districts have instituted mask mandates of some kind, requiring face coverings while indoors. Paxtons office warned in a statement that it anticipates the filing of additional lawsuits if school districts and other governmental entities continue to defy state law.

Abbott has defended his ban by saying that students can still choose to wear masks but it protects the authority of parents to make up their own mind about what they want for their children. The Texas Supreme Court has sided with Abbott, although several districts are still trying to obtain court orders to block the ban on mask mandates from being enforced. All the back and forth court cases and resolutions means theres lots of confusion among Texans over who is required to wear a mask.

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One school district in Texas, which is not among those who were sued, instituted a mask requirement this week after two junior high school teachers died from COVID-19. Connally ISD, in McLennan County, shut down all of its campuses on August 31 amid an increase in cases and later said everyone had to wear a mask when the school reopened after Labor Day. As educators, it is our duty to keep our students safe and healthy. We feel instituting a mask mandate is a step towards doing this, Superintendent Wesley Holt said in an email to parents and employees.
Poprad Lake remains tourists' favourite Tatras spot. What about cyclists' top places?

In August, the Tatras National Park counted tourists, cyclists and dogs in the largest Slovak mountains.

Several cycling routes run across the higher parts of the High Tatras, but most of them are quite demanding. The routes in Ticha Dolina and Koprova Dolina are suitable for less skilled cyclists. (Source: Adriana Hudecova/TASR)

With travel restrictions in place due to the pandemic, thousands of Slovaks flocked to the Tatra Mountains last summer, breaking the 1980 record, but this summer was far from record-breaking.

As many as 22,437 tourists visited Tatras National Park (TANAP) on a single day in August, which is much less compared to the last summer figure of 30,232 visitors. Still, it is the ninth highest figure in history, which has taken place since 1972.

TANAP has also revealed the most visited places in the park this summer. Popradske Pleso mountain lake remained the most popular destination for tourists.

Rysy

A total of 4,180 tourists set out on a trip to the lake on the second Thursday of August, which is 2,500 tourists less compared to August 2020.

Hrebienok resort and the Skalnate Pleso mountain lake also entered the list of most visited sites in the national park, but even these places saw a drop in the number of tourists.

As for the pair of monitored peaks, Rysy maintained first place, with 919 tourists climbing the peak from both sides of the Tatras. Krivan peak was visited by 434 tourists on August 12.

In the Orava region part of the Western Tatras, Rohacska Dolina valley welcomed 1,079 visitors on the day of tourist-counting, whereas only 279 visitors walked through Ticha Dolina valley on the same day.

Valleys in the Liptov region were also popular in the summer, but it is the Ziarska Dolina valley that tops the list of the most visited valleys in this region once again.

Cyclists' top places

Though of dozens of cyclists were seen in various parts of the national park on August 12, the most sought-after area among cyclists was Podbanske, a settlement on the border of the High and Western Tatras.

Read also:

Read also: Blog: The ultimate guide to where to stay in the High Tatras Read more

Although the difference in the number of cyclists in Ticha Dolina and Koprova Dolina exploring the valleys on August 12 is tiny, it is the latter that has come out as more popular. However, last year, more cyclists were recorded in Ticha Dolina.

A total of 1,056 cyclists biked around Tatras National Park on the second Thursday of August, of which 444 rode on e-bikes. Last year it was 952 cyclists, of which 259 used e-bikes.

This summer, a route from the Tatranska Polianka settlement to the Sliezsky Dom hotel by the Velicke Pleso mountain lake was also popular.

Rysy is one of the most visited peaks in the Tatras National Park. (Source: Milan Kapusta/TASR)

In Pieniny National park (PIENAP), the number of cyclists was even higher on August 12: 1,185 people cycled from Cerveny Klastor to Lesnica.

Dog visitors

In 2019, TANAP began to count dogs visiting the park as well. While 253 dogs were registered on a single day of August that year, it was 355 dogs in 2020. Most of them were spotted near Popradske Pleso, Rohacska Dolina, Ziarska Dolina and Mlynicka Dolina.

This year, 298 dogs visited the national park, mostly Popradske Pleso and Strbske Pleso.

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Read also: From grazing sheep to internationally recognised resort. Demanovska Dolina marks 100 years of tourism Read more

Even though figures provided by TANAP are not as good as those from last August, they are still better than the 2012 figures when only 7,660 tourists visited the park.

Spectacular Slovakia travel guides

11. Sep 2021 at 9:30 | Compiled by Spectator staff
https://sputniknews.com/20210910/israel-calls-for-rapid-action-against-iran-claiming-tehran-is-on-path-to-obtain-nukes-1088966615.html

Israel Calls for 'Rapid Action' Against Iran, Claiming Tehran Is on Path to Obtain Nukes

Israel Calls for 'Rapid Action' Against Iran, Claiming Tehran Is on Path to Obtain Nukes

Bennett Urges Countries to Stop Iran From Uncontrolled Uranium Enrichment Amid Latest IEAE Report

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2021-09-10T22:59+0000

2021-09-10T22:59+0000

international atomic energy agency (iaea)

naftali bennett

joint comprehensive plan of action (jcpoa)

uranium enrichment

iran nuclear agreement

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Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett has called for an appropriate and rapid international reaction against Iran from the international community, citing the recent conclusion from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which said Tehran has violated some JCPOA provisions.The prime minister called the negotiations with Iran anaive approach and said that the authorities in Tehran should be replaced through avigorous stand by the international community, backed up by decisions and actions.Earlier this week, the IAEA criticized Iran for refusing to provide inspectors with access to video cameras installed at Iranian nuclear facilities. In the absence of regular inspections, halted in February, cameras remain the only form of monitoring. However, the cameras need maintenance, but the inspectors said one of the four cameras was destroyed, and the videos taken by the other cameras have disappeared.The agency also said Tehran has recently quadrupled its reserves of highly enriched uranium, having at its disposal 10 kilograms of 60-percent enriched material. The amount of 20-percent enriched uranium also increased, from 62.8 to 84.3 kilograms.Amid the unpredictable outcome of the JCPOA negotiations, Bennett earlier claimed that the Jewish state would do everything to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons since its not part of the deal.At a meeting with a bipartisan delegation from the US House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee, Bennett noted that the US' return to the nuclear deal would be a mistake and stressed that Israel would not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons.The past six rounds of negotiations, concluded on 20 June, have not produced any results yet. Recently, Iran requested a delay amid the inauguration of the new President Ebrahim Raisi on 5 August and the formation of a new government. Raisi is said to support a harder line on Israel in comparison with his more moderate predecessor Hassan Rouhani.On Wednesday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned Tehran that further delay would put the sides of the deal closer to the point at which a strict return to compliance with the JCPOA does not reproduce the benefits that that agreement achieved.Tehran has repeatedly said that it does not plan to construct nuclear weapons, stating that it will comply with the agreements provisions if sanctions, reimposed after the US withdrawal from the treaty in 2018, are lifted.

Hess The world must deal with Israeli nucs. Israel has 300-400 Nuclear bombs and missiles. As the world biggest sponsor and exporter of terrorism, Israel poses the greatest threat to peace and humanity. 9

vot tak appropriate and rapid international reaction ... What is needed is a appropriate and rapid international reaction to end israeli war crimes and influence of governments, and terminate toxic zionist propaganda in the media. Thumbs down. 8

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/20-years-after-911-were-still-morons-1088967489.html

20 Years After 9/11, Were Still Morons

20 Years After 9/11, Were Still Morons

If crisis creates opportunity, we couldnt possibly have squandered the possibilities presented by 9/11 more spectacularly. We certainly couldnt have failed... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T04:00+0000

2021-09-11T04:00+0000

2021-09-11T04:00+0000

columnists

us

afghanistan

pakistan

cia

9/11

al-qaeda

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We had to do something. That was and remains the generic explanation for what we did in response to 9/11invading Afghanistan and Iraq, directing the CIA to covertly overthrow the governments of Haiti, Venezuela, Belarus, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan and a bunch of other countries, lamely legalizing torture, kidnapping via extraordinary rendition to Guantanamo and other concentration camps, building a drone armada and sparking a drone arms race.Acting purely on speculation, news media was reporting as early as the afternoon of September 11 that Al Qaeda was responsible. That same day, Vice President Dick Cheney argued for invading Iraq. We began bombing Afghanistan October 7, less than a month later, without evidence that Afghanistan was guilty. A week later, the Taliban offered to turn over bin Laden; Bush refused. Before you act, you think. We didnt.What should we have doneafter giving it a good think?A smart people led by a good president would have had three priorities: bring the perpetrators to justice, punish any nation-states that were involved, and reduce the chances of future terrorist attacks.The 19 hijackers were suicides, but plotters like Al Qaedas Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who lived in Pakistan, were not. Since we have an extradition treaty with Pakistan, we could have asked Pakistani authorities to arrest him and send him to face trial in the US or at the international war crimes tribunal at The Hague. Instead, we kidnapped him to CIA dark sites including Gitmo and subjected him to waterboarding 266 times. Because of this and other torture, as well as his illegal detention in violation of habeas corpus, KSM cant face trial in a real, i.e. civilian, court. Not only will 9/11 families never see justice carried out, weve managed to turn KSM into a victim, just as he wanted.The Inter-Services Intelligence agency, Pakistans CIA, financed and provided intelligence to Al Qaeda. Pakistan harbored bin Laden. Pakistan played host to hundreds of Al Qaeda training camps. Pakistanis I talked to after 9/11 were shocked that the U.S. didnt attack their country, instead giving its Taliban-aligned dictator General Pervez Musharraf billions in military and financial aid.Evidence linking top Saudi Arabian officials to 9/11 has been scarce. But 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi, several are reported to have met with mid-level Saudi intelligence agents before the attacks, and, most notably, Saudi Arabia exports its radical brand of Sunni Islam, Wahhabism, all over the world. The Taliban and Al Qaeda initially recruited many of their members from Wahhabi madrassas financed by the Saudis in Pakistan and Central Asia.We should have treated 9/11 for what it was: a crime. Policemen, not soldiers, should have tracked down the perps. They should have been given lawyers, not torture. They should have faced fair trials. But if we had to go the military route, we should have invaded Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, the two countries responsible, not Afghanistan and Iraq, two countries that had nothing to do with it. Pakistan and Saudi Arabia were and remain far more dangerous to their neighbors than Afghanistan or Iraq.Occupying Saudi Arabia, the worlds biggest exporter of Islamic extremism and global terrorism, would have done a lot to reduce the threat of another 9/11. But the most effective way to make us less of a target is to make the rest of the world look upon us with favor. Some people will always hate us. Thats inevitable. Our goal should be to reduce their number to as close to zero as humanly possible.We cant eliminate anti-Americanism by killing its adherents. Weve been trying to do that for 20 years using drones and missile strikes; all weve accomplished is killing a lot of innocent people and making the rest of the world look at us with disgust and contempt. You kill anti-Americanism by treating people everywhere with respect and kindness. That includes those we suspect of doing us harm.Unfortunately for us and the world, we learned nothing from 9/11. Not even losing Afghanistan back to the Taliban in the most humiliating U.S. defeat since Vietnam, having nothing to show for 20 years of war, has taught us a thing. Were still a hammer that sees everything as a nail, a blunt, stupid people whose idea of a plan is to keep indiscriminately bombing innocent civilians.Ted Rall (Twitter: @tedrall), the political cartoonist, columnist and graphic novelist, is the author of a new graphic novel about a journalist gone bad, The Stringer. Order one today. You can support Teds hard-hitting political cartoons and columns and see his work first by sponsoring his work on Patreon.

https://sputniknews.com/20210908/saudi-arabia-backs-full-declassification-of-us-911-docs-to-end-baseless-allegations-1088891150.html

Matthew_21 Anyone who studies all the evidence will realize it was a Mossad operation with the purpose of engaging the US military against the moslem states surrounding Israel and rendering them dysfunctional. 15

TruePatriot Absolutely, completely spot on Ted. Bravo, well done. 10

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/911-anniversary-nasa-shares-images-of-that-day-taken-by-us-astronaut-on-iss--1088992177.html

9/11 Anniversary: NASA Shares Images of That Day Taken by US Astronaut on ISS

9/11 Anniversary: NASA Shares Images of That Day Taken by US Astronaut on ISS

The agency noted that the September 11th attacks are considered a national catastrophe in the US that resulted in a "staggering loss of life" and, importantly... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T20:31+0000

2021-09-11T20:31+0000

2021-09-11T20:31+0000

9/11: 20 years later

new york

nasa

us

world trade center

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new york city

terror

9/11

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NASA is commemorating the 20th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks, which killed almost 3,000 people. In a satellite image shared by NASA on Saturday, billowing smoke above Manhattan can be seen from space after two hijacked planes crashed into the two World Trade Center towers."The world changed today. What I say or do is very minor compared to the significance of what happened to our country today when it was attacked," Culbertson said in a public letter posted after the terror attacks, per the agency."The dichotomy of being on a spacecraft dedicated to improving life on the earth and watching life being destroyed by such willful, terrible acts is jolting to the psyche, no matter who you are," he noted.After 9/11, NASA research programs were demanded for the ground, with the agency collaborating with FEMA to fly sensors over the damaged areas aboard aircraft in search of aerial contaminants, as well as using satellite resources to monitor from above.In commemoration of the victims, NASA flew over 6,000 4-by-6-inch (10-by-15 cm) flags on Endeavour's December 2001 trip. In the summer of 2002, the flags were handed to relatives. The agency also used aluminum from the World Trade Center towers that was emblazoned with an American flag on rock abrasion tools for the Mars Exploration Rovers Spirit and Opportunity.

Thomas Turk Shame on author Kirill for not bringing in at least one article contra to the US Govt. Conspiracy theory. Instead, here involving the liars at nasa, (no et, no real ufos no Mars cities etc). Where, Kirill is a single article from Architect and Engineers.. or Pilots for.. 911 truth? 1

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/911-collapsed-towers-and-empire-1088980956.html

9/11 Collapsed Towers And Empire

9/11 Collapsed Towers And Empire

The United States 245-year history as a political entity has been one long trail of wars and more wars. It is estimated that nearly 95 percent of that... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T10:46+0000

2021-09-11T10:46+0000

2021-09-11T10:46+0000

joe biden

9/11

war

us

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afghanistan

september 11

9/11 attacks

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But since the 9/11 terror attacks in 2001, the US has gone into hyper-war mode. Twenty years ago, the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan ushered in multiple other American wars and covert operations from Asia to Africa, from the Middle East to the Americas. At one point, the former Obama administration was bombing seven countries simultaneously all in the name of fighting terrorism. Hundreds of US bombs rain down somewhere on the planet every day. What is rather sickening is how the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 event this weekend is marked with solemn speeches by US president Joe Biden and his British counterpart Boris Johnson  the two countries that spearheaded the War on Terror era. Biden claims that 9/11 demonstrates the unity and resilience of the American people, while Johnson blusters with platitudes about 9/11 showing that terrorists did not defeat Western democracy and freedoms. This self-indulgent piffle is contemptible and nauseating. Two decades after the US and Britain launched their criminal blitzkrieg on Afghanistan and the rest of the world, those two nations are more financially broke than ever. Internally, they are more bitterly divided than ever. More evidently, their so-called democracies are in reality oligarchies where a tiny rich elite rule over a mass of impoverished people who are spied on and treated like serfs by unaccountable secret agencies and a mass media in hock with oligarchic masters. If there was a genuine commemoration of 9/11 it would entail a mass uprising by the people to overthrow the war-mongering class system that Biden and Johnson serve as frontmen. Just this week  of all weeks  the American and British states are in effect admitting that their societies are collapsing from vast economic inequality and crumbling infrastructure. The Biden administration is trying to release a budget of up to $4.5 trillion to alleviate poverty and repair decrepit roads, bridges, buildings and other public utilities. The Johnson regime in Britain is forced to admit that the National Health Service is overwhelmed by a chronic lack of funding. Taxes are being hiked that will hit low-income workers in order to pay for the 12 billion ($16bn) needed to prop up the enfeebled health service. All of the cost for trying to repair the US and Britain to make these countries a modicum of decency for its citizens to live in could have been covered by the expenditure on wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Yemen and elsewhere that the US and Britain have directly or indirectly been involved in. A new estimate of the cost for the war on terror by the United States alone is put at $8 trillion. This is roughly double the infrastructure bill that Biden is trying to get passed by Congress. American politicians are objecting to the extravagance of that rescue budget, yet they had no qualms about spending $8 trillion on wars. It is also estimated that for Britain its military adventurism in Afghanistan alone cost a total of $30 billion. Again, just imagine how British society might be better off if that money had been spent instead on attending to the health needs of its citizens. But 9/11 also ushered in wanton warmongering regimes in Washington and London that have bled the American and British public of finances and democratic rights. In 2001, the US national debt was about $6 trillion. This year that debt burden on future American generations has escalated to $28 trillion  a crushing, unsustainable burden largely driven by criminal wars. The healthcare costs for American military veterans wounded and maimed from the wars on terror are projected at $2 trillion. Over 30,000 US service members and veterans are reckoned to have committed suicide over the past 20 years. Thats 10 times the number of American people who died on the day of 9/11. Untold millions of innocent civilians were killed by the wars that the US and British launched after 9/11. Such suffering and destruction all for nothing except for the enrichment of war-profiteering corporations and the oligarchic elite. The United States and Britain have been so deformed by criminal wars they have become dysfunctional and dystopian. They have inflicted failed states around the world, but none more so than on their own people. The towers that fell on 9/11 were a premonition of much bigger collapse.The views and opinions in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of Sputnik

https://sputniknews.com/20210910/new-yorks-twin-towers-symbol-of-capitalist-might-laid-low-in-911-attacks-1088924270.html

https://sputniknews.com/20210910/twenty-years-after-911-us--nato-allies-less-safe-and-closer-to-economic-abyss-analyst-says-1088945396.html

vot tak The usa and uk are mere tools in the hands of israel. Their devolvement to feudalism is intended. Afterall, they are colonies whose purpose is to serve israeli interests. 3

Thomas Turk Finian, stated.. But since the 9/11 terror attacks in 2001''. Eyes wide SHUT eh? There were NO terror attacks.. nor planes. No Boeing airliner can fly at a sea level speed of 580mph, without ripping off its wings and tail, and needing 4X the engine power to reach that speed. Can Finian explain where were the 2 massive 1500 foot central cores, with their lifts, shafts and motors, as NIS assured us the floors had 'pancaked'? Or where were the millions of tons in the 2X 100 meter high piles of rubble from the collapsed buildings, which the laws of physics tell us MUST BE there? Those should have taken 4 years to dismantle, not done 4 hours overnight, and illegally, without the needed investigation. Search ''9/11 Hologram Plane Theory - Bill Cooper RIP Nov 5 2001' NO DNA test to identify any fvictim from the Twins? When a human body is 'vaporized' to the finest dust at 3000C, based on microscopic, melted iron spheres in the dust. (Danish U Prof0. then NO DNA! Same as Bali!! 2

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/attack-on-america-is-attack-on-us-israel-says-on-911-anniversary-1088993777.html

'Attack on America Is Attack on Us', Israel Says on 9/11 Anniversary

'Attack on America Is Attack on Us', Israel Says on 9/11 Anniversary

The key message in statements made by Western politicians is that despite the monstrosity of the attacks, terrorists have failed to instill fear in Western... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T23:23+0000

2021-09-11T23:23+0000

2021-09-11T23:23+0000

west

yair lapid

us

israel

terror attack

9/11

9/11 attacks

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On the 20th anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid extended a message of support to the US, saying that an attack on America is "an attack on us."The US has been a strong ally of Israel for years. The Jewish state has enjoyed close military and economic ties with the US, playing a critical role in promoting positive relations between Israel and its Arab neighbors, including Jordan, Lebanon, and Egypt, as well as several others in the Abraham Accords, and often siding with Israel on the Iranian nuclear program and allegations of its development of nuclear weapons.The United States' overall foreign policy in the Middle East is closely linked to the Jewish state, and the United States Congress has insisted on maintaining a close and supportive relationship with Israel.Former US president Donald Trump acted as a friend to the Middle Eastern nation during his term in the White House. Under Trump, the US recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital, opening a consulate there on the 70th anniversary of Israel's independence. The Trump administration also became the first nation to recognize Tel Aviv's authority over the occupied Golan Heights.Despite the controversy these decisions evoked, the Biden administration has continued with the current bilateral course of relations. During a May escalation of the conflict between Israel and Hamas, however, some critics suggested the White House's response to the flare-up conflict was muted.Western Allies Pay Tribute on 9/11Lapid's remarks were added to a chorus of sympathy from world leaders honoring the two-decade anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the US and declaring that the assailants had failed to destroy Western principles.The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said in a statement that September 11 marks the day when Western nations remember "those who risked everything to help them." She also pledged support to the US in "defending freedom & compassion over hate."French President Emmanuel Macron tweeted a bilingual post, stating that France "will never forget."Earlier in the day, New York City's downtown saw a memorial service in commemoration of the attacks which took place 20 years ago. Throughout the service, six moments of silence were held in memory of the victims of attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and United Airlines Flight 93 which crashed in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, on the same day.

Manix The entire world knows and have ample evidence thet ISRAEL DID 9-11 16

Curmudgeon You must hand it to Israel, they did s brilliant job of destroying the twin towers, collecting the insurance money, shorting airline stocks, getting America to invade 5 Muslim countries they don't like, and without anyone suspecting who was really behind it 11

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/biden-touts-nations-unity-and-resilience-as-our-greatest-strength-ahead-of-911-anniversary-1088972939.html

Biden Touts Nation's 'Unity and Resilience' as 'Our Greatest Strength' Ahead of 9/11 Anniversary

Biden Touts Nation's 'Unity and Resilience' as 'Our Greatest Strength' Ahead of 9/11 Anniversary

A plethora of commemorative events are set to take place on the twentieth anniversary of the terror attack on 11 September 2001 carried out by members of the... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T05:42+0000

2021-09-11T05:42+0000

2021-09-11T06:31+0000

joe biden

9/11

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daesh

daesh

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9/11: 20 years later

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US President Joe Biden has called on the nation to never lose the sense of tremendous unity that helped it rally together in the wake of the 11 September 2001 terror attacks. Underscoring the lessons learned from those tragic events twenty years ago that resulted in the death of 2,977 people, Biden said in a taped video message released by the White House: Biden went on to honour all those emergency workers who responded to the attacks at the time, saying that heroism everywhere  in places expected and unexpected. He also spoke of the "darker forces of human nature - fear and anger, resentment and violence against Muslim Americans" in the wake of the attacks, but emphasised again that unity is the one thing that must never break." Ahead of the plethora of commemorative events planned across the nation for Saturday, Joe Biden said: "No matter how much time has passed, these commemorations bring everything painfully back as if you just got the news a few seconds ago." The POTUS arrived in New York on Friday night as he is set to visit the three attack sites with First Lady, Jill Biden. The National September 11 Memorial, standing in the place of the former twin towers of the World Trade Center, is the first stop of the presidents agenda. From there, his route lies towards the field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where one of the planes had fell after its passengers tackled the terrorists to prevent it from reaching its Washington destination. The last stop is the Pentagon, just outside Washington DC. Six moments of silence are to be part of the memorial ceremony, to correspond with when the hijackers crashed Flight 11 into the north tower of the World Trade Center; the United Airlines Flight 175 struck the south tower; American Airlines Flight 77 hit the Pentagon; the moment when the south tower collapsed; the United Airlines Flight 93 crashed into an empty field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania; and the north tower collapsed. The anniversary comes as the United States' abrupt exit from Afghanistan has been slammed as a disaster and absolute humiliation by former president Donald Trump. The ex-POTUS fed into the chorus of criticism that had been targeting Joe Biden and his administration for the Afghanistan exit and hectic evacuation, saying on Fox Business: The tragic events, the twentieth anniversary of which is being now marked, saw four US passenger jets seized by al-Qaeda* terrorists - two of which were flown into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York. Another plane crashed into the Pentagon, outside the US capital, and a fourth plane crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. In the wake of those events, after the Taliban, then controlling Afghanistan, had refused to extradite al-Qaeda members, the US launched "Operation Enduring Freedom", with then-President George W. Bush announcing airstrikes targeting both al-Qaeda and the Islamist group in Afghanistan. In the early hours of August 31st, America ended its almost twenty-year presence in the war-torn country as the last of the US forces swiftly departed Afghanistan, allowing the Taliban to launch a swift offensive to reclaim power. Upon reaching the capital on August 31st, the Islamist group toppled the Kabul government and announced its second advent to power, prompting western nations to launch a frantic effort to evacuate thousands of their citizens and vulnerable Afghans from the South Asian nation. *The Taliban, Daesh, al-Qaeda are terrorist groups banned in Russia and many other countries.

Piet Heinz It is a good time for Bennet, the president of Israel to approach the leaders in Afghanistan and recognize eachother as the powers on the ground and do not talk about eachothers internal affaires, be Chinese. Dont mention Hijabs or Arabs but talk about Tactical and Stratigical issues. Like to give the USA a hugh army base at the border with Iran and Russia to make the USA forget the 20 years war and 2 trillion lose and the hostile environment that Iraq is becaming. Pakistan will follow the Taliban and normalize with Israel too after the Taliban does and after those two did, all the other countries will follow and let Iran alone. Iran does not want to recognize Taliban and want to use Panshir as it does with Hezbollah in Libanon. Iran does not want to share regional power with anyone. Taliban and Israel are survivers because they are adaptable to change as Charles Darwin would say while Iran and Russia are rusty against anyone, Russia with Europe and Iran with the region. (Part1).. 6

Piet Heinz ..(Part2) In 40 years Iran will be still talking about Massoud and the Panshir. 6

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/despite-toying-with-mini-brexit-norway-not-expected-to-jeopardise-ties-with-eu-bloc-1088987106.html

Despite Toying With 'Mini Brexit' Norway Not Expected to 'Jeopardise' Ties with EU Bloc

Despite Toying With 'Mini Brexit' Norway Not Expected to 'Jeopardise' Ties with EU Bloc

Norway will hold elections on 13 September, that polls suggest the ruling Conservative Party is likely to lose to a Labour-led coalition, with many wondering... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T15:17+0000

2021-09-11T15:17+0000

2021-09-11T15:17+0000

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As Norway is set to vote in parliamentary elections on Monday, the Scandinavian country's relationship with the European Union is not deemed to be heading for much dramatic change, despite predicted outcomes, reported AP. Norway, while not a member of the EU, is closely linked to the bloc through a European Economic Area (EEA) agreement, granting it access to the common market. In turn, the country is required to adopt a majority of European directives. Polls have suggested the country is heading for a change of administration after eight years of a pro-European centre-right government led by the Conservative Party's Erna Solberg. The left-of-centre "red" bloc has been pulling ahead in polls by a good margin.Labour leader Jonas Gahr Store, tipped to become Norway's next prime minister, will be entrusted with forming a "red-green" coalition. Norway's relationship with the European bloc has been called into question by both the Centre Party and the Socialist Left. The Labour Party's closest allies jointly pull in around 20 percent of voter support.The Centre Party has argued its case, hoping to replace the EEA with a plethora of individual trade and cooperation agreements. However, Labour leader Jonas Gahr Store appears to be unwilling to jeopardise ties with Norway's biggest trading partner."If your wife were riding roughshod over you every day, maybe you would react", responded Slagsvold Vedum of the Centre Party. Norwegian eurosceptics may have toyed with the notion of a "mini-Brexit" in the wake of Britain's departure from the bloc, but the challenges plaguing the UK-EU divorce have hardly been encouraging, suggests the outlet.Norwegians rejected EU membership in two referendums, held in 1972 and 1994, with a majority supporting the current EEA agreement. Accordingly, the issue was shifted to the backburner during the election campaign as the Centre Party witnessed its support dwindle. While Norway's relationship with the bloc will hinge on the distribution of seats in parliament post-election, little overall change is expected, according to analysts. "The Labour Party will surely be firm about the need to maintain the EEA agreement even if that means making concessions to the other parties in other areas", Johannes Bergh, a political scientist at the Institute for Social Research, was quoted as predicting. EU spokesman Peter Stano was cited as underscoring that the EEA agreement is "fundamental" for relations between the EU and its partners, such as Norway, Iceland, and Liechtenstein. However, he refused to "speculate on possible election outcomes".

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/escape-from-israels-most-guarded-prison-was-possible-due-to-9-mistakes-here-they-are-1088973452.html

Escape From Israel's Most Guarded Prison Was Possible Due to 9 Mistakes, Here They Are

Escape From Israel's Most Guarded Prison Was Possible Due to 9 Mistakes, Here They Are

The probe into the country's most notorious jailbreak has yet to kick off, but some failures have already been highlighted by Israeli media. These included a... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T07:16+0000

2021-09-11T07:16+0000

2021-09-11T07:19+0000

israel

probe

prisoners

prison

palestinians

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Four out of the six Palestinian prisoners who escaped from the Gilboa prison in northern Israel have been caught. The hunt for the remaining two continues.Minister of Public Security Minister Omer Bar Lev has already stated that he would open a probe into the prison break that has attracted much local and international media attention. He has also promised to "turn every stone" in order to understand what went wrong, and how the escape was made possible.For now, Israeli authorities are still scratching their heads over how the six escaped from the most secure Israeli prison but local media says there was too much negligence around that incident and that the writing has long been on the wall.Fatal MistakesHere are the main nine mistakes made by Israel that enabled the six Palestinians, all of whom had been charged with terrorism activity, to escape.1. In 2014, three out of the six escapees attempted an escape. At the time, they were being kept in the same cell and used the same method -- digging a tunnel that was hidden under one of the bathroom tiles. They were eventually caught, but jail authorities failed to treat the hole they had dug. The inmates were punished but they were not separated.2. According to prison regulations, inmates are supposed to be shuffled around once every six months. That is done in order to prevent them from bonding but in the case of the six, that measure was not implemented.3. The prisoners dug a tunnel that was 21 to 25 metres long. How did they know the direction it should be taken? And how did they figure out where the exit should be? Reports suggest that the answers to these questions they found online, as a detailed plan of the Gilboa prison was publicly available on the website of the architectural office that designed and built the jail.4. A week before the escape, Zakaria Zubeidi, a Palestinian inmate from Fatah, asked the prison authorities to move him into a cell together with the five inmates that belonged to a radical group, the Islamic Jihad. Normally, convicts stick together according to their affiliation and the fact that such a request was submitted should have rang an alarm. But it didn't and the transfer was made, resulting in the escape.5. On the night of the escape, a female warden who was stationed at the watch tower fell asleep. On Friday, after she gave her testimony, she even admitted that she heard noises but ignored them and continued sleeping. In addition, another tower that's observing the area of the tunnel's exit was not manned, and authorities say it was because of "staffing issues".6. The Gilboa prison has a control room with multiple monitors. On the night of the escape, the room was manned but the wardens were not watching the screens.7. A year ago, the prison has purchased an advanced taping system that aimed at listening to the conversations of the inmates and fish suspicious content. It was also aimed at blocking dangerous conversations. But it turned out that it has never been activated and that enabled the six prisoners to carry out their operation and even get in touch with a car that has been waiting for them.8. Prisoners know that the Shabak, or Israel's internal spy agency, is watching them. They also know that the prison authorities are watching them from up close. But in the case of the six fugitives those bodies have failed to collect the much-needed intelligence that would prevent their escape.9. Shortly before the jailbreak, the prison changed its phone numbers but it forgot to update the local police station. On the night of the escape, a cab driver that passed in the vicinity of the jail noticed three suspicious men, who were wearing a brown uniform (associated with security prisoners). He alerted the police, which in return tried to reach out to the prison authorities but they failed to do so. As a result, precious time has been wasted.Questions That Still Need to Be AnsweredThere are many other questions that beg to be answered. It is not clear, with which tools the inmates dag the tunnel, where did they throw the soil and how come the sound of digging was not even heard.It is also not clear, whether the six Palestinians have received assistance from within the prison. Evidence indicates that it was indeed the case. The probe that is soon to kick off is bound to find out.

https://sputniknews.com/20210909/prison-break-as-israel-continues-manhunt-for-6-palestinian-fugitives-heres-how-they-escaped-1088906890.html

Hess One important point. Two of the Palestinian prisoners have love (or sexual) relations with two Israeli female prison guards. It is well-know that Israeli women like Palestinian men, despit a strict law which forbids Jews from marrying Palestinians. 0

asavetmd Israel has a couple of hundred Nuclear Missiles, some of which are on Submarines. We dont need to help them. 0

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/ex-mossad-chief-recounts-how--why-911-changed-wests-security-policy-pushing-it-closer-to-israel-1088974748.html

Ex-Mossad Chief Recounts How & Why 9/11 Changed West's Security Policy, Pushing it Closer to Israel

Ex-Mossad Chief Recounts How & Why 9/11 Changed West's Security Policy, Pushing it Closer to Israel

Shortly after the assaults, the delegations of many Western countries visited Israel to learn how it secures its airport. They also wanted to find out how to... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T07:22+0000

2021-09-11T07:22+0000

2021-09-11T07:26+0000

9/11: 20 years later

mossad

9/11

us

israel

afghanistan

security

military campaign

terror attack

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Danny Yatom, the former head of Israel's spy agency, the Mossad, remembers well that tragic Tuesday, 11 September 2001, when two planes crashed into the World Trade Center in New York. A third plane hit a part of the Pentagon, the headquarters of the US Department of Defence. The last one -- with which the al-Qaeda terrorists planned to hit the White House -- fell in an open field following a clash between the passengers of the aircraft and the extremists. At that time, Yatom had already left the Mossad but he was still an important figure within Israel's security apparatus and someone who had been linked to key players of Israeli politics. Shocker The events of 11 September didn't catch Yatom by surprise. With an impressive military career under his belt, and with in-depth knowledge about the various terrorist groups and their capabilities, he knew well of the hazards extremists organisations posed.But the scope of the attack and the fact that it was carried out on American soil was nevertheless a shocker. It was just as surprising for the US. The 9/11 attacks claimed the lives of nearly 3,000 people and 25,000 being injured, causing $2 trillion in damage. Advice Needed When the dust settled, the US started to analyse what went wrong. With that came a change in policy. "The tragedy changed America's offensive and defensive approaches. It changed their security procedures. They became more meticulous in checking travellers, started to rely more on technology and manometer and implemented many regulations on what was banned or permissible on a flight." What it also changed was the US and many other states' attitude towards Israel. Shortly after he left the Mossad, Yatom became a politician and saw multiple delegations from all over the world coming to Israel in search for advice. Now, twenty years after the notorious attacks, he says the world hasn't become safer but politicians and the public have become more aware of the dangers posed by radicals. What they also understood is that in order to maintain their countries' security they needed to make sure that stability was also available in other parts of the world. This was used as a pretext by many Western states to launch military campaigns in such countries as Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. They claimed they wanted to curb terror, but as extremists keep rearing their heads in many of those states, while the price for their endeavour continues to claim lives and take a financial toll, some have realised they would be better off without boots on the ground. The US has already left Afghanistan; its last troops left the war-torn country at the end of August. Washington is also planning to take a similar step in Iraq, vowing to withdraw its forces by the end of this year. Yatom understands the reasons behind their decision but warns that the battle against extremists is far from over. *Al-Qaeda is a terrorist group banned in Russia and many other countries.

https://sputniknews.com/20210910/new-yorks-twin-towers-symbol-of-capitalist-might-laid-low-in-911-attacks-1088924270.html

https://sputniknews.com/20210911/thought-i-left-my-daughter-with-no-father-911-survivor-who-opted-to-help-rescuers-in-twin-towers-1088938127.html

Martian That whole 9/11 crime was a mutual venture of USrael and IsrAmerca with one aim in mind: a total world domination. 33

Dano Jean It was a false flag by Israel for Israel. Israel benefitted from this terririst event hands down. Most of its enemies have been eliminated, its arab neighbor either destabilized or replaced with amiable yes men as leaders who are willing to do Israel's bidding, billions in aid and arms and a drone assassination program that gets rid of whomever Israel doesn't like. Basically 911 is an event which takes out ALL the hurdles to the zionist dream of greater Israel. 28

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/farmers-call-off-week-long-protest-in-indias-haryana-after-govt-agrees-to-their-demands-1088983127.html

Farmers Call Off Week-Long Protest in India's Haryana After Gov't Agrees to Their Demands

Farmers Call Off Week-Long Protest in India's Haryana After Gov't Agrees to Their Demands

On Saturday, a press conference was held after the fourth round of meetings between agitating farmers and the Haryana government. Although the protesting... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T16:09+0000

2021-09-11T16:09+0000

2021-09-11T16:09+0000

india

protest

farmers

haryana

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Farmers demonstrating in Haryana called off their protest on Saturday after the state government assured an investigation into purported police brutality during their protest last month. Additional Chief Secretary Devender Singh has promised a judicial inquiry by a retired judge to ensure impartiality. The state government also agreed to provide jobs to two relatives of a deceased farmer who died during the police action last month. What Happened During the Protests?On 28 August, police in Haryana beat farmers who blocked a highway while going to Karnal to agitate against State Chief Manohar Lal Khattar over farm laws with bamboo sticks. At least 10 people were wounded as a result. Later, videos emerged appearing to show IAS officer Ayush Sinha ordering the police to "break the heads" of any farmer protesting against the farm laws. The footage went viral on social media platforms and sparked massive outrage. Since 7 September, farmers have been agitating and demanding the authorities accept their demands, including the dismissal of Ayush Sinha. After the video of Sinha came out, Haryana Chief Khattar said during a press conference: "Although the officer's [Ayush Sinha's] choice of words was not correct, strictness had to be maintained to ensure the law and order situation there was kept under check". The protesting farmers had also threatened the authorities, saying they may maintain a permanent protest site."We may have a permanent protest like the Singhu and Tikri border here", said farmer leader Rakesh Tikait. Farmers have been protesting along the borders of Delhi and Uttar Pradesh since last year over three contention farm laws.

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/fauci-says-biden-moderate-with-new-covid-jab-mandates-he-would-opt-for-just-vaccinate-or-not-1088978747.html

Fauci Says Biden 'Moderate' With New COVID Jab Mandates, He Would Opt for 'Just Vaccinate or Not'

Fauci Says Biden 'Moderate' With New COVID Jab Mandates, He Would Opt for 'Just Vaccinate or Not'

Republican governors and politicians earlier slammed US President Joe Biden's executive orders mandating that all federal workers get COVID-19 vaccinations if... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T10:23+0000

2021-09-11T10:23+0000

2021-09-11T11:54+0000

joe biden

anthony fauci

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delta variant of covid-19

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Dr Anthony Fauci has defended President Joe Biden's new rule, announced on Thursday, to require all private employers with 100 or more employees to mandate COVID-19 vaccines or weekly testing for the virus. The POTUS was "trying to be moderate" with his newly-announced jab rules, believed the chief medical adviser to the president. The physician-scientist indicated that he would personally be in favour of making it "just vaccinate or not". The US immunologist serving as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) said in the CNN interview that the president was "clearly frustrated" with Americans hesitating to get vaccinated. He admitted that he was "equally frustrated" with the pace of inoculation across the nation.Fauci insisted that POTUS has the authority to implement the new rules, and claimed he doesn't see "any issue" that would prevent them from entering force. On 9 September, Joe Biden said that vaccinated Americans had been "patient" enough and that the refusal of others to get jabs has "cost all of us". As part of a multi-pronged strategy he signed executive orders directing the US Labour Department to mandate companies with 100 or more employees to require proof of vaccination or weekly negative test results. The administration is also set to impose new vaccination requirements on federal employees, federal contractors, and healthcare workers at facilities that receive federal funding, without a testing option.Previously, the Biden administration mandated coronavirus vaccines only for employees at US nursing homes receiving federal funding. The decisions come as part of the new national strategy, dubbed "Path Out of the Pandemic" in light of the challenges presented by the Delta variant of the coronavirus. Many Republican governors and politicians slammed the introduction of vaccination mandates, vowing to challenge them in court. Republican Governor of South Carolina Henry McMaster promised to oppose Joe Biden's "unconstitutional" requirement of enforced vaccinations for businesses involving more than 100 employees to "the gates of hell".Texas Governor Greg Abbott called Bidens "assault on private businesses" nothing but a "power grab".Many Republicans were indignant over Biden's words about vaccination no longer being "about freedom, or personal choice", but about "protecting yourself and those around you". Christina Pushaw, a spokeswoman for the Florida governor, said that the remark was "the most disturbing thing Ive ever heard a politician say". This comes as only 53.6 percent of the US population is fully vaccinated, according to data analysed by John Hopkins University. Fears have been triggered by a wave of infections driven by the Delta variant of the coronavirus, deemed more contagious and faster-spreading than earlier forms of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. The US is registering about 1,500 deaths daily for the first time since March, and some 152,000 Americans have been testing positive for COVID-19 each day nationwide over the past two weeks, according to The New York Times.

TruePatriot When will this clown be arrested for his crimes against humanity and his role in bioweapons engineering? 7

FeEisi Will the Navajo Nation, the Dakota Nation and other tribes go along with Biden's mandate? If not they might receive Covid refugees trying to escape Biden. Covid refugees can also go to Mexico. AMLO is probably against the Biden mandates. 2

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/hamas-warns-of-escalation-of-confrontation-with-israel-after-escaped-prisoners-recaptured-1088982369.html

Hamas Warns of Escalation of Confrontation With Israel After Escaped Prisoners Recaptured

Hamas Warns of Escalation of Confrontation With Israel After Escaped Prisoners Recaptured

Palestinians across the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza held a day of rage on Friday in solidarity with prisoners in Israeli jails, in the aftermath of... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T11:40+0000

2021-09-11T11:40+0000

2021-09-11T11:51+0000

hamas

israel

gaza

palestinian islamic jihad (pij)

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Hamas, the Palestinian political and militant movement that governs Gaza, has warned that the confrontation with Israel may escalate in the wake of the rearrest of four of the six Palestinian prisoners who escaped Gilboa Prison through a secretly-dug underground tunnel.Referring to the escaped men as the heroes of the Battle of Freedom Tunnel, the militant group suggested that their escape served to break the prestige of the occupation and its security system, and revived the Palestinian peoples hopes that it is only a matter of time until the West Bank blows up in Israels face.The Israel Defence Forces offered a rare admission of responsibility for their military operation in Gaza early Saturday, stating that IDF fighter jets and helicopters attacked a Hamas position said to be used for machine gun fire, as well as a storage site and military compound used to produce concrete for terrorist tunnels.The Israeli strikes followed the issuing of a red alert in Eshkol, an Israeli region near the Gaza border, warning of possible rocket attacks coming out of the besieged territory. The IDF indicated that it intercepted one rocket using its Iron Dome air defence system, but did not specify who launched it.Palestinians clashed with Israeli security forces in East Jerusalem and the West Bank on Friday amid a series of day of rage rallies in support of the escaped prisoners. A 50-year-old Palestinian doctor was shot dead by police after allegedly stabbing and injuring a police officer. Forty more people were injured in the violence.Four of the six Palestinians who escaped from Gilboa Prison on 6 September were recaptured as of Saturday. Five of the six escapees are reportedly members of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a Gaza-based political and militant group which like Hamas has waged a guerrilla war against Israel. The imprisoned men were jailed for their membership in banned organisations, and for suspected attacks on Israelis. Israel and its US and European allies consider both Hamas and Islamic Jihad as terrorist groups.Israeli officials have vowed to recapture the two remaining fugitives.Hamas TensionsThe escalating tensions between Hamas militants and Israel over the prison escape comes in the wake of this springs Israel-Palestine crisis, which saw Israel launching hundreds of air and missile strikes into Gaza after Hamas militants fired thousands of rockets into southern Israel. Over 300 people were killed in the violence, mostly Palestinians.

https://sputniknews.com/20210911/explosions-heard-in-gaza-following-recent-rocket-launch---reports-1088969326.html

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/hard-times-covid-looms-over-ganesha-festivities-as-indian-sculptors-fear-worst-is-yet-to-come-1088937508.html

'Hard Times': COVID Looms Over Ganesha Festivities as Indian Sculptors Fear Worst is Yet to Come

'Hard Times': COVID Looms Over Ganesha Festivities as Indian Sculptors Fear Worst is Yet to Come

Idol worship is an integral part of most Hindu religious celebrations and is especially visible during big festivals like "Durga Puja", "Diwali", and "Ganesh... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

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2021-09-11T11:48+0000

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Every August, Suraj Padhyal from the Indian state of Rajasthan travels about 170 km from Jaipur to Delhi accompanied by his two brothers and their wives. For the next three months, they devotedly create sculptures, mainly of Lord Ganesha, and Goddesses Lakshmi and Durga. The Padhyal family is not alone. There are many other such families who await this time of the year with immense enthusiasm, hoping for a good income to survive on the rest of the year. Sputnik visited Delhi's largest markets for idol sellers  Chittranjan Park, Govind Puri, and the outskirts of Delhi  Faridabad to speak to a few people involved in the business of making and selling idols.This year, as the celebrations for Ganesh Chaturthi begin, the Padhyal family has only been able to sell 27 of their 110 Ganesh idols.Suraj Padhyal shared that this year they have failed to even recover their basic costs. Asked about what will happen to all the idols they've already made, he said: "We will try to sell these idols during the upcoming festival of lights Diwali, slated for 5 November, when Lord Ganesha and Goddess Lakshmi are worshipped in houses. Otherwise, we will immerse them".Pre-COVID these idols used to be placed in makeshift temples along roadsides or in colonies, or other public places, however, due to the pandemic, the government has restricted public celebrations to prevent large crowds from gathering. But all these measures have badly affected the livelihoods of small-scale sculptors or people who sell idols.Indians celebrate about 36 different large festivals annually, most of them falling around the Ganesha Chaturthi festivities.As per tradition, ardent devotees of Ganesha, the lord of auspiciousness, prosperity, and happiness, bring home his idol and worship it. They host the deity for three to eleven days. Later, these idols are immersed with reverence in rivers, lakes, or even wells to bid farewell to the divine guest for the year.No Longer Business as UsualSpeaking about his family's business before COVID, Padhyal said: "We used to get [an] advance booking of at least 20 idols every year. Some of the idols used to be as tall as 30 feet".But this year the situation is different.What is usually a bustling time for those who sculpt idols has turned into a grim reminder of the economic impact of the pandemic, especially for artists like Prakash Rathore, whose income depends on the festive season.Prakash Rathore, a known sculptor in Delhi, said: "Last year, the government banned people from visiting most of the pandals, and puja organisers keep the idol height as low 4-5 feet because they want to keep it a low-key affair. We're seeing a similar situation this year".Sarika Shakle, 37, a Delhi resident and contractual labourer, said: "On normal days, I sell vegetables, I sell idols this time of year. But, this year, there is no demand in the market".

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/indian-cabinet-minister-slams-rahul-gandhi-he-has-become-a-dream-trader-in-kashmir-1088976359.html

Indian Cabinet Minister Slams Rahul Gandhi: 'He Has Become a Dream Trader In Kashmir'

Indian Cabinet Minister Slams Rahul Gandhi: 'He Has Become a Dream Trader In Kashmir'

Congress party member Rahul Gandhi has accused the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) of trying to ruin the culture of Jammu... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T09:56+0000

2021-09-11T09:56+0000

2021-09-11T09:56+0000

bharatiya janata party (bjp)

india

indian national congress

rahul gandhi

jammu and kashmir

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Indian Minority Affairs Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi on Saturday said that the Congress party has committed the crime of destroying Jammu and Kashmir for their political gains. He further added that rather than apologising, Rahul Gandhi has become a "dream trader" in the Valley. This comes a day after Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who is on a two-day visit to Jammu, said that he and his family are Kashmiir Pandits and promised that he will do something for his "Kashmiri Pandit brothers". In the early 90s, the Kashmiri Pandits, a group of Kashmiri Hindus, were forced to flee from the Kashmir Valley to Jammu and other parts of the country after the outbreak of militancy in the region. Soon after his comments, the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) hit back at Gandhi and called him "immature and irresponsible". In a press conference, BJP's Spokesperson Sambit Patra said the "problems of Jammu and Kashmir are the legacy of the Gandhi family. It was (former Indian prime minister) Jawaharlal Nehru who was responsible for the problems of Kashmir." Astonishingly, Rahul Gandhi "very conveniently forgot that the woes of the Kashmiri Pandits were because of the politics of appeasement of the Congress and like-minded parties", Patra said. Meanwhile, Kavinder Gupta, senior BJP leader and former Deputy Chief Minister of erstwhile J&K state said that the "exodus of Kashmiri Pandits took place under the nose of Congress rule in the country." Had Congress played its role maturely during the early 1990s, the situation here would have been different, with J&K touching the heights of progress, Gupta said. Last month, Jammu and Kashmir's Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha said that the union territory's administration is committed to ensure a dignified return of Kashmiri pandits to the Valley. The administration has also launched a portal for the Kashmiri Pandits to reclaim their properties that were left behind.

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/jet-fuel-can-melt-steel-beams-911-eyewitness-reveals-why-he-doesnt-believe-it-was-an-inside-job-1088984724.html

Jet Fuel Can Melt Steel Beams? 9/11 Eyewitness Reveals Why He Doesnt Believe It Was an Inside Job

Jet Fuel Can Melt Steel Beams? 9/11 Eyewitness Reveals Why He Doesnt Believe It Was an Inside Job

Saturday marks the 20th anniversary of the 11 September 2001 terror attacks  the deadliest acts of terror in US history. The attacks killed nearly 3,000... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T13:20+0000

2021-09-11T13:20+0000

2021-09-11T13:36+0000

9/11: 20 years later

9/11

september 11

conspiracy theory

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Jiri Boudnik, a Czechoslovak-born architect who assisted in the 9/11 rescue effort, and who was in New York City on the day a pair of jet airliners flown by terrorist hijackers slammed into the World Trade Centers Twin Towers, is confident in the official story of the towers collapse, and believes that a conspiracy would have involved too many people to keep a secret.In 20 years, we have not heard any credible confessions about a conspiracy, the architect suggested, adding that he had physical evidence confirming the involvement of aircraft in the attack on the buildings, thereby debunking the controlled demolition claims.Boudnik is confident that the Twin Towers collapsed mainly due to the jet fuel present in the aircraft that flew into the towers, which he said contributed to the creation of a fiery inferno on many floors of the buildings, and violated their steel beams integrity to the breaking point. If it wasnt for the jet fuel, the buildings could have withstood the terrorist attack, the architect assured.2,753 people died in New York City on 9/11, among them the passengers of the two hijacked airliners, people inside the Twin Towers and their immediate vicinity, as well as police and firefighters who ran into the buildings to try to assist in evacuation operations. 189 more people perished in the attack on the Pentagon, and 44 in Pennsylvania as they attempted to take back control of the hijacked aircraft, which was reportedly on route for the White House.Boudnik was working on a project in Brooklyn on 11 September, 2001, and volunteered to assist in the 9/11 cleanup operations in the immediate aftermath of the attacks, quickly working to create 3D and 4D models of Ground Zero which assisted emergency rescue workers in searching for survivors.Jet Fuel Cant Melt Steel BeamsThe Twin Towers relatively smooth, controlled demolition-style collapse, combined with similarly mysterious destruction of 7 World Trade Center several hours after the Twin Towers fell, has given rise to conspiracy theories that the buildings may have contained explosives, planted either by terrorists or other unknown forces. In the immediate aftermath of the attacks, some eyewitnesses and TV commentators speculated on the presence of such explosives in the buildings, but such theories were later dismissed.Engineers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology conducted an investigation into the physics behind World Trade Centers destruction, concluding that the planes damaged the Twin Towers support columns as they smashed into the buildings, with fires caused by ample jet fuel onboard the aircraft reaching up to 1,000 degrees Celsius, causing beams to melt and prompting the collapse of the towers. However, in the years since, some civil engineers have challenged this version of events, and other official conclusions of 9/11-related engineering investigations.The Jet Fuel Cant Melt Steel Beams theory is just one of a host of 9/11-related conspiracy theories which quickly arose in the wake of the attacks, with others pointing to the official 9/11 commission reports ignorance or omission of a number of facts, particularly as relates to allegations that the intelligence services of Saudi Arabia or other countries may have been involved.Many conspiracy theories surrounding 9/11 have been fueled by the Bush administrations aggressive use of the 9/11 tragedy to declare a global war on terror and to declare a series of preemptive wars to try to reshape the Middle East. In the year 2000, a neoconservative Washington-based think tank known as the Project for the New American Century released Rebuilding Americas Defences, a document which suggested that absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event  like a new Pearl Harbor, the United States would need many years to achieve its goals of cementing its position as the worlds sole superpower. Conspiracy theorists have used this document, and the fact that PNAC contained many Bush-era officials, including Dick Cheney, Robert Kagan, William Kristol, Paul Wolfowitz and Donald Rumsfeld, as evidence that 9/11 may have been an inside job.In addition to being used as a pretext to justify the invasion of Afghanistan over the Talibans* harbouring of al-Qaeda* leader and suspected 9/11 mastermind Osama bin Laden, the 2001 attacks were used make possible the 2003 war with Saddam Husseins Iraq, amid allegations that he was cooperating with al-Qaeda. In 2007, four years after the Iraq invasion, former Bush-era CIA Director Tenet admitted to 60 Minutes that the US was never able to verify that there was any Iraqi authority, direction and control, complicity with al-Qaeda for 9/11 or any operational act against America, period.The Taliban, who recently reestablished control over Afghanistan in the wake of the Kabul governments sudden collapse, continue to maintain that there was no proof that bin Laden was involved in 9/11.

https://sputniknews.com/20210910/bizarre-conspiracy-theories-that-have-haunted-911-attacks-for-two-decades-1088924962.html

https://sputniknews.com/20210826/taliban-claims-theres-no-proof-osama-bin-laden-was-behind-911-attacks-1083718601.html

Muhammad-Aryan Shame on this news outlet for spreading fake news. 22

Muhammad-Aryan The official conspiracy theory aka '9/11 Commission report' expects its reader to suspend laws of physics and common sense when reading it. 19

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/jill-what-is-it-joe-bidens-first-reaction-to-911-in-spotlight-on-20th-anniversary-of-attacks-1088985297.html

'Jill, What is It?' Joe Biden's First Reaction to 9/11 in Spotlight on 20th Anniversary of Attacks

'Jill, What is It?' Joe Biden's First Reaction to 9/11 in Spotlight on 20th Anniversary of Attacks

Back in 2001, US President Joe Biden was a US senator for Delaware who was commuting to Washington on a daily basis. It was during one of his morning trips on... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T13:44+0000

2021-09-11T13:44+0000

2021-09-11T14:12+0000

9/11: 20 years later

joe biden

united states

afghanistan

9/11

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As the world commemorates 20 years since the deadly 11 September attacks, US President Joe Bidens first reaction to the horrific events has seen renewed attention in the media in the light of the chaotic US withdrawal from Afghanistan.In Joe Bidens 2007 memoir 'Promises to Keep: On Life and Politics, the then-senator recalled his experience on the morning of terror, when two planes hijacked by al-Qaeda terrorists flew into the twin towers of the World Trade Center.Biden, who was commuting from Wilmington to Washington on that day as usual, was on the phone with his wife Jill, who told him that the second of the planes had crashed into the building."Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God, the future First Lady apparently told her husband as he was on a train."Jill, what is it?""Another plane ... the other tower."In the book, Biden recounted seeing smoke around the Capitol when he arrived at Union Station, as a third plane had just hit the side of the Pentagon.The fourth aircraft, that was flying towards Washington to target either the White House or the Capitol building, later crashed into a Pennsylvania field as passengers fought with the terrorist on board to divert the flight from its intended aim.Bidens family apparently told the senator to leave Washington as all House and Senate office buildings were being evacuated, but the senator had refused. He said in the memoir that it was important to "show the country we were still doing business and pushed to call Congress into session."This nation is too big, too strong, too united, too much a power in terms of our cohesion and our values to let this break us apart. And it won't happen, Biden added.The future president then received a call from Bush himself, who wanted to thank the senator for his TV comments.Former Rep. Bob Brady of Philadelphia, who has reportedly been with Biden for most of the day, told CNN that during the call the senator had strongly urged Bush to return to Washington immediately:The recount of the presidents experience of the 9/11 events has been shared by CNN at the time when the US administration is licking wounds around its rambling withdrawal from Afghanistan.13 US service members and over a hundred of civilians died in Kabul last month following a terrorist attack near the citys airport as the West was trying to get out its citizens and allies from the country, which had been captured by the Taliban*.Washington later responded to the attack with an airstrike on Kabul, saying that they had managed to kill two Daesh-K* militants. A bombshell report later argued, however, that in reality the strike killed 10 civilians, including seven children, in what could have been an erroneous judgement about the terrorist suspects daily routine.* Daesh and the Taliban are terrorist groups banned in Russia and many other countries.

carlosconde099 Biden is a lier. What matters the stories he tells? 6

Thomas Turk ... since the deadly 11 September attacks, '' Just doing my job, says Aleksandra, spewing the Mainstream's BIG LIE. There were NO terror attacks.. nor planes. No Boeing airliner can fly at a sea level speed of 580mph, without ripping off its wings and tail, and needing 4X the engine power to reach that speed. Missing is any photo showing the 2 massive 1500 foot central cores of The Twins, as NIS assured us the floors had 'pancaked' Also not shown were the 2X 100 meter high piles of rubble from the collapsed buildings, that the laws of physics tell us MUST BE there. Those should have taken maybe 4 years to dismantle, not done in 4 hours overnight, and illegally, without the needed investigation. Search ''9/11 Hologram Plane Theory - Bill Cooper RIP Nov 5 2001' And there was NO DNA test to identify a single death. When a human body is 'vaporized' to the finest dust at 3000C, (Danish U Prof, based on melted iron iron micro-spheres). there can be NO DNA. Same as at Bali!! 1

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joe biden, united states, afghanistan, 9/11
https://sputniknews.com/20210911/khamenei-lauds-irans-naval-might-as-mini-armada-that-terrorized-us-on-high-seas-returns-home-1088987455.html

Khamenei Lauds Iran's Naval Might as Mini-Armada That Terrorised US on High Seas Returns Home

Khamenei Lauds Iran's Naval Might as Mini-Armada That Terrorised US on High Seas Returns Home

Iran deployed a pair of warships on a 45,000 km journey spanning three oceans in May, with the trip including the Islamic Republic's first-ever deployment in... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T14:33+0000

2021-09-11T14:33+0000

2021-09-11T14:44+0000

world

iran

iranian navy

ayatollah seyed ali khamenei

sahand

makran

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Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei has heaped praise on Iran's Navy over the "momentous naval mission" carried out by the Sahand destroyer and the Makran forward base and support vessel during their 133-day, cross-oceanic, cross-continental voyage.Ordering the military to continue to "maintain and upgrade" its capabilities, the supreme leader asked Mousavi to convey his personal "gratitude and appreciation to the commander and to every single member of the flotilla" over the success of the mission.The 75th fleet returned to its home port on Tuesday after a whirlwind, 45,000-km (28,000-nautical mile) trip that took it across three oceans and past 55 countries on three continents. The flotilla set sail from Bandar Abbas in May, travelling through the northern and western Indian Ocean, past the Cape of Good Hope and into the South Atlantic, where it sailed northward. In June, US officials and media expressed concerns that the ships were on route to Venezuela  Iran's Latin American ally, and that they may have been carrying economic assistance or even weapons. Instead, the ships continued north into the northern Atlantic Ocean, past the English Channel and into the Baltic Sea, docking in St. Petersburg to take part in a grand parade dedicated to the 325th anniversary of the founding of the Russian Navy in late July.'Gates of the Atlantic Opened to Us'Iran's naval officers appeared to be mindful of the psychological impact their ships' presence in places they'd never been before had on the United States. In July, Rear Adm. Hossein Khanzadi, then commander of Iran's Navy, said the flotilla's deployment sent "a special message" to America. Rear Adm. Shahram Irani, who replaced Khanzadi in August following presidential elections, emphasised last week that the flotilla was able to complete the trip without assistance from any other nation, and said that the warships did not need to make any port calls. He promised that Iran would continue to maintain its "determining presence in the oceans".The Sahand is a Moudge-class (literally "Wave-class") warship with a 2,500-tonne displacement, is 95 metres long, and has a complement of 140 officers and seamen. The ship's equipment includes long-range radar, electronic warfare and decoy systems, naval guns, cannons, and machine guns, as well as surface-to-air and surface-to-surface missiles, in addition to anti-submarine torpedoes and a landing bay sufficient to hold one helicopter.The Makran, named after the coastal region of Baluchistan, is a new class of ship for Iran's Navy built from a converted oil tanker. The 230 metre-long, 111,000+ tonne vessel is designed to serve as a mobile sea base for ultra-long-range naval operations, and is able to transport fuel, supplies, weapons, and a wide variety of military equipment both in its hull and on its deck. Its defences reportedly include rocket-launching speedboats and submersibles, drones, and helicopters, as well as advanced cruise missiles. The ship is also theoretically able to deploy almost any road-mobile piece of armament in use by the Iranian Army, coastal defence, or air defence forces.

https://sputniknews.com/20210725/iranian-warship-that-petrified-us-and-uk-on-high-seas-spotted-at-russian-naval-parade--video-1083458379.html

https://sputniknews.com/20210711/irans-navy-chief-admits-tehran-sent-warships-to-atlantic-partly-to-annoy-americans-1083362149.html

netman The next one will sail to Venezuela hopefully in collaboration with China fleet...! 2

TruePatriot Well done Iran. Next trip, Cuba and Venezuela. 2

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/lebanons-hezbollah-says-iranian-fuel-shipments-proves-ability-to-confront-us-siege-1088988799.html

Lebanon's Hezbollah Says Iranian Fuel Shipments Proves Ability to 'Confront US Siege'

Lebanon's Hezbollah Says Iranian Fuel Shipments Proves Ability to 'Confront US Siege'

The first vessel containing Iranian fuel bound for Lebanon reportedly entered Syrian waters last week, with sources telling news agencies that the fuel would... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T15:53+0000

2021-09-11T15:53+0000

2021-09-11T16:03+0000

hezbollah

united states

iran

lebanon

economic crisis

crisis

fuel

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Iran's shipment of fuel to Lebanon is a major victory against the United States and its "schemes", Hezbollah deputy chief Naim Qassem has suggested.The official suggested that the "transformations" taking place in Lebanon run counter to the schemes envisioned by the US and Israel  Hezbollah's sworn enemy, and stressed that the militant group would continue to face the American "siege" of Lebanon, just as it has faced the Israeli occupation of Lebanon in years past.Lebanon is facing severe fuel shortages that have affected both the private and public sector, with strategic areas, including hospitals and transportation, crippled as a result of the scarcity.Hezbollah plays a major role in Lebanon's sectarian-based politics. Last month, the Shia movement's leader, Hassan Nasrallah, announced that the group had secured an agreement with Iran to deliver at least three shipments of fuel to Lebanon. The deliveries are expected to take place in spite of US pressure on third countries not to accept energy from the Islamic Republic under penalty of sanctions.Last week, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian told the Lebanese Free Patriotic Movement leader that Tehran was prepared to sell additional fuel to the Lebanese government or individual Lebanese businessmen if necessary. The FPM is a major Christian political party founded by President Michel Aoun, and has 18 seats in Lebanon's 128-seat parliament.President Aoun announced a compromise agreement with the country's political forces on the creation of a new government on Friday, with foreign business media expressing hope that the new prime minister, Sunni businessman Najib Mikati, would help quell the crisis and bring the country back into the fold of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. The western-dominated institutions have refused to provide aid to Lebanon in the absence of liberal economic reforms and anti-corruption measures. Mikati has been endorsed by most of Lebanon's political forces, including Hezbollah and Amal, another major Shia party, as well as Sunni forces.Lebanon's fuel shortages are just one component of a broader economic, financial, and banking crisis facing the country in recent years. The calamity began in mid-2019 as a currency and debt crisis, and have since been exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic and the associated drop in economic activity, as well as last year's massive ammonium nitrate blast in the port of Beirut. Earlier this year, the World Bank warned the economic depression facing Lebanon today is shaping up to be among the most serious anywhere in the world since the mid-1800s, and that only a reform of its "bankrupt economic system, which benefited a few for so long" could save the country from further degradation and social conflict, or even civil war.

https://sputniknews.com/20210903/iran-confirms-readiness-to-sell-more-fuel-to-lebanon-if-necessary-following-watershed-deal-1083791828.html

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/nato-chief-backs-biden-afghan-pullout-warns-its-easier-to-start-a-military-operation-than-end-it-1088977546.html

NATO Chief Backs Biden Afghan Pullout, Warns It's 'Easier to Start a Military Operation Than End It

NATO Chief Backs Biden Afghan Pullout, Warns It's 'Easier to Start a Military Operation Than End It

After the debacle in Afghanistan triggered by the precipitous withdrawal of US troops, there have been renewed calls for an EU military force with a genuine... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T08:41+0000

2021-09-11T08:41+0000

2021-09-11T08:41+0000

afghanistan

joe biden

united states

afghanistan

taliban

jens stoltenberg

nato

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NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has pushed back against criticism that European allies were not duly consulted ahead of the abrupt US withdrawal from Afghanistan, which has been slammed by critics as nothing short of a mistake of historic magnitude. NATO gave its unanimous approval for the withdrawal as far back as April, said Stoltenberg in a wide-ranging interview at the alliances headquarters on Thursday, cited by The New York Times. He conceded that once the United States had opted for a pullout, it was hard for other allies to continue without the United States. It was not a realistic option. In February 2020 then-President Donald Trump had signed a bilateral deal with the Taliban* in Doha, Qatar, that committed the US to withdraw troops from Afghanistan by May 2021. The deal had obliged the Taliban Islamist group to take steps to prevent groups including al-Qaeda* from threatening the security of the US and its allies. Sources are cited as suggesting Stoltenberg had urged a conditional withdrawal of US and NATO forces from Afghanistan, that would have held the Taliban* to their pledge to seek a negotiated political solution with all forces concerned. Stoltenberg stopping short of confirming this, underscoring in the interview that no objections had been voiced by allies regarding the Biden pullout plan taken in April. He added that the options at the time were, threaten to leave and risk the Taliban returning, or to stay, but then with more fighting and more casualties. Perhaps the speed with which the Taliban would topple the Western-backed government was not anticipated, but everyone understood the risks of pullout, according to Stoltenberg.The NATO chief defended President Bidens decision on a rapid withdrawal and the ensuing chaotic evacuation from Kabul after Taliban had seized the capital on August 15. According to the NATO secretary-general, the blame for the lightening-swift deterioration of the situation in the South Asian country lay with the Afghan government. What we saw was a collapse of the political and military leadership, and that triggered the collapse of the whole defence against the Taliban. In the interview, Stoltenberg, who claimed he was heartbroken to see the Taliban being back, added that subsequent analysis would consider to what degree the withdrawal of US and NATO forces had brought forward the collapse of the Kabul government. My main focus is how we can preserve the gains made in the fight against terrorism and how you get people out of Afghanistan, he said. European Army Jens Stoltenberg weighed in on the recently reemerged calls for a separate European Union military force, claiming it could only weaken the trans-Atlantic alliance. For European allies to go to their parliaments and ask for more money and more soldiers to send into harms way in Afghanistan in a mission launched to protect the United States would have been difficult after Washington decided to leave, conceded Stoltenberg, adding: The Afghanistan withdrawal may lend fresh urgency to earlier calls by some European leaders, such as French President Emmanuel Macron, pushing for the bloc to pursue a security policy less dependent on America. At Thursdays informal meeting in Kranj, Slovenia, the EU defence ministers discussed the establishment of a rapid reaction force that could also act independently of the US military.European defence policy will only be credible if we are also able to launch complex military operations outside our borders, acting EU Commissioner for Internal Market and Industrial Policy Thierry Breton was cited by Suddeutsche Zeitung as saying.In the UK, the Afghanistan withdrawal was branded the biggest foreign policy disaster since Suez, prompting policymakers to think about how we handle friends, who matters and how we defend our interests, according to Tom Tugendhat, the Conservative chair of the British parliaments foreign affairs committee. However, Jens Stoltenberg emphasised on Thursday that any attempt to weaken the bond between Europe and North America will not only weaken NATO, it will divide Europe itself. Looking back on the almost 20 years-long US and NATO stint in Afghanistan, Stoltenberg suggested that failures of Western intervention should remind everyone, how serious it is to use military force and to go into another country, concluding that its easier to start a military operation than to end it.*A terrorist group outlawed in Russia and many other countries.

WhatTheFishIsThis Somebody please cut this annoying wagging tail off .. 2

Question All Then why, Loudmouth Stolenburg, are you living to make war with Russia? Is it because you are of no use anywhee else? 2

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/new-lebanese-pm-says-he-would-accept-help-from-any-country-with-exception-of-israel-1088968997.html

New Lebanese PM Says He Would Accept Help From Any Country With Exception of Israel

New Lebanese PM Says He Would Accept Help From Any Country With Exception of Israel

New Lebanese Prime Minister Claimed He Would Accept Help From Any Country With Exception of Israel

2021-09-11T01:03+0000

2021-09-11T01:03+0000

2021-09-11T01:03+0000

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humanitarian aid

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Prime Minister Najib Mikati pledged on Friday that he would tackle the disastrous economic situation in Lebanon, saying he is ready to cooperate with any county except Israel.When asked by a reporter whether he would partner with Syria to overcome the crisis, Mikati noted that Beirut will deal with anyone for the sake of Lebanons interest, with the exception of Israel, of course.According to Israeli media, Tel Aviv had earlier allegedly proposed humanitarian aid to Lebanon.The countries havent established diplomatic relations amid Israels confrontation with Lebanese Shia Islamist political group Hezbollah, based in the countrys south.The August intensification of the border conflict between Israel and Lebanon was said to be the most serious in 15 years since the Lebanese-Israeli war in 2006. On 6 August, Hezbollah fired 19 rockets towards Israel, and the IDF fired back.The political turbulence in Lebanon started in August last year after the resignation of the country's government led by Hassan Diab amid the massive explosion in Beirut that caused catastrophic losses.The compromise Prime Minister Mustafa Adeeb was unable to form a government. As a result, in October parliament asked Saad Hariri to return, who had left his position as prime minister a year earlier amid local protests. After 10 months, however, Hariri was unable to agree with the president on the distribution of ministerial posts between Muslims and Christians and resigned in July.

Preterist-ADSeventy Thats understandable because of unBiblical Israels nuclear missile strike in the port of Beirut in August of 2020. 3

vot tak "with the exception of Israel, of course. ... That is what needs to be done. Isolate the israelis/zionists and neutralize their influence machine. Other than the quotes from the Lebanese PM, the article is mostly zio-media in pov and shallowness. Thumbs down. 0

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/prince-andrews-lawyers-have-a-plan-how-to-dodge-virginia-roberts-giuffre-rape-suit-1088975990.html

Prince Andrews Lawyers 'Have a Plan How to Dodge Virginia Roberts Giuffre Rape Suit'

Prince Andrews Lawyers 'Have a Plan How to Dodge Virginia Roberts Giuffre Rape Suit'

Jeffrey Epsteins alleged sex slave Virginia Roberts Giuffre filed a civil lawsuit against the Queens second son Prince Andrew last month, accusing the... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T08:01+0000

2021-09-11T08:01+0000

2021-09-11T08:01+0000

united kingdom

news

prince andrew

virginia roberts giuffre

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The Duke of York has been served court documents naming him as a defendant in the Virginia Roberts Giuffre rape case but lawyers for the embattled royal are claiming that the procedure was not done properly and are planning to boycott the upcoming court hearing, the Daily Mail reported.Prince Andrew is said to have received the papers on 27 August, after weeks of avoidance, a legal team for Virginia Roberts Giuffre said in a new court filing.How They Tried to Reach the DukeA London-based process server, Cesar Augusto Sepulveda, filed an affidavit on 10 September detailing that he first went to Prince Andrews Windsor mansion, Royal Lodge, on 12 August to hand him the papers. His attempts to get closer to the Duke were apparently thwarted by Metropolitan Police officers, who told him that they were instructed not to allow anyone attending there for the purpose of serving court process on the grounds of the property. Sepulveda said that he was advised at that time that no papers left for the Duke would be forwarded to him.However, over two weeks later, he made another attempt to reach the Duke and was finally able to leave the court documents with the Met officer who was on duty at the mansions gate, the filing cited by the Daily Mail reads.The serving has apparently been ratified according to rules established by the Supreme Court of England and Wales but hasn't been confirmed by Buckingham Palace or Prince Andrews legal team.A lawyer for Virginia Roberts Giuffre, David Boies, said they'd made a massive effort trying to hand the papers to the Duke, both through the post and e-mails. Boies argued that his legal team had forwarded copies of the summons to five different lawyers, believing that they could be the ones representing the Queens son. The legal team also emailed some copies to the Dukes public email and via a same-day courier service and regular post to his Royal Lodge.Regrettable AttemptsDespite Boies claims that they did everything they could to make sure the summons have been properly served, the Princes team still found these measures objectionable and regrettable, according to a court letter obtained by ABC News.Prince Andrews lawyer Gary Bloxsome reportedly said in a letter addressed to British judicial official that Roberts Giuffres lawyers have made several public, indeed well-publicised, attempts at irregular service of these proceedings in this jurisdiction, in at least one case accompanied by a media representative.The lawyer also said that British legal procedures require that a request for assistance from a UK court official must originate from a judicial or diplomatic officer in the US in order to be regarded as valid.Bloxsome wrote that if such a request will be made by the judge overseeing the case, "then it is likely that our client will be content to agree to a convenient method of alternative service".The solicitor, however, indicated in the letter that at the moment his firm is not involved in the Roberts Giuffre rape case.Its not clear whether the Dukes representatives will turn up for the Monday hearing on the case that will be done through a conference call before a Manhattan judge.Its up to US district judge Lewis Kaplan who will oversee the hearing to decide whether the serving has been official.Fraud Lawsuit?Virginia Roberts Giuffre maintains she was forced to have sex with Prince Andrew on the orders of Epstein and his then-girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell at least three times when she was young and vulnerable. According to the woman, she was still 17 when it happened the first time in Maxwells London home.In August, Roberts Giuffre, now 38, filed a civil lawsuit against the Prince, accusing him of rape, sexual assault and battery. The Prince has not commented on the suit and has kept a low profile through this summer, as he was making back and forward trips to his mothers Balmoral estate in Scotland.The Dukes lawyers reportedly believe that Virginia Roberts Giuffres civil lawsuit against the prince was not valid in the first place and can be dodged on a technicality: a 2009 confidential settlement Virginia Roberts Giuffre reached with Epstein in Florida. The document has potentially prohibited her from taking any legal actions against individuals she's since identified as the financiers associates.As such, US lawyer Alan Dershowitz, who was long accused by Roberts Giuffre as being Epsteins co-conspirator, said this week that he strongly suspected that Virginia and her lawyers may have committed fraud on the court by filing a lawsuit against Prince Andrew after dismissing the battery case against the lawyer.Roberts Giuffres lawyers, however, claim that there is no evidence Prince Andrew was intended to be covered by the release.The Duke of York maintains that he has no recollection of ever meeting Virginia Roberts Giuffre or having sex with her, despite an existing photo which shows them together.

Mike Literous Im pretty sure excepting money for sex 20 years ago isn't being 'raped' 8

See you in the ice having sex with Frank N Stein's monster love doll isn't rape. The love doll looks 18 and being what turns out to be a golem puppet would give all the signs and confirmations that she was an eager and willing participant. The deception would have been done by the golem. 2

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united kingdom, news, prince andrew, virginia roberts giuffre
https://sputniknews.com/20210911/thought-i-left-my-daughter-with-no-father-911-survivor-who-opted-to-help-rescuers-in-twin-towers-1088938127.html

Thought I Left My Daughter With No Father: 9/11 Survivor Who Opted to Help Rescuers in Twin Towers

Thought I Left My Daughter With No Father: 9/11 Survivor Who Opted to Help Rescuers in Twin Towers

Tuesday, 11 September 2001, became a pivotal day for America as the nation faced the deadliest terror attack in history, with al-Qaeda members hijacking four... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T05:00+0000

2021-09-11T05:00+0000

2021-09-11T14:41+0000

news

world

opinion

us

world trade center

terror attack

9/11

daesh

al-qaeda

9/11: 20 years later

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It was an ordinary sunny morning in New York City, when Greg Amira, a vice-president of Morgan Stanley at the time, was going to work on the 73rd floor of the World Trade Center's South Tower on 11 September 2001. The World Trade Center, a large complex of seven buildings in the financial heart of Lower Manhattan, hosted about 17,000 workers, who, like Amira, commuted to their jobs that day.The situation changed in the blink of an eye at 8:46 am, when an American Airlines plane carrying 76 passengers and 11 crew members, suddenly crashed into the North Tower."I was on my way into work that day when the first tower was hit," Amira recalls. "There was initially some confusion about whether to evacuate or not and then quickly they came back on the loudspeakers and asked us to evacuate the building."Amira quickly went down the staircase of the South Tower, not knowing what was going on. When the man was somewhere in the low teens, the building was hit by a second plane that crashed into the South Tower at 9:03 am. Amira called his wife trying to find out what was happening but the phone line was dead.However, when he saw seriously injured people coming out of the North Tower he rushed to the rescue instead of trying to save his own life. Amira explains his sudden decision which nearly cost him his life by his military background. Perhaps, the fact that his father served in the New York City Police Department for over 30 years also influenced his choice. "So it's kind of like in your blood, I'll say, to run towards a catastrophe, not away," the survivor says."Against the will of many of my coworkers, I went back inside, made my way to the lobby number one, it seemed that's where most of the injured were coming from," he recalls.Amira offered his help to firemen in the lobby of the North Tower. He was still working there when he heard a loud rumble that then got louder. The man quickly hit the ground in a spread-eagle fashion thinking a blast was coming "from either incoming artillery or a grenade or whatever." Apparently, it was military training that guided his instincts again at this moment, according to him.It appears that this manoeuvre saved him when the glass shattered and then blew out accompanied by a burst of flames.Amira regained consciousness when a fireman started shaking him to get out. The fireman helped the man rise to his feet and said: "We need to get out of here. How do we get out of here?" It was hard to see anything because of the cloud of dust hanging in the air and it took a few minutes before it started to settle. The upper part of the lobby was three stories in height and the sunlight was coming through and soon they were able to make out a clear passage around a much higher ceiling area of the lobby."We started to make our way in that direction. As we did, there were loads of bodies on the ground," Amira says.Again, from his military training and from what his father showed him when he was younger, Amira immediately went to check the pulse on the neck of those lying on the floor. But the fireman stopped him saying: "There's no time for that  flick them in the eye and if they don't move, keep going." Alas, nobody was left alive.Once Amira got closer to the West Side Highway  the outer part of the North Tower building  he realised that he almost couldn't breathe: he had a lot of debris in his mouth and all over his body."Let's get out of here," the fireman rushed him. The next few moments will stay in Amira's memory forever. The falling building trapped Amira, the fireman who saved him, and the photographer. The only survivor was Amira, who, badly injured, was later dug out of the rubble.About 3,000 people died on that day in what turned out to be the worst-ever terrorist attack in the United States. All in all, terrorists associated with al-Qaeda hijacked four planes. Two of them hit the Twin Towers. The buildings' steel was badly damaged leading to the collapse of the South Tower at 9:59am and the North Tower at 10:28am. Meanwhile, at 9:37am a third plane hit the west wall of the Pentagon in Arlington, and a fourth one crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania at 10:03am. Years later, the the 9/11 Commission concluded that a group of passengers managed to stop the terrorists from attacking their target, which could presumably have been the White House or the US Congress.More than 2,700 people were killed in New York City alone. It took a lot of time and effort to identify victims' remains. According to The New York Times, forensic scientists had to test more than 22,000 body parts  some no bigger than a Tic Tac  recovered from the World Trade Center site.Looking back at 11 September 2001, Amira says: "I would hope that the 9/11 events are a constant reminder of what can happen, what would happen if we let out guard down. Let's hope in the future - at least in our lifetime - that that's the single largest terrorist event on US soil."However, he does not believe that the US achieved its goals in Afghanistan, which was invaded in retaliation for the terror attack immediately after 9/11. "Yes, we were after the Taliban*, but really we were going after al-Qaeda. We were going after training grounds for terrorist groups that were attacking the United States and our allies abroad," he says. However, although US troops had yet to complete their withdrawal last month, Daesh-K* brazenly attacked the Americans and Afghans at Kabul airport. The suicide bombing attack claimed the lives of 13 US military servicemen.*Al-Qaeda, the Taliban and Daesh-K (ISIS-K) are terrorist organisations banned in Russia and many other states.

Shalom Soros Who cares about dead Yankees and their false flag attack, which merely served as an excuse and pretense for the advancement of Zbigniew Brzezinski's "Grand Chessboard" doctrine! Sputnik doesn't do itself any favors by parroting Anglo-Zionist CIA-engineered narratives. The only victims worth remembering are the millions of innocent people around the globe who fell victim to the United States' bloodthirsty war campaigns against their respective countries in the aftermath. So, quit the Yankee sob stories! This nation of genocidal killers deserves no pity. 3

Thomas Turk SHAME on Sputnik Author Ekaterine spreading cia/ deep state lies ''' became a pivotal day for America as the nation faced the deadliest terror attack in history..'' There were NO terror attacks.. nor planes. No Boeing airliner can fly at a sea level speed of 580mph, without ripping off its wings and tail, and in any case needing 4X the engine power to reach that speed. Missing on any photo are the 2 massive 1500 foot central cores, as NIS assured us the floors had 'pancaked' Also no photo of the 2X 100 meter high piles of rubble of the collapsed buildings, based on the laws of physics. All that should have taken 4 years to dismantle, not be done 4 hours overnight, illegally, without the needed investigation. Search ''9/11 Hologram Plane Theory - Bill Cooper RIP Nov 5 2001' And where is any DNA test to identify a single death? When a human body is 'vaporized' to the finest dust at 3000C, (estimated by Danish Metallurgist, based on the microscopic, melted metal spheres in the dust), 1

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/three-people-three-stories-one-tragedy-witnesses-recall-911-on-20th-anniversary-1088975472.html

Three People, Three Stories, One Tragedy: Witnesses Recall 9/11 on 20th Anniversary

Three People, Three Stories, One Tragedy: Witnesses Recall 9/11 on 20th Anniversary

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) Ekaterina Chukaeva - A firefighter who rushed to Ground Zero to save lives, a blind man whose guide dog navigated him and 30 other people... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T07:26+0000

2021-09-11T07:26+0000

2021-09-11T07:47+0000

9/11: 20 years later

us

world trade center

anniversary

september 11

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Tuesday, 11 September 20 years ago became the black day for the whole of humanity which divided the lives of the majority of the Americans into two parts  before and after. Back then, Al Qaeda* terrorists crashed two hijacked commercial planes in the twin towers of the World Trade Center (WTC) in New York. The third plane hit the Pentagon near Washington, while the fourth hijacked plane fell down in the state of Pennsylvania. Nearly 3,000 people were killed that day and over 25,000 were injured.According to a recent poll released ahead of the anniversary, nearly two-thirds of US adults say 9/11 permanently changed life in the country, the highest level recorded in two decades.All The Time Wondering How We Get' People Out of DebrisAs the reports about the attacks started emerging, thousands of search and rescue workers were rushed to Ground Zero and Greg Hess, a member of the Indianapolis Fire Department, was one of them. He was a member of the Indiana Task Force-1 The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Search and Rescue team that travelled to the scene. His team arrived in New York 16 hours after the second tower fell and remained on the scene for eight days.The job of their team was to assist the remaining rescue personnel. Hess explained that his team was specialized in heavy rescue, rope rescue, confined space rescue and water rescue among other things.According to Hess, the disaster affected everyone worldwide and it indeed changed how everyone goes about their lives every day. He admitted that since he was a firefighter and paramedic, he managed to cope with the emotional effects, but "it was still overwhelming."The dust from the attacks suffused the air of Lower Manhattan with millions of tonnes of construction debris, asbestos, and glass, as well as such chemicals as lead and mercury. The contaminants are known to trigger the development of cancer, serious respiratory illnesses, heart and kidney damage, and other diseases in the human body. Nearly 10,000 first responders and people who were close to the WTC on the day of the attacks have been diagnosed with cancer.Hess was one of those affected by the consequences of the tragedy. In 2007, he was diagnosed with Stage 3A Colon cancer, which was directly related to his exposures at Ground Zero. Of the 62 members of Task Force 1, twenty-six people have come down with various illnesses from Ground Zero and four have died from their illness.Hero Dog Roselle Guided People Out of WTCBack then, on 11 September, not only people were trying to save lives. Some 300 four-legged heroes were involved in the rescue efforts, as well. One of such canines was yellow labrador Roselle, who saved her owner and 30 others by calmly guiding them to safety down 80 floors through the fire, debris and smoke.Roselle was a three-year-old guide dog for Michael Hingson, a sales manager for Fortune 500 company Quantum, which was planning to do some special sales training seminars that Tuesday. The companys staff was finishing final preparations when at 8:45 in the morning they heard something that resembled a muffled explosion.The office of their company was 18 floors below where the plane hit the building and on the other side of the building. Hingson came back over toward his desk where Roselle was  her usual place. She seemed calm. One of Hingsons colleagues saw fire and started to panic a little bit and said they have to get out of here. Hingson recalled that he tried to calm him down.When they were going to the stairs, Hingson suddenly felt an odor of the fumes from burning jet fuel. He did a lot of travel and he knew how the plane fuel smelled.During their evacuation, Roselle who did not show any fear was receiving commands from Hingson.After they got outside, they were very close to Tower Two when it collapsed.Back at home, Roselle acted as if nothing happened and she started playing with Hingsons retired guide dog, Linnie.Roselle was fine in the beginning but later she contracted a disease called immune-mediated thrombocytopenia, an auto-immune disease where the immune system destroys platelets within the body.Roselle passed away in 2011 at the age of 14. Hingson, who after the tragedy became a motivational speaker, dedicated a book about her and set up Roselle's Dream Foundation to raise money to aid vision-impaired people in everyday life. She was posthumously named American Hero Dog of the Year 2011 by American Humane.Hingsons current guide dog is called Alamo. He says 5-year-old Alamo loves cameras and loves to sit on the lap.That Woman Reminded Me of Figures in PompeiiStan Honda was working as a contract photographer for Agence France-Presse when his colleague called him early in the morning to say a plane had crashed into the WTC. Both thought that it was a private plane and they decided to get to the scene.Honda was photographing one of the towers when it broke apart, apparently, this was the first tower collapsing."I dont remember that moment, but a second later there was a huge roar, like a train, that continued for minutes. A giant cloud of smoke and dust appeared, coming in my direction down streets and between buildings. As the cloud advanced, people were running from it," he recalled.Honda kept on taking photos until it became as dark as night due to the smoke. It was difficult to see anything and eventually, he saw a police officer pulling people into an office building lobby. Honda also went into the lobby. That is where he would take the most famous and iconic pictures of the 9/11 tragedy.After the photo, the woman became known as the "dust lady" in the media. Only in 2002, her identity was released. Her name was Marcy Borders from Bayonne, New Jersey and she was a legal assistant working at the Bank of America in the WTC. Honda and his colleagues went to her to get an interview.Marcy was 28 when the tragedy happened and later she admitted that she would never recover from the depression she developed after the attacks. In 2014, she developed stomach cancer which she believed was triggered by the toxic dust she was exposed to during the collapse of the WTC. She died in 2015 at the age of 42."I was sad when I heard about her death in 2015. By reading the stories about her, it seemed Marcy had a lot of ups and downs in her life and she had a rough time after the 2001 experience. But her life seemed to be improving until she was diagnosed with stomach cancer. She seemed to be a real survivor of Sept. 11, so it was sad to see her die so young," Honda admitted.*A terrorist group outlawed in Russia and many other countries.

eddie Three people, three stories? More like "Two planes, Three Buildings". 8

Thomas Turk Why is there no investigative journalism here from Sputnik writers? There were NO hijacked commercial jets and NO terrrrs. No Boeing airliner can fly at a sea level speed of 580mph, without ripping off its wings and tail, and in any case needing 4X the engine power to reach that speed. No photo exists of the 2 massive 1500 foot central cores, with their lifts, shafts and motors, as NIS assured us the floors had 'pancaked' so HAD TO BE THERE! Nor photos of the 2X 100 meter high piles of rubble from the collapsed buildings. Physics Laws state they MUST BE THERE! It should have taken maybe 4 years to dismantle those millions of tons, not illegally done in 4 hours overnight, without the needed investigation. Search ''9/11 Hologram Plane Theory - Bill Cooper RIP Nov 5 2001'. NO victim DNA? Not at 3000C, as Danish U Prof. calculated, from melted microscopic iron spheres in the dust. 1

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us, world trade center, anniversary, september 11
https://sputniknews.com/20210911/us-inexplicably-pulls-patriot-missiles-out-of-saudi-arabia-amid-houthi-missile-and-drone-attacks-1088980127.html

US Inexplicably Pulls Patriot Missiles Out of Saudi Arabia Amid Houthi Missile and Drone Attacks

US Inexplicably Pulls Patriot Missiles Out of Saudi Arabia Amid Houthi Missile and Drone Attacks

The Gulf sheikdom has spent years facing a stream of missile and drone attacks carried out by Yemens Houthi militia, with the militants beginning the strikes... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T10:29+0000

2021-09-11T10:29+0000

2021-09-11T10:30+0000

yemen

saudi arabia

patriot

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The United States has removed a Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) system and multiple Patriot missile batteries from Saudi Arabia, The Associated Press reports, citing an analysis of satellite photos by a private earth imaging company.According to the news agency, satellite snaps by Planet Labs show that the air and missile defence systems have been removed from a runway at the Prince Sultan Air Base, a military facility situated about 115 km outside Riyadh.The advanced air defence equipment and several thousand US troops were deployed in Saudi Arabia in late 2019, in the wake of the devastating drone attacks on a pair of oil processing facilities in the Kingdoms east, which temporarily knocked out half of the countrys oil production.The Saudi Defence Ministry brushed off the significance of the redeployment, hailing Riyadhs strong, longstanding and historic ties with Washington and insisting that the sheikdoms military was capable of defending its lands, seas and airspace, and protecting its people independently.Riyadh has repeatedly accused Iran of involvement in the 2019 drone attacks on its oil processing infrastructure. The Islamic Republic vocally denied any role in the strikes, while the Houthis claimed responsibility, insisted they carried them out independently and warned that further strikes would be incoming if Saudi forces did not leave their country.The news of the suspected removal of American air defence systems comes in the wake of US Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austins inexplicable decision Wednesday to indefinitely postpone his visit to Saudi Arabia, with the Pentagon citing scheduling issues and saying Austin looks forward to rescheduling at the soonest opportunity.Saudi Arabia is known to have its own stock of Patriot missile batteries, which it purchased in the mid-2000s. The countrys inventory is thought to consist of as many as 640 of the $3 million apiece missiles and an unknown number of launchers.Yemen StagmireSaudi Arabias cities, military bases, energy production and processing facilities, airports, and other infrastructure are under constant threat of attack by Houthi ballistic missiles and small bomb-laden drones. The Houthis began their missile and drone attacks in the aftermath of the March 2015 Saudi-led incursion into the country to try to restore the toppled government of Yemeni president Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi. Hadi fled Yemen in late 2014, settling in Riyadh and forming a Gulf state-backed government in exile.Saudi Arabia floated a new peace initiative in March 2021, after the withdrawal of direct US military support for its Yemen war. The initiative included a nationwide ceasefire. The Houthis, a moderate Islamist and anti-Zionist political and militant movement, rejected the ceasefire idea, saying Riyadh must first lift its economic blockade against Yemeni ports and airports to help resolve the dire humanitarian situation in areas they control.The United Nations has warned that Yemen is facing the worlds worst humanitarian crisis, and has estimated that nearly 21 million people are in need of protection or basic humanitarian assistance, including food aid. As many as 233,000 people have been killed in the Yemen conflict to date, both as a result of fighting and due to the humanitarian crisis caused by the Saudi-led coalitions blockade.

https://sputniknews.com/20210829/at-least-two-killed-16-wounded-in-houthi-strikes-on-yemeni-military-base-reports-say-1083744390.html

Mike Literous They don't work that's why....shhhhhh don't tell anyone. 8

Question All Psst..money back guarantee. We agree they don't work! Neither does the "Iron Dome" 8

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yemen, saudi arabia, patriot
https://sputniknews.com/20210911/us-may-include-israel-and-gulf-state-allies-in-its-new-drone-based-task-force-iranian-media-says-1088991818.html

US May Include Israel and Gulf State Allies in Its New Drone-based Task Force, Iranian Media Says

US May Include Israel and Gulf State Allies in Its New Drone-based Task Force, Iranian Media Says

On Wednesday, the US Navys 5th Fleet unveiled plans to create a new task force headquartered in Bahrain. The force expected to be equipped with the latest US... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T19:03+0000

2021-09-11T19:03+0000

2021-09-11T19:18+0000

persian gulf

united states

israel

iran

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The US military may use its new Persian Gulf task force to create a joint naval unit containing military forces from its Gulf allies, as well as Israel, and use these forces to carry out proxy missions to destabilize the region, Irans semi-official Nour News Agency suspects.In this context, Washington will hand over part of the mission of its military forces in West Asia to the Arab countries in the region and the Zionist entity, so that the vacuum of its direct presence in West Asia and the Persian Gulf will be felt less sharply, the outlet, which Western media suspect may have links to Irans Revolutionary Guards, or to the Islamic Republics Supreme National Security Council, added.In its announcement on the creation of a new Mideast-based task force, formally known as Task Force 59, on Wednesday, officials from the USs 5th Fleet did not mention whether any foreign allies would be involved in the new force. 5thFleet commander Vice Adm. Brad Cooper told media that the US wants to put more systems out there in the maritime domain above, on and below the sea, and have more eyes on whats happening out there.Cooper did not specify what specific drone systems may be used by the new force, but AP has speculated that the unmanned vehicles may include long-range and long-endurance aerial spy drones, unmanned surface vessels like the Sea Hawk and Sea Hunter, and torpedo-shaped underwater drones.Iran has some experience with US unmanned systems operating in the Persian Gulf. In 2019, the Revolutionary Guards shot down a $220 million US surveillance drone operating over Iranian airspace in the Persian Gulf. The incident brought the two nations to the brink of war.Cooper didn't clarify the new drone-based task forces expected interactions with the Iranian military, saying the Navy was very aware of Irans posture and will be prepared to deal with that appropriately. The commander did not elaborate.The 5th Fleet is formally tasked with guarding the approach to the Strait of Hormuz, through which some 20 percent of the worlds crude oil passes. Iran has repeatedly stressed that it and other Gulf nations can come to an agreement to secure the Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz independently, without the interference of outside powers like the US and Israel. In 2019, then-Iranian President Hassan Rouhani proposed the so-called Hormuz Peace Initiative at the 74th United Nations General Assembly, and invited countries of the region, including Saudi Arabia, with which Iran has had historically tense relations, to join.

https://sputniknews.com/20210810/iran-accuses-israel-of-whitewashing-own-terrorism-against-commercial-ships-via-tanker-attack-claim-1083572097.html

mandrake My guess is that the so called gulf allies much would prefer to remain on the sideline and the sole reason they are called allies is that the offerings moronistan offers cant be turned down. Reluctant participation! 1

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/were-an-embarrassed-country-trump-slams-biden-in-extensive-interview-ahead-of-911-anniversary-1088968085.html

'We're an Embarrassed Country': Trump Slams Biden in Extensive Interview Ahead of 9/11 Anniversary

'We're an Embarrassed Country': Trump Slams Biden in Extensive Interview Ahead of 9/11 Anniversary

President Biden has recently faced an unprecedented crisis for himself due to an ill-planned and hasty evacuation of troops and collaborators from Afghanistan... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T01:58+0000

2021-09-11T01:58+0000

2021-09-11T02:03+0000

afghanistan

joe biden

afghanistan

us troop withdrawal

us troops in afghanistan

afghanistan war

troops withdrawal

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biden administration

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https://cdn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/09/0b/1088969537_0:0:3073:1728_1920x0_80_0_0_8d9c45597ad28c8a038dacba2c2ce645.jpg

Former President Donald Trump slammed the Biden Administration's "rushed" withdrawal of military assets from Afghanistan again, adding that there has "never been a greater embarrassment" to the US, due to "an incompetent person" leading it.In an interview with Fox News, Trump, while discussing the events of September 11, 2001, highlighted what he dubbed a "terrible week in our history recently."Trump, who as president secured an agreement with the Taliban for a troop departure with an initial deadline in May, assured again that this "never would have happened" under his presidency.The former president also said that over the 18-month period, the US had not lost a single "soldier or an American," hence the withdrawal and peace process were "going along very well."'Big Open Wound, Void' to Be Filled by TalibanTrump said of the Biden administration's withdrawal of US forces, which ended on August 31 with all the country's military assets removed, that it "created this big open wound, a void, and the Taliban just came in and filled it, and within 24 hours, they controlled the whole country.""When I heard they were taking the military out, I thought, thats inconceivable," said the ex-president, stressing that things like that "should have ever happened."The mission of evacuation has ended its military phase and entered a "diplomatic" phase, according to the Biden administration. And based on the latest official statements and media reports, the State Department is focusing on a diplomatic mission to remove known American citizens and Afghan allies in Afghanistan, which they estimate to be around 100 people.Thus, the administration announced on Thursday that Americans, not specifying if it was those who have reportedly been kept on the ground at the airport in Afghanistan's northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif, had been safely evacuated from Kabul to Qatar, and that the Taliban had been "cooperative" and "business-like and professional" while administration officials worked to evacuate US citizens.A 'Sad & Pathetic' WithdrawalThe former president said that the Biden administration "looks like fools" and that its rhetoric following the completion of the withdrawal is "sad and pathetic."Furthermore, the attention of the former president shifted toward the huge amount of military equipment and vehicles, estimated by him to be worth about $85 billion, left in the war-torn country and allegedly inherited by the Taliban. Trump noted that once the US had "tremendous airpower," which is now in the hands of the Taliban.Trump also praised his administration's diplomatic and military successes in the Middle East, claiming that he "got rid of 100% of the ISIS caliphate, [Iranian general] Soleimani, [Daesh* head] al Baghdadi," while also brokering the Abraham Accords, a peace pact between Israel and the United Arab Emirates that restored diplomatic relations.In the end, Trump came to the conclusion that the US has "to do what we have to do.""Were an embarrassed country, and weve never had anything like this," Trump stressed. "Were not respected anymore.We're disrespected all over the world."According to US National Security Council Spokesperson Emily Horne, the government supported the evacuation of 21 Americans and 11 lawful permanent residents from Kabul airport and overland to a neighboring country as of Friday. However, she stressed that details of the operations will not be shared due to the ongoing threat of terrorism.*The Taliban, Daesh are terrorist groups banned in Russia and a number of other countries.

https://sputniknews.com/20210902/trump-blasts-lies-about-disabled-hardware-as-he-shares-clip-of-taliban-parading-us-equipment-1083778279.html

NthrnNYker59 Oh STOP.... fascist amerika has been an embarrassment for decades and decades. 8

vot tak The usa has been a embarrassment since it began, but the trump regime was one of those times the embarrassment really stood out. Especially trump himself. The guy would sell his own mother if his zio-masters told him to. 5

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https://sputniknews.com/20210911/why-will-it-be-difficult-for-the-taliban-to-disown-etim-despite-its-assurances-to-china-1088973198.html

Why Will It Be 'Difficult' for the Taliban to 'Disown' ETIM Despite its Assurances to China?

Why Will It Be 'Difficult' for the Taliban to 'Disown' ETIM Despite its Assurances to China?

Republican lawmakers in the US Congress have said that the Biden administration's "disastrous" troop pullout from Afghanistan presents China with an... 11.09.2021, Sputnik International

2021-09-11T08:18+0000

2021-09-11T08:18+0000

2021-09-11T08:18+0000

afghanistan

afghanistan

east turkestan islamic movement (etim)

pakistan

belt and road initiative

us forces afghanistan

uyghurs

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Indias leading Chinese studies experts reckon that it is too early for the international community to declare China a clear winner following to the US withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, stating it would be "difficult" for the Taliban* to disown the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), the terrorist group calling for a separate Uyghur homeland.The observations were made during a panel discussion on the geostrategic implications of US troop withdrawal from Afghanistan on 10 September. The virtual event was organised by a New Delhi-based foreign policy think tank, the Eurasian Foundation.The East Asian expert also points out that ETIMs deputy commander Hajji Furqan had yet to be handed over to China despite the Taliban calling Beijing its friend on several occasions.During his meeting with Talibans co-founder and former political office chief Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar in Tianjin in July this year, Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi said that the ETIM poses a direct threat to China's national security and territorial integrity.A United Nations Security Council (UNSC) report dated 1 June claims that Furqan leads as many as 1,000 foreign fighters, including nearly 400 operatives of the ETIM in Afghanistans Badakhshan Province. The report alleges that Furqan is also deputy commander of Al-Qaeda tasked with recruitment of foreign fighters.The report states that the ETIM has been facilitating the movement of fighters from Afghanistan and even Syria in a bid to realise its stated goal of carving out a separate Uyghur state.Meanwhile, the Taliban has rejected a widely-accepted assertion that Osama Bin Laden was behind the 9/11 terrorist attacks, with spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid telling NBC News last month that there was no proof of his involvement. Otherwise, the Taliban maintains that it won't allow Afghan soil to be used by any foreign terrorist group.Kondapalli claims that the reorganisation of the leadership of the Chinese Peoples Liberation Armys (PLA) Western Theatre Command, announced this week was reflective of Beijings concerns along its western borders. China's state media has reported that President Xi Jinping has appointed Wang Haijiang as the new general of the Western Theatre Command, the third leadership change in a year.Professor Kondapalli also feels that there are a host of other potential challenges too which could create problems with China-Taliban cooperation. Chinas dependence on Pakistan to manage its ties with the Taliban could prove problematic in coming days, as the international community begins to scrutinise Islamabads reported role in interfering in Afghanistans internal process by helping the Taliban, the Indian expert feels.He goes on to refer to reports of Pakistani forces using Chinese-made CH-4 drones to bomb targets in the Panjshir province this month. The mountainous province is yet to be captured by the Taliban, which otherwise controls nearly every other part of Afghanistan.Lastly, Kondapalli argues that too strong a government in Kabul isnt necessarily good news for Pakistan.One must not forget that the question of the Durand Line (the Pakistan-Afghanistan border) is still unsettled. The Taliban, backed by its Pashtun power base, could seek to reunite the Pashtun community in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Such differences risk affecting the overall equilibrium among Islamabad, Beijing and a Taliban-controlled Kabul, the academic says.Economic Instability in Afghanistan a Concern, Says ExpertProfessor Sanjay Pandey, the former director of the Centre for Russian and Central Asian Studies (CRCAS) at JNU, says the economic instability in Afghanistan due to the freezing of nearly $9 billion of Kabuls funds in foreign accounts last month may force it turn to arms and drugs trafficking into neighbouring nations.The Chinese foreign ministry this week announced a $31 million in emergency aid to Afghanistan, its first since the Taliban captured power last month.Professor Swaran Singh, a professor at Centre for International Politics, Organisation & Disarmament, JNU, points out that it was too early to buy into the Talibans assurances of not supporting terrorism in Xinjiang.But if the Taliban cooperates with China in the realm of counter-terrorism, Beijing could be the greatest beneficiary out of the US troop pullout. None of the possibilities are being ruled out as yet, he says.Singh points out that extending the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a Beijing-baked multi-trillion dollar venture, remained another primary objective of China.With a friendly Taliban-led regime in Kabul and the US troops gone, Beijing is sensing a real opportunity to realise its vision as well as support Afghanistans economic re-construction, suggests Singh.*The Taliban and Daesh are terrorist groups banned in Russia and many other countries.

https://sputniknews.com/20210830/taliban-hails-great-neighbor-china-renews-promise-not-to-let-terrorists-base-in-afghanistan-1083755330.html

https://sputniknews.com/20210829/pentagon-admits-co-mingling-of-taliban-haqqani-backtracks-on-separate-entities-valuation-1083744270.html

https://sputniknews.com/20210909/iran-slams-foreign-intervention-in-afghanistan-amid-concerns-pakistan-is-helping-taliban-1088905266.html

https://sputniknews.com/20210824/china-iran-step-in-to-aid-afghanistan-as-us-freezes-kabuls-foreign-assets-after-taliban-takeover-1083698025.html

Ahson China is having a hard time dealing with CPEC in half failed state Pakistan and preventing its failure. Here we're discussing a what if Chinese involvement in totally failed state Afghanistan? This is absurd! 2

WhatTheFishIsThis Terrorists going into China will be easily noticed and spotted .. due to Chinese language and dialects !! 2

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The September to remember at Woodbine Mohawk Park continued on Saturday (Sept. 11) with a program that featured more than $3 million in purses in several sought-after stakes events, highlighted by Canadian harness racing's richest pacing event, the $1 million Pepsi North America Cup.

Saturdays jam-packed stakes card also included the $392,000 Peaceful Way final for two-year-old trotting fillies, the $240,000 Goodtimes for three-year-old trotters, the $425,000 Fan Hanover final for three-year-old pacing fillies, the $640,000 William Wellwood Memorial for two-year-old trotters and two divisions of the Champlain for two-year-old pacers as well as a $40,000 Open Handicap Pace and $50,000 Three-Year-Old Open Pace.

Trot Insider provided live coverage of the stakes events, and those recaps and replays follow.

Desperate Man Wins The 2021 North America Cup

With numerous runner-up efforts and finishes behind heavy favourite Bulldog Hanover on his card, Desperate Man avenged his defeat in the Pepsi North America Cup elimination to down his provincial rival and take top crown in the $1 million final on Saturday (Sept. 11) at Woodbine Mohawk Park....read on

King Of The North Lands Golden Ticket

The road to the 2021 Mohawk Million winner's circle now goes through King Of The North, the first horse officially entered in the million-dollar event by virtue of his victory in the $640,000 William Wellwood Memorial for two-year-old trotters on Saturday (Sept. 11) at Woodbine Mohawk Park....read on

Fire Start Hanover Monstrous In Fan Hanover

Fire Start Hanover is harness racing's newest millionaire after a dazzling effort in the 2021 Fan Hanover Final for three-year-old pacing fillies on Saturday (Sept. 11) at Woodbine Mohawk Park....read on

Fashion Frenzie Fires In Goodtimes Final

A backstretch sweep to the lead by Fashion Frenzie proved the winning move in the breeze of the Saturday (Sept. 11) card at Woodbine Mohawk Park as the elimination winner scored a 1:53.2 victory in the $240,000 Goodtimes Final....read on

Venerable Stays Perfect In Peaceful Way

Is she the best two-year-old trotter in North America? Venerable might have the chance to prove it in a few weeks time if her connections give the undefeated filly a shot against the boys in the 2021 Mohawk Million....read on

Stonebridge Helios, Silver Label Dominate Champlains

Odds-on favourites Stonebridge Helios and Silver Label served notice to their competition, each going powerful miles to win their respective divisions of the Champlain Stakes on Saturday (Sept. 11) at Woodbine Mohawk Park....read on

Powertrain Powerful In Open Pace

Give full marks to pacing colt Powertrain, who wasn't North America Cup-eligible but certainly showed he belongs with those colts with a dazzling mile in a $50,000 Three-Year-Old Open Pace contested on the 2021 Pepsi North America Cup undercard....read on

Warrawee Vital Vicious In Open Pace

Track-record holder Warrawee Vital braved the stretch headwinds at the start and to the finish to post a front-stepping victory in the $40,000 Open Handicap Pace on Saturday (Sept. 11) at Woodbine Mohawk Park....read on

For the results from Saturday's stellar card of harness racing, click the following link: Saturday Results - Woodbine Mohawk Park.
On a night that saw seven divisions of the Kindergarten Series for two-year-olds, Niki Hill was the most impressive winner Friday at The Meadowlands, scoring in 1:51.1 in the second leg for two-year-old fillies on the pace.

The Chris Ryder trainee remained unbeaten in three lifetime starts while lifting her career earnings to $47,291 for owner Tom Hill after leaving alertly from post eight in the 10-horse field with Dexter Dunn driving and reaching the quarter while parked in :28.

The 1-9 favourite sailed past the half in :56 and three-quarters in 1:23.3 before pacing her final quarter in :27.3 to report home a 3-1/4-length winner over Find Happiness. Hood Party was third.

A $155,000 Lexington Select Sales purchase, Niki Hill returned $2.10 to her backers. The time for the mile was three-fifths of a second slower than her lifetime best, which she set in Pennsylvania Sire Stakes action on August 9 at Pocono Downs.

It was a big night for Ryder as his trainee Ill Drink To That was over at Yonkers winning the $200,000 New York Sire Stakes Final for three-year-old pacing colts. But the trainer didnt miss his fillys win.

I was at The Meadowlands early and then zipped over to Yonkers, said Ryder. Niki Hill is terrific. We havent raced her much yet this year so we can concentrate on the bigger races later on. Shes in the eliminations for the Shes A Great Lady next week. Then, shell go to the Breeders Crown, Three Diamonds and Kindergarten Final.

The daughter of Always B Miki-Road Bet is doing her best to fill the void for Hill and Ryder left by Party Girl Hill, whose career was cut short by an injury after winning 15 of 16 races a year ago.

Tom Hill was held up in England, said Ryder, so he asked me to find a top filly for him. I liked everything about Niki Hill. Shes a half-sister to Cattlewash, who won in 1:46.4 a couple of days before the sale. It feels good to make up for that loss.

The $20,000 divisions for pacing colts went to Early Action (David Miller), who lowered his mark to 1:51.2 for trainer Joe Holloway while extending his win streak to three, and the Jim Campbell-trained Jo Pas Warrior (Tyler Buter), who took a new mark of 1:52.

The trotting colt divisions were won by the George Ducharme-trained Testing Testing (David Miller) in a career-best 1:54.4 mile and the 1:57.3 maiden-breaker By The Book (Todd McCarthy), who upset in a three-across finish for the Noel Daley stable.

A pair of first-time winners were in the spotlight in the trotting filly divisions as La Vie En Blanc (Dexter Dunn) prevailed in 1:56.4 for trainer Tony Alagna and Just Bee Awesome (Steve Smith) upset in 1:56.2 for conditioner Brett Pelling.

A LITTLE MORE: Dave Miller, Dunn, Todd McCarthy and Tyler Buter all recorded driving doubles on the card.  Izzy Estrada trained two to victory lane.  All-source handle totaled $1,962,356.  Racing resumes Saturday at 6:20 p.m.

(With files from Meadowlands Racetrack)
And then we started getting parents coming into the school saying, Im pulling my kids out. And were just trying to be like, 'OK whatever.' Were not making a fuss. We dont even know what to argue about.  It was hard, because we had to keep school going, but we knew that there was something so terrible going on, and trying to keep it (school) normal for kids.

Kerri Dishman, owner of Fresh Foods:

My memory of 9/11 as I was holding my newborn baby (two weeks old) on that day when it happened and just wondering what in the world this small child has been born into?

 It was scary that day because there was just so much unknown. You turn on your TV, and they just play that over and over  of the towers crashing. And not knowing why and what else is going on, but knowing that something horrific just happened to our country.

 My heart just hurt for all of those people in New York City as they had missing family members. And as a new mother, I could relate to those who it was their child there or, as a wife, I could relate to those who maybe they lost their spouse. My heart hurt for those people.

Alan AJ Trook, American Legion Post 36 finance officer:
Hifter launched a military offensive in 2019 to capture the capital, a campaign backed by Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Russia and France. But his march on Tripoli ultimately failed in June 2020 after Turkey sent troops to support the government, which also had the backing of Qatar and Italy. This paved the way for the October cease-fire agreement.

Kubis urged Libyas rivals to join forces and ensure inclusive, free, fair parliamentary and presidential elections, which are to be seen as the essential step in further stabilizing and uniting Libya.

He said more than 500,000 new voters have recently registered, bringing the total to over 2.8 million -- 40% of them women. Most of the new voters are under 30 years old, he said, a clear testament to the young generations eagerness to take part in determining the fate of their country through a democratic process.

Kubis said Libya needs to move beyond the state of paralyzing perpetual crisis and conflict and perennial transition to build a united, stable and secure country that can focus on development. He stressed that elections are a political and security necessity ensuring that the positive developments achieved in Libya since October 2020 continue.
Back at the World Trade Center, firefighters and police were rushing in to help.

Then, 42 minutes after the first attack the South Tower collapsed in a massive cloud of dust and smoke. At 10:30 a.m. the North Tower collapsed.

Watching it on TV was unreal, shocking and terrifying. In less than an hour, almost 3,000 lives were stolen. In less than an hour, our world had been turned upside down, our feeling of safety collapsed with the towers.

The shock and pain that day produced should never be forgotten. The lives stolen by 19 cowards should never be forgotten. There is no excuse for such a horrible act of hate.

Twenty years has passed, but may we NEVER EVER FORGET.

CLARIFICATION

In my last weeks column on transparency, I want to make it clear I was not accusing anyone of wrong doing. I was very concerned the mayor and council were not willing to share the names of the finalists, however, my concerns was not based on accurate information. One of our reporters was offered the names, but turned them down. I didnt learn about this until Wednesday, Sept. 8. There is a huge concern with any and all government officials, hired and elected for transparency. Scottsbluffs city manager, mayor and council tried to be and we, your newspaper, dropped the ball. For that, I am sorry.

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Chart 1 shows that the US stock market is in a long-term uptrend relative to the rest of the world. The upper window compares the S&P to the Vanguard All-World ex-US ETF and indicates a recent breakout from a consolidation reverse head-and-shoulders. The lower panel substitutes the S&P Equal Weight ETF; it, too, is in an uptrend against the rest of the world.

Chart 1

You may be asking the question, "If the US is the place to be, why look at anything else?" The answer lies in the fact that individual country ETFs, like sectors, are continually rotating in popularity amongst investors and traders. Since there are always new ones emerging or fading, the point of this article is to draw your attention to some interesting funds that may be about to emerge. In that respect, I am really referring to relative action, as the vast majority of country ETFs are already in established uptrends from an absolute price aspect. Consequently, we can refer to these ETFs as relative sleepers, which are positioned to potentially take over from the US leadership in the event that it should start to falter.

Israel

Israel is a great example of this positive absolute/weak-but-stabilizing RS combination, as the price has clearly managed to break above its 2014-2020 resistance trendline and 65-week EMA. Since the long-term KST, which you can read about here, is also positive, there is little doubt that this ETF is in a primary uptrend. The bottom two windows, like all the remaining charts, display the relative line to the iShares MSCI World Stock ETF (ACWI) together with its long-term KST for relative action. In Israel's case, the situation is mixed but promising. That's because the RS KST has just gone positive, but the relative line itself is just below its 2015-2021 down trendline and 65-week EMA.

Chart 2 Europe

Europe has been a relative laggard for some time, although some areas, notably Scandinavia and the Netherlands, have outperformed the world over the last few years. The UK, Norway and Italy may be set to follow suit.

Chart 3 shows that the UK ETF (EWU) has recently cleared a trendline, joining the 2014, 2018 and 2020 peaks. The price is comfortably above its 65-week EMA and the KST is positive. Its failure arises from the fact that the RS line has been unable to seriously clear its 65-week EMA since 2014. It's also significant that the EMA is currently trading at the same level as the dashed-green trendline. The effect is that they reinforce each other as an area of resistance, which, if bettered, would represent a very bullish signal, especially as the KST for relative action is already positive.

Chart 3The Norwegian ETF (NORW) is in a very similar position to that of the EWU, in that the price has already cleared long-term resistance. Unlike its other Scandinavian counterparts, NORW has not yet been able to establish a trend of improving relative action, though it is very close to its 2014-2021 down trendline. The rising KST for relative action is encouraging from that aspect.

Chart 4The Italian ETF, the EWI, tried seven times to clear the 2009-2021 resistance trendline, shown in Chart 5. It finally did it earlier this year. The trend of relative action has gone flat since April of 2020, with the result being that the RS line is right at the convergence of two trendlines and its 65-week EMA. Since the KST for relative action is in a rising trend, it seems likely that this formidable resistance will be successfully overcome.

Chart 5 Latin America

In 2020, Mexico (EWW) broke below significant support in the form of the horizontal dashed red trendline in Chart 6. However, the break turned out to be a whipsaw. That meant that a powerful rally was likely to follow, as market participants scrambled to get back on the right side of the market. We have already seen an advance, which has resulted in a decisive break above the 2014-2021 down trendline. However, the size of that false downside break should enable the price to power still higher. Note that the RS line is close to its 65-week EMA and 2013-2021 down trendline. It has also gone extremely quiet, all of which suggests that, when it does break to the upside, a very powerful RS rally will follow. The positive RS KST argues for an eventual bullish relative break.

Chart 6

Further south, the Global X Argentina ETF has completed an inverse head-and-shoulders for both the absolute and relative prices. The two KSTs are also in the black.

Chart 7

Frontier Markets

The iShares MSCI Frontier 100 ETF (FM) recently broke to a new all-time high. Just as impressive was the ability of the RS line to clear its 2018-2021 down trendline and complete a small base. A little more improvement in relative action will place the overall technical position in a solidly positive light.

Chart 8The largest country holding for the Frontier Markets ETF is in Vietnam. The VanEck Vectors Vietnam ETF (VNM) is featured in Chart 9. Its technical picture is very similar to the European ETFs described earlier, whereby the price itself has broken above significant resistance and the RS line is poised to violate its long-term down trendline.

Chart 9Egypt has tentatively violated its 65-week EMA and 2014-2021 down trendline. It needs to be watched closely, since the long-term KST for the absolute price (and that of the relative one) are not yet in a uniform ally bullish trend. The overall technical action, though, does qualify as a potential sleeper.

Chart 10Good luck and good charting,

Martin J. Pring

This article is an updated version of an article previously published on Tuesday, September 7th at 6:55pm ET in the member-exclusive blog Martin Pring's Market Roundup.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position or opinion of Pring Turner Capital Group of Walnut Creek or its affiliates.
His taped audition for The Tragedy of Macbeth went well enough to land him an in-person audition. Thompson arrived at the Hollywood studio to find himself in a room with Coen and McDormand, who had recently won her second Academy Award for Best Actress. McDormand played Lord Macbeth as they went through a scene together.

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Im about four lines into the audition and Im looking at Fran and going, Holy smokes, this is the best Macbeth Ive ever seen, Thompson said.

He landed the role as one of the assassins recruited by Macbeth in his violent scramble for power. Thompson and the other cast members went through an extensive set of rehearsals and practices before the movie began shooting in February 2020.

The scale of the preparations was a change of pace for Thompson, who has more often appeared in independent films or single episodes of television shows this decade. Thompson said it was also the quietest set hed been on, as many of the actors and crew were eager to hear what Coen had to say.

The movie was just over halfway through filming when COVID shut everything down in March. Thompsons best point of comparison for the upheaval that followed was seeing Mount St. Helens erupt back in 1980.
A roughly 9-hour attack on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001 has cast a two-decade-long shadow over the nation, creating a pivotal stopwatch of life before the War on Terror and after.

Nearly 3,000 people were killed Sept. 11 when hijacked planes crashed into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., a Pennsylvania field and the World Trade Center in New York City, causing the latters twin towers to collapse.

Afterward, the nation formed a new way of life that included more restrictions and safety protocols and a new terrorist enemy. In Cowlitz County, the Port of Longview banned public access and the Islamic community received backlash.

Port of Longview

Federal regulations banned public access at the Port of Longview and implemented safety measures like fences, gates and security cards after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Public access to the Port of Longview was closed in 2003, blocking a once-popular fishing destination for the community, including off-duty longshoremen, said Port of Longview Communications Manager Ashley Helenberg.

The Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002 was signed almost a year after the attacks and added safety measures to ports based on size and type of handled cargo. The Port of Longview added security cards for employees, 2 miles of fencing, 13 security gates and up to 30 security guards and supporting office staff.

Before, Sept. 11, Manager of Marine Terminals and Maritime Project Manager Larry Landgraver said two night watchmen guarded the facility to prevent break ins. The first set of federal regulations took effect in 2004, according to the port.

The Port of Longview is a deep-water port along the Columbia River where hundreds of vessels import and export up to millions of metric tons of bulk items like grains, lumber and paper a year. Helenberg said the port provides direct access to the U.S. and the security measures protect the nations gateway.

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Neither American nor foreign ship crews can walk the port unsupervised, Landgraver said. Crews sign out and back into the facility if they leave the property. Signs along the facility gauge the regional terrorist threat from one to three as part of U.S. Coast Guards Maritime Security system. Landgraver said the threat has not been raised since the systems implementation.

In a nod to pre-9/11 regulations, Helenberg said the port offers summer bus tours of the facility, and took over Willow Grove from the county in 2016 to provide a way for the public to use port land.

Its important for the community to still have access, she said.

Muslims

Kelso Longview Islamic Community President Brian Shaheed had only been a converted Muslim for about five years before the Islamic extremist Al Qaeda initiated the Sept. 11 attacks. About a month afterwards, Shaheed, who was living in Port Angeles at the time, said everything changed.

Islam was pushed in the spotlight, he said, and not in a good way. There was a lot of misinformation.

Shaheed said strangers approached him when wearing traditional Islamic clothes on Port Angeles streets and told the U.S. citizen to go back to his own country. He said he developed a paranoia, and started gauging peoples body language when entering rooms and eyeing exits.

The verbal attacks, Shaheed said, inspired him to speak at local schools and civic organizations to educate people on the peaceful religion. At a 2011 lecture at Washington State University Vancouver, he said the facility received bomb threats related to his presence. Before the pandemic, he said a man walked by the Islamic communitys Kelso-based mosque and called him a terrorist, but returned to apologize about a week later.

While Shaheed said he lives with the label of being othered in society, overall, the tightknit community of Kelso and Longview has been supportive.

For every one person whos been mean or negative in the past, there have been 10 that have showed support, he said. This is my home.

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It was yet another day dedicated to launches in the world of technology today, although one went wrong. WhatsApp launched end-to-end encrypted chat backups and Amazon launched Fire TV Stick 4K Max in India. In addition to that, Facebook and Ray-Ban launched smart-glasses. On the other hand, Reliance Jio and Google delayed the launch of the JioPhone Next launch. Heres what created a buzz in the tech world today:

WhatsApp gets E2EE chat backups

WhatsApp today announced that it will soon start rolling out end-to-end encrypted (E2EE) chat backups on its Android and iOS-based apps. WhatsApp said neither WhatsApp nor the backup service provider will be able to access their backup encryption key.

Reliance Jio, Google delay JioPhone Next launch

Reliance Jio and Google today announced that they have started testing their JioPhone Next smartphone with a limited set of users and that the phone will arrive in the markets around Diwali. Earlier, the JioPhone Next was set to go on sale in India on September 10.

Google Search on Web gets dark mode

Google today rolled out dark mode functionality to all its users on the web. Google said that once users have selected the dark theme in Google Search on the web, all the Google Search pages including the Google homepage, search results page, and Search settings will turn dark.

Facebook, Ray-Ban introduces Ray-Ban Stories

Facebook today launched its first smart glasses called Ray-Ban Stories in a partnership with Ray-Ban. The Ray-Ban Stories can take photos and short 30-second videos, they can also play music, podcasts, and make calls. Ray-Ban Stories are up for sale in the US, UK, Canada, Italy, Ireland, and Australia at a price of $299 ( 21,975 approx).

Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Max launched

Amazon has announced the new Fire TV Stick 4K Max which the company claims is 40% more powerful than Fire TV Stick 4K. It features a quad-core 1.8GHz processor and 2GB of RAM. It also features support for 4K UHD, HDR, and HDR10+ streaming as well as Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos. The Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Max is already available for pre-order for 6,499 on Amazon.in and Amazon kiosks.
It would take 15 billion years for the clock that occupies Jun Ye's basement lab at the University of Colorado to lose a second -- about how long the universe has existed. For this invention, the Chinese-American scientist, along with Hidetoshi Katori of Japan, will split $3 million as co-winners of the 2022 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics. Working independently, the two developed techniques using lasers to trap and cool atoms, then harness their vibrations to drive what are known as "optical lattice clocks," the most precise timekeeping pieces ever built.

By comparison, current atomic clocks lose a second once every 100 million years. But what is gained by greater accuracy? "It's really an instrument to allow you to probe the basic fabric of space-time in the universe," Ye told AFP.

In Ye's lab, researchers have shown that time moves slower when the clock is moved closer to the ground by a matter of centimeters, in line with Einstein's predictions of relativity. Applied to current technology, these clocks could improve GPS navigation accuracy by a factor of a thousand, or help smoothly land an unmanned spaceplane on Mars.

A brief history of time

Improving the precision and accuracy of timekeeping has been a goal since ancient Egyptians and Chinese made sundials. A key breakthrough came with the invention of the pendulum clock in 1656, which relies on a swinging weight to keep time, and a few decades later chronometers were accurate enough to determine a ship's longitude at sea.

The early 20th century saw the advent of quartz clocks, which when jolted with electricity resonate at very specific, high frequencies, or number of ticks in a second.

Quartz clocks are ubiquitous in modern electronics, but are still somewhat susceptible to variations caused by the manufacturing process, or conditions like temperature. The next great leap in timekeeping came from harnessing the movements of energized atoms to develop atomic clocks, which are immune the effects of such environmental variations.

Physicists know that a single, very high frequency will cause particles called electrons that orbit the nucleus of a specific type of atom to jump to a higher energy state, finding an orbit further away from the nucleus.

Atomic clocks generate the approximate frequency that causes atoms of the element Cesium to jump to that higher energy state. Then, a detector counts the number of those energized atoms, adjusting the frequency if necessary to make the clock more precise. So precise that since 1967, one second has been defined as 9,192,631,770 oscillations of a Cesium atom.

Exploring the universe, and Earth

Katori's and Ye's labs have found ways to improve atomic clocks even further by moving oscillations to the visible end of the electromagnetic spectrum, with frequencies a hundred thousand times higher than those used in current atomic clocks -- to make them even more accurate.

They realized they needed a way to trap the atoms -- in this case, of the element strontium -- and hold them still with ultralow temperatures to help measure time properly. If the atoms are falling due to gravity or are otherwise moving, there would be a loss of accuracy, and relativity would cause distorting effects on the timekeeping. To trap the atoms, the inventors created an "optical lattice" made by laser waves moving in opposite directions to form a stationary, egg carton-like shape.

Ye is excited about the potential use of his clock. For example, synchronizing the clocks of the world's best observatories down to the tiniest fractions of a second would allow astronomers to better conceptualize black holes. Better clocks can also shed new light on the Earth's geological processes.

Relativity tells us that time slows down when it approaches a massive body, so a sufficiently accurate clock could tell scientists the difference between solid rock and volcanic lava below the surface, helping to predict an eruption. Or indeed, measure the levels of the oceans, or how much water flows beneath a desert.

The next great challenge, Ye says, will be miniaturizing the technology so it can be moved out of a lab. The scientist admits it's sometimes hard to explain fundamental physics concepts to the public. "But when they hear about clocks, they can feel it's a tangible thing, they can make a connection to that, and that's very rewarding," he said.
Glynn County held remembrance services Saturday for events that happened 20 years ago far away in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania but which drew the nation into war and cost the lives of local people.
CONFUSION AND DISILLUSION: Amid numerous other complaints about unfair treatment of 9/11 first-responders and survivors, some advocates say that boundary lines for the Victim Compensation Fund were too narrowly drawn, not stretching far enough into areas of the city where smaller particles released into the area by the destruction of the World Trade Center spread and infected residents and workers.
"Look at where it's gone: You have people storming the Capitol because they believe the election was a fraud. You have people who won't get vaccinated and they're dying in hospitals," Rowe says. "We've gotten to the point where information is actually killing people."

There were, of course, conspiracy theories before 9/11 happened  John F. Kennedy's assassination, the moon landing, a supposed 1947 UFO crash in Roswell, New Mexico. And the country's interest in alternative, fringe theories was on the rise before 9/11, exemplified by the 1990s show "The X-Files," with its taglines of "The truth is out there" and "trust no one." But it was 9/11 that heralded our current era of suspicion and disbelief and revealed the internet's ability to catalyze conspiracy theories.

"Conspiracy theories have always been with us, and it's just the means of sharing them that has changed," says Karen Douglas, a psychology professor at the University of Kent in England who studies why people believe such explanations. "The internet has made conspiracy theories more visible and easy to share than ever before. People can also very quickly find like-minded others, join groups, and share their opinions."

MORE ANNIVERSARY COVERAGE:
Anite McBride, former aide to President George W. Bush and chief of staff to first lady Laura Bush, is executive-in-residence at the Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies in the School of Public Affairs at American University in Washington, D.C. She wrote this for The Conversation, an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts. Read the original article at theconversation.com.
Russian internet giant Yandex has been the target of a record-breaking distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack by a new botnet called Meris.

The botnet is believed to have pummeled the company's web infrastructure with millions of HTTP requests, before hitting a peak of 21.8 million requests per second (RPS), dwarfing a recent botnet-powered attack that came to light last month, bombarding an unnamed Cloudflare customer in the financial industry with 17.2 million RPS.

Russian DDoS mitigation service Qrator Labs, which disclosed details of the attack on Thursday, called Meris  meaning "Plague" in the Latvian language  a "botnet of a new kind."

"It is also clear that this particular botnet is still growing. There is a suggestion that the botnet could grow in force through password brute-forcing, although we tend to neglect that as a slight possibility. That looks like some vulnerability that was either kept secret before the massive campaign's start or sold on the black market," the researchers noted, adding Meris "can overwhelm almost any infrastructure, including some highly robust networks [] due to the enormous RPS power that it brings along."

The DDoS attacks leveraged a technique called HTTP pipelining that allows a client (i.e., a web browser) to open a connection to the server and make multiple requests without waiting for each response. The malicious traffic originated from over 250,000 infected hosts, primarily network devices from Mikrotik, with evidence pointing to a spectrum of RouterOS versions that have been weaponized by exploiting as-yet-unknown vulnerabilities.

But in a forum post, the Latvian network equipment manufacturer said these attacks employ the same set of routers that were compromised via a 2018 vulnerability (CVE-2018-14847, CVSS score: 9.1) that has since been patched and that there are no new (zero-day) vulnerabilities impacting the devices.

"Unfortunately, closing the vulnerability does not immediately protect these routers. If somebody got your password in 2018, just an upgrade will not help. You must also change password, re-check your firewall if it does not allow remote access to unknown parties, and look for scripts that you did not create," it noted.

Meris has also been linked to a number of DDoS attacks, including that mitigated by Cloudflare, noting the overlaps in "durations and distributions across countries."

While it's highly recommended to upgrade MikroTik devices to the latest firmware to combat any potential botnet attacks, organizations are also advised to change their administration passwords to safeguard against brute-force attempts.
If he got a call, I had to go do my job, Schliep said. He couldnt think about what was happening in New York.

Capt. Ryan Seaman of the Grand Island Fire Department was struck by the selfless act performed by the New York City firefighters.

They put others before them, and their brotherhood showed through in their actions, Seaman said.

They were going to do anything to help other people, and it didnt matter if it meant harm to them or not, he said.

That was one of the bigger conclusions that Seaman drew from 9/11. He thought about what firefighters do day in and day out, whether its a big city or Grand Island. We are there for the citizens, he said.

Seaman, now 37, was a junior in high school when the towers came down.

He was sitting in calculus class at Republican Valley High School when they told us they were going to have a TV downstairs in the common area because something had happened. So we went down there and watched the events unfold.

At that point, Seaman didnt know what he was going to do for a living. His father was a volunteer firefighter, and he had seen him at work.
Grand Island and Hall County officials this week shared with The Independent their memories of Sept. 11, 2001, and reflected on the importance of the day.

The attacked happened just after 8:30 a.m. CDT.

Regional Planner Chad Nabity has been serving the community since December 1999.

I remember sitting in my office listening to the reports on NPR. When I went home for lunch my 3-year-old had to tell me about the airplanes hitting the building, Nabity recalled. It is hard to believe that it was 20 years ago. The memory is still very fresh.

District 35 Sen. Ray Aguilar at that time had been serving in the Nebraska Legislature since 1999, and was the states first Hispanic legislator. Last year he was elected to another legislative term.

My wife and I were getting ready for work when morning news went to a special report and we actually watched the second plane hit the tower. It was terrifying and you knew we were going to war! First thoughts were of grief for all the victims and responders. We prayed for them, we must never forget!

Pam Lancaster, chair of the Hall County Board of Commissioners, said the 20th anniversary of the attack brings back memories and emotional feelings.
KEARNEY  Cheyenne Weiss was just 8 years old on 9/11, but she still remembers.

She remembers sitting on the bed with her aunt at home at Cape Canaveral, Fla., and watching the World Trade Center towers fall.

I didnt know what was happening, but my aunt started crying, Weiss said.

Lost on that day was her fathers first cousin, David Martin Weiss, 41, a firefighter in New York City. He went into the towers to help, but his body was never recovered.

Today, Weiss is the director and a family service assistant at Early Head Start at 601 Central Ave. She is also a firefighter/EMT at Elm Creek.

Weiss didnt know David, but she did research on him and learned that he was dedicated to helping others.

I found out that he had done a lot of fire and rescue, she said.

David Weiss was an ironworker before he became a firefighter. He become a member of the New York City Fire Departments elite force, Rescue Company 1 in Times Square.
How should one best observe the anniversary of the horrific terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001?

These annual commemorations have always been momentous and solemn occasions, and the attention of the American people is where it deserves to be  on the men, women and children who needlessly died that day. It is right and proper that our focus should be first and foremost on the tragic loss of those lives.

It is also right and proper that we should reflect on the lessons of 9/11 and how it came to pass that more than 2,600 Americans were killed over the course of a few hours that day. Even more importantly, we should ask ourselves whether the United States has learned the lessons of 9/11, and whether our government lived up to the commitment that encapsulates the post-9/11 admonition of the American people: Never Forget.

But it seems that our government may have forgotten the central lesson of 9/11  that loosely-governed lands over which the U.S. has little or no intelligence visibility create the permissive environment most attractive to terrorist organizations that desire to strike America. The collapse of Afghanistan into the arms of the Taliban has once again set the stage for that nation to host terrorist groups that target the West.
It took some time for the gravity of the day to sink in, Brown said.

You didn't even really have time to stop and think about what had happened. It was a few days later before it actually sunk in, She said. I went back into the Pentagon to see the damage. Then it really, it really struck home what had happened.

While she had trained for situations like this, Brown said she had never before witnessed anything similar to the attacks that took place on 9/11 and the primary lesson in her mind is to make sure it never happens again. She said she is concerned about the groundwork the U.S. has laid in Afghanistan today and she believes the groundwork is there for another possible attack.

But I'm very concerned right now that we are not taking the terrorist threat as seriously as we should. We think the Taliban has changed. The Taliban has not changed, Brown said. They still want to do away with the U.S, and I'm afraid we're helping them in that goal. And so that's what really concerns me right now.

Randy Grant, of DeSoto, was scheduled to fly his last trip before retirement as a commercial airline pilot with United Airlines on 9/11.
Two distinct opinions on U.S. involvement in Afghanistan were shared in recent segments of an ongoing discussion series hosted by the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University Carbondale.

As part of the institutes Understanding Our New World virtual conversation series, Marine Corps veteran and former senatorial candidate Amy McGrath and Andrew Bacevich, author and president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, shared their perspectives of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the two decades of the conflict.

McGrath joined John Shaw, director of the institute, for a virtual discussion on Aug. 31. The former lieutenant colonel and fighter pilot said she felt that much of the Afghan war was politicized.

Its a very sad situation. The war had been lost over many, many years, she said. The war was political and we lost the political part because we never really had a strategy. It is extremely difficult to build a nation that had been completely destroyed like Afghanistan.

McGrath said some of the plans for the nation were misguided.
YORKVILLE, Ill. (AP)  A man who accused Dennis Hastert of child sexual abuse then sued the former U.S. House speaker for refusing to pay $1.8m in exchange for his silence will be named in court if his case goes to trial this month, a judge ruled.

The man has been referred to only as James Doe in court papers since the breach of contract lawsuit was filed in 2016. But during a hearing on Thursday, Kendall County Chief Judge Robert Pilmer agreed with Hastert's attorney that the man's name must be made public at trial, the Chicago Tribune reported.

The man says Hastert paid him only about half of the promised $3.5 million in hush money. An attorney for Hastert's accuser has said publicizing his name would cause great psychological damage to him in the form of shame and embarrassment.

After the ruling, attorney Kristi Brown said she and her client were disappointed but had prepared for such a decision.

"It doesnt change that we intend to go forward with the trial, she said. Jury selection is scheduled to begin Sept. 20.
A 13-mile march through Chicago is set for Saturday in honor of the lives lost to a bomb attack in Afghanistan and on 9/11.

The Chicago Marines Foundation was organizing the hump, as Marines call a hike, marking 1 mile for each military member killed in Kabul on Aug. 26.

The walk is open to the public and will start with a memorial program at 7:30 a.m. at the Cloud Gate sculpture, known as The Bean, in Millenium Park. A moment of silence will be observed at 7:46 a.m., the time the first plane hit the World Trade Center in a terrorist attack in New York City on Sept. 11, 2001, that prompted the war in Afghanistan.

That will be followed by the national anthem and Marines Hymn, with step-off at 8 a.m. and arrival at Old Crow Smokehouse in Wrigleyville by 1 p.m.

Details and the parade route are posted online.

The Marines Foundation acknowledged the march was short-fused, meaning done with short notice. It posted a statement on Facebook that the goal is to honor lives lost and to provide comfort, esprit de corps, and if necessary, a shoulder to cry on for those of you hurting from the events of the past 20 years and this summer. ... We love you, we need you here and want to see you out.
Immediately, the conversation turned to "What we should do? Should we join the military? Should we stock up on food and gasoline?"

We parted ways without making any real decisions, other than to meet up Friday night for drinks.

That afternoon I had class at John A. Logan College. Upon my arrival, I found that nearly all the classes had been canceled. There were large TVs that had been set up all over campus playing the various news networks coverage of the events of that day.

How haunting it was as Peter Jennings voice echoed down the empty hallways from one end of campus to the other.

As I drove home, it was obvious that panic was setting in. All the gas stations had lines backing up 10 and 20 cars deep. Gas prices had jumped from $1.25 a gallon to $4 and $5 a gallon in a matter of hours. Many of these gas stations were later charged with price gouging by the Illinois Attorney General's Office.

In the years since, I have traveled to New York City several times. I saw the Sept. 11 site in 2007 when it was still essentially a hole in the ground. I have been back since and have seen the Sept. 11 memorial that serves to beautifully commemorate the lives lost on that day.
"It just made me feel sorta weird inside, because that was the last thing on my mind that terrorists would come," Hutto said.

Roberts said, "I didn't feel too well. I felt like crying. I'm from Seattle, Washington, so I might not be visiting there very much anymore."

Marcus said her articles have centered around how children have been affected and what they should be told, especially older ones. "They could help fight the terrorists and do things to prevent terrorist attacks. It never really crossed my mind, but it's really important now that it has happened. I think about it

A lot," she said.

Huggins said, "I was really surprised. I thought that we were a good country and that nobody was going to hurt us. When this happened, it just turned everything around."

Holley was also shocked and confused about the attacks. "I didn't think it was that big of a deal, but they were playing the two towers collapsing over and over again when I went home that night. ... It was just really shocking."
"One of the saving graces was the training that we went through for three months prior to leaving, but there's only so much training you can do when it comes to being thrust into a new mission. A lot of it comes down to your value system, your beliefs and just doing what's right," Connor said. "Most of the teams prayed before they went out, and I think most of us knew that God was sovereign over us. That relieved a lot of the stress, too."

A war of words was also fought off the battlefields, one which Connor said led to misconceptions among the region's Islamic population. The messages that while freedom "may look good, it doesn't work" and that democracy will only lead to decadence and licentiousness are among "the rhetoric from the Islamists that we face," he said.

"The Taliban, who still wish to come back to power, ... hate democracy, liberty, women's rights, religious freedoms. They are supported by millions of radicals throughout the world," said Connor, who touts as one of his personal heroes leading English abolitionist William Wilberforce, who said, "The only solid hopes for the well-being of my country depend no so much on her fleets and armies ... as on the persuasion that she still contains many, who, in a degenerate age, love and obey the Gospel of Christ."
"I did pretty good without her, but I know I'm going to do even better with her," said Colden, who will graduate from Calhoun County High School on May 28.

Carroll expressed her happiness to be home in time to witness not only Colden's high school graduation, but daughter Lakeisha Davis' college graduation. Davis, 23, will graduate from Lander College on May 8 as a registered nurse.

Also returning home was Staff Sgt. Isiah Taylor.

"We are just glad to be home," he said. Taylor, who was ready to get back to his wife in Moncks Corner, is the son of James and Dorothy Felder of Orangeburg.

"I got lots of support from my family - support in the form of e-mails and packages," South Carolina State University student Sgt. Christopher Scott said, smiling as he hugged his first cousin, Luenetta Grayson of Ridgeland.

Scott, a social work major specializing in assisting deaf and hearing impaired children, said his one-year deployment came just before graduation in 2003. A member of the 991st Transportation Company out of Salisbury, N.C., whose motto is "Hook and Roll," Scott said it may take him another year to graduate, but he said didn't mind being deployed.
Coming into his house after his morning walk, Henry Lloyd was greeted by the ringing of his telephone last Tuesday morning. When he answered, his son on the other end of the wire excitedly told him to turn on his television immediately.

Lloyd, a resident of Orangeburg, couldn't, wouldn't believe his eyes.

"I had to turn away and then look back at it," Lloyd said. "And even when I looked at it again, I couldn't believe it. It's still hard to believe and I guess we'll never accept it. In my mind the New York skyline hasn't changed. I guess if I was there, it would be different. I'd have to accept it."

It was doubly hard for Lloyd to accept the tragic terrorist attack that brought down the twin towers of the World Trade Center. First, because of the numbers of people injured and killed; secondly, because he had worked on the construction crew that built the towers which dwarfed many of the buildings in New York City, the city where he lived for 40 years.

"I worked on the concrete and carpenter crews at the World Trade Center," Lloyd said. "I know how those buildings were put together. I worked on the reinforcements for them. It's hard to believe that those enormous buildings are not there anymore.
The soldiers at this position were primarily Nepalese and Hindu (with a smattering of UK soldiers in specialized duties and at least one Christian Nepalese). Despite their background, they had posted a sign at the entrance reading "Merry Christmas 2007." The Ghurkas had even put up some small decorations. We received word the Taliban planned to take advantage of either Christmas Eve or Christmas Day for an attack, so that cut out any kind of celebrations. Everyone in this position was in a security posture.

On Christmas Day, our group moved back to the small base behind this position. The base was a bit more secure and so we saw much more in the way of Christmas decorations and activities. The coalition commander planned a Christmas meal with chickens he had bought from local Afghans. His higher commander made a short visit and brought a goat by helicopter to add to the Christmas meal. It is difficult to express the joy of soldiers getting a "hot" meal after days or weeks with cold rations. Suffice it to say that this Christmas dinner (fixed by the Nepalese soldiers) was the highlight of our day and week. As the temperature had gone down to about 20 degrees at night and still quite chilly in the day (with no real heat on the base), a hot meal was a small chance to thaw out. In addition to the meal, most soldiers, including our group, played various games. This included a game of catching a chicken with blindfolds on (the Nepalese influence!).
However, after a bit of time moving in, we again began taking effective fire from a compound. As with the first close air support mission, the fighters were eliminated before we moved forward. During the day, we had a few "pop shot" incidents and were able to eliminate Taliban attempting to retreat. At night, while overwatching the village, we received intelligence of multiple Taliban massing to attack our position. Close air support was able to pound the enemy trench line throughout the night while we watched from under a mile away.

We had similar experiences as described above over the next couple of days. Each night, we slept on the ground in between pulling security rotations. This area of Afghanistan saw warm days but below-freezing nights, so sleep was rather intermittent. During this time, we were able to call in 2,000 bomb strikes to destroy enemy tunnels and hide-out/cashes leading into the villages. On the last day of the operation, our Afghan Forces spotted multiple enemy fighters. We chased them into a compound. This is an experience I will not forget. Think about it: You know the enemy fighters are somewhere in the compound and wait to see them with each turn and each room you search. You have switched your rifle from "safe" to "fire" and know you will have a split second to pull the trigger to kill up close. At the same time, you know some civilians might be in the compound so you will have to discriminate before firing. You expect to be shot at with each step: Looking up, looking behind, looking at holes, etc. In this case, the enemy fighters got away through a well hole and tunnel (we later found and arrested them outside the compound).
Firefights were among the incidences he and his team had to prepare for in their fight against the Taliban, the group of fundamentalist insurgents who generally produce their most intense attacks from the mountainous terrain in Afghanistan.

"A lot was going on at all times. As far as what you saw, it may have been weeks before any sort of incident. Sometimes they can somewhat close together. You just never know. Every time you step outside the wire, you prepare to get hit. There were quite a number (of suicide bombers) in the southern region," he said, noting that the Humvees were generally well protected against the violent blasts of bombs and IEDs.

"The soldiers are going through a well-deserved rest right now. They went out to some of the most dangerous locations, but the policing was at rock bottom. Men weren't getting paid, there were no uniforms and they didn't know how to fight back. They (police) were purposely targeted by the Taliban," said Connor, noting that his team's work was not in vain.

"We worked on getting the proper recruitment and standards. We moved the baton a sizable length while we were over there. The baton still has a long way to go, but I think one of the things we figured out was that the police are the key to winning this war," Connor said.
It was about to the point when you needed to get extra dispatchers to answer the calls, he added.

People were calling and reporting different things. It kept us busy for a while, but it was a good thing because people were reporting things that werent what they were thinking, but something we needed to look into, he said.

During that time, Ravenell also heard stories from deputies who said when they saw individuals or firefighters or law enforcement officers running into the buildings and a majority of them didnt make it out, it had an impact on them positively and negatively because at some time you never know when we may have to run into a building and not make it out.

He also remembers the prayers for the families affected by the 9-11 attacks.

When these types of incidents happen, you want to see those who are faithful and believe in God and are praying for those families whose loved ones arent here anymore because of those heroic acts of trying to save someone elses life, he said.

The Orangeburg County Sheriffs Offices chaplains program partnered with other agencies to ship water to those working at Ground Zero.
"We come with heavy hearts," said the Rev. Lula Vaughn. "We pray for our people to come together and be of one accord. If there's a time to come together, now is the time."

Orangeburg Mayor Paul Miller said he "cannot think of any worse tragedy" than what happened Tuesday. "Somehow or somewhere there must be a purpose in this. I see our country coming together, uniting behind our president. I see world leaders uniting behind the United States of America.

"Maybe this is a wake-up call for Orangeburg, South Carolina," the mayor continued. "We need to join hands one with another and make this a community of character and move forward to do what God has called us to do, and that is to do His will."

The Rev. Nathaniel McMillan, pastor of Petra Ministries International, prayed, "O God, we need you like we've never needed you before. We don't know what to do, but our eyes are upon you. We need healing today. Father, we ask you to heal the nation."

"Although violated, having death and destruction rained upon us, we are still one nation under God," said the Rev. Burt Williams of Northside Baptist Church.
Since the story of Prince Harry in Afghanistan broke in late February '08, friends and family have asked about service with him. As the lead U.S. adviser in Helmand Province (the "United Kingdom" area of responsibility within Afghanistan), it was almost inevitable that I would see Harry during his tour of duty. However, as events in late December through early January would transpire, we actually lived on the same tiny base in southern Helmand for a couple of weeks. Another time, with other Americans, I served with Harry on the same operation for almost two weeks in Northern Helmand. Throughout, I had the opportunity to get to know the young man Harry as a junior officer under rather difficult and dangerous circumstances. What follows are my observations and thoughts about Prince Harry, third in line to the crown of the United Kingdom and second lieutenant in the Household Calvary Regiment of the British Army.

I first met Prince Harry on Christmas Eve 2007 on a forward outpost facing Taliban lines in southern Helmand. This outpost was manned by Gurkha soldiers operating out of a tiny base about 400 meters to our rear (Note: I had been warned the day before that Harry would be serving at that small base. A British officer had asked that we Americans not disclose this "secret" until after his return to the United Kingdom scheduled in March or April). Harry had arrived at the small base on Christmas Eve and immediately decided to visit some of his men serving on the forward outpost. I was at the position with two other Americans getting a feel for what would be required when we deployed Afghan troops. Harry was in his full "battle rattle," which consisted of body armor, helmet, weapon and ammunition and I could tell that Harry wanted to be treated as any other junior officer and not a prince. Harry was nice when soldiers asked to take a picture with him but made it clear pictures could not be released until he was home. Unlike almost every other day at this outpost, the enemy made no attempt to attack it with direct or indirect fire. Harry went back to the small base and we spent the night on the outpost.
"On one mission, we lost nine windshields," Hardy said. "But they told us we couldn't shoot back."

At the end of the day, the soldiers simply did not leave the fighting and go into camp. They gathered in compounds as a security measure, sleeping atop their vehicles.

But at night, in what Hardy called the "hellacious heat," armed insurgents would make their attacks.

"I don't mean to sound callous, but at night, when the mortars would come in, we didn't think anything about it," Hardy said. "You look around to make sure everyone is okay, and you go back to sleep. If it's going to hit you, it's going to hit you."

And when the sun rose over the horizon, the results of the previous night could be seen. Bodies of the enemy combatants lay in the streets.

"If they had stopped fighting, they would have gotten a good meal, they would have still been living," Hardy said. "That's how I saw it. But they kept fighting."

Days lengthened into weeks, weeks into months. Hardy and the rest wondered when - or if - they'd be sent home. They thought when they got to Baghdad that it would be over, they could go home.

"But our company passed through Baghdad and kept going, kept going north," Hardy said.
She kept her faith. "In case you think you're in a situation you cannot get out of, with God, you can," she said.

Barker emphasized to her audience of children that the adults followed the instructions they learned during the fire drills they practiced as children.

"They could save your life," she said. "We did what we had to do. No stopping, no looking and no talking. Everybody was very orderly. Everybody was helping everybody else. We would let all of the injured people" pass ahead of them.

"We first saw the firemen on the 24th floor," she said. "They were exhausted" but determined to keep climbing.

"When we reached the ground floor, we thought we were OK. Everybody was hugging and kissing each other," Barker said. They were within sight of the main entrance, but still inside the building.

"Then Building Two fell. And when it did, it caused an explosion in my building. This big cloud of smoke came at us like it was chasing us. Then there was another explosion.

"I was blown one place and my boss was blown another," said Barker, who was blown out of her shoes and was injured. "I prayed real hard. I thought I had died. I really did.
"They got the order to evacuate when the first plane hit the other building," she said. "(My son) was able to evacuate and when he got down to the bottom, that's when the second plane hit.

"Jay was able to call me on his cell phone not too long after that," she said.

Link said her son was also in the World Trade Center during the terrorist bombing of 1993.

"He said there was no comparison ... it was unbelievable," she said.

Morgan Stanley devised their own evacuation system after the World Trade Center was bombed in 1993, Livingston said.

"After the '93 bombing, we had some additional stairwells and evacuation routes built for every floor we occupied," Livingston said. "We had our own contingency plan over and above the Ports Authority's. Under the order, you get out and there's no turning back.

"We're so glad we did it," he said. "We got our folks out ... so far all but 50. We don't know if the remaining 50 are alive or not. We're all praying they are."

Livingston, who makes three to four trips to the World Trade Center every year, said he was scheduled to be there next month.
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SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  California's Secretary of State said Friday she won't require a more rigorous audit of next week's recall election results that could remove Gov. Gavin Newsom from office, saying concerns about the security of the state's election management system are inaccurate.

A group of eight election security experts  including computer scientists, election technology experts and cybersecurity researchers  said the audit is needed after copies of Dominion Voting System's election management system were released publicly last month at an event organized by MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell.

The experts, who detailed their concerns in a letter to Secretary of State Shirly Weber last week, said the management system is very similar to the one used in 40 of Californias 58 counties, adding the threat cannot be fully defended against by technical means.

But Weber, a Democrat who was appointed to the job by Newsom earlier this year, said it's not possible to conduct the type of audit the experts requested on such short notice. She said that audit requires significant preparation, training and testing," adding that nearly all of the state's local elections officers had never done this type of audit before.
Its rare for outside parties to get involved in Wyoming politics. Until recently, there was a common sentiment that Wyoming voters did not want outsiders coming into the state telling them how to vote or how to run their state. But Trump has changed American politics, and while Wyoming residents may have previously been averse to outsiders weighing in, that may no longer be such a commonly held belief. For example, Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Florida, received a warm welcome in January when he traveled to Cheyenne for an anti-Cheney rally.

I think that what we are seeing are sort of this arrogance of outside political operatives thinking that they can come into Wyoming and try to fool Wyoming voters and try to ultimately convince Wyoming voters to do what the folks in Bedminster or Mar-a-Lago think make sense to us, Cheney said. That tells you about what they think about the voters of Wyoming, and our voters are not going to fall for that. It never will work here.

Hageman was a serious candidate in 2018 Wyoming Governors race, and she now has Trumps backing in the state where 70% of the electorate  the highest rate in the country in the 2020 election  voted for the former president.
Whatever you think about the U.S. Supreme Courts controversial, 5-4 midnight ruling on the Texas statute forbidding most abortions in the state, one thing is clear: the Court bears, in the name of accountability, the great responsibility of explaining its reasoning to the American people.

The Courts reliance on the shadow docket, a historic practice of ruling on emergency petitions, to uphold a novel law that greatly diminishes Roe v. Wade and converts every Texan into a law enforcement official, constituted a sharp departure from the usual process. The Court spent less than three days on the case. There was no oral argument. The opinion was unsigned and a mere paragraph long. Given the Courts weighty impact on a constitutional battle that has been raging since at least 1973, when the Court held that women possess a fundamental right to obtain an abortion, the citizenry had every right to expect more transparency from the nations highest tribunal.

Justice Hugo Black was fond of reminding his colleagues of the Courts duty to explain its reasoning in terms that average Americans could understand. The Constitution was written for the people, not the government, he often said. For Justice Black, this meant that the Courts opinions sorting out the meaning of constitutional provisions and language should be clearly written in the name of transparency and accountability.
Comparable to the Vietnam war, the initial foray onto foreign soil was justifiable. Destroying the enemy to provide the Afghan people a chance to protect themselves and live free was every bit as noble as that of the soldiers that served in Vietnam, who tried to protect the South Vietnamese people from Communism.

Much like the ending in Vietnam, our forces were abruptly called back to their homeland. They are told Its over. They were commanded to leave allies, weapons, equipment, blood, sweat and tears. The marked difference may be their homecoming, but the question to them is why were they there, and what happens to them now?

On the crisis line and among my growing group of veterans, the sense of not being allowed to complete their mission or finish their job is overwhelming. Many of them feel that they somehow failed, but I couldnt mean it more when I tell them that they didnt. Their service matters.

To all veterans and service members still on duty  whenever and wherever you servedthat gallant quarter of a percent who carried a crushing burden with little fanfare and few complaints  you are the very best of us. Bravo Zulu (well done.)

Whatever anyone might think of war, those that served under Old Glory deserve a better ending.

Shelagh Wulff Wisdom is a hardcore country soul whose life has evolved around ranching, livestock, horses and writing. She lives on a small ranch with her husband south of Douglas and is a dedicated advocate for veterans.

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While conceding that political patronage is a major factor in appointments to State enterprises, retired permanent secretary Arlene McComie says it has to be considered that those people must know what it means to govern.
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Khalil David and his sister Khalia stand together proudly during the Ministry of Educations announcement of pupils performance at the 2021 Secondary Entrance Examination at the Office of the Ministry of Education, Port of Spain on Thursday. They hold special gifts Khalil received from bmobile.

Photo courtesy ANTONIA PHILLIP
The eyes and ears of employees and employers alike are intensely focused on the industrial relations battle between Republic Bank and the Banking, Insurance and General Workers Union (BIGWU) and, by extension, the trade union movement, regarding the banks position: unvaccinated workers are required to pay for Covid-19 tests every two weeks.
Honeas cause has gained attention online and on social media over the last week as well. She started a Change.org petition calling for additional services at her school for survivors of sexual assault and violence, and as of Friday evening the petition had garnered more than 17,000 signatures.

There was another protest at Marana High on Wednesday and one at Mountain View High, also in the district, on Friday, which drew about 200 students.

The protest was during lunch, and students showed up wearing teal, the signature color for sexual assault awareness, and holding signs that called for accountability and an end to sexual violence.

A number of students spoke to the crowd, giving heartfelt speeches about their own encounters with sexual violence and the ways they have been taught it was their fault. Mountain View senior Roo Key, 17, spoke at the protest and helped arrange it.

She said the protest isnt about starting a quarrel with the district but rather to call for change.
City officials have introduced new rules meant to restrict where and how telecom companies install 5G poles in Tucson, representing a possible solution for those who have long criticized the scaled-down cell towers for being eyesores in residential neighborhoods.

Tucson residents have complained about 5G poles popping up in front of their homes for nearly a year. Some have even said the sudden installation of the 35-foot-tall structures has damaged private landscaping, and thousands more are expected to go up in the coming years.

The guidelines  released Aug. 20 as part of the Department of Transportation and Mobilitys Public Utility Administrative Manual  are intended to prevent those forthcoming poles from causing further problems for community members. They include general design and placement rules for 5G poles, as well as a provision that allows the public to view and comment on new projects during the planning stage.

But the manual may lack the teeth some residents hoped it would have.

State law prevents the city from dictating specific locations for 5G poles, and telecom companies will not be required to change their design plans in response to resident feedback. The new rules also will not apply to existing poles.
PHOENIX  A Republican state senator who has backed away from the election audit she once supported is now the victim of at least one threat.

You have one chance to give the American people the Audit report or were coming for you, said an email sent Thursday to Sen. Michelle Ugenti-Rita, R-Scottsdale, from someone identified as Matt Boster.

We know where you live, we know where you get your groceries and we know where your family lives, the message said. You better do the right thing or your going to feel the consequences.

Ugenti-Rita, who reposted the message on Twitter, said it has been turned over to law enforcement.

My familys safety is my #1 priority and I will NOT tolerate anyone going after me or my family, she wrote.

But the senator said she expects threats like this to continue because of what she calls misinformation and the unmet expectations of the public surrounding the audit.

She did not return calls seeking further comment.
Tucson Unified is appealing a Court of Appeals decision that TUSD homeowners are solely responsible for the cost of court-ordered desegregation programs, with no help from the state.

The unanimous decision by judges, on Aug. 18, overturned a previous decision by the Arizona Tax Court requiring the Legislature to repay outstanding desegregation money, saying lawmakers were within their rights three years ago in deciding such expenses were the sole responsibility of district residents and should not burden taxpayers from around the state.

But TUSD and Pima County, which is getting involved because it levies taxes for the district and all local governments, think this latest interpretation is wrong and that an increase in property taxes to TUSD homeowners would run afoul of a 1980 constitutional amendment limiting local taxes to not exceeded a 1% property tax cap.

Last months ruling affected $8.1 million that a trial judge had previously ruled the state owed to TUSD after he found the 2018 legislative maneuver illegal. During the appeal, the state declined to pay the district, and the amount in question is now $10.6 million, according to TUSD.
The Danielson estate also accused Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt of playing a role by broadcasting last summer that he had adopted a new policy and generally wouldnt pursue what he considered public order crimes such as criminal mischief, interfering with an officer or a stand-alone riot charge, and instead would focus on deliberate property damage and threats of force or actual force against others.

Schmidts office didnt immediately return a message seeking comment.

Residents protested police violence against people of color in cities around the country after the 2020 death of George Floyd, a Black man killed by a white officer in Minneapolis. In Portland, demonstrations were nearly nightly and led to complaints that authorities were heavy-handed in their use of force to control crowds.

Michael Reinoehl, a self-described anti-fascist who said he provided security for racial justice protests in Portland, appeared to have targeted Danielson, according to surveillance camera video of the shooting released by police. Reinoehl, 48, emerged from an alcove of a downtown parking garage before firing two gunshots as Danielson was walking in downtown after the rally, according to a police affidavit.

The suit says Danielson deployed bear spray at Reinoehl in response to the gunshots.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP)  A state court judge declined Friday to halt enforcement of an Iowa law that prohibits school boards from enacting mask requirements, saying there is no evidence that any school board would immediately impose a mask mandate if the law wasn't in effect.

The ruling came in a lawsuit filed by Frances Parr, a mother of twin boys from Council Bluffs. She sued the state, Gov. Kim Reynolds and several state officials last month in Polk County District Court, seeking an order halting enforcement of the law

Judge Celene Gogerty, who was appointed to the bench by Reynolds in November 2018, said Parr has presented no evidence that a temporary injunction would alleviate Parr's alleged harm causes by the law.

Thus, on the evidence presented by the plaintiffs, even if the court imposed the temporary injunction, there is no evidence a mask mandate would be imposed by the plaintiffs school board and the plaintiffs would be in the exact position prior to the implementation of the proposed injunction, she wrote.
The rain wet tinder-dry vegetation and will cool down the fire for one or two days, which firefighters hoped to use to strengthen and expand fire lines in an effort to finally surround the blaze, fire officials said.

However, after a weekend of clear skies and light winds, a ridge of high pressure could bring a warming trend through next week, Jack Messick, incident meteorologist for the fire, said Friday evening.

The rain slowed down the fire but once the sun gets on it, the winds blowing on it, it eventually is going to pick up again and dry off enough and its going to start running again, said Tony Brownell, an operations section chief with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

The threat of new lightning-sparked fires came as more than 13,000 firefighters were working to rein in 13 major fires and more than 12,000 residents were still waiting to return to evacuated homes, according to state agencies.

The Caldor Fire, which at its peak forced 22,000 people to evacuate South Lake Tahoe and areas near the Nevada state line, was 53% contained after burning more than 341 square miles (883 square kilometers) and destroying more than 1,000 structures, including hundreds of homes.
Vast Bank has hired an additional 30 or so employees  many in the tech and financial fields  and plans to hire at least 30 to 50 more, he said.

While some of those jobs may be remote and national, many will be in Tulsa and in Oklahoma, he said.

What this did is our evolutionary transformation as a community bank, he said, noting that only a few years ago, Vast Bank was known as Valley National Bank.

Essentially, weve gone from a community bank to a high-path, high-tech firm, ... yet our focus is still going to be on community, the state of Oklahoma and the region, Cavness said.

The past few weeks have been somewhat of a whirlwind, with Vast Bank offering new services like appointments for individuals who may know nothing about cryptocurrency, videoconferencing calls for interested parties, and even estate planning, he said.

Nobody has had anything negative to say when we announced, he said.

He also said the bank will remain a supporter of community events such as the Tulsa Tough bicycle races and the Tulsa Run, among others.
This was a time when it was thought that Indian culture was dying out, and so many of these objects were purchased for next to nothing, Halfmoon said. When we made the selection, one of the curatorial team discovered that many of the families who originally owned these items were still here, and we reached out to them. Many of them didnt even know these items were in the Smithsonians collection.

We were just blown away by how much these families knew about these objects, which they hadnt seen in nearly 100 years, Halfmoon said. They shared with us some profound stories that weve been able to incorporate into the exhibit.

While much of the museum is ready for the public, Halfmoon said that some aspects, such as the Family Discovery Center, aimed at younger visitors, and planned galleries for shorter-term exhibits, are yet to be completed.

As much as we tried to incorporate in the museum, theres still so much to tell about Native peoples, she said. Thats something we will be addressing in the future, with additional exhibits and programming.

For senior curator Ahtone, the goal she hopes the First Americans Museum achieves is a simple one.
During the sentencing hearing held in Tulsa federal court, Frizzell noted that Adebara acted as an intermediary, laundering funds here for individuals engaged in the romance fraud scam.

Prosecutors said the scammers would build rapport with their victims before telling them they had encountered a financial crisis of some sort as a means to plead for money and property from the victims.

In some cases the fraudsters told the victims that they needed money to help them return from outside the United States.

The group would open checking accounts using fake identification to deposit and launder funds sent to them through the scam, prosecutors said.

The scammers then used the funds to purchase luxury vehicles and to purchase and export salvaged vehicles and car parts overseas, usually to Nigeria.

The victims were said to be living in Pryor, as well as other in Florida and Ohio, with some of the accused living in Norman and attending school at the University of Oklahoma.

Former U.S. Attorney Trent Shores said when the indictments were announced that sadly, experience tells us that these victims will never see their money again.
Sept. 7, 2021 video. Speaker is Dr. Travis Campbell, Chair, Department of Pediatrics/The Childrens Hospital at Saint Francis

Tulsa Public Schools and Saint Francis Health System will team up Saturday to provide free COVID-19 vaccinations for students age 12 and older and their families.

The clinic will operate from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the TPS Education Service Center, 3027 S. New Haven Ave.

According to COVID-19 data released Friday afternoon, TPS experienced a week-to-week drop in the number of confirmed cases and close-contact exposures.

Through the close of business Thursday, TPS had 615 close-contact exposures and 96 confirmed cases of COVID-19 among its students and staff. Students accounted for 80 of the confirmed cases and 547 of the exposures.

By comparison, TPS reported 141 confirmed cases and 1,036 close-contact exposures on Sept. 3.

Skelly Elementary School accounted for 102 close-contact exposures and eight confirmed cases. Cooper and Lanier elementary schools each had eight confirmed cases.

Appointments for the Saturday clinic can be scheduled online at tulsaschools.org/vaccine. Walk-ins will also be welcome.

Students 17 and younger must be accompanied by a parent or guardian to receive a vaccination.
Saint Francis Health System will commemorate the anniversary Saturday by hosting a Blue Mass.

A Blue Mass is a special Mass celebrated to pray for blessings upon police, firefighters, paramedics and other first responders.

The Mass, which will last around 30 minutes, will begin at 9 a.m., and is open to the public.

It will be held in the chapel of Saint Francis Hospital, 6161 S. Yale Ave.

Attendees are asked to park in lot P1 near the main entrance. The chapel is located adjacent to the main lobby.

Masks are required at all times in the hospital and chapel.

Tulsa Area United Way officials announced that they will mark the anniversary Saturday as part of their campaign kickoff event.

A ceremony to announce the annual campaign goal is set for 10 a.m. in the Arvest Bank parking lot near Sixth and Main streets.

The announcement will be followed by a tribute to the first responders and victims of the 9/11 attacks.

The KIPP Tulsa Charter School Drum Corp will perform.

The campaign kickoff also includes the return this year of the Downtown Deco Bike Challenge.

For each person who makes their way through a balloon arch between 8 a.m. and noon, Price Family Properties will donate $100 to TAUW up to $100,000.

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Starting this weekend, members of the Park Church of Christ in Tulsa invite guests to join them for a trip back to the time of Moses.

The Tabernacle Experience, featuring a life-size replica of the original tabernacle as described in the Bibles book of Exodus, will be open to visitors for two weeks on the churchs campus at 10600 E. 96th St.

Hours are 11 a.m.-7 p.m. daily through Sept. 24. Admission is $5 per person and includes a 50-minute guided audio tour.

Mitch Wilburn, The Parks senior minister, said that when the church hosted the tabernacle once previously, it drew more than a thousand visitors from a three-state region.

We are so excited about The Tabernacle Experience being with us again, Wilburn said. This nationally recognized ministry proved to be an enormous blessing to our region in the past. So many of the concepts of the New Testament cannot be fully grasped without an understanding of the tabernacle.

As part of the guided audio tour, visitors can step into the shoes of priests and participate in hands-on rituals.

Helping bring it all to life are replicas of the Ark of the Covenant and other features of the original tabernacle.
NEW DELHI (AP)  Top ministers from India and Australia on Saturday called for international anti-terror efforts in Afghanistan, bolstering mutual security ties and blunting China's growing regional assertiveness.

Australia's foreign and defense ministers met their Indian counterparts in New Delhi, the second stop on a four-nation tour.

Australias Foreign Minister Marise Payne said the future of Afghanistan was a central concern for both India and Pakistan. She said the gains of the past 20 years  such as women's empowerment and steps toward an inclusive society  should not be allowed to be reversed.

Australia also wants to strike a free trade deal with India to reduce its economic reliance on an increasingly hostile China.

Indias External Affairs Minister Subhramanyam Jaishankar praised the renewed vigor with which both sides are now engaging on trade issues, without providing further details. Bilateral trade between India and Australia is around $20 billion annually, his ministry says.
China will give Vietnam an additional three million doses of COVID-19 vaccine, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi announced during a meeting with Vietnam Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh in Hanoi on Friday.

The shipments of vaccine will be delivered this year, bringing Chinas total donations to the Southeast Asian country to 5.7 million shots.

Vietnam marks the first leg of Wangs four-country Asian tour through Wednesday, which also includes Singapore, Cambodia and South Korea.

Following his arrival in Hanoi, Wang co-chaired a meeting of the China-Vietnam steering committee for bilateral cooperation  an inter-government mechanism  with Vietnam deputy premier Minh.

The two sides agreed that the Vietnam-China relationship maintains a positive development trend, with their key leaders continuing close contact and exchanges through various forms and at high frequency since the previous meeting in July 2020.

Exchange and cooperation among ministries, agencies and localities have also been promoted, including helping each other in the fight against COVID-19.

The two leaders also discussed a number of issues such as unbalanced trade, export congestion at Chinas border gates, and the need to accelerate the progress of some economic cooperation projects.

The two sides agreed to promote the organization of high-level visits and meetings, effectively implement cooperation between the two Parties, and promote the important role of the two foreign ministries in coordinating and strengthening the two countries relations.

Wang and Minh also agreed to thoroughly implement exchange and cooperation mechanisms in the fields of defense, security, law enforcement, experience exchange and cooperation in COVID-19 prevention and control, including vaccine cooperation.

Regarding vaccines, Wang announced that China will offer three million more doses of COVID-19 vaccine to Vietnam this year.

Some Chinese localities have also donated vaccines and medical equipment to Vietnamese localities, according to the Chinese foreign minister.

Deputy premier Minh, for his part, highly appreciated Chinas support.

Minh and Wang agreed to resume commercial flights when conditions permit in order to facilitate traveling and goods transporting.

The two sides saw eye to eye to implement effective measures to push economic and trade cooperation in a sustainable, stable, and balanced manner while finalizing procedures to open the market for some agricultural produce of Vietnam.

Discussing the border and territorial issues in an open and frank manner, the two sides agreed to cooperate to manage well the land border on the basis of strict compliance with agreements and legal documents on the border.

Regarding the issues at sea, the two countries agreed to continue to control disagreements and not take any action to complicate the situation and expand disputes.

The two countries agreed to maintain peace and stability in the East Vietnam Sea.

Vietnam and China will promote negotiation and cooperation mechanisms to achieve substantive progress, including cooperation in less sensitive areas, on the delimitation of the sea area beyond the mouth of the Gulf of Tonkin, as well as speeding up completion to sign a new agreement on fishery cooperation in the Gulf of Tonkin.

Deputy PM Minh emphasized the importance of respecting each others legitimate rights and interests, in accordance with international law, including the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

After Fridays meeting, Chinese foreign minister Wang is expected to continue his three-day visit in Vietnam with talks with Vietnamese Minister of Foreign Affairs Bui Thanh Son and meetings with senior Vietnamese leaders.

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Check out the news you should not miss today:

Politics

-- China will provide Vietnam with an additional three million doses of Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine, bringing total donations to the Southeast Asian country to 5.7 million, Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi announced during a meeting with Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh in Hanoi on Friday.

-- During a meeting with UNDP Vietnam's Deputy Resident Representative Patrick Haverman, VNMAC General Director Tran Trung Hoa said the country would receive US$25 million from South Korea given the Korea-Vietnam Mine Action Project to overcome the consequences of post-war bombs, mines.

Society

-- Police in Ho Chi Minh City have apprehended two men for impersonating military officers to travel through COVID-19 checkpoints and transport antibody drugs for COVID-19 patients.

-- Authorities in Ho Chi Minh City have launched an investigation after uncovering 9,600 cartons of COVID-19 treatment medication smuggled from China in District 8.

-- About 11,130 mooncakes suspected to be of substandard quality were seized when officials raided a facility in Hoai Duc District, Hanoi on Friday.

-- Doctors of Cho Ray Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City have successfully saved a man who was stabbed with a 50-centimeter long iron pipe from the front of his left thigh to the back of the buttock.

Education

-- Authorities in the southern province of Soc Trang will provide financial relief for students and their parents by waiving the tuition fee until the end of 2021 at all K-12 facilities.

World News

-- Britain's Prince Andrew has been served with a lawsuit by a woman accusing him of sexually assaulting and battering her two decades ago, when she asserts she was also being abused by the financier Jeffrey Epstein, according to Reuters on Friday.

-- Top U.S. health officials believe that Pfizer Inc's COVID-19 vaccine could be authorized for children aged 5-11 years old by the end of October, Reuters reported on Friday.

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Ho Chi Minh City authorities have asked medical facilities to conduct COVID-19 tests on all people having symptoms of a cough, fever, and difficulty breathing to detect positive cases early and prevent the risk of transmission.

The municipal Department of Health announced the decision in a document on Friday.

Accordingly, people found having signs of a cough, a fever, trouble breathing, or respiratory inflammation and those visiting medical establishments for such symptoms must all be tested for COVID-19.

Workers at those facilities are also subject to testing every three days.

More medical workers will be mobilized to give assistance in sample collection.

In addition, the health department requested medical facilities to continue instructing people in conducting rapid antigen tests on their own, under the assistance of medical staff or trained volunteers in a safe manner.

The municipal Steering Committee for COVID-19 Prevention and Control previously issued a document on beefing up mass testing in the city early this week.

Accordingly, authorities in districts and Thu Duc City were requested to report on their local testing results and the classification of areas by risk levels, as well as continue with the testing drive in very high- and high-risk zones until September 15.

The national system of COVID-19 case management recorded 7,539 new cases in Ho Chi Minh City between 5:00 pm Thursday and 5:00 pm Friday.

The southern metropolis has documented a total of 286,242 local infections since a new bout hit Vietnam on April 27.

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As students in Ho Chi Minh City have started their new school year in online classrooms, parents across the southern metropolis are scrambling to find laptops, tablets, and smartphones so their children can use to log into classes.

Soaring demand

Demand for laptops in early September doubled compared to one year ago, according to a representative from electronic retailer The Gioi Di Dong.

Similarly, Nguyen The Kha, director of the telecom-mobile unit of FPT Shop system, said its August sales increase by 60 percent compared to the same period last year, thanks to a 50 percent growth in demand for laptops and tablets.

Kha attributed the soaring demand to the massive amount of Ho Chi Minh City residents working and studying from home.

He also noted that the best-selling brands at FPT stores at the moment are Apple, Samsung, Masstel, and Lenovo.

Meanwhile, CellphoneS, another electronics retailer with outlets across the city, said its August sales for tablets and laptops jumped 35 percent compared to one month earlier and 300 percent compared to the same time last year.

50 percent of our revenue came from the tablet and laptop sales, a company associate said.

The majority of customers sought low-end laptops at prices ranging from VND10-20 million ($437-$874).

In late August, right before the new school year, our average daily tablet sales were about three times higher than normal days and twice as much as our pre-COVID numbers, he added.

Parents go all-out

As the 2011-22 school year has come with classes held entirely online, parents in Ho Chi Minh City are scrambling to prepare their children for distance learning.

Xuan Mai, the mother of a K-12 student in Ho Chi Minh City, said she and her family left most of their belongings at home when they fled the city before the start of a strict social distancing mandate back in July.

Now, quartered in her hometown where electronics retailers are few and far between, she was having trouble finding a device suitable for her childs studies.

I thought our stay in the countryside would end before the new school year, so it didnt really cross my mind to bring school supplies.

I just bought a new laptop, headset, and webcam for his online classes, but it was difficult because there are still strict social distancing rules here.

Meanwhile, those who chose to remain in the city have not had it much easier.

Most stores are closed, so I had to scour the internet for suppliers and figure out how quickly they could deliver and whether or not Id be able to receive the delivery before classes started.

I thought it would be easy but it took several days, said Hoang Hai, a parent in District 1.

For lower-income families, buying new devices is not an option, leading many to purchase unreliable products that are not quite adequate for the online learning environment, particularly at a time when professional IT support is out of reach due to travel restrictions and closures.

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Typhoon Conson, the fifth storm to appear in the East Vietnam Sea this year, has passed Vietnams Hoang Sa (Paracel) Islands and is heading to the countrys north central provinces along with heavy rains, the national weather agency reported.

At 4:00 am on Saturday, the storm was spotted at about 230km east off the coast from Quang Tri to Quang Nam Provinces, packing winds of 90 to 100 kilometers per hour and gusts of up to 133 kilometers per hour, the National Center for Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting said.

Typhoon Conson is moving west at five kilometers per hour and will reach the waters off Quang Tri and Quang Nam Provinces at 4:00 am Sunday, with the strongest winds of 90 kilometers per hour.

The storm is going to bring heavy rains to many provinces, including the area between Quang Tri and Quang Ngai, and Binh Dinh, Kon Tum and Gia Lai, with rainfalls from 50 to over 100 millimeters.

Due to its impact, the northwest and middle parts of the East Vietnam Sea will turn rough with rainstorms and powerful cyclones.

In the next 24 to 48 hours, the storm will move west at a speed of five to 10 kilometers per hour and weaken into a tropical depression while moving inland.

At 4:00 am Monday, the depression with winds of 50 kilometers per hour will land in the Quang Tri - Quang Nam area before moving west to enter Laos and wane into a low-pressure system.

From now to Monday, torrential rains will cover the Quang Tri - Quang Ngai area, with precipitations ranging from 100 to 350 millimeters.

In the provinces from Quang Binh to Thanh Hoa, moderate to heavy rains, with rainfall measuring up to 250 millimeters, will take place from Sunday to Tuesday.

Binh Dinh, Kon Tum and Gia Lai Provinces will have milder rains from now until Sunday.

Meanwhile, the southern part of the East Vietnam Sea and the waters from Binh Thuan to Ca Mau Provinces are going to have strong southwest winds of up to 74 kilometers per hour and strong currents with waves as high as four meters.

Localities likely to be affected by the typhoon have checked residents living in areas prone to landslides and flash floods and taken measures to evacuate them.

More than 766,000 people in the northern mountainous provinces and central coastal provinces are expected to be evacuated from risky areas, according to the Central Steering Committee for Natural Disaster Prevention and Control.

By 6:00 am Saturday, border guards from Quang Ninh to Binh Thuan Provinces had fired firecrackers as a storm signal at 42 points, according to a quick report from the Border Guard Command.

Currently, there have been 70 ships with 640 people operating in the northern part of the East Vietnam Sea and the waters off Paracel Islands.

These vessels have received the storm warning and are moving out of the dangerous areas.

Meanwhile, border guards of Thanh Hoa Province reported they have got in contact again with three fishing boats with which they had previously lost touch and that these vessels are returning ashore.

After Typhoon Conson, six to eight other storms and tropical depressions are likely to appear in the East Vietnam Sea this year, of which two to four will directly affect Vietnam, meteorologists have warned.

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Only certain groups of vaccine recipients will have to undergo blood pressure measurement before their inoculation while others will be able to skip this step following the Vietnamese Ministry of Healths new guidance issued on Friday.

People subject to blood pressure checking include those with a history of high or low blood pressure, over 65 years old, or having underlying heart diseases.

The new procedure will start with checking the recipients medical history, followed by clinical assessment of body temperature, blood pressure in required cases, pulse, and respiratory rate in people with a history of heart failure or abnormal findings such as chest pain or difficulty breathing.

Medical staff must then observe the recipients general conditions to decide whether to go on with the inoculation or transfer them to another vaccination facility that is capable of handling anaphylactic reactions.

The health ministrys new guidance also advises caution against six groups of vaccine recipients.

They include people with a history of allergies, underlying diseases or chronic diseases, losing consciousness or their behavioral capacity, or suffering thrombocytopenia and blood clotting disorders, and women over 13 weeks of pregnancy.

The last group is those with abnormal vital signs, such as body temperature below 35.5 degrees Celsius or higher than 37.5 degrees Celsius, too slow or too fast pulse, or blood pressure 30mmHg higher than normal.

The guidance also requires the delay of vaccination for people with a history of COVID-19 infection within six months, acute illnesses, and women pregnant less than three weeks.

Meanwhile, vaccination shall be contraindicated for cases with an anaphylactic reaction to the same type of COVID-19 vaccine in the previous injection or with any contraindication as announced by the vaccine manufacturers.

Vietnam had administered over 26 million COVID-19 vaccine doses as of Friday, including over one million injections on Thursday.

Some 4.5 million people have been fully vaccinated.

The country has received about 33.5 million doses of vaccines in total and is expected to get millions more by Sunday.

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Vietnamese police have arrested and prosecuted a woman who joined an overseas reactionary organization and performed her assigned tasks that were aimed to subvert the administration.

Police of southern An Giang Province on Friday prosecuted 62-year-old Le Thi Kim Phi, a local resident, on charges of acting to overthrow the peoples administration, as prescribed in Vietnams Penal Code.

The woman was found using her Facebook account named Phi Kim from September to December 2020 to contact with a number of reactionaries being members of the so-called Provisional National Government of Vietnam, an U.S.-based exiled reactionary organization led by Dao Minh Quan.

During the period, Phi regularly read, commented and shared articles, videos and photos with contents against the Party and the State of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, investigators said.

She joined this reactionary organization in January this year and was assigned to propagate and promote its activities, as well as recruit new members.

After keeping watch on Phis reactionary activities, police have seized from her Facebook account six videos and 440 pages of materials that were used for propaganda against the State and activities aimed at overturning the administration.

The provincial police are continuing their investigation into the case.

Three months ago, the Hau Giang Province Peoples Court sentenced another Facebook user, Dang Hoang Minh, 28, to seven years in prison on charges of making, storing and spreading information, materials and items against the State of Socialist Republic of Vietnam.

From June to December 2020, Minh posted on his Facebook account many articles that slandered and insulted the Party and the State, offended the late President Ho Chi Minh, distorted and defamed the administration, and disseminated fabricated information that caused confusion to the public, according to the indictment.

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SBS screens the documentary Looking For Life On Mars in which Perseverance undertakes NASAs most ambitious hunt.

Follow along as NASA launches the Mars 2020 Mission, perhaps the most ambitious hunt ever for signs of life on Mars. For the first time, in February 2021, a rover attempts a risky landing in Jezero Crater, the coveted site of an ancient river delta that scientists believe once held all the ingredients for life.

If the rover, called Perseverance, finds signs of life from an age when Mars was a watery planet like Earth, it could mean life is more likely to exist elsewhere in the solar system  and beyond. But getting to Jezero isnt easy, as the craters boulders and cliffs make it a dangerous place to land.

The spacecraft reaches Mars atmosphere traveling at over 12,000 miles per hour and has a few minutes to execute an elaborate descent manoeuvre and lower the car-sized rover to the surface in just the right spot. If successful, Perseverance will comb the area and collect samples for possible return to Earth.

Traveling onboard Perseverance is a four-pound helicopter that will conduct a series of test flights  the first on another planet. During its journey, Perseverance will also test technology designed to produce oxygen from the Martian atmosphere, in hopes that the gas could be used for fuel  or for humans to breathe  on future missions.

Wednesday, 15 September at 8.30pm on SBS.
Forget about Byron Bay.

The Block looks set to head to Gisborne South, 40 minutes north west of Melbourne for 2022.

The Sunday Herald Sun reports a farm-style setting with five houses on an estate is tipped, after executive producer Julian Cress bought in the area.

We never confirm where we are making the show because we like to retain some element of surprise for our contestants, Cress said.

While I cant confirm any rumour about where we are going next year, lifestyle properties in regional areas sounds like a great idea.

If the rumour is true, whoever thought of it is a genius.

So what about those Byron Bay rumours?

Nine has its annual Upfronts on Wednesday, but as TV Tonight previously noted, Nine had also announced Beach House Escape for 2021.
A labourer carries vegetable oil packets on a tricycle as a man stands in front of his shop selling food grains, at a wholesale market in Kolkata

By Rajendra Jadhav

MUMBAI (Reuters) -India has cut base import taxes on palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil, according to a government notification, as the world's biggest vegetable oil buyer tries to cool near-record price rises.

The reduction in taxes could bring down prices of the edible oils in India and boost consumption, effectively increasing overseas buying by the south Asian country.

The base import tax on crude palm oil has been slashed to 2.5% from 10%, while the tax on crude soyoil and crude sunflower oil has been reduced to 2.5% from 7.5%, the government said in a notification late on Friday. The base import tax on refined grades of palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil cut to 32.5% from 37.5%.

After the cuts, crude palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil imports will be subject to a 24.75% tax in total, including a 2.5% base import duty and other taxes, while refined grades of palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil would carry a 35.75% tax in total.

India fulfils more than two-thirds of its edible oil demand through imports and has been struggling to contain a rally in local oil prices for the last few months.

The country imports palm oil mainly from top producers Indonesia and Malaysia, while other oils, such as soy and sunflower, come from Argentina, Brazil, Ukraine and Russia.

The reduction in taxes would bring down edible oil prices ahead of key festivals, when edible oil demand rises in the country, said Govindbhai Patel, managing director of trading firm G.G. Patel & Nikhil Research Company.

New Delhi cut import taxes on palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil, but kept import duties intact on crude rapeseed oil at 38.5%, said B.V. Mehta, executive director of the Solvent Extractors' Association of India.

"There is a need to bring down import tax on rapeseed oil as well since the price has nearly doubled in a year," Mehta said.

(Reporting by Rajendra Jadhav; Editing by William Mallard and Raju Gopalakrishnan)
Lebanese multihyphenate Nadine Labakis most recent directorial effort, the Oscar-nominated Capernaum, shed light on Beiruts desperation before her city was blasted last year by one of the biggest non-nuclear explosions ever recorded. She is in Venice this year as an actor in Mounia Akls first feature Costa Brava, Lebanon, which against all odds started shooting two months after the blast, also defying the pandemic and Lebanons economic collapse.

The potent pic, which screened in Venice Horizons, sees Labaki and Palestinian actor Saleh Bakri (The Bands Visit) playing Soraya and Walid, a couple who have left Beirut with their children for an idyllic, isolated life in the Lebanese mountains, until one day the government decides to build a garbage landfill right beside their house. Labaki spoke to Variety about how important it was for her to get back to work on a pic that says a lot about her countrys plight, but also speaks to the world at large. Excerpts.

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Costa Brava begins with a shot of the Beirut port. I could not help thinking about the symbolic significance of that.

That made it very emotional for all of us that were part of this film. The crew, the actors, the Lebanese people who attended the Venice screening. I think it was a very emotional journey. Its not just another film. Its really about what we are going through, and it reflects what we are living right now. The contradictions and the love/hate relationship with our country; our struggles and ambivalence in our feelings. Do we stay? Do we leave? How much are we willing to give up to stay and resist? What can you do in this situation? Can you isolate yourself like the family in the film? Or should you leave the country because you need to survive and you need to protect your sanity? Or should you instead just dive into the chaos and try to change and be part of the change, even though you may lose yourself?

Story continues

Then there is also a purely ecological aspect that can be stripped away from the countrys context.

Well, many people around the world are living in this self-sustainable, self-sufficient way. Moving away from the cities and back into nature. Lots of people are experiencing this new way of living. But we struggle between these two lifestyles. Do we do that [go back to nature] and remain open and connected to the world, or do we go back to the way we used to live, with the pollution and the traffic, the tall buildings and cement and plastic? We have strayed so far from the real thing, and from nature. I think on the whole its a big question that we need to start asking ourselves.

It sounds like you are personally living this struggle in real life.

I am. I identify a lot with Soraya. My family and I have decided to also live in the countryside. We live in a cabin in the woods, we grow our own vegetables and fruits, we have chickens and goats, we make our own cheese. We live a very similar life [to the family in the film]. For me it was very natural to be her. It was an act of resistance. We are not going to surrender to the state of being zombies that we were in and just pick up the pieces and start working again, because its our duty. The cultural resistance in Lebanon is the only thing thats going to save us.

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China is a latecomer to the eastern Mediterranean development boom but has used its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) as a gateway to enter the area. As Global Voices writes, Turkey is also developing its own trans-regional strategy for economic and strategic cooperation, most notably the Middle Corridor Initiative. In their efforts to influence this region, are Beijing and Ankara allies or opponents?

The global political economy and geopolitics of the eastern Mediterranean

Centrally located in between Asia, Africa, and Europe, the eastern Mediterranean has been an important strategic junction for global trade throughout its history.

The eastern Mediterranean also provides the shortest maritime route between Asian and European markets, thanks to the Suez Canal that connects the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. Almost 12 percent of global commerce and over 1 trillion US dollars worth of goods pass through the Canal annually. The region also serves as an important route for transporting petroleum and gas from the Gulf to the European markets. Approximately 70 percent of Europes energy demands are transported through the Mediterranean annually.

Home to regional power holders such as Greece, Turkey, Israel, and Egypt, the eastern Mediterraneans geo-economic and geopolitical significance has historically attracted non-regional major powers to the region: the US, together with NATO allies; Russia which has reinforced its influence since the civil war in Syria; and now China which only started to build roots in late 2013, once the BRI was initiated in Turkey.

Chinas eastern Mediterranean policy and the BRI

So far, China is mostly present via infrastructure investments including the China-Central Asia-West Asia economic corridor and the Maritime Silk Road, such as the Piraeus Port in Greece, Kumport in Turkey, El Dekheila and Alexandria ports in Egypt, and Haifa and Ashdod ports in Israel.

In Egypt, China has invested in the Suez Canal industrial zone and is building parts of the New Administrative Capital as well as financing approximately 85 percent of the 3 billion US dollar project as part of its Silk Road Economic Belt. Similarly, since 2016 China has invested in numerous clean energy projects in Greece. And in Israel, it has invested in transportation, technology, and other industries. Chinas largest investment in the country so far is the Emba Hunutlu power station, a coal-based power plant. The country is also in talks with Turkey to finance the Kanal Istanbul project, a shipping canal aiming to connect the Sea of Marmara to the Black Sea. China's private sector is also getting involved in a wild set of activities  over 1,000 Chinese companies have invested in Turkish sectors from tourism and finance to transportation, mining, and energy.

In recent years, China has also sought to increase its military presence in the region. In May 2015, Beijing conducted its first-ever military exercise in the Mediterranean alongside Russia. Two years later, it conducted a live-fire drill. China's increased economic relations in this part of the Mediterranean can be traced to a turning point in 2011 when it had to evacuate its citizens from Libya following instability in the country, and realized it needed more efforts to protect its investments in the region.

Turkeys Middle Corridor and assertive policies in the eastern Mediterranean

In November 2015, Turkey and China signed a Memorandum of Understanding to align Turkeys Middle Corridor Initiative with the BRI.

Through the Middle Corridor, Turkey aims to use its geographic advantage as a gateway between Asia, Europe, and the Middle East to become a hub for East-West trade. These plans were highlighted by Minister of Transport and Infrastructure Adil Karaismailoglu, who said in a statement in June, with the Middle Corridor, Turkey will turn into a new global logistics base.

In 2015, the Republican Peoples Party (CHP), Turkeys main opposition party, proposed the Centre Turkey (Merkez Turkiye) project, which aims to center Turkey as a logistics and production hub connecting Europe, Asia, and Africa. This project extends the Middle Corridor to Africa via the Middle East while maintaining its compatibility with the BRI. It is also an indication of shared interest between Turkey's leading government and the opposition parties.

If Turkey can position itself as an economic zone between Europe, Asia, and the MENA region, the Middle Corridor could become more attractive to China and other regional partners, thus increasing Turkeys economic and political gains.

A working paper published by the Asian Development Bank in May 2021 suggests that an intra-regional trade zone and extra-regional economic integration policies developed as part of the Middle Corridor could facilitate engagement between the EU and China. Such a trade zone, led by Turkey and supported by trans-regional trade, could also strengthen Turkeys role for regional states, the EU, and China.

However, unlike Chinas BRI, Turkeys regional integration vision does not include a maritime corridor. Instead, from 2015 onwards, Turkey has implemented an assertive eastern Mediterranean policy relying on military capabilities, rather than diplomatic talks, to enforce its maritime jurisdiction claims vis-a-vis regional states like Greece, Southern Cyprus, and Egypt. Still, Turkeys latest Eastern Mediterranean policies can also be considered defensive.

In January 2019, Southern Cyprus (Republic of Cyprus), Egypt, Greece, Israel, Italy, Jordan, and Palestine established the East Med Gas Forum to create an energy hub in the region. Turkeys exclusion from the group caused tension in Ankara, promoting Turkey to launch a unilateral gas exploration and drilling effort supported by warships. In November 2019, Turkey and Libya delineated their maritime border, which partially overlapped with the Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) of Greece and Egypt, triggering strong reactions from both.

Local experts, such as researcher Ilhan Uzgel, say Turkeys current assertive naval policies in the eastern Mediterranean, encapsulated by the Blue Homeland doctrine of 2013, are similar to the neo-Ottomanist policies promoted by Turkeys former Minister of Foreign Affairs and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu in the 2000s and early 2010s.

Turkeys offensive policies have triggered strong reactions from other regional powers and exacerbated tensions in some cases. In May 2020, foreign ministers of Cyprus, Egypt, France, Greece, and the UAE denounced Turkeys activities in the Southern Cypriot Exclusive Economic Zone, an area of the sea in which a sovereign state has special rights regarding the exploration and use of marine resources. In September 2020, then-US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo confirmed US support for Greece, as did Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi in November. The following month, the European Council imposed sanctions on Turkey.

Regional competitors or collaborators?

China typically stays silent on tensions within the Mediterranean in an effort to maintain positive relations in the region and maximize its benefits. However, this position might change depending on future developments.

According to Gu Zhenglong and Zou Zhiqiang from Shanghai International Studies University and Zhang Lin from Zhejiang International Studies University, Turkeys policies in the eastern Mediterranean are causing instability. If continued, China might reevaluate Turkeys role in the BRI.

Currently, China seems to favor Greece for its trade relations with Europe. Piraeus Port is located closer to European markets and provides a shorter and more cost-effective route than Turkeys Kumport. However, as the six-day blockage of the Suez Canal in March 2021 has shown, the development of alternative trade routes is essential. According to Minister Karaismailoglu, the Middle Corridor is the most suitable alternative East-West trade route.

Due to these developments, China and Turkey are expected to continue to collaborate to align their distinct but overlapping visions for trans-continental integration, as was reinforced by Chinese Vice President Wang Qishan. Should Ankara's political and military ambitions in the region increase, Beijing might reconsider Turkey's role as a reliable partner in the BRI.
For the last three decades normalising diplomatic relations with Azerbaijan and Turkey was impossible when Armenia occupied twenty prevent of Azerbaijani territory in 1994-2000. But the situation has radically changed following the 44-day Second Karabakh War allowing Armenian nationalists to give up their fantasies about a Greater Armenia composed of eastern Turkey and western Azerbaijan (Karabakh), a goal which the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF)/Dashnaks has long supported. As Eurasia Review writes, the Dashnaks traditionally held a strong influence over the Armenian diaspora and continue to hold influence over Armenias Ministry of Foreign Affairs as seen its continued support for the right to self-determination of the so-called Republic of Artsakh.

With Azerbaijan now in control of Karabakh and seven surrounding districts an opportunity has arisen for Armenia to negotiate a post-conflict peace treaty with Azerbaijan. The basis for this would be Armenian nationalists dropping their fantasies about a greater Armenia, accepting Azerbaijani sovereignty over Karabakh and ending demands for self-determination of the Republic of Artsakh.

Since becoming an independent state in the early 1990s, Armenia has oriented towards autocratic and imperial Russia and theocratic Iran. 25,000 Armenians in Karabakh are holding three million Armenians to ransom. Both countries are under extensive international sanctions. Armenia pursued a pro-Russian foreign policy and joined Russian-led integration projects, such as the CSTO (Collective Security Treaty Organisation) and Eurasian Economic Union.

Armenia has no land border with Russia and overland trade must go through Georgia with whom relations have been poor. With Yerevans support for a Greater Armenia through miatsum (unification of Armenia and Karabakh) it is not surprising Georgians are suspicious of separatist sentiment among its Armenian minority

Armenia shares a small 44 km border with Iran with whom it has sought (unsuccessfully) to balance against over-reliance on Russia. Armenias much longer borders with Turkey and Azerbaijan have remained closed because of its occupation (until last years 44-day war) of a fifth of Azerbaijani territory.

Armenia should sign a comprehensive post-conflict peace treaty with Azerbaijan which would bring five strategic benefits to Armenia.

Firstly, Armenia could begin to pursue a balanced foreign policy between Europe and Eurasia, thereby reducing its reliance on rogue states Russia and Iran. Russia has no interest in seeing an economically prosperous Armenia as the Kremlin only views the country as part of its Eurasian sphere of influence and as a territory to locate Russian military bases.

Secondly, Armenia could participate to a far greater extent in the European Unions (EU) Eastern Partnership which would be far more beneficial to its development than Vladimir Putins Eurasian Economic Union. Armenia has until now straddled between the Eurasian Economic Union, which it is a member of, and the EU. The normalisation of relations with Azerbaijan followed by that with Turkey would provide Armenia with increased opportunities to integrate into the EUs Customs Union through the DCFTA (Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Association).

Armenia should take its cues from Ukraine which has massively increased its trade with the EU since signing an Association Agreement in 2014. The EU accounts for nearly half of Ukrainian exports. Boosting trade is one important benefit but what are also important are other benefits to the Armenian economy, such as the EUs demands for higher standards, less corruption, fewer regulations, and better-quality products.

Thirdly, the opening of Armenias borders with Turkey and Azerbaijan would massively boost regional trade and thereby economic growth. Armenia would be able to reduce the dominance of Russia and Iran in its trade by joining regional integration projects from which it has been hitherto excluded. Participation in these would greatly benefit the Armenian economy and reduce the outflow of its population seeking employment and a better life elsewhere.

Two million Armenians live and work in Russia. This is a huge number considering there are only three million people in Armenia.

Azerbaijan and Turkey have a combined population of 92 million which represents a huge potential market. Both countries are next door to Armenia and therefore exports to them would dramatically reduce transportation costs compared to trade with far away Russia and Iran.

Fourthly, reducing ties to Russia and Iran would improve Armenias poor international image. Armenia has voted, together with rogue states North Korea, Syria, Myanmar, Iran, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, against every UN resolution denouncing Russias occupation of Crimea. Armenian politicians of cues demand the right to the self-determination of Republic of Artsakh based on Russias discourse on self-determination of Crimea.

Reliance on Iran coupled with a stagnant economy has given Armenia the temptation to assist Tehran to bypass international sanctions imposed by the US and other Western countries. Armenia has acted as an intermediary for Bulgarian arms to Iran which Tehran transferred to pro-Iranian terrorist groups in Iraq, and which were then used to launch attacks against US troops. Armenia has supplied biochemical equipment to an Iranian front company in the UAE. Armenia has assisted in deception schemes to provide aircraft which mysteriously undertake emergency landings in Tehran and are then corporate raided into the countrys civilian airline fleets. Armenia has been sanctioned by the US government for providing air services and banking services respectively to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force, designated a foreign terrorist group by the US, and Iranian government.

Fifthly, Armenia would be able to participate in regional energy projects, such as the Southern Gas Corridor thereby negating Armenias reliance on imports of gas from Iran. Until now pipelines have bypassed Armenia by exporting gas and oil into Europe via Turkey and Georgia though the Baku-Tbilisi-Supsa, Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan, Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum, and Trans-Anatolian pipelines.

The potential is enormous for Armenia to participate alongside its Azerbaijani, Turkish and Georgian neighbours in these expanding energy hubs, pipeline projects and exports.

The ending of Azerbaijans occupation of Azerbaijan territory in last years 44-day war has opened the potential for Armenia to escape from its reliance on rogue states Russia and Iran. Armenian politicians and nationalists should negotiate a post-conflict peace treaty which recognises the former Soviet internal republican boundaries as post-Soviet international borders. This would require relinquishing claims to Karabakh and support for the self-determination of the so-called Republic of Artsakh.

Armenia could choose to not sign a treaty but this would lead to a continuation of decades of economic stagnation and international opprobrium. Or Armenia could accept the new realities brought about by the end of the Karabakh conflict, become less reliant on Russia and Iran and boost its economy, standards of living and trade by participating in regional and European integration.
When President Shavkat Mirziyoyev decided Uzbekistans inefficient and laggard economy needed a legislative overhaul, he turned not to his ministers nor the countrys parliament, but a more unusual source: an Indian-born former British civil servant. Appointed last September as a formal adviser to the Uzbek leader, Suma Chakrabarti is a rarity in Central Asia: a foreigner with clear influence at the highest level of government.

According to Financial Times, he represents a concerted effort by Tashkent to attract international investors, financiers and corporates by employing one of their own. I agree that my appointment is a little unusual and I think it arose from an awareness that, after a quarter century of relative isolation, the Uzbekistan government needed someone with international experience and connections to quality-assure the reforms the new administration had in mind, Chakrabarti explains.

In his previous role as head of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, he had first met Mirziyoyev in early 2017, soon after the Uzbek president was sworn in. Chakrabarti stepped down as head of the EBRD in July last year.I advise the president personally and, through him, his cabinet and the government, Chakrabarti says. The advice he seeks is widely varied, but generally focuses on economic development, Uzbekistans relations with the international financial markets, and how to improve public administration.

Chakrabartis first year in the role has yielded a sprawling economic reform programme, signed into law by Mirziyoyev in July. The wide-ranging and ambitious road map calls for dozens of new initiatives to spur growth, ranging from a new tax code for small businesses and a revamped anti-corruption law, to efforts to privatise assets in the aviation and railway industries. Many of the initiatives borrow from best practices promoted by Chakrabartis former employer, which have often failed to be fully implemented by Uzbekistan and its neighbours.

The region has long been seen as ripe for economic growth, thanks to its natural resource base and a geographical location that facilitates trade. But the Soviet legacy of bureaucracy, state control of the economy, and official corruption have long stymied reform efforts. In addition, the autocratic and dictatorial regimes that have run many of the regions states for the past three decades  plus powerful local oligarchs with vested business interests  have proved unwilling to fully trust in western advisers and embrace international best practices. Previous attempts by western advisers to influence Central Asian policy have been mixed. Former British prime minister Tony Blair was hired as an adviser to Kazakhstan in 2011, but ended the relationship five years later amid controversy over crackdowns on civil rights by the countrys then-president during his tenure.

Chakrabarti is not alone as an outsider advising Tashkent. Under Mirziyoyev, Uzbekistans government has contracted more than a dozen foreign consultants. It currently employs organisations including the World Bank and IMF, banks JPMorgan, Citi and Rothschild & Co, and law firm Dentons on project-based contracts, according to the countrys finance ministry. I am one of the few engaged in a long-term advisory capacity and given an office and support staff to do my work, says Chakrabarti. Most others have been engaged in project work or in advising the [state-owned enterprises] on how to access international capital. In my experience, this is normal.

The reasons behind Tashkents reform rhetoric are two-fold. First, Mirziyoyev wants to broaden Uzbekistans foreign relations, and sees overseas investment and trade as a key part of that. Second, its economy needs a growth spurt to bridge the gap in gross domestic product per capita to other post-Soviet states such as Russia, Georgia and Azerbaijan.

Reducing the role of the state, a perennial and tenacious challenge across the former USSR, is a constant theme for the more than 100 initiatives across the 22 areas of Chakrabartis road map. Almost 80 per cent of Uzbekistans workforce is employed by the private sector, but it accounts for only 57 per cent of GDP. I would say that, while the impetus comes from the top, there is very widespread agreement across all walks of life in Uzbekistan that there must be room for private initiative and ambition, Chakrabarti. Given Uzbekistans fast-growing and youthful population, these businesses need room to grow. Equally, economic growth requires capital, including international capital. To attract it, the leading state-owned enterprises need major reform and restructuring in line with international standards.

Chakrabarti has no doubt that international investors are changing their approach to Uzbekistan and support the pledges made by Mirziyoyev. There is genuine enthusiasm for what is happening in Uzbekistan now. There is caution too, of course. Investors and bankers always want assurance that attitudes have changed and the reforms will persist, he says. There have been privatisation efforts in Uzbekistans past which went nowhere, and the international financial community is aware of this, he adds. But it is becoming clear that the environment has completely changed, that reform is indeed irreversible.
More fences and walls are not being considered as strong enough preventive measures by some European authorities in order to deal with the recent increase in the number of migrants, mainly from Afghanistan, who are reaching Europe.

Besides, some EU authorities believe that building additional camps would help solve this problem, despite such places being infamous for many unlawful affairs, such as beating, sexual assaults, and even cases of refugee murders, SchenegenVisaInfo.com reports.

However, the construction of detention camps to place refugees from other countries and halt them from moving freely to other territories was discussed by the EU Interior Ministers during a meeting held in Brussels earlier this month.

Such camps have been proposed to be built across Central Asian countries, such as Iran, Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Turkey, to stop refugees from seeking international protection in European countries.

In this regard, earlier this month, Brussels offered to draft proposals for a 600 million EU package for neighboring countries of Afghanistan in order to accept the refugees and for the upkeep of such camps.

According to some EU authorities, such a move would avoid a repeat of 2015s migrant crisis. In 2015, amid tensions between Turkey and the EU authorities, about one million refugees were permitted to enter European countries.

During the meeting held in Brussels, EU Ministers stressed that such a situation should not be repeated.

Its very important to accelerate diplomatic efforts. I expect the European Commission, if we agree politically today, to strongly support the neighboring countries if they take Afghan refugees.  If we act quickly, we wont repeat 2015, German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer pointed out in this regard, as the World Socialist Web Site reported.

In this regard, the Austrian, Danish, and Czech interior Ministers published a joint statement declaring that the most important thing right now is to send the right message into the region: Stay there, and we will support the region to help the people.

In the statement regarding the current situation in Afghanistan, it was noted that based on lessons learned, the EU and the Member States stand determined to cooperate to stop the recurrence of uncontrolled large-scale illegal migration movements faced in the past.

A large number of refugees are currently in detention camps in Europe, such as those in the Canary Islands, in Turkey, or Moria in Greece.

On this day one year ago, the Moria camp in Greece was destroyed by fires, while many of the refugees continue to experience anxiety, depression, and other behavioral problems, according to ReliefWeb.

Even though the EUs Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson previously promised there would be no more Morias, the migrant and refugee issues continue to be among top EU problems with no effective problem-solving.
North Korea held a parade on Thursday showcasing military dogs and virus workers in orange hazmat suits, but leader Kim Jong Un still managed to seize the spotlight by looking thinner and more energetic than he has in years. As CBS News reports, during the event late Wednesday, Kim, wearing a cream-colored suit and a shiny white tie, emerged as the clock struck midnight. He beamed in response to thunderous applause from performers and spectators filling Pyongyang's brightly illuminated Kim Il Sung Square, named after his grandfather, the country's founder.

He smiled widely, waved to the crowd and kissed children who presented him with flowers before taking his spot on a balcony to observe the parade. He laughed vigorously and applauded the marchers throughout the event, while holding animated chats with senior officials.It was a stark change from 2018, when TV footage showed him struggling to catch his breath while accompanying South Korean President Moon Jae-in on a short hike to North Korea's Mount Paektu during a period of diplomatic engagement. Moon, who is three decades older than Kim, didn't seemed fazed by the walk at all."His face is clearly thinner and he is moving much more vigorously," said Park Won-gon, a professor of North Korea studies at Seoul's Ewha Womans University.

Kim's weight loss became noticeable in June, when he made his first public appearance in weeks to convene a ruling party meeting. Some North Korea watchers then said that Kim, who is about 5 feet, 8 inches tall and has previously weighed 308 pounds, may have lost 22-44 pounds.

Most experts say Kim's weight loss is more likely a result of efforts to improve his shape than an indicator of health problems, considering his regular public activity. It may also have a political purpose.Kim is facing perhaps his toughest moment as he approaches a decade of rule, with North Korea wrestling with U.S.-led economic sanctions over its nuclear weapons, pandemic border closures that cause further strain to its broken economy, and food shortages made worse by floods in recent summers.

It has become crucial for Kim to build an image as a young and vigorous leader who can navigate the country out of trouble, analyst Park said. Such image-making efforts would align with the latest parade, which showcased civil defense units involved in efforts to rebuild the economy and communities destroyed by floods and emphasized a domestic message for unity. Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, said Kim, with his weight loss and cheerful demeanor at the parade, is likely trying to project an image of a "normal statesman" who engages with the public."He's also a husband and a father of three children who is approaching his 40s, so it isn't strange that he would care about his health," Yang said.

Kim's health is the focus of keen outside attention as the 37-year-old leader hasn't publicly anointed a successor who would take control of North Korea's advancing nuclear arsenal targeting Asian rivals and the American homeland. He has been known for heavy drinking and smoking and comes from a family with a history of heart problems. His father and grandfather, who ruled North Korea before him, both died of heart issues"Considering the North's political system, where the supreme leader decides everything, Kim's health is an extremely important security matter," Park said. "It's likely there were internal concerns that he was overweight, and it would have been important for Kim to reduce those concerns and present himself as a young and healthy leader who's capable of doing things."

Dr. Cheong Seong-Chang, Director of the Center for North Korean Studies at the Sejong Institute in South Korea, told CBS News that Kim may also have wanted with the parade, to "show the world that North Korea is safe from the coronavirus, as they have repeatedly said."
On September 11-12, the holiday Moscow - Baku: Hearts Unite" is being held at VDNKh, in pavilion 14 Azerbaijan, in honour of City Day.

Within the framework of the holiday, guests can visit the exhibition and fair area, where products from Azerbaijan are presented. Guests can taste the legendary Azerbaijani tea, as well as take pictures at the national-style photo zone. At the creative and artistic platform, everyone can paint the recognizable silhouettes of Moscow and Bakus sights. There is also an opportunity to take a virtual tour of Baku and the historical places of Azerbaijan.

The program includes fiery Azerbaijani dances performed by national choreographic groups on folk instruments. On Saturday afternoon, Muscovites and guests of the city participated in the Azerbaijani Yalli folk dance.
Two Turkish soldiers were killed and three others were injured in an attack carried out in the de-escalation zone in Syria's Idlib province, the Defense Ministry said Saturday, Daily Sabah reports.

The ministry noted that the attack targeted a vehicle of Turkish soldiers returning after a search mission.

The ministry extended condolences to the families and loved ones of the soldiers.
Azerbaijani Defense Minister Colonel General Zakir Hasanov expressed his condolences to Turkish National Defense Minister Hulusi Akar and Chief of the General Staff, General Yashar Guler in connection with the deaths and injuries of Turkish army servicemen as a result of the attack in Idlib.

I am deeply saddened by the news of the death and injury of servicemen of the fraternal Turkish Armed Forces as a result of the treacherous attack in the Syrian city of Idlib. Please accept my condolences, "the message says.
The death toll after the fire and subsequent explosions of ammunition in the warehouses of a military unit in the Zhambyl region of Kazakhstan, which took place on August 26, increased to 17, the press service of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of Kazakhstan informed.

It is specified that a firefighter who was injured as a result of an explosion in the Zhambyl region died today. "Earlier, he was taken to the hospital of the Scientific Research Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics in the city of Nur-Sultan, where he underwent treatment," the Ministrys statement reads.

The search for one missing person is ongoing.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi will pay an official visit to Tehran tonight. He will hold talks with the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Mohammad Eslami, the official representative of the AEOI, Behruz Kamalvandi informed.

"Grossi will arrive on a one-day visit. An agreement was reached to discuss various aspects of cooperation between the IAEA and Iran on Sunday with the head of the AEOI Mohammad Eslami," TASS quotes Kamalvandi as saying.
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and German Chancellor Angela Merkel discussed the implementation of the Nord Stream 2 project.

According to Morawiecki, the parties discussed potential decisions related to a change in the US position on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline.

We discussed a difficult topic - Nord Stream 2, gas transit through Ukraine and Poland, potential solutions related to a change in the US position, the head of the Polish government said at a joint press conference with the Chancellor.
Russian President Vladimir Putin thinks that Moscow authorities find a balance between forced restrictions and the normal development in the conditions of the coronavirus pandemic, TASS reports.

"For the second year, unfortunately, we are celebrating this holiday (Moscow City Day) in the complex conditions of the epidemic. I think that many will agree with me, it is precisely Moscow that demonstrates an example of coordinated effective actions in counteracting this threat, finds a balance between forced restrictions necessary to protect the lives of thousands of people and the normal functioning of a multimillion city, its development," the head of state said at a ceremony dedicated to Moscow City Day at the Zaryadye concert hall.

"And this, undoubtedly, is a major contribution by the capitals mayor Sergei Semyonovich Sobyanin," the president said. "This is your achievement," the president told the mayor to the applause. According to Putin, the mayor "is not afraid to assume responsibility when making, unfortunately, not always popular but necessary decisions." "And, of course, a credit should be given to the entire Moscows management team," the president added.

According to the head of state, "the Moscow business, industry, construction in many ways are not only the indicators of overcoming the consequences of the downturn caused by the epidemic but they also demonstrate, ensure, good development rates that have already surpassed the 2019 level."

"The capitals doctors, nurses, ambulance teams - all medical workers, despite the increased workload, fatigue accumulated over these difficult months - we understand this very well, we realize that - nevertheless, all the medical personnel continues to work intensively, selflessly," Putin said. He noted that effective treatment methods are being developed, doctors cooperate with their colleagues in the regions, Moscow scientists developed reliable Sputnik V, Sputnik Light and CoviVac vaccines.

The president thanked separately all Moscow residents for their "patience and resilience" as well as volunteers for their effort.
Palestinian radicals from the Gaza Strip fired a rocket in the direction of Israel. The missile was intercepted by the Iron Dome aerial defence system.

"After the sirens sounded in the south of Israel, we inform that one missile was fired from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory. It was intercepted by the Iron Dome aerial defence system," the press service of the Israel Defense Forces informed.
Several popular resorts on Egypts north coast closed their beaches on Friday after a man was injured in an alleged shark attack that caused widespread panic on social media, The National reports.

A lifeguard working at a popular gated beach resort on the north coast was reportedly performing a routine patrol of the water when he was injured. The man is alive and his wounds have been treated.

The resorts management quickly reported the incident to the authorities, claiming that two sharks had been sighted in the water. A swimming ban was quickly sent out to all the resorts residents who were asked to stay out of the water until further investigations could be carried out.

News of a shark attack on the Mediterranean coast began to spread like wildfire, causing shock and panic. Many social media users expressed their surprise, as shark attacks are usually associated with the Red Sea.

In response to the mounting hysteria online, Egypts Environment Ministry issued a statement on Friday afternoon explaining that it had received a report of a shark attack and that it had sent a team to investigate the water and to examine the lifeguards injuries.

The ministry denied that the mans injuries were caused by a shark bite, explaining that its medical team had found that the man's wounds had been caused by a sharp metal object and not a shark.

No shark attacks have ever been reported on Egypts Mediterranean shores, the ministry said.
Russia sees no threat of migration of the instability from Afghanistan to the territory of its allies in Central Asia, but "keeps its gunpowder dry" just in case, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Friday, TASS reports

"We keep our gunpowder dry, of course. But, at this point, we have no reason to see a real threat of migration of these troubled events to our allies territory. But we do everything to be ready for such a situation," he said.

He added that Russia worked closely with its Central Asian allies, including in the military sense.

Following the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Taliban movement (outlawed in Russia) promptly seized control over the country. By September 8, the Taliban formed an interim government that only includes members of the movement.
Although the Vietnamese rice industry has set itself an ambitious export target for 2021, domestic rice farmers and suppliers remain cautious amid the ongoing health crisis and complications in international trade.

The Vietnam Food Association (VFA) expects to export up to 6.2 million tonnes of rice this year. However, pressure has accumulated this year as Vietnams rice exports in the first seven months only reached about 3.5 million tonnes, down 12.7 per cent over the same period in 2020.

Vietnams rice exports are shifting to higher-value varieties, while accepting a partial reduction in export volume. In 2020, the nation exported 6.15 million tonnes of rice, reaching a turnover of over $3 billion, down 3.5 per cent in volume and up 9.3 per cent in value compared to 2019.

Vietnam is already a major rice production centre of the world, said Hoang Trong Thuy, an agricultural researcher in Vietnam.

Nevertheless, Vietnams 2021 target for rice exports may not be reached, as the pandemic and other difficulties in overseas markets are threatening this goal.

Data from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) showed that rice prices increased in the first seven months of 2021, albeit with limited supplies due to the ongoing health crisis.

The local anti-pandemic measures have led to a fundamental change in the management of rice production, Thuy explained.

Thuy, who has conducted more than 40 years of research in agriculture, said that before the pandemic, rice farmers were insecure about this years summer-autumn crop, due to the higher price of fertilisers. And now, there are many signs of them focusing on the autumn-winter crop.

Complex situation

The pressure has been obvious in many of the industrys recent video conferences, reflecting the growing concern of state management agencies that aim to ensure rice exports keep up to maintain Vietnams second position in the world market.

However, the rice supply chain is fragmented, with weakened production and less confidence on the side of the purchasing enterprises. These shortcomings may even exacerbate the internal problems of Vietnams agricultural sector and weigh on its growth.

The supply of rice from Vietnam to the world market is showing signs of decline, mostly because of delayed transportation and global food hoarding. Data from the MARD showed that rice exports to Malaysia have plummeted by nearly 60 per cent in volume and more than 50 per cent in value.

Meanwhile, exports to the Philippines continued on the previous downward trend. In the first seven months, exports to this market decreased by 15 per cent (1.27 million tonnes) compared to the same period last year.

The Philippines is the leading market for imported rice from Vietnam. But as that nations president ordered temporarily adjusting the import tax rate for rice since May, the numbers have been declining. The adjustment of the rice import tax to 35 per cent helps the Philippines to secure a stable rice supply amid the pandemic. The country is expected to import about 1.69 million tonnes of the grains this year, according to its Department of Agriculture.

The presidents ordinance is valid for one year, causing Vietnamese rice exporters to lose their advantage, while other countries like India and Pakistan  the strongest competitors to Vietnam  profit from this ordinance.

In Vietnam, the re-emergence of COVID-19 caused huge changes in rice production and trading, stemming from concerns of many businesses about slowed down exports and plummeting prices. Data from the VFA showed that the export price of Vietnams broken rice fell to $385 per tonne in the trading session on August 19, down $83 compared to the beginning of July, and the lowest level since February 2020.

Towards pole position

Trung An High-Tech Agriculture JSC was expected to resume exports to South Korea on August 16, according to a directive of the prime minister. Pham Thai Binh, general director of Trung An, said that the company had to change this plan because the southern provinces continued to implement social distancing. The total amount of Trung Ans rice to be delivered is more than 22,000 tonnes, but the company will have to renegotiate the delivery time and carefully calculate new orders.

Binh realised that Vietnams rice exports are being affected by the large imports of Indian rice. Vietnam has become Indias eighth-largest rice importer. Indias rice exports to Vietnam reached nearly 247,000 tonnes in the first three months of 2021, an increase of more than 325 per cent over the same period in 2020, according to Indias Ministry of Trade and Industry.

Binh said that Vietnam is allowing rampant rice imports, though the country annually produces over 43 million tonnes of rice itself, with 6-7 million tonnes reserved for exports. In most trade agreement negotiations, Vietnam tries to ask countries to increase rice imports. During the 10 years of negotiating the deal with the European Union, the bloc has given Vietnam a quota of 80,000 tonnes of rice.

The benefits of the ASEAN-India Free Trade Area explain Indias increasing rice exports to Vietnam. According to the special preferential import tariff of the agreement, various sorts of broken rice imported from India enjoy zero tariffs. Because a tonne of Vietnamese rice is about $100 more expensive than Indian rice, difficulties with origin fraud are on the horizon.

Le Thanh Tung, deputy director of the Crop Production Department under the MARD, found that with a total of 8.5 million tonnes of rice in the summer-autumn crop this year, farmers in the Mekong Delta had to spend more than VND1.25 trillion ($52.82 million). According to calculations by the Ministry of Finance, the average price of summer-autumn rice in 2021 from the Mekong Delta only rose by 0.5 US cents compared to the summer-autumn crop in 2020.

According to Tung, in August and September, Vietnam has the highest commercial rice production. But so far, only about 600,000 hectares of the summer-autumn crop have been harvested. Some localities have started sowing the autumn-winter crop already, but as the price of rice has decreased, and harvesting and processing remain difficult, some farmers are hesitant to start with the new crop.

Tung hopes that the measures to support businesses and farmers to overcome the current difficulties are soon deployed, which would contribute to ensuring this years rice export target of the country.

The US Department of Agriculture in May forecast that Vietnam would continue to rank second in rice exports in 2021, while global demand and reserves remain high. Global rice imports are expected to amount to about 44.8 million tonnes, up 1 per cent compared to 2020. Some markets that are expected to continue to increase rice imports are the Philippines (up 13 per cent), the Ivory Coast (up 9.1 per cent), Ghana (up 5.6 per cent), and the European Union (up 2.1 per cent). China will remain the largest rice importer in 2021 with 2.9 million tonnes, followed by the EU with 2.45 million tonnes and the Philippines with 2.2 million tonnes  all of which are also the main export markets of Vietnamese rice.

Source: VIR
Spending 11 years researching herbs used for cancer drugs, a university lecturer, now 33, has decided to return to school to study for a masters degree to reach her goal.

Nguyen Thi Ngoc Hanh

As a child, Nguyen Thi Ngoc Hanh, dreamed of creating a cancer drug with low production costs made of Vietnams medicinal herbs.

In 2007, Hanh registered to study biotechnology at the HCM City University of Technology. After graduation, she continued studying for a masters degree at the International University in 2012.

During and after the study for masters degree, Hanhs research focused on developing drugs to treat cancer from herbs. Her masters thesis on isolation of exopolysaccharide with biological activity from slime mold in 2015 was cited by the scientific council as having high practicality.

She decided, however, to postpone a doctoral program because she could not receive funding for her project on drug development.

During that time, I had three big concerns  researching anti-cancer active elements; improving the awareness of the community of cancer patients about living well and happily with the disease; and carrying out activities to support the community of cancer patients."

According to Hanh, many cancer patients have no access to the right knowledge and treatment methods. And many people abuse traditional herbal medicine, functional food and non-official therapies. This makes them miss the golden time for cancer treatment.

When they go back to the hospital for treatment, their conditions are too serious, or if they still can be treated, the treatment is very expensive.

Hanh said heightening awareness in the community, together with treatment, is needed. If cancer patients have better knowledge about treatment, they can overcome or deal with side effects and successfully follow the treatment process.

The research in Vietnam can only isolate the compounds that kill cancer cells, but in-depth research is needed on virulence and disease models, as well as clinical trials, to produce authentic pharmaceutical products.

Hanh wants to develop cancer drugs from medicinal herbs, identify toxins and the right dosage, to create useful and safe drugs.

Hanh understands that if she doesnt have knowledge to upgrade the research on anti-cancer compounds, the potential antineoplastic agents cannot be developed into pharmaceutical products.

That is why she decided to seek a scholarship to study abroad to do further work research on Vietnams medicinal herbs.

Hanh first learned about Cancer Research UK during her research, the world's largest fund for cancer research and philanthropy.

The more I learned about the fund, the more I wanted to UK to study, so that, when returning to Vietnam, I can create beneficial activities for cancer patients in the country, she said.

Hanh decided to apply for Chevening scholarship in 2018. However, she could not persuade the jury board to grant her a scholarship that year.

However, she did not give up. Three years later, after a lot of effort, she succeeded in obtaining the scholarship granted by the UK Government. This year, she was chosen to study for a masters degree in cancer research and precision oncology at Glasgow University.

After four years, I finally have the opportunity to set foot in the UK to fulfill my dream of learning how to research and develop cancer drugs as well as learn the skills to operate activities that support cancer patients, she said.

Thuy Nga

PhD production plan: Will Project 89 go a new way? Before launching Project 89 that aimed to produce 7,300 more lecturers with a doctoral degree, the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) ran two projects on preparing human resources with doctoral and masters degrees, worth trillions of VND.
A quick survey of businesses via the webinar "FPT eCovax  the digital solution for businesses to overcome the pandemic" found three major problems that businesses are facing now.

First, productivity decline as workers work from home (43 percent). Second, congestion of papers, bills and contracts because of the work-from-home regime (20 percent). Third, interruption in communication and information exchange (13 percent).

Businesses also don't know how the pandemic will develop or how to cope with it.

Le Van Thanh, Chair of Dong Luc Group, said his company is now facing problems which had never happened during its 32-year operation. The pandemic has caused a dramatic drop in turnover and upset all business strategies.

His shops all have closed during social distancing and the company contacts clients via online channels, including social networks, Zalo and e-commerce sites. The work of seeking clients can be implemented only via these platforms.

Shifting from offline to online sales is the only choice for now.

This is a great challenge, because we communicated with clients face to face in the past, he said.

He said that going digitized is a must. Building a website for niche markets is crucial and it needs to be updated. The company app serves online sales for sale agents and clients.

Marketing and sales in the time to come will mainly be done via online, with interactions on e-commerce sites and social networks, he said.

Do Thanh Nam, Card and Digital Banking Director of Vietbank, said the bank has been seriously hit by the pandemic. Officers dont have enough equipment and tools to work from home. The coordination among divisions of the bank is difficult.

The bank lacks workers for some services such as card production and supplying banknotes for ATMs (auto telling machines).

Because of the pandemic, clients are reluctant to make transactions. This has affected deposits, lending and growth. The bank has to try every possible way to interact with clients, including Zalo, chatting apps, and social platforms. However, bank officers communicate with clients mostly via calls, which is costly.

CEO Nguyen Tri Anh of MED-GROUP, a business in the healthcare sector, said the number of clients has soared during the pandemic.

There are two problems. First, we have to ensure safety for both workers, doctors and clients and patients. Second, we need to organize the operation so it goes smoothly and effectively, though the workload has increased dramatically, he said.

Anh said that the company would not be able to exist if it did not apply technology.

It is estimated that the company now has to test 20,000-40,000 samples each day, or five times higher than ordinary days. This doesnt include 20,000 samples tested in localities.

At this moment, I believe that all businesses are aware of the importance of technology application, he said.

Speeding up digital transformation

According to Do Thanh Nam of Vietbank, the banks leadership set a roadmap for the digitization process in 2025-2030. Because of the pandemic, the process has accelerated.

Vietbank launched new services after the pandemic broke out, such as withdrawal of cash without using cards, eKYC (electronic Know Your Customer) , and products on social platforms.

The bank has completed a bank app which satisfies all the requests of the clients, replacing 70-80 percent of traditional banking services.

These include new digital products such as new online card and bank account, contactless card technology, and card security development at highest level. The bank has also cooperated with marketplaces and retailers to provide services. Clients dont need to go to stores, but can shop online.

Nguyen Xuan Khoa from TH Food Chai JSC said the company will speed up digital transformation.

He cited tasks that need to be done, from a customer care system to better understanding of customers needs and directly communicating with clients. Speeding up and connecting e-commerce sites, promoting online payments, and connecting e-wallets and electronic payment portals are also important.

Nguyen Van Khoa, CEO of FPT, the Vietnamese largest information technology corporation, said that small and micro enterprises need to determine what is needed now.

I recommend that they spend VND1-3 million a month to use SaaS (Software as a service) products. This is just like buying a car. We dont necessarily have to buy an expensive car. The most important thing is that we use the car effectively, he said.

Duy Anh

Infrastructure ready for digital economy, society: Minister Green and digital development is the main development trend in the first half of the 21st century.
With a vote of confidence of 100%, Mr. Nguyen Dang Binh, Deputy Secretary of Bac Kan Provincial Party Committee was elected as Chairman of Bac Kan Provincial People's Committee for the 2021-2026 term.

Chairwoman of the Bac Kan Provincial People's Council Phuong Thi Thanh congratulates the newly-elected Chairman of Bac Kan Provincial People's Committee Nguyen Dang Binh.

Binh was elected at an unscheduled meeting of the People's Council of Bac Kan province on September 9.

Mr. Binhs predecessor is Mr. Nguyen Long Hai, an alternate member of the Party Central Committee, who has been appointed by the Politburo as the Secretary of the Party Committee of the Central Enterprise Block.

Previously, on September 8, the Party Committee of Bac Kan province held a conference to announce the decision of the Secretariat of the Party Central Committee on the resignation of Mr. Binh as Vice head of the Office of the Central Party Committee to assume the position of Deputy Secretary of Bac Kan Provincial Party Committee for the 2020-2025 term.

Mr. Binh was born on May 8, 1978, in Xuan Canh commune, Dong Anh district, Hanoi. He holds a doctoral degree in economics.

The newly-appointed Deputy Secretary of the Bac Kan Provincial Party Committee grew up from the Ministry of Planning and Investment. In 2009, he was Head of the Balance and Forecasting Division of the Department of National Economic Summary. In 2013, he was appointed Deputy Director of the National Economic Summary.

In June 2013, he joined the Office of the Party Central Committee, holding the position of Director of the General Department. In September 2019, he was appointed as assistant to the Secretary of the Party Central Committee. In April 2020, he was appointed Deputy Chief of the Office of the Party Central Committee.

Thu Hang
Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong hosted a reception in Hanoi on September 11 for Wang Yi, State Councillor and Foreign Minister of China,

who is in Vietnam for an official visit and to co-chair the 13th meeting of the Steering Committee for Vietnam-China Bilateral Cooperation.

Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong (R) greets Wang Yi, State Councilor and Foreign Minister of China (Photo; VNA).

Minister Wang Yi congratulated Vietnam on the successful organization of the 13th National Party Congress and noted his belief that under the leadership of the Communist Party of Vietnam headed by General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong, the Vietnamese people will achieve the development goals for 2030 and 2045 set by the Congress.

The Chinese minister informed this host on the common perceptions and important outcomes reached during the 13th meeting of the Steering Committee for Vietnam-China Bilateral Cooperation.

He stated that the two sides should strengthen political trust, promote cooperation across the fields and constantly enrich the content of the China-Vietnam comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership.

Wang also said China is willing to work with Vietnam in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic.

Welcoming Wang and the Chinese delegation to Vietnam, Party General Secretary Trong appreciated the outcomes of the 13th meeting of the Steering Committee for Vietnam-China Bilateral Cooperation and the official visit by the Chinese Foreign Minister. He said the visit will contribute to promoting cooperation between the two countries in the time ahead.

The Vietnamese Party leader congratulated China on the 100th founding anniversary of the Communist Party of China and the 72nd National Day of China. He re-affirmed that the Vietnamese Party and State attach importance to the neighbourly friendship and the comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership between Vietnam and China.

Appreciating the good developments in the relations between the two Parties and countries in the recent past, General Secretary Trong proposed that the two sides continue to increase high-level contact, strengthen mutual friendship and political trust, enhance the effectiveness of cooperative mechanisms between the two Parties and promote the sharing of experience in Party building and national governance.

The Party chief also urged promoting win-win substantial collaboration between the two countries ministries, sectors and localities, bolstering educational work to raise the awareness of their people, especially young generations, about the traditional friendship between the two Parties and nations, and patiently settling disputes and differences, thus helping boost the healthy and sustainable development of the Vietnam-China comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership for the benefits of their people./.

Vietnam treasures relations with China: PM Pham Minh Chinh

Vietnam attaches importance to developing ties with China and considers this as a leading priority in its foreign policy, PM Pham Minh Chinh told Chinese State Councillor and Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi at their meeting on September 11.

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh (R) and Chinese State Councillor and Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi in Hanoi on September 11 (Photo: VNA)

Vietnam attaches importance to developing ties with China and considers this as a leading priority in its foreign policy, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh told Chinese State Councillor and Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi at their meeting in Hanoi on September 11.

The host leader affirmed that the traditional friendship between Vietnam and China is a precious asset of the countries Parties, States, and peoples, and that the reinforcement of bilateral relations is an important factor for each countrys development and also a contribution to regional and global peace, cooperation, and development.

He expressed his belief that both sides will work together to effectively implement the common perceptions and agreements reached at the 13th meeting of the Vietnam - China Steering Committee for Bilateral Cooperation, maintain frequent contact between their senior leaders, and further promote exchange and cooperation mechanisms to enhance mutual understanding and trust, thus fostering relations between the two Parties and States in an increasingly substantive and effective manner.

With regard to cooperation in the COVID-19 fight, PM Chinh lauded the countries close coordination and mutual support since the pandemic broke out and thanked China for assisting Vietnam with vaccine via different forms, especially the provision of another 3 million vaccine doses announced during this trip by Wang.

He expressed his hope that China will continue supplying vaccine for Vietnam; transfer production technology for COVID-19 vaccine and treatment drugs; carry out COVID-19 vaccine purchase contracts to meet Vietnams demand, particularly in this September and October; share experience in disease treatment; and coordinate in controlling the pandemic in border areas.

For economic ties, the Government leader asked both sides to facilitate cross-border trading, especially the trading of Vietnams farm produce, aquatic products, and seasonal fruit, to help balance bilateral trade. He called for coordination to remove obstacles to investment projects, including the Cat Linh - Ha Dong urban railway project.

He also encouraged Chinese enterprises to invest in projects that match the two countries relations so that the people can enjoy the benefits from the substantive achievements of the bilateral friendship.

In terms of the East Sea issue, in a straightforward and constructive spirit, the PM stressed that both sides should instruct their law enforcement forces at sea to adhere to the high-level common perceptions and the Vietnam - China agreement on basic principles guiding the settlement of sea-related issues, strive to properly settle and control disputes well, maintain a peaceful and stable environment at sea; while working with ASEAN countries to seriously implement the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the East Sea, step up the negotiation on a substantive and effective Code of Conduct in the waters, comply with international law, especially the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), and ensure security, safety, and freedom of navigation and overflight.

For his part, State Councillor and Foreign Minister Wang affirmed that the Chinese Party, State, and people attach great importance to the friendly neighbourliness and comprehensive cooperation with their Vietnamese counterparts.

He thanked Vietnam for supporting and assisting China since COVID-19 first broke out, stressing that China is ready to continue helping Vietnam in the current period as it considers the difficulties facing Vietnam as its own.

He expressed support for PM Chinhs opinions about the orientations and measures for reinforcing the two Parties and countries relations.

China will effectively carry out the outcomes of the 13th meeting of the Steering Committee for Bilateral Cooperation, further intensify win-win cooperation in all fields, and seriously carry out the high-level common perceptions about the control and proper settlement of disagreements, thereby unceasingly developing the China - Vietnam comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership in a healthy and stable manner to bring practical benefits to both peoples, the Chinese official affirmed.

Foreign ministers talk measures for strengthening Vietnam - China ties

Vietnamese Minister of Foreign Affairs Bui Thanh Son and Chinese State Councillor and Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi held talks in Hanoi on September 11, discussing ways to promote the countries comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership.

The two sides applauded the recent strides in the Vietnam - China relations, stressing that the frequent meetings in flexible forms between senior leaders of the countries Parties and States since the beginning of 2021 have mapped out major orientations for bilateral cooperation and created an important driving force for exchanges and cooperation in various fields.

They agreed that amid the complex and considerably changing international situation, Vietnam and Chinas enhancement of political trust and comprehensive cooperation matches the fundamental and long-term interests of both the peoples.

In the time ahead, the two foreign ministries will keep working closely to advise the countries leaders in increasing contact; stepping up friendship exchanges and all-round cooperation at all levels between sectors, localities, and peoples; tightening links in economy, trade, and the areas for which both sides hold potential, especially in infrastructure building and transport projects connecting the two countries; and bolstering the exchange of opinions about and mutual support in multilateral issues and at multilateral organisations.

The officials discussed specific measures to enhance bilateral coordination in COVID-19 prevention and control and maintenance of trading and economic activities.

FM Son thanked the Chinese Government for providing Vietnam with an additional 3 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine. He expressed his hope that the two countries will keep strengthening ties in the COVID-19 combat, particularly in terms of vaccine.

The host asked China to provide favourable customs clearance procedures for Vietnamese goods, especially farm produce, at border gates and permit more fruits from Vietnam to be exported via official channels to China, thus helping to balance bilateral trade and sustain their supply and production chains.

He also called for coordination to speed up joint projects such as the Cat Linh - Ha Dong urban railway project in Hanoi and some others on social welfare funded by China.

At the talks, the two sides gave open and straightforward opinions about border and territorial issues. They suggested detailed measures for land border management on the basis of reached agreements and legal documents on border, especially keeping close coordination among the mechanisms of the Land Border Joint Committee and localities so as to share information and handle emerging issues in a timely manner.

The ministers agreed to continue seriously complying with the common perceptions reached between senior Vietnamese and Chinese leaders, controlling sea-related disputes well, jointly maintaining peace and stability in the East Sea, and together with ASEAN countries stepping up negotiations to soon attain an efficient, effective, and substantive Code of Conduct in the East Sea that is in line with international law, including the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

Minister Son emphasised the need to respect the rights and legitimate interests of coastal countries in conformity with international law, including the 1982 UNCLOS.

The two officials also highly valued the increasingly fruitful cooperation between the two foreign ministries, agreeing to intensify the collaboration between the ministries agencies./.

Source: VNA
NanoDragon, a nano-layer cubesat satellite developed by the Vietnam National Space Centre (VNSC) under the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, is scheduled to be launched into orbit from Japan on October 1.







NanoDragon, a nano-layer cubesat satellite developed by the Vietnam National Space Centre (VNSC) under the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, is scheduled to be launched into orbit from Japan on October 1. (Photo: VNSC)

The 3.8-kilogramme satellite will be sent into outer space from the Uchinoura Space Center in Japans Kagoshima prefecture, following the launch of the 1-kilogramme microsatellite PicoDragon and the 50-kg satellite MicroDragon, also developed by the VNSC, in 2013 and 2019, respectively.

In 2023, LOTUSat-1, an earth observation satellite manufactured by Japan under a VNSC project, is expected to be launched, making it the first radar observation satellite of Vietnam.

These mark the first major steps forward taken by the countrys fledgling aerospace industry.

PicoDragon was completely built in Vietnam by a group of local researchers who had zero experience in the field, said VNSC General Director Assoc. Prof., Dr. Pham Anh Tuan. They were experts in different areas of the science-technology industry before gathering for the project, so they got shaky at first and started to learn everything from scratch, he said.

MicroDragon, meanwhile, was created in a more professional environment in Japan with 36 Vietnamese engineers in support of Japanese professors and more advanced technologies, according to Tuan.

NanoDragon was completely made in Vietnam and by Vietnamese engineers from the VNSC, from the stage of design through manufacturing, testing and others.

Dr. Le Xuan Huy, VNSC Deputy Director and a member of the research team, said NanoDragon is yet to reach expectation as it was developed with limited infrastructure. To partly fix the problems, the team had to ask for cooperation from foreign partners to have some parts of the project done overseas, he added.

The developers expect the satellite will function well to monitor marine vehicles with an automatic identification system and send relating data back to the ground.

Vietnam should view the aerospace as one of the five spaces it must master to be capable of safeguarding the national interests, Tuan said. Aerospace technologies require big resources, from capital to human resources and time, to ensure its balanced and sustainable development, he noted, adding that to boost the space science and industry, the country needs to stimulate demand for related technologies.

NanoDragon is the result of a project to design, manufacture, launch and test operation of a nano-sized microsatellite under the national space science and technology programme in the 2016-2020 period.

The government has recently approved a strategy for the development and application of aerospace science and technology by 2030 with an aim to expand the use of these technologies, master the design and manufacturing technologies of earth observation satellites, and support start-ups in the field.

Vietnams mission of conquering the space will be of the future generation but the mission to form an innovation culture and nurture passion for science among young people belongs to that of today, Tuan stressed./.

Source: VNA
The provinces of Binh Dinh and Ba Ria - Vung Tau have sent dozens of buses to HCM City to transport children, pregnant women, and disadvantaged people from Ho Chi Minh City back to their hometowns.

On the morning of September 10, 20 buses carried 450 people citizens of the central province of Binh Dinh who were stuck in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnams largest Covid-19 epicenter, to Quy Nhon city, Binh Dinh. Among them, there were 373 students, 41 pregnant women and 36 disadvantaged people.

Upon arriving in Quy Nhon, they were brought to concentrated quarantine sites or hotels where they have to pay quarantine fees. Pregnant women were sent for home quarantine.

Binh Dinh province plans to send about 40 buses more to pick up Binh Dinhs students who are now in HCM City and pandemic-hit southern provinces back to their hometown to enter the new school year, which started on September 9.

Previously, on September 9, a flight carrying 193 Binh Dinh residents in Ho Chi Minh City to their hometown landed safely at Phu Cat airport. Passengers were also pregnant women, disadvantaged people and children.

This was the ninth flight in a series of free flights offered by the authorities of Binh Dinh province in combination with the Association of Binh Dinh Citizens in HCM City to bring Binh Dinh residents back home. The previous eight flights transported 1,514 Binh Dinh residents from HCM City and some southern provinces to Binh Dinh.

At the same time, the southern province of Ba Ria - Vung Tau on September 9 picked up the first 26 local residents, including 24 pregnant women and two children from HCM City by bus. These people are at a concentrated quarantine center in Chau Duc district.

Thousands of Ba Ria-Vung Tau citizens working and living in Ho Chi Minh City have registered to return to their hometown. Theprovince is working on a plan to repatriate its citizens back home, with priority given to pregnant women, children, and the elderly.

Binh Dinh's residents in Ho Chi Minh City in protective clothes at a bus station to return to their hometowns.

Upon arriving in Quy Nhon City, Binh Dinh province, they immediately moved to the concentrated quarantine site based in a kindergarten.

Q.T - Quang Hung
Dr Kidong Park, Representative of the World Health Organisation (WHO) in Vietnam, has highlighted the Vietnamese Governments measures and efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic.

browser not support iframe.

The whole-of-society approach is led by the highest level of the Government, with the Prime Minister now heading the National Steering Committee for COVID-19 prevention and control. This demonstrates the strong determination of the Government to combat the outbreak situation, Park said in an inclusive interview granted to the Vietnam News Agency (VNA) on September 10.

Following is the full text of the interview.

What are the WHOs opinion of safely living with the COVID-19 pandemic? What are the specific steps Vietnam should take to safely adapt to life amid the pandemic?

The world has been fighting this pandemic profusely in the past 20 months. In Vietnam, our early and strong action in 2020 kept in virus at bay. However, we have been facing the most challenging phase of the pandemic in the last four and half months. Vietnam has been taking a whole-of-society approach to limit transmission and save peoples lives.

It now seems clear that globally, the virus will not disappear  at least not in the near future. The virus will continue to spread and endanger peoples lives. It will also have both short- and long-term financial consequences.

At the same time, we have gained more knowledge on the virus  its characteristics and who are at higher risk of severe disease. We also have effective tools to fight the virus  5K and vaccine.

With this in mind, WHO can see some scenarios for the future.

The first scenario is where our actions allow us to live with the virus, also called the NEW NORMAL.

We reduce the risk it poses by making the best use of vaccination and other prevention measures, and respond with short, targeted measures.

This does not mean giving up on controlling the virus. We focus on trying to limit spread, protecting the most vulnerable, and in doing so, reduce the health and broader social impacts of outbreaks.

The second scenario is where more dangerous variants are able to evolve  variants that spread even more easily, cause more severe disease, or are resistant to existing vaccines.

This scenario  and all of the associated health, social and economic costs  is the one we wanted to avoid if possible.

Which of these two scenarios becomes reality depends on which individual and collective actions we choose to take in the weeks and months ahead. So it is in our power to shape the course that the pandemic takes next.

The Government may consider the followings to shape the future scenario of this pandemic toward more favorable one:

First, getting priority populations, especially health workers, older people, those with co-morbidities and then whole communities, vaccinated as quickly as possible is crucial.

Second, give more priorities of vaccination to areas with relatively weaker health system and fragile settings.

Third, continue to strictly practice 5K measures at home, school, workplace etc., with the personal protective behaviors and public health measures that reduce transmission even some social distancing measures are relaxed.

Fourth, further strengthen health system capacity to better manage serious COVID-19 patients while introducing appropriate right care pathway model to avoid overloading of hospitals with mild and moderate cases.

Using these tools in combination is the key to limiting spread, and the virus ability to mutate into more dangerous variants.

The Government, and with support from the people, can work hand in hand to do all we can to avoid the second future scenario.

What is WHOs assessment about Vietnams home-grown COVID-19 vaccine and medicine?

I am aware that a few COVID-19 vaccine candidates are being developed by manufacturers in Vietnam. Some are already at clinical trial phases.

WHO has supported Vietnam in strengthening the capacity of national regulatory authority of vaccine and medicine, the NRA. The NRA Vietnam has been certified as the Maturity Level 3 by WHO in 2020 which is the second highest level in WHO assessment scheme of NRA. It means that the NRA in Vietnam is capable to guide vaccine manufactures and evaluate the efficacy, safety and quality of vaccine candidates.

I would remind you that the development of new vaccine is very challenging task. Sometimes, it fails.

The best way to support the vaccine research and development in county is to let the NRA and the developer do it scientific way and do not skip any essential step to ensure efficacy, safety and quality of vaccines under development.

WHOs evaluation on the countrys COVID-19 prevention and control measures in the past time? What should Vietnam do in the time to com

Vietnam is still in a very complicated and difficult outbreak situation, with number of cases crossing more than half million since beginning of September. We continue to report high numbers of daily recorded cases and deaths over the past weeks, mainly from Ho Chi Minh City and neighboring provinces. This trend is concerning as it indicates a very high risk of onwards community transmission.

Health care facilities in outbreak provinces are overstretched, health care system is under a huge pressure and health care workers are overwhelmed.

The Government of Vietnam has been tirelessly implementing measures, making tremendous efforts and mobilising resources to fight this pandemic, especially to support hotspot provinces. We have seen human resources and technical experts sent for surge support to provinces that needed additional capacities.

The whole-of-society approach is led by the highest level of the Government, with the Prime Minister now heading the National Steering Committee for COVID-19 prevention and control. This demonstrates the strong determination of the Government to combat the outbreak situation.

There is still a lot of tasks ahead to overcome and the next few weeks will be critical. WHO remains confident that Vietnams robust public health emergency response is on the right track in managing the current outbreaks./.

Source: VNA
Ambassador Nguyen Hai Bang, Permanent Representative of Vietnam to ASEAN, chaired the 65th meeting of the Initiative for ASEAN Integration Task Force and the task forces 11th consultation with ASEAN partners via videoconference on September 9-10.

Participants in the virtual 65th IAI Task Force meeting.

Ambassador Nguyen Hai Bang, Permanent Representative of Vietnam to ASEAN, chaired the 65th meeting of the Initiative for ASEAN Integration (IAI) Task Force and the task forces 11th consultation with ASEAN partners via videoconference on September 9 and 10.

The meetings are regular events at the ambassador and permanent representative level between ASEAN countries and partners to review the implementation of projects within the IAI framework, and to propose measures for further improving the implementation effectiveness of IAI work plans.

The 65th IAI Task Force meeting listened to reports by Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, and Vietnam, which are the main beneficiaries of the IAI.

The task force acknowledged the official conclusion of the IAI Work Plan III (2016 - 2020) on July 31, 2021, with 23 of the 26 action lines implemented (equivalent to 88.5 percent) on all the five strategic areas, and 133 projects carried out at the total cost of 42.87 million USD. The three remaining proposed projects have been transferred to the IAI Work Plan IV.

The task force also approved one new project, raising the number of approved projects under the IAI Work Plan IV (2021 - 2025) to 22, including 17 funded by Singapore, three by Japan, one by Australia, and another co-sponsored by Singapore and Japan.

Ambassador Bang, who is also Chair of the IAI Task Force in 2021, applauded the completion with good outcomes of the IAI Work Plan III and highly valued the initial results of the projects under the Work Plan IV.

The task force agreed to continue stepping the implementation of the Work Plan IV, with a focus on settling socio-economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

At the 11th consultation between the task force and ASEAN partners, Australia, Japan, the Republic of Korea, China, New Zealand, Canada, the UK, and the EU affirmed continued support for ASEAN within the IAI framework, and that they will share opinions and experience to help carry out the Work Plan IV more effectively.

On behalf of the task force, Bang appreciated the partners contributions to the IAI projects, noting that these projects have been and will continue contributing to the ASEAN Comprehensive Recovery Framework as well as the blocs efforts in COVID-19 response.

He also appealed to the partners to keep actively contributing the IAI Work Plan IV.

The IAI was launched in 2000 with the goal of narrowing the developing gap among ASEAN countries and assisting new members (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, and Vietnam) to fully integrate into the regional economy./.

Source: VNA
Raytheon, the giant defense contractor with a plant in Waco, reveals that four employees from other locations were killed during the terrorist attacks in Washington, D.C., and New York. The company increases security at its massive plant at Texas State Technical College airport.

Extensive security checks at entrances to Fort Hood cause two- to three-hour waits to enter the post.

Stores report they are running out of American flags and red, white and blue items.

Business marquees in Waco proclaim God Bless America and America and Freedom will Prevail.

The Islamic Center of Waco is on heightened alert and plans a memorial service for the victims during its Friday service at the mosque.

Baylor University officials fear students with Middle Eastern backgrounds might be scapegoated and meet with international students to discuss safety precautions.

The owner of a local gun shop reports a 25 percent increase in the sale of ammunition and guns since the terrorist attacks.

Thursday, Sept. 13

A memorial service is held at Heritage Square in downtown Waco for victims of the terrorist attacks. The day is designated a county-wide day of mourning.
Commemorating the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on U.S. centers of commerce and military might that left nearly 3,000 dead means reevaluating many goals, many missions. Among them: our declared war on terrorism, a commitment President George W. Bush correctly warned would be long in the undertaking  and that he soon undermined by taking his eyes off the terrorists behind the 9/11 attacks and invading Iraq, upsetting the balance of Mideast power in ways that imperil us today.

Gauging goals means gauging other presidential administrations, including the Trump administration that negotiated de facto U.S. surrender terms with the Taliban. And it means gauging the Biden administrations precipitous withdrawal, even though chaos was always guaranteed in such an evacuation. Let no one claim the sacrifices of the 13 U.S. service members killed on Aug. 26 were in vain amid a remarkable airlift of some 120,000 people out of harms way, including U.S. citizens and Afghan refugees.

To a degree, the war on terrorism was a qualified success. It drove the Taliban into the hills, prevented further major terrorist attacks on our soil from abroad, and pursued and killed terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants. Yet it never exterminated the Taliban and always allowed for their return the moment we quit Afghanistan. If the outcome of the war on terrorism now seems murky, many of us must accept some of the blame. Except for those who saw loved ones serve in Afghanistan, Iraq and other volatile parts of the Mideast, few back home sacrificed. At one point, President Bush told us to shop. Never were we asked to pay a patriots tax to help fund a two-front war with an all-volunteer army. Instead, we kept cutting taxes, incurring billions in debt to heap on our progeny.
Day-and-date releases proliferated during the pandemic while studios turned to boosting their in-home streaming services and compensating for diminished ticket sales. Theater owners have said that sacrifices many millions in box office and may deter from a movie's cultural impact.

And, lately, the box-office returns  even during the recent coronavirus surge  have been promising. Disney's Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings smashed the record for Labor Day openings last weekend, earning $90 million over the four-day weekend. Many in the industry have taken that as proof of the power of a theater-only release, and a positive sign for the fall movie season. Sony Pictures immediately after moved up the release of its Marvel sequel, Venom: Let There Be Carnage.

Following the tremendous box office success of our summer films which included five of the top eight domestic releases of the year, we are excited to update our theatrical plans for the remainder of 2021, said Kareem Daniel, chairman of Disney Media & Entertainment Distribution. As confidence in moviegoing continues to improve, we look forward to entertaining audiences in theaters, while maintaining the flexibility to give our Disney+ subscribers the gift of Encanto this holiday season.

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Still, many labor leaders are hesitant to wade into the mandate issue. Many of the employers of the workers of the Laborer's District Council of Western Pennsylvania, like hospitals, have begun requiring vaccinations. Whenever members complain, the council's business manager, Phillip Ameris, tells them it's not the union's call.

"What we have said is, 'we encourage our members to the get the vaccine, but what were telling everyone to do is to go to your physician, Ameris said. Were trying to keep it nonpolitical. ... Go to your doctor and ask your doctor what is best for you.

Some of the most heated opposition has come from law enforcement unions. In Newark on Thursday, police and fire unions from across New Jersey protested against the mayor's vaccine mandate outside city hall. Police unions from Chicago to Richmond have pushed back against mandates in their cities. In Portland, Oregon, the local police union got its members exempted from the city's vaccine order and a group of police and firefighter unions are suing Gov. Kate Brown to block the state's vaccine requirement for its workers.
For those of us old enough to properly remember this day 20 years ago, it left an indelible scar that will likely remain with us for the rest of our lives Its still not an easy subject for discussion, especially given recent events, so rather than disappear down any number of rabbit holes those conversations might conjure, we thought our readers might like to hear what it was like for those who served with the 113th Wing Capital Guardians DC Air National Guard on September 11th, 2001  our first and lonely line of defense in that seemingly forgotten theatre of combat surrounding Washington DC that day. And one of our own belonged to this unit, Stephen Chapis; we feel sure that you will find his narrative as gripping and relevant as we did. On a personal note, I still recall the eery, nighttime roar of the 113th Wings F-16s  afterburners blazing  as they scorched over my home in Northern Virginia on regular occasions during the weeks following 9/11. Despite my unease at seeing such patrols and not knowing what they might be chasing, it was decidedly reassuring to see them guarding our skies

DARKEST OF DAYS 113th WING on 9/11

by Stephen Chapis

For the members of the 113th Wing, District of Columbia Air National Guard, Tuesday, September 11, 2001, was their first day back to work after returning from Red Flag two days prior. Upon realizing that America was under attack, and with smoke billowing from the Pentagon clearly visible from their flightline at Andrews Air Force Base, the Capital Guardians swiftly organized Combat Air Patrols over Washington, D.C., readying their F-16Cs for a new kind of warfare.

DEFENDING NORTH AMERICA

Before delving into the details regarding the 113th Wing on 9/11, its perhaps best to discuss a little history regarding the aerial defense of the homeland, and how the organizations came to be

Aerospace Defense Command (ADC) was created in 1946 as an integrated air defense system for the Continental United States (CONUS). In late 1956, as the Cold War became yet more frigid, the Joint Canadian-U.S. Military Group recommended the establishment of a defense network of the entire North American continent. Consequently, North American Air Defense (NORAD) was established in February 1957, with ADC forming a major component. At the height of the Cold War, ADC consisted of 93 active duty USAF interceptor squadrons, 76 ANG interceptor squadrons, Navy fighter squadrons, USAF and USN airborne early warning squadrons, as well as radar and anti-aircraft missiles units. All of these units were poised to repel any attack by Soviet bombers flying over the North Pole in the first strike on North America.

In 1977, both Congress and the USAF Chief of Staff instituted major re-alignments in order to reduce costs, and in 1979 ADC was inactivated and interceptor fighter squadrons were placed under Air Defense, Tactical Air Command (ADTAC). Throughout the 1980s, the number of interceptor squadrons slowly dwindled, followed by an even sharper reduction after the Soviet Union dissolved in 1989. On the morning of September 11, 2001, NORAD had just 14 fighter aircraft available at seven alert sites across the entire North American continent! On that morning, the Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) was defended by a pair of Massachusetts ANG F-15A Eagles of the 104th Fighter Wing (FW) at Otis Air National Guard Base and a detachment of two F-16ADFs from the North Dakota ANG 119th FW at Langley AFB, Virginia.

Whereas all other ANG units report to their respective state governors, the District of Columbia ANG reports directly to the President of the United States. Although the Block 30 F-16Cs of the DC ANG 121st FS were parked a mere 11 miles from the Pentagon, they were not part of NEADS. The events of that fateful morning would radically change the 113th in the post-9/11 world.

BACK TO THE ROUTINE, UNTIL

In the two weeks prior to September 11, 2001, the 113th had deployed from Andrews AFB in Clinton, Maryland to Nellis AFB in Las Vegas, Nevada, to take part in the Red Flag military exercises as part of their spin-up for an upcoming deployment to Operation Southern Watch in the skies over Iraq. Personnel and aircraft had returned to Andrews on Saturday, September 8 and were off-duty Sunday and Monday. On that gorgeous, fateful Tuesday morning the Capital Guardians had returned to their routine duties, but that would change forever in the coming hours

At 0800hrs in the 121st FS Operations Building adjacent to the flightline, several officers and NCOs gathered for the morning maintenance meeting. Those in attendance included then-Lieutenant Colonel (Lt Col) Marc Sass Sasseville, Director of Operations 121st FS; then-Captain (Capt.) Brandon IGOR Rasmussen, and then-Major Daniel Razin Caine, who was the Supervisor of Flying (SOF) that day. At the same moment, American Airlines Flight 11, a Boeing 767-223, took off from Boston-Logan International Airport bound for Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). As the DC Guardsmen organized the flight schedule for the coming week, Mohamed Atta launched the al Qaeda terrorist plot at 0814hrs when he hijacked American 11 over Albany, New York, and turned the aircraft towards New York City.

Twenty-eight minutes after Atta took control of that airliner, United Airlines Flight 175, a Boeing 767-222, en route from Boston Logan to LAX, was also hijacked. Simultaneously, the F-15s at Otis were ordered to battle stations and the scramble order came just four minutes later at 0845hrs. One minute later the course of American history was forever and horrifyingly altered when Atta flew American 11 into World Trade Center 1 (North Tower) at 465mph. The Eagles at Otis were wheels up at 0852hrs.

Back at Andrews, the maintenance meeting was interrupted just before 0900hrs when someone cracked the door open to inform the group that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center (WTC) and then closed the door. In a 2016 interview, now-Brigadier General (Brig Gen) Caine recalled, We all thought the weather must be bad in New York City and it was a case of a light airplane flying into a building inadvertently. Meanwhile, in northern Virginia, Technical Sargent (TSgt) Ralph Huppert, a bomb loader with the 113th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron (AMS), was on his way to the base when he heard the news of the first plane strike on the radio. He wondered to himself, What kind of idiot can hit a building on such a clear day?

A few minutes after hearing the news that an aircraft had struck the WTC, the planning meeting adjourned and Maj Caine and the others went into the lounge where a crowd had gathered around the television, watching the tragedy unfolding at Tower 1. Within minutes, they were stunned to see United 175, flown by Marwan al Shehhi, slam into WTC 2 (South Tower) at 0903hrs. Today, Brig Gen Caine vividly remembers that moment, We all stood there in silence as the second aircraft came into the picture and struck the second tower. We knew immediately that our country was under attack. You could have heard a pin drop for the first few seconds and then it was like a switch was thrown and we got to work. I went to the ops desk and picked up the phone and called the bomb dump and told them to uncrate the live AIM-9s and bring them around. They did not have a TV down there, so they thought I was nuts. Out on the Dulles Toll Road, TSgt Huppert heard the news of the second tower strike and mashed his accelerator  making the rest of his commute at high speed. A naval officer passed him at one point, the two of them briefly exchanging expressions of disbelief!

The air war over the United States was just beginning. By the time United 175 struck Tower 2, American Airlines Flight 77 had been under the control of hijacker-pilot Hani Hanjour for almost ten minutes. Like his fellow terrorists, Hanjour turned off the transponder, which kept flight controllers from seeing the Boeing 757s exact heading, altitude, and airspeed. At the 121st Ops Desk, Lt Col Sasseville had a phone to each ear. When Caine hung up the phone with the bomb dump, he immediately called the units Secret Service contact and asked what the Capital Guardians could do to help. He was told that they would call him back. He then attempted to contact Maj Billy Hutch Hutchinson who was leading a three-ship air-to-ground training mission over North Carolina. Caine was unable to contact Hutch directly due to the distance, so he did so through the Tennessee ANG KC-135 that was refueling the three DC Vipers. Caine ordered Hutch and his wingmen to RTB (Return to Base) as quickly as possible.

Meanwhile, Capt Rasmussen and then-1st Lieutenant Heather Lucky Penney were leaning on the desk because, as now-retired Maj. Rasmussen said in a recent interview, The ops desk is where we get our go orders. As Caine finished talking to the distant KC-135, another phone rang as he recalls; It was a military aid at the Presidential Emergency Ops Center (PEOC) at the White House. He said, Get anything you can airborne immediately; the nation is under attack. That is when General Wherley walked in. Brig Gen David F. Wherley, Jr. (1947-2009) was the 113th Wing Commander on 9/11. Rasmussen recounted this moment, General Wherley took the phone from Razin and said, Theyre loading missiles. You guys get ready to step while I get permission to use them. The aid at the PEOC was on another phone with a White House official who was face-to-face with Vice President Dick Cheney, who gave the order to get fighters airborne and do whatever necessary to protect the White House and take out any aircraft that threatens the Capitol. Gen Wherley took this to mean that his pilots would launch weapons-free. The Capital Guardians had their go orders.

In June 2016, now-Major General (Maj Gen) Sasseville talked about what he called the shortest flight briefing in history, Razin, Lucky, IGOR, and myself, plus the guys airborne on the training sortie were pretty much the full-time cadre of pilots that day. Wed just come back from Nellis and all the traditional Guardsmen went back to their civilian jobs. I said pretty much what we were going to do is point defense. Lucky and I would launch immediately without weapons so Razin and IGOR would wait until they had AIM-9s loaded. They would launch as Wild Flight. They had no operational weapons other than the 20mm TP (Target Practice) rounds in their wing-root mounted M61A1 Gattling gun  such ammunition would be about as effective at shooting down an airliner as the other kind of TP

When Sass wrapped up the briefing, he and Lucky went to life-support to suit up and it was there that they discussed the ominous tactics theyd have to employ if they had to bring down an airliner. Sasseville continued, I was an airline pilot, so I knew that the TP ammo would do nothing but go through the skin. Even if it hit a fuel tank it may not set off the spark to blow it up. Even if it did explode it might [not] be enough to bring it down. Even a heavily damaged airliner can still fly  look what happened with that DC-10 in Sioux City (referencing United Airlines Flight 232, a DC-10 which crash-landed in Sioux City, Iowa on July 19, 1989, after suffering the catastrophic failure of its tail-mounted engine, which led to the loss of all flight controls). So, we knew wed have to drop the jet. Wed have to make it stop flying.

With reports coming in that the missing American 77 was potentially headed south, NEADS scrambled the North Dakota ANG F-16ADFs (Quit Flight) out of Langley at 0924hrs, but the standard Cold War-era scramble procedure was for the Vipers to head east while climbing to 29,000 feet, which is what Quit Flight did for 60 miles before they were vectored northwest towards Baltimore-Washington International (BWI) Airport. While Quit Flight was getting airborne, hijacker-pilot Ziad Jarrah stormed the cockpit of United Flight 93, a Boeing 757, switched off the transponder, and turned back towards his assigned target.

It was now 0937hrs and Huppert was struggling to navigate through rush hour traffic on the crowded Beltway when Hanjour flew American 77 into the west side of the Pentagon at 530mph. In a 2014 interview, Huppert recalled, I saw the smoke rising into the air and I could smell it as I crossed the Woodrow Wilson [Bridge] because the wind was carrying it south down the Potomac. When I got to the shop, I immediately went to the flightline, where I joined the guys in dropping the travel pods and TERs and loading the AIM-9s so we could get jets in the air.

NO MATTER WHAT, IVE GOT YOUR BACK

On any given morning prior to 9/11, the 113th flightline was a somewhat serene and secluded locale. Situated in the southeast corner of Andrews AFB, the ramp was naturally isolated from view by a small gully and a grove of trees. It was not uncommon for maintenance personnel to hear birds chirping in the trees or see deer drinking from the creek while working on their Vipers. But on that morning, the pall of black smoke rising from the Pentagon was clearly visible over the trees as maintenance personnel worked feverishly to ready their Block 30s for war over the nations capital. Brig Gen Caine said of the men and women of the 113th AMS, The accomplishment of the maintenance guys on 9/11 was nothing short of extraordinary.

The exact timeline of events at Andrews that morning is understandably fuzzy, due to the frenetic nature of events taking place, but at some point, while Wild Flight was getting suited up, the three-ship training flight had landed. Since Hutch had the most fuel, albeit a paltry 2,800lbs, he was ordered to launch again and head north to look for any airliners coming down the river at low altitude, but he saw none and returned to Andrews.

At 0958hrs, just as Tower 2 collapsed in NYC, Brig Gen Wherley stopped his pilots just as they were running out the door towards the flightline. Brig Gen Caine recalled, General Wherley met us and gave us the very liberal rules of engagement (ROE) that were in effect that morning, and they pretty much put it all on us. Then he said something that I will never forget. He looked at Sass and me and then our wingmen and said, Look. I dont know what you are going to face out there, but one thing you gotta know is, no matter what, Ive got your back. I will never forget that moment.

At 1028hrs, as Tower 1 collapsed in NYC, Sasseville (Wild 1, F-16C 85-461) and Penney (Wild 2, F-16C 85-474) lit their afterburners and rocketed into the unknown with just 200 rounds of 20mm TP ammo between them. When they split up into their point defense combat air patrol (CAP) Sasseville re-evaluated his ramming tactic, When we got split up I knew we would not have time to rejoin to take out the airliner together, so I thought the best way to take it out was to go for the wing root, which would certainly bring it down.

Back on the ramp at Andrews, Caine (Wild 3, F-16C 86-209) and Rasmussen (Wild 4, F-16C 85-438) were watching the weapons load crews upload two live AIM-9Ls on each jet when Caine gave Rasmussen one final ROE (Rules of Engagement). Rasmussen remembered, Razin looked at me and said, Alright. Heres the deal, bro. Dont shoot it unless I shoot it first, and if I shoot it make sure it goes down. Thankfully it didnt come to that.

In aerial combat, pilots often establish a reference point from which the position of an aircraft can be determined. This reference point is called bullseye. When Sasseville and Penney headed west, Sasseville flew over a Target store south of Reagan National Airport that had the companys bullseye logo painted on the roof! So, he marked the location and informed Washington Center and Reagan Approach that the point was bullseye for what became a defensive counterair (DCA) mission. In June 2016, Rasmussen reflected on the early part of what would be a 3.8-hour sortie, Razin and I launched out of there just like we do every day of the week, but when we headed west I saw the smoke from the Pentagon. It was the blackest caldron of smoke Id ever seen. Thats when it got real. I mean it was like, No shit, youre in the show now. Lets go to work.

Once Caine and Rasmussen were airborne, Sasseville assigned each member of Wild Flight a quadrant of airspace around bullseye. When Rasmussen was assigned the southeast sector, which covered southern Maryland where Rasmussen and his wife lived, the air war over America suddenly became intensely personal for him, None of us had any inkling about what was going to happen that morning. When I got up, like everyone else I figured it was going to be another typical workday. Now it was mid-morning and I was literally flying Point Defense DCA over my own house.

As each pilot began to patrol their sector, they steeled themselves for the possibility of intercepting and shooting down United 93, unaware of the fact, as most were at the time, that United 93 crashed in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania at 1003hrs. Brig Gen Caine reflected, Ya know, there is not a day that goes by that I dont think of the passengers on United 93. I have no idea if we would have been able to do anything about it if we had to because of the timing and how things went down that day, but we did not have to because of the bravery of those passengers. The selfless sacrifice of the passengers on United 93, at least in the minds of the Capital Guardians, was the first strike back at al Qaeda in the War on Terror. That very morning, by themselves, when they knew absolutely what they were doing, they took on those terrorists in what was one of the boldest exhibits of the American spirit.

Rasmussen had barely begun to patrol his sector of airspace when he got his first vector of the day. He recalled, Washington Center vectored me south to intercept two tracks a mile apart, headed north at high speed and at low altitude. I thought to myself, They [terrorists] learned to fly formation did they? So I hauled ass south, locked them up, and rolled in on what turned out to be the Fargo Vipers. They were at about 5,000 feet and hauling the mail at about 450 knots. I rolled up so they could see me and called them on Guard and gave them the frequencies we were using and a quick brief on the DCA wed set up.

According to Penney, NEAD sent a tanker into the area so the Vipers could stay airborne and since theyd been airborne for quite a while at high speed, the Fargo jets hit the tanker first. In short order Wild and Quit Flights had their DCA firmly established and began rotating to the tanker that was orbiting at 25,000 feet right over downtown Washington, DC. Rasmussen praised the air traffic controllers on duty that day, Washington Center and Reagan Approach got up to speed real quick. Being air traffic controllers, it was not the first time theyd given vectors and traffic call-outs. Theyd call Bullseye and give us bearing, range, and altitude and wed run the intercept. It really went like clockwork. It was amazing.

Since they did not have live missiles loaded, Sasseville and Penney recovered at Andrews first while Caine, Rasmussen, and Quit Flight continued to run intercepts, often at rooftop level, on unidentified aircraft, and escorting them to the nearest airport. We intercepted a lot of people that day, everything from helicopters and private aircraft to business jets and airliners. As the day went on the airspace became cleaner and cleaner once the FAA called for the airspace shutdown, Caine remembers. Early in the mission, Rasmussen said every time he looked at his radar, he saw hit after hit after hit. IGOR recounted, We intercepted news helicopters and medevac helicopters headed to the Pentagon to evacuate casualties. We also did a lot of general aviation intercepts because some guy that has an airplane sees the stuff on TV and wants to see it for himself, so he takes off without a flight plan and trundles into the area until he gets a face full of F-16 and is told this is neither the time nor the place to be rubber-necking.

ESCORTING AIR FORCE ONE

After nearly four hours in the air, Wild 3 and 4 finally recovered at Andrews. By 1500hrs Caine said there was an AWACS, a KC-135, a KC-10, and a four-ship of Langley Eagles stacked up over Washington DC. Caine and Rasmussen were done flying for the day, but Sasseville and Penney now had live AIM-9Ls loaded on their jets, so they launched on their second sortie of the day. It would be a memorable flight.

Sass and Lucky joined the other fighters over DC and since the Capital Guardians were on their home turf and had an established relationship with the local controllers, they were the initial CAP commanders. Sass recalled what is likely to be the most memorable intercept of his life, AWACS vectored us about 120 miles to the west, but I wasnt sure what they wanted us to do at first. They were trying to get a fighter escort for Air Force One but were trying not to publicize it because we did not have secure comms. So, Lucky and I headed out there and two of the Eagles came with us. I put Lucky about 10 miles out in front as a pathfinder and the Eagles were high and to the right, while I joined up on the left-wing. I felt like I was being given the responsibility of getting the President back in [to Andrews], so out of habit I got in close to visually inspect the aircraft and then took up a position off the left-wing.

In addition to the DC F-16s and Langley F-15s, a pair of Texas ANG F-16s were five miles in trail. These six fighters escorted Air Force One all the way to its landing at Andrews. The Texas F-16s landed behind the VC-25, but Sasseville and Penney remained airborne another 45 minutes. At the conclusion of our interview, Sasseville reflected on this unique sortie, As far as I know that was the first and only time Air Force One had a fighter escort.

READY FOR THE UNKNOWN

As the day progressed, 113th maintenance personnel moved every available F-16 out to Taxiway Echo, as close to the runway as possible in case they needed to scramble to intercept any other hijacked airliners. Initially, the jets were loaded only with 20mm HEI and live AIM-9Ls because there were no live AIM-120s on the base. There were rumors that they would be coming in from an undisclosed location and would arrive around midnight. Huppert recalls, The 130 landed and did a 180 in the middle of the runway and taxied back to the first turn off. He rolled up to the first jet, did another 180, and parked with the loading ramp facing the F-16s. With the 130 still running, we lined up the jammers, unloaded the crated 120s, and took them directly to the jets where the load crews got them uploaded. It was a wild night.

During a brief moment of respite on an otherwise busy night, Huppert took a moment to marvel at the silent star-filled sky above Andrews, I looked up and saw no air traffic at all, but then coming from the south I saw the lights from a tanker and it was refueling an F-16. You could also see the lights of other F-16s in formation with the tanker. It was an amazing sight to see but also eerie when you realized that they were the only jets flying over DC that night.

Master Sergeant Michael Porter, a former bomb loader that had recently taken a position in the 113th Quality Assurance office, recalls seeing the tankers too and added that he could hear the F-16s changing power settings to maintain formation with the tanker. During the night Porter snapped fourteen surreal black & white photos of maintenance and weapons personnel preparing F-16s for a 6-hour midnight DCA mission. These photos, many of which are published here for the very first time, are the only known photos that document combat operations at Andrews AFB on September 11, 2001.

As the clock ticked past midnight and 9/11 became 9/12, the Capital Guardians went about their business of making every F-16 ready for round the clock patrols and standing ready to repel any follow-up attacks. Many members would remain at Andrews for almost 24 hours straight, leaving only when they were ordered to stand down. Although they appeared calm and resolute on the outside, they knew in the back of their minds that the 113th Wing, the United States, and the entire world would never be able to return to the seemingly care-free times that they enjoyed when the sun first rose on September 11, 2001  one of the darkest days in American history.

We thank our very own Stephen Chapis for this chilling article describing what it was like for the Capital Guardians, some of whom made it into the air to defend Washington, DC on 9/11. Chapis is a U.S. Air Force/Air National Guard veteran who deployed to Azraq, Jordan in 2003 as part of Operation Iraqi Freedom. He served as a bomb loader with the 113th Wing DC ANG between 1993-2014, although he was at Sheppard AFB in Texas for a training course during that dark day in September 2001.

And as an aside, while it might seem a little premature to think of the F-16 as a warbird these days, with the type still fielded in huge numbers throughout the U.S. inventory and the air arms of other nations, the Fighting Falcon has indeed entered warbird status, with several examples soon to join the civilian ranks within commercial operations providing adversary air combat training to military units around the world. So this story very much fits within our remit here
Andy Clark, a former Waterloo police officer, also presented emergency responders at the stations with a box of cupcakes from the organizers. Participants planned to do that at each of the stops, he said.

Clark also spoke to the group before it left the courthouse lot, urging support for police and mentioning an issue that has caused some in the Cedar Valley to rally around the Waterloo police.

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Police officers across this country need the support of all citizens  especially you, the silent majority, he said. Its a very difficult time for Waterloo cops, in addition to cops all over the country.

He brought up the griffin symbol that used to be on the side of Waterloo police vehicles and will soon be removed from uniforms and most other department property.

The red griffin design, which included the term vigilance, was officially retired by a unanimous vote of the City Council in August 2020. A new logo was approved on a 5-2 vote in May. Critics of the griffin logo have said it looks like a Klu Klux Klan dragon while supporters have denied any resemblance to that symbol or any connection to the racist organization.
Copyright  2021 Albuquerque Journal

A state district judge tossed a petition Friday that sought to disqualify Eddy Aragon as an Albuquerque mayoral candidate, alleging that he improperly listed a commercial address as his residence.

Second Judicial District Judge Joshua Allison dismissed the petition, finding that Aragons residence in a commercial office building doesnt disqualify him under the citys election code.

Allison found that Aragon lives in the city, and that the address on his voter registration corresponds with that listed on his declaration of candidacy  the two key requirements in the citys election code.

A conservative radio host and station owner, Aragon acknowledged he lives in the commercial building where he operates his radio station in the 2300 block of Renard SE.

He declared his candidacy Aug. 24, joining incumbent Tim Keller and Bernalillo County Sheriff Manuel Gonzales on the Nov. 2 ballot.

Whether Aragon is legally allowed to live in a commercial building is outside the scope of the case, Allison said.

This is a case where we have a person living in a place where he may not legally be permitted to live under city zoning codes, Allison said at the close of a three-hour hearing. Im not going to wade into those waters.

The petition was filed Aug. 31 by Esther Rivera, a registered city voter, asking the judge to direct Bernalillo County Clerk Linda Stover to disqualify Aragon and remove his name from the ballot.

The petition alleged that Aragons listed address is in an area zoned NR-BP  nonresidential/business park  which allows office and commercial uses, but not residential.

Stover said her office doesnt investigate the zoning designation of a candidates address.

We wait for a judge to tell us how this is handled, Stover said.

Also on Friday, a Santa Fe judge scheduled an emergency hearing Tuesday for Gonzales in his lawsuit against Albuquerque City Clerk Ethan Watson.

The suit alleges Watson showed bias in denying Gonzales more than $600,000 in public financing.
Copyright  2021 Albuquerque Journal

After nearly four years leading Albuquerques economic development efforts, Synthia Jaramillo has accepted a national position with the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

The opportunity to work directly with Hispanic business enterprises on a national scale is really exciting, Jaramillo told the Journal.

Jaramillo began her new role as senior vice president of corporate relations for the national Hispanic chamber this week, after leaving as Albuquerques economic development director.

Jaramillo, who worked for the Albuquerque Hispano Chamber of Commerce before taking the city job, said shes maintained a close relationship with the national chamber for much of her career, and the opportunity to help businesses grow on a national level appealed to her.

Im going to be doing what I was doing locally, but on a national scale, and thats really what excited me initially, Jaramillo said.

Jaramillo, the first Latina to serve as director of the citys economic development department, was appointed by Mayor Tim Keller in 2017.

Prior to her appointment, Jaramillo said the city had been engaged in traditional business recruitment and retention efforts. However, she said she felt the citys ability to work with small businesses, particularly those from minority communities, was lacking.

In all honesty, they just werent a priority before, Jaramillo said.

With Jaramillo in charge, the city opened a small business office and established its Albuquerque Minority Business Development Agency Business Center using a grant from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Jaramillo said the aspect of her tenure she was most proud of was helping to build a more diverse department that looked more like the community it served.

Just the fact that we were able to create a department thats reflective of Albuquerques community  that was huge for me and for (Keller), Jaramillo said.

Damian Lara, the departments deputy director, has been named interim director.

While keeping an Albuquerque home, Jaramillo plans to eventually relocate to Washington, D.C.
New Mexico beers are bringing home some medal.

The winners at the Great American Beer Festival were announced Friday via a live stream and New Mexico beers won medals in four different categories  two gold and two silver, to be exact.

Ex Novo Brewery in Corrales clenched a gold medal for Threat Level Turquoise in the American-Style Strong Pale Ale category. Ex Novo founder and president and Corrales native Joel Gregory opened his first location in Portland, Oregon, in 2014. He recently moved back to New Mexico and opened the Corrales brewery.

Were so proud of this beer, Gregory said. And are excited to represent New Mexico on a national scale.

Ponderosa also claimed gold in the Hoppy Lager category for its Italian Pilsner.

Marble Brewery, a staple in the New Mexico craft beer scene for more than a decade, is bringing home silver in the Extra Special Bitter category for its Eastside Special Bitter beer.

The team has weathered the storm and this win is the culmination of Marbles resilience, creativity and passion to represent New Mexico through world class beer, said Barbie Gonzalez, president and chief operating officer.

Marble brewmaster Josh Trujillo said, Beer built what we have and will continue to be our top priority.

Finally, Second Street won a silver for its Oktoberfest, a German-Style Marzen.

There were 98 categories and approximately 2,200 breweries from across the country participating. Judging for the festival took place at the end of August and beginning of September. However, this year the public portion of the event, which can draw crowds of up to 60,000, was canceled as a result of the pandemic.

Next years event will be the 40th anniversary and organizers plan to return to an in-person festival from Oct. 6 to 8 at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver.
Every year, about a month before the actual date, Geri Lynn Matthews feels 9/11 coming on.

I know its coming, and I want the day to be over, said Matthews, 64, a retired clinical and medical social worker. When it is 9/11, I cant wait for it to be 9/12.

Matthews is a native New Yorker, but she has lived most of her life in Albuquerque and she was living in Littleton, Colorado, on the day of the terrorist attacks on the Twin Towers.

She and her husband, Michael, a 30-year Air Force veteran and also a New York City native, moved back to New York six days after 9/11.

A lot of people were leaving, and we were moving back, Matthews said. Before 9/11 Michael and I had been talking about moving back, or at least visiting, because he had a brother there who was dying of cancer and I had a sister there. When 9/11 happened, I said Lets go. I just felt compelled. I have a lot of experience working with trauma, and I just felt like I could do what I do best. I had no job set up and no place to live there. We just started driving.

As they drove into the city over the George Washington Bridge, they could see the smoke from the Twin Towers site.

Family took us in until we could find our own place, Matthews said. We lived there for four years.

During those years, she worked for a Fire Department of New York counseling services unit, helping firefighters and other first responders deal with the trauma of their experiences and trying to help survivors cope with the loss of loved ones and long-cherished plans.

It was the stories of those people that hit her like shrapnel, inflicting the invisible wounds that resurface every year at this time because she knows 9/11 is not done claiming victims.

A lot of people are still dying of gastrointestinal diseases, an assortment of cancers, a lot of respiratory illnesses, she said. There are a lot of mental health issues, a lot of stress, divorces, suicides and alcoholism.

Harrowing stories

Matthews was born in Brooklyn and moved to Long Island when she was 12. She was in her mid-20s when she came to Albuquerque in the early 80s, following her parents who had fallen in love with the city during a visit. She earned a masters degree in social work at New Mexico Highlands University and held licenses in medical social work and clinical social work.

When she arrived in New York after 9/11, she applied for work with the city fire department, but she was working as a counselor for the U.S. Postal Service when she got a phone call from the FDNY counseling unit in January 2002.

I went for an interview, and when I walked out I had the job, Matthews said. I was the clinical supervisor of the unit on Long Island. They basically didnt tell us what to do. They gave us a budget, and they gave us a little house on the Suffolk Community College/Brentwood Campus. We set up the kitchen to look like a firehouse kitchen. Coffee was always available, and there was a lot of food.

There were so many people coming through the door, we didnt get to eat. I had two pagers. I was working seven days a week. But it wasnt just me. It was me and my co-workers. It was a team effort.

One group she counseled were widows.

These were all very young women, Matthews said. A lot of them were pregnant or had babies. When you are that young and you are a widow, your future is done, your dreams are shot. A lot of them were in shock. How do you go on?

And she counseled rescue workers, people haunted by what they had seen and by lost comrades.

Sometimes I would sit there as composed as I could be. Just hold the space, she said. That was a challenge. I had to listen to the stories of people who saw people jumping out of buildings. What that sounded like.

But as harrowing as those stories were, Matthews said they did not really claw at her core until the spring of 2002 when she visited the pile or the pit, the rubble left behind when the Twin Towers fell.

We were watching men digging, shoveling, sorting through stuff, looking for remains, Matthews said. Its different when someone is telling you something. But when you are there, its a visceral experience. You get emotional.

An honor to help

Geri Lynn and Michael returned to Albuquerque in 2005 and bought a house in the Northeast Heights. For the last 10 years she has been making documentary films on topics such as rape in the military, the role of trees in our world and contaminated water.

But she stays in touch with some of the firefighters and widows she met in New York in the years just after 9/11.

It was an honor to have had this experience, to have supported the firefighters, the police and family members during this historic trauma, she said. It was the toughest job I ever had, but I couldnt wait to get to work. I loved the people.
Editors Note: Journal reporter Mike Gallagher was among a handful of Journal reporters and photographers who traveled to New York in the days and months following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

As they have every year since 9/11, electricians in southern Manhattan have done the grunt work to assemble the Tribute in Light  the iconic public artwork that sends two towers of light into the night sky in memory of the men and women who lost their lives in the terrorist attacks in New York City, Pennsylvania and the Pentagon.

They have spent days hauling heavy cables onto the roof of the Battery Parking Garage south of the new World Trade Center and in sight of the Statue of Liberty. Theyve brought up banks holding 88, 7,000-watt xenon lights and set them into two 48-foot squares in the same orientation as the Twin Towers that were reduced to rubble. The lights have been connected to the cables and the cables to the two generators parked eight stories below.

The culmination of their work will be on display beginning at dusk Saturday when they hit the switch.

Kevin Flynn was there at the start, the first foreman on the Tribute in Light project. Now retired, Flynn was the union shop steward at the Verizon building where electricians and members of the Communications Workers worked under arduous conditions to restore electric power and telecommunications to Wall Street after the attack.

And it was Flynn who  in November 2001  guided Journal photographer Richard Pipes and myself around Ground Zero, introducing us to Red Cross volunteers and people working at and around the site. It was our second trip to New York after 9/11 to report stories for the Journal.

In the early years of the Tribute in Light, Flynn worked with Michael Ahern and his production company to make the vision a reality. The display was first switched on six months after the attack and now lights up the New York skyline from dusk to dawn beginning at sunset on Sept. 11.

We had to do something to uplift the spirits of the people, Flynn said in an interview last week.

Flynn, who went out of his way to help us because he said he feels a special attachment to New Mexico having attended the College of Santa Fe in the late 1960s and early 1970s, was at the Battery Parking Garage last week  passing around a cellphone to the electricians for long-distance interviews with the Journal.

To a person, those working on this years Tribute in Light said it was an honor.

Frank Leonard from Five Star Electric assembled the team, choosing electricians who have connections to 9/11 and to construction of the new World Trade Center. Leonard said his older brother, a member of the New York City Fire Department, died of cancer attributed to his work at Ground Zero.

The guys start calling me as September approaches asking to be on the job, he said.

Leonard said, Its not a walk in the park. Those cables are heavy.

This is the first year an apprentice, Jonathan Lazo-Estrada, will work on the Tribute in Light.

Lazo-Estrada is in the third year of his four-year apprenticeship with the IBEW, which he started a few years after he served as a Marine Corps lance corporal in Afghanistan in 2012 and 2013.

Im very grateful for the honor, it would be an honor for any New Yorker to work on this, Lazo-Estrada said. My father worked on The Pile after 9/11 operating a payloader to haul away the debris gathered by the bucket lines.

Being chosen for the crew is an honor and George Tencic, one of several journeymen electricians who have worked on the tribute for the last 10 years, pushed to include Lazo-Estrada.

If anyone should be here, Jonathan should. Hes the guy who deserved to be here for his service, Tencic said. I told them if the spot was already taken, he could have mine.

True honor

When Flynn retired, the foremans job was turned over to his friend Mickey OConnell.

In the days after the 9/11 attacks, OConnell worked on The Pile in the bucket brigades moving rubble one bucket at a time in the hopes of finding survivors. His sons later joined the Army and were deployed to the Middle East.

When the lights get energized there is a profound sense of honor and sadness for the loss of the people in those attacks, he said.

When OConnell retired three years ago, he was replaced by Billy McCann. McCan was an apprentice electrician when he started working on The Pile on Sept. 13, 2001.

When I got there, we didnt even have buckets, McCann said. We used our hands and one time I turned around and there was Mickey (OConnell) handing me a garbage pail.

It is a true honor, McCann said, to work on the towers of light.

The business manager for IBEW Local 3, Chris Erikson, said the COVID-19 pandemic almost forced cancellation of the tribute last year.

There was an uproar, Erikson said. The first responders, fire and police, were very upset. The financing was found, and the tribute went on as scheduled.

Hell of a view

It normally takes a 40-member crew of a dozen electricians working with stagehands from Michael Ahern Productions to set up and operate the Tribute in Light display. This years work was interrupted by the remnants of Hurricane Ida, which caused flooding in New Jersey and many parts of New York City.

After the electricians finish their work, the stagehands manage the production elements of the tribute under the 9/11 Memorial and Museum.

Many of the electricians who set the lights up this year have worked on the project for 10 years or more. They also worked on the Freedom Tower, the informal name for the 1,792-foot-tall One World Trade Center tower, which was built on the site of the attack.

Christian Baerga was at the topping off of the Freedom Tower, putting the Federal Aviation Administration beacon on the top of the building with other electrical workers and they were talking about how to honor the 21 electricians from Local 3 and Local 1212 who died on 9/11.

Baerga said one of the welders working nearby said he had high-grade engraving tools and volunteered to put the names of those who died on the base plate of the beacon.

We got the official list of those who died from the Local and those names are now on top of the building, Baerga said.  Most people dont like being that high up, but it is a hell of a view.
Albuquerque ground to a halt

I was mayor of Albuquerque on 9/11.

That morning I received a call from the Airport manager that airliners in the sector were being diverted to Albuquerque and that they were taking up space on the runways and taxiways. I hadnt watched news that morning and this was how I learned of the attack.

I went directly to my office in City Hall and ordered the Emergency Operations Center to be activated for the first time so that the city could be prepared for any eventuality. The city ground to a halt. Later that afternoon I took a helicopter ride around the metro area and found it to be eerily quiet. Everyone was inside watching the events in NYC at the Trade Center.

We went to the Airport to greet and set up services for all the stranded passengers. Albuquerque came together.

Jim Baca

Albuquerque

In the air when news broke

On Tuesday, September 11, 2001, my husband and I were on a Sabena flight from Brussels to Dallas, returning from a rare and special vacation.

At about 11 a.m. ADT our pilot announced, Ladies and gentlemen, in about 20 minutes we will be landing in St. Johns, Newfoundland.

We soon learned that we had been directed to land at the nearest airport due to major air crashes in the U.S. During a long wait on the tarmac, our pilot tuned his radio to the local CBC station where we got all the news, including President Bushs declaration of war.

Eventually we were welcomed warmly to Canada and treated with the greatest kindness, generosity and respect imaginable until we could finally get home to Albuquerque nearly a week later. Thus began our love affair with Maritime Canada, which continues to today.

Susan Collins

Albuquerque

Turn on the TV! Were under attack!

On the morning of 9/11, my wife, Paula, and I were having coffee in our house in California.

The phone rang, and it was our daughter. She was at her first job after college, working as an aide on U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinsteins Washington, D.C., staff.

The call was brief  Turn on the TV! Were under attack!

We complied, and then tried to call her back, but the phone lines were totally overwhelmed. Finally, later that evening, she was able to call us back from her apartment. The staff were kept in the Senate offices for about five hours, before they were allowed to leave.

David Blacher

Albuquerque

I knew the world had changed

I was a U.S. Air Force lieutenant colonel, stationed in the Pentagon on 9/11.

One of our section officers called after the first plane crash, telling us to turn on the news. We were stunned to see a commercial airliner crash into the tower, and speculated on how this could have occurred.

After the second crash, we knew these events were intentional, deliberate attacks.

Shortly thereafter, the building shook hard and we heard the explosion of the third plane crashing into the Pentagon. Alarms went off, and we began evacuating the building. The halls were eerily quiet even though jammed with personnel.

The evacuation was orderly and we were out in several minutes. The odor of burning jet fuel hung in the air and sirens were wailing. We crossed I-395 to Pentagon City, which was a scene of chaos. Seeing smoke pouring from the Pentagon, I knew the world had changed.

Steven Rinaldi

Albuquerque

Staten Island resident recalls quiet sadness

I was on my way to vote in the New York City Primary election. Mayor Rudy Giuliani would soon finish his second term as mayor, and it was important to choose his successor. But when the announcement of the bombing of the Twin Towers came over the radio, the mayoral election and everything else were overshadowed by the tragedy.

I changed my destination to my office, where everyone was sad and anxious. The Twin Towers were only a few miles from Staten Island, where I lived and worked. I remember only the quiet sadness of the remainder of the day.

The next day, Staten Island was locked down because of a suspicious car. There was no actual problem, but the police had to be cautious. No one knew what might happen next.

A few days later I rode near the World Trade Center. I still remember the horrible smell of burning.

Sept. 11, 2001, is a day that will always remain in my memory. I didnt know anyone who was there, but it felt as though the whole city was there.

Lucy Birbiglia

Albuquerque

Fighter jets were flying outside DC windows

I heard the news on my way to work at the International Labor Office in Washington, D.C. After the second plane hit, I knew this was really horrible.

At work, all of our small staff and a few European visitors were in the directors office watching television.

At 19th and L Streets we were close enough to the White House and other government buildings to be in the no-fly zone, but there were fighter jets flying outside the windows on Sept. 11.

We heard that the plane that eventually crashed in Pennsylvania was coming toward the State Department or the Capitol.

All of our eternal thanks and condolences should go to the families of the brave passengers on the plane in Pennsylvania who gave their lives to save others and to all the families and friends who lost so much in New York and at the Pentagon.

Marjorie Crow

Albuquerque

Anxiety and grief every August, September

I grew up in the Washington, D.C., area. When 9/11 happened, I was a college freshman in Northern Virginia.

For the first time, I realized that Americans were vulnerable to attack just like the rest of the world.

The D.C. attack hit me in a very personal way because that region and its landmarks were my home.

For months whenever you drove past the Pentagon, you could see the huge hole in it.

Honestly, 9/11 changed everything for me. My generation fought the wars. Within a few years, I had been a bridesmaid in two separate weddings where one partner was about to be deployed for a second time to the Middle East.

Its been 20 years and I still have anxiety and grief for several weeks every August and September.

Lee Ann Bisulca

Albuquerque

Traumatic birthday

The 9/11 horror was especially traumatic for me because it was my birthday.

That fateful day, I used a vacation day from work, like I always do, and slept in. I woke up that morning with the intent of having a leisurely, relaxing day.

I turned on the TV in my bedroom and was curious as to why the Today show was showing two smoking buildings. I turned the channel to GMA and got the same result. For that matter, ESPN, the Weather Channel and Nickelodeon were ALL preempted and showing the same exact shot.

I knew something horribly wrong had occurred when the network evening news guys, Dan Rather, Peter Jennings and Tom Brokaw were all on the air that morning. It took me a few minutes to connect the dots, but I eventually realized what happened that awful morning. I sat there in my bed paralyzed with horror. Sick to my stomach.

I then felt guilty having the nerve to want to celebrate my day. Survivors guilt? Probably. I later found out there were support groups consisting of others whose birthday is also Sept. 11. It made me feel better knowing it wasnt just me who felt guilty. Im better now. Doctors and dentists office personnel no longer give me the look when I tell them my birthdate: 9/11. Worst birthday ever.

George Scott

Albuquerque

Students questions

Sept. 11, 2001, 8:50 a.m.: I opened the door to let my third graders into class.

Every child asked me if I knew a plane had hit this tall building in New York?

They had frightened looks in their eyes, but I reassured them that we were far away from New York City and we were very safe here in our classroom.

Parents started trickling in throughout the day to pick up their children. When one parent, whose husband was the manager of Coronado Center, came in and said they were closing down the shopping center for safety reasons, it suddenly hit closer to home.

Now it was the teacher with the frightened look in her eyes.

Renee Rodarte-Keeling

Albuquerque

Leaning on faith

Twenty years ago at this time I had recently become a widow. It was a very difficult time, and I was leaning on my faith to get me through those grief ridden days.

On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, I had the Today show on television and heard the commentators say that a plane had hit one of the trade towers.

As I turned to focus on the TV, I saw the second plane hit the other trade tower. The unbelievable was happening right in front of me and the whole country.

In the days that followed, our nation united. Nobody cared about political differences or the color of one anothers skin. We were all American citizens.

Sadly, that unity has been lost. Today, race problems abound, and our political system is as acrimonious as its ever been. As for me, I continue to lean on my faith.

Mary Wentworth

Albuquerque

Still affected

I was in Ruidoso on that Tuesday. I was working for NMEDD. I saw the TV coverage of the first airplane flying into a World Trade Center tower.

I immediately called my brother, Richard Thompson; his company office was in Lower Manhattan. I knew he had views of the twin towers; Ive been there many times.

When Richard answered his phone, as we were talking, he witnessed the second airplane attack the second tower. I remembered what he said  I wont repeat it  but it was devastating!

Through all of the devastation, Richard took/walked all of his staff to safety to his home in Upper Manhattan. My sister, Ruthann, had just left the Pentagon, prior to the attack there. From Santa Fe to New York, Pentagon, & Shanksville, Pennsylvania, as AMERICANS, we are still affected  20 YEARS LATER! GOD BLESS AMERICA!

Rosemary Thompson

Santa Fe
Copyright  2021 Albuquerque Journal

The city of Albuquerque is planning to close the door on its elevator maintenance inspection program.

Mayor Tim Keller has sent legislation to the City Council that would formally eliminate the roughly $167,500 program that sends a city employee to commercial buildings to check the elevators rope and counterweight, car control, lighting and adherence to other maintenance requirements proscribed by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.

Albuquerque is the only city in NM that was having these elevator inspections, city Planning Department spokesman Rick De Reyes said.

If the legislation passes, De Reyes said property owners would have to schedule third-party inspectors to perform regular inspections.

The city will rely on the building owner for compliance with elevator maintenance, Albuquerque Chief Building Official Land Clark said in emailed answers to Journal questions. That is the standard elsewhere in New Mexico, he said, though the city would investigate any complaints.

The Planning Department currently has one inspector whose sole function is to perform annual checks on the 1,586 elevators around the city.

De Reyes said the employee is still doing the job, but the city cut funding for the inspections during the last budget cycle. The legislation before the City Council would formally ground the program, he said.

Should it pass, the employee would be reassigned to another Planning Division, Clark said.
Organizations and agencies around New Mexico are holding events to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. Here is a list of some of the events:

Albuquerque

 Fallen Heroes 9/11 Memorial at Alvarado Square

6:46 a.m. at 415 Silver SW

Bernalillo County honor guards will stand silent watch over 343 sets of firefighter bunker gear for a total of 343 minutes in remembrance of 343 firefighters and 71 law enforcement officers killed in the attacks. There will be a laying of wreaths and, starting at 9 a.m., Bernalillo County firefighters will also strike the four-fives on a ceremonial bell on the hour.

 9/11 Salute to Patriots at the New Mexico Veterans Memorial

11 a.m. at 1100 Louisiana SE

The event will feature a 50-person choir, honor guard and guest speakers including Gold Star Mothers along with tributes to first responders, service members and others who died in the attacks. Face coverings are requested.

 9/11 Stair Climb and Memorial Ceremony at Civic Plaza

Stair climb begins at 8:46 a.m., memorial starts at 1 p.m. at 401 Second NW.

Albuquerque Fire Rescue firefighters will complete the annual 110-story stair climb to honor the 343 New York firefighters who died in the attacks. Afterward, a memorial will be held by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, Mayor Tim Keller, Interim Fire Chief Gene Gallegos and Police Chief Harold Medina.

Rio Rancho

 Sunrise Service at Vista Verde Memorial Park

7 a.m. at 4310 Sarah SE, Rio Rancho

A hot air balloon launch and service to commemorate victims of the attacks. Food and drinks will be provided.

Santa Fe

 9/11 Procession and Ceremony in Santa Fe

9:15 a.m. remembrance ceremony at Santa Fe Plaza.

The ceremony will include bagpipes, a memorial stair climb by members of the Santa Fe Fire Department and the dedication of 343 roses in honor of the 343 firefighters who lost their lives in the attacks.

Las Cruces

 20th Anniversary of 9/11 in Las Cruces

8:30 a.m. at 201 East Picacho Ave.

The Las Cruces Fire Department Honor Guard will post colors and conduct a bell ringing ceremony at Fire Station 1. At 9 a.m. LCFD firefighters will have a memorial stair climb at Electric Caregiver Tower but the event is closed to the public due to COVID-19 guidelines.
Organizations and agencies around New Mexico are holding events to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. Here is a list of some of the events:

6:46 a.m. at 415 Silver SW

Bernalillo County honor guards will stand silent watch over 343 sets of firefighter bunker gear for a total of 343 minutes in remembrance of 343 firefighters and 71 law enforcement officers killed in the attacks. There will be a laying of wreaths and, starting at 9 a.m., Bernalillo County firefighters will also strike the four-fives on a ceremonial bell on the hour.

 9/11 Salute to Patriots at the New Mexico Veterans Memorial

11 a.m. at 1100 Louisiana SE

The event will feature a 50-person choir, honor guard and guest speakers including Gold Star Mothers along with tributes to first responders, service members and others who died in the attacks. Face coverings are requested.

 9/11 Stair Climb and Memorial Ceremony at Civic Plaza

Stair climb begins at 8:46 a.m., memorial starts at 1 p.m. at 401 Second NW.

Albuquerque Fire Rescue firefighters will complete the annual 110-story stair climb to honor the 343 New York firefighters who died in the attacks. Afterward, a memorial will be held by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, Mayor Tim Keller, Interim Fire Chief Gene Gallegos and Police Chief Harold Medina.

7 a.m. at 4310 Sarah SE, Rio Rancho

A hot air balloon launch and service to commemorate victims of the attacks. Food and drinks will be provided.

 9/11 Procession and Ceremony in Santa Fe

9:15 a.m. remembrance ceremony at Santa Fe Plaza.

The ceremony will include bagpipes, a memorial stair climb by members of the Santa Fe Fire Department and the dedication of 343 roses in honor of the 343 firefighters who lost their lives in the attacks.

 20th Anniversary of 9/11 in Las Cruces

8:30 a.m. at 201 East Picacho Ave.

The Las Cruces Fire Department Honor Guard will post colors and conduct a bell ringing ceremony at Fire Station 1. At 9 a.m. LCFD firefighters will have a memorial stair climb at Electric Caregiver Tower but the event is closed to the public due to COVID-19 guidelines.
CHALMETTE, La.  Darkness set in for Natasha Blunt well before Hurricane Ida knocked out power across Louisiana.

Months into the pandemic, she faced eviction from her New Orleans apartment. She lost her job at a banquet hall. She suffered two strokes. And she struggled to help her 5-year-old grandson keep up with schoolwork at home.

Like nearly a fifth of the states population  disproportionately represented by Black residents and women  Blunt, 51, lives below the poverty line, and the economic fallout of the pandemic sent her to the brink. With the help of a legal aid group and grassroots donors, she moved to Chalmette, a few miles outside New Orleans, and tried to settle into a two-bedroom apartment. Using a cane and taking a slew of medications since her strokes, she was unable to return to work. But federal benefits kept food in the fridge for the most part.

Then came Hurricane Ida.

The storm ravaged Louisiana as the fifth-strongest hurricane to ever hit the U.S. mainland, wiping out the power grid before marching up the coast and sparking devastating flooding in the Northeast. Among survivors of the deadly storm, the toll has been deepest in many ways for people like Blunt  those who already lost livelihoods to the COVID-19 pandemic in a region of longstanding racial and social inequality. Advocates say the small wins theyd made for marginalized communities and people of color since the pandemic began have been quickly wiped out.

The government is really disconnected from what its like for people who have little to no safety net, said Maggie Harris, a documentarian and grassroots organizer who last year created a fundraiser for Blunt and other women economically devastated by the pandemic. You marginalize people, you dont pay them enough, they have health problems and arent insured, you offer little cash assistance or rent assistance, and you allow them to be evicted.

The message that people get is their lives are expendable.

As Ida approached Louisiana, Blunt knew it was intensifying rapidly. She evacuated to a hotel in Lafayette, more than two hours west of her new home, a day ahead of landfall. But she could afford only a short stay, and the hotel was booked with other evacuees. She had to return to Chalmette, despite officials warnings not to go back to hot, humid cities with boil-water advisories and no power.

Her apartment was pitch black. Idas Category 4 winds had blown in the windows of her upstairs bedroom. Her few possessions  beds, clothing, furniture  were waterlogged. Shed spent her last dollars getting to the hotel, with no federal aid to evacuate.

Its like Ive got to start all over again, Blunt said, sobbing as she surveyed the first floor of her apartment, where she sleeps now that the bedroom is uninhabitable. Every time I get a step ahead, I get pushed back down. And Im tired. I dont see no way out.

Now, Blunt faces eviction for the second time in a year. Her only hope, she said, is Social Security and other disability benefits. She applied before the storm, she said, but has yet to hear back  social safety net programs are often disrupted in the wake of disasters.

Blunt wants to find a new home, preferably far from the storm-battered Gulf Coast  a place where grandson Kamille can resume schooling without worrying about power and Internet outages. But shes far from optimistic.

This is the end of the road; I cant go on much longer, she said. Kamille put down his kindergarten worksheet to gently rub his grandmas leg.

Dont cry, he told her. She managed a tender reply: Do your ABCs, baby.

____

Anti-poverty and housing advocates in Louisiana bemoan links between being Black or brown, living in impoverished areas, and being underserved by governmental disaster response. Available aid from anti-poverty programs often fails to meet the heightened needs of storm victims in states of emergency.

And that, the advocates say, is what happened during Ida. In Louisiana, where 17 storms that caused at least $1 billion in damage have hit since 2000, nonprofits see some of the most dire need and the starkest divide along socioeconomics lines.

One of the things that we get really frustrated about, in terms of the narrative, is people saying, Ugh, Louisiana is so resilient, said Ashley Shelton of the Power Coalition for Equality and Justice, a statewide nonprofit that provides resources and encourages civic participation in underserved communities of color.

We dont want to be resilient forever, she said. Yes, were beautiful and resourceful people. But when you force people to live in a constant state of resilience, its just oppression. Fix the systems that are structurally broken.

It doesnt help that Louisianas poverty rate is higher than the national average, according to the Census Bureau s American Community Survey. High poverty makes the prospect of temporary or permanent relocation precarious for people who were already teetering on the edge before disaster struck, said Andreanecia Morris of HousingNOLA, a program of the Greater New Orleans Housing Alliance.

Housing is a foundational issue for all of these catastrophes, whether that be COVID, economic crisis, criminal justice, or education, Morris said. Our failure to address racial bias, gender bias and poverty bias in housing impedes all of those things. There is nowhere that is more clear than in our governments response to disasters. And this one is no different.

Less than a week after Ida hit, Morris spent a day canvassing areas of New Orleans where her organization helps the neediest cases. In the Lower Ninth Ward, a New Orleans neighborhood that suffered immensely after Hurricane Katrina, 57-year-old Lationa Kemp found herself cut off from most aid.

Kemp said she had been relying on neighbors with cars to get ice, hot meals and bottled water. To stay cool, Kemp left her front door open for fresh air. Shed gone days without power, and Ida had caused roof leaks and fence damage.

To Morris, the situation was urgent. Kemp had disputes with her landlord over the homes condition, and the threat of eviction loomed. The landlord listed on her eviction notice did not respond to APs calls for comment.

Morris wants to get Kemp and her 25-year-old son, Alvin, moved elsewhere permanently. In the meantime, Morris suggested a cooling center.

Thank you, baby, but Im fine, Kemp told her, explaining that shed rather stay in a dilapidated home  past experiences make her fear the shelter system. I already told the Lord, Im praying that when I leave out of here, Im going to a better house. Ill have better income so I wont have to go through this anymore.

The Biden administration set aside nearly $50 billion for rental assistance during the pandemic, but the money has been slow to get out the door. Advocates in Louisiana say they hoped those COVID-19 funds could be transitioned for storm aid, too, but that it hasnt been so easy. And, for people like Blunt and Kemp, the technological savvy needed to apply online can be a hurdle.

Eventually, the Kemps will probably get the help they need, but it takes time, said Cynthia Wiggins, a tenant and property manager at New Orleans public housing development Guste Homes, one of just a few resident management corporations left in the U.S., where tenants share the responsibilities that landlords typically shoulder.

Theres nothing that we can do to get around the process, Wiggins said. We have the available units, but we paused processing applications when the storm hit.

____

Like many in Louisiana, Blunt has survived her share of storms  starting with her birth, during the fallout of Hurricane Camille in 1969. As she tells it, her pregnant mother had been moved to a naval medical ship to give birth. Today, Blunt can chuckle over the coincidence of her grandsons name, Kamille.

Its like the storms keep coming for me, she said, laughing.

The memory of Katrina is scarier. Blunt evacuated to Alabama and then Chicago. When it was safe, she and Kamilles grandfather returned to their home in New Orleans seventh ward to find floodwater damage. But even with the horror stories of Katrina, Blunt said, Ida has been worse for her.

This here was my worst-ever life experience, coming back to this, coming back to darkness, she said. Im mad enough, Im sick and scared as it is. Now, Im tossing and turning at night.

It might be enough for the lifelong Louisiana resident to leave for good. As she finds herself trashing her storm-damaged belongings, she said she sees no way to find peace in the state.

Shes not alone. Many people have fled the state after major storms, data show. In metro New Orleans, and even in Chalmette in particular, the U.S. Census Bureau recorded signification population loss from its 2000 to 2020 counts. After Katrina, in 2006, nearly 160,000 Louisiana residents in total moved to Texas, Georgia and Mississippi. Louisianas population rebounded as people returned to rebuild, but its been in decline again since 2016.

For families who stay in spite of natural disasters, it seems each new generation learns new lessons of survival, said Toya Lewis of Project Hustle, a New Orleans nonprofit that organizes Black and brown street vendors who work in the informal economies.

No one was prepared to be without power in New Orleans for more than eight days, Lewis said. Were taking all of this lived experience and organizing to thrive. We must begin organizing around our survival.

And Blunt knows that no matter where she ends up, shell survive. Even in the darkness, she finds some light by helping her community  trying to secure a power source for a neighbors breathing machine, sharing her car as a way for folks to charge cellphones. She tells herself: Im going to be OK.  I do good. I dont hurt nobody. Im still standing.

Theres solace in the glimmers of light, but she wants more  not just for her, but for her grandson. I want us to go somewhere better, Blunt said, helping Kamille with the TV remote, the power finally restored in their apartment.

Somewhere I can be stable. I just want to be stable.

___

AP writers Seth Borenstein in Kensington, Maryland, and Michael Schneider in Orlando, Florida, contributed to this report.

___

Morrison is a member of the APs Race and Ethnicity team. Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/aaronlmorrison.
KABUL, Afghanistan  A Taliban official said that the group raised their flag over the Afghan presidential palace in a brief ceremony on Saturday  the same day the U.S. and the world marked the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

The milestone anniversary takes place just weeks after the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the return to power of the Taliban, the faction that sheltered the al-Qaida terror network founded by Osama bin Laden that carried out the attacks.

The Talibans new Prime Minister Mohammad Hasan Akhund raised the flag in a ceremony at 11 a.m. local time to mark the official start of work by the Talibans 33-member caretaker government, said Ahmadullahh Muttaqi, multimedia chief of the groups cultural commission.

Earlier, another Taliban official said the religious militias black and white flag was first raised at the palace on Friday. The militant group has also painted their banner on the entry gate to the U.S. Embassy building.

The U.S. is marking the 9/11 anniversary with commemorations at New Yorks World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

___

KABUL, Afghanistan  The Taliban shot dead the brother of Amrullah Saleh, the former vice president of Afghanistan, and his driver in northern Panjshir province, Salehs nephew said Saturday.

Shuresh Saleh said his uncle Rohullah Azizi was going somewhere in a car Thursday when Taliban fighters stopped him at a checkpoint. As we hear at the moment Taliban shot him and his driver at the checkpoint. he said.

A message left with a Taliban spokesman Saturday was not immediately returned.

Shuresh Saleh said it was unclear where his uncle, an anti-Taliban fighter, was headed when the Taliban caught him. He said phones were not working in the area.

Amrullah Saleh led forces resisting the Taliban in Panjshir, which was the last holdout province to be overrun by Afghanistans new rulers.

Videos circulating on social media purportedly show Taliban opening fire on anti-Taliban fighters in Panjshir whom they have arrested.

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MORE ON AFGHANISTAN:

 US gives 1st public look inside base housing Afghans

 UN raises alarm on Taliban crackdown on dissent, journalists

 Pentagon chief: al-Qaida may seek comeback in Afghanistan

 Analysis: Taliban hard-line path worsens Afghanistan dilemma

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 Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/afghanistan

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KABUL, Afghanistan  More than 250 foreign nationals have left Afghanistan in the past three days, says Zalmay Khalilzad, Washingtons special envoy and the architect of an often criticized deal with the Taliban.

The deal signed last year provided for the safe withdrawal of U.S and NATO troops but say his critics was heavily weighted in favor of the hardline-Islamic movement.

In a series of tweets Khalilzad praised both the Middle Eastern State of Qatar, whose national airline carried out the flights and the Talibans cooperation in this important effort, for the recent departure of foreign nationals from Afghanistan.

We will continue to engage the government of Qatar, the Taliban, and others to ensure the safe passage of our citizens, other foreign nationals, and Afghans that want to leave, Khalilzad tweeted.

However, hundreds of Afghans, including U.S. citizens and green card holders, remain stranded in northern Afghanistans Mazar-e-Sharif waiting to be evacuated but stopped by Taliban rulers demanding travel documents.
NEW YORK  From an urban memorial to a remote field to the heart of of the nations military might, President Joe Biden on Saturday paid tribute at three hallowed places of grief and remembrance to honor the lives lost two decades ago in the 9/11 terror attacks.

The solemn day of commemoration offered frequent reminders for Americans of a time when they united in the face of unimaginable tragedy. That fading spirit of 9/11 was invoked most forcefully by the president at the time of the attacks, George W. Bush, who said, That is the America I know, in stark contrast to the bitterly divided nation Biden now leads.

Biden left the speech-making to others, paying his respects at the trio of sites in New York, Pennsylvania and outside Washington where four hijacked planes crashed on Sept. 11, 2001, killing nearly 3,000 people, shattering the nations sense of security and launching the country into two decades of warfare.

Biden wiped away a tear as he stood in silence at the site where the World Trade Center towers fell, and looked up at the haunting sound of a jet plane under clear blue skies reminiscent of that fateful day.

In a grassy field in Pennsylvania, Biden comforted family members gathered at a stone boulder near Shanksville that marked where passengers brought down a hijacked plane that had been headed for the nations capital. At the Pentagon, Biden and his wife, Jill, took a moment of silence before a wreath studded with white, purple and red flowers on display in front of the memorial benches that mark the victims of the attack at the military headquarters.

Delivering Bud Light and appreciation to the Shanksville Volunteer Fire Department, which responded to the crash of United Flight 93, Biden praised Bushs comments in his only public remarks of the day, saying the Republican made a really good speech today  genuinely, and wondered aloud what those who died that day would think of todays rancor.

Gesturing to a cross-shaped memorial made of steel from the twin towers adjacent to the firehouse, Biden reflected: Im thinking what, what what would the people who died, what would they be thinking. Would they think this makes sense for us to be doing this kind of thing where you ride down the street and someone has a sign saying f- so-and-so?'

It was a reference to an explicit sign attacking Biden last week in New Jersey as he toured storm damage that was displayed by supporters of former President Donald Trump. Biden expressed incredulity at recent comments by Trump, whom he accused of abandoning the nations ideals during his time in office.

Everyone says, Biden, why do you keep insisting on trying to bring the country together? the president told reporters. Thats the thing thats going to affect our well-being more than anything else.

In a frequent refrain of his presidency warning of the rise of autocracies, he added, Are we going to, in the next four, five, six, ten years, demonstrate that democracies can work, or not?

At ground zero in New York City, Biden stood side by side with former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton at the National September 11 Memorial as the names of the dead were read aloud by their loved ones. Each man wore a blue ribbon and held his hand over his heart as a procession marched a flag through the memorial before hundreds of people, some carrying photos of loved ones lost in the attacks.

Bush, delivering the keynote address in Shanksville, lamented that so much of our politics have become a naked appeal to anger, fear and resentment.

On Americas day of trial and grief, I saw millions of people instinctively grab for a neighbors hand, and rally for the cause of one another, Bush said. That is the America I know.

Alluding to domestic turmoil, including the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol, Bush said that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders but from violence that gathers within. He added that while they have little cultural similarity to the 9/11 attackers, they are children of the same foul spirit, and it is our continuing duty to confront them.

Vice President Kamala Harris also spoke at the Flight 93 National Memorial, echoing the theme of unity as she praised the courage of those passengers and the resilience of Americans who came together in the days after the attacks.

In a time of outright terror, we turned toward each other, Harris said. If we do the hard work of working together as Americans, if we remain united in purpose, we will be prepared for whatever comes next.

Biden was a U.S. senator when hijackers commandeered four planes and carried out the attacks. He was Obamas vice president in 2011 when the country observed the 10th anniversary of the strikes. Saturdays commemoration was his first as commander in chief.

It is now Biden who shoulders the responsibility borne by his predecessors to prevent another strike. He must do that against fears of a rise in terrorism after the hasty U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, where those who planned the Sept. 11 attacks were sheltered.

In remarks at the firehouse Biden defended the withdrawal, which culminated with a massive airlift to evacuate more than 110,000 Americans and allies  but still resulted in many being left behind for an uncertain future under Taliban rule.

Could al-Qaida come back? Yeah. But guess what, its already back other places, Biden said. Whats the strategy? Every place where al-Qaida is, were going to invade and have troops stay in? Cmon.

Rather than deliver formal remarks, Biden released a taped address late Friday about the anniversary in which he spoke about the true sense of national unity that emerged after the attacks, seen in heroism everywhere  in places expected and unexpected.

To me thats the central lesson of Sept. 11, he said. Unity is our greatest strength.

Biden became the fourth president to console the nation on the anniversary of that dark day, one that has shaped many of the most consequential domestic and foreign policy decisions made by the chief executives over the past two decades.

Trump skipped the official 9/11 memorial ceremonies and instead visited a fire station and police precinct in New York, where he laced into Biden over his withdrawal from Afghanistan and repeated lies about the 2020 election as he paid tribute to New Yorks first responders.

Bush was reading a book to Florida schoolchildren when the planes slammed into the World Trade Center. He spent that day being kept out of Washington for security reasons  a decision then-Sen. Biden urged him to reconsider, the current president has written  and then delivered a brief, halting speech that night from the White House to a terrified nation.

The terrorist attack would define Bushs presidency. The following year, he chose Ellis Island as the location to deliver his first anniversary address, the Statue of Liberty over his shoulder as he pledged, What our enemies have begun, we will finish.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were still deadly when Obama visited the Pentagon to mark his first Sept. 11 in office in 2009.

By the time Obama spoke at the 10th anniversary, attack mastermind Osama bin Laden was dead, killed in a May 2011 Navy SEAL raid. Though the nation remained entangled overseas, and vigilant against threats, the anniversary became more about healing.

Trump pledged to get the U.S. out of Afghanistan, but his words during his first Sept. 11 anniversary ceremony in 2017 were a vivid warning to terrorists, telling these savage killers that there is no dark corner beyond our reach, no sanctuary beyond our grasp, and nowhere to hide anywhere on this very large earth.

___

Jaffe reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Jill Colvin in New York and Aamer Madhani in Wilmington, Delaware, contributed to this report.
WENN/Instar/Derrick Salters Movie

The Coldplay lead vocalist has purchased the stormtrooper helmet previously used by Forest Whitaker in 'Rogue One: A Star Wars Story', and donated it for fundraiser.

Sep 11, 2021

AceShowbiz - Chris Martin has bought a "Star Wars" stormtrooper helmet belonging to Forest Whitaker to raise money for charity.

Forest wore the iconic helmet when he played rebel leader Saw Gerrera in the 2016 sci-fi movie "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story", and had kept hold of the prop after filming concluded as a memento.

And this week (ends12Sep21), Coldplay frontman Chris purchased the exclusive memorabilia from Forest with the intention of auctioning it off to raise money for a good cause.

Chris has donated the helmet - which has been signed by Forest, his "Star Wars" co-stars, Chris, and his bandmates Guy Berryman, Will Champion, and Jonny Buckland - to his friend Emmanuel Kelly, a refugee and musician from Iraq who was left with severely underdeveloped limbs after he fell victim to chemical warfare.

Emmanuel is set to auction the prop at the This Is Icon fashion week event at the Landmark Hotel in London next week (17Sep) for the charity Wellchild, which provides care for seriously ill children and young people.

A source told The Sun newspaper's Bizarre column, "Chris left everyone speechless when he handed over the helmet to Emmanuel to auction off. It's a priceless piece of memorabilia from 'Star Wars.' "

"The organisers are expecting the bidding to go mad. Hopefully it will go for a lot of cash."

The news comes after Chris previously revealed his love of the "Star Wars' franchise when he said Coldplay's upcoming album, "Music of the Spheres" - which is due to be released on 15 October - was inspired by the hugely popular movie series.

He said, "One time I was watching 'Star Wars' and they had the scene with the Cantina band right? And I was like: 'I wonder what musicians are like across the universe?' and that led to this whole thing and now here we are."
Instagram Celebrity

During an outing on September 3, Tori sparked plastic surgery rumors as she resembled a lot like the former 'KUWTK' star, but now the 'Beverly Hills, 90210' alum has addressed the speculations.

Sep 11, 2021

AceShowbiz - Tori Spelling shocked fans when she came out with a new look earlier this month. During an outing on September 3, Tori sparked plastic surgery rumors as she resembled a lot like Khloe Kardashian, but now the actress has addressed the speculations during a new interview.

Denying that she went under the knife, the "Beverly Hills, 90210" alum said in the Thursday, September 9 episode of Sirius XM's "Jeff Lewis Live", "First of all, I have an amazing makeup artist now." She went on to say, "Her name is Hailey Hoff, and with contour, she does makeup like no one else."

During the interview, the 48-year-old actress admitted that she did "look completely different." Tori continued, "I look like I've had a nose job. Like, it's straight now." However, she insisted that "it's all contouring."

Tori also said that her new glow might also be due to a skin care treatment she recently tried during a trip to Carson City, Nevada. As some people praised her "flawless" skin in a selfie featuring her and Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi, the actres said, "It could be the exosomes too. So maybe I'm looking younger. They said I looked Snooki's age. She's 33. I'm like, 'I'll take that.' "

Back in 2019, Tori also set the records straight regarding plastic surgery rumors surrounding her since she was young. "The one thing for me that has stuck forever was the plastic surgery thing," she said. "I literally had my nose done and my boobs done, and that's it. I'm constantly reading that I've done more."

"People have been talking about me having plastic surgery since I was 17," she continued. "I remember my dad [producer Aaron Spelling] saying, 'Don't worry. It will go away next week.' But that one thing has stayed with me my entire career!"
WENN/FayesVision Music

When taking the stage at Crystal Palace Park in London, the 'Certified Lover Boy' artist and his pal perform their collaborative tracks like 'Way 2 Sexy' and 'Life Is Good'.

Sep 11, 2021

AceShowbiz - Drake has delighted fans with his surprise appearance on the first day of Wireless 2021. The "Certified Lover Boy" artist, who is not on the line-up for the music festival, showed up during Future's set with the words "Hey Wireless, the boy is home" being projected on the big screen behind the stage.

When taking the stage at Crystal Palace Park in London on Friday, September 10, the Canadian native greeted the attendees with a brief speech. "I'ma tell you something. I don't even remember what this s**t feels like. I just want to take this in, all these beautiful people in the audience. We love you so much," he gushed.

"We miss you so much," Drake continued, before noting that it had been about two years since the last time he performed live. He added, "We wrote a lot of songs that we played in our crib or in our studio that we never got to do in front of y'all."

Drake and Future then performed their most recent collaborative track, "Way 2 Sexy" featuring Young Thug. In addition, the duo entertained the concertgoers with their 2020 song, "Life is Good". Drake also performed some of his own songs, including "Laugh Now, Cry Later".

Earlier this week, fans began to speculate that Drake would appear at the Wireless Festival after spotting him boarding a flight with Future. Some fans also allegedly tracked his plane flying from Houston to London.

Drake's performance at the U.K. festival has left fans clamoring for more. One person on Twitter wrote, "nah i'm heartbroken after seeing videos from wireless i need a drake tour asap." Another echoed, "I really hope Drake gives us a CLB tour." A third then chimed in, "I'll wait for Drake's Tour instead of 15 mins cameo."

Aside from Drake and Future, artists like Ivorian Doll, Lil Uzi Vert, Giggs, Unknown T as well as Young T & Bugsey performed at the Friday concert.
WENN/Dominic Chan Celebrity

According to his manager Theresa Fortier, the Xander Harris depicter has suffered 'deep-seated medical problems and immense pain' after he was arrested in Indiana for prescription fraud.

Sep 11, 2021

AceShowbiz - Nicholas Brendon has withdrawn from promotional events for his new movie "Wanton Want". The "Buffy the Vampire Slayers" actor claims that he's suffering from medical issues since a recent jail stint.

According to his manager Theresa Fortier, Nicholas has suffered "deep-seated medical problems and immense pain" after he was arrested last month in Indiana for prescription fraud. Daily Mail reports that he experiences "paralysis in his genitals" and legs.

It is reported that Nicholas is currently awaiting scans on his back and groin areas. His manager also adds that the actor, who has Cauda equina syndrome, will be undergoing a major back surgery in the coming days. The condition, which happens when the nerve roots in the lumbar spine are compressed, was allegedly exacerbated by his jail stint in August.

"Right now he is concentrating on his health. He is not doing promotion for the film," Theresa explained.

Nicholas was arrested in August for allegedly obtaining prescription drugs by fraud. The actor was pulled over by police officers in Indiana after they spotted him driving his Dodge Journey erratically in Vigo County. The actor, who played Xander Harris on The WB series, was sweating profusely and he appeared nervous "due to a visibly racing pulse on his neck and shaking hands," according to cops.

He was asked to hand over identification, but he gave the cops a California ID under the name Kelton Schultz instead, explaining that was the name of his twin brother. Police found a bag that contained "crystal/powder residue" and a pill bottle in a bag with a medication prescribed to Nicholas Bender in the car.

Police then proceeded with further search and found several more plastic bags containing residue but no other contraband, and a prescription filled that same day at a Kroger grocery store. Of lying about his identity, Nicholas reasoned "they have the same prescription and they fill each other's prescription" and admitted to taking pills that were prescribed to Kelton.

Nicholas was arrested for failure to identify and obtaining a prescription by fraud, but was then released on his own recognizance.
Music

Months after honoring Glenn Johnson with the release of a surprise seven-song EP, the 'Rockstar' hitmaker appears to address the tragic death of his older brother through 'Lonely'.

Sep 11, 2021

AceShowbiz - Rapper DaBaby has marked the anniversary of his brother's death by releasing a new track with Lil Wayne, which appears to address the tragedy.

Glenn Johnson died as a result of a self-inflicted gunshot wound a year ago (2020), and in his new tune, "Lonely", DaBaby opens up about the incident.

"As if I got a reason to act like I'm lonely/ I saw my big brother laid out with his brains blown out/ It's been catchin' up on me/ S**t, how would you act if your bro took his life?" he raps.

The "Rockstar" hitmaker previously honored his late brother with the release of his surprise seven-song EP, "My Brother's Keeper (Long Live G)", in November 2020. It featured the track "Brother's Keeper", which detailed the siblings' struggles growing up and urged fans to "never let depression go unchecked."

Johnson reportedly shot himself in Charlotte, North Carolina, hours after he posted a video, during which he was visibly upset and crying about the way his life had turned out. In the clip, he could be seen holding a firearm in a car.

Following his passing, DaBaby alluded to his brother having suffered from depression, posting on Twitter, "If you can't get over depression GET HELP, you see a loved one struggling get them help, they refuse to get help, MAKE em get treated anyway. You suffer from PTSD [Post Traumatic Stress Disorder] take that s**t serious & get help! I'm bouta get a therapist my d**n self! #LongliveG [sic]."

DaBaby's seven-song EP included collaborations with Meek Mill, Polo G and NoCap, and Toosii.
Instagram Celebrity

The 'Keeping Up with the Kardashians' alum, who has her own clothing line Good American, takes to social media to post a picture of custom Talentless merchandise laid out on her lawn.

Sep 11, 2021

AceShowbiz - Khloe Kardashian has proven that she has nothing against Scott Disick. Despite his drama with her sister Kourtney Kardashian, the Good American founder still showed support for the former "Flip It Like Disick" star by promoting his clothing line on social media.

Making use of Instagram Story on Thursday, September 9, the 37-year-old "Keeping up with the Kardashians" alum let out a picture of custom Talentless merchandise laid out on her lawn. They included sweatshirts and T-shirts with her name embroidered on them. In the accompaniment of the post, she wrote, "Thank you @talentless @letthelordbewithyou."

Khloe Kardashian promoted Scott Disick's clothing line despite his drama with Kourtney Kardashian.

Khloe's post came more than a week after Scott got exposed by Kourtney's other ex, Younes Bendjima. In late August, Younes shared a screenshot of his DM from Scott with a photo of Kourtney kissing her current beau Travis Barker during a vacation. "Yo, is this chick OK!???? Broooo, like what is this? In the middle of Italy," so read Scott's DM, to which Younes replied, "Doesn't matter to me as long as shes happy. PS: i aint your bro."

Days later, Kourtney seemingly threw shade at Scott by sharing a cryptic message on Instagram Story. At that time, she shared a picture of a comic featuring a couple kissing. "Relax... This is going to hurt forever," the woman in the picture said. In the caption, the mother of three wrote, "HOW TO GET OVER SOMEONE who treated you BADLY."

The drama apparently has cost Scott's relationship with Amelia Hamlin. They reportedly broke up earlier this month because the 20-year-old model "is done with Scott for now."

While Scott might have a rocky relationship with Kourtney, he has been such a good friend for Khloe. In June, Scott defended Khloe after an online troll asked her, "who is she?!" in her Instagram post. Noticing the comment, he fired back, "Who isn't she? That's the question!"
Instagram Celebrity

The one-half of City Girls was previously rumored to be romantically linked to the Bad Boy Records founder before he was spotted cozying up to Future's ex and baby mama.

Sep 11, 2021

AceShowbiz - Does Yung Miami feel a sharp pang of jealousy after Joie Chavis and Sean "P. Diddy" Combs sparked dating rumors? The City Girls star has seemingly unfollowed her former bestie after the latter was spotted cozying up to the hip-hop mogul.

The Gossip Twins' Instagram account posted evidence of the apparent broken friendship. In a screenshot of the two's following lists, Yung Miami is no longer following Joie, while the latter still has the former on her list of followed accounts.

Just a week ago, they were still cool as they still hung out together. In a clip posted on Joie's Instagram Story at the time, the model and the rapper were goofing around as they puckered up to the camera.

While Yung Miami has not explained the reason why she unfollowed Joie, this arrives after the 32-year-old social media personality was caught getting affectionate with Diddy while on a romantic yacht vacation.

In pictures which surfaced online earlier this week, the rumored lovebirds frolicked while on board a yacht in Ibiza. They were pictured kissing and cuddling on a couch, and at one point, the rapper who donned a green shirt and print shorts, was seen lying on top of Joie as she was relaxing on a lounge chair. The Bad Boy Records founder was also pictured hugging his alleged new flame, who showed off her curves in a black-and-yellow two-piece bikini, from behind.

Back in June, meanwhile, Yung Miami and Diddy were rumored to be an item after she posted on her own Instagram account photos of her with the Bad Boy Records founder back in June. In the images, they were holding hands while posing on the staircase. The two dressed up to the nine for Quality Control CEO Pierre "P" Thomas' star-studded 40th birthday. They, however, never publicly confirmed their relationship.
BUTTE COUNTY, Calif. - An 18-year-old is being tried as an adult and was charged with attempted murder with great bodily injury and possession of an illegal assault weapon, according to the Butte County Superior Court.

Deshawn Kelley was charged Friday in connection to a shooting on the bike path near Rio Linda Ave. in Chico on May 13, 2020.

On that day, police received several reports of gunshots in that area and an officer responded to the area.

When the officer arrived at the scene, the officer found a 23-year-old man with numerous gunshot wounds. The man was transported to Enloe Medical Center with life-threatening injuries.

Officers began investigating by gathering surveillance videos, witness statements and phone records that later identified Kelley, who was 17 at the time, as the suspect.

Police determined Kelley went to the bike path with a semi-auto pistol to confront a high school classmate.

Kelley was walking down the bike path when he heard a bicyclist coming from behind and he hid in bushes. When the bicyclist got with three to five feet, Kelley jumped out of the bushes and unloaded the entire magazine, according to District Attorney Mike Ramsey.

The 23-year-old victim told detectives Kelley did not say anything to him before shooting him and the investigation revealed the two did not know each other.

Detectives then learned Kelley took off for Southern California after the shooting.

Kelley was located by Chico Police Department on June 17, 2020, and arrested Kelley when he was in possession of an AR-15 style assault rifle.

Ramsey filed charges in the juvenile court and petitioned the court have Kelley tried as an adult due to the level of the crime.

On Sept. 1, 2021, a juvenile court judge agreed that Kelley is tried as an adult.

Kelley was transported to the Butte County Jail from the Butte County Juvenile Hall.

Kelley was arraigned in court Friday afternoon and further arraignment and entry of plea are scheduled for Sept. 15. His bail is set at $1,565,000.

Ramsey said the 23-year-old man survived the shooting after a month in ICU and multiple surgeries. The man is still recovering from the injuries he suffered.
CHICO, Calif. - President Biden's new pandemic response plan mandates all employers with more than 100 workers to be vaccinated.

"I don't think they should force us to get a vaccination and stuff like that because if people don't want to get it then that's their choice, one unvaccinated local grocery store worker said. "If I am going to be required to and they literally force me to then I kind of have to."

If workers refuse to get vaccinated then they will have to get tested weekly for the virus.

"Every workplace has mandatory things that you have to do and stuff, but having to vaccinated I think that's going way too overboard, the grocery worker said.

Some people told Action News Now they think that this new requirement will allow them to feel safer while doing things like grocery shopping.

"Requiring people that are going to be in settings that are surrounded by a whole lot of other people to either be vaccinated or tested is certainly not unreasonable, Sarah Thompson, who lives in Chico, told Action News Now.

Whether potentially slowing the spread or not, some do not agree with the mandate.

"I think that's taking away people's right to privacy and I think it is coercive government overreach, Theresa Moser, who lives in Chico said.

Companies with 100 or more employees will face a $14,000 violation from The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) if they do not comply with the mandate.

"That policy I just really disagree with that it kind of throws out anything that I have a choice in the matter and it's just kind of forcing me to do that, the grocery store worker said.

Most of the local big companies that Action News Now talked with today said that the mandate comes as a bit of a shock to them, but they are ready to do whatever it takes to keep both their employees and the public safe.

The White House is still working on increasing the supply of virus tests and what the exact requirements of the mandate will be.
TRINITY COUNTY, Calif. - The Trinity County Sheriffs Office issued new evacuation orders for the Denny area.

At 2:45 p.m., the Sheriff's Office issued the order which includes the area along Denny Rd. northeast to Zeigler Point Rd. through Denny proper to the wilderness boundary. Denny Rd. will be closed at Zeigler Point Rd.

There is also an evacuation warning for the Hawkins Bar and Trinity Village area.

This includes all areas in Hawkins Bar and Trinity Village north of Highway 299 between Suzie Q Rd. and Gray Falls Campground.

The roads include Suzie Q Rd., Denny Rd. to Ziegler Point Rd., Lone Pine Rd., Big Oak Rd., China Flat Rd., Flame Tree Rd., Coon Creek Rd., Pony Creek Rd., Gray Flat Rd., Emerald City Lane and Ammon Rd.

The Monument Fire is 204,436 acres and 45% contained.
OROVILLE, Calif. - Oroville Police arrested a woman they say intentionally started a fire that burned down a new apartment building.

Part of the area is completely pure charcoal and charred remains.

We were watching TV a little bit and all of a sudden we heard this woosh, Alice Medeiros, who lives across the street said.

Medeiros lives in Tuscan Villa Apartments which are right across from the now burned Olive Ranch Apartment that was under construction.

The heat from the fire broke several windows from Medeiros home and hers wasnt the only one.

Her next-door neighbor, Michael Murray, also experienced the same.

Murray says he was caught by surprise by the fire.

The windows in my house started cracking, so I came out here, and turned around. I thought my building was on fire, Murray said.

His building survived but some cars parked on the street did not. Damage is visible on the headlights and bumpers.

We were really lucky, I really believe that God was watching out for us for some reason last night because, this building, even the manager and the maintenance guy said that what they saw, they thought this building was gone, Medeiros said.

Police are still investigating the case and are asking anyone with more information to call the Oroville Police Department.
Emerald Media (an investment platform backed by KKR) and Mayfield India have today announced that they have sold their stake in Amagi, a global leader in cloud-based SaaS technology for broadcast and connected TV. Accel, Avataar, Norwest Venture Partners, along with existing Amagi investor Premji Invest have collectively invested well over US$100 million to pick up the stake held by Emerald Media and Mayfield India.

Amagi started in 2008 in India as a cloud-based geo-targeted TV advertising company, but pivoted in 2018 to build a global leadership position in SaaS-based broadcast and streaming of 24x7 live linear channels. Today, Amagi supports over 800 channels on its platform including playout and redundancies, Amagi has emerged as one of the largest cloud deployments in the world with distribution in 40 countries across cable, connected TV and OTT. It has developed deep technical integration with ad supported platforms such as The Roku Channel, Samsung TV Plus, Pluto TV, Plex, Redbox, STIRR, VIZIO, Xumo and other top 30 OTT platforms, providing one of the most comprehensive distribution coverage for content owners to reach their audiences in the US, LatAm, Europe and Asia.

SCREENXX Awards 2021 Last Date for nomination of Digital Video Content and OTT Platform.. - Monday, September 20, 2021 - ENTRIES OPEN

Emerald Media and Mayfield India were early investors in Amagi. They invested at a time when cloud technology in broadcast media was in its infancy. We are grateful to them for believing in our vision and supporting our rapid growth over the last few years, said Baskar Subramanian, co-founder and CEO, Amagi.

Amagi has established itself as the de facto SaaS platform for media brands resulting in significant growth in recent years. The company revenues have grown by 136% in the fiscal ending March 21 and this momentum continues, driven by 44% YoY growth in new customers. Amagi enables up to 40% savings in cost of operations as compared to traditional delivery models. As ad spends shift to connected TV and OTT, Amagi has also been enabling customers to effectively monetize their content libraries, with its new product introductions. In fact, it has been delivering 5-10x growth in ad impressions for some of its top customers in recent times.

Our journey of partnering with Baskar, Srividhya and Srinivasan in bringing alive their vision of becoming one of the fastest growing media SaaS companies in the world has been an enriching one. Amagi has today catapulted to international success with a global footprint and a robust growth trajectory on the back of its bold and pioneering technology innovation along with their ability to foresee the needs of the industry. We are confident of their continued success and wish them well on their journey ahead. said Rajesh Kamat, Managing Director, Emerald Media KKRs Pan Asian Media Investment Platform

Mayfield being the first institutional investor in Amagi in 2013, we have observed this company grow from an India focused technology and services player to a truly global and dominant SaaS enterprise on the back of their unique and homegrown IP stack. We wish all three founders and the incoming investors all the best in the years to come, said Vikram Godse, Managing Partner, MF Advisors who invested in the Series A round in 2013

Amagi provides a complete suite of solutions for content creation, distribution and monetization for TV and OTT. The company also has a state-of-the-art cloud broadcast operations center that can support 1000+ live linear channels. Amagi clients include A+E Networks UK, beIN Sports, CuriosityStream, Discovery Networks, Fox Networks, Fremantle, NBCUniversal, Tastemade, Tegna, Vice Media, and Warner Media, among others.
Skore - a sexual wellness brand under the TTK Group, in partnership with Isobar - the digital agency from the house of dentsu India, had recently collaborated with Clubhouse to take its Cliteracy Drive a step forward. The attempt here was to build conversations on a subject, still considered to be a social taboo.

A quick recap: Conceptualised by Isobar India, Skores Cliteracy Drive was launched on August 8 to commemorate International Female Orgasm Day. It was a fun educational campaign to spread awareness about womens orgasms. The association with Clubhouse, a social audio app, was an integral part of the campaign. It also drove awareness about the brands orgasm gel, Skore Oh! Gel. In a country where 65-75% of women dont reach orgasm during sexual intercourse and 15% of women have never had an orgasm in their sexual life, this path-breaking work sparked a much-needed revolution.

Clubhouse has been the talk of the town for quite some time now. It is popularly looked upon as a more human place on the Internet where people come together for great conversations. Home to hundreds of thousands of discussions on every topic under the sun, this social audio app is also an opportunity for brands to have meaningful conversations with their audience and deeply understand them for who they are.

So, here are the top 4 lessons learnt:

1. Be where your audience is:

Though Skore targets everyone, it is skewed toward the younger generation since they are more open and comfortable to explore and understand the subject. Additionally, discussing sex is a private behaviour. So, what better place to choose for this campaign than a closed room where a group of people can openly talk about sex, thus, making Clubhouse the ideal platform.

2. Choose the right voice for deeper engagement:

Due to its popularity and appeal, the Dark Room - one of the most popular clubs on Clubhouse, was chosen for the conversation. It was hosted by popular content creators - Santu Mishra and Aishwarya Subramanyam who regularly speak on tabooed topics. The room was aptly themed Sleepless with Skore on the night of August 8. Conversations revolved around the need for women to explore pleasure and orgasms with the help of Skore products along with the need for men to be cliterate. Result? Close to 1000 participants joined the conversations wherein most of them chose to stay for the complete 2-hour session. This was a huge leap considering that people today are unwilling to invest even 30 seconds of their time on communication from brands. Perhaps, no other digital medium, social media, or branded content can elicit such long duration of engagements and interactions in a screen-cluttered age of ever-shortening attention spans.

3. Be open and brave to really listen:

With the platform following an audio-only format, there were no inhibitions. The conversations, therefore, were a lot more open and feedbacks could be understood firsthand. This was important because whenever brands do consumer immersions to get feedback on their products, there are other factors impacting the integrity of findings including the respondent & researchers biases and transparency of findings. Hence, not only was Skore the first brand to associate with Clubhouse in India but it was also for the first time that a brand was actively listening to opinions, conversations, and feedback on an open platform from its core TG on the subject and also on the brand itself. Furthermore, Skore received numerous organic mentions during conversations that were completely unseeded and opened itself to previously untapped segments, including topics related to the LGBTQIA+ community.

4. Fit in, dont force yourself in:

The conversations were genuine and organic and sometimes also related to personal experiences. It was, therefore, important for the brand to be an enabler of the conversation rather than trying to be the hero. This effectively means that brands need to be brave to put people and their voice first and not be pushy trying to turn the conversation into a brand speak.

Arjun Siva, DGM, Digital Marketing & eCommerce, TTK Healthcare said, Ive been an early-ish user of Clubhouse, and I am fascinated by the openness that the platform fosters. While it is still early days, and Clubhouse may not give me the reach that a traditional digital advertising platform can, it will be interesting to see how the platform evolves to pair the unmatched engagement it provides, with scale.

Aalap Desai, National Creative Director, Isobar India added, "The International Day of Female Orgasm was just the right fit to introduce Skore on Clubhouse. The right audience, the right room, the right conversation and bam! We create another first in the category."

Priyanka Shah, AVP Media, Isobar India commented, Skore leveraged Clubhouse for a brand-new opportunity to earn credibility by discussing topics that theyre experts on. They also earned greater trust by making themselves available to listen and talk candidly with their audiences. We at Isobar firmly believe that this level of trust-building with potential customers is a chance that shouldnt go begging in the value-driven climate of 2021.
Global leader in the arena of digital geospatial information and services, Magnasoft today announced the appointment of Ravi Shelvankar as Chief Business Officer, Hi-tech & Automotive, North America.

Magnasoft 3.0 is getting strengthened with exceptional additions to its leadership teams across all verticals. After bringing on board industry veterans like Bhupinder Singh as a Member of the Board and Mike McGill as Vice President, Sales & Market Development, Ravi Shelvankars appointment is the right next step for Magnasoft to make a significant impact on the USD 440 billion geospatial market.

Ravi Shelvankar is based out of the Bay Area. He brings with him over 20 years of experience in directing leading-edge services business models, strategic sales and Fortune 500 key account management with outstanding record of achievement in complex multimillion-dollar, multiyear deals and contracts. He is a highly acclaimed name in the Hi-tech sector with proven success in driving innovative digital transformation initiatives for leading global enterprises. Be it ValuePoint Technologies, CSS Corp., Sify Americas or Infosys, under his leadership, the companies have procured and maintained long-term relationships with several high-value clients.

Commenting on Ravi Shelvankars joining, Bobbie H Kalra, Co-founder & CEO, Magnasoft says, We are absolutely delighted to have Ravi in our Hi-tech & Automotive team. In our newest version, we are largely focusing on new verticals such as Utilities & Communications and Hi-tech & Automotive. The Hi-tech market is growing exponentially. The global autonomous vehicle market is projected to garner $556.67 billion by 2026. Moreover, hyperscalers are exhibiting unprecedented growth and Magnasoft is aiming to play an important role in this growth journey.

Keeping in view the vast leadership experience that Ravi holds in the Hi-tech industry, his mentoring will prove invaluable at this time. I am confident that under his leadership many important business relations will flourish. His extensive experience in varied leadership positions as CEO and CBO that spans through global conglomerates, right from Infosys to Sify Americas to iGATE will add phenomenal value to the organization at this point, Bobbie H Kalra further adds.

Equally excited to begin this association with Magnasoft, Ravi Shelvankar says, Magnasoft offers a full suite of Data Solutions for Vehicle Autonomy. AI data augmented with human intelligence is the next big thing in the Connected Vehicle space. For Automobile Manufacturers to derive the best value out of their AI/ML, connectivity, LiDAR and other initiatives the availability of last mile data curated with human intelligence is critical. Magnasoft brings in the unique blend of diverse domains - from automation and labelling to HD mapping to reference data curation combined with expertise in managing data from different sources such as cameras, LiDAR, GPS, IMU and radars. It is exciting to be a part of this growing team. Together, I look forward to achieving many milestones.

Magnasoft has been confidently treading new paths and achieving success owing to its out-of-the box thinking approach, supported by initial investments from Cafe Coffee Day and incredible mentorship of IT doyens like Phaneesh Murthy, Abraham Mathews and Rajiv Kuchhal, who are in the Board of Directors. Ravis contributions as the Chief Business Officer will take this growth trajectory to a whole new level.
Wonderchef, the pioneering brand of finest kitchenware in the country, has brought in leading actress Kriti Sanon as its brand ambassador. Known for her wide-ranging film choices, fitness and her love for food and family, Kriti has embarked on this new journey with Wonderchef to spearhead the companys vision of building a vibrant brand that not only focuses on health but also on the innovation and modern outlook. Like Kriti, the brand is breaking old moulds and creating new paradigms for todays women.

Kriti personifies Wonderchefs values as a health oriented, innovative and contemporary brand. Her versatility cuts across genres and geographies which is in line with the companys strategy of reaching a wider audience all across India. Just like Kriti, the brand believes in evolving continuously and coming up with newer, better appliances & cookware.

Talking about the association, Mr. Ravi Saxena, Founder and Managing Director, Wonderchef said: The engagement with Kriti will amplify our efforts to create more awareness about healthy cooking and capture wider demography. Taking Kriti as our brand ambassador was a natural choice for us because Wonderchef relates with Kriti as a self-made independent person with a mix of modern and traditional values. The vividness of her persona and the finesse with which she connects with the audience make her the ideal choice for strengthening our positioning. She brings glamour, universal appeal and feminine touch to the brand.

Excited about the partnership Kriti Sanon commented: I had an immediate connect with the brand. In todays sedentary world, it is very important to have healthy food and Wonderchef not only enables healthy cooking at home without any hassle but also brings style and modernity to the kitchen. I am overjoyed to have the opportunity to represent the brand. We are what we eat and I look forward to fostering healthier eating habits by being a part of Wonderchef family.

Traditionally cooking has been considered the job of the woman of the house. All kitchenware brands have reinforced this image further by showing women alone cooking for the entire family and their friends, whereas the husband is shown making the choice of what she must use in the kitchen. Mr. Saxena added Wonderchef is a modern and progressive brand. Our customer is broad minded and believes in gender equality. Our campaign enhances this positioning where Kriti involves her friend in co-creating delicious recipes while using Wonderchef appliances. She even gives him the title of Wonderchef when he prepares a full meal.

The TVC will be launched simultaneously across multiple channels including digital. An extensive print campaign is also planned along with prominent presence across general trade, modern trade and exclusive brand outlets. This will create 360 degree visibility for this new association.
Some people have a knack for successfully growing profitable cover crops, anywhere, under any conditions. For others, successfully planting cover crops in drought conditions may be difficult to achieve.

To increase the potential for success, farmers might ask themselves what their goals are for planting cover crops. Reduction of wind and water erosion, additional livestock feed, or better soil health and water retention are common reasons for planting a cover crop.

But there are so many questions to answer. Will there be enough moisture for germination? What temperatures will we have? Will we be able to terminate the cover crop properly to maximize crop production? Will there be an economic return from growing cover crops?

These topics were discussed by the University of Minnesota (U of M) Extension crops team during the final Strategic Farming: Field Notes podcast held live on Aug. 25.

The Extension educators included: Troy Salzer, Jared Goplen, Ryan Miller and Liz Stahl, as well as Anna Cates, Minnesota State Soil Health specialist.

Once weve picked our goals for cover crops, here are some things to consider:

Reduction of wind and water erosion

During the 2020-21 open winter, wind blew away topsoil in many regions.

For farmers who want to reduce wind erosion, planting an inexpensive cover crop could help.

Winter rye seems to have a slight advantage over winter wheat or triticale, said the educators. The former is a little cheaper than the latter two choices.
Paying homage to the traditions of the western stock horse, the Montana 4-H Working Ranch Horse Project is one of the fastest growing projects in Montana 4-H. Those enrolled get to learn about, perfect, and demonstrate horseback skills that are used nearly every day in a real ranch situation.

Youth enrolled in the project also have the opportunity to participate with their horses at the Montana State 4-H Working Ranch Horse Finals. This year the finals were held Aug. 28-29 in Vaughn, Mont.

Lindsay Garpestad, head of sponsor relations and a member of the Montana 4-H Working Ranch Horse Committee, offers a unique perspective on the growth of the project. She remembers competing in the project 10 years ago when she was in 4-H. Comparing then to now, Garpestad says the project and the state finals has absolutely transformed in a good way.

I can tell you this project has gone from one class held in conjunction with the state 4-H Horse Show to an independent two-day event, she commented.

Any 4-H member who competes in the project at their county fair is eligible to show at the Montana 4-H Working Ranch Horse Finals.

The first day of the competition at the state finals this year, 4-H youth competed against other members in their level. The project is broken down into levels, one through four. All youth start out in level one and progress on through the levels with each level requiring the horse and rider to display a more advanced set of skills.

Youth in each level demonstrated their skills across five different classes, which included a knowledge test, riding their horse through a pattern, sorting cattle, roping heading and roping heeling. Breaking the show down into the five different classes gave the youth more opportunities to place and win prizes, Garpestad pointed out.
Imad Enchassi, Muslim chaplain and professor of Islamic Studies at Oklahoma City University, prayed for the safety of Afghan people during an interfaith service at the Oklahoma City National Memorial on Aug. 31.

A Catholic organization responsible for refugee resettlement and leaders of the Oklahoma City Muslim community are preparing for hundreds of displaced Afghan families to arrive in Oklahoma.

The questions of when they might arrive, how many are coming and where they will be housed remain unanswered one week after the final U.S. troops and diplomats departed Afghanistan. Over 120,000 Afghans and U.S. citizens were airlifted from Kabul during the massive humanitarian operation. The evacuees include those who helped U.S. interests during the 20-year war, participated in human rights activism on behalf of U.S. nongovernmental organizations, worked for U.S. based media outlets and have dual citizenship.

Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese Oklahoma City is the organization historically in charge of refugee resettlement in Oklahoma, contracting with federal agencies to provide short and long-term resources.

Patrick Raglow, executive director of Catholic Charities, said he expects hundreds of Afghan families to be resettled in Oklahoma.

"Our work begins upon arrival," Raglow said, "and hopefully, we get enough advanced notice so that we can be prepared to receive them."

Dr. Imad Enchassi, senior imam at the Islamic Society of Greater Oklahoma City, has been working with Catholic Charities and the Muslim community to prepare. Enchassi said Afghans in the Oklahoma Muslim community are hearing from evacuated family members that refugees are being taken to various military bases, one of which might be Fort Sill in Lawton.

As scenes of panic and despair from Kabul permeated print and electronic media last month, Enchassi said he and his organization have been contacted with countless offers of help and support. Oklahoma's Kevin Stitt was among 37 U.S. governors to declare their willingness to accept refugees.

"I could tell you, once I announced from the pulpit that refugees will be coming here, not only from the Muslim community, but from a large portion of Oklahoma community, everybody wants to help," Enchassi said. "'How can we help? What is it that we could do? I have an extra apartment; I have an extra car. I would be able to employ (them).'"

He added he has already received hundreds of applications for translators and other kinds of volunteers to help with the resettlement efforts.

Adam Soltani, executive director of the Oklahoma City chapter of the Council on Islamic-American Relations, said community leaders are learning more everyday about the refugee resettlement process and how Oklahomans may be able to assist.

"The mere fact that so many people have reached out, that's a positive thing," Soltani said. "You know, that's definitely a shift in the right direction."

Countering Hate

Though it is uplifting to hear the number of Oklahomans wanting to help potential new neighbors, Soltani said he has identified a slight uptick in hate mail to his inbox and to his organization. He said some of it was reminiscent of responses following 9/11 or in 2010, when the Oklahoma legislature made a move to ban Sharia law with State Question 755.

In one notable public anti-Muslim declaration in 2014, then State Rep. John Bennett referred to Islam as a "cancer in our nation that needs to be cut out." Bennett, who is currently chairman of the Oklahoma Republican Party, went on to call the Council on Islamic-American Relations a "terrorist group" and once required Muslim students to fill out a questionnaire asking them if they beat their wives, before they could meet with him in person.

With the prospect of Afghan families arriving, Soltani said the biggest challenge Muslims in Oklahoma face is educating people on the difference between what Islam is as a faith and theology and media coverage of extremist groups like the Taliban, the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda.

"We're seeing that increase in hate rhetoric, and it seems like deja vu almost to where we're having to explain to other people, again," he said. "What is Islam? Who are Muslims? What is Sharia law all about? You know, what are women's rights in Islam? What is the difference between somebody who adopts an extremist ideology versus somebody who falls in the orthodox ideology?" he said.

Navigating The Resettlement Process

Raglow said there will likely be 300 to 400 refugee families resettled across the Oklahoma City and Tulsa metroplexes.

Refugees must first be thoroughly vetted for biographical information and their potential for being national security risks. The process usually starts in a refugee's native country, or a neighboring country, and can take a few years to complete. In the case of fleeing Afghans, waiting for documentation and interviews to be completed abroad was not an option.

Instead, they were directed to apply for humanitarian parole, which works as a temporary non-legal status for refugees that have an urgent humanitarian or public benefit reason for leaving their country but still need to be vetted. Beneficiaries of humanitarian parole must take steps to attain legal authorization and remain in the U.S. once they are here.

Enchassi said Catholic Charities isn't expecting to begin processing refugees until late September.

The U.S. Department of Defense has authorized seven military bases in New Jersey, New Mexico, Texas, Virginia and Wisconsin as centers to receive, integrate and initially house refugees. Fort Sill in Lawton has not been so designated, according to Ygal Kaufman, public affairs specialist at Fort Sill, though in an email Kaufman added that Fort Sill personnel are aiding resettlement efforts at authorized military bases.

In the past, Oklahoma successfully resettled refugees from Vietnam, Burma, Cambodia, Eritrea, Iraq, Syria and even Afghanistan, when people were fleeing the first occupation of the country by the Taliban in the 1990s.

For the first six months after arriving, refugees receive federally funded support through Catholic Charities in the form of services such as housing, cash payments varying by family size, medical care, school registration for children and English language lessons. The Spero Project, a nonprofit that specifically focuses on providing long-term resources to refugees, steps in to maintain steady community support for refugees years after their resettlement.

The Spero Project doesn't receive any government funding to help provide resources for refugees though, instead the organization relies on private and community donations, fundraisers and volunteers to provide services. Funded by private and community donations, The Spero Project offers a one-on-one English Immersion Program, citizenship test classes, driving lessons and student enrollment and support services.

"(Catholic Charities') primary work is in the first 90 days, and then they're working on new families that are coming in," said Kaitlyn Ritchie, director of programs at The Spero Project. "So that's kind of where our organization comes in partnership with them to be that more longstanding relational connection."

Welcoming Fleeing Afghans

On Aug. 18, Gov. Stitt released a statement inviting Afghan refugees to Oklahoma.

"I welcome Afghans fleeing the Taliban regime to come to Oklahoma and live in the freedom we hold so dearly," Stitt said. "My office is exploring every possible avenue to help ensure no American citizen or any of our allies are left behind."

According to a HuffPost analysis, a total of 37 governors have expressed a willingness to accept refugees, 11 have remained publicly silent. Only two  from South Dakota and Wyoming  have expressed a disinterest in the matter.

Former Gov. Frank Keating, who served Oklahoma from 1995 to 2003, said there may be actionable steps Stitt can take to facilitate refugee resettlement in Oklahoma.

The governor can urge the state's congressional delegation to support legislation specifically facilitating the resettlement of refugees from Afghanistan the way Congress did after the 1975 fall of Saigon for hundreds of thousands of southeast Asians.

"There's got to be a process," he said, "Whether Governor Stitt has set up that process or another congressional act is needed, I don't know."

State Rep. Mauree Turner, D-Oklahoma City, is the first Muslim elected to the Oklahoma legislature and one of 18 Democrats in a Republican dominated House of Representatives. Turner called on Stitt to aid in the resettlement of Afghan refugees while making the state safer for all Oklahomans by addressing the "ongoing Covid crisis."

"(Oklahoma) can act on both of these things," Turner said, "but we need leadership that's willing to take those steps."

Oklahoma Watch is a nonprofit organization that produces in-depth and investigative journalism on important public-policy issues facing the state. The organization's website is at http://www.oklahomawatch.org.
In the campy and not necessarily entirely family-friendly (it was the first movie to be released with the PG-13 rating in America) but nonetheless culturally significant 1984 film, Red Dawn, a group of teenagers wage a guerilla war against invading Soviet soldiers in the Colorado Rockies.

What is especially curious about the film, especially for us living in the morally grey twenty-first century in which anti-heroes are just as popular as heroes, is the clear patriotic and anti-Communist message of the film.

The Soviets are unquestionably bad, and the Americans are the good guys.

Indeed, with a few exceptions, this message was by and large accepted by most Americans not only throughout the 1980s but throughout the Cold War.

For better or worse, as the United States and Russia struggled for world dominance in the twentieth century, most Americans viewed liberal democratic capitalism as superior to Soviet communism.

However, with the proliferation of the multinarrative and conspiracy-driven culture of the twenty-first century digital age, a host of variant ideologies have taken root in the American mind, ranging from monarchy and German National Socialism to various forms of anarcho-libertarianism as well as every variant of Marxism under the sun.

Moreover, many Americans of the right and left no longer feel loyal to the United States, its traditions, or its government.

Throughout social media, it is not uncommon to find Americans sympathetic to countries such as Iran, Syria, Sweden, and, yes, even Canada, arguing that these countries and their leaders are superior to a decadent and morally bankrupt United States.

One of the countries that has drawn the most sympathy -- especially among the American right -- is Vladimir Putins Russia. As evidenced by a host of memes, podcasts, and articles, many on the right view Putins Russia as the savior of the West.

Arguing that Putin has restored Christianity in Russia and has effectively won the culture war against the left in his home country, some on the right view Russia as being Americas moral superior. Indeed, some have even suggested that if Russia were to engage in a war with the United States, it would be far better for Americans if Russia won.

Attempting to dissuade conservatives from sympathy for Russia, former Defense Intelligence Agency analyst Rebekah Koffler argues in Putins Playbook: Russias Secret Plan to Defeat America (Washington, DC Regnery Gateway, 2021. 410pp. $28.99) that Vladimir Putin views America as his mortal enemy and that Russia is already engaged in an information and cyberwar with the United States and is, even more alarmingly, preparing for what they feel may be an inevitable kinetic and even nuclear war with the United States.

Koffler is ethnically Russian and was born in Soviet Kazakhstan in the Soviet Union. However, although growing up under Communism, her mother encouraged her and her sister not to trust Soviet propaganda. After a foreign exchange visit to Great Britain, Koffler quickly realized that many of the stories Soviet authorities told of the West were lies. Having become enchanted with the United States, she moved to America and married an American, hoping to serve the United States in the intelligence community.

Her research into Vladimir Putin and Russia has led her to believe that Russia poses a clear and present danger to the United States.

Despite warning of Russian influence in the United States, throughout Putins Playbook Koffler insists that she does not believe the Steele Dossier or Russiagate narrative concerning President Trump. Koffler herself worked under General Michael Flynn who was appointed by Barack Obama as DIA director in 2012, and she does not believe that General Flynn conspired with Russia. Kofflers view is that Russia simply wanted to sow chaos regarding the election and thus helped create the impression that Donald Trumps 2016 election was illegitimate.

This desire to sow chaos, Koffler argues, is at the heart of Russias information strategy, which following the direction of Putins Brain, Aleksandr Dugin. As Koffler notes, in his 1997 book Foundations of Geopolitics, Dugin argues that Russia must weaken and deceive in order to win its conflict with the United States as well as introducing geopolitical discord into Americas internal reality by encouraging separatism and ethnic, social, and racial conflicts as well as actively support dissident movements [and] extremist, racist groups and sects...

This point is key, for Koffler is not the only one to suggest that Dugin and other Russian assets have used various hardline movements in the United States to sow discord. Koffler argues that the Russians know that the profound religious, ethnic, and political divisions in America are tremendous opportunities to exploit.

In Putins Playbook, Koffler also suggests that, in addition to waging a media and propaganda war against the United States, Russia preparing for a kinetic or hot war as well as a potential nuclear war with America.

Identifying U.S. involvement in the color revolutions of Ukraine, Georgia, and Kyrgyzstan, Putin feels that he himself will eventually be on the list. The Russian leadership is also aware of the work of Halford Mackinder, known as the Mackinder Doctrine, which emphasizes the importance of Eurasia on the world stage. Mackinders analysis was later developed by John Spykman in the 1930s and then later again by former Carter National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski in his 1997 The Grand Chessboard: American Primary and Its Geostrategic Imperatives. As demonstrated by a 2016 Russian Center for Strategic Assessments and Forecasts report, the Russians see the American wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Yugoslavia, Libya, and Syria as attempts of the United States to put the Mackinder Doctrine into effect and seize control of Eurasia.

Koffler argues that Vladimir Putin, unafraid to facedown the Americans, envisions himself as a new czar who will bring back the glory of Russia and rule a Eurasian empire. The Russian people likewise desire a strong ruler and are, for the most part, united behind Putin. Drawing from the work of George Kennan, Koffler argues that the Russians have always been surrounded by enemies and are a people forged for suffering and war.

Another of Kofflers crucial points, which has been echoed by military and intelligence figures for decades, is the reality that America no longer has full-spectrum military dominance.

Under Putin, Russia has attempted to expand and update both its conventional as well as its nuclear military power. Countering U.S. aggression to Russia, Putin himself has been making many hostile moves toward the United States, showing Russias new military capabilities. Since 2007, Russia Tu-95 Bear bombers have engaged in sorties near the United States; some of these runs even have breached U.S. airspace. Moreover, as a show of force, on March 1, 2018, Putin showed a video rendering of what appeared to be a nuclear strike on the state of Florida, where U.S. Special Operations Command is located.

However, perhaps the most dispiriting element of Putins Playbook is Kofflers admission that the United States is increasingly resembling the Soviet Union of her youth. No longer in America is Marxism a marginal phenomenon. Rather, Culture Marxism is taught to Americans from kindergarten to graduate school. Moreover, as Russians were in the Soviet Union, Americans are now tracked, traced, monitored, and punished for politically incorrect speech or for questioning powerful government entities. Putin, Dugin, and other Russians are not entirely wrong in their criticism of the decadence and hypocrisy of the West.

As Koffler frequently implies, America will not be saved by being defeated or conquered by Russia. Rather, conservatives must reengage and (peacefully) fight the culture wars once more.

Koffler hopes that the war in Russia will be won by the United States, but it will only be won by an America that does not succumb to the siren song of the same totalitarian ideology that poisoned Russia during the Soviet Union and now takes a different but not necessarily less aggressive form during the reign of Vladimir Putin.

Image: Regnery

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By definition, a facade is the outside appearance of a building. Buildings on Hollywood sets are often called facades because outside appearance is all they are. They look like complete buildings from the front, but from the inside, one can see that they're merely shells  completely hollow.

Just like a Hollywood set, Joe Biden is all facade and no substance. He's a hollow man.

The Biden facade has been carefully crafted over decades by himself, his enablers, and the propaganda ministry. Before the last election, I was told by one of his supporters that he seemed like a "genuine and likable guy." He's just a normal guy from a working neighborhood in Scranton, with no pretensions and absolutely nothing elitist about him.

An incredible number of Americans have been taken in by his smile and images of him joking around with us common people. Do you remember that picture of him with a biker woman sitting on his lap while they flirted and laughed it up? That's the Joe the media presented to us.

The propaganda ministry also packaged him as the experienced, steady hand. He was cast as the adult in the room who would return normalcy to our country. No living politician had more foreign policy experience than Joe. He would heal America's relationship with its allies and reset its position on the world stage.

But that image has always been a facade. The real Joe Biden is something very different from what one sees from the outside. He is not the kind old uncle. He is short-tempered and nasty when confronted with anything other than fawning adoration. Remember when voters dared to question him on the campaign trail? He immediately lost his temper, calling them vile names. He called one person fat and called numerous others liars ("lying dog-faced pony soldier"?). He even challenged one prospective voter to a fight  and these were the people whose votes he was courting.

Joe's whole career has been an exercise in dishonesty. We don't need to examine his 48 years on the government dole to get a sense of it. We need only listen to what he's said in the past two weeks. "No American will be left behind in Afghanistan." But Americans were left behind  under his orders. "The Taliban is in no position to overrun the country." But they did  and he asked the Afghan president to lie about it. "You're not going to see a Vietnam-type humiliation in Afghanistan." I guess he was accidentally honest with that one  the humiliation is much worse than Vietnam. But my personal favorite is, "The buck stops with me." But none of this is my fault.

In addition to being a proven liar, Biden is perhaps the most corrupt politician to ever occupy the Oval Office. While vice president, he had a Ukrainian prosecutor fired to stop an investigation of his son, Hunter  and bragged about it to an audience. As revealed by Hunter's abandoned laptop, we now know that "the Big Guy" was getting a 10-percent cut of Hunter's ill-gotten proceeds. The mob call that "wetting his beak." Lunch Bucket Joe's net worth is estimated to be 9 million dollars. Exactly how did someone who has spent his entire career on the government payroll acquire such wealth?

Isn't it interesting that the propaganda ministry tried to tar Donald Trump as a racist for his entire term, and then put a facade on an actual racist, who was its preferred candidate? Joe has always been prone to racially inappropriate comments. Remember when he said, "You cannot go to a 7-11 or a Dunkin Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent"? Comments such as that have never been just the gaffe master putting his foot in his mouth. They were Freudian slips. They're called that because they accidentally reveal something about the man. In this case, he is the same man that called a former KKK member his close friend and even did a eulogy at his funeral. I notice that the cancel crew has nothing to say about that.

Biden has displayed years of sexually inappropriate behavior. Dozens of young girls have been subjected to unwelcome touching or smelling  right in front of the cameras. During a speech, he stopped; looked down at a girl; and said, "Man, I'll tell you what, look at her. She looks like she's 19 years old sitting there like a little lady with her legs crossed." The girl was six years old. That should pretty much peg the creep factor meter. But it doesn't stop with creepy remarks and touching. He's been credibly accused of assaulting a woman (Tara Reid) in the U.S. Capitol. The cancel crew seems to have little interest in any of this, either.

Lunch Bucket Joe has never been the sweet, caring old uncle. His actions reveal callousness and an apparent lack of empathy toward others. When receiving the bodies of thirteen slain soldiers at Dover Air Force Base, he repeatedly checked his watch. When meeting with the parents of the deceased, he kept talking about his grief for his late son Beau  not the soldiers murdered under his watch. He had more important things to do than comfort the families. Perhaps he was late for his afternoon ice cream break. But now that he's back on vacation, he'll be getting to the ice cream shop on time for the next week or two.

As for the assertion that we now have an adult in the room, I have one thing to say: Afghanistan. The utter incompetence of the operation not only snatched defeat from the jaws of victory but left our relationships with allies in tatters. Robert Gates once said Joe Biden has been wrong on nearly every foreign policy issue of the last 40 years. Make it 48 years now.

Joe Biden's entire career has been a smoke-and-mirrors show put on by himself and his patrons. He's presented as the genuine, likable guy on the outside  but he's a corrupt, ruthless con man on the inside. Those who facilitated his elevation to the presidency should be ashamed:

the mainstream media

the NeverTrumps

the Democrat crime family

the Biden voters

the Supreme Court

We're being led by a petulant, narcissistic child with no apparent sense of right or wrong  and it's all their fault. Unfortunately, as we've seen in the past month, Joe Biden's flaws have serious real-world implications. We have thirteen dead soldiers, hundreds of American hostages, and an untold number of allies facing execution  and we're only seven months into his first term.

Just like those Hollywood sets, Joe Biden is all facade. When one looks behind the crafted image, one finds no wisdom, no principles, and no moral compass. God help the hostages we left behind in Afghanistan because President Asterisk surely will not.

John Green is a political refugee from Minnesota, now residing in Idaho. He currently writes at the American Free News Network (americanfreenewsnetwork.org). He can be followed on Facebook or reached at greenjeg@gmail.com.

Image: Marc Nozell via Flickr, CC BY 2.0.

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At 8:45 A.M. on September 11, I was on the phone with the editor at the European Wall Street Journal. We were discussing the op-ed about financing terrorism I had written for the paper, which was to run the next day. The TVs regular morning chatter in the background suddenly changed, and an anxious voice announced that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. We hung up and I rushed to my window, which has a clear view of downtown Manhattan and the World Trade Center. At first, I saw smoke rising in the distance; before long a thick, black cloud had engulfed the Twin Towers. Later the sky turned black, and the buildings disappeared altogether. I called the editor backit was still possible to get a connection to Europeand after describing the horrors outside my window, I suggested a new lead for the op-ed; I knew instinctively that this was no accident, but a terror attack.

This is how my op-ed titled Evils Unwitting Helper appeared on the morning of September 12, 2001. I wrote that terrorism does not happen in a political vacuum. The policies pursued by Western nations impact directly on both the means available to terrorists and the motivations driving their evil agendas. It is imperative that we assess what has gone wrong and begin to set those policies right."

This is when the idea for writing my book: Funding Evil, How Terrorism is Financed  and How to Stop It, which demanded to stop those who make terrorists activities possiblethe paymasters, so that horror like September 11 never happen again.

It took some time for the U.S. government to confirmed that al-Qaeda and other Islamist terrorist organizations have been raising money through charitable organizations, fundraisers in mosques, illegal and sometimes legal businesses, from used-cars sales to honey manufacturing to mining, to drug-trafficking, arms, and people smuggling, to mention but a few. They often are also the beneficiaries of states that provide money, arms, training camps, and safe haven. Since radical Islamists terrorists goal is to harm America, in 2001, the idea that any U.S. administration would fund such groups seemed preposterous

But years of investigations into radical Islamist terrorist financing offered many examples of different U.S. administrations -- mostly Democrats -- complicity. Funding Palestinian terrorist groups began in 1993, with the Clinton administration legitimizing and funding Yasser Arafat and his Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO -- an umbrella group  including Fatah, Hamas, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, all dedicated to the destruction of Israel and the establishment of a Palestinian state, in place of Israel), which until then were on the FBIs most-wanted list.

The alleged reason for the funding was Arafats promise to stop the PLOs terrorist activities. This promise, which he and the PLO have been repeatedly violating, gifted the Palestinian terrorist with land in Judea and Samaria, and the Gaza Strip, which the Palestinians have used ever since not to create a functioning state, but to lunch attacks against Israel. Despite this, the U.S., joined by the U.N., the European Union and nations, Arab states, the World Bank, and other international organizations never stopped sending billions of dollars to the Palestinians who killed Americans and continue their terrorism against Israel.

In May 2011, after the radical Muslim Brotherhood won the Egyptian election, President Obama stated that the participation of Egypts religious parties would create the best foundation for lasting stability in Egypt democratic political order. Obama promised $1 billion to support Egypts democratic revolution.

But the Muslim Brotherhoods creed is anything but democratic. They, like the Taliban, and the Mullahs in Iran, rule by enforcing sharia. Despite the growing opposition to the Muslim Brotherhoods government oppression of civil rights and devastation of the countrys economy, the U.S. seemed determined to assist the Brotherhood. On March 3, 2013, Secretary of State John Kerry visited Morsi and gifted him $250 million in U.S. aid, and an additional $250 million for climate projects from the World Bank.

Muslim Brotherhood logo with the word "prepare" in Arabic

On April 30, 2013, in Cairo, Morsi was given the opportunity to flaunt the latest advances in Egypts process of democratic transition, to a Congressional delegation, headed by Chairperson of Intelligence Committee Senator Dianne Feinstein (D- CA). Instead of calling his bluff, the delegation reiterated the strength and depth of Egyptian-American relations. The Americans further ensured Muslim Brother Morsi that the U.S. will not let him down, because Egypts stability is key to the stability of the region.

In 2015, the Obama administration, as part of its negotiations with the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) that was supposed to stop Irans development of nuclear weapons, gave at least $150 billion to Tehran, of which at least $1.8 billion was in cash. Then-secretary of State John Kerry acknowledged that some of the money will end up in the hands of the IRGC or other entities, some of which are labeled terrorists. Im not going to sit here and tell you that every component of that can be prevented.

Two weeks ago, the Biden administration, which is mostly a replica of the Obama administration, gifted the Afghan radical Islamist Taliban that enabled al-Qaeda training-camps, whose graduates attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on 9/11, at least $85 billion worth of weapons and piles of cash.

It is hard to escape the conclusion that Democrat-led administrations are bent on funding U.S. enemies.

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Last Friday, Rolling Stone magazine carried a story based on remarks that Dr. Jason McElyea made to a local station. He claimed that hospitals in Oklahoma were swarmed with patients overdosing on Ivermectin, causing other patients, such as gunshot victims, to be neglected.

Predictably Rachel Maddow and her myriad comrades on the left gleefully amplified this story on social media. (Drew Holden comprehensively chronicled this on Twitter.) The Guardian , Insider , Newsweek , and many other news outlets also carried the story. The propaganda balloon bulged so much that this became a national, perhaps even global story.

Fortunately, the pin of facts popped the balloon before it could bloat any further.

The Northeastern Health System Sequoyah issued a statement on its website refuting the allegations made in the Rolling Stone article:

Although Dr Jason McElyea is not an employee of NHS Sequoyah, he is affiliated with a medical staffing group that provides coverage for our emergency room. With that said, Dr McElyea has not worked at our Sallisaw location in over two months. NHS Sequoyah has not treated any patients due to complications related to taking ivermectin. This includes not treating any patients for Ivermectin overdose. All patients who have visited our emergency room have received medical attention as appropriate.

It must be remembered that, back in 2014, Rolling Stone magazine carried a story about the horrifying account of a gang rape at the University of Virginia student campus fraternity house. The story turned out to be false. The magazine then retracted the story and apologized to readers and all of those who were damaged by our story and the ensuing fallout. An investigation found Rolling Stone magazine guilty of defamation over a false article. The magazine ended up paying $1.65 million to the University of Virginia fraternity over the discredited rape story.

Rolling Stone magazine clearly failed at every stage including reporting, editing, editorial supervision, and fact-checking for both the gang-rape story and the Ivermectin overdose story. The question remains: Why do well-funded and well-staffed news organizations such as Rolling Stone fail so consistently?

The root cause of these failures is news organizations no longer consider reporting facts to be their function. Instead, they exist to propagate the Narrative. They have cultivated an audience that only wants its biases confirmed. Presenting their audiences with inconvenient facts may see them opt for another news outlet. Hence, they carry only those stories that fit the Narrative. All inconvenient stories are either killed or spun.

When they learn of a story such as the Ivermectin overdose, they are so overcome by a desire for it to be true that they abandon all due diligence. In their minds, the Ivermectin story is about anti-science dunderheads and a dog-whistle for Trump supporters foolish enough to treat COVID by consuming a drug meant for deworming horses. The implicit message is they received their deserved comeuppance by ending up in the emergency room. Trump supporters almost killing themselves is both satisfying and hilarious for leftist journalists.

They also know that, to push the message that vaccinations are the only way to stop COVID, they must convince people that alternative approaches mean death.

Journalists could easily have debunked the Ivermectin overdose claim by calling any of the hospitals in Oklahoma. A basic background check would have established that NHS Sequoyah did not employ Dr. McElyea, which should have prompted reporters to interview other doctors. The falsehood could have been identified in a matter of minutes.

Also troubling was the time that was taken to correct these stories. Both Rolling Stone and The Guardian should have removed their stories from the website and published the retraction only. Instead, they merely added notes of correction while the stories remain on their websites.

The propaganda traveled halfway around the world before the truth had a chance to get its trousers on. For the propagandists, this is mission accomplished.

So, is there a solution?

Its impossible to eliminate bias. There will always be certain stories that the left wants to be true and other stories that the right wants to be true.

The solution is to have diverse people in the newsroom. This is not the phony neo-liberal diversity of liked-minded people belonging to various races, nationalities, sexual orientations, and religions. This is the real diversity of opinions, perspectives, ideologies, and political affiliations. Here, a right-leaning individual who wanted the ivermectin overdose story to be false would have gone out of his way to investigate and debunk it.

But do not expect this solution to be applied any time soon. Can you imagine the newsrooms of organizations such as Rolling Stone, The New York Times, or The Washington Post employing right-leaning journalists?

This story is merely a symptom of the grave illness that has afflicted the news media for decades. Alas, there is no cure for this illness simply because news organizations dont see it as an ailment. They are proud propagandists, so any course correction is quite out of the question. As a news consumer, you have no option but to presume every story to be false until proven true.

Ivermectin cartoon by Ghenghis Gary.

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On the twentieth anniversary of 9/11, the effort by much of our cultural elite to rewrite history, which started on September 12, continues ever on. The point is to distract from the attacks carried out by the non-Western, non-Judeo-Christian, non-democratic terrorists and impart the message that nothing has changed: America is still the bad guy, same as it ever was.

The latest effort concerns the Facebook documentary The Outsider, by filmmakers Steven Rosenbaum and Pamela Yoder, which manufactures a "controversy" about the creation of the National September 11 Museum at the World Trade Center. Its purpose is to give weight to the filmmakers' opinion that the memorial should be less about the September 11 attacks and more about the political and moral rot of America.

"It's nationalistic, belligerent, and grievance-based," is how Rosenbaum describes the museum without a hint of irony. He means that the museum recognizes that the attacks happened and implies that America was wronged.

Imagine the cluelessness required to complain that the 9/11 museum at the WTC is "grievance-based." Not to mention "belligerent." Yet that pretty much encompasses a certain cultural and intellectual take on 9/11.

This view holds that America has no grievance, making any belligerence unjustified. The only questions are, how were the attacks America's fault? And what are the lasting lessons of 9/11 as regards America's misconduct?

"If you went," Rosenbaum continues, speaking of a visit to the museum, "you wind up feeling sad and angry, and is that what a museum is supposed to do?"

I would suggest that if a visit to the National September 11 Museum at the WTC did not leave you feeling sad and angry (along with, say, proud and hopeful), either the museum failed or there is something sadly wrong with you.

Along these same lines, the filmmakers  disregarding the momentous effort and ultimate sacrifice made by so many that day to save and help others, regardless of race, creed, color, or any other artificial divisions  complain that there are no exhibits dedicated to the hate and intolerance they know is inherent in the American DNA. In this case, they speak of the infamous "Islamophobia."

In the same vein, Time Magazine tells us of a "recently published call to reform the September 11 Museum" by Asad Dandia, a "Brooklyn-based Muslim writer and organizer" who writes that "there is a real danger that visitors stop at the word Islam and assign collective responsibility.'"

Collectively assigning bigotry and ignorance to Americans, Time summed up what Dandia told it by saying that "the average American may not be able to parse the nuanced differences between Islamism, jihadism and Islamic law when they hear references in the museum." And then, quoting Dandia directly, Time writes, "'So where do they direct their anger? Often at Muslims.'"

Except that in the eight years since the museum has been opened, not one simple-minded American, incapable of parsing those nuances, and triggered by the sight of a destroyed fire truck or a twisted piece of WTC steel or a film of innocents falling from the towers, has assigned collective responsibility for the attacks and then gone out and assaulted Muslims.

Those same Americans, however, may have stopped at the "Halal Guys" for lunch.

What did happen in America following 9/11, though? A series of brutal attacks by immigrant and home-grown Muslim terrorists on Americans (and worldwide, on Westerners in general). The last occurred on October 31, 2017, just steps from the WTC site and the museum. Muslim Uzbekistan immigrant Sayfullo Habibullaevich Saipov, 29, in America since 2010 as a winner of our "Diversity Immigrant Lottery" (there's that "Islamophobia" in action), and evidently unable to parse those nuances between jihadism and Islamic law, was so inspired by ISIS to kill Americans in the name of Islam that he drove a rented pickup truck into the crowd on the West Side Highway bicycle path, killing eight. That's more than were killed at the '93 WTC bombing. Eleven more were injured.

Further ignoring minor annoying nuances, six of his murder victims were foreign tourists, including a 31-year-old Belgian woman who was the mother of a months-old infant.

The effort by Rosenbaum and so many of our cultural and academic elite is not guided by a desire for mutual understanding or world peace. Nor are they free-thinking warriors gallantly taking arms against censorship.

Instead, they want to deny, diminish, and obfuscate  that is, censor  the memory and history of 9/11 in order to impose their viewpoints. Their special targets are the coming generations who have no memory of the attacks.

The disaster in Afghanistan, conducted in a way that was blatantly oblivious of history, has again demonstrated how much we need to appreciate, preserve, and honestly convey the history of September 11.

"How we ended up" with a 9/11 WTC museum dedicated to 9/11 "will be a source of debate for years to come," Rosenbaum claims. "But we can fix it."

"Who controls the past controls the future." That's the goal. For the sake of truth and our security, we cannot let that happen.

Note: On 9/11, my brother, Capt. William F. Burke, Jr., FDNY, gave his life. His half burnt-out rig, Engine 21, is a permanent exhibit in the museum. I served on the family advisory committee to the museum. I won the return of the iconic WTC Sphere to Ground Zero and co-founded the annual 1 WTC Stair Climb in honor of Captain Billy Burke.

Image: Firetruck at the National September 11 Museum at the World Trade Center by Gabichan2020. CC BY-SA 4.0.

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Joe Biden took to his little lectern on Thursday, shaking with righteous anger. As you already know, he wasn't angry at al-Qaeda/Taliban terrorists who slaughtered thirteen Americans last month. Nor was he angry about the sex trafficking flowing into America through our southern border and on planes loaded with unvetted Afghan "refugees." Instead, his anger was reserved for those intransigent Americans who refuse to get vaccinated.

They must be punished, he said, whether by being forced out of their jobs or having weekly swabs stuck so high in their noses that they risk piercing their brains. Others have already commented on the constitutional problems with Biden's remedy for the evil unvaxxed. I want to talk about a few more practical issues.

First, too few people are paying attention to the fact that this draconian, indeed, fascist dictate is for a virus that, for people under 70, has a mortality rate that is less than 1%. If a virus with a 10%, 20%, or higher mortality rate were sweeping through America, the panic factor might be different. But again, we're talking about less than 1% for those under 70. (And for those older than 70, the issue tends to be co-morbidities, including obesity.) Just keep in mind that America fought a successful revolution even as smallpox, with its 30% mortality rate, was sweeping through the colonies.

Second, this is not a vaccine. If it were a vaccine, those who are vaccinated would be perfectly safe from those who are not vaccinated. For example, Howard Stern, who said "f--- their freedom" because this 67-year-old multi-millionaire (worth over $200 million) wants to leave his gated enclave to eat at a restaurant, wouldn't be going full fascist on the rest of us if the vaccine worked. Instead, he'd be toddling off to dine at some fancy club, sneering at the unvaccinated and their illness. Likewise, if this were a vaccine, those who were vaccinated would not need masks, because they would not be either virus givers or receivers.

Third, Biden has exempted the millions of illegal aliens pouring into the country from the mandate, as well as members of Congress and their staff. One can view this two ways: Biden hates all these people and wants them to die from COVID. Or, considering that <1% mortality rate, along with all the problems associated with the vaccine, Biden hates everyone else and wants all these latter people to risk death or other permanent health problems. Remember, please, that teenage boys' risk of heart problems from the vaccine is six times greater than the risk of becoming seriously ill from COVID.

Fourth, as Anony Mee wrote me based on experience with the federal government, there are some practical problems with the mandate. Do any of you believe that there are enough swabs, testing sites, medical personnel, diagnostic reagents, and related people and materials to process as many as 80 million tests a week? Moreover, the PCR tests that are still common despite their accuracy issues can take as much as a week to deliver a result.

Fifth, Anony Mee had another practical point: "Don't forget the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act of 1995." It's more than likely that both the Department of Labor and OSHA lack funding to cover enforcing these new mandates.

Sixth, there is the brain and skill drain, not just from the federal government's civil service, but from the military as well. Anony Mee wrote about the civil service, but it's easy to imagine that the military will be affected as well (although the Defense Department and Air Force deny a claim that highly skilled people are already submitting their resignations):

The US is the largest single employer of hard science PhDs in the country, and most probably the entire world. Of distinguishable groups, PhDs are the least vaccinated. Can the USG afford to lose them? DARPA? USDA which has the largest research institution, the Agricultural Research Service, in the world? Walter Reed researchers?

As a bonus, here's Ron DeSantis ripping Biden a new one:

Here he comes from Washington DC instituting an unprecedented mandate, even his own people acknowledged is unconstitutional. Thats not leadership. The problem I have with Joe Biden is-this guy doesnt take responsibility for anything. Hes always trying to blame other people. pic.twitter.com/ZAhN1mva6o  Christina Pushaw (@ChristinaPushaw) September 10, 2021

I believe that the vaccine mandate will get pushed back. Indeed, I'm inclined to agree with those who claim that Biden is doing it both to distract from Afghanistan and to ride the wave of the delta variant's inevitable decline. (That is, as the delta variant inevitably lessens, Biden will claim the credit.) However, I also believe that America's large corporations, all of which are run by college graduates who have been marinated in leftism, will take the mandate as a green light to impose vaccine requirements on their employees.

While I don't see this ending well, there is a little light at the end of the tunnel. I spent some time last week with young tech workers and learned that very slowly, little by little, they're starting to push back against the idea that the world must stop for a virus that has no effect on them.

Image: Joe Biden. YouTube screen grab.

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On Sept. 9, Joe Biden delivered his major address from the White House about new, tough antiChina virus COVID measures he proposes to take. He was overbearing. He was angry and unpleasant. He blamed everyone but himself.

But in the speech and all its arguments and supposed data to support his overreach, he employed a miasma of lies, which were evident from the start.

1:03  When I became President (January 20 2021), about 2 million Americans were fully vaccinated[.]

FACT CHECK TIME: According to Bloomberg News, an average of 983,000 Americans had been vaccinated daily during the week of January 16-22. That's about 6.9 million Americans. In the previous week (January 915), some 844,000 Americans on daily average were vaccinated; from New Year's Day to January 8, a half-million Americans on daily average were jabbed; from Christmas to New Year's Day, it was a daily average of 277,000 Americans. The first week of vaccination was the week prior to Christmas, and during this week, 111,000 Americans on daily average were vaccinated.

The weekly totals then were 777,000 (week before Christmas) + 1.9 million (Christmas to New Year's) + 3.5 million (January 18) + 5.9 million (January 915) + 6.9 million = 19 million Americans.

Nineteen million Americans, not Biden's claimed 2 million, had been vaccinated prior to him becoming president.

1:16  Before I took office, we hadn't ordered enough vaccine for every American[.]

FACT CHECK TIME: On March 2, Biden also made this same false claim. At that time, KHN & PolitiFact HealthCheck rated this claim as "MOSTLY FALSE."

The Trump administration had ordered some 800 million doses of vaccine from around a half-dozen providers. Most of those vaccines had not yet been granted FDA approval, but the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines won FDA approval in December 2020, and Trump had already ordered 100 million of those doses from each of the two companies (200 million doses total); the size of the American vaccine-eligible population (age 12 and up) was 255 million. On December 23, after the FDA had announced approval of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines, Trump ordered an additional 120 million doses, and in this fashion, there was more than enough vaccine for all the 255 million aged 12 and up American population to receive vaccine.

2:59  And to make matter worse, there are elected officials actively working to undermine the fight against COVID-19. Instead of encouraging people to get vaccinated and mask-up, they're ordering mobile morgues for the unvaccinated dying from Covid in their communities[.]

"Mobile morgues"? Morgues are places where you put people who are already dead, not those who are sick and still alive. The remark makes no sense at all.

4:20  But the world's leading scientists confirm, that if you are fully vaccinated, your risk of severe illness from Covid-19 is very low. In fact, based on available data from the summer, only one out of every 160,000 fully vaccinated was hospitalized for Covid, per day[.] ... We're going to protect vaccinated workers from unvaccinated co-workers[.]

But Biden, you just said the risk to the vaccinated is already incredibly low!

5:00  And a distinct minority of Americans, supported by a stink minority of elected officials, are keeping us from turning the corner[.]

5:17 We cannot allow these actions to stand in the way of protecting the large majority of Americans who have done their part. I want to get back to life as normal[.]

So do we all, Biden, and you're in our way.

5:29  As your president, I'm announcing tonight, a new plan, to require more Kamericans to be vaccinated[.]

11:58  For the vast majority of you, who've gotten vaccinated, I understand you anger, at those who haven't gotten vaccinated[.]

That is stupid. Biden had already assured us that vaccinated people run an incredibly remote risk of getting sick. That being the case, why then should we good vaccinated people care one way or another about those who haven't been vaccinated? We're not going to get sick anyway.

22:35  We also know this virus transcends borders[.]

Yah, like the U.S.Mexico border, where literally hundreds of thousands on unvaccinated and infected illegals continue to pour over! Biden is angry at the alleged threat the unvaccinated give to the rest of us  so why is he not concerned about the unvaccinated illegals?

That's why even as we execute this plan at home, we need to continue fighting the virus overseas[.]

Why not at the border itself, then, in this case?

Image: Pixabay, Pixabay License.

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What's going on with the Los Angeles Times?

Was it bad enough that the paper downplayed a racist assault on a leading California gubernatorial candidate, Larry Elder, where a white leftist wearing a gorilla mask hurled an egg at the head of Elder, a black man, expressing a common trope among racists who compare black people to apes? Recall that Roseanne Barr was fired from her popular television show for that one after she compared White House advisor Valerie Jarrett to an ape on Twitter.

Nooo, not at all to these practitioners of "journalism." They had to keep manufacturing the lies and omissions, their latest a pictorial lie that looks like a fresh bid to smear Elder:

The Los Angeles Times is under fire for a pair of misleading tweets about GOP California gubernatorial candidate Larry Elder, who had an egg thrown at him by a person in a gorilla mask while walking in Los Angeles on Wednesday#NextRevFNC @SteveHiltonx https://t.co/RiA6YhPY8Z  The Next Revolution (@NextRevFNC) September 10, 2021

It follows from their low-reasoned endorsement for Elder's rival, Gov. Gavin Newsom, their op-ed calling Elder 'the black face of white supremacy', and their latest suggestion that Elder isn't really black. They've also put out what appear to be push-polls against Elder, not quite in line with other polls. While the Times has a generally good record on its polling, according to Five Thirty-Eight, its methodology in the past has been phone polls. This latest Berkeley IGS poll that it paid for, signaling that all is over for Larry, was done by email on registered voters, which, close to election time, isn't as historically useful. The sum message of all these little things is that they have it in for Elder.

Now we move on to the late-day dirty tricks.

In the first photo, they the racist attack on Elder "a hostile reception." By their logic, this comparable picture from Norman Rockwell, painted in 1964, complete with flung tomatoes at a black girl, would also be called "a hostile reception" by the Times, too, rather than what Rockwell called it, which was "The Problem We All Live With." To the Los Angeles Times, Elder, not the racist leftist who committed the actual assault, was the problem, with Elder's ideas just naturally drawing "a hostile reception," even as the ape mask goes unaddressed.

The Los Angeles County Sheriff certainly thinks it's a problem. And so does the LAPD, which is investigating the assault as a racist hate crime and looking for the assailant.

Being forced to report the matter or else look like utter newsroom losers who are out of the loop, the Times then cooked up a photo manipulation to go with its headline, which is where the second photo came up:

This is how the LA Times reported the assault on Larry Elder and his entourage.



- Used a picture of him clasping a woman's face. She is one of his supporters.

- Misleadingly refers to the assault as an "altercation" to paint him as the aggressor, in conjunction with the photo. pic.twitter.com/MZVtTT6pGt  Ian Miles Cheong @ stillgray.substack.com (@stillgray) September 10, 2021

Notice how it called the matter an "altercation" rather than an unprovoked assault, suggesting that Elder was somehow involved in the matter as if it were a he-said, she-said event, and boys will be boys. Fact is, Elder was assaulted, an aide was punched, and the entourage was hustled out of that area without retaliation. That's no altercation, that's an unprovoked attack.

Then it gets worse: Notice how the photo, positioned under the misleading headline, has a carefully chosen frame making it appear as though Elder was slapping the woman. He was in fact embracing her as a supporter, but a casual headline-reader, which the LA Times knows most readers are likely to be, would think that Elder was the one who launched some kind of assault.

How many frames did they have to go through in an automatically clicking photographer's camera, or else photographer's video, to come up with that one? The photo was obviously carefully selected, and someone took quite a bit of time to go through the footage, frame by frame, until he had just the right photo to mislead readers.

The lady in the picture, whose face was being warmly touched by Elder, and not being slapped, had some choice words about the matter.

Who is she? She's apparently an Elder supporter, not someone she's got into an "altercation" with. Fox News notes that her Twitter account was unverified, which is true as it is of most people, but it's interesting that there's an impressive LinkedIn page with the same unusual name (Basque origin, with a typically Cuban first name, same as Soledad O'Brien), from Venice, California, showing a longtime neighborhood community leader in Venice who has supported the Elder recall in other matters, and it would make it quite likely that she is the same person. She is protesting the use of her image to cast a false light on what was happening as the fallout from the racist hate attack on Elder continued.

In the news industry, under the heading of libel and its four privacy torts, there is a category called 'false light' reporting which is actually actionable. According to the Digital Media Law Center:

False light is one of the four categories of "privacy torts" (the others being misappropriation, intrusion, and publication of private facts). While the nature of false light claims vary by state, they generally protect people from offensive and false facts stated about them to the public. Not all states recognize claims for false light [California does]. In the states that do recognize a cause of action for false light, the specific requirements to raise a claim vary. Accordingly, you should review your individual state section listed at the bottom of this page for specific information about your state. Generally speaking, a false light claim requires the following: The defendant published the information widely (i.e., not to just a single person, as in defamation); the publication identifies the plaintiff; it places the plaintiff in a "false light" that would be highly offensive to a reasonable person; and the defendant was at fault in publishing the information. See Restatement (Second) of Torts  652E.

It adds:

Some states, including California, hold that unlike defamation, false light concerns untrue implications rather than directly false statements. For instance, an article about sex offenders illustrated with a stock photograph of an individual who is not, in fact, a sex offender could give rise to a false light claim, even if the article and photo caption never make the explicit false statement (i.e., identifying the person in the photo as a sex offender) that would support a defamation claim.

She could have some grounds for a case, although not every condition has been met -- the Times didn't identify her by name even though she's pretty easy to find on LinkedIn and it's pretty likely that the reporters knew who she was, given her prominence as a community leader. One wonders if that omission was intentional as a means of avoiding such a suit. Everything else in that choice of pictures was. Ursua appears to have plenty of money to pay for lawyers so it would be interesting to see if that happens. Already she's filed hate crime charges with another woman, stating that the incident did not make her feel safe. The LA Times, after more than 20 hours of the manipulative photo on its site, has replaced it.

The final question, though, is this:

Why is the Los Angeles Times doing this? Poll after poll is showing that Newsom has the recall in the bag. The Hoover Institution and its formidable scholars, citing various megatrends, think this recall may not make it. While the Los Angeles Times-financed Berkeley IGS poll shows Newsom winning by a very large margin, other polls, including the pretty reliable Trafalgar polls, and others with good reputations, show that Newsom is winning, too. Here is the RealClearPolitics lineup. Dirty tricks are typically done by utterly desperate creatures making a last stand before they go down in flames. We don't see that here. All we see are efforts to take down Elder which revolve around racist attacks. This is strange stuff. Joel Pollak at Breitbart noted that the Los Angeles Times apologized recently for its racist history. All a reader can conclude from this behavior is that when people tell you who they are, believe them.

Image: Make a Meme / shareable meme, public domain

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Five years ago, the Trump base could not understand the NeverTrump Republicans who were willing to have the horrible Hillary Clinton in the White House, not the Trump they loathed. Thank G-d, that did not come to pass.

But today  there is a curious silence in the NeverTrump camp now that they have succeeded in getting the loathed Trump out of the White House...for Biden. Does anyone hear a Bret Stephens, a William Kristol  even Liz Cheney, whooping and hollering in gleeful jubilation that with President Biden in the White House, the Oval Office is Trump-rein?

I don't hear these faux Republican malcontents praising Biden to the heavens  Biden, who probably can't distinguish COVID-19 from the common cold, Biden, who is a serial liar and likely a sociopath, Biden, whose idea of policy is to reverse whatever Trump did (but not necessarily on Afghanistan). Consider, too, for all the slurs, lies, and contumely hurled at Mr. Trump, no one ever suggested that someone was sending him instructions  except of course the base lie that Putin was his puppet master. The anti-Trump calumnies included the phony assertion that President Trump was mentally challenged, not fit to be president. But that was sheer propaganda, indulged in by the NeverTrump Republicans, happily joining the rabid, radical left, with both groups terminally beset by Trump Derangement Syndrome.

Does one hear of Biden Derangement Syndrome? Fact is, if we were to hear of this malady, the sole person afflicted would be Biden himself.

The truth is that while the NeverTrump crowd still belch fire and brimstone at the thought of a re-elected President Trump come 2024, we don't hear them crowing about how much better off the country is now that Biden has defeated him.

The false charges that Trump could not handle the economy, the coronavirus, relations with our nation's allies  these and more have become valid criticisms of Biden's presidency. The NeverTrump crowd joined the left in opposing  for the sake of opposing  the Trump policy on immigration, particularly with respect to the southern border. It is now generally conceded, except for the rabid, radical left, that Biden's border policy is a disaster, if he has a border policy at all.

Consider the sorry case of Liz Cheney, who never misses an opportunity to badmouth Mr. Trump with the most specious of accusations. Has anyone heard her boast how wonderful the country is with Biden at the helm? How could she when there is absolutely no cause for such boasting? And what of the people who doubt that he is at the helm? Their number must be legion.

And let's not overlook poll numbers. The Trump-loathing Republicans shouted with schadenfreude at poll numbers showing Mr. Trump's to be in the mid- to low- 40s. But with the media incessantly defaming him personally, and covering up his successes in domestic and foreign policy, it is a wonder that his poll numbers were over 40% positive. Yet with the media covering up Biden's failures, with the media ignoring his mental lapses, with the media spiking evidence of Biden family corruption  Biden's actual poll numbers are not much better than the artificially depressed numbers of Donald Trump.

It is as if a power greater than all of us decided: "Okay, NeverTrump malcontents, you bore false witness against Donald Trump? Now see how fares the nominee you worked so mightily to elect over Trump  so that the people will realize that you do not work for the common good of the society, as Madison called for in Federalist No. 57, just your narrow, self-serving interests.

Heavens, even the Trump-loathing Peggy Noonan has been forced to admit: Biden "no longer comes across as empathetic, much less serious." As my late mom, Annie Zukerman, would say: NeverTrump crowd, "you made your bed. Now lie in it."

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The painful controversy over the 9/11, or the Ground Zero, Mosque, as locals called it, was resurrected by the ineptitude and callousness of the CEO of the (Jewish) Anti-Defamation League, Jonathan Greenblatt.

Eleven years ago, the ADL stood firmly with the majority of Americans who opposed the construction of a mosque just two blocks away from Ground Zero.

Most Americans saw the mosque as a stab in the heart of the families who lost their loved ones to radical Islamist terrorists, a laceration of wounds barely healed.

When Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the mosque's developer, proposed to call it Cordoba House, he added insult to injury. The mosque in Cordoba, Spain was a triumphalist mosque that, according to Christian tradition, was built on top of the Basilica of Saint Vincent of Saragossa in the eighth century. It was not until the reconquest of Spain that the location's Catholic origins were restored.

Although Imam Rauf proposed this as a center for outreach to many faiths and a means of reconciliation between the Muslim and non-Muslim communities, many Americans, including some leading political figures, saw this as Muslims creating a triumphalist mosque  a repeat of Cordoba  yards from the horror and tragedy of Ground Zero and a slap in the face to the families of the victims and the survivors.

After all, mosques sit atop the site of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, the most sacred land in Judaism. The famed Hagia Sophia in Istanbul was built as a Christian Basilica in the sixth century by the emperor Justinian. A thousand years later, when the Muslims conquered Constantinople in 1453, they turned the Hagia Sophia into a triumphalist mosque. In the 1930s, the secular government of Turkey turned the Hagia Sophia into a museum. But with the revival of a fundamentalist Islam sweeping through Turkey, the Hagia Sophia will once again become a mosque.

Imam Rauf became swept up in controversy. Some saw him as an idealist reaching out for interfaith understanding, while others saw him as a man who could not articulate a strong denunciation of terrorism, especially when it came to Hamas. The project passed to a developer, who turned it into expensive condominiums.

In late 2019, there were rumblings of creating a prayer center, a distinction from a mosque with minimal difference, on the site. Pamela Geller, who had stood with the 9/11 families on the front line of opposition to the mosque, took to the pages of American Thinker to denounce the project.

Geller was criticized by liberal media for not appropriately making the hair-splitting distinction between a mosque and a prayer center. But the rumblings came to nothing. The advertised Park 51 Project, as it later came to be known, has a website that directs readers to a prayer service in Tribeca, not at Park 51.

So capitalism won out. There was more money to be made in selling luxury condominiums than in creating a prayer center.

The torn sensibilities of the 9/11 families receded because so did the controversy.

Now, on the 20th anniversary of the horror of 9/11, Jonathan Greenblatt, a onetime special assistant to then-president Barack Obama, has indulged his lofty hubris to apologize for opposing this desecration of the memories of the victims of 9/11.

In doing so, he has compromised the Anti-Defamation League's reputation. It will not be the same. Judea Pearl, the father of Wall Street Journal correspondent Daniel Pearl, who was murdered by Muslin extremists in Pakistan, rendered an opinion more representative of the Jewish community. Two blocks, 180 meters from Ground Zero, was not the place for a mosque.

It is to be remembered that an estimated one in six victims of 9/11 had some Irish heritage. New York Police and New York Fire have longstanding lineages in the Irish communities of the New York Metropolitan Area.

By apologizing for the ADL's opposition to an Islamic Mosque at Ground Zero, Jonathan Greenblatt has most certainly alienated the Irish community and most of America, whose wounds he has torn open with a grotesque act of self-indulgence.

Does Jonathan Greenblatt represent the interests of Jews or of liberal Democrats? They are not the same!

Abraham H. Miller is an emeritus professor of political science, University of Cincinnati.

Image: ADL.

To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here.
Two essays.

Ronald T. Trowbridge writes:

No, no, no! Say it isn't so: the National Archives places the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and Declaration of Independence under the heading "Harmful Language Alert." It trigger-warns that such documents may "reflect racist, sexist, ableist, misogynistic/misogynoir, and xenophobic opinions and attitudes; be discriminatory towards or exclude diverse views on sexuality, gender, religion and more."

The National Archives' racism task force claimed in April that the Archives Rotunda, which houses the founding documents, is an example of "structural racism."

It was a young Hillsdale College student, Haley Strack, who discovered and revealed to the public on September 8 the National Archives' smear of the Constitution and other revered documents. She did so in "National Archives Slaps 'Harmful Content' Warning on Constitution, All Other Founding Documents."

Times have changed. In the late 1980s, I was staff director of the presidential and bipartisan Commission on the Bicentennial of the U.S. Constitution, chaired by Chief Justice Warren Burger, whom I served as what he called his "chief of staff." We didn't know that we were championing a document that the National Archives would later declare as having harmful content and as falling within the category of racism. Serving on the commission were Democrats Rep. Lindy Boggs, Sen. Edward Kennedy, and Sen. Dennis DeConcini, and Republicans Rep. Philip Crane, Sen. Mark Hatfield, and Sen. Strom Thurmond. I can assure readers that these political leaders revered the Constitution, not even beginning to think it needed a trigger warning. The chief justice, as chairman, would not allow any member to politicize the commission. No one even tried  not even Strom Thurmond or Ted Kennedy.

Chief Justice Burger wrote in the foreword to the commission's edition of the Constitution: "This Constitution was not perfect; it is not perfect today even with amendments, but it has continued longer than any other written form of government." He agreed with British prime minister Benjamin Disraeli that "the Constitution was the most remarkable political document ever struck by the hand of man."

I am reminded here of an observation by Samuel Johnson: "A man," in this egregious case the governing directors at the National Archives, "might write such stuff forever if he would abandon his mind to it." They will rewrite history as they want it to be, in the political way they seek.

In fact, the National Archives has stated that it will work "in conjunction with diverse communities and seek to balance the preservation of this history with sensitivity to how these materials are presented to and perceived by users."

If you don't like history, just change it the way you would your shirt.

Ronald L. Trowbridge, Ph.D. is a policy fellow at the Independent Institute in Oakland, Calif. He was appointed by President Reagan to the United States Information Agency and later served as chief of staff for U.S. chief justice Warren Burger.

Eric Utter writes:

The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) recently determined that America's founding documents may be "harmful or difficult" for some users to view since they reflect "outdated, biased, offensive, and possibly violent views and opinions." Therefore, it posted a "harmful language alert" above its online catalog of the documents. You know, offensive documents like the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights.

When users click the alert link, they are redirected to NARA's "Statement on Potentially Harmful Content," where the agency dutifully and dolefully explains that it is "[their] charge to preserve and make available these historical records." Just doing our job, repulsive as it is, doggone it.

NARA then helpfully includes a lengthy and specific list of the types of "harmful or difficult" content that may be encountered when one reads through the documents. It notes that some items may:

reflect racist, sexist, ableist, misogynistic/misogynoir, and xenophobic opinions and attitudes;

be discriminatory toward or exclude diverse views on sexuality, gender, religion, and more;

include graphic content of historical events such as violent death, medical procedures, crime, wars/terrorist acts, natural disasters, and more;

demonstrate bias and exclusion in institutional collecting and digitization policies.

Below the online catalog of the heinous freedom-inducing documents, NARA solemnly vows to work "in conjunction with diverse communities" so as to "balance the preservation of [America's] history with sensitivity to how these materials are presented to and perceived by users."

Earlier this year, NARA's Task Force on Racism asserted that the rotunda in NARA's own flagship building is an example of "structural racism" because it "lauds wealthy white men in the nation's founding while marginalizing BIPOC, women, and other communities." The Task Force's report recommended that "trigger warnings" be put in place with historical content to "forewarn audiences of content that may cause intense physiological and psychological symptoms." The report states: "Providing an advisory notice to users gives us an opportunity to mitigate harm and contextualize the records. It creates a space to share with the public our ultimate goals for reparative description, demonstrate our commitment to the process, and address any barriers that we may face in achieving these goals."

Whew. Where to start? "Harmful language alert"? For our founding documents?! Listen to many rap music songs, and you'll hear potentially harmful language. The lies emanating from the mainstream media and the mouths of many of our ruling elites can truly be considered harmful language. Should the Founders not have spoken of taxation without representation and resisting arbitrary and odious British rule? Apparently, NARA considers "When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation" harmful language.

"Reparative description" is naught but a euphemism for altering history to suit one's needs, for obfuscating, selectively highlighting, inventing...lying. Those of a leftist bent are enraged that the Founders didn't specifically mention, say, the non-binary or the LGBT community? In the 1700s? Guess what! The unacknowledged truth is they didn't have to. They did something far better and more profound. They proclaimed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that 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."

It is impossible to be more inclusive than "all men are created equal" and are "endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." (Don't give me the "but they only meant 'men'" crap. "Men" simply meant "human beings.")

That declaration was unprecedented, radical, shocking to much of the world, and more inclusive than anything ever uttered before, indicative of a society that would be more inclusive than any other society ever was.

That was the whole point.

And that inclusiveness, and those rights, were guaranteed! Not by a man or a government made up of imperfect, fallible humans. But by our Creator. So they should never  could never  legitimately be taken from any of us.

The Founders knew that pure democracy had always led to chaos and the abridging of minority rights by the majority. That's why they birthed a representative republic. They disdained monarchy and detested tyranny and dictatorship. Yet today, Democratic Socialists, big government champions, the Deep State  and their lying media lapdogs  think nothing of trying to strip us of our rights. They are bringing the country ever closer to the tyranny the Founders so detested.

Democrats and progressives can literally say anything, no matter how vile and demonstrably false, and get away with it. Yet many of these "woke" charlatans label our Founding documents as "harmful language"?!

NARA thinks these documents may somehow be "difficult" to view?

The opposite should be the case. They inspired a nation. And much of the world. They gave hope to countless souls. If anything, they should resonate more strongly today than at any time since the Civil War.

"Difficult"? Each of us should commit to doing the "difficult" things, like pushing back and telling the truth. No matter how great the cost may be.

Let us vow to rescue and resuscitate the nation the Founders created.

Let us vow never to surrender. It is fitting that we do this on 9/11.

And forevermore.

Image: Pixabay.

To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here.
Over in Chile, they remember another anniversary  of the 1973 overthrow of President Allende.

Back in 1970, Salvador Allende was elected in a very controversial three-way race that ended up in the Chilean supreme court. The vote results were:

Salvador Allende, socialist 1,075,616

Jorge Alessandri, independent 1,036,278

Radomiro Tomic, Christian Democrat 824,849

Allende won a plurality, or 36%. It was challenged and ultimately upheld in the courts. In retrospect, a runoff would have been better, and Alessandri would have probably won. It did not happen that way, and Allende, whose socialist party was actually to the left of the Chilean communist party, made a massive turn to the left.

By the summer of 1973, Chile was in turmoil. Shortages abounded, political prisons were filled, workers were on strike, and Fidel Castro literally came down to give orders. President Allende had lost control of the situation. I recall a business colleague of my father who returned from a trip to Santiago horrified with the situation. He saw the panic in the streets, frustration, and called it a perfect storm for a coup.

Allende embarked on what he called a "Chilean path to socialism," but he totally misread public opinion. Chile did not vote for a bona fide communist revolution, and President Allende was totally out of line. By the way, I see a connection to the current Biden presidency, or how the left totally misunderstood the election. In Chile, that election result was comparable to the bitter fight between Trump and Biden but in no way a statement that the nation wanted a leftist transformation.

In early September, the Chilean legislature and the Chilean high court had ordered General Augusto Pinochet to take over. That was what the left calls the "coup," although there are those in Chile who said it was not a coup, given that Pinochet did not act on his own. He formed a military government and from there learned that it was not easy to turn around a country devastated by decades of extended socialism, culminating in the full-blown communism of Allende. He implemented market reforms, through his "Chicago Boys" free-market economists, the first time such reforms had been tried  privatization, free trade, private savings accounts for pensions (truly revolutionary)  which was a radical shift. At times, the reforms were painful, and the adjustment was hard on the Chilean people. Pinochet backtracked at least once, but in the end, he went with the market reforms because they worked better than all other approaches.

Is Chile better off today? I say "yes," but I respect those Chileans who lost loved ones during a difficult period. That included victims of the Marxists, of course, but also people on the left. According to reports, as many as 40,000 people were killed or tortured or disappeared at the hands of the regime  the vast majority in guerrilla combat with the Chilean army in the first three years, yet there were many innocents, and that's a black eye for the Pinochet years.

Finally, Pinochet left power after losing big in a plebiscite in 1988, a notable thing, given that actual dictators do not give up power. Chile began its return to democracy the next year, and here we are.

At the end of the day, Pinochet's legacy is a prosperous and non-communist Chile, as Paul Weyrich wrote when Pinochet died in 2006.

Pinochet saved Chile from turning into Cuba or Venezuela, and most locals are very happy about that. At the same time, Chile's left has flourished lately, and let's hope the new generation does not destroy the amazing progress of the last decades.

PS: You can listen to my show (Canto Talk).

Image: Yutaka Seki via PXHere, CC BY 2.0.

To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here.
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Sai Dharam Tej's Latest Health Bulletin Released:- Mega hero Sai Dharam Tej is passionate about bikes and on the evening of Vinayaka Chavithi, the young actor went for a bike ride in the city. The actor met with a road accident on the Cable Bridge of Durgam Cheruvu and injured himself. The actor was rushed to Medicover Hospitals in Madhapur and he was taken to Apollo Hospitals for better medical assistance. The actor turned unconscious after the accident which left the Mega fans worried. The entire Mega family rushed to Apollo Hospitals and a health bulletin was released. Allu Aravind met the press and announced that he is out of danger and he had no injuries to head and other internal organs.

@IamSaiDharamTej met with an accident few hours ago & has suffered minor injuries & bruises.



Wish to share with All Fans & Well Wishers that There is absolutely NO cause for Concern or Anxiety.He is recovering under expert medical supervision & shall be back in a couple of days. pic.twitter.com/JnuZqx8aZT  Chiranjeevi Konidela (@KChiruTweets) September 10, 2021

"Mr Sai Dharam Tej was brought to Apollo Hospitals, Jubilee Hills following a road traffic accident. He was intubated and put on assisted respiration at the nearest hospital and later shifted here. As of now, he is medically stable. There are no major injuries to his brain, spine and major organs based on the preliminary investigations. He sustained soft tissue injuries and a collar bone fracture. He is being closely monitored and further evaluation will be done, over the next 24 hours. There is no need for any immediate surgical intervention. The next medical update will be released at 9 AM in the morning" told the health bulletin.

(Source: Twitter)

The recent health bulletin was released this morning which said that he is stable and he will continue to be on assisted respiration in ICU. The next medical update will be shared tomorrow morning. The entire Mega family is monitoring his health condition. Wishing Sai Dharam Tej a speedy recovery.

(Video Source: NTV Telugu)
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The Queen, Boris Johnson and Sir Keir Starmer have marked the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks by praising the international resolve that has grown from the al Qaida-led tragedy.

In a defiant message to be played at a memorial event at the Olympic Park in east London on Saturday, the Prime Minister said the threat of terrorism remained but people refused to live their lives in permanent fear.

The fact that we are coming together today  in sorrow but also in faith and resolve  demonstrates the failure of terrorism and the strength of the bonds between us, Mr Johnson said.

The Queen remembered her visit to the site of the attack.

In a message to the US President Joe Biden, she said: As we mark the 20th anniversary of the terrible attacks on September 11 2001, my thoughts and prayers, and those of my family and the entire nation, remain with the victims, survivors and families affected, as well as the first responders and rescue workers called to duty.

My visit to the site of the World Trade Centre in 2010 is held fast in my memory.

It reminds me that as we honour those from many nations, faiths and backgrounds who lost their lives, we also pay tribute to the resilience and determination of the communities who joined together to rebuild.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex changed the website of their Archewell Foundation to show rows of victims names.

Labour leader Sir Keir, who attended a private memorial service in the September 11 Memorial Garden in Grosvenor Square in London on Saturday, said the consequences of the attacks were still being felt to this day, adding the tragedy was still so raw.

He said: But as we mark this anniversary Im convinced our resolve has never been stronger.

We will continue to fight terror and violence, by promoting our values of justice and peace.

Mr Johnson said recent events in Afghanistan had only strengthened peoples belief in freedom and democracy.

And in a message on a card from the PM laid in Grosvenor Square, he said flowers laid were in remembrance of those taken from us on 9/11, and in defiance of those who would have us live in fear.

A spokesman for Mr Johnson said on Friday that the Prime Minister would mark the anniversary at home as he works from Chequers this weekend.

The political leaders comments came as the prime minister at the time of the attacks  Tony Blair  said the international community must be prepared to take action against the Taliban if they again allow Afghanistan to become a base of terrorism.

Mr Blair said the US and its allies had no choice but to invade after the Taliban refused to give up the al Qaida leadership responsible for the attacks.

The former head of the UK armed forces, General Lord Richards, said the return of the Taliban in Afghanistan raised the prospect of another 9/11 as ungoverned spaces opened up which the terrorists were able to exploit.

I think we are (closer to another 9/11). Weve now been pitched back into a dark period which we somehow have to manage, he told LBC.
Six men including a Briton have been arrested off the coast of Plymouth after authorities seized more than two tonnes of cocaine worth around 160 million.

The National Crime Agency (NCA) said an operation involving its personnel as well as the Australian Federal Police (AFP) and Border Force arrested the British man from Stockton-on-Tees, County Durham, and five Nicaraguans aboard a Jamaican-flagged yacht 80 miles out to sea.

Border Force Maritime Commands 42-metre cutter Searcher and 19-metre coastal patrol vessel Alert had covertly identified and monitored luxury yacht Kahus movements.

Kahu, which was sailing from the Caribbean, was intercepted and boarded by specialist highly-skilled Border Force and NCA officers in international waters north of Guernsey.

The yacht was then escorted back to an undisclosed location on the UK mainland where a team carried out a deep rummage search and discovered the enormous haul of Class A drugs.

The men, whose ages range from 24 to 49, were arrested on suspicion of drug trafficking and remain in custody awaiting interviews, the NCA added in its statement.

NCA deputy director Matt Horne said: Theres no doubt these drugs would have been sold on into communities across the UK in such ways as County Lines fuelling more crime and misery.

Organised crime groups (OCG) are motivated by money.

The deprivation of these drugs will smash a hole in the OCGs plans and ability to operate.

A man being taken off the Jamaican-flagged yacht Kahu at an undisclosed location (NCA/PA)

Also, the arrests of the men transporting the drugs means the crime group has lost trusted offenders who would have been key to their operation.

We continue to work with partners at home such as Border Force and those abroad such as the AFP to protect the public from the Class A drugs threat.

The NCA said the arrests demonstrate the strength of its international partnerships, working with the AFP who as part of the operation used evidence from their Operation Ironside, the countrys investigation into the AnOm encrypted comms platform.

AFP assistant commissioner Lesa Gale, said: Intelligence from Operation Ironside had enabled the AFP to assist international enforcement partners in disrupting an alleged sophisticated criminal network.

The Jamaican-flagged yacht Kahu at an undisclosed location (NCA/PA)

Operation Ironside has opened the door to unprecedented collaboration across law enforcement agencies around the globe.

This result highlights the importance of the AFPs partnership with the NCA to combat offshore transnational organised crime that impacts both of our countries.

The AFP and NCA have a strong, historic relationship and both agencies recognise the significant threat to national security posed by transnational organised crime.
Engelbert Humperdinck has said he considered cancelling his forthcoming tour following the death of his wife.

The crooner, 85, was married to Patricia for almost 60 years when she died in February after contracting Covid-19.

She had been suffering from Alzheimers disease for more than a decade.

Engelbert Humperdinck has revealed he almost axed his UK tour while dealing with the death of his wife (Ian West/PA)

Humperdinck, known for hits including Release Me and The Last Waltz, told the Mirror the family faced an agonising wait before they could bring Patricias body home to Leicester from Los Angeles.

He said: Things are not good. Its not been easy. We had to wait from February to July to bring her back to England.

Leicester is home, but we couldnt move her back until we had permission. We had to wait months and months for the funeral and all that got on top of me.

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And Humperdinck said he almost cancelled his The Legend Continues UK tour, which is due to begin in October.

He said: I felt I couldnt face doing it, but my whole family said, Dont you think she would want you to do what you do, instead of sitting at home? What are you going to do if you dont? So Im going to do it.

Humperdinck added: Its going to be mighty difficult. I deal with sensitive lyrics and I read lyrics a lot differently now than I did before, but Im sure my little girl will be watching over me.

Humperdinck previously revealed Patricia was surrounded by three of their four children when she died, with the fourth on video call.
Thousands of people on Saturday attended the New York memorial service marking the 20th anniversary since the Sept. 11 attacks.

Many of them held signs with photos of family members who were killed in the World Trade Center buildings.

"WE WILL NEVER FORGET" read at least one such sign.

[The things they kept: 9/11 survivors and family members open up about the mementos that helped them heal]

[Remembering to remember the World Trade Center]

Photos of 9/11 victims are carried by family and friends. (Ed Jones-Pool/Getty Images)

At 8:46 a.m., exactly two decades go, five hijackers took control of American Airlines Flight 11 and plunged it into the North Tower above its 90th floor, starting the horrors that would kill almost 3,000 in New York City, the Pentagon, and in a field outside of Shanksville, Pa.

At the same time in New York, 20 years later, the large crowd of people bowed their heads and observed a moment of silence.

"These 20 years have felt like both a long time and a short time, and as we recite the names of those we lost, my memory goes back to that terrible day," Mike Low, whose daughter Sara was a flight attendant on Flight 11, said before the reading of the names. "Today, this is a quiet place of memory."

Retired Willow Springs (Ill.) Police Chief Sam Pulia and his nephew Chicago Police Sgt. Daniel Pulia place flags at the site of the South Tower at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in New York City. (David Handschuh, Pool/Getty Images)

Family members of the attacks' victims, police officers, firefighters, officials including both President Biden and former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, and many others gathered at the Ground Zero memorial, now a plaza and museum honoring those who lost their lives in the coordinated terror attacks.

Biden also traveled to wreath-laying services at the Pentagon and in Shanksville, where former President George W. Bush spoke earlier in the day. The three sites are just a small handful of memorials held across the U.S. to commemorate the lives lost in the attacks, which include many first responders who rushed into the burning towers.

"Twenty years ago, we all found in different ways, in different places, but all at the same moment, that our lives would be changed forever," Bush said at the Flight 93 National Memorial, which marks the location of where the flight crashed after passengers and crew attempted to wrestle back control of the plane from hijackers. All 44 people on board, including the hijackers, were killed.

"The world was loud with carnage and sirens, and then quiet with missing voices that would never be heard again," Bush continued. "These lives remain precious to our country and infinitely precious to many of you. Today we remember your loss, we share your sorrow, and we honor the men and women you have loved so long and so well."

Former President George W. Bush speaks during a 9/11 commemoration at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pa. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

Biden did not speak at the Ground Zero service, but he released a video overnight to mark the occasion. He noted that he has a close friend from Delaware who lost his son in the South Tower.

"To the families of the 2,977 people, from more than 90 nations, killed on Sept. 11, 2001, in New York City, Arlington, Va., and Shanksville, Pa., and the thousand more who were injured, America and the world commemorate you and your loved ones, the pieces of your soul," Biden said.

Click and drag to explore the 9/11 memorial

He added: "We honor all of those who risked and gave their lives in the minutes, hours, months and years afterwards. The firefighters, the police officers, EMTs, and construction workers, and doctors, and nurses, and faith leaders, service members, veterans  all of the everyday people who gave their all to rescue, recover and rebuild. But it's so hard, whether it's the first year or the 20th. Children are growing up without parents. Parents have suffered without children. Husbands and wives have had to find ways forward without the partners in their lives.

No matter how much time has passed, these commemorations bring everything painfully back as if you just got the news a few seconds ago. So on this day, Jill and I hold you close in our hearts and send you our love."
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YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 11, ARMENPRESS. The new Belgian ambassador to Armenia Marc Michielsen presented the copy of credentials to foreign minister Ararat Mirzoyan on September 11.

FM Mirzoyan congratulated the ambassador on assuming office and expressed conviction that Michielsen will contribute to advancing the Armenian-Belgian multi-sector cooperation, political dialogue and bilateral and multilateral agenda.

FM Mirzoyan and Ambassador Michielsen discussed possibilities for enhancing the trade-economic relations and boosting partnership in the high-tech sector. Re-launching the Yerevan-Brussels air communication was highlighted.

The Armenia-European Union cooperation was also discussed. Mirzoyan underscored that the effective implementation of the Armenia-EU CEPA  ratified by Belgium  as well as the implementation of inclusive programs as part of the Eastern Partnership format will contribute to deepening bilateral relations and sectoral partnership.

FM Mirzoyan and Ambassador Michielsen exchanged ideas over regional peace and security matters. Mirzoyan expressed conviction that a lasting and stable peace in the region can be achieved only through a comprehensive solution of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict under the auspices of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-chairmanship. The Armenian FM also welcomed Belgiums position over this issue.

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 11, ARMENPRESS. The United States has again reiterated that it doesnt consider the issue of the status of Nagorno Karabakh to be resolved.

United States Ambassador to Armenia Lynne Tracy was asked by reporters on the potential resumption of the Armenian-Azerbaijani negotiations under the auspices of the OSCE Minsk Group. Ambassador Tracy said that the United States, as a Minsk Group Co-Chair, is doing everything to support bringing the parties together under the auspices of the Minsk Group, because we think that these very fundamental issues of peace and security require negotiations and diplomacy.

Secretary Blinken has made our commitment to this process very clear on several occasions. Its obviously a very tough environment. Thirty years of war and tensions are not going to be resolved overnight. But we understand that there are some fundamental issues that do have to be addressed, and one of them, as I have said before, is that we dont consider the status of Nagorno Karabakh resolved. And we will continue to keep that on the agenda of the Minsk Group," Tracy said.

Earlier in August, the US Ambassador to Armenia had again said that the Nagorno Karabakh conflict has not been resolved because the status of Nagorno Karabakh remains to be decided.

Editing by Stepan Kocharyan
With both the OBC and Patel vote banks crucial, it would be interesting to see who the BJP top brass decide on as Mr Rupanis successor

New Delhi: Just like his predecessor Anandiben Patel, Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani on Saturday tendered his resignation, in a sudden political development more than a year before Prime Minister Narendra Modis home state is due to hold Assembly elections. In a state where the BJP has been ruling since 1998, Mr Modi remains the only BJP CM since then to complete full term in office, whose term is also considered as the benchmark for all his successors. Gujarat becomes the third state, after Uttarakhand and Karnataka, where the BJP top brass has favoured a leadership change, something it was perceived to be against during the Modi governments first term.

Assembly polls are due in Gujarat by the end of next year. The BJP had won 99 Assembly seats out of total 182 in 2017, bringing down the tally from 115 it had won in 2012. The Congress had increased its tally from 57 to 77 in 2017. Ms Patel, now the governor of UP, had announced her resignation in 2016 through the social media after completing 75 years, an unofficial age bar in the BJP on holding any constitutional post. The late Keshubhai Patel, who was the BJP chief minister in 1998, was forced to resign in 2001 soon after the Bhuj earthquake.

For many, a soft spoken Mr Rupani seemed not suitable for the post when the Opposition, including the Congress, has leaders who are known for indulging in aggressive politics.

With Mr Rupanis resignation, the Opposition camp in the state claimed that the BJP top brass was forced to go in for leadership change because of anti-incumbency against its state government. The Gujarat unit was rife with speculation that the decision was to check the rift between the government and the organisation and also to take corrective measures after a survey predicted that the BJP may face more trouble than in the last Assembly polls due to non-performance in some areas, including Covid-19 management during the second wave of the global pandemic. Speculation is also rife that at least six non-performing ministers in the Rupani Cabinet will not be included in the new chief ministers team.

With both the OBC and Patel vote banks crucial in the state, it would be interesting to see who the BJP top brass decide on as Mr Rupanis successor while there is a growing demand for an OBC census.

The names of Union ministers Mansukh Mandaviya and Parshottam Rupala are doing the rounds as possible successors, along with deputy chief minister Nitin Patel, state BJP vice-president Gordhan Zadaphia, Daman and Diu administrator Praful Khoda Patel and state minister R.C. Faldu. The BJP legislature party is likely to meet either on Sunday or Monday to take a call on the matter.

Gujarat BJP spokesman Yamal Vyas said in Gandhinagar that a meeting of BJP MLAs will be held soon, possibly tomorrow. Rejecting the buzz that he was in the race for CM, BJP state unit chief C.R. Patil said: I am not in any competition for the post of chief minister.

After submitting his resignation to state governor Acharya Devvrat, Mr Rupani said while addressing the media: In the BJP, there has been a tradition that the responsibilities of party workers change from time to time. I will be ready to take whatever responsibility the party gives me in the future.

He went on to add: I was allowed to serve the state for five years. I have contributed to the development of the state. I will further do whatever is asked by my party.
Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
The goal of the program was to pit pilots against what is called a professional adversary force in intense dissimilar air combat training scenarios. That adversary force meant pilots equipped with the same type of aircraft, flying against their opponents in mock combat exercises.Tasked with acting as sparring partners are the so-called Aggressor Squadrons , with the 64th presently doing so. Deployed with the 57th Adversary Tactics Group at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada, this group is currently flying about 30 F-16 Fighting Falcons, most of them painted in the colors of enemy or perceived-as-enemy nations, including Russia.The shadowy figure of the plane you see here belongs to one of those Aggressor Squadron F-16s . Its impossible to make out the colors on its body, due to the beautiful sunset backdrop, but the machine looks incredibly impressive even so.The plane was captured on camera at the beginning of August by an U.S. Air Force (USAF) tech sergeant. It shows the plane, of the F-16C variety, taking off from Nellis for a nighttime training run during the Red Flag-Nellis 21-3 exercise. Its task was to take on pilots of the 414th Combat Training Squadron.As for the F-16 itself, the plane barely needs an introduction. Into service since the 1970s, at about the same time as the Aggressor program, it is one of the most widespread military planes in the world.It was not fielded by 64th since it arrived, though. The squadron used over the years a great deal of airplanes, including T-38s, F-5s, and F-15Cs.
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Via a process called chemical looping, Lang Qin, a co-author on the study and a research associate in chemical and biomolecular engineering at Ohio State University, says iron sulfide with just trace amounts of molybdenum as an additive can solve two problems.Qin says hydrogen sulfide is a particularly harmful gas used in industry and thus makes it an ideal base material to use in a process that turns it into something less toxic and ultimately, valuable.They call it the SULGEN process, and it involves using a pure chemical, iron sulfide, for in a process for industrial use. But the issue is scale as iron sulfide alone isnt up to the task. Qin and the team went in search of inexpensive chemicals they could use to catalyze the transformation in high quantities. It appears the answer may be to introduce a trace amount of molybdenum into the iron sulfide.It is too soon to tell if our research can replace any of the hydrogen fuel production technologies that are out there, says Kalyani Jangam, the lead author of the study and a graduate student in Ohio States Clean Energy Research Laboratory . But what we are doing is adjusting this decomposition process and making a valuable product from that.The study found that molybdenum improves the breakdown of hydrogen sulfide and splits it into two parts  hydrogen fuel and sulfur.Qin says the big picture result is to solve the harmful gas issues and he adds that the chemical looping process takes care of that problem.You can read the entire paper - if you're so inclined - via theSustainable Chemical Engineering.
Carmakers are one by one suspending their operations temporarily because of the lack of semiconductors, with larger companies like Ford even being forced to halt the manufacturing of the most popular models simply because not enough chips are available.This time, the one coming with some bad news on this front is none other than General Motors, as the company confirmed itd be hit harder than originally predicted by this huge semiconductor struggle.So the impact of the chip shortage on its North America operations wouldnt total 100,000 units as originally anticipated but double that figure, as GMs finance chief Paul Jacobson says the company expects a drop in production of as much as 200,000 cars.However, Jacobson also has some good news. 2022 is expected to come with a slight recovery in terms of semiconductor inventory, so General Motors has every reason to believe itll be whats being described as a more stable year. However, dont expect things to return to the pre-2020 levels, as chip foundries across the world will still have a hard time aligning their production with the global demand.So while 2022 will indeed bring improvements for the semiconductor supply chain, the chip shortage wouldnt be over, with more and more companies expecting the crisis to continue into 2023.For the time being, however, carmakers out there, both in the United States and everywhere else across the globe, are looking into ways to minimize the impact of the lack of semiconductors on their output.While some are suspending the production altogether, waiting for suppliers to send more semiconductors, others are giving up on some systems installed on their cars, therefore reducing the number of chips that are required for a new model.
At first glance, it doesnt seem like the go-to vacation destination, but after a 9-hour flight from Bucharest, Romania, with a technical stop in Hurghada, Egypt, I found myself in Mombasa. This is Kenyas second-biggest city after the capital, Nairobi, home to almost 4 million people, most of whom came from the rural areas in search of a better life.Not knowing what to expect, I stepped out of the airport, looking for the shuttle bus to take me (and the missus) to the hotel. Only shuttle bus has a different meaning than what were normally used to, because it was an old and tiny Nissan van. Almost one hour later, we found ourselves at our first destination, on the coast of the Indian Ocean, in the Bamburi district of Mombasa, which is not far from a neighborhood that some millionaires call home: Nyali.After settling in, it was time for the highlight of the trip: a 3-day safari . We woke up very early in the morning with the enthusiasm of children looking for presents under the Christmas tree. Our guide was waiting for us in the lobby, and behind him was a cool 4x4, modified for the arduous roads of the African bush. It had a jacked-up suspension, M/T tires that they have to replace every 20,000 km (~12,500 miles) to avoid getting a flat, snorkel, steel bumpers, and a chunky bulbar up front.Since it was tweaked for seeing animals in their natural habitat, this Toyota Land Cruiser , and every other one that normally does the same job, has a longer rear overhang in order to fit more people, and a roof that goes up manually, giving occupants a 360-degree, windowless view of the surrounding area.The cockpit looked very basic, with manual windows all around and no air conditioning. But thats fine, because less equipment means less stuff to break down. The vehicle is built like a tank. The doors are heavy, the steering has a nice weight to it, although it feels kind of disconnected from the front wheels, the five-speed manual gearbox is very robust, and the naturally aspirated diesel engine, which our guide knew nothing about, fired up on the first try.From the moment I laid eyes on it, I knew I had to drive it, even for a few minutes. But that required patience and a lot of luck, because if anything was to happen to it while I sat in the drivers seat , the guide would have had to pay for all repairs and he would have been jobless.Fortunately, the Gods smiled on this mzungu, because on the third and final day of the safari, on the last game drive, the driver asked me if I still want to test it out. Then, all of a sudden, he stopped in the middle of the dirt road, in Tsavo West, next to a ranger outpost, and said okay, hop in, and Ill sit next to you like a boss!. This region is known by the locals as Maneater Alley for obvious lion-related issues.In what felt like a blink of an eye, I finally found myself in the drivers seat, in a surreal and unforgiving environment, right next to an electric fence that surrounded the Presidents farm, where they grow vegetables. I pulled a chunky lever, adjusted the seat, pressed the clutch, shifted into first gear, and I was off.The driving part felt like a walk in the park, even on the slippery sand/mud, though doing that while keeping an eye open for wildlife proved impossible. Thus, I left that job to the guide and concentrated on keeping us and the Land Cruiser safe, and simply enjoyed the views for what felt like 10 minutes.However, I was already driving for about an hour, and since we were approaching the national park exit, I eventually had to pull over and leave the driving part to the expert who knew all roads by heart.Thank you, Ali (our guide), for making my dream come true!
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Fortunately, this ride only exists in the digital world, as it had its pixels rearranged by WinningDesigns on Facebook. Besides the aforementioned mods , the rendering portrays the zero-emission crossover coupe with BBS alloys, swollen-up fenders, and no black plastic cladding on the lower parts of the body, save for the rear bumper attachment.While rendering artists have gotten their hands on the C40 Recharge , customers will have to wait a bit longer before they are able to drive theirs. The vehicle will hit the assembly line at the Ghent plant in Belgium this fall, and it is expected to arrive in the United States before the end of the year. Pricing will kick off at $58,750, and it will be offered in two trim levels, named the Plus and Ultimate.The Android Operating System will be offered as standard, and the better-equipped grade will feature things such as the 20-inch alloys wheels, 360-degree camera system, panoramic moonroof, LED lights, and Harmon Kardon audio.No matter which one interested parties will go for, both feature a 78battery that powers two electric motors. The C40 Recharge has a combined output of 402 bhp and 487 lb-ft (660 Nm) of torque, taking 4.5 seconds from 0 to 60 mph (0-96 kph).In Europe, the electric crossover has been available for pre-orders since earlier this year, launching in the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and UK first, and other local markets later. On a full charge, it has a range of 260 miles (420 km) on thecycle, and the battery can be recharged to 80% in approximately 40 minutes.
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The answer to that question depends, of course, on how thick your wallet / bank account is. Dutch company Edorado Marine has a new proposal that will hopefully spark a revolution in the industry: a fully electric hydrofoil powerboat that is equal parts luxurious and clean. Called the Edorado S8, the latest addition to the companys lineup is seen as the sustainable way of boating , with deep roots to the past but looking ahead into the future, before all the other big boat makers.Edorado S8 was officially introduced this week, at the Royal Maas Yacht Club in Rotterdam, Netherlands. Launch Edition models are already available for pre-orders, but future customers of the standard model can also sign up for a waitlist.Founded by Giel Groothuis, CEO, and Godert van Hardenbroek, Product Architect, in 2015, after a chance meeting at an industry event in 2012, Edorado Marine aims to solve one of the marine industrys biggest problems: its significant carbon footprint. To put it in very simple terms, boats pollute the very environment theyre supposed to help explore , so a sustainable option is a must.The S8 wants to be that option. It is fully electric, so it doesnt burn fuel, and doesnt pollute through emissions or noise. It also uses an advanced hydrofoil system, which allows it to rise over the waterline at high speeds and glide seamlessly, maintaining high speeds without creating wake , and thus reducing the damage to shorelines. The only waves this powerboat aims to make are within the marine industry, Groothuis and van Hardenbroek say in a statement for FutureRide What is considered innovation in the boating industry just doesnt cut it anymore in the current reality of the climate crisis, Groothuis explains. What is needed is a rapid transition to zero emissions, also for the leisure industry. After owning petrol-fueled boats, I realized that a complete overhaul of this product category is long overdue. The traditional boating industry is just waiting to be disrupted by a clean-tech approach. Our goal with the Edorado 8S is to chart a course for clean powerboating.As for how exactly the S8 plans to do all this disrupting , the plan is simple: by means of a lightweight boat with powerful motors, the hydrofoils, advanced tech, and a designer interior with all the trappings of the one-percenter lifestyle. If youre going to make a premium product, you might as well go all the way out.The S8 is 8.40 m (27.5 ft) long, 2.50 m (8.2 ft) wide, and has a displacement of just 1,950 kg (4,300 pounds) thanks to the carbon fiber hull. The hydrofoils are fully retractable, allowing it to moor in shallow waters and be easily transportable. When deployed, they self-adjust for stability , and reduce drag and water resistance by as much as 60%, so this makes the S8 pretty fast, as well. Twin 50motors and the 80battery pack guarantee a top speed of 38 knots, and an estimated range of 40 nautical miles at a cruising speed of 25 knots. The range qualifies the S8 as a dayboat, while CE-C certification means its suitable for lakes, rivers, and coastal waters. Advanced features include connectivity through the Edorado app, which will see it updated over-the-air, Collision Impact Safety System (CISS), and proprietary Automatic Control System. The cockpit is minimalist and intuitive, with central steering and navigation controls, and three 15-inch monitors for everything else. Bluetooth sound system and integrated mood lighting are also offered.The interior by Ivo van Hulten aims to hark back to the classic design of sailboats, and stands out for a minimalist approach as well. However, minimalist doesnt mean incomplete, so the S8 comes with a built-in picnic set for two, with a specially designed wine cooler, and other onboard premium features that are yet to be detailed. The transom folds down to create a swim platform with ladder for easy access in and from the water, and theres a lounge pad for sunning, integrated in the rear of the boat.In short, the Edorado S8 could be the perfect powerboat for the eco-conscious millionaire who wont give up on the luxury lifestyle he or she is accustomed to. It comes with a price to match: the standard model costs 350,000, which is roughly $414,000 at the current exchange rate. As it turns out, youput a price on a guilt-free conscience
Introduced for the 1971 model year, the Pinto was the first subcompact produced by Ford in North America. The company's answer to the growing popularity of Japanese imports such as the Toyota Corolla, the Pinto was developed in just 25 months at the time when the industry average was 43 months.The Pinto became popular due to its fairly nice design, low price, and extensive options list, but it had one major issue. Due to a lack of structural reinforcement in the rear, the car was prone to fuel leakage and fire in the event of a rear-end collision. This became apparent when Pintos started turning into fireballs and people started getting killed after low-speed crashes.Ford recalled 1.5 million vehicles in 1978, the largest in automotive history at the time. However, it was all too late as lawsuits were already pouring in and Ford spent millions of dollars settling court cases. Ironically, it was still cheaper than modifying the Pinto's fuel system to reduce fire risk.Having spent almost 50 years at the top of America's luxury market, Cadillac was having trouble adjusting to the late 1970s market when consumers were moving toward European imports and smaller sedans. So GM decided to develop a four-door smaller than the Seville in an effort to compete with the up-and-coming Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Audi compacts.But while all the other Cadillacs had unique designs in the GM lineup, the Cimarron was mostly a rebadged Chevrolet Cavalier. It was also powered by a lazy four-cylinder engine for three years until Cadillac added a V6 to the lineup. With disappointing sales that barely exceeded 20,000 units per year from 1982 to 1987, the Cimarron was discontinued in 1988.An overpriced Chevrolet that had nothing to do with a Cadillac beyond the badge, the Cimarron remains, to this day, the brand's biggest flop. Yup, it's even worse than the Opel Omega-based Catera.Cadillac wasn't the only GM brand struggling in the 1970s. Oldsmobile had also lost its identity and it was living off badge-engineered nameplates. But this wasn't the only issue with the fourth-generation Cutlass Supreme.With most American manufacturers focusing on downsizing and fuel efficiency, General Motors decided to use Oldsmobile to introduce diesel engines to the American market. When the fourth-gen midsize debuted in 1978, it was available with a 4.3-liter V8 oil burner.But the diesel was far from reliable and, to top it all off, a decline in gasoline prices made them less desirable in the early 1980s. Oldsmobile eventually developed a more durable 5.7-liter V8, but it was already too late. Almost 40 years later and U.S. buyers still aren't fond of oil burners. And GM's ill-fated diesel may be the one to blame.Unlike other cars listed here, the Edsel wasn't all that terrible, but a rather poor display of marketing. The brand named after the son of company founder Henry Ford was established in 1956 to bridge the gap between the affordable Ford vehicles and the mid-range Mercury products. And to make sure it debuts with a bang, FoMoCo spent a lot of cash on its pre-introduction publicity campaign.Ford promised an "entirely new kind of car," but on "E Day" people saw a range of vehicles that shared most of their underpinnings and body parts with other Ford models. In addition, the front-end design looked strange and the cars were almost as expensive as their Mercury counterparts.While Edsel introduced a few new features, including automatic lubrication and self-adjusting rear brakes, the brand didn't bring all that many customers into dealerships. To make matters worse, it had to compete with brands like Pontiac, Oldsmobile, Buick, Dodge, and DeSoto without having an established brand image. Ford eventually decided to discontinue Edsel only three years later. The ordeal cost Ford a whopping $250 million.While working at Ford, Lee Iacocca started a friendship with Alejandro de Tomaso, which led to the creation of the De Tomaso Pantera . More than 10 years later, Iacocca and De Tomaso teamed up again to create an Italian-American grand tourer. This time around, Iacocca was heading Chrysler, while De Tomaso was the owner of Maserati.The result was the Chrysler TC, a LeBaron redesigned by Maserati and assembled in Italy. Developed as an image builder that would give Chrysler an exciting product, the TC was a failure that was discontinued after only a couple of years on the market.What killed it? Well, it was a mix of poor styling, mundane performance, and expensive pricing. Many critics also argued that the Chrysler TC looked too similar to the LeBaron GTC convertible that was notably more affordable and came with similar features.Chrysler sold only 7,300 TCs over three model years. In 2019, Bob Lutz revealed that the TC project cost Chrysler almost $600 million, which results in a cost of $80,000 to produce each car. That's about $160,000 in 2021.Often called the "worst car in history," the Yugo GV was a subcompact hatchback manufactured by Yugoslavian automaker Zastava. Introduced in 1980 as a shortened variant of the Fiat 128, the Yugo was marketed in the United States from 1985 to 1992 by Malcolm Bricklin.Priced at only $4,000, the Yugo was actually off to a great start in North America, with more than 1,000 cars sold in a single day. The Eastern European hatchback moved more than 48,000 units in 1987, but things went sour when serious quality issues began to surface. The car was also painfully slow and performed poorly in all crash tests.The Yugo became the laughing stock of the car industry and sales plummeted hard toward the 1990s. The final blow came in 1992 when Yugo America went bankrupt during the Yugoslav civil war and the United Nations issued a trade embargo on Serbia.
Two decades later, we don't have to look hard to find changes in our lives that happened because of 9/11, from air travel headaches to fear-driven politics that still disrupts many Americans' lives.

Two decades later, we don't have to look hard to find changes in our lives that happened because of 9/11, from air travel headaches to fear-driven politics that still disrupts many Americans' lives.

Here we've identified the biggest changes that had a lasting impact  or foreshadowed broader social dilemmas we're grappling with today, like the vulnerabilities of the internet and our attitudes toward privacy.

War powers: The 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force was so broad that it has been used by four American presidents to justify military operations around the world, Axios' Zach Basu reports.

It allows the president to use force against anyone "he determines" was involved in 9/11  a sweeping, vague authorization meant to help the U.S. "prevent any future acts of international terrorism" against the homeland.

While this initially applied to al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan, the law's blank-check language has been cited for operations in Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Libya, Syria, Niger, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya and the Philippines, as well as the indefinite detention of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay.

And the full extent of the law's global reach is not even publicly known: The list of countries where the U.S. is waging the war on terror under the 2001 AUMF is classified, according to a statement from the White House in April.

"The authority that has been delegated to the president, we absolutely have to return it to Congress portfolio," Rep. Peter Meijer (R-Mich.), an Iraq War veteran, told Axios' Alayna Treene. Meijer flew to Kabul a week before the United States' planned withdrawal.

Air travel: 9/11 changed, perhaps most obviously, the entire experience of air travel, Axios executive editor Sara Kehaulani Goo writes.

The attacks created a crisis of confidence, not only in our leaders' ability to imagine the threat at home, but in our ability to feel safe again. The U.S. government created two new agencies (the Department of Homeland Security and the Transportation Security Administration), spent billions on screening equipment, and instituted new security procedures at airports that have been copied at major public events and schools around the country.

9/11 also changed the roles of what we expect from private sector employees. Pilots could carry guns in the cockpit. Flight attendants got more training on how to deal with unruly passengers. Air marshals were secretly assigned to flights.

New rules required airlines to collect more information from each passenger, including date of birth and full name, to check against terrorism "watch list" databases, which flagged thousands of innocent travelers.

Privacy: The attacks increased our willingness to give up some privacy to make air travel  and many other transactions  more convenient, Sara also reports.

Private companies found that Americans were willing to pay hundreds of dollars and give up some privacy  a face scan, a fingerprint, personal details  for the ability to skip more time-consuming screening of their bags and clothing at checkpoints.

Even the TSA created a "pre-check" program, collecting fees and offering separate lines for travelers who gave up personal information in exchange for a faster line.

Security: Cities became less open, Axios' Jennifer Kingson writes.

No longer can anyone walk into an office building in New York City (and many other places) and take the elevator up to any floor. We must show a license or other ID, sometimes have a photo taken, sign a register, and have our host put us on a list or call down to a guard.

Urban surveillance systems, which were already marching forward, intensified and proliferated more quickly than they might have if the terror attacks hadn't happened.

Tech: The internet of 2021 was born in the ashes of 2001, Axios managing editor Scott Rosenberg writes.

When the Twin Towers fell, the first news of the disaster was posted online by a theater blogger named James Marino, who'd watched the mayhem on the skyline from his office in a Broadway high-rise and posted about it at 8:56 a.m. (The AP had its own story a minute earlier, but most news sites hadn't gotten it up yet.)

Today's internet moves at a different scale and pace, but the online aftermath of 9/11 exposed, in embryo, every one of the vulnerabilities we've grown to understand since: the rise of conspiracy theories, political polarization and online echo chambers; the spread of hate speech; and the diminishing potency of facts.

Racial profiling: The attacks drew focus to the way law enforcement profiles Arab Americans and Muslim Americans and the discrimination they face, Axios' Russell Contreras reports.

The Patriot Act and the way innocent Arab Americans and Muslim Americans experienced harsh questioning at airports, ports of entry and in public places drew scrutiny in the years following the attacks and foreshadowed the current reckoning with the nation's systemic racism.

Immigration: The politics of immigration permanently changed after the attacks, Russell also writes.

Before Sept. 11, the Bush administration was pushing a massive immigration reform bill that could have offered a pathway for citizenship for millions of undocumented immigrants. After the attacks, the federal government turned to stricter policies along the U.S.-Mexico border out of fear that potential terrorists would use it to enter the U.S.

Mexican and Central American immigrants, once hailed in early 2001 as builders of the U.S. economy, experienced demonization, and politicians used them as scapegoats during elections.

Health care: While it's clear that the U.S. was woefully unprepared for the pandemic, there was a flurry of funding in the years after 9/11  and the anthrax attacks that immediately followed  that could have made us more prepared for COVID had the funding been sustained, Axios' Tina Reed reports.

There was a flurry of investment in public health in the years immediately following  including spending on hospitals aimed at increasing preparedness training and supplies  although that money quickly dried up as interest in 9/11 waned.

In 2007, in addition to vaccines against bioterrorism threats, the Department of Health and Human Services awarded more than $3 billion to support pandemic preparedness.

Increased concern around the threat of bioterrorism led to the creation of the National Biodefense Analysis and Countermeasures Center, the National Bioforensic Analysis Center, and the first bioattack warning system known as BioWatch and later Project Bioshield.

Go deeper:

My 9/11 story: A New Yorker's account
Two students in Florida are accused of plotting a mass shooting at their middle school. (Source: WBBH, LEE COUNTY SHERIFFS OFFICE, PHILLIP BYRD, INSTAGRAM, CNN, Phillip Byrd/Instagram via CNN Wire)
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Brian Smith served four years in the U.S. Marine Corps, and retired as an assistant chief with the California Highway Patrol. He resides in Bakersfield. If you have a personal Cop Tale to share, please contact Smith at bmsmith778@gmail.com.
Contact The Californians Herb Benham at 661-395-7279 or hbenham@bakersfield.com. His column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays; the views expressed are his own.
The 15th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and those who perished in them were remembered locally Sunday with the unveiling of the
Conceptually it makes a lot of sense to farmers and oil producers alike: Use the latest filtration technology to turn one of Kern's most troub
When Azucena Rosas started feeling labor pains last week, she knew it wouldn't be long until she would be in the delivery room.
Eileen Ivers, 'Jim Hendrix of the Fiddle,' Plays Oregon Coast Oct. 3

Published 09/06/21 at 5:26 AM PDT

By Oregon Coast Beach Connection staff

(Lincoln City, Oregon)  She's known as the Jimi Hendrix of the violin and she's coming to the central Oregon coast.

Fiddler Eileen Ivers shows up at the Lincoln City Cultural Center on October 3, playing at 7 p.m., bringing a celebrated new way of playing the old time instrument.

She causes people to ask: what is the difference between the fiddle and the violin? In the hands of this fiery, cutting-edge Bronx-born woman, there is no difference. She's been a guest soloist with over 50 symphony orchestras, and shreds electric fiddle through fuzz, wah wah and looping effects, ending up with being called the future of the Celtic Fiddle by the Washington Post, and the Jimi Hendrix of the violin by the New York Times. She's also a nine-time All-Ireland Fiddle Champion.

Grammy-Awarded and Emmy-nominated, Eileen Ivers, continues to push the fiddling tradition boundaries from a folk music staple to a fiercely fresh, powerfully beautiful, intensely driving world stage experience. Eileen has performed with Sting, Fiddlers 3' with Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg and Regina Carter, Patti Smith, Al Di Meola, The Chieftains, was the groundbreaking Musical Star of Riverdance, a founding member of Cherish the Ladies, a former member of the Hall & Oates band, a featured instrumentalist on soundtracks including Gangs of New York and Back to Titanic, and she is one of the most awarded All-Ireland Fiddle and Banjo champions ever.

Eileen has been proclaimed a national treasure by NCTA Board Chairman George Holt as she celebrates her 30 plus year career as a performer, composer, producer, songwriter, band leader, educator, multi-instrumentalist and renowned pioneer in connecting her American, Irish traditional, jazz, blues, and world roots.

One thing the Oregon coast audience will get to witness is some of Eileen's most recent CD, Beyond the Bog Road. In the album's extensively researched sixteen-page liner, it notes focus on the influences of the Celtic tradition on Roots music (bluegrass, French-Canadian, Cajun, Appalachian, Americana) and how the music journeyed on to become a fundamental ingredient of the American Country music tradition. Irish Music Magazine called it a triumph a musical Magnus-Opus and the album reached number one on the Alt-Country Roots Music Chart.

Eileen's new, energetic, joyous and passionate band, Universal Roots, connect music, cultures, stories and emotions that tie us together celebrating the fact that we are more alike than dissimilar. Music truly is the universal language. The ensemble, with a broad array of instrumentation, features Matt Mancuso (lead vocals, guitar, trumpet, fiddle), Buddy Connolly (button accordion, whistles, piano, vocals), Lindsey Horner (upright and electric bass, baritone sax, vocals), Dave Barckow (lead vocals, percussion, guitar), together with Eileen on fiddle, mandolin, banjo, bodhran, and live looping.

The Eileen Ivers concert will be the first of six concerts in the LCCC's 2021-22 Celtic Music Series. The live music will continue with the duo of Lisa Lynne and Aryeh Frankfurter (Nov. 4), a Celtic Christmas with Men of Worth (Dec. 9), Andrew Finn Magill and Dave Curley (Jan. 27), Cantrip (Feb. 20) and fiddler Gerry O'Connor with Richard Mandel (April 26). Current LCCC members will be extended a special series package price, with all six concerts for $125; this deal and other series packages will go on sale on Sept. 10.

The Lincoln City Cultural Center is located at 540 NE Hwy. 101, inside the historic Delake School. Reserved, table seats for the Oct. 3 show with Eileen Ivers are $20 for youth, $32 for seniors and students, and $35 for adults. Purchase online at lincolncity-culturalcenter.org, over the phone at 541-994-9994, or in person during regular building hours, 10 am to 4 pm Thursday through Monday. MORE PHOTOS BELOW

Doors at the center, 540 NE Hwy. 101, will open at 6:30 pm. Tickets are on sale now at lincolncity-culturalcenter.org.

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Today marks two decades since our nation watched two planes fly into the World Trade Center and one into the Pentagon. Its been two decades since brave passengers attempted to regain control of a hijacked plane. Its been two decades since the events of September 11th culminated in one of the most controversial wars in American history.

While this day is seared into the minds of many Americans, teachers across the nation have wrestled with how to teach the impact to a generation that wasnt alive on that fateful day.

Regardless of our age, there was an innocence that was lost on September 11 that none of us will ever get back, said West Brook High School history teacher Candace LeMasters. Thats for me. Thats for people who were young children. Thats for those who have grown up in the world (after) 9/11 and for everyone thats going to come. No longer could we assume that we were safe because we live in the United States. Life would never be the same.

Port Arthur Memorial High School history teacher Donald Bouley noted that September 11 shows that even the most powerful nations, such as the U.S., are vulnerable to attacks within their borders.

Teaching in public schools about the events of Sept. 11 is required by the state of Texas. But how they handle it is up to each individual teacher.

In the week culminating in September 11, Bouley started his 11th Grade class off with photographs of the day and a reminder that they could leave class if the images were too intense for them.

He showed photos of the impacted towers, people jumping to their deaths and the field where United Airlines Flight 93 crashed in Pennsylvania. They watched an informative animated video explaining what happened on this day  and why  to young people who were not alive at the time.

Bouley then had students imagine what they would have done if they were the pilot, a passenger, then-President George W. Bush or his cabinet. They journaled. And afterward, they discussed.

He also planned to show the students a documentary called 102 Minutes That Changed America. The 2008 film by The History Channel shows video footage chronicling the attack on the World Trade Center.

He says he works to teach strictly the indisputable facts, despite the war that followed being colored by politics, worldviews, conspiracy theories, xenophobia, social media, religion and the news media.

The War on Terror is not just a United States war. Its a global war, he said. I think that it's important to present both sides. It affected different people in different ways. It affected the Middle East differently than it affected America.

But he laments that at this point, there is not nearly as much scholarly documentation about the war in Afghanistan as other events in history.

Nevertheless, he thinks it will only take 5 or 10 years for educators to be able to teach about Afghanistan with the same academic rigor that they can teach about the Vietnam War.

LeMasters reminds her students that everyone witnessing an event brings different experiences. As a result, even unbiased research can be impacted by an individuals point of view.

In fact, thats inspired her to implement Culturally-Responsive Teaching, which connects students own experiences to what they learn in school.

You can learn facts, but it's what you bring, LeMasters explained. I mean, it's your knowledge, your background, your experiences that you bring to formulate an idea and argument and history. There's going to be different perspectives, and it doesn't mean that any side is more right than the other because history is something you have to reflectively and critically think about.

While 9/11 changed the world for everyone, it changed people differently.

When you learn to appreciate the perspective of other people, then I think that that helps you grow as a person, LeMasters said. It helps your mind take in other ideas.

This week, she had students ask their parents about their experience on September 11, 2001.

Students were astounded to discover that their oft-forgetful parents could remember minute details from that day, such as the food they ate for breakfast.

She also had the students answer the question: Which is more important to you? Liberty or Security?

Its questions like these that allow the teachers to make a historical event more than just what they read about in a textbook.

Sometimes kids don't want to be in a class, and you have to tell them why it's important, LeMasters said. I love being able to teach young people to think. Its important for them to learn to have a voice.

rachel.kersey@beaumontenterprise.com

twitter.com/ontheREKord
I watched the faces of the students in Donald Bouleys history class at Port Arthur Memorial High School on Wednesday morning as they stared up at a screen projecting images from the attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and the thwarted third target that resulted in the crash in rural Pennsylvania.

Most watched, some slept, some doodled in a notebook or snuck a peek at their phone amid the rooms dimmed lights.

No face revealed the trauma, confusion, fear or sadness that Im sure transformed the faces of Americans across the country that were old enough to see and understand the gravity of what was unfolding before their eyes on that day  many, many faces, and mine among them.

Ill never forget where I was on September 11, 2001  Interstate 64, heading back to visit my parents in Cincinnati from a job in Jasper, Indiana, on my day off.

I was listening to the radio when the New York City-based show hosts suddenly broke away from their usual comedic banter to address an apparent plane crash into a Manhattan building.

It was Howard Stern. I thought they were joking.

Then I realized maybe they werent.

Shortly after, a second plane hit the South Tower.

No, this wasnt a bad joke, nor was it simply a horrific plane accident.

This was an act of terrorism happening in real time, and I was on the highway  driving, desperately flipping through radio channels in search of a news site.

I pulled over at a gas station, hoping there would be a television with the news on or someone there who could tell me what was going on.

This was 2001. Cell phones werent a thing everyone had and definitely not something I had.

The gas station was a bust. So, I just kept scrolling through the radio until I reached my parents house, where my mom and dad and I would spend pretty much the rest of the day and night and the day after watching the news.

We saw the images of chaos and the images of terror.

We saw bodies falling down past the glass pane exterior of the North Tower, then the South Tower  forced to jump or maybe choosing to as flames consumed the top floors and those trapped within.

Then the towers fell, one after the other, spilling debris and utter chaos through the streets of Manhattan.

What followed were fresher traumas flashed across the screen  images from the fallen buildings  bodies being pulled from the rubble, most memorably the fire department chaplain, whod gone in to minister to the firefighters and died amid the buildings collapse.

It was surreal.

There is really no other word to describe that day or the days that followed. It was just one surreal moment followed by another  a reality never thought possible followed by another reality never thought possible.

In short, this was our Pearl Harbor moment.

This moment, like that one, was a tipping point in Americas coming of age.

Every tragedy of that magnitude marks a point of innocence lost  when you realize that the world is a dark and complicated place, filled with passions and hatreds that can forever alter the course of the world in ways that can never be undone.

Times when you realize that, at any moment, a dire series of events may unfold and but for the grace of God go I, you may just be that person in the wrong place at the wrong time.

How could these kids understand this?

None were alive when 9/11 took place.

In the days leading up to the 20th anniversary of the deadly, life-altering terrorist attack, these images, this moment is perhaps just another history lesson.

Weve all been there  heard our elders utter words like, Ill never forget where I was when   insert any relevant tragic moment in history here: The assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Pearl Harbor, President John F. Kennedys assassination, the Columbine high school massacre.

You hear those words, but you cant appreciate their full meaning until you experience it.

I look at their faces  some watching, some bored, some simply asleep.

I hope your teachers can show you the magnitude of what happened that day. I hope you understand.

But I also kind of hope you dont.

I hope you never have your loss of innocence moment.

I hope you dont see anything remotely like 9/11.

I hope you never have your eyes widened in horror and sadness  a grief you cannot comprehend and can never unsee.

kbrent@beaumontenterprise.com
There are images and heart-wrenching moments that Jerry Cammarata, a part-time Lake Worth, Florida, resident said he will never forget.

"It was a movie. It could not have possibly been real life," Cammarata said, recalling the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

The former commissioner and member of New York Citys Central Board of Education was in his office, blocks away from the World Trade Center, when he and other co-workers looked out of the window and saw smoke.

"I got in my car against traffic and rode all the way to the World Trade Center," Cammarata said.

It was there he saw people jumping from above, a detail he said is difficult to talk about and hard to forget.

"And then to hear the thump  that part will never escape," he said.

Distraught by what he had just witnessed, he made his way to a bunker used by city leaders in emergencies.

Alongside then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and other commissioners, they were all almost immediately told to evacuate.

"We all ran down the stairs," Cammarata said. "Rudy went out one door, I went out another door and tried to get as far away from the building, and, as we did, that's when the second plane hit.

"Everybody knew they had to do something because lives were in jeopardy," said Cammarata.

"At that point, there wasnt the right thing. The only thing was to do what you instinctively were trained to do," he said.

"For me, it was, 'Get to those schools,'" he said.

Thousands of kids in nearby buildings were taken to safety, some even on boats.

While Cammarata calls this part of it all a miracle, the lives that were lost continue to carry a heavy weight on his heart.

"Many of our friends just didnt make it, it wasnt nice," he said, tearfully.

Twenty years later, he said theres still a lesson to be learned.

"I think what 9/11 really taught us was that all people can hold hands, all people can get along and all people can work towards a common cause," Cammarata said.
On Saturday afternoon, members of the family that owns Katys Video in south-central Beaumont set to work cleaning up the aftermath of an event few people would wish to go through.

The day was much like the one before it, sunny and hot  a typical August in Southeast Texas.

But instead of customers coming in and out of the family-run business on Saturday, the two men were replacing the buildings front door and cleaning up other damage after an armed-robbery-turned-shootout that occurred the previous day.

Bullet holes riddled a plexiglass cashier barrier guard, glass display case and the wall of the store, 2568 College St, owned by Humberto Ordaz and his wife, Kathy.

Katys Video offers a wide variety of items, like a flea market, including some products from Mexico. The family thinks the men mistakenly thought the business had a lot of money.

A relative, who asked to remain anonymous for safety reasons, told The Enterprise on Saturday afternoon that this is the second time in nearly two decades the business has been robbed.

This time, the familys matriarch and her daughter were working around 5 p.m. at the store behind the cash register when two armed men  who have not yet been arrested  entered the store, demanded money and began shooting.

Related: Two people shot at SE Texas video store

The relative said the 18-year-old daughter was shot seven times, including in the upper body around the chest and shoulder area. She was taken to a local hospital in critical condition, but the relative said she is expected to survive and be moved from the Intensive Care Unit to a regular hospital room soon. She was just 2 years old when the business was first robbed.

Her mother was shot five times, including in the lower side of her body. The woman, who is in her 50s, also was taken to the hospital and is expected to survive, the relative said.

They are doing better right now, the relative said.

The relative said a customer in the store during the robbery also had his wallet taken from him. At one point, one of the women who were working shot back at the two men.

During the robbery, the employees and suspects fired multiple shots at each other, police said in a news release. Both of the employees were struck by gunshots.

The relative said the customer helped the women after the the suspects fled in a mid-sized, maroon SUV.

He called 911, and 911 told him what to do to put pressure on the bullet holes, the relative said. Whatever he did  he saved her life.

While the two women recover, family members have been working to prepare the business to reopen  after the mother is released from the hospital.

Top hits: Get Beaumont Enterprise stories sent directly to your inbox

But even when their wounds heal, the experience will remain with everyone involved.

For everybody, you know, we were thinking we were safe, the relative said. Sometimes, I leave my kids in here for a little while we go to eat. Its changing the way we think. I dont think it is safe anymore. It has been crazy around here lately.

As of Saturday afternoon, the incident remained under investigation by the Beaumont Police Department. Police do not know if the suspects were injured in the exchange of gunfire. The same suspects are believed to be involved in at least one other aggravated robbery in the same area within the past week, officers said previously.

During the Aug. 13 incident, two men matching the same description entered La Tejana at 3045 College St. at 3 p.m. The armed men also threatened employees and demanded money before leaving in a maroon SUV, police said.

A video of the men allegedly fleeing the previous incident is posted on the Beaumont Police Facebook page. Anyone with information about these crimes, may contact Beaumont Police at (409) 832-1234 or submit anonymous tips through Southeast Texas Crime Stoppers by calling (409) 833-TIPS. You can also download the P3 Tips app on your smartphone to submit tips anonymously. Tips may be eligible for a cash reward.

meagan.ellsworth@beaumontenterprise.com

twitter.com/megzmagpie
HALLE, Germany (AP)  It's a scorching September day and the Green party candidate hoping to succeed Angela Merkel as German chancellor leaps on stage in front of hundreds of supporters for what should be a home run.

Surveys show climate change is among the top concerns for many voters, and the audience in the eastern city of Halle is made up largely of students and retirees eager to hear how Annalena Baerbock plans to safeguard their future  or that of their grandchildren.

The Greens have long championed the fight against global warming. Ahead of Germany's Sept. 26 vote they offer arguably the most comprehensive program for making Europe's biggest economy carbon neutral, with a mix of government incentives and penalties for polluters.

But while voters readily admit they are worried about the state of the planet, especially after the deadly floods that hit Germany in July, many are wary of committing to the kind of radical transformation required  fearing the bill they might receive for it.

The climate crisis is now," Baerbock tells the rally. "Thats why we need to act now, in the year 2021.

The audience responds with polite applause; a listener then asks her about people in rural areas who worry that the changes required to combat climate change  such as banning cars with combustion engines  could threaten their way of life.

Baerbock says she wants electric vehicles to be affordable for everybody within a decade, if necessary with a subsidy of up to 9,000 euros (over $10,600) for low earners, but some are skeptical.

They dont say enough where the money is going to come from," said Sonja Solisch, a health care worker.

Solisch sympathizes with the Greens' goals but says voters like her have other worries too.

"Good train connections, good road connections, things like that need to be paid for too, she said.

A survey released Friday by public broadcaster ZDF found climate and environment ranked as the most important election issue for 43% of respondents  ahead of the coronavirus pandemic and migration. The same poll, a representative phone survey of about 1,250 voters with a margin of error of up to 3 percentage points, showed the Greens trailing the center-left Social Democrats and Merkel's center-right Union bloc.

Steffi Lemke, a long-time Greens lawmaker, argues that the two governing parties are shying away from telling voters the brutal facts about climate change, including about the cost.

The problem is that it will be far more expensive if we do nothing," she told The Associated Press, citing the 30 billion euros that federal and state governments recently agreed to spend on rebuilding western regions hit by devastating flash floods this summer. If we dont change the economy and our society, its going to be unaffordable.

The party, which wants to earmark 50 billion euros a year to make the country cleaner and more equitable, has attracted large donations from rich individuals worried about climate change.

In April, a bitcoin millionaire gave half his fortune to the Greens in the hope that they will regulate the energy-hogging virtual currency.

This week the party received a record donation of 1.25 million euros ($1.48 million) from Steven Schuurman, the Dutch founder of software company Elastic.

Its very obvious that Germany is a political and economic force to be reckoned with in Europe and the world he told the AP, adding that the Greens offer pragmatic solutions" to the climate crisis.

One man hoping such solutions come sooner, rather than later, is Andreas Geron, the mayor of Sinzig, whose town was badly hit by the floods. Two months on he worries that families whose houses were destroyed in the disaster may move away for good unless the next government quickly changes existing zoning laws to take into account the heightened risk of similar floods in the future.

There are elections soon, but by the time parliament has come together another month or more will pass," he said. "Thats time we simply dont have.

Baerbock, who at 40 is significantly younger than her two main rivals, cites a recent U.N. report showing that time is running out to prevent catastrophic planetary warming. She then urges her audience in Halle to reach out to colleagues, friends and family  even their ex-spouses  to drive home the urgency of electing politicians willing to tackle the problem.

I honestly dont want my children, who are 6 and 9, or your children and grandchildren, to ask us in 20 years time: Why didnt you turn the rudder around back then, she said.

Her words echo a dry political tome published in 1997 about the need to devote financial resources to saving the environment.

The book, titled The Price of Survival, was written by Germany's then-environment minister  Angela Merkel.

___

Follow APs coverage of Germanys election at https://apnews.com/hub/germany-election
VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (AP)  A Tidewater Virginia man will be sentenced in December after pleading guilty to taking part in the riot earlier this year at the U.S. Capitol.

Jacob Jake Hiles, 42, pleaded guilty Thursday by video in federal court in Washington to a misdemeanor count of parading, demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building, according to court information. Maximum penalties for the count are six months in prison and a $5,000 fine, according to his plea agreement.
Bennington, VT (05201)

Today

Thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. High 83F. Winds SW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

Showers and thundershowers this evening, then cloudy with rain likely overnight. A few storms may be severe. Low 61F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%.
Bennington, VT (05201)

Today

Thunderstorms with locally heavy downpours. A few storms may be severe. High 84F. Winds SW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

Showers and thundershowers early, then overcast overnight with occasional rain. Low 61F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%.
The body of a U.S. Marine killed in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan has returned home to Massachusetts on the 20th anniversary of the attacks that led to Americas longest war
Cases appear to be ticking down again in Berkshire County. But, will that continue as the impact of Labor Day becomes clear and the weather turns cold?
To mark the 20th anniversary of 9/11, we asked Berkshire Eagle readers to share where they were when the towers fell that September morning. T
Some scars we must learn to live with, for though their originating wounds fade over the distance of time they can never fully heal. And while two decades have passed since Sept. 11, 2001, for some of our fellow Americans, the trauma in that day of infamy does not feel so distant. Some of those wounds, carried over 20 years, still feel like they were inflicted yesterday: an unknowing final goodbye to a loved one; images of devastation burned into the psyche; a blanket of chaos smothering the world like the eerie ash that coated New Yorkers skin and skyline.

Many remember where they were on 9/11, but for many of our Berkshire neighbors, some of whom shared their stories with The Eagle, theirs were particularly intense scenes in a nationwide tragedy. Foster Goodrich still feels the last embrace he had with his beloved brother, Peter, in Williamstown, before learning a week later that his soulmate since birth was on United Airlines Flight 175. Mike Jaffe, now a Great Barrington resident, remembers all the details of the morning when he made a fateful decision to eat breakfast with his family, delaying the commute to his job on the 96th floor of the World Trade Center north tower. Larry Beach, of Clarksburg, vividly recalls hearing the unmistakable sound of engines throttling back while walking through a Pentagon courtyard at 9:37 a.m., followed by a fireball exploding from the building and airplane insulation falling around him.

On this day, we solemnly mourn the thousands of lives senselessly lost  including courageous first responders who ran toward unimaginable danger to help others  in a terror attack that pierced the heart of our country like no other in its history. We honor the veterans and their families whose lives were forever changed by the ensuing war on terror. We also wrestle with the evolving anguish that still lingers as we look back on 20 years of processing such incalculable grief at a national scale. We owe it to ourselves as Americans to honestly grapple with the fact that this processing has not always been healthy or fruitful  from jingoistic war-making in theaters like Iraq and Afghanistan to the anti-immigrant and xenophobic sentiments that continue to sustain the worst corners of our politics. But we also owe it to the victims and survivors of that hellish day to recognize our capacities to strive for good in the wake of catastrophe and the points of resilience that buoyed us  and build upon them.

Peter Goodrichs family, for instance, saw the anniversary of the terror attacks not just as a time of mourning but a time of service. In 2004, the Goodriches founded a program to help educate young Afghan people. They brought high school- and college-aged students to the U.S. to study, and through the Peter M. Goodrich Memorial Foundation supported several humanitarian projects in Afghanistan, including the creation of a school in Logar Province. They lost a family member who meant the world to them, and transformed their grief into a lifeline for people they didnt even know on the other side of the world.

In the Berkshires more broadly, its heartening to see the kind of unity that should be embraced as a counter to cruel terror that ultimately seeks to divide us. The unique burden put on everyday Muslims and Arabs across America after 9/11, from discrimination to targeted hate crimes, is a moral stain unjustifiable by the fears inevitably sparked by mass atrocities like 9/11. Some Muslim-Americans who spoke to The Eagle, though, said that while they still experience that discrimination  particularly while traveling  they feel valued and at-home in the Berkshires. We always can and should work to make our communities more inclusive, but we should also be proud that the Berkshires neighborly values can embody the best of how our nation should respond to and cope with our darkest hours, whether they were yesterday or 20 years ago.

Among the devastating elements of events like 9/11, often a striking one is how arbitrarily suffering is distributed in the moments just before and after. Someone boards a plane on a Tuesday morning; another person has breakfast with family and is late to work; a young adult makes her family proud by enlisting in the military; a Muslim family immigrates to their new home in the U.S.  none could know what history had in store. But what is not arbitrary is how we choose to rise from the ashes of sheer destruction. The unity that America saw immediately after 9/11 is now sorely absent; it is up to us, as individuals and communities, whether we can get it back. The lessons of dealing with the political distortions that often follow such nationally traumatic events are not learned automatically; we must take on the responsibility of grappling with them. The time we have with loved ones is finite and fleeting; never take it for granted.

The Goodrich family chose a path of healing that didnt just help them go on but saw that others were helped to go on as well. They certainly went above and beyond in the project of turning grief into service of others, but we are all capable of joining this project in small but meaningful ways. As the nation prominently revisits this painful moment 20 years on, it is a heavy day for us all, but for some it is unfathomably so. Turn to those in your lives whose loss was particularly grievous and let them know that we still support them, as neighbors and as an American community. We will never forget the impact of that day, but we must also never forget that duty to help heal with which we are all tasked.
Artist Amy Sheralds iconic portrait of Breonna Taylor went on display Friday (Sept. 10) at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture as part of a celebration to mark the museums fifth anniversary.

The exhibit, Reckoning: Protest. Defiance. Resilience, opened in the museums Visual Art and the American Experience space. It explores the Black Lives Matter movement, police and vigilante violence against African Americans and how art depicts Black resistance, resilience and protest.

RELATED: Breonna Taylor, One Year Later: A Video Timeline

Taylor is the 26-year-lold emergency medical tech worker who was shot to death on March 13, 2020 by Louisville police officers in a botched drug raid.

I think it is a really important moment. Our fifth anniversary is a chance to look back, look ahead and look around, a chance to honor the moment we are in, the museum director Kevin Young said, according to The Washington Post.
Written by Nigel Roberts

President Joe Bidens administration took concrete steps this week to make good on its promise to support the nations historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) On Friday (Sept. 9), Vice President Kamala Harris, a Howard University graduate, capped off a weeklong series of events for HBCU Week with a visit to Hampton University in Virginia, where she toured the schools STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) facilities. RELATED: Sen. Kamala Harris Speaks To HBCU Students About Her Possible First 100 Days In Office As a proud HBCU alumnus, its a privilege to work for the first HBCU graduate to serve as the vice president and an administration that understands HBCUs are engines of opportunity that are instrumental in preparing future leaders, said Vince Evans, Florida A&M University graduate and deputy director of the Office of Public Engagement & Intergovernmental Affairs, Office of the Vice President.

Yesterday, Vice President Harris, Senior Advisor Cedric Richmond, and White House staffers met in celebration of #HBCUWeek. We are proud to have alumni of Historically Black Colleges and Universities as integral figures within the Biden-Harris Administration. pic.twitter.com/DBM8EyXOM2  The White House (@WhiteHouse) September 10, 2021

The White House Initiative on HBCUs hosted the 2021 HBCU Week Conference, which included a range of events and opportunities for federal agencies, private sector companies and philanthropic organizations to engage with HBCUs. Biden officially started the weeklong celebration of Black higher learning on Sept. 3 by signing a proclamation that recognized September 5 - 11 as National HBCU Week.  I call upon educators, public officials, professional organizations, corporations, and all Americans to observe this week with appropriate programs, ceremonies, and activities that acknowledge the countless contributions these institutions and their alumni have made to our country, notes the Proclamation signed by President Biden. It continues, Since 1837, Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) have educated and prepared millions of people to lift up our Nation and make their impact on the world. These essential institutions have been critical engines of opportunity for generations of American families  they are incubators of excellence, helping to shape the story of our Nation and deliver on the promise of a more perfect Union. During National Historically Black Colleges and Universities Week, we celebrate the vital role that HBCUs play in molding Black leaders and ensuring that America continues to move closer to reaching its full potential. The president also signed an executive order that established the White House Initiative on Advancing Educational Equity, Opportunity, and Excellence through HBCUs.

During National Historically Black Colleges and Universities Week, our administration celebrates HBCUs for their essential role in providing opportunity for generations of American families and recommit to our support of their vital mission.https://t.co/snETHf7hLL  The White House (@WhiteHouse) September 7, 2021

The administration also continued its efforts to shore up the finances at HBCUs. It has proposed approximately $239 million in new institutional aid funding for the institutions in the Department of Education budget for next year, a White House statement said. HBCUs have been underfunded for decades, in many cases by state lawmakers who diverted budget spending away from the schools, to the tune of billions of dollars. RELATED: New Bipartisan HBCU Bill Would Bring Funding To Rebuild, Repair, and Modernize Campuses With students returning to campus, one of the events included a roundtable discussion on COVID-19 vaccinations. Dr. Anthony Faucci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and White House senior policy advisor Dr. Cameron Webb hosted the discussion with student leaders from several HBCUs.

Today we continue to celebrate HBCU week with a roundtable with Dr. Fauci, Dr. Webb, and 5 HBCU student leaders, highlighting their incredible work encouraging their communities to get vaccinated. pic.twitter.com/it3sCbyxtU  Cedric Richmond (@Richmond46) September 9, 2021

Im extremely proud of what this administration has accomplished in its first year and look forward to continuing our efforts on behalf of HBCUs across the country, Evans stated. And the week-long dedication To HBCUs culminated on Friday (September 10) when White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre held a press briefing via video conferencing from the White House for student journalists at several HBCUS.
Weather Alert

...FLASH FLOOD WATCH IN EFFECT UNTIL 7 PM CDT/8 PM EDT/ THIS EVENING... The National Weather Service in Louisville has issued a * Flash Flood Watch for portions of east central Kentucky, north central Kentucky, northwest Kentucky and south central Kentucky, including the following areas, in east central Kentucky, Anderson, Bourbon, Boyle, Clark, Fayette, Garrard, Jessamine, Madison, Mercer, Nicholas and Woodford. In north central Kentucky, Hardin, Larue, Nelson and Washington. In northwest Kentucky, Ohio. In south central Kentucky, Adair, Allen, Barren, Butler, Casey, Cumberland, Edmonson, Grayson, Green, Hart, Lincoln, Logan, Marion, Metcalfe, Monroe, Simpson, Taylor and Warren. * Until 7 PM CDT/8 PM EDT/ this evening. * A line of showers and storms will persist across portions of central Kentucky this morning and potentially result in flash flooding. Additional showers and storms are likely to fire off this afternoon ahead of a cold front and could contribute to additional flooding. The flood threat should end late this evening as the cold front pushes through the region. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS... You should monitor later forecasts and be prepared to take action should Flash Flood Warnings be issued. &&
CIL will contribute Rs 5 crores

Coal India Ltd (CIL), under the Ministry of Coal, has signed an MoU with the Department of Health & Family Welfare, Government of Assam for strengthening the health infrastructure at the Silchar Medical College & Hospital, Silchar, the only Medical College and Hospital in Barak Valley Region, Assam.

In this new CSR initiative, CIL will contribute Rs 5 crores towards setting up an ICU facility and medical gas pipeline in the Silchar Medical College & Hospital which will benefit over 40 lakh people of the state.

The MoU was signed in the presence of Dr Himanta Biswa Sarma, Chief Minister of Assam and Health Minister Keshab Mahanta.

CIL and its subsidiaries have undertaken several high-investment, high-impact projects to help improve medical facilities across the country. Notable projects being the Medical College cum Hospital at Talcher in Odisha for Rs 492 crores, Premashraya, a home for children and their families seeking cancer treatment at Kolkata for Rs 41 crores, Support for Bone Marrow transplants of children suffering from Thalassemia for Rs 40 crores and a Cardiac Care Centre at Jharsuguda, Odisha for Rs 75 crores.
'Infant and Child Mortality In Assam  Demographic and Socio-Economic Interrelations' book was also launched

Union Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare, Dr Bharati Pravin Pawar inaugurated and presided over the seminar on Population, Human Capital and Sustainable Development (healthy people  healthy future), in Delhi. She also inaugurated a digital population clock at the Institute for Economic Growth nestled inside the University of Delhi. The Union Minister launched a book titled 'Infant and Child Mortality In Assam  Demographic and Socio-Economic Interrelations' written by Dr Dipanjali Haloi and Dr Suresh Sharma and an HMIS Brochure / Ready Reckoner at the event.

Dr Pawar spoke on the need to have greater discussion and awareness on the population as India is poised to become the most populous country by 2027 according to estimates. She underlined that the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare is committed to strengthening the health infrastructure across the country and fulfil the Prime Ministers Vision of 'Health for All.'

Dr Pawar observed, Population policy should intend to stabilise population and it requires both macro and micro approach. Government is ensuring that everyone gets clean fuel, house, clean water and health care. Enumerating how population estimation is critical in the distribution and access to public goods, she brought to light the critical role Population Research Centers (PRCs) can play in researching contemporary issues.

The Health Minister appreciated the wide range of studies conducted by the PRCs which help in policy formulation and evaluation of schemes. She noted that PRCs have visited all the Health and Wellness centres in India. She underlined how Population Research Centres can help the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in monitoring various flagship programmes of the Government of India like Lakshya, Kayakalp and Ayushman Bharat.

Dr Pawar emphasised that the population clock will be beneficial to everyone as it provides an interactive and quick overview of the entire nations population. She said that the population clock will provide minute by minute estimate of Indias population. It will also help in capturing data regarding total fertility rate, infant mortality rate and maternal mortality rate. She hoped that this clock will be able to create awareness in young generations apart from its importance in research.

Sandhya Krishnamurthy, DG (Stats), DK Ojha, DDG (Stats.) and other senior officials of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare were also present.
Is it okay to get 2 doses from different vaccine candidates?

The vaccine drive in India is going at a steady pace. Presently, 329 million population has been inoculated with dose one and 126.7 million with both doses. While initially the thought process and assumptions were to receive two dosages from the same vaccine candidate, recent medical developments suggest that getting dosages from two different candidates is more effective.

Earlier this month, DGCI gave its approval to an ICMR study on mixing Covishield and Covaxin doses. The study found that mixing Covishield and Covaxin jabs relays a stronger immune response with minimal adverse effects. Moreover, heterologous vaccinations are already being given in other countries with combinations of Moderna, Pfizer, AstraZeneca shots. The worlds first study on using a cocktail of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine and Russias Sputnik Light vaccine showed no serious adverse events or cases of coronavirus post-vaccination. The heterogeneous boosting approach (vaccine cocktail using human adenovirus serotype 26 as the first component and human adenovirus serotype 5 as the second component) is at the core of Sputnik V.

Therefore, it is becoming more likely that India may start giving vaccine cocktails to its citizens. However, what is the need for the same? Does it provide better efficacy than getting both doses from the same candidate? Let us delve deeper.

Vaccine cocktail

When two vaccines platforms are mixed, it is known as a vaccine cocktail or heterologous vaccination. Mixing the two results in a stronger immune response. In addition, cocktails may also increase the effectiveness of the shots against new variants like the Delta Variant.

Change in level of efficacy

The trials conducted for vaccine cocktails in Europe, mixing the AstraZeneca adenoviral vector vaccine with Pfizers mRNA vaccine yielded positive results, as compared to two shots of either AZ or Pfizer vaccine. The recipients showed better immunogenicity, i.e. stronger and wider range of immune responses; as well as higher reactogenicity, i.e. a higher rate of side effects. Overall efficacy was found to be better and the combination was deemed safe with no significant adverse events.

While India awaits the entry of Pfizers mRNA vaccine into the fold, the National Technical Advisory Group (NTAGI) has proposed to go ahead with a cocktail of Covishield and Sputnik V, which has certain benefits.

Both Covishield and Sputnik V are adenoviral vector vaccines. Covishield uses a Chimpanzee adenovirus while Sputnik V uses two different Human Adenoviruses. When the vaccine is administered, the immune system is naive to both the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein and the adenoviral vector.

But when the subsequent dose is administered, the immune system reacts against the adenoviral vector as well, thus reducing the vaccine efficacy to an extent. This phenomenon is seen with Covishield, which uses the same vector for both doses. Sputnik V uses two different vectors to avoid this response. A cocktail of Covishield and Sputnik V allows us to bypass this immune response, thereby improving the efficacy of the vaccines.

Since both vaccines use the same platform  adenoviral vector  minimal safety issues are expected. As mentioned above, there may be an increased incidence of side effects. More importantly, it should provide a robust, wide-ranging immune response, that may help tackle the existing and upcoming variants better.

While the proposal is based on preliminary results, the final decision would depend on emerging scientific evidence, as well as the production and availability of vaccines.

Speed of vaccination drives

By giving two dosages from different candidates, it helps the healthcare system with a breather by reducing the load on accelerated vaccine manufacture and subsequent increase in the costs. Hence, vaccine cocktails give a window to accelerate vaccination campaigns, maximising their impact on the control of the pandemic.

The threat of the looming third wave is very much present. We must continue to take the necessary precautions and not become callous in our approach. Also, to note that vaccination is the only permanent and viable long-term solution against the virus. So, with dwindling vaccine rates and issues with supply chains, a heterologous vaccination platform could be our saving grace. It may allow India to use its stockpile of COVID-19 vaccines more effectively to fully vaccinate more people in the country.

Dr Haryax Pathak, Member, iCart- India COVID Apex Research Team, Vadodara
On the morning of September 11, 2001, Boudnik wanted to warn rescue teams of a potential collapse of the WTC Towers. Crossing the Brooklyn Bridge on foot, he reached the WTC site too late. In the early hours of the next day, he helped recover bodies and began surveying surrounding buildings for collateral damage. Within days, Boudnik started developing a series of 3D physical models of the "aftermath" WTC site as a communication tool for all the rescue and recovery teams involved. As a form of PTSD therapy, he wrote a book TOWERS - 9/11 STORY . The book was recently published as an

Jiri Boudnik, born in Pilsen, escaped from Communist Czechoslovakia in 1987 with his mother and sister. Jiri just turned 17, his sister was 10. They arrived in the USA in 1989. Jiri was educated first as an artist at the Munson Williams Proctor School of Art in Utica, NY, and later transferred to The Cooper Union in Manhattan, where he received his degree in architecture. He later worked as a structural engineer and an architect on many New York high-rise buildings, including NYU Palladium and the Federal Courthouse in Brooklyn. Since then, Boudnik has worked as an architect, specializing in high-rise residential buildings in Manhattan. He's recently relocated to Pilsen, Czech Republic, working as an architect and a designer for his Czech and American clients, keeping close ties to New York, his second home. born in Pilsen, escaped from Communist Czechoslovakia in 1987 with his mother and sister. Jiri just turned 17, his sister was 10. They arrived in the USA in 1989. Jiri was educated first as an artist at the Munson Williams Proctor School of Art in Utica, NY, and later transferred to The Cooper Union in Manhattan, where he received his degree in architecture. He later worked as a structural engineer and an architect on many New York high-rise buildings, including NYU Palladium and the Federal Courthouse in Brooklyn. Since then, Boudnik has worked as an architect, specializing in high-rise residential buildings in Manhattan. He's recently relocated to Pilsen, Czech Republic, working as an architect and a designer for his Czech and American clients, keeping close ties to New York, his second home.

Interview with Jiri Boudnik


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Ground Zero, New York City, N.Y. (Sept. 17, 2001) -- An aerial view shows only a small portion of the crime scene where the World Trade Center collapsed following the Sept. 11 terrorist attack.
The Berejiklian governments green light to outdoor gatherings for vaccinated Sydneysiders has come too late to save Sculpture by the Sea.

For the second year, the popular outdoor event that before COVID-19 would draw up to half a million visitors to the two-kilometre coastal walk from Bondi to Tamarama has been cancelled due to the pandemic lockdowns.

Organisers are looking for a new date in 2022 after conceding they could not comply with health restrictions and limit crowds to the doubled vaccinated without doing the unthinkable and cordoning off the entire coastal walk.

Marina DeBriss artwork wont be displayed in Sculpture by the Sea this year. Credit:Steven Siewert

Sculpture by the Sea was originally postponed to October 21 with the same lineup of artists after failing to secure an exemption from the NSW Health Department in 2020.
Power ballads could get those feelings across, just as big song and dance numbers could deliver the glitz and showmanship that Jamie craved. I love music, says Butterell later. Music cuts to the heart. We all have songs in our lives that take us back to memory. Music does that in ways nothing else can do. They also wanted to set it in Sheffield, rather than Newcastle. Even if it hadnt been commissioned by the Crucible, which sets out to involve local communities in its productions, they would have made that transition. Sheffield is a very warm city. There is a great sense of humour and a fantastic music scene. It just felt like a natural fit, says MacRae. But we came here because Jonathan is from Sheffield, and he had quite a Jamie-sort-of-childhood. Not as a boy in a dress, but he ran away to Broadway to be a choreographer. So, a metaphorical dress. Harwood, who had never worn make-up before the film, with Grant in Everybodys Talking About Jamie. Butterell grew up on a housing estate. When I first created this as a theatre piece, I wanted to create a love letter to Sheffield because there are assumptions that come with certain communities and I wanted to sort of blow those assumptions, he says. Growing up gay there wasnt easy, certainly. But its hard to be anything. Being gay was one of them. It was hard to be working class. I grew up in a large extended Irish Catholic family. What I observed was a lot of love, a lot of support and a celebration of what I was. I remember when I left home at 17, I got a letter on my bed the day before from my mum saying, Jonathan, you have probably chosen to walk a rocky path, but keep walking it. And yes, maybe they will throw rocks at you but dont stray from that path. My mum is a working-class woman from Sheffield, you know. Thats why this particular story spoke to me. Because I watched Margaret Campbell do exactly that same thing with Jamie Campbell.

The initial stage show was made with local kids; the film was cast with auditions open to anyone around the country, but many of the performers attend the schools where they are now filming. There was one girl who had literally just left her school, done her prom and six weeks later was filming this prom in her own school again. So, it was very local for some people. It is being shot during school holidays; when I visit, the production is also using a school that has been shut as a rehearsal space. Its not glamorous, but the setting makes even a mass dance number  Work of Art, phenomenally energetic  seem that much more homespun. Unusually, when Warp Films wanted to turn it into a film, they wanted to keep the original creative team. Butterell had only directed theatre, but they werent worried about that. And we always talked about it being a movie, even before it literally became one, says MacRae. Jonathan wanted it to be like a pop album with a movie vibe. And Im from a television background. Id never done theatre before. When I wrote it, I was thinking of it very filmically. And now we get the opportunity to open the doors and do things you cant do on stage. Like having people run through busy shopping streets and all the fun of having the extras. The Campbells are renamed New for fictional purposes. Tom MacRae says they retained the key elements of the story told in the documentary  boy in a dress, mother who supports him and will buy him large shoes, estranged dad, a drag mentor (played here with vivid brio by Richard E. Grant) and that northern city atmosphere  but he didnt consult the Campbells or show them the script until it was finished.

We have known Jamie since he was 20, so this was something that had happened to him really quite recently, he says. And I knew I had to be able to take that character and put him through the wringer; I knew he was going to break his mums heart in Act II; I knew he was going to become full of himself and an egomaniac and have to realise that. And I didnt want to say thats what I think about Jamie Campbell. When I wrote his arguments with his mum, I was saying ,well, Im not saying Jamie Campbell would say this or that. Its Jamie New. Although now that we know Jamie and Margaret really well, they say, oh no, we used to have those arguments all the time! Loading Right down to the words he used in the script, he adds; Margaret marvels at how he got inside her head. And of course, when we met Jamie, he just loved it. Hes been the biggest supporter we could have - and very honest about saying, oh yeah, I would have done that and a hundred times worse. Now its lovely having him around, but we just needed that creative space, at the start, to make it our Jamie before giving it back to him, so he could make a decision about whether he would choose it or not. The film was shot in July 2019, before COVID-19 shut down the theatres and most film production. Before the set visit, I went to see the musical on stage. The audience was thrilled with it. Two years later, Everyones Talking About Jamie has been one of the first shows to open in the cautious unlocking of London and is once again doing brisk business. You will usually see a lot of grey hair if you go to a London theatre show, but the session I attended was notable for the number of out-of-town teenagers looking self-consciously sophisticated in the lobby bar. Actually, Ive observed such a cross-generational audience, says Butterell. I remember in Sheffield, about the sixth or seventh performance, there was one grandma with a boy  he couldnt have been more than seven or eight  who came in a dress with lipstick on.

Travelling around the United States to promote the film version, he sees couples coming with their children. And the dad might be going, Well, what the hell have I come to see? and then suddenly burst out laughing. Or I see the wife suddenly bend to her handbag for a tissue because theres this older straight guy in tears. Even in the south, people love it. There is an assumption that this audience is not going to find that joy. And they have! Loading It is a long time since we all became unexpectedly hot in the Sheffield shopping mall. Well, the whole world has been waiting, so it feels like part of the massive experience everyones been going through, says Butterell. With all the stopping and starting, the film was finished only at the beginning of this year. And it feels timely. It feels like time for a bit of joy to come into the world. Weve lived in a world that has just been entrenched in different politics, in some kind of binary sense of who we are, for so long  when we are all a glorious queer mess of human beings! I never want to wave a flag; my belief is just in telling stories and letting people take from them what they want. But if there is a message behind this, its just to create a safe space for people to be themselves. Everybodys Talking About Jamie is streaming on Amazon Prime Video from September 17.
People with religious trauma sometimes present with anxiety, depression or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), so they might get diagnosed with one of those. She added that religious trauma presents differently depending on the person, their background and experiences. The formation of the Sydney-based Recovering from Religion (RfR) group nearly 18 months ago, operating under the auspices of the US-based non-profit established in 2009, was borne out of DSouzas own struggle to find help after she quit the Jehovahs Witnesses. Raised by two followers the activist, who lives in Camden in south-western Sydney and works in healthcare, was the only Jehovahs Witness among about 700 students at her school and was constantly teased. Saturday mornings when we went preaching door-to-door were an emotional rollercoaster of fear, anxiety and praise, DSouza says. But I was indoctrinated to believe that I would live forever, in paradise, on Earth.

She left school after year 10, never pursued university  which she says the church discourages  and began carrying out 90 hours a month of voluntary door knocking. In 1999 she married Sasha DSouza, then a full-time volunteer. Although they wanted kids, they decided not to pursue IVF in case they had to destroy embryos later and go against the teachings of the Jehovahs Witnesses and the Watchtower Bible & Tract Society of Australia, the non-profit that governs them. In 2012, her husband began to wake up to the religion, as DSouza puts it, over what he viewed as inconsistencies in its teachings, culture and history. By 2015 he had left the Jehovahs Witnesses. DSouza quit the meetings but remained a believer until she read a 2016 report by The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse which found that the Australian church failed to protect children in its care from sexual predators. It was the final straw. It was a very destabilising time, you lose your sense of identity, says DSouza, who no longer has any contact with her family. You cant describe it to those closest to you because theyre still in the religion. The couple were disfellowshipped in November 2019 after speaking out against the Jehovahs Witnesses. Although she sought professional counselling beginning in 2017, DSouza realised that there needed to be a way for ex-believers to share their stories. After hearing about RfR via a US-based friend, she decided to start a Sydney group. Today it has 252 members, with those who have been associated with Pentecostalism, the Anglican and Baptist churches and the Jehovahs Witnesses dominating the group. There are also members with experiences of Catholicism, Mormonism, the Exclusive Brethren, the Mennonites, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism and the Falun Gong movement.

Normally up to 26 members attend meetings  now held online due to COVID-19  with up to four newcomers each time. Today RfR has 252 members, with those who have been associated with Pentecostalism, the Anglican and Baptist churches and the Jehovahs Witnesses dominating the group. Credit:Michele Mossop The topics that come to the surface tend to be gender and sexual identity, raising children differently from how you were raised, fear of telling your family and spouses about your doubts, childhood indoctrination and early trauma, says DSouza. There are plans for a Perth group. DSouza says that the Australian branches may be used as a template for versions to be established in Ireland, New Zealand, Spain and other countries. Dr Heidi Nicholl, the CEO of Humanists Australia (HA), a new Melbourne-based charity for those with a secular world view, says they are seeing a need for support for people who were or had been associated with religion. HA does not offer professional counselling, but she says that HA are hearing every day directly from large - and increasing - numbers of people who have been actively traumatised by their years in [organised religion].

The sort of ongoing tough love that tries to force you to conform to church ideals can take a huge toll, says Nicholl. One HA member, Les Allan, has set up the Melbourne-based Ex-Religious Support Network (ESN). Allan, 65, who has been in the secular space for decades, says it is believed to be the first of its kind. While it does not offer professional counselling, ESN has a strong relationship with Winzenried and a Facebook page with 233 members who can contact each other at any time about anything. A separate group with 184 people is for monthly gatherings, at the moment held online. Between June and July this year they had 30 new members, and Allan has been contacted by people expressing interest in setting up Perth and Queensland-based groups. One member, Axel*, quit his Islamic faith of 31 years in April 2018. I gave ... so much of my life, to religion and Ill spend the rest of my life trying to make sense of that. Sherrie DSouza

I had a major breakdown at the end of 2019. Religion was the cause and Im struggling to find my identity at the moment, he says. I want to tell my family, but I just cant because I know the effects it would have on me and them. Its a struggle every day. Turning 40 this year made him confront even more missed chances to explore his career, hobbies, and travel. If I wasnt constrained by the purity of religion, I would have dated and not rushed to marry, he says. Theyre sentiments shared by DSouza. Yes, I gave my life, so much of my life, to religion  and Ill spend the rest of my life trying to make sense of that, she said. But I can do something with the life I have now.
Former prime minister Tony Abbott has been fined $500 for allegedly failing to wear a mask as required by public health orders.

Mr Abbott was photographed this week by a member of the public in Manly who observed him talking to a friend at Fairy Bower near the main beach.

He was subsequently reported to NSW Police, who confirmed on Saturday the former prime minister had been issued with a fine.

A 63-year-old man was issued a $500 Penalty Infringement Notice on Friday (10 September, 2021), for failure to comply with wearing face covering directive, police said in a statement.
A picnic seems like a meagre reward for enduring Sydneys gruelling lockdown, but Jane Stuart is relishing the prospect of meeting up with friends and family.

Summers around the corner and Christmas, and we all want to know its gradually going to get easier, she said. And this is the first step.

Jane Stuart with husband Angus and her four children in Centennial Park. Credit:Steven Siewert

Mrs Stuart, from Woollahra, said the easing of restrictions for the fully vaccinated also means people will be able to enjoy each others company without looking over their shoulder the whole time.

Its been upsetting for so many people, she said. Were just looking for good news at the moment. Were all being patient, but at the same time were only human.
New York: The morning was remarkably similar to that exactly 20 years earlier. Sun glowing in a clear blue sky. Temperatures in the mid-20 degrees celsius. A light breeze blowing in off the Hudson River. New York at her late summer finest as the city that never sleeps took a breath to mark the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks.

Americans are not renowned for their subtlety, but this occasion was restrained and dignified. Only the family members of those who died in the attacks, plus a few journalists, were invited to the official commemoration ceremony at the World Trade Centre site. The focus was not on patriotism or politics but paying tribute to the 2977 victims of the worst foreign terrorist attack in American history.

From left, former president Bill Clinton, former first lady Hillary Clinton, former president Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, President Joe Biden, first lady Jill Biden, former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, Bloombergs partner Diana Taylor, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, and Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer, at the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum in New York. Credit:Chip Somodevilla/Pool Photo via AP

The family members started arriving at dawn, many of them wearing specially made T-shirts emblazoned with images of their deceased loved ones.

At 8.46am everyone at the memorial observed a minutes silence to mark the time hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 smashed into the North Tower.
The will observe September 17 as "black day" on the completion of one year of the enactment of the Centre's three farm laws, a party statement said.

The party workers will also take out a protest march from Gurdwara Rakabganj to parliament on the day demanding repeal of the laws.

A decision to this effect was taken in a meeting of SAD MLAs, party district presidents and members of the core committee. Party chief Sukhbir Singh Badal presided over the meeting, the statement said.

SAD vice president Daljit Singh Cheema said party leaders and workers along with farmers of Punjab will participate in the protest march and appealed to everyone to be a part of it wholeheartedly.

He said before beginning the protest march, 'ardas' (prayer) will be performed for repeal of the three farm laws.

Cheema also said that the Akali Dal is the only political party which "sacrificed" ministership and alliance for the cause of farmers, whereas others only claimed to have resignation letters in their pockets which were never tendered.

He said the SAD has stood like a rock with farmers and will continue to do so till the black laws are not repealed.

Bathinda MP Harsimrat Kaur Badal had resigned as Union Minister of Food Processing Industries, while the Akali Dal had quit the Democratic Alliance over the contentious laws last year.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
With one more fatality, the death toll due to viral fever and rose to 58 on Saturday in this district even as 100 new patients were admitted to hospitals, officials said.

According to a bulletin issued by the Chief Medical Officer's office, one more death has been reported from the district, battling the outbreak for the past three weeks, taking the toll to 58.

Principal of the Government Medical College, Dr. Sangeeta Aneja said 100 new patients were admitted to different wards of the hospital on Saturday.

Dr Aneja said a total of 389 patients, mostly children, are undergoing treatment currently in the Medical College hospital. She said no death has been reported from the Medical College on Saturday.

Of the 150 rapid tests done on Saturday, 50 have come positive, she said.

Meanwhile, the CMO Dr Dinesh Kumar Premi issued notices to six women health workers at Usayani Primary Health Centre for being absent for several days, and ordered them to join back immediately and explain the reason for their absence.

The CMO office also said the testing of malaria, and viral disease was continuously being done in the district and the affected patients were being admitted immediately to hospitals to ensure better treatment.

Firozabad, around 50 km from Agra and 320 km from Lucknow, has been battling an outbreak of dengue and deadly viral fever for the past three weeks now, with most of the victims being children.

Some cases have also been found in neighbouring Mathura, Agra and Mainpuri, according to officials.

(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.)
India on Friday reported a net increase of 870 in active cases to take its count to 391,516. Indias share of global active cases now stands at 2.08 per cent (one in 48). The country is sixth among the most affected countries by active cases. On Friday, it added 33,376 cases to take its total caseload to 33,208,330 from 33,174,954  an increase of 0.1%. And, with 308 new fatalities, its Covid-19 reached 442,317, or 1.33 per cent of total confirmed infections.

With 6,527,175 more Covid-19 vaccine doses being administered on Friday, Indias total count of vaccine shots so far reached 730,589,688. The count of recovered cases across India, meanwhile, reached 32,374,497  or 97.49 per cent of total caseload  with 37,681 new cured cases being reported on Saturday.

Now the sixth-most-affected country by active cases, third by deaths, second by total cases, and first by recoveries, India has added 262,423 cases in the past 7 days.

India now accounts for 2.08% of all active cases globally (one in every 48 active cases), and 9.56% of all deaths (one in every 10 deaths).

India has so far administered 723,784,586 vaccine doses. That is 2200.01 per cent of its total caseload, and 52.36 per cent of its population.

Among Indian states, the top 5 in terms of number of vaccine shots administered are Uttar Pradesh (91091272), Maharashtra (71411434), Gujarat (55535223), Rajasthan (54199901), and Madhya Pradesh (53607148).

Among states with more than 10 million population, the top 5 in number of vaccine shots per one million population are Kerala (953142), Uttarakhand (873862), Gujarat (869471), Delhi (850554), and Karnataka (739465).

Backwards from here, the last 1 million cases for India have come in 27 days.

The count of active cases across India on Saturday saw a net addition of 870, compared to net reduction 2,358 on Friday. States and UTs hat have seen the biggest daily net increase in active cases are Kerala (1298), Andhra Pradesh (495), Tamil Nadu (83), Odisha (50), and Meghalaya (37).

With 32,198 new daily recoveries, Indias recovery rate stands at 97.49%, while fatality rate remained unchanged at 1.33%.

The Indian states and UTs with the worst case fatality rates at present are Punjab (2.74%), Uttarakhand (2.15%), and Maharashtra (2.12%). The rate in as many as 16 is higher than the national average.

Indias new daily closed cases stand at 32,506  308 deaths and 32,198 recoveries. The share of deaths in total closed cases stands at 0.94%.

Indias 5-day moving average of daily rate of addition to total cases stands at 0.1%.

Indias doubling time for total cases stands at 689.3 days, and for deaths at 995.1 days.

Overall, five states with the biggest 24-hour jump in total cases are Kerala (25010), Tamil Nadu (1631), Andhra Pradesh (1608), Karnataka (967), and West Bengal (753).

Among states with more than 100,000 cases, the five with worst recovery rates at present are Kerala (93.99%).

India on Friday conducted 1,592,135 to take the total count of tests conducted so far in the country to 540,196,989. The test positivity rate recorded was 2.2%.

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 Dadra & Nagar Haveli-Daman & Diu (14.74%), Goa (13.86%), Kerala (13.1%), Sikkim (12.63%), and Maharashtra (11.66%).

Five states with the highest TPR by daily numbers for tests and cases added  are Kerala (16.53%), Sikkim (10.42%), Mizoram (7.4%), Manipur (6.77%), and Meghalaya (4.46%).

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 (1408108), J&K (1016873), Kerala (926671), Karnataka (667157), and Telangana (642935).

The five most affected states by total cases are Maharashtra (6497872), Kerala (4334704), Karnataka (2960131), Tamil Nadu (2630592), and Andhra Pradesh (2027650).

Maharashtra, the most affected state overall, has reported 0 new cases to take its tally to 6497872.

Kerala, the second-most-affected state by total tally, has added 25010 cases to take its tally to 4334704.

Karnataka, the third-most-affected state, has reported 967 cases to take its tally to 2960131.

Tamil Nadu has added 1631 cases to take its tally to 2630592.

Andhra Pradesh has seen its tally going up by 1608 to 2027650030.

Uttar Pradesh has added 9 cases to take its tally to 1709512.

Delhi has added 36 cases to take its tally to 1438154.
In a surprising political development, Chief Minister Vijay Rupani on Saturday submitted his resignation to governor Acharya Devvrat. Rupani, who made the announcement while talking to reporters, did not reveal what prompted him to step down.

"I have resigned from the post of Chief Minister," said Rupani on Saturday at Raj Bhavan in Gandhinagar after meeting Governor.

"I want to thank BJP for giving me this opportunity to serve as Gujarat's CM. During my tenure, I got the opportunity to add to the development of the state under PM Modi's leadership. I have conveyed my wishes to work in party organisation under the leadership of Prime Minister and under the guidance of BJP chief," said Rupani.

"I am just a worker of the organisation and will continue to be so. For the upcoming state Assembly elections, definitely our PM will be the face," Rupani said, when asked who will be the face for the elections.

The unexpected move comes ahead of Assembly elections in PM Modi's home state early next year. Rupani reached the Raj Bhavan shortly after PM Modi inaugurated Sardardham Bhavan in Gujarat's Ahmedabad and performed 'bhoomi pujan' of Sardardham Phase-II Kanya Chhatralaya (girls' hostel) through video conferencing.

Vijay Rupani took the state's Chief Ministerial position on August 7, 2016, and is representing Rajkot West in the Legislative Assembly.

Rupani is the fourth BJP chief minister to step down in recent months. In July, B S Yediyurappa resigned as CM of Karnataka in July and Uttarakhand witnessed two CMs' exit, where Tirath Singh Rawat quit barely 4 months after replacing Trivendra Rawat.

It is learnt from sources that the party will declare Rupani's replacement by Sunday. Most likely his replacement could be deputy chief minister Nitin Patel, reported IANS.





The 65-year-old leader said that the BJP is an ideology-driven party and the roles of workers keep changing there.

"I have decided to resign because the development journey of Gujarat should continue under Prime Minister Narendra Nodi's guidance and new leadership. BJP is an ideology-driven party and the roles of workers keep changing there," Rupani added.

In the 2017 state election, the BJP won 99 of the state's 182 Assembly seats, Congress got 77 seats.
The India Meteorological Department (IMD) on Saturday informed that the heavy rainfall in Delhi will continue till Sunday morning as the low-pressure area over east Rajasthan and another forming over the Bay of Bengal are likely to intensify further.

According to senior scientist, RK Jenamani the national capital will receive a fresh bout of rain from September 17.

"Heavy rainfall in Delhi will continue till tomorrow morning. It will cover Delhi-NCR, Punjab and Rajasthan. Systems over east Rajasthan and another forming over the Bay of Bengal are likely to intensify further. Delhi will receive a fresh spell of rain from September 17-18," said Jenamani.

Interestingly, the senior scientist informed that the national capital has received the highest 24-hour rainfall this year in 121 years.

He said, "Delhi received the highest 24-hour rainfall this year, in 121 years. It has received 390 mm rainfall in September-- the highest in 77 years, after 417 mm in September 1944. Delhi has recorded 1139 mm rainfall in four months, which is highest in 46 years, below 1155 mm in 1975."

Several areas, including the Delhi airport, were waterlogged after heavy rain lashed the national capital on Saturday. Heavy rainfall and consequent waterlogging have disrupted the normal, everyday life in various parts of Delhi.

Due to incessant rains in the national capital, several routes were either partially or completely waterlogged causing disruption in traffic movement. Several areas were submerged due to continuous heavy rain. Waterlogging was also witnessed near RK Puram, Moti Bagh, India Gate, Delhi Airport, Minto Bridge, ITO, Dwarka, Palam, and Madhu Vihar area.

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America's Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry would travel to India next week, during which the two countries would launch the Climate Action and Finance Mobilisation Dialogue, the State Department said on Friday.

"During his visit, the United States and India will launch the Climate Action and Finance Mobilisation Dialogue (CAFMD), one of the two main tracks of the US-India Agenda 2030 Partnership that President Biden and Prime Minister Modi announced at the Leaders Summit on Climate in April 2021, the State Department said.

As part of America's efforts to engage with international counterparts on actions to address the climate crisis, the State Department said Kerry will meet with Government of India counterparts and private sector leaders to discuss efforts to raise global climate ambition and speed up India's clean energy transition.

Kerry will bolster the United States' bilateral and multilateral climate efforts ahead of the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which will be held October 31 to November 12, 2021, in Glasgow, United Kingdom, the media release said.

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Prime Minister on Saturday said the world has now realised that a permanent solution to tragedies, like the 9/11 terror attack, would be found through India's human values.

He said that 9/11 is a date that is remembered for the attack on humanity and it has taught many things to the world.

Modi was speaking after inaugurating via video conference the Sardardham Bhavan complex in Ahmedabad, where job aspirants and students would be given training. He also performed the bhoomi pujan of Sardardham Phase-II Kanya Chhatralaya, a girls' hostel.

"Today is September 11, that is 9/11, a date in the history of the world that is also known for attacks on humanity. But this same date also taught a lot to the whole world," he said.

It was on September 11, 1893, when on the occasion of the Parliament of the World's Religions held in Chicago, Swami Vivekananda stood on the global stage and introduced to the world the human values of India, he said.

"Today, the world is realising that the lasting solution to tragedies like two decades-old 9/11 will be (found) through these values of humanity. Also, if we need to remember lessons learnt from these terrorist attacks, then we also need to keep making efforts for human values with full faith," Modi added.

Modi announced setting up a chair for Tamil studies dedicated to Tamil poet Subramania Bharati on the occasion of his death anniversary. The chair will be set up in the Faculty of Arts of Banaras Hindu University, he said.

"Today is the 100th death anniversary of India's great scholar, philosopher and freedom fighter Subramania Bharati. The vision of 'Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat' that Sardar (Patel) saheb carried, the same philosophy has been shining with full divinity in the Tamil writings of Mahakavi Bharati," he said.

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The Haryana government on Saturday ordered a probe into last month's clash between farmers and police and sent the IAS officer at the centre of a row between the two sides on leave. Following this, the farmers said they would call off their protest outside the Karnal district headquarters.

The probe will be conducted by a retired judge, Haryana Additional Chief Secretary Devender Singh told the media in Karnal. The probe will be completed within a month and former SDM Ayush Sinha will remain on leave during the time, Singh added.

Farmer leader Gurnam Singh Chaduni, who was also part of the press conference, said they would now call off their sit-in outside the Karnal district headquarters.

The farmers had been demanding the suspension of Sinha, who was caught on tape allegedly telling policemen to "break the heads" of farmers if they cross the line. About 10 protesters were hurt in the clash with police in Karnal on August 28 when they tried to march towards the venue of a BJP meeting.

Devender Singh also announced that jobs would be given to two family members of a farmer, who the protesters claimed had died after he was injured during the lathicharge. This allegation was earlier by the administration.

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President will lay foundation stones for Uttar Pradesh Law University and new building complex of Allahabad High Court on Saturday.

"The President of India, will visit Uttar Pradesh (Prayagraj) tomorrow (September 11, 2021) to lay the foundation stones for Uttar Pradesh Law University and new building complex of Allahabad High Court," informed an official release by the President's Secretariat yesterday.

Earlier in August, President Kovind visited the state wherein he addressed various public outreach programmes.

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External Affairs Minister on Saturday held talks with his Australian counterpart Marise Payne ahead of the inaugural 'two-plus-two' ministerial dialogue between the two countries.

It is learnt that the developments in Afghanistan and ways to further strengthen cooperation in the Indo-Pacific figured in the talks between the two foreign ministers.

"Delighted to welcome my good friend FM @MarisePayne of Australia.

We now start our discussions," Jaishankar tweeted.

Payne and Australian Defence Minister Peter Dutton arrived here on Friday on a three-day visit primarily to take part in the inaugural two-plus-two ministerial dialogue on Saturday.

The Indian delegation at the talks will be led by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Jaishankar.

The two defence ministers on Friday discussed the fragile security situation in Afghanistan and their "common concerns" relating possible spread of terrorism from Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.

The defence and military cooperation between India and Australia is on an upswing in the last few years.

In June last year, India and Australia elevated their ties to a comprehensive strategic partnership and signed a landmark deal for reciprocal access to military bases for logistics support during an online summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Australian counterpart Scott Morrison.

The Australian Navy was part of the recent Malabar naval exercise that also featured the navies of India, the US and Japan.

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India has cut base import taxes on palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil, a government order showed, as the world's biggest vegetable oil buyer tries to cool near-record price rises.

The reduction in taxes could bring down prices of the edible oils in India and boost consumption, effectively increasing overseas buying by the south Asian country.

The base import tax on crude palm oil has been slashed to 2.5% from 10%, while the tax on crude soyoil and crude sunflower oil has been reduced to 2.5% from 7.5%, the government said in a notification late on Friday. The base import tax on refined grades of palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil cut to 32.5% from 37.5%.

After the cuts, crude palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil imports will be subject to a 24.75% tax in total, including a 2.5% base import duty and other taxes, while refined grades of palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil would carry a 35.75% tax in total.

India fulfils more than two-thirds of its edible oil demand through imports and has been struggling to contain a rally in local oil prices for the last few months.

The country imports palm oil mainly from top producers Indonesia and Malaysia, while other oils, such as soy and sunflower, come from Argentina, Brazil, Ukraine and Russia.

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The government should iron out the issues hindering the signing of Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) with the US and the EU nations as domestic exporters are at a disadvantage due to the absence of these agreements, a parliamentary panel has recommended in a report submitted on Saturday.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Commerce chaired by YSR Congress leader Vijaysai Reddy submitted the report to Chairman of Rajya Sabha Venkaiah Naidu, wherein it has expressed concern that India's contracted from 2019-20, registering a negative growth rate of (-) 15.73 percent in 2020.

In view of the crucial role played by in the overall economic growth of a country, the Committee in the report opined that India needs to step up its effort in export promotion, expand its export baskets and penetrate new export markets to recover from its current slump and increase its share in global

The panel also underlined that the Indian exporters are at a disadvantage in the US and the European markets while competing with other exporting nations due to the absence of FTAs with the US and the EU countries.

The Committee recommends the Department of Commerce to iron out the issues that hindered the signing of FTAs with our leading trade partners and enter into trade agreements that are beneficial for our country while balancing the interest of the domestic market with that of our exporters, the report stated.

The panel also expressed concern that the share of rail freight vis--vis road is only 35 percent whereas the trend is reversed in developed countries.

The Committee, therefore, recommends the Ministry of Railways to undertake a detailed study on the reason for low share of rail and take a concerted effort to increase the share of rail in freight traffic, the report said.

At the same time, the panel said, it is disheartening to note that the Ministry of Railways is unable to provide competitive freight rate for movement of export consignment.

The Committee feels that this will adversely affect the competitiveness of India's exports in global markets as freight cost plays a crucial role in determining the final price of the product, as per the report.

The panel undertook an in-depth examination of export-oriented measures and held seven meetings with all stakeholders spanning over for nearly twenty hours, it said.

The panel led by Reddy, who is a noted chartered accountant and former director of Oriental Bank of Commerce, in the report recommended the government to take appropriate measures, relook its export strategies and policies to achieve a positive growth rate of exports and higher share in global exports markets.

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MONROVIA (Reuters) - signed an agreement on Friday to stay for at least 25 more years in Liberia, where it will at least triple its iron ore production and invest an additional $800 million, the company's executive chairman and Liberia's president said.

Annual production will increase to 15 million tonnes during a first phase of expansion and could rise as high as 30 million tonnes, Executive Chairman Lakshmi Mittal said at the signing ceremony.

The steel and mining company first signed a 25-year deal with Liberia in 2005 and shipped the first iron ore from its Yekepa mine in 2011.

It had been aiming to expand output to 15 million tonnes much sooner, but those plans were put on hold in 2014 when it declared force majeure on the expansion project because of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

Liberian President George Weah said production would hit 15 million tonnes within the next three years and that the government would receive a total of $65 million from

The project is expected to create 1,000 direct jobs, 2,000 temporary construction-related jobs and about 4,000 indirect jobs, Weah said.

"The government considers you an important ally in its drive to accelerate the growth of our economy under our national development plan," Weah told Mittal.

Liberia, with huge mining and agriculture potential, has attracted billions of dollars in resource investment since the end of a 1989-2003 civil war, but its infrastructure remains underdeveloped and most of its 5 million people live in poverty.

Weah said the deal, which is an amendment to the existing agreement, still needs to be approved by his cabinet and the parliament.

(Reporting by Alphonso Toweh; writing by Aaron Ross; Editing by Bate Felix)

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By Paresh Dave

OAKLAND, Calif. (Reuters) - Android app makers suing to stop Alphabet Inc's Google from siphoning up to 30% of their sales received little reassurance about their chances on Friday as a judge allowed a comparable fee charged by Inc to stand.

Developers including "Fortnite" maker Epic Games in the last year took aim at the two biggest mobile app stores, run by and Google. The critics view the fee as needlessly high, costing developers collectively billions of dollars a year, and a function of the two big tech having monopoly power.

Google's trial is at least a year away, time both sides could use to hone arguments based on the decision, legal experts said.

In a ruling on Friday following a trial between Epic Games and Apple, U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers required Apple to let developers tell customers about ways to pay outside of its App Store, leading Apple shares to fall 3.3%. Alphabet dropped 1.9%.

Google's Play store employs rules similar to the ones struck down in the Apple case, limiting developer communications with their customers, and Tom Forte, an analyst at D.A. Davidson, said Google could be at risk, too. He also noted the remaining risk of new regulatory action by lawmakers.

But Gonzalez Rogers allowed to stand requirements that developers bemoan even more. Those rules, including that in-app payments be made on Apple's own system, allow the company to collect its 15-30% fee.

Apple General Counsel Katherine Adams told reporters that her company was "extremely pleased." Epic Chief Executive Tim Sweeney wrote on Twitter that, "Today's ruling isn't a win for developers or for consumers."

Vanderbilt Law School professor Rebecca Haw Allensworth said she agreed Gonzalez Rogers' findings were discouraging for the case against Google, while Valarie Williams, an antitrust partner at law firm Alston & Bird, said Google "will likely be encouraged by the ruling."

The judge said the Apple restrictions allow users to rest assured that the apps they buy for the most part are free of viruses and pornography and that what they paid for will be delivered.

"App distribution restrictions increase security in the 'broad' sense by allowing Apple to filter fraud, objectionable content, and piracy during app review while imposing heightened requirements for privacy," Gonzalez Rogers wrote.

Apple's fee leads to "extraordinary profits," according to her ruling. But if she forced Apple to ease restrictions, the company might struggle to gain any remuneration for providing a platform to developers, she said. Apple's selling point to consumers about having strong security and a centralized system also would be undermined, the judge added.

Its 30% rate, she said, was set "almost by accident when it first launched the App Store" rather than as a result of market power.

Google has made similar arguments of privacy and security benefits as justification for its rules and fee, and it has long followed Apple's lead on commission levels, Google documents revealed in lawsuits show.

With Google's smaller share in the U.S. mobile app market, plaintiffs may have to reframe arguments to succeed against Google. Gonzalez Rogers said Epic's challenge of any commission at all was an unreasonable position versus Apple, and that Epic failed to offer clear evidence of the iPhone maker being a monopolist.

Tweaked arguments may not be enough. The case against Google has been more difficult from the start. Google makes it possible to install apps from other sources, taking away from the monopoly argument. It also historically has been more lenient in enforcing some of its policies.

Google, Epic and attorneys for other developers suing the Play Store operator declined to comment. Utah's attorney general, which is helping lead a related lawsuit by U.S. states, said it is reviewing the judgment.

(Reporting by Paresh Dave; Additional reporting by Akanksha Rana in Bangalore and Stephen Nellis; Editing by Peter Henderson and Daniel Wallis)

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Food and job insecurity are now the primary causes of concern for families in Afghanistan, Anthea Webb, deputy regional director for the World Food Program (WFP), told a UN press briefing.

With winter setting in and the economy on the verge of collapsing, their worries are also growing, she said via a conference call on Friday.

Quoting from the latest survey of the WFP, she said that 93 per cent of households in have no sufficient access to food now, reports xinhua news agency.

The randomised phone survey, carried out from August 21 to September 5 in all provinces in the country, revealed that three in four Afghan families have been reducing portions or borrowing food.

"They are buying cheaper food, foregoing more nutritious options such as meat, dairy products and vegetables. Parents are skipping meals entirely to allow their children to eat," Webb said.

She added that food insecurity in had already been widespread before August 15, with 81 per cent of households reporting insufficient food consumption, with one in three Afghans signalling acute food insecurity.

"It is now a race against time to deliver lifesaving assistance to the Afghan people before roads are cut off by snow," the UN official said.

She told reporters that the main reason the situation had gotten so much worse over the past month was that many Afghans did not have access to the money they needed to buy enough food.

has also witnessed drought this year, which led to a 40 per cent decline in domestic food production.

It has caused food prices to skyrocket.

Wheat prices have gone up by 25 per cent while many essential ration items have to be imported and purchased at higher rates.

Presently in Afghanistan, half of the population, 18 million people, need humanitarian assistance to survive.

A third do not know where their next meal is coming from. More than half of all children under 5 are at risk of acute malnutrition.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has announced that he will travel to Geneva on September 13 to convene a high-level humanitarian meeting to address the growing needs in Afghanistan.

--IANS

ksk/

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Twenty years after 9/11, Sekou Siby still feels the pangs of survivor's guilt. A cook and dishwasher at the World Trade Center's Windows on the World restaurant, Siby had swapped shifts that day with a co-worker who ended up dying in the terrorist attacks.

The tragedy sent Siby on a path he had never imagined he would take when he emigrated from the Ivory Coast in 1996: He made it his mission to advocate for higher pay and better working conditions for restaurant workers a role that has gained importance as the restaurant industry has struggled more than most in the grip of the viral pandemic.

Siby, 56, is now the president of Restaurant Opportunities Center United, a nationwide advocacy group that emerged from the attacks.

The pandemic's calamitous impact on restaurant workers has raised the group's profile since last year's widespread shutdowns initially cost 6 million restaurant workers nearly half the industry's total their jobs. ROC United, using donated funds from foundations, responded by distributing $10 million in cash payments to about 5,000 laid-off workers.

The money was a financial life-saver for people like Jazz Salm, 37, who lost her server job at a Sunrise, Florida, Chili's that closed in March 2020 when the pandemic erupted. The $225 she received from ROC United enabled her to pay her mobile phone bill her only connection to the internet, which she needed to file for unemployment aid.

Compounding her difficulties, Florida's unemployment aid system, like other states', was overwhelmed at the time.

They were actually the first people to help me out, Salm said. It was a month before I saw unemployment. They really saved my rear end.

ROC United helped keep its members informed during last year's debates over stimulus checks, supplemental unemployment aid, and other financial support. Salm, along with about 11,000 others, participated in a Facebook Live event with Sen. Elizabeth Warren in May 2020 discussing the Massachusetts Democrat's Essential Workers Bill of Rights that called for hazard pay, protective gear, and paid leave for essential workers, which includes food service workers.

The group has also been active in seeking changes in social policies, having marched on behalf of a higher minimum wage and for the elimination of the federal tipped minimum wage for restaurant waiters, which has remained $2.13 for 30 years.

All the while, Siby has been driven by the memories of his 73 Windows on the World co-workers, many of them fellow immigrants, who died in the 9/11 attacks.

Without 9/11, there wouldn't have been a ROC United," he said. The fact that I was able to turn whatever anger I had to support other people who were more desperate than me, is what allowed me to turn the corner.

Windows on the World was a unionized workplace, and after the 9/11 attacks, its union donated money to an informal group that helped former employees who were out of work. In April 2002, that organization became ROC United, with Siby as its first member. He later worked as a community organizer for the organization, using his fluency in French and Spanish to connect with immigrants in New York City, before becoming executive director in 2017, and CEO last year.

Siby still keeps photos of co-workers he lost that day. One of them shows Abdoul Karim Troare, a fellow immigrant from Ivory Coast who had been Siby's roommate when he arrived in the United States in 1996.

Traore helped Siby find his job as a cook and dishwasher at Windows on the World. And it was Troare's wife, Hadidjatou Karamoko, who first alerted Siby to the Sept. 11 attacks. She called to say that Traore wasn't answering his phone.

Traore had left that morning at 4 a.m. for his other job, delivering newspapers, before heading to the Twin Towers at 7:30 that morning.

I did not know that it was the last time I was going to see him and hear his voice, she said Wednesday in a virtual call organized by ROC, her first public comments about her husband.

Another photo captures Siby and Isidro Ottenwalder, who had just obtained his citizenship six months before the attacks, allowing him to travel to his native Dominican Republic to marry before returning to New York City.

And then there was Moises Rivas, who had asked Siby take his Sunday shift at Windows on the World. Rivas, 29, who was performing with his band that Saturday night, didn't want to work an early morning shift, which often began at 5 am. In return, he offered to work Siby's shift that Tuesday, Sept. 11. An immigrant from Ecuador, he left behind a wife and two children.

In the years that followed 9/11, ROC United began engaging with victims of other tragedies. After Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in 2005, the group established its first chapter outside New York City. It now has 59 employees in 11 cities, including Los Angeles, Chicago and Minneapolis.

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India and Australia on Saturday emphasised on their shared vision of a free, open and inclusive region, and also the importance of combating terrorism without compromise.

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and Defence Minister Rajath Singh held the 'two-plus-two' talks here with their Australian counterparts Marise Payne and Peter Dutton.

At a press event after the talks, Singh said the partnership between India and Australia was based on shared vision of free, open, inclusive and prosperous region.

He said that during the talks, a rules-based order was emphasised upon.

In his remarks, Jaishankar said the two sides discussed future collaboration to deal with COVID-19 pandemic.

Jaishankar also asserted on the importance of combating terrorism without any compromise.

"Today is the 20th anniversary of 9/11, it is a reminder, if one is still needed, of the importance of combating terrorism without compromise. Close as we are to its epicentre, let us appreciate the value of cooperation to that end," he said.

Payne said Australian and India share a positive vision of free, open and secure Indo pacific.

The two sides also discussed the situation in Afghanistan at length, the leaders said.

"Last month did see the fall of Kabul and along with the ongoing fight against terrorism, the future of Afghanistan remains a central concern to both our countries," Payne said.

"Both of our countries have been victims of appalling terrorist attacks and this day September 11 will be forever remembered for those terrible events 20 years ago when terrorists struct at the heart of our friend -- the US -- and also by extension at a modern, pluralist and democratic world," she said.

Dutton hailed the bilateral defence relationship and said that it was at a historic high.

The foreign and defence ministerial talks took place amid renewed efforts by the Quad member countries to expand cooperation in the region. Besides India and Australia, the Quad comprises the US and Japan.

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India and Australia on Saturday dismissed criticism that Quad was a sort of an 'Asian NATO' with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar asserting that it is important not to "misrepresent" the reality.

The assertion came at a joint press event after External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and Defence Minister Rajath Singh held the inaugural 'two-plus-two' dialogue here with their Australian counterparts Marise Payne and Peter Dutton.

Asked about Quad being referred to as an 'Asian NATO', Jaishankar said,"we call ourselves Quad and Quad is a platform where four countries have come to cooperate for their benefit and for the benefit of the world."



"I think a term like is very much a cold war term, looking back. I think Quad looks in the future, it reflects globalisation, it reflects the compulsions of countries to work together," he said.

Jaishankar also pointed out that Quad was currently focussed on issues such as vaccines, supply chains, education and connectivity.

"I can't see any relationship between such issues and the or any other kind of organisations like that. So I think it is important not to misrepresent what is the reality out there," he asserted.

Echoing similar views, Payne said as Australia and India have re-energised relations, there is also the opportunity to work through smaller groups like the Quad and other pieces of regional architecture like the East Asia Summit or the ASEAN regional forum.

"Quad members are champions of ASEAN centrality, we actively engage in that ASEAN architecture. We are committed to supporting the practical implementation of the ASEAN outlook on the Indo-Pacific," she said.

"We also say that we have a positive and practical agenda -- around vaccines, around climate, around critical technology also trying to address some of the dangerous misinformation that pervades the world experience in relation to the (Covid) pandemic," the minister said.

Referring to the Quad, she said the constructive engagement in a normal diplomatic network was overwhelmingly about contributing positively for that "open, inclusive and resilient region in which we all want to live".

Speaking at an event here, Payne on Friday had said the Quad has evolved "swiftly" and very "effectively" and that Australia commends India for taking a strong leadership role in the region.

In the first Quad summit in March, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, US President Joe Biden, Australian PM Scott Morrison and Japanese PM Yoshihide Suga vowed to strive for an Indo-Pacific region that is free, open, inclusive, healthy, anchored by democratic values, and unconstrained by coercion, in an apparent message to China.

Both China and Russia have been critical of Quad. While Beijing has been claiming that the alliance was aimed against it, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov had called it an "Asian NATO" and criticised the grouping.

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India and Australia on Saturday held the inaugural foreign and defence ministerial dialogue to boost overall strategic ties in the backdrop of an unsettling phase of geopolitical flux in the region.

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and Defence Minister Rajath Singh held the 'two-plus-two' talks here with their Australian counterparts Marise Payne and Peter Dutton.

Jaishankar described the in-person talks as "productive". "A productive 2+2 meeting today with Australia," he tweeted.

The talks took place at a time the global focus is on the situation in Afghanistan after its takeover by the Taliban last month, and it is understood that the issue figured in these deliberations.

The two sides held extensive talks on all key issues of strategic interests including the situation in the Indo-Pacific in the face of China's growing muscle-flexing in the region, people familiar with the development said.

The overall focus was to ramp up the strategic ties, they said.

The outcome of the talks will be shared by the four ministers at a joint press conference later.

While Singh held wide-ranging discussions with Australian defence minister Dutton on Friday, Jaishankar met foreign minister Payne in the morning ahead of the 'two-plus-two' dialogue.

In their talks, the two defence ministers discussed the fragile security situation in Afghanistan and their "common concerns" relating possible spread of terrorism from the Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.

The foreign and defence ministerial talks took place amid renewed efforts by the Quad member countries to expand cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region.

Besides India and Australia, the Quad comprises the US and Japan.

In an address at an event organised by the Observer Research Organisation, Payne on Friday said the Quad has evolved "swiftly" and very "effectively" and commended India for taking a strong leadership role in the region.

Talking about "significant challenges" facing the Indo-Pacific, the Australian foreign minister said Canberra seeks a region where rights of large and small countries are respected and that no "single dominant power" dictates the outcome for

The dialogue between the foreign and defence ministers was instituted as part of an overall goal to expand strategic cooperation between the two countries.

India has such a framework for talks with a very few countries including the US and Japan.

The defence and military cooperation between India and Australia is on an upswing in the last few years.

In June last year, India and Australia elevated their ties to a comprehensive strategic partnership and signed a landmark deal for reciprocal access to military bases for logistics support during an online summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Australian counterpart Scott Morrison.

The Australian Navy was part of the recent Malabar naval exercise that also featured navies of India, the US and Japan.

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India as a key regional player and ally of the US and its history of investments in could have a positive impact on the future of the country now under control, a US State Department spokesperson has said here.

In an interview with PTI ahead of the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks this week, Zed Tarar reiterated US President Joe Biden's message that the war in had achieved its central mission to eliminate the Al Qaeda terror network behind the attacks on September 11, 2001.

Now, the focus is on working with "like-minded partners and democracies", such as India, to look towards the next chapter of supporting the people of

"India being a regional ally has a role to play; and the humanitarian role and previous investment role is one that could have a positive impact on the future of Afghanistan, said Tarar, the London-based Hindu/Urdu spokesperson for the US State Department.

India as an elected member of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has a role to play. We are in close consultations in New York, New Delhi and Washington with India on this issue, he said.

The US forces completed their withdrawal from Afghanistan ahead of the August 31 deadline, at the end of an unprecedented airlift to evacuate over 100,000 people by air from the Afghan capital Kabul.

On some of the voices questioning the timing and manner of the withdrawal, Tarar was categorical that it was time for the US to end the war.

I think what we have to be clear on is that the had an objective in Afghanistan and that was to eliminate Al Qaeda. We've completed that objective as of many years ago. We've also trained hundreds of thousands of Afghan forces over the last 20 years at a cost of over a trillion dollars. This was the time now to end the war in Afghanistan and remove US and allied forces from the country, he said.

As President Biden has said, there was never going to be a perfect time to do this. We were never going to have perfect conditions on the ground, he said, adding that the US President was determined not to hand over the war to the next incumbent in the White House.

On the question of having to work with the in the future, the official said it was still early days as the US wants the to live up to its promises, also flagging the group's designation as a terror outfit under US law.

At this time, it is very early days to say one way or the other whether we can or cannot work with the Taliban. We will have to see over time. Our interests align on the ISIS-K [terror group] issue, whether we can work together or not, is hard to say. I have to also point out that the Taliban are a designated terrorist group under US laws and the State Department executive branch will follow all federal regulations in dealing with the Taliban, he said.

With reference to the other player in the region, Pakistan, the US official noted that the country has a role to play in "promoting a stable, secure Afghanistan".

"We understand Pakistanis have said quite clearly that they want to see a peaceful Afghanistan, in which human rights are respected, and we hope that continues to be the position," he said.

Asked about the wider terror threat in the region and fears that the troop withdrawal has made the region more volatile, he reiterated that the US reserves the right to take any further action necessary against terrorism.

However, the focus must now also be on the terror threats of the next decade and beyond.

Tarar said: The takes the threat from terror very seriously and we reserve the right to retaliate against and dismantle terrorist networks wherever we find them. The truth is, at this point, the new threat that we face is not emanating from Afghanistan but from Africa.

The threats we are monitoring are not 2001 threats but today's threats, in 2021. And, we are also looking at what the next 10 years of threats would be. To only look at Afghanistan and ignore the rest of the world is a mistake.

In this context, he flagged the Islamic State (ISIS) network in the Sahel region of Africa as the Number One threat being closely monitored by the US and its G7 partners.

(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.)
President Joe Biden's sweeping new vaccine requirements have Republican governors threatening lawsuits. His unapologetic response: Have at it.

The administration is gearing up for another major clash between federal and state rule. But while many details about the rules remain unknown, Biden appears to be on firm legal ground to issue the directive in the name of protecting employee safety, according to several experts interviewed by The Associated Press.

My bet is that with respect to that statutory authority, they're on pretty strong footing given the evidence strongly suggesting the degree of risk that (unvaccinated individuals) pose, not only to themselves but also unto others, said University of Connecticut law professor Sachin Pandya.

Republicans swiftly denounced the mandate that could impact 100 million Americans as government overreach and vowed to sue, and private employers who resist the requirements may do so as well.

Texas Gov Greg Abbott called it an assault on private businesses" while Gov. Henry McMaster promised to "fight them to the gates of hell to protect the liberty and livelihood of every South Carolinian.

The Republican National Committee has also said it will sue the administration to protect Americans and their liberties.

Such cases could present another clash between state and federal authority at a time when Biden's Justice Department is already suing Texas over its new state law that bans most abortions, arguing that it was enacted in open defiance of the Constitution.

The White House is gearing up for legal challenges and believes that even if some of the mandates are tossed out, millions of Americans will get a shot because of the new requirements saving lives and preventing the spread of the virus.

Biden is putting enforcement in the hands of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which is drafting a rule over the coming weeks, Jeffrey Zients, the White House response coordinator, said Friday. He warned that if a workplace refuses to follow the standard, the OSHA fines could be quite significant.

\\



Courts have upheld vaccination requirements as a condition of employment, both before the pandemic in challenges brought by health care workers and since the outbreak, said Lindsay Wiley, director of the Health Law and Policy Program at American University Washington College of Law.

Where Biden's vaccine requirements could be more open to attack is over questions of whether the administration followed the proper process to implement them, she said.

The argument that mandatory vaccination impermissibly infringes on bodily autonomy or medical decision making, those arguments have not been successful and I don't expect that to change, Wiley said.

I think the challenges that are harder to predict the outcome of are going to be the ones that are really sort of the boring challenges about whether they followed the right process.

Emergency temporary standards under which the rules are being implemented on a fast track have been particularly vulnerable to challenges, Wiley said. But the risks presented by the and the existence of a declared public health emergency could put this one on stronger footing than any other ones past administrations have tried to impose that have been challenged in court, she said.

Indeed, the question of whether the mandate is legally sound is separate from whether it will be upheld by judges, including by a conservative-majority Supreme Court which has trended toward generous interpretations of religious freedom and may be looking to ensure that any mandate sufficiently takes faith-based objections into account.

Vaccination has become politicised and there are many Republican district judges who might be hostile to the regulation for political reasons," said Michael Harper, a Boston University law professor.

I could imagine an unfortunate opinion that attempted to justify this political stance by rejecting the use of OSHA against infectious disease rather than against hazards intrinsic to the workplace, Harper wrote in an email.

The expansive rules mandate that all employers with more than 100 workers require them to be vaccinated or test for the virus weekly, affecting about 80 million Americans. And the roughly 17 million workers at health facilities that receive federal Medicare or Medicaid also will have to be fully vaccinated.

(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 Russian Foreign Ministry on Friday summoned US Ambassador John Sullivan to complain about alleged interference by American "digital giants" in Russia's upcoming parliamentary election.

A ministry statement said Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov claimed "possesses irrefutable evidence of the violation of Russian legislation by American digital giants' in the context of the preparation and conduct of elections to the State Duma."



The statement did not give details of the complaint, but Russian authorities have pressured Google and Apple to remove apps of the Smart Voting initiative designed by the team of imprisoned opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

The programme aims to advise voters which candidates are in the best position to defeat candidates from United Russia, the party that dominates parliament, in the September 19 election.

A US State Department spokeswoman, Jalina Porter, said Sullivan met with the deputy foreign minister to discuss a range of issues in support of President Biden's desire for a stable and predictable relationship with She declined to comment on the Russian claims of election interference by the US tech companies.

Russian authorities this year declared Navalny's organisations to be extremist, and hardly any Kremlin critics have been allowed on the ballot for the parliament election. Although the other sizable parties on the ballot routinely support President Vladimir Putin -- as does United -- Smart Voting's intent is to undermine United Russia's dominance of the political landscape, thereby casting a shadow on Putin.

Navalny devised the idea in 2018 and it has proved to be effective in previous regional elections. In 2019, it helped opposition candidates win 20 of 45 seats on the Moscow city council.

Authorities have blocked most access to Smart Voting's website, leaving it available largely through apps, and it is unclear how widely it will be used in the parliamentary election.

(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 of today is far different from the of Sept. 11, 2001.

All but four of the 19 hijackers on were Saudi citizens, and the Saudi kingdom was the birthplace of Osama bin Laden, the head of al-Qaida and mastermind of the attack 20 years ago.

In the two decades since then, has confronted al-Qaida on its own soil, revamped its textbooks, worked to curb terror financing and partnered with the to counter terrorism.

It wasn't until the last five years, though, that the kingdom began backing away from the religious ideology upon which it was founded and which it espoused within and outside its borders Wahhabism, a strict interpretation of Islam that helped spawn generations of mujahedeen.

For countless numbers of people in the United States, Saudi Arabia will forever be associated with 9/11, the collapse of the World Trade Towers and the deaths of nearly 3,000 people.

To this day, victims' families are trying to hold the Saudi government accountable in New York and have pushed President Joe Biden to declassify certain documents related to the attacks, despite Saudi government insistence that any allegation of complicity is categorically false.

Victims of a 2019 shooting at a Florida military base and their families are also suing Saudi Arabia for monetary damages, claiming the kingdom knew the Saudi Air Force officer had been radicalized and could have prevented the killings.

Saudi Arabia's close partnership with the United States, including the presence of American troops in the kingdom after the first Gulf War, made its leadership a target of extremist groups.

It is important to realize that the terrorists who struck the U.S. on September 11 have also targeted Saudi Arabia's people, leadership, military personnel and even our holiest religious sites in Mecca and Medina on multiple occasions, Fahad Nazer, the Saudi Embassy spokesperson in Washington, told The Associated Press. He said Saudi-U.S. counterterrorism work has saved thousands of lives.

Yet even as Saudi Arabia battled al-Qaida and later attacks by the IS group, the Al Saud rulers continued to give ultraconservative clerics monopoly over preaching and influence over society in exchange for their staunch backing of the monarchy.

That decades-old pact unraveled before a roomful of foreign investors in 2017 when Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman declared a return to moderate Islam.

A year earlier, with backing from his father the king, the prince had clipped the powers of the country's religious police the ones who would chase young Saudi men and women out of parks for mingling, go after cars playing music and force stores to close during the five daily prayers.

It's a new country. It is a country in the making," says Raghida Dergham, founder of the Beirut Institute think tank and a longtime columnist in Saudi papers. What has happened over the past 20 years in Saudi Arabia, Dergham says, has amounted to a major cleanup of extremism ... and it has not been easy."



The crown prince doubled down in April of this year in remarks to Saudi TV. He said Saudi identity is built on its Islamic and Arab heritage.

His words appeared to equate the two, and pointed to the broader effort the state has embarked on to affirm a national Saudi identity that is no longer tied to pan-Islamic causes nor the religious ideologies of Sheikh Mohammed Ibn Abdul-Wahhab, whose ultraconservative teachings of Islam in the 18th century are widely referred to by his name.

If Sheikh Mohammed Abdel-Wahhab came out of his grave and found us adhering to his text and closing our eyes to independent reasoning (ijtihad) or deifying him, he would be the first to oppose such a thing, Prince Mohammed said.

Ali Shihabi, who has ties to the royal court, says the kingdom's new tone signals to any fence-sitting clerics" that moderation is the only path to take going forward.

Moderation, though, goes only so far. As Saudi Arabia works to alter perceptions and control the narrative of its past for new generations of Saudis two decades after 9/11, it remains politically repressive.

Prince Mohammed's rapid changes are part of a hurried effort that have coincided with him amassing power by sidelining rivals, like the country's former counterterrorism czar, and clamping down hard on critics, including the killing of Saudi writer Jamal Khashoggi in Turkey by agents who worked for the prince.

Bruce Riedel, a Brookings Institution scholar who served at the CIA for 30 years, says the U.S.-Saudi relationship has gone through fundamental changes over the years, but that even in the best of times it's a tough sell to portray Saudi Arabia as America's best friend.

While Saudi Arabia remains far from an open society, the cloud of social restrictions that loomed over generations in the kingdom is dissipating. No longer are eye-popping concerts, movie theaters and women driving impossible or illegal.

My own perspective is that there's envy of the younger generation that get to have these opportunities, says Hisham Fageeh, a 33-year-old Saudi filmmaker, actor and writer working in Los Angeles who grew up in the shadow of

But there are questions about where this new path will lead.

There's multiple doors that people can walk through, Fageeh says. The challenge is going to be, how do we integrate all our parts our past, our present and our future?"



In the two decades since 9/11, Saudi Arabia and the world have been reshaped by social media, the internet and global connectivity. In Saudi Arabia, though, there is also a massive generational shift taking hold. Well over a third of the population of Saudi Arabia is under 14, born years after More than 60% are under 35.

All came of age in the aftermath of the Sept. 11th attacks. They, like the 36-year-old crown prince, were not even born when the Shah of Iran was toppled in 1979 and replaced by an anti-U.S. and anti-Saudi Shiite regime. That same year, Sunni Muslim extremists laid siege to Mecca, Islam's holiest site.

Saudi rulers responded to the events of that year by empowering the state's hardliners and allowing Wahhabism to further shape life in Saudi Arabia. A struggle for power between Saudi Arabia and Iran emerged, one that has continued to play out in sectarian proxy wars across the Middle East.

As recently as the still-current Syrian civil war, Saudi Arabia and other Arab Gulf states either encouraged or turned a blind eye to the arming, financing and recruitment of jihadi fighters who battled Shiite militias and Iran-backed fighters.

But it was the shared effort of the United States, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan in the 1980s that may be reverberating loudest today. Years before being stripped of his Saudi citizenship, bin Laden and other mujahedeen were armed and financed by the CIA and the kingdom to defeat the Soviets in Afghanistan during the Cold War.

Years later, bin Laden would plot the 9/11 attacks from al-Qaida's base in Afghanistan, sheltered by the Taliban the group that, as of a few weeks ago, are back in power.

When judging Saudi Arabia, Dergham says, look at the wider strategic interests that have long underpinned U.S.-Saudi relations. Americans just think Saudi Arabia equals 9/11, she said. You know, wake up and smell the roses. This has been a partnership, an alliance with the for years and years.
More than 250 foreign nationals have left in the past three days, says Zalmay Khalilzad, Washington's special envoy and the architect of an often criticised deal with the

The deal signed last year provided for the safe withdrawal of U.S and NATO troops but say his critics was heavily weighted in favor of the hardline-Islamic movement.

In a series of tweets Khalilzad praised both the Middle Eastern State of Qatar, whose national airline carried out the flights and the Taliban's cooperation in this important effort, for the recent departure of foreign nationals from

We will continue to engage the government of Qatar, the Taliban, and to ensure the safe passage of our citizens, other foreign nationals, and Afghans that want to leave, Khalilzad tweeted.

However, hundreds of Afghans, including U.S. citizens and green card holders, remain stranded in northern Afghanistan's Mazar-e-Sharif waiting to be evacuated but stopped by rulers demanding travel documents.

(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 credit ratings agency ICRA has reaffirmed its rating on the credit instruments of Indraprastha Gas worth Rs 4,000 crore at '[ICRA] AAA' and '[ICRA] A1+'.

"Outlook on the long-term rating is stable, the company said.

ICRA said that the ratings reaffirmation factors in the company's favourable business risk profile arising from its current exclusive position in the city gas distribution (CGD) business in Delhi (or National Capital Territory, NCT) and infrastructure exclusivity (up to December 2023) for its NCT operations.

The ratings also draw comfort from the favorable demand outlook and growth prospects for the compressed natural gas (CNG) and piped natural gas (PNG) segments over the medium to long term and the company's secure gas tie-up with GAIL for a large portion of its current operations.

The ratings also reflect the company's strong financial risk profile with robust profitability and cash generation from operations and its strong return and credit metrics.

Further, the ratings favorably consider IGL's strong parentage, with GAIL and BPCL being the main shareholders.

ICRA notes that the sales volumes of the company across all segments barring PNG (domestic) have been adversely impacted due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, with the easing of lockdowns volumes across most segments (barring commercial) have largely recovered and the company expects the impact on aggregate volumes in FY2021 to be less than 10% of its FY2019 volumes.

The credit ratings agency further said that the liquidity profile of the company is expected to remain superior with healthy cash accruals, large cash and liquid investments, nil debt and negative net working capital intensity.

Though the capex plans of the company are expected to remain high going forward, nevertheless the healthy cash accruals and large cash and liquid investments are expected to maintain the liquidity comfortable.

Indraprastha Gas (IGL) is a natural gas distribution company. It supplies natural gas as cooking and vehicular fuel. As on 30 June 2021, GAIL, BPCL and the Delhi government held 22.5%, 22.5% and 5%, respectively, stake in the company.

The company's consolidated net profit surged to Rs 277.95 crore in Q1 FY22 from Rs 35.18 crore in Q1 FY21. Net sales increased to Rs 1257.39 crore in the quarter ended June 2021 as against Rs 638.57 crore during the previous quarter ended June 2020.

The scrip shed 0.16% to end at Rs 564.05 on the BSE on Thursday. The domestic equity market was shut of Friday (10 September 2021) on account of Ganesh Chaturthi.

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Returning to national politics after a sizeable Afghan-Taliban break, we raise three questions. With the caution that the first two will be irrelevant unless we square up to the third first.

Here we go: Is Narendra Modi beatable, or unbeatable, sort of cast-in titanium as I might have described him sometimes, not merely Teflon coated? If hes beatable, what will it take to defeat him? A face, a slogan, a manifesto, an ideology, or all of the above? Is anyone even trying to beat him? Hand on your heart, face up to the third first. Who among the ...
Chandigarh [India], September 11 (ANI/PRNewswire): Chandigarh University Gharuan ranked 52nd among Indian Universities in the recently released NIRF Rankings 2021 by the Ministry of Education, Government of India.

Chandigarh University ranked 1st amongst the Private Universities in North India while it bagged 3rd position in Punjab in the NIRF Top Universities category. In addition Chandigarh University ranked 1st amongst the Private Engineering Universities of North India while it ranked 61st amongst the top Engineering Institutions of India with an overall score of 45.01.

The B-School of Chandigarh University is the only Management Institution from Chandigarh Tricity to be ranked amongst the Top 50 Management Universities of India, while the Architecture College bagged 16th position amongst the Top Architecture Institutions of India.

Chandigarh University also attained 77th rank in the Overall Indian Universities category of NIRF Rankings 2021 while it ranked 6th in North India. The Engineering institution of Chandigarh University moved 23 notches above in the Engineering category while it improved its ranking in Management by 6 positions in comparison to NIRF Rankings 2020.

Chandigarh University outclassed Punjab Engineering College (70th) and Panjab University (89th) in the Engineering domain. Chandigarh University scored an overall score of 46.15 in the Indian Universities Ranking where it scored 57.48 points in Teaching, Learning & Resources (TLR), 14.24 in Research & Professional practices (RP), 63.40 in Graduation Outcomes (GO), 75.44 in Outreach and Inclusivity (OI) and 44.23 in Perception. Under the overall category Chandigarh University score 44.62 this year and 57.48 in TLR, 14.24 in the RPC, 63.40 in GO and 75.44 in the OI and score 28.91 in perception.

Every year, the Ministry of Education comes out with Top Universities and Top Institutions Rankings in various domains of Engineering, Pharmacy, Management, College, Architecture, Law, Medical and Dental under the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF).

Satnam Singh Sandhu, Chancellor Chandigarh University speaking on the positioning of Chandigarh University amongst the top Universities of India in the NIRF 2021 Rankings said, "Ever since its inception, Chandigarh University has been committed to disseminate quality academic learning to its students which matches the Global Standards. All the stakeholders including students, faculty, alumni and industry have contributed through their efforts to make Chandigarh University a Centre-of-Excellence in Higher Education and its performance in NIRF Rankings 2021 is an endorsement of our vision to be amongst the Top Ranked Higher Education Institutions of the World".

Satnam Singh Sandhu, Chancellor Chandigarh University speaking on the positioning of Chandigarh University amongst the top Universities of India in the NIRF 2021 Rankings said, "Ranking defines the standards of an Educational Institution in the field of Quality Teaching, Industry Exposure, Research and Development that is offered to its students. It help the students in taking the crucial decision of choosing the best of institution for higher studies".

With the positioning of Chandigarh University amongst the top Universities of India, the responsibility of the institution has increased as we are not only confined to perform good in National and International Academic Rankings but also want to contribute in the exercise of Nation Building by preparing the next generation professionals for the Industry, he added.

Senior Vice President, Chandigarh University, Prof. Himani Sood said, "We have achieved excellent results in NIRF Rankings 2021 and we owe this success to Industry who have always endorsed our academic learning model by participating actively in campus placements every year".

This story is provided by PRNewswire. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PRNewswire)

DISCLAIMER

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Here is todays ranking of the 10 most-read news stories in China, in economics, finance and current affairs, to help give you a sense of whats trending in the Chinese language sphere.

Chinese social media users have been paying close attention to Chinese embassy in Seoul denying media reports that Chinas crackdown on fandom is targeted at South Korean celebrities. They are also following Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lams announcement that the city will allow Chinese mainland and Macao residents to enter it without going through mandatory quarantine starting Sept. 15.

1. Chinese embassy in Seoul denies media reports that Chinas crackdown on fandom targets Korean celebrities

A spokesperson of the Chinese embassy in South Korea said in a Wednesday statement that Chinas recent actions against fans or celebrities wont affect Chinas normal exchanges (external source, in Chinese) with any country, in response to South Korean media concerns that the crackdown would affect bilateral cultural exchanges and target Korean celebrities.

2. Chinese celebrities endorsing false ads should be banned from advertising for three years, lawyer says

Chinese lawyer Yue Yanshan said Thursday during an interview with state-run broadcaster CCTV that celebrities endorsing false ads should be banned from advertising for three years (external source, in Chinese) under Chinese law, after famous variety show host Li Weijia was accused of endorsing a milk tea brand that defrauded franchisees.

3. North Korea suspended from 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics by the IOC

The Executive Board of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided Wednesday to suspend North Korea from the IOC (external source) until the end of 2022, due to the countrys unilateral decision not to participate in the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020, according to a statement. This means North Korea will miss the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.

4. Ford hires former Apple and Tesla executive Doug Field as advanced technology chief

Ford Motor Co. announced Tuesday it has hired Doug Field (external source) as its chief advanced technology and embedded systems officer, as the company continues to advance its Ford+ growth plan. Field joined Ford from Apple Inc., where he serves as vice president of special projects. He also served as Teslas executive and led the development of the popular Model 3 for a time.

5. China pledges to donate 100 million more vaccine doses to developing countries

President Xi Jinping pledged Thursday to donate an additional 100 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines (external source) to developing countries this year, after China had provided more than 1 billion doses to over 100 countries and international organizations, the state-run Xinhua News Agency reported.

Photo: VCG

6. Tencent, NetEase summoned over new gaming rules for kids

Several Chinese regulators Wednesday called in online gaming companies including Tencent Holdings Ltd. and NetEase Inc. to ensure they follow Beijings new restrictions on video gaming for minors, including limiting the amount of time children can play to three hours a week.

7. State Council urges local authorities to remove restrictions on unvaccinated residents

Wu Liangyou, an official at the National Health Commission, said at a press conference Tuesday that authorities in some places banned unvaccinated residents from entering key public areas (external source, in Chinese) such as supermarkets and hospitals, and prohibited unvaccinated students from entering schools, violating the vaccination principle and causing them to be inconvenienced. The State Council, Chinas cabinet, has urged local authorities to correct such practices, Wu said.

8. Hong Kong to forego quarantine for visiting mainland and Macao residents

Hong Kong will allow Chinese mainland and Macao residents to enter the city without going through mandatory quarantine starting Sept. 15, implementing a measure that had been delayed since May, Chief Executive Carrie Lam announced Tuesday.

9. State media reports rhodiums sea freight has increased 10 times this year compared with last year

The price of rhodium, a precious and silver-white metal, has tripled to reach 6,000 yuan ($932) per gram this year from 2,000 yuan per gram last year, according to national broadcaster CCTV. The metals sea freight has also increased 10 times (external source, in Chinese) this year, CCTV reported.

10. China completes preclinical studies on inactivated vaccine designed to tackle delta variant

China has completed preclinical studies on an inactivated vaccine (external source, in Chinese) against the highly transmissible delta variant, CCTV reported. The broadcaster cited experts as saying that although Chinas current inactivated vaccines are still effective against the strain, Covid-19 is constantly mutating and the country should be better prepared.

Translated by reporter Wang Xintong.

Caixin has not independently verified the veracity or accuracy of all of the headlines or stories.

The daily ranking of most-read news stories among Chinese people, about China and global affairs, is jointly provided to you by Caixin Insight and HANA Data, an artificial intelligence technology team.

The key indicators calculated on the list are based on mass data sourced from Chinas mainstream social media platforms and online news websites. Click here for a detailed introduction of our methodology.
The Information Office of the Putian government holds a press conference Friday to discuss the new cluster of Covid-19 infections. Photo: putian.gov.cn

Chinas latest local Covid-19 outbreak was reported in East Chinas Fujian province on Friday, with a cluster of six infections traced back to a local man who had recently travelled to Singapore, according to the health authorities,

Three elementary school students and three of their parents have been transferred to a hospital designated for Covid-19 patients for isolation and treatment, the city government of Putian said at a Friday press conference (link in Chinese).

The government also said that more than 260 close contacts of the six have been quarantined for medical observation. The neighborhoods in which the patients lived have been classed as being at medium-risk for Covid-19 infection and residents have been asked to stay at home for the time being, the authorities added.

The cluster was discovered through routine nucleic acid testing at a school in the coastal citys Fengting town (), with two students  a pair of brothers  initially testing positive.

The health authorities then expanded the scope of the testing and discovered the four other cases.

One of the three parents, surnamed Lin, is suspected to be the source of the cluster. Lin arrived in Fujians costal city of Xiamen on Aug. 4 from Singapore, and went through a 14 day mandatory quarantine at a hotel. He then returned to Putian, where he spent one week at a mandatory quarantine facility in Xianyou county (), before going home for continued observation on Aug. 26.

Singapore has been suffering from a new wave of Covid-19 since early August, with the average daily caseload rising from 76 a few weeks ago to 288 in the last week. On Friday, the Singaporean health ministry reported 573 new Covid-19 cases and warned that the figure could top 1,000 soon, The Straits Times reported.

Lin tested negative three times while in quarantine in Xianyou before being confirmed of positive infection during the expanded testing, the local government said.

The story has been updated to reflect that Lin was one of the three parents that tested positive of infection on Friday.

Contact reporter Lu Zhenhua (zhenhualu@caixin.com) editor Joshua Dummer (joshuadummer@caixin.com)

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St. Johnsbury, VT (05819)

Today

Variable clouds with scattered thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. High 81F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%..

Tonight

Rain showers this evening with overcast skies overnight. Low 54F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
St. Johnsbury, VT (05819)

Today

Variable clouds with scattered thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. High 81F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%..

Tonight

Showers early, then cloudy overnight. Low 54F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
Morehead City firefighters bow their heads during a ceremony held Friday at Carteret Community College to commemorate the 20th anniversary of 9/11. (Cheryl Burke photo)
The view from above at Outer Banks Distilling in Manteo.
Photo: The Canadian Press Quebec Premier Francois Legault walks out of a news conference at the end of a three-day pre-session caucus, Friday, September 10, 2021 in Quebec City. Legault criticized the first question asked by the moderator at the federal leaders debate. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jacques Boissinot

A question about two Quebec laws at Thursday night's English-language federal leaders debate was an unacceptable attack on the province, Premier Francois Legault said Friday.

In her first question to Bloc Quebecois Leader Yves-Francois Blanchet, moderator Shachi Kurl described two Quebec laws  one restricting the wearing of religious symbols by certain government employees, the other a language law reform  as "discriminatory."

"You deny that Quebec has problems with racism, yet you defend legislation, such as bills 96 and 21, which marginalize religious minorities, anglophones and allophones," Kurl said in the preamble to her question.

That was an attack on the Quebec nation, Legault told reporters in Quebec City, adding that Kurl and the group of broadcasters that organized the debate need to apologize.

"That was an attack, for sure, against Quebec, against our responsibilities. I am responsible to protect French, to protect our values, and somebody is saying that I should not do that. Its unacceptable, he said.

Legault took particular issue with the way Kurl asked the question -- stating as a fact that the laws were discriminatory.

Claiming that protecting French is discriminatory, or even racist, its ridiculous, he said.

Legault described Bill 21, which restricts the wearing of religious symbols by some government employees, such as police officers and teachers, as a "moderate law" democratically adopted by the province's legislature and supported by the "vast majority" of Quebecers.

Bill 21 doesn't apply in the rest of Canada. So please, please, it's none of your business, he said.

Bill 21 has been controversial in Quebec, where despite being shielded by the Constitution's notwithstanding clause it has been challenged by civil liberties groups and organizations representing Muslims. In April, a Superior Court judge upheld most of the law, striking down elements that applied to English-language school boards and the province's legislature.

Bill 96, which remains before the legislature, would unilaterally change the Canadian Constitution to affirm that Quebec is a nation and that French is its official language. The bill would strengthen sign laws and language requirements for businesses, including those in federally regulated industries. Other provisions would cap enrolment at English junior colleges and grant new powers to the French-language watchdog.

The law has been criticized by anglophone-rights groups in part, because, like Bill 21, it pre-emptively invokes the notwithstanding clause to shield it from constitutional challenges.

Legault was not alone in his criticism of the moderator's question.

Provincial Liberal Leader Dominique Anglade also described it as "unacceptable" and "Quebec bashing" in a post on Twitter. "There's no place for this kind of discourse," she added.

The Angus Reid Institute, where Kurl is president, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday afternoon, but the Debate Broadcast Group provided an emailed statement.

"Shachi Kurls question regarding Quebecs provincial Bill 21 and Bill 96 was asked to give Mr. Blanchet an opportunity to explain his partys view of these bills, both of which have been widely reported on and discussed since they were introduced in the Quebec National Assembly," said Leon Mar, a spokesman for the group. "The question addressed these bills explicitly; it did not state that Quebecers are racist."

Legault also, for the second day in a row, criticized the NDP, Liberals and Greens, saying that the three parties want to diminish Quebec's autonomy.

We have three leaders now that are proposing to get into Quebecs jurisdiction, we have three leaders saying that they may oppose, in court, Bill 21, three leaders that are not ready to give us more responsibility to choose new immigrants," he said.

On Thursday, Legault praised Conservative Leader Erin O'Toole's stances on health-care funding and immigration, as well as his promise not to join a challenge to Bill 21. However, the premier said he is worried O'Toole would scrap a $6-billion child-care deal between Quebec and Ottawa, adding that a minority government would be preferable to a majority.
Photo: BC Gov Flickr

B.C.s Human Rights Tribunal has dismissed complaints against provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry and Premier John Horgan that asserted British Columbians human rights had been violated on the grounds of disability and political belief.

Both have been dismissed in the complaint screening stage. In the Sept. 9 decisions, the tribunal chair said that neither of the complaints established facts showing a breach of B.C.s Human Rights Code.

The complaint against Henry alleged discrimination on the basis of physical disability as a result of the new BC Vaccine Card. The new card, announced Aug. 29, will be required to access a broad range of social, recreational, and discretionary events and businesses, including restaurants. British Columbians will need to start showing their card on Sept. 13.

In that case, the complainant said he had asthma, claiming it was a physical disability and thus covered by the code.

He says only that [i]n a news conference, it was announced that the experimental vaccine is being made mandatory, and that he does not want services limited because of your experimental vaccine, tribunal chair Emily Ohler said. At best, the complainant references a prospective adverse impact, not one that he has actually experienced.

Further, Ohler wrote, he would then have to allege facts that could establish a connection between having asthma and not being fully vaccinated, such as his disability preventing him from being able to get vaccinated. An ideological opposition to or distrust of the vaccine would not be enough.

In the complaint against Horgan, the complainant said they filed it on behalf of people who are opposed to being forced into getting the COVID?19 vaccination and getting our basic human rights and freedoms stripped from us.

They alleged discrimination on the grounds of political belief.

The British Columbia government has made a very aggressive and unjustified move that goes against our basic human right to bodily autonomy and medical freedoms, the complainant said in the anonymized decision. The government has no right to tell us what goes into our bodies or threatening us into getting this vaccination by taking away our basic rights and freedoms. This is segregation, discrimination, and derogatory, and has no place in modern society.

Ohler said she accepted that one could have a genuinely held belief opposing government rules regarding vaccination and that such a belief could be a political belief within the meaning of the code.

In saying this, however, I stress that protection from discrimination based on political belief does not exempt a person from following provincial health orders or rules, Ohler said.

Ohler said the complainant did not identify how the vaccination requirement has affected her, or anyone else who objects to it, in their employment.

The code does not permit a direct challenge to a public health order based merely on disagreement with it, Ohler said. Without allegations of an actual adverse impact experienced by the proposed class in their employment, this complaint could not establish a breach of the code.

The tribunal does not usually release screening decisions but Ohler said the exemption was made due to high public interest in the issue.

In order to protect their privacy, the complainants were not identified, Ohler said.
Photo: The Canadian Press Unifor president Jerry Dias makes remarks to the De Havilland picket line at the Downsview plant in Toronto on Tuesday, August 24, 2021. is warning members who refuse to receive a COVID-19 vaccination that they could end up losing their jobs if their company adopts a vaccine mandate.THE CANADIAN PRESS/Christopher Katsarov

The head of Canada's largest private sector labour union has a blunt message for Unifor staff: Get vaccinated or find another job.

The union recently advised its 425 staff members that they will be placed on an unpaid leave of absence until they get vaccinated against COVID-19.

"And if they don't get vaccinated within a reasonable period of time, well then that's fine," said Jerry Dias. "They can work for another organization. I'm not messing around with this."

Dias also has a warning for Unifor members who are holding out against being vaccinated, saying they could end up losing their jobs if their employer adopts a vaccine mandate.

"If people are terminated because they make the decision that they're not going to be vaccinated, then our lawyers are saying to us that they will stay terminated," Dias said in an interview.

The growing number of vaccine mandates in the public and private sectors have exposed a fault line in Canada's labour movement.

Canadian National Railway Co. and WestJet Airlines are among the latest large employers to announce their vaccination policies, following an Aug. 13 directive from Ottawa that requires all employees in federally regulated industries to be vaccinated.

Both railways and airlines are members of that group, which also includes banks, telecommunications companies and employees of Crown corporations.

Montreal-based CN will require all employees in Canada, contractors, consultants, agents, suppliers and anyone who accesses its Canadian properties to be vaccinated as of Nov. 1. It said requests for medical or religious exemptions will be considered on an individual basis.

Calgary-based WestJet's mandate is effective Oct. 30. The airline said it will accommodate employees who are unable to be vaccinated but those who fail to attest their vaccination status by Sept. 24 or achieve full-vaccination status by Oct. 30 will face unpaid leave or termination.

Like Air Canada, WestJet is not providing COVID-19 testing as an alternative to vaccination.

Unifor's executive committee voted unanimously to support vaccine mandates, and Ontario unions for elementary and secondary teachers have voiced their support for mandatory vaccinations in schools.

A pro-mandate position in the context of a pandemic is not surprising given the union's duty to protect the health and safety of its members, says Alison Braley-Rattai, assistant professor of labour studies at Brock University.

"In a different context, however, that could change," she wrote in an email.

"For example, if your employer wanted you to be vaccinated against some non-transmissible disease to reduce the risk of you being absent from work due to illness, a union would likely oppose such a policy."

Whether employees should face job loss is also an open question given that we don't know how things will look a year from now, she said.

"A union could readily argue that termination is an extreme response to a mandate that may end up being temporary, and that the worst thing one should face is a temporary unpaid leave."

Unions opposed to vaccine mandates include the Toronto Police Association and the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 113, which represents public transit workers in Toronto and the York Region.

Police association president Jon Reid said it will "make every effort to protect all of our members and therefore, does not support this mandatory vaccination announcement or mandatory disclosure."

ATU local 113 president Carlos Santos pushed back against the Toronto Transit Commission's mandatory vaccination policy.

The union has urged members not to disclose any private medical information to the country's largest transit authority.

"ATU Local 113 opposes this policy, and we will fight to defend your right to make your own personal health decisions and protect your private medical information," Santos said in a letter to members on the union's website.

Santos added that the union will oppose any discipline imposed on members.

However, Dias said the labour movement should be candid with people about whether unions can actually block terminations.

"I think there's a lot of unions out there that frankly don't have the political will to be honest," he said, adding that the union isn't obligated to take a case to arbitration.

"According to our lawyers, if they are fired for refusing to take a vaccine and they don't have a bona fide medical reason to do so that an arbitrator will very likely side with the employer."

While the Canadian Labour Congress supports vaccinations, it says the country's unions are concerned that mandatory vaccinations will hand employers overreaching powers.

"Any decision to impose mandatory vaccination policies must be based on scientific evidence and be made by public health officials, not employers or unions," it stated in a news release.

It said unions must be consulted in the development and implementation of any mandatory vaccination policies with exemptions and accommodations and privacy protections being essential.

The central labour body in Canada said it rejects threats of discipline or termination as an approach to increasing vaccination rates.

"Unions will defend workers interests and insist employers respect the terms and conditions of the collective agreement and human rights codes."

Various national unions similarly support vaccines in general while seeking oversight for sweeping employer mandates.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees says governments and employers need to consult with unions before finalizing and implementing vaccine policies. It also says workers who cannot be vaccinated for medical or religious reasons must be accommodated under human rights legislation.

"As a union, we recognize our obligation to those members who are not vaccinated," it stated, adding that alternate work arrangements, screening and testing before entering the workplace can be effective.

Public Service Alliance of Canada national president Chris Aylward said it supports the government's goals but the verification of vaccination or medical status of members must respect their legal right to privacy.

The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAMAW) said it categorically reject terminations and discipline as leverage to increase vaccination rates.

"Punitive policies are not conducive for a positive workplace and a healthy relationship with employees."

Teamsters Canada questioned the urgency of the government's push for a vaccine mandate given alternative ways to encourage vaccination.

"Canada already has one of the worlds best vaccination programmes, and other measures like provincial vaccine passport systems had promising potential."
Photo: TC Energy Corporation

Late last week, the Canada Energy Regulator (CER) granted TC Energys request to shield its insurers from prying eyes after the company said it was concerned its bottom line could be hurt.

TC Energy filed its application in May, about a month after the CER granted a similar request to Trans Mountain. In the application, it said its insurance providers, and insurers generally, are regularly receiving anti-energy industry communications, and because of pressure from activists, several major insurance companies have renounced their support of certain energy sectors and have committed to exiting the insurance market for these industries.

Continued disclosure of the names of insurance providers can therefore reasonably be expected to harm the TC Gas Pipelines competitive position and negatively impact their customers, the company said in its request.

The green-lit request applies to TC Energys subsidiaries  TransCanada PipeLines Limited, NOVA Gas Transmission Ltd., Foothills Pipe Lines Ltd., Trans Quebec & Maritimes Pipeline Inc., and Great Lakes Pipeline Canada Ltd.  collectively called the TC Gas Pipelines in the application.

TC Energy laid out the precedent set by granting Trans Mountain the ability to deny the public access to insurance information and said the same principles apply.

In its decision, the CER explains one of three conditions must be met to give the go-ahead. The company must show that revealing insurers could be expected to reasonably harm the companys competitive position, that there is a risk someones safety could be jeopardized, or that the company can demonstrate information about its insurers has been consistently treated as confidential  and if so, then it also needs to show its right to privacy outweighs the publics right to know.

The CER granted TC Energys request but disagreed with much of its rationale.

In fact, the commission said the company did not provide any evidence its bottom line has been impacted, unlike Trans Mountain, which could point to a shrinking pool of insurers.

Further, TC Gas Pipelines has not provided any evidence of the substantial risks that may result from the disclosure of its insurers names, the commission found.

That means TC Energy managed to pull the curtain across its list of insurers based on consistently treating the information as confidential. However, the CER notes in its decision the company has named insurers in past filings and began concealing names in June with its new insurance policies.

The commission concludes ... that TC Gas Pipelines has treated the names of its insurers within the updated certificate of insurance as confidential information since the expiry of the previous certificates on 31 May 2021.

In other words, because TC Energy committed to keeping its new list of insurers private, its confidentiality outweighs the public interest in disclosure. The commission also ruled that unless there is a material change, the new confidentiality rules can apply indefinitely.

Kyle Gracey, a research analyst with Oil Change International, says fossil fuel companies are reacting defensively to the work of campaigners who are targeting insurance companies and other financial institutions as a way to apply pressure to the oil and gas sector.

There is a significant public benefit in people knowing who these insurers are because of the danger that fossil fuel infrastructure poses in the first place, said Gracey, referring to the industrys role fuelling the climate crisis. Knowing who is involved in causing harm to you is a pretty reasonable expectation.

Gracey said its not just the generalized impact of climate change that should give the public the right to know, its also important for investors as the financial sector becomes increasingly concerned with climate-related disclosures.

It's really hard to tell whether your insurance company is in support of sustainability measures and is in support of fighting the climate crisis if no one can even know what those companies are invested in, he said. So it's a matter of basic transparency, and a matter of increasing the accountability to the insurance industry for either their complicity in advancing the climate crisis, or in understanding which companies truly are trying to take a different position, and which ones are not.

TC Gas Pipelines has until Sept. 17 to file unredacted insurance information with the CER.

TC Energy is one of the largest fossil fuel infrastructure companies in North America, with a pipeline network stretching from northern Alberta to Houston. The company has natural gas pipelines in Mexico as well.
Photo: The Canadian Press The roof of Mary Queen of Peace elementary school was torn off after Hurricane Larry crossed over Newfoundland's Avalon Peninsula in the early morning hours, in St. John's, Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Daly

UPDATE 2:30 p.m.

The City of St. John's is asking residents to stay home out of it  as the Newfoundland and Labrador saying goes  so crews can clean up the torn branches, downed power lines and scattered debris flung about the streets by hurricane Larry.

The storm made landfall as a Category 1 hurricane along the southern coast of the island at 11:45 p.m. Atlantic time on Friday, bringing sheets of rain and sustained winds of up to 130 km/h across the Avalon Peninsula, which includes the provincial capital of St. John's. Wind gusts reached at speeds as high as 182 km/h, according to measurements at the Cape St. Mary's Lighthouse.

The winds resulted in massive storm surges that brought waves up onto the road in places such as St. Vincent's, a popular spot to watch whales along the southern Avalon. In St. John's, the streets were lined with branches torn from trees, debris pried from houses and, in the Rabbittown neighborhood, a tossed-about easy chair.

"Hurricane Larry caused a significant amount of tree and property damage throughout our city," said St. John's Mayor Danny Breen said at a news conference Saturday.

Still, he said, "it could have been a lot worse."

Larry came barreling across the Atlantic and up into Placentia Bay, a wide expanse of water separating the Avalon Peninsula from the rest of the island, just as high tide set in. The storm surges combined with the high water levels wreaked havoc in some of the coastal communities along Placentia Bay.

Alex Best woke up Saturday morning to find his wharf in Southern Harbour had just about washed away -- and it almost took his boat with it.

The 86-year-old retired fisherman said he hasn't seen high water conditions like those wrought by Larry in many decades.

"Our environment's going so bad, I mean that's what's causing us to have so may storms so often now," he said in a phone interview Saturday. "And we're not doing anything to fix it, either -- only letting it get worse all the time."

Sitting on his deck Saturday and surveying the damage, Best said he's taking it all in stride.

"One day at a time," he said. "As long as you're able to get up and go, that's the main thing."

Along the western coast of Placentia Bay, in Marystown, the fire department had to evacuate two houses because the water was creeping up to their front doors, said Fire Chief Justin Bolt. "Residents in that area hadn't experienced the water to that height from previous storms," he said. "There was a personal wharf in that area that they just managed to secure to prevent it from going afloat."

Larry felt comparable to hurricane Igor, Bolt said, which caused widespread damage across the island in 2010 and even swept a man out to sea.

Back in St. John's, nearly 10,000 people in the area were still without power on Saturday evening, Newfoundland Power's website said. Earlier in the day, more than 30,000 in the metro region were in the dark. The winds tore part of the roof of Mary Queen of Peace Elementary School and it lay in a heap of siding and nail-riddled boards some distance away. A huge blue tent set up along Quidi Vidi lake to house a music festival was stripped to its frame, and the road-facing windows were shattered in an empty building in the nearby Rawlins Cross intersection.

ORIGINAL 7 a.m.

People in eastern Newfoundland woke up Saturday to streets littered with branches and debris, torn and tossed around by the ferocious winds of hurricane Larry.

Larry made landfall as a Category 1 storm just after midnight Friday along the southern coast of the island, bringing sheets of rain and sustained winds of 130 km/h across the Avalon Peninsula, which includes the provincial capital of St. John's.

The city's streets were lined with fallen branches Saturday morning, and trees were uprooted and overturned on many lawns.

A small crowd gathered around Mary Queen of Peace elementary school Saturday, shaking their heads slowly as fragments of the school's shredded roof whipped around in the remaining winds. A large part of the roof was blown clear off the building and lay in a heap of siding and nail-riddled boards on the ground some distance away.

As of 10 a.m., nearly 30,000 people in the St. John's region were still without power, Newfoundland Power's website said. But the lights and coffee makers were on at a Tim Horton's near the Rooms provincial art gallery, and the lineup to get a morning coffee snaked through the restaurant and out the door.

Brandon Snook was outside the coffee shop with his infant son, Myles, as his wife grabbed a few cups inside. They didn't have any power to make their own, he said.

Myles slept through the entire night, Snook said, clearly impressed. "My sister, her little little one lost her play house," he said. "It got smashed up against the house in about two million pieces."

His own house made it through OK, he said -- just a bit of siding peeled loose.

An empty building nearby in the Rawlins Cross intersection wasn't so lucky; several of its traffic-facing windows were shattered in their frames, leaving the inside of the building completely exposed.

Up the street, parts of the green iron fencing surrounding the Basilica Cathedral had fallen down and several of the massive structures windows were missing.

The Royal Newfoundland Constabulary urged pedestrians and drivers across the peninsula to stay home as officers swept the area to report fallen trees and power lines.

Newfoundland Power, meanwhile, assured those in the dark that crews had been out since daybreak to work on the power lines.
Photo: The Canadian Press Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, left, and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, take part in the federal election English-language Leaders debate in Gatineau, Que., on Thursday, Sept. 9, 2021. Federal leaders have not focused on addressing systemic racism during the campaign, despite the urgency of the issue after findings of unmarked graves at former residential schools and rising hate against minority communities during the COVID-19 pandemic, says the founder of an anti-hate group.

Federal leaders have not focused on addressing systemic racism during the campaign, despite the urgency of the issue after findings of unmarked graves at former residential schools and rising hate against minority communities during the COVID-19 pandemic, advocates say.

While the Liberals and NDP have included programs in their election platforms to tackle barriers that people of colour face, the Conservatives dont mention the word "racism" even once in their 150-page election plan, said Fareed Khan of Canadians United Against Hate.

Regardless of promises, Khan said the lack of discussion by Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh of fighting racism during their campaign events makes him wonder how seriously they are taking the issue.

"On the one platform when it would make the biggest impact during an election, they haven't talked about it, Khan said.

So what that says to me and a lot of people, activists, is that maybe what they've said over the last year is just a lot of talk, and they're not as serious about fighting hate as they said they were.

Khan said the campaign is an opportunity for politicians to explain how they will respond to those who have protested against anti-Black racism, called for justice for Indigenous Peoples and demanded action against Islamophobia.

"The people have spoken. They want action on this," he said.

The issue of systemic racism reached the campaign trail this week after Bloc Quebecois Leader Yves-Francois Blanchet complained about a debate question that he said painted Quebecers as racist. Trudeau and Conservative Leader Erin OToole jumped to defend Quebec as not racist, while Singh said its unhelpful to single out any one province.

The question was about Quebec laws the moderator deemed "discriminatory," including Bill 21, which bans some civil servants from wearing religious garb on the job. Mustafa Farooq, chief executive officer of the National Council of Canadian Muslims, said it was "shameful" the main party leaders did not step in to argue the law was discriminatory.

But on Friday, Trudeau told dozens of people gathered in a restaurant in Scarborough, Ont., that the pandemic hit racialized people harder than others and saw an increase in hatred and intolerance. The rise in hate has been aggravated by COVID-19 but the issue is "bigger than that, he added.

"We see more and more white supremacist groups and racist groups taking toeholds on the internet, and more and more in our communities," he said.

After defending his government's record on supporting racialized communities, Trudeau promised to introduce a new law combating online hate in 100 days of his new mandate if re-elected.

Speaking to reporters in Ottawa on Friday, Singh said systemic racism is a problem many people live with every day.

"We've seen it in police violence (where) racialized people who had mental health or health concerns ended up losing their lives. We know that this is a problem that exists and it needs to be fixed, and we are committed to fixing it."

OToole said in a statement that every day, people experience discrimination or racism in some form and he is committed to working with communities to find concrete solutions to these problems.

Conservatives believe that the institutional failings that have led to these outcomes can and must be urgently addressed. It is imperative that we meet this challenge with practical policy changes that solve institutional and systemic problems, he said.

While the Tory platform doesnt contain the word "racism," it does propose strengthening the Criminal Code to protect Canadians from online hate and notes that racialized people have been disproportionately impacted by unemployment during the pandemic.

Chief R. Donald Maracle of the Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte First Nation in Ontario said there are programs in place, funded federally and provincially, to eliminate racism but it still is a problem.

"First Nations people have suffered racism by government over decades, with a lack of investments to deal with housing and water and post-secondary education and also lack of opportunity for employment and training," he said.

"In recent years the governments have invested a lot of money to try to overcome those barriers."

He said there are many competing issues to be addressed by political leaders during the campaign with the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the economy.

"The focus seems to be to keep the economy restarted and return to some kind of normal life for most Canadians, but again there's a lot of racism that has caused a lot of systemic poverty," he said.

"It's an issue that remains outstanding to be addressed."

Andrew Griffith, a former director at the federal immigration department, said it's surprising that the Conservatives didn't include any specific measures to end racism in their platform despite the rise of hate during the pandemic.

The pandemic also highlighted the link between being a member of a minority group or an immigrant community and the lack of access to health care and good housing, he said.

"Ongoing issues in terms of policing, various reports in terms of increased anti-Asian incidents, antisemitism remains perennial, attacks on Muslims, including the most recent ones in London, (Ont.), so there's a whole series of issues there that I find it striking that there's really nothing there in the (Conservative) platform," he said.

Farooq, of the National Council of Canadian Muslims, said it's saddening that federal leaders are not prioritizing tackling systemic racism.

"We have a week or so left in this federal election campaign. I would hope that they take seriously what Canadians have been asking for," he said.

All major federal leaders travelled to London, Ont., in June to show solidarity with the Muslim community after a vehicle attack against a Muslim family left four dead and a nine-year-old boy seriously injured.

"It's easy to talk in the aftermath of a tragedy and to say that you're committed to action and doing something, Farooq said. But the real test is at a time like this. What are you actually committed to standing on and standing for?"
Photo: Evan Buhlmer, Rocky Mountain Outlook

Albertas Bow Valleys hospitality sector, one of the main economic muscles in Banff, Canmore and Lake Louise, is direly understaffed and it's forcing businesses to make tough financial decisions.

Its the worst Ive ever seen, Michel Dufresne, director at the Job Resource Centre in Banff and Canmore said of his 30 years of living and working in the Bow Valley about the lack of workers.

Everyone has pitched up wages, but it doesnt matter what you pay; theres nobody to take the job."

Dufresne added statistics from five years ago showed there were between 2,000 to 3,000 foreign workers in the Bow Valley who made up between 20 to 30 per cent of the hospitality workforce.

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit in March 2020 and businesses began layoffs, there was a mass exodus of international workers from the Bow Valley returning to countries such as the Czech Republic, the U.K. and Australia.

We have a very low inventory of job-seekers at this point, said Dufresne. High volume of job postings for everything in hospitality. This year is worse because we dont have the foreigners, we dont have the eastern Canadians, we dont have the out-of-area traffic we used to get.

"One of the bulk groups is the Australians. They're not allowed to leave. They can leave for essential travel only. The work visa program, thats shut down now and we dont anticipate it to open until the new year."

According to the latest Statistics Canada data, nationally, the workforce in food services and accommodation grew by 35,000 in July  the most of any sector. Alberta was not among the notable provinces where the increase happened, which were in Ontario and Manitoba.

Tourists have been flocking to the Bow Valley in the pre- and post-vaccination era, and the High Country Inn in Banff is taking precautions to make sure guests  and employees  are taken care of during despite being understaffed.

The hotel, which has an average one-night stay ranging from $235 to $300, has been turning guests away on occasion by blocking online reservations.

Theres definitely a [financial] loss there, said Jordan Irwin, general manager at High Country Inn. But Im happy with revenue and the quality of the product weve been able to deliver to guests without making our staff work crazy hours.

In order to attract new staff and keep current members, Irwin said the hotel has increased wages and a bonus structure is being offered.

Pre-COVID-19, Irwin regularly saw job-seekers with a stack of paper resumes going from property-to-property on Banff Avenue looking for work. He said its been a big hit without the international market, whom Banff relies upon for staffing.

I think on the simplest terms for us, you take away working holiday visas, and you take away the need for a lot of entry-level Canadian staff with the CERB and theres not a lot left over, said Irwin. I would say thats the environment the governments created with the program with CERB [Canadian Emergency Response Benefit].

Im very thankful for the subsidies that theyve provided for businesses, but on the other hand, I think its been too generous with the CERB and theres always a lag period when something like that ends before you see the workforce get back and intact again.

CERB, which provided millions of Canadians with financial relief during the COVID-19 pandemic, ends September 25.
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A student was arrested Friday afternoon at Central High School.

Just before school was released, the school resource officer assigned to Central High School made an arrest of a juvenile male student after a domestic assault occurred on school property.

The student was charged with domestic assault and possession of a firearm on school property.

During the course of the arrest, the SRO also recovered a loaded Glock handgun with a high capacity magazine in the suspects possession.

As this incident and investigation involves juveniles, no further details are available at this time.




A pair of 5k program records fell on Friday evening for the Covenant cross country teams at the ninth annual UNG Invitational in Oakwood, Ga. S.K. Lipperd set the women's record and placed third overall, while Josiah Mellott broke the men's 5k mark.The Scots men finished third overall in the meet with 67 points. The women placed fourth, out of 12, with 114 points.Lipperd set the pace for the women with her third-place finish and program-record 5k time of 18:35.1. That time was 15 seconds faster than Hannah Matthews' previous program record set back in 2012.The top three men's 5k times were set in the meet.Mellott came away with the program record in the 5k distance. The freshman placed 10th in the meet with a time of 16:23.3, breaking a 20-year-old record set by Brad Williams in 2001 (16:32). Mellott was one of four Scots to finish in the top-16 of the event.Micaiah Allison was right on Mellott's heels as he finished in a time of 16:23.9 to place 11th overall and set a personal record while taking the second-best time in program history. Benjamin Jones was 12th with a personal-record time of 16:29.2, the third-fastest mark in program history.Ian Sneller was 16th overall with a time of 16:39.7 to set a personal best. Shea Fisler was 18th (16:46.1), Will Holland placed 40th (17:53.0), and Ethan Caswell 46th (18:29.5) as all three runners set personal records.Mattie Parker was the second women's finisher as she placed 31st with a time of 20:53.2, while Maggie Henry was not far behind at 20:58.1 to place 34th. Lydia Dorman was 35th with a time of 21:06.5. Lydia Moore (21:52.3), Matilda Green (22:17.7), and Kali Hina (22:30.8) rounded out the top-seven finishers for the Scots.Piedmont took the men's title with 43 points, while host North Georgia was the women's champion with 33 points.
An officer made contact with a woman on Cherry Street via phone call per her request. She said at approximately 2:30 a.m. a man made eye contact with her, approached her, and said, "Hey." She said he placed his hands on her hips and gently moved her over as he passed her. She said this action was unnecessary as he already had plenty of room to pass her. She said she is a "key witness" in a case where the man is a suspect. She said she was informed by two investigators that a TPO was put in place for her against the man. The officer checked the man's information through dispatch and was unable to find the woman listed as a protected party on his TPO. The woman lastly wanted the officer to document that the man's ex-girlfriend "Victoria" moved into an apartment building next to her. She felt this was suspicious.

* * *

An officer responded to a disorder on Sharp Street where a woman said she was in a verbal argument with a man. The man was no longer on the scene when police arrived. While speaking to the woman, the man returned and he told the officer he had left to cool off and get away from the woman to allow her to calm down. The officer spoke with another man who said it was only a verbal argument between the man and woman. Because the man didn't live at the address, he agreed to leave and not return that night.

* * *



A woman on Oak Street reported excessive noise from the patrons of Mary's Bar at 2125 McCallie

Ave. While speaking to the woman the officer could hear excessively loud music from cars parked in the parking lot and side streets from the patrons of Mary's Bar. The woman told the officer this has been an ongoing issue for weeks now and she cannot sleep at night. Police went through the area and spoke to over a dozen people hanging around the exterior of Mary's Bar with excessively loud music playing. The people turned down the music when asked to. The officer spoke with one of the owners of Mary's Bar and explained to her she needs to help enforce the noise ordinance with her patrons while they are on or in the immediate area of the property.

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A Mapco clerk at 4711 Brainerd Road said a black male, middle aged, entered the store wearing pants and a gray shirt. As he entered the store he said, "I got eight minutes left!" He waited for another customer to enter the store, walked up to pay for his two cases of glass bottled Bud Light then decided he did not want to pay and left the store (passing all points of sale without attempting to pay). The two cases of Bud Light totaled approximately $25. The store clerk said he will have the manager reach out with camera footage at his earliest convenience. It appears at this time the suspect may have walked behind the Boost Mobile store with the cases of beer but the store clerk is not sure at this time.

* * *

An officer responded to a theft from motor vehicle at Conn's Furniture Store, 5844 Brainerd Road. The officer spoke with a coworker of the victim, who said the man had already left for his truck route. He said the man arrived at work, placed his personal car keys inside his lunchbox, and placed his lunchbox inside his delivery truck (a Conn's box truck). He then went inside the office, and remained there until he was ready to leave on his route. Upon returning to the truck, he discovered that his lunchbox was gone, along with the car keys therein. The coworker said there was a camera overlooking the area which may have caught someone walking past the building, but that they wouldn't have access to the footage until the manager arrived later this morning. The officer provided their card with the complaint number so that the manager could email the security footage if it shows anything useful. The man's personal vehicle is a white Nissan Sentra. Upon his request, the coworker disconnected his battery to prevent theft of the vehicle once the suspect discovers the car keys. The man will have a new key made.

* * *

An officer wrote a continuation/supplement for an extortion/blackmail on Asbury Drive. Police spoke with the man by phone who said that "Spence" had contacted him multiple times since he blocked the number he originally was using after making the original report. The man said he received messages saying, "I have given you enough time and he would be sending the photos" and "dont thank you can get away from this." The man said he received the messages from two numbers, and neither number had been used by "Spence" previously. Police attempted to locate a history on both numbers but could not locate any history on either number. Police used Zlookup and discovered both numbers belonged to a Textnow website.

* * *

Police spoke with a woman on the phone on Carousel Road who said there have been speeders in the area. She requested more patrol in the area and a surveillance vehicle placed in the flat portion of Carousel Road to deter crime. Police added the residence to the watch list.

* * *

A man on 3rd Avenue called police because he wanted a woman removed from his home. He told police she had paid him $200 as a rent payment. Police spoke with the woman who confirmed that she had paid the man the $200. She also said that she is going to be moving out. Police spoke with both of them and they both agreed to staying away from each other.

* * *

An officer was dispatched to Georgia Avenue to have an improperly parked vehicle towed. The vehicle was parked in a city permit reserved space that was marked off with cones and signs. The cones and signs where the vehicle was parked had been moved. Multiple attempts were made to contact the owner and none were successful. A-1 Towing responded on scene to tow the vehicle.

* * *

A man on East Main Street told police a woman had been texting and calling him leaving threatening messages. The man answered a call from the woman while police were with him. Police told both of them they should delete each the other's number and refrain from contacting one another. Both agreed to this.

* * *

Police were called to Hixson Pike where there was a verbal disorder between the complainant and a man. The man denied any disorder and the complainant wanted to make sure the ladies working in the parlor did not have any trouble out of the man.

* * *

Police were called to Memorial Hixson to speak with a man who had been in an accident. He told police that while he was turning into 5731 Hwy. 153, New York Pizza Department, he hit a large pothole and his motorcycle came out from under him and tipped over on the right side. His right leg was scraped on his knee, foot and his right hand. He was at the hospital checking to see if he needed to get stitches for his injuries. His motorcycle had damage on the right side from the bike tipping over and scraping the ground. He was able to ride his bike back home and then take his car to the hospital. He said he did not want a crash report but he was upset that the pothole had not been fixed for so long.

* * *

Police were called to 2020 Gunbarrel Road where a man was smoking marijuana in front of Walmart. Officers had the man put out his blunt and discovered a bag with marijuana. Officers could not verify if the marijuana was from a medical marijuana dispensary. Officers took it and the bag and will take it to property.

* * *

An officer responded to an abandoned vehicle at 409 Signal Mountain Road. The black Toyota T-100 was partially in the third lane and on the sidewalk on the northbound side of Signa Mountain Road. The owner was not present. The tag was run, with no results. The VIN was run in all 50 states with no results as well. Cain's Wrecker was called to recover the vehicle.

* * *

Police were called to 1100 Mountain Creek Road where a complainant said they saw what appeared to be a bad wreck at the traffic circle. The complainant could not identify the vehicle and believed it left the scene. Upon arrival officers conducted a search of the area and only found small debris that could not be identified if it was related to this incident. No property damage was observed and the vehicle was unable to be located.

* * *

Police received a call about a suspicious vehicle that was parked at 7701 Lee Highway for over a week and that they would like police to check it out to make sure it was not stolen. Police ran the VIN on the vehicle and it came back as not stolen. The worker at this Mapco stated that he had a wrecker on the way to tow the vehicle from Airport Wrecker service.

* * *

Police were called to 1001 Hixson Pike where there was a suspicious woman by the gas pumps at Circle K. She said she was homeless and not from the local area. She had no active warrants on file and she was transported to the Community Kitchen at her request.

* * *

The superintendent of a construction site on Judd Road said one of his company's trucks was stolen. The truck was entered in the NCIC system as stolen. The white truck has two logo stickers on both sides of the truck. The vehicle was later located by Louisville Metro Police Department in Kentucky. The truck was removed from NCIC by dispatch and they were unable to notify the owner due to no answer or voicemail available.

* * *

Police were called to an apartment on McBrien Road where a woman said another woman showed up at her apartment unannounced. The woman woke her up by pounding on the door. But when she tried to see who it was, the other woman put her finger over the peephole. She then used her patio door to walk around the corner to see who was at her door and saw the woman. The two of them got into a verbal argument, and at one point, the other woman told her not to show up to court over their case. While she was leaving, the woman claimed that the other woman attempted to run her over in the parking lot. She also said that the other woman backed into her parked car while leaving the area. She wasn't concerned about her car because there was little to no damage. However, she wants to prosecute the other woman for attempting to run her over. The officer told the woman that they will report the incident but that the officer will not be taking out warrants. The officer told her that a warrant could be secured if more evidence was provided. Police told her to contact the apartment management to obtain the security footage of the parking lot. She told the officer she would contact police once she has the video footage of the incident.

* * *

While on patrol on North Market Street, an officer saw a woman sitting on the bridge railing with her legs hanging off the river side. The officer got out with the woman who said she was just enjoying the rain and hanging out waiting for her ride. The officer distracted her and told her that someone was calling her since her phone was sitting next to her. When she looked down at the phone the officer lifted her off the railing for her safety. She assisted the officer by putting her arms around the officer's shoulders and laughed. The woman said that she was not suicidal and had already called a friend to give her a ride, who she was on the phone with. The woman said she has been feeling down but was adamant that she wasn't planning to jump or harm herself and that she wouldn't have called her friend for a ride if she wasn't okay. The woman said that she had been drinking and made a poor choice to sit on the railing. The officer spent some time talking to her and she did not seem to be in a state of distress. Out of an abundance of caution the officer attempted to persuade the woman to take her to the ER and just talk to a health care professional, but she once again denied that she was suicidal and said that she had just made a poor decision to sit on the rail. She apologized for creating any issue for police and requested a ride to the friend's home on Chestnut Street. The officer took her to her friend's home where she thanked the officer and was seen going inside.
Sometimes one role is all it takes. For Kat Dennings, that one role was Sex and the City. The actor launched her successful career with just one role on the show, even though it only lasted one episode. Now, Dennings has gone on to star in her own sitcom, 2 Broke Girls, and shes a part of the Marvel universe. But that one role wasnt that easy for her to deal with. Dennings had to ask Kim Cattrall a really awkward question to get through her scene.

Kat Dennings landed 2 Broke Girls because of a one episode role on Sex and the City

Kat Dennings | Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic

Dennings may be 100% Hollywood now, but she didnt start out that way. The 2 Broke Girls actress actually had a very sheltered upbringing in rural Pennsylvania. According to The Wire, her bubble was burst when she was 14 and landed a role on Sex and the City. Dennings SATC character only lasts one episode, but the role made a lasting impression on 2 Broke Girls creator Michael Patrick King.

In her episode, Dennings plays a 13 year old in the middle of throwing her Bat Mitzvah. According to The Looper, she hires Samantha to plan the event, and even for Samantha, shes a bit much. Dennings character and her young friends act a lot like Carrie Bradshaw and the gang, which Carrie notices. Basically Dennings is a miniature version of the shows main characters, at just 13. In real life, nothing was further from the truth. In fact, Dennings didnt even know what some of the lines in her scene meant.

Kat Dennings wasnt sure what the lines in her Sex and the City scene meant

Sex and the City was an HBO classic. The show could have never aired on network television. The word sex is literally in the name. Most episodes are filled with hookups, one night stands, and Carrie and the gang discussing sex acts over brunch. It isnt exactly kid friendly, and Dennings was a child when she starred in the show at 14. Add that to her incredibly sheltered life, and Dennings had no idea what some of her scene even meant.

Dennings was forced to ask her costar Cattrall what the word b*** j** meant. Luckily Cattrall was able to enlighten Dennings, although the 2 Broke Girls actress didnt mention how her parents felt about Cattralls impromptu lesson.

Now, Kat Dennings is a part of the Marvel universe

Even though Dennings didnt quite understand the things her character was saying, she pulled off the role so well that King thought of her years later when he was casting for 2 Broke Girls. The show lasted six years before wrapping up. But Dennings wasnt done. She jumped on other projects right away, including starring in and executive producing the Hulu show Dollface. Now, Dennings has earned her place in the Marvel universe as astrophysicist Darcy Lewis.

Dennings first played the character in two of the Thor movies, but her recent appearance in Wandavision has cemented Darcys place in Marvel, and could bring Dennings endless roles in the future. Wandavision, a Marvel based series that appeared on Disney+, made it clear that Darcy could appear in future Marvel movies. Although a lot of characters died in Avengers: Endgame thanks to Thanos, Wandavision canonizes Darcys survival. It shows her earning a doctorate, which means she may be a valuable asset to future heroes.

To her credit, Dennings never seems to stop being grateful for her career. Shes happy to have a role in Marvel, although shes not quite sure how she landed it. In reality, the answer is probably simple. Its all thanks to an episode of Sex and the City.

RELATED: Sex and the City: Sarah Jessica Parker Showed Off Carrie Bradshaws New Tutu for And Just Like That
Cocaine Cowboys: The Kings of Miami is a six-part Netflix documentary series that tells a wild tale. The subject is the rise and fall of a cocaine empire led by two Cuban men named Sal Magluta and Willy Falcon. In just the span of a few years, they went from childhood friends to drug kingpins known as Los Muchachos.

The docuseries features a number of interviews with everyone from law enforcement officers to those involved in Magluta and Falcons drug empire. Including former Real Housewives of Miami star Alexia Echevarria, the ex-wife of Pedro Pegy Rosello.

According to the reality star, she never suspected that her ex-husband was a drug dealer when they were dating.

Cocaine Cowboys and Real Housewives of Miami star Alexia Echevarria | Aaron Davidson/WireImage

Alexia Echevarria opens about her first marriage in Cocaine Cowboys

The new Netflix series features Alexia sharing details about her relationship with Pedro, who she calls Peter. They met back in 1987 after she graduated from college, when Alexia was just 23. By 1991 they were engaged. But that happened to be the same time that Pedros work with Los Muchachos caught up with him.

They had to cancel their wedding, and he went on the lam. Only to be apprehended a short while later. Still, Alexia chose to stick by her husband. And when he was out on bail in 1992, they got married and welcomed their first child, Peter Jr. Then, Pedro was sentenced to four years in prison.

The Real Housewives of Miami alum split from the drug kingpin in 1996

After Pedros release from prison in 1996, Alexia got pregnant with their son Frankie. But the couple divorced later that same year. Looking back, Alexia says that when she first met Pedro she suspected he was already married. The first night they hung out together, Alexia recalls Pedro getting a phone call and suddenly telling her he had to go.

What do you mean you gotta go? Alexia asked him. Hes like, Yeah, but you can stay. And Im like, Im not staying. He left so quickly that at that moment I said, This guy has a girlfriend or hes married. Little did I know that it was some shipment that was coming in, and he had to go pick up the merchandise.

Alexia Echevarria claims in Cocaine Cowboys that her ex-husband did not look like a drug dealer

Throughout the 1980s, Los Muchachos was a group of Miami-based drug traffickers that brought in more than 75 tons of cocaine into the United States from Colombia. Pedro became part of that operation after he met Sal and Willy as a teenager, working his way up from cleaning cars to trafficking drugs.

He had a major role in the business when he first met Alexia. But she insists that she had no idea he was a drug dealer when they started dating. She recalled that everybody spoke so nicely of him and no one warned her to be careful of him.

In the very, very beginning, I never suspected anything of him, she explained. Peter did not look like a drug dealer to me. I didnt know what a drug dealer was really supposed to look like, except maybe Scarface.

Pedro Pegy Rosello paid for $42K in cash for her engagement ring

Alexia says that her ex told her that he ran his parents business, but he didnt go into any detail about it. She says he would leave in the morning to go to the gym, and then he was supposedly going to work. But, she didnt know what work was.

When they were dating, Pedro was earning about $250,000 per month ($600K in todays money). He was supporting his entire family and dishing out $30K per month in rent alone for everyones homes and apartments. He also paid for Alexias $42K engagement ring in cash.

I started thinking about all these different things that were signs, the cash, the different boats, the different cars, Alexia recalled. I mean nothing was ever his, but it was the family.

Cocaine Cowboys reveals that law enforcement was planning to arrest Pedro on his wedding day

Alexia says she and Pedro were living the perfect fake life before his arrest. But when he found out the Feds were coming after him, she could tell he was afraid.

I heard that they were waiting for me to get married, that they were gonna go arrest me on the day of my wedding, Pedro explained. I had to call the whole thing off. I mean, it broke my heart to tell her, Hey, listen. We cant do it.'

When she found out the list of charges against Pedro  and the US attorney refused to let him out on bond because he was a threat to society  Alexia says she thought they had the wrong person.

Pedro Pegy Rosello is back in prison

She couldnt cut ties with him because thats when he needed her the most. But, Alexia did cooperate with authorities because she feared Pedro was facing life in prison.

Peters always been a great dad. He refuses to grow up, but hes grown up a little bit, Alexia said at the end of Cocaine Cowboys. I dont want him to get in trouble again. I dont want my kids or myself to go through that pain.

However, after Pegys interview for the docuseries, he was arrested for attempting to sell five kilograms of cocaine to a DEA informant. He is back in prison and is now scheduled to be released in 2022.

The life that I live. I dont want it for my kids, he said.

Cocaine Cowboys is now playing on Netflix. Meanwhile, Alexia Echevarria is currently filming the Real Housewives of Miami reboot which will air later this year on Peacock.

RELATED: RHOM: Peacock Confirms New Season of The Real Housewives of Miami
The Come From Away film debuted on Apple TV+ on Sept. 10. Its timing couldnt be more apt. And not just because it was filmed to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The staged production was filmed live during the coronavirus (COVID-19) shutdown, marking the first Broadway performance since the pandemic shut down live theater. And while 9/11 doesnt seem like the best subject for a musical, this story finds its perfect home in live theater. Its great that this show can now be watched by millions.

The Come From Away film delivers a beautiful example of humanity that will uplift any viewer. But some may also find themselves feeling waves of sadness whenever the Canadian townspeople say, You would have done the same. Based on what weve seen over the last 1.5 years of American life, I cant confidently say we would.

Jenn Colella, Emily Walton, Q. Smith, and Joel Hatch in the Come From Away film | Apple TV+

Is Come From Away a true story?

Come From Away tells the true story of the Canadian town of Gander and its townspeoples incredible acts of humanity on Sept. 11, 2001. Gander is a tiny town in Newfoundland that had a population of less than 10,000 people in 2001. The town has an airport that was once a bustling hub for planes to refuel on long journeys. But technological advances in aviation made pit stops in Gander unnecessary. As one of the characters in Come From Away notes, planes being instructed to land in Gander now meant something terrible had happened.

When the American airspace was closed following the attacks, 38 planes were redirected to the Canadian town, nearly doubling its population instantly. The passengers were stuck on their planes for an entire day when they arrived, many unable to reach their family members via phone. Most of them had no idea what had happened in the United States until they disembarked.

While they waited anxiously to leave the aircrafts, the people of Gander dropped everything to help prepare accommodations for the 7,000 displaced passengers and flight staffs. The community gathered food, toiletries, bedding, clothes, medicines, and most importantly, phones. The town also figured out how to communicate with non-English speakers, made accommodations for everyones various faiths, and cared for the many animals on the planes. They kept this up for five days until the American airspace was reopened. And they made lifelong connections along the way.

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Apple TV+s Come From Away film takes on new meaning because of the pandemic

In Come From Away, each member of the cast plays multiple characters. And each character is based on real people in Gander and the plane people. One of those characters is Beverley Bass, the first American female pilot to be named captain. Played by Jenn Colella (who earned a Tony nomination for her performance), one of her songs reveals Bass colleague, Charles F. Burlingame, was the captain of American Airlines Flight 77the plane that hit the Pentagon. Other characters are Ganders then mayor Claude Elliott (who is disappointed by U.S./Canada relations during the pandemic), and Nick and Diane Marsona married couple who met during those five days in Gander.

The musical is bookended by the song Welcome to the Rock, a fitting opening number that encapsulates the towns culture. Its fiercely positive, all about community, and states that all who come from away are welcome in Gander. And their actions certainly prove that. The musical is performed in one act and never slows its pace. Its mostly sung-through, with some dialogue added into the songs. And much of the dialogue is direct quotes from peoples experiences during those five fateful days.

The Come From Away film will warm your heart and remind you of the profound beauty of collectivism during tragedy. Ganders seemingly unending supply of compassion makes you feel grateful that kind of kindness exists. Its joyous moments will remind anyone who witnessed the events of Sept. 11 (in person or on the news) of how that horrific day brought people together. But for American viewers, it may also produce pangs of shame.

Come From Away is supposed to be an inspiring tale of resilient humanity in the midst of horror. And it certainly succeeds on that front. But the timing of its release contextualizes the production in a new way. And it stings.

The Come From Away film ensemble | Apple TV+

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Come From Aways beautiful message persists, but watching it in 2021 stings

Twenty years after the day that changed Americas collective psyche forever, we find ourselves in the middle of another horrific mass trauma. Except this time around, that trauma has pressed on for almost two years with still no end in sight. According to The Atlantic, coronavirus deaths in the U.S. match 9/11s death toll every three days. And yet, there are still millions of Americans refusing to get vaccinated and wear masks to help their fellow citizens. Misinformation runs rampant. Distrust is at an all-time high. Unmasked COVID-19 deniers cough on people in grocery stores for fun. Healthcare workers buy fake COVID-19 vaccination cards.

As Elliott told CTV News in 2020, When we come to those times of tragedy in our life, we need everybody helping each other. In the U.S., we have not seen that happen enough.

Sept. 11, 2001 marked the beginning of two decades worth of the toxic American individualism we see today. The fear the terrorist attacks instilled in us alland the government action that fear producedprogressed and evolved over the last two decades into distrust, otherism, extreme xenophobia, and a fundamental lack of care for other peoples wellbeing. I was 8 years old in 2001. I am now 28. And growing up over the last 20 years has taught many millennials that we cannot expect communities and government officials to help people when its needed most. Our countrys capacity for caring for others has corroded. And it can all be traced back to that Tuesday morning in September.

Every time someone in Come From Away said You would have done the same to an American character, I felt a pang of shame. Because the last 1.5 years of American life has proven just how much Americans have failed to learn the lesson Gander taught. Weve spent the last 18 months watching as other countries provided aid to their people without blinking an eye. And whats worse is the U.S. has everything it needs to provide that same aid. It just chose not to. And there are too many American citizens who dont think thats a massive failure.

Whats even more troubling is Americans are now in a place to act like Gander. With countless people fleeing Afghanistan in search of safer harbors, I fear we will fail to rise to the occasion to help these people like Gander helped us. If we wont do it for our own people, what makes us think we would do it for others? Let alone a group of innocent civilians weve spent two decades unjustly demonizing.

I genuinely hope Im wrong. But every time someone said You would have done the same, I found myself thinking, Oh, God. You really dont know how much we wouldnt.
Disney just announced changes to their 2021 schedule. With theater attendance increasing little by little, many studios are hedging their bets on full-fledged cinematic releases. Though the debate rages on about day-and-date hybrid movie drops, the success of Shang-Chi is a motivating force.

Disney is moving forward with exclusive theater-only releases. The Last Duel and these other films will remain in theaters for a minimum of 45 days before shifting to streaming.

Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, and Jodie Comer | Vittorio Zunino Celotto/Getty Images

The Last Duel

According to the Walt Disney Companys latest press release, The Last Duel arrives in theaters on Oct. 15. Adapted from Eric Jagers 2004 novel, the film takes place in 1386 and follows the story of Jean de Carrouges and Jacques Le Gris. Jean de Carrouges wife, Marguerite, accused Le Gris of rape, and the two men battled it out. Directed by Ridley Scott, The Last Duel is a gripping tale of betrayal and vengeance set against the brutality and female oppression of 14th century France.

Ben Affleck co-wrote the script and the film stars Jodie Comer as Marguerite, Matt Damon as Jean de Carrouges, and Adam Driver as Jacques Le Gris.

Rons Gone Wrong

Family film Rons Gone Wrong will be released only in theaters on Oct. 22. Per the press release, the story follows awkward middle schooler Barney and his robot, Ron. Rons hilarious malfunctions set against the backdrop of the social media age, launch them into an action-packed journey in which boy and robot come to terms with the wonderful messiness of true friendship.

Eternals

Marvels next major movie is Eternals with a star-studded cast that includes Richard Madden, Salma Hayek, and Angelina Jolie. The superhero flick had its date switched due the pandemic but will now drop in theaters on Nov. 5.

Encanto

Encanto, due for a Nov. 24 theatrical release, will run through the holidays and arrive on Disney+ on Dec. 24 as a full feature. The animated fantasy tale is all about magic and the Madrigal family. Set in Colombia, the film centers on 15-year-old Mirabel, her troubles with where she fits into the world, and an event that puts her family in peril.

West Side Story

Steven Spielberg enters the movie musical world for the first time with his take on West Side Story. Take things back to New York in 1957 where the Jets and Sharks have a fierce rivalry. Ansel Elgort and Rachel Zegler play Tony and Maria, and the film homes in on the Puerto Rican experience in the 1950s. Spielberg worked on the script as early as 2016, and now its finally hitting the big screen on Dec. 10.

The Kings Man

Disney and 20th Century Studios plan to release The Kings Man on Dec. 22. A prequel to the Kingsman spy thriller series, the movie goes back in time. Per the logline, As a collection of historys worst tyrants and criminal masterminds gather to plot a war to wipe out millions, one man must race against time to stop them. Discover the origins of the very first independent intelligence agency in The Kings Man. Previously, the film was set for February 2020 drop date.
Kylie Jenner is one of the most popular members of the Kardashian-Jenner clan. The young makeup maven was first introduced to fans in 2007, when her familys reality series, Keeping Up with the Kardashians, debuted on television. At first, Jenner seemed like any other preteen girl  slightly awkward in her own skin and struggling to find her identity. These days, however, Jenner is known as one of the hottest women on social media. She regularly shares a variety of filtered, posed photos on her Instagram page, but recently, fans were treated to the sight of Jenner on the cover of Elle Russia. While Jenner undoubtedly looks beautiful on the cover, some fans took to Reddit to discuss Jenners look, and in the process, compared her modeling skills to that of the other Kardashians.

Kylie Jenner is well known for her sleek Instagram aesthetic

Kylie Jenner attends the 2020 Vanity Fair Oscar Party at Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts. | ToniAnne Barson/WireImage/Getty Images

Kylie Jenner has always been under scrutiny for her social media presence. In the early days of her fame, she was known to rock edgy looks and was a particular fan of blue hair and black leather ensembles. Still, as she grew into maturity, Jenner started to favor distinctly adult outfits and poses, and she has no problem showing lots of skin on social media.

While Jenner has been slammed for her super-sexy aesthetic, there are many of her fans who appreciate that she is so confident. Those fans have followed her career as shes posed for several high-fashion magazines, including, most recently, Elle Russia.

What do Kylie Jenner fans have to say about her Elle cover?

On the cover of Elle Russia, Jenner can be seen wearing a long winter coat with a fur collar, along with some matching leather gloves and thigh-high boots. Jenner appears to be holding the coat closed with one hand, while the other rests lightly on her bare thigh, above the edge of the boot. The look is quite different from Jenners usual skimpy ensembles, and fans quickly took to Reddit to discuss the cover and Jenners pose.

The asymmetry between the lips and nose is so strange. Kylie does not look like this IRL. I wonder if whoever did the editing is just really bad? one fan wrote.

Another fan joked about her now-familiar expression, writing, Can she ever do another face than the dead sex eyes.

Still, several fans defended Jenners Elle Russia cover, with one writing, I dont know about the pose, but I love this kind of outfit on her. Its weird and creative without being too much. Also a nice change from her usual extra slim outfit.

Kylie Jenner fans compared her and Kendall Jenners modeling styles

THE 24K COLLECTION IS OFFICIALLY LIVE!!! head over to https://t.co/ObiDG3J5sw before its gone  @kyliecosmetics pic.twitter.com/Eq9uSP7XY6  Kylie Jenner (@KylieJenner) August 10, 2021

Of course, Kylie Jenner isnt the only model in the Kardashian-Jenner family. The most famous model in the bunch is Kendall Jenner, who is well known for her work with nearly every major fashion brand in the industry. Jenner has walked the runway for Victorias Secret and is often seen in campaigns advertising perfume, expensive clothing, and accessories.

In the Reddit thread, some fans compared Kylies modeling to the work that Kendall does, with one fan writing that Kylie might actually be a better model because Kylie has more of a marketable sexy vibe and Kendall seems a lot of awkward and not sexy in a lot of her pics.

Still, some fans claimed that since Kylie has the same expression in every picture, it is proof positive that Kendall is the better model. Ultimately, with modeling being so subjective, every Kardashian-Jenner fan will have their own interpretation of every social media post and magazine cover.

RELATED: Kylie Jenner Fans Are Confused By 1 Swimsuit on Kylie Swims Instagram Page
The Monkees often released bubblegum pop songs; however, they could be musical innovators as well. For example, The Monkees Micky Dolenz said he believes he is the first musician to use a certain instrument on a pop/rock record. He appears to have been the first musician to use the instrument on a song that reached the mainstream.

The Monkees Micky Dolenz had to have this cutting-edge instrument

During an interview with Under the Radar, Dolenz discussed using the Moog synthesizer on The Monkees songs Daily Nightly and Star Collector. I believe I am the first to have used the Moog on a pop/rock record, he said. There had been some recordings before that but I think it was classical music. I just heard about the Moog and saw one and said I gotta have one of those.'

Dolenz gave fans insight into what it was like to use a synthesizer in the 1960s. It was tough to use, Ill be honest, the early synthesizers, he said. First of all, they were monophonic, you could only play one note at a time, which made it tricky to record but it took a heck of a long time to set it up.

RELATED: How The Monkees Peter Tork Felt When the Sex Pistols Covered (Im Not Your) Steppin Stone

Dolenz revealed he used his synthesizer with one of the most famous musicians of the 1960s. I had it in my studio and, one of my claims to fame, I dont like it drop names, but one night John Lennon sat on the Moog synthesizer in my studio and made flying saucer sounds all night long, Dolenz recalled.

How Micky Dolenz was ahead of the curve

Was Dolenz the first musician to use the Moog synthesizer on a pop/rock record? The A.V. Club says Daily Nightly was the first rock song to use the Moog synthesizer that reached a wide audience because The Monkees performed it on their show. Dolenz was definitely ahead of the curve. Other bands like The Beatles, The Doors, and The Byrds embraced the Moog synthesizer after The Monkees did.

RELATED: What Linda Ronstadts Different Drum Sounded Like When It Was Going to Be a Monkees Song

How the world reacted to The Monkees Daily Nightly

Daily Nightly was included on the Prefab Fours album Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn, And Jones Ltd. Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn, And Jones Ltd. reached No. 1 on the Billboard 200, staying on the chart for 64 weeks. Daily Nightly was not a single, so it didnt chart on the Billboard Hot 100.

RELATED: The Monkees: Mike Nesmith Was Speechless When He Heard John Lennons Tape of Jimi Hendrix Playing This Song

Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn, And Jones Ltd. was a hit in the United Kingdom as well. The Official Charts Company reports the album reached No. 5 in the U.K., staying on the chart for 11 weeks. Daily Nightly wasnt a single, but it found its way into a lot of consumers hands. While the song was not a hit, it remains a footnote in the history of the Moog synthesizer becoming a popular instrument in mainstream music.
Born into a cult and raised by bohemians, award-winning actor Joaquin Phoenix became a vegetarian at a very young age. As ex-pat kids, he and his siblings supplemented the family income by busking in the streets of foreign countries while their parents panhandled and preached on behalf of the cult.

River Phoenix | George Rose/Getty Images

Today, Joaquin and his partner are dedicated vegans. Did his now-deceased brother, River Phoenix, share Joaquins enthusiasm for veganism? Heres what we know:

A tale of two brothers (and a couple of sisters)

River Jude Bottom was born in Madras, Oregon on August 23, 1970. According to his parents, Arlyn and John Lee Bottom, their eldest child was named for the river of life in Herman Hesses enlightening 1922 novel, Siddhartha.

By the time River was two years old, his mom and dad had joined the Children of God religious cult, moved the family to Texas, and presented the youngster with a baby sister they named Rain Joan of Arc.

The itinerant hippie family was living in Puerto Rico when Joaquin Rafael joined the Bottom clan on October 28, 1974. Two years later, their younger sister Libertad Liberty Mariposa was born in Caracas, Venezuela.

Shortly thereafter, the family boarded a cargo ship to Miami in an effort to flee the Children of God cult. It was aboard that boat that River and Joaquin became vegetarians, explains Mens Health.

The Phoenix family went vegan rather suddenly

Right around the time Joker premiered in 2019, Joaquin sat for an interview with Vanity Fair, during which he explained the traumatic shipboard experience that inspired his sudden and everlasting distaste for dining upon animal flesh. It was Joaquins third birthday, River was almost eight, and the Bottom family was traveling on an oceangoing freighter from Venezuela to Florida.

Among the onboard cargo was a container of Tonka toys, and one of the ships crew gifted the birthday boy with a small toy truck. Another crew member baked a cake which Joaquin vividly remembers because it was the first birthday cake hed ever seen.

After enjoying a makeshift birthday party, Joaquin, his sister, Rain, and his older brother, River made their way to the deck to watch the flying fish that are common to that part of the Atlantic. Soon, they noticed a nearby fishing boat.

The kids observed the fishermen reeling in their catch which they plucked from the rods and violently bashed to death. It was that sight, and the sudden realization that the meals hed grown up with came from living creatures, that caused Joaquin to burst into tears and yell at his mom:

I have a vivid memory of my moms face. I have seen that same face maybe one other time, where she was completely speechless because we yelled at her. How come you didnt tell us thats what fish was? I remember tears streaming down her face. She didnt know what to say.

Settling for a while in Winter Park, Florida, the family changed their surname to Phoenix and swore off animals forever. The youngest sibling, Summer Joy, was born in 1979 after which the newly-named Phoenix clan made their way to Hollywood, California where they reinvented themselves as animal rights activists and television actors.

Mom Arlyn, who now goes by the name Heart, got the kids an agent with the stipulation that due to their solid vegetarianism, neither River nor Joaquin would audition for McDonalds ads, according to AreTheyVegan.

In 1982, both River and Joaquin, who was going by the stage name Leaf, landed parts on the TV series, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. The series lasted only one season but paved the way for bigger acting jobs, explains Biography.

Major movies and a meatless way of life

Many movies ensued, and Joaquin and his late brother, River, still hold the record for being the only sibling pair to ever be nominated for identical acting Oscars. River was nominated for Best Supporting Actor for his part in the 1988 movie, Running on Empty, and Joaquin received the same nomination for Gladiator in 2000.

Like his brother, he did not win his first Oscar nod but did get two more Best Actor nominations, for Walk the Line in 2006 and The Master in 2013. Unlike his brother River, Joaquin finally did win the Academy Award for Best Actor for his leading role in Joker, explains The Things. River Phoenix was still a vegetarian when he died of an overdose on a Hollywood sidewalk before ever taking an Oscar home.

In 2020, Phoenix and his fiance, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo actor, Rooney Mara, welcomed a son and named him River in honor of his late uncle. Aside from parental duties, the pair share a deep dedication to the vegan lifestyle.

Before baby River was born, the couple marched in a National Animal Rights Day demonstration during which they and other parade participants carried dead animals in their arms, says Page Six. Phoenix says he wont force veganism on River, but he and Mara also wont perpetuate the lie that farm animals are happy on their way to becoming hamburgers.

Im not going to indoctrinate him with the idea that McDonalds have a Happy Meal because theres nothing f happy about that meal.

RELATED: Why Did Oscar-Nominated Joker Star Joaquin Phoenix Get Arrested?
In this Sept. 13, 2018, photo, Melissa Boerst, a Lithium Nevada Corp. geologist, points to an area of future exploration from a drill site at the Thacker Pass Project in Humboldt County. A federal judge has denied tribal leaders' bid to temporarily block digging for an archaeological study required before construction can begin for a Nevada lithium mine on what they say is sacred land where their ancestors were massacred more than century ago. U.S. District Judge Miranda Du refused three tribes' request for a preliminary injunction blocking the trenching planned to collect samples near the Oregon line at the site of the largest known lithium deposit in the United States.
2 elderly pastors imprisoned for their faith in Eritrea

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Two elderly pastors are being held in Eritreas maximum-security interrogation center as one of the worlds most repressive and closed countries continues to persecute Christians.

Pastor Girmay Araya, 75, and Pastor Samuel Okbamichael, 74, were taken from their homes in the middle of the night and brought to an unknown location, the news agency Church in Chains reported, according to the U.S.-based persecution watchdog International Christian Concern. It later emerged that the two pastors were taken to the maximum-security Wengel Mermera Central Criminal Investigation interrogation centre 

Police intended to also arrest 72-year-old Pastor Georgio Gebreab but they found him sick in bed and told him he was under house arrest until he is well enough to be taken into custody.

When arrested, Eritreas persecuted Christians often disappear without a trace, leaving their loved ones with no information on their whereabouts or safety. Prison conditions are some of the harshest in the world, with inmates kept in shipping containers and believers often tortured in an attempt to get them to renounce their faith.

Eritreas President Isaias Afewerki is a member of the Eritrean Orthodox Church in Asmara  belonging to the largest among the only three Christian denominations allowed to function in the country: the Eritrean Orthodox, Roman Catholic and Lutheran churches.

Afewerki, 75, whos the leader of the ruling Peoples Front for Democracy and Justice Party, also has a reputation of being an alcoholic and a ruthless autocrat. Afewerkis policy of restrictions is more about his fear that religion will mobilize people as a political force than religion itself.

In March, authorities raided two separate prayer meetings in Asmara and the city of Assab and imprisoned 13 of the 35 Christians, including several women, who were taken into custody, ICC reported at the time.

Its not known if the 13 Christians have been released.

In February, 70 Christians from evangelical and Orthodox backgrounds, including women, were released from three prisons in Eritrea, some after being held without charge for more than a decade.

Since last September, at least 160 Christians had been released from prisons in Eritrea at the time, but the news arrests dampened hopes that the government was easing its harsh repressive policy against Christians, Barnabas Fund said at the time.

In Eritrea, citizens have a duty to report anything untoward happening in their community, Release International added. This can turn ordinary neighbors into spies. In some cases, their own family members have reported Christians.
Chaplain who ministered to hundreds of families at ground zero reflects on God's faithfulness

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Twenty years after the events of Sept. 11, 2001, a Navy chaplain who ministered to hundreds of grieving families at ground zero has shared the incredible ways God showed up amid tragedy and provided comfort to those suffering.

Jim Jenkins, who was a Navy chaplain serving with the Coast Guard as part of the Chaplains Emergency Response Team, traveled to ground zero mere days after al-Qaeda affiliated terrorists hijacked four commercial jetliners and flew them into the twin towers of the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, killing nearly 3,000 people.

What Jenkins saw when he arrived at the wreckage of the towers will forever be engrained in his memory.

The only way I could describe it is, I saw footage of Berlin after the bombing. It looked like that as far as your eye could see. The TV couldn't give you a sense of the scope of the massive debris field, he told The Christian Post. It was so intense, so sobering.

The Lord had the appointments made for me already, who I was going to talk to, who was going to walk up to me, and what I was supposed to say. I got there right when I needed to, and not a moment before.

The following two weeks were a blur for Jenkins. For the first part of the day, he and his team would minister to the rescue and recovery workers at ground zero, the smell of burnt flesh lingering in the air.

For the first three hours of the day we were actually at the pile where they were looking for bodies, he recalled.

The second part of the day, Jenkins comforted those at a makeshift morgue: It looked like a MASH hospital attached to the medical examiner's office, he said. It was full of refrigerated trucks with body parts in it. They were trying to identify people.

But the most emotionally, spiritually and mentally taxing part of his day were the evenings when he would accompany grieving families to ground zero. He stood by, praying for people as they watched their loved ones move from the rubble to the stretcher.

I talked a lot about the promises of God and of the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, Jenkins reflected. I really felt that, when I was ministering to people, they werent seeing my face. I believe they were seeing the face of God and experiencing His favor.

When he thinks about his time serving at ground zero, Jenkins said he can see Gods hand in nearly every circumstance. He shared the "incredible" way then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani personally comforted first responders, chaplains and grieving families.

Giuliani came over to me, grabbed both my hands and stared at my face for a moment. Thank you for coming here to be with us," he said. It meant so much to see him right there, grieving with us.

In another instance, a man named Cleveland knelt on the Staten Island Ferry and asked him to pray amid a bomb threat.

One of his most vivid memories, however, is how a German Shepherd rescue dog comforted him as he sat on the ground one afternoon, exhausted and emotionally spent from the wreckage around him.

He came over and he put his head in my lap, he said. I looked up at the dog, and the dam broke. I finally just cried for the first time since Id gotten to ground zero. It was this incredible cathartic moment. The Lord took care of me right when I needed it.

Through a series of unlikely events, Jenkins would connect with the dogs owners years later.

After returning home, Jenkins struggled to cope with what hed seen at ground zero. He developed a precancerous condition of his sinuses and esophagus due to breathing in toxic chemicals. He was diagnosed with PTSD and to this day has recurring nightmares that his hands wont work as he tries to retrieve bodies from the rubble.

But even in his darkest moments, Jenkins said he feels the hand of God comforting him, telling him that He is present in even the bleakest of circumstances.

Something happens when you pray, when you cry out to God with groanings too deep for words, he said. Wherever we are, the Lord will meet us right in the midst of our brokenness.

Jenkins shares his story in his book, From Rubble to Redemption: A Ground Zero Chaplain Remembers. In his 2014 book, Fatal Drift: Is the Church Losing its Anchor?, he challenges the Church to remain steadfast in the face of obstacles.

He noted that tragedies present a unique opportunity for the Church. Like 9/11, in the midst of a pandemic, many people are asking, Where is God in the middle of this?

I can tell you firsthand that God is here, he emphasized. I'm encouraging believers to remember that. Jesus helped me in my rubble. He helped me when I was afraid. This is an unusual, open door for the Church to be forthright about who the Lord is and what He can do.

In the years following Sept. 11, 2001, numerous first responders, survivors and pastors have shared stories of how God proved Himself faithful amid tragedy.

Recently, Mickey Stonier, who serves as an executive pastor at the Rock Church in California, and a fire chaplain, revealed how his time as a first responder at ground zero taught him the true meaning of servanthood.

When you are there at Ground Zero, knowing the world has completely changed, the only posture you can take is that of a servant, he said in an interview with Rock Church writer Susanna Fleming. That is what a pastor or a chaplain really is at the end of the day  a servant. You feel so humbled that you are the one who gets to be there for those who are going through this horrific, life-changing experience, and all you can do is just serve them.

I have come to realize that a lot of people I work with on a weekly basis are having a 9/11 experience in their lives. It might not be on the news, but it is a traumatic moment in which their world is crumbling down around them. In those moments, I know what to do. I know I get to serve.

In an increasingly polarized society, Stonier issued a call for unity, urging believers not to forget their shared humanity in Christ.

From 9/11 to early October, our country pulled together and was very unified because of what had happened. Then we started to get into the blame faze and started to fragment again. The world has been through so much trauma this year, and polarization has caused us to forget to honor one another. But as Christians, we are called to serve and love another, no matter our different backgrounds.
Here's why members of Congress are exempt from Biden's vaccine mandate

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President Joe Bidens executive orders requiring federal employees, contractors and private employers with more than 100 workers to mandate vaccinations or weekly testing for COVID-19 exempts members of Congress, federal judges and their staffers.

In the coming weeks, the Labor Departments Occupational Safety and Health Administration plans to issue an emergency temporary standard implementing the new requirement.

According to the order, businesses can face fines of up to $14,000 if they do not comply.

Because the president's executive order for federal workers and contractors only applies to the executive branch, those who work under the legislative and judicial branches of the federal government are not included.

In an executive order signed Thursday, Biden wrote: It is the policy of my Administration to halt the spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), including the B.1.617.2 (Delta) variant, by relying on the best available data and science-based public health measures.

It continued: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) within the Department of Health and Human Services has determined that the best way to slow the spread of COVID-19 and to prevent infection by the Delta variant or other variants is to be vaccinated.

The order added that for the health and safety of the federal workforce and the efficiency of the civil service, it is necessary to require COVID-19 vaccination for all Federal employees, subject to such exceptions as required by law.

In another executive order, also signed this week, Biden wrote: My message to unvaccinated Americans is this, what more is there to wait for? What more do you need to see? Weve made vaccinations free, safe and convenient. The vaccine is FDA-approved. Over 200 million Americans have gotten at least one shot. Weve been patient, but our patience is wearing thin.

Biden added:  The Department of Labor is developing an emergency rule to require all employers with 100 or more employees, that together employ over 80 million workers, to ensure their workforces are fully vaccinated or show a negative test at least once a week.

Employers understandably have concerns about compliance and enforcement, The Wall Street Journal wrote in an editorial. Are they supposed to pay for unvaccinated workers weekly testing, and what kind of proof of testing or vaccination must they require? Will franchisees and corporations be liable as joint employers? Nobody knows.

It also noted that OSHA has never mandated vaccinations.

Mr. Bidens logic is also contradictory. In his speech he stressed that the vaccinated are safe from serious Covid. Yet he said the unvaccinated must protect the vaccinated, they added.

Last month, when Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., was asked about requiring members of Congress to be vaccinated, she responded, We cannot require someone to be vaccinated. Its just not what we can do, Forbes noted.

The vaccination status of members of Congress, she added, is a matter of privacy.

Days earlier, however, 20 members of the House sent a letter to Dr. Brian Monahan, who serves as the attending physician, asking him to mandate vaccinations for members of Congress and their staff or to require COVID-19 testing on a twice-weekly basis.

Responding to Bidens mandate, Guy T. Williams, chief executive of Gulf Coast Bank & Trust in Louisiana, told the Journal, I dont think he has the constitutional authority. Does the president of the United States get to dictate vaccinations?

Similarly, Jeremy Boreing, the co-founder and co-CEO of The Daily Wire, announced on Thursday evening that the media outlet, which has over 100 employees, is preparing to fight Bidens vaccine mandate.

I just got off the phone with our lawyers and I just want to reiterate something that I already said today on Twitter: No, Boreing said. The Daily Wire does have more than 100 employees, but we wont be enforcing Joe Bidens unconstitutional and tyrannical vaccine mandate. Thats it, well use every tool at our disposal, including legal action to resist.

Boreing stressed that the company is not anti-vaccine, but is opposed to Bidens mandate, which it deems as unconstitutional.

Research by the National Academy for State Health Policy shows that Montana is the only state that has banned private employers from mandating coronavirus vaccinations for their workers.

Other Republican-led states might also fight the federal vaccine mandate, as several governors and members of Congress have also denounced Biden's plans.

I will pursue every legal option available to the state of Georgia to stop this blatantly unlawful overreach by the Biden administration, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp tweeted.

Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts also responded, saying: This plan isnt about public health  this is about government control and taking away personal liberties. Americans, not the federal government, are responsible for taking charge of their personal health.

While the number of COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations have been rising in many states, a CDC study shows 74% of people infected in Massachusetts COVID-19 outbreak were fully vaccinated and four of those who were vaccinated were admitted to a hospital.

Last month, officials in Israel said that of the countrys 650 new daily COVID-19 cases, more than half were among the fully vaccinated.

Researchers from Maccabi Healthcare and Tel Aviv University in Israel recently found that natural immunity affords longer-lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease, and hospitalization due to the Delta variant.

This is the largest real-world observational study comparing natural immunity, gained through previous SARS-CoV-2 infection, to vaccine-induced immunity, afforded by the BNT162b2 mRNA vaccine, the researchers said.

Other studies have also shown that people who've already contracted the coronavirus will likely have lifetime immunity.
When being pro-life equates to a pink slip

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Well, its happened again.

John Gibson, the CEO of gamemaker Tripwire Interactive, had the audacity to tweet his support for Texas new abortion law and, because in doing so he publicly outed himself as pro-life, was immediately bullied by the leftist mob out of his job.

Never mind that half to (now) over half of American people are pro-life. Never mind that good science backs the truth claim that life begins at conception. Never mind that he and all of us have the right to free speech. As has happened so many times in the past, the preach-tolerance-but-always-be-intolerant left came for Mr. Gibsons livelihood because they disagreed with his belief.

His experience reminds me of Brendan Eich who founded software maker Mozilla, but was forced out of his job as CEO because he dared to make a single contribution to Proposition 8, which was a California amendment that defined marriage as being between one man and one woman.

Regarding Mr. Gibson, the PR arm of Tripwire Interactive issued the predictable press release stating Gibsons comments disregarded the values of our whole team, our partners and much of our broader community. Our leadership team at Tripwire are deeply sorry and are unified in our commitment to take swift action and to foster a more positive environment.

So, is one of Tripwire Interactives corporate values abortion? Can you not be pro-life and work at Tripwire? Evidently not; the company views pro-life as negative versus positive. Like one of Babylon Bees latest headlines read: Democrats Warn Millions Of Lives Could Be Saved If Texas Abortion Ban Goes Into Effect.

My favorite part of these press releases is when the company says (as Tripwire did), they are promoting open dialogue. That is, unless you open your mouth and say something they disagree with.

These situations always stir strong debates over free speech, corporate responsibility, and outright fear over how an individuals personal beliefs can result in the loss of their job. For example, if a person posts a Facebook picture of their participation in a right to life march, are they at risk of losing their position because someone at the company sees their post and charges them with creating a hostile workplace environment because they oppose womens reproductive rights?

This type of situation is far from hypothetical as I found out some time back. A number of years ago, the CEO of a company I was working for called me with some alarming news. One of my executive peers had come to him and was demanding that I be terminated from the company.

The person found some articles Id previously written for The Christian Post offensive and wanted me gone. Fortunately, the company backed my right of free expression and the matter was resolved.

I was one of the lucky ones. Others like Mr. Gibson and Mr. Eich experience injustice and much worse outcomes.

Let me be clear on the fact that I am neither a lawyer nor a human resources expert on this subject. However, I have been a professional in the secular workforce for a few decades, working both in individual contributor and executive positions so I do have some experience in this area.

In my opinion, if a persons personal belief (1) does not directly conflict with the foundational mission of the company; (2) has not been practiced within the organization to such an extent that laws governing the workplace have been broken; (3) has not been continually and abusively promoting their belief to workers within the organization and simply practice it outside of the professional workplace setting, then the person in question should be free from any retaliation if their beliefs conflict with others in the organization.

Our biblical response

Let me suggest two things for Christians to consider when it comes to protecting ourselves in the workplace.

First, it goes without saying that we should do everything possible to reflect the character of Christ in our place of employment. This equates to over-delivering in our jobs, obeying our superiors, respecting everyone, and living out the golden rule.

In addition to being the right way for us to live, it also serves as a protectant when wrongful accusations come our way  something that Peter mentions in his first epistle: Who is there to harm you if you prove zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for the sake of righteousness, you are blessed. And do not fear their intimidation, and do not be troubled, but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence; and keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ will be put to shame (1 Pet. 3:13-16, emphasis mine).

Second, rather than just laying back and trusting in the Lord, we need to understand that a justifiable course of action is respectfully defending ourselves when falsely accused and not allowing ourselves to suffer the loss our opponents intend.

For example, when Paul was about to be beaten by Romans officials because of a riot started by his enemies at Jerusalem, he disarmed the situation by appealing to the prevailing Roman laws: But when they had stretched him out for the whips, Paul said to the centurion who was standing by, Is it lawful for you to flog a man who is a Roman citizen and uncondemned? (Acts 22:25).

Paul appealed to his own government laws, which in his case were being violated at the time, to stop his unfair treatment. It is absolutely proper for us to do the same when we are being attacked.

Last Thought

On an episode of the old sitcom "Gilligans Island," something is causing the men on the island to go bald. Gilligan is first, but hes consoled by the Skipper who tells him things arent so bad. Then the Skipper goes bald. When Gilligan tries the same logic on him, the Skipper tells him, But things have become much worse! When asked why by Gilligan, he says Because now its happened to ME!

Whatever your worldview, I doubt seriously that you want to live in a culture where holding a private belief that does not violate the primary mission of your company or practiced in a way that is illegal can cost you your source of income. It takes wisdom, discernment, integrity and a willingness to push aside personal bias sometimes to uphold and defend this right, but defend it we must.
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We stood at the edge of the Hudson River watching firefighting boats zoom past us. They were headed toward the stretch of coastline nearest to the fires that were raging at the destroyed World Trade Center complex. Although I was emotionally spent and too exhausted to speak, I marveled at the courage of those crews as they rushed toward the terror we had been trying so desperately to escape.

Just a few hours earlier, my husband Brian and I had been standing on our apartment terrace, monitoring the thick black smoke billowing from the North Tower of the World Trade Center, six blocks away, when a passenger jet swooped above our heads and flew straight into the South Tower. The impact lifted us off our feet and blew us back into our apartment, panicking us so much that we galloped down 24 flights of stairs with our 40-pound dog. It wasnt until we hit the street that I realized I was barefoot and wearing my pink knee-length cotton nightgown.

But there was no turning back, and I soon realized no one was going to notice what I was wearing anyway. Hysterical men and women in every kind of attire were rushing directly into traffic, leaping over cement dividers, and dodging cars, ambulances and fire trucks. We ran south, joining thousands seeking the haven of Battery Park. But the crumbling towers had coated the park and everyone in it with waves of ash and dust and yellow gunk, sparking new waves of terror and desperation with every shift of the wind.

Hemmed in by smoke and destruction, as well as the bodies of water that stood as a barrier to an escape route, we felt cut off from the rest of New York City. We crouched on the bank of the Hudson, surrounded by thousands of other injured, traumatized people, who also felt trapped.

I gazed out into the river and recognized the outline of a tugboat moving closer and closer to the shore.

As the tugboat approached, the crew threw ropes over the pedestrian railing to secure it. After loading about 50 people, the tugboat backed up and left.

It will be back, Brian said reassuringly. They saw how many people are standing here. Lets get in line to catch the next one. We joined a queue with others who were also desperately hoping to be rescued.

After a few minutes, we saw another, much bigger boat approaching. It was a NY Waterway, a ferry that travels between New York and New Jersey. And it was coming to get us!

As it pulled up alongside the railing, I became acutely aware this was not a loading zone. We were on a pedestrian walkway secured by a 4-foot-high safety railing, and the deck of the boat was about 7 feet below the top of the seawall, leaving a big gap between the top of the safety railing and the deck of the ferry. I was shocked the captain would even try to board here.

With no ladder or ramp to bridge the gap between the walkway and the deck, two muscular men began helping people over the rail and lowering them into the boat. It was awkward and slow  and definitely did not meet New York Citys stringent safety rules  but it was working.

Brian tossed Gabriel to the outstretched arms of a deckhand in the boat. Then, the guys who were helping to lower people took my forearms and eased me down. Brian climbed over the railing and jumped down onto the deck to join us.

As we made our way to seats on the open-air top deck, I took stock of the other evacuees. There were about 200 on board  office employees, hotel staff, students from Lower Manhattan schools, and mothers holding babies.

Some appeared unscathed, as if they had been nowhere near the chaos. Others were yellow from dust, like us. A few were red from blood. I tried not to stare at a blood-soaked man whose clothes had more gaping holes than intact material. Many people were crying, yet no one was talking.

We collapsed onto a bench, and Brian gathered Gaby onto his lap. It felt so good to sit down.

A wave of relief washed over me as we chugged away from the shore. After three hours of terror, we were off the island. We were alive.

As we sailed away from Manhattan, boats of all shapes and sizes were racing toward it from every direction. I had never seen so many boats sailing through the waterways at once.

When we stepped ashore in New Jersey, I looked back at my beloved city, shrouded now by a massive yellow, white and black cloud. We unloaded quickly, and without a backward glance, our captain and his crew turned the boat around and headed straight back into that massive cloud.

I later learned that Brian and I were two of the approximately 500,000 people rescued by boat that day from the island of Manhattan in a span of about nine hours.

According to a 2014 article in the U.S. Naval Institute News, the Sept. 11 boatlift became the largest sea evacuation in recorded history, surpassing even the Miracle of Dunkirk, the rescue of Allied soldiers from the coast of France during World War II.

Boat owners and operators who participated in the evacuation were answering a plea from the U.S. Coast Guard, which requested volunteers to move people out of Manhattan into safety. About 800 individuals manning 150 boats answered the call, many going back and forth across the harbor all day, dropping off passengers in New Jersey, Brooklyn, Staten Island and upper Manhattan.

Without those maritime heroes, that day would have played out much worse for hundreds of thousands of us.

I believe God put me in that place and time to do His will, said Peter Johansen, former COO of NY Waterways who was a key organizer of the boat evacuation. Peter, a Christian whose son is a pastor in Southeast Pennsylvania, adds, When the Coast Guard sent out the message Calling All Boats, the mariners did as they have always done, rescue those in danger. I wouldnt want to live in a world where that didnt happen.

The selfless acts of those heroes and others who helped Brian and me in the 9/11 aftermath, including a church that provided financial assistance, helped lift us out of the depths of despair. We rededicated ourselves to the Lord shortly after the attacks and started on a faith journey that continues to this day.

On the 20th anniversary of 9/11, we mourn and remember the incredible loss of almost 3,000 lives. But on a day that saw the worst of humanity, we also saw some of the best. Those involved in the maritime rescue represented the best of humanity. And we will never forget them.
Church in Wales to allow pastors to bless same-sex marriages, wont conduct gay weddings

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The Church in Wales, composed of six Anglican dioceses in the United Kingdom, will allow clergy to hold services designed to bless same-sex civil partnerships or marriages. However, the church will not allow clergy to conduct legally binding same-sex marriage ceremonies.

On Monday, the governing body of the Church in Wales passed a bill by more than the necessary two-thirds majority, following a debate at a three-day conference at the International Convention Centre Wales in Newport.

The bishops approved the bill by a unanimous vote, while the clergy voted 28 to 12 in favor with two abstentions. The laity voted 49 to 10 with one abstention.

The bill's passage will remain in effect for five years for a trial period. However, if any church staff prefer not to participate in the blessing ceremonies for same-sex unions, they can choose not to participate.

Church in Wales Senior Bishop Andy John said he knows the decision to honor and bless LGBT couples in blessing ceremonies would receive backlash from those who disagree. However, he finds the passage of the policy to be a development of the Church.

But every development is to some degree a departure; something changes wherever there is a new expression of practice, he said to the crowd at the meeting. And even when such a change appears consonant with a stated position, it is nevertheless a change.

Bishop Gregory Cameron of St Asaph, who introduced the bill, said, the church has spoken decisively today in favour of blessings.

I come out of this debate with no sense of triumph, he said in a statement, but believing that the Church in Wales has done the right thing under God for the LGBTQIA+ community.

Multiple bishops who introduced the bill stated in an explanatory memorandum in August that they believe the legislation will reveal that loving and faithful commitment is worthy of acceptance by the Church by asking Gods blessing upon their commitment.

The memorandum also acknowledges that the decision would be controversial, but also a step on the way towards repentance of a history in the Church which has demonised and persecuted gay and lesbian people, forcing them into fear, dishonesty and sometimes even hypocrisy, preventing them from publicly living lives of committed partnership.

The Evangelical Fellowship in the Church of Wales expressed disappointment in the passing of the bill.

For many in EFCW, this decision will come with a sense of sadness that the Church in Wales has decided to depart from a traditional understanding of marriage, and with great uncertainty about how to move forward in good conscience, a statement on the EFCW Facebook page reads.

The EFCW executive welcomes any comments that the membership would like to be considered at [a Sept. 20] meeting. It will enable us to ensure that we are properly taking into account the breadth of concerns of the membership.

Before the vote, Bishop John reportedly made an announcement in which he compared the passing of the legislation to other changes in the Churchs history.

When the Church changed its position on forbidding meat with blood in it, or saw that slavery in all and any form was wicked, there was change, he said during the Monday meeting. Mission always lies at the heart of faith.  And being alive to God, to what might happen next, is part of remaining curious and open to new opportunity.

A priest in training for the Church in Wales, Ruth Eleri James, is in a same-sex relationship with her partner, Hannah, a lay member of the governing body.

She told BBC news the final vote is important to her and prays for the day when they can have the sacrament of marriage in a church.

"It will reflect the real love and welcome that we have personally experienced in our local churches, who we know long to be able to offer something to couples who are in same-sex relationships, she was quoted as saying. But it's also important because this is a message to LGBTQ folk in society at large to say their relationships are loved and blessed by God, and that's a message that hasn't been given, certainly in my lifetime, and I long to be able to share that with people.
Congregants accuse elders of forcing out pastor who they say wanted to stay in pulpit until his last breath

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Congregants at Calvary Chapel Melbourne in Florida are upset and asking questions after elders at the multi-campus megachurch announced that Mark Balmer, their founder and senior pastor for some three decades, would no longer be leading the church. Several church members expressed the belief that they were certain Balmer would have preferred to stand in the pulpit until his last breath.

Ecclesiastes tells us, There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under the heavens. Although we are sure Pastor Mark would want to stand in the pulpit until his last breath, the elders with support of senior leadership, believe it is time for Pastor Mark to pass the baton, the elders said in a statement published on Facebook last Sunday. The same statement was delivered by the elders during a service a day earlier where Balmer, 77, was noticeably absent.

We have been in discussion with Pastor Mark for the past two years, and although this decision was not easy to make, we believe it is the right time. Per this announcement, Pastor Mark will no longer be serving as senior pastor and head elder, however, he will retain the title of founding pastor/pastor emeritus, the elders added in the statement.

The elders said the decision to retire Balmer was not inspired by any moral failure or any financial impropriety. They further noted that they encouraged Balmer to enjoy a long-deserved sabbatical after which we are in prayer with him as to the best utilization of his gifts to further serve our fellowship and the Body of Christ.

A woman who said she attended the second service at Calvary Chapel Melbourne with her husband noted in a response on Facebook that she was disappointed by the way Balmers retirement was handled.

What I witnessed on Sunday was at best very disappointing. I was continuously praying for the Holy Spirit to help me process the information shared by the elders. The information provided was nothing short of a well-written, sugar-coated series of words which said nothing and meant nothing. No reason whatsoever was provided and we were simply asked to go along with it because the elders had prayed about it for two years, she wrote.

She further expressed doubt that the elders were "unanimous" in their decision to transition the pastor.

Another commenter said when she first heard the statement from the elders on Saturday, she congratulated Balmer on social media. But after reading the published statement on Sunday, she had a change of heart.

How disrespectful to make an announcement of such weight without Pastor Mark being present. That's not Pastor Mark's way of taking a break ... At this point, I am in wait-and-see what Pastor Mark has to say. I believe he will speak openly to us when he has gathered his emotions and spent more time with God for guidance. Until then, many prayers for Pastor Mark and Lynda, she wrote.

Other church members also expressed their disappointment with Balmers abrupt retirement. One raised concerns that the move by the elders had divided the congregation.

Im sad to say Pastor Mark Balmer has been forced out at Calvary Chapel of Melbourne," the member wrote on Facebook, adding that the situation is "disappointing" and "beyond sad."

In their statement Sunday, the elders said Balmer started Calvary Chapel Melbourne nearly 30 years ago while serving as an elder at Calvary Chapel Merritt Island and full-time director of pharmacy at Wuesthoff Hospital.

He eventually retired from his secular job to devote himself to the church. Under his leadership, it grew to become the largest multisite church in Brevard County.

A report in Florida Today said prior to the pandemic, the church and its campuses in West Melbourne, Sebastian and Viera attracted at least 10,000 people to weekly services.

Bill Beck, the church administrator for Calvary Chapel Melbourne, told the publication that even though Balmers retirement had been under discussion for years and a transition plan had been created, he declined to discuss it as time went on.

It became increasingly obvious that he didnt want to talk about it," Beck said. "The elders wanted to have that conversation. The elders came to the unanimous decision that he needed to step down. Theres just no good way to do it. We love Pastor Mark, we honor him. But it is the elders job to hold church leadership accountable and to do what's best for the church.
Americans split on Texas heartbeat abortion law: poll

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About a week after a Texas pro-life law went into effect, a new poll reveals that Americans are split in their opinions about the measure, reflecting the partisan divides that have come to define American politics.

A poll released by Rasmussen Reports Tuesday found that a plurality of likely voters (46%) approve of the Texas Heartbeat Act, which went into effect last Wednesday. Forty-three percent of respondents disapprove of the law while 11% told the pollster they were not sure what they thought of the law.

Broken down by partisan affiliation, 70% of Republicans support the Texas law. In comparison, approval of the law was measured at just 23% among Democrats and 44% among voters not affiliated with either major political party. Demographic groups most supportive of the law included men (51%), racial minorities other than black voters (54%) and those between the ages of 40 and 64.

Meanwhile, the Texas law registered the lowest approval ratings from women (41%), black voters (36%), white voters (45%), voters with incomes above $200,000 a year and those with graduate degrees.

Signed into law by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in May, Senate Bill 8, also known as the Texas Heartbeat Act, bans abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected, usually around six weeks gestation. The law also allows private citizens to sue individuals who perform abortions and those who help women obtain illegal abortions.

The U.S. Supreme Court allowed the law to go into effect, rejecting pleas by abortion providers to block it. Litigation against the law is expected to continue in the lower courts.

The Rasmussen poll also asked respondents if they thought that abortion laws should be determined by state governments or by the federal government. Forty-six percent of likely voters believe that state governments should determine abortion laws, 34% want abortion laws determined at the federal level and the remaining 20% are not sure.

Among Republicans, support for deciding abortion laws at the state level stands at 64%. Much lower percentages of Democrats (31%) and unaffiliated voters (44%) believe that the responsibility for determining abortion laws should lie with the states.

While a plurality of likely voters support SB 8, 46% of respondents expressed support for President Joe Bidens vow to launch a whole-of-government effort  to ensure that women in Texas have access to safe and legal abortions. Democrats demonstrated the highest level of support for the presidents push to combat the abortion law (74%) while 19% of Republicans and 44% of unaffiliated voters backed Bidens effort.

The Rasmussen poll surveyed 1,000 likely voters between Sept. 5-6 and had a margin of error of +/- 3 percentage points.

Over time, public opinion polling has painted conflicting pictures about Americans views on abortion. According to a survey from Pew Research Center, 59% of Americans think abortion should be legal in all or most cases and 39% want the killing of preborn babies to be illegal in all or most cases.

Data collected by Pew between 1995 and 2021 found that support for abortion in all or most cases reached a high of 61% in 2019, but has since dwindled back down a little bit. Support for abortion in all or most cases reached a low of 47% in 2009 as opposition to abortion in all or most cases reached a high of 44%.

Polling conducted by Gallup has indicated momentum for the pro-life movement in recent years. While most Americans (56%) identified as pro-choice in 1995, that majority was reduced to a plurality by 2017.

In 2019, for the first time since Gallup began asking voters whether they identified as pro-life or pro-choice, more Americans identified as pro-life (49%) than pro-choice (48%). By 2021, the share of Americans who identified as pro-choice had increased to 49% while 48% identified as pro-life.

Abortion has been legal in all 50 U.S. states since the 1973 Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade, which has prevented states from restricting abortions before the point of viability. While the Supreme Court did not explicitly rule on the constitutionality of SB 8, the most restrictive abortion law allowed to take effect in the country, it has announced that it will issue a ruling on Mississippis 15-week abortion ban.

A ruling in favor of the state of Mississippi, which is asking the justices to uphold the law, would significantly weaken the precedent set by Roe v. Wade. Pro-life activists believe that such a decision would pave the way for more states to follow Mississippis lead and enable the Supreme Court to hear other cases challenging other pro-life legislation passed at the state level.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP)  Technology companies that led the charge into remote work as the pandemic unfurled are confronting a new challenge: how, when and even whether they should bring long-isolated employees back to offices that have been designed for teamwork.

I thought this period of remote work would be the most challenging year-and-half of my career, but its not, said Brent Hyder, the chief people officer for business software maker Salesforce and its roughly 65,000 employees worldwide. Getting everything started back up the way it needs to be is proving to be even more difficult.

That transition has been complicated by the rapid spread of the delta variant, which has scrambled the plans many tech companies had for bringing back most of their workers near or after Labor Day weekend. Microsoft has pushed those dates back to October while Apple, Google, Facebook, Amazon and a growing list of others have already decided wait until next year.

Given how they set the tone for remote work, tech companies return-to-office policies will likely have ripple effects across other industries. Employers next steps could redefine how and where people work, predicts Laura Boudreau, a Columbia University assistant economics professor who studies workplace issues.

We have moved beyond the theme of remote work being a temporary thing, Boudreau says. The longer the pandemic has stretched on, she says, the harder its become to tell employees to come back to the office, particularly full time.

Because they typically revolve around digital and online products, most tech jobs are tailor made for remote work. Yet most major tech companies insist that their employees should be ready to work in the office two or three days each week after the pandemic is over.

The main reason: Tech companies have long believed that employees clustered together in a physical space will swap ideas and spawn innovations that probably wouldnt have happened in isolation. Thats one reason tech titans have poured billions of dollars into corporate campuses interspersed with alluring common areas meant to lure employees out of their cubicles and into casual collisions that turn into brainstorming sessions.

But the concept of water cooler innovation may be overblown, says Christy Lake, chief people officer for business software maker Twilio.

There is no data that supports that really happens in real life, and yet we all subscribe to it, Lake says. You cant put the genie back in the bottle and tell people, Oh you have to be back in the office or innovation wont happen. 

Twilio isnt bringing back most of its roughly 6,300 employees back to its offices until early next year at the earliest, and plans to allow most of them to figure how frequently they should come in.

This hybrid approach permitting employees to toggle between remote and in-office work has been widely embraced in the technology industry, particularly among the largest companies with the biggest payrolls.

Nearly two-thirds of the more than 200 companies responding to a mid-July survey in the tech-centric Bay Area said they are expecting their workers to come into the office two or three days each week. Before the pandemic, 70% of these employers required their workers to be in the office, according to the Bay Area Council, a business policy group that commissioned the poll.

Even Zoom, the Silicon Valley videoconferencing service that saw its revenue and stock price soar during the pandemic, says most of its employees still prefer to come into the office part of the time. There isnt a one-size-fits-all approach to returning to the office, Kelly Steckelberg, Zooms chief financial officer, recently wrote in a blog post.

But the biggest tech companies, which have profited even more than Zoom as the pandemic that made their products indispensable for many workers, arent giving employees much choice in the matter. Apple, Google, Amazon, and Microsoft have made it clear that they want most of their workers together at least a few days each week to maintain their culture and pace of innovation.

That well-worn creed sounds like backward thinking to Ed Zitron, who runs a public relations firm representing technology companies  and which has been fully remote since it launched in 2012.

The only reason to have an office, he says, is to satisfy managers with vested interests in grouping people together so that they can look at them and feel good about the people that they own ... so that they can enjoy that power.

Switching to hybrid work is ideal for people like Kelly Soderlund, a mother of two young children who works in offices in San Francisco and Palo Alto, California, for travel management company TripActions, which has about 1,200 employees worldwide. She couldnt wait to return when the company partially reopened its offices in June, partly because she missed the built-in buffer that her roughly one-hour commute provided between her personal and professional life.

When I dont have that, I wake up in the morning, I start doing work and I take my kids to their camp or their daycare, Soderlund says. And then I come back and I work and then we pick them up, make dinner and then I go back to work. So, it feels like its just work all the time.

Soderlund believes being together in an office leads to more collaboration, although she also learned from the pandemic that workers dont need to be there every day for teamwork to happen.

Camaraderie and the need to separate work from home are among the top reasons employees at business software maker Adobe cite for coming back to the office, said Gloria Chen, chief people officer for one of Silicon Valleys older companies. Working from home is here to stay, but we also continue to value people coming together, she said.

The transition from the pandemic should enable smaller tech companies to adopt more flexible work-from-home policies that may help them lure away top-notch engineers from other firms more insistent on having people in the office, says Boudreau, the Columbia University scholar.

Labor markets are relatively tight now, so employees have more bargaining chips than they have had in a while, Boudreau says.

Ankur Dahiya, who launched his software startup RunX last year during the pandemic lockdowns, believes that remote work has helped him hire employees that otherwise may not have been candidates. The eight-worker startup rents a San Francisco office one day a week so Dahiya can meet with employees who live nearby, but other employees are in Canada, Nevada, and Oregon. The workers living outside of California have been flying in once every three months for super productive meetings and brainstorming, says Dahiya, who has previously worked at Facebook and Twitter.

Ive worked in offices for the last 10 years and I know theres just so much time lost, Dahiya says, recalling all the random conversations, lengthy meetings, aimless wandering, and other disruptions that seem to occur in those settings.

Twilios Lake is hoping the remote-work experience will transform employee behavior in the office, too, once they come back. She hopes that the remote experience will have given employees a chance to better understand how their teams work.

I think more than anything it is going to cause us to become more intentional about when, why and how we come together, she says.

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An earlier version of this story incorrectly referred to the name of the software company Adobe

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Follow AP coverage of how the coronavirus pandemic is transforming the economy at: https://apnews.com/hub/changing-economy
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Bennifer 2.0 is coming to Austin, y'all. According to TMZ, Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez have rented "a luxury condo" in the Capital City, where Affleck is slated to film the new Robert Rodriguez movie.

The elder Affleck will be in Texas to shoot Hypnotic, the latest film from Austin-based Rodriguez. Filming is scheduled to begin September 20 on the flick. "The action thriller will follow a detective who becomes entangled in a mystery involving his missing daughter and a secret government program while investigating a string of high-end crimes," writes Deadline of what seems to be the Ben Affleck-iest Ben Affleck movie plot ever.
Marcey Phillips was in high school when she gave birth to her eldest son about nine months before a shaken world witnessed the start of the two-decade War on Terror.

Perpetrated by the terrorist network al-Qaida, as supported by the Taliban government, the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the U.S. pushed Phillips to enlist in the military. A 39-year-old Conroe resident and Iraq War veteran, Phillips has been left disconcerted by the handling of last months withdrawl of American forces from Afghanistan.

I understand that at some point you have to say, Lets go home. I just feel like there has to be a plan. A better plan could have been in place then that plan, Phillips said of the seemingly hasty exit by the U.S. I would have that distrust in leadership that they were going to do right by me if I was still in, if I was still deployable.

NEVER FORGET: What 9/11 meant for Houston's Afghan Americans

Duty bound

Growing up in East Bernard, about a 90-minute drive southwest from Conroe, Marcey Walters knew she wanted to take up the family tradition of joining the U.S. Army.

Her father and her paternal grandfather served during the Vietnam War and in World War II, respectively. Her maternal grandfather was in the U.S. Navy during World War II and his father, her great-grandfather, was an Army man in World War I.

Marcey connected with her dads father, who died when she was only 2, by reading over his correspondence with family and over a journal he kept.

All of his letters home were so upbeat and positive, but then he had his little diary that he carried with him like a little pocket (notebook)  and on the same date, he would be talking about how terrible things were, she said. I just thought it was so neat that he had so much compassion for his family to keep things positive for them so that they didnt worry about him.

An unexpected pregnancy forced a teenaged Marcey to put off her plans as the military, she explained, required her child to be at least 2 years old before she could enlist.

Watching America burn on 9/11, the new mom was emboldened to follow in her forebears soldierly tracks.

In my heart, I knew that was a direction that I wanted to go. I just didnt know my timeline and whenever (the attacks) happened it was like, OK. This is definitely going to happen. Im definitely going to serve, she said.

MORE FROM THE AUTHOR: Ground Zero chaplain from The Woodlands longs for post-9/11 unity

Her dad was worried because the situation reminded him of the leadup to Vietnam and he still remembered how that conflict affected some of his military friends. But seeing how impassioned his daughter was, he gave her no push back.

She signed her enlistment papers in late 2002, fours day after her sons second birthday.

Completing the mission

Phillips one-tour deployment started in 2005 as part of the eight years she would complete with the Texas Army National Guard, where she eventually became a sergeant. Phillips ducked tracer ammunition rounds in Tikrit, Iraq while her unit endured a bevy of attacks in which many of its soldiers were killed.

She moved to Conroe in 2008 with her husband, Scott Phillips, 43, whom she met while the two were in the same unit. Marcey Phillips left the service in part to help her husbands rehabilitation from severe injuries he sustained as a soldier.

Now a mom to two additional boys, Phillips is a junior vice commander at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 4709 in Conroe. She can be seen accompanied by Beignet, a short-legged, black-coated female Labrador retriever, who as an emotional support dog helps Phillips with her PTSD and is trained to detect oncoming seizures.

The events taking shape in Afganistan these past several weeks have spurred concern among many Conroe veterans, she shared.

The final U.S. military flights left Afghanistan at the end of August with the Taliban having retaken full control of the country. A few days before, in the capital city of Kabul, 13 U.S. troops died in an assault orchestrated by the Islamic State through a pair of suicide bombers and a gunman.

Also claiming 60 Afghan lives, the strikes on Aug. 26 made it the deadliest day for American service members since an August 2011 incident in the country. As of Wednesday, the White House reported about 100 U.S. citizens remained in Afghanistan.

For Phillips and other Conroe vets, she said, the pullouts execution has been a debacle jeopardizing the security of Americans and allies.

COVID: Local 4 year old dies after contracting coronavirus

It just goes against the fiber of our being to leave somebody behind and without a plan, without some kind of contingency to do our best by them, she said tearfully. Theyve done their best by us and thats the least that we owe them.

The lack of a clearly definable victory in Afghanistan has Phillips and others at Conroes VFW post concerned former and active-duty military suicide rates will increase in the year to come. Philips said she knows of at least one U.S. Marine in Montgomery County who recently died of suicide.

There was an average 17.2 military veteran suicides a day in 2019, according to the 2021 National Veteran Suicide Prevention Annual Report published by the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs.

Go check on your people. Dont be afraid to ask for help if you need it, has been the message Phillips said the Conroe VFW post has promoted recently, adding Lets work together to take care of each other.

Further obligations

Whatever worries she may have about current military morale, Phillips holds out hope for the familys legacy to continue. Hunter, her 11-year-old, has not shown any inclination. But Stone, her 9-year-old, has voiced interest in being a fifth-generation soldier.

Phillips eldest son will turn 21 in a few months. Jalen Phillips is a student at Lone Star College. He wants to pursue a marketing career and has no desire to join the military, his mom said.

He always says hes seen what weve gone through and doesnt want to go through it, Marcey Phillips said, referring to her husbands multiple surgeries and her PTSD.

Jalen, she said, has told her he primarily remembers his maternal grandparents taking care of him as a kid. Still, one memory she has from 9/11 is seeing the traces of bloodshed on TV and immediately leaving the college campus she was at that morning to pick her baby boy from day care.

I just needed him, she said.

jose.gonzalez@chron.com

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Audrey Diwans 1960s abortion drama LEvenement (Happening) won the Golden Lion at the 78th Venice International Film Festival, while the runner up honor went to Paolo Sorrentinos semi-autobiographical The Hand of God.

Diwan's film about a French college student who finds herself with an unwanted pregnancy was the unanimous choice from the prestigious jury that included recent Oscar winners Bong Joon Ho and Chloe Zhao.

The competition this year was robust, including well-received films like Jane Campions The Power of the Dog, Pedro Almodovars Parallel Mothers, Maggie Gyllenhaals The Lost Daughter and The Hand of God. Twenty-one films were vying for the prize, which has become a promising early indicator of a films Oscars prospects.

I did this movie with anger. I did the movie with desire also. I did it with my belly, my guts, my heart, my head, Diwan said Saturday. I wanted Happening to be an experience.

Diwan is the sixth woman to have directed a Golden Lion winning film. Others include Chloe Zhao (Nomadland), Margarethe Von Trotta (Marianne & Juliane), Agnes Varda (Vagabond), Mira Nair (Monsoon Wedding) and Sofia Coppola (Somewhere).

Sorrentino's The Hand of God, based on a formative personal tragedy, took the Silver while Campion won the Silver Lion for best director for her period epic The Power of her Dog. Its her second time winning a runner-up prize at Venice. Her first was in 1990 for An Angel at My Table, a Janet Frame biopic.

Its amazing to get an award from you people, Campion said, talking to the jury standing beside her. Youve made the bar very, very high for me in cinema, Bong, Chloe.

Penelope Cruz won the Volpi Cup for best actress for her performance as a new mother in Almodovars Parallel Mothers. She thanked her director and frequent collaborator for Inspiring me every day with your search for truth.

You have created magic again and I could not be more grateful or proud to be part of it, Cruz continued. I adore you.

Gyllenhaal won best screenplay for her adaptation of Elena Ferrantes 2008 novel The Lost Daughter, which is both her first screenplay and film as a director.

I cant tell you how thrilled I am to be here, Gyllenhaal said. I was married in Italy, in Puglia. I found out I was pregnant with my second daughter in Italy. And really my life as a director and writer and my film was born here in this theater.

Gyllenhaal said her film is Italian in its bones even though it was shot in Greece and in the English language.

In a way as women we have been born into an agreement to be silent and Ferrante broke that agreement, Gyllenhaal said. I had the same feeling seeing The Piano when I was in high school.

John Arcilla was awarded the Volpi Cup for best actor for On The Job: The Missing 8.

The festival has in the past decade reestablished itself as the preeminent launch pad for awards hopefuls. Zhaos Nomadland won the prize last year and went on to win best picture, best director and best actor at the Oscars. In addition to Zhao and Bong, who served as president, the jury also included actors Sarah Gadon and Cynthia Erivo and directors Saverio Costanzo (My Brilliant Friend) and Alexander Nanau (Collective).

Zhaos trajectory was the second time in four years that the Golden Lion winner has won best picture. Guillermo del Toros The Shape of Water shared a similar path. Venices 2019 winner, Joker, simply went on to get 10 Oscar nods, including one for best picture.

Not winning the top prize at Venice doesnt end an Oscar campaign before it starts, though. Many eventual winners simply premiered at the festival, and not always even in the competition before winning best picture (Birdman and Spotlight) or best director (Damien Chazelle for La La Land, Alfonso Cuaron for Gravity and Roma, del Toro for The Shape of Water and Alejandro G. Inarritu for Birdman).

Some of this year's biggest premieres were not part of the competition, including Ridley Scotts The Last Duel, Denis Villeneuves Dune and Edgar Wrights Last Night in Soho.

In the Horizons section, which spotlights emerging filmmakers, Pilgrims by Laurynas Bareisa won best picture. The actor award went to Piseth Chhun of White Building and actress to Laure Calamy for A plein temps, which also won best director for Eric Gravel.

The awards ceremony brings to a close the first major film festival of the fall season which thus far has appeared to be a resounding success, despite the delta variant. The COVID safety protocols were strict and the films strong.

But Venice also successfully brought the glamour back to a red carpet that may have been less crowded than usual but made up for in viral moments, from a teasingly tender embrace between co-stars Oscar Isaac and Jessica Chastain to the red carpet debut of Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck  although perhaps it should be called a debut redo since the two rekindled a romance that ended 18 years ago.

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Follow AP Film Writer Lindsey Bahr on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ldbahr
(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.)

Julia Raifman, Boston University and Alexandra Skinner, Boston University

(THE CONVERSATION) President Joseph Biden on Sept. 9, 2021, unveiled his revamped strategy to confront the pandemic, outlining an approach that focuses heavily on attempting to reduce the number of unvaccinated Americans.

The new plan comes at a crucial time. The delta variant continues to spread in states across America. The virus is currently taking more than 1,500 lives each day, and new hospital admissionsof children are higher now than at any other point during the pandemic. Concern is especially high in states with low vaccination rates. High transmission is also harming economic recovery as people stay home to avoid the virus.

As such, policies aimed at getting people vaccinated make sense  vaccination is a proven way to protect populations from hospitalizationsand death from coronavirus infection.

To encourage vaccination, the president is mandating that employees at companies with more than 100 workers are either vaccinated or test for the virus every week. His new plan also includes enhanced production of rapid tests and making them available either free to Medicaid recipients or at cost via retailers such as Walmart and Amazon.

As leaders of a team of health policy researchers that track policy responses to COVID-19, we know there is no perfect approach to preventing the virus. It is certainly encouraging that the administration has acknowledged that more needed to be done  and the measures outlined by the president are likely to encourage vaccinations. But we believe they would work better if supplemented by further actions  be it at a federal or state level  that would protect vulnerable people through stronger mask mandates and improved vaccine delivery.

We are also concerned that the headline policy  mandating workplace vaccinations  may have only a limited impact in low-income communities where many workers are independent contractors like gig workers and agricultural workers. Analyses show unvaccinated rates tend to be higher in such communities.

No federal mask policies

Bidens plan would continue to require the use of masks on interstate transit and federal property and doubles the fine for failure to comply. But it fell short of calling for universal mask policies.

This is despite internal documents from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in which scientists made clear that universal masking is essential to reduce transmission.

Stronger mask policies would be especially helpful for immediately reducing the transmission of the delta variant, especially in higher-risk indoor spaces and among children who are not eligible for vaccines. Hospitalizations in the U.S. of children went from record lows to record highs  and climbing  in a span of just four weeks.

Mask mandates can reduce community transmission, allowing more time to intensify vaccine delivery efforts and messaging.

A data-driven approach to mask mandates would supplement the measures Biden has laid out in his path out of the pandemic. Such a policy has been put to good use in Nevada, where mask mandates come into effect in counties with high numbers of infections and are then removed when cases fall below a certain level.

Vaccine mandates may still miss population groups

The administrations plan includes a vaccine mandate for federal employees and health care workers at Medicaid and Medicare serving hospitals. The administration also asked the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to develop a rule that would require these employers to provide paid time off for vaccination and recovery.

While many federal employees, health care workers and higher-income workers are already vaccinated, even modest increases could make a difference, especially in regions with low vaccination rates.

The new vaccine mandates are less likely to reach low-income workers, many of whom are considered independent contractors or who work in small restaurants or other businesses and as such will not be covered.

Research has shown that vaccination rates tend to be lower in lower-income communities. This may be because lower-paid workers are focused on meeting other needs like food, housing and child care for their families, have less time because they are working more than one job or cannot afford unpaid time off work to get a shot.

[Over 100,000 readers rely on The Conversations newsletter to understand the world. Sign up today.]

The delta variant continues to spread rapidly through the U.S. State leaders can play an important role in speeding up vaccine delivery efforts at schools, neighborhoods and workplaces. Efforts that are directed toward low-income communities and workers where vaccination rates remain lowest are more likely to yield greater results. And mask policies could slow the spread of COVID-19 until more adults and children can be vaccinated.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here: https://theconversation.com/bidens-pandemic-plan-overlooks-mask-mandates-and-vulnerable-populations-167667.
LAS CRUCES, N.M. (AP)  A 16-year-old boy has been arrested in connection with a fatal shooting in Las Cruces last weekend.

Las Cruces police said Friday the boy was arrested based on a tip investigators received after releasing surveillance camera photos of a car believed to be near the shooting scene. Authorities believe he's responsible for the Sunday morning shooting of Matthew Portillo.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  California lawmakers moved Friday to extend and streamline an assisted death law, reducing the time until terminal patients can acquire the fatal drugs.

The current minimum 15-day waiting period required between the time patients make separate oral requests for medication would be reduced to 48 hours. The bill would also eliminate a requirement that a patient make a final written attestation within 48 hours of taking the medication.

It became clear that some well-intentioned aspects of the law serve as barriers for terminally ill patients who seek aid in dying, Democratic Assemblyman Jim Wood said.

Plenty of safeguards remain in the bill, he and other proponents said.

The law that took effect in June 2016 had been set to expire in another five years, but the bill would keep it in place until 2031.

More than 2,800 people have received a prescription since the law took effect, Wood said, of which more than 1,800 died from the drugs.

There have been no reported cases or instances of abuse or coercion, he said.

The state Assembly advanced the bill Friday on a 47-14 vote, and the Senate agreed on a 26-8 roll call. That sent it to Gov. Gavin Newsom for his consideration. No lawmakers spoke in opposition.

However, Disability Rights California and the California Catholic Conference opposed the bill, citing inequities in the health care system that harm people with disabilities, the aging, and Black and Latino residents.

The measure can subtly pressure people who fear becoming a financial or emotional burden to their families, the Catholic Conference said.

A bad day should not result in a death sentence, said the disabilities group.

"This bill is not about helping people die. It is about allowing people dignity and reducing suffering at the end of an unwinnable fight, Democratic Assemblywoman Cecilia Aguiar-Curry said.

Earlier this year, New Mexico reduced its waiting period to 48 hours, she said.
LAS VEGAS (AP)  Three construction workers were injured in Las Vegas when lightning struck about five feet from where they were eating lunch.

Las Vegas Fire and Rescue said one worker was taken to a hospital to be checked out but was conscious and talking after the Friday afternoon incident. The other two workers were treated at the scene and released.
NEW CASTLE, Del. (AP)  A New Jersey man was critically wounded Saturday after being shot several times when a late-night fight occurred in a large outdoor crowd in Delaware, police said.

The fight occurred about 1:30 a.m. at an intersection with U.S. Highway 13 near New Castle, Delaware State Police said in a news release.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP)  The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America installed its first openly transgender bishop in a service held in San Francisco's Grace Cathedral on Saturday.

The Rev. Megan Rohrer will lead one of the church's 65 synods, overseeing nearly 200 congregations in Northern California and northern Nevada.

My call is ... to be up to the same messy, loving things I was up to before, Rohrer told worshippers. But mostly, if you'll let me, and I think you will, my hope is to love you and beyond that, to love what you love.

Rohrer was elected in May to serve a six-year term as bishop of the Sierra Pacific Synod after its current bishop announced his retirement.

I step into this role because a diverse community of Lutherans in Northern California and Nevada prayerfully and thoughtfully voted to do a historic thing, Rohrer said in a statement. My installation will celebrate all that is possible when we trust God to shepherd us forward.

Rohrer, who uses the pronoun they," previously served as pastor of Grace Lutheran Church in San Francisco and a chaplain coordinator for the city's police department, and also helped minister to the city's homeless and LGTBQ community. They studied religion at Augustana University in their hometown of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, before moving to California to pursue master and doctoral degrees at the Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley.

Rohrer became one of seven LGBTQ pastors accepted by the progressive Evangelical Lutheran church in 2010 after it allowed ordination of pastors in same-sex relationships. Rohrer is married and has two children.

The church is one of the largest Christian denominations in the United States with about 3.3 million members.

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This story has been updated to correct the name of the church. It is the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, not of America.

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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.
LAWRENCE, Mass. (AP)  The body of a U.S. Marine killed in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan returned home Saturday in a solemn procession through Massachusetts on the 20th anniversary of the attacks that led to America's longest war.

Sgt. Johanny Rosario Pichardo died in the Aug. 26 bombing near the Kabul airport where people were being evacuated amid the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. A dozen other U.S. service members and 169 Afghans were killed as people struggled to get into the airport and on flights out of the country.

Dignitaries including Gov. Charlie Baker, Boston Mayor Kim Janey and U.S. Sen. Edward Markey paid their respects to her family as the body arrived at Bostons Logan International Airport.

In Rosario Pichardo's hometown of Lawrence, people lined highway overpasses and streets waving American flags as the vehicle procession made its way through the city near the New Hampshire state line.

A Marine honor guard carried the flag-draped draped casket into the Farrah Funeral Home as police, firefighters and others stood and saluted.

We will never forget her name, Lawrence Mayor Kendrys Vasquez said afterward. We are proud to have her home.

Francisco Urena, a former state veterans affairs commissioner who has been assisting Rosarios family, said the significance of the fallen soldier coming home on the anniversary of the attack that prompted the war that ultimately cost her life isn't lost on her family.

You have to understand that Johanny was five, a kindergartner 20 years ago. She has lived in a country at war," he said. "She volunteered to serve our country and volunteered to be in that mission.

Saturday represents the true beginning of the the family's grieving, as many recently arrived from Rosario Pichardo's native Dominican Republic and elsewhere, Urena said.

This has been a long time coming for this family. This has been very difficult days, sleepless nights, he said. But the city of Lawrence came together to ensure that this young Marine sergeant and her family are not alone during this time.

The 25-year-old served with the Naval Amphibious Force, Task Force 51/5th Marine Expeditionary Brigade. She and other Marines were killed as they were helping to screen Afghans and others at the gate of the Kabul airport. They were all awarded the Purple Heart last week.

A funeral Mass will be held Monday morning at St. Marys of the Assumption Church for Rosario Pichardos family and other invited guests.

On Tuesday, there will be a public wake at Veterans Memorial Stadium next to Lawrence High School, where Rosario Pichardo graduated. Shell be laid to rest at Bellevue Cemetery in a section reserved for military veterans.
MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP)  Gov. Phil Scott is urging Vermonters to display American flags as a way to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on the United States.

On Friday Scott issued a proclamation urging Vermonters to fly the flags as part of an effort to recapture the spirit of unity Vermonters felt twenty years ago in the aftermath of the attacks.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP)  A state court judge declined Friday to halt enforcement of an Iowa law that prohibits school boards from enacting mask requirements, saying there is no evidence that any school board would immediately impose a mask mandate if the law wasn't in effect.

The ruling came in a lawsuit filed by Frances Parr, a mother of twin boys from Council Bluffs. She sued the state, Gov. Kim Reynolds and several state officials last month in Polk County District Court, seeking an order halting enforcement of the law

Judge Celene Gogerty, who was appointed to the bench by Reynolds in November 2018, said Parr has presented no evidence that a temporary injunction would alleviate Parr's alleged harm causes by the law.

Thus, on the evidence presented by the plaintiffs, even if the court imposed the temporary injunction, there is no evidence a mask mandate would be imposed by the plaintiffs school board and the plaintiffs would be in the exact position prior to the implementation of the proposed injunction, she wrote.

Parr asserts that the law Reynolds signed in May violates her constitutional rights. Her sons were set to start first grade in the Council Bluffs Community School District this fall, but she is teaching them at home over fears for their safety since the school cannot require other students to wear masks.

Gogerty also said a temporary injunction is allowed when there is no other available remedy to the plaintiffs in a case. Parr also has asked Gogerty to issue an order for a universal mask mandate for all students and school personnel until a voluntary plan can be implemented that separates mask-wearing students and staff from those who refuse. That request has not yet been argued before the judge but is another available remedy, Gogerty said.

Lawyers for the state have asked the judge to dismiss the lawsuit, claiming Parr has no legal standing to sue and that the court should not overturn the right of the legislative branch to make such political decisions. A hearing date was not immediately set for that motion.
BLUE SPRINGS, Mo. (AP)  A judge has ordered a suburban Kansas City restaurant to close temporarily because the owner repeatedly refused to follow a mask mandate.

Jackson County Judge James Kanatazar on Friday granted the county's request for a temporary restraining order against Rae's Cafe in Blue Springs.

The county also filed a motion seeking to permanently prevent the owner from operating in violation of the health order.

Before the judge's ruling, Jackson County health officials and sheriff's deputies served the cafe owner, Amanda Wohletz, with an order to close because the mask mandate was being ignored. But the business continued to operate Friday morning.

Raes Cafe's food permit was suspended last week. The owner then reopened as a private club, which charges customers $1 to join and prohibits masks.

Jackson County said in a statement it would take the necessary steps to ensure the health order is enforced.

Wohletz has said she and all her workers are medically exempt from the mask mandate but has not explained what medical conditions they have, The Kansas City Star reported.

The county said Rae's Cafe is the first business it has tried to close for not following county requirements during the COVID-19 pandemic.
FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (AP)  Prosecutors will be allowed to present evidence at an upcoming trial that they say shows a U.S. Air Force airman charged in the death of Mennonite woman had disdain for the religious group, a judge ruled Friday.

The evidence includes text message exchanges between defendant Mark Gooch and his brothers where he talked about surveilling Mennonite churches in metropolitan Phoenix and praising one for ticketing a Mennonite during a traffic stop.

Gooch is charged in the shooting death of Sasha Krause, who lived in a Mennonite community outside Farmington, New Mexico. Krause disappeared while gathering materials for a Sunday school course in January 2020, and her body was found outside Flagstaff more than a month later.

Jury selection begins Sept. 21 for the three-week trial. Gooch faces life in prison if convicted of first-degree murder and other charges.

Coconino County Superior Court Judge Cathleen Brown Nichols wrapped up a two-day hearing Friday on requests to refine the evidence. She said the text messages sent before and after Krause's death point to motive and are more relevant than prejudicial.

It's for the jury to decide if the defendant had some sort of religious bias toward Mennonites, she said.

Brown Nichols also allowed evidence from cell phone data that prosecutors say showed Gooch returned to the forested area where Krause's body was left before authorities discovered it.

The court is persuaded by the state's argument that this purported evidence does connect him to the scene of the murder, the judge said.

Gooch attended the hearing virtually from jail.

Gooch's attorney, Bruce Griffen, had argued that the text message exchanges were among thousands that Gooch sent and received, and were the only two that mentioned Mennonites. Gooch didn't initiate the exchange with the brother who was a state trooper in Virginia, he said. He simply responded in a boisterous, pile-on fashion, well after Krause's death, Griffen argued.

Gooch used words like surveillance in the exchange with another brother because he has a military background, Griffen said. And Gooch's text that the older people he saw weren't like the Mennonites he grew up with means Gooch is a young guy, and that's not his crowd, Griffen said.

The state is reading so much more into that, Griffen argued.

Gooch told authorities he drove to the churches because he was looking for fellowship, according to public records. But the prosecutor, Ammon Barker, said neither of the text exchanges suggest Gooch was looking for a nice, Mennonite church.

The state is not saying because he's surveilling people, he's a murderer or has a character trait for being a murderer," Barker said. It shows motive.

Gooch and Krause didn't know each other but both grew up in large families who were part of the Mennonite church. Gooch never became a church member. Krause became part of a group of conservative Mennonites where women wear head coverings and long dresses or skirts, and men were plain clothing, her community has said.

Brown Nichols earlier rejected a request to admit evidence that Gooch might have targeted Mennonites in burglaries as a teenager in Wisconsin. A childhood friend of Gooch testified Thursday that he didn't recall Gooch saying that he disliked Mennonites.

Brown Nichols has yet to rule on a defense request to determine whether statements that Gooch made to a detective during an interview at Luke Air Force Base where he was stationed in metropolitan Phoenix were lawfully obtained.
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP)  A lawsuit filed in federal court is asking a judge to overturn a requirement in South Carolina ethics laws that makes it illegal for anyone who files a complaint against a public official from talking about it unless the complaint is found valid.

The lawsuit is filed by a whistleblower who says a state lawmaker broke ethics laws by voting in favor of a special interest that paid the legislator $108,000 over three years through contracts with firms with ties to the lawmaker.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP)  A North Carolina man has been arrested in connection with the shooting death of a 3-year-old boy who was sleeping inside his home, police said Friday.

The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department said in a news release that detectives filed multiple charges against QuaTonio Stephens, 21, including accessory after the fact to murder, seven counts of assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill and three counts of shooting into an occupied dwelling.
BILOXI, Miss. (AP)  A Mississippi man is in custody in the death of his father, who disappeared earlier this month.

Biloxi Police arrested Noble V. Marske, 41, of Biloxi, Saturday on a charge of first-degree murder. The body of Marske's father, 66-year-old Van L. Marske, was found Friday near Mississippi 603 in Bay St. Louis, news outlets reported. The Biloxi Police Department said in a news release that the elder man had been reported missing a day earlier. He was last seen alive Sept. 4 in Biloxi.
HYANNIS, Mass. (AP)  The John F. Kennedy Museum on Cape Cod is showcasing a rocking chair from the Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York favored by the late president.

The museum in Hyannis, where the Kennedy's famous summer compound is located, opened an exhibit on the chair earlier this month.

With its low seat and curved back, the chair provided comfort to help ease Kennedy's chronic back pain from injuries suffered during World War II, according to the museum.

The Massachusetts Democrat eventually purchased more than a dozen of them for the White House, Camp David, Hyannisport, and Palm Beach, and his preference for the seats prompted a resurgence in popularity of rocking chairs.

It is so fitting that the rocking chair that brought so much comfort to President Kennedy has made it to his beloved Cape Cod, a special place where he sought solace throughout his life," Wendy Northcross, the museums executive director, said in a statement.

The museum says Kennedy gifted the rocking chair to the Waldorf Astoria in 1962, in keeping with a tradition of presidents donating a keepsake as a remembrance of their stays in the hotel's presidential suite.

The chair will be on loan to the Hyannis museum for the next two years while the New York property undergoes an extensive restoration.

When the Waldorf Astoria reopens in 2023, the rocking chair will return as part of a permanent exhibit on the history of the hotel, which marks its 90th anniversary in October.
LIMA, Peru (AP)  Abimael Guzman, the leader of the brutal Shining Path insurgency in Peru who was captured in 1992, died on Saturday in a military hospital after an illness. He was 86.

Guzman died at 6:40 a.m. after suffering from an infection, Justice Minister Anibal Torres said.

Guzman, a former philosophy professor, launched an insurgency against the state in 1980 and presided over numerous car bombings and assassinations in the years that followed. Guzman was captured in 1992 and sentenced to life in prison for terrorism and other crimes.

President Pedro Castillo tweeted that Guzman was responsible for taking countless'' lives.

Our position condemning terrorism is firm and unwavering. Only in democracy will we build a Peru of justice and development for our people, Castillo said.

Even so, Castillo has faced criticism over alleged links of some of his Cabinet ministers to the Shining Path. Primer Minister Guido Bellido has been investigated by authorities over his alleged sympathy for the group. Last week, a media outlet made public police records from the 1980s that describe Labor Minister Iber Maravi as a Shining Path member and a fugitive.

We do not forget the horror of that time, and his death will not erase his crimes, Economy Minister Pedro Francke said.

Guzman preached a messianic vision of a classless Maoist utopia based on pure communism, considering himself the Fourth Sword of Marxism after Karl Marx, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and Mao Zedong. He advocated a peasant revolution in which rebels would first gain control of the countryside and then advance to the cities.

Guzmans movement declared armed struggle on the eve of Perus presidential elections in May 1980, the first democratic vote after 12 years of military rule.

Throughout the 1980s, the man known to his followers as Presidente Gonzalo built up an organization that grew to 10,000 armed fighters before his capture inside a Lima safehouse in September 1992 by a special intelligence group of the Peruvian police backed by the United States. Since then, he was housed in a military prison on the shores of the Pacific that was built to hold him.

By the time Guzman called for peace talks a year after his arrest, guerrilla violence had claimed tens of thousands of lives in Peru, displaced at least 600,000 people and caused an estimated $22 billion in damage.

Unlike other leftwing insurgent groups in the region, (the Shining Path) targeted civilians and actively sought to terrorize them, both in the cities and in the countryside, Noam Lupu, associate director of the Latin American Public Opinion Project at Vanderbilt University, said in an email about Shining Path. The fear that this generated in Peru was extraordinary, and it has marked Peruvian politics and society since. Shining Paths violence is a big part of why Castillos is the first explicitly leftist presidential administration in Peru since the 1980s.

A truth commission in 2003 blamed the Shining Path for more than half of nearly 70,000 estimated deaths and disappearances caused by various rebel groups and brutal government counterinsurgency efforts between 1980 and 2000.

Yet it lived on in a political movement formed by Guzmans followers that sought amnesty for all political prisoners, including the Shining Path founder. The Movement for Amnesty and Fundamental Right failed, however, to register as a political party in 2012 in the face of fierce opposition from Peruvians with bitter memories of the destruction brought by the Shining Path.

In its songs and slogans, the Shining Path celebrated bloodletting, describing death as necessary to irrigate the revolution.

Its militants bombed electrical towers, bridges and factories in the countryside, assassinated mayors and massacred villagers. In the insurgencys later years, they targeted civilians in Lima with indiscriminate bombings.

For 12 years, Peruvian authorities could not crack the Shining Paths ranks, organized in a near-impenetrable vertical cell structure. Guzman was nearly captured at a safehouse in Lima in June 1990, but slipped away.

A January 1991 police raid in Lima found a videotape showing Guzman and other rebel leaders mourning at the funeral of his wife, Augusta La Torre, known as Comrade Norah. About 15 years Guzmans junior, La Torre was No. 2 in the Shining Paths command structure before dying under mysterious circumstances in 1988.

Analysts believe she may have been murdered or forced to commit suicide over an internal political dispute.

The video showed a portly Guzman, wearing thick glasses and snapping his fingers as he drunkenly danced to music from the 1960s movie Zorba the Greek. It was the first image Peruvians had seen of him since a mug shot taken during a 1978 arrest.

After La Torre died, she was replaced as No. 2 by Elena Iparraguirre, alias Comrade Miriam, who later also became Guzmans wife.

Guzman married Iparraguirre in 2010 at the maximum-security prison inside the naval base in Lima where he was serving a life term. Iparraguirre, also captured in 1992, was brought from the womens prison for the ceremony.

Guzman was initially sentenced to life imprisonment by a secret military tribunal, but Perus top court ruled in 2003 that the original sentencing was unconstitutional and ordered a new trial. He also received a life sentence at the 2006 retrial.

The Shining Path was severely weakened after Guzmans capture and his later calls for peace talks. Small bands of rebels have nevertheless remained active in remote valleys, producing cocaine and protecting drug runners.

Guzman was born the illegitimate son of a prosperous trader in Tambo, Arequipa, in Perus southern Andes on Dec. 3, 1934.

He studied law and philosophy at the University of San Agustin in Arequipa, where he wrote two graduate theses: The Theory of Space in Kant and another on law titled The Democratic-Bourgeois State.

Mr. Guzman was an extraordinarily brilliant man, very studious, very disciplined, recalled Miguel Rodriguez Rivas, one of his professors.

Guzman took a teaching job in 1963 at the state University of San Cristobal de Huamanga in Ayacucho, an impoverished central Andean capital neglected for centuries by Perus traditional power elite in coastal Lima.

In Ayacucho, he joined the pro-Chinese Bandera Roja political party, or Red Flag, becoming head of its military commission and visiting China in 1965.

Later returning to Ayacucho, Guzman discovered that political rivals had expelled him from the party and he formed his own splinter group.

A descendant of the white elite that had governed Peru since the Spanish destroyed the Inca empire nearly 500 years earlier, Guzman recruited the sons and daughters of Quechua-speaking Indigenous peasants as he gradually took control of the university.

During the 1970s, his student followers spanned out into the countryside to conduct detailed studies of communities that would be used years later to consolidate guerrilla control in the zone.

Over 10 years, Guzman patiently planned before launching his war on what he characterized as Perus rotten and antiquated state, taking the government by surprise.

Peruvian officials were debating what to do with Guzman's body.

Torres told state television they would study the possibility of cremation and warned that "paying homage to or mobilizing in the memory of Abimael Guzman would be considered an apology for terrorism.

Sebastian Chavez, Guzman's lawyer, said that by law the decision belongs to his wife, Iparraguirre, who is in a prison in Lima.

She will decide what steps will be taken, he said.
LA CONNER, Wash. (AP)  The Swinomish Tribe is threatening to sue the federal government to speed up estuary restoration  and salmon preservation  on the Skagit River delta.

Much of the estuary has been drained and closed off with tide gates to facilitate agriculture, but such habitat is crucial for juvenile salmon.

The tribe says that under an agreement reached in 2010  following a prior lawsuit  the Army Corps of Engineers isnt supposed to grant construction permits to dike districts for work on the tide gates unless they first restore estuary habitat.

But for the past five years, the Corps has been doing just that, the tribe says. During that time, at least 660 acres should have been restored.

The restoration efforts are now behind the agreement's schedule, which calls for restoring 2,700 acres by 2035. At the current pace, it will take a century to complete that, tribal scientists say.

The tribe notified the Army Corps this week that it intends to sue within 60 days, saying the agency has allowed the dike districts to violate the Endangered Species Act. Skagit River Chinook salmon are protected under the law.

The Army Corps and NOAA Fisheries said they are reviewing the tribe's claims.

We are gravely concerned about the current state of the Skagit River estuary, which is critical for Chinook recovery in the Puget Sound, Swinomish Tribal Chairman Steve Edwards said in a news release. There are tribal members that cant feed their families because our salmon are hurting and cant recover without more estuary habitat.

NOAA Fisheries has identified degraded estuary habitat as one of the main threats to Skagit River Chinook, which are a primary food source for endangered Southern Resident orcas.
The National Nurses Union applauded President Joe Biden's proposal to require that companies with more than 100 employees vaccinate their work force. The American Federation of Teachers once said vaccine mandates weren't necessary, but now embraces them. In Oregon, police and firefighter unions are suing to block a mask mandate for state workers.

The labor movement is torn over vaccine requirements  much like the country as a whole  wanting to both support its political ally in Biden and protect its members against infection but also not wanting to trample their workers' rights.

Labor unions are a microcosm of the society we live in, said Patricia Campos-Medina, executive director of Cornell University's The Worker Institute. The same political divide we have right now exists within the rank and file of unions.

That divide complicates matters for Biden as he tries to get the delta variant under control. Unions are a key part of the Democratic Party, and Biden has embraced them to burnish his blue-collar, middle-class image. Dissent in Biden's own coalition may make it especially hard for him to implement new vaccination requirements. Some unions representing federal workers already objected to his push for inoculation among the U.S. government workforce, saying such matters involving new workplace requirements and discipline need to be negotiated at the bargaining table.

In a sign of the importance of the issue to the Biden administration, the White House reached out to union presidents before Biden announced his new policy Thursday and will continue to check in with labor leaders, said an administration official, who insisted on anonymity to discuss forthcoming plans.

Biden will require companies with more than 100 workers to give their employees shots or test them weekly. He will also mandate shots for executive branch workers and federal contractors with no testing opt-out. The new requirements could cover 100 million Americans.

Momentum seems to be on the side of mandates. The AFL-CIO, the umbrella organization over much of the country's unions, backed Biden's plan in a statement released Friday. The resurgence of COVID-19 requires swift and immediate action, and we commend President Biden for taking additional steps to help put an end to this crisis. Everyone should be vaccinated  as one step in stopping the pandemic, the organization's president, Liz Shuler, said in the statement.

The AFT two weeks ago mandated that its employees in its offices be vaccinated and has become a strong advocate of workplaces requiring vaccinations. Safety and health have been our north star since the beginning of the pandemic, said Randi Weingarten, the union's president. The union's support for mandates, she added, creates great cheer among two-thirds of our people and will create agita in one-third of the people.

Still, many labor leaders are hesitant to wade into the mandate issue. Many of the employers of the workers of the Laborer's District Council of Western Pennsylvania, like hospitals, have begun requiring vaccinations. Whenever members complain, the council's business manager, Phillip Ameris, tells them it's not the union's call.

"What we have said is, 'we encourage our members to the get the vaccine, but what were telling everyone to do is to go to your physician, Ameris said. Were trying to keep it nonpolitical. ... Go to your doctor and ask your doctor what is best for you.

Some of the most heated opposition has come from law enforcement unions. In Newark on Thursday, police and fire unions from across New Jersey protested against the mayor's vaccine mandate outside city hall. Police unions from Chicago to Richmond have pushed back against mandates in their cities. In Portland, Oregon, the local police union got its members exempted from the city's vaccine order and a group of police and firefighter unions are suing Gov. Kate Brown to block the state's vaccine requirement for its workers.

Simon Haeder, a political scientist who studies vaccine mandates at Penn State University, said it makes sense that the strongest resistance has come from police and firefighters. The more conservative side of the labor movement, in terms of politics, are going to be the police and firefighter unions, he said, noting that response to the coronavirus has become highly polarized. Yes, you're a union person and yes, you want the workplace to get back to normal, but the identity of being a Republican outweighs a lot of those things.

Bill Johnson, executive director of the National Association of Police Organizations, said police officers are reacting like most Americans. You've got, like in the rest of the country, really strong feelings on both sides, Johnson said.

Still, police unions can see the writing on the wall  and want any mandates to be negotiated through the collective bargaining process, Johnson said. There's a sense from the union perspective that vaccination policy is pretty much going to be mandated, he said. We want a place at the table when we discuss implementation.

Campos-Medina said mandatory vaccination is such an obviously important public health policy that she expects unions to ultimately accept it. She compared it to bans on indoor smoking, which rankled some unions years ago but is a subject which hardly ever comes up at the bargaining table today. We will get there, she said.

Weingarten's union had initially, like Biden, opposed vaccine mandates and said persuading workers to get their shots was a better approach. But after the delta variant kicked caseloads higher this summer and filled up hospital beds, AFT reconsidered.

She, too, thinks unions will almost all ultimately coalesce behind a pro-mandate position. But, she notes, it will take time.

The leadership in unions I talk to know that vaccines are really important, Weingarten said. What they're trying to do is balance between all these different services and responsibilities we have to our members.

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Associated Press writers Josh Boak in Washington and Marc Levy in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, contributed to this report.

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This story has been corrected by deleting the reference to the AFL-CIO statement praising mandates, which it did not explicitly do. It did back the plan.
PHOENIX (AP)  Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey is planning to push legislation that will require that students be taught about the 9/11 attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people.

Ducey announced the plan on Friday, a day before the 20th anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon using hijacked jetliners. A fourth commercial jet with terrorists in control was headed toward Washington D.C. before passengers stormed the cockpit. The plane crashed into a Pennsylvania farm field, killing all on board.
The U.S. Department of Justice sued the state of Texas on Thursday, arguing that SB8 - the so-called heartbeat statute that bans abortion after six weeks of pregnancy - violated the Constitution and is preempted by federal law. The complaint could be just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the federal response to the unusual Texas statute.

Texas's law resembles other heartbeat bills, which criminalize abortions performed when a doctor can detect fetal cardiac activity. But there is one key difference: Texas outsources enforcement to private citizens (any private citizen) who can sue abortion providers or those who "aid or abet" them and receive a minimum of $10,000 in damages for each abortion in violation of the law. The state's law was based on a model created in Waskom, Texas, a town of less than 2,000 people near the Louisiana border. Mark Lee Dixon, a Southern Baptist pastor and ardent opponent of abortion, had read a news article from the early 1990s suggesting that a pro-choice donor stood ready to buy land and build a clinic in Waskom if Louisiana shut down its facilities.

Waskom passed a law to prevent this (remote) possibility, banning abortion and allowing private citizens to sue to enforce the law. Soon, similar sanctuary-city-like movements had spread across Texas and beyond.

In enacting SB8, Texas relied on a doctrine called sovereign immunity to protect itself from legal challenges. Individuals can enforce their constitutional rights only against the government and its agents, and the 11th Amendment to the Constitution has been interpreted to limit when someone can sue a state government. In 1908, in a decision called Ex parte Young, the Supreme Court created an exception to this rule for people suing state officials charged with enforcing an unconstitutional law. But for SB8, there is a catch: The Texas law allows only private individuals to sue and prohibits state officials from enforcing the law.

So when abortion providers, who questioned the constitutionality of SB8 (which clearly bans abortion before viability in contravention of Roe v. Wade), sued to attempt to block it, they named as defendants a group of state officials, judges and a single antiabortion activist.

Providers argued that the state officials, judges and activist would enforce the statute's unconstitutional provisions. A trial judge temporarily enjoined SB8 while litigation unfolded, but the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals put a halt to proceedings in the district court, ruling that state officials were the wrong targets of the lawsuit. The providers then asked the Supreme Court for an emergency order to stop SB8, but last week, the high court let the Texas law go into effect. While not weighing in on the constitutionality of the law, a majority of the justices said that the providers had not proved that they had found the right defendants to sue - and that the state might have immunity after all.

The Biden administration did not take long to react, vowing a "whole of government" response to Texas's bill. The Justice Department complaint came Thursday in federal district court, claiming authority to "ensure that Texas cannot evade its obligations under the Constitution." Specifically, the department argues that the federal government is charged with ensuring protection of constitutional rights, and the Texas law seeks to impede that duty. The complaint does not stop there, arguing further that Texas violates federal law "by purporting to prohibit federal agencies from carrying out their responsibilities under federal law," exposing federal employees to potential lawsuits under SB8 and stopping federal employees from performing abortions in cases of rape or incest.

At first, the complaint seems to underscore the limits of the federal government's power to respond to Texas. A doctrine called standing, or locus standi, limits who can bring a claim in federal court. The Supreme Court has held that at a minimum, someone with standing must have an actual or threatened injury, traceable to the person being sued, that could be cured by a favorable court decision.

And the federal government might not meet that standard. The complaint argues that the Biden administration must vindicate the rights of women and doctors because Texas has blocked them from doing so themselves. But even if the administration is right that Texas "has acted in open defiance of the Constitution," that doesn't mean that the government has suffered the kind of harm required to have standing in federal court. The Fifth Circuit (and, ultimately, the Supreme Court) could respond that the kind of harm alleged by the United States - being unable to protect a Texan's right to have an abortion, for example - is too abstract. And since no private citizen has yet tried to collect damages under the law, it is not clear that the Justice Department has anyone to hold accountable for enforcing the unconstitutional law.

What's remarkable about the complaint, though, is not necessarily its chances of success. It's the first time the Justice Department has intervened to enjoin a state abortion restriction, period, not just the first time it's done so with arguments grounded in principles of federalism. That said, before Texas, no state had ever successfully enacted an unconstitutional law that made its enforcement mechanism - private citizens suing for money damages - a shield against court scrutiny.

So the Justice Department's willingness to intervene against Texas spotlights new terrain in the abortion debate. In the course of outlining how various federal government agencies and programs touch on abortion care (such as those provided in federal prisons or to federal employees), the brief makes plain the many ways in which abortion features in federal law. The U.S. government could stake out places and supply personnel for abortion provision, governed by federal laws, that are not subject to state restrictions or, for that matter, to lawsuits under laws like SB8. Federal employees would be immune from lawsuits commenced by private citizens.

The suit is also a reminder that the federal government could proactively protect abortion rights for the same reasons it argues that the Texas law must fall: Federal regulation trumps state regulation. Under constitutional principles that accord federal law supremacy, the federal government could do a lot to preserve and expand abortion rights even in the face of newfound efforts to restrict them in Republican-controlled states. Congress could, of course, pass a law like the Women's Health Protection Act, which is before both the House and Senate but is unlikely to make its way past a potential GOP filibuster. The bill would create a statutory right to abortion and seeks to preempt most of the restrictions on state lawbooks now.

Federal agencies, like the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, also could play a role - which wouldn't require navigating bipartisan abortion politics. The FDA is presently reconsidering the rules governing medication abortion that require in-person dispensation and prohibit pharmacies from stocking the two-drug regimen. This week's events suggest that the Biden administration, galvanized by the extraordinary events in Texas, may abandon some of its previous reticence to support abortion rights. If the FDA permits abortion pills to be mailed to patients or to be picked up at a pharmacy, early abortion (before 10 weeks of pregnancy) will be portable and cheaper. Each time a federal agency or the executive branch acts to extend abortion rights, the question of whether those actions overrides state laws to the contrary becomes live.

Ultimately, even if the lawsuit against Texas fails, the Biden administration has sent a message to Texas and other copycat states with action and not just words. That matters because the federal government could be a powerful facilitator of abortion care if the Supreme Court abandons a nationwide constitutional right to abortion. By the end of this term, the Supreme Court will decide whether bans on abortion before viability, such as SB8, are constitutional. If the justices give states the green light to restrict abortion throughout pregnancy, already scarce abortion services in the South and Midwest will probably cease to exist as states enact near-total bans. But coordinated federal activity, buoyed by an already well-mobilized movement for abortion access, could close the gaps in coverage.

When so much about abortion seems to hinge on the Supreme Court, it's easy to believe that the fate of abortion rights turns on judges alone. But the opposite may be true. The Roe v. Wade decision did not come down in a vacuum; it was part of a much broader story of grass-roots mobilization and legislative organizing. If, as many expect, the Supreme Court reverses Roe, that opinion will have its own grass-roots history - decades of work by the antiabortion movement to attack judicial overreaching and popularize fetal rights. Officially, the Supreme Court pays no attention to politics or popular opinion. Unofficially, it's much more complicated. The court rarely strays too far from public opinion, at least not without facing a significant backlash.

Texas's law certainly reflects the work of some true believers. But there is no shortage of politicians - including some of the red-state governors positioning themselves for a presidential run in 2024 - who gravitate to abortion bans mostly because they will expect them to pay off politically. Polls tell us that most Americans favor restrictions on abortion but oppose early abortion bans - and they want Roe v. Wade to remain the law. That hardly matters if only abortion opponents donate and vote based on the issue.

Win or lose, by filing this complaint, the administration is lending its voice to those opposed to Texas's law - a chorus that supporters of abortion rights hope will eventually become too loud to ignore. By joining the opposition to SB8, the federal government signals that it will respond to the political fallout and outrage expressed at Texas and the Supreme Court. What happens to abortion in America has always depended on political mobilization. No Supreme Court decision can change that.

- - -

Mary Ziegler is the Stearns Weaver Miller professor at Florida State University College of Law and author of "Abortion and the Law in America, Roe v. Wade to the Present. Mary Ziegler is the Stearns Weaver Miller professor at Florida State University College of Law and author of "Abortion and the Law in America, Roe v. Wade to the Present.
First things first: on Friday, Real Time With Bill Maher was renewed through 2024. Perhaps that news was why Maher got especially robust cheers as he took to the stage for this weeks episode. His monologue found him taking on Texass abortion ban after six weeks. I bought a car last year, Maher said. They gave me more time to see if I wanted to keep the satellite radio. And he went on to dub the bounty-hunter aspects of the law Riches for Snitches.

Also up for discussion: the restoration of air travel at Kabuls airport and the California recall election. Larry [Elder] used to do our show, Maher said. We should have Larry on again, after he loses, he continued, to tremendous applause.

The theme of California politics continued with the episodes first guest, Representative Barbara Lee  who is perhaps best-known nationally for her vote against war in Afghanistan 20 years ago. In keeping with one of his preferred themes this season, Maher asked her about standing up to ideas of groupthink. Lee didnt tackle that head-on at first, opting instead to make a thorough case for not making important decisions when tempers are heated.

Rep. Lees vote from 20 years ago was the subject of much of their conversation. Lee also brought up the subject of her father, a veteran of World War II and the Korean War, who told her that shed made the right decision with her vote. All told, she made a convincing case for clear-headed decisionmaking and consideration of the consequences of a particular vote  both lessons that resonate deeply today.

Maher was joined by panelists Christina Bellantoni (director of USC Annenbergs Media Center) and George F. Will (author of American Happiness and Discontents: The Unruly Torrent, 2008-2020). The first subject of debate was President Bidens new vaccine mandate, which Bellantoni enthusiastically backed. Will was less taken, arguing that it was an overreach of federal authority, and predicting a legal challenge. And soon, Maher had guided the discussion to one of his preferred subjects  the relative fitness level of Americans. Here, he pondered what the governments role in that could be, to which his panelists had different opinions.

The California recall election also came up for debate  along with, more broadly, the argument of whether the Biden presidency should be written off after nine months. Its like an instant gratification problem, Bellantoni argued. And she went on to note that if more states had the same mechanisms California did, youd probably see a number of similar initiatives around the country. And Will pointed out that you cant call a mulligan on a particular election.

From there, Maher steered the discussion to another recurring subject: wokeness and the state of education. Will viewed this through the lens of an issue with parenting; this included an allusion to participation trophies and led to Will and Maher bantering about the National Archives enacting trigger warnings for the Declaration of Independence, something that was proposed months ago in a National Archives task force report and has now turned into a minor right-wing cause celebre.

It was left to Bellantoni, who actually works in academia, to push back against this, which she did. Her argument was that depictions of universities as a battleground were fundamentally inaccurate  and she cited some examples from her own experience teaching to make her point. It is a moment where people are recognizing that others have different lived experiences than theirs, she said  and got in a dig at Baby Boomers.

New Rules brought the episode to a close, with Maher riffing on Republicans with guns, the return of ABBA and an overly complex pun about house music. The bulk of the segment focused on climate changes effects on the country  notably, extreme storms on the east coast and drought on the west. Mahers solution? Could we, perhaps, pipe the flooding from the Northeast to the Southwest?

And here, Maher returned to another of his running concerns: that the country needs to think bigger when it comes to infrastructure. And he made a solid point about a liquid  that the same basic principle was put into use by the Romans and the Incas centuries ago, and that Israels use of desalinization could offer a solution to Californias droughts. As Maher pointed out, were not far from an era of water refugees in the West  and climate change isnt slowing down.

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The post The California Recall Looms Large on This Weeks Real Time With Bill Maher appeared first on InsideHook.
A. Officials knew the mandates were coming for years; they should have phased in the increase.

B. There's no master plan to justify the millions extra they are collecting.

C. It's Save Our Waters Week; this shows officials care about the environment.

D. Vote them all out of office.

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Marijo Krogman, 86, Clinton, died Sunday, September 12th. Mass will be celebrated at 10:00 AM Saturday, September 18th at Prince of Peace. Visitation from 9:00 AM until the time of the Mass Saturday. Pape Funeral Home is assisting.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 11) President Rodrigo Duterte has warned he will stop government transactions with the Philippine Red Cross (PRC) if the humanitarian agency refuses to submit itself to a state audit.

In an address aired on Saturday, Duterte said he will ask PRC chairman Senator Richard Gordon to open up their records  or else the government will disassociate with the organization.

So in the coming days, I will write you a letter, to open up your records Kung ayaw mo, mapipilitan akong (If you refuse, I will be forced) [to] totally disassociate with you, Duterte said.

I will stop government, the national government and all, from having transactions with you, in any manner. Hindi ako magbigay ng pera sa iyo (I wont give you any funds). As far as Im concerned, Red Cross does not exist. Either you submit an auditing procedure or we quarrel, he added.

Duterte earlier called on the Commission on Audit to check on the PRC  a non-government and non-profit organization  as he accused Gordon of using its funds for his electoral campaigns.

READ: 'Unsalaried volunteer': PH Red Cross, Gordon dismiss Duterte's allegations

COA chairman Mike Aguinaldo, however, has said the agency has no authority to conduct an audit of Red Cross given its nature as an NGO.

Despite this, Duterte isnt giving up. He said that if COA refuses to do the audit, it would constitute dereliction of duty.

Its going to be a long, legal battle if he (Aguinaldo) refuses, Duterte said.

But I am prepared to go into it and demand really the accountability of Senator Gordon and all of them in the Red Cross to account for the money that was given by the government of the Philippines for the longest time, the President added.
(CNN) -- Anxiety is high among parents as more kids head back to school without the protection of a Covid-19 vaccine for at least a few more months.

Parents have a reason to be concerned. After months of declining cases, the virus is finding the unvaccinated.

Adolescents as young as 12 can be vaccinated against Covid-19, but younger children aren't eligible yet.

Children made up more than a quarter of the reported cases for the week ending September 2. "After declining in early summer, child cases have increased exponentially, with over 750,000 cases added between August 5 and September 2," the American Academy of Pediatrics said Tuesday. The most recent weekly case number marks about a 250% increase since the week of July 22-29, when the AAP counted 71,726 new cases in children.

Children have largely been spared the worst of Covid-19 -- hospitalizations and deaths are more rare for children than for adults -- although children's hospitals are filling up in Covid-19 hotspots around the country.

A kids' vaccine cannot come soon enough, but the process is taking longer than some initially expected.

"We had really hoped that maybe we would have something in place before we tried to bring kids back into the school classroom, but, unfortunately, we haven't been able to do that," said Dr. Emily Chapman, senior vice president and chief medical officer at Children's Minnesota.

Timeline for younger children's Covid-19 vaccines

Trial data are still being gathered for Covid-19 vaccines for younger children. Once the vaccine companies have trial results, they'll need to submit the information to the US Food and Drug Administration, which will assess the vaccines for authorization.

Dr. Scott Gottlieb, a former FDA commissioner who now sits on the board of Covid-19 vaccine maker Pfizer, said earlier this month on CBS' Face the Nation that the company will likely be able to file the data for 5-11-year-olds for authorization "at some point in September" and then file the application for an emergency use of the vaccine "potentially as early as October."

"That'll put us on a time frame where the vaccines could be available at some point late fall, more likely early winter depending on how long FDA takes to review the application," Gottlieb said.

There's no official timetable once a company submits to the FDA. Emergency use considerations can take several weeks.

"There's always something that makes things not the way we think," said Dr. Stanley Perlman, who is on the FDA's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee and is also a pediatrician and professor of microbiology and immunology at the University of Iowa Health Care. "Obviously, we want it done as soon as possible, but we want it done right."

When asked earlier this month whether a Covid-19 vaccine will be authorized for young children before Thanksgiving, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN's Wolf Blitzer that he hopes so, but he does not want to get ahead of the FDA.

"They should be getting the data, at least in one of the companies, by the end of September," noted Fauci.

"Then the data will be presented to the FDA, and the FDA will make a determination whether they will grant that under an emergency use authorization or some other mechanism."

CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said during a National Parent Teacher Association town hall earlier this month that she is hopeful the Pfizer vaccine will be available for kids in 2021.

"Everybody is looking at this with urgency. Everyone recognizes how important it is for those children to have access to vaccines," she said when asked about the timeline. "My understanding of the timeline is pretty consistent with what is being said: the middle of fall is my understanding, early fall is when we will anticipate seeing the data, and then it will lie with the hands of the FDA. And I'm hopeful for the end of the year."

Data for 2-to-5-year-olds could arrive soon after the older kids' data. For the youngest children, Pfizer told CNN it could potentially have enough research by October or November, and shortly thereafter ask the FDA to authorize emergency use.

Moderna's trial is underway, but is a few months behind Pfizer. Johnson & Johnson doesn't expect its multiple trials in children to even start until the fall.

Why a vaccine for younger children takes longer

Hundreds of millions of adults have been vaccinated, proving that the Covid-19 vaccines are safe and effective, but those results are not a substitute for the research needed in kids.

"As much as we would like to go ahead and start vaccinating our children now, it's most important that we take this time to ensure that the science is rigorous," said Minnesota's Chapman.

For the kid's version of the Covid-19 vaccine, scientists use results from the adult trials and a full pediatric trial.

Having the adult research speeds up the process. For people as young as 12, Perlman explains, the companies didn't have to enroll the 30,000 people it needed for adult trials because it could do what's called "immunobridging." The data showed that for this age group, the immune response was the equivalent of adults'.

Companies take a similar approach with the younger kids, but in early August, the FDA asked for six months of follow-up safety data, instead of the two months it asked for with adults. It also asked Pfizer and Moderna to double the number of children ages 5 to 11 in clinical trials.

Vaccine advisers to the CDC said in June there is a likely association between the mRNA Covid-19 vaccines and extremely rare cases of heart inflammation in adolescents and young adults, but the benefits of vaccination still clearly outweigh the risks. The inflammation cases appeared to be mild, and they resolved quickly on their own or with minimal treatment.

At Texas Children's Hospital, interim pediatrician-in-chief Dr. James Versalovic said it was no problem to recruit more kids for the Pfizer and Moderna trials. Many trial sites have long waiting lists. The trial expansion, though, added at least a month more to the research process.

"We all agreed it was worthwhile, just to make the trials even more robust data to provide that additional level of reassurance to parents across the country. It does lengthen the trial, but just a bit," Versalovic said.

'Children are not small adults'

Children's vaccine trials actually start in adults.

"Typically, every vaccine candidate, even for other conditions, would be evaluated first in adult patients and then in progressively younger ages," explained Dr. Kari Simonsen, who is leading the trial of the Pfizer vaccine at Children's Hospital & Medical Center in Omaha. "We can't make assumptions about the safety or tolerability of medicines in children being the same as for adults," she said.

It's because of biology.

"As we are fond of saying in pediatrics: Children are not small adults. Children are children," said Versalovic. "Their bodies are developing and will react differently, and we need to treat them differently."

When it gets to the kids' phase of the testing, scientists make their best educated guess on what dose would be safe and generate an immune response. The levels and timing is based on development stages.

"By and large our children have very active and responsive immune systems, and so we suspect that smaller doses of vaccine will trigger an adequate response in a child to successfully fight off infection," said Chapman.

As with any vaccine testing, it must go through a three-phase trial before the FDA can authorize it. The first phase tests to see if the vaccine is safe in about 20 to 100 healthy kids.

Since these are expedited trials, scientists have combined phases 2 and 3 of the trials so they can do more steps in parallel, Versalovic said. In these phases, scientists monitor safety and test to see if the children's immune systems respond to the vaccine. At this step, scientist recruit hundreds or even thousands of children. Some get vaccine, some get placebo and results are compared.

Only after these steps are complete can a company ask the FDA for authorization or approval.

If the FDA signs off on it, the vaccine gets another set of expert eyes with the CDC's Advisory Council on Immunization Practices. That committee also puts together a formal recommendation around the delivery, storage, timing, distribution, and administration of the vaccine. The committee's recommendation becomes official when the CDC director reviews and approves it.

In these intervening months, the experts say, children can stay Covid-19 free. Adults, though, will have to help them.

"Best thing we can do for them is surround them with adults who are vaccinated," Chapman said. "And surround them with people who are masking and keep their masks on as much as possible."

This story was first published on CNN.com "Why a Covid-19 vaccine for younger children is taking longer than a vaccine for adults".
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, September 2)  Senate leaders will ask for a hold departure order to be issued against former Budget Undersecretary Christopher Lloyd Lao and executives of Pharmally Pharmaceutical Corporation amid investigations by Congress into allegedly overpriced purchases of supplies for pandemic response.

Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon on Thursday said he has received reports Lao is planning to leave the country, so it will be an added "caution" to prevent him from bolting.

He also wants a similar order issued against Pharmally Pharmaceutical Corporate chairman Huang Tzu Yen and the company treasurer. He said the officials cannot be served subpoenas because their registered office address in Taguig has been vacant for three years now.

Drilon added there are suspicions that at least one of the executives already left for a Middle Eastern country.

RELATED: Head of Pharmally, PH's top medical supplier during pandemic, wanted in Taiwan

Pharmally is in the spotlight as Senate hearings reveal that the small company has bagged over P8.68 billion worth of government contracts, including the purchase of allegedly overpriced medical supplies for COVID-19. Lao was the one who awarded the deal when he was the head of the Procurement Service of the Department of Budget and Management.

When asked if a hold departure order will also be requested for President Rodrigo Duterte's former adviser Michael Yang  whose named is also being linked to Pharmally, Drilon said they have no clue where he is.

RELATED: Duterte defends Michael Yang, ex-DBM exec Lao amid allegations of links to govt supplier

Senate President Tito Sotto said they will seek a hold departure order "whatever legal way is possible."

According to the Bureau of Immigration, orders to hold the departure of accused individuals come from Regional Trial Courts. Drilon said he will check if the Senate can file a petition for the issuance of this order.

CNN Philippines correspondent Eimor Santos contributed to this report.
Penn State College Republicans organized a memorial service on Old Main lawn Friday to pay tribute to the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The service fell one day before the 20th anniversary of the tragedy.

On Thursday, the night before the event, students planted 2,977 American flags on Old Main lawn  each representing a victim of 9/11.

Additional American flags were planted at the service for the names of each of the 10 Penn Staters who were killed by terrorists on 9/11. A moment of silence followed the reading of each name.

U.S. Rep. Fred Keller of Pennsylvanias 12th congressional district, spoke at the memorial service about the importance of honoring the victims of 9/11, fallen and current service members and American exceptionalism.

Were exceptional as Americans in what unites us, which is the belief in what the flag stands for, Keller said. And that is the belief in self-governance  we define our government, it does not define us. And these people that perished, perished believing that and knowing that.

Keller went on to say he could not feel better about the gathered group of students and community members at Penn State participating in the memorial service.

I know we always say, We are Penn State, but we need to say We are America, Keller said. And for that we should be very proud.

Matthew Soska, vice president of Penn State College Republicans, noted the importance of not blotting out the realities of history with ignorance but rather continuing to remember the horrors of 9/11.

We made a promise on 9/11 that we would never forget the victims, Soska (junior-political science and philosophy) said. The only way to erase history is to forget history, so its a great thing to keep doing this to always remind people of the sacrifices and struggles that make our country great.

As two decades have now passed since 9/11, the youngest group of Americans who were alive for the attacks are now about 20 years old, a fact Justin Pavonarius, the director of special events for Penn State College Republicans, said applied to himself.

I was alive for 9/11, but I wasnt even a year old, Pavonarius (junior-political science and economics) said. So its important to keep this tradition going as more and more college students will have not been around when 9/11 happened.

Although the American flags are planted each year around 9/11, the 20th anniversary was the first time a memorial service was held since the attacks, according to Morgan Watt, president of Penn State College Republicans. Pavonarius said there was a wide variety of volunteers who were moved to help as they passed Old Main last night.

Every year we put out the flags, and we have people who arent Republicans who come by and also put down flags, Pavonarius said. We had people from the community, we had little kids helping put out the flags last night  its great to see the community honor 9/11.

The service also paid tribute to the 13 Americans service members who were recently killed in the terrorist attacks at the Kabul airport in Afghanistan by reading their names aloud, followed by a moment of silence. A red rose was placed at a flag for each service member.

Pavonarius referenced the connection between the Islamic terrorist attacks on Americans on 9/11 and the recent takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban.

Whats happening in Afghanistan and 9/11 are related, he said. So its important for us to take the time to memorialize those individuals who gave their life up fighting for freedom around the world, defending and representing the United States proudly.

Watt (senior-animal science) said she was disappointed in President Joe Biden's administrations handling of the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan and the subsequent Taliban takeover.

Any life lost is too many, and those 13 Americans will never be forgotten, Watt said. We want to honor those Americans, and we should never let anything like that ever happen again.

Whether the instance was less than a month ago or two decades ago, Watt said she is determined to keep American victims of terrorism at the forefront of peoples minds.

We felt like it was our duty to honor all of the victims, especially the Penn State victims of 9/11, Watt said. It was really important for us to put on a ceremony and to read the names so that everyone knows that we lost important people on that day and that well never forget.

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Colorado politicians weighed in on the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks Saturday morning.

This is what they said.

Gov. Jared Polis ordered flags to be lowered to half-staff on all public buildings statewide from sunrise to sunset:

20 years ago, Americans started our day like any other only to find our worlds shattered by mid-morning as the terrorist attacks of 9/11 played out. We remember and mourn those we lost in New York City, in a field in Pennsylvania, and at the Pentagon. They were our loved ones and friends, families were instantly torn apart by an unspeakable attack on our nation. Everyone remembers where they were when tragedy struck, and as we reflect on the 20 years since that dreadful day, let us remember the innocent lives taken away, let us honor the first responders who heroically put themselves in harms way to save others, and let us pay tribute to our service members and first responders who fight to protect us from terrorist attack. Our country is resilient, it is steadfast even in the face of terror. In this solemn moment, let us recognize our humanity in the face of tragedy, and our countrys unyielding will to prevail. On this solemn anniversary, we keep in our hearts the memory of those lost.

U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet of Denver:

On September 11, 2001, terrorists attacked our nation and our democratic way of life. They failed. Twenty years later, America still has the strongest economy in the world, the most capable fighting force ever assembled, and, despite our challenges, the oldest democracy in human history.

The attacks brought out the best in our nation  courage, resolve, and resilience  but they also set in motion challenges that remain with us today. Powerful unity gave way to intense partisan division. Strategic global leadership became reckless unilateralism and nation-building. Then and now, politicians played to our darkest impulses of fear, hatred, and isolation at the expense of our highest ideals.

As we reflect on the past 20 years, we must remember the 3,000 Americans lost that terrible morning, along with the men and women who gave their lives in Afghanistan and Iraq, our veterans who still bear the wounds of war (many, invisible), and the first responders who still struggle with sickness. They did their duty to our nation, and their example calls on us to do the same  by learning from the past 20 years, correcting course where we must, and coming together in common purpose.

Sen. John Hickenlooper of Denver (via Twitter):

"Today we remember those lost 20 years ago and the tremendous courage of the first responders who stepped forward to help on that fateful day.

"To the families of 9/11, survivors, first responders, veterans and service members: We stand with you, today and always. #NeverForget"

U.S. Rep. Ken Buck of Windsor:

"Today we remember those precious lives that were lost 20 years ago. We remember the heroes and first responders who displayed such bravery and courage. Our prayers are with their families today.

"We continue to honor their lives and sacrifices by never forgetting. #September11"

U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert of Rifle (via Twitter):

"Never forget. We are better together."

U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette of Denver (three tweets):

September 11, 2001 is a day that many of us will never forget. The tragic events that unfolded that day changed the course of our nations history forever.

While the images of that frightful day still play vividly in the minds of most Americans so, too, must the memories of those we lost. We must never forget the victims and their families.

We must never forget the bravery of our first responders who selflessly rushed into a burning building to try to save others. And, we must never forget the heroes of Flight 93 whose courage and sacrifice likely saved countless lives  and whose actions likely prevented an even bigger tragedy from occurring.

As we take time today to remember the victims and honor the heroes of that tragic day 20 years ago, let us also remind ourselves how we, as a country, were able to come together in the wake of that attack - and how, to this day, our unity remains our greatest strength.

U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn of Colorado Springs:

"Our nation solemnly remembers the 2,977 men, women, and children that were lost during the 9/11 terrorist attacks on our soil. These attacks forever changed the free world. In the aftermath of these tragic events, America came together as one nation, under God.

"In the following years, our service members risked their lives to ensure that America would be safe once again. As we reflect on the twenty years since this fateful day, we express our deep gratitude to our brave men and women in uniform and thank them for their service. Their efforts were not wasted or in vain. They made the world a safer and more secure place.

"Today, join me in remembering and honoring those we have lost, those who gave so much, and those who remain with us today. Let us never forget the spirit of unity and patriotism that brought our nation together as we overcame this incomprehensible tragedy."

U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse of Lafayette (via Twitter):

"Today, on the 20th anniversary of September 11, 2001, we remember those we lost twenty years ago and honor those who answered the call to defend our country following the attacks. #NeverForget"

U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter of Arvada:

"The horrific events of September 11, 2001 remain a vivid and painful memory for all of us who bore witness and the infamous date will forever live on in history books and for generations to come. I think often of the thousands of families who have had to live on with the devastation or loss of a loved one from that day. From the ashes rose courage demonstrated by so many Americans that day, particularly our remarkable and courageous first responders, firefighters and medical personnel who saved countless lives. And to our servicemembers, past and present, who answered the call to serve their country in the years following the 9/11 attacks  thank you. Your service and sacrifice will never be forgotten. Two decades later, our world has changed but the strength and resiliency of the American spirit is stronger than ever.

State Senate President Leroy Garcia of Pueblo (via Twitter):

"20 years ago today, our country endured an unspeakable tragedy. We will never forget the innocent victims, the courageous survivors, and all the heroes who stepped up on 9/11/2001 and in the years following to keep us all safe."

House Speaker Alec Garnett of Denver (via Twitter):

"We remember all those lost 20 years ago. #NeverForget"

House Republican leader Hugh McKean of Loveland (via Twitter):

"Remembering 9/11: Fighting for Freedom, Then and Now." (with a link to a personal essay)

Secretary of State Jena Griswold of Estes Park:

"Today is a solemn day for Americans.

"As we commemorate this day, I wanted to send a message of support to all of the families and friends who lost loved ones on 9/11. We will never forget the courage and bravery of our first responders and the countless American heroes who ran towards the chaos to save lives. We hold the lost Americans in our hearts and the memories of them that will always be a blessing.

"As we reflect on this tragedy, let us also continue building a stronger, more united future."

Morgan Carroll, chair of the Colorado Democratic Party:

On this day, the 20th anniversary of 9/11, we honor the memory of the first responders and those who died in the attacks, and those who gave their lives to protect our country in the aftermath. There is no better way to honor their memory than for us as a country, no matter your political affiliation, to rise above agents of division and come together like we did 20 years ago. Our future depends on it.

Kristi Burton Brown, chair of the Colorado Republican Party (retweeted a comment from MSNBC host Joe Scarborough)

"#September11 #NeverForget"
A group of Colorado House Republicans have a message for Democratic President Joe Biden, who is expected to visit Denver on Tuesday.

"We will not be showing you or your agents our papers," wrote six of the chamber's most conservative members in a letter to the White House Friday.

The issue is the president's stepped up measures to get more people vaccinated, which some Republicans see as an infringement of their rights.

"This executive order is discriminatory, completely unconstitutional and contradicts our founding documents that set up a brilliant system of checks and balances within limited government," the letter continued. "You are not King or Dictator of America. You work for We the People, all of us, regardless of our medical status. This is a clear attempt to divide America and to distract from your own failures as President."

The letter was signed by Reps. Patrick Neville of Castle Rock, Dave Williams of Colorado Springs, Kevin Van Winkle of Highlands Ranch, Shane Sandridge of Colorado Springs, Kim Ransom of northwest Douglas County and Ron Hanks of Fremont County.

The full letter states:

Mr. President,

Your action regarding vaccine passports is tyranny by executive order. While we recognize that you have an obvious political need to distract the American public from your disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan and the Americans that were left behind, we are dismayed you chose to attack hardworking Americans through your latest executive order. Americans are not your enemy; freedom is not your enemy. Freedom is what has made our country so wonderful.

We will not be showing you or your agents our papers. This executive order is discriminatory, completely unconstitutional and contradicts our founding documents that set up a brilliant system of checks and balances within limited government. You are not King or Dictator of America. You work for We the People, all of us, regardless of our medical status. This is a clear attempt to divide America and to distract from your own failures as President. While you may have support from other authoritarian powers and unelected bureaucrats, it does not give you authority to attack individual liberty and destroy jobs and our economy in the process.

We encourage Americans to live free. In freedom, we encourage Americans to better themselves and their families. We encourage them to make their own health decisions, to consult with their own medical providers, and to access all relevant treatments available to them free from interference by you, or by unelected bureaucrats. We encourage everyone to embrace their religious liberties, to speak peacefully and freely against tyranny, and to use the judicial branch as a balancing power to stop orders like this. We encourage them to engage in open and free commerce, to innovate, to explore new ideas, to hire, to grow, to thrive, and to endeavor to make all of us better, freer and more prosperous.

We are an exceptional nation because of our freedom and liberty. Our nation was founded in freedom and liberty, and we will remain a nation that embraces freedom and liberty. We stand here to support the individual rights of all Americans and the way of our Republic.
In the summer between election years, the dog days are the lull when the political world tends to recline in anticipation of the busy months ahead, between legislative sessions and typically before campaigns are in full swing. This year, the pace hasnt slowed a bit in the U.S. Senate, with lawmakers scrambling to reach a vote on a massive infrastructure bill as the weeks-long August recess looms, but back in Colorado the political world appears to be taking a breather.
This year our dine and drink business locations throughout the Gorge have suffered with closures. You can help support your favorites by purchasing take out and gift cards. Many of these business will offer curb-side delivery and some will deliver to your home. Lets keep the Gorge going strong!
The Missourians Opinion section is a public forum for the discussion of ideas. The views presented in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Missourian or the University of Missouri. If you would like to contribute to the Opinion page with a response or an original topic of your own, visit our submission form
Jim Nowlan is a retired professor of American politics who has taught in China on several occasions. Allen Andersen is a retired businessman and economic development consultant. They reside in central Illinois.
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Massachusetts guy Jayme Gordon wrote a story called "Panda Power." And then in 2007, he was in a movie theater when he saw a trailer for an upcoming animated movie called Kung Fu Panda. He said to himself, "This movie ... doesn't seem very similar to my story at all." But maybe he could convince people it was. So the following year, he sued DreamWorks, saying they'd ripped off his story, which he now claimed had always been titled "Kung Fu Panda Power."

DreamWorks had actually based much of the movie on a video game project of theirs called T'ai Fu: Wrath of the Tiger. That game featured no pandas; for those, it's possible DreamWorks took inspiration from another game, Warcraft III, which had introduced kung fu pandas as an April Fools' joke. Or, maybe they thought of it totally on their ownit's really not that specific of an idea.

As proof that DreamWorks had plagiarized him, Gordon offered a series of drawings he'd made of his characters in the '90s. As you can see from his drawing, this wasn't exactly a smoking gun. The bear doesn't look that much like Po from Kung Fu Panda, and we don't know who that other animal is supposed to look like:

via FBI

But when the DreamWorks lawyers looked closer at the drawings, they found the evidence was worse than insufficient. It turned out Gordon had himself traced the drawingfrom a coloring book, earlier put out by Disney:

via FBI

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Disney had put out that book in 1996, while Gordon claimed to have made the drawings in 1992. So the man was committing fraud, and when investigators looked further, he destroyed the evidence. So, while most frivolous plagiarism lawsuits just get laughed out of court, Gordon suffered a worse fate. He was sentenced to two years in prison ... and also had to pay the legal fees of the mighty DreamWorks, totaling $3 million.

We can only assume that he then tried to rip off Kung Fu Panda further, by breaking out of prison, returning to his hometown, and unleashing a violent vengeful rampage.

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There's a lot of more you didn't know about this movie:

Charlie Kaufman Did Rewrites for Kung Fu Panda 2

Kung Fu Panda's Wacky Hero Gruesomely Murders The Villain

Meet Thailand's Buddhist/Pop Culture Temple

Top image: DreamWorks

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Joyce S. Norrod, 86, of Crossville, passed away on Sept. 8, 2021, at her home in Crossville. Mrs. Norrod was born on May 20, 1935, in White County, daughter of Allen Smith and Anna O'Dell Smith. Joyce was a homemaker and a founding member of the Crossville First Church of the Nazarene. She w
HCCA Releases False Claims in Healthcare Book About the FCA to Support Compliance Professionals in the Fight Against Healthcare Fraud
When and where you need it! 786 Hwy. 7
By Anita Fitzhugh

Jamil Kochais highly acclaimed debut novel, 99 Nights in Logar, is both a dream realized and a celebration of his Afghan heritage.

Born in a refugee camp in Pakistan, Kochai immigrated to California as an infant. A trip back to his native Afghanistan 12 years later inspired his novel, as did his large, multi-generational family that only spoke Pashto at home.

I had a teacher in elementary school who spent every day after school helping me learn English, Kochai said. I still remember my father saying that every child is a rocket and just needs a little spark to lift off. This teacher was my spark.

Kochai is the recipient of the 2021 Rising Star Award, given by the Sacramento State Alumni Association to Sac State graduates who have made outstanding contributions professionally, to the community, or to the University.

Rising Star honoree Jamil Kochai is making his mark as a writer whose literary voice is informed by family and tradition - as well as great talent. (Sacramento State/Student Affairs Marketing and Communications)

Kochai credits a number of educators for helping launch his career as a writer.

One of my teachers at River City High School in West Sacramento noticed my interests in reading and writing, and strongly encouraged me to take a creative writing class, Kochai said.

Then, during my second year at Sac State, I enrolled in a creative writing class with Professor Doug Rice. He was a brilliant teacher who has this really great technique in which he incorporates not only writing, but philosophy and life lessons. I workshopped my first short story with him and he was very supportive.

Rice, now professor emeritus of Film and English, has high praise for his former student.

In his writing and in his daily life, Jamil does not merely look at the world; he looks into the world, Rice said. As a writer and as an intellectual, he is taking new and more profound risks  aesthetically as well as politically.

In the face of political turmoil, writers have a responsibility to become engaged and to become a voice of conscience. Jamil is exactly that. True artists risk becoming vulnerable. Jamil has such courage. And Jamil had that same courage while a student at Sacramento State.

As a young author, Kochais contributions to the literary world are noteworthy and impressive: His novel was a finalist for the Pen/Hemingway Award and a story of his won an O. Henry Award. His work has appeared in multiple publications, including The New Yorker, The New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times.

Following his graduation from Sac State, Kochai earned a masters in Creative Writing from UC Davis and was the Truman Capote Distinguished Fellow at the Iowa University Writers Workshop. Currently, he is in his second year of the Wallace Stegner Fellowship at Stanford University and is working on his second novel.

Kochai credits much of his success in writing to finding his voice, one that reflects his familys Afghan history and traditions of storytelling.

Throughout my life there were all these times when we were sitting for dinner or drinking tea and all of the sudden in the middle of a conversation everyone is laughing and then someone dives into a story from back home from their childhood, he said.

This rich storytelling tradition weaves its way throughout the pages and characters of 99 Nights in Logar, with one chapter written entirely in Pashto.

I found a voice that is multilingual and incorporates elements of Pashto and Farsi, and California lingo and slang, Kochai said. It was only when I became comfortable writing in that voice that I began to value my own parents stories and my writing, I think, really took off.

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Black and Hispanic women make up about 25 percent of the states female population but represent about 53 percent of domestic violence arrest cases for adult females in 2020, judicial branch data shows.

Its a disparity that is playing out in courtrooms across the state, according to public defenders who contend that Black and brown women often face harsher penalties and longer court proceedings to gain a favorable outcome.

This is real, it is very real, said Jassette Henry, a senior assistant public defender in New Britain and a tri-chair of the Racial Justice and Cultural Competency Committee within the states Division of Public Defender Services. The question is, what are we going to do about it?

Black people are overrepresented in arrests, Henry said. Its not surprising that Black women are getting arrested in a domestic violence incident at a higher rate. They call police and wind up arrested. Its also about how they are treated in the system and what kind of hoops they have to go through to get a favorable disposition. Its very disturbing. This is a real issue.

According to judicial branch figures analyzed by C-HIT, in 2020, Black women were charged in 2,118 domestic violence cases, and Hispanic women were charged in 1,525 cases compared with white women, who were charged in 2,963 domestic violence cases during the same period. The cases include females 18 years and older.

The inequality is not new, the data show. Black and Hispanic women made up an average of 49 percent of the domestic violence cases filed against adult women from 2016 to 2019, even as overall domestic violence cases involving females dropped from 8,160 to 6,772.

The demographic data was compiled from police arrest reports, judicial branch officials said. The cases range from disorderly conduct to murder, officials said.

Adult white women make up about 75 percent of the states female population, according to estimates provided by the U.S. Census American Community Survey. Adult Black women make up 10.8 percent and adult Hispanic women make up about 14.4 percent of the population.

The domestic violence arrests are a microcosm of what youre seeing in the wider system, said Christine Rapillo, the states chief public defender who runs the Division of Public Defender Services. Poverty drives a lot of this. We see higher rates of arrest in poorer communities, which tend to be communities of color.

Lack Of Diversity In Criminal Justice, Understanding The Culture

One problem is that there isnt much employee diversity in the states criminal justice system positions that deal with defendants of color, Henry said.

There are offices in the division that have no Black or Hispanic public defenders, Henry said. If attorneys dont understand our culture, how can they advocate for their clients? How do we deal with this inside the courtroom when we are in front of a white judge or a white prosecutor? And how do we educate our public defenders who are not people of color to understand our culture?

The key is hiring a more diverse workforce and educating law enforcement and court staff, including judges, in cultural competency, Rapillo said.

If you have never stood in the shoes of a Black woman, you arent going to know what cultural factors are driving the situation, Rapillo said. We need a more diverse workforce, and we can educate people to be more aware. Diversity brings different perspectives to the work.

The Division of Criminal Justice, which encompasses the states prosecutors, is committed to hiring people of diverse backgrounds, thoughts and experiences, according to a statement issued by the agency. The Division is continually working to assemble a staff that reflects the communities we serve because we believe diversity strengthens the Division and bolsters trust in the criminal justice system, the statement said.

The agency said decisions about whether to pursue criminal cases are based on the facts of the case, the evidence and the law. Prosecutors in Connecticut strive every day to achieve justice for all parties involved in a case, making sure to consider the needs of the victims and the safety of society, the agency said.

New Approaches: Connecting Women To Services

Service providers contend that they serve victims of domestic violence in a culturally competent way. But many acknowledged that the coronavirus pandemic highlighted inequities in the system and forced providers to seek ways to engage more women of color to seek services.

Black women may be more hesitant to call police or seek services because the arrest of a partner could mean a loss of income, or a protective order could bar a partner from contact, which could lead to child care issues for the victim, some providers said.

Overall, our services are pretty evenly split among demographic groups, said Maria Guzman, director of Safe Connect, a program offered by the Connecticut Coalition Against Domestic Violence. But disparities in the way cases are handled can still exist in ways we dont recognize, Guzman said.

CCADV is the umbrella organization for the states 18 providers that offer shelter and counseling to victims of domestic violence. Statewide, about 60 percent of clients are white, 30 percent are Hispanic and 20 percent are Black, according to Tanya Johnson, CCADVs vice president of operations.

We recognize that there are many people who will not come through traditional brick-and-mortar service providers, Johnson said. They go to faith-based and smaller providers. Its very formidable for people to seek help when English isnt their first language or if they are experiencing extreme poverty.

Women of color are perceived as strong and able to take care of themselves and their families, Guzman said. That can lead to some hard decisions, she said. Do I ask law enforcement to intervene when communities of color are being incarcerated at higher rates? Communities of color are much more conscious of police brutality. Law enforcement may not always be the best option. We have to offer options that are relevant for them.

CCADV started a program last year to provide training in English and Spanish to faith-based communities so the organizations can recognize domestic violence and connect victims with resources since many women of color will not turn to regular channels for help.

We train faith-based leaders in how to have the difficult conversation about domestic violence and how to do outreach to break the silence of domestic violence, said Wanda Gaines, director of diversity and accessibility for CCADV, who conducts the training in Spanish. We know that different cultures dont want to talk about domestic violence. We are teaching leaders what domestic violence is and how to bring this into their conversations with people.

The Center for Family Justice, which provides shelter and domestic violence services in Bridgeport and surrounding towns, also offers outreach through a Latino team that goes to churches and into the community.

When we think about who we trust, women of color are not going to be walking into the police department to seek help, said center CEO and President Debra Greenwood. You have to ask women of color, what are your experiences? Some have sons, and they say Im afraid they cant be out on the street. When you are afraid, you have a mindset that immediately puts a wall up.

The pandemic and the social justice issues that came to the forefront in 2020 highlighted areas where domestic violence service providers needed to do better, said Barbara Damon, executive director of the Prudence Crandall Center in New Britain.

Sometimes it means crafting a safety plan that doesnt include police, she said. Its easy for us to think we know what the best thing is in any situation, Damon said. But thats not always true. Now were talking about how you can be as safe as possible. The key for us is not to give into stereotypes and meeting people where they are and taking the time to understand white privilege and the built-in racism in our society. We cant do this work without that understanding.

This story was reported under a partnership with the Connecticut Health I-Team (c-hit.org), a nonprofit news organization dedicated to health reporting.
WASHINGTON  The Institute for American Indian Studies in Washington is participating in the Smithsonian Magazines nationwide event, Museum Day, Sept. 18.

In this initiative, participating museums across the United States open their doors for free to those who download a branded ticket from the Smithsonian Magazines website. This event allows museums nationwide to emulate the spirit of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., which offers free admission every day, according to a statement.

This year's theme, "Experience America," represents a return to normalcy in the safest possible way. The Institute for American Indian Studies will have safety precautions in place for this year's event so guests can comfortably enjoy their time at the museum.

We are thrilled to join forces with Smithsonian Magazines Museum Day to bring educational experiences to families and children and to help foster a limitless quest for knowledge, said Chris Combs, Executive Director of the Institute. Museum Day goes beyond getting visitors through museum doors, it also serves as a reminder of people, places, and cultural experiences that have the power to educate and unite us all.

Tickets are available for download at www.smithsonianmag.com/; click Get a Ticket and filter your search by state, location, or the type of museum. Patrons will be asked to enter their name, email address and to confirm the museum to visit before downloading a ticket. For free admission, guests must present an official Museum Day Ticket. This ticket provides general admission for the ticket holder plus one guest. Only one ticket may be downloaded per email address and once you download a ticket you cannot change your mind, because there are no takebacks. If you go to Museum Day with more than one guest, other guests will have to pay full admission.

Located on 15 woodland acres the IAIS preserves and educates through archeology, research, exhibitions, and programs. We have an outdoor replicated 16th c. Algonkian Village, the award-winning Wigwam Escape, and a Museum with temporary and permanent displays of authentic artifacts from prehistory to the present that allows visitors to foster a new understanding of the world and the history and culture of Native Americans. The Institute for American Indian Studies is located on 38 Curtis Road in Washington Connecticut.
BRIDGEPORT  One year ago the police force faced one of the darkest days in its history when then-Chief Armando Perez, after a lengthy law enforcement career capped off with his promotion to top cop, was arrested for cheating to get that job.

Perez subsequently resigned, pleaded guilty and began serving his year-and-one-day sentence in federal prison May 23. And the department where he spent 37 years of his life has moved on without him, though with plenty of turmoil.

Acting Police Chief Rebeca Garcias leadership has frequently been questioned by critics on and off the force and the union, which has been working without a contract since July 1, says too many members are fleeing to other municipalities even as a recent recruitment drive drew several hundred fewer applicants than the last hiring push.

Now, current contract negotiations, a looming hunt for a new chief and other developments could make the next few weeks and months even more consequential than when Perez was taken into custody last Sept. 10.

Accreditation

In the short term, the department may be facing some welcome good news. At next Thursdays meeting of Connecticuts Police Officer Standards and Training Council, POSTs members are scheduled to vote on whether, following a four year effort, the citys department has earned accreditation.

It matters for the same reason ... that when you go to college, you want to go to an accredited college that practices best practices (and) doesnt operate by a whim, making policy by reaction rather than on research, professor John DeCarlo, director of the University of New Havens masters program in criminal justice, told Hearst Connecticut Media in July. Accreditation brings to policing an organizational structure, a portable body of best practices and a level of accountability that just does not exist in a non-accredited police department.

Achieving such a designation would place Bridgeports local law enforcement agency on a short list of just over three dozen other departments around the state that have upgraded policies and procedures to Connecticuts highest standards.

William Steck, a POST executive, said this week that POST staff have recommended Bridgeport receive accreditation but the full council has to decide whether or not thats going to happen.

While an affirmative vote by the standards council Thursday will be a big win, there are other pending issues that will significantly determine the departments future, like who will be hired to replace Perez.

Acting chief

Garcia assumed that responsibility less than a year after becoming Perezs assistant chief in December 2019, and has not had an easy 12 months. Almost immediately after Ganim put her in charge last September some elected officials demanded the mayor either hire other finalists who lost out to Perez in 2018s chief search or launch a new nationwide hunt for candidates.

Meanwhile a lawsuit challenging the legality of Garcias promotion to assistant chief by colleagues who wanted the opportunity to compete for that role is still pending in state Superior Court.

In March the police union voted no confidence in Garcia's leadership. Then in June the Bridgeport Guardians  a minority officer organization  called for her removal, alleging Black members in particular were subjected under Garcia to disparate treatment and a hostile work environment.

In August the Guardians called for federal oversight of the department in light of new allegations of racism that occurred under Perez.

Neither Ganim nor Garcia returned requests for comment about the state of the department post-Perez.

Ganim has, at least publicly, mostly ignored the controversies swirling around his acting top cop, but earlier this week his office confirmed an independent investigator has been assigned to investigate all complaints as filed by the Bridgeport Guardians.

Rather than launching a new chief search, the administration in April announced it would first seek to replace the department head who was also arrested last Sept. 10 for conspiring to help Perez cheat  then-Personnel Director David Dunn, who similarly resigned, pleaded guilty but received a shorter, four-month prison sentence.

The city recently began advertising for a new personnel head. The application deadline is Sept. 20.

City Councilman Matthew McCarthy, who co-chairs the contracts committee which votes on mayoral hires, has for months been urging Ganim to launch a chief search and hire an outsider rather than, as was the case with Perez and Garcia, promoting from within.

I think having a permanent chief from outside of the department  maybe even outside of Connecticut  will be the best step toward righting the ship, McCarthy reiterated this week. Fresh eyes. Fresh face. Theres no favoritism. Theyll come in and just, hopefully, make changes.

McCarthy said he is particularly alarmed by the number of officers who have departed this year under Garcia.

Its a public crisis right now, he said.

Decreasing headcount

This week Police Union President Sgt. Brad Seeley told Hearst that 39 officers have left the force since January  16 retired and 23 transferred to other municipalities.

We are currently trying to get the city to pay attention to the growing staffing crisis within the police department, Seeley said in a statement. That was one of the issues our members raised when they concluded the no-confidence (vote) that passed. ... We are now down to approximately 335 officers.

The city did not respond to a request to corroborate the unions data. Garcia in July stated the optimum manpower is 426 officers and as of June 30 she had 349 men and women under her command.

Ganims administration in April launched a recruitment drive to fill around 60 positions, but as reported earlier this summer, the effort fell short of previous years: 419 candidates applied compared with 1,013 six years ago.

As of July 1 the union has been working without a contract. Seeley declined to comment on specifics of the ongoing negotiations but said making the benefits offered Bridgeport officers more competitive should be a priority.

We are losing dedicated officers to neighboring towns that offer significantly more affordable benefits, competitive pay and retiree health insurance, he said. This is a threat to maintaining community safety. The city and department needs to take the situation seriously.

Garcia has previously acknowledged being told in exit interviews that health insurance costs were a concern, and has explored requiring future recruits remain on the job in Bridgeport for around five years.

Requiring not just police but all municipal employees to contribute more to their healthcare was a cost-saving priority for former Mayor Bill Finch, whom Ganim defeated in the 2015 Democratic mayoral primary in part with the help of the police union at the time.

Councilman Scott Burns, a co-chairman of that bodys budget committee, said this week, We absolutely have to look at it (healthcare) if we are losing younger officers. But he also acknowledged the competing concern of rolling back Finchs effort, which was aimed at saving taxpayers money.

Weve got to look at the whole picture and get a grip on whats going on there, Burns said.

The council had intended to take a more proactive role in the negotiating process, submitting recommended contract changes to municipal negotiators ahead of time, rather than waiting for the sides to reach a deal and submit it to the legislative body for a vote.

But McCarthy said that effort has gone nowhere, citing concerns that, under the state Freedom of Information Act, any discussions might have to be public, undermining the Ganim administrations negotiating tactics.

Social services

However Burns and Council President Aidee Nieves co-chaired the police reform task force of representatives from Ganims staff and community leaders that in April issued a report suggesting several ways of reforming the force to hold officers more accountable and improve community relations.

Some of the recommendations in that document  disciplinary changes, modifications to overtime and civilian-izing some jobs  were expected to be considered by the Ganim administration as it pursues a new union pact.

Also the city is slowly moving ahead with fulfilling another of the task forces proposals to create a civilian social services unit that use trained counselors to respond to certain calls, freeing officers to focus on crimes and public safety.

An aggressive timeline had that unit up-and-running by now. Burns this week said the job descriptions are being finalized and should soon be made public.

A fairly simple example  a guy who has a habitual substance issue. You dont need to send a cop there to devote an hour, two hours, whatever to that same person, time over time over time, Burns said. You send the social services person and that loosens up the manpower demands a little bit.
DALLAS (AP)  President Joe Biden and his team are promoting an agreement reached with the U.S. airline industry to cut aircraft greenhouse-gas emissions 20% by decade's end, but the deal might not fly.

In an announcement Thursday, the White House unveiled an array of measures to reduce climate-changing emissions. The administration is also setting a goal of replacing all of today's kerosene-based jet fuel with cleaner or sustainable fuel by 2050.

Climate experts say that while the effort is laudable, the administration's approach is aspirational and unrealistic. The targets are voluntary, and robust government support will be needed to offset the higher cost of sustainable fuel  up to three times more than regular fuel.

Airlines in fact have talked up sustainable jet fuel for years and even made small investments in it, but it may prove to be a vision beyond Biden's promised reach. Airline executives have expressed concern in particular that flight shaming  famously advocated by Swedish activist Greta Thunberg  could catch on in the U.S. if the companies are seen as uncaring about the environment.

WHITE HOUSE, touting Biden's steps to involve the government, aircraft makers, airlines and fuel suppliers to boost the use of cleaner fuels: The measures will result in the production and use of billions of gallons of sustainable fuel that will enable aviation emissions to drop 20% by 2030 when compared to business as usual.

THE FACTS: That's a giant step that will be highly difficult, if not impossible, to achieve.

Only 2.4 million gallons of sustainable aviation fuel, or SAF, were produced in the United States in 2019, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. In contrast, airlines burned 21.5 billion gallons of regular fuel that year. That means just over 0.01% of the nations supply currently comes from sustainable fuel.

The airline industry says bridging the gap will require bold steps including grants and tax credits for producers, government support for research, and more. Biden is seeking a SAF tax credit as part of a $3.5 trillion spending bill being pushed in Congress by Democrats, but its outcome remains uncertain. Even with that money, it's not clear all those things would be enough to meet the administration's ambitious goals, according to aviation experts.

Aspirational goals like this dont move markets, says Dan Rutherford, who oversees aviation research at the International Council on Clean Transportation, an environmental group based in Washington.

Without a government mandate or very strong incentives, Rutherford says, I doubt that much SAF will be generated. He notes that the International Air Transport Association, a global trade group for airlines, had a voluntary goal of 10% sustainable fuel by 2017 and the federal government had a target of 1 billion gallons per year by 2018, and neither came anywhere close.

Liz Jones, a climate-law attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, says the administration plan largely relies on biofuels aspirations that simply arent based on reality.

Airlines have been announcing promises to become carbon neutral around the middle of the century, and some have invested in sustainable fuel as they defend against criticism over aviations role in climate change. Airplanes produce only around 3% of the worlds heat-trapping emissions, but their share is growing rapidly.

Jones says, however, that nothing in the administration's plan would force airlines to live up to their promises.

And even the best-case scenario doesnt cut climate pollution fast enough, she says. "The Biden EPA needs to set strong airplane emissions standards now, not get mired in the myth of sustainable airline fuels.

The White House and airline trade groups are counting on tax credits to produce three billion gallons a year by 2030. Airline trade groups are pushing Congress to enact a tax credit of $1.50 to $2 per gallon, depending on how much the fuel reduces greenhouse gas emissions when burned.

Airlines for America, a trade group for the biggest U.S. airlines, had previously set a goal of producing 2 billion gallons of sustainable fuel in 2030. This week, the group agreed to back the White House goals.

The airline group's president, Nicholas Calio, said the airlines are proud of our record on climate change, but we know the climate change challenge has only continued to intensify, and so it raised its goal for sustainable fuel.

Airlines are also placing orders and making investments in startups that are designing aircraft powered by electricity or hydrogen. Some of the manufacturers aim to have small electric planes of up to 19 seats in service by the end of the decade.

We want to operate aircraft that are very good for the environment in the long run," Andrew Nocella, the chief commercial officer of United Airlines, said this week. How they come to be and when they come to be is still a little bit TBD (to be determined)."

___

Associated Press writer Hope Yen contributed to this report.

___

EDITOR'S NOTE  A look at the veracity of claims by political figures.

___

Find AP Fact Checks at http://apnews.com/APFactCheck

Follow @APFactCheck on Twitter: https://twitter.com/APFactCheck
WASHINGTON (AP)  President Joe Bidens sweeping new vaccine requirements have Republican governors threatening lawsuits. His unapologetic response: Have at it.

The administration is gearing up for another major clash between federal and state rule. But while many details about the rules remain unknown, Biden appears to be on firm legal ground to issue the directive in the name of protecting employee safety, according to several experts interviewed by The Associated Press.

My bet is that with respect to that statutory authority, theyre on pretty strong footing given the evidence strongly suggesting  the degree of risk that (unvaccinated individuals) pose, not only to themselves but also unto others, said University of Connecticut law professor Sachin Pandya.

Republicans swiftly denounced the mandate that could impact 100 million Americans as government overreach and vowed to sue, and private employers who resist the requirements may do so as well. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott called it an assault on private businesses" while Gov. Henry McMaster promised to "fight them to the gates of hell to protect the liberty and livelihood of every South Carolinian. The Republican National Committee has also said it will sue the administration to protect Americans and their liberties.

Such cases could present another clash between state and federal authority at a time when Biden's Justice Department is already suing Texas over its new state law that bans most abortions, arguing that it was enacted in open defiance of the Constitution.

The White House is gearing up for legal challenges and believes that even if some of the mandates are tossed out, millions of Americans will get a shot because of the new requirements  saving lives and preventing the spread of the virus.

Biden is putting enforcement in the hands of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which is drafting a rule over the coming weeks, Jeffrey Zients, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, said Friday. He warned that if a workplace refuses to follow the standard, the OSHA fines could be quite significant.

Courts have upheld vaccination requirements as a condition of employment, both before the pandemic  in challenges brought by health care workers  and since the coronavirus outbreak, said Lindsay Wiley, director of the Health Law and Policy Program at American University Washington College of Law.

Where Biden's vaccine requirements could be more open to attack is over questions of whether the administration followed the proper process to implement them, she said.

The argument that mandatory vaccination impermissibly infringes on bodily autonomy or medical decision making, those arguments have not been successful and I dont expect that to change, Wiley said. I think the challenges that are harder to predict the outcome of are going to be the ones that are really sort of the boring challenges about whether they followed the right process.

Emergency temporary standards  under which the rules are being implemented on a fast track  have been particularly vulnerable to challenges, Wiley said. But the risks presented by the coronavirus and the existence of a declared public health emergency could put this one on stronger footing than any other ones past administrations have tried to impose that have been challenged in court, she said.

Indeed, the question of whether the mandate is legally sound is separate from whether it will be upheld by judges, including by a conservative-majority Supreme Court which has trended toward generous interpretations of religious freedom and may be looking to ensure that any mandate sufficiently takes faith-based objections into account.

Vaccination has become politicized and there are many Republican district judges who might be hostile to the regulation for political reasons," said Michael Harper, a Boston University law professor.

I could imagine an unfortunate opinion that attempted to justify this political stance by rejecting the use of OSHA against infectious disease rather than against hazards intrinsic to the workplace, Harper wrote in an email.

The expansive rules mandate that all employers with more than 100 workers require them to be vaccinated or test for the virus weekly, affecting about 80 million Americans. And the roughly 17 million workers at health facilities that receive federal Medicare or Medicaid also will have to be fully vaccinated.

Biden is also requiring vaccination for employees of the executive branch and contractors who do business with the federal government  with no option to test out. That covers several million more workers.

Republican-dominated Montana stands alone in having a state law on the books that directly contradicts the new federal mandate. The state passed a law earlier this year making it illegal for private employers to require vaccines as a condition for employment.

But University of Montana constitutional law professor Anthony Johnstone said the federal rules would trump the state law. That means larger Montana businesses that previously couldnt require their employees to get vaccinated will now likely be required to, including hospitals that are some of the largest employers in the sparsely populated state.

Given that the rules are still being drafted and haven't been released, experts say the devil is in the details. It remains to be seen exactly what the rule will require employers to do or not do, and how it accounts for things such as other rights that unvaccinated employees may assert, such as the right to a disability accommodation, Pandya said.

For example  with the growing number of fully remote businesses and workers  if the rules are written to include people who don't have workplace exposure, there certainly is room for an issue there," said Erika Todd, an employment attorney with Sullivan & Worcester in Boston.

Charles Craver, a labor and employment law professor at George Washington University, said the mandate presented a close question" legally. But he said the Biden administration did have a legitimate argument that such a requirement was necessary for employers to protect the safety of workers, customers and members of the public.

The thornier question, though, is how employers  and courts  will sort through requests for accommodations for employees on religious or other grounds.

Though such accommodations may include having an employee work from home, you can have a situation where someone has to be present and you cant provide an accommodation because of the danger involved," he added.

I would not be a betting person if this went up before the Supreme Court, Craver said. I could even picture the court divided 5-4, and I wouldnt bet which way it would go.

____

Richer reported from Boston. Reporter Iris Samuels contributed to this report from Helena, Montana. Samuels 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.
LAS VEGAS (AP)  A judge in Las Vegas has dismissed a lawsuit in a dispute over control of the Republican party in the Las Vegas area, telling acting party leaders and a Trump faction claiming control that courts shouldn't settle what she termed an intra-party political fight.

The decision Thursday by Clark County District Court Judge Susan Johnson in Las Vegas overturned a court order last week by another judge but did not immediately resolve the question of Clark County Republican Central Committee leadership.
TLALNEPANTLA, Mexico (AP)  A section of mountain on the outskirts of Mexico City gave way Friday, plunging rocks the size of small homes onto a densely populated neighborhood and leaving at least one person dead and 10 others missing.

Firefighters scaled a three-story pile of rocks that appeared to be resting on houses in Tlalnepantla, which is part of Mexico state. The state surrounds the capital on three sides.

As rescuers climbed the immense pile of debris, they occasionally raised their fists in the air, the familiar signal for silence to listen for people trapped below. Firefighters and volunteers formed bucket brigades to pass 5-gallon containers of smaller debris away as they excavated.

In this moment our priority is focused on rescuing the people who unfortunately were surprised at the site of the incident, said Tlalnepantla Mayor Raciel Perez Cruz in a video message. Authorities had evacuated surrounding homes and asked people to avoid the area so rescuers could work.

Rescuers carried a body on a stretcher covered with a sheet past AP journalists. The Mexico state Civil Defense agency said in a statement that at least 10 people were reported missing.

Among the volunteers were 30-year-old construction worker Martin Carmona, 30, and his 14-year-old son. They organized us in a chain to take out buckets of sand, stone and rubble, Carmona said. A co-worker lives there. He has a wife and two young children under the debris.

Carmona and his son arrived to the pile before government rescuers and his friend was already there digging for his wife and kids.

Neighbors began to complain that they need more help and organization.

Carmona said rescuers heard children, but after two hours of removing debris, authorities told volunteers to leave the area. Only relatives stayed to help the rescuers.

Search dogs clambered over the rubble with their handlers.

Ana Luisa Borges, 39, said she lives just three houses down from those hit by the landslide.

It thundered horribly, she said of the sound of the slide. I grabbed my youngest son and ran out (of the house). Then came a very big cloud of dust. Fortunately, her other four children were in school.

There are a number of houses there, she said of the slide area. There was a building, but they tell us there are people there and children. I saw one person come out with head injury.

Borges said they have been warned that another rock could come down and that she didnt know where they were going to sleep tonight.

Theyve only told us that we have to leave (our homes)," she said.

Tlalnepantla officials announced they were opening several shelters for displaced residents.

The neighborhood is a heap of jumbled houses climbing the mountainside, many with corrugated tin roofs, separated in places by just a steep staircase.

One massive boulder stopped against a two-story house barely its equal, knocking out the front wall and spilling the homes contents into the street. A path of destruction traced uphill.

Maximinio Andrade, who lives with his parents and siblings  14 family members in all  near the slide walked down the steep street pushing a flat-screen television on a hand cart. He had not been home at the time of the landslide, but feared thieves would enter now that the surrounding homes had been evacuated.

Theyve already started stealing from the destroyed homes, he said.

National Guard troops and rescue teams carrying lengths of rope made their way through narrow streets.

Images from the area showed a segment of the steep, green side of the peak known as Chiquihuite sheared off above a field of giant rubble with closely packed homes remaining on either side.

Mexico state Gov. Alfredo del Mazo said via Twitter that local, state and federal authorities were coordinating to secure the zone in case of more slides and to remove rubble to locate possible victims.

The landslide follows days of heavy rain in central Mexico and a 7.0-magnitude earthquake Tuesday night near Acapulco that shook buildings 200 miles (320 kilometers) away in Mexico City.

While visiting the scene later Friday, Del Mazo said authorities believe four homes were destroyed in the landslide and another 80 were evacuated as a precaution.

Its likely the earthquake and the intense rain we have had in recent days have affected (the area) and for this came the landslide and the break up of the mountain, he said.
JACKSON, Miss. (AP)  Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves said Friday that Democratic President Joe Bidens new federal vaccine requirements are clearly unconstitutional and said he believes Biden issued the mandate to try to distract the world from the fallout over his decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan.

This is the same bait and switch. The president wants us to be talking about anything but Afghanistan, the Republican governor said at a news conference outside the Governors Mansion in Jackson. He wants us to talk about anything but Afghanistan, and sadly, hes willing to trample on the rights of 100 million Americans to try to help himself politically. That, to me, is disgusting.

Biden's sweeping new federal vaccine requirements announced Thursday mandate that all employers with more than 100 workers require them to be vaccinated or test for the virus weekly, affecting about 80 million Americans. And the roughly 17 million workers at health facilities that receive federal Medicare or Medicaid also will have to be fully vaccinated.

Reeves called the requirements tyrannical and said a member of the executive branch does not have the authority to mandate that workers be vaccinated.

Its clearly unconstitutional for the president, to unilaterally with one signature, decide something of this magnitude, he said.

Every person in America should be scared to death of what this President is trying to do, he continued. You know, every tyrant in history has said that what they were trying to do was because it was in the best interest of the people.

He said he expects the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down the requirement and said Mississippi will join other states in filing a lawsuit. He called it an attack on hard-working Americans.

In essence, what the president saying is... hard-working Americans  many of whom work here and live here in Mississippi  hard-working Mississippians have to choose between either injecting themselves with something and potentially having the ability to earn a living to produce food for their family, he said. Thats a ridiculous choice.

Reeves said he made the decision to get the shot and encourages Mississippi residents to do the same.

But if he has the ability to unilaterally do this, then there is no limit on the powers of the presidency, he said. Thats not called a true democracy. That is tyranny  and we do not want that in America.

Mississippi is among the least vaccinated states, with 41% of residents fully vaccinated, according to the Mississippi State Department of Health.

Reeves on Friday also announced that he will expand Mississippis COVID-19 state of emergency for an additional 30 days. He said the extension will ease the process of marshalling additional resources, like healthcare workers, to help the state fight the virus. It will also allow the governor to call on the keep Mississippi National Guard for aid, if necessary.

___

Leah Willingham 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.
FAIRFIELD  Caitlin Clarkson Pereira is among the newest class of firefighter recruits, making her the departments first female firefighter hire in 25 years and third overall.

I am so humble and proud to be one of the new firefighters in Fairfield, Pereira said. It really is an incredible feeling to know that now I am a member of the fire department that I grew up idolizing so much.

Pereira, a Fairfield native, joins fellow Fairfield Fire Department recruits Luke Hawthorne, of Mansfield; Michael Canil, of Bethel; and Matthew Rowan, of Trumbull. The four recently swore their oath, the department announced.

Its always an exciting thing for us welcoming these new recruits, Deputy Chief Kyran Dunn said. Theyre a new part of our family.

We have had female firefighters that have worked seamlessly and honorably so we are very happy about having Caitlin Pereira as one of our newest hires, Dunn added.

In 1987, Fairfields fire department hired Lauri Jepsen. Jespen would go on to spend 31 years with the department before retiring as a lieutenant in 2018. Firefighter Peggy Marlowe also worked for the department for about 12 years before retiring nearly 15 years ago.

Despite the presence of Jespen and Marlowe, Pereira never thought being a firefighter was a career path she could actually go down, although, it had always been her childhood dream.

As a young girl growing up in Fairfield, Pereira idolized the towns firefighters. She had always been interested in fire services and with a natural passion for helping people, it seemed like a possible career path. However, as Pereira grew up, the lack of representation of women in fire services led to an unintentional realization that perhaps fire services wasnt for her.

I remember being in high school looking up the physical fitness requirements for the fire service and I started reading them and was intimidated right off the bat, Pereira said. I filed being a firefighter away in a folder of childhood dreams and thats where it was going to stay.

Pereira said that it can be really hard to aspire to be something that you dont see in real life. Dunn agreed and said it is important the department does more recruitment and gets the message out that it is something women can do.

A lot of times people go into vocations that there is a family member involved in, Dunn said. I think the lack of females traditionally in fire service didnt help, but now that more females are getting into it and becoming mentors and role models for women I think it is going to happen.

For me, I had a family background and I always knew I would want to be a firefighter, he added. The women who have been hired have done really well so were hoping that situation does change and that females know that this is a great career and its certainly obtainable.

Pereira initially chose a career path in education as she tried to follow her passion in helping others. However, as time went on she always felt that something was missing and that there was always something else that she wanted to do for people.

I wanted people to expect me to go above and beyond and I truly believe that firefighters are the worlds greatest problem solvers  the ones that we look to in our moments of crisis, Pereira said. I think being a career firefighter is the epitome of a helper and its the best way to help so many people in a variety of different ways.

Pereira said what ultimately made her finally go after the childhood dream was some advice she received from a few firefighters. When she first started to expressed what her dream had been, the firefighters said, We need you. Its the same advice she would give to any women who wanted to be a firefighter now.

The fire service needs representation, Pereira said. Its not an easy path for sure. I worked really hard to get here and the other women who I am at the academy with have worked so hard to get where they are, but its certainly possible.

There are 71 students in the current recruit class at the Connecticut Fire Academy, six of whom are women hailing from the towns of Fairfield, Ridgefield, Manchester and West Hartford. The academy doesnt track the number of women its trained overall.

While the amount of female students could be considered small, Pereira said the potential that these women have on impacting their communities is something that cant be overlooked.

It is a huge point of pride and its very empowering, Pereira said. You never know who may be watching you or who youre making and impression on. Its very humbling to think that I might be somebody who is making an impression on a young girl some point down the road.

Dunn said while Pereira is currently the only female firefighter at the department, it wont be for long with the numbers of women getting into fire services increasing. In fact, Dunn said the next person on the fire departments list who will probably be hired during the winter of 2022 is also a woman.
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP)  An Ohio woman pleaded guilty Friday to helping plan the killings of eight members of a family, becoming the second member of her own family to admit to a role in a shocking crime prosecutors say stemmed from a dispute over custody of her granddaughter.

Angela Wagner, 50, pleaded guilty in southern Ohios Pike County to conspiracy to commit aggravated murder, along with burglary, evidence tampering and other charges.

In exchange for the plea, prosecutors dropped aggravated murder charges against her and recommended that she serve a 30-year prison sentence. Her agreement to testify against other remaining defendants was also part of the deal, they said.

She didn't make any statements during the hearing.

Her husband and their two adult sons also were charged in the 2016 slayings of seven adults and a teenage boy from the Rhoden family. Wagners plea comes nearly five months after her son Edward Jake Wagner pleaded guilty to aggravated murder and other charges and agreed to testify against the other three in a deal that would help all four avoid potential death sentences.

George Billy Wagner III and George Wagner IV have pleaded not guilty.

The fatal shootings at three trailers and a camper near Piketon in April 2016 terrified residents in a stretch of rural Ohio and launched one of the states most extensive criminal investigations, which led to the Wagners arrest more than two years later.

The Wagners spent months planning the killings and targeted some of the victims, but some sadly were killed because they happened to be there, said special prosecutor Angela Canepa.

Most of the victims were repeatedly shot in the head, and some showed signs of bruising. Three young children at the scenes were unharmed.

The victims were 40-year-old Christopher Rhoden Sr.; his ex-wife, 37-year-old Dana Rhoden; their three children, 20-year-old Clarence Frankie Rhoden, 16-year-old Christopher Jr., and 19-year-old Hanna; Clarence Rhodens fiancee, 20-year-old Hannah Gilley; Christopher Rhoden Sr.s brother, 44-year-old Kenneth Rhoden; and a cousin, 38-year-old Gary Rhoden.

Prosecutors say the Wagner family planned the killings for months, motivated by a dispute over custody of the daughter Jake Wagner had with Hanna Rhoden.

The Wagners used guns with homemade silencers, allowing them to kill their victims as they slept, according to the prosecutors.

Angela Wagner was fully aware of the plans and bought several items used to carry out the killings, including phone jammers that would have prevented the victims from calling for help, Canepa said.

She also forged custody documents and monitored some of the victims' social media accounts before the killings, Canepa said. Wagner approached prosecutors about a deal and gave them new information after her son pleaded guilty, Canepa said.

Jake Wagner pleaded guilty in April on the fifth anniversary of the slayings and said in court that he was deeply and very sorry. He hasnt been sentenced, but his lawyer said he understood that he would spend his life in prison.

Christopher Rhoden Sr.s brother, Tony Rhoden Sr., has said the family was grateful for the first plea as some semblance of justice.

He also has sued the Wagners. That case is pending.

___

Seewer reported from Toledo.
I believe we do what we have to do at the time with the information that we know and the resources that we have, and we do the best that we can because thats what we were asked to do.

Lt. Col. Maria Emery

Lt. Col. Maria Emery
There are so many resources in Kankakee County available to veterans if they are willing to reach out and find them, said Peterson.

 Check in with local American Legions or VFWs. With this, Peterson said, there are so many Vietnam veterans in this area that could shed some very important light to any of those veterans who are having a hard time finding their way out of the dark right now.

I definitely think that, now is a time where, after a lot of veterans were dealing with isolation already [due to the pandemic], throwing this on top of that could just lead to a really dangerous state of mind, Peterson explained. So I think its really important to touch base with our veterans to let them know were here for them in whatever way they need us to be here for them.

When things like that happen, it makes one question everything. How could it not? said Eric Peterson, who shared that people can help the veterans of Operation Enduring Freedom by offering them someone to talk to.

Experience with the Afghan people

"Anyone I know of from overseas that dealt with the people of Afghanistan enjoyed the people of Afghanistan.

"When I was with the Department of Defense, we had local drivers who would pick us up from our location because we lived in downtown Kabul in apartment buildings. If it was something essential, I would roll out with the team in our vehicles to go somewhere. But if I wanted to go to the gym, I would call a local driver who would come and pick me up and take me to the military base where I could go work out.

"One day in particular, this local driver picked me up and he was bringing me to the military base. I was wearing gym clothes and I had my handgun with me. We got stopped at a traffic stop by Afghan national police. Im by myself, Im in this foreign land and all I have is this local driver who really doesnt owe anything to us  he couldve done whatever he wanted at that point.

"This police officer had an AK-47 in my face and was asking for all of these papers that Id never heard of in my life. When I didnt know what to do, I asked my driver to translate for me. I asked him to ask the police officer how much it would cost for me to get out of here. When I proposed that question, I did it because we never knew who to trust out there. There was a prison outside of Kabul that had ex-pats from other countries that we were aware of  so it was very possible that, if that local driver wanted to, he couldve said anything and couldve gotten me taken away. But he helped facilitate the conversation with that police officer, in which case I paid him off and we got out of there and he got me to my military base.

"When those moments happen, you dont realize how much you count on the people that live in that country. Thats one small example of many, where, by working with the locals, it helped us out in ways that I cant even explain."

 Eric Peterson
Elizabeth City, NC (27909)

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Robert Wendell Glover, 81, of Dalton, Georgia passed away on September, 13th 2021 at home surrounded by his loving family. He was preceded in death by his wife of 57 years Patricia Lee McKaig Glover. Robert loved his family and Country and proudly served in the United States Air Force. Born 
Ronald Leland Dickison of Ironton, Ohio passed away Saturday, September 11, 2021 at home surrounded by his family. Ronald was born November 11, 1942 in Ashland, Kentucky. He was the son of the late Ben Dickison and Dorothy Gillium. There will be a celebration of life, 1:00 P.M., Saturday, Se
Sunbury, PA (17801)

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Thunderstorms, accompanied by locally heavy rainfall at times. A few storms may be severe. High 84F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%. Rainfall near an inch..

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Showers with a possible thunderstorm early, then variable clouds overnight with still a chance of showers. A few storms may be severe. Low 63F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%.
Sunbury, PA (17801)

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Thunderstorms, accompanied by locally heavy rainfall at times. A few storms may be severe. High near 85F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near an inch..

Tonight

Showers with a possible thunderstorm early, then variable clouds overnight with still a chance of showers. A few storms may be severe. Low 63F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%.
For the past few months, Ministers and Tory MPs have become increasingly concerned about Boris Johnson and his erratic political agenda.

Hug-a-fish environmentalism. Confusion, contradiction and prevarication over Covid passports. An obsession with high-cost vanity projects such as an Irish Sea bridge.

As one Minister told me: Its all a bit Red Ed.

Nick Clegg only got caught telling one massive lie to the electorate. But in the course of unleashing his 12 billion social care tax raid, Boris has told three of them

Over the first three years of the tax rise, only 5.3 billion of the anticipated 36 billion will actually be directed towards social care

This morning, after a week which saw the Prime Minister formally lay to rest the Conservatives reputation as the party of low taxation, those same MPs are no longer worried that Boris is the new Ed Miliband.

Instead, they fear he has become the new Nick Clegg.

Its a disaster, one despairing backbencher told me. Weve betrayed our own voters. This is Boriss tuition fees moment.

It isnt. Nick Clegg only got caught telling one massive lie to the electorate. But in the course of unleashing his 12 billion social care tax raid, Boris has told three of them.

The first lie was the most blatant. We will not raise the rate of income tax, VAT or National Insurance, he said at the time of his Election manifesto launch.

Read my lips, we will not be raising taxes, he told broadcaster Nick Ferrari.

If Jeremy Corbyn were allowed into Downing Street, he would whack up your taxes, he warned in his first party conference speech as leader. Corbyn would put up taxes for everyone.

Corbyn didnt. But Boris just has.

The second lie was over the reason for the tax hike. It was time to fix the crisis in social care, the Prime Minister announced. Governments have ducked this problem for decades. There can be no more dither and delay.

But no sooner had his plans been unveiled than it became clear the dither and delay will continue. Over the first three years of the tax rise, only 5.3 billion of the anticipated 36 billion will actually be directed towards social care.

The bulk of the revenue will be funnelled towards NHS waiting lists. Nor is there any guarantee that after that period any additional funds for social care will be provided. When asked, Health Secretary Sajid Javid couldnt even guarantee the new tax take of 30 billion would be sufficient to clear the NHS Covid backlog.

The third lie was over the justification for this manifesto-shredding tax hike. A global pandemic was in no ones manifesto, Boris pleaded. True. But the social care crisis hasnt appeared overnight.

When the manifesto was drafted  long before Covid reared its ugly head  there was no suggestion within it that a magic money tree had been found to provide an additional 12 billion a year to end the iniquities of Britains broken social care system.

Of course, this isnt necessarily fatal, as Keir Starmer is still incapable of effectively attacking the Tories crumbling right flank

The idea that social care was on the brink of being fixed, only for the pesky virus to come along and ruin everything, is a fantasy. If Boris had simply stuck with waiting lists and announced Covid has left us with millions of untreated patients. It wasnt something we could possibly have foreseen when the manifesto was written. Im going to have to raise taxes till the situation is resolved, that would have been one thing. It may at least have enjoyed public understanding, if not support. And would possibly have been viewed as a legitimate response to a global crisis, rather than a flagrant manifesto breach.

But thats not what hes doing. Instead of a one-off emergency cash injection, he has decided to write his great tax betrayal into law, and ring-fence it for perpetuity. As a result, Labour has taken its first lead in the polls since January.

Of course, this isnt necessarily fatal, as Keir Starmer is still incapable of effectively attacking the Tories crumbling right flank. Whatever promises Boris has broken, the voters still see higher taxes and higher spending embedded deep in Starmers DNA.

And the spectacle of him railing against a 36 billion NHS cash injection will only add to the impression that he remains the leader of Her Majestys Loyal Opportunists.

But this is not just another unfortunate blunder, one that will eventually be dismissed with a bit of engaging bluster and some sugary retrospection about getting Brexit done. Lasting damage has been done to Boris and his party.

At least hes been brave in finally trying to get to grips with this issue, some people have claimed. No, he hasnt. The person who showed genuine political courage over social care was Theresa May.

She was open about the need to finally tackle the crisis, she had the guts to level with the voters about it and she paid the political price. Boris has tried to sneak his policy past the electorate concealed in a hospital gown and a Covid mask.

Some others have claimed he should be applauded for this act of subterfuge. That its politically astute to use the pandemic as cover for introducing a policy that will benefit a significant number of Tory voters.

But again, the polls reveal this theory to be bankrupt. Its true that a detailed YouGov analysis shows a majority of Conservative voters back the plan. But 34 per cent oppose it  19 per cent of them strongly. And any policy that alienates one in three of your partys existing supporters is political suicide.

Forget the esoteric  and ultimately subjective  debate about whether the policy is socially progressive or regressive. Cast aside, too, the arcane argument over whether it is sufficiently Tory. Boriss appeal has always been based on his pragmatism, not any devotion to a pre-proscribed ideology.

All people need to focus on  amid the clumsy sophistry of the past few days  is a single truth. Which is that Boris gave a solemn vow to the British people not to raise their taxes. And he broke it.

Ever since his election, Boriss opponents have been trying to frame him as a perfidious charlatan. And theyve failed.

Partly, thats because his roguish, nod-and-a-wink charm proved refreshing in an era of holier-than-thou political hypocrisy. Partly, its because voters, to an extent, see deceit as the currency of politics.

And partly, its because on the big issues  Brexit, the Covid vaccine  Boris has delivered what he said hed deliver.

But from here on those charges will begin to stick. He could have levelled with the voters, been honest and open about raising their National Insurance contributions, and asked for their mandate in an Election most MPs think is little more than 18 months away.

The polls may fluctuate. Starmer may vacillate. But there will come a point in the months or years ahead where Boris will again turn to the British people and say: Please trust me

Instead, he has opted to join the ranks of the Missionary Politicians. That grey, faceless column of benign plutocrats who believe the people are too stupid or too indolent to understand whats good for them. And that, as a result, the only way to govern is to lie, implement a policy anyway and hope they eventually forget or forgive.

But whatever happens, the breach of faith has been made now. And it cannot be undone.

The polls may fluctuate. Starmer may vacillate. But there will come a point in the months or years ahead where Boris will again turn to the British people and say: Please trust me. And they will raise an eyebrow and refer him back to the events of last week.

He will attempt to expose Labours own honeyed pledges. And find his accusations falling on increasingly deaf ears. The next Tory manifesto? If penned by Boris, it will hardly be worth the paper its written on.

Read my lips, Boris told the British people, we will not be raising taxes. And then he did.
Back in the late 1940s, Sir Winston Churchill was about to address a huge Tory rally in the cavernous Central Hall, Westminster. In the build-up to the event, he had taken neither alcohol nor tobacco.

It was only as he prepared to mount the steps on to the stage to face an excited audience that he stuck a fat cigar in his face and lit up, proudly declaring to his chairman, the late Sir Hugh Linstead, a predecessor of mine as Member for Putney: My boy, never forget your trademark.

And so he clambered up, puffing away, to yet another standing ovation.

But what happens when you forget your trademark? Boris Johnsons Conservatives are about to find out.

The catastrophic announcement about lashings of new cash for the NHS and social care breached not one but two fundamental pledges in the Tory manifesto  promises not to raise taxes.

To allow the burden of taxation to become the biggest in 70 years is a fundamental breach of everything the Conservative Party has traditionally stood for. And it has, predictably enough, gone down like a lead balloon.

Boris Johnson who has forgotten the Tory trademark, according to DAVID MELLOR

The first opinion poll from YouGov, published on Friday, puts the Conservatives on 33 per cent, two points behind Labour.

As recently as May, the Tories were 18 per cent ahead.

When questioned, less than half the sample believed the Tories were any longer the party of low taxation. Just as worryingly, despite all that money pouring in, hardly any sceptics have been persuaded the NHS really is safe in the hands of the Tories.

It is a potentially disastrous turnaround in public perception, made inevitable because Boris himself has no fundamental beliefs except, maybe, the greater glory of Boris  and certainly no grasp of detail.

And he isnt a Churchill, though hed love to be.

Instead, hes Mr Micawber, always hoping that something will turn up. As of now, thats likely to be electoral oblivion because what happens when this unfocused spending fails to deliver? Why, more cash will have to be poured in.

Its the road to ruin. And its been made possible by a simple fact that, up to now, most of his supporters have chosen to ignore: Boris isnt really a Conservative.

At best, hes an English nationalist. At worst, hes a tax- and-spend socialist, who once tried to forget about the tax bit. But of course he cant, and, last week the cost of his spend, spend, spend policies finally hit home.

A great leader whistles a tune the public can hum. Low taxes, Tory, good. High taxes, Labour, bad.

A big hit for decades, now to be replaced by the kind of tuneless rubbish composed by the notorious German composer Stockhausen.

Churchill was once asked (perhaps apocryphally) if he had ever heard of Stockhausen. He replied: No, but I have stepped in some.

In the meanwhile, we are also beginning to learn what the NHS will do with all this new cash of yours. They have begun by recruiting 42 additional pen-pushers on salaries of up to 270,000.

Can you imagine Mrs Thatcher ever doing what Boris did last week? I was her youngest Minister for four years and a member of her Government for nine, until her fall in 1990.

She treated me with even more contempt than my mother did, but I put up with it because she believed in something worth believing in, and wanted to do something for the benefit of our nation, not just be somebody.

Margaret Thatcher had an impassioned belief in the fundamentals of Conservatism. Personal freedom. Confining the state to the few things only the state could do. Above all, leaving as much money as possible in the hands of the people.

Boris doesnt believe any of that stuff. And he will pay a heavy price if he continues to make it clear to the electorate that he has no time for Thatcherite principles.

There must be people in Johnsons Cabinet who realise with the same clarity I do that the Tories are chucking it all away. Yet none of them stood up to him last week.

Thats because Boriss Cabinet, with a few honourable exceptions, such as the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rishi Sunak, is weak. Few would even have been junior Ministers in one of Mrs Thatchers governments. They were chosen not for their all-round capability, but because they backed Boris. Anyone with what the religious call doubts was ruthlessly excluded. Interestingly, something Mrs Thatcher never did.

Her Cabinet consisted of lots of men who felt little loyalty to her, or indeed her beliefs, but who could do their jobs. One of them was my first boss, Francis Pym, Leader of the House of Commons. He would sit with his head in his hands in his office with me during her TV broadcasts, intoning: I wish she hadnt said that. But he was a hugely well-respected man and did every job she gave him extremely well.

Boris can best be described as indecisive about most things in the past few months, but now hes not so sure.

To reshuffle or not to reshuffle? He let it be known at the beginning of the week that he was going to do it. By the end, he let it be known he wasnt, after all.

And so his poor performers will be left to stumble on as unconvincingly as ever.

What a joy it was last week to hear several highly effective interviews from the new Health Secretary, Sajid Javid. But he is only there because the wretched Matt Hancock could not be saved by Boris, however much he might have wanted to.

Javids authoritative performances are a sure sign that there is much talent on the Tory backbenches that Boris needs to employ immediately. He certainly needs more Ministers sceptical about his fundamental belief that you just chuck money at problems.

He needs a new Kenneth Clarke, who, when Health Secretary (I was his deputy), pointed across Whitehall to the Cenotaph and said: People keep demanding we increase the proportion of GDP devoted to health, regardless of what we do with it. Makes no real sense.

So why dont we just get some cash from the Treasury, pile it high in used tenners up against the Cenotaph, make a bonfire of them and dance round naked shouting we have just increased the proportion of GDP allocated to health?

As for Dominic Raabs holiday, he can spend a whole year in Crete for all I care, but should have the decency to resign as Foreign Secretary first.

When I was appointed to Government in a lowly role at the Department of Energy, I was on holiday in the States. Foolishly, I asked Mrs Thatcher if I should come back. Immediately, she said. Be at your desk within 24 hours. Its a privilege to serve.

Sadly, Boris doesnt think like that, and seems to let them go away whenever they want, even in the middle of an international crisis.

I began by recalling a political leader of the past: Winston Churchill. How about another one  Michael Foot?

Foot was a charismatic fellow with a brilliant turn of phrase used to great effect in Parliament, at party conferences and elsewhere. Remind you of anyone?

But Michael Foot had a flaw. He was once described as a man possessed of every ability save that of making himself useful to his fellow citizens.

His own father (a noted Liberal) once observed that his other children were all picky eaters, but Michael would swallow anything.

Boris would like to be Churchill reincarnated. But on the evidence of last week, hes in danger of becoming a new Michael Foot, who disastrously lost the 1983 Election as his full range of beliefs became known to the British public.
The Sir Winston Churchill Memorial Trust has decided to remove the great man's Christian name from the trust's title because they say his views on race are now 'unacceptable'.

What an attitude towards race has to do with Churchill's Christian name beats me, but the trust also wanted to pull his picture off its website. Now it has backed down on that one. The picture stays.

Cowards.

If the trust really wants to hold its noses in distaste, it should hand back the millions of pounds that people in Britain and abroad donated after Churchill's death.

The trust was set up in 1965 with the support of Churchill's family to be the main memorial to the wartime leader. Those thousands of generous people from around the world thought Churchill was a hero. Their money has allowed the trust to make investments that leave it rich enough to fund generations of Churchill Fellows.

But, no, the trust will not give back the money which the alleged racist attracted. Instead, it wants to keep the money but insult Churchill's memory.

I know about the trust and its money. Early in my career, I was a Churchill Fellow. I also know about Churchill and what the race-obsessed Left-wing now calls his racism.

But then, I would. I am Irish.

British Prime Minister Winston Churchill in November 1941

If you think Churchill was heavy on Indians, Muslims and Africans, brace yourself for what he said about the Irish and their desire to be independent of the Empire. Any list in Ireland of the ten most hated people always includes Oliver Cromwell and Winston Churchill.

As Ireland struggled for its independence 100 years ago, Churchill told the Commons that allowing a nation across the Irish Sea to become a republic was akin to offering a country up to a miserable gang of human leopards in West Africa. He said Ireland was nothing but 'a small poor, sparsely populated island, lapped about by British sea power'.

In 1920, as the Irish fought for freedom, Churchill, Secretary of State for War, turned loose on the Irish the paramilitary police known as Black and Tans. Ireland recognised them as 'the scum of the British Army'. They butchered at will, committing atrocities.

Churchill did not stop them. His policy was that the Irish, when they resisted Empire, should be considered 'savages, rascals, and rapscallions'. I am an Irish patriot. Yet if you want to know what I think about all that, I think: 'So what?'

Churchill was a man of his times. I don't confect outrage for a man born in 1874. Nothing he believed was unusual for his generation.

The woke-warriors need to park their adolescent outrage and understand that. Otherwise, in 100 years' time, they themselves will be considered nothing better than a 21st Century version of the witch-hunters of Salem.

In the matter of Churchill and Asians, Africans, Muslims, the Irish and the rest, the permanently outraged need to grow up and roll with it. I did.

When I was a young reporter on the Daily Telegraph, I was encouraged to apply to the Churchill Memorial Trust for a fellowship to allow me to study the European Economic Community at a journalists' course in Paris for eight months. I applied and was invited to the trust headquarters for an interview.

One of the panel was Lady Soames, Churchill's daughter.

The problem was, just before the interview I'd read some detailed stuff on fellowships and realised they were just for British citizens.

When I arrived before the panel, I began by explaining that, sorry, I wasn't British, I was Irish. Lady Soames smiled sweetly. 'We count them as British,' she said.

I paused. I felt my County Cork rebel heart skip a beat.

I could have stood up and walked out, saying I was insulted by such a neo-colonialist outlook. I could have told Lady Soames that Ireland had spilled blood for centuries to obtain its independence from the British Empire. We did not remain some branch of Britain.

That is what today's race-hunters, the woke-warriors searching across history for reasons to be 'offended', would have done. But I didn't.

I just smiled back at Lady Soames. I won my fellowship. Because I am an adult who has read history.

I know what Churchill did besides being insulting about Muslims and the rest of us. If I put him in the scales of virtue against the German and Japanese war machines, Churchill wins, always, and in such an overwhelming way that I must forgive his earlier sins.

I say that because the Irish still have a lot of sins that need forgiveness, so I am in no position to say Churchill must be cancelled.

Churchill fought for his country. I respect that, even though it was not my country.

Only an intellectual teenager with an outrage problem would not.

Great men make judgments of their own times. The point of studying history is to learn how they thought and why they thought that way. It is not to hunt down a list of white men  it is always white men  to condemn. That is something the woke-warriors need to learn. That is, if they want to learn anything. Most of them appear determined only to destroy.

As for Churchill and what the trust now calls his 'unacceptable' views, Julia Weston, its 100,000-a-year chief executive, needs to tell us which historical figure could pass her purity test, since Winston Churchill does not. In other words, who, in the opinion of Ms Weston, is historically pure enough to have a trust named for him?

Clearly not Cromwell. Not any of the Tudor monarchs. Not Nelson. Not Francis Drake. Not Sir Thomas More. Not Henry V, if any of the woke-warriors know who he was.

Maybe Wellington. But then, he was Irish.
This newspaper is a committed supporter of Boris Johnson and the Conservative Government, especially because of their praiseworthy successes in getting Brexit done, and in masterminding and implementing one of the most effective Covid vaccine programmes in the world.

The Mail on Sunday now sincerely hopes that the Prime Ministers decision to break clear manifesto promises, especially by increasing taxation to boost the NHS and social care, will not come back to bite him in future. But after the events of the past week, it is not easy to be optimistic.

Was it really wise for a Premier who is so often accused of playing fast and loose with the truth to brazenly rip up an undoubted, undeniable personal pledge?

The Mail on Sunday now sincerely hopes that the Prime Ministers decision to break clear manifesto promises, especially by increasing taxation to boost the NHS and social care, will not come back to bite him in future

Perhaps even more important, was it wise to endanger the Tories reputation as the party of low taxation  a reputation that plays a major part in securing the loyalty of Conservative voters who believe passionately that free men and women should be allowed to spend or save their own hard-earned money as they wish, as far as possible?

We strongly advised against this move, but it has now happened. The task of the Governments friends and supporters now is to ensure that something good comes out of this unsatisfactory episode  in which the official Opposition had little of interest or worth to say.

Millions of homeowners regard the houses for which they have worked and saved all their lives as much more than assets, and are distressed by the danger that they may be forced to sell them to pay for care in later life.

The Governments new levy simply does not remove that risk from large numbers of people, and there is still a strong incentive to devise some form of insurance against this, which the Government should urgently pursue.

There is also the continuing question of the NHS, much more loved in the abstract than it is when people come up against it in practice. One thing is now absolutely settled. The years of Labour claims that they were the sole party of the NHS, and that the Tories did not care about it and would not spend on it, have been proven to be utterly false. Now that the Conservatives are at least as much the party of the NHS as Labour, if not rather more so, they are freer to improve it.

In fact, they have an obligation to do so. Uncritical worship is never good for any institution, and the reverence given to the Health Service has protected its leaden bureaucracy, and its regrettable clinical failures.

The foolish idea that the only other possible model is the grotesque failed health system in the US is far too common among politicians and media.

In fact, many other advanced countries  from Canada to Sweden  have health systems from which we could and should learn much.

Let us hope that Downing Streets new delivery unit, headed by Emily Lawson, who was very effective in guiding the NHS vaccination programme, will make sure that the new money now flowing into the NHS does some measurable good.

Once this levy begins to appear on the nations payslips, voters are going to want to know that they are getting their moneys worth. And so they should.

Higher taxes are never welcome, but they are much more tolerable if they are obviously giving something back to those who pay them.
When life becomes overwhelming for one of her three profoundly autistic sons, Kathrine Peereboom's go-to plan is a drive to the local park.

The familiar route is one of the quickest ways to soothe Oliver, eight, or Joshua, seven and five-year-old Tyler, who crave routine and thrive in structured environments like most children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD).

Such drives are common coping tools used by families across Australia, but one that has been taken from them by the five-kilometre travel limit imposed during lockdown, robbing the autistic kids and their parents of the routines they rely upon.

Ms Peereboom, who works full-time as the founder and CEO of ASD charity Spectrum Support from her home on the Gold Coast, has been spared the worst of the restrictions due to Queensland's minimal outbreaks.

But through her work she knows of countless parents across New South Wales and Victoria where punishing months-long lockdowns have pushed special-needs families to breaking point.

Kathrine and Steve Peereboom with their sons Oliver, eight, Joshua, seven, and five-year-old Tyler, all of whom are profoundly autistic

Like all children with Autism Spectrum Disorder, Joshua, Oliver and Tyler (pictured) crave routine and thrive in structured environments. The pandemic has upended life as they knew it

'It's been diabolical. There have been moments of serious mental health decline, not just for us as parents, but for the children too,' Ms Peereboom told Daily Mail Australia.

'Autistic families need to be given an exemption to go for a drive and travel to locations they feel comfortable in.

'Our community is hurting so badly. There's been a lot of anger, we feel forgotten.'

ASD covers a range of developmental disabilities including autism and Asperger syndrome that cause significant social, communication and behavioural challenges.

The spectrum covers everyone from the peculiarly gifted to the severely impaired, but what they share is an extreme dependency on routine and distress when unfamiliar circumstances impede on their world.

When school is suddenly taken away, visits to the playground banned, when their favourite foods are unavailable due to panic buyers and freight disruption, it can have a dire impact on kids who find even small tweaks to routine frightening.

It is estimated that one in 70 Australians now live with the disorder, the equivalent of 357,000 people.

But despite its size and the very specific assistance it needs to cope during Covid, Ms Peereboom said the autistic community has been offered next to nothing in terms of support since the lockdowns began more than 18 months ago.

Kathrine Peereboom, CEO of Spectrum Support and mother of three profoundly autistic sons

She slammed the government for withholding exemptions from the parents and carers of autistic children after coronavirus upended the carefully crafted timetables that took them years to perfect.

The constant changes and flip-flopping in and out of lockdown have caused enormous distress for children with ASD, who struggle to understand why they suddenly cannot go to school or play at the park.

The increase in domestic violence, depression and suicidal tendencies brought about by lockdowns have been well documented, but Ms Peereboom said the rate they have accelerated within the autistic community is devastating.

She spoke of parents who have had their homes ransacked by their own children, who are 'crumbling' and can no longer cope with the limitations of lockdown.

Ms Peereboom knows of a single mother raising two autistic children in regional NSW, who made an appointment for the Pfizer vaccine only to be told she could not attend the clinic under current restrictions because she was outside the 5km radius.

Ms Peereboom described the regression she sees in her little boys (pictured) during lockdown as 'devastating'

'I had her call me sobbing, her children are both regressing at the moment and her mental health is just abominable,' she said.

'The pressure on these families, particularly single parent families, is so immense.'

Ms Peereboom also took aim at Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews over his controversial decision to rope off playgrounds and skate parks after the state went into its sixth lockdown on August 5.

'These places are a lifeline for autistic families, we need priority exemptions,' she said.

Panic buying and stockpiling when lockdowns were imposed also had an acute impact on the autistic community, with families like the Peerebooms unable to source essential items that often mean the difference between a peaceful day and all-out meltdown.

One of Ms Peereboom's sons, who refuses to eat most foods, has been hospitalised four times in the past year for starvation because the snacks he does eat have been continuously sold out

'We're still having problems getting core items. All three of my boys are in nappies and I haven't been able to get them in supermarkets,' Ms Peereboom said.

One of her sons who refuses to eat most foods has been hospitalised four times in the past year for starvation because the handful of snacks he does eat have been continuously out of stock.

Ms Peereboom believes the pandemic has highlighted a glaring lack of consideration for Australia's autistic community that must now be addressed.

'It just shows how out of touch [the government] is with the Australian people, particularly disabled Australian people,' she said.

'We're not being heard.'

To help her sons (pictured with dad, Steve) and tens of thousands like them, Ms Peereboom says the government must give exemptions to autistic families

Ms Peereboom believes the response of governments to the pandemic was wrong, wasting too much time and resources on policing the healthy and fixating on vaccinations when they should be concentrating on helping the vulnerable cope with virus that is here to stay.

'The families are screaming, it's just horrible,' she said.

'More needs to be done for the elderly and the disabled community, we need to be uniting people rather than tearing them apart.'

She believes all Australian states must abandon the pursuit of a 'Covid zero strategy' and focus their efforts on providing support for those who need it most.

'When you look at the rest of the world and how they're now managing the pandemic, everyone is just living their lives,' she said.

'I'm fearful for the mental health of Australians as a collective. People who can't pay rent, can't go to work - what are they gonna do when suicides continue to increase, what's the plan for that?

'The bottom line is, autistic families need exemptions and they need them now.'



For support regarding caring for children or adults with ASD, call Autism Spectrum Australia on 1800 277 328.

You can also visit the website at Autism Spectrum Australia or Spectrum Support Australia.
What you see on your TV on Saturday nights  a seamless procession of beautifully dressed and stunningly made-up couples dancing to wonderful backdrops and stunning light shows  is a world away from whats going on behind the scenes.

With dozens of dancers to dress between each sequence, it takes an army of frantic make-up artists, costume designers, studio technicians and choreographers to bring the show to the screen each week.

Here, Strictlys unsung heroes tell Lisa Sewards what their typical week is like, and why they love it...

THE DRESS ADORNED WITH 15,000 CRYSTALS

Strictly Come Dancing's unsung heroes reveal what their typical week is like in preparation for the Saturday night shows. Pictured: Adam Peaty tries a frock on for size at his first fitting last month

With just a week to go before the launch show, stress levels are high among the 12 costume designers. Finishing touches are being made to sketches and their 20 sewing machines are fully engaged on the creations that will be showcased next week.

Costume designer Vicky Gill has been making sure the celebrities and professionals sparkle every Saturday since 2012.

Weve met everyone for this series now and were starting to construct their frocks, she says. The launch show numbers are fabulous.

From beads and satin to velvet, mesh, lace and feathers, multiple textures and fabrics are flung all over the place in Vickys workshop. Contrary to popular belief, not one sequin is used on the show.

Rhinestones and crystals are the sparkle of choice, with at least 170,000 of them in wardrobe at any one time.

Its all about the layering of textures, not just the beads, says Vicky. Plus lots of colour. In the early days people wanted black but now we use lots of colour and prints. Costume designer Vicky Gill revealed they've started to construct the frocks for this year's contestants.

Costume designer Vicky Gill revealed they've started to construct the frocks for this year's contestants. Pictured left: early sketches for costumes, right: a costume under construction

There are at least 170,000 rhinestones and crystals in wardrobe at any one time. Pictured: Crystals being applied

'Crystals are still vital though  its Strictly. There are 1,144 in each pack and well use at least 1,000 packs a series.

STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL The costume team make around 300 outfits every series. Each ballroom dress uses around 8-10m of fabric. Advertisement

Some five stoners, as the gem-appliers are known, will work through the night as the competition heats up to sew hundreds of thousands of gems on to the dresses.

Kara Tointon wore a dress in the 2010 final that had 15,000 crystals on it, reveals Vicky.

One of her biggest challenges is keeping up with the celebrities weight loss (John Sergeant lost about 2st in 2008 and his trousers had to be taken in every week). But this year she thinks things might be different.

All of our gentlemen are in really good shape so they can pretty much wear anything, she says.

But most of the competitors do change shape. Last year wardrobe was quite a scary place for Ranvir Singh at first, but by the end of the show she was stepping into a dress that a professional could have worn.

THE PRO DANCERS ARE THE REAL SUPERHEROES OF THE SHOW

Janette Manrara, 37, revealed professional dancers work with their celeb partner Monday through to Thursday. Pictured: Pro dancer Janette Manrara is the new co-host of spin-off show It Takes Two

Watching the Strictly 2021 pro dancers film their opening number for the new series was highly emotional for Janette Manrara. The Miami-born dancer was one of them for eight years until she quit her role in June to become Zoe Balls replacement on spin-off show It Takes Two.

She may have landed her dream job, but Janette, 37, whos married to fellow pro dancer Aljaz Skorjanec, relished her time as a dancer even though it was tough.

On Monday through to Thursday youre working with your celeb partner, then on Friday youre in the studio all day for rehearsals, she says.

On Saturday youre on duty all day doing the show, and on Sunday you choreograph. Then there are the group dances, they film three in a day, from 9am to 9pm. Its a lot. Youre a dancer, a friend, a creative  its a very intense show but the best one.

A lot depends on your celebrity. Soap stars dont have a lot of time because theyre filming, so you just have to be on call. But for example, HRVY, my partner last year, dedicated his whole schedule to Strictly so we did 10am-9pm every day to perfect it.

Theyre really long hours and youre on your feet all day. Youre exhausted and your brain is trying to keep up.

Janette is joining co-host Rylan Clark-Neal for It Takes Two on BBC2 on weeknights. Pictured: Janette with her husband, fellow pro Aljaz Skorjanec

For the pros its about being creative and thinking, How do I teach? For the celebrities its, How do I lock in all this information? Its also about building muscle memory, which happens with repetitiveness, like when you drive a car. Your body just knows what it needs to do.

Thats all behind her now as shell be joining co-host Rylan Clark-Neal for It Takes Two on BBC2 on weeknights.

My goal is to really champion the professional dancers because theyre the superheroes of the show, she says.

Right now theyre all bubbled up. Im obviously away from Aljaz, but I still get swept off my feet dancing with him. So Im very lucky.

A TOTALLY NEW LOOK IN TWO MINUTES FLAT? IT'S CRAZY!

Make-up designer Lisa Armstrong and her team begin their week with the 'concept document' that kickstarts the ideas. Pictured: Lisa Armstrong (left) with past contestant Lisa Snowdon

Make-up designer Lisa Armstrong and her team have to work wonders in the turnaround between dances on Strictly  sometimes they have as little as two minutes with each dancer. Its crazy, she says.

I remember in last years final I was in the make-up room with six or seven people working on one of the pro dancers who was literally being sewn into a costume, hairpieces were being taken off, lipstick was being removed, earrings were being put in, shoes were being buttoned up, all at once.

'The poor girl. Youve got one person with their head up your armpit, one persons arm between your legs, someone squirts you in the eye with hairspray.

'Were trying to create perfect red lips and their heads being pulled backwards, their knickers are being sewn in... its madness.

STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL 252 litres of hairspray is used every series  thats enough to fill six Mini Cooper petrol tanks. Advertisement

Lisa and her teams week begins with the concept document that kickstarts the ideas.

That tells us who the couple are, what theyre dancing and what kind of style it is. We then look at the staging notes, the lighting, the projections on the floor, where the couple start, says Lisa, who is Ant McPartlins ex-wife and has been with the show for 13 years.

Then we meet with hair designer Lisa Davey and start pulling images together with the producers and director of choreography Jason Gilkison. We have a WhatsApp group called Slap and Barnet where we share images.

'Were all massively prepared so we can pull it together for the dress run, and then we finalise the looks and perfect them for the live show.

All the females have to wear false eyelashes for camera impact, but spray tan, glitter and dramatic make-up are par for the course for everyone.

Each girl has a new set of lashes every week so I have boxes of them. Were never going to run out. And I have tubs and tubs and tubs of biodegradable glitter, body shimmer and body mist.

Naturally its a daunting prospect for many, but one thing is guaranteed: they all become more daring as the weeks go by.

Louise Redknapp (pictured) just wanted a little watercolour on her eyes, no lashes and a nude tone to her lipstick, however by week three she was rocking big hair and red lips

As soon as you enter Strictly it becomes your world, Lisa explains. Take Louise Redknapp.

'Although she came from a performing career she just wanted a little watercolour on her eyes, no lashes, a nude tone to her lipstick, her hair just tonged a little. By week three she was rocking a leotard, big hair and red lips doing Flashdance.

Its the same story in the tanning booth. Ed Balls was famously horrified at the prospect of turning orange at first.

He didnt expect hed ever be walking into a tanning booth, but its on tap every week at Strictly. When he saw the results he was first in the queue to strip off when the tanning girls go in on a Friday. But I put my foot down on Halloween week  there are no tans for anyone as we dont want orange zombies!

I definitely think a lot more men are now up for a bit of eyeliner or nail polish. We say, Guys, go for that really sexy, smouldering look for the Argentine Tango. They love it!

THE WOMAN WHO PULLS IT ALL TOGETHER

Executive producer Sarah James, said decisions for Strictly go right to the top because the show is important to the BBC. Pictured: Dave Arch and the band

Executive producer Sarah James has worked on Big Brother, The X Factor and BGT, but Strictly has been the highlight of her career. Ive never worked with a team before where everyone cares so much, she says.

It all starts with signing up the right mix of celebs. Its quite organic. Our talent executive Stefania Aleksander brings suggestions and we come up with a wish list of people wed love, explains Sarah.

Luckily a lot of those people were up for it this year. If someones interested we meet up and talk them through it. Because the show is so important to the BBC the decisions go right to the top. Its vital that theres someone for every member of the family to get behind.

Another major part of Sarahs job is getting the music right.

Our creative team work with the pro dancers and celebs to pick the right style of music to showcase their routine. Its important to have a balance in terms of high and low tempo, current songs and classics in each show.

'Then our music producer liaises with Dave Arch and the band. Incredibly, from that edit Dave will go away and write the music for everyone in the band. Its a very well-oiled machine.

It does sometimes break down though. During the Lindy-Hop-A-Thon in 2018 when we had all the dancers on the floor at the same time the technology the judges were using to score them went down live on air, recalls Sarah.

It didnt feel funny at the time but I can see the funny side now.
The Queen will split her time between Windsor Castle and Buckingham Palace when she returns from her summer getaway at Balmoral so the public don't question the 369million refurbishment bill on her London home, a royal expert has claimed.

Her Majesty, 95, has been a her summer home since June, it is her first stay at her beloved Scottish sanctuary since the death of her husband the Duke of Edinburgh in April.

Before her summer trip, she was living at Windsor Castle in Berkshire, but she is expected to spend more time in London on her return.

The Queen will split her time between Windsor Castle and Buckingham Palace when she returns from her summer getaway at Balmoral so the public don't question the 369million refurbishment bill on her London home, a royal expert has claimed

Speaking to True Royalty TVs The Royal Beat, royal editor Roya Nikkhah, said: 'I think the plan is for her to stay at Windsor.

'I expect we will see more activity with her back at Buckingham Palace as we approach the Platinum Jubilee next year.

'I think she will resume residence again at Buckingham Palace in order to justify the 369,000,000 refurb.

'[Otherwise] many people would [think] whats the point of the [refurb].

The bill for the refurbishment will be met by taxpayers via the Sovereign Grant - the annual fee paid by the Government to the monarch - which this year came to 42million - with a third of the cash set aside for maintaining Royal palaces

Earlier this year, The Queen decided to carry on with her Balmoral holiday after a staff member at the Scottish estate tested positive for coronavirus.

Her Majesty, who is double-jabbed, decided to stay in Scotland 'get back to normal' following the death of Prince Philip.

Buckingham Palace restoration: Who's footing the 369million bill? The works will cost the taxpayer millions as the total bill is expected to reach 369million. The Sovereign Grant, which comes from general taxation, will be hiked up during renovation period to cover the costs. And while there has been complaint about the taxpayers footing the bill, the palace will continue to operate as usual, generating millions for the economy through tourism and events. The Queen currently gets an amount which is equivalent to 15 per cent of the profits from the Crown Estate, but this will increase to 25 per cent. Buckingham Palace, originally Buckingham House, was built in 1703 and has been extended out ever since. But many of the wires and inner workings which keep it functioning are becoming old and in need of replacement - hence the huge project. The master of the Queen's household overseeing the 369 million refurbishment of Buckingham Palace has vowed to stay within budget and time on the gigantic project. Advertisement

The monarch, who once described the virus as a 'plague' sweeping the planet, had a castle-full of relatives visiting this summer including Prince Andrew and his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, Princess Beatrice and husband Edoardo Mozzi, and Prince Edward and Sophie, Countess of Wessex.

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and their children also came to stay.

Scotland has been a welcome retreat for the royal family since Queen Victoria's day, with the Windsors relaxing and enjoying country pursuits in the stunning setting of the Scottish Highlands.

Meanwhile, the renovation work at her London home is being carried out in the Palace's East Wing, which aims to make its plumbing, heating and electricity cabling more cost-efficient.

The Wing has been stripped of its flooring, furniture and 3000 pieces of artwork and artefacts, and its floorboards will all be lifted ahead of the reservicing of the old pipes and wires in the palace's biggest refurbishment since before the Second World War.

The bill for the refurbishment will be met by taxpayers via the Sovereign Grant - the annual fee paid by the Government to the monarch - which this year came to 42million - with a third of the cash set aside for maintaining Royal palaces.

It comes as The Queen today led tributes to the victims and survivors of 9/11 on the 20th anniversary of the attacks.

In her heartfelt message to President Joe Biden, the royal reflected on her visit to the site of the attack back in 2010.

She said: 'As we mark the 20th anniversary of the terrible attacks on September 11 2001, my thoughts and prayers, and those of my family and the entire nation, remain with the victims, survivors and families affected, as well as the first responders and rescue workers called to duty.

'My visit to the site of the World Trade Centre in 2010 is held fast in my memory.

'It reminds me that as we honour those from many nations, faiths and backgrounds who lost their lives, we also pay tribute to the resilience and determination of the communities who joined together to rebuild.'

The Royal Beat is available on True Royalty TV
A TikTok user has cleverly fired back at people who argue that the COVID-19 vaccines negatively impact fertility  by pointing out that many of these same people eat Taco Bell without worrying what's in it.

Bexie has gone viral with the clip after posting it yesterday, sharing her reaction to 'when people say the COVID vaccine will make me infertile.'

Using a clip from the 2015 Lukas Graham song 'Mama Said,' she cuts to images of the Taco Bell menu, as well as a California state warning about possible exposure to chemicals that can cause cancer and reproductive harm.

Bexie employed a popular TikTok trend to make her point, playing her video with the song Mama Said.

The lyrics go: 'Mama said that it was okay / Mama said that it was quite alright.'

In her clip, she spotlights the crispy chicken sandwich taco, pretending to purchase it on the Taco Bell app.

But at the checkout page, a warning from the state of California shows up under the order total.

'WARNING - Cancer and Reproductive Harm,' it says, pointing customers to P65Warnings.ca.gov/restaurant.

The website offers information of California's Proposition 65, also known as the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986.

The act requires the state to maintain and update a list of chemicals known to the state to cause cancer or reproductive toxicity, according to the OEHHA.

Businesses must warn customers if their products contain these ingredients.

One of the ingredients, acrylamide, can be found in many fried or baked foods and is 'known to the State of California to cause cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm.'

The Proposition 65 warning is also but on alcoholic beverages, fish (which contain mercury), and certain balsamic vinegars (which can contain lead).

Viral: TikTok users have been tickled by Bexie's video, flooding her with comments of support and agreement

TikTok users have been tickled by Bexie's video, flooding her with comments of support and agreement.

'People are so worried about the vaccine when they don't even pay attention what's in their food,' wrote one.

'It's pretty strange that my fetus be craving Taco Bell sometimes,' wrote another.

'You afraid of a vaccine but will eat anything like they don't put chemicals in it,' said one more.

'My old boss swears against the vaccine but gets Botox amongst other things and eats Taco Bell on the daily!' said yet another.
A former New York Police Department detective who was diagnosed with a 9/11-related terminal illness has opened up about how his inhalation of toxic dust and smoke after the terrorist attacks has impacted his health 20 years later.

Tom Frey, 58, was diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis  a terminal lung disease  in 2016 while battling Hodgkins Lymphoma. He was given one year to live, but five years later, he is still alive and runs a support group for others who are suffering from pulmonary fibrosis.

'I would do it all over again,' he told Fox News of his work as a first responder and his hand in New York City's recovery efforts. 'We all knew the air was bad, you knew you were going to get sick.'

Trauma: Tom Frey, a former New York Police Department detective, has opened up about being diagnosed with a 9/11-related terminal illness ahead of the 20th anniversary of the attacks

Illness: Frey was diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis, a terminal lung disease, in 2016 while battling Hodgkins Lymphoma

Frey, who was assigned to the Manhattan detective borough, recalled taking his partner to the emergency room after he was 'clobbered' with debris and then returning to the World Trade Center hours after the attacks.

The retired NYPD detective referred to the rubble of the collapsed twin towers as 'the pile' while looking back on his work at ground zero that day.

'We went to work on the pile, pulling buckets and looking for survivors,' he told the outlet. 'We kept doing various assignments: going to the morgue, traveling to DNA testing sites and then heading back to the pile. The death certificates came later.'

He added: 'We werent prepared. There were no hazmat suits, no masks. You learned a lot from it. It was a devastating day, which became a devastating year and then a devastating three years.'

In an essay Frey wrote for Today in 2019, he explained that a week after the attacks, he was sent to a Staten Island landfill to look for remains in the rubble, which he did for a couple of months. He believes that's where he got sick.

Looking back: He recalled taking his partner who was hit with debris to the emergency room on 9/11 before returning to the World Trade Center hours after the attacks

Health hazard: Frey said they didn't have any hazmat suits or masks while they searched for survivors in the rubble at ground zero, which he referred to as 'the pile'

'We wore these white suits. They were fine until you went to eat,' he wrote. 'You would take your mask and suit off, and the dust would blow on the food. I thought, "This isnt good," but at the time we didnt realize what was going on.

'In the beginning, you would take your suit home with you. Then after a couple of weeks, they said, "Dont bring these suits home with you, make sure you dont bring your shoes into the house."'

Frey watched other first responders get sick over the years and thought he was 'one of the lucky ones' until he got diagnosed with Hodgkins Lymphoma in February 2016.

'I had to get 12 rounds of chemotherapy, but after the ninth session, I developed shortness of breath,' he explained. 'It turned out the chemotherapy cocktail I received  called ABVD  contained bleomycin, which leads to bleomycin lung toxicity in 10 percent of patients.

'Before the chemotherapy, my lungs were 100 percent. But the bleomycin lung toxicity caused pulmonary fibrosis  a fire in my lungs. When I was first diagnosed in November 2016, it was a shock. Its a terminal disease.'

Frey said that he struggled to walk from the bedroom to the doorway, but then he found a specialist and the Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation (PFF), through which he runs a monthly support group.

Recovery: Workers are seen removing rubble from the World Trade Center on the night of September 23, 2001

Recovery: A week after the attacks, Frey was sent to a Staten Island landfill to look for remains in the rubble, which he did for a couple of months

Toxic: Frey explained that they wore white suits, but dust would blow on their food when they took off their protective gear to eat lunch

'People are scared,' he told Fox News of working with new group members. 'Being told you have a year or two to live is like a jail sentence. People are looking for answers. We talk to them about oxygen, hospice, home care. We walk them through getting their affairs in order. We bring it to reality.'

Frey said he has had difficulties getting oxygen tanks and medications through the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund, claiming that that the 'doctors working with patients through the fund are getting paid slowly.'

First responders suffering from cancer often have to deal with two-hour wait times when calling for help, according to the former detective.

'Its unfair to the people going through different illnesses,' he said.

No regrets: Frey, who was initially given one year to live, said that he 'would do it all over again' while reflecting on his heroic recovery efforts on 9/11

Frey, who has defied the odds after initially being given just a year to live, explained in a recent update to his Today essay that he 'had to be very careful about coming in contact with germs' long before the COVID-19 pandemic.

'A regular cold could give me pneumonia and put me in the intensive care unit,' he wrote. 'I was wearing a mask before masks were fashionable and I used to get some weird stares when I wore one on a plane and in the supermarket. Now I blend in.'

Frey shared that COVID-19 has made his health struggles even more complicated and prevented him from getting a lung transplant.

'Something gave me pneumonia in January of 2020. I don't know if it was COVID, but I was lucky to get out of the hospital from that one,' he said. 'I was scheduled for a lung transplant last year, but it was canceled due to COVID. It's still up in the air.

'I'm fully vaccinated and I'm looking into now getting a booster shot.'

Frey now relies on machines to help him breathe, saying every breath is a 'struggle' and reminds him of his pulmonary fibrosis diagnosis.

After a meeting with his pulmonologist in August, he learned he lost 10 percent lung function in six months.

'You come into my house it's like a hospital almost with the machines and pill bottles. Since my lungs are going, my heart is getting affected,' he wrote.

'But I'm lucky to be alive. Lucky to be here. I take life one day at a time. I'm in the bonus rounds here.'
A government employee who survived the September 11 attacks on the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, dreaded its anniversary for 19 years  but this year, he's reclaiming the day by getting married.

U.S. Navy Chief Petty Officer Chris Akers was at the Pentagon on September 11, 2001 when a hijacked American Airlines flight flew into the building, killing all 64 people on board and 125 more inside.

Every year after, he the anniversary was 'a day of gloom' that he was spend in silent reflection. But this year will be different: On September 11, 2021, Akers is set to marry Aleisha Hagele.

'Were reclaiming that day and turning it into a day of love and a day that deserves celebration,' he told the The State Journal-Register.

Making it his: U.S. Navy Chief Petty Officer Chris Akers survived the September 11 attacks on the Pentagon and dreaded its anniversary for 19 years  but this year, he's reclaiming the day by getting married

Tragic day: He was at the Pentagon on September 11, 2001 when a hijacked American Airlines flight flew into the building, killing all 64 people on board and 125 more inside

At 8:37 a.m. local time, he was working in a fourth-floor storeroom, holding frozen meat, when he felt was seemed like 'a violent earthquake'

On that day in 2001, Akers was working as the galley supervisor at U.S. Secretary of Navy Gordon England's executive dining facility.

Earlier that morning, he'd heard about each of the two planes hitting the World Trade Center.

At 8:37 a.m. local time, he was working in a fourth-floor storeroom, holding frozen meat, when he felt was seemed like 'a violent earthquake.'

'The air was sucked out of the room and any door that was open slammed shut,' he recalled.

Fire alarms began to go off, and it was 'chaotic' as those in the building were evacuated via an exit route most of the evacuation doors around them shut. They walked out into the Metro before going out through the public entrance, taking an hour to get out of the building.

It wasn't until he and his colleagues made their way to one of the nearby hotel conference rooms that had opened to employees that he learned what had happened.

Remembering: Fire alarms began to go off, and it was 'chaotic' as those in the building were evacuated

Destruction: Earlier that morning, two planes had hit the Twin Towers in New York City

He spent some of the days following on the USNS Comfort, a Navy hospital ship where he volunteered with food service for first responders at Ground Zero in New York City.

Like many who survived the attacks both at the Pentagon and the World Trade Center, Akers traumatized by what he experienced, and says that every year after, 9/11 anniversaries were 'days of dread.'

In 2002, he was still at the Pentagon, then working as Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's personal steward. On that first anniversary, he spent almost the whole day staring out the window, dreading that another plane was coming.

'I was waiting for something to happen, thinking there was another shoe that (would) drop,' he said. 'If they did it on Sept. 11, 2001, they could do it on Sept. 11, 2002.'

September 11 continued to be 'a day of bad, traumatic memories' for years after.

But this year is destined to be different: On Saturday, the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attack, he will marry his fiancee.

Turning it around: September 11 continued to be 'a day of bad, traumatic memories' for years after  but now he will share it with Aleisha Hagele

'Were reclaiming that day and turning it into a day of love and a day that deserves celebration,' he said

Akers met Hagele, 39, in a social media group in 2019, and the two got engaged last summer.

After agreeing on a September wedding, they eventually decided to reclaim the 11th as a happy day.

But though it will be a celebration, the couple will still acknowledge the tragedy of the anniversary in several ways.

Their wedding officiant will lead a moment of silence at the beginning of the ceremony, and their 'in memoriam' table for lost loved ones will also have a place for the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

'We do intend to acknowledge [the day] for what it is, but also to make sure we are making our day the central focus and that it is a celebration of our love,' Akers said.

'Were intentionally attaching something to this day,' he added. 'Were going to make this moment something else thats worthy of celebration.'
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We have all heard of priests being defrocked.

But Reverend Kate Bottley has given the term another meaning after she and Strictly Come Dancing star Ian Waite have both disrobed for a new BBC programme in which they pose as life models.

They are part of what the broadcaster is billing as the 'UK's largest ever live, life drawing masterclass', which will air across BBC2 and BBC4 next Sunday night.

Reverend Kate Bottley - star of Googlebox - has given 'priests being defrocked' another meaning after she h disrobed for a new BBC programme

Kae is part of what the broadcaster is billing as the 'UK's largest ever live, life drawing masterclass', which will air across BBC2 and BBC4 next Sunday night.

Kate was joined by Strictly Come Dancing Professional Iain Waite, who stripped down to a purple tunic as he posed in a Birmingham Paek

Life Drawing Live! is aimed at encouraging people to take part in life drawing. The Rev Bottley and Mr Waite's segments of the show were filmed in Birmingham's Cannon Hill Park.

Life Drawing Live! is aimed at encouraging people to take part in life drawing.

The Rev Bottley and Mr Waite's segments of the show were filmed in Birmingham's Cannon Hill Park.

Pictures from the filming show the 46-year-old, part-time Church of England priest, who found fame for her role on Channel 4's Gogglebox, lying on a chaise lounge with a blue piece of blue fabric draped over her.

Mr Waite, 50, is seen posing with a purple piece of material covering his middle.

In the programme, artist Adebanji Alade will be seen encouraging the public to draw the two celebrities in a series of poses.

Kate Bottley said: 'The film for Life Drawing Live! was fun and empowering to be part of.

Pictures from the filming show the 46-year-old, part-time Church of England priest, who found fame for her role on Channel 4's Gogglebox, lying on a chaise lounge with a blue piece of blue fabric draped over her

Kate said that filming the show was 'empowering' and that she felt 'safe among friends' and not 'nervous or vulnerable'

The Reverend said she wasn't expected to feel such a connection to the people drawing her - she is pictured posing in the park

'I expected to feel nervous and vulnerable, it wasn't like that. I felt safe and amongst friends.

'What I wasn't expecting was to feel such a connection to the people drawing me. It was the perfect socially distanced group activity!

'And the drawings were a joy.' Ian Waite added.

'I've always been into drawing, even at school I was known as the artist! I think drawing can transport you to another place and be very therapeutic, so I was delighted to model for Life Drawing Live!'

The Gogglebox star, pictured on a chaise lounge, added that life drawing is the ' as the perfect socially distanced group activity'

When the show airs, BBC2 viewers will watch amateur artist celebrities creating their pieces of art, while experts will help with advice

Viewers wishing to have a go at drawing along from home will be able to watch BBC4 which will offer a 'Pose Cam' which will offer a 'fixed-camera view' of the model's poses

Adebanji Alade said: 'It was great to have Kate and Ian as models for the day and I loved the way they engaged and interacted with the public.

'The vibe on the day was simply amazing, watching people from all walks of life take a step of courage to try out life drawing was a great sight.

'I'm a great advocate for everyone picking up a pencil and paper to try out drawing. I believe we all have the ability and capacity to do it and enjoy it.'

When the show airs, BBC2 viewers will watch amateur artist celebrities creating their pieces of art, while experts will help with advice.

Those taking part will then be asked to upload their efforts while the show is airing, with some getting feedback during the programme. Kate is pictured before stripping off

Strike a pose! The Reverend looked at ease as she slipped off into just a purple tunic in Birmingham's Cannon Park

The programme, which will air on the two channels from 9pm-11pm on Sunday, will be hosted by comedian, presenter and artist Joe Lycett. Iain Waite is pictured on the show

Viewers wishing to have a go at drawing along from home will be able to watch BBC4 which will offer a 'Pose Cam' which will offer a 'fixed-camera view' of the model's poses.

Those taking part will then be asked to upload their efforts while the show is airing, with some getting feedback during the programme.

The programme, which will air on the two channels from 9pm-11pm on Sunday, will be hosted by comedian, presenter and artist Joe Lycett.

Life Drawing Live! will be broadcast on BBC Two and BBC Four this Sunday 12th September at 9pm-11pm
An alcohol free beer specialist has become Britain's most decorated brewer of all time at the World Beer Awards.

Big Drop, who make 0 per cent ABV stout, have picked up their seventh award at the World Beer Awards this week.

The company's title's include 'World's Best' for two of its 0.5 per cent ABV beers  Paradiso Citra IPA and Galactic Milk Stout.

An alcohol free beer specialist has become Britain's most decorated brewer of all time at the World Beer Awards

Now with seven 'World's Best' titles under its belt, three of them for Galactic, Big Drop not only tops the table of UK brewers but can lay claim to having the world's most awarded beer of all time, alcohol free or otherwise.

Galactic - described as rich, unctuous and an absolutely decadent treat of a beer - has won 20 of Big Drop's 70 international beer awards since its launch in 2016.

Both of this year's winners having previously beaten alcohol rivals in blind tastings.

WHAT AWARDS HAS BIG DROP WON? YEAR AWARD CATEGORY (* including full-strength) RESULT 2021 USA Beer Ratings Non Alcoholic Beer Silver 87 2021 World Beer Awards No & Low Alcohol Stout World's Best 2021 World Beer Awards No & Low Alcohol World's Best 2021 US Open Beer Championship Non Alcoholic Stout Bronze 2020 Imbibe No & Low Taste Awards Best No & Low Other Beer Style Award Highly Commended 2020 Asia Beer Challenge Alcohol-Free Beer (Top Fermentation) Bronze 2020 World Beer Awards Flavoured Low Strength World's Best 2020 Global Beer Masters Lo/No Silver 2020 USA Beer Ratings Open* Silver 86 2020 European Beer Challenge Alcohol-free Beer (Top Fermentation) Silver 2020 US Open Beer Championship Non-Alcoholic Stout Silver 2020 AF Beer Awards Classic Second 2019 European Beer Challenge Alcohol-Free Beer (Top Fermentation) Double Gold 2019 European Beer Challenge Low Alcohol Gold 2019 International Brewing Awards No and Low Alcohol Silver 2019 US Open Beer Championship Non Alcoholic Stout Gold 2019 International Beer Challenge Lo/No Bronze 2019 Stockholm Beer & Whisky Festival Open* Best in Show 2019 Belgium Beer Awards Low Alc Bronze 2017 World Beer Awards Flavoured Stout* Silver 2017 International Beer Challenge Speciality* Gold

Paradiso was the UK's winner in the Speciality IPA category of last year's World Beer Awards, nudging 6 per cent ABV entries into second and third place. Likewise, Galactic was out-performing regular stouts in the World Beer Awards before it had its own AF category.

Rob Fink, Founder and CEO of Big Drop, said: 'When we started out, we decided that we shouldn't just be aiming to make decent AF beers but, rather, creating great tasting beers that happen to be alcohol free.

'As there weren't many awards around for alcohol free beer at the time, we just entered the normal categories instead.

'The results speak for themselves and reinforce our belief that alcohol free beers, made in the right way by expert brewers using carefully selected ingredients, don't have to compromise on taste.'

Mr Fink added the secret to Galactic's success is its 'brew-to-strength' or Reduced Amylase Brewing technique, pioneered by Big Drop and seen as game-changing for the category, which has often been considered a 'distress purchase'.

This technique allows the beer to be fully fermented without the need to extract alcohol once it had been brewed.

By remaining under the 'alcohol free' threshold of 0.5% ABV throughout the whole process, Big Drop can retain the flavours and texture that would have traditionally been stripped out by removing the alcohol.

The beer has won the hearts of critics and food writers alike.

Melissa Cole, of the British Guild of Beer Writers described the stout as the 'most impressive no/low alcohol beer I have ever tried, while Adrain Chiles wrote in the Guardian the Pale Ale is 'excellent' while the stout 'really is the business.

Meanwhile, drinks expert Olly Smith wrote in the Mail On Sunday: 'By far the best of the low-alcohol brigade is Big Drop Brewing Co. All its beers come in at just 0.5%, and all of them are excellent  the stout in particular is a jaw-dropper. Superb flavour without compromise'.

The company was launched in 2016 as the world's first brewer dedicated to alcohol-free beer by City lawyer, Rob Fink and long-time friend James Kindred.

Both had recently become fathers and were looking to cut back on the booze but could not find any decent alternatives to their favourite craft beers.

It has since won 70 international beer awards, including seven times 'World's Best' at the World Beer Awards and beating full-strength rivals in blind-tastings on a number of occasions.

It's now available in 10,000 locations throughout Europe, Australia, Canada and the US.

In the UK, Big Drop has listings with major pub groups, restaurants and supermarkets.
Nigella Lawson is known for comfort cooking and indulgent at home treats, but her latest recipe has even got her fans questioning the unusual combination of ingredients.

The TV cook, 61, who lives in London, posted a recipe to her 2.5 million Instagram followers of no-churn coffee ice-cream in brioche bun.

Some branded it 'tempting' and 'indulgent' while others were left baffled at the recipe.

The TV cook, 61, who lives in London, posted a recipe to her 2.5 million Instagram folloeersof no-churn coffee ice-cream in brioche bun.

In typical extravagant style, the domestic goddess shared a photo of the pictures, with the caption: 'Midweek Treat: #RecipeOfTheDay is my One-Step No-Churn Coffee Ice Cream.

'You could mix it up now (its not yet 9am) and eat it this evening! One of my absolute favourite ice creams, especially in brioche buns!

The recipe, which she shared online, includes whisking together double cream, condensed milk, instant espresso powder and espresso liqueur until stiff peaks form and then freezing it over night and then serving in a brioche bun.

'I'm almost embarrassed at how easy this is but, as you will find out, simple though it is to make, its flavour is deep, complex and utterly compelling,' she wrote online.

'You could (and I often do) serve it with a chocolate sauce but my absolute favourite way of eating this is by squidging it into little brioches, like sweet burger buns, as they do in the south of Italy,' she added.

Many fans thought the recipe was genius, with comedian Dawn French writing: ' Ice cream IN A BUN?! Oh Nigella thank you'.

The TV cook, 61, who lives in London, posted a recipe to her 2.5 million Instagram followers of no-churn coffee ice-cream in brioche bun

Another fan wrote 'tempting' while a third added, 'amazing!'.

Other observed the recipe was 'very Sicilian' while some even suggested adding chocolate chunks to the recipe or serving it in a hot cross bun.

However, some fans were questioning the combination, with one commenting: 'Ice cream??? In a bun???'

Many fans thought the recipe was genius, with comedian Dawn French writing: ' Ice cream IN A BUN?! Oh Nigella thank you'.

It comes after Nigella revealed she has ditched the word 's**t' from her recipes after saying it had developed a 'coarser' and 'more cruel' meaning in recent years.

The food writer posted her recipe of the day - Ruby Red Raspberries in Chardonnay Jelly - to her Twitter account last month, with dozens of fans saying it was one of their favourites.

But the eagle-eyed among them noted that when the recipe first appeared in one of her books - 2002's Forever Summer - it was called S**t Red Raspberries in Chardonnay Jelly.

One fan questioned why she dropped the term, saying: 'Wonderful recipe (as always!) but it makes me wonder what has happened to this country when we can't even call that recipe by its hilarious original name. What has happened to our free speech, humour and a sense fun? I love your turn of phrase Nigella!

Nigella replied: 'I feel that the word has taken on a coarser, more cruel connotation, and I'm not happy with that.'
My little brother Omar has always been fearless, pretty much. I'm two years older, but when we were children he was always the first to climb a tree or jump a fence.

I still call him my little brother  but by the time he was in his 20s he was 6ft 1in, with a 14-stone muscular frame who had trained in the British Army. He became a bit of a local hero, too.

He once came to the rescue of a woman who was being robbed at knifepoint  chasing her assailant away.

Yet today, at the age of 33, following a devastating road accident, he faces spending the rest of his life consigned to an old people's home, alongside dementia patients in their 80s.

Eight years ago, Omar's motorbike skidded over a manhole cover, and he was catapulted into a lamp post then a telephone box.

He sustained 27 bone fractures, severed nerves in the neck, arm and back, dislocated his skull from his spine, became deaf in one ear and suffered four brain haemorrhages.

Omar Moustapha , now 33, with his sister, Mariam. Eight years ago, his motorbike skidded over a manhole cover, and he was catapulted into a lamp post then a telephone box. He sustained 27 bone fractures, severed nerves in the neck, arm and back, dislocated his skull from his spine, became deaf in one ear and suffered four brain haemorrhages

He wasn't expected to wake up from a coma, which lasted for a fortnight  but he did.

He spent 16 months in hospital where he had 30 operations, as well as multiple psychiatric assessments as the brain damage has left him with long-term mental health problems.

Omar, my heroic brother, has made remarkable steps to recovery  yet he can't walk longer than a few metres unaided and needs help to wash, dress and do other day-to-day things.

Damage to the nerves in his throat mean he is vulnerable to spasms when eating and drinking, so needs help to prevent him from choking. We've had inadequate help from local healthcare teams, so he is now reliant on our mother, who is 64, and 35-year-old me.

My family has tried everything to get the care Omar desperately needs to live as independently as possible. Ealing Council, in West London, made this impossible from the beginning.

Every request was met with push back. We've written to our MP, James Murray, submitted reports by GPs, surgeons and psychiatrists to support the case for extra help  to no avail.

Mariam pictured with Omar on a night out in 2009. 'My family has tried everything to get the care Omar desperately needs to live as independently as possible. Ealing Council, in West London, made this impossible from the beginning,' says Mariam

The council's only suggestion is for him to go into an old people's home, because specialist services for disabled younger people are so scarce. It's not something he wants to do, not least because he was previously put in one and he felt so desperate he tried to take his own life.

Just over two years ago, The Mail on Sunday revealed that thousands of young Britons with disabilities were languishing in nursing homes.

One woman, 46-year-old Nina Thair, an assistant headteacher from Brighton, was placed in a nursing home for dementia patients when a multiple sclerosis relapse left her unable to live independently. The local council refused to pay the fees  leaving Nina to foot the 4,800 monthly bill.

That shocking story marked the launch of The Mail on Sunday's Dignity For Disabled People campaign, in which we highlighted shocking injustices dealt to some of the most vulnerable people in our society.

And all the while, the nightmarish situation had been playing out in my own house for the previous five years. Despite my role as one of The Mail on Sunday's fitness experts, I haven't written about this until now.

Omar didn't want people to know that he can't cope on his own. But the situation has become so desperate that we have little choice but to speak out.

I hope by doing so people will see that if it can happen to a family like ours, it could happen to anyone.

Omar was just 24 when he became one of the 1.2 million Britons with severe disabilities. I'll never forget the sight of the policeman at the doorstep, and the heart-stopping moment he told us my brother had been airlifted to hospital.

The officer took us to his bedside, while my mother, my younger sister  who has Down's syndrome and I sat in silence, terrified.

We slept by Omar's bedside for two weeks, preparing for his heart to stop at any moment, while doctors explained that if he did wake up, for the rest of his life he'd be reliant on a wheelchair and an oxygen tank to breathe.

Then came the miraculous moment he began to breathe without a machine  and we realised he might make it after all.

After being discharged from hospital, his care at a rehabilitation centre in Banstead, Surrey, was exemplary. The experts there were teaching him how to, quite literally, get back on his feet.

And it seemed to be working. Having been told he'd never walk again, he'd managed to make it down an entire corridor, picking up one leg at a time using his left arm  the only limb he still has slight feeling in.

It's a fact More than 400,000 wheelchair-users in England live in homes that are deemed inaccessible, claims housing association Habinteg.

The number of disabled people waiting for suitable housing has risen by ten per cent since 2017 to roughly 120,000. Advertisement

But one day the doctor entered his room and told us the local council had cut funding for his care. He had to be out within the week.

Omar had recently split from his wife, with whom he had a two- month-old son and shared a flat, so we had planned that, at some point when he was much better, he'd return to the family home, where my mother and I could look after him. But we weren't ready yet.

His doctors told us our three-bedroom house would need a complete overhaul to meet Omar's needs: railings installed to help him get up and down stairs, a wet room on the ground floor and walls knocked through to create more space. We begged for more time. The answer was no.

Instead, Omar would have to be admitted to the local nursing home, where he'd receive 24-hour care, paid for by the local council.

He was inconsolable, and slumped into a deep depression, repeating 'my life is over,' again and again.

He moved there in late 2015. The elderly man in the room opposite would scream expletives throughout the day and into the night. Many others were dying.

While the rehab team in Surrey had worked hard to get Omar moving again, here, staff did little to help him.

He grew angry, began hitting his head against the walls, throwing objects in frustration and became verbally aggressive.

This behaviour would have left the old Omar mortified  he could be hot-headed, but never, ever threatening. The brain haemorrhages have made him prone to outbursts.

After a few days he phoned our mother, begging us to come and collect him. Back at home, he got even worse.

He could barely balance, as nerve damage to his ankles has made his feet 'lifeless'. Sometimes he resorted to crawling back up the stairs, to be safe.

The council provided a wheelchair, but due to the lack of feeling in his arms he can't use it independently. Splints don't help either, as they cause him pain. Showering became more infrequent  the ordeal of having his mother or sister assist him proved embarrassing.

Terrified of the mountain that was the staircase, he chose to spend most days in his bedroom, increasingly depressed.

According to Government guidance, those with an ongoing healthcare need, such as Omar, qualify for NHS support  but funding and staffing problems mean patients often face delays of several years before accessing essential care and equipment.

A social worker's assessment in 2015 concluded that Omar needed 24-hour assistance and that, given his age and mental health risk, it was important he retained as much independence as possible.

The council agreed to find Omar his own accessible flat in the local area  but even this has been impossible.

Omar is desperate for his own space, away from his mother and sister. Our once enviably close brother-sister relationship is in tatters.

Omar, aged five, and elder sister Mariam playing on go-karts in 1994. She always admired his fearless nature before his accident in 2013

Having to ask his sister to be on hand should he fall when using the toilet is beyond humiliating. And watching me go out to work and enjoy dinners with friends, while his only outing was to the hospital, to have his wounds dressed, has been excruciating.

Omar preferred not to talk to me, or ask for help.

The council suggested sending carers three times a day to help with cleaning, cooking and personal care duties, when my mother and I couldn't manage.

But Omar's brain injury means he is paranoid. He gets aggressive around strangers in his house.

In 2017, the council offered Omar a flat 20 minutes from home  but in the heart of a notorious estate.

At the viewing, we learnt the next-door neighbour had recently been released from prison.

We explained to the council that we didn't feel it would be safe, given my brother's physical and mental vulnerabilities. It also suggested a one-bedroom flat, despite Omar's team of consultants warning against him living alone.

Even when The Mail on Sunday contacted Ealing council to clarify details, they continued to claim he did not require a live-in carer, which made him ineligible for a two-bedroom property.

We've struggled on over the past few years, my mother and I doing alternate shifts, with Omar becoming more and more disengaged with life.

Then, in February last year, while I was out working, he had a bad fall down the stairs and was screaming in pain. In a fury, he dragged himself into my mother's bedroom, grabbed hold of some glass vases on the shelves and smashed them.

Then he attempted suicide in front of her. She called the police, who took him to a psychiatric hospital.

The psychiatrist prescribed antidepressants, and wrote a strongly worded letter to health chiefs in charge of Omar's care, warning of the urgency of his living situation and that he should not be left to live alone.

He came home a few days later, and 18 months on, we're in the same situation. Omar's life has become what he describes as 'a hamster wheel'. 'Every day I wake up, I'm just waiting to go back to sleep. It's killing me inside.'

When our local MP approached the council, asking for a meeting to discuss Omar's case, he was told: 'Sorry, no meetings with politicians at the moment, because of Covid.'

No Zoom meeting, or phone call. Nothing. Meanwhile, Omar's physical condition has taken another dive. In April he underwent another operation on his sciatic nerve, which stretches from the leg to the lower spine.

Ever since, his balance has got worse and he hasn't ventured out of the house in five months, until the end of last week, in the run-up to the publication of this article  which seems to have offered him new hope.

When he found out I'd be writing it, he wasn't thrilled, but agreed because of the comfort he knew it would offer thousands in a similar position. He's made peace with the fact his secret will soon be out. Finally, his voice will be heard.

We can only hope those at the top of the chain are listening.

In a statement, Ealing council said: 'Social housing is in very short supply in Ealing, with more than 11,300 households waiting for a council home.

'We ensure homes go to those who need them most by allocating our finite resources according to priority.

'Mr Moustapha has been in our second-highest priority allocation band since 2016.'

Pledge support for Omar by visiting gofundme.com and searching Omar Moustapha
Stephen

ITV, Monday

Rating:

The North Water

BBC2, Friday

Rating:

The best programme on television at the moment isnt Vigil  what happened in Florida can stay in Florida, as far as Im concerned  but Stephen. It is deftly written, deftly performed, sober and meticulous, respectful and affecting.

Its set in 2006, which is, as the opening titles told us, 13 years after Stephen Lawrence was stabbed to death on a chilly London street, and seven years after a public inquiry found the Metropolitan Police to be perniciously and institutionally racist, yet his parents were still fighting for justice.

It is also, I should have said, enraging.

Doreen and Neville Lawrence  played superbly by Sharlene Whyte (above centre) and Hugh Quarshie  are still being fobbed off by those higher up the chain

ITV loves these real-life police procedurals and somehow understands how to make them with class (see Little Boy Blue, White House Farm, The Pembrokeshire Murders). In other hands they can often be a disaster (see Channel 4s Deceit, ugh).

This is elegantly written by Frank and Joe Cottrell Boyce and stars Steve Coogan as DCI Clive Driscoll, who volunteers to reinvestigate the Lawrence case after discovering that all the files relating to the investigation have been left behind in a now-defunct police station.

Nice.

Many feared Coogan would be too Partridge-y for the role but he is excellent. His Driscoll is caring, compassionate, determined and believable, even if, perhaps, hes a little too saintly.

His quirk, after all, isnt alcoholism or drug addiction or depression brought about by a traumatic backstory seen via flashback. Its playing the piano for old folk in a care home. Sweet, but there may not be a spin-off series in that.

Many feared Steve Coogan (above) would be too Partridge-y for the role but he is excellent. His DCI Clive Driscoll is caring, compassionate, determined and believable

This week it was episode two (of three). Doreen and Neville Lawrence  played superbly by Sharlene Whyte and Hugh Quarshie  are still being fobbed off by those higher up the chain, while Driscoll uncovers more and more of the Mets failures. (Even litany of failures doesnt get near it.)

The police knew whodunnit, the Lawrences knew whodunnit, everyone knew whodunnit, yet no suspect had ever been charged. Lessons had been learnt by this point, youd think, but no, not at all.

We all know Stephen was stabbed by his own knife when he tried to rip off a dealer, says one officer. What are you? another asks Driscoll, part of the Lawrences private police force now?

Driscoll is methodical, but this is never plodding, as we can sense a case building, and so want the killers to go down. He revisits all the old evidence, including the forensics.

Back in 1993 the official forensic service didnt even bother with some tests because they said it wouldnt be worth it. Driscoll orders them to be done by a private company and a hair is found on a suspects clothing that could be Stephens, and a drop of blood is also discovered that is definitely his.

There were several standout scenes. One involved a witness coming forward who saw everything and could identify all the killers. Why wait until now? he was asked. Im a racist, he says, so I didnt lose any sleep over it.

Other gripping scenes included Neville in the cemetery, Doreen in the police station after shed been car-jacked, and the one in her kitchen where Driscoll, still trying to win her trust, tells her he admires her strength and the way she has kept on fighting.

I didnt plan for it, she says plainly. I thought the killers would just be arrested. I didnt expect getting justice to be my job. She then added that she still dreamed of Stephen: He is so, so sad and angry to not be alive Im not strong. I have no choice.

Enraging and heartbreaking too.

The new series The North Water is dark. Literally. I turned the brightness on my TV to full whack, but so many of the early scenes took place in barely-candlelit taverns or barely-candlelit cabins that I didnt have a clue what was going on.

The crew, as far as I could make out, includes a disgraced doctor (Jack OConnell), a whaler (Colin Farrell), and the ships captain (Stephen Graham, above with O'Connell)

Who is doing that grunting? Who is picking the fight? By the end of this first episode we had, at least, made it to the Arctic Circle, where the light was brilliantly white, but be careful what you wish for.

A prolonged seal-clubbing scene ensued. (Please, please, make it dark again!)

This is a five-part adaptation of an Ian McGuire novel by film-maker Andrew Haigh, set aboard a whaling ship in 1859. The crew, as far as I could make out, includes a disgraced doctor (Jack OConnell), a whaler (Colin Farrell) who is pure evil and may or may not have been the one grunting in the opening scene, and the ships captain (Stephen Graham), who is undertaking the mission for secret reasons that arent good.

This has terrific production values, as The Terror did, but it is, I should warn you, both extremely grunty and extremely (actually, exclusively) male. Im guessing were in for a survivalist tale that will also explore the beast in man, and if you like that sort of thing you will like this.

And thats my conclusion. From what I could see of it.
They: What Muslims And Non-Muslims Get Wrong About Each Other

Sarfraz Manzoor Wildfire 20

Rating:

Broadcaster and journalist Sarfraz Manzoor grew up as the youngest son of Pakistani immigrants in Bury Park, a predominantly Muslim area of Luton. His mother arrived in Britain in 1974 yet can still speak only Urdu.

Escaping a stiffly traditional home environment and the prospect of an arranged marriage, Manzoor moved to Manchester to study, and later gravitated to London, where he built a successful media career.

On the surface, Manzoor is a poster boy for integration, but deep down he worries that he has travelled too far from his upbringing; his older brother jibes that hes only interested in being a Muslim when hes being paid to write about it.

They is pitched as an attempt to grapple with the prejudices that hamper relations between Muslim and non-Muslim communities in Britain (above, inside the Hagba Sophia mosque)

If segregation refers to living in a self-reinforcing bubble, he ponders, then maybe I do live in a segregated community  one that is, on the whole, white, well educated and well-to-do.

They is pitched as an attempt to grapple with the prejudices and misunderstandings that hamper relations between Muslim and non-Muslim communities in Britain. At heart, however, its a deeply personal attempt to reconcile the conflicted facets of Manzoors sense of self.

Each chapter interrogates fault lines concerning attitudes to violence, women, marriage, integration, education and patriotism. Manzoor doesnt pussyfoot around persistent issues within Islamic culture in regard to antisemitism, homophobia and the grooming of vulnerable white girls.

He claims that many negative beliefs associated with Islam arent a Muslim thing at all, but stem instead from outdated Pakistani cultural norms.

He highlights the extent to which the weaponised grievances of extremists on both sides are rooted in religious ignorance. Koranic knowledge among jihadis is laughably poor, just as Right-wing agitators are almost wholly illiterate on the intricacies of Islam.

He interviews figures from inside and outside Muslim communities who have experienced and challenged religious intransigence.

While acknowledging the complexities surrounding these issues, They bends perhaps a little too readily towards optimism, occasionally lapsing into the well-meaning platitudes of a middle-class dinner party.

It is most compelling when Manzoor writes from the centre of his own conflict and examines his default positions. In particular, he writes movingly about the toll exacted by his decision to marry a white, Scottish Christian, causing a deep rift within his family.

He ends with a eulogy to his mother. If her half-century of cultural isolation is symbolic of mistrust between communities, her blameless life and acceptance of her daughter-in-law and grandchildren are grounds for positivity.

Manzoor doesnt offer solutions beyond pleas for greater understanding and integration on both sides but, ultimately, the book is less about answers than the importance of asking more questions.

The Right To Sex

Amia Srinivasan Bloomsbury 20

Rating:

The Right To Sex is a highly anticipated debut collection of essays by 36-year-old Amia Srinivasan, the rock-star philosopher and fellow of All Souls College, Oxford.

Each chapter ruminates on some matter pertaining to sex, from Incels to sex work to whether or not academics ought to sleep with their students.

The book is an expansion on Srinivasans widely read 2018 essay for the London Review Of Books titled Does Anyone Have The Right To Sex?, which suggested that, although we do have the right not to have sex with people we dont fancy, we should probably feel a bit guilty about it, since the biological basis of sexual desire has an annoying habit of getting in the way of quests for Utopia.

The Right To Sex is a highly anticipated debut collection of essays by 36-year-old Amia Srinivasan (above), the rock-star philosopher and fellow of All Souls College, Oxford

These other, newer essays are similar in style. Srinivasan writes in elegant and meandering prose, occasionally playing with challenging ideas, but then losing her nerve at the last moment.

Gaps in the argument are filled with rhetorical questions and disjointed leaps to the next subsection. A chapter on porn flirts with the case for stronger regulation, but then shies away from saying anything meaningful, concluding that, hey, porn is bad, but maybe legal restrictions are worse? (Are they? Arent they?)

Gushing praise describes The Right To Sex as extraordinary, a classic and set to change the world. But whats really extraordinary about this book is that someone as obviously clever as Srinivasan could have wrestled with her subject, applied her considerable intellect to the task, and then just happened to arrive at a set of opinions shared by almost everyone else in her peer group.

This is essentially a very stylish defence of mainstream feminism in 2021, written by a thinker who is either disappointingly conventional, or else afraid of upsetting her colleagues (or maybe both).

Louise Perry
Henry 'Chips' Channon: The Diaries 1938-43

Edited by Simon Hefter Hutchinson 35

Rating:

Chips must rate as one of the most inappropriate nicknames ever. Henry Chips Channon was a snobbish multi-millionaire who lived in one of the most expensive houses in London and liked to be chauffeured around in a green Rolls-Royce.

He probably never ate a chip in his life, unless he forced one down while trying to win over the voters of Southend, the constituency for which he served as Conservative MP from 1935 until his death in 1958.

Simple food always gives one indigestion, is one of the bons mots in this, the second volume of his diaries. Others include Royalty is a heady wine and Are all women mad? I suspect so.

Henry Chips Channon (above, with Lady Cunard) was a snobbish multi-millionaire who lived in one of the most expensive houses in London and liked to be chauffeured around

Even as London is being bombed, he swans around the city, shopping for bejewelled cufflinks, tucking into rich meals at the Savoy or Claridges, throwing dinner parties for 24 at his home in Belgravia, or relaxing in a Turkish bath. A phrase that regularly pops up in the diaries is Had my bottom cleansed today, or words to that effect.

Chips Channon kept diaries throughout his adult life. A shortish volume of them was published nine years after his death, but it had been heavily cut by both his wife and his boyfriend.

Many of those he had insulted in them were still alive, among them the Queen Mother (at heart snobbish and insincere) and that scheming woman Diana Boothby, who smells so strongly that I once nearly fainted when sitting next to her.

Now that his victims are all dead and buried, the diaries are being published in their entirety  three volumes, each of them more than a thousand pages. The first volume, published earlier this year, covered Channons glory years.

Already wealthy, he married an even wealthier woman (a Guinness heiress), successfully launched himself into both politics and high society, chummed up with the Duke and Duchess of Windsor in the years before the abdication, and was invited to the flashiest parties thrown by all the most welcoming Nazis  Goring, Ribbentrop, Goebbels  when he toured Germany in 1936.

Already wealthy, Channon (above with his son, Paul, by Herbert James Gunn, 1942) married an even wealthier woman (a Guinness heiress), successfully launched himself into politics

In that volume he found Hitler amiable and semi-divine, and was captivated by the way Gorings merry eyes twinkled. He seems a lovably disarming man. As you may have gathered already, Chips Channon was not the best judge of character.

Or of anything else, for that matter. A convinced appeaser, as late as May 1939, we find him saying that all my sympathies are with Hitler, and that the press has been unfair to the poor man.

It is hopeless in England: give a dog a bad name and he can never recover. On August 24, 1939, he asserts that The whole House expects war: only I do not. Just ten days later, on September 3, war was declared.

On that day, Channon notes that this is proof of the Foreign Offices long hatred of the Germans, and Jewry the world over triumphs.

On July 5, 1940, he further notes that people are beginning to say that Hitler will never attack this country. By the end of August, the attacks had begun.

And so it goes on, his sure instinct for faulty prediction. If Hitler does attack Russia, it will be the cleverest act of his whole career, he writes in June 1941.  His position would then seem impregnable.

The meticulous editor of his diaries, Simon Heffer, sets him right. A serious misjudgment by Channon: it was the attack on Russia that lost Hitler the war.

Channon hero-worships Neville Chamberlain  the greatest man of all time  and detests fat wicked old Winston, labelling him the man who has never been right. When Churchill finally becomes Prime Minister, he bursts into tears, exasperated that England in her darkest hour had surrendered her destiny to the greatest opportunist and political adventurer alive.

His only hope is that Winston, with too much rope, is certain to crash one day.

His abuse of Churchill  a bully, an irritating tyrant, unfair, unkind, wrong  continues, come what may. Winston is losing the war if he has not lost it, he writes in June 1942. He is the most dangerous man in England.

Like many a marginalised backbencher, Channon was convinced of his own centrality and believed that, with a word in the right ear, he could shape world events.

Consequently, he devoted an inordinate amount of time to fruitless plotting. The really only startling thing about my intrigues is that they always come off, he confided to his diary.

But he was talking nonsense: the only thing they always came off was the rails. In November 1942, having just been sacked from his very lowly job of Parliamentary Private Secretary to an Under-Secretary of State, he sets his sights on the House of Lords.

I want to be a peer: there are many ways of becoming one. The quickest would be for Leslie Hore-Belisha to become Prime Minister. To do that he would first have to be a Conservative  so I had a confidential chat with him.

IT'S A FACT Chicago-born Channon was stridently anti-American, yet he was happy to live off the $175,000 he received from his US family. Advertisement

One of the remarkable aspects of this volume is how little the war impinges on his social life. Bombs may fall, even on his own house, but he never lets them get in the way of his party-going.

Sadly, most of the grandees with whom he mixes are now forgotten figures. It may be fun to hear that Queen Marie of Yugoslavia was wicked, obese, obscene, evil-speaking and smelling, but it would be a lot more fun if we knew who she was.

Heffer does his best to revive these obscure royals and aristocrats by applying lengthy defibrillating footnotes to them  Gilbert James Heathcote-Drummond-Willoughby succeeded his father as 3rd Earl of Ancaster, and so forth  but they remain determinedly lifeless.

Channon reached his peak as a social diarist in the first volume, when he was still a member of Edward and Mrs Simpsons circle. But by 1938 they were in exile, and he had lost touch with them.

Without their presence his diaries become an endless succession of the same old names and titles, few of any significance beyond their power to irritate. He drops hundreds of names  but few people alive today will be bothered to catch any of them.

Though the original volume of his diaries was heavily abridged, with many of the juiciest bits removed, it was about the right length. In these extended volumes there are nuggets to be found, but they lie buried beneath a suffocating morass of dreary social and political hobnobbery.

Its all too much. In April 1939, he writes:  the Under-Secretaryship has been given to Osbert Peake, a popular, but not very great appointment. I should have preferred Ralph Assheton or Victor Raikes.

To which the only valid response is Who? Who? Who?

But he carries on regardless. I lead London society, my house is the loveliest  indeed the last and only stronghold remaining of the aristocracy and ancien regime  in society I am unrivalled, he boasts on page 893.

But by now, with the world in peril, he has clearly become too silly and shallow a figure for anyone of any real stature to bother cultivating. Churchill cold-shoulders him, and he barely ever meets King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, who fail to include him among their 800 guests at a ball at Buckingham Palace.

I shall not forget this slight, he rages, adding that the Queen is not only fundamentally treacherous but remarkably snobbish.

In 1941, no longer even a PPS, he sets his sights on becoming Governor of Bermuda, but fails. Instead, his old boss, Rab Butler, suggests making him Deputy Lord Lieutenant of Essex, but that never happens either.

This volume includes frequent tussles with his rich and flighty wife Honor, who, after affairs with, among others, a Hungarian count and a ski instructor, is intent on divorcing him and marrying a horse dealer.

I think she is a nymphomaniac she has a horrible character, he rants. He worries that the scandal of divorce will mean the end of a peerage, of my political aspirations, of vast wealth, and great names and position.

He entertains doubts, not only about Honor, but about all women. They are untrustworthy, usually, too emotional, and not very pleasant or constructive characters. I shouldnt mind if I never saw one again.

Small wonder, then, that he should be plotting his own future with a dashing young lover, an interior decorator called Peter Coats, a Pierrot of charm and Aryan good looks, to whom he writes up to seven letters a day.

No doubt their romance will be continuing at length in Volume 3, which is to be published early next year. But Im not sure I still have the stamina for it.
When Lisa Shannon couldnt cope with her depression any longer she decided to take her own life but was stopped by daughter Ellie. They reveal how that dark day brought them closer

Lisa with Ellie on her graduation day

Lisas Story : Lisa Shannon, 50, is a therapist and lives in the Wirral with her husband Nick, 53, and daughters Ellie, 25, and Evie, 18

Opening my bedside table drawer, I searched for the bag of antidepressants and painkillers Id been secretly stockpiling. That bag was my escape plan, but it was gone.

When Ellie later told me shed found it and flushed the tablets away, I was furious. So lost in my depression, I didnt stop for even a moment to think about her; what it must be like to know your mother wants to die.

Three years on from that day, I still carry so much guilt, but also indescribable gratitude. It is because of Ellie that Im here today.

My decision to end my life in the summer of 2018 was the culmination of decades of living with depression. It was a constant presence in my life. Sometimes it lurked in the background, at other times it wreaked havoc.

Lisa and Ellie in 1999: despite the difficult times, Ellie remembers cuddles with her mum

Ive been estranged from my mother for most of my adult life. She was emotionally unavailable and I grew up never feeling good enough for her. Shed tell me how lucky I was because we had a nice home and material possessions, but I envied friends whose mothers showed them love.

For so long I believed there was something inherently wrong with me. After therapy I came to understand how I was broken by that dysfunctional relationship and that my mental health problems  which included a constant craving for validation as well as low self-esteem  all stemmed from it.

I gave birth to Ellie when I was 24, and I was terrified of motherhood. Id read all the books, I knew how to care for her practically, but I didnt know how to be a good mother. I was scared Id damage her emotionally in the way I had been.

Without a positive maternal role model of my own I felt totally out of my depth, and when Ellie was nine months old, I handed her over to a childminder and returned to work as a fraud investigator, firmly believing that her carer, who was so warm and natural with her, could give her what I couldnt.

My second daughter Evie was born seven years later, but I still had little confidence in myself as a mum. When it came to anything challenging in motherhood, I felt I wasnt good enough. I never bought clothes in the next size up for the girls until they absolutely needed them  I was scared theyd die because I hadnt taken care of them properly. It was emotionally exhausting living that way and robbed me of so much of the happiness I know other mums feel during those early years.

Sisters Evie and Ellie, 2005

After Evie was born, I went back to university to study law, going on to qualify as a barrister. Studying and training with two young children was gruelling but I was convinced this would make me someone I was finally proud of.

One of the ways my mental health problems manifested was a constant craving for perfection and approval. Our home was always spotless. I remember Ellie not wanting friends to play with her toys in case it made a mess. We can laugh now about my show tea towels, but she grew up believing it was normal to live like that.

I have huge regrets about the behaviour Ellie witnessed growing up. I was trapped in a cycle of trying to silence the demons in my mind by always striving to be in control at home, and pushing myself to be the best at work  then burning out and crashing.

I would take to my bed for days at a time, weeping inconsolably, or project my anger with myself on to the girls and my husband, putting my marriage under strain, too.

For more than 20 years I tried many times to fix myself with everything from counselling and cognitive behavioural therapy to antidepressants and reiki. Nothing worked.

I even qualified as a counsellor in the belief that I could find something that had been missed, something that would heal me.

Even when there were periods where I felt less troubled, that familiar darkness would eventually return and in 2015 I began to plummet into the darkest period of my life.

Ellie left home to go to university and, as much as I was happy for her to be spreading her wings, I was really hit by how much Id come to rely on her. She helped ground me, and gave me love and approval. Without her, I felt bereft. Mentally, I was exhausted from decades of depression, carrying the weight of anxiety and sadness; forever flagellating myself for not being enough.

That year I took an overdose at home but Nick and Evie found me. I made myself sick and refused to go to hospital. I insisted Ellie wasnt told and the next morning even flew to Geneva for a work meeting.

I carried on gradually unravelling from that low point, and by the summer of 2018 was suicidal again. I felt very calm about it and genuinely didnt think Ellie and Evies lives would be poorer without me. I believed it would be better for them, and it never crossed my mind theyd miss me. After all, Id never been the mother they deserved or so my depression told me.

Early that summer I stood on a bridge, planning to jump off, but a good samaritan saw me and convinced me to climb down. I drove home and said nothing to Nick and the girls. A few weeks later I tried again, waiting on a local railway platform only for the train Id planned to throw myself in front of to be cancelled. If ever I needed confirmation of how useless I was I wasnt even able to kill myself.

That was when I began stashing away tablets, determined that this would be my final, and successful, attempt. I was so angry when Ellie found them  I didnt understand why she wouldnt let me finally be at peace.

Nick, Ellie and Evie begged me to seek help again and reluctantly I began a new treatment called rapid transformational therapy (RTT). It combines aspects of neuro-linguistic programming, cognitive behavioural therapy and hypnotherapy  and, to my amazement, it was effective. It addressed the root causes of my depression and released me from blaming myself for being broken. So life-changing  and lifesaving  was it, I decided to retrain as an RTT therapist myself, and now run my own practice.

I wish I could turn back time and be a different mother, but I cant. All I can do is be a better one, and Im much more supportive and approachable now that Im not wrapped up in my own struggles.

I owe Ellie so much. It feels wonderful to simply be a mother and daughter  and best friends  without the spectre of mental illness. I may have given her life, but she saved mine and I will never forget that.

Ellies Story: Ellie Shannon, 25, is a teacher

A happier family: Lisa with Evie, husband Nick and Ellie, Christmas 2020

Flushing away those tablets, one question went round and round in my mind. Why? Was I not enough for Mum to want to live?

Id spent years trying to please her, make her smile, fix her, long before I realised how broken she was  but it hadnt been enough. She wanted to leave me and I felt sad, confused and as if Id failed her in some way.

Since that dark day in 2018, both my sister and I have had therapy and its helped us understand that Mum was so blinded by depression, she thought death was better than carrying on her life with us. I know now there is nothing I could have done differently, and just feel relieved I was able to stop her.

When Mum and I talk about my childhood, our memories often differ. At the forefront of her recollections are the difficult times. The days she would cry in bed, her frantic cleaning of our already spotless home and, of course, her suicide attempts.

I try to reassure her that, yes, I remember those times, too, but I also remember her cuddles at bedtime when I was little, family holidays, and her pride in all my achievements at school and then university. She was a much better mum than she thinks she was; depression has clouded her perceptions of herself during those years.

Something we share is a knowledge that weve both been shaped by our mothers. Growing up with a parent with chronic depression has made me a people-pleaser, and I can lack confidence due to years of trying but not succeeding to make her better. I dont dwell on who I might be were it not for her depression. What would be the point? Neither of us can change the past.

Seeing Mum recover over the past three years, feeling so positive about life again, my relief is indescribable. At the back of my mind I have a fear she might plummet to that dark place again but she reassures me how different her state of mind is and I hope, as time passes, that I can have complete faith she is safe.

The impact of Mums depression on our family has been, perhaps surprisingly, a positive one. We are very open about our emotions with one another; weve become a support network, which has been more important than ever during the pandemic.

I have a version of Mum in my life Ive never had before, and our bond is strong. Mum has regrets but I remind her that despite reaching such a low point, she didnt give up. She tried to battle her demons, heal herself  and she succeeded.
Parenthood, break-ups, friendship, weird crushes theyre all played out hilariously in SHARON HORGANs mega-hit series Motherland. So is it inspired by her own life as a solo mum? Absolutely everything happens at the school gates, she tells Cole Moreton

Sharon wears coat, Esau Yori

Sharon Horgan looks happy this morning. I feel like Ive had a bit of a mental turnaround, she says brightly. Im feeling pretty nimble at the moment.

Thats great to hear from the British-Irish comedian and actor who has made us laugh so much (and wince at her hilariously accurate observations of modern life) in shows like Pulling, Catastrophe and the great Motherland, which she co-writes.

Sharon has admitted to struggling a bit over the past year or two, with Covid restrictions and a crisis in her industry as well as the aftermath of a divorce. So whats brought on the change?

I stopped drinking, she jokes. Not for any particular reason. Like everyone in the world, my lockdown year-and-a-half was a bit gin-infused, so I thought: Ill just knock that on the head. Its only been about four months, but I have a mad amount of energy. The bigger truth is that she is naturally energised by work, writing and performing.

Sharon didnt find fame until she was in her 30s but she turned 50 a year ago and seems to be working incredibly hard to make up for lost time. Besides her own shows, her production company Merman makes series like There She Goes with David Tennant and Aisling Beas This Way Up, in which Sharon plays big sister Shona. Then theres the acting career, which has seen her lead the movie Military Wives with Kristin Scott Thomas and match Hollywood star James McAvoy for sheer moving brilliance in the recent BBC Covid drama Together.

Sharon will soon be seen shimmying for all shes worth in the movie version of the hit West End musical Everybodys Talking About Jamie. And for the past month she has been in Ireland, where she grew up, filming a secret project of her own. I got the last plane out of Dublin last night and Im a zombie, she says, flapping her hand to indicate weariness. Its a short distance, its just that it was such a scramble the last couple of days. Then a late night flight, dragging two kids and a bunch of suitcases back. Anyway, Im clapped out.

Coat, jacket and boots, Stella McCartney. Ring, Julia Cook at Branch on the Park

But her version of clapped out is very different to mine  and probably yours  as Sharon is still fizzing with wit and words, even as shes making coffee in the kitchen of her big house in Hackney, East London, and talking about the dog. Ive got a half bichon frise, half King Charles. Half genius, half idiot. He is called Ozzie.

This is very much the off-duty Sharon Horgan, wandering about in a comfortable sweatshirt, looking sharply beautiful even early on a Saturday morning, with her long hair loose and a bit wild. Theyre making me go and get it done for work, she says, showing her roots coming through and laughing. All very different from the tense, commanding teacher called Miss Hedge she is about to play in Jamie.

Like the West End show, the movie is based on the true story of Jamie Campbell from County Durham who dreamed of being a drag queen at 16 and was refused entry to his school prom in a dress until the pupils and parents rebelled in his support. I went to see the musical. I took my girls along and I found that a joyous experience, says Sharon, who has two teenage daughters with the businessman Jeremy Rainbird. They split in 2019 but remain friends and partners in Merman as well as sharing the raising of Sadhbh (an Irish name pronounced Sive) and Amer, who are 17 and 13. The shows songs are by Dan Gillespie Sells of the band The Feeling. I love the music and I found the story really life-affirming. We were all hugging at the end, having a cry and a dance. Then I heard from Jonathan Butterell, who was going to direct the movie, and I honestly didnt think I was going to do it. But his email was so nice and his vision for the film was inventive. It sounded like a cool thing to be part of.

I didnt start writing and performing until i was in my 30s. I think i was afraid of failing

Butterell is an acclaimed choreographer making his directing debut. Newcomers Max Harwood as Jamie New and Lauren Patel as his best friend Pritti are joined by Sarah Lancashire as Jamies mum and a fabulous Richard E Grant as a former drag queen turned costume shop owner who comes out of retirement to mentor the boy. Sharon says, I did my usual thing of saying: Why would you want me? I cant sing and I definitely cant dance. Jonathan said: None of that matters. He wanted me because of the characters hed seen me play. Miss Hedge could come across as quite brittle, so she needed warmth.

Sharon actually does a fine job of singing and dancing like a breathy, teacherly Vogue-era Madonna in one of the films set-piece numbers. And in other scenes she manages to convey with just a glance or a tone of voice that the teacher is a woman with frustrations and regrets all her own.

The movie was shot in Sheffield, where Butterell comes from. Sharon admits it challenged her emotions. We were in a proper school and going back to one of those gives you the heebie-jeebies! But we spent so long in that hot classroom with all those kids, they ended up being so helpful. How so? This is an amazing job to have but sometimes, like any job, its hard, she says. You get jaded. You feel like a piece of meat. You get into your make-up chair at six in the morning and you wont see your own kids until you get home at eight in the evening. And your ego gets battered during filming or you feel like you havent done your best. All the niggles get under your skin, especially as you get older. But I was sitting in this room with all these teenagers and you just cant be jaded around them. Theyre so happy to be there performing. They were really life-affirming.

Sharon (centre) in her first hit comedy Pulling with Rebekah Staton and Tanya Franks

Jamie is all about following your dream, so I want to find out how Sharon got to where she is. And it turns out this took her a surprisingly long time. I didnt even earn my first pay cheque doing what I do now until I was at least 31, she says.

Sharon was born in London in 1970, but her parents moved to County Meath in Ireland to run a turkey farm when she was four. After convent school Sharon studied art. I worked as a chambermaid and a barmaid and saved up so I could pay for this drama course at the weekends, while I was at art college during the week, she says. God, what a work ethic! But then I dropped out of both and went to London.

Then all her dreams came true? No! I went to London and worked in Kilburn Job Centre for six-and-a-half-years. Theres nothing wrong with that, she says, unless you dont want to be there. I wasnt interested in progressing. Its like when an actor takes a job waitressing, and they dont want to be the manager, but after three years carrying plates, theyre like: Oh s***! Thats what happened to me.

Why did she get stuck for so long? I cant explain that, other than I thought writing and performing was too impossible. Or I didnt have the tools. Or I was afraid of failing. She wasnt from a privileged or showbiz family. Sometimes it can be your background, but my four brothers and sisters all grew up on the same farm in the same tiny village and were all doing really well for ourselves. Maria Horgan is a successful producer; Lorraine an actor who has been in Peaky Blinders. Mark has just made a highly acclaimed podcast called Where Is George Gibney? and Shane is a former Irish rugby star. There must have been a sense of If you work hard, things are possible drilled into us.

Coat, trousers and boots, Esau Yori. Belt, Zeynep Kartal

Are the siblings competitive among themselves? Oh yeah. Were still ridiculously keen to get pats on the back from our parents. From each other as well. It feels wonderful to have your siblings congratulate you on something youve done. I get affronted if they dont. I try to hide it, but if something that Ive made has gone out into the world and I dont hear from them, Im gutted.

Shes being very friendly but Sharon is formidable and I can imagine her getting fierce, so do any of them ever dare to say they dont like something? The one who dares to say that is my dad. He will always just say: I wasnt sure about that one, Sharon. And I kind of go: Well, OK. She acts out taking a deep breath to calm herself and hold it in. But hes so complimentary if its something he loves. I get beautifully composed emails and messages when hes blown away. Its addictive, isnt it? Praise. But we are a tight-knit family and supportive of each other. Im lucky to have that.

Young Sharon got out of her rut at the Job Centre by going to study English at Brunel University. She also met a writer called Dennis Kelly who became her collaborator. And so I woke up. I saw a point in the distance and figured Id go for it. Its about having the right people around you, and for me that was Dennis. They sent off sketches to the BBC which led to their first hit Pulling, about a single young woman with a chaotic life. We were both living in shared, low-level accommodation and doing jobs we didnt like and in relationships that were going nowhere. The bones of Pulling were our lives.

Next came the Bafta-winning Catastrophe with the American actor and writer Rob Delaney. The show was a huge success for Channel 4, although neither stopped to take that in. I dont often sit back and reflect. Every time Rob and I made a new series of Catastrophe wed say: We should go for a burger at least, and just sit and talk about how great it is to be doing this. But we never did. Why not? We both had families. And once you finish writing something youre making it, then promoting, then youre starting a new one again.

Catastrophe was about a woman in her 30s who became pregnant by a businessman she barely knew and had to decide whether to try to make a go of it. In real life, Sharon met Jeremy Rainbird at a party in Lewisham when she was 34, conceived Sadhbh early in the relationship and married him in 2005. They then had Amer but divorced amicably after 14 years. Though she doesnt like talking about her private life, nor her current relationship status, Sharon did say publicly over the summer. Im having to grow up. Jeremy would probably laugh at that because I still have an enormous amount to learn and my girls tell me regularly that I dont know how to work the house, like its a Hoover or something. Thats changing, she added: But, you know, recently I got builders in and did some renovations and this is sounding ridiculous because Im 50, but it was the first time Ive done that on my own. I do stuff on my own now and I kind of like it.

Karen in award-winning series Catastrophe with Rob Delaney

Because so much of what she writes is clearly inspired by what she sees around her, do friends and family know they are all potential sources of material? Well, not my daughters. I am madly interested in the teenage brain, especially because of how hard it is to be a teenager at the moment, but I would never write about a teenage girl. I think thats completely unfair and I just wouldnt, she says intently. But friends? Yeah. And family? Yes. And partners? I have done. So, I think its OK. I dont think I take the p***. If I ever do take anything wholesale, I let them know or ask permission.

And thats certainly true of Motherland, the wonderful series starring Anna Maxwell Martin, which Sharon co-writes and produces. It dares to say the unsayable about what its like to be a modern mum, struggling to hold it all together and secretly resenting your kids for stealing your life. There are definitely mums in Motherland who are based on my good local friends here in Hackney. But they like it. Theyre happy for me to do that.

How do her daughters really feel about her career? Its a bit embarrassing for my girls. There are sex scenes out there ready and waiting to be watched by their peers. Thats mortifying. I have embarrassed them hugely. Have they said so? Yeah. I mean, my daughters have told me when kids at school have said: Why did your mum write a show where she has sex in the first five minutes? You know, its a good question

Im a bit of a ballbreaker as a parent. i dont want my daughters to feel the privilege too much

Are they interested in her work? Yeah. My elder girl does media studies and has a really good eye. Shell tell you whats s*** and whats not and shes right a lot of the time. Would she like them to follow her into the business? I think it would be terrible to become an actor; thats a hard slog and it doesnt often work out. Id much rather there was something else in their futures. But I think theyre interested in the production side of it. Theres something magical about watching a set be built then come to life.

Television is a much better place for young women than it used to be. There is really affirming content out there now for them. My elder daughter totally devoured Fleabag. Watching a female character struggle or be funny or smart on TV, that kind of thing wasnt there before, says Sharon, who has been a major force in that change herself.

I guess all the people they come into contact with in my life are women who are running their own production companies or creating their own shows. Our director, script supervisor, second unit director and one of our producers are all women. Before it would have been a sea of white men, she says. Its a good thing for girls to be around that.

Sharon as teacher Miss Hedge in her new movie Everybodys Talking About Jamie

After Catastrophe was up for an Emmy she starting working some of the time in America, writing the comedy drama Divorce for Sarah Jessica Parker in New York. Sharon must be worth a tidy sum by now, so how does she keep her girls down to earth? Im a bit of a ballbreaker as a parent. It is important for me that they dont feel the privilege too much. Im definitely not a parent who lavishes anything. Im really tight-fisted actually, she says proudly. And theres this constant conversation we have about what happens when they reach the age when theyre  sort of  kicked out.

Has she seen rental prices lately? I know! And the other part of me desperately wants to just lock them in the basement. But I talk a lot to them about how hard I had to work to get where I wanted to be. I take nothing for granted and Im grateful for everything. Some people say theres a liberation that comes from turning 50  so, a year on, has she got there yet? Yeah. I think so. Myself and my friend Zoe turned 50 at the same time and we were both a bit depressed about it. So we just gave ourselves a good talking to and looked at the alternative, which is being in the ground. So I have this positive connection with it now, which is: Im alive! And I do feel kind of alive at the moment, even though Im exhausted.

She sounds surprised to find herself so at ease with the world. Yeah. This is a slightly positive attitude Im not really used to having! Long may she enjoy it, because everybodys talking about Jamie but its Sharon who keeps making us laugh.

Everybodys Talking About Jamie will be released on Prime Video on 17 September

Picture Director : Ester Malloy.

Styling: Rachel Davis.

Hair: Declan Sheils at Premier Hair using Hair by Sam McKnight.

Make-up: Nicola Schuller using 111 Skin and Nude by Nature.
Have you ever thought about pitching your business to a group of experienced investors, similar to Dragons Den? Or perhaps you're a budding angel investor who wants to put money into the next Revolut or Monzo.

The Seed Stage is an opportunity for small start-ups to pitch to some of Europe's top venture capital funds in just five minutes.

Taos Grisdale and Hector Mason launched the investment event just before the first lockdown in March 2020.

Their plan was to change how startups get funding by bringing both parties together in one place, and they have billed it as 'Dragons Den on a bigger scale'.

'Dragons Den on a bigger scale': Investment forum The Seed Stage gives startups the chance to pitch to Europe's top VC funds, as well as everyday investors

Seventy top venture capital firms support The Seed Stage and attend the pitch events.

'The sector is highly fragmented, and characterised by information and communication silos which mean that both startups and investors spend huge amounts of time trying to find one another, let alone actually pitching and getting investment' says Grisdale.

'This antiquated approach takes founders away from growing their businesses, which is a lose-lose situation for both founders and investors.'

The VC world has long been criticised for being too closed a circle with limited diversity.

In Europe, around 91 per cent of venture money went to startups with all-male founding teams last year, according to a 2020 report from Atomico.

This has led to the creation of a number of networking events, and some VC funds like Ada Ventures have explicitly committed to investing in overlooked founders.

However, issues still remain at pre-seed and seed stage level - especially for founders that don't have a bumper book of contacts.

Grisdale and Mason know these issues well having worked in the VC world for a number of years.

Grisdale works at DMG Ventures, the venture arm of the Daily Mail which has invested in companies like Cazoo and Zoopla. Before that he worked at investor True Capital, and he has also had a brief stint at a startup.

Hector Mason launched two businesses before joining VC fund Episode One Ventures

Mason knows the struggles startups have at an early stage, having launched two businesses before joining VC fund Episode 1 Ventures.

There is clearly demand for the platform provided by Seed Stage, as there have been 1,000 applications from startups at its last two events.

Interested businesses have until 20 September to apply to get a chance at pitching at the next event on 21 October.

Founders are asked to provide information on their business including what sector they operate in, how much revenue they've made and how much they are looking to raise.

The VC funds help whittle the applications down from around 1,000 to 15, and those startups are then invited to pitch at the demo day in October.

'It is a tough application process, with many amazing startups not getting the chance to pitch,' says Grisdale.

However, even those who do not pitch on the day will still make themselves known to the 70 top venture capital firms who support The Seed Stage.

'There have been several instances already where companies not shortlisted for pitch day have still received investment from 1 or more of the 70 funds.'

For Michael Dunnett-Stone, who launched his business Feasty this year, it has changed everything.

He pitched his company, which helps social media chefs grow and monetise their business, at an event earlier this year and has since received funding.

'It's changed everything. It was just me in my bedroom with a laptop and now I've hired a team,' he says. 'We're hiring a team of three or four developers, I have an office. It's a proper business now.'

Everyday investors can invest in the next big thing

October's event will take place virtually and will follow a similar outline to The Seed Stage's previous events.

This time though, everyday investors will be able to invest small amounts in companies they see pitch via a special purpose vehicle.

An SPV is usually structured as an LLC and can be used as a funding structure, where all investors are pooled together into a single entity.

Taos Grisdale launched The Seed Stage while working at True Capital

Investing at an early stage in promising companies is still relatively rare, other than through crowdfunding platforms.

'Crowdcube and Seedrs have done a good job opening up access to private market investing but the problem is there's still quite a stigma attached to those sort of platforms in VCs' eyes,' says Mason.

'They tend to attract second or third tier private companies because it's easier for top tier companies to go and speak to a few VCs and they can raise money relatively easily.

'We're not on a mission to kill crowdfunding The deals that reach Crowcube and Seedrs are never vetted by VCs or angel investors. They go through rudimentary regulatory checks.'

By investing through the Seed Stage, sophisticated investors or high net worth individuals will have access to top tier companies that have a stamp approval from leading VC funds.

Attendees interested in investing will have to sign up with investment platform Odin which runs the necessary regulatory processes. The minimum investment is 1,000.

Startups can apply to pitch here
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A new documentary that chronicles the creation of the 9/11 Memorial & Museum has become entangled in controversy due to what the institution claims are parts that are inaccurate and defamatory  and pushed the filmmakers to cut scenes.

The museum had the right to review the film and objected to several scenes in The Outsider that it asserts damages its reputation, including one in which a vendor showed ties for its gift shop. Even before it opened in May 2014, some of the victims' families were outraged there would be a gift shop where their loved ones died. The memorial first asked that 36 scenes be removed, The New York Times reported, and then 18, according to the New York Daily News.

Steven Rosenbaum, one of the documentary's directors, told DailyMail.com that the institution was 'furious' after seeing the film. Instead of being a review of the facts, he said, they were taking an editorial position. 'The concern about the museum's control over the story has only grown.'

Legal letters have gone back and forth over the documentary as well as the large video archive that Rosenbaum and his co-director and wife Pamela Yoder donated in 2008. Rosenbaum said that the museum had been restricting access to the 500 hours of video. 'It was meant to be a public archive,' he said.

The Associated Press reported Friday that the museum 'is backing off uncommon restrictions on researchers after complaints that the institution was stifling scholarship.' Lee Cochran, spokeswoman for the 9/11 Memorial Museum, referred DailyMail.com to the article.

She had no comment when asked via email Friday whether the museum was pursuing legal action against the filmmakers.

'The scenes the museum took most issue with include the voice recording of a woman in the final moments of her life and footage of people falling from the buildings,' Cochran wrote in an emailed statement to DailyMail.com, referring to a 911 call a woman in the Twin Towers made the day of the attacks that was part of the film.

'The museum specifically did not include the voice recording in the core historical exhibition out of respect for the victim and her family. Similarly, the museum only shows non-moving imagery of those individuals falling from the buildings and provides a warning sign in front of the alcove in which it's presented so that visitors aren't unwittingly confronted with extremely disturbing material.'

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The creation of the 9/11 Memorial & Museum, above, was a complicated and politically fraught process that took several years. From 2008 until the museum opened in May 2014, filmmakers Pamela Yoder and Steven Rosenbaum had behind-the-scenes access to the debate, disagreement and discussion of what would be built at the World Trade Center site after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 that took the lives of nearly 3,000 people. Their new documentary, The Outsider, offers an inside look into the undertaking

The museum, which had the right to review the documentary for security reasons and defamation, objected to several scenes - at one point 36, The New York Times reported - and asked to have them removed. Rosenbaum told DailyMail.com they had two camera crews working fulltime from 2008 to May 2014 for a total of 670 hours of footage. Above, Alice Greenwald, then the museum's director, during the filming of The Outsider. In the documentary, she said: 'Every step of the way, you have to be asking the question, does this violate a trust that we have with those who lost their loved ones? Does this violate the memory of the people who were murdered?' Greenwald is now the museum's president and CEO

Michael Shulan, above, was in his neighborhood, Soho, near the Twin Towers when the attacks happened. He observed that people seemed to gravitate toward that morning's paper that had been affixed to a storefront. He then added an archival image of the World Trade Center and as the day progressed, people were taking pictures of that picture. Soon, he was running a crowdsourced photo gallery with an exhibition titled Here is New York: A Democracy of Photographs. Later on, he was asked to be the museum's creative director. 'I have always been somewhat of an outsider in any setting because that is my personality,' Shulan said in the new documentary, which noted he was novice curator among experienced executive staff

In the documentary, Shulan wanted the museum to ask more questions about the attacks and its aftermath. He said: 'At a certain moment in this project, there was clearly a shift. It was a narrowing of the aspirations of the project. It was a narrowing of the narrative even.' He left his role after the museum opened in May 2014. Above, the 9/11 Memorial & Museum when it was closed due to COVID-19 in April 2020. It faces an $18 million deficit because of the pandemic shutdown, reduced capacity and as the city's tourism levels remain low. Due to budget constraints, the nonprofit canceled special programming that was to coincide with the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks, according to The New York Times

In a way, Rosenbaum and Yoder have been working on their latest film for 20 years.

'This isn't anything you sign up for,' he told DailyMail.com.

In 2002, they released a documentary called 7 Days of September, which is a 'woven first-person narrative from 28 New Yorkers into an intimate and urgent remembrance of the attacks and the week that followed,' according to The Outsider's website.

Yoder also 'oversaw the acquisition and curation of the historic CameraPlanet Archive, (now) known as the largest single collection of 9/11 video in the world,' according to the film's site. In 2008, they donated their large video archive to the memorial, which led to the access for their documentary, Rosenbaum explained. From 2008 to May 2014 when the museum opened, he said that they had two camera crews working fulltime. Ultimately, they ended up with 670 hours of footage.

One of the scenes the museum took issue with was when a woman displayed ties as a possible item for its gift shop in a meeting. Rosenbaum said there were hours of footage about the gift shop.

'There wasn't a hidden camera,' Rosenbaum told DailyMail.com.

Rosenbaum said that some families that have seen the documentary told him that the tie scene proved their 'worst fears.'

Another scene it objected to was 'a museum official saying, "Fruit is so much healthier than donuts," saying it would "damage the reputation of the staff member and the entire team,"' according to the New York Daily News. It is unclear what was the context in which this comment was made.

Some have criticized the institution for presenting a simplified version of the attacks and their continued aftermath - most recently seen last month in the chaotic withdrawal in Afghanistan, which included a suicide bombing at the Kabul airport that left 170 civilians and 13 United States service members dead. The country is once again under Taliban control.

Tom Hennes, the lead exhibition designer for the museum, quit the project twice. 'It's essentially generating a much more imposed narrative upon the day and the aftermath than we had started with,' he said in the documentary.

However, Hennes also pointed to the powerful pressures on the museum and its director Alice Greenwald in both the film and in a phone interview with DailyMail.com. He said the project was complicated.

In The Outsider, Greenwald said: 'The politics are the terrain we're in. The World Trade Center has always been a complicated site.'

The museum declined DailyMail.com's interview request for Greenwald.

On September 11, 2001, hijackers used commercial airplanes as weapons and rammed one first into the North Tower, then a second into the South. First responders rushed to the World Trade Center and both 110-story skyscrapers collapsed. Terrorists also took over a plane that hit the Pentagon and a fourth that ultimately went down in a Pennsylvania field after passengers fought back. Above, the North Tower, right, and the South Tower, left, the morning of the attacks

Above, an aerial view of what was once the World Trade Center complex on September 16, 2001. After the Twin Towers fell, thousands - emergency workers, firefighters, police officers, volunteers and others - flooded the site to begin searching for survivors. It was perilous work and soon became clear that there were few to rescue. While fires burned, many then sifted through the debris to find the remains of those who were lost. The recovery and cleanup of Ground Zero was officially completed in May 2002. Breathing in the toxic dust after the attacks has caused health issues, illness, cancer and death for first responders, those who assisted in the cleanup as well as those who lived, worked or went to school in the surrounding area. 'The number of cancer victims... has risen to 23,710, including 1,510 people who died,' health officials told the New York Post in an August 21 article

Above, the two memorial waterfall pools in the former footprints of the fallen Twin Towers. Names of those who died in the 2001 attack and the 1993 bombing are etched along the top. The 9/11 Memorial & Museum is seen between the two pools in an image from June 2018. It took many years and, according to NBC News, more than $700 million to build the pools, which opened on the tenth anniversary of the attacks, and the museum, which opened in May 2014. An international competition to design the memorial started in April 2003. 'In January 2004, the design submitted by architect Michael Arad and landscape architect Peter Walker, Reflecting Absence, was chosen as the winning entry,' according to the museum's website

The Fire Department of the City of New York, known as the FDNY, lost 343 firefighters on September 11, 2001. After the first plane hit the North Tower that morning at 8:46 a.m., firefighters were focused on search and rescue. 'Chief officers considered a limited, localized collapse of the towers possible, but did not think that they would collapse entirely,' according to a FDNY report about its response. A second plane crashed into the South Tower at 9:03 and the building collapsed at 9:59 a.m. The North Tower fell at 10:28 a.m.

The Outsider opens with footage of smoke billowing out of the Twin Towers.

On September 11, 2001, hijackers used commercial airplanes as weapons and rammed one first into the North Tower, then a second into the South. First responders rushed to the World Trade Center complex. Terrorists also took over a plane that hit the Pentagon and a fourth that ultimately went down in a Pennsylvania field after passengers fought back. The two 110-story skyscrapers collapsed.

Michael Shulan was in his neighborhood, Soho, near the Twin Towers, when he observed people gravitating toward that morning's newspaper that had been affixed to a storefront.

'People were touching this thing and seeming to take some solace in this. And I suddenly remembered I had an old picture of the World Trade Center. So I ran upstairs and I got this picture and I taped it up. And as the day wore on, I noticed that people now came by and were taking pictures of the picture. And that was how the whole thing started.'

He converted his empty storefront into a crowdsourced photo gallery. Posted out front was a sign that stated: 'We urge anyone with photographs related to the events of 9/11/2001 to join the exhibition.' Titled Here is New York: A Democracy of Photographs, the exhibition was a salve for many after the attacks and it received widespread attention and media coverage. Shulan's knowledge of images from that day led to the role of the museum's creative director.

'I knew coming in here that I was between a rock and a hard place because I'm not the director, I'm not the institution and I'm not the designer so what I am in the end,' he said in the documentary. 'What is a creative director? When they offered me the title, I said sounds great, what is it?'

The Outsider noted that Shulan was a novice curator among experienced executive staff. Greenwald, the director, had spent 19 years at the Holocaust Museum and had her own vision, according to the documentary. 'Michael wanted to engender questions. Alice wanted to provide answers,' the film's narrator said.

Greenwald said that their task involved figuring out what people wanted the memorial to be: a shrine, collection, portal, archive or multimedia experience. 'We've been hired to create this museum. We're going to do it in as a deliberate and responsible and responsive way as we can.'

It took several years and more than $700 million to build the two memorial pools, which opened in 2011, and the museum, which opened in May 2014, according to NBC News. The 9/11 Memorial & Museum honor the victims of the September 11, 2001 attacks and the bombing on February 26, 1993 that killed six people.

'There needs to be a mechanism in which people can begin to query the reasons why it happened,' Greenwald said. 'And so part of what the museum has to do is actually give people a safe place to reencounter what happened.'

Above, Jan Ramirez, chief curator, left, talks with Amy Weisser, senior vice president of exhibitions, right. In the documentary, The Outsider, Weisser is seen working on the images of the victims. 'One of the things I find after I look at them for a long time is that they all begin to feel familiar,' she said. The last column is one of the museum's main artifacts. Ramirez explained: 'One of the few pieces that went directly from Ground Zero to here.' When people found out it was the last ceremonial piece of steel, people who had helped to the recovery and cleanup effort started to mark it, she said. The museum tried to preserve all of those improvised postings that were made with duct tape, magic marker and illuminated spray paint, Ramirez said

Some have criticized the institution for presenting a simplified version of the attacks and their continued aftermath - most recently seen in the chaotic withdrawal in Afghanistan, which is again under Taliban control. Tom Hennes, the lead exhibition designer for the museum, quit the project twice. 'It's essentially generating a much more imposed narrative upon the day and the aftermath than we had started with,' he said in the documentary. However, Hennes also pointed to the powerful pressures on the museum and its director Alice Greenwald in both the film and in a phone interview with DailyMail.com. He said the project was complicated
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It was a morning marked with chaos, courage, calamity and ultimately deep loss. When the commercial plane hit the North Tower at 8:46 a.m., it was unclear at first what had just happened in Lower Manhattan.

But it was clear to first responders that people needed help. Cops, firefighters  some had witnessed the surreal moment in the sky  rushed to the World Trade Center complex. Thick black smoke was already pouring out of the burning building.

Elevators were out. Firefighters climbed the stairs of the 110-story tower to figure out what was happening on its upper floors to report back. 911 operators tried to keep people calm as wave after wave of calls rolled in.

It was unthinkable that the skyscraper and its twin, which for so long had been a fixture of the New York City skyline, would completely collapse.

First responders were trying to get a grip on the crisis when another plane struck the South Tower at 9:03 a.m.

At 9:37 a.m., a third plane ripped a hole into the Pentagon near Washington, D.C.

Minutes earlier, four men had hijacked flight 93 and rerouted it from San Francisco to Washington, D.C.  their target was believed to be the White House or the U.S. Capitol. Forced to the back of the plane, passengers and crew called family and friends who told them America was under attack. Understanding what was at stake and that their lives were in peril, they bravely fought to get inside the cockpit. In response, the hijackers downed the plane in a Pennsylvania field.

The South Tower fell at 9:59 a.m. The North buckled at 10:28 a.m.

Nearly 3,000 people died.

The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 unfolded in 102 minutes.

The war on terror began that October. Seeking to destroy the terrorist network al Qaeda and its leader Osama bin Laden, who was behind the attacks, U.S. and British forces bombed Afghanistan where the Taliban had given him sanctuary. Last month, the Taliban regained control of the country amid a mishandled drawdown and a Kabul airport suicide bombing that killed over 170 people including 13 U.S. service members.

More than $4 trillion has been spent for two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq  which started in March 2003 until the U.S. withdrawal in December 2011  that Brown University's Cost of War project estimates killed at least 433,000 people.

The World Trade Center was an idea for decades that finally became a design of two 110-story towers in the 1960s. Built for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the 16-acre 'superblock' with its own zip code would have seven buildings. Construction on One World Trade Center, right, began in 1968 and was 'topped out' - meaning the last piece of steel was placed - in December 1970. Two World Trade Center, left, was topped out in July 1971. The two buildings were officially opened on April 4, 1973. Five more buildings - Marriott Hotel at 3 WTC, 4 WTC, 5 WTC, 6 WTC and 7 WTC - completed the complex. Dubbed the Twin Towers, the two skyscrapers became an iconic part of New York City's skyline. Above, the South Tower, left, and the North Tower, right, in 1998

The Twin Towers were first targeted on February 26, 1993. At around 12:17 p.m. a bomb went off in the underground garage of the North Tower. Six people were killed and over 1,000 were injured. While looking through the rubble, the FBI found the remnants of the rented van that held the 1,200 pounds of explosives. When one of the members of the plot went to get back his $400 deposit back, the FBI arrested him, according to the agency's website. The leader of the attack, Ramzi Yousef, evaded capture for two years before his arrest. Yousef, who is currently serving life in prison, is the nephew of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Known as KSM, he was arrested in Pakistan in 2003 and faces charges of being the architect of the September 11, 2001 terrorism attacks at a military tribunal in Guantanamo Bay. Left, first responders at the Twin Towers after the explosion in 1993. Right, two NYPD officers help a woman at the scene

When the first plane slammed into the North Tower at 8:46 a.m. on Tuesday, September 11, 2001, it was not immediately clear it was an attack. President George W. Bush was at a Florida elementary school and was initially told 'that a small, twin-engine plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. The President's reaction was that the incident must have been caused by a pilot error,' according to The 9/11 Commission Report, which was released in July 2004. The notion it was an accident was dispelled when the second plane hit the South Tower at 9:03 a.m. It is seen above bursting into flames after the crash

The attacks happened quickly. The North Tower was hit at 8:46 a.m., then 17 minutes later the South. A third hijacked plane ripped a hole into the western side of the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. and 184 people were killed. At both the Twin Towers and the Pentagon, bravery was on display from first responders as well as people helping others to evacuate. 'Lt. Col. Ted Anderson carried two of the injured away from the burning building. Then he re-entered the smoke-filled Pentagon through a broken window to drag out two more injured employees, one whose clothes were on fire,' according to a 2008 article on the Army's website. Above, a helicopter flies over the Pentagon after the attack

Not long before the third plane crashed into the Pentagon, a fourth flight, United Airlines Flight 93, was hijacked. Forced to the back of the plane, passengers and crew called family and friends who told them America was under attack. After voting to revolt, they bravely fought to get inside the cockpit. In response, the hijackers downed the plane in field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, seen above the day after the attacks as investigators search for the plane's recorders. 'With almost no time to decide, they gave the entire country an incalculable gift. They saved the capitol from attack. They saved God knows how many lives. They saved the terrorists from claiming the symbolic victory of smashing the center of American government. And they did it as citizens,' former President Bill Clinton said at the flight's memorial dedication on September 10, 2011

That morning, 19 men boarded four different commercial flights  all slated to cross the country from the East Coast to the West  as part of a coordinated attack.

'They were planning to hijack these planes and turn them into large guided missiles, loaded with up to 11,400 gallons of jet fuel. By 8:00 a.m. of Tuesday, September 11, 2001, they had defeated all the security layers that America's civil aviation security system then had in place to prevent a hijacking,' according to The 9/11 Commission Report, which was released in July 2004.

On American Airlines Flight 11, the hijackers stabbed two flight attendants, used some kind of irritant like pepper spray or mace in first class, and pushed passengers and crew to the back of the plane. They also claimed to have a bomb.

One of the flight attendants, Betty Ong, called the airline's reservations office in North Carolina and told them what was happening.

'We are flying low. We are flying very very low. We are flying way too low,' Ong said, according to the report.

'Oh my God we are way too low.'

The plane was the first one to be turned into a weapon when it slammed into the North Tower from its 93rd to 99th floors.

United Airlines Flight 175 was the second to be hijacked. Similar tactics to flight 11 were used, according to the report. Crew members were stabbed and the hijackers had mace, knives and claimed to have a bomb.

Passengers and crew also called family and friends to report the hijacking and what was happening. One passenger said they were thinking about storming the cockpit, according to the report.

Peter Hanson called his father Lee and spoke with him twice.

'It's getting bad, Dad. A stewardess was stabbed. They seem to have knives and Mace. They said they have a bomb. It's getting very bad on the plane. Passengers are throwing up and getting sick. The plane is making jerky movements. I don't think the pilot is flying the plane. I think we are going down. I think they intend to go to Chicago or someplace and fly into a building. Don't worry, Dad. If it happens, it'll be very fast. My God, my God.'

The call cut off, according to the report. Lee Hanson turned on the television and saw the second plane hit the South Tower from its 77th to 85th floors.

According to The 9/11 Commission Report: 'Most federal agencies learned about the crash in New York from CNN.' When President George W. Bush, above, heard a second plane hit the South Tower, he told the commission 'his instinct was to project calm, not to have the country see an excited reaction at a moment of crisis.' The press was there to cover his visit to the Emma E. Booker Elementary School in Sarasota, Florida. After the Pentagon was also attacked, Bush told Vice President Dick Cheney, according to the report: 'Sounds like we have a minor war going on here. I heard about the Pentagon. We're at war somebody's going to pay'

First responders rushed to the World Trade Center after the first plane crashed into the North Tower. The Fire Department of the City of New York, known as FDNY, called a fifth alarm and units flooded the scene. According to the report, fire chiefs determined it would primarily be a rescue mission. When they entered the lobby of One World Trade Center, firefighters 'encountered badly burned civilians who had been caught in the path of a fireball.' But lights were still functioning and 'one engine and one ladder began climbing as scouting units and reporting back to chiefs in the lobby,' according to the report. Division Chief for Lower Manhattan Peter Hayden said: 'We had a very strong sense we would lose firefighters and that we were in deep trouble, but we had estimates of 25,000 to 50,000 civilians, and we had to try to rescue them.' Above, people flee as the World Trade Center collapses

Above, Marcy Borders covered in dust as she takes refuge in an office building following the Twin Towers collapse. This image became well-known. Borders was working for Bank of America on the 81st floor of the North Tower when the plane hit, according to her obituary in The New York Times. 'We had no idea what was going on,' she told filmmaker Mike McGregor in an interview. 'The way the building was shaking, I couldn't sit there.' She managed to get out of the building. Borders died of stomach cancer at the age of 42 in 2015, according to the obituary

'Clearly, however, the prospect of another plane hitting the second building was beyond the contemplation of anyone giving advice. According to one of the first fire chiefs to arrive, such a scenario was unimaginable, "beyond our consciousness,"' according to the report. First responders were trying to get a grip on the crisis when another plane struck the South Tower at 9:03 a.m. The South Tower fell at 9:59 a.m. The North buckled at 10:28 a.m. Above, firefighter Gerard McGibbon, of Engine 283 in Brownsville, Brooklyn, prays after the World Trade Center fell. Many first responders lost their lives: 343 firefighters, 37 police officers for the Port Authority, 23 NYPD as well as other emergency service workers

By the time passengers on the third plane that was hijacked, American Airlines Flight 77, were calling friends and families, the attacks on the Twin Towers were known. Like the other two flights, the hijackers had knives and passengers were moved to the back of the plane.

The flight crashed into the western part of the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia across from Washington, D.C.

'No one at the (Federal Aviation Administration) or the airlines that day had ever dealt with multiple hijackings. Such a plot had never been carried out anywhere in the world in more than 30 years, and never in the United States. As news of the hijackings filtered through the FAA and the airlines, it does not seem to have occurred to their leadership that they needed to alert other aircraft in the air that they too might be at risk,' according to the report.

The last plane to be overtaken by terrorists was United Airlines Flight 93, which took off late. Unlike the other flights, there were four men  not five  to hijack the plane. The operative who was likely the fifth 'had been refused entry by a suspicious immigration inspector at Florida's Orlando International Airport in August,' according to the report.

And unlike the other flights in which the hijackers started their takeover of the cockpit 30 minutes in, the report noted that on flight 93, it was 46 minutes. Wearing red bandanas, the hijackers had knives and also claimed to have a bomb.

The FBI told the commission 'they found no trace of explosives at crash sites.'

Passengers and crew were forced to the back of the plane. They started calling those on the ground and learned about the other hijackings and the Twin Towers.

They decided to fight back.

One passenger said they had 'voted whether to rush the terrorists in an attempt to retake the plane,' according to the report.

'At 9:57, the passenger assault began. Several passengers had terminated phone calls with loved ones in order to join the revolt. One of the callers ended her message as follows: "Everyone's running up to first class. I've got to go. Bye."'

In response, the hijacker flying rolled the plane left and right but the passengers persisted to get into the cockpit. He downed the plane into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

After the Twin Towers collapsed that morning, as soon as it was possible, thousands of NYPD, firefighters, emergency medical technicians, doctors, paramedics, construction workers, volunteers and others started searching for survivors  some accounts have people using their hands to dig. Fires continued to burn and the site was extremely dangerous. Above, firefighters work around the World Trade Center after both towers collapsed on September 11, 2001

Above, two days after the attacks, first responders continued to search for possible survivors. The bleak reality that there were few survivors gave way to the recovery and cleanup effort at what was once One World Trade Center and Two World Trade Center. Thousands worked what was called the 'pile' and searched for remains at Ground Zero. Heartbreaking missing person posters were soon everywhere near the cordoned-off site. Still today, there are remains that have not been identified

Smoke, dust and debris infiltrated Lower Manhattan and marred the air. Today, some 400,000 people are believed to have been affected by the toxins exposed at the site. The number of people  first responders, volunteers and those who lived, worked or went to school in the area  diagnosed with cancer has increased to 23,710, health officials told the New York Post. This includes 1,510 people who have died, according to the August 21 article. Above, rescue workers on September 20, 2001

After the Twin Towers collapsed that morning, as soon as it was possible, thousands of NYPD, firefighters, emergency medical technicians, doctors, paramedics, construction workers, volunteers and others started searching for survivors  some accounts have people using their hands to dig. Fires continued to burn and the site was extremely dangerous.

Smoke, dust and debris infiltrated Lower Manhattan and marred the air. Today, some 400,000 people are believed to have been affected by the toxins exposed at the site. The number of people  first responders, volunteers and those who lived, worked or went to school in the area  diagnosed with cancer has increased to 23,710, health officials told the New York Post. This includes 1,510 people who have died, according to the August 21 article.

The bleak reality that there were few survivors gave way to the recovery and cleanup effort at what was once One World Trade Center and Two World Trade Center. Thousands worked what was called the 'pile' and searched for remains at Ground Zero.

Heartbreaking missing person posters were soon everywhere near the cordoned-off site. Still today, there are remains that have not been identified.

Many lauded Mayor Rudy Giuliani for his leadership after the attacks and there was a push for the city to regain a semblance of normalcy and show strength, which included reopening Wall Street six days later on September 17. In light of what is now known about the area's air quality, some of these moves have been criticized.

President George W. Bush addressed the nation after the attacks on September 11, 2001. He stated: 'We will make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbor them.' The Taliban refused to turn over al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, who was behind the attacks and had sanctuary in Afghanistan since 1996. On October 7, 2001, U.S. and British forces targeted the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan with missile strikes as part of what was called Operation Enduring Freedom. By the end of 2001, Taliban rule was over and Hamid Karzai became the leader of interim government, then president. He served in that role until September 2014. Above, a U.S. B-52 plane drops bombs in Afghanistan in an undated photo

In his State of Union address in January 2002, Bush called Iraq, Iran and North Korea the 'axis of evil.' The case was then made that Iraq's dictator Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction. On March 20, 2003, the U.S. began its airstrike campaign and by April, it had control of Baghdad. On May 1, 2003, Bush declared 'Mission Accomplished.' Fighting continued until August 31, 2010 when combat operations officially ended. The U.S. withdrew its troops in December 2011. Saddam Hussein was captured in December 2003, tried and hanged in December 2006. Above, a convoy of U.S. Marine Humvees in Fallujah in November 2004

President George W. Bush was at an elementary school in Florida when the first plane hit the North Tower, which was thought initially to be an accident. When the second plane crashed into the South Tower, it was clear that the United States was under attack. For the first time, all commercial flights were grounded nationwide. Bush was soon on Air Force One. He addressed the nation that night and stated, 'We will make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbor them.'

Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden had been in Afghanistan since 1996. Born in Saudi Arabia to a wealthy construction magnate, bin Laden had first been in the country to join those fighting the Soviet Union, which invaded Afghanistan in late 1979 to prop up the pro-communist government. Throughout the 1980s, the United States funded those who fought against the Soviets.

In 1988, bin Laden and others started al Qaeda.

The Soviet Union withdrew in February 1989 and by the end of 1991, it collapsed. Into this power vacuum stepped the Taliban, who had control of Kabul by 1996. Under their rule, men had to have beards and women had to be completely covered if in public. Art was destroyed and music was banned with the exception of religious chants and songs.

'Convicted thieves had their hands cut off. Murderers were publicly executed. The punishments and the trials were carried out publicly in a stadium filled with thousands  barbaric scenes that still generate fear,' Kathy Gannon, an AP journalist who has covered the country for 30 years, wrote.

In the 1990s, the CIA described bin Laden as an 'extremist financier,' according to The 9/11 Commission Report. The same year he was back in Afghanistan after being kicked out of Sudan  1996  the agency was putting together a unit to focus on him, according to the report. By 1997, the agency realized that bin Laden was more than a moneyman and in the years leading up to the September 11, 2001 attacks, it had put together capture plans for bin Laden, according to the report. The Clinton administration tried to get the Taliban to turn him over.

The report details that the Bush administration was warned that bin Laden was planning an attack. Bush's daily brief on August 6, 2001 included 'Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US,' according to the report.

After the attacks, the Taliban again refused to hand over bin Laden. On October 7, 2001, the U.S. with British support bombed al Qaeda and Taliban targets in Afghanistan for part of what was called Operation Enduring Freedom.

That October, Congress passed what is known as the Patriot Act, which, among many other things, increased law enforcement's ability to surveil as well as penalties for terrorism. It is officially called the USA PATRIOT Act, which stands for United and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism. Parts of the law are permanent, others have been reauthorized by Congress, Bush and President Barack Obama.

In 2013, Edward Snowden leaked NSA documents to journalists that revealed the scope of the government's mass surveillance of U.S. citizens and residents by using a section of the Patriot Act. The law remains controversial to this day.

In the months following the attacks, the Office of Homeland Security and the Transportation Security Administration, known as the TSA, were also established. The Department of Homeland was officially founded in November 2002.

By the end of 2001, Taliban rule was over and Hamid Karzai became the leader of interim government, then president. He served in that role until September 2014.

In his State of Union address in January 2002, Bush called Iraq, Iran and North Korea the 'axis of evil.' The case was then made that Iraq's dictator Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction. On March 20, 2003, the U.S. began its airstrike campaign and by April, it had control of Baghdad. On May 1, 2003, Bush declared 'Mission Accomplished.' Fighting continued until August 31, 2010 when combat operations officially ended. The U.S. withdrew its troops in December 2011.

Saddam Hussein was captured in December 2003, tried and hanged in December 2006.

Osama bin Laden was killed in Pakistan in May 2011.

The cleanup of Ground Zero, which remained dangerous, was officially completed on May 30, 2002. It took 100 days for the fires to stop burning after the attacks.

The World Trade Center was a complex of seven buildings. When the Twin Towers collapsed, the Marriott Hotel  3 World Trade Center  also fell. Later that day, 7 World Trade Center collapsed. The complex's other buildings  4 WTC, 5 WTC and 6 WTC  were damaged during the attacks and demolished.

Debate over how to redevelop the 16-acre site was fierce and continues to this day. Memorial pools in the footprints of the towers to honor those who died on September 11 and in the underground bombing from February 26, 1993 opened in 2011. The 9/11 Memorial & Museum opened in May 2014 with One World Trade Center opening that November.

Above, Robert Peraza, who lost his son Robert David Peraza, pauses at his son's name at the North Pool during the tenth anniversary ceremonies on September 11, 2011. 'I was just honoring Rob... I was saying a prayer for his soul,' Peraza told ABC, according to NPR. His son, Rob, worked as a trader for Cantor Fitzgerald and was on the 104th floor of the North Tower on September 11, 2001, according to NPR. The Memorial pools - 'twin waterfall pools surrounded by bronze parapets that list the names of the victims of the 9/11 attacks and the 1993 World Trade Center bombing,' according to the 9/11 Memorial & Museum website - opened on September 11, 2011

The first memorial to open was at the Pentagon on September 11, 2008, seen above. There are 184 memorial units to honor those lost that day at the military headquarters and those on flight 77. The stainless steel and cantilevered benches have a 'lighted pool of flowing water,' and 'a permanent tribute, by name, to each victim,' according to its website. 'The victims  men, women, and children  ranged in age from three to seventy-one, and represented a cross-section of America. The physical damage to the Pentagon was rebuilt in less than one year, but the attacks forever changed our world'

The last plane to be overtaken by terrorists was United Airlines Flight 93, which took off late. Unlike the other flights, there were four men  not five  to hijack the plane. Passengers and crew members were forced to the back of the plane and started calling those on the ground. They learned about the other hijackings and the Twin Towers - and decided to fight back. In response the hijackers tried to roll the plane to left and right and then downed it into a Pennsylvania field. Above, the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania on May 26, 2021. The completed memorial opened in 2015
Between Sydney Airport and Long Bay jail is a clump of sand dunes at Botany where the bullet-riddled bodies of two minor criminals were planted in the 1980s.

Across Botany Bay at Kurnell are more dunes where the remains of another small-time crook killed in the same decade stayed hidden in the sand for more than 20 years.

These burial sites, which may yet give up more skeletons from unsolved homicides, are referred to by some police as Neddy Smith's killing fields.

Smith, who died at Long Bay on Wednesday aged 76, can no longer defend himself against claims he used these lonely spots to dispose of gangland corpses.

Neither can the families of his alleged or suspected victims expect much chance of getting the answers they crave.

Neddy Smith has been linked to the murders of three criminals found buried at Botany and Kurnell in Sydney's south-east. He was convicted of killing one, cleared of a second and interviewed but never charged over a third. Smith is pictured in prison with his daughter Jaime

Police believe Sydney model Mark Johnston was killed by gangster Neddy Smith, who died in prison on Wedneday. Johnston disappeared in 1986 and parts of his skeleton were found at Kurnell in Sydney's south-east in 2007 but were not identified until last year

Police believe an area near Foreshore Road at Botany (above) was used as a body dumping ground by Neddy Smith. The remains of brothel keeper Harvey Jones and drug dealer Bruce Sandery were found there in 1995 and 1988 respectively

Smith was cleared of murdering one of the men whose cadaver was found at Botany and convicted of murdering a second whose grave was found 13 years after he was killed.

He was interviewed over the disappearance of a third man who went missing 36 years ago and whose partial skeleton was eventually found at Kurnell.

Those bones, belonging to model and cocaine dealer Mark Arthur Johnston, were not uncovered until 2007 and only formally identified in February last year.

One of Johnston's relatives told Daily Mail Australia on Thursday she did not wish to discuss Smith's death or the slim chance anyone would now be charged with her loved one's slaying.

'I have absolutely nothing to say about that man's passing,' she said.

The woman had been surprised last year to be told by homicide detectives they had identified the bones at Kurnell as Johnston's and wanted only to quietly take receipt of his remains.

'This whole sorry saga has been going on far too long and, there has been an overkill of sensational interest in the affair by the press that has spread over years,' she said.

It has been speculated that hitman Christopher Dale Flannery, who disappeared in 1985, could also be buried near the airport but Neddy Smith is not his suspected killer. Flannery is pictured

Mark Johnston was last seen by friends leaving the Bellevue Hotel at Paddington in Sydney's eastern suburbs about 7pm on September 1, 1986. The Bellevue is pictured

Johnston, who once appeared in television commercials for Kentucky Fried Chicken, was dubbed the 'playboy punter' when he disappeared.

The 36-year-old was last seen by friends leaving the Bellevue Hotel at Paddington in Sydney's eastern suburbs at about 7pm on September 1, 1986.

It is believed he had gone to the home of his solicitor, the late Graham Valentine 'Val' Bellamy, to collect $60,000 in drug money the criminal lawyer was holding for him.

Eight days later, Johnston's hired Holden Commodore was found at Maroubra, about 10km away, after an anonymous telephone call.

Police located 465 grams of cocaine in the boot of the car and 52 grams of the same drug in the glove box.

A coronial inquest in 1999 heard Smith, who was then in jail for two murders, told a cellmate about garrotting a man in Bellamy's home in a description police believe fits Johnston's murder.

Neddy Smith (left) is pictured with brothel-keeper Harvey Jones and his then wife Debra. Smith was convicted in 1998 of murdering Jones in 1983. Jones was found buried off Foreshore Road at Botany in 1995

Skeletal remains from several people were dug up during construction of the desalination plant at Kurnell. A shin bone was first uncovered by workers in early October 2007. A week later ribs and other smaller bones were found 300m away in scrub off Sir Joseph Banks Drive (pictured)

Parts of Johnston's skeleton were found during construction of the desalination plant at Kurnell but were not unidentified for 13 more years.

Skeletal remains from several people were dug up during plant excavations, not all of which belonged to the missing drug dealer.

A shin bone was first uncovered by workers in early October 2007. A week later ribs and other smaller bones were found 300m away in scrub off Sir Joseph Banks Drive.

Further searching unearthed a pelvis and foot bones, some of which were in a sock, at what detectives have described as underworld body dumping ground.

It has been speculated that hitman Christopher Dale Flannery, who disappeared on in 1985, could also be buried near the airport but Smith is not the main suspect in that crime.

The Kurnell site is across the water from Foreshore Road, Botany, where the body of brothel-keeper Harvey Francois Jones was found buried in 1995. He had been shot twice in the chest 12 years earlier.

Eight days after Mark Johnston visited his lawyer Val Bellamy at Dover Heights his hired Holden Commodore was found at Maroubra, about 10km away, after an anonymous telephone call

Jones, an associate of Smith's, was said to have last been seen in the armed robber and drug baron's company in the Star Hotel at Alexandria on July 15, 1983.

Smith, who had been convicted in 1990 of murdering tow truck driver Ronald Flavell in 1987, was charged while he was behind bars with killing 29-year-old Jones and six other underworld figures.

Those charges were based on his supposed confessions to a heroin-addicted cellmate dubbed Mr Brown who Smith claimed had set him up on behalf of police.

Smith maintained he was simply 'talking s***' to the informer Mr Brown but tapes of their conversations helped convince a jury to convict him of murdering Jones.

Mr Brown said in evidence: 'He told me that Jones was crying and he said, "I'd die for you, Ned", and Ned said, "Well, you're about to, ya c***".

"Ned told me then that, "I blew his heart out with a big 357".'

For Jones's murder Smith was sentenced in 1998 to life in prison.

Ten years earlier the remains of drug dealer Bruce Douglas Sandery had been uncovered in a shallow grave about 200m from where Jones was buried.

The remains of drug dealer Bruce Douglas Sandery (above) were found in a shallow grave about 200m from where Harvey Jones was buried. He was last seen alive at the Zetland Hotel on April 12, 1988. That night residents in nearby in Hansard Street reported hearing gunshots

Coroner John Abernethy found Mark Johnston was killed at Dover Heights on September 1, 1986 and forwarded a brief of evidence to the NSW Director of Public Prosecutions. No one was ever charged with Johnston's murder

The 37-year-old drug dealer was last seen alive at the Zetland Hotel on April 12, 1988. That night residents in nearby in Hansard Street reported hearing gunshots and seeing three men lift a body into a white van. His body was found in October.

Smith was charged with murdering Sandery but the case was dropped in 1996 at committal. He was also cleared of having murdered drug dealers Lewton Shu (1983), Danny Chubb (1984), Barry McCann and Barry Croft (both 1987) at the same hearing.

The notorious gangster was acquitted of sex worker Sallie-Anne Huckstepp's 1986 murder three years later. The bodies of Chubb, McCann, Croft, Shu and Huckstepp were found at the time they were killed.

Johnston's fate remained a mystery for two more decades. The bones found at Kurnell in 2007 were subject to further forensic examination in 2019 following technological advancements and the implementation of new testing systems.

The coronial inquest in 1999 had found Johnston died on September 1, 1986, at Dover Heights, a 15-minute drive from where he was last seen.

The inquest heard evidence Johnston had gone to Bellamy's home at Dover Heights the night he disappeared. No one has ever been charged with his murder but Smith was interviewed by detectives.

In a prison conversation with this reporter 15 years ago Smith named another (obscure) criminal as being involved in Johnston's death and wrongly suggested his body was buried in the Royal National Park.

During the inquest the missing man's father Arthur Johnston told Coroner John Abernethy he believed Smith killed his son and Bellamy ordered him to do it.

Mr Johnston thought Mark was murdered because Bellamy, who has since died, wanted to cover up keeping the $60,000 his son gave the solicitor to hold.

Gangster Arthur Stanley 'Neddy' Smith allegedly told a cellmate he had killed a man in solicitor Val Bellamy's Dover Heights home. Police believe that man was Mark Johnston

In a conversation recorded in 1994, Smith told his cellmate Mr Brown that Bellamy had paid him $60,000 to kill an unnamed man from whose death the solicitor stood to gain $500,000.

Smith allegedly said that while Bellamy's wife and daughters were out of the house he had handcuffed the man and slowly garrotted him with a cord.

He allegedly said he chose to strangle the man instead of shooting him because Bellamy would not want to see blood on his new carpet.

Neddy Smith was charged with seven underworld murders during the 1990s but was convicted of only one

Bellamy told police in 1986 that Johnston had spent 15 minutes in his home the night he disappeared, collected his $60,000 in cash and left in a taxi.

He also told detectives he was constrained by client confidentiality from fully discussing his financial arrangements with Johnston.

Mr Johnston told the inquest he called Bellamy a week after his son's disappearance to express concern about Mark's welfare and whereabouts.

'Mr Bellamy appeared to me very reluctant to engage in any verbal dialogue with me,' Mr Johnston said.

Mr Johnston, a World War II veteran who has also since died, said he believed Bellamy was 'motivated by greed and avarice' and took his son's money.

'To ensure concealment of this misappropriation, Bellamy had only one course of action and that was to remove my son from the scene.'

'I hold no grievance against Mr Neddy Smith. I regard him as the implement that Mr Bellamy used to remove the evidence of his misdemeanours.'

Mr Abernethy terminated his inquiry after two days and ordered a brief of evidence be handed to the Director of Public Prosecutions, which decided to take no action.

Mr Johnston, who flew 73 sorties over the Western Desert and Europe, spent his last decades hoping his son's body would be found and buried.

Strike Force Brompton was established to re-investigate the presumed murder of Mark Johnston but its chief suspect has taken whatever he knew to the grave.

Netflix is currently screening a remastered version of the award-winning television series Blue Murder which dramatises the crimes of life and crimes of Neddy Smith.
Russia's foreign ministry summoned U.S. ambassador John Sullivan and presented him 'irrefutable proof' that US tech companies are interfering with upcoming local elections.

Russian officials claim that U.S. based tech companies violated Russian laws in connection with the September 17-19 elections to the lower house State Duma.

They are outraged at the social media firms - including Facebook and Twitter - over their refusal to censor posts in accordance with draconian Russian laws.

Vladimir Putin's regime has also been angered by the failure of tech companies to store data from local users on domestic servers, which could potentially give them easier access to the personal details of anti-Putin dissenters.

In his meeting with ambassador Sullivan, deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov expressed the 'categorical inadmissibility of interference in the domestic affairs of our country,' AFP reported.



Deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov expressed the 'categorical inadmissibility of interference in the domestic affairs of our country,' to US ambassador John Sullivan (pictured)

President Vladimir Putin (pictured) that month complained about the growing influence of large technology companies, which he said were competing with states

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Jalina Porter did not address Russian officials complaints about U.S. tech companies during the meeting but said it covered a 'range of bilateral matters' in support of US President Joe Biden's 'desire for a stable and predictable relationship with Russia.'

Although no specifics of interference have been provided, Russian media regulator Roskomnadzor warned Google and Apple to remove jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny's 'Smart Voting' app from their app stores, which could help locals vote tactically to oust or weaken Putin's regime.

Roskomnadzor said their refusal to do so could be seen as election interference, Aljazeera.com reported.

The 'Smart Voting' app has called for minors to join rallies, a tactic that has led Putin's increasingly unpopular United Russia party, currently polling at less than 30 percent, to lose a number of seats in recent local elections.

Roskomnadzor said Monday it blocked a website credited to Navalny which instructed Russians how to vote out politicians of the ruling United Russia party.

Moscow has ramped up control of the internet and is taking legal action against foreign tech companies for not deleting content banned by authorities.

Nearly all vocal Kremlin critics, including Alexei Navalny's (pictured) allies, are barred from contesting this month's parliamentary polls

Moscow has ramped up control of the internet and is taking legal action against foreign tech companies for not deleting content banned by authorities

It has led to U.S.-based internet companies including Facebook, Twitter and Google, to face a series of fines for failing to delete content requested by Russia's media watchdog and for not storing the data of Russian users on domestic servers.

Nearly all vocal Kremlin critics, including Navalny's allies, are barred from contesting this month's parliamentary polls.

Russia's claims of U.S. interference is ironic considering recent history between the two nations.

The United States has held Russia responsible for meddling in its elections and for large-scale cyberattacks.

In 2020 a Senate Intel committee report concluded that Russia launched an aggressive effort to interfere in the 2016 presidential election on behalf of Trump, and associates of the Republican candidate who were in regular touch with Russians throughout the campaign were eager to benefit from the help.

This summer, Russian-based hackers launched a cyberattack on at least 200 information technology management firms in the U.S. and demanded up to $5 million in ransom.

The REvil gang, a major Russian-speaking ransomware syndicate was determined to be behind the attack despite President Joe Biden's earlier threats of 'retaliation' to Russian President Vladimir Putin if the hacks continued.
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An 'apocalyptic' tornado tore through a Sicilian island on Friday night, killing two people and leaving nine others seriously injured.

The tornado struck the Italian island of Pantelleria, south of Sicily, shortly before 7pm local time (5pm GMT) and ripped roofs off houses, firefighters confirmed.

The whirlwind 'hit and overturned six cars', with shocking photographs showing one vehicle thrown against a house and another lying battered in a field, the civil protection agency said in a post on Facebook.

Two people were killed in the tornado, and were later identified as an off-duty fireman who was stationed on the island, and an 86-year-old male resident, according to Italian news agency ANSA.

The tornado struck the Italian island of Pantelleria, south of Sicily, shortly before 7pm (1700 GMT) and overturned cars (pictured), firefighters confirmed

Shocking photographs showed one vehicle thrown against a house and another left lying battered in a field, the civil protection agency said in a post on Facebook

The whirlwind tornado 'hit and overturned six cars' (pictured), and two people were left dead while nine others were injured, according to firefighters

The victims were in separate cars which were among some ten vehicles that were flipped into the air by the force of the 'apocalyptic' tornado, ANSA said.

The devastating scenes reportedly saw the deceased thrown free of their vehicles, with one victim landing on a low wall, and the other on the ground.

At least one car landed on its roof while another ended up on its smashed front end.

As well as the two fatalities, nine people were injured, including two in critical condition, Pantelleria Mayor Vincenzo Vittorio Campo told Sky TG24 TV.

The mayor said no one appeared to be missing on the island after the tornado ripped through the island, adding: 'We are still trying to figure out what happened.'

Residents described the scenes of destruction left behind as 'apocalyptic', while the strong winds were said to have ripped down a coastal road in mere seconds.

Mario Valenza, who lives in the Campobello district of Pantelleria, said his house was completely 'gutted' and his roof and doors were ripped off during the tornado.

Mario, who will be staying at his daughter's house until he can inspect the damage at his home, said: 'I was not at home at that moment - he says - inside there was only Assian, my Maremma sheepdog.

Two people were killed, and were later identified as an off-duty fireman who was stationed on the island, and an 86-year-old resident, according to ANSA. Pictured: Damage from tornado

The victims were in separate cars which were among some ten vehicles flipped into the air by the force of the 'apocalyptic' tornado, ANSA said. Pictured: Two wrecked cars in tornado

Nine people were injured, including two in critical condition, Pantelleria Mayor Vincenzo Vittorio Campo said. Pictured: Damage caused by the tornado in Pantelleria

A hospital helicopter from nearby Lampedusa island was ready to provide assistance once the weather improved. Pictured: Crushed car and damage caused by the tornado

'He was saved because, out of fear, he hid under the bed, thus escaping the fury of the wind and water. The vortex entered the window destroying everything inside.'

Pino Guida, resident in the Karuscia district of Pantelleria whose house is just 1km from where the whirlwind destroyed homes and cars, told La Sicilia: 'I felt very strong rain and wind, something really anomalous for our island.

'It all happened in a moment.'

Guida said they were unable to leave their house due to the intensity of the rain and 'strength' of the wind.

Guida continued: 'At a certain point the light also went out and at that point we thought that the whirlwind had caused serious damage, even if we could not imagine there were also victims.'

The strong winds also ripped down a coastal road on the Mediterranean island in seconds', local media reported.

'It was an apocalyptic sight,' an unnamed paramedic at the scene told ANSA.

A hospital helicopter from nearby Lampedusa island was unable to reach the island due to the bad weather but was set to provide help once the weather improved.

In a tweet, firefighters said: 'Utility poles bent over, roofs damaged and trees knocked down.'

Pantelleria, famed for its volcanic cliffs and hot spring waters, is popular with tourists and regularly attracts A-lister celebrities including Sting and Giorgio Armani, who owns a luxury villa there.

The Italian news agency ANSA said the dead were identified as island residents - a firefighter who is stationed on the island and an 86-year-old man.

The victims were in separate cars which were among some 10 vehicles that were flipped into the air by the force of the tornado, ANSA said. At least one car landed on its roof while another ended up on its smashed front end.

Nine persons were injured, including two in critical condition, Pantelleria Mayor Vincenzo Vittorio Campo told Sky TG24 TV. No one appeared to be missing on the island, the mayor said.

The dead were thrown free of their vehicles, with one victim landing on a low wall and the other on the ground, ANSA said.
Schools that exclude difficult or low-achieving pupils to maintain their standing in league tables are to be named and shamed by Ofsted.

The watchdog is cracking down on 'off-rolling', in which headteachers game the system to ditch youngsters informally.

Parents are pressured to withdraw their children to prevent GCSE results and attendance figures being hit.

Ofsted has warned schools that they will be named and shamed if they 'off-roll' troublesome or underachieving pupils in an effort to artificially inflate their exam grades by pressurising poor performers into dropping out

Unlike formal exclusions, it is not necessary to record why these pupils are removed.

Chris Russell, Ofsted's new national education director, said inspectors must explicitly describe the practice, adding: 'Some schools issued press releases stating off-rolling was not found because Ofsted did not use those words.

'We do not want to leave any ambiguity, because we act in the interests of pupils and parents. Therefore, we are introducing standard wording for any inspection that finds off-rolling.'

Ofsted defines 'off-rolling' as: 'The practice of removing a pupil from the school roll without a formal, permanent exclusion or by encouraging a parent to remove their child from the school roll, when the removal is primarily in the interests of the school rather than in the best interests of the pupil. Off-rolling in these circumstances is a form of 'gaming'.'

Ofsted have said the practice of off-rolling is unacceptable and a form of 'gaming'

Mr Russell stressed that off-rolling is unacceptable.

'When inspectors find evidence of off-rolling, they will address this in the report and may take it into consideration when reaching key judgements,' he added.

Professor Alan Smithers, director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at Buckingham University, said it was a 'pernicious practice', adding: 'It's good that Ofsted is going to name and shame.

'Schools attempting to game the system should be called out.'
This is the terrifying moment a Florida woman is chased by an aggressive alligator while on an otherwise peaceful paddleboard trip.

Vicki Reamy Baker posted several videos and photos to her Facebook account on Wednesday, showing her frantic attempts to paddle away from the predator before using her paddle to push the alligator away.

'What are you doing?! Get away from me!' Baker yelled as it continued to swim towards her.

'Oh, s***! Oh my God!' she exclaimed as the gator hissed after she pushed the animal away with her paddle.

'Someone has been feeding this one and made him very dangerous. He tried to bite my board,' Baker captioned the Facebook video, which has been viewed nearly 300,000 times as of Friday.

'What are you doing?! Get away from me!' Baker yelled as the alligator continued to swim towards her

'Oh, s***! Oh my God!' she exclaimed as the gator hissed after she pushed the animal away with her paddle

Baker becomes increasingly concerned as the gator continues to aggressively pursue her.

'Why are you messing with me?' she asks. 'Why are you trying to BITE me? What the heck, man!'

'Look how close he is to me. He tried to bite me and my paddleboard,' Baker exclaimed to someone off-camera.

'I've never had a gator come at me like that before.'

After Baker swats the alligator away using her paddle, a man off-camera can be heard saying: 'Ma'am, I would suggest backing up considering you just made him pretty mad.'

Baker, who lives in Florida, is in the epicenter for alligator sightings nationwide, with Enjuris reporting one alligator for every 15 residents in the Sunshine State

'Someone has been feeding this one and made him very dangerous. He tried to bite my board,' Baker captioned the Facebook video, which had accrued 239k views as of Friday

The FWC reports that there have been 413 documented alligator bites in the Florida since 1948, 25 of which were fatal attacks

Baker, who lives in Florida, is in the epicenter for alligator sightings nationwide, with Enjuris reporting one alligator for every 15 residents in the Sunshine State.

Florida alligator bite statistics date back to 1948, ranging around three major bites per year. The chance of someone being attacked is one in 3.2 million, according to Enjuris.

The increase in gator attacks likely has more to do with the rapid increase in Florida's human population than it does with the overall number of alligators, which has sits at at about 1.3 million, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

The FWC reports that there have been 413 documented alligator bites in the Florida since 1948, 25 of which were fatal attacks.

Florida alligator bite statistics date back to 1948, ranging around three major bites per year. The chance of someone being attacked is one in 3.2 million, according to Enjuris

Over the last 10 years, Florida has averaged seven unprovoked bites per year that are serious enough to require professional medical treatment

The likelihood of a Florida resident being seriously injured during an unprovoked alligator incident in Florida is roughly only one in 3.1 million

Over the last 10 years, Florida has averaged seven unprovoked bites per year that are serious enough to require professional medical treatment.

The likelihood of a Florida resident being seriously injured during an unprovoked alligator incident in Florida is roughly only one in 3.1 million.

If you encounter an alligator that is believed to pose a threat to people, pets or property, call the FWCs Nuisance Alligator Hotline, toll-free at 1-866-FWC-GATOR (392-4286).

The FWCs Statewide Nuisance Alligator Program (SNAP) uses contracted nuisance alligator trappers throughout the state to remove alligators 4 feet in length or greater that are believed to pose a threat.
New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer has said he will defy Mayor Bill de Blasio's order for city workers to return to working in their offices.

Desperate to revive Manhattan's ailing business districts, de Blasio ordered all city employees to begin working from their offices starting on Monday, the same day vaccine passport enforcement goes into effect.

In a series of tweets on Friday, Stringer slammed the mayor's demand and said that he and his staff would continue working from home until at least next month, citing the Delta variant surge and saying productivity had not suffered during remote work.

'Mr. Mayor, this is not the time for a 'my way or the highway' approach,' Stringer wrote.

New York City's controller has slammed Mayor de Blasio (above) over his mandate for all city workers to return to the office on Monday, and will refuse to comply

New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer (above) has said he will defy Mayor Bill de Blasio's order for city workers to return to working in their offices

'We will be delaying a fuller return to the workplace until at least October 12, to give us more time to assess the situation on the ground and build out a program for hybrid work,' the comptroller added.

The mayor's office did not immediately respond to an inquiry from DailyMail.com after-hours on Friday.

The comptroller is an elected office in New York, one that Stringer has long used to launch broadsides at de Blasio in perennial, and unsuccessful, bids for the mayor's office.

De Blasio has claimed that city workers have not performed well during remote work, although his critics accuse him of catering to Manhattan real estate moguls who are desperate for officer workers to return to the borough's business districts.

'We have not had a particularly stellar experience with remote employment,' the mayor told WNYC-FM in an interview on Friday.

De Blasio said that remote working had 'a huge impact, unfortunately in the wrong direction.'

An angry caller to the radio station who said she was a city worker furiously objected, saying: 'You said we haven't been effective working remotely, I really have to object to that.'

Office buildings, which make up the heart of midtown Manhattan, stand largely empty on March 04, 2021 in New York City. De Blasio is desperate to revive ailing business districts

Stringer disagreed however, saying that his staff had performed well during 18 months of largely working remotely.

'Our offices productivity has been maintained throughout the pandemic, and we want to expand on what has worked,' Stringer tweeted.

'It is a time to throw out the old playbook and recognize what many private sector companies already havethat productivity and remote work are not mutually exclusive,' he added.

Stringer said that his primary concern was the health and safety of his staff.

'The Delta variant remains a concern and our vaccination rates as a city are not yet where they should be. We are not though this yet,' he wrote.

Stringer's target date for returning to the office is in line with the October date for state workers set by Governor Kathy Hochul. Many private employers have also pushed back return dates, some until 2022.

A man moves furniture out of a building in midtown on August 30, 2021 in New York City. New York City depends economically on both tourists and office workers

De Blasio's return-to-office initiative is part of the mayor's strategy to revive the city's economy while attempting to minimize the threat from the pandemic through vaccination.

He has ordered all city workers to get vaccinated for COVID-19 or tested weekly, and rolled out a vaccine passport scheme that requires proof of vaccination or a negative test to enter many businesses, including restaurants and bars.

Enforcement of the mayor's passport mandate also takes effect on Monday, with businesses facing fines of up to $5,000 per violation.

Monday also marks the return of public school students to the classroom for the fall term.
Ministers are set to water down a shake-up of planning thanks to opposition in the Tory shires, it was reported last night.

Many of the reforms - which are designed to help build 300,000 extra homes per year - are set to be scrapped and watered down by the Government, reports suggested.

Ministers had said they wanted to overhaul the planning system to allow new homes to be built, in what would have been the biggest shake-up of the system in 70 years.

But it is understood they are now considering abandoning the plan to make local housing targets mandatory.

Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick is also likely to scrap the 'zonal system' under which neighbours would be unable to object to new homes in many areas, The Times reported.

Many of the reforms - which are designed to help build 300,000 extra homes per year - are set to be scrapped by the Government, reports suggested. Pictured: Boris Johson

Ministers previously argued that reforms would boost the building of high-quality, sustainable homes, by streamlining the process and cutting red tape.

The Planning Bill, first mooted in the Queen's Speech earlier this year, was designed to create a simpler, faster and more modern planning system - to replace the current one, dating back to the post-Second World War era of 1947.

But proposals to stop homeowners being able to object to planning applications through a zonal system, and mandatory housebuilding targets for councils, may now be scrapped, according to The Times.

The newspaper reported that Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick would present a pared-back policy following a backlash from voters and Tory MPs in southern England.

Tory MPs blamed the original plans for the Conservatives' defeat in the Chesham and Amersham by-election in June to the Liberal Democrats.

Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick (pictured) is likely to scrap the 'zonal system' under which neighbours would be unable to object to new homes in many areas

Ministers had said they wanted to overhaul the planning system to allow new homes to be built, in what would have been the biggest shake-up of the system in 70 years (stock image)

Leaflets from the Lib Dems at the time attacked the policy and included quotes from prominent Tories, such as former prime minister Theresa May and former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith, criticising the reforms.

Detractors had been vocal in warning that the plans would undermine local democracy by removing the public's right to be heard in person.

It was also reported that the massive growth in housebuilding numbers had prompted questions over whether the proposals were needed.

Almost 244,000 homes were reportedly built in 2019-20, the highest number recorded since the late 1980s, with developers seeming to cope well despite the Covid-19 pandemic.

There are also reportedly more than 1.1million houses with planning permission that are yet to be built, according to analysis by the Local Government Association.

A Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government spokesman said on Friday: 'We will not comment on speculation. Our response to the consultation will be released in due course.'
Council tax may have to increase for millions of households in 2022 to pay for social care despite Boris Johnson's manifesto-busting raid on national insurance, ministers fear.

Town halls will likely need additional funding due to most of the money raised from the 1.25 per cent NI increase set to go to the NHS over three years before it is diverted into social care in 2024.

Families would then be left facing a 'double whammy' of tax increases in April next year, with some ministers now believing council tax rises of around five or six per cent on average will be levied to plug the gap, The Telegraph reports.

Some Tory MPs now worry they will meet upset local party members when they return from Westminster to their constituencies for the first time since the tax hike was passed through the Commons.

A government source said: 'There will be pressure but that is one of a number of factors. Some of the others are looking more positive than councils were telling us six months ago.'

Town halls will likely need additional funding due to most of the money raised from the 1.25 per cent NI increase set to go to the NHS over three years before it is diverted into social care in 2024 (pictured: Boris Johnson)

Conservative support plummeted five points to 33 per cent while Labour's share increased by one point to 35 per cent, putting Sir Keir Starmer's party ahead of the Tories for the first time since January

The House voted by 319 to 248 in favour of the 1.25 percentage point increase in NI contributions amid deep unhappiness among many Conservative MPs

Does Tory care cap risk Red Wall seats? Plan may favour South as Labour takes poll lead By Daniel Martin, Policy Editor for the Daily Mail Suggestions that the social care cap will help Londoners more than Northerners may put the Tories' Red Wall seats at risk, the party was warned last night. Homeowners in the North face losing three times more of their assets than families in the capital  while those in the Midlands will lose twice as much  according to an analysis. It adds to concerns that the proposals will do little to prevent people having to sell their homes. On Tuesday the Prime Minister unveiled his care plan, which will see a lifetime cap of 86,000 on care costs  paid for by a 1.25 percentage point increase in National Insurance. A poll published yesterday  showing Labour ahead of the Conservatives for the first time since January  has caused jitters in the Tory ranks. The YouGov survey found Sir Keir Starmer's party on 35 per cent  two points ahead of the Tories on 33 per cent. This is the Conservatives' lowest rating since the 2019 election. Last week the Health Foundation think-tank suggested the care cost cap could actually benefit those living in the North. This is because, under the current system where people face unlimited care costs, northern homeowners pay more as a proportion of the value of their home than those in the South. They said this difference would be lessened if a cap was imposed. But the new analysis, compiled by Labour, looked at average house prices in each constituency to see how far the 86,000 cap will protect the value of someone's home. It showed that property-owners in the North could face care costs up to three-fifths of their assets including the value of their home. In Red Wall seats won by the Conservatives in 2019, homeowners face losing 55 per cent of their assets. In comparison, homeowners in London face costs of just 17 per cent of their assets. Labour said this meant homeowners in the North with significant care needs were more likely to have to sell their home and will lose more of the value of the property. But the Culture Secretary dismissed the poll, saying he believed voters will 'ultimately recognise' that the tax rise was necessary. Oliver Dowden said: 'Finally the Prime Minister has actually done something about this... The electorate reward governments who are willing to take difficult decisions in order to protect the long-term national interest.' Advertisement

One senior minister said the idea of council tax bills increasing was a 'worry', adding: 'At the end of it all, people are going to ask themselves do they want the Government to level with them and be honest or do they want a government that wrings its hands and does nothing.'

Ministers have been trying to quell Tory panic as a poll showed support slumping amid the massive 12billion national insurance raid.

Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden said voters would eventually 'reward' the government for making difficult decisions - despite YouGov finding a five-point drop in backing for the ruling party.

The 33 per cent support is the lowest level since the election in 2019. Two-thirds said they do not believe keeping taxes low is a priority for Boris Johnson of his party.

Labour was in the lead for the first time since January with 35 per cent - although in a more optimistic sign for the Tories Keir Starmer only managed to soak up one extra point.

Sir Keir Starmer is now expected to use a speech at a summit for Labour leaders in local government to set out his stall for the reform of social care.

Sir Keir will be speaking after a week in which the Government unveiled manifesto-busting plans to raise national insurance in order to clear the NHS backlog and fix the social care crisis.

But Labour has been criticised, including by those inside the party, for not presenting an alternative while slamming Boris Johnson's plans.

At the LGA Labour Leaders' Summit on Saturday, where Sir Keir is attending in person, he is expected to say that Labour would 'ask those with the broadest shoulders to carry the burden'.

He will say: 'Labour's aim isn't just to 'fix the crisis in social care' - as the Prime Minister has repeatedly promised but failed to deliver. Instead, Labour's vision for social care is to ensure all older and disabled people get the support they need to live the life they choose.'

He is expected to outline how this would include a shift to prevention and early intervention for those with care needs, and a preference for keeping them at home.

He will say that Labour would 'champion independent and fulfilling lives for working-age adults with disabilities - so people have choice and control over the support they get, and their views drive change in the system'.

Sir Keir will promise a 'new deal' for care workers and unpaid carers.

He will say that by comparison, the Government plan is 'a rushed out, half-baked, mess that won't give social care the resources needed, won't actually reform social care, won't create more and better-paid jobs, isn't fair across the regions or generations, and won't stop people selling off their homes to fund care'.

Sir Keir will appeal to local authorities as he will suggest the PM's proposals will force them to raise council tax as they will not receive any extra cash.

He will add: 'This is an unfair plan that doesn't work. And who is left with the bill? It's working people. It's especially low earners and young people who have already borne the brunt of the economic impact of the pandemic.'
Tony Blair and Gordon Brown are to snub a celebration to mark the 100th anniversary of Chequers as the Prime Ministers country residence, it was revealed last night.

All former PMs have been invited to the event next Saturday  but the two ex-Labour leaders said they are unable to attend.

Boris Johnson will host the function at the 16th century house in Buckinghamshire. All three surviving former Conservative PMs  Sir John Major, David Cameron and Theresa May  are expected to be present.

Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, pictured, will not attend a party to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the start of Chequers being used as an official retreat for the serving prime minister

Chequers, pictured, was handed over to the nation in 1917 for the use of the serving PM

Tony Blair owns a Grade I listed mansion just 15 miles from the country estate which was gifted to the nation by Tory MP Sir Arthur Lee

But Mr Blair and Mr Brown said they were invited at short notice and already have other plans.

It comes despite Mr Blair living just 15 miles from Chequers. He owns a seven-bedroom Grade I listed mansion in Wotton Underwood, Buckinghamshire.

Chequers was handed to the nation in 1917 as a country retreat for the serving prime minister.

The house was handed over by Tory MP Sir Arthur Lee after he noted that, traditionally, prime ministers had been from the landed gentry and had country residences of their own in which to entertain foreign dignitaries or simply to relax.

Sir Arthur said that with the advent of democracy, leaders were now much less likely to own mansions, meaning they needed somewhere of their own to relax.

A spokesman for Mr Blair said he had not pulled out of the event as he had never said he was going. And existing commitments meant he was unable to attend, she said.

While a spokesman for the Office of Gordon and Sarah Brown said the couple was invited one month ago to an event a few days from now on September 18  but due to the short notice they cannot change their pre-arranged plans, adding: There is no question of them pulling out of a pre-agreed arrangement.

Mrs May will apparently attend the event. Mr Camerons spokesman would not confirm, while Sir Johns office did not respond.

The house was built in around 1565 between the towns of Princes Risborough and Wendover. The Chequers Estate Act 1917 created a trust allowing PMs to use the mansion. It has been a favourite of many leaders, with Margaret Thatcher saying: I do not think anyone has stayed long at Chequers without falling in love with it.

Mrs Thatcher invited Mikhail Gorbachev for talks there months before he became Soviet leader, setting in train the events which led to the end of the Cold War.

Mrs May held an important meeting of her Cabinet to thrash out her Brexit deal in 2018 prompting Mr Johnson to resign as her foreign secretary just days later. And after he took over as PM, Mr Johnson chose to recover at Chequers after being hospitalised with Covid.

Chequers houses one of the largest collections of art and memorabilia related to Oliver Cromwell in the country. It also contains many other national antiques and books, held in its long room, including a diary of Admiral Lord Nelson.

While prime ministers can visit Chequers, there are also two other grace-and-favour houses for others. The Chancellor can make use of Dorneywood in Buckinghamshire, while the Foreign Secretary can stay at Chevening in Kent.
A bartender has been sacked after allegedly making vile comments about a teenage customer's skirt.

Lash technician Jorja Millington, 19, was out celebrating a birthday with a group of friends at the Ironbark Tavern and Cidery in Perth's outer suburbs last week.

The law student was shocked when a bartender allegedly told her: 'I wish your skirt was shorter, you look like a little whore'.

Ms Millington claimed she and her group then approached the venue's manager about the bartender's alleged behaviour.

Jorja Millington, 19, (pictured) was celebrating a friends birthday at the Ironbark Tavern and Cidery in Caversham, WA, when a bartender made derogatory comments towards her

Instead, the manager replied 'it was a joke' and 'not be too hard on him because he is Zimbabwean', offering Ms Millington a bottle of wine as compensation.

'I didn't want a bottle of wine, I wanted the situation to be dealt with accordingly and have the staff member held accountable,' Ms Millington told Perth Now.

'Wine is what you offer someone whose had a bad meal, not who has been called a whore.'

After rejecting the bottle of wine, the woman and her group were later asked by bar staff to leave the venue for 'carrying on'.

Footage shows Ms Millington and her group were booted from the venue for 'carrying on'

Footage of the incident shows Ms Millington was pushed out of the venue by a male worker while a member of the group is seen throwing a plastic cup at the bar as they are being ejected from the premises.

The tavern apologised and confirmed the bartender was fired in a post to its Instagram page on Monday, claiming they spoke to the woman and her mother.

'We apologise for the delay in this much needed apology, weve been investigating the matter thoroughly and have already spoken to the girl involved and her mother,' the tavern wrote.

'We would start off by saying how shocked we are about what was said to this young lady yesterday on our premises. We take full responsibility for what unfolded. The staff member involved no longer works for us as this is not our code of conduct and never has been.'

The Ironbark Tavern and Cidery (pictured) have since apologised for the incident on via its Instagram page confirming the bartender has been sacked since the incident

The venue also claimed the group were repeatedly asked to leave the premises after they became 'verbally abusive' towards staff.

'The footage shown is when the group were repeatedly asked to leave, becoming verbally abusive plus throwing drinks across the bar which is why they were ushered out,' the tavern wrote.

Ms Millington told Perth Now she had reported the incident to Fremantle Police but said officers would not investigate the issue.
A man who shot his male lover with a bolt gun when the victim was naked, blindfolded, wearing a dog collar and had his wrists tied with cable ties has been jailed for nine years.

When the victim regained consciousness, Orr told him he had shot him to 'get you to relax'.

Newcastle District Court Judge Roy Ellis said on Friday Stephen Orr had given no reason for the bizarre attack but it was safe to say 'no sane person does what this person did in the circumstances of this case'.

Stephen Orr (pictured) has been jailed for nine years for shooting his date in the neck with a bolt gun in 2017

Judge Ellis said he did not believe the bolt gun attack was planned but the complete absence of a motive was concerning.

The victim had contacted Stephen Orr on a casual sex website where they discussed their sexual fantasies before agreeing to meet at a Pokolbin pub in the Hunter in August 2017.

Orr, 59, who pleaded guilty to wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm, detaining a person for advantage, firing a rifle with disregard for safety and possessing a prohibited firearm, drove the man to a Paynes Crossing property about 50 kilometres away.

Orr told the victim - who was 68 at the time - there was no mobile phone service at the remote property and asked if anyone knew of his plans for that afternoon.

After the man told him no, Orr read him a fake note telling him three other men would be joining them but they were in fact alone on the property.

Orr took his date to a Paynes Crossing property (pictured) before he shot him in the neck with the bolt gun during their caravan sex romp

Defence barrister Garry Jauncey told the court Orr had written the note because the victim had not been interested in a 'one-on-one tryst'.

Mr Jauncey said while it appeared there was no reason for the shooting, a psychologist believed it was because Orr, who was married at the time, had been in 'conflict with his own sexuality'.

The victim had agreed Orr could blindfold him with duct tape, tie his wrists with cable ties and place a dog's collar around his neck before they had consensual sex in a caravan.

The pair had sex another two times before Orr put the bolt gun - which is normally used to stun animals before they are slaughtered - to his neck and shot him, damaging two vertebrae and causing the victim to black out.

Orr was standing about seven metres from the victim when he told him, 'I will kill you here.'

As the terrified naked victim started running for his life towards the road, Orr fired a shot in his direction with a 12-gauge shotgun.

Orr pleaded guilty to wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm, detaining a person for advantage, firing a rifle with disregard for safety and possessing a prohibited firearm at Newcastle District Court (pictured)

Orr then dropped the shotgun and ran after the victim, caught up with him and tried to drag him by the cable ties around his wrists back to the caravan.

The victim fell over, managed to take off the collar and hit Orr with it before climbing over a fence to get to the road.

The victim flagged down a passing motorist and was taken to hospital with two fractured vertebrae and a laceration to his neck.

Crown prosecutor Robert Munro said everything that happened had been consensual before Orr reached for the bolt gun.

'This is not about sex. It's not about a robbery gone wrong. It can only really be about violence,' Mr Munro said.

Orr, who has been in custody since his arrest on August 13, 2017, was jailed for nine years with a non-parole period of five years and six months. He will be due for parole on February 12, 2023.
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Afghan men have been photographed apparently enjoying life under Taliban rule by visiting restaurants and parks and riding in pedal boats despite the horrific abuses being carried out by the new regime.

In Herat yesterday, there were scenes of men laughing together while making the most of their relative freedoms, even while armed Taliban soldiers stood guard nearby.

Afghan men flocked to restaurants, gathered in a park and even enjoyed a leisurely ride on the water in scenes appearing to show normal life far removed from the violence and oppression of women elsewhere.

There were similar images last month of Taliban fighters trying out funfair dodgems as the terror group tries to soften its global image with a more progressive and moderate outlook.

But away from the cameras, women's rights continue to be oppressed, protests are being shut down and it comes only weeks after terrifying scenes at Kabul Airport and elsewhere in Afghanistan.

Many Afghan men are continuing to enjoy life under Taliban rule by visiting restaurants and parks and riding in pedal boats despite the horrific abuses being carried out by the new regime

The Afghan citizens flocked to restaurants, gathered in the park and even enjoyed a leisurely ride on the water in scenes of normal life far removed from the tales of violence and oppression

Afghan men are seen in a restaurant in Herat on Friday with no women in sight as residents adjust to the new Taliban regime

In Herat, there were scenes of joy as men laughed together while making the most of their relative freedoms

There have been reports of door-to-door executions of women and allies of the previous administration, amid crackdowns on girls' access to education, sport and a career.

The UN chief has called on all countries around the world to order the Taliban to deliver an inclusive government that respects the rights of women and girls.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said world leaders should engage with the new regime and tell them Afghanistan should not be a sanctuary for terrorism anymore and should play a constructive role in international relations.

He told a news conference on Friday 'it's important that independently of different strategies, of different forms of contact, all countries are able to convey the same message and to engage with the Taliban in an effective way.'

He said the UN is 'permanently engaging with the Taliban and we believe that a dialogue with the Taliban is absolutely essential at the present moment.'

Guterres said humanitarian aid is also essential and efforts must be made to prevent 'an economic meltdown' in Afghanistan.

A barefoot Taliban soldier carrying a gun walks outside a mosque in Herat as Afghanistan adjusts to its new government and way of life

There have been reports of door-to-door executions of women and allies of the previous administration, amid crackdowns on girls' access to education, sport and a career

An armed Taliban soldier stands by the pond in the park where a number of men enjoyed a pedal boat ride in the waters on Friday

He said the country's financial situation is 'very difficult' and 'it is essential to find ways, through some waivers or some mechanisms' to inject cash in the economy to avoid a meltdown.

Looking ahead, Guterres said, 'what would be positive is to have simultaneously the formation in Afghanistan of an inclusive government' that respects previous international commitments by the Afghan state and takes into account concerns about terrorism, human rights and other issues leading to 'a normalisation of the relations of the international community with Afghanistan.'

Despite his appeal, a number of governments have signalled their reluctance to formally recognise the newly-formed Taliban government.

Pakistan's foreign minister says the international community is not in a hurry to certify the government, although it has a desire to engage with it.

The UN chief has called on all countries around the world to order the Taliban to deliver an inclusive government that respects the rights of women and girls

A number of governments have signalled their reluctance to formally recognise the newly-formed Taliban government

Afghans gather near an armoured vehicle in Herat on Friday while women's rights are being eroded under the new Taliban rule

Shah Mahmood Qureshi spoke at a joint news conference after holding talks with his Spanish counterpart Jose Manuel Albares in the capital, Islamabad.

Qureshi said that he had come to this belief after having meetings with diplomats from various countries. He said that 'people are watching, they are waiting, they are looking at the unfolding events of Afghanistan.'

Qureshi said 'I see a desire to engage but not a rush to recognize' the Taliban.

In his remarks, Albares said Spain wants to see a stable and peaceful Afghanistan.

He also said Spain wanted safe transit for those who wanted to leave Afghanistan to travel to Spain.

Meanwhile Russia's top diplomat says he is not recommending that an official delegation be sent from Moscow to a ceremony inaugurating the Taliban.

Taliban supporters pray in a park in Herat. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said world leaders should engage with the new regime

German international broadcaster Deutsche Welle says 10 of its correspondents in Afghanistan have left the country for Pakistan

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov this week appeared to suggest that Russia could send high-level representation to such a ceremony if the Taliban formed a government that sufficiently represented the country's ethnic groups.

But on Friday he was quoted by Russian news agencies as saying he envisioned only representation by Russia's ambassador.

In a change of tone from the US, officials said if the Taliban lives up to all its commitments, brings greater stability to Afghanistan and the region, demonstrates widespread inclusion, and protects the gains of the last 20 years 'we'll work with it.'

He said the standards the international community has set are clear and include facilitating safe passage for Afghans and foreign nationals who want to leave Afghanistan and respecting the country's obligations under international humanitarian law 'including those related to the protection of civilians.'

Afghan women walk together into a mosque amid increasing reports of violence and crackdowns on freedom of speech

US,officials said if the Taliban lives up to all its commitments, brings greater stability to Afghanistan and the region, demonstrates widespread inclusion, and protects the gains of the last 20 years 'we'll work with it'

'We're watching closely to see that those standards are met,' he said.

DeLaurentis told the council that following the US withdrawal and the Taliban takeover, Afghanistan needs the United Nations and the UN political mission in the country 'more than ever.'

He said 'the United States remains committed to the people of Afghanistan,' and as the country's largest humanitarian donor it is helping partners on the ground provide assistance, 'but the needs are vast.'

With the diplomatic footprint in the country reduced, DeLaurentis said, 'the UN has a vitally important role to play' not only in coordinating aid but in preventing human rights violations and abuses and pursuing accountability for those that have occurred, and in protecting children and civilians.

Meanwhile German international broadcaster Deutsche Welle says 10 of its correspondents in Afghanistan have left the country for Pakistan, after it was previously unable to get them out of Kabul by air.

A UN development agency said Afghanistan is teetering on the brink of 'universal poverty' which could become a reality in the middle of next year

Deutsche Welle said in a statement Friday that the journalists, including its only female correspondent in Afghanistan, were able to leave on Thursday.

It didn't detail how exactly they got out of Afghanistan, but said that 'due to a variety of reasons' an evacuation by air had not worked out. The group had waited unsuccessfully outside the Kabul airport for days.

As a result, the broadcaster said, 'all options were explored to get the group out of the country by another route.'

Deutsche Welle director general Peter Limbourg thanked the German government, 'without whom this evacuation would not have been possible,' and Qatar, which he said made an 'enormous effort.' He said authorities in Islamabad had granted permission for the evacuation of the families on humanitarian grounds.

The evacuated correspondents are to be taken to Bonn, Germany. The broadcaster said it is in talks with authorities to bring relatives of the employees of its Dari and Pashto services to Germany, as well as two correspondents and their families who had returned to their hometowns after weeks of waiting in Kabul.

It comes amid a warning from the UN development agency which said Afghanistan is teetering on the brink of 'universal poverty' which could become a reality in the middle of next year unless urgent efforts are made to bolster local communities and their economies.

Per capita income more than doubled in the last 20 years, life expectancy at birth was extended by about nine years, the number of years of schooling rose from six to 10, 'and we got women into university'

It said the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan has put 20 years of steady economic gains at risk.

The UN Development Program outlined four scenarios for Afghanistan following the Taliban's August 15 assumption of power that predict the country's GDP will decline between 3.6 per cent and 13.2 per cent in the next fiscal year starting in June 2022, depending on the intensity of the crisis and how much the world engages with the Taliban. That is in sharp contrast to the expected 4 per cent growth in GDP before the fall of the government.

'Afghanistan pretty much faces universal poverty by the middle of next year,' Kanni Wignaraja, UNDP's Asia-Pacific Director, told a news conference Thursday launching its 28-page assessment. 'That's where we're heading - it's 97-98% (poverty rate) no matter how you work these projections.'

Currently, the poverty rate is 72 per cent and Wignaraja pointed to many development gains after the Taliban were ousted from power in 2001: Per capita income more than doubled in the last 20 years, life expectancy at birth was extended by about nine years, the number of years of schooling rose from six to 10, 'and we got women into university.'

But she said Afghanistan now faces 'a humanitarian and development disaster' resulting from political instability, frozen foreign reserves, a collapsed public finance system, 'a crush on local banking because of this,' as well as the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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The Queen and Boris Johnson have lead tributes to the victims and survivors of 9/11 on the 20th anniversary of the attacks.

In her heartfelt message to President Joe Biden, the Queen reflected on her visit to the site of the attack back in 2010.

In a message to the US President Joe Biden, she said: 'As we mark the 20th anniversary of the terrible attacks on September 11 2001, my thoughts and prayers, and those of my family and the entire nation, remain with the victims, survivors and families affected, as well as the first responders and rescue workers called to duty.

'My visit to the site of the World Trade Centre in 2010 is held fast in my memory.

'It reminds me that as we honour those from many nations, faiths and backgrounds who lost their lives, we also pay tribute to the resilience and determination of the communities who joined together to rebuild.'

In a defiant message played at a memorial event at the Olympic Park in east London today, the Prime Minister said the threat of terrorism remained but people refused to live their lives in 'permanent fear'.

'The fact that we are coming together today - in sorrow but also in faith and resolve - demonstrates the failure of terrorism and the strength of the bonds between us,' Mr Johnson said.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex changed the website of their Archewell Foundation to show rows of victims' names.

Labour leader Sir Keir, who attended a private memorial service in the September 11 Memorial Garden in Grosvenor Square in London, said the consequences of the attacks were 'still being felt to this day', adding the tragedy was 'still so raw'.

Delegates from the United States Embassy stand as the US national anthem is played at the Guard Change at Windsor Castle tomark the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attack

American Airlines flight crew shed tears as they pay their respects at the September 11 Memorial Garden at Grosvenor Square in London

A man and a woman embrace at a memorial service for victims the September 11 Memorial Garden at Grosvenor Square

A woman lays a flower wreath at a private memorial service for victims of 9/11 at the Memorial Garden in London

American Airlines flight crew embrace each other during a service to remember the victims who died when an American Airlines flight was hijacked by five al-Qaeda terrorists 20 years ago

Flowers from UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson were laid in the September 11 Memorial Garden in Grosvenor Square this morning, with the signed note reading: 'In remembrance of those taken from us on 9/11 and in defiance of those who would have us live in fear'

A man weeps while reading messaging and looking at the flowers laid in tribute for the victims of 9/11 at Grosvenor Square in London

In her heartfelt message to President Joe Biden, the Queen reflected on her visit to the site of the attack back in 2010 (pictured)

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer arrives holding a bunch of flowers to lay them in the September 11 Memorial Garden in Grosvenor Square in London

Delegates from the United States Embassy including Acting Ambassador, Philip T Reeker, (pictured in the red tie) at the Guard Change at Windsor Castle, to mark the 20th anniversary of the US terrorist attack

Members of the public view the flowers laid in the September 11 Memorial Garden in Grosvenor Square, London, to mark the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attack

In her heartfelt message to President Joe Biden, the Queen reflected on her visit to the site of the attack back in 2010

The Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall also paid tribute to those involved in the attacks

The Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall also paid tribute to those involved in the attacks.

They said: 'On the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, we remember all those who lost their lives and pay tribute to the tireless work of the emergency services, some of whom paid the ultimate sacrifice to save others.'

Sir Keir added: 'But as we mark this anniversary I'm convinced our resolve has never been stronger.

'We will continue to fight terror and violence, by promoting our values of justice and peace.'

Mr Johnson said recent events in Afghanistan had only strengthened people's belief in freedom and democracy.

And in a message on a card from the PM laid in Grosvenor Square, he said flowers laid were 'in remembrance of those taken from us on 9/11, and in defiance of those who would have us live in fear'.

A spokesman for Mr Johnson said on Friday that the Prime Minister would 'mark the anniversary at home' as he works from Chequers this weekend.

The political leaders' comments came as the prime minister at the time of the attacks - Tony Blair - said the international community must be prepared to take action against the Taliban if they again allow Afghanistan to become a base of terrorism.

Mr Blair said the US and its allies had no choice but to invade after the Taliban refused to give up the al Qaida leadership responsible for the attacks.

The former head of the UK armed forces, General Lord Richards, said the return of the Taliban in Afghanistan raised the prospect of 'another 9/11' as ungoverned spaces opened up which the terrorists were able to exploit.

'I think we are (closer to another 9/11). We've now been pitched back into a dark period which we somehow have to manage,' he told LBC.

Former prime minister David Cameron has remembered trying to reach his wife, Samantha, who was working in New York when the September 11 attacks struck in 2001.

He said: '20 years ago today I held my phone and anxiously pressed redial repeatedly, trying to reach Sam who was working in NYC.

'I will never forget the worry, and the huge relief when, after some hours, I found out she was safe. Today, we commemorate those who were not as fortunate.

'We remember the victims who so sadly lost their lives, the survivors and all those who were affected from the horror and devastation of 9/11.

'We pay respect to the heroes who risked their own lives to respond. These are human stories; human tragedies. We will never forget.'

A man wipes away a tear during a private memorial service for family members of the victims of 9/11 in the Memorial Garden in Grosvenor Square, London

Flower wreaths are lain in the Memorial Garden in Grosvenor Square in London along with a picture Karlie Rogers, a 26-year-old University of Sussex graduate, who was one of 67 Brits to die in the terrorist attack in New York on September 11, 2001

The Changing of the Guard at Windsor Castle on the 20th anniversary of September 11, 2001

United States Embassy Acting Ambassador, Philip T Reeker, Charge d'Affaires, (pictured right) takes the salute at the Guard Change at Windsor Castle

Large crowds lined the streets in Windsor this morning as military personnel including a marching band arrive for the Guard Change at Windsor Castle to mark 20 years since the terrible events of 9/11

The US national is played at Windsor Castle to mark the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 US terror attacks

The Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall also paid tribute to those involved in the attacks.

World leaders paid tribute to the victims and survivors of the attacks on the World Trade Center in 2001 (pictured)

People have been leaving flowers and American flags rest beside the names of the fallen on the south pool at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum

The Queen (pictured in August) and Boris Johnson have lead tributes to the victims and survivors of 9/11 on the 20th anniversary of the attacks

The acting US ambassador mentioned the special relationship between the United States and the UK on the 20-year anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, which he said remains 'so crucial to all of us'.

Philip T Reeker said the US would be 'forever grateful' for the 'enduring friendship' and highlighted the importance of unity between the two countries.

A special changing of the guard ceremony during which the US national anthem was played took place at Windsor Castle on Saturday morning to mark the anniversary of the atrocity.

Hundreds of people gathered inside and outside the walls of the castle to watch as the Band of the Welsh Guards processed through the gates then struck up the Star Spangled Banner.

The anthem was played at Buckingham Palace 20 years ago on September 12 2001, in solidarity with the victims of the atrocity and Saturday's rendition was followed by a minute's silence.

Mr Reeker said the ceremony at Windsor Castle this morning was a reminder that the US had 'no closer ally' than the United Kingdom.

'It's an incredible privilege to represent my country today on this sombre anniversary but at this ceremony,' he told the PA news agency.

The acting US ambassador Philip T Reeker (pictured) mentioned the special relationship between the United States and the UK on the 20-year anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, which he said remains 'so crucial to all of us'

A special changing of the guard ceremony during which the US national anthem was played took place at Windsor Castle on Saturday morning to mark the anniversary of the atrocity

The anthem was played at Buckingham Palace 20 years ago on September 12 2001, in solidarity with the victims of the atrocity and Saturday's rendition was followed by a minute's silence. Pictured: Members from the US Embassy

Acting Ambassador, Philip T Reeker, Charge d'Affaires, takes the salute at the Guard Change at Windsor Castle on September 11, 2021

Mr Reeker said the ceremony at Windsor Castle this morning was a reminder that the US had 'no closer ally' than the United Kingdom

Hundreds of people gathered inside and outside the walls of the castle to watch as the Band of the Welsh Guards processed through the gates then struck up the Star Spangled Banner

'We're incredibly grateful to her Majesty the Queen for the playing of our national anthem.

'(It) represents the friendship and solidarity between our two countries, the United States and the United Kingdom, and united is the key word. This has shown the special relationship remains so crucial to all of us.

'Speaking for the United States, we have no closer ally and no closer friend in good times and in bad times, and we are very much reminded of that today ... through the enduring relationship between our two countries.'

He added: 'United is a word I underscore in United States, and United Kingdom.

'We realise we have to face challenges together and we've done that for more than three-quarters of a century.'

'My thoughts today are, of course, with all 3,000 of those who we lost in the attacks ... including each and every one of the British citizens who were killed,' said Mr Reeker.

'What is important is that our solidarity with allies, particularly the United Kingdom, is on display today.

'We will face challenges as we have before and certainly will do in the future, and we do that together, united in our own friendship, and for that enduring friendship we will be forever grateful.'

Keir Starmer pays his respects as he takes a moment's silence, saying in a statement that on the 20th anniversary of 9/11, the consequences of the attacks were 'still being felt to this day' adding the tragedy was 'still so raw'

The Tribute in Light in downtown Manhattan, a memorial to the victims of 9/11 terrorist attacks, on the eve of the 20th anniversary of the attack

Visitors browse the south pool as flowers and American flags rest among the names of the fallen at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum
More children have have been shot in Chicago this year than the number of kids who have died of COVID-19 during the pandemic.

A total of 214 children, under the age of 17, have died from the virus while a total of 261 have been shot in the liberal city this year alone, according to data from police and the Center for Disease Control. Of those 261 minors who were shot, 41 were fatally wounded.

Although COVID-19 cases among children spiked over the summer, the death rates in the demographic remain low, accounting for just 0-0.27 percent of pandemic fatalities nationwide.

According to the Illinois Department of Public Health, 25 people under the age of 18 died of the coronavirus since the onset of the pandemic in March of last year, the agency told Fox News.

That equals out to six minor deaths in every 100,000 people under 18 in the state.

Only seven states of the entire 52 reported no deaths among children, the CDC and American Academy of Pediatrics report.

In Chicago, more children have been shot across the city than have died of the virus in the whole state of Illinois.

Over Labor Day weekend alone, 63 people were shot in Chicago, including eight children. Among the six victims who died was 4-year-old Mychal Moultry, who was shot dead last Friday after a bullet was shot through the window of his father's home as he sat inside getting his hair braided.

Four-year-old Michael Moultry Jr critically wounded in a Friday night, Sept. 3, 2021, shooting inside a Woodlawn home has died

Pictured: Crime in Chicago as of August 31, according to Chicago Police Department

Although COVID-19 cases among children spiked over the summer, the death rates in the demographic remain low, accounting for just 0-0.27 percent of pandemic fatalities nationwide

Pictured: A graph showing more kids shot in Chicago than have died from COVID-19 across US this year

Moultry was visiting Chicago with his mother from Alabama when he was killed.

His mother, Angela Gregg told Chicago Tribune that she wants answers over why he was shot dead.

'(He's) not supposed to lose his life at 4 years old, and somebody needs to step up and say something,' she said.

'The police dont know anything yet because no one is talking. No one is coming forward.

'People arent answering their doors, and the people that are answering their doors are saying they dont know anything.  Somebody in Chicago knows something.'

Chicago Police Superintendent David O. Brown asked reporters on Monday why someone who would shoot a gun be around children

Chicago Police Superintendent David O. Brown addressed the bloody Labor Weekend in a press conference, where he asked reporters why the gunmen are 'continuing to be around young people'.

'Youre harming this community. Youre harming these families,' he said, addressing the gunmen.

Michael Moultry Jr, right, with his father Mychal Moultry Sr, left

'And we will be relentless in pursuing you as an offender.'

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot expressed frustration with the lack of community cooperation when it comes to working with authorities, oftentimes done out of fear of retribution.

'I understand the fear thats out there but Im just calling upon people in these neighborhoods...,' Lightfoot said.

'Youve got to have your faith overcome your fear, youve got to step up.'

In July, President Joe Biden met with Lightfoot following a particularly violent July Fourth weekend, where 100 people were shot.

Biden had just recently introduced several proposals the month prior, in an effort to fight gun crime in major cities nationwide, specifically illegal guns with assistance from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Victoria's health minister has taken aim at Gladys Berejiklian for her decision to pull the plug on NSW's daily Covid-19 press conferences.

Martin Foley had a stinging response when asked if Victoria would follow suit, saying he had 'no plans, sadly' to axe the state's daily briefings.

'Every day the message changes,' Mr Foley said on Saturday.

'This is a public health crisis, the likes of which we have not seen in a century. The fate of our public health system is on the cusp here and it's important that we use every opportunity.'

Victoria recorded 450 new cases of Covid-19 - the highest daily number in the latest Delta outbreak - as authorities race to trace hundreds of mystery infections.

Mr Foley stressed the importance of fronting the media every day amid fears Victoria could be stuck in lockdown for months.

'It's an important part of getting the message out that it's not just numbers, it's people, it's lives, it's health systems,' he said.

'We have to take every opportunity to get that message out.'

Health Minister Martin Foley (pictured) said he had no plans to abandon Victoria's daily Covid-19 press conferences on Saturday

As the outbreak deepens in locked-down NSW and Victoria, Gladys Berejiklian announced on Friday she would no longer run daily press briefings.

In an effort to normalise living with Covid, the premier said residents needed to accept that the virus will be around for the next three to four years.

She said she would only hold press conferences when there were important announcements to make.

The announcement sparked controversy, with some Australians accusing the premier of avoiding accountability and others praising her for shifting the narrative and focusing on living with Covid.

'Lets be clear, the only reason Gladys Berejiklian is ceasing daily NSW pressers is to avoid any questions or any accountability from the media at a time she has predicted constantly to be the worst for NSW. There is no other reason,' one wrote on Twitter.

'Gladys Berejiklian just announced - on a day where NSW is still seeing 1500+ new cases - that she won't be doing daily press conferences anymore. What a gutless move,' commented another.

'The worst yet to come but the NSW premier will not provide daily updates of Covid, accountability is disappearing from the government,' added a third.

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian (pictured) has been scrutinised for pulling the plug on the state's daily Covid-19 updates after announcing the axing on Friday

Victoria now has 2793 total active cases, including 407 children under nine years old, 449 people aged between 10 and 19 years old, 97 people in their 20s, and 485 people in their 30s.

'We continue to see this outbreak being concentrated in the young and the unvaccinated,' Mr Foley told reporters.

The state has 143 people in hospital with COVID-19, up 17 from Friday, with 34 of those people in intensive care units and 26 of them on a ventilator.

Eighty-nine per cent of those people in hospital have had no vaccination jab, while 11 per cent of them have had one dose.

None of them are fully vaccinated.

'The message is pretty clear - being fully vaccinated keeps you safe, keeps you out of hospital and, more importantly, keeps those that you love and are supporting in your community safe,' Mr Foley said.

While more than 70 per cent of Saturday's new cases were recorded in Melbourne's northern suburbs, there were eight new cases in regional Victoria, including five in Geelong, one in Cohuna, one in Daylesford and one in Beveridge.

This comes as most of regional Victoria except Greater Shepparton emerged from lockdown on Friday, with retail and hospitality allowed to reopen under strict rules.

Gladys Berejiklian said the move to cancel daily press conferences was to 'normalise' living with the virus (pictured, locked-down Sydneysiders exercising in Bondi)

But Mr Foley said there were no plans for a snap lockdown.

'There's no plans at this time to take such measures, but they are always informed by public health advice, and they will continue to be so,' he said.

'All the decisions that public health officials take - and that the government supports - are based on public health advice.

'And they of course look every day, every hour, at the patterns of transmission and the stories behind where the cases are.'

Shepparton is expected to be released from its lockdown next week, while people in Melbourne are waiting for the state government to announce its plans to ease restrictions.

Premier Daniel Andrews earlier said the government is waiting for detailed modelling from the Burnett Institute before making an announcement.
An 11-year-old boy in Colorado was murdered by his stepmother in his bedroom before she stuffed his body in a suitcase, drove to Florida and threw the case off a bridge, a court has been told.

Prosecutors in El Paso County, Colorado, laid out their case against Letecia Stauch, 37, on Thursday.

They were aiming to convince Judge Gregory Werner that there was enough evidence to proceed with the case. He will announce his decision on September 23.

Gannon Stauch was reported missing on January 27, 2020.

Jason Yoder, with Santa Rosa County Sheriff's office in Florida, told the court that their forensic experts believe the boy was killed in his bedroom then driven to the area.

Yoder's team found Stauch's body on March 18, beneath an overpass.

Gannon Stauch's stepmother Letecia appeared in court in Colorado on Thursday for a hearing over the murder of the 11-year-old boy, to decide if there is enough evidence to proceed

The suspected killer (pictured after her arrest in South Carolina in March 2020) was extradited to Colorado

In testimony that left the child's relatives wiping away tears in the courtroom, Yoder said the child's body had a fractured skull, a gunshot wound to the lower left jaw, and 18 apparent stab wounds - including cuts on the hands and arms consistent with defensive wounds.

An investigator in Colorado, Kevin Clark, then told the court that phone records and internet search information showed Letecia Stauch searching online for cheap car rentals the morning she reported her stepson missing.

She then collected a rental car, which was used to transport the body.

Another rental van was hired to drive down to Florida with her daughter Harley Hunt, now 18.

Stauch texted Hunt to buy carpet cleaner, trash bags, and baking soda. Investigators believe these products were used to clean Gannon's murder scene.

Stauch is accused of hitting Gannon with a blunt object, stabbing and shooting him before dumping his body in a suitcase

Gannon (pictured) disappeared in Colorado Springs in January 2020. His body was found on March 20, 2020 - 1,400 miles away in Florida

Deputy John Sarkisian with El Paso County Sheriff's Office testified about the days spent searching for the missing boy, and then finding blood stains inside the house.

The court also heard that the child's father, Eugene 'Al' Stauch, was in Oklahoma with work at the time his son vanished. His mother, Landen Hiott, is also not believed to be involved.

Letecia Stauch's DNA was present on a 9mm handgun investigators found in the Stauch family's house. A forensic exam determined that a bullet lodged in Gannon Stauch's head had been fired from the same gun.

She called 911 shortly before 7pm on January 27, 2020 to say Gannon had failed to return from his friend's house.

But investigators said Letecia had not gone to search for the boy, and couldn't provide the name of Gannon's friend or his parents.

Her story then 'dramatically changed multiple times over the following days,' the affidavit states.

'Letecia lied to investigators on multiple occasions, has unexplained abnormal behavior such as obtaining a rental car, disconnecting her cell phone from the cellular network for an extended period of time, the false reporting of an alleged rape, abnormal patterns of travel, a continuously evolving story with material changes in facts and circumstances, and has since left the State of Colorado,' the affidavit explains.

Stauch was ruled fit to stand trial on January 27, 2021.

She had wanted to represent herself, before receiving new counsel.

The stepmother faces counts of first-degree murder, child abuse and tampering with a body - in addition to evidence tampering and eight charges of violence.

She also faces charges from June, when she was caught allegedly plotting to escape from El Paso County Jail in Colorado Springs.

The suspected killer had planned to use a broom handle to bust the cell window and had measured herself to check she could fit through it to escape.

Stauch had allegedly enlisted the help of a fellow inmate and offered her money in exchange for helping her, but the other inmate told officials of her plan.

Stauch was already classed as a flight risk and was being kept in segregation from other inmates, spending just one hour a day out of her cell in free time that she must spend alone.
CNN host Jake Tapper has issued rare criticism of President Joe Biden, slamming him for taking a 'scolding' tone in his announcement of sweeping new COVID-19 vaccine rules.

Tapper, the chief Washington correspondent at the liberal-leaning network, made the stinging remarks on Friday, a day after Biden issued the vaccine orders affecting 100 million.

Companies with more than 100 workers must require staff to get vaccinated or tested weekly, or face fines under the new rules. Federal employees and healthcare workers must get vaccinated or lose their jobs, with no testing alternative.

In his address to the nation on Thursday, Biden took a harsh tone toward the unvaccinated, telling them: 'We've been patient, but our patience is wearing thin. And your refusal has cost all of us. So, please, do the right thing.'

Appearing on CNN New Day, Tapper remarked: 'He took on a scolding tone talking to the people who are unvaccinated, talking about how, you know, people's patience is running out. Talking about this mandate.'

CNN host Jake Tapper (right) has issued rare criticism of President Joe Biden, slamming him for taking a 'scolding' tone toward the unvaccinated

In his address to the nation on Thursday, Biden took a harsh tone toward the unvaccinated, telling them: 'We've been patient, but our patience is wearing thin. And your refusal has cost all of us. So, please, do the right thing'

'I don't think scolding is the approach. There are these purveyors of misinformation out there, and they're not just on the right. Robert Kennedy Jr is one of the most notorious ones,' said Tapper.

'[Biden's] scolding the people that are being lied to as opposed to the liars,' the CNN star added. 'Instead of shaming the liars and trying to educate the people being lied to, he's scolding the people being lied to.'

'You see him moving from persuasion to coercion,' observed Tapper.

'This is part of the ethos in this country. People don't want big government telling them what to do

The CNN host also remarked that there are 'legitimate Constitutional questions' about whether the mandate on private businesses would stand up under court challenges.

'I'm not saying it's unconstitutional. I'm just saying there is a debate to be had. There are enough skeptics on the Supreme Court that I don't think anybody can stand here with any confidence say this will withstand the scrutiny of this court, which is obviously more conservative,' said Tapper.

Tappers commentary drew harsh reactions from some CNN viewers, who expressed their support for Biden's stance on vaccines and fury at the CNN host for criticizing the Democrat.

"I don't think scolding is the approach. There are these purveyors of misinformation out there, and they're not just on the right. Robert Kennedy Jr. is one of the most notorious ones ... [Biden's] scolding the people that are being lied to as opposed to the liars" -- Jake Tapper pic.twitter.com/KYWK7IYA4r  Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 10, 2021

'STFU @jaketapper YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM!! Do you like ANYONE?? @CNN is it time for his contract be DONE!!' one person tweeted.

'F*** off. For how long are we gonna give the benefit of the doubt to these people? At some point we have to give them agency. They are still getting people killed when we could have been over this pandemic, it's been long time to take out the belt,' another wrote.

'Oh f*** right off, Tapper. They've tried educating. Facts roll off these people like water off a duck. My state held a $1 million lottery. They've literally tried BRIBERY. You can only coddle children throwing tantrums for so long,' tweeted another.

Tapper has said publicly that he is not a member of any political party, but his political commentary often shows a tendency to align with CNN's liberal slant, and his comments on Friday marked a departure from form.

At one point in Tapper's commentary, New Day host John Berman appeared to be trying in vain redirect the conversation toward criticism of J.D. Vance, the Republican author and Senate candidate in Ohio who urged private companies not to comply with the order.

However, Tapper brushed the topic aside and stuck with his withering critique of Biden, at times using language that sounded similar to Republican criticisms.

Ultra-conservative Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas, for example, accused Biden of 'scolding and condescending to Americans, dripping with scorn that somehow this is their fault that they have been infected with a virus.'

'We're playing for real here. This isn't a game,' Biden told his GOP critics, a day after announcing new vaccine mandates

Republicans swiftly denounced the mandate that could impact 100 million Americans as government overreach and vowed to sue, and private employers who resist the requirements may do so as well.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott called it an 'assault on private businesses' while Governor Henry McMaster promised to 'fight them to the gates of hell to protect the liberty and livelihood of every South Carolinian.'

The Republican National Committee has also said it will sue the administration 'to protect Americans and their liberties.'

Biden was defiant in the face of the legal challenges, telling his opponents on Friday: 'Have at it.'

The opposition follows Biden's announcement Thursday of a major plan to control the pandemic as the highly contagious Delta variant drives 1,500 deaths and 150,000 cases a day.

Biden is mandating that all employers with more than 100 workers require their employees to be vaccinated or test for the virus weekly, affecting about 80 million Americans.

Another 17 million workers at health facilities that receive federal Medicare or Medicaid also will have to be vaccinated, as will all employees of the executive branch and contractors who do business with the federal government.
Tony Abbott has blasted the 'snitch' who reported him to police for not wearing a mask while talking to a friend during lockdown.

The former prime minister copped a $500 fine after he was spotted without a mask by the beach at Manly on Sydney's northern beaches on Wednesday morning.

Mr Abbott, 63, denied he broke the public health order laws but said he wouldn't challenge the fine to avoid 'wasting police time'.

'I just want to say two things. First, I believe that I was well within the law, reasonably interpreted,' he told reporters on Saturday.

'Second, I never thought dobbing and snitching was part of the Australian character.

'I think as soon as we can leave this health police state mindset behind us, the better for everyone.'

Tony Abbott (pictured with wife Margie) said he will not be challenging the $500 fine he copped for not wearing a mask during Sydney's lockdown

NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard has not commented on the situation, urging the public as a whole to comply with health orders

NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard today commented on Tony Abbott getting fined $500 for not wearing a face mask, as the state recorded 1,599 new Covid-19 cases and eight deaths on Saturday.

'It does not matter who you are, whatever station you have in life. There are [health] orders,' he said.

'Nobody likes to have these orders, but it is to keep everybody safe and I hope people will comply with the orders.'

Apart from once holding overlapped Northern Beaches electorates for the Liberal Party, their offspring dated.

Dave Hazzard went out with Bridget Abbott.

Mr Abbott was photographed without a mask by an onlooker near Fairy Bower on Wednesday morning.

All Sydneysiders are permitted to exercise but must carry a mask with them at all times.

The former PM claimed he had been exercising at the time and drinking a coffee, and therefore wasn't required to wear a face covering.

Look, I regard myself as having been at all times within the rules. I was surfing. That's exercise. I was with one other person. That's permitted. I then walked briskly to the coffee shop, that's permitted,' he said.

'I didn't have a mask on while I was drinking coffee. That's permitted. So, all ridgy didgy even under the current rather oppressive regime.'

Former Prime Minister Tony Abbott has been fined $500 by NSW police on Friday after he was spotted maskless at Fairy Bower Beach (pictured) in Sydney's north on Wednesday morning=

Mr Abbott being dobbed in by a local makes concerns he aired just a week ago about the behaviour of Australians in lockdown eerily prescient.

'There are aspects of contemporary Australia, which I personally find a little bit unsettling,' he told the Australia's Heartland with Tony Abbott podcast by the libertarian Institute of Public Affairs think tank.

'The readiness of people to dob and snitch on their neighbours worries me a lot, frankly.'

Mr Abbott likened those who called the cops to dob in someone for not having a face mask to the secret police in communist East Germany.

'If you're walking down the street and you see someone come out of his house without a mask and you call the police, well, frankly, that's just Stasi-like behaviour,' he said.

Mr Abbott (pictured with wife Margie) said he had been exercising at the time and drinking a coffee and therefore wasn't required to wear a face covering

But he clarified: 'Look, if you're walking down the street and you see a burglary taking place or an assault taking place, it's only right and proper that you should call the police.'

The witness who dobbed the former Australian leader in claimed they heard Mr Abbott tell his friend 's**t, I don't have my mask'.

'When the premier says 'people should use their judgement', this shows that even a former leader of this country can't even be trusted to use his judgement,' the witness told news.com.au.

Mr Abbott isn't the only Australian politician to be dobbed in for not complying with the health orders.

Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce had to fork out $200 after he was caught not wearing a mask while stopping at a petrol station in the NSW town of Armidale in June.

A local saw Mr Joyce maskless and phoned authorities, who then fined him.
Fox New host Sean Hannity slammed President Joe Biden for using unvaccinated Americans as a 'political scapegoat' while implementing a sweeping nationwide COVID-19 vaccine mandate, despite pledging for unity at his inauguration seven months ago.

'It's your body, his choice,' the Hannity said on Friday. 'With an unconstitutional, illegal, unethical federal vaccine mandate, on that, by the way, he said he would never support.'

On Thursday, Biden announced sweeping new COVID-19 vaccine mandate as part of the federal government's aggressive new approach to fight that pandemic. It included rules that will affect two-thirds of the American workforce.

It includes mandating all federal employees and federal contractors get vaccinated, requiring vaccinations for more than 17 million healthcare workers at Medicare and Medicaid-participating facilities and requiring all businesses with 100 or more employees to tell their workers to get vaccinated or submit to weekly COVID testing.

About 73.4 percent of Americans over the age of 12 have at least one vaccine dose, but less than 63 percent are fully vaccinated - far short of the threshold to reach herd immunity.

According to Hannity, Biden's approach is a 'cold, calculated political ploy' to divide Americans.

'Joe Biden's heartfelt unity pledge lasted all of seven months,' Hannity said.

Fox New host Sean Hannity slammed President Joe Biden for using unvaccinated Americans as a 'political scapegoat' while implementing a sweeping nationwide COVID-19 vaccine mandate

Pictured: Vaccine rollout as of September 10, showing a noticeable drop in daily vaccinations dropping in recent months

'Now, it's us versus them, and Dr. Joe's patience is wearing thin.'

The Fox News host specifically mentioned the president's inauguration speech, where Biden called upon the country to unify amidst the hearty of the coronavirus pandemic.

Hannity highlighted Biden's statements in his inaugural speech, where he called for unity among Americans, with his statements toward vaccinated Americans.

'Clearly, Joe's unity pledge was a lie,' Hannity said.

'Now, half the country is enemy number one, because they don't want to follow Dr. Joe?'

He added that the White House was treating unvaccinated Americans as 'political scapegoats' while offering contradictory vaccine mandates.

'In fact, Democrats say nicer things about illegal immigrants and even the Taliban, some of them, than the 80 million unvaccinated Americans,' Hannity said,

'It's your body, his choice': Sean Hannity said while slamming Biden for using Americans as a 'political scapegoat' with sweeping vaccine mandate despite inaugural pledge for unity

On Thursday, Biden announced that any employers with more than 100 employees needed to require staffers to be vaccinated, or face weekly COVID-19 tests

Pictured: Percentage of the US population vaccinated so far, showing a total of 62.7 percent of Americans with at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine

Calling Biden's vaccine mandate 'deeply unconstitutional,' Hannity applauded the likes of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who have since pledged their efforts to strike down the mandate, while saying it's in 'serious legal jeopardy.'

'Anyone with a brain knows the mandate is in serious legal jeopardy,' said Hannity. 'Even fake news CNN attorneys recognize this.'

The outspoken GOP pundit cited the fundamental American idea of individual freedom in allowing those the right to decide whether or not to get vaccinated, with 62.7 percent of Americans having at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine as of September 10.

'Individual freedom, liberty is a precious right in this country,' Hannity said.

'Once you lose it, it will be gone forever.'
South Australia will become the first state to make the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccination available to all residents aged over 12 years, including those above 60.

Premier Steven Marshall made the announcement less than 24 hours after the Northern Territory confirmed over-60s in the Top End could get the Pfizer jab.

'It's on for young and old,' Mr Marshall told reporters on Saturday.

SA Premier Steven Marshall announced on Saturday that Pfizer will be available for those over the age of 12

'From Monday, children aged 12 to 15 and people aged 60 and over will be able to book in for Pfizer vaccinations at state-run clinics.

'It's part of our plan to accelerate our pathway out of the pandemic as we add more than 60,000 new appointments from next week.'

Forty per cent of South Australians were fully vaccinated, Mr Marshall said.

'We know there have been many people over the age of 60 who said, 'We don't want the AstraZeneca, we want the Pfizer jab, this is why we are not having the jab',' the premier said.

From Monday, people aged over 12 in South Australia will be able to book in for Pfizer vaccines

He encouraged South Australians who had already received a first dose of AstraZeneca to get a second AZ shot.

Saturday's vaccination announcement coincided with news of one new COVID-19 case in South Australia.

The 'essential worker' is a miner who arrived in Adelaide on a flight from Sydney about 9.30am on Friday.

This announcement coincides with the one new case of Covid in the state where an essential worker flew into Adelaide from Sydney on Friday morning

'There will be people in South Australia who receive an SMS about this (potential) exposure,' Chief Public Health Officer Nicola Spurrier said.

The man travelled on flight VA406 and authorities confirmed he had been in isolation since arriving at the airport.

A mass vaccination clinic at Adelaide Showground this week doubled its capacity, and further pop-up clinics are being rolled out across the state.

Mr Marshall said the state was vaccinating about 100,000 people a week, which would help work towards easing border restrictions in time for Christmas.
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Of the 27 scientists who wrote a letter in The Lancet medical journal dismissing the possibility that Covid-19 originated from a Wuhan lab, 26 have links to its Chinese researchers, their colleagues or its benefactors, a new investigation has revealed.

On March 7 last year, the influential journal published the letter in which the 27 scientists said they 'strongly condemned conspiracy theories' surrounding the origins of the coronavirus pandemic that has impacted all corners of the world.

All debate into whether Covid-19 had man-made origins or leaked from the lab in Wuhan - the Chinese city that was ground-zero for the virus - was effectively shut down by the letter.

Of the 27 scientists who wrote a letter in The Lancet medical journal dismissing the possibility that Covid-19 originated from the Wuhan Institute of Virology (pictured), 26 have links to its Chinese researchers, their colleagues or its benefactors, a new investigation has revealed

However, an investigation by The Daily Telegraph newspaper into the signatories has found that 26 of the 27 had some link to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where the leak was suspected - calling into question their impartiality.

Signatories include Dr Peter Daszak, the British president of EcoHealth Alliance, which funnelled money into controversial research at a Wuhan Institute of Virology, and UK Government scientific adviser Sir Jeremy Farrar.

Only one - Dr Ronald Corley, a microbiology expert from Boston University - has been found to have no links back to funders or researchers at the Wuhan institute.

Below, the MailOnline looks at those signatories named by The Telegraph's investigation - and other key figures and organisations - to have links with the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Dr Peter Daszak

Zoologist, EcoHealth Alliance, New York

The orchestrator of the letter, British zoologist Peter Daszak, was already found to have a conflict of interest through him being president of the US-based EcoHealth Alliance, which has funded research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Despite declaring no conflicts of interest at the time the letter was penned, The Lancet was forced to publish an addendum to the letter acknowledging Daszak's connection to EcoHealth Alliance.

The letter played a key role in suppressing early debate on the pandemic's origins, but its credibility has since been questioned after details emerged of the involvement of Peter Daszak (pictured), a major financial backer of the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIU)

Chinese virologist Shi Zhengli (left) is seen inside the P4 laboratory in Wuhan, capital of China's Hubei province on February 23, 2017

In an email made public through Freedom of Information requests, Mr Daszak is said to have revealed on February 8 that he composed the letter after being asked by 'our collaborators' in China for a 'show of support'.

Scandal hit Dr Daszak has since been removed from the UN-backed Lancet commission looking at the origins of the pandemic.

However, The Telegraph has reported that five other signatories also worked for the same organisation. None of whom declared their involvement.

Two such signatories include Dr William Karesh, an infectious disease expert and Professor Hume Field, veterinary sciences expert.

Dr Jeremy Farrar

Tropical medicine expert and SAGE adviser & The Wellcome Trust, London

Pictured: Dr Jeremy Farrar, tropical medicine expert and SAGE adviser. Also of the Wellcome Trust

The newspaper also found that three of the signatories were from Britain's Wellcome Trust.

Signatory Sir Jeremy Farrar, a member of the UK's Sage and the director of the Trust, has in the past published work with George Gao, the head of the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, whom he has described as 'an old friend'.

Dr Gao, who studied at Oxford University, is a former research assistant at the Wellcome Trust. Mr Daszak has claimed Dr Gao supported his nomination to the National Academy of Sciences, according to The Telegraph.

The Chinese scientist also has connections to Shi Zhengli, the scientist who has become known as 'batwoman' on account of her research into bat coronaviruses in Wuhan. Her team discovered a virus in 2013 which is the closest ever previously found to Sars-Cov-2 - the virus that causes Covid-19.

Two other signatories - Dr Josie Golding and Professor Mike Turner - are known to have current or past connections with the Wellcome Trust.

Dr Golding is the Trust's Epidemics lead, while Prof. Turner is a Parasitology expert at the University of Glasgow, and formerly worked with the Trust.

George F. Gao, head of China's Center for Diseases Prevention and Control, attends a session at the China Development Forum in Beijing, China March 20, 2021

Speaking to the MailOnline in June on the lab leak theory, Dr Farrar said: 'The origins of Sars-Cov-2 are not yet certain  it is possible the origin will never be fully established  but nature is a powerful force and, 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. It is most likely it crossed the species barrier to infect and then adapt to humans at some point in 2019, but there are other possibilities which cannot be completely ruled out and retaining an open mind is critical.

'There is no place for unsubstantiated rumour, or conspiracy theories often fuelled for political purposes.'

Professor Linda Saif

Microbiology expert, The Ohio State University

Microbiology expert Professor Linda Saif, another signatory, spoke at a workshop in Wuhan in May 2017 along with Dr Shi and Dr Gao. The workshop was partly organised by the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

The level of security in Chinese labs was among the topics discussed at the workshop, while Professor Saif's talk covered animal coronaviruses.

Professor Linda Saif

The Global Virome Project

Two more signatories on The Lancet letter are in the leadership team of the Global Virome Project - an organisations whose goal is to detect and identify 99 percent or more of potential zoonotic viral threats.

Mr Daszak is the treasurer of the Global Virome Project, while Dr Gao helped launch it, with EcoHealth Alliance as one of its partners.

The Global Virome Project took over from the Predict project, which discovered more than 1,000 unique viruses in animals and humans.

But according to The Telegraph, the Predict project was also found to have part-funded contentious work by Wuhan researchers on bat coronaviruses, which were altered to see if they could infect humans.

The funds for the research were provided by the EcoHealth Alliance.

Professor John Mackenzie

Tropical infectious diseases expert, Curtin University, Perth, Australia

Professor John Mackenzie

Tropical infectious disease expert Professor John Mackenzie who works out of Curtin University in Perth, Australia, was another of the signatories.

The investigation has found that he did not disclose that he was still listed as a committee member of the the Scientific Advisory Committee of Centre for Emerging Infectious Diseases at the Wuhan institute.

Professor Kanta Subbarao

Virology expert, The University of Melbourne, Australia

Professor Kanta Subbarao Virology expert, The University of Melbourne, Australia

Professor Kanta Subbarao, another signatory from the University of Melbourne, spoke at a conference on emerging diseases in Wuhan in 2016 which was part-organised by the the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Prof. Subbarao was still chief of the US-based National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAD) Emerging Respiratory Viruses Section.

Five more of the letter's signatories have all been found by the investigation to have published articles with Professor Ralph Baric.

Professor Prof Ralph Baric

While Prof Baric was omitted from the list of signatories, he was collaborating with Shi Zhengli and the Wuhan Institute of Virology, researching genetically manipulated coronaviruses to see if they could be made to infect humans.

Earlier this year, Republicans in the US argued that the virus was possibly genetically modified, and cite an interview with Baric in which he said it was possible to engineer a virus, 'without leaving a trace.'

Pictured: Ralph Baric, researcher and lab leader at North Carolina's Gillings School of Global Public Health, in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, February 14, 2020

Baric was initially asked to add his name to the letter by Mr Daszak, with emails between the pair recently coming to light ahead of The Lancet letter's publication, showing that the pair decided to mask their association with the Wuhan institute to avoid looking 'self-serving'.

Mr Daszak told Prof Baric that he would publish the letter in such a way that it doesn't 'link it back to our collaboration so we maximise an independent voice'.

Professor Peter Palese

Microbiology expert, Icahn School of Medicine, New York

Professor Peter Palese

A number of those who signed the letter have since changed their stance with some calling for a full inquiry into the origins of Covid-19.

Speaking to the MailOnline in June, Professor Peter Palese - a microbiology expert from Icahn School of Medicine, New York, said: 'I believe a thorough investigation about the origin of the Covid-19 virus is needed.

'A lot of disturbing information has surfaced since the Lancet letter I signed, so I want to see answers covering all questions.'

Asked how he was originally approached to sign the letter and what new information had come to light specifically, Professor Palese declined to comment.

Professor Stanley Perlman

Microbiology expert, University of Iowa

Signatory Prof Stanley Perlman, of the University of Iowa, told The Telegraph: 'It is difficult to eliminate a possible lab leak as part of the process, so this still needs to be considered.'

Professor Charles Calisher

Microbiolgy expert, Colorado State University

Professor Charles Calisher, who signed the letter downplayed the letter to The Telegraph, saying that the intention behind it was never to suggest Covid-19 might have not originated in nature, but rather that there was a lack of data to make such a claim.

Professor Charles Calisher (left) and Professor Stanley Perlman (right)

Professor Bernard Roizman

Microbiology expert, University of Chicago

Professor Bernard Roizman told the Wall Street Journal in May that since signing the letter, he has become convinced that the deadly virus was released by a 'sloppy' scientists.

Dr Ronald Corley

Microbiology expert, NEIDL Institute, Boston

Out of the 27 signatories of the Lancet Letter, The Telegraph reported that it could find no connection between just one and the Wuhan Institute of Virology - Dr Ronald Corley from Boston University.

Dr Ronald Corley (left) and Professor Bernard Roizman (right)

Reacting to the findings of the investigation, researchers into the lab-leak theory who were blocked and branded conspiracy theorists called it an 'extreme cover up' on Friday, the newspaper reported.

Molecular biologist Prof Richard Ebright, of Rutgers University, fought to uncover the truth behind the Covid pandemic.

He told The Telegraph that after the June addendum that disclosed that Daszak had connections to the Wuhan institute, the other 27 signatories were invited to offer any of their own competing interests.

'Incredibly, only Daszak appears to have done so,' Ebright told the newspaper.

'Conflicts of interest were not reported for any of the other 26 signers of the letter  not even those with obviously material undisclosed conflicts such as EcoHealth employees and Predict contractors.'

Angus Dalgleish, professor of oncology at St Georges, University of London, warned that it could now be too late to fully learn the origins of Covid-19 because of what he called 'stalling', but remained hopeful that the evidence 'is out there'.
Ex-Channel 7 host Andrew O'Keefe has been charged with assault and breaking an AVO after he was arrested on Friday evening, just two months after having similar charges dropped in court.

The 49-year-old troubled TV star was picked up by police at 5pm in an apartment on Kent Street in Sydney's CBD following an alleged domestic incident involving a woman in the city's eastern suburbs on Wednesday.

Mr O'Keefe has been charged with assault occasioning actual bodily harm, common assault, contravening an AVO and resisting an officer in execution of duty, NSW Police told Daily Mail Australia in a statement.

It continued: 'Police will allege in court that a man was involved in a domestic-related incident with a woman at a home in Point Piper on the evening of Wednesday, September 8'.

The former Deal or No Deal host was granted bail in Parramatta Bail Court on Saturday, commenting to Channel 10 reporters on his way out of the courtroom: 'Well I'm just getting back from last time... two strikes and you're out in this country'.

Ex-Channel 7 host Andrew O'Keefe has been charged with assault and breaking an AVO

The former Deal or No Deal host was granted bail in Parramatta Bail Court on Saturday, commenting to Channel 10 reporters on his way out of the courtroom: 'Well I'm just getting back from last time... two strikes and you're out in this country'

'I spent a night in hospital, I spent a night in jail, despite an agreement with police that would not happen. There is a dispute about facts, a significant dispute about the facts (of what happened on Wednesday).'

He will appear in court again later this week.

Two months ago Mr O'Keefe was charged with slapping, kicking and spitting on his doctor girlfriend in a row over an ice pipe she claimed he was carrying at a party.

He appeared before Sydney's Waverley Local Court on June 25, charged with three counts of assaulting his ex-lover of two years, Dr Orly Lavee.

Two of the charges, which occurred at their home in Randwick, were dismissed on mental health grounds - although his lawyers indicated he would have otherwise pleaded guilty to them.

A third assault charge related to an alleged incident at Kangaroo Valley earlier this year and was withdrawn by prosecutors.

The court heard Mr O'Keefe, who suffers bipolar and substance abuse disorders, was in a 'hyper-manic' state when he assaulted Dr Lavee at their home on January 30 after the couple attended a birthday party in Surry Hills.

Two months ago Mr O'Keefe was charged with slapping, kicking and spitting on his doctor girlfriend in a row over an ice pipe she claimed he was carrying at a party (pictured with his lawyer leaving Waverley court in June)

He appeared before Sydney's Waverley Local Court on June 25, charged with three counts of assaulting his ex-lover of two years, Dr Orly Lavee (both pictured)

Magistrate Hudson found Mr O'Keefe had been in a 'hyper-manic' bipolar state at the time of the offending, was remorseful and contrite.

He has had dozens of psychological and psychiatric appointments and weeks-long stays receiving mental health treatment since the incident.

The court heard Mr O'Keefe's family had an extensive history of mood disorders.

His rock star uncle Johnny O'Keefe spent two months of almost every year at the Ryde Psychiatric hospital, the court heard.

An apprehended violence order was left in place between the former couple.

When Daily Mail Australia asked Mr O'Keefe outside court if his television career was over, he said: 'I'm not sure if I'm over or if TV's over.'
Taliban fighters beheaded an Afghan soldier before singing as they held the severed head of the victim aloft by his hair, before sharing the video in an online chat room.

In the 30-second clip, the group of Taliban fighters can be heard chanting 'Mujahideen' as they parade the man's head around.

Six of the men were holding rifles and another was clutching on to two bloodied knives, in footage that first appeared in the Washington Examiner.

The depraved footage emerged as a Taliban spokesman today claimed that they were not violent, insisted women would have 'basic rights' and claimed the new government was 'building a welfare state.'

The Taliban shared a sickening video of six fighters chanting around the body of an Afghan solider as they carried his head by the hair. Pictured: A grab of the Taliban fighters from the harrowing clip

The Taliban fighters started shouting praise for the Taliban's supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada (pictured)

It is believed the man on the ground was an Afghan solider due to the colour of his dark green uniform - similar to that given to the national army by the US.

The man carrying the knives puts them in the air as they continue to chant Mujahideen - an Arabic term which refers to Muslims who fight on behalf of the faith or the Muslim community.

They then start shouting praise for the Taliban's supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada.

The video ends with the group stating they must shoot the Afghan soldiers because 'he has to look shot'.

It comes after Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen spoke to the BBC today, claiming that the jihadists had changed significantly from the bloodthirsty Islamists of the early 2000s.

'We are the people of Afghanistan,' Shaheen said. 'Many of us were doing the jihad, the resistance, against then Soviet union and now the 20 year occupation by the US and allies.

'Now, we are focusing on lifting the lives of our people, the construction of Afghanistan, creating jobs for our people, building a welfare state,' he continued.

'If I compare it to the past, we had a domestic war, fighting. But now we are focusing more on our economic activities, on creating jobs, expanding education, other needs of the people.'

Responding to questions about the violence shown by the Taliban, Shaheen said: 'Violence is not the official policy. If everyone wants to have a demonstration they should get permission from the minister interior and state the demonstration will take place.'

He added that those who wish to organise protests must get official permission from the interior ministry.

'With no freedom of speech we go into a dictatorship which is against the rules of Islam,' he said. 'But we do not want a chaotic situation to be brought and we had some ISIS people posing at demonstrations trying to get into the presidential palace and explode themselves.'

With regards to the reported attacks on journalists, Shaheen said that any such attacks in the future would investigated.

The man was the brother of Amrullah Saleh (pictured in 2019), the former Afghan vice president who became one of the leaders of anti-Taliban opposition forces in Panjshir Valley

The beheading footage emerged just days after Taliban militants executed the brother of one of the Afghan resistance fighters' leaders.

The man was the brother of Amrullah Saleh, the former Afghan vice president who became one of the leaders of anti-Taliban opposition forces in the Panjshir valley.

The news that Saleh's brother Rohullah Azizi was killed came days after Taliban forces took control of the provincial centre of Panjshir, the last province holding out against them after the took control of the rest of Afghanistan last month.

'They executed my uncle,' Ebadullah Saleh told Reuters in a text. 'They killed him yesterday and would not let us bury him. They kept saying his body should rot.'

The Urdu language account of the Taliban information service Alemarah said that 'according to reports' Rohullah Saleh was killed during fighting in Panjshir.

Saleh, a former head of the National Directorate of Security, the intelligence service of the Western-backed government that collapsed last month, is at large though his exact location remains unclear.

The National Resistance Front of Afghanistan, which groups opposition forces loyal to local leader Ahmad Massoud, has pledged to continue opposing the Taliban even after the fall of Panjshir's provincial capital Bazarak.

The news of Rohullah Saleh's execution comes after the UN warned the Taliban have started carrying out 'reprisal killings'.

The UN envoy for Afghanistan Deborah Lyons said there had been 'credible allegations' of targeted killings 'despite the many statements granting general amnesties'.

She added Afghan security officials and people who worked for the previous administration were at risk.

The Taliban have been at pains to present a reformed image since sweeping to power on August 15, pledging a more moderate brand of rule.

But videos and footage from inside Afghanistan have told a different story, showing the militants beating and whipping people on the streets as reports emerged of targeted killings and fighters going door-to-door searching for blue US passports.

Earlier, a second charter flight carrying foreigners out of Afghanistan left Kabul airport - the latest sign Kabul Airport is close to resuming commercial operations after the chaotic US-led evacuation ended on August 30.

Just over 100 foreigners, including 13 Brits, left Kabul yesterday on a charter flight.

A second charter flight carrying foreigners out of Afghanistan has left Kabul airport today as the UN warned the Taliban have started carrying out 'reprisal killings'

Passengers get on a shuttle bus before boarding a Qatar Airways flight out of Kabul Airport today

The UN envoy for Afghanistan Deborah Lyons said 'there have been credible allegations of reprisal killings... despite the many statements granting general amnesties'

The White House has praised the Taliban for being 'businesslike and professional' in allowing the flight to leave.

It comes as unconfirmed reports in the capital suggested the Taliban may hold a ceremony to swear in the new government on Saturday - the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks that triggered the end of their first stint in power.

As news of a resumption in evacuation flights spread, some people gathered at the airport gates, pleading with Taliban guards to get in.

'If I can't go just kill me!' said one woman, among a group of women and children each carrying backpacks.

Many Afghans in the capital are fearful of a repeat of the hardline Islamist group's brutal and repressive rule from 1996-2001.

This was the first large-scale departure flight since the final US troops left on August 31 - an evacuation flight from Kabul to Qatar with just over 100 foreigners on board

The Taliban have already begun to segregate men and women students and medical staff, suggested women will be banned from playing sports, and unveiled an all-male government drawn exclusively from loyalist ranks.

More than 100 passengers were on the Qatar Airways flight that landed in Doha on Thursday evening, 10 days after a mammoth, chaotic airlift of more than 120,000 people came to a dramatic close with the US pullout.

In the days that followed the Taliban's blitz, the airport had become a tragic symbol of desperation among Afghans terrified of the militants' return to power - with thousands of people crowding around its gates daily, and some even clinging to jets as they took off.

More than 100 people were killed, including 13 US troops, in a suicide attack on August 26 near the airport that was claimed by the Islamic State group's local chapter.

Qatar has said it worked with Turkey to swiftly resume operations at Kabul's airport to allow the flow of people and aid.

The Taliban have repeatedly claimed they would not seek revenge against those who worked with the previous regime - and all Afghans would be granted free passage out of the country when commercial flights resume.

However, they have shown clear signs that they will not tolerate opposition.

Earlier this week, armed Taliban militants dispersed hundreds of protesters, sometimes by firing shots into the air, in cities across Afghanistan, including Kabul, Faizabad in the northeast and Herat in the west, where two people were shot dead.

They also moved to snuff out any further civil unrest, saying protests would need prior authorisation from the justice ministry and no demonstrations were allowed 'for the time being'.

A Taliban fighter pulls his M-16 on a female protester in Kabul at a protest against the all-male administration on Tuesday
Health authorities are alarmed at the sudden spike in the number of pregnant women falling severely ill with Covid-19, with the virus causing premature births and in one case even infecting the unborn baby.

Seven pregnant women with critical cases of Covid were taken to Monash Medical Centre in Melbourne this week.

One of the mothers is in intensive care fighting for life, and severely premature babies are being looked after in neonatal intensive care.

Seven pregnant women with critical cases of Covid were taken to Monash Medical Centre last week, with mums experiencing premature births and babies arriving with the virus

On Sunday any woman 24 weeks along in their pregnancy or more will gain priority access to Pfizer vaccinations at Victoria's state-run hubs.

Head of Perinatal Services at Monash Health Dr Ryan Hodges spoke at Victoria's Covid-19 press conference on Saturday and expressed his team's worry over the increase in cases.

'What we've seen over the last week has caused alarm,' Dr Hodges said.

'We have lots of women now who are very sick, who are very high risk of having their babies born early.'

Dr Hodges said pregnant women who fall ill with the virus are five times more likely to need to be admitted to Monash Health, and there is a one in three chance they will need oxygen therapy when they are in hospital.

He said there is also a one in seven chance they will end up in intensive care, and there is a one in two chance of an emergency delivery of their baby.

Dr Hodges added: 'There is a one in two chance of caesarean section, and you are twice as likely to have a stillborn.

'At the moment at Monash Women's, we have seven women who are pregnant who are in hospital.

'One of whom is in intensive care at 24 weeks gestation with a 600-gram baby. She is unwell.'

Dr Ryan Hodges, Head of Perinatal Services at Monash Health, said pregnant women who fall ill with the virus are five times more like to need to be admitted to Monash Health

'We have 26 weeks, we have 28 weeks, we have 30 weeks - these are very high risk and extremely premature babies due to the degree of their infection,' Dr Hodges expressed.

He also mentioned that a mother who was Covid-positive was brought into hospital on Friday night with her baby, who also had the virus.

Overwhelmingly, the women being looked after are not vaccinated and are believed to be from Melbourne's northern and western suburbs.

Maternity wards in Australia kept a close eye on how the Delta strain affected pregnancies in the US, the UK and Europe, and have now prepared themselves for the full brunt.

Dr Hodges noted that over 200,000 pregnant women in the US and the UK had no adverse reactions to the Pfizer vaccine, which showed how safe it is.

Dr Hodges noted that over 200,000 pregnant women in the US and the UK had no adverse reactions to the Pfizer vaccine, which showed how safe it is (stock image)

'It does not increase the risk of miscarriage; it does not increase the risk of abnormalities in your body; it does not increase the risk of pregnancy complications,' he added.

'It prevents severe disease, it prevents you coming to Monash, it prevents you having your baby born early and coming to our intensive care unit.'

He said the immune protection response crosses the placenta to the baby and gives it protection from the virus.

The Monash maternity ward was shocked by the Delta strain's severity on pregnant women and stated it was more dangerous than what is seen with the flu.

'This not what we see with influenza,' Dr Hodges said.

'I never would have seven sick women in hospital with influenza.'

The Monash maternity ward was shocked by the Delta strain's severity on pregnant women and stated it was more dangerous than what is seen with the flu (stock image)

Victoria recorded 450 locally acquired Covid-19 cases on Saturday, and there are now 2,793 active cases.

143 of Victoria's active cases are in hospital with 34 in intensive care and 26 on ventilators.

Only 11 per cent of people hospitalised had received one dose, with 89 per cent not vaccinated.
Cressida Dick has warned tech giants are making it impossible to identify and stop terrorists from carrying out deadly attacks.

The Metropolitan police chief said the current focus on encryption by big tech companies 'is only serving to make our job to identify and stop these people even harder'.

Dame Cressida yesterday had her contract at the Met extended until April 24 despite furious backlash from former Tory MPs.

It comes after the head of MI5 warned Britain could face a spectacular attack like 9/11 after the Wests withdrawal from Afghanistan.

Ken McCallum said the security service was concerned that terrorists would be able to regroup and plan sophisticated operations targeting the UK.

Dame Cressida Dick has warned tech giants are making it impossible to identify and stop terrorists from carrying out deadly attacks

Pictured: Smoke pours from the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New Yorkafter 9/11, 20 years ago today

And writing for the Daily Telegraph, Dame Cressida warned end-to-end encryption  which allows terrorists to message each other in secrecy  is giving terrorists an advantage over police.

She said: 'The current focus on encryption by many big tech companies is only serving to make our job to identify and stop these people even harder, if not impossible in some cases.'

Dame Cressida said 9/11 was a 'watershed moment, confirming that terrorism was a truly global threat that required a global response'.

And she said the terrorist landscape has shifted since the attack in New York 20 years ago, with sophisticated plots giving way to more rudimentary ones that require less planning.

She wrote: 'That global shift has only gathered pace in recent years with advances in communications technology.

'Terrorist groups  whatever their warped ideology or persuasion  have exploited this to reach, recruit and inspire anyone, anywhere and at any time through social media and the internet.'

Yesterday it was announced that Dame Cressida would stay on as Scotland Yard commissioner until April 2024 despite a wave of protests.

Former Tory MP Harvey Proctor, 74, said he was 'bitterly disappointed' by the news.

He was one of three men who had their houses raided by officers from the Met's failed Operation Midland launched in reaction to false allegations by jailed fantasist Carl Beech about a murderous VIP paedophile ring.

Earlier this week he was among a number of high-profile figures to sign an open letter to the Prime Minister accusing the commissioner of 'presiding over a culture of incompetence and cover-up' and calling for reforms in policing.

Mr Proctor said: 'I am bitterly disappointed by the decision. It is obscene. I believe the Government will rue the day of this terribly bad and wrong decision.'

Reform UK's Richard Tice tweeted: 'Resign or be fired: Cressida Dick should not be rewarded for a long catalogue of failures with new 2 year contract.

'Her performance has been woeful. This Govt is incapable of holding senior people to account to perform, to do their job properly.'

Lib Dem leader Ed Davey was among those calling for her to be fired on Thursday, while GB News commentator Patrick Christys said: 'If Cressida Dick was in any other job, she'd be asked to move on.'

MI5 chief warns Britain could face a 'spectacular' attack like 9/11 after Afghanistan withdrawal as he reveals 31 'late stage' plots to attack the UK have been thwarted in four years

By REBECCA CAMBER CHIEF CRIME CORRESPONDENT FOR THE DAILY MAIL and MARTIN ROBINSON CHIEF RERPORTER FOR MAILONLINE

The head of MI5 has warned that Britain could face a spectacular attack like 9/11 after the Wests withdrawal from Afghanistan.

Ken McCallum said the security service was concerned that terrorists would be able to regroup and plan sophisticated operations targeting the UK.

Yesterday he revealed that MI5 and the police have thwarted 31 late-stage plots to attack Britain in the past four years, including six during the pandemic.

Head of MI5 Ken McCallum, pictured, has revealed the security services and police have foiled 31 'late-state' terror plots over the past four years

Two of those plots are thought to have been disrupted in recent weeks.

The MI5 director general said the Talibans takeover of Afghanistan had heartened and emboldened extremists.

UK could be flooded with heroin after fall of Afghanistan Britain could be flooded with heroin after the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban, police leaders fear. The country creates 82 per cent of the worlds heroin supply. Donna Jones, serious crime lead at the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners, said: I dont think the increase (in heroin) is hitting Britains streets yet but I think it will do over the next six to 12 months... because of British and US forces not being [in Afghanistan] to control and regulate airports and borders. Advertisement

Mr McCallum recalled the thwarted 2006 transatlantic airline plot to detonate liquid explosives on seven aircraft taking off from Heathrow, saying plots of that spectacular magnitude had been less common due to 20-year effort to combat the terrorist threat from Afghanistan.

He told the BBC Radio 4s Today programme ahead of todays 9/11 anniversary: The big concern flowing from Afghanistan, alongside the immediate inspirational effect, is the risk that terrorists reconstitute and once again pose us more in the way of well developed, sophisticated plots of the sort that we faced in 9/11 and the years thereafter.

There is no doubt that recent events in Afghanistan will have heartened and emboldened some of those extremists, and so being vigilant to precisely those kinds of risks is what my organisation is focused on, along with a range of other threats.

He said Islamist extremists posed the greatest problem, but a growing number of threats were from far-Right groups.

Mr McCallum said the threat of terrorism in the UK remains 'a real and enduring thing' - and that the coronavirus pandemic has not diminished this.

Britain's top secret agent also described turning to a spy colleague as the second plane hit the Twin Towers on 9/11 and immediately knew Osama bin Laden was behind the attack.

He said: 'We do face a consistent global struggle to defeat extremism and to guard against terrorism - this is a real problem. In the last four years, working with the police, my organisation has disrupted 31 late-stage attack plots in Great Britain.

'That number includes mainly Islamist attack plots but also a growing number of attack plots from right wing terrorists.'

'Even during the pandemic period which we have all been enduring for the past two years, we have had to disrupt six late-stage attack plots,' he said, adding: 'So, the terrorist threat to the UK, I am sorry to say is a real and enduring thing'.

Mr McCallum said that 'inspired' terrorist acts were 'by volume' the largest number of threats that MI5 and their partners faced in the UK.

'There is no doubt that events in Afghanistan will have heartened and emboldened some of those extremists and so being vigilant to precisely those kinds of risks that my organisation is focused on along with a range of other threats,' he said.

The former head of the UK armed forces General Lord Richards also raised the prospect of another 9/11 yesterday, saying ungoverned spaces have opened up in Afghanistan which terrorists would be able to exploit.

MI5 spooks immediately knew Osama Bin Laden was behind 9/11

And former PM Tony Blair said governments must take action against the Taliban if they again allow the country to become a base for terrorism.

Mr McCallum also described where he was on the morning of 9/11 and how colleagues knew they would be dealing with the aftermath for 'the next 10 years'.

'On the morning of 9/11 when the first plane hit the two towers we turned on the television in the corner of the room, and as the second plane struck, a colleague quietly said 'Osama Bin Laden',' he told the BBC's Today programme.

'Someone else said 'I guess we all know what we're going to be doing for the next 10 years of our lives', and so it proved.

'In the 20 years since we have faced wave after wave of terrorism from extremists seeking to cause mass casualties and prepared to give up their lives in the act - that is a horrifying reality but, by the same token, it is also extremely motivating for my organisation.'

Mr McCallum said that although more directed plots from terrorist organisations take time to organise and carry out, psychological boosts for their causes could happen 'overnight'.

'Terrorist threats tend not to change overnight in the sense of directed plotting or training camps or infrastructure - the sorts of things that al Qaeda enjoyed in Afghanistan at the time of 9/11,' he told the BBC's Today programme.

'These things do inherently take time to build, and the 20-year effort to reduce the terrorist threat from Afghanistan has been largely successful.

'But what does happen overnight, even though those directed plots and centrally organised bits of terrorism take a bit longer to rebuild... Overnight, you can have a psychological boost, a morale boost to extremists already here, or in other countries.

'So we need to be vigilant both for the increase in inspired terrorism which has become a real trend for us to deal with over the last five to 10 years, alongside the potential regrowth of al Qaeda-style directed plots.'
A group of pigs are wreaking havoc on the M62 in Salford after deciding to make their way into the road - causing 40-minute delays and four miles of traffic.

At least 19 pigs were spotted on motorway cameras roaming around on the inside lane and along the grass verge.

Pictures from the scene show traffic officers armed with brooms attempting to herd the escaped pigs out of the road.

A group of pigs caused havoc on the M62 in Salford after they decided to make their way into the road

The pigs in the road have caused 40-minute delays and tailbacks for 4 miles as traffic officers attempt to secure the road

At least 19 pigs were spotted on motorway cameras roaming around on the inside lane and along the grass verge

North West Motorway Police said the animals were on the loose between junctions 12 and 11 eastbound - the Eccles and Birchwood interchanges.

Highways England Northwest tweeted: ' #M62 westbound #J12 (#EcclesInterchange #M60 #M602) to #J11 (#WarringtonEast #Birchwood #A574) traffic has been temporarily stopped due to a number of pigs which are being a bit of a swine and won't move.'

The cheeky animals' appearance meant all the lanes on the motorway had to close and resulted in 40-minute delays and four miles of stationary traffic.

'Highways England have the Traffic Stopped M62 J12 to J11 Eastbound,' North West Motorway Police tweeted.

National Highways confirmed just before 11.20am that the pigs had been successfully moved on and returned to their field.

North West Motorway Police said the animals were on the loose between junctions 12 and 11 eastbound - the Eccles and Birchwood interchanges

The pigs were persistent and the M62 is still suffering delays as a result of their appearance

It comes after traffic was held up for around an hour-and-a-half after an escaped cow broke through a fence and wandered onto the M25 - causing traffic chaos on Thursday.

The rogue heifer stood in the middle of the anticlockwise carriageway leaving all traffic held up in both directions.

Highways England officers and the farmer tried to get the farm animal back into the field next to the motorway as vehicles backed up from near Junction 6 at Godstone, Surrey.

Vehicles ground to a halt from around 12 miles near Merstham, Surrey, to Clacket Lane services near Westerham.

Motorway cameras showed all traffic was stationary just after 9am with the cow roaming across the road as Highways England tried to shepherd it back to the green pastures.

Highway authorities took to Twitter to keep drivers updated while people explained they were stuck in the queues

Surrey Police said the cow made a bid for freedom just after 8.30am, but officers did not attend the scene.

A spokeswoman for the force said: 'We were called at 8.35am by a member of the public to alert us to the fact that a cow had broken through the fence at Godstone on the M25, anti-clockwise between junctions 7 and 5. Highways England are dealing with the incident and are in touch with the farmer.'

Even after the animal was removed, there were further delays of another half-an-hour due to the backlog of traffic.

Highways England confirmed the runaway cow was ushered back into the safety of the field just after 9.20am.

A spokeswoman said: 'A cow left an adjacent field and made its way on to the M25 anti-clockwise, between junction 6 and 5 near Godstone in Surrey at 8.36am this morning.

Highways England were forced to close the M25 in both directions for 90 minutes after a cow broke onto the carriageway near Godstone, Surrey

The incident led to 12 mile tailbacks across Surrey until the farmer was able to retrieve his cow

The traffic was held up after the cow was stuk in the middle lane of the motorway

'Traffic officers and the farmer worked together and the cow is back in the field. Traffic has been released in both directions.

'There are residual delays of 30 minutes above normal journey time reported.. The carriageways were re-opened at 9.23am.'

One passing motorist wrote on social media: 'Stuck in traffic #J6 #M25. I think there's a large animal on the motorway.'

While another Twitter user pictured the cow in the middle of the road and added: 'This is what happens when you travel on the M25. Oh dear.'
Terrified locals have voiced their fears after a teenage girl was raped in an alleyway in broad daylight near Bradford.

The 18-year-old was attacked near a pub in Wibsey, a town outside of the city on Friday afternoon, police confirmed.

Detectives have launched an investigation into the attack but have not yet made any arrests.

Gemma Wright, 20, lives in the next street to where the rape happened. She said: 'Its terrifying to think that women aren't safe here, even during daylight hours.

'How did nobody hear or see anything?

'Me and my girlfriends are scared that it could happen to us. I hope the man who did this is caught quickly.'

Pictured: Yorkshire Police at the scene on Saturday of the rape of an 18 year old in Wibsey, Bradford in broad daylight. She was attacked on Friday night, officers said

Pictured: An aerial view showing the rear entrance of the alleyway, with three police officers seen standing guard on Saturday

Pictured left: A view from above down the alleyway where an 18-year-old girl was raped on Friday. Right: An officer stands guard of the alleyway

Pictured: A police officer stands guard at the entrance to an alleyway where an 18-year-old girl was raped on Friday

The alleyway runs between two houses, from a cul-de-sac to another street and cordon is now in place with a heavy police presence at the scene.

Local residents told YorkshireLive that the sight of the police cordon had caused a lot of concern among those in the area.

A spokesman for the force said: 'Police are investigating following a report of a rape which was received at 5.45pm yesterday.

'A scene is in place in Wibsey while enquiries continue and an 18-year-old woman is being supported by specially trained officers.'

Gemma's friend, who didn't wish to be identified, said: 'The poor lass who was raped is about the same age as us and probably thought that it couldn't happen to her. Now we are thinking that it could happen to us.'

Police continue to stand at the cordon I near the narrow alleyway.

Another Wibsey resident, Carole Smith, 33, said: 'Until this animal is caught we are not going to feel safe walking the streets.

'Attacking a girl in broad daylight shows he's not scared of getting caught.'

Pictured: A police officer stands guard next to the entrance to the alleyway in which an 18-year-old girl was raped on Friday in broad daylight. Investigations are on-going

According to a reporter working for the Yorkshire news outlet, the alleyway runs between two houses, from a cul-de-sac to another street.

'One woman on the Hardy Street side said all the neighbours talk a lot to each other and nobody heard, saw or knows anything about what's happened,' the reporter said.

Police were said to be guarding the entrance of the alleyway, with pictures showing police tape blocking it at each end.
Eurosceptic Norwegian politicians building a head of steam ahead of Monday's national elections say they hope to challenge the 'unaccountable bureaucrats in Brussels', as the country prepares for the prospect of a 'mini-Brexit.

After eight years of a pro-European conservative government, led by Erna Solberg's Hyre, polling shows the ruling party has been hemorrhaging support over the past 12 months.

A left-green coalition of some form is expected to emerge victorious at national elections on Monday, with any partnership replying on the support of several Eurosceptic parties.

Now opposition parties gearing up for a serious challenge have slammed 'unaccountable bureaucrats in Brussels' amid a backlash against the bloc ahead of next week's elections.

'The problem with the agreement we have today is that we gradually transfer more and more power from the Storting (Norway's parliament), from Norwegian lawmakers to the bureaucrats in Brussels who are not accountable,' Centre Party leader Trygve Slagsvold Vedum explained.

Experts are now predicting Oslo's relationship with the European Union could suffer as a result, as Norwegian Eurosceptics hope for their own 'mini-Brexit'.

Opposition parties gearing up for a serious challenge have slammed 'unaccountable bureaucrats in Brussels' amid a backlash against the bloc ahead of next week's elections. Above: Trygve Slagsvold Vedum (middle) speaks alongside leadership rivals Erna Solberg and Jonas Gahr Store (left)

Brussels is said to be watching on in nervous anticipation as polls ahead of Norway's elections suggest the country is considering a 'mini-Brexit'. [File picture]

Norway isn't a member of the European Union, but has been closely linked to the bloc since 1992 through its own European Economic Area agreement.

The deal provides the small Scandinavian country access to the common market in exchange for the adoption of most European directives - including the free movements of people, workers, and tariff-free trading.

While Norwegians have rejected EU membership twice, in referendums in 1972 and 1994, a majority are in favour of the current EEA agreement.

'In Norway, we saw that the EU is a very tough negotiating partner and even a big country like Britain did not manage to win very much in its negotiations,' said Ulf Sverdrup, director of the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs.

But both the Centre Party and the Socialist Left - the Labour Party's closest allies, which together have around 20 percent of voter support - have called for the current marriage of convenience to come to an end.

During the election campaign, the EU issue has gradually been pushed to the back burner as the Centre Party - which briefly led in the polls - has seen its support deflate.

Defending the interests of its rural base, the Centre Party wants to replace the EEA with trade and cooperation agreements.

However, Labour leader Jonas Gahr Store, who is expected to become the next prime minister, does not want to jeopardise the country's ties to the EU, which is by far Norway's biggest trading partner.

After eight years of a pro-European conservative government, led by Erna Solberg's (above) Hyre, polling shows the ruling party has been hemorrhaging support over the past 12 months

Labour leader Jonas Gahr Store (pictured) said he does not want to 'jeoparadise' his country's ties to the EU

'If I go to my wife and say "Look, we've been married for years and things are pretty good, but now I want to look around to see if there are any other options out there"... Nobody is going to pick up the phone and be willing to renegotiate the terms', he said in the same debate.

There is a possibility the parties unite on global issues, such as the fight against climate change, to bring Norway and the EU closer together.

'Cooperation with the EU will very likely become stronger because of the climate issue' which 'could become a source of friction' within the next coalition, Sverdrup suggested.

'Even though the past 25 years have been a period of increasingly close cooperation, and though we can therefore expect that it will probably continue, there are still question marks' surrounding Norway's future ties to the EU, he said.

The EEA agreement is 'fundamental' for relations between the EU and its partners Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein, according to EU spokesman Peter Stano.

But when it comes to future relations the spokesman added: 'We do not speculate on possible election outcomes nor do we comment on different party positions.'

'The dictatorship of Brussels didn't suit the British...and they left': Poland issues Brexit warning to EU after the bloc ordered them to bring in judicial reform

By Chris Jewers for MailOnline

Poland has issued a Brexit-related warning to the European Union after the bloc ordered them to bring in judicial reform, or face fines.

A spokesman for Poland's conservative nationalist governing party, Law and Justice, said Thursday it would 'have to search for drastic solutions' to its dispute with the EU, before pointing to Britain and its exit from the Bloc.

Speaking during a discussion at an economic forum in Poland, Ryszard Terlecki said that the party wants to remain in the EU and have a cooperative relationship, but that the EU 'should be acceptable to us.'

'If things go the way they are likely to go, we will have to search for drastic solutions,' he warned. 'The British showed that the dictatorship of the Brussels bureaucracy did not suit them and turned around and left,' he said, referring to Brexit.

His comments came after the European Commission said on Tuesday that it had asked the EU's court of justice to impose daily fines on Poland over its rule of law, and a controversial chamber of the Polish Supreme Court that disciplines judges and prosecutors.

The EU's justice commissioner has also suggested withholding the country's Covid-19 recovery funds until it brings in the judicial reform and removes the chamber.

Brussels argues it threatens the country's judicial independence, and despite Warsaw saying it would dismantle the chamber, the EU said Poland had 'not taken all the measures necessary.'

Speaking during a discussion at an economic forum in Poland, Ryszard Terlecki (pictured in 2020, file photo) said that the party wants to remain in the EU and have a cooperative relationship with the bloc but that the EU 'should be acceptable to us'

The European Commission said on Tuesday that it had asked the EU's court of justice to impose daily fines on Poland over its rule of law, and a controversial chamber of the Polish Supreme Court (pictured in November, file photo) that disciplines judges and prosecutors

In response to Terlecki's warning, Polish opposition politicians accused the governing party of putting Poland's membership in the EU in danger.

Former President of the European Council Donald Tusk, who is now the leader of Poland's opposition party - Civic Platform - warned today of the 'constant undermining' or Poland's presence in the EU by the Law and Justice party.

When asked whether he was confident of Poland's continued membership of the EU, he said: 'No, I don't have such peace of mind and no-one should have.

'Disasters such as, for example Brexit, or Poland's potential exit from the EU, very often happen not because someone has planned them, but because someone has been unable to plan a wise alternative to such a potential drama.'

Government spokesman Piotr Mueller denied that there is any intention to leave the 27-member bloc, saying: 'We will not follow the way of Great Britain.'

Terlecki, who is also the leader of the ruling party's group in parliament, spoke after the bloc moved earlier this week to punish Poland financially for actions that increase the governing party's control over the courts.

Brussels says they are against EU law.

Government spokesman Piotr Mueller (pictured) denied that there is any intention to leave the 27-member bloc, saying: 'We will not follow the way of Great Britain', after Terlecki's comments sparked furious backlash from opposition parties saying Poland's EU membership was at risk

Former President of the European Council Donald Tusk, who is now the leader of Poland's opposition party - Civic Platform - warned today of the 'constant undermining' or Poland's presence in the EU by the Law and Justice party

Opposition lawmakers seized on Terlecki's comment to accuse Law and Justice of seeking Poland's departure from the EU. Senate Speaker Tomasz Grodzki said it would not be in Poland's interest to leave the EU.

Amid the uproar, Terlecki tweeted Thursday that he does not support leaving the bloc, saying: 'Poland was, is and will be a member of the EU.

Despite the Polish government's long-running disputes with the EU, surveys show that the vast majority of Poles are in favour of membership of the bloc.

Hungary, seen as a close ally of Poland's in the EU bloc - hit out at Brussels for pushing to impose fines over its judicial reform.

Hungary's justice minister Judit Varga accused the EU of 'attacking' Warsaw and intervening in its legislative process, and called Brussels 'scandalous and arrogant' to dismantle the controversial chamber.

'The European Commission made a rude attack on Poland,' the justice minister said in a post on Facebook.

'The procedure is not only outrageous but also completely unacceptable ... With this scandalous and arrogant step, the Commission crossed a border that we previously thought was unimaginable,' she added. 'We broadly endorse Poland and show solidarity with our Polish friends.'

Hungary's justice minister Judit Varga (pictured) has accused the EU of 'attacking' Warsaw and intervening in its legislative process, and called Brussels 'scandalous and arrogant' to dismantle the controversial chamber

Hungary and Poland have been key allies in recent years, with both being ruled by nationalist governments that have locked horns with Brussels over press freedoms and LGBT rights.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban also assured Polish President Andrzej Duda that his government would give 'solidarity and support' and, during a Thursday meeting between the pair, accused Brussels of 'abusing its power'.

Poland has also been told by the European Union that it will need to prove that it is no longer defying the EU court over its judicial independence in order to start receiving its Covid-19 recovery money.

Didier Reynders, the EU's justice commissioner, said that it was logical that the EU would not distribute the 36bn Poland had applied for under the Bloc's recovery package, which is awaiting approval from the European Commission.

That is until it has made a 'real change' to its disciplinary chamber for judges, Reynders said, before adding that the penalties should be as high as 1m a day for Poland, although he stressed the amount was up to the court.

'I must say that we are at the end of the so-called dialogue on this with Poland. We have tried to engage in a real dialogue with some letters and some documents, then before the Court,' Reynders said, according to The Financial Times.

'We have received positive reactions from the Court of Justice but there is no intention from Poland to be in full compliance with ECJ rulings, and so the next step is financial.'

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban also assured Polish President Andrzej Duda (pictured) that his government would give 'solidarity and support' in its conflict with the EU

Didier Reynders, the EU's justice commissioner, said that it was logical that the EU would not distribute the 36bn Poland had applied for under the Bloc's recovery package until it had made the reform to its judiciary

The EU is also at loggerheads with Poland over issues ranging from a challenge by its government to the primacy of EU law to LGBT rights and press freedoms.

The Commission recently warned five Polish regional councils they could lose funding over declarations that they were 'LGBT-free', and it has said Warsaw's position that EU law does not stand above national law is holding up the release of 57 billion euros in EU recovery funds.

Polish Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro accused the EU of double standards, saying the justice systems of other European countries functioned in a similar way to Poland's.

'Today's decision... is another manifestation of the European Commission's aggression towards Poland, an attempt to limit our sovereignty and an attack on the Polish legal order,' he told a press conference.

The EU says the Polish chamber is being used to pressure judges or exert political control over judicial decisions and its top court, ruling that it undercuts EU law, has ordered that it be dissolved.

The Polish government said three weeks ago that the chamber would be dismantled as part of wider judiciary reforms in coming months, but the executive Commission said it was now taking action.

'The Commission is asking the Court to impose a daily penalty payment on Poland for as long as the measures imposed by the court's order are not fully implemented,' the Commission said in a statement.

The European Commission argues that, while the chamber may not be accepting any new cases, it is still working through existing cases.

Piotr Muller said it would present its proposals for judicial reform in the autumn.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have paid tribute to the victims of 9/11 on the 20th anniversary of the attack by changing their Archwell website to show the names of the almost 3,000 people that lost their lives.

The Duke and Duchess' homepage was blacked out on Saturday with nothing but white text reading 'In Memoriam, September 11, 2001' followed by rows of the names of the victims.

The attack on New York City on September 11, 2001 claimed the lives of 2,977 victims across four sites - the two World Trade Center towers, The Pentagon and where Flight 93 crashed in Pennsylvania.

In addition, the 19 terrorists involved in the attacks on the day were killed. Their names were not included on the Archwell homepage memorial.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have paid tribute to the victims of 9/11 on the 20th anniversary of the attack by changing their Archwell website to show the names of the almost 3,000 people that lost their lives (pictured)

The Duke and Duchess' (pictured together in 2020) homepage was blacked out on Saturday with nothing but white text reading 'In Memoriam, September 11, 2001' followed by rows of the names of the victims

The Queen and Boris Johnson lead tributes in the UK today.

In her heartfelt message to President Joe Biden, the 95-year-old monarch reflected on her visit to the site of the attack back in 2010.

She said: 'As we mark the 20th anniversary of the terrible attacks on September 11 2001, my thoughts and prayers, and those of my family and the entire nation, remain with the victims, survivors and families affected, as well as the first responders and rescue workers called to duty.

My visit to the site of the World Trade Centre in 2010 is held fast in my memory.

'It reminds me that as we honour those from many nations, faiths and backgrounds who lost their lives, we also pay tribute to the resilience and determination of the communities who joined together to rebuild.'

The Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall also paid tribute to those involved in the attacks.

The Queen (pictured in August) and Boris Johnson have lead tributes to the victims and survivors of 9/11 on the 20th anniversary of the attacks

In her heartfelt message to President Joe Biden, the Queen reflected on her visit to the site of the attack back in 2010 (pictured)

They said: 'On the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, we remember all those who lost their lives and pay tribute to the tireless work of the emergency services, some of whom paid the ultimate sacrifice to save others.'

In a defiant message to be played at a memorial event at the Olympic Park in east London today, the Prime Minister said the threat of terrorism remained but people refused to live their lives in 'permanent fear'.

'The fact that we are coming together today  in sorrow but also in faith and resolve  demonstrates the failure of terrorism and the strength of the bonds between us,' Mr Johnson said.

The Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall also paid tribute to those involved in the attacks.

World leaders paid tribute to the victims and survivors of the attacks on the World Trade Center in 2001 (pictured)

People have been leaving flowers and American flags rest beside the names of the fallen on the south pool at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said the consequences of the attacks were 'still being felt to this day', adding the tragedy was 'still so raw'.

He said: 'But as we mark this anniversary I'm convinced our resolve has never been stronger.

'We will continue to fight terror and violence, by promoting our values of justice and peace.'

Mr Johnson said recent events in Afghanistan had only strengthened people's belief in freedom and democracy.

The political leaders' comments came as the prime minister at the time of the attacks  Tony Blair  said the international community must be prepared to take action against the Taliban if they again allow Afghanistan to become a base of terrorism.

The Tribute in Light in downtown Manhattan, a memorial to the victims of 9/11 terrorist attacks, on the eve of the 20th anniversary of the attack

Visitors browse the south pool as flowers and American flags rest among the names of the fallen at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum

Mr Blair said the US and its allies had no choice but to invade after the Taliban refused to give up the al Qaida leadership responsible for the attacks.

The former head of the UK armed forces, General Lord Richards, said the return of the Taliban in Afghanistan raised the prospect of 'another 9/11' as ungoverned spaces opened up which the terrorists were able to exploit.

'I think we are (closer to another 9/11). We've now been pitched back into a dark period which we somehow have to manage,' he told LBC.
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President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden visited all three sites Saturday where terrorists killed Americans on September 11, 2001, marking the 20th anniversary of the attacks.

The Bidens woke up in New York and joined the Clintons and the Obamas at a ceremony at Ground Zero, before traveling to Shanksville, Pennsylvania and then the Pentagon for wreath-laying services.

'These memorials are really important. But theyre also incredibly difficult for the people affected by them, because it brings back the moment they got the phone call, it brings back the instant they got the news, no matter how years go by,' Biden told reporters in Pennsylvania.

At the western Pennsylvania site, Vice President Kamala Harris had called for a 'united America' Saturday as she joined former President George W. Bush at the 9/11 memorial ceremony in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, to mark the 20th anniversary of the terror attacks.

Harris, a Democrat, followed Bush, a Republican, who used his speech to condemn 'violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home,' calling them 'children of the same foul spirit' - an apparent reference to both the 9/11 hijackers and the January 6 Capitol insurrectionists.

Before leaving Pennsylvania, the Bidens paid a visit to the Shanksville Volunteer Fire Department, which responded to the crash on September 11. Dr. Jill Biden was captured passing out Bud Light and IC Light - a local Pittsburgh brew - to the first responders. President Biden took photos with firefighters and their families, including - he told reporters - some boys in Trump hats.

He also had an across-the-aisle compliment for Bush.

'I thought that President Bush made a really good speech today,' Biden said. 'Genuinely good speech, about who we are. The core of who we are is not divided.'

Biden brought up the MAGA hat photos, as he commended Bush's remarks, and expressed his hope that the United States could be more united. He said it was important to prove to autocrats like Chinese President Jinping Xi and Russian President Vladimir Putin that democracies can succeed.

'Are we going to, in the next four, five, six, ten years, demonstrate that democracies can work, or not?' he asked. 'We actually can, in fact, lead by the example of our power again.'

At the final stop, the Bidens, Harris and second gentleman Doug Emhoff gathered at the Pentagon late Saturday afternoon, for a playing of Taps as they gathered around a wreath, with Dr. Biden squeezing Harris' hand.

Queen Elizabeth sent a heartfelt message to Biden as the U.S. marked the anniversary of the tragedy.

'As we mark the 20th anniversary of the terrible attacks on September 11 2001, my thoughts and prayers, and those of my family and the entire nation, remain with the victims, survivors and families affected, as well as the first responders and rescue workers called to duty,' the Queen said. 'My visit to the site of the World Trade Center in 2010 is held fast in my memory,' she added.

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden joined Vice President Kamala Harris and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff at the Pentagon Saturday afternoon for a wreath-laying ceremony. Biden visited Ground Zero and Shanksville earlier Saturday, while Harris spoke at Shanksville

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden (right) hold hands and are followed by Vice President Kamala Harris and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff (left) to a wreath-laying ceremony at the Pentagon Saturday

The first and second couples held hands and gathered around a wreath outside the Pentagon to mark the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden lay a wreath at the Wall of Names during a visit to the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville

The Bidens walk through the western Pennsylvania where Flight 93 crashed on September 11, 2001

First lady Jill Biden was captured giving firefighters six-packs of Bud Light and IC Light - a local Pittsburgh brew - at the Shanksville Volunteer Fire Department after she and President Joe Biden laid a wreath at the Flight 93 memorial

Kamala Harris called for a 'united America' Saturday as she joined former President George Bush at the 9/11 memorial ceremony in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, to mark the 20th anniversary of America's darkest day

President George W. Bush used his speech in Shanksville to talk about violent extremism at home

President Joe Biden gazes upward as he attends Saturday's 9/11 memorial ceremony alongside Dr. Jill Biden, the Clintons, the Obamas and other elected officials

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden depart New York City Saturday en route to Shanksville, Pennsylvania where the president will lay a wreath to mark the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks

From left: Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, President Joe Biden, First Lady Jill Biden, Michael Bloomberg, Diana Taylor, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer place their hands on their hearts at the beginning of the 9/11 ceremony

The One World Trade Center is seen during the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks in New York

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden arrive at the National September 11 Memorial in New York on Saturday

President Joe Biden is captured pulling down his mask to greet someone at Saturday's 9/11 memorial ceremony in New York

Former President George W. Bush (right) and former First Lady Laura Bush attended the memorial service Saturday in Shanksville, Pennsylvania

Vice President Kamala Harris (left) arrives at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania with her husband Doug Emhoff (center left) and Interior Secretary Deb Haaland (center right)

Early Saturday morning, the Bidens filed into the Manhattan event with former President Barack Obama and Bill Clinton and former first ladies Michelle Obama and ex-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Biden didn't speak at the ceremony in New York - as he chose to release a video Friday sharing his reflections instead.

Members of Congress, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, also attended the New York memorial service.

Former President Donald Trump, a native New Yorker, said on Fox News on Friday that he will travel to Ground Zero to mark the attacks' 20th anniversary, but didn't specify timing.

He didn't run into Biden on Saturday.

Trump's ex-attorney, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani - who was mayor during the attacks - attended the Ground Zero ceremony.

Giuliani was among the high-profile Trump allies who pushed the so-called 'big lie' - that Biden wasn't the legitimate winner of the 2020 election.

Trump sent out a statement complimenting Giuliani Saturday morning.

'Congratulations to Rudy Giuliani (for the 20th time!), the greatest Mayor in the history of New York City, for having shown such leadership and doing such an incredible job during and after the attack on our Nation!' the ex-president said.

Trump sent out additional statements critical of Biden's Afghanistan pull-out throughout the somber day.

Biden defended the withdrawal and brushed off criticism when speaking to the press in Pennsylvania.

'It's hard to explain to anybody, how else could you get out?' Biden said. 'For example, if we were in Tajikistan and pulled up a C-130 and said were going to let, you know, anybody who was involved with being sympathetic to us to get on the plane, youd have people hanging in the wheel well. C'mon.'

When asked about his sinking poll numbers he responded, 'I'm a big boy, I've been doing this a long time.'

He also knocked Trump for recent comments the Republican made about Richmond's decision to remove a large Robert E. Lee statue. Trump had suggested the confederate general was so great he would have won the war in Afghanistan.

More generally, Biden expressed disgust with the coarseness of political rhetoric.

'They think this makes sense for us to be in this kind of thing where you ride down the street and someone has a sign saying "F so and so?"' he asked.

Biden avoided some additional awkwardness at Saturday's ceremonies by signing an executive order that ordered a review of the classified documents related to the attack - something 9/11 families, first responders and survivors have demanded.

Former President Barack Obama gives a salute as he enters Saturday's 9/11 ceremony in New York alongside former First Lady Michelle Obama

Bruce Springsteen played 'I'll See You In My Dreams,' after a bell chimed at 9:03 a.m., marking when Flight 175 hit the second World Trade Center tower

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg arrives for ceremonies Saturday marking the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York arrives Saturday at the ceremony marking the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is captured arriving Saturday at Ground Zero

New York police and firefighters hold a US flag as a band plays the National Anthem at the National 9/11 Memorial during a ceremony commemorating the 20th anniversary

An American flag is unfurled at the Pentagon in Washington Saturday to mark the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks

Two bells were rung after each of the names of the victims of the Flight 93 were read aloud during Saturday's 9/11 ceremony in Shanksville, Pennsylvania

READ PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH'S SPEECH IN SHANKSVILLE, PENNSYLVANIA ON THE 20TH ANNIVERSARY OF 9/11 Laura and I are honored to be with you. Madam Vice President, Vice President Cheney. Governor Wolf, Secretary Haaland, and distinguished guests. Twenty years ago, we all found in different ways in different places, but all at the same moment that our lives would be changed forever. The world was loud with carnage and sirens. And then quiet with missing voices that would never be heard again. These lives remain precious to our country and infinitely precious to many of you. Today we remember your loss. We share your sorrow, and we honor the men and women that you have loved for so long and so well. For those too young to recall that clear September day, it is hard to describe the mix of feelings we experienced. There was horror at the scale of destruction and awe at the bravery and kindness that rose to meet it. There was shock at the audacity of evil and gratitude for the heroism and decency that opposed it. In the sacrifice of the first responders, in the mutual aid of strangers, in the solidarity of grief and grace, the actions of an enemy revealed the spirit of a people. And we were proud of our wounded nation. And these memories of passengers and crew of Flight 93 must always have an honored place. Here the intended targets, became the instruments of rescue. And many who are now alive owe a vast unconscious debt to the defiance displayed in the skies above this field. It would be a mistake to idealize the experience of those terrible events. All that many people could initially see was the brute randomness of death. All that many could feel was unearned suffering. All that many could hear was God's terrible silence. There are many who still struggle with a lonely pain that cuts deep within. In those fateful hours we learned other lessons as well. We saw that Americans were vulnerable, but not fragile, that they possess a core of strength that survives the worst that life can bring. We learned that bravery is more common than we imagined. Merging with sudden splendor in the face of death. We vividly felt how every hour with our loved ones was a temporary and holy gift. And we found that even the longest days end. Many of us who've tried to make spiritual sense of these events. There is no simple explanation for the mix of providence and human will that sets the direction of our lives. But comfort can come from a different sort of knowledge. After wandering long and lost in the dark many had found they were actually walking step by step toward grace. As a nation or adjustments had been profound many Americans struggled to understand why an enemy would hate us with such zeal. The security measures incorporated into our lives are both sources of comfort and reminders of our vulnerability. And we have seen growing evidence that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders, but from violence that gathers within. There's little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home, but then there's disdainful pluralism in their disregard for human life. In their determination to defile national symbols they are children of the same foul spirit and it is our continuing duty to confront them. After 911, millions of brave Americans stepped forward and volunteered to serve in the armed forces. The military measures taken over the last 20 years to pursue dangers at their source, have led to debate. But one thing is certain. We owe an assurance who all who have fought our nation's most recent battles. Let me speak directly to veterans and people in uniform. The cause you pursued and the call of duty is the noblest America has to offer. You have shielded your fellow citizens from danger. You have defended the beliefs of your country and advanced the rights of the downtrodden. You have been the face of hope and mercy in dark places. You have been a force of good in the world. Nothing that has followed, nothing, can tarnish your honor or diminish your accomplishments. To you and to the honor of dead, our country is forever grateful. In the weeks and months following the 9/11 attacks, I was proud to lead an amazing, resilient, united people. When it comes to the unity of America, those days seem distant from our own. Malign force seems at work in our common life, that turns every disagreement into an argument. And every argument into a clash of cultures. So much of our politics has become a naked appeal to anger, fear and resentment. That leaves us worried about our nation and our future together. I come without explanations or solutions. I can only tell you what I've seen on America's day of trial and grief, I saw millions of people instinctively grabbed before a neighbor's hand and rally to the cause of one another. That is the America I know. At a time when religious bigotry might have flowed freely, I saw Americans reject prejudice and embrace people of Muslim faith. That is the nation I know. At a time when nativism could have stirred hatred and violence against people perceived as outsiders, I saw America's reaffirm their welcome to immigrants and refugees. That is the nation. I know. At a time when some viewed the rising generation as individualistic and decadent, I saw young people embrace an ethic of service, and rise to selfless action. That is a nation I know. This is not mere nostalgia, it is the truest version of ourselves. It is what we have been and what we can be again. Twenty years ago terrorists chose a random group of Americans on a routine flight to be collateral damage in a spectacular act of terror. The 33 passengers and seven crew of Flight 93 could have been any group of citizens, selected by fate. In a sense, they stood in for us all. The terrorists soon discovered that a random group of Americans is an exceptional group of people. Facing an impossible circumstance, they comforted their loved ones by phone, braced each other for action and defeated the designs of evil. These Americans were brave, strong and united in ways that shocked the terrorists, which should not surprise any of us. This is the nation we know. And whenever we need hope and inspiration, we look to the skies, and remember. God bless. Advertisement

The president had been told by nearly 1,800 Americans impacted by the terror attacks last month not to come to any of the 20th anniversary events unless he declassified documents that potentially show Saudi government links to the September 11, 2001 hijackers.

Biden's order makes no mention of Saudi Arabia.

Bush, who rarely makes public appearances, used his speech to address domestic terrorism. He also told veterans and servicemembers that their sacrifices in the War on Teror weren't for nothing. And the former leader pushed the nation to display the same sort of unity that was present in the days following the September 11, 2001 attacks.

'Many Americans struggled to understand why an enemy would hate us with such zeal,' Bush said. 'The security measure incorporated into our lives are both sources of comfort and reminders of our vulnerability. And we have seen growing evidence that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders but from violence that gathers within.'

The former Republican president noted that there is 'little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home' except for their 'disregard of human life.'

'In their determination to defile national symbols they are children of the same foul spirit and it is our continuing duty to confront them,' Bush said - an apparent refrence to both the 9/11 hijackers and the January 6 Capitol insurrectionists.

Queen Elizabeth sends 'thoughts and prayers' to victims of 'terrible' 9/11 attacks on 20th anniversary as US delegates hold a minute's silence at Windsor Castle In her heartfelt message to President Joe Biden, Queen Elizabeth reflected on her visit to Ground Zero back in 2010. As we mark the 20th anniversary of the terrible attacks on September 11 2001, my thoughts and prayers, and those of my family and the entire nation, remain with the victims, survivors and families affected, as well as the first responders and rescue workers called to duty. 'My visit to the site of the World Trade Center in 2010 is held fast in my memory. 'It reminds me that as we honour those from many nations, faiths and backgrounds who lost their lives, we also pay tribute to the resilience and determination of the communities who joined together to rebuild.' In a defiant message played at a memorial event at the Olympic Park in east London, U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the threat of terrorism remained but people refused to live their lives in 'permanent fear'. 'The fact that we are coming together today - in sorrow but also in faith and resolve - demonstrates the failure of terrorism and the strength of the bonds between us,' Johnson said. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex changed the website of their Archewell Foundation to show rows of victims' names. Advertisement

Bush also aimed to assuage concerns voiced by veterans and servicemembers that their time in Afghanistan was all for naught - with the Taliban quickly taking over the country ahead of President Joe Biden's August 31 messy pull-out.

'One thing is certain, we owe an assurance to all who have fought our nation's most recent battles,' Bush said. 'Let me speak directly to veterans and people in uniform.'

'You have shielded your fellow citizens from danger. You have defended the beliefs of your country and advanced the rights of the downtrodden. You have been the face of hope and mercy in dark places. You have been a force of good in the world,' said the former commander-in-chief.

Nothing that has followed, nothing, can tarnish your honor or diminish your accomplishments,' Bush stated. 'To you and to the honor of dead, our country is forever grateful.'

Bush recalled that in the weeks following the attacks, 'I was proud to lead an amazing, resilient, united people.'

'When it comes to the unity of America, those days seem distant from our own,' he said. 'Malign force seems at work in our common life. That turns every disagreement into an argument and every argument into a clash of cultures.'

'So much of our politics has become a naked appeal to anger, fear and resentment,' he continued. 'That leaves us worried about our nation and our future together.'

Bush said that he had come to Pennsylvania 'without explanations or solutions.'

'I can only tell you what I've seen - on America's day of trial and grief I saw millions of people instinctively grab for a neighbor's hand and rally to the cause of one another. That is the America I know,' Bush said to applause.

'At a time when religious bigotry might have flowed freely, I saw Americans reject prejudice and embrace people of Muslim faith. That is the nation I know,' he said.

'At a time when nativism could have stirred hatred and violence against people perceived as outsiders, I saw Americans reaffirm their welcome to immigrants and refugees. That is the nation I know,' Bush continued.

Bush also defended millennials, who he said were described as 'individualistic and decadent,' saying they embraced an 'ethic of service' and 'selfless action.'

'This is not mere nostalgia - it is the truest version of ourselves,' he said. 'It is what we have been. And what we can be again.'

The Twin Towers are seen on fire minutes after commercial airplanes were crashed into them by Al Qaeda hijackers on September 11, 2001

Saturday's ceremony in New York included a playing of the National Anthem and bells chiming for when each of the four planes crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and finally a field in Somerset, County, Pennsylvania - sparing either the White House or the U.S. Capitol.

Family members read the names of the deceased, giving tributes to husbands, wives, uncles, sisters, brothers and children who were among the 2,977 killed.

Bruce Springsteen played 'I'll See You In My Dreams,' after a bell chimed at 9:03 a.m., marking when Flight 175 hit the second World Trade Center tower.

General Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke at the Pentagon.
A Georgia man who was shot and killed outside a Comfort Inn in Queens by a suspected hitman dressed as a Hasidic Jew had $10,000 in his pocket at the time, police said.

Jermaine Dixon, 46, of St. Albans, was getting into his car in South Ozone Park on Monday morning when the disguised hitman ran up to him and shot him at point-blank range in the back of the head.

Police officials told the New York Post that the gunman had targeted Dixon because he believed the ex-convict, who spent 19 years in jail for murder and drugs charges, was cooperating with law enforcement as an informant and tried to steal the wad of cash without success.

Jermaine Dixon, 46, can be seen walking to his car (top middle in light colored clothing) as the shooter looks under his hood (dressed in black) before he ambushed and shot Dixon as he was getting into his car in Queens, New York. Police said Dixon had been carrying $10,000

Dixon can be seen through the tree limbs unresponsively slumped in the front seat of his car as the shooter runs back to his vehicle and flees

The cold-blooded execution, which was captured by surveillance cameras, took place in broad daylight, less than a year after Dixon, a former gang member, was released from prison after serving 19 years for a murder conviction.

A former member of the Brooklyn 'Patio Crew', named for a Flatbush restaurant where the gang hung out, Dixon served nearly two decades in prison for the 1992 murder of Alphonso Gooden and drug charges, records show.

His brother, Emile Dixon, was also convicted for killing Gooden and is serving a life sentence.

Detectives told NBC that in the weeks leading up to his death, Dixon would look around him whenever he walked from the hotel to his rental car, as if he knew someone was after him.

A spokesperson for the NYPD told DailyMail.com on Friday that so far there have been no updates in the search for the killer, and the investigation was ongoing.

Video obtained by DailyMail.com shows the killer wearing a traditional rekel - a long, black coat - and a wide-brimmed black hat.

The NYPD are looking for a man last seen dressed in all black with a mask and dark skinned

The police are looking for a white Nissan sedan that the killer drove off in

Body of shooting victim Jermaine Dixon is wheeled away after EMTs pronounced he was dead at the scene

The gunman had his trunk, hood and car door open before hunching under the hood as Dixon approached his own car, according the video.

Once Dixon turned his back on the man to open the door of his car, the hitman ran across the street and shot the former 'Patio Crew' gang member in the back of the head, the video showed.

Dixon's body was slumped in the front seat as the man ran back to his car, slammed the hood down and drove away from the scene.

Cops discovered the slain victim around 8 a.m. on South Conduit Avenue in South Ozone Park and Dixon was pronounced dead at the scene.

The NYPD described the killer as a dark-skinned man last seen wearing all black and a mask. They are working to establish whether the killer is a member of the Hasidic community, or if he just donned the clothing as a disguise.

Court documents show that a deal to cooperate with the feds fell apart after prosecutors discovered Dixon was the triggerman in Gooden's murder, the Daily News reported.

Police cordon off scene of fatal shooting where a gunman faked car trouble before executing his victim. The investigation is still on going

Dixon, described as a 'good guy' by mourning family members, became a model prisoner and his life sentence was reduced to a 30 years.

He pursued a bachelor's degree in business and filed for compassionate release, where he took responsibility for his actions and asked for a chance to prove himself, the Daily News reported.

'It is clear that I am not the young man that your honor sentenced 20 years ago,' Dixon wrote to Judge Raymond Dearie. 'I am now asking your honor to again take a chance with me and let me re-enter society to prove to myself, my mother, children, family and also the court that I can and will do the right thing upon release...I blame no one but myself for the road I chose that put me in my current situation. '

His plea was convincing and Dearie said he was compelled to give Dixon a 'chance.'

A spokesperson for the NYPD told DailyMail.com on Friday that so far there have been no updates in the search for the killer, and the investigation was ongoing.
Madrid police arrested a former Venezuelan spymaster wanted on US narcoterrorism charges after capturing him in a hideout apartment in the Spanish city nearly two years after he disappeared.

Gen Hugo Carvajal, nicknamed El Pollo (The Chicken), evaded capture on a US warrant for drug trafficking charges with plastic surgery, wigs, a fake mustache and a new safe house every three months.

He was finally brought to justice Thursday, after a tip-off from a US Drugs Enforcement Agency (DEA) agent about his whereabouts.

The 61-year-old former Venezuelan diplomat and retired general was forced underground a second time in 2019 after Spain's National Court ruled that he should be extradited to New York to face federal charges for working with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) to 'flood' the US with cocaine.

But the two-year manhunt for Carvajal ended Thursday night when police raided a rundown apartment in a quiet Madrid neighborhood. They found the fugitive in a back room holding a sharp knife in what they described as a last desperate attempt to evade arrest.

In a video Spanish National Police officers are seen arresting Hugo 'El Pollo' Carvajal, a former Venezuelan diplomat and retired general, in Madrid on Thursday

Madrid police arrested former Venezuelan spymaster Gen Hugo Carvajal (pictured), nicknamed El Pollo (The Chicken), wanted on US narcoterrorism charges after capturing him in a hideout apartment in the Spanish city nearly two years after he disappeared

The two-year manhunt for Carvajal ended Thursday night when police raided a rundown apartment in a quiet Madrid neighborhood (pictured). They found the fugitive in a back room holding a sharp knife in what they described as a last desperate attempt to evade arrest

Carvajal has been a thorn in the side of the US Drug Enforcement Administration since 2014 when he was arrested in Aruba only to go free after President Nicolas Maduro's government pressured the small Dutch Caribbean island to release him.

The DEA declined to comment but Spanish police said a dog was Carvajal's constant companion in what was otherwise a very lonely, restricted life.

'He changed hideouts every three months, using properties in which he lived cloistered, without going out into the streets, for fear he would be recognized publicly,' police said in a statement.

Steeped in spy craft, he changed phones often and relied on others to deliver food. He breathed fresh air only at night, when he would step onto his apartment's plant-covered balcony in disguise.

After his first arrest he returned to Caracas an anti-imperialist hero but was quickly relegated to a minor role in the ruling socialist party.

Then in 2019 he broke with Maduro amid a wave of antigovernment unrest, urging fellow members of the military to switch allegiance to Juan Guaido, the opposition leader the US had just recognized as Venezuela's legitimate president.

He resurfaced in Europe months later, greeted at Madrid's airport by two Spanish intelligence officers after traveling there with a false passport, The Associated Press previously reported. From there, he had hoped to continue plotting against Maduro.

While on the run he was rumored to be in Portugal, then a hideout in the Caribbean.

Some Venezuelans at the time believed he was already on US soil spilling secrets about the Venezuelan military's involvement in drug trafficking, or had returned to Caracas to make amends with the government he had vowed to overthrow.

Others speculated he was being protected by Spain's leftist government, which has strayed from Americas hardline policy seeking to isolate Maduro.

The reality was much simpler: The Chicken had never left Madrid. His last hideout was a mere 1.5mile from the headquarters of the National Police.

Venezuelans speculated where Carvajal (pictured with wife Angelica Flores and two of their five children) could have been hiding but the reality was much simpler: The Chicken had never left Madrid. His last hideout was a mere 1.5mile from the headquarters of the National Police

The US offered $10million for Carvajal's arrest, repeatedly advertising the reward as bait in the hopes that someone from Carvajal's inner circle would betray him but it's not immediately clear if somebody snitched

'If they actually manage to extradite him this time, it will be a spectacular way to show how justice is winning over diplomacy and intelligence operations,' said Dick Gregorie, a federal prosecutor in Miami who indicted Carvajal on drug charges.

Gregorie compared Carvajal to another spymaster he investigated, former Panamanian strongman Gen Manuel Noriega. Both men, he said, were capable of cutting deals on all sides while scuttling the pursuit of justice.

'He could've been sent here a number of times but for various reasons that are undisclosed he was allowed to go,' said Gregorie, who is now retired.

'But he is probably the most knowledgeable defendant with regards to all of the corruption and dirty deeds that went on in Venezuela for a decade,' he added.

Carvajal's capture was made possible thanks to intelligence provided by the DEA in June, according to a document published Friday by Spain's El Mundo newspaper.

In the two-page confidential letter, Dustin Harmon, a DEA attache in Madrid, provided police with the name and contact details for a Venezuelan woman he said owned and lived in the apartment where Carvajal was hiding.

Special forces with Spain's National Police broke into the apartment on Thursday, where the fugitive's presence had gone unnoticed even by those sharing the 12-story building.

The US offered $10million for Carvajal's arrest, repeatedly advertising the reward as bait in the hopes that someone from Carvajal's inner circle would betray him.

But it's not immediately clear if somebody snitched. His wife Angelica Flores, who lived in Madrid with the couple's five children and other relatives, provided little insight.

'I'm prepared for either situation, the good or the bad,' she told the AP when contacted by phone with the news. 'It's up to him and others to give statements. This case will continue and we'll see how it ends.'

The case against Carvajal in New York centers on a DC-9 jet from Caracas that landed in southern Mexico in 2006 with 5.6 tons of cocaine packed into 128 suitcases.

He faces incriminating evidence from phone records, drug ledgers and the testimony of at least 10 witnesses, among them former members of the so-called 'Cartel of the Suns' comprised of corrupt Venezuelan military officers deep into the narcotics trade, according to an affidavit accompanying the indictment.

The New York indictment also repeats an accusation that Carvajal provided Colombian rebels with automatic weapons and protection inside Venezuela.

Carvajal wrote in a social media post earlier this month: 'It's a lie that will eventually collapse. I've always trusted that the truth will prevail'

'Carvajal is the key link that can explain the business dealings between Colombian guerrillas, Mexican drug cartels and other criminal organizations in the US and Europe,' said Martin Rodil, a Washington-based security consultant for US law enforcement who has worked on multiple Venezuelan investigations.

'He was the hinge between all those groups,' Rodil added but the former general scoffed at the allegations.

He said his contacts with the FARC - designated a terrorist organization by the US - were authorized by Chavez and limited to securing the release of a kidnapped Venezuelan businessman and paving the way for peace talks with the Colombian government.

He also maintains that judicial probes in Venezuela and Mexico never linked him to the cocaine-laden plane and that the aircraft's owner backs his alibi.

The extradition order against Carvajal followed a back-and-forth legal battle in which Spain's National Court reversed an earlier ruling by a high court magistrate throwing out the US warrant for being politically motivated.

In the interim Carvajal was released and fled when he was tipped off he would be rearrested. He wasn't heard from again - except when he said last year that he was going underground to protest what he viewed as political interference in his case.

He resurfaced on social media earlier this month, posting what could be a preview of his eventual defense: A statement accusing former Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, who was for years Americas main caretaker in the war on drugs, of 'fabricating' evidence against him and the Chavez government even as it was cooperating with US prosecutors to arrest Colombian narcos hiding inside Venezuela.

'It's a lie that will eventually collapse,' Carvajal wrote. 'I've always trusted that the truth will prevail.'
Hundreds of pro-Taliban Afghan women attended a lecture at Kabul university today wearing in full-face veils in support of the new regime's hardline policies on gender segregation.

About 300 women - covered head-to-toe in accordance with strict new dress policies for education - waved white Taliban flags as speakers railed against the West and expressed support for the Islamists' policies.

A handful wore blue burqas, which have only a small mesh window to see from, but most wore black niqabs covering most of the face apart from the eyes.

Many also wore black gloves.

Pictured: Afghan students listen to women speakers prior to their pro-Taliban rally outside the Shaheed Rabbani Education University in Kabul, Afghanistan, 11 September 2021

Women's rights in Afghanistan were sharply curtailed under the Taliban's 1996-2001 rule, but since returning to power last month they have claimed they will implement a less extreme rule.

This time, women will be allowed to attend university as long as classes are segregated by sex or at least divided by a curtain, the Taliban's education authority has said.

They must also wear an abaya robe and niqab.

The women, who organisers said were students, listened to a series of speeches at Shaheed Rabbani Education University in the capital, Kabul.

Large Taliban flags flanked the podium, as the female speakers criticised women who have protested across Afghanistan in recent days.

They also defended the new government of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, which has banned demonstrations unless permission is granted by the justice ministry.

Daud Haqqani, director of foreign relations at the education ministry, said the protest was organised by the women, who had asked and been granted permission to demonstrate.

About 300 women - covered head-to-toe in accordance with strict new dress policies for education - waved Taliban flags as speakers (pictured) railed against the West and expressed support for the Islamists' policies

Taliban fighters stand guard outside a hall during a female student gathering before a pro-Taliban rally at the Shaheed Rabbani Education University in Kabul on September 11, 2021

'We are against those women who are protesting on the streets, claiming they are representative of women,' said the first speaker, covered head to toe.

'Is it freedom to like the last government? No, it is not freedom. The last government were misusing women. They were recruiting women just by their beauty,' she claimed.

Some in the audience held babies, who occasionally cried during the speeches, while others were young girls clearly too young for university.

A student named Shabana Omari told the crowd she agreed with the Taliban's policy that women should cover their heads.

'Those not wearing the hijab are harming all of us,' she said, referring to the headscarves worn by many Muslim women.

'The hijab is not an individual thing.'

Some in the audience held babies (pictured), who occasionally cried during the speeches, while others were young girls clearly too young for university

A handful wore blue burqas, which have only a small mesh window to see from, but most wore black niqabs covering most of the face apart from the eyes (pictured)

Omari concluded her speech by leading a chorus of 'Allahu Akbar', or 'God is greatest'.

Another speaker, Somaiya, said history had changed since the Taliban came back.

'After this we will not see 'bihijabi' (people not wearing headscarves),' she said.

'Women will be safe after this. We are supporting our government with all our strength.'

After the speeches in the meeting hall, the women walked in organised lines a short distance on the street outside, holding printed banners and flanked by Taliban soldiers carrying rifles and machine guns.

The public demonstration was in stark contrast with scenes in Kabul and elsewhere earlier in the week, when Taliban fighters fired into the air to disperse a number of protests against their rule, shooting two people dead.

Pictured: Veiled women hold banners and placards while marching during a pro-Taliban rally outside the Shaheed Rabbani Education University in Kabul on September 11, 2021

'Women who left Afghanistan cannot represent us,' one pro-Taliban banner on Saturday read.

'We are satisfied with attitude and behaviour of Mujahideens (Taliban)' read another.

The Taliban say they want to distance themselves from the harsher policies of old, when half the population was excluded from work and education.

Under new rules, women may work 'in accordance with the principles of Islam', the Taliban have decreed, but few details have yet been given as to what that exactly might mean.

Earlier this week, Taliban fighters beat female protesters and opened fire to disperse demonstrators in Kabul - just hours after the Islamists banned rallies.

The militants announced a moratorium on demonstrations 'for the time being' on Wednesday night after the group was humiliated by viral images of women standing up to them.

Footage posted online purported to show Taliban fighters beating female protesters in the streets - with one militant seen striking a woman with a crutch, hitting her on the arm before chasing her away.

Footage posted online purported to show one militant seen striking a woman with a crutch, hitting her on the arm before chasing her away

Taliban fighters were seen beating female protesters and opening fire to disperse them in Kabul hours after the Islamists banned rallies amid a wave of demonstrations

Video also showed armed Islamists brandishing guns chasing women away from a busy road. It came amid reports women defied the Taliban ban on protests, gathering outside the Pakistan Embassy in Kabul until the militants opened fire to disperse the crowd.

Footage showed Taliban in military fatigues preventing demonstrators from gathering and shouting at them to disperse. Gunshots and screams are then heard in the shaky footage, which MailOnline was unable to independently verify, before it hastily ends.

Protest organisers had called off demonstrations after the ban was announced on Wednesday night amid a noticeably stronger armed Taliban presence - including special forces in military fatigues - on the streets of Kabul.

The Islamists have taken a harsh stance to demonstrators - locking a crowd women in a basement to prevent them joining protests and whipping those who made to the rallies this week.

Footage also showed the militants threatening demonstrators with weapons and firing warning shots into the air to forcibly disperse crowds. While harrowing images also emerged of journalists with angry welts and bruises after they were detained by Taliban fighters.

The protests are proving an early test for the Taliban who have seen a show of resistance since taking power on August 15 that was unthinkable under the extremist group's last regime in the 1990s.
The family of a MAGA supporter allegedly shot dead by an Antifa member in Portland are suing the Oregon city for $13m after blaming its 'hands-off' approach to protests for the killing.

Aaron 'Jay' Danielson's family filed the suit in a federal court on Friday, claiming the city and its leaders' negligence contributed to his death, according to OregonLive.com.

It claims that the 'hands-off approach' of dealing with the political demonstrations and counter-protests in 2020 allowed a 'culture of vigilante policing' between civilians and led to Danielson's murder on August 29, 2020.

The lawsuit also accused Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt of being accountable in Danielson's death by publicly announcing that he most likely wouldn't pursue what he considered public order crimes.

'We are seeking justice for the preventable death of a young man, gunned down in a city with a dangerous and deadly hands-off approach to public safety,' Christopher L. Cauble, the attorney for Danielson's estate, said in a statement.

Aaron 'Jay' Danielson, 39, cancelled his 40th birthday plans to go to the pro-Trump rally, according to reports; he was later shot dead in during clashes

Police arrived on the scene 'within a minute' of when gunshots rang out. The victim, later identified as Danielson, is seen wearing a hat with the insignia of Patriot Prayer, a right-wing group whose members have frequently clashed with protesters in Portland in the past

Danielson's friends and family say they do not know why he would have canceled his birthday plans to go camping as he loved nature 'He was not one to start a fight or get loud in somebodys face', one friend said

'City leadership and law enforcement have failed to find an effective response to clashing groups of protesters. For well over a year, they have known when and where these rallies would occur and the likelihood of escalating violence. Yet no strategy of protective intervention has been utilized to this day. This reckless dereliction of duty, cost our client, Aaron Danielson, his life,' the attorney said.

The lawsuit alleges that law enforcement policies fostered an environment where protesters could expect 'a skeletal and passive police presence' leading up to Danielson's death.

It claims that Portland Police Bureau officers were instructed to avoid disputes between opposing political groups .

The estate is seeking $13 million in damages: $1.5 million in economic damages, $1.5 million in non-economic damages and up to $10 million in punitive damages.

Danielson, a supporter of right-wing group Patriot Prayer, was killed in Portland had cancelled his 40th birthday plans to go to the pro-Trump rally, according to reports.

Danielson, 39, is said to have been gunned down just before he got home as Black Lives Matter protesters clashed with Trump supporters who drove in a caravan through the city.

Joey Gibson, the leader of Patriot Prayer, said: 'He loved to go to demonstrations.' But Danielson's friends and family say they do not know why he would have canceled his birthday plans to go camping as he loved nature, The Oregonian reports.

Stephanie Wilcox, 37, told the paper: 'He liked to watch and take videos. He was not one to start a fight or get loud in somebody's face.'

In disturbing footage, recorded by videographer Justin Dunlap, the victim, later identified as Danielson, appears to be following two other people down a street before two gunshots ring out and a cloud of smoke erupts at the source.

The person who appeared to fire the shots and a handful of other people nearby then flee out of view as the victim staggers for a few feet and collapses on the ground.

Street medics and protesters help to treat Danielson, who was shot near a Pro-Trump rally

Michael Forest Reinoehl, the Antifa member under investigation for shooting dead a Trump supporter in Portland, was abusive to his mother and stole from his family, his sister claimed to DailyMail.com

Several people are seen rushing over when a car turns a corner and skids to a stop in front of the victim, Danielson, who Gibson said kept a low profile and was only armed with bear spray, was shot in the chest and died at the scene.

Gibson said Danielson had earlier spent time 'just talking to random BLM supporters' at a pro-police demonstration in Camas the night before.

Michael Forest Reinoehl, 48, was identified by anonymous police sources cited by The Oregonian as the man under investigation for the shooting. No one has been arrested in the case.

Reinoehl is also said to have been at the event in Camas the night before; it is not known if the two men met that night.

He was shot dead by police on September 3 when police surrounded him outside an apartment complex in Lacey, Washington.

In an interview at her Oregon home, Michael's sister April told DailyMail.com her brother had been estranged from their family for three years after stealing medication from their mother who has dementia.

Danielson's friend Chandler Pappas, who was with him on the night he was shot, told The Common Sense Conservative: 'They recognized our Patriot Prayer hats. They executed my partner. They hunted him down.'

Just hours before he was shot in the chest, Danielson and his friend were seen heading downtown to protect a flag-waving caravan of Trump supporters.

They wore hats with the insignia of Patriot Prayer and appeared armed with knives and paintball guns.

'Paint is a defensive mechanism. Paint is not bullets,' Trump said during a White House briefing adding that someone connected with violent protests 'shot a young gentleman and killed him. Not with paint but with a bullet.'

In cellphone video of the shooting, both Danielson and his assailant were seen on a darkened street. At least three shots rang out in a smoky haze, followed by images of Danielson crumpled on the ground as the friend, Chandler Pappas, slaps him in the face and rolls him over, yelling 'Jay! Jay!'

'He was a good man and he was just killed senselessly for no reason other than he believed something different than they do,' Pappas told supporters during a rally. 'He was Christian. He was conservative.'

Added Patriot Prayer founder Joey Gibson on his Facebook page: 'We love Jay and he had such a huge heart. God bless him and the life he lived.'

Luke Carrillo, center, speaks about Aaron Danielson at a news conference after his death

Portland police hold back a man who was friends with Danielson, the victim of Saturday night's fatal shooting, minutes after the incident

What to know about Patriot Prayer as Trump supporters take stand in Portland Since 2016, Patriot Prayer has hosted dozens of pro-gun, pro-Trump rallies in the Pacific Northwest and attendees have repeatedly clashed with left-wing groups in the Portland area. In August, the group's supporters have staged counter-rallies which have sometimes turned violent. Supporters have echoed Trump's characterization of Portland protesters as 'radical anarchists.' Patriot Prayer, founded by right-wing activist Joey Gibson, says it is on a non-violent mission to prevent the United States from becoming a 'Godless, socialist' country, but its opponents accuse it of provoking clashes. The group's rallies have been attended by the Proud Boys and other anti-government extremist groups with records of violence, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. On Sunday, Oregon Governor Kate Brown denounced Patriot Prayer supporters as instigators of the violence. 'The right-wing group Patriot Prayer and self-proclaimed militia members drove into downtown Portland last night, armed and looking for a fight,' Brown said in a statement. 'I will not allow Patriot Prayer and armed white supremacists to bring more bloodshed to our streets.' Gibson denies that the group espouses violence, white supremacy or xenophobia. On local radio this week, he described the shooting victim, Danielson, as a 'very gentle, very courageous' person. Gibson faces felony riot charges stemming from a 2019 clash with left-wing activists outside a pub in Portland to which he has pleaded not guilty. He did not return Reuters' request for comment. Patriot Prayer has some 3,000 members in a private Facebook group and more than 34,000 followers on a public Facebook page. Advertisement

Ex-girlfriend Christine Banks said Danielson didn't discuss politics much but of the weeks-long protests in Portland: 'He didn't think it was right. ... He was there for peace.'

Banks said Danielson was a good person who loved nature and animals.

'If you ask anybody, the one thing theyll remember him by is his goofy, beautiful smile,' she said.

'He cared about what you believed in and not the color of your skin.'

A GoFundMe site said it had raised $33,000 from more than 900 donors for 'legal/lawyer fees, and towards fulfilling all other incurred costs in this time of need.'

Danielson, a burly, bearded man, helped run a company in Portland called North West Specialty Moving that focused on transporting heavy items such as marble statues, hot tubs and gun safes.

The companys address, which is the same address listed for Danielson for two parking violations in 2019, is a modest blue bungalow in a residential neighborhood in southwest Portland.

Luke Carrillo, Danielsons long-time business partner, said they'd been friends for 20 years.

'We have lived and worked together day in and day out,' he told reporters. 'We are like brothers, brothers that chose one another.'

Danielson was associated with another company, Oregon Pro Arms LLC, which according to state records is focused primarily on moving gun safes.

Just hours before the shooting, Pappas stood in a mall parking lot in suburban Clackamas talking to a reporter from the Portland Tribune.

The man next to him who appeared to be Danielson didnt say much, except to make a reference to a journalist who had been attacked last year in Portland.

'Were all about independent journalism,' the man said.

Pappas at one point interjected, referring to the Trump caravan, 'Im here to stop people from assaulting these people.'

Critics have said that instead of keeping the peace, Patriot Prayer has helped incite violence. Last month in nearby Gresham, Pappas showed up to counter a Black Lives Matter event and, according to the Portland Tribune, declared: 'I came here ready for war.'

Portland police have yet to make an arrest, they asked for witnesses and those who had taken video of the scene to contact them.

A small memorial to Danielson took shape Monday on a sidewalk in front of the parking structure where he collapsed. It included four yellow daises tied to a tree, a small American flag flapping in the wind, and a sympathy card with a Bible verse and handwritten note.

'Jay went to Jesus, where will you go?'
Top law firm Boies Schiller Flexner has seen an exodus of dozens of attorneys after staff have taken issue with some of its client base, the founder's son's alleged use of the n-word and his other son's alleged favorable treatment in securing an office design contract, according to a report.

Multiple insiders at Boies Schiller Flexner told CNBC there has been a dramatic exodus of talent from the legal powerhouse due to a series of controversial decisions made by founders David Boies and Jonathan Schiller.

In 2020 alone, the workforce shrank by more than a third, from around 320 attorneys to 200 by the end of the year, including the loss of almost 60 partners, Bloomberg reported.

Last week, the woman thought to have been tapped to become the firm's successor - Natasha Harrison - stood down from her leadership role. She will stay on at the firm at least through the end of 2021. Harrison is based in London, with sources citing the ongoing COVID restrictions on people from the UK visiting the US as the reason for her departure.

Some staffers are said to have been upset over Boies' decision to represent convicted rapist Harvey Weinstein and disgraced Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes, CNBC reported.

Meanwhile, others are said to have taken issue with the way the company dealt with Schiller's two sons.

Sources said staff were left 'horrified' when Josh Schiller, an attorney at the firm, allegedly used the n-word at a company party.

The issue was allegedly raised to the firm's leadership and a member of the management committee demanded an investigation but no one from the party was ever contacted over the incident, reported CNBC.

This January, Josh was also arrested for domestic abuse and put on temporary leave. He has since returned to work at the firm after prosecutors dropped the charges and the law firm's outside investigators cleared him.

Schiller's other son Aaron Schiller, boss of architecture firm Schiller Projects, was also accused by some staffers of being granted special treatment in securing a contract to design the law firm's offices in New York, San Francisco and Washington.

Sources claim that some staff are unhappy with the firm's glittering new Hudson Yards offices in NYC, because its open-plan layout is not conducive to private conversations with clients.

A spokesperson for Boies Schiller told CNBC the two founders were not making all the decisions at the company and that it is the managing partners that oversee the day-to-day running of the firm.

Top law firm Boies Schiller Flexner has lost around 100 attorneys in the space of a year after staff have taken issue with its 'unsavory' client base, the founder's son's alleged use of the N-word and his other son's alleged favorable treatment in securing an office design contract, according to a report. Founders David Boies (left) and Jonathan Schiller (right)

Some people were driven to quit over Boies' decision to represent convicted rapist Harvey Weinstein (left) and disgraced Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes (right), the insiders said

Matt Schwartz, one of four new co-managing partners at Boies Schiller, said the founders are 'part of' discussions about deals with outside vendors but are far from 'running everything.'

'David and Jonathan are on the executive committee. Of course they are part of those discussions,' said Schwartz.

'They hold the titles of managing partners and are an important resource for us. But truly and honestly in every way the four new managing partners of Natasha [Harrison], Sigrid, Alan and myself run the day-to-day operations at this firm and we do so under the guidance and oversight of the executive committee.

'Whoever is telling you that the founding partners are running everything is wrong.

'The short answer is if I want to know how much money we are paying for any particular vendor or item, yes, that is something that is knowable.'

Boies Schiller was founded by Boies and Schiller in 1997, before becoming one of America's largest law firms.

That year, Boies was hired to represent the US government in its high-profile antitrust case against software giant Microsoft.

Boies then famously represented then-Vice President Al Gore in his Supreme Court battle over the 2000 presidential election recount.

Since then, the company has represented some of the biggest corporations including Facebook and American Express and high-profile clients including Weinstein, Holmes and Jeffrey Epstein victims including Virginia Roberts.

Insiders told CNBC that the firm's ties to Weinstein and Holmes had pushed several employees to leave.

Others are said to have taken issue with the way the company dealt with Schiller's two sons. Sources said staff were left 'horrified' when Josh Schiller (pictured), an attorney at the firm, allegedly used the n-word at a company party

This January, Josh was also arrested for domestic abuse and put on temporary leave. He has since returned to work at the firm after prosecutors dropped the charges and the law firm's outside investigators cleared him. Josh with wife Melissa Siebel Schiller in 2007

The jury at Weinstein's 2020 rape trial heard testimony from a lawyer at the firm admitting it had previously acted as a go-between helping the disgraced media mogul hire private investigation firm Black Cube.

He did so to try to squash a damning 2017 New York Times report which revealed Weinstein had paid off multiple women to make their sexual harassment allegations go away.

The report was released and ultimately led to Weinstein's downfall and the #MeToo movement.

Weinstein was found guilty of rape and sexual assault in 2020 and sentenced to 23 years in prison.

Weinstein is now facing fresh sex-related charges in Los Angeles.

Boies also admitted to contracting Black Cube on Weinstein's behalf.

Insiders told CNBC a group of employees raised concerns about Boies' work with Weinstein with a member of the management committee.

Then, several staff members also confronted Boies at a private retreat in 2017.

Boies admitted in a 2018 interview that he has made mistakes but was just doing his job.

Boies Schiller told CNBC in a statement: 'Retaining Black Cube for Weinstein was a serious mistake as David has, himself, said. We have since implemented procedures ensuring that never happens again.

A spokesperson for Boies Schiller told CNBC the two founders were not making all the decisions at the company and that it is the managing partners that oversee the day-to-day running of the firm. David Boies pictured

'Having said that, I don't believe there is another firm where you can consistently do well while doing good at the scale and level we have historically done that and continue to today.'

Boies also previously represented Holmes in her dispute with the Wall Street Journal over its plans to release its damning expose on Theranos.

Despite efforts to quash the story, it was released.

Holmes is currently on trial accused of defrauding investors and customers in her medical company Theranos by falsely claiming to have developed technology that could run a wide range of health tests on a single drop of blood.

Her trial was put on pause Friday just three days after it began after a juror came in contact with someone who tested positive for COVID-19.

As well as the 'unsavory' clients, several employees are said to have quit after being unhappy with its handling of issues with Josh Schiller, reported CNBC.

Josh allegedly tried to imitate a joke by black comedian Dave Chapelle comparing the use of the n-word to a homophobic slur while at a party hosted by then-partner Susan Estrich.

He later allegedly claimed it was a joke, a source told CNBC.

The incident is said to have left many staffers 'horrified' and Estrich sent a memo to leadership calling it inappropriate. She later left the firm.

Harrison was also allegedly unimpressed with the company's treatment of Josh - which was topped off by the domestic abuse allegations leveled against him in January, reported CNBC.

Weinstein in court during a pre-trial hearing in July after being extradited from New York to Los Angeles to face sex-related charges in California

Josh is married to California Governor Gavin Newsom's sister-in-law Melissa Siebel Schiller, whose sister is Newsom's wife Jennifer.

Sources told CNBC several leaders were also unhappy that they weren't consulted about Josh's brother Aaron being awarded work on the company's new offices.

Schwartz told CNBC that Schiller was not responsible for deciding to give the work to his son's company.

'It was made by other members of the firm management and was the process of competitive bidding,' Schwartz said.

Harrison, who was seen to be next-in-line to lead the company, announced last week she was stepping down from her role as deputy chair.

This means she will no longer be able to be appointed to chair.

While she told CNBC she is 'not in discussions with any other law firms, nor do I plan to enter into discussions with any other law firms, and any suggestion to the contrary is false,' insiders said she could be leaving the firm soon.

Several sources said there have been concerns for some time around who will succeed the founders, citing a lack of succession planning in place.

Schwartz told CNBC he did not know of any plans for the founders retiring yet and insisted the law firm is 'now run by a group of people that is much broader than the founding partners.'

'The day to day is run exclusively by the four new managing partners, with guidance from, but not control by, the founding partners. That is the succession plan in action,' he said.

A spokesman for Boies Schiller Flexner said: 'The Daily Mail is rehashing an article that purports to break new ground while relying solely on anonymous sources complaining about topics that have been covered ad nauseam for more than a year.

'Printing a story today that our firm reduced its headcount in 2020, while positioning it as breaking news, is grossly unfair  although perhaps not as unfair as giving our firm 17 minutes on a Saturday morning to provide a statement before posting a pre-written story online.'
California Governor and #MeToo champion Gavin Newsom accepted an expensive bottle of wine from the lawyer hired to represent Harvey Weinstein and dig up dirt on the women who accused him of sexual assault.

Democratic superlawyer David Boies gave Newsom the $300 bottle of wine weeks after Boies led a smear campaign against Weinstein's accusers, according to the Washington Free Beacon.

Boies helps run prestigious law firm Boies Schiller Flexner, which has also hit the headlines this weekend over a raft of staff departures linked to its work with Weinstein, Theranos founder Elizabeth Smart, and claims of nepotism linked to co-founder Jonathan Schiller's two sons. The firm has denied claims of impropriety.

While others cut ties with Boies because of his work with the disgraced Hollywood producer, Newsom accepted the pricey gift on December 8, 2017, more than a month after reports revealed the lawyer worked to discredit Weinstein's alleged victims.

The gift is set to reignite accusations that Newsom's wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom, helped Boies try to squash negative stories about Weinstein.

California Governor and #MeToo champion Gavin Newsom (left) accepted a $300 bottle of wine as a gift from Democratic superlawyer hired to represent Harvey Weinstein, David Boies (right), weeks after reports that the lawyer worked to discredit Weinstein's alleged victims

David Boies (pictured right with Harvey Weinstein in 2002) was hired to represent the disgraced Hollywood producer and dig up dirt on the women who accused him of sexual assault

The gift will surely fuel accusations that Newsom's wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom (right), helped Boies try to squash negative stories about Weinstein

Meanwhile, in the closing days of Newsom's recall election - which ends on Tuesday - actress Rose McGowan, one of Weinstein's alleged assault victims, told Dave Rubin on his show The Rubin Report that Newsom's wife Jennifer called her back in 2017 to try and broker a deal between her and Boies to make the story go away.

'This is about six months before the New York Times article on Weinstein that I set up broke,' McGowan told Rubin.

Weinstein is pictured in 2016, the year before he was brought down by the #MeToo scandal and faced 11 additional sex crimes while already serving 23 years in New York

She added: 'And she called me on behalf of a Theranos board member... long-time lawyer of Hillary and Bill Clinton and Weinstein, one David Boies. So this woman... some blonde lady with the last name of Newsom, cold calls me and is like, "David Boies wants to know what it would take to make you happy."

'I don't know if it would be fiscal numeration. I don't know. Absolutely nothing would make me happy.'

Despite McGowan's allegations, Jennifer herself accused Weinstein of behaving inappropriately with her at a film festival years before the allegations against the 69-year-old came to light.

'I was naive, new to the industry, and didnt know how to deal with his aggressive advances,' she penned in a column for the Huffington Post, which also slammed 'the entire engine of Harvey Weinstein's business and legal machines' for working to silence victims.

Two months later Newsom accepted the bottle of wine.

Jennifer also championed the #MeToo movement along with her husband, who has claimed to be a dedicated ally.

Newsom called it 'a cultural movement, not a political movement' while campaigning in Sacramento in 2018, though he was at the center of his own sex scandal as mayor of San Francisco.

Actress Rose McGowan (pictured), one of Weinstein's alleged assault victims, told Dave Rubin on his show The Rubin Report that Jennifer called her back in 2017 to try and broker a deal between her and Boies to make the story go away

A decade after the affair the now-governor is up for recall after the petition to remove him from office. The recall election ends Tuesday, September 14

David Boies wants to know what it would take to make you happy@rosemcgowan tells me that Gavin Newsoms wife Jennifer called her on behalf of Harvey Weinsteins lawyer six months before the Weinstein scandal broke to make the story go away. pic.twitter.com/IG99Pb6tvl  Dave Rubin (@RubinReport) September 9, 2021

He admitted to having an affair in February 2007 when he separated from his first wife Kimberly Guilfoyle with his subordinate Ruby Rippey-Tourk, who was also the wife of his chief campaign advisor.

Rippey-Tourk worked as Newsoms appointment secretary. Her husband, Alex Tourk, resigned from Newsoms campaign after he found out about their relationship.

Guilfoyle went on to become a Fox News host, and is now in a relationship with Donald Trump Jr.

Newsom said of the affair in Sacramento: 'I acknowledged it. I apologized for it. I learned an enormous amount from it. We were very open and honest about it... And I am, every day, trying to be a champion and a model.'

A decade after the affair the now-governor is up for recall after the petition to remove him from office following 'laws he endorsed favor foreign nationals, in our country illegally, over that of our own citizens...the highest taxes in the nation, the highest homelessness rates and the lowest quality of life as a result,' according to the petitioners' grievances.

'He has imposed sanctuary state status and fails to enforce immigration laws. He unilaterally over-ruled the will of the people regarding the death penalty. He seeks to impose additional burdens on our state by the following; removing the protections of Proposition 13, rationing our water use, increasing taxes and restricting parental rights,' it added.

People behind the recall effort have slated Newsom over the Golden State's draconian COVID restrictions, which went on longer than any other US state.

He outraged voters after dining inside at the ultra-exclusive French Laundry restaurant in November 2020, while urging Californians to stay out of restaurants.

And Newsom faced further accusations of being an out-of-touch hypocrite after admitting his kids had returned to in-person lessons at their private school in October 2020, while many Californian public school districts refused to do so.

Newsom has raised $70 million for his campaign, and is widely expected to survive the September 14 recall effort.

Republican challenger Larry Elder, who has pledged to take a far more libertarian attitude to governing should he win, is the candidate seen as the most likely to unseat Newsom should the polls prove wrong.
Ray DeMonia, 73, of Cullman, Alabama

An Alabama man died of heart failure after being turned away from 43 hospitals across three southern states that were overrun with COVID patients.

Ray DeMonia, 73, was eventually admitted to a hospital in Meridian, Mississippi, 200 miles away from his home in Cullman, Alabama, but was too sick to save, and died on September 1.

DeMonia, who ran an antiquing business for 40 years, had suffered a heart incident just days before his birthday and needed a specialized cardiac ICU bed.

His family said that staff at their local hospital had contacted 43 hospitals across three states asking for a free bed before they finally located on in Meridian, Mississippi, according to DeMonia's obituary.

He died shortly after arriving at the Rush Foundation Hospital.

'In honor of Ray, please get vaccinated if you have not, in an effort to free up resources for non-COVID-related emergencies,' his obit read.

DeMonia's death came on the same day the US reported 180,000 new COVID cases, with a majority concentrated in the South.

COVID-19 Hospitalizations saw a dramatic spike in August in Alabama and the rest of the US

Alabama has been trailing behind in vaccination rates, with the state only recently reporting that about 50% of its eligible population has received at least one dose

The Alabama Health Department recently reported that just over half of those eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine have gotten at least one jab.

That falls well short of the national average of 63.7 per cent who've had at least one dose, and 54 per cent of Americans who are fully-vaccinated.

During the week of DeMonia's death, Alabama reported a shortage of ICU hospital beds, with more than half of them being occupied by COVID-19 patients, CBS 42 reported.

The Alabama Hospital Association had called the situation 'dire.'

'We're certainly not trending in the right direction,' AHA Deputy Director Danne Howard told CBS the day DeMonia died.

'That's why we're so aggressively trying to find additional resources, so those decisions don't have to be made, so those type of life-or-death situations are not something that have to be faced.'

Johns Hopkins University & Medicine found that Alabama ICU beds were at 103% capacity that week, and the Montgomery Advertiser reported that unvaccinated patients continue to make up the majority of COVID-19 patients in the ICUs.

DeMonia's family have asked others to get vaccinated to avoid the situation they went through. Pictured, a woman getting vaccinated in Altamonte Springs, Florida, in August

Russell Griffin, a professor of epidemiology at University of Alabama Birmingham who has studied patients hospitalized at the university's hospital for COVID, said 61 of 66 patients in intensive care for COVID were unvaccinated.

He added that the about half of the vaccinated patients in the ICUs are there because they are immunocompromised due to organ transplants or chemotherapies.

By comparison, the unvaccinated population that ends up in ICU generally lacks comorbidities, or the presence of two or more medical conditions.

'There have been no deaths under the age of 65 in the vaccinated population at UAB,' Griffin said.

On Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported more than 163,000 new cases in the U.S., and nearly 1,650 new deaths.

More than 75% of adults eligible for the vaccine in the U.S. have gotten at least one jab, according to the CDC.
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Former President George W. Bush used his 9/11 anniversary speech in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, Saturday to condemn 'violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home,' calling them 'children of the same foul spirit.'

Bush also used his address to tell veterans and servicemembers that their sacrifices in the War on Terror weren't for nothing and pushed the nation to display the same sort of unity that was present in the days after September 11 2001.

'Many Americans struggled to understand why an enemy would hate us with such zeal,' Bush said.

'The security measures incorporated into our lives are both sources of comfort and reminders of our vulnerability.

'And we have seen growing evidence that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders but from violence that gathers within.'

The former president said there is 'little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home' except for their 'disregard of human life.'

'In their determination to defile national symbols they are children of the same foul spirit and it is our continuing duty to confront them,' Bush said - an apparent reference to both the 9/11 hijackers and the January 6 Capitol rioters.

Bush, who was less than one year into his presidency when 2,977 Americans were killed in the terrorist attacks, addressed victims' family members Saturday morning to mark the 20th anniversary of the horrific day.

The former Republican president was joined by Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, where Flight 93 crashed after brave passengers and crew members on board tried to take the plane back from the terrorists on route to Washington DC.

All 40 passengers and crew died when the plane went down as they thwarted the attack on the terrorists' suspected target of either the White House or the US Capitol.

Former President George W. Bush used his 9/11 anniversary speech in Shanksville, Pennsylvania , Saturday to condemn 'violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home,' calling them 'children of the same foul spirit.'

Former First Lady Laura Bush (left) and former President George W. Bush hold hands prior to his speech Saturday in Shanksville, Pennsylvania

The One World Trade Center is seen Saturday during the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks in New York City

Bush paid tribute to the people on board Flight 93 and said many people now alive 'owe a vast unconscious debt' to them.

'Twenty years ago, terrorists chose a random group of Americans on a routine flight to be collateral damage in a spectacular act of terror,' said Bush.

'The 33 passengers and seven crew of Flight 93 could have been any group of citizens selected by fate. In a sense, they stood in for us all.'

He continued: 'Here the intended target became the instruments of rescue and many who are now alive owe a vast unconscious debt to the defiance displayed in the skies above this field.'

Bush also aimed to assuage concerns voiced by veterans and servicemembers that their time in Afghanistan was in vain - after the Taliban quickly took control of the country ahead of President Joe Biden's August 31 chaotic withdrawal.

'One thing is certain, we owe an assurance to all who have fought our nation's most recent battles,' Bush said. 'Let me speak directly to veterans and people in uniform.'

'You have shielded your fellow citizens from danger. You have defended the beliefs of your country and advanced the rights of the downtrodden.

'You have been the face of hope and mercy in dark places. You have been a force of good in the world,' said the former commander-in-chief.

'Nothing that has followed, nothing, can tarnish your honor or diminish your accomplishments,' Bush stated. 'To you and to the honor of dead, our country is forever grateful.'

Bush recalled that in the weeks following the attacks 'I was proud to lead an amazing, resilient, united people.'

'When it comes to the unity of America, those days seem distant from our own,' he said.

'Malign force seems at work in our common life. That turns every disagreement into an argument and every argument into a clash of cultures.'

'So much of our politics has become a naked appeal to anger, fear and resentment,' he continued. 'That leaves us worried about our nation and our future together.'

Bush said that he had come to Pennsylvania 'without explanations or solutions.'

George W. Bush and Laura Bush put their hands on their hearts as they say a prayer during the 9/11 commemoration ceremony

Bush also used his address to tell veterans and servicemembers that their sacrifices in the War on Terror weren't for nothing and pushed the nation to display the same sort of unity that was present in the days after September 11 2001

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden lay a wreath at the Wall of Names during a visit to the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville

'I can only tell you what I've seen - on America's day of trial and grief I saw millions of people instinctively grab for a neighbor's hand and rally to the cause of one another. That is the America I know,' Bush said to applause.

'At a time when religious bigotry might have flowed freely, I saw Americans reject prejudice and embrace people of Muslim faith. That is the nation I know,' he said.

'At a time when nativism could have stirred hatred and violence against people perceived as outsiders, I saw Americans reaffirm their welcome to immigrants and refugees. That is the nation I know,' Bush continued.

Bush also defended millennials, who he said were described as 'individualistic and decadent,' saying they embraced an 'ethic of service' and 'selfless action.'

'This is not mere nostalgia - it is the truest version of ourselves,' he said. 'It is what we have been. And what we can be again.'

Later when he visited Shanksville, President Joe Biden had high praise for Bush's remarks.

'I thought that President Bush made a really good speech today,' Biden said. 'Genuinely good speech, about who we are. The core of who we are is not divided.'

Harris also addressed the survivors and victims' families gathered, in Shanksville, calling on Americans to remember the 'unity' that came out of the tragedy two decades ago.

The vice president said such unity is 'essential to our shared prosperity, our national security, and to our standing in the world.'

'On the days that followed September 11th, 2001, we were all reminded that unity is possible in America. We were reminded, too, that unity is imperative in America.

'It is essential to our shared prosperity, our national security, and to our standing in the world,' Harris said.

President Joe Biden gazes upward as he attends Saturday's 9/11 memorial ceremony alongside Dr. Jill Biden, the Clintons, the Obamas and other elected officials

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden depart New York City Saturday en route to Shanksville, Pennsylvania where the president will lay a wreath to mark the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks

From left: Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, President Joe Biden, First Lady Jill Biden, Michael Bloomberg, Diana Taylor, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer place their hands on their hearts at the beginning of the 9/11 ceremony

READ PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH'S SPEECH IN SHANKSVILLE, PENNSYLVANIA ON THE 20TH ANNIVERSARY OF 9/11 Laura and I are honored to be with you. Madam Vice President, Vice President Cheney. Governor Wolf, Secretary Haaland, and distinguished guests. Twenty years ago, we all found in different ways in different places, but all at the same moment that our lives would be changed forever. The world was loud with carnage and sirens. And then quiet with missing voices that would never be heard again. These lives remain precious to our country and infinitely precious to many of you. Today we remember your loss. We share your sorrow, and we honor the men and women that you have loved for so long and so well. For those too young to recall that clear September day, it is hard to describe the mix of feelings we experienced. There was horror at the scale of destruction and awe at the bravery and kindness that rose to meet it. There was shock at the audacity of evil and gratitude for the heroism and decency that opposed it. In the sacrifice of the first responders, in the mutual aid of strangers, in the solidarity of grief and grace, the actions of an enemy revealed the spirit of a people. And we were proud of our wounded nation. And these memories of passengers and crew of Flight 93 must always have an honored place. Here the intended targets, became the instruments of rescue. And many who are now alive owe a vast unconscious debt to the defiance displayed in the skies above this field. It would be a mistake to idealize the experience of those terrible events. All that many people could initially see was the brute randomness of death. All that many could feel was unearned suffering. All that many could hear was God's terrible silence. There are many who still struggle with a lonely pain that cuts deep within. In those fateful hours we learned other lessons as well. We saw that Americans were vulnerable, but not fragile, that they possess a core of strength that survives the worst that life can bring. We learned that bravery is more common than we imagined. Merging with sudden splendor in the face of death. We vividly felt how every hour with our loved ones was a temporary and holy gift. And we found that even the longest days end. Many of us who've tried to make spiritual sense of these events. There is no simple explanation for the mix of providence and human will that sets the direction of our lives. But comfort can come from a different sort of knowledge. After wandering long and lost in the dark many had found they were actually walking step by step toward grace. As a nation or adjustments had been profound many Americans struggled to understand why an enemy would hate us with such zeal. The security measures incorporated into our lives are both sources of comfort and reminders of our vulnerability. And we have seen growing evidence that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders, but from violence that gathers within. There's little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home, but then there's disdainful pluralism in their disregard for human life. In their determination to defile national symbols they are children of the same foul spirit and it is our continuing duty to confront them. After 911, millions of brave Americans stepped forward and volunteered to serve in the armed forces. The military measures taken over the last 20 years to pursue dangers at their source, have led to debate. But one thing is certain. We owe an assurance who all who have fought our nation's most recent battles. Let me speak directly to veterans and people in uniform. The cause you pursued and the call of duty is the noblest America has to offer. You have shielded your fellow citizens from danger. You have defended the beliefs of your country and advanced the rights of the downtrodden. You have been the face of hope and mercy in dark places. You have been a force of good in the world. Nothing that has followed, nothing, can tarnish your honor or diminish your accomplishments. To you and to the honor of dead, our country is forever grateful. In the weeks and months following the 9/11 attacks, I was proud to lead an amazing, resilient, united people. When it comes to the unity of America, those days seem distant from our own. Malign force seems at work in our common life, that turns every disagreement into an argument. And every argument into a clash of cultures. So much of our politics has become a naked appeal to anger, fear and resentment. That leaves us worried about our nation and our future together. I come without explanations or solutions. I can only tell you what I've seen on America's day of trial and grief, I saw millions of people instinctively grabbed before a neighbor's hand and rally to the cause of one another. That is the America I know. At a time when religious bigotry might have flowed freely, I saw Americans reject prejudice and embrace people of Muslim faith. That is the nation I know. At a time when nativism could have stirred hatred and violence against people perceived as outsiders, I saw America's reaffirm their welcome to immigrants and refugees. That is the nation. I know. At a time when some viewed the rising generation as individualistic and decadent, I saw young people embrace an ethic of service, and rise to selfless action. That is a nation I know. This is not mere nostalgia, it is the truest version of ourselves. It is what we have been and what we can be again. Twenty years ago terrorists chose a random group of Americans on a routine flight to be collateral damage in a spectacular act of terror. The 33 passengers and seven crew of Flight 93 could have been any group of citizens, selected by fate. In a sense, they stood in for us all. The terrorists soon discovered that a random group of Americans is an exceptional group of people. Facing an impossible circumstance, they comforted their loved ones by phone, braced each other for action and defeated the designs of evil. These Americans were brave, strong and united in ways that shocked the terrorists, which should not surprise any of us. This is the nation we know. And whenever we need hope and inspiration, we look to the skies, and remember. God bless. Advertisement

During Bush's speech, President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden were headed for Shanksville.

They lay a wreath at the Wall of Names during their visit to the Flight 93 National Memorial.

Biden will now head to the Pentagon as he visits all three sites of the terrorist attacks Saturday. Harris will join the president at the Pentagon.

Biden and the first lady first attended the New York City ceremony at Ground Zero earlier Saturday.

There, they filed into the event with former President Barack Obama and Bill Clinton and former first ladies Michelle Obama and ex-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Biden didn't speak at the ceremony in New York - as he chose to release a video Friday sharing his reflections instead.

Members of Congress, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, also attended the New York memorial service.

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden arrive at the National September 11 Memorial in New York on Saturday

President Joe Biden is captured pulling down his mask to greet someone at Saturday's 9/11 memorial ceremony in New York

Former President George W. Bush (right) and former First Lady Laura Bush attended the memorial service Saturday in Shanksville, Pennsylvania

Vice President Kamala Harris (left) arrives at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania with her husband Doug Emhoff (center left) and Interior Secretary Deb Haaland (center right)

Meanwhile, Donald Trump is the only surviving US president not expected to attend one of the official ceremonies.

Trump said on Fox News on Friday he will travel to Ground Zero to mark the attacks' 20th anniversary, but didn't specify timing.

He didn't run into Biden on Saturday.

Trump's ex-attorney, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani - who was mayor during the attacks - attended the Ground Zero ceremony.

Giuliani was among the high-profile Trump allies who pushed the so-called 'big lie' - that Biden wasn't the legitimate winner of the 2020 election.

Trump sent out a statement complimenting Giuliani Saturday morning.

'Congratulations to Rudy Giuliani (for the 20th time!), the greatest Mayor in the history of New York City, for having shown such leadership and doing such an incredible job during and after the attack on our Nation!' the ex-president said.

Biden avoided some additional awkwardness at Saturday's ceremony by signing an executive order that ordered a review of the classified documents related to the attack - something 9/11 families, first responders and survivors have demanded.

Former President Barack Obama gives a salute as he enters Saturday's 9/11 ceremony in New York alongside former First Lady Michelle Obama

Bruce Springsteen played 'I'll See You In My Dreams,' after a bell chimed at 9:03 a.m., marking when Flight 175 hit the second World Trade Center tower

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg arrives for ceremonies Saturday marking the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York arrives Saturday at the ceremony marking the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is captured arriving Saturday at Ground Zero

New York police and firefighters hold a US flag as a band plays the National Anthem at the National 9/11 Memorial during a ceremony commemorating the 20th anniversary

An American flag is unfurled at the Pentagon in Washington Saturday to mark the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks

Two bells were rung after each of the names of the victims of the Flight 93 were read aloud during Saturday's 9/11 ceremony in Shanksville, Pennsylvania

The president had been told by nearly 1,800 Americans impacted by the terror attacks last month not to come to any of the 20th anniversary events unless he declassified documents that potentially show Saudi government links to the September 11, 2001 hijackers.

Biden's order makes no mention of Saudi Arabia.

'When I ran for president, I made a commitment to ensuring transparency regarding the declassification of documents on the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on America,' Biden said in a statement.

'As we approach the 20th anniversary of that tragic day, I am honoring that commitment.'

'Today, I signed an executive order directing the Department of Justice and other relevant agencies to oversee a declassification review of documents related to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's September 11th investigations.

'The executive order requires the Attorney General to release the declassified documents publicly over the next six months,' Biden said in a statement last Friday.

The Twin Towers are seen on fire minutes after commercial airplanes were crashed into them by Al Qaeda hijackers on September 11, 2001

Saturday's ceremony in New York included a playing of the National Anthem and bells chiming for when each of the four planes crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and finally a field in Somerset, County, Pennsylvania - sparing either the White House or the US Capitol.

Family members read the names of the deceased, giving tributes to husbands, wives, uncles, sisters, brothers and children who were among the 2,977 killed.

Bruce Springsteen played 'I'll See You In My Dreams,' after a bell chimed at 9:03am, marking when Flight 175 hit the second World Trade Center tower.

General Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke at the Pentagon.
A man was trapped in broken elevator at a run-down Manhattan homeless shelter run by ex-New York governor Andrew Cuomo's sister for four days before he was rescued by the FDNY.

The trapped man, who has yet to be identified, was severely dehydrated when he was rescued and was rushed to Harlem Hospital, according to the New York Post.

He was released from the hospital around 10am Sunday after the serious but not life-threatening condition.

The ordeal took place at HELP Meyer Mental Health +Shelter located at 600 East 125th Street on Wards Island, which the city pays more than $5,300 for each man it houses in 95 dorm-style rooms, which can hold up to 200 men.

The shelter is one of 24 operated by HELP USA, a nonprofit organization that grew out of one funded by ex-Gov Cuomo in 1986. It has been headed by his sister Maria Cuomo Cole since 1993.

An unidentified man was trapped in broken elevator for four days at run-down Manhattan homeless shelter HELP Meyer Mental Health +Shelter (pictured) located on Wards Island. The city pays more than $5,300 monthly to operate and house 200 single men in 95 dorm-style rooms

HELP USA has a five-year, $63.7million contract with the city Department of Homeless Services to manage HELP Meyer through June 2023, according to the city comptroller's website.

But shelter residents filed as many as 11 complaints on the faulty elevators with little to no response, the NY Post reported, and said the elevators are constantly out of order.

This HELP USA location was not listed as an offering on the organization's website with the other housing developments.

Resident Horace Clay, 45, said he's been forced to wait hours for an elevator to leave his room on the sixth floor where he lives.

Clay told the NY Post: 'I have osteoarthritis in my hips and I have always had issues with these elevators, which is a safety issue for me. I cannot do the stairs.

'You can call 311, make all the complaints you want but they dont get things done here.'

The shelter is headed by ex-New York governor Andrew Cuomo's sister Maria Cuomo Cole (pictured) and has a five-year, $63.7million contract with the city Department of Homeless Services to manage HELP Meyer through June 2023

Fellow resident Alex Silvagnoli, 55, added: 'At least once a day youre forced to use the stairs because the elevators dont come.

'There are people in here with wheelchairs. How are they going to get out in an emergency with no elevators?'

A HELP USA spokesman blamed the issues at the troubled shelter on the state Office of Mental Health (OMH).

They claimed the state agency - which leases the space for the shelter on the sixth, seventh and eighth floors of the state-owned building - is 'responsible for elevator maintenance' and responding to distress calls.

OMH told the NY Post it was 'not advised that the maintenance company was servicing the elevator or taking it off-line on the date in question' and declined to comment further.

The scandal emerged a month after Andrew Cuomo announced his resignation after New York Attorney General Letitia James published an investigation accusing him of sexually harassing 11 different women.

He denies those allegations, and has since been replaced as New York Governor by his former Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul.
As chilling reports of beheadings and beatings come out of Afghanistan, the Taliban are continuing to insist the new regime has changed from when it was last in power.

Speaking on the BBC's Today Programme, Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen said that after 20 years of fighting, the new leaders of Afghanistan wanted to build a 'welfare state' for its people.

'We are the people of Afghanistan', Suhail said on Saturday, while insisting that violence 'is not their policy' and that women 'have their basic rights'.

Meanwhile, war-weary residents of Kabul expressed anger and feelings of betrayal by the United States as the world marked the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks that prompted a U.S. invasion of Afghanistan toppling of its Taliban rulers at the time.

But after a two-decade occupation, U.S. forces abruptly pulled out of Afghanistan last month, triggering the collapse of its Western-backed government and the Taliban's dramatic return to power.

The group claims they have changed from 20 years ago, and intend to build a new country for its people. On the ground reports, however, paint a different picture.

Pictured: Taliban forces stand guard at a roadside Afghan women hold placards during a pro-Taliban rally outside the Shaheed Rabbani Education University in Kabul, Afghanistan, 11 September 2021

'We are the people of Afghanistan,' Shaheen told the BBC. 'Many of us were doing the jihad, the resistance, against then Soviet union and now the 20 year occupation by the US and allies.

'Now, we are focusing on lifting the lives of our people, the construction of Afghanistan, creating jobs for our people, building a welfare state, he continied.

'If I compare it to the past, we had a domestic war, fighting. But now we are focusing more on our economic activities, on creating jobs, expanding education, other needs of the people.'

But despite the Taliban's insistence that they have changed since they were last in power from 1996 to 2001 - when women and girls were denied equal rights under strict Sharia law, television was banned and music was forbidden - reports from the country suggest otherwise.

A video obtained by the Washington Examiner on Saturday showed Taliban fighters beheaded an Afghan soldier before singing as they held the severed head of the victim aloft by his hair.

Other footage has shown militants beating and whipping people on the streets as reports emerged of targeted killings and fighters going door-to-door searching for blue US passports.

While harrowing images also emerged of journalists with angry welts and bruises after they were detained by Taliban fighters.

Responding to questions about the violence shown by the Taliban, Shaheen said: 'Violence is not the official policy. If everyone wants to have a demonstration they should get permission from the minister interior and state the demonstration will take place.'

He added that those who wish to organise protests must get official permission from the interior ministry.

'With no freedom of speech we go into a dictatorship which is against the rules of Islam,' he said. 'But we do not want a chaotic situation to be brought and we had some ISIS people posing at demonstrations trying to get into the presidential palace and explode themselves.'

With regards to the reported attacks on journalists, Shaheen said that any such attacks in the future would investigated.

Speaking on the BBC's Today Programme, Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen (pictured in March earlier this year) said that after 20 years of fighting, the new leaders of Afghanistan wanted to build a 'welfare state' for its people

'With the passage of time we will legislate about journalists' freedom of speech so they can work peacefully. These incidents will be investigated.'

Earlier this week, Taliban fighters were seen to beat female protesters and opened fire to disperse demonstrators in Kabul - just hours after the Islamists banned rallies.

The militants announced a moratorium on demonstrations 'for the time being' on Wednesday night after the group was humiliated by viral images of women standing up to them.

Footage posted online purported to show Taliban fighters beating female protesters in the streets - with one militant seen striking a woman with a crutch, hitting her on the arm before chasing her away.

'They should share their concerns with the official authority, work with them and know the realities of the situation which is rather than sitting and hiding they will have all their basic rights,' the Taliban spokesman claimed.

'I know the policy. They [women] can go to the bazaar, they can go shopping. I don't know if someone is posing as the Taliban asking these questions and giving us a bad name. Of course we are committed to that [letting women work].

Pictured: Taliban forces stand guard at a roadside Afghan women hold placards during a pro-Taliban rally outside the Shaheed Rabbani Education University in Kabul, Afghanistan, 11 September 2021

'They can come to work, We call on all female employees to resume their work. So the policy is there and will be completed in days.'

Afghanistan has now been under Taliban rule for almost a month, with Kabul falling on August 15. But for many in the country, it will take far longer to forgive the U.S. and other Western nations for leaving the country to the militants.

'The misfortunes we are currently experiencing are because of America,' said Abdul Waris, a Kabul resident, as the white flags of the Taliban emblazoned with lines from the Koran hung from nearby lampposts.

Some of the mostly young men who spoke to Reuters news agency complained that U.S. forces had not tried to help the Afghan people.

'After the September 11 events took place, the Americans were in our country for 20 years for their own benefit,' said Jalil Ahmad.

'They took the benefits they had in mind for 20 years while we did not get any benefit from them. They have left the country in a state of confusion.'

Bearded Taliban fighters with guns slung over their shoulders were visible around the capital but the mood was quiet and calm following the dramatic changes of recent weeks.

Footage posted online purported to show one militant seen striking a woman with a crutch, hitting her on the arm before chasing her away

'Now there is security and security is good... May God give the Taliban more strength to maintain this (calm) forever,' said resident Gul Agha Laghmni.

U.S. forces toppled the Taliban after the 9/11 attacks because they had provided sanctuary to Osama bin Laden, leader of al Qaeda, which carried out the attacks.

Since returning to power last month, the Taliban has appointed an acting cabinet including several former militants held by the United States in Guantanamo Bay.

Western leaders have expressed concern over the outlook for human rights, especially for women, under Taliban rule. Several street protests led by women have been broken up in the past two weeks, and some people have been detained and beaten. The Taliban have promised to investigate such incidents.

When they were last in power from 1996 to 2001, the Taliban imposed a strict version of Islamic law and often punished people with public floggings, amputations and executions. Women's rights to work and education were severely restricted.

There were relatively few women on the streets of Kabul on Saturday, and all those who were out had their heads covered - a fact welcomed by residents such as Shah Raoof.

'In the presence of America, there was a lot of commotion in our country. Women were unveiled,' he said. 'The majority of our youth fled, a number were martyred and a number of others were afflicted by America through war and misery.'

Not all Afghan women are against the new Taliban regime, however.

Pictured: Afghan students listen to women speakers prior to their pro-Taliban rally outside the Shaheed Rabbani Education University in Kabul, Afghanistan, 11 September 2021

On Saturday, hundreds of pro-Taliban Afghan women attended a lecture at Kabul university wearing in full-face veils in support of the new regime's hardline policies on gender segregation.

About 300 women - covered head-to-toe in accordance with strict new dress policies for education - waved white Taliban flags as speakers railed against the West and expressed support for the Islamists' policies.

A handful wore blue burqas, which have only a small mesh window to see from, but most wore black niqabs covering most of the face apart from the eyes. Many also wore black gloves.
Rachel Beeton (pictured), 38, is believed to be in the Lincolnshire or West Midlands area after breaching her licence conditions

A manhunt is underway for a wanted mother who has gone on the run after vowing to murder her ex-partner and his girlfriend.

Rachel Beeton, 38, is believed to be in the Lincolnshire or West Midlands area after breaching her licence conditions.

Lincolnshire Police said she had been jailed for assault and are now urging the public for help in tracing her.

It comes after she was locked up in 2018 for trashing her ex-partner's car and his new lover's apartment.

While in custody, and despite being placed under a restraining order, Beeton continued to write to her former partner - before telling a friend in a letter of how she planned to kill both him and his new lover.

At a trial, prosecutor Lucky Thandi told Lincoln Crown Court that the letter was intercepted by prison staff.

She said: 'In the letter she said she would put a knife right through her ex-partner and his new partner.

'She detailed how she was spending her nights planning to kill her.'

She went on to say she had every intention of killing her ex's new partner on her release from prison, the court was told.

Despite being handed a four-year jail term and a 10-year restraining order, Beeton was caught sending another death threat in 2019.

In the missive written from HMP Peterborough, Beeton wrote: 'If it's the last thing I do I will find your ***** and make her pay for this.

'I will hunt her down like the dog she is and I will kill her, slowly so she knows the pain I feel without my kids.

'She will be begging me to kill her by the time I'm finished with her.

Rachel Beeton, 36, swore to exact 'revenge' on her former partner's new lover by hunting her down 'like the dog she is'

Prisoner officers intercepted Beeton's sadistic letter in the post box after a fellow inmate dobbed on her

'They can keep me as long as they want to in here, but I will get my revenge. She will DIE.'

Prisoner officers only intercepted Beeton's letter in the post box after a fellow inmate raised the alarm.

In her police interview, Beeton said she wrote the letter because she was 'p***ed off' and told officers she 'couldn't be a***d' to talk to them.

The latest death threat saw her sentence extended by two months.

Anyone who knows of her whereabouts should call Lincolnshire Police on 101, quoting incident 513 of September 9.
Former French health minister Agnes Buzyn was charged on Friday over her handling of the Covid-19 pandemic after investigators at a special court in Paris concluded there were grounds to prosecute her.

Buzyn has been charged with 'endangering the lives of others', the prosecutor of the Republic's Court of Justice said, but not for a second possible offence of 'failure to stop a disaster'.

The former doctor, who will be able to appeal the charge, arrived for a hearing at the court on Friday morning saying she welcomed 'an excellent opportunity for me to explain myself and to establish the truth.'

The 58-year-old added that she would not 'let the action of the government be discredited, or my action as a minister, when we did so much to prepare our country for a global health crisis that is still ongoing.'

The charges are a blow for President Emmanuel Macron, whose handling of the health crisis will face scrutiny during election campaigning next year, but the court also immediately faced allegations of judicial overreach.

Former French health minister Agnes Buzyn (pictured arriving to Paris' Court of Justice on Friday) was charged on Friday over her handling of the Covid-19 pandemic after investigators at a special court in Paris concluded there were grounds to prosecute her

French gendarmes disperse protesters during a demonstration against France's restrictions, including compulsory health passes, in Paris today

Former prime minister Edouard Philippe and current Health Minister Olivier Veran are also being investigated by magistrates at the court and have seen their offices searched.

The ruling will likely stir a debate about the blame and responsibility for the spread of Covid-19, which caught governments, many health experts and the World Health Organization by surprise as it began spreading from China in early 2020.

France has seen over 115,000 deaths and more than 6.89 cases. The disease has killed more than 4.5 million people worldwide so far.

Buzyn, who resigned from her post in February last year, weeks after the first Covid cases were confirmed in France, has faced criticism and ridicule over her initial statements about the pandemic.

She said initially in January 2020 that there was 'practically no risk' of importing Covid-19 from the Chinese city at the origin of the outbreak, Wuhan, and then said the 'risk of a spread of the coronavirus among the population is very small'.

A month later, as she left the ministry to launch a failed bid to become Paris mayor, she claimed that 'the tsunami has yet to come', in an apparent contradiction of her earlier statements.

France's fourth surge of infections has been receding in recent weeks as the government has stepped up vaccination efforts. Thursday saw France record 18,120 new cases of coronavirus, and 95 related deaths. Pictured: Graphs showing France's new daily Covid cases and deaths

The cancer and transplant specialist later told a parliamentary investigation that she had alerted the president and then prime minister Philippe to the potential 'dangers' of Covid-19 as early as January.

France also faced a severe shortage of masks at the start of the pandemic and the government was inconsistent in its advice on face coverings, initially questioning their effectiveness, then mandating them in public spaces.

Anne Genetet, an MP from the ruling LREM party, said she was 'shocked' and 'angry' by the precedent set by the court, which has special powers to prosecute ministers.

'We shouldn't be surprised if no one wants to enter politics anymore, or be a minister,' Genetet told the LCI channel.

The Republic's Court of Justice was created in 1993 as a way of improving accountability due to perceptions that cabinet members were able to escape legal censure for their actions in office.

Police clash with protesters during demonstrations in Paris against compulsory Covid passes in Fance

A woman squares up to a line of armed riot police as unrest over Covid measures continues

Members of the public are allowed to file complaints to the court if they consider they are the victim of a crime carried out by a member of the government.

Around 14,500 complaints - from individuals, doctors, associations and even prisoners - have piled up over the government's handling of the pandemic, its top prosecutor said this week.

Some critics accuse the court of being too slow and lenient, while others see the current investigation as being an example of the justice system going too far.

Jean Garrigues, a French political historian who is often supportive of the government, called Buzyn's appearance at the court 'a serious blow to the separation of powers.'

'It's up to voters and not judges to sanction a politician for their words and deeds,' he wrote on Twitter.

The court has become increasingly contested, with both former president Francois Hollande and incumbent Macron pledging to scrap it.

Buzyn quit politics and in January joined the cabinet of World Health Organization's director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who has also been under fire for his response to the pandemic.
A former homicide detective who spent six years working on the unsolved 1988 murder of a 19-year-old woman believes her killer is remorseful and that he could confess if interviewed by police.

George Ossipo said the relatively respectful way in which Veronica Wiederhold's remains were placed near a junk yard in Mount Vernon, upstate New York, suggest guilt on the part of the killer.

He explained: 'He placed her like a little flower. He didn't just dump her. That's why I think there is remorse in him. This is weighing on him. I think if [police detectives] get him in a room, he will confess.'

Wiederhold's body was discovered on Valentine's Day, 1988, when the owners of the nearby junkyard reported finding her body laid a top a set of used garage door springs and posed with her legs crossed at the ankles.

Ossipo also revealed that a potential suspect is in investigators' sights. The ex-cop, who worked for Mount Vernon PD, said that he got a call shortly after retiring in 2010 from a forensic lab biologist about DNA from a man arrested in Massachusetts that matched DNA found near the junkyard on Carleton Avenue, in Mount Vernon, New York.

He believes that man, who was arrested for selling drugs by a school and whose identity had not been made publicly available, could be the killer of Wiederhold,who was known as the Mount Vernon Jane Doe until familial DNA was used to finally identify her earlier this year.

Composite made of the Mount Vernon Jane Doe, whose body was found on Valentine's Day in 1998. She was identified in July as Veronica Wiederhold, 19, of Queens

George Ossipo, A former homicide detective for the Mount Vernon Police Department, was first assigned to the case in 2004. He believes a Massachusetts man is the killer

The body was found on Carleton Avenue beside a local junkyard

Mt. Vernon police declined to comment as the investigation is still ongoing.

According to the autopsy, the Wiederhold was strangled to death just hours before police discovered her body. She had bruises above her left eye, as well as binding marks on her wrists, ankles, and neck.

Wiederhold had been buried in an unmarked grave at Beechwoods Cemetery, in New Rochelle.

Laura Murphy, chief of the Westchester County District Attorney's Office Cold Case Bureau, who led efforts to uncover Wiederhold's identity, said the victim was last seen by her family at the end of 1987, Loud reports.

She is believed to have been working as an exotic dancer at the time of her death.

Wiederhold's family said they tried filing a missing persons report, but a search of the New York Police Department's records found no such report.

Her age at the time - 19 - meant that her case was not considered with the same urgency as it would have had she been under 18.

Murphy added that the breakthrough would not have been possible without the Mt. Vernon Police Department, who 'never put the case on a shelf.'

'They kept following up on it and they had a number of leads about who she was, but not about how she came to be where she was found. Figuring out her identity became the top priority,' Murphy told The Daily Beast.

Ossipo first got the case in 2004, with a case file that included very little information to go on. The first thing he did was make a call to forensics.

'They had collected 10 body tissue samples, but everything had been lost except for a set of fingernails from her left hand.

They were able to extract her DNA, as well as that of a potential male suspect. This suggested she struggled or scratched the guy who assaulted her.'

An FBI flier seeking the identity of the Mount Vernon Jane Doe

Ossipo also followed up on the owners of the junkyard, who revealed that it was their nephew who first spotted the body, but they refused to give his name up because they claimed he had previous troubles with the law and wanted to keep him out.

The cop says he was curious about why the body had been placed close to a yard guarded by a Belgian Malinois dog, which would likely have barked at a stranger.

Although the detective believed the nephew could be a key witness or suspect, Ossipo was unable to pin down his identity and he was never named a suspect.

Detectives then believed Wiederhold could have been a victim of the notorious serial killer Francisco Acevedo, who killed three women from Yonkers in 1989 and 1996 and posed the victims in a similar way to how Wiederhold was found.

However, his DNA did not match any of the samples found at the scene and he was found to have been in prison, in Connecticut, at the time the murder took place.

With the investigation still on going, Murphy said her department is also in the process of getting an amended death certificate that will officially recognize Jane Doe as Veronica Weiderhold.

'Her grave stone will also be replaced and marked with her name. Regardless of what happens with the investigation, it's a success story when you can finally know who the person in an unmarked grave really is,' Murphy said.
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Dramatic footage has revealed how casualties are dealt with under the waves as for the first time British cameras have been given access on board a hunter-killer submarine.

'Casualty, casualty, casualty!' is announced from one of the intercom speakers on board HMS Trenchant before crewmates are seen scrambling to get first aid supplies to the right area of the vessel.

The footage, from Channel 5's new documentary Submarine: Life Under the Waves, shows the medical party rushing to the nuclear reactor where the incident took place.

The crew member has to be evacuated in the middle of the Atlantic, forcing the submarine to surface even though rough seas make removing him from the boat extremely dangerous.

Pictured: Crew members on board HMS Trenchant. Left to right: Andy Pandyan, Jon Sheldon, Dave Burrell, Jim Reid, Andy Benzie

The footage, from Channel 5's new documentary Submarine: Life Under the Waves, shows the medical party rushing to the nuclear reactor where the incident took place. Pictured: Crew member Charlie Drake

HMS Trenchant is a 5,300-tonne nuclear submarine on its four-month tour of duty in the mid-Atlantic

HMS Trenchant is a 5,300-tonne nuclear submarine on its four-month tour of duty in the mid-Atlantic.

It was first launched by war hero Vice Admiral Sir Arthur Hezlet, commander of the original HMS Trenchant submarine, during World War II.

In scenes reminiscent of the BBC drama Vigil set on a submarine, the documentary shows how the crew are forced to live in extremely close quarters while helping guard the UK's Trident missiles and keep British waters safe.

In scenes reminiscent of the BBC drama Vigil set on a submarine, the documentary shows how the crew are forced to live in extremely close quarters while helping guard the UK's Trident missiles and keep British waters safe. Pictured: Captain Stephen Brian

The submarine was first launched by war hero Vice Admiral Sir Arthur Hezlet, commander of the original HMS Trenchant submarine, during World War II. Pictured: Luke Thompson

The first episode of the docuseries, which airs on Monday at 9pm, shows the crew preparing the 279-foot submarine to leave port for the first time in six months. Pictured: Danny Parsons, Alex Moor and an HM Trenchant diver

Pictured is one of the HMS Trenchant's crew members Adam Hughes

The first episode of the docuseries, which airs on Monday at 9pm, shows the crew preparing the 279-foot submarine to leave port for the first time in six months.

Enough food is loaded on the vessel to last 120 days while they voyage to protect another British submarine that's carrying Trident nuclear missiles.

But early on the crew's fridge breaks down and threatens the ship's entire supply of fresh food.

And when that crisis is conquered a fire in the engine room breaks out forcing the ship to return to port for repairs during an urgent mission to find a Russian submarine.

In the next episode of the series chaos ensues when the submarine's toilets suffer a major blockage and all seven bathrooms are closed for several hours, leaving the crew unable to use them while the ship tries to stop Russian vessels from entering British waters.

A Russian submarine is soon discovered heading towards the UK and Trenchant is forced to respond and defend British waters.

Submarine: Life Under The Waves - Monday September 13 and 20 - 9pm, Channel 5
The body of a man has been recovered by the coastguard in the English Channel, Sussex Police have said.

The force said: 'On Saturday afternoon, September 11, the body of a man was recovered by HM Coastguard in mid-English Channel, following information from a passing vessel, and was brought to Eastbourne.

'Enquiries are under way and no further information is available at this time.'

The body of a man has been recovered by the coastguard in the English Channel, Sussex Police have said. Pictured: migrants arriving in Dover

It comes as Border Force consider using jet skis to spin migrant dinghies off course and send them back to France, it was reported last night.

Training is said to have taken place over the summer, with officials learning how to redirect migrants back to French waters using the high-powered armoured 'personal water craft'.

The plans, overseen by Home Secretary Priti Patel, will require two jet skis to intercept and circle boats attempting to make the crossing.

Border Force officers will attempt to maneouvre the dinghy in the water with one pusing back from the bow, while the second nudges the stern at its motor.

Jet skis could be used by Border Force officers to spin migrant dinghy around and send them back to France in new plans by Priti Patel. Pictured: Two Border Force officers use jet skis to patrol the Channel in Kent in June 2021

After the boat has been spun around, the jet skis escort it back to French waters, the Sun reported.

Former Navy chief Admiral Lord West told the newspaper the plans were 'an accident waiting to happen', adding: 'It's not clever and it is problematic.'

He also warned that the complicated maneouvre could cause the boats to capsize, espically if the people on board were not cooperating, and they could fall into the sea.

'Who's going to rescue them then?' he said.

The plans will require two jet skis to intercept dinghies attempting to make the crossing, maneouvre them around and escort them back to French waters (pictured in June)

This comes as Priti Patel is to spend 200million on a fleet of border patrol boats as she steps up attempts to stop migrants crossing the Channel.

The Home Secretary has ordered a major replacement of Border Force's five ageing cutters, official documents show.

The vessels could be used to block dinghies from entering UK waters  the controversial 'push-back' tactic announced this week.

The huge sum to upgrade the fleet comes on top of the 54million due to be handed to France for coastal patrols and surveillance  which could now be withheld following a diplomatic spat between Whitehall and Paris.

Priti Patel is to spend 200million on a fleet of border patrol boats as she steps up attempts to stop migrants crossing the Channel

It comes as migrants continue to make it across the Strait of Dover, with 1,800 arriving along the South Coast this week alone.

Last night, a Home Office spokesman said: 'As part of our ongoing investment into the UK's border security, the planning process for the replacement of Border Force's existing cutter fleet is in its early stages. No final decisions have been made.'

Tony Smith, former director-general of Border Force, said the current boats were in urgent need of replacement as they were originally only designed to be used by customs officers. 'They aren't really equipped to pick up migrants, so I am glad they are doing this,' he added.

'We have to accept that we now have an ongoing maritime threat and Border Force has to adapt.'

Most of the 137ft patrol boats are almost 20 years old. They can reach 26 knots, but are not equipped to detain suspected people smugglers or process asylum claims on board as other countries do.

The vessels could be used to block dinghies from entering UK waters  the controversial 'push-back' tactic announced this week

Migrants arrive at Dover Docks amid a huge surge in arrivals by sea from France

The cutters are now used almost exclusively in the Channel after the first wave of migrant crossings meant two had to be redeployed from the Mediterranean.

The proposal, from the latest version of the Home Office's procurement schedule, reveals that the process to upgrade the cutters will start in April.

The latest estimate for the cost of the programme is 200million, but it is unclear how many vessels will be built for this sum.

MPs on the Commons home affairs committee warned five years ago that the UK had a 'worryingly low' number of boats to patrol thousands of miles of coast.

The procurement document also shows plans are under way to spend 18million on drones to monitor the Strait of Dover, and 6million on aerial surveillance.

The plans follow a growing row over the record numbers of asylum-seekers making it across the Channel despite huge amounts of British taxpayers' money being handed to France, supposedly to tackle the problem.

Cabinet minister Oliver Dowden said yesterday that the Home Secretary was right to threaten to withhold the 54million promised in July unless French police stop more boats setting sail.

The UK has given 192million to France since 2014, much of it used to toughen security and stop migrants stowing on cross-Channel lorries, ferries and trains.

Police patrol the stretch of beach for migrants between Wimereux and Audresselles, Northern France

Mr Dowden, the Culture Secretary, also backed Miss Patel's proposal to get Border Force captains to stop the dinghies getting through, despite claims that it was impractical and unlawful.

He told LBC radio: 'These people are going from a safe country, which is France, to England. So it's right that we try and stop it  mainly because criminal gangs are the beneficiaries.

'The Home Secretary's looked at a huge range of different solutions  we've given extra money to the French border force, we're introducing legislation and one of the things she's looking at doing is turning boats back.

'It's appropriate to look at the full suite of those measures.

'We have said that will include looking at turning migrants back, but only in accordance with international law. Clearly, the safety of migrants is paramount.'

Miss Patel's French counterpart, Gerald Darmanin, has warned he will not accept 'financial blackmail'.

Calais mayor Natacha Bouchart said the pushback tactic was 'irresponsible', and asked if Britain would open fire on migrants, adding: 'Are they going to shoot at the boats and passengers?'

Home Office figures released last night show 1,801 people made it across the Channel in small boats this week. So far this year, around 14,500 have made the crossing  almost twice the 8,410 recorded in the whole of 2020.

Look, we ARE patrolling the beaches, claim the French: Police monitor northern coast for migrants leaving for Britain as they stand around remains of Nazi concrete gun emplacement

By Neil Sears in Wimereux, France, for the Daily Mail

Through the grey of early-morning half-light, a dozen dark figures could be seen on the beach. Occasionally they ventured into the rolling dunes, and powerful torches lit up the darkness.

As dawn broke yesterday, it became clear that these were French police officers  and that, belatedly, at least some of the northern coast was being closely monitored for migrants leaving for Britain.

In a week when unauthorised seaborne arrivals in Kent from France once again approached 1,000 in one single day, and Home Secretary Priti Patel threatened to cut funding for French Channel policing, the authorities there were finally sparked into action.

At least some of the northern coast of France was being closely monitored for migrants leaving for Britain

It was clearly designed to show people smugglers, and the public, that the French police mean business. By all accounts it is too late  and impossible to sustain. The Daily Mail saw as many as ten police vehicles in the beach car parks between the resorts of Wimereux and Ambleteuse, 20 miles south-west of Calais.

Most of the police, all with handguns, positioned themselves around the remains of a concrete gun emplacement built by the Nazis in a vain bid to stop the British.

When the Allied invasion finally came, in 1944, we chose another beach.

People smugglers going the other way yesterday were doing something similar.

The police trained their binoculars on the dunes, where migrants have been inflating dinghies before dashing down to the waves.

As the sun rose, a 20ft rigid inflatable boat was clear to see.

A group of migrants had made it to the beach, and been disturbed. The police had slashed it, and left it there as a warning.

We turned the boats around - and Britain can too: Australia's ex-minister for foreign affairs ALEXANDER DOWNER says the UK must smash business model of people trafficker gangs

Your Home Secretary, Priti Patel, has been widely ridiculed on both sides of the Channel for suggesting that boats carrying migrants be physically 'pushed back' towards the French coast.

Yet, from my experience as Australia's former minister for foreign affairs, I know that a 'push-back' policy can work.

To solve a migration crisis, you have to smash the business model of the criminal gangs of people traffickers.

From my experience as Australia's former minister for foreign affairs, I know that a 'push-back' policy can work

And the only way to do that is to convince would-be migrants  who are of course the smugglers' paying customers  that they have little chance of reaching British shores.

On a calm summer's day, it is highly likely that a boat which goes unchallenged will make it across the smooth and relatively short stretch of the English Channel. The instinct is, of course, to give it a try.

But if you introduce obstacles that sharply increase the prospect of failure, the economic equation changes. The migrants will stop paying for places on the boats, and the traffickers will stop buying and kitting out the vessels.

Around the turn of the millennium, boats carrying large numbers of economic migrants began arriving in Australian waters from Indonesia.

This was problematic on various levels.

A group of migrants are brought in to Dover, Kent, following a small boat incident in the Channel this week

First, it was a hazardous sea voyage and the migrants were in grave danger not just from the elements, but also from the traffickers operating the boats  criminals who had little regard for their safety and who would exploit them.

Second, the new arrivals were making a mockery of our asylum and immigration systems by leap-frogging the 20,000 or so refugees we admitted every year in orderly settlement programmes.

So we decided on direct action. We sent out patrol boats to intercept the vessels operated by the traffickers, boarded them and took command.

Safety checks and running repairs were made, then the migrants' boats were refuelled and pointed back towards Indonesia.

Ships of the Australian Navy patrolled the waters to ensure they did not turn around again.

We also provided the Indonesian authorities with the precise co-ordinates of the boats so they could monitor their progress and be on hand if there was an emergency.

Sri Lankan asylum seekers destined for Australia and New Zealand are stopped en route

As word spread around Indonesia that we were determined to stamp out the trafficking, it soon stemmed the numbers. I see no reason why this cannot be done in the Channel.

French ministers have already objected to your Home Secretary's proposal, but that was predictable.

What the British Government needs to make clear is that its laws are being broken, and that the problem originates in France. Under international law, there is no basis for migrants leaving a safe country such as France to seek asylum in another country.

I've heard some media commentators talking about migrants 'fleeing France', which is ridiculous. I was in the Dordogne on holiday recently, and very civilised it was too.

None of the hundreds of men, women and children arriving on beaches of the south coast  more than 14,000 so far this year  was at any risk of being persecuted in France; nor would any face recrimination if forced to return there.

Let us be honest; these migrant voyages are a highly profitable criminal racket being run by unscrupulous gangs.

Rohingya migrants rest on a boat off the coast of Indonesia after Australian officials turned them back

As minister for foreign affairs, it was my job to placate the Indonesians, who were initially furious about our 'push-back' policy. But they calmed down, and tacitly accepted our reasons for acting as we did  to stop a criminal venture putting lives at risk and the abuse of our immigration system.

No self-respecting country could do otherwise.

When a subsequent Australian Labour government dropped our policy of interception, citing human rights concerns, the financial incentive for the traffickers was restored and the boats reappeared.

It was only when multiple boats sank with the loss of hundreds of lives  including one particular tragedy in December 2010 when 50 migrants died  that the policy was re-implemented. It has remained in force ever since.

My advice to Miss Patel would be to introduce the 'push-back' policy without fanfare, and to keep the French informed on a need-to-know basis only.

The vast majority of those coming across the Channel are young men who are economic migrants, so they respond to economic forces.

To the critics already arguing that it is dangerous to board vessels in the Channel and turn them around, I say it is less risky than allowing this dismal trade in human cargo to continue.

It would be necessary for some border and immigration staff to undergo specific training and I am sure the Australian government would be happy to assist in this.

Our policy was controversial when it was introduced 20 years ago. But now it is widely accepted that if you are a country determined to remain open to genuine refugees and legal immigrants, then your borders have to be protected.
Police have issued a photograph of a mother-of-four who is accused of killing her own children in a brutal motorway crash and is believed to have gone on the run.

Mary McCann, 35, of Derby, failed to appear before Aylesbury Crown Court on Friday to answer two charges of causing death by dangerous driving.

She is set to stand trial over the deaths of her son Smaller, 10, and daughter Lilly, 4, after slamming her white Vauxhall Astra into a Scania HGV while driving on the M1 near J14 and J15 on Monday, August 9.

The lorry driver was unhurt, but the motorway was closed for 12 hours.

On Saturday, Thames Valley Police appealed for the public's help amid a hunt for the mother-of-four after prosecutors admitted that they 'don't know where she is'.

Police have issued a photograph of Mary McCann, 35, of Derby, who is accused of killing her own children in a brutal motorway crash and is believed to have gone on the run

Ms McCann (pictured with son Smaller) failed to appear before Aylesbury Crown Court on Friday to answer two charges of causing death by dangerous driving

The force issued a picture of Ms McCann, who speaks with an Irish accent, and said it is possible that she may have altered her appearance.

Ms McCann is white, approximately 5ft 1ins tall, of medium build, with brown hair and blue eyes.

She is known to have links to Derby, Huntingdon, Luton, the Notholt and Uxbridge areas of London and also the Republic of Ireland.

Sergeant Dominic Mahon, of the Thanes Valley Police's Joint Operations Roads Policing Unit said: 'We are appealing for the public's help in locating Mary McCann after she failed to appear at court in connection with a fatal road traffic collision in Milton Keynes.

'We believe that it may be possible for McCann to try to alter her appearance.

'If anyone believes they recognise McCann, or has any information as to her whereabouts, then please get in touch with Thames Valley Police.

'We do not believe that she poses a danger to the wider public, however if you see her please call Thames Valley Police on 101, and quote reference number 43210356500.

'Alternatively, if you wish to remain anonymous, you can contact the independent charity Crimestoppers for 100% anonymity by calling 0800 555 111 or via their website.'

Prosecutors yesterday admitted they 'do not know where she is', with Ms McCann failing to contact her solicitors after the funeral of her two children she is accused of killing last week.

On Saturday, Thames Valley Police appealed for the public's help amid a hunt for the mother-of-four after prosecutors admitted on Friday that they 'don't know where she is'

She is set to stand trial over the deaths of her son Smaller (left), 10, and daughter Lilly, 4, after slamming her white Vauxhall Astra into a Scania HGV while driving on the M1

Ms McCann approximately 5ft 1ins tall, with brown hair and blue eyes. She is known to have links to Derby, Huntingdon, Luton, the Notholt and Uxbridge areas of London and Ireland

Prosecutor Heather Stangoe told the judge: 'Unfortunately, we do not know where she is. We were informed through her solicitor that they had failed to make contact with the defendant. Her bail address was her sister's and she is not there.

'It was the funeral of her children this week. Her one year old child is with the grandmother and is safe.'

The judge issued a warrant, not backed for bail, for her arrest saying he wanted the Home Office to put ports and airports on alert for her.

'It is most likely she will flee to Ireland,' he said.

He added: 'This is a sad case, but by absconding to avoid the indictment being put is in my view tactical.'

The 35-year-old, of Bamford Avenue, Derby, was driving a white Vauxhall Astra that collided with a Scania HGV at about ten past eleven at night on Monday August 9th.

Her son Smaller, 10, and daughter Lilly, 4, were killed in the crash on the northbound carriageway between junctions 14 and 15, near Milton Keynes.

Defence barrister Laban Leake said: 'The funerals were on Monday and Tuesday. She is no longer at the aunt's address.

'She gave a telephone number (for her), An attempt was made to contact that number, but there was no response.'

Mr Leake added: 'We know nothing of her state of mind.'

The children's aunt, Margaret McCann, 26, said the family were on the way back from a party in London when the horror crash occurred.

Ms McCann was injured and another daughter, two, was strapped into her seat in the car and survived the crash. Her 13-year-old daughter had stayed in London.

Their mother's Facebook page showed an image of smaller next to a birthday cake and 10th birthday balloon from earlier on Monday

There was also a post of a birthday cake showing it was Smaller's 10th birthday on the day he died

The HGV driver was not injured in the incident, which happened at about 11.10pm on Monday August 9 (file photo)

Devastated family members paid heartbreaking tributes to the children on social media.

One wrote: 'Life is cruel to take them away from my lovely brother. Best old father in the world, he put them first no matter how hard he hit they were his life please god give him the strength.'

The children's aunt said: 'RIP my perfect little niece and nephew. Aunt Elizabeth's old pet Smaller and me little frilly Lilly.

'Love you always and forever and never in this lifetime will you ever be forgotten, always loved.'

A family friend put: 'Mortal divine RIP beautiful angels. So sorry for your loss, their poor mommy and daddy.'

A cousin wrote: 'Can't believe I'm even writing this but rest in peace to my two beautiful little cousins Smaller and Lilly.

'I love you with all my heart. I love you so much this don't even feel real. What has this world come to, hearts in bits. RIP my babies.'

The court was told on Friday that the funerals of McCann's two children had taken place last week. Her one-year-old child is with the grandmother and is safe.
Anti-vaccine mandate protesters gathered at Ground Zero on the 20th anniversary of 9/11 branding Joe Biden a 'killer, pervert and a traitor' as he visited the New York City memorial.

A small group of people held red, white and blue-colored posters demanding 'no forced vaccines' or mask rules for children as the president honored the nearly 3,000 people who died from the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center.

One protester held up a sign saying 'Latinos against forced vaccine' as families of the deceased marked the anniversary.

On the 20th anniversary of 9/11 protestors took to the outskirts of Ground Zero to protest against the vaccine mandate President Joe Biden put into action on Thursday

A small group of people held red, white and blue-colored posters demanding 'no forced vaccines' and calling Biden a 'killer,' a 'pervert' and a 'traitor' as the President honored the nearly 3,000 people who died from the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center

From left: Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, President Joe Biden, First Lady Jill Biden, Michael Bloomberg, Diana Taylor, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer place their hands on their hearts at the beginning of the 9/11 ceremony

Kamala Harris called for a 'united America' Saturday as she joined former President George Bush at the 9/11 memorial ceremony in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, to mark the 20th anniversary of America's darkest day

President Joe Biden, First Lady Jill Biden, Barack and Michelle Obama, and Bill and Hillary Clinton were in attendance for the 9/11 ceremony, along with former NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Diana Taylor, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.

Former President Donald Trump will make his own appearance at the site later on Saturday.

Biden didn't speak at the ceremony in New York - as he chose to release a video Friday sharing his reflections instead.

It's unknown if any of the politicians noticed the group, which was kept well away from the reflecting pools which mark where the Twin Towers once stood, where dignitaries and families of those killed gathered.

At the memorial ceremony in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, Harris urged Americans to remember the 'unity' that came out of the tragedy two decades ago, saying it is 'essential to our shared prosperity, our national security, and to our standing in the world'.

The anti-vaccine mandate protest came after Biden announced his new aggressive approach to fight the Covid-19 pandemic, which the White House said will affect two-thirds of the American workforce.

The strategy involves six steps aimed at boosting the US vaccination rate, which fell over the summer as a new wave fueled by the Delta variant plunged health care systems in areas with largely unvaccinated populations back into disarray.

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden arrive at the National September 11 Memorial in New York on Saturday

The anti-vaccine mandate protest came after Biden announced his new aggressive approach to fight the Covid-19 pandemic, which the White House said will affect two-thirds of the American workforce

About 73.4 per cent of Americans over the age of 12 have at least one vaccine dose, but less than 63 per cent are fully vaccinated - far short of the threshold to reach herd immunity.

Biden's approach plans to mandate all federal employees and federal contractors get vaccinated.

It also requires vaccinations for more than 17million healthcare workers at Medicare and Medicaid-participating facilities, and requires all businesses with 100 or more employees to tell their workers to get vaccinated or submit to weekly COVID testing.

But the unprecedented nature of the announcement left many confused on how vaccination requirements would be implemented on such a wide scale.

In her daily White House briefing on Friday Press Secretary Jen Psaki did little to unravel those mysteries.

Asked about how otherwise expensive testing equipment would be funded and whether the White House would weigh in on a timeline for private businesses to enact the rule, she didn't provide any direct answers but rather said there were plans ready for the government to aid and assist employers.

The rule will be enforced by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), a regulatory arm of the Labor Department, for companies with more than 100 employees.

The rate of COVID vaccinations slowed down going into summer, sending the White House into a frenzy looking for ways to encourage people to get the shot

Biden ordered the agency to implement an Emergency Temporary Standard that would penalize companies that don't comply up to $14,000.

But because there's no national system in place to track vaccination status, enforcement will likely depend on employees reporting violations to OSHA.

Federal workers who fail to get the shot within 75 days can face disciplinary action, which White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki warned Thursday rises to termination. 'Hopefully it doesnt come to that,' she said at her daily news briefing.

She added that the rule would likely mean employees need to be fully vaccinated with two doses of the shot but it remains unclear if that's certain.

While private businesses that employ less than 100 people are exempt from Biden's rule, the White House has signaled strong support for private-sector vaccine mandates.

Workers not under OSHA protections also can't be affected. According to the agency's site that includes people who are self-employed and people in industries whose hazards are regulated by another federal agency like the Mine Safety and Heath Administration or the Department of Energy - though the latter now falls under Biden's order for federal employees.

As far as when the mandate starts, the White House said OSHA will likely issue a rule 'in the coming weeks'.

Psaki didn't provide a timeline at Friday's briefing but said 'every resource in the federal government' would be used 'to get this going rapidly'.
U.S forces were caught off guard when a Guinean colonel they trained turned out to be the mastermind behind the country's recent coup and is now the leader of the West African nation.

Col. Mamady Doumbouya has declared himself the new leader of Guinea after he led special forces into the presidential palace and deposed the country's 83-year-old president, Alpha Conde, on September 5, the New York Times reported.

He is said to have slipped away to mount the coup early Sunday, raising suspicions he did so while his US instructors were asleep.

They had been working with Doumbouya and other Guinean service personnel to train them in counterterrorism techniques, and to help them prop up their civilian government.

Guinea's new leader and his allies are said to have been angered after Conde successfully changed the country's constitution to enable him to serve a third term as president.

Doumbouya, once a close ally to Conde, is a familiar figure to American forces, who have been in the country since July to train a group of about 100 Special Forces members led by the Colonel and have worked with him for years.

Col. Mamady Doumbouya (pictured) led special forces into the presidential palace and deposed the country's 83-year-old president Alpha Conde

Doumbouya (center) is a familiar figure to American forces who have helped train 100 Special Forces members led by the Colonel and have worked with him for years

83-year-old president Alpha Conde, (pictured) whose popularity in the country has been declining for years. was deposed

Kelly Cahalan, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Africa Command, told the Times the coup is 'inconsistent with U.S. military training and education.'

U.S. officials also told the Times, who obtained a photo of Doumbouya posing with U.S. military officials outside the American Embassy, they were 'puzzled' by his decision to stage a coup at a moment when he was working so closely with Americans.

U.S. officials said they were looking into reports that Doumbouya and his conspirators slipped away from the training base in the middle of the night while instructors were sleeping, the Times reported.

Due to the timing and the close relationship with the Colonel the current situation has been an 'embarrassment' for the Pentagon, the Times reported.

U.S. officials have even had to clarify that the U.S. did not have previous knowledge or any involvement in the coup.

'We do not have any information on how the apparent military seizure of power occurred, and had no prior indication of these events,' Bardha S. Azari, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Africa Command, told the Times in an emailed statement.

On Sunday green berets are recorded driving a four-wheel drive vehicle with Guinean soldiers hanging from the back as they smile and touch hands with locals chanting 'freedom!'

People celebrate as the Guinean Special Forces arrive at the Palace of the People in Conakry on Monday

People celebrate in the streets with members of Guinea's armed forces after the arrest of Guinea's president, Alpha Conde

Leading to further suspicion of American involvement is a video of American solders smiling as they make their way to the U.S. Embassy on Sunday.

A group of green berets were recorded driving a four-wheel drive vehicle with Guinean soldiers hanging from the back as they smile and touch hands with locals chanting 'freedom!'

American officials were forced to clarify that the recorded incident was not reflective of any support for the coup.

'The U.S. government and military are not involved in this apparent military seizure of power in any way,' Azari told the Times.

Doumbouya, who at 41 is now the second-youngest leader of an African state, served in Afghanistan and Ivory Coast and completed a commando training course in Israel, before serving as a French Legionnaire, the Times reported.

Following last Sunday's storming of the presidential palace which killed 11, the Colonel appeared on television draped in the country's flag and claimed he was forced to seize power because of the actions of President Conde, whose popularity in the country has been declining for years.

The Times reported that despite his 'disaffection' with president Conde, Doumbouya's coup was most likely fueled by tensions within the defense establishment, specifically with Guinea's defense minister, Mohamed Diane who the colonel said deprived his Special Forces unit of resources.
On a crisp November night in 2009, a police convoy was closing in on a grey Vauxhall Zafira winding through the dark streets of South London at more than 60mph  slowing only for the speed cameras.

As the Zafira signalled to turn in to a maze of side streets, it was time to move in. If the driver was the man they suspected, this was serious.

He might even be seeking out another target. Suburban streets at the dead of night were his hunting ground.

'Go, go, go, take him now,' urged the team leader into a covert microphone. The convoy came alive, the wail of sirens and flood of blue lights forcing the Zafira to brake sharply and pull in to the kerb.

That driver was 52-year-old Delroy Grant, one of the nation's most wanted men  a sex predator thought to have preyed on hundreds of elderly men and women across a swathe of the capital for two decades.

This was the Night Stalker  and his time was up.

It was seven months earlier, in April 2009, that I'd been asked to review Operation Minstead, the long-running Met Police investigation into the Night Stalker's crimes.

They wanted a 'fresh pair of eyes' following my team's success putting Levi Bellfield behind bars.

That investigation, over three long years, had sent that most infamous of serial murderers to prison forever for the murders of Marsha McDonnell, Amelie Delagrange and Milly Dowler.

I was 48 years old, two years away from the end of a 30-year police career. I knew that the Night Stalker would be my last and probably greatest challenge.

But every statement I read and every victim I spoke to made me more determined that we should succeed. The paperwork showed a litany of one man's horrific abuse of the elderly.

The attack that  at the time  we thought was the first occurred in Shirley, south of Croydon, on a Monday evening, October 12, 1992.

The 89-year-old spinster victim was attacked in her bed by a black man wearing a balaclava.

Delroy Grant - the Night Stalker - was a sex predator thought to have preyed on hundreds of elderly men and women for two decades. Pictured: Delroy Grant approaching an ATM machine in Honor Oak Park in August 2009

He held her down, pinning her to her bed as she awoke to be confronted by a masked silhouette in the darkness, virtually blinded by the beam of his torch pointing directly into her eyes.

He had broken in by a side kitchen window, taken out her lightbulbs, disconnected her phone line and then raped her before stealing 25 cash, a pocket watch and jewellery.

Unusually, he had kissed her, both on the cheek and mouth, during her ordeal, pulling her face to his with such force that he dislodged her dentures.

It was not until six years later, in the early hours of Saturday, September 5, 1998, that a further rape was committed that yielded a DNA profile matching the 1992 offence. It was now a series.

The 81-year-old lady lived alone in a bungalow in a quiet cul-de-sac in Warlingham, Surrey. She had severe mobility issues after a double hip replacement, suffered from arthritis and was dependent on a stick to walk.

Her screams stifled by a gloved hand, she had told him, with unwarranted politeness: 'I think you are thoroughly mean.'

The scientific examination of the scene was to prove most crucial: the intruder had attempted to force his way in through a window using a screwdriver, which had left a distinctive 1cm indentation mark on the frame. This would prove extremely useful, as he used the same tool during several later crimes.

Twelve further attacks in 1999, linked by DNA or tool marks, showed the Night Stalker was becoming a creature of habit.

The panes of glass removed from their frames, the disabled lights, the disconnected phone lines, the clothing, the torch, the masking and the manner of dealing with the victims after waking them from their sleep  his signature methods were very distinctive.

The most harrowing of all these disturbing reports involved an 88-year-old woman in Orpington.

At three in the morning on Thursday, August 5, 1999, she was woken by a noise and saw a figure at the foot of her bed who subjected her to an assault so violent she needed extensive emergency surgery.

It was the closest the Night Stalker ever came to killing a victim there and then. She never returned to her tidy little bungalow, being discharged from hospital to sheltered accommodation. And while her injuries were repaired, her mind never healed.

In 2009, when we looked back at all similar crimes, it became clear that the scale of the Night Stalker's offending was much wider than had been thought.

Between the 'first' and 'second' rapes, in 1992 and 1998, it was possible to list a further 32 offences likely to have been committed by him.

Somehow, no thought had been given to unusual features that suggested a one-man crime wave  despite the reported offences being shared across just five divisions of the Metropolitan Police and the Surrey force.

It took a moment for this to sink in. Part of me hated feeling so critical of my colleagues. But mostly I was shocked. And angry.

Because it was becoming clear to me that, with this extra intelligence, it might have been possible to nip the whole Night Stalker horror in the bud.

Dozens more offences took place from 2002 onwards, each with the same features or DNA to suggest it had almost certainly been him. But Operation Minstead had never changed its primary strategy.

Each new offence was treated as if it were a homicide, with forensic examination of the scene, house-to-house inquiries and so on.

The main task, as Operation Minstead saw it, was to obtain DNA samples from a list of 30,000 possible suspects  all black, as every victim had described their assailant  living in the Night Stalker's territory of South-East London.

Those suspects had grown up as black men in London in the 1970s and 1980s and would have reason to be suspicious of the police. And they were likely to refuse a swab.

It confirmed my long-held belief that DNA screening ought only to be a tactic of last resort.

When I asked the investigation's lone detective inspector, Nathan Eason, about the success rate of the swabbing operation he admitted: 'Last week we got one. Just one.'

It dawned on me that we didn't need to prove who had committed the new offences because the DNA from the old ones would ensure that, once caught, the Night Stalker would go to jail.

All we needed was to find out who the hell he was. And so was born the idea of 'Minstead Lite'.

The basis of my plan was that all new offences should be treated not as crimes to be fully investigated but as intelligence opportunities, which would greatly reduce the workload.

Grant, 52, (pictured) was found guilty of a total of 29 offences including rape, indecent assault, burglary and theft stretching from 1992 to 2009 and was sentenced to 27 years

We also started looking at all offences likely to come within the scope of Minstead, including those 'screened out' because they didn't have all the telltale signs of his modus operandi (MO).

This would turn out to be one of my most important decisions and it took just a few days for this new policy to be justified.

In the early hours of May 25, 2009, a burglary took place in Bromley, home of an elderly woman and her son.

It was reported to our team but discounted because the perpetrator hadn't stolen anything and had not interacted with the victims.

But when the son noticed the volume of orange juice in a carton in the fridge had reduced overnight, it was swabbed. The DNA was an exact match to the Night Stalker.

I now had evidence that if we were to carry on screening out offences that didn't exactly match his MO, we were going to miss vital intelligence opportunities.

We also found, on a neighbour's CCTV, footage of the bottom half of the Night Stalker as he walked to the house.

How many other opportunities like this had been missed?

Crucial information also came from victims' debit cards. After one offence, three attempts were made to use a victim's bank card at a cash machine in Honor Oak Park in South-East London.

The same machine had been used by the Night Stalker two years previously. Simon Morgan, the senior investigating officer, had arranged for CCTV to be installed in case our suspect returned.

I watched as, at 3.51am, a medium-height, medium-build man in a mid-blue cagoule zipped up to his nose, hood pulled over his head, walked briskly towards the ATM.

I decided to put surveillance on this machine, from midnight until 5.30am. Four or five nights later, the Night Stalker was in the home of an 82-year-old woman in Lee. At 5.36am the officers left their post.

But seven minutes later, at 5.43am, the Night Stalker appeared on the cameras to make his illicit withdrawal. They had missed him by the narrowest of margins.

The pain of that failure remained with us until we finally arrested him. And when we did, those pictures of the blue cagoule were to become very important.

The offences had been coming in steadily during September 2009, 16 reports in 19 days. It was time to put a new strategy into action.

When I was a young PC in Tottenham, we'd captured two lone serial criminals simply by keeping watch across the neighbourhoods in which they were offending. To do the same to capture the Night Stalker meant covering a much larger area  his territory was a quarter of London.

But our analyst, Richard Moore, found his favoured hunting ground was around the A232 at Shirley, east of Croydon. Restricting our watch to an area of two miles would make it just possible to contain.

A detailed plan evolved. We knew that the Night Stalker walked to the home he wanted to attack, at least for the last part of his route, and that he probably used a vehicle before that. The area we were to target was largely residential, with little pedestrian traffic after dark.

By observing every inch of the pavement in the target roads, with about 70 officers hiding in houses and buildings, and with hidden cameras to fill the gaps, we would ensure nobody could walk in or out without us seeing them.

We would also have use of a control room at Central 3000, an anonymous office block near Vauxhall.

This had a bank of 18 TV screens across one wall, into which the feed from any of thousands of local authority or Transport for London CCTV cameras could be piped and recorded, as well as images from our own hidden cameras.

Wednesday, October 28, 2009, was the first day of surveillance.

In November 2009, a police convoy closed in on Grant's Vauxhall Zafira in South London and his time was up. Pictured: Crowbar in the Vauxhall, which Grant used to enter a house on October 18, 2009

The Night Stalker had been busy. While we were all watching the Shirley plot, he had committed three burglaries.

Two were near Elmers End, less than half a mile from the north-west corner of our plot. The third was towards the rear of Bethlem Royal Hospital. I picked up the map, incredulous.

The next thought brought me goosebumps. The timespan between them  less than 30 minutes from the second to the third  made it virtually impossible that he could have got between them by foot.

He had to have been driving, and the most logical route would have been down Orchard Way  straight through the middle of our plot.

We had definitely seen no black male pedestrians, so one of the handful of cars we had watched go past just a few hours ago had to have been the Night Stalker.

CCTV from a school revealed what had to be our target vehicle passing south at 5.13am. It was silver or grey, possibly an estate.

I knew where our next inquiry would be made  Andy Wooller, at the Transport Research Laboratory, was my go-to person for identifying cars, having turned up trumps in the Levi Bellfield case.

Within 20 minutes, I had my answer. He was 75 per cent certain it was a Vauxhall Zafira, the B model.

On the second night of surveillance, an alert came from Lambeth, the furthest north of any of the offences.

The victim had called 999 when she heard an intruder, and an officer in a response car had spotted the fleeing figure and given chase on foot, only to lose him.

My first concern was that he might have changed his target area so significantly because the surveillance detail had leaked. Perhaps more worrying was trying to imagine how the Night Stalker would react to this very close shave.

If he stopped offending, the surveillance operation would be useless and we would be back to square one.

For a couple of weeks, this slick and intensive surveillance came to nothing. Then on a Saturday evening, November 14, ironically my first weekend off, I was jolted awake by my mobile at 1.30am.

'It looks like we've got him,' DI Nathan Eason said.

Surveillance officers had noticed a Vauxhall Zafira on Orchard Way, a black man jogging towards the car and driving away. In Central 3000, Nathan had made all the right calls.

The mobile surveillance team sprang into action, following him for about three miles until intercepting him as he turned into a street of 1930s terrace homes, typical Night Stalker territory.

In the glove compartment was the black balaclava, the blue cagoule was tossed on the passenger seat.

That the clothes were accompanied by a crowbar, a torch and what was later to prove the screwdriver that had left so many distinctive marks was the icing on the cake.

We had done it: after 17 years of Minstead, the new strategy had got him in 17 days. The emotion, the pride and relief were similar to what I had felt when Levi Bellfield had been convicted. It was what I went to work for.

Grant  a doting husband and kindly neighbour who led an appalling double life  was found guilty of a total of 29 offences including rape, indecent assault, burglary and theft stretching from 1992 to 2009.

He was sentenced to 27 years, and will not be released until he is at least 80. I'm often asked how many crimes I think he committed. The best I can offer is an 'at least' figure, a total of 204 offences from August 1990 to November 2009.

Delroy Easton Grant was unique: a man the like of which had not been seen before and, we must hope, will never be seen again.

 Colin Sutton, 2021

Manhunt: The Night Stalker, by Colin Sutton, is published by John Blake on September 16, priced 8.99.

To pre-order a copy for 8.09, go to mailshop.co.uk/books or call 020 3308 9193 before September 26. Free UK delivery on orders over 20.
The brother of a British 9/11 victim has accused Saudi Arabian officials of being involved in the 2001 terrorist attacks after the FBI accidentally identified one of the Arab state's diplomats as having allegedly assisted the hijackers.

Rupert Cushny, 68, spoke out ahead of the 20th anniversary of the atrocities after investigators named Mussaed Ahmed al-Jarrah as a mystery 'third man' who is said to have helped the terrorists.

Al-Jarrah, who denies any involvement in the plot, worked at the Saudi embassy in Washington DC and is said to have instructed two people to help Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdhar settle when they arrived in the country ahead of the attacks.

Al-Hazmi and al-Mindhar took part in the hijacking of the American Airlines plane that flew into the Pentagon killing 125 people.

In all, more than 3,000 people were killed in the atrocities which also saw two planes hit the Twin Towers in New York and a fourth crash in Pennsylvania.

Rupert Cushny (pictured) has accused Saudi Arabian officials of being involved in 9/11 after the FBI accidentally identified a diplomat as having helped the hijackers

Investigators named Mussaed Ahmed al-Jarrah (pictured) as a mystery 'third man' assisting the terrorists

Among 67 British victims was 47-year-old Gavin Cushny, an IT expert from the Isle of Lewis working for Cantor Fitzgerald on the 104th floor of the North Tower, the first building to be hit.

In all, 15 of the 19 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia and the families of victims have filed a lawsuit accusing the government in Riyadh of being complicit in the attacks.

Gavin's brother, Rupert, an author from Warlingham, Surrey, said: 'The Saudi involvement has always been extraordinarily fishy but I think it's extremely important that any wrongdoing is exposed to the wider world, specifically by Saudi Arabia. With this name coming out I believe it shows the Saudis did assist the hijackers'.

Lawyers believe the desert kingdom funded the terror network which carried out the attacks, al Qaeda, to stop homegrown fundamentalists turning against the ruling royal family.

The terror mastermind, Osama bin Laden, was from a prominent Saudi family before setting up training camps in Afghanistan.

Among 67 British victims was 47-year-old Gavin Cushny, an IT expert from the Isle of Lewis working for Cantor Fitzgerald on the 104th floor of the North Tower

Rupert added: 'If you look at it, it's Saudi Arabia's brutality and horrific regime that gave birth to Osama bin Laden. It is a very repressive regime, still living in the Dark Ages in terms of civil liberties and suppression of minorities. They just happen to be incredibly wealthy and have lots of oil so we bend over backwards for them'.

Al-Jarrah  whose name was accidently left unredacted in court papers by an FBI official - is believed to have tasked two men, Fahad al-Thumairy and Omar al-Bayoumi, to help the hijackers.

At the time al-Thumairy was a Saudi Islamic Affairs official and radical cleric who was the imam of the King Fahd Mosque in Los Angeles, and al-Bayoumi was a suspected Saudi government agent.

Lawyers representing the pair have denied their involvement with the plan to assist the terrorists.

Investigators believe that when the two Pentagon hijackers arrived in California, al-Bayoumi found them a flat, lent them money and set up a bank account for them.

The Saudi government denies any involvement in the 9/11 attacks and the 9/11 Commission report found 'no evidence that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials individually funded' the atrocities.

More than 3,000 people were killed in the atrocities which saw two planes hit the Twin Towers in New York, a third hit the Pentagon and a fourth which crashed in Virginia

But the commission did note 'the likelihood' that Saudi-government sponsored charities did.

Brett Eagleson, a spokesman for the 9/11 familes whose father was killed in the attacks, said: 'This shows there is a complete government cover-up of the Saudi involvement. It demonstrates there was a hierachy of command coming from the Saudi Embassy to the Ministry of Islamic Affairs (in Los Angeles) to the hijackers'.

Gavin, a former student at St Andrews University, had just got engaged to his American fiance, Susan Brady, when he was killed.

He died trying to escape down the stairwell of the North Tower and his body was found in the rubble two months later surrounded by 12 dead firemen.

Rupert recalled watching the drama unfold on television unaware that his younger brother was inside one of the buildings under attack.

'I'd seen him at our father's funeral six months earlier but I hadn't realised where he would be working. It was only when one of his best university friends phoned my elder brother that I found out.

Al-Jarrah is suspected of providing money, lodging and help to two of the hijackers Khalid al-Mihdhar (left) and Nawaf al-Hazmi (right) who hijacked the plane which flew into the Pentagon

Al-Mihdhar and al-Hazmi were two of the five terrorists who hijacked and crashed American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon (seen above)

'For a long period of time I assumed I'd watched my brother commit suicide without knowing it (by jumping from the building) or gone up to the top floor and not been rescued by a helicopter.

'However, Gavin was an extraordinarily brave man with a phenomenal desire for life and in early November his body was found intact except below his knees with another victim and 12 dead firemen. He'd managed to break out but sadly not far enough'.

Last week a friend of Gavin's from St Andrews told of a chilling conversation she's ahead with him after another terrorist attack on the Twin Towers seven years earlier:

Al-Jarrah is accused of directing Saudi official Fahad al-Thumairy (left) and suspected Saudi intelligence agent Omar al-Bayoumi (right) of setting the two hijackers up with a place to stay and opening a bank account for them

Joyce Lewis said: 'While we were discussing it Gavin gazed up at the Twin Towers, then turned to me and said: 'Can you believe that some people working inside there actually walked down more than 80 stairs?'

But in a horrible twist of fate Gavin went on to work in the Twin Towers and was the only employee at Cantor Fitzgerald to survive the blast from the planes - only to die in the stairwell trying to get out.

Al-Jarrah insisted he did not have any involvement in the terrorist attacks, testifying that he had no knowledge of the two hijackers Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi prior to September 11.

When asked if he had ever 'heard the names' of the hijackers before the attack, he responded: 'No, not at all.'

Lawyer Michael Kellogg said: 'The record will show no support for Plaintiffs' baseless allegations that al Thumairy or al Bayoumi received or gave any directions to assist the 9/11 hijackers.'
Boris Johnson is facing calls to order an independent inquiry into the death of a schoolboy after the release of official documents sparked claims of a cover-up.

The files reveal that lethal hydrogen cyanide gas was detected in the home of seven-year-old Zane Gbangbola, who died from toxic fumes seven years ago after his family's home in Chertsey, Surrey, was flooded.

His parents insist he was killed by the deadly gas, which had seeped from toxic waste dumped in a former landfill site nearby.

But in 2016, a coroner ruled the boy had been poisoned by carbon monoxide from a petrol-powered pump used to clear floodwater.

Now, The Mail on Sunday has obtained more than 100 pages of emails and an incident log written by Public Health England officials.

These reveal that hydrogen cyanide was detected three times in the house by firefighters using specialist gas-testing equipment  but no carbon monoxide was found  and that the pump blamed for the tragedy was not even used.

The files reveal that lethal hydrogen cyanide gas was detected in the home of seven-year-old Zane Gbangbola (pictured), who died from toxic fumes seven years ago after his family's home in Chertsey, Surrey, was flooded

They also show that despite the cyanide readings, senior officials briefed the media that Zane's death was the result of carbon monoxide poisoning. Public health officials were warned not to mention hydrogen cyanide as a potential cause.

Parents Kye Gbangbola and Nicole Lawler

Pleading with the Prime Minister to intervene, Zane's parents, Kye and Nicole, last night said: 'We believe the authorities lied pretty much from the moment that we lost our son.

'That is why we call on Boris Johnson to do the decent thing and open an independent panel inquiry so we can finally get to the truth and get justice for Zane.'

A petition launched by the couple has attracted 110,000 signatures, and Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer is backing their campaign.

Sir Keir said: 'I fully support their campaign for an independent panel inquiry to finally get to the truth about Zane's tragic death.'

Pressure for an inquiry increased last year when a retired Ministry of Defence engineer told the BBC that military contractors dumped chemical waste in gravel pits close to the family's home.

It also emerged that experts from the top-secret Porton Down defence laboratory rushed to the scene.

The documents obtained by the MoS  which were not disclosed to the coroner  provide fresh detail about what happened after Zane's mother found him at their riverside home on February 8, 2014.

The house in Chertsey where Zane died in 2014. PHE denied it had come under pressure to focus on carbon monoxide as the cause of Zane's death

He was pronounced dead on arrival at hospital; his father was paralysed. The cause was determined as exposure to cyanide.

An entry on the PHE incident log at 9.49am reveals that the fire service had 'positively identified HCN (hydrogen cyanide) gas on three occasions at the property', adding that 'continuous exposure to HCN builds up in the blood and can produce cardiac arrest type symptoms' and that Zane and his parents 'may have had extended exposure to the low levels of HCN over a period of weeks'.

By 7.24pm, public health officials were being encouraged to focus on carbon monoxide poisoning.

But an internal update from the Surrey Police Gold Commander 40 minutes later makes clear that cyanide had been detected and the petrol pump had not been in use.

PHE denied it had come under pressure to focus on carbon monoxide as the cause of Zane's death.

It added that its experts had provided evidence and documents to the coroner and that an expert from the PHE-commissioned National Poisons Information Service had also appeared at the inquest.

A spokesman for Richard Travers, the Surrey Coroner, said the six-week inquest had been 'independent, full, frank and fearless' and that 'a substantial amount of evidence including that from in excess of 70 witnesses' had been heard.
Addiction referrals have soared by 300 per cent amid the Covid-19 pandemic

Cocaine use is now 'spiralling out of control' among Britain's middle classes

Cocaine use is 'spiralling out of control' among Britain's middle classes, with addiction referrals soaring by 300 per cent during the pandemic.

Jan Gerber, who runs the Paracelsus Recovery clinic, warned that social media and the 'dark corners of the web' had made it easier for people to find dealers who will deliver drugs to their door  with the result that usage levels are at an all-time high among professionals.

'From what we are seeing among our clients, cocaine has become the norm at dinner parties in the UK,' said Mr Gerber, who runs centres for wealthy clients in London and Zurich.

'People are acting like wine snobs when it comes to cocaine, priding themselves on having the strongest and more pure forms of the drug.'

Cocaine use is 'spiralling out of control' among Britain's middle classes, with addiction referrals soaring by 300 per cent during the pandemic (stock image)

Experts warn the strength and purity of the drug has increased from 20 per cent a decade ago to 80 per cent.

Official figures show that there were 777 deaths involving cocaine in England and Wales last year, five times as many as a decade ago.

Meanwhile, Scotland recorded 459 cocaine deaths, more than four times higher than in 2015.

It comes as six men were arrested off the Devon coast and more than two tons of cocaine worth 160 million was seized.

The National Crime Agency said an operation involving its personnel as well as the Australian Federal Police and Border Force arrested a British man from Stockton-on-Tees, County Durham, and five Nicaraguans on a Jamaican-flagged yacht 80 miles out at sea.

Mr Gerber said people in Britain were increasingly taking a cocktail of substances.

'People are mixing alcohol and cocaine which causes the liver to produce cocaethylene, a poisonous chemical which can be many times more toxic than cocaine itself.

'Yes, cocaine has always been a popular party drug. However, abuse is clearly at an all-time high, both in terms of the amount consumed and the number of people taking the drug.

Jan Gerber, who runs the Paracelsus Recovery clinic, warned that social media had made it easier for people to find dealers who will deliver drugs to their door (stock image)

'Many successful people who may not have been the party type were suddenly developing habits in lockdown due to the stress and isolation.

'In addition, people were stuck at home and free to take however much they wanted. As a result, they began taking much higher quantities than if they were out at a bar or party. They're carrying on that habit now they're free to socialise again.'

Policing Minister Kit Malthouse recently warned that middle-class users needed to 'connect themselves with the violence' of the drugs trade ahead of a new Government strategy to change the 'perceived acceptability' of taking drugs.

'In cities like Liverpool, Manchester and London, they see the dead kids on the news, they see what the impact of the drugs industry is on other people, but they don't see the part they play,' he told The Times.

The Home Office is devising an advertising campaign that links casual drug use with the impact it is having, from gang violence on UK streets to murder and child exploitation in Central and South America.

It is hoped a hard-hitting advertisement campaign can make snorting cocaine as socially unacceptable as drink-driving.
A professor has hit out at cancel culture after his lectures were axed following a 'vicious, militant' campaign by students who branded him Islamophobic.

University chiefs rejected complaints that human rights expert Steven Greer had expressed 'bigoted views' after a five-month investigation  but have still pulled his module from their syllabus.

He accused senior academics of 'capitulating' to the threats of students who had called for the module at Bristol University's law school to be scrapped over his 'reported use of discriminatory remarks and Islamophobic comments'.

An online petition which was launched by members of the university's Islamic Society, Brisoc, attracted 3,700 signatures.

University chiefs rejected complaints that Steven Greer (pictured) had expressed 'bigoted views' after a five-month investigation  but have still pulled his module from their syllabus

Meanwhile, Prof Greer said he had to flee the family home amid fears for his safety following the campaign against him.

Critics claimed a lecture slide that mentioned the 2015 terror attack on the Paris offices of Charlie Hebdo, a magazine that had published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, was 'Islamophobic rhetoric'.

Prof Greer also highlighted the inferior treatment of women and non-Muslims in Islamic nations, and the harsh penalties handed out under sharia law.

But he believes he largely came under attack because he supports the Government's Prevent programme to stop radicalisation, which critics have branded anti-Islamic.

Prof Greer, who has worked at the university since the 1980s, told The Mail on Sunday: 'Brisoc's campaign has been vicious and punitive and has put me and my family under intolerable stress. It has been very threatening and frightening.'

He revealed that he 'came across a stranger loitering outside our home' shortly after news of the controversy emerged, adding: 'They gave an implausible excuse and left.

He accused academics of 'capitulating' to the students' threats who called for his Bristol University (pictured) module to be scrapped over his 'reported use of discriminatory remarks'

'Was it just a coincidence or a reconnoitre? We'll never know. My family and I were, of course, very rattled by this.

'Taking no chances, my wife and I fled our home to stay somewhere safer for several days.

'Going public in The Mail on Sunday may increase or decrease the risk to my personal safety. I just don't know.

'But the attack upon me is an attack upon a fundamental freedom and this is something worth standing up for, even if I'm harmed as a result.'

Although a formal investigation came down in favour of Prof Greer, he received an email from academic chiefs last week which said his module on Islam, China and the Far East was being dropped so Muslim students would 'not feel that their religion is being singled out or in any way 'othered' by the class material'.

Prof Greer said: 'Militant minorities are increasingly intent on dictating the content and delivery of university education through vilification, intimidation and threats.

'Their purpose is to silence lawful and legitimate opinion simply because they disagree with it.

'The law school has capitulated in a manner which is at variance with the result of the university's inquiry into my case.'

Prof Greer faced particular criticism over his defence of Prevent, but said the allegation that the programme was Islamophobic had been 'resoundingly discredited by the best and most recent research it simply doesn't stack up against the evidence.'

Of the 697 cases taken on by Prevent last year, 43 per cent were for far-Right extremism and 30 per cent were Islamist.

An online petition which was launched by members of the university's Islamic Society, Brisoc, attracted 3,700 signatures

Prof Greer, whose book, Tackling Terrorism In Britain: Threats, Responses And Challenges Twenty Years After 9/11, will be published next month, is due to retire at the end of this academic year, but has been signed off work by a doctor because of the impact of the saga on his health.

Students can appeal the ruling in favour of Prof Greer, and a Bristol University spokesman said: 'Our student complaints procedure has two stages and remains ongoing until both stages are complete.

'Material from the unit in question is still being taught but in a new format. This change is quite independent of the complaint raised and conforms with normal practice in the school in allowing the development of new teaching material to match students' current interests.'

Avon and Somerset Police said it was investigating a complaint of harassment. Brisoc did not respond to a request for comment.

Their online petition referred to 'a pattern of what can only be perceived to be hostility and bigotry towards Muslims which Prof Greer freely disseminates under the pretext of 'academic freedom'.'

Toby Young, of the Free Speech Union, said: 'Bristol's treatment of Prof Greer is outrageous.

'By kowtowing to the Islamic Society, the university has issued a gold-embossed invitation to activists to submit vexatious complaints about its employees.'
Ive just returned from five days in glorious, historic, Green-lit Malta. No Amber gambling for me.

I ate well, met fascinating people, soaked up the sun in the company of the brother and sister-in-law I havent seen since pre-lockdown and felt my blood pressure plummet from 148 over 96 to 127 over 70 in the time it takes to down a Moscow Mule.

Yet, Im here to tell you I will never go abroad again. Never. Neither will any sensible, sentient human being over 70. Not if they have to fly in to Heathrow, that is. It took years off my life.

I knew it would be hard fielding all the necessary documents, but thought I had it all covered with a folder as thick as an arm and full back-up on my iPhone.

I knew there was likely to be a problem because my passport says Lipman and my NHS bumf is in my married name, Rosenthal, but I was well prepared for that with a doctors letter, a gas bill, my marriage and birth certificates and, as an afterthought, a letter from The Central Chancery of The Orders of Knighthood.

Maureen Lipman: Im here to tell you I will never go abroad again. Never. Neither will any sensible, sentient human being over 70

Could it harm?

Two days before departure, I had had my expensive PCR test conducted by some shady characters in a corner shop which used to be a beauty spa five minutes ago, and booked a second test for two days after my return. I had instructions to have another PCR in any pharmacy in Malta to tide me over until my re-entrance to the UK.

Also required would be an all-important Locator Form (remember those words) to be filled in before, after, during and probably hereto after my five restful effing days abroad. To some extent, this worked and I got through check-in and customs here with a nod and a wink, a flash of my folder and a show-and-tell skim through my phone.

As I indicated, Malta was the very nicest and most interesting place to explore and the years fell off me. The problems began when no pharmacy in Malta actually did PCR tests, save at the airport and one distant pharmacy, Browns, in another town. Only by dint of a detour in my one-day guided tour was I able to get nasally swabbed by a jolly man in scrubs, flip-flops and Hawaiian shorts. The result, he said, would arrive on my phone within 24 hours.

I now had several Locator Forms and several Covid negative tests on the phone, confusingly interspaced between emails from my daughter, my agent, Rula Lenska, Gyles Brandreth and the assistants office of Coronation Street.

Pictured: Passengers queue to check in for their flights at Heathrow Terminal 5

Skimming through my Covid memorabilia on my phone was no longer an option.

So, after five fine days I headed, fatter and pinker, for Luqa airport and the check-in desk where the operator displayed a large black mask over her nose and her chin. I showed her my Locator Form and explained my passport and she said: Cnnushwmne  hovifst  dwonanede?

Er Im sorry, I didnt catch that? I said, inclining an ear to her screen.

She sighed. She was too tired to look up. It was getting to the end of her shift.

Cnnushwmnehovifst, she repeated in a slightly louder voice. Dwonanede?

I felt my throat clog up.

I really dont I mean I cant  er look  is it one of these?

I fluttered my folder in front of her blank gaze, and something I once read in a Terence Rattigan play came into my brain: She was as bored as the face of a fish.

She shook her head and said the Cnnushwmneh thing all over again. I thrust my email contents at her through the plastic

Is it this? Or this?

Or  oops, no  wait, is this what you want?

She waved a dismissive hand for me to step aside. I felt something snap. I sang out in a wobbly tone unlike my real voice. IM DOING MY BEST!

Her mask stared at mine

Im doing my best to give you what you w w wa  then came the humdinger.

IM 75 AND my ankles are swollen like two puff adders and I DONT KNOW WHAT YOU WANT FROM ME!

Well, in time, a ridiculously kind person on Information helped me find the form and I managed to make it through the undressing, dressing and metal-detecting bits and on to the plane and a nice quiet read of the London Review Of Books from July, but as we began descending I started to panic about immigration and the next Locator Form which was now demanding a reference number for the Covid test Id had in Valletta.

I couldnt manage to up  or is it down  load it from one email on to another. Both the stewardess, bless her, and the kind lady in the next but one seat tried to help me do it and still it failed.

I found myself the last person on the plane. I started walking, my knapsack on my back, Happy Wanderer-style, with the Duty Free bags clinking and biting into my wrist.

I walked to the walking escalator, which propelled me along, then to the tarmac which didnt and thence to the next escalator which was static, which threw me off balance and made me walk like an extra in Michael Jacksons Thriller video. By the time I reached Arrivals, I was a bit short of breath and even more so when I saw the upward escalator was jammed, with at least 50 people stuck on it and the immigration hall at the top was looking like the third day of Glastonbury.

I mean, Welcome to Terminal 5, Gateway to Babel. By Pieter Bruegel.

Thousands of tired souls with prams and scooters and squalling babes and elderly, limping codgers  one of whom was me  shuffling and snaking around meaningless ropes to beg or barter their way into this sceptred isle.

My throat clogged up again. My eyes began to prickle yes, I was about to go off on one. I had no conception of whether my panic was real or whether I am actually the best actress there has ever been. By the time I reached my barrier, I was hyper-ventilating and my knees were bending like Clive Dunns in Dads Army.

Heres my p passport but I cant  I gasped to the raised eyebrows of the official I need to can I sit? I whispered throwing myself on to a Sikh official standing nearby I am Its my mask its I cant catch my br

Bless his heart, he ushered me straight through, Locator Form notwithstanding  and indeed, by now, I wasnt standing, just bobbing and weaving like a plastic duck in an amusement arcade.

A stool was fetched. Paramedics were mentioned and a smallish crowd gathered around to suck in my air.

The upshot was that I recovered, with a can of water and some Security TLC, and waddled off to Baggage Reclaim which resembled the scene of a crime in a Scorsese film and thence, because I couldnt locate the Heathrow Express and frankly didnt want to to the desperate and endless queue for an 80 taxi.

I left my hotel in Malta, where they are one hour ahead, at 3.30pm and got home by midnight. I would go back tomorrow but only if I could go by pony and trap.

Otherwise its a no-brainer. I will never leave England again.
Posing as a high-school cheerleader, this is the deputy head teacher of a primary school who has been charged with aiding the rape of a young girl.

Parents of pupils at St Georges Central Church of England Primary near Wigan spoke of their shock after learning that Julie Morris had been remanded in custody charged with facilitating the rape of a child under 13.

The 44-year-old  one of three child protection officers in charge of safeguarding at the school  also posed in an Alice In Wonderland outfit for the schools prospectus.

Many who collected children from the school gates on Friday expressed support for the deputy head

Her cheerleader photograph was posted on social media.

The school last week sent a letter to the parents of pupils explaining the seriousness of the offences faced by Ms Morris, who was also the maths and religious education lead at the 340-pupil school, where she had taught for nearly a decade.

Many who collected children from the school gates on Friday expressed support for the deputy head.

One mother said: All my children have gone to this school and to say Im shocked is an understatement. I really hope its not true. Its sad the school has been dragged into it.

Another said: Ive nothing bad to say about her. The charges are very serious and what makes it more shocking is that she is a deputy head in charge of young children.

In my mind its innocent until proven guilty.

Parents of pupils at St Georges Central Church of England Primary near Wigan spoke of their shock after learning that Julie Morris had been remanded in custody

Ms Morris has also been charged with inciting sexual activity with a child under 13

Detectives for Merseyside Police said the alleged offences did not relate to Ms Morriss work at the school in Tyldesley, Greater Manchester.

Ms Morris has been suspended by Wigan Council pending the outcome of the case.

Her LinkedIn profile, which was taken down last week, stated that she had studied psychology at Lancaster University and had a qualification from Edge Hill University.

Her neighbours on a quiet housing estate in Hindley, near Wigan, expressed their shock. One said: She is our neighbour and friend.

It must be an awful time for her family and we didnt have any idea. All we can do is wait for the trial and see what happens.

Ms Morris has also been charged with inciting sexual activity with a child under 13.

She was charged alongside David Morris, 52, of Eccleston, near St Helens on Merseyside, who faces three counts of rape of a girl under 13 and inciting a girl under 13 to engage in sexual activity.

The pair share a surname but are understood to not be married or related. Both were remanded in custody last week until their appearance at Liverpool Crown Court next month.
A repeat offender from the Bronx stabbed a California tourist in the stomach Friday night in Midtown Manhattan after the victim confronted the attacker for throwing a pack of strawberries at him.

Adan Moreno allegedly threw the fruit towards a 29-year-old man from Los Angeles as he walked with his brother, girlfriend and two young kids on West 38th Street towards Broadway around 9.40pm.

'You better get the f*** out of here. I'll kill you,' Moreno, 29, said as he chased the victim before stabbing him in the stomach, according to the New York Post.

The victim was taken to Bellevue Hospital and his injuries were not life-threatening.

Meanwhile, multiple witnesses led cops to Moreno and he was quickly arrested. Cops also recovered the knife at the scene, as reported by the NY Post.

Adan Moreno, a 29-year-old repeat offender from the Bronx, stabbed a California tourist in the stomach Friday night in Midtown Manhattan after the victim confronted the attacker for throwing a pack of strawberries at him

Moreno allegedly threw the fruit towards a 29-year-old man from Los Angeles as he walked with his brother, girlfriend and two young kids on West 38th Street towards Broadway around 9.40pm

Police charged the Moreno with second-degree assault, reckless endangerment and criminal possession of a weapon, plus two counts of acting in a manner injurious to a child less than 17 and five counts of menacing.

But this wasn't Moreno's first run-in with the law. On August 7 he was arrested for punching a 44-year-old man in the face on the corner of Hooper Street and Broadway in Williamsburg.

Nearly two weeks later on August 17 he was arrested again on Union Square East near East 15th Street in Manhattan for punching a 49-year-old in the face, according to NY Post.

Both victims suffered minor injuries but the details of each incident were not immediately available.

The stabbing comes just after New York Mayor Bill de Blasio's announcement at a press conference last week that the city has experienced one of the safest Augusts on record.

At a press conference last week New York mayor Bill de Blasio released last month's citywide crime statistics where he crowed that crime in August 2021 dropped 5.4 per cent compared to the same time last year

Despite an overall decrease in crime felony assaults saw a 5.5 per cent increase

De Blasio released last month's citywide crime statistics where he crowed that crime in August 2021 dropped 5.4 per cent compared to the same time last year, despite the fact that felony assaults saw a 5.5 per cent increase.

'We got a lot more to go, let me be clear,' De Blasio said at the press conference. 'One crime is one crime too many for all of us and we have big challenges ahead, particularly in the Bronx,' he added.

He also noted that citywide, 'murder is down nearly nine per cent' and shooting incidents have decreased by 3.7 per cent overall.

But terrifying photo and video evidence of serious crime shared by the NYPD have served as evidence that the Big Apple can still be a very dangerous place.

Earlier this week, dramatic video footage captured the moment two armed gunmen ambushed a 25-year-old man leaving a New York gambling den with a wad of cash in his hand.

According to authorities, the unnamed man left the illegal gambling hotspot in Washington Heights while holding an undisclosed amount of money when two masked men hopped out of a black Chevy Tahoe and opened fire around 7am.

The victim and a friend were chased up Amsterdam Avenue before several rounds were fired at them.

The man was shot in the leg and shoulder and was eventually able to escape the gunman, although police haven't said if his winnings were stolen. DailyMail.com has contacted the NYPD for further information.

Earlier this week two armed gunmen ambushed a 25-year-old man leaving a New York gambling den with a wad of cash in his hand

The NYPD released video footage of the ambush as one of the gunman (pictured) chases the man and a friend up Amsterdam Avenue before firing several rounds at them, shooting the man with the cash in the leg and shoulder

He was taken to Harlem Hospital where he was listed in stable condition, according to authorities. It is unclear if he will face any charges over visiting the gambling den.

After the shooting the gunman returned to the black SUV alongside his accomplice and the two men fled the scene before police could arrive.

Police described the shooter as heavyset with a medium complexion, and was last seen wearing a Champion hoodie sweatshirt along with a black mask, black sneakers and black pants.

The second suspect, who police say was armed but did not open fire, was said to have a medium build and was seen on video wearing a black mask, black hoodie, black sneakers and black pants similar to the gunman.

Police are seeking the public's assistance in identifying the two suspects, as no arrests have been made. Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at (800) 577-TIPS. All calls will be kept confidential.
Border Force officers are set to use X-ray technology to confirm the age of asylum-seekers arriving in boats across the Channel.

A Government document seen by The Mail on Sunday reveals how the Home Office is planning to use medical scans to verify the ages of migrants who claim to be children.

It follows a string of high-profile cases in which would-be asylum-seekers falsely claimed to be under 18. One spent six weeks as a Year 11 pupil at a school in Ipswich in 2018 before the local authority discovered he was years older.

The UK is one of only a few countries not to use scientific methods to check the ages of asylum-seekers, according to the document. At present, social workers simply study the behaviour and language of those claiming to be children to assess whether they are telling the truth.

But X-rays of teeth and wrist bones can provide a more accurate picture of a young person's age.

Migrants arrive at Dover Docks in a Border Force vessel last week

The document reveals that the Home Office is looking for a private-sector firm to carry out assessments at several sites, adding: 'The initial estimate is for a requirement of approximately 1,000 assessments a year. However, this will fluctuate, potentially significantly.

'It is understood that the use of X-rays are the most common form of imaging techniques for these purposes, but other methods would not be precluded if they can be demonstrated to be viable and effective and the exact type of X-ray is still to be determined.'

Home Office research has found up to 54 per cent of migrants claiming to be children were over 18.

Ahmed Hassan, an Iraqi asylum-seeker who planted a bomb on the London Underground in 2017 that partially exploded, injuring 23 people, pretended to be 16.

A judge who jailed the Iraqi for 34 years in 2018 said he was satisfied he was over 18.

Alp Mehmet, chairman of the Migration Watch UK think-tank, said: 'Adult migrants claiming to be children has long been an issue at the border, with an over-readiness to accept the word of claimants.

'We are among very few European countries that don't use scientific evidence in verifying age. It has been a major hole in our defences that traffickers have been only too ready to exploit.

'If this is now going to change, it is a welcome development.'

However, the scans are likely to anger human rights groups. In 2018, German doctors branded proposals to subject migrants to X-ray examinations 'unethical' and unreliable.

More than 14,000 migrants have crossed the Channel since January, compared with 8,420 for the whole of last year. A total of 126 migrants, including several women and children, were rescued by the French in the Strait of Dover on Friday after attempting to reach the UK.

Home Secretary Priti Patel has promised to pay France 54.2 million to tackle the problem, although a 28.2 million payment in November failed to stop the crossings.

It emerged yesterday that Ms Patel was also planning to spend 200 million on a fleet of patrol boats to replace Border Force's five ageing cutters, which detect illegal immigration and smuggling.

Home Secretary Priti Patel has promised to pay France 54.2 million to tackle the problem, although a 28.2 million payment in November failed to stop the crossings

A document seen by The Mail on Sunday suggests the Home Office wants to charter a vessel to accommodate 12 Border Force officers, three crew and 75 'passengers' and have a 'rescue platform' at the stern for plucking migrants to safety from dinghies. It would exceed 25 knots and have a crane to launch a small rescue craft. The Home Office was unable to say last night whether this would supplement existing cutters or was the specification for their replacements.

A shipping broker estimated that such a vessel could cost taxpayers 11,700 a day  3,600 in charter and crew costs and 8,100 for fuel.

Border Force is to get new powers next year to operate in French waters and officers are being trained in so-called 'pushback' tactics to turn migrant vessels away.

The Home Office said: 'We are seeing an unacceptable rise in dangerous and unnecessary small boat crossings. That's why we continue to explore all options available to bring these numbers down.'
Is Alan Sugar about to be told: 'You're fired'?

The Apprentice star is one of 24 peers under investigation by Parliament's ethics watchdog over outside interests.

The famous hothead, who was rather absurdly ennobled by Gordon Brown in 2009, has been accused of failing to declare his interests correctly.

The tough transparency rules require peers to give a brief description of the work carried out by the company that pays them.

Alan Sugar (pictured) is one of 24 peers under investigation by Parliament's ethics watchdog over outside interests

It can be as vague as 'security' or 'media', yet it appears these 24 peers found this requirement too hard to meet.

So what of Lord Sugar's interests?

As well as his TV work hosting The Apprentice, Junior Apprentice and Australian Celebrity Apprentice, he has 28 directorships and finds time for paid 'fireside chats'.

What then of his contribution to the House of Lords?

Well, he hasn't had time to vote since 2017, the last time he spoke in the Second Chamber was in 2018, and he has no written questions to his name.

Talking of which, Sugar, 74, does insist The Apprentice candidates use his title, and proudly displays it on his social media accounts, where, unlike Parliament, he sees it more worth his while to maintain his gruff presence.

The tough transparency rules require peers to give a brief description of the work carried out by the company that pays them. Pictured: Lord Alan Sugar in the Lords chamber

The Lords Commissioners for Standards, which launched the probe last week, technically has the power to expel and suspend peers.

Naturally, in this instance Lord Sugar and his fellow peers under investigation will at most be given a slap on the wrist.

Isn't it time that the watchdog grasped the nettle and gave the boot to peers who clearly have more interest in their personal and business affairs?

MPs love a trip to the Apple Store at the taxpayers' expense  Angela Rayner perhaps more than most.

After criticism for putting two sets of AirPods on expenses, Angela Rayner (pictured) has paid back the cost of an Apple Pencil and a keyboard she bought to go with her 1,919 iPad Pro

But after criticism for putting not one but two sets of AirPods on expenses, Labour's frontline Shadow Minister has quietly paid back the cost of an Apple Pencil and a keyboard she bought to go with her 1,919 iPad Pro.

The two gadgets cost 256. Surely the AirPods at 249 a set should be next? Baby steps

I hear that Downing Street's second most rampant occupant has been managing to control his libido and other appetites.

Downing Street's dog Dilyn (pictured) has been managing to control his libido and has become 'more chilled', says a mole

For now at least, Dilyn the dog is 'more chilled', says my mole. Perhaps the arrival of rival pup Nova at Rishi Sunak's well-run operation next door has his paranoid neighbours worried.

There's nothing like planning law reform to make twitchy Tory MPs concerned about how it will go down with constituents.

The sniping has already begun over the divisive issue as it returns to the Commons agenda.

One furious Tory has questioned the loyalty of the adviser in No 10 behind the policy  apparently, when Jack Airey left his previous career as a think-tank wonk, he also left behind his Labour mug.
The Florida Department of Health reported 2,488 deaths from COVID-19 over the last seven days - the highest weekly figure since the pandemic began.

But there was also a glimmer of hope for the Sunshine State, as weekly COVID cases dropped by nearly 30,000, sparking hopes that the Delta variant may be on the wane.

The state previously reported 129,202 cases between August 27 and September 2. But figures from Johns Hopkins University released Friday state reported 100,249 cases between September 3 to September 9, News 8 reported.

Johns Hopkins figures put Florida's total deaths at 2,448 between September 3 and September 9. Florida state's report revealed that 353 deaths occurred in the past seven days, although the Sunshine State - which has released figures weekly instead of daily since June - often adds on deaths at a later date.

In the last seven days, on average, the state has added 339 deaths and 15,633 cases to the daily cumulative total, according to the Miami Herald's calculations of a separate set of data from the Centers for Disease Control.

This comes as the US continues to see spikes and drops in daily COVID-19 cases amid the Delta variant, which brought record number of daily cases throughout August, peaking at 322,934.

The U.S. neared the peak again on Friday as Johns Hopkins University & Medicine reported about 262,076 new cases and about 4,409 new deaths.

That figure includes the 2,448 weekly deaths recorded by Florida on Friday.

Despite facing record high COVID-19 deaths, Florida has seen its weekly number of COVID-19 cases drop. This latest week saw cases fall by nearly 300,000

The US saw a recent spike of more than 260,000 new cases reported on Friday

America continues to lead the world in COVID-19 cases since the pandemic first began

The first case of COVID-19 in United States was reported 597 days ago on January 21, 2020, and the nation continues to lead among the countries with the highest number of positive cases at more than 40 million reported.

Florida alone has accounted for nearly 3.5 million cases and reported more than 48,000 deaths so far, according to JHU.

Figures show that 75 per cent of eligible Americans have gotten at least one jab of the vaccine.

Around 56 per cent of those eligible in Florida are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, slightly above the national average of 54 per cent of Americans who are fully inoculated.

Vaccinations across the state saw a significant decline as the state reported more than 518,000 doses administered on the week of August 27, but only 349,845 administered the following week.

This comes as Florida Gov. Mike DeSantis continues to butt heads with President Joe Biden on mask and vaccine mandates.

DeSantis had ordered all schools in the state to not impose any masking policies or face budget cuts, much to the chagrin of Biden, who promised to help bring funding to the schools who broke away from the governor's orders.

Florida's First District Court of Appeals reinstated the state's ban on mask mandates in schools on Friday after DeSantis filed an emergency appeal hours after a judge ruled against his executive order for the second time.

'No surprise here  the 1st DCA has restored the right of parents to make the best decisions for their children, DeSantis wrote on Twitter after the reinstatement. I will continue to fight for parents rights.

Florida Gov. Mike DeSantis, left, has repeatedly criticized US President Joe Biden's backing of mask and vaccine mandates

Florida parents protested that they did not want their children to wear masks in school

'No surprise here  the 1st DCA has restored the right of parents to make the best decisions for their children, De Santis wrote on Twitter after the reinstatement. I will continue to fight for parents rights, he then added

The court's decree means the state can now go after schools financially if they decide to impose mask mandates.

A spokesperson for DeSantis, Christina Pushaw, praised the decision on Twitter.

'1st District Court of Appeals just granted the State of Florida's request to reinstate the stay - meaning, the rule requiring ALL Florida school districts to protect parents' rights to make choices about masking kids is BACK in effect!' Pushaw proudly declared Friday.

The ruling comes despite objections from concerned parents who fear DeSantis' policy could cause 'irreparable harm' to their children amid the Delta variant.

Thirteen of Florida's 67 school districts currently have mask requirements.

In contrast, the state has begun to withhold funds equivalent to monthly salaries of school board members in Alachua and Broward counties, and have begun looking in for other counties that are not playing ball.

'1st District Court of Appeals just granted the State of Florida's request to reinstate the stay - meaning, the rule requiring ALL Florida school districts to protect parents' rights to make choices about masking kids is BACK in effect!' DeSantis' spokesperson Christina Pushaw proudly declared Friday after the governor's motion went through

The ruling is the latest development in an ongoing saga between the state and several local school districts as some Florida schools are fighting for legal mask mandates after a significant, statewide surge of COVID-19 cases. Pictured are masked students in Florida last month

This all comes the day after President Joe Biden's administration announcing the creation of a new grant designed specifically to cover any fines or withholding of funds that school districts face because of their mask rules.

Republicans nationwide tore into Biden on Thursday after he announced he'd use an emergency order to force businesses with 100 or more employees to mandate vaccines or weekly COVID testing.

'Forcing this and coercing people, I don't think is the right decision. I'd imagine that you're gonna see a lot of activity in the courts if they try to do that through an executive action,' DeSantis said during a press conference Thursday.
Double-jabbed travellers will no longer have to take expensive PCR Covid tests when returning to the UK, the Government is poised to announce.

Officials are working towards scrapping the requirement for green and amber list countries before the half-term holidays next month, The Mail on Sunday can reveal, providing a huge boost for millions of holidaymakers and the beleaguered travel industry.

Travellers will no longer need Covid tests before leaving for Britain, while the unpopular PCR tests currently required on the second day after arrival will be replaced by cheaper lateral flow tests.

The move will slash the cost of family holidays by hundreds of pounds. Currently, the PCR test can cost more than 100, while the NHS offers free lateral flow tests.

Officials are working towards scrapping the requirement for green and amber list countries before the half-term holidays next month, The Mail on Sunday can reveal, providing a huge boost for millions of holidaymakers and the beleaguered travel industry

The plan will be discussed this week by Boris Johnson, Chancellor Rishi Sunak, Health Secretary Sajid Javid and Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove who form the so-called Covid-O committee.

The change would also tackle fears that some PCR firms are profiteering and could provide an incentive for people to be vaccinated, as the new rules would only apply to those who have been double jabbed.

News of the plan came as:

The Prime Minister prepared to set out his winter plan for coronavirus on Tuesday, saying: Life has returned to a sense of normality... Im determined to get rid of any powers we no longer need because of our vaccine defences;

The UKs Chief Medical Officers were expected to recommend extending the vaccine rollout to 12- to 15-year-olds as soon as September 22, despite the independent Joint Committee on Vaccinations and Immunisation (JCVI) refusing to do the same;

Ministers were expecting the JCVI to recommend a vaccine booster programme;

A further 29,547 cases and 156 deaths were recorded, while the number of people who have received two doses of a vaccine reached nearly 81 per cent of the adult population;

American bank Goldman Sachs urged its entire 6,000-strong workforce in the UK to return to the office from tomorrow, with Cabinet Secretary Simon Case facing calls to encourage more civil servants to get back to their desks.

Travellers will no longer need Covid tests before leaving for Britain, while the unpopular PCR tests currently required on the second day after arrival will be replaced by cheaper lateral flow tests

At present, the Government requires all those entering the UK to pay for a PCR coronavirus test on or before the second day after their arrival, no matter what their vaccination status. Those arriving from countries on the Governments amber list also have to take a pre-departure test, which can be a PCR or lateral flow test.

The test is not required for green list countries, while those travelling from red list nations must pay to stay in UK quarantine hotels for ten days.

Travellers will still be required to adhere to the testing rules of the country to which they are travelling but most EU countries have abandoned the requirement for PCR tests for the fully vaccinated.

Details for those under the age of 16 arriving in the UK are still being finalised but the intention is for them to be subject to the same system.

Travellers will still be required to adhere to the testing rules of the country to which they are travelling but most EU countries have abandoned the requirement for PCR tests for the fully vaccinated

Paul Charles, boss of The PC Agency travel firm, said last night: This would be a significant vote-winner with consumers and the industry. Its exactly what weve been calling for because these tests have been expensive and too confusing.

Its a significant move that would boost confidence and help the travel sector recover substantially. It would help airlines, tour operators, and hoteliers, and crucially, it would help the inbound travel industry which is in turmoil.

Current test rules would remain in place for those not double jabbed. There has been mounting anger about the cost of PCR tests, with a family of four often having to spend 600 or more. The Competition and Markets Authority last week reported widespread complaints of dodgy pricing practices to unfair terms to failure to provide tests on time or at all.

On Tuesday, Mr Johnson will set out his plan to combat Covid-19 this winter, when a rise in cases is predicted. He is expected to say that vaccines will remain the first line of defence and downplay the prospect of another lockdown by repealing several Government powers including the ability to close sectors of the economy, curtail events and gatherings, and detain infectious people.

Current test rules would remain in place for those not double jabbed

Legal powers in the Coronavirus Act to disrupt education and temporarily shut schools will also be removed, but others  such as giving sick pay to people isolating from day one and being able to direct schools to remain open if they close against Government guidance  will remain. An announcement on booster jabs is also imminent, with the JCVI widely predicted to back the move.

Chris Whitty, Englands Chief Medical Officer, and his counterparts in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland are expected to recommend that vaccinations be given to 12- to 15-year-olds  advice the Prime Minister is set to accept.

Tory MP Robert Halfon last night said that if that happens, Mr Johnson and Professor Whitty should write to all parents in England to explain why theyve made their decision, the science behind it, and why theyve made a different decision to the JCVI. He added that there must be a rule of parental consent, except in the most extreme circumstances.
The Prince of Wales personally handed an honorary knighthood to a billionaire Saudi supporter of his charity during a taxpayer-funded trip to the Middle East.

The Mail on Sunday can reveal that Prince Charles found time between a blizzard of official engagements to pose for photographs with a beaming Mohammed Abdul Latif Jameel at an investiture ceremony on February 10, 2015.

But the event at the British Embassy in Riyadh was not mentioned in the 774-word Court Circular descriptions of the future Kings activities during his six-day official tour on behalf of the Government. Pictures of the investiture emerged only when Mr Jameel posted them on his personal website.

The Mail on Sunday can reveal that Prince Charles found time between a blizzard of official engagements to pose for photographs with a beaming Mohammed Abdul Latif Jameel at an investiture ceremony on February 10, 2015

One of Saudi Arabias richest men, Mr Jameel, 66, is a longstanding supporter of Dumfries House, the 18th Century Palladian mansion in Scotland saved for the nation by Charles in 2007. He is also a trustee of the Princes School of Traditional Arts and an ambassador of The Princes Foundation.

A spokesman for the billionaire last night insisted that he had never sought, or been offered, an honour from Charles or anyone linked to the Prince in return for a charitable donation.

Despite that, Norman Baker, an expert on Royal finances, urged Charles to come clean and said he would be asking the Metropolitan Police to investigate the awarding of Mr Jameels knighthood.

The former Minister has already asked Met Commissioner Cressida Dick to investigate the circumstances around the award of an honour to another donor, Mahfouz Marei Mubarak bin Mahfouz, and the role played by Charless closest aide Michael Fawcett.

But the event at the British Embassy in Riyadh was not mentioned in the 774-word Court Circular descriptions of the future Kings activities during his six-day official tour on behalf of the Government, and came to light only when Mr Jameel posted pictures on his personal website

Mr Fawcett temporarily stepped down as chief executive of The Princes Foundation last weekend when The Mail on Sunday revealed a bombshell letter in which he offered to help secure a knighthood and citizenship for Dr Bin Mahfouz.

The smell of scandal is growing stronger, Mr Baker said. I will be bringing this fresh case to the attention of the police. This is not the way the heir to the Throne should be behaving.

The MoS can also reveal:

A third fixer involved in a controversial 500,000 cash for access donation to the Princes Foundation is a glamorous Belarusian called Volha Havorchanka;

Leaked emails show William Bortrick, the editor of Burkes Peerage, knew about the same deal with banker Dmitry Leus  despite his previous denials;

Lord Brownlow, a Tory donor embroiled in a row over the refurbishment of Boris Johnsons Downing Street flat, also bailed out Charless struggling eco village at Dumfries House;

The Princes Foundation paid Mr Fawcett using a controversial arrangement that could have reduced their respective tax bills.

Mr Jameel has other connections with the Royal Family. Prince Andrew was photographed in 2011 frolicking in the sea off Corsica on his 150ft super-yacht. He also counts U2 frontman Bono among his friends, while his son, Hassan, dated pop star Rihanna for four years.

The billionaire forged his friendship with Charles 15 years ago through their shared love of art. Companies House records show that he has been involved with Charless charity since 2006, serving as director of the Princes School of Traditional Arts for 12 years until 2018.

According to his website, a third school in his Jameel House of Traditional Arts project is currently under development on the estate of Dumfries House.

Announcing the centre  which will cover almost five acres  in 2018, Simon Sadinsky, deputy executive director for education at The Princes Foundation, said: Thanks to the generosity of Mohammed Jameel, this will be a remarkable facility.

The Prince last year sent a personal video message of congratulations when Mr Jameels company and charity celebrated their 75th anniversary.

A spokesman for the billionaire said last night: Mohammed Jameel has never at any time sought any honour. The award of a knighthood came as a total surprise to him.

When the British Embassy in Riyadh publicly announced the honour, approved by the Queen, it noted Mr Jameels support for the arts, particularly the V&A Museum. There was no mention of donations to The Princes Foundation.

It is not normal practice to include such an investiture on the Court Circular and a Palace source pointed out that, far from being private, the award was made clear on a British Government website.

Charity pay packet of Prince Charles' closest aide Michael Fawcett is paid to the former valet's catering company - avoiding payroll tax

Dumfries House charity paid 311,000 to Michael Fawcett's hospitality company

Money was for his role as the charity's executive director and company services

Premier Mode was separately paid more than 300,000 by the charity

The charity pay packet of Prince Charles's closest aide was paid for three years into the former valet's catering company  avoiding the need to shell out on payroll taxes.

The Dumfries House charity paid 311,000 into Michael Fawcett's events hospitality company Premier Mode Ltd between 2015 and 2018, according to an analysis of its accounts.

The money was for his role as the charity's executive director and for services provided by his company. Premier Mode was separately paid more than 300,000 by the charity over the same period for organising events.

Ministers have launched a series of crackdowns on schemes in which bosses' salaries and fees are paid into private companies to reduce income tax and National Insurance payments.

The Prince's Foundation  the new name for the Dumfries House charity  may now face questions about why these funds were paid 'off payroll' to Mr Fawcett. There is no suggestion the arrangement was in breach of tax laws.

Graham Smith of Republic, which campaigns for the abolition of the monarchy, said: 'This looks like a questionable arrangement.

'We need to be told how much money was paid to this company, how much tax was paid and who made the decision to make these payments.'

Between 2015 and 2018, the charity made payments of 173,000 to Premier Mode 'with respect to the Executive Director's role within the Trust' and 138,000 for services provided by the company.

It also paid 18,170 to a filming company between 2015 and 2018 where Mr Fawcett's son Oliver is a director.

The charity and Mr Fawcett declined to comment but a source said that the accounts were independently audited and published each year.
A Subway worker was suspended after dramatic surveillance footage showing her bravely fighting off an armed robber was leaked online.

Araceli Sotelo was working alone at a Subway in Rockford, Illinois last Sunday when a man stormed in demanding money.

'He kind of just showed me his gun, and I was like freaking out like, 'woah you can't do that please leave,'' Sotelo said. '[He said] 'give me all the money' and I said 'I do not have any money, like, I do not have any money.' That is all I had and he was just like, 'give me everything before I hurt you.''

Araceli Sotelo was working alone at a Subway in Rockford, Illinois when a man dressed in all black came in the store demanding money

Sotelo yelled at the man to leave the store and fought back when he grabbed her purse

She wrestled the man pulling off his hoodie and what appears to be a red scarf. The man then dropped his gun and her purse in the struggle. Sotelo snatched the gun from the floor and hit the man with it when he refused to give her the purse

In the video, Sotelo can be heard frantically screaming 'stop' and 'get out' in attempts to get the man to leave the store at 1120 East State Street.

The man refused to leave and then grabbed Sotelo's purse. That's when she decided to fight back.

'He was smaller than me, so I have that advantage. I'm bigger than him, so I could at least put my weight on him, push him, or something,' Sotelo said.

Surveillance footage of the store shows Sotelo wrestling with the man and dragging him from behind the counter. The man dressed in a black t-shirt, hoodie, and ski mask eventually drops Sotelo's purse, what appears to be a red scarf, and his gun on the ground.

Sotelo grabs the mans gun and the black hoodie that she wrestled from him as he picks up her purse. She yells at him to give her the purse and then hits the man with his gun.

'He dropped (the gun) trying to hold onto my purse, and I end up pulling his sweatshirt off him and I was like 'show your face, show your face, you are on camera.' and he was like 'here you can have your purse back just give me back my stuff.' He wanted me to give him back his gun and his clothes,' Sotelo said.

'I just hit him on the head with it, that is what he was doing to me.'

Surveillance footage of the attempted robbery was posted online and shared on Sotelo's TikTok account.

Sotelo said that she was suspended from her job after footage of the attempted robbery was posted online. She claims that she did not leak the video

The Subway store owner told Sotelo that she would be suspended until all the footage of the attempted robbery was taken off the internet

Despite Sotelo's brave defense against the attempted robbery, the Subway employee was suspended from her job several days later.

Sotelo said she was told, ''if every one of these videos are not taken offline you will be suspended,' and then I texted them and I'm like 'how long am I suspended for?' They said till everything is removed online. I have no ability to do that,' Sotelo said.

Sotelo said she did not leak the video, and says the store owner is now ignoring her.

'They did not want anyone to know, they wanted to be private that it happened to me and that I fought back, but I think they did that because they do not want corporate to know,' Sotelo said.

A GoFundMe page has been set up by Sotelo's mother to raise funds to fix Sotelo's phone that was broken during the fight and to cover the loss of her purse.
Abimael Guzman, the founder of Peruvian communist group Shining Path, died aged 86 of poor health in his prison cell on Saturday while serving a life sentence after trying to overthrow the government.

Guzman, who headed the communist-obsessed renegade group and terrorized Peru throughout the 1980s and 90s, was convicted as a terrorist in 1992 in Lima, Peru, and jailed for the rest of his life.

As the leader of the Shining Path, Guzman sparked a conflict that resulted in the death of at least 69,000 Peruvians at the hands of guerillas. The terrorist group also slaughtered dogs and hung their lifeless bodies on lampposts throughout the capital for Lima residents to wake up to one December morning.

Each dog had a sign around its neck with a slogan referring to the Chinese Communist Party, and claimed the animals were symbols of capitalism.

Guzman died in a maximum-security prison in the Callao naval base in Peru. Prison officials said his health had been declining for several weeks leading up to his death and he was released from a hospital in early August.

Abimael Guzman (pictured in 2017), the founder of Peruvian rebel group called the Shining Path, died aged 86 of poor health in his prison cell on Saturday while serving a life sentence after trying to overthrow the government

Guzman (pictured after his capture on September 24, 1992), who headed the communist-obsessed renegade group and terrorized Peru throughout the 1980s and 90s, was convicted as a terrorist. When he was sentenced in 1992 in Lima, Peru, he was paraded in front of press in a striped white and black uniform not normally used for prisoners in the country

He passed away one day before the anniversary of his capture nearly 30 years ago, when he was paraded in front of press in a striped white and black uniform not normally used in Peru.

The head of Peru's prison system Susana Silva told Radio Programs del Peru (RPP) on Saturday that Guzman's health condition worsened in the past two days.

She added that he was set to receive more medical attention but was pronounced dead in his cell around 6.40am local time. Silva declined to comment further on what had killed the famed communist.

President Pedro Castillo tweeted: 'The terrorist leader Abimael Guzman has died, responsible for the loss of an uncountable number of lives. Our position condemning terrorism is firm and unwavering. Only in democracy will we build a just Peru.'

A former philosophy professor, Guzman was a lifelong communist who traveled to China in the late 1960s and was awed by Mao Zedong's Cultural Revolution.

He had a vision of Peru without money, banks, industry or foreign trade and set out to bring Mao's brand of communism to Peru through a class war he launched in 1980 - when Peru held its first democratic elections following over a decade of military dictatorship.

Guzman, pictured in 1993, died in a maximum-security prison in the Callao naval base in Peru. Prison officials said his health had been declining for several weeks leading up to his death and he was released from a hospital in early August

The Shining Path (whose leaders are pictured in 2004) sparked a conflict that resulted in the death of at least 69,000 Peruvians at the hands of guerillas. The terrorist group also slaughtered dogs and hung their lifeless bodies on lampposts throughout the capital for Lima residents to wake up to one December morning

The Shining Path's bold and immaculately planned attacks, its networks of informants and spies and Guzman's uncanny ability to evade arrest gave him an almost legendary reputation for seeming to be in all places at once. He is pictured here in 2004

Guzman founded the Sendero Luminoso - the Shining Path - and transformed it from a ragtag band of peasants and radical students into Latin America's most stubborn guerrilla force.

An estimated 69,000 people, mostly in Peru's poor interior and indigenous Andean communities, were killed between 1980 and 2000 in the internal conflict launched by the terrorist group.

The Shining Path's bold and immaculately planned attacks, its networks of informants and spies and Guzman's uncanny ability to evade arrest gave him an almost legendary reputation for seeming to be in all places at once.

Guzman was married to fellow Shining Path member Augusta La Torre, who died of mysterious circumstances in the late 1980s.

He then married longtime girlfriend Elena Iparraguirre in 2010. Iparraguirre is also serving a life sentence for her role as a leader in the Shining Path.
More students are winning university places in every demographic of the UK  except for white males.

Figures show that the number of white men getting on to degree courses has fallen almost ten per cent compared to 2014. In contrast, the number of Asian men securing places has risen by 26 per cent, and Asian women 39 per cent.

The shocking disparity has been revealed by analysis of figures from admissions service UCAS by The Mail on Sunday.

This year, a record number of UK candidates secured a place within a month of A-level results day, with 448,080 students scheduled to start degree courses this autumn, up from 441,720 last year.

The number of white males has fallen from 127,330 in 2020 to 127,250 this year  just the latest evidence of a long-term decline

But the number of white males has fallen from 127,330 in 2020 to 127,250 this year  just the latest evidence of a long-term decline.

The alarming statistics will renew fears that white working-class men are being left behind in the race to obtain the qualifications usually needed to get a good job, and that the Governments levelling-up agenda is floundering.

In a report this year, MPs found white children on free school meals  and boys in particular  persistently underperform at school compared with other ethnic groups.

As a result, just 13 per cent of white working-class boys go on to higher education. The Education Select Committees report warned these children had been failed by decades of neglect.

It said that universities were failing to set goals to boost the numbers of white working-class students and, most controversially, that the increasing use of the term white privilege in debates about inequality could be divisive. Oxford University chemistry professor Peter Edwards, said the UCAS figures highlight a pattern of underachievement among the largest group of disadvantaged pupils. These young people see the continuing special dispensations such as quotas aimed at other groups who are, in fact, consistently outperforming white working-class males, he said.

I have seen the real distaste and disdain of academics for the mores of the white working-class male. These young people have much to contribute and their ambitions must now be rekindled. My concern is that their sense of feeling forgotten at the expense of other groups will lead to grave societal problems.

The Education Select Committees report warned these children had been failed by decades of neglect

Many academics are calling on the Government to tackle the issue. Successive governments have failed these kids, said Professor Matthew Goodwin, from Kent University. Everybody has become obsessed about every disadvantaged group except this one. Something has to change and Boris Johnson should be doing far more to level up these kids.

The Department for Education said last night: We have made real progress in supporting more young people from disadvantaged backgrounds into higher education with record numbers earning a place at university this year, but we know there is more to do.

Ensuring everyone has the opportunity to access a world-class education remains a priority, and we expect universities to do all they can to help disadvantaged students.
Goldman Sachs has urged its entire 6,000-strong workforce in the UK to return to the office from tomorrow.

An internal memo sent to employees at the US banking giant says they will no longer be required to socially distance and encourages those not yet vaccinated to get jabbed.

Seating will return to full occupancy, meaning we will be able to welcome all of our people in the UK back into the office, says the memo from Richard Gnodde, chief executive of Goldman Sachs International.

An internal memo sent to employees at the US banking giant says they will no longer be required to socially distance and encourages those not yet vaccinated to get jabbed. Prince Charles is pictured above at Goldman Sachs HQ in London in July

The move will heap pressure on central and local government to do more to get civil servants back to their desks.

Vaccines Minister Nadhim Zahawi last week admitted that just one in four of his civil servants were working from their offices.

It comes as a rift begins to develop between those who favour returning to the office full-time and those opposed. City workers have even coined the term TW*Ts for workers who come in to the office only on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.

A poll of 2,000 workers by office expert Orega found 53 per cent wanted to adopt the model of Monday and Friday at home, with the middle of the week in the office.

Sources said Goldman Sachs was among a swathe of investment banks including J P Morgan, Bank of America and Deutsche which have been encouraging staff to be fully vaccinated before returning to the office  although they have stopped short of making it mandatory.

It comes as a rift begins to develop between those who favour returning to the office full-time and those opposed. Workers are pictured above at the HQ in July during the Prince's visit

In his memo, Mr Gnodde said the vast majority of our people are now fully vaccinated, adding: Its been encouraging that weve recently seen around half of our London population coming in each day.

Employers have so far stopped short of requiring vaccines but are increasing pressure on staff to get them. Morrisons said it would cut sick pay for unvaccinated staff who needed to self-isolate.

City firms last week saw a sharp rise in numbers working from offices. Sources said pubs and restaurants were livelier and Pret A Manger boss Pano Christou today tells The Mail on Sunday his firm saw a 15 per cent surge in sales.
The Cabinet Secretary Simon Case is under mounting pressure to order civil servants back to their offices in Whitehall as one Minister admitted: My department is like the Mary Celeste.

While millions more Britons returned to work last week, many Government departments remained largely deserted.

Despite the frustration of Ministers, Mr Case, who was appointed head of the Civil Service last September, has not made any written request for the Permanent Secretaries of each department to urge their staff to return.

The Cabinet Secretary Simon Case is under mounting pressure to order civil servants back to their offices in Whitehall as one Minister admitted: My department is like the Mary Celeste'

Likening his department to the Mary Celeste, the deserted ghost ship discovered in the Atlantic in 1872, a Cabinet Minister told The Mail on Sunday that he had tried getting people in but ruefully acknowledged there was a limit to what he can tell officials without more support from Mr Case.

However, despite no letter being sent, a Cabinet Office source told the Mail on Sunday: "The Cabinet Secretary made it quite clear to permanent secretaries last week that ministers expected to see civil servants return to office."

Mr Cases predecessor, Sir Mark Sedwill, last year wrote to all Permanent Secretaries telling them to move quickly to seek to bring more staff back into the office in a Covid-secure way.

Those efforts were hampered by the second wave of coronavirus last autumn. But the Cabinet Office confirmed that Mr Case has not issued any written direction for civil servants to return to their offices, despite Government guidance to work from home being lifted in July.

There are almost 470,000 civil servants in central government and 1.3 million council employees in local authorities.

While exact figures for how many public sector staff are working from home are not available, some Government departments are said to have 80 per cent of staff still working from home.

A Government spokesman last night said: We are gradually increasing the numbers of staff in the workplace, while ensuring we retain the flexibility of home-based working where appropriate.
Former Royal Marine Pen Farthing has revealed his staff who worked at an animal shelter in Kabul have finally made it out of Taliban-led Afghanistan.

Paul 'Pen' Farthing said it was 'absolutely mind-blowing' that his 68 members of staff at the Nowzad shelter had made it out of Afghanistan and arrived in the Pakistan capital on Saturday.

Mr Farthing, 52, from Essex, previously said he was working 'every day' to get his Afghan staff out after he was forced to leave them behind amid chaotic scenes in Kabul last month.

Sharing the good news, he tweeted that his Operation Ark campaign to get workers and animals from the Kabul shelter out of the country had been 'a complete success'.

Paul 'Pen' Farthing said it was 'absolutely mind-blowing' that his 68 members of staff (some pictured) at Kabul's Nowzad shelter had made it to the Pakistan capital on Saturday

Mr Farthing (pictured in May 2013), who is now in Oslo with his wife Kaisa, said he was 'so bloody happy' that the Nowzad staff, were safely in the care of the British High Commission

He said he was 'so bloody happy' that the Nowzad staff, who had reared dozens of rescued animals by hand, had safely made it to Islamabad and were in the care of the British High Commission.

Mr Farthing, who is now in Oslo with his wife Kaisa, wrote: 'This is absolutely mind-blowing. It has still not really sunk in.'

Alongside his post, he shared pictures of the staff grinning after their arrival in Pakistan, saying their joyful faces 'just tells you everything you need to know'.

The former Royal Marine had been criticised over his evacuation of nearly 200 dogs and cats from Afghanistan while he was still working to get almost 70 of his 'terrified' staff out of the country.

The Afghan staff were not able to leave during the hurried mass evacuation as foreign troops withdrew from the nation some two decades after US forces removed the militants from power in 2001.

Responding to the news, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab tweeted: 'Pleased that Nowzad's Afghan staff, who were called for evacuation, successfully crossed the border into Pakistan today.

Mr Farthing (pictured), from Essex, previously said he was working 'every day' to get his Afghan staff out after he was forced to leave them behind amid chaotic scenes in Kabul

Sharing the good news, he tweeted that his Operation Ark campaign to get workers and animals from the Kabul shelter out of the country had been 'a complete success'

'Our @ukinpakistan staff are assisting them and we look forward to welcoming them to the UK in the coming days.'

Defence Secretary Ben Wallace had complained some of Mr Farthing's more militant supporters had 'taken up too much time' of senior British commanders trying to get humans out of the country.

Since arriving back in England at the end of August, Mr Farthing had been working to help evacuate 68 Nowzad animal shelter staff and family members, including 25 children and one newborn baby, from Afghanistan.

The Operation Ark campaign has caused considerable controversy, despite receiving a huge amount of public support.

Mr Farthing also apologised for leaving an expletive-laden message for a Government aide as he was trying to carry out the evacuation.

Previously speaking to BBC Radio 5 Live, Mr Farthing had said Operation Ark was 'always' about getting both people and animals out of the country.

He said: 'We are not giving up. People think I've got the animals out, that's it. It is not. Operation Ark was always people and animals.

'I talk to them daily. They are terrified. Our little operations room is still going every day to get them out.

'It took a while to get the visas from the British government. If I had hammered them harder and got the visas a day before, we could have got through.'

Since arriving back in England at the end of August, Mr Farthing (pictured) had been working to help evacuate 68 Nowzad animal shelter staff and family members out of Afghanistan

Defence Secretary Ben Wallace (pictured) had complained some of Mr Farthing's more militant supporters had 'taken up too much time' of senior British commanders

He added: 'They had the correct paperwork from the British government to leave, but Joe Biden had changed the rules two hours earlier to state only people with passports with a visa in would be allowed into the airport.

'I pleaded, pleaded, pleaded with the Taliban commander. I was on the ground, pleading with him and he stuck an AK47 in my face. There was nothing I could do.'

Dominic Dyer, a supporter of Mr Farthing who assisted with the operation, has said the 100 dogs and 70 cats are in a 'very good condition' in quarantine kennels across the UK, with hundreds of people looking to adopt them.

Mr Dyer said: 'We had a good plan of action and the animals are doing very well in the kennels - and despite the difficult journey, they've been durable and tough.

'Over the next few weeks the animals will start to be rehomed, we have hundreds of people for each dog or cat- so it's very likely all of them will be adopted and taken in by different families.

'They are some of the most famous animals in the world right now, so there will be no shortage, but we want to be clear it's not first come first served.

'Nowzad is only a small charity so the process will be a slow one and there is an awful lot of work to be done.'

He said there will be a 'screening process' to pick the most 'suitable homes' for the animals.
It was perhaps unsurprising that Boris Johnson appeared in a hurry to escape from the House of Commons chamber as soon as MPs had voted in favour of his controversial social care reforms.

Not only had he risked the wrath of voters and Conservative colleagues alike by unveiling a package that leaves taxpayers facing a 36 billion bill, he had broken previously made commitments in the process.

But The Mail on Sunday can reveal that the Prime Minister actually bolted out of Westminster so he could spend the evening rubbing shoulders with billionaires, financiers and other wealthy Tory donors.

Within seconds of the result of the vote being announced at 7.28pm on Wednesday, Mr Johnson was out of his seat and walking briskly towards the door.

The Prime Minister bolted out of Westminster so he could spend the evening with billionaires, financiers and other wealthy Tory donors at an event at Hertford House (pictured)

Following a two-mile journey through Central London, he stepped out of his chauffeur-driven car minutes later in the courtyard of Hertford House, home to the famous Wallace Collection of art treasures.

Chancellor Rishi Sunak arrived soon afterwards.

The venue, which is packed with Old Masters and thousands of artefacts, promises a 'taste of old world glamour in the heart of London' to anyone willing to pay up to 12,000 to hire a room for a reception. It had been hired on this occasion by the Conservative Party Treasurer's Group.

Around 70 donors were invited to mingle with Mr Johnson and Mr Sunak. With guests arriving for drinks and canapes shortly before 7pm, one was heard saying: 'They're coming after the vote.'

Former Tory party treasurer Lord Howard Leigh gave a speech, followed by remarks from Mr Johnson, who was described as being in 'ebullient' form.

Other senior Tories in attendance included Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden, Vaccines Minister Nadhim Zahawi and the PM's chief of staff, Dan Rosenfield.

Meanwhile, the names on the guest list included British-Australian businessman Michael Hintze, whose net worth is estimated at 1.5 billion and who has donated millions to the Conservatives.

Malik Karim, the investment banker who founded Fenchurch Advisory Partners, was also present, as was Lord Rami Ranger, a businessman who has contributed more than 1 million to the party coffers and who received a peerage from Theresa May.

Chancellor Rishi Sunak (pictured arriving at the event) arrived soon afterwards after voting for Boris Johnson's controversial social care reforms at the House of Commons

Yet while sources said Mr Johnson had the appearance of a leader at the height of his political power, the timing of the event is bound to raise questions about his judgment  coming as it did so soon after MPs had agreed to boost spending on the NHS and social care with a levy funded by National Insurance and dividend tax rises.

The event came after the Prime Minister performed a series of manoeuvres to outfox his opponents, including raising the threat of a Cabinet reshuffle to push through his plans to finally fix Britain's social care crisis, which he had promised on the steps of Downing Street two years ago.

The huge political gamble meant breaking two manifesto pledges and increasing Britain's tax burden to its highest level in 70 years to about 35.5 per cent of the country's gross domestic product by the end of the Parliament.

Crucially, the move was seen by many traditional Tories as a final departure from low-tax Conservatism.

The plans, which had been closely guarded for months, were thrashed out between Mr Johnson, Mr Sunak and Health Secretary Sajid Javid.

The three had initially planned to announce the changes in July to coincide with Mr Johnson's second anniversary as Prime Minister but that timetable was shelved when Mr Javid was diagnosed with Covid-19 and Mr Johnson was 'pinged', so both had to self-isolate.

Reports began to swirl in the final days of the summer recess that the plan would be unveiled as soon as Parliament returned.

Then details began to leak out, initially of the National Insurance hike, prompting a furious Tory reaction that young people would have to fund pensioners' care.

Nothing was finalised at that point, however, with the Treasury keen to avoid effectively handing a blank cheque to the health service. Intensive talks were held last weekend, which Mr Johnson joined from Balmoral where he and his wife Carrie were visiting the Queen.

Key changes were introduced as a result of the backlash  a dividend tax rise was included in the final package so the wealthy would take more of the burden.

Around 70 donors (unknown donors pictured) were invited to mingle with Mr Johnson and Mr Sunak at Hertford House, home to the famous Wallace Collection of art treasures

Meanwhile, it was decided that working pensioners would also pay the 1.25 percentage point rise in National Insurance.

It was also agreed that the pensions triple lock would also be suspended for a year, saving the Treasury billions. Mr Sunak attended a reception with backbench MPs last Monday and urged them to remain 'loyal' while party whips privately warned that a vote against Mr Johnson's proposal would be taken as a vote of no confidence in his leadership.

Meanwhile, rumours began to circulate of an imminent Cabinet reshuffle. Well-placed sources say the threat of demotions and hope of promotions helped to muffle concerns in the Cabinet ranks.

When the plans were presented on Tuesday morning, only a handful of Ministers voiced concerns  including Trade Secretary Liz Truss, EU Relations Secretary Lord Frost and Commons Leader Jacob Rees-Mogg  who asked why the Government couldn't borrow more money instead.

Mr Sunak said that would break the party's pledge to voters to be fiscally responsible.

On the day of the vote, Mr Johnson met backbenchers at a meeting of the 1922 Committee  which consists of all backbench Tories.

Just five Tory MPs voted against the tax rise, while about three dozen others abstained.

When MPs flocked to the Commons Terrace after the vote, neither Mr Johnson nor Mr Sunak were there.

They were, instead, rubbing shoulders with super-rich donors.
Rachel Rickard Straus, The Mail on Sundays outstanding Deputy Personal Finance Editor, swept the field at last weeks prestigious Headline Money awards.

Rachel joined the paper a year ago and was voted overall money journalist of the year for her work across the newspapers must-read Personal Finance and Wealth sections.

She was also named both savings and investment journalist of the year.

At a glitzy awards ceremony in Central London, praise was heaped on Rachel, with judges describing her financial journalism as possessing a human touch.

Rachel joined the paper a year ago and was voted overall money journalist of the year for her work across the newspapers must-read Personal Finance and Wealth sections

Her work on Wealth came in for particular praise.

One judge said: She aims to help people invest their money and does it very well.

Another described her writing as beautiful.

The awards, dubbed the Oscars of financial journalism, confirm The Mail on Sundays commitment to money coverage par excellence.

Led by the multi-award-winning Jeff Prestridge, the Personal Finance and Wealth sections are considered essential weekend reading for those who want to ensure they make the right financial decisions and choices.

A key component of the brilliant Mail on Sunday.
Boris Johnson faces a 100-strong Tory protest over his controversial 12 billion social care programme amid claims it could cost him the next Election.

Former party leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith spearheaded mounting protests last night at a 'chaotic' tax hike plan, which set the Government adrift from true Conservative values.

But party MPs in seats seized from Labour in the North and Midlands went further to brand the National Insurance rise a disaster that spelt 'doom' for the party at the next Election.

One said privately: 'This is a Red Wall tax in all but name and it's a gift to Labour.'

The fears come amid research from the TaxPayers' Alliance that the new NI levy will disproportionately affect workers in the North and Midlands, as well as working people compared to the retired.

Former party leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith spearheaded mounting protests last night at a 'chaotic' tax hike plan, which set the Government adrift from true Conservative values

Rebels now claim there are as many as 100 Tory MPs in a so-called 'awkward squad' organising against the plans. And they warned that revolts in further votes on the plans this week could surpass last week's, where five Tories voted against and more than 35 abstained despite being warned they could bring down the Government if the measure was defeated.

Senior Tory MP Marcus Fysh last night warned: 'Without much greater explanation and concessions, the Government faces a potentially much greater rebellion from the Tory benches this week.'

Branding the tax rise plans 'ill-thought-out', he added that the Tories abandoned their 'hard-earned' reputation as the party of low taxes 'at our peril'. Leaders of the group are set to meet Chancellor Rishi Sunak tomorrow ahead of further votes on the NI proposals on Tuesday in a debate on the Health and Social Care Levy Bill.

In a hugely controversial move last week, the Prime Minister ordered Tory MPs to vote though a 1.25 per cent rise in NI from next April, initially to raise 36 billion in three years mostly to combat Covid-related NHS waiting lists and then to fund radical reforms to help spare people having to sell their homes to fund social care.

Senior Tory MP Marcus Fysh (left) last night warned: 'Without much greater explanation and concessions, the Government faces a potentially much greater rebellion from the Tory benches this week'

Homes law shake-up axed after backlash Ministers are set to drop controversial changes to planning laws that would have stripped homeowners of the right to object to new houses in their area. Following a backlash from Tory MPs, reforms to build 300,000 homes a year by 2025 will be diluted, according to The Times. In a consultation, the Government suggested ripping up the planning application process and replacing it with a zonal system forcing local councils to meet mandatory building targets. But the overhaul  the biggest shake-up of planning laws for 70 years  met strong opposition in rural areas. Tory MPs blamed it for the party's defeat to the Lib Dems at the Chesham and Amersham by-election in June. Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick will reportedly ditch mandatory targets and the zonal system. Instead, councils will identify 'growth sites' with a presumption in favour of development so applications are fast-tracked. The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said: 'We will not comment on speculation. Our response to the consultation will be released in due course.' Advertisement

Mr Johnson justified the move by insisting his Government 'will not duck the tough decisions needed to get NHS patients the treatment they need and to fix our broken social care system'.

But the NI rise  breaking a clear manifesto pledge in the 2019 election manifesto that delivered Mr Johnson an 80-strong majority in the Commons  has plunged his party into a bitter civil war and identity crisis. Writing in the MoS today, David Mellor  who served in Margaret Thatcher's government  criticises Mr Johnson for committing a 'fundamental breach' of Conservative principles.

There were also complaints that last week's vote was only won because Tory whips 'bullied' new MPs into believing the measure amounted to a 'vote of confidence' in Mr Johnson and the Government could fall if it was defeated.

And there was anger over claims that No 10 had deliberately fuelled rumours of a reshuffle to deter rebels hopeful of a ministerial job or promotion.

Last night, party insiders said the PM may have made an 'error' by not holding the reshuffle last Thursday as widely trailed.

They warned Mr Johnson risked becoming 'the boy who cried wolf' if reshuffles were endlessly mooted without actually taking place.

However, one Minister warned that Mr Johnson 'doesn't like sacking people' and knows they 'create more enemies and only make a handful of people happy'. No sooner had the Government won last week's vote than rumours of the shake-up subsided  only for some to forecast that it would now take place this week, once the care levy Bill had got through the Commons.

Last night, another Minister dismissed talk of a further major rebellion this week, claiming that Tory rebels had made their protest last week and were unlikely to repeat it.

MARCUS FYSH: Tories are the party of low tax  we lose that reputation at our peril

By Tory MP Marcus Fysh

Marcus Fysh is Tory MP for Yeovil

The Prime Minister deserves praise for his energy and compassion in putting care for those who find it hard to look after themselves at the top of the national agenda.

But the ill-thought-out tax rise plans foisted on Conservative MPs last week are deeply flawed and have caused deep upset in the party.

The scale of the rebellion in the Commons last week, with nearly 40 Tory MPs abstaining, was proof of that,

We are, by tradition, the party of low tax.

We abandon that hard-earned reputation at our peril.

In the last few days, I have spoken to many other Tory MPs who share my deep concerns at the approach the Government is now taking.

And I must warn that without much greater explanation and concessions, the Government faces a potentially much greater rebellion from the Tory benches when we vote on the full Health and Social Care Levy Bill this week.

Of course, it is vital that we get our response to these challenges of reforming social care provision right.

But I believe that reaching for big tax levers is risky, as the broad drag on people's incomes and spending might well hinder the way they can help us pull through.

It could well depress tax revenue that we need to grow fast to match demand for public services and repair our groaning balance sheet.

We also need actually to fix social care, and get it more capacity now to enable the NHS to discharge patients into the community, recover and clear the backlogs. The current plan in that respect needs more work, and it would be fairer for the wealthiest retirees, who sometimes have assets that have risen greatly in value and high pension incomes of types no longer available to those of working age, to make more of a contribution to their outsized generation's need.

There is a way through, but it needs honest clear eyed thinking about the big picture as well as practically detailed measures.

People believe National Insurance contributions have been about pooling resources to provide for the future, but this has not in fact been the case for a very long time. They have rather been used as soon as they are collected to pay for present spending on current year 'entitlements', and to obtain credit against future generations for even more, in the form of debt.

Most western Governments have spent the last decades running such arguably Ponzi-like schemes, while pretending that all is OK. It is not.

The debt is increasingly having to be bought up with central bank money to be affordable, and the purchasing power of the pound in most people's pockets - unless they are lucky or have worked hard enough to have assets - keeps ebbing away.

In my view we must look to the roots of the modern social construct and its radical and Christian traditions. to find inspiration for modern Conservatism and indeed liberal, social democracy in how to deal with this.

The philosophy, if not always best execution, of looking after each other responsibly is right before our eyes, in the first trades unions, the mutual and friendly societies, the cooperatives that Disraeli recognised as important innovation in help for each other and young Churchill crossed the floor to support as the Liberal government looked to provide them with national assistance.

They pooled resources, in one way or another, to look after each other and themselves in the future, not by taking on debt but by cooperating and investing.

So if we are going to expand National Insurance now let's reform it so it actually means what it says.

The most powerful weapon we have against the debt problem we have is the power of compounding investment returns.

The modern digital world offers new ways of pooling savings, investments, insurance, and help for each other without middle men, counterparty or management risks and costs.

We should be imaginative in engaging or subsidising these for social care, and rebate any currently proposed extra levies to those who participate and are adequately provided for in such ways.

Above all, let's make providing for ourselves and our parents and grandparents cheap for those who can least afford.

Marcus Fysh is Tory MP for Yeovil.
University Challenge bosses have recruited a diversity producer to boost the number of women taking part.

As The Mail on Sunday revealed last week, only 17 out of 64 contestants featured so far in the current series have been women.

The alarming disparity comes despite quizmaster Jeremy Paxman questioning six years ago why so few made it on to the long-running BBC2 show.

University Challenge has recruited a diversity producer to boost the number of women taking part. Only 17 out of 64 contestants featured in the current series (pictured) have been women

Now ITV Studios, which makes the programme, have appointed a staff member to work with organisers in universities to increase the number of female contestants.

When asked for a reason why women steered clear of the show Rose McKeown, a star of the 2017 winning team from St John's College, Cambridge, said: 'The most obvious one is, unfortunately, the hostility some female contestants are subjected to on social media.'

A University Challenge spokesman said: 'The make-up of each team is decided by the university it represents.

'However, ensuring that the teams are much more representative of student populations around the UK is a priority for us.'
Villagers campaigning against sex parties at their old local pub have been accused of hate crimes.

The men-only gatherings have been held twice a month for nearly three years at the former Old Hall Inn in Sea Palling, Norfolk.

Now a small group of local residents has started demanding the end of the xxx club nites run by a male social club called Norfolk Lab, whose website states the parties offer a safe and friendly environment where men can meet other men and have adult fun in five playrooms, including a mock dungeon.

But protesters set up a Facebook page called the Sea Palling Action Group (SPAG) to publicise complaints about the party nights.

Pride protesters near the home of transgender woman Mary Carberry who has been allowing a club to hold men-only sex parties at her house,

Matters boiled over when members allegedly used transphobic language on Facebook while talking about Mary Carberry, who describes herself as a transgender woman and bought the 18th Century property seven years ago.

Andrew Livingstone, vice-chair of Great Yarmouth and Waveney Pride, said: Mary was misgendered on Facebook by members of the SPAG who referred to her as he, called her a fake woman and made comments such as, That man needs to understand.

I spent five hours online trying to tell them how transphobic and offensive their language was, but they believe they have done nothing wrong.

Yesterday about a dozen Pride supporters staged a protest to show their solidarity with Ms Carberry. It came after police were called earlier this month when locals protested outside the former pub when a party was going on.

A spokesman for Norfolk Lab described the group as a non-profit club, but confirmed that party guests at each event paid 15 each for running costs including snacks and tea and coffee.

The spokesman said most parties were attended by up to 17 men, although one had 35 party-goers. He added: Things had all been pretty quiet until some people started taking pictures of cars [arriving at the parties]. Someone was deliberately walking a dog across the road to slow people down. Pictures of one guest who has an 82-year-old partner with Alzheimers were then posted online.

Ms Carberry said: My home is a nice safe place for the LGBT community. The parties are very discreet. I dont need a licence because they are private parties which are not open to the public.

But one local resident said: The real issue is a sex establishment being run in a small family-oriented village. I dont think many people especially with young families want such an establishment on their doorstep.

The men-only gatherings have been held twice a month for nearly three years at the former Old Hall Inn in Sea Palling, Norfolk

Harry Blathwayt, the local Lib Dem councillor for North Norfolk District Council, said he did not personally object to the parties, but he was understanding of the concerns of many local people.

He added: People are concerned that the activities at the house might impinge on what they consider to be the natural order of things in a small Norfolk seaside village. There are a lot of families with children here.

A Norfolk Police spokesman said: Police proactively attended an address in Sea Palling on Saturday evening, September 4, to prevent a potential breach of the peace. There has been increased community tension in recent weeks relating to events being held at the address.

The spokesman said officers had spoken to all parties involved and were continuing to work with them to resolve matters.
A glamorous Belarusian investment banker can today be revealed as a central figure in a scheme to sell access to the Prince of Wales in exchange for donations to his charities.

Volha Havorchanka  pictured right with her business partner and society fixer Michael Wynne-Parker  was tasked with introducing wealthy Russians to influential figures in the British establishment.

A string of cash for access revelations by The Mail on Sunday have sparked an investigation by The Princes Foundation and the temporary resignation of Michael Fawcett, the chief executive of the charity and Charless most trusted adviser.

Volha Havorchanka (Lebedeva) in a red dress with her husband, Anatoly (Left) and Michael Wynne ParkerImage

Ms Havorchanka denies knowledge of any donations, but the involvement of the 33-year-old raises tantalising questions about the scale of Russian involvement in Charless charitable operations.

It also gives a new dimension to one of the more mysterious elements of the saga  how a 500,000 donation to The Princes Foundation from a former Russian banker called Dmitry Leus has apparently vanished.

Philanthropist Mr Leus says he wanted to donate to The Princes Foundation because it shared his values of supporting young people through sport.

Through a British barrister he met Ms Havorchanka, who introduced him to Mr Wynne-Parker, her co-director of Introcom Ltd, which helps wealthy  and often foreign  clients gain access to influential British figures.

Mr Leus was advised by Mr Wynne-Parker that the suggested 500,000 donation could be made through the accounts of Burkes Peerage, the gentry guide which is edited by William Bortrick.

A 500,000 donation to The Princes Foundation from a former Russian banker called Dmitry Leus has apparently vanished

All seemed well until father-of-four Mr Leus learned that The Princes Foundation had decided last autumn not to accept his money because its ethics committee did not consider him appropriate.

Yet a year after that decision, Mr Leus, 51, has still not had his money returned and has become so exasperated that he has not ruled out going to the police.

When the MoS revealed two weeks ago the contents of an email written by Mr Wynne-Parker that offered dinner and an overnight stay at Dumfries House  the country mansion in Scotland saved for the nation by Charles in 2007  in return for a six-figure donation, Mr Bortrick denied all knowledge of any cash for access scheme or of handling any funds.

However, this newspaper has obtained emails from Mr Bortrick which appear to show the contrary.

The two emails sent last month state that Mr Leuss wife, Zhanna, made a 200,000 payment to Burkes Peerage marked Charitable Donation HRH Prince of W on May 11, 2020. A second payment of 300,000 was made to the same account on September 3 last year.

The emails appear to show that just 100,000 of that sum was sent on to The Princes Foundation. In an email on August 31, Mr Bortrick says: 100,000 was sent in tranches on 11 May, 2020, to The Princes Foundation, who acknowledged Mr Leuss kind benefaction in writing.

But when the 100,000 was returned, Mr Bortrick sent it along with an additional 100,000 to a charity called Children and the Arts in two separate transactions on September 24 and 25 last year.

The charity was started in 2005 by the Prince of Wales. It later split from his foundation and is now in the process of being wound up.

Curiously, the charitys latest accounts for the year to September 30, 2020, state: The charity organised itself to secure the funds of 233,000 to settle its remaining liabilities and undertake the orderly closure of its business activity.

It is unclear whether the 200,000 donation to Children and the Arts detailed by Mr Bortrick was used by the charity to settle its liabilities. A spokesman for Hussam Otaibi, a Jordanian merchant banker and chairman of Children and the Arts, declined to say where the 200,000 donation had gone.

In another twist, Mr Bortricks emails show that 200,000 was sent to Mr Wynne-Parkers Introcom International and he says the final 100,000 was retained by him. He said the funds remain secure for Mr Leus. Mr Bortrick did not respond to requests for comment.

For his part, Mr Leus simply wants his money back and said last night: My contribution to The Princes Foundation was intended to support their educational and heritage goals, in particular their innovative training programmes. I never had as my goal a dinner or overnight invitation.

My private hope was that eventually some collaboration might have been possible with The Princes Foundation for the creation of a national fencing centre to bring the sport to disadvantaged young people nationwide. Given that my private charitable donation has been made public in recent media coverage, I must clarify certain points.

The emails appear to show that just 100,000 of that sum was sent on to The Princes Foundation

I made two separate donations together totalling 500,000 to The Princes Foundation via Burkes Peerage. I have now learned that not all of these funds were then transferred on to The Princes Foundation. No funds at all were returned to me from Burkes Peerage.

This is especially upsetting as these funds could have done so much good for all the children and young people our foundation supports. My commitment to supporting children and young adults in the UK and beyond remains undiminished.

Ms Havorchanka, who studied at Londons City University, declined to comment and denies any knowledge of a cash for access scheme involving the Prince and his charities. Intriguingly, however, her profile disappeared from Introcoms website hours after the MoS revealed the existence of the scheme a fortnight ago.

Her biography  which has vanished from the site  read: Specialising in working with high net worth individuals, Volha has developed an understanding of the clients all-round requirements.

Successful people are not only looking to find the right place for their money and the right manager but they are keen on social opportunities that most successful people find difficult to fulfill [...] Together with Michael, Volha has managed to achieve great client satisfaction and peace of mind.

A source close to Ms Havorchanka, who has been director of Introcom Ltd since 2017, denied receiving any money which had been destined for The Princes Foundation, but said that Mr Wynne-Parker had recently sent her money which was the repayment of a personal loan.

Douglas Connell, chairman of The Princes Foundation, said: Following the publication of an initial allegation relating to middlemen and donors, the trustees instigated a full and rigorous investigation with the assistance of forensic accountants from one of the big four accountancy firms. This investigation is ongoing. The full review is expected to take several weeks.

Charles project bailed out by Prime Ministers flat donor

By Ashlie McAnally

A Tory donor caught up in the row about the refurbishment of Boris Johnsons flat also bailed out Prince Charless struggling eco village at Dumfries House.

Lord Brownlow was revealed this year to have partly funded work at No 11 Downing Street after Mr Johnsons then fiancee, Carrie Symonds, allegedly objected to the John Lewis furniture nightmare left by Theresa May.

But the peer, who was a policeman before making a fortune in the finance sector, also stepped in when the Prince of Wales struggled to sell properties at Knockroon in East Ayrshire.

Lord Brownlow was revealed this year to have partly funded work at No 11 Downing Street

The new development of 770 homes was intended to be like Poundbury  the Dorset village built to meet the Princes architectural and community values.

In plans drawn up after Charles put together a consortium to buy Dumfries House in 2007, the sale of the houses at Knockroon would produce millions of pounds that could be used to renovate the run-down Palladian mansion. But after developers struggled to sell even the first phase of 31 houses, Lord Brownlows Havisham investment group stepped in to buy nine properties as buy-to-lets and a cafe.

The 45 million acquisition of Dumfries House  including 20 million borrowed through Charless charitable organisation, The Princes Foundation  was a financial risk for the future king.

However, it came with 68 acres of farmland where he hoped to create his eco-village and raise more than enough money to repay his charitys debts and fund ambitious plans for restoring Dumfries House. Experts say the scheme was worthy but misconceived, with the properties too expensive for the former mining area.

The first tranche of flats and houses went on sale in 2011, with a four-bedroom house costing 220,000. By comparison, a three-bedroom property in nearby Cumnock was on the market for 39,950 at the time. The failure of Knockroon is thought to explain why Charles turned to donors to bankroll Dumfries House.

A Tory donor caught up in the row about the refurbishment of Boris Johnsons flat also bailed out Prince Charles

Charles really put everything on the line financially and emotionally for the purchase of the house and estate, said royal author Ingrid Seward. Knockroon was crucial to the economics. He wanted to create his own Scottish Poundbury, a showpiece model village of sustainable living to help offset the cost and create long-term sustainability. But it hasnt worked out so far.

The failure to build as many houses as he would have liked put pressure on raising money from other sources  including donors.

Despite the intervention of the Havisham Group, Knockroon developer Hope Homes walked away from the project in 2015.

Lord Brownlow contributed 58,000 towards the refurbishment of No 11. Mr Johnson subsequently repaid the money.

The Havisham Group did not respond to requests for comment.

A spokesman for The Princes Foundation said last night: As our annual accounts show, The Princes Foundation remains in robust financial health.

A source stressed that the sum borrowed to partly enable the purchase of Dumfries House in 2007 has long since been paid off.
Sir Keir Starmer was last night mocked as more Lib Dem than Labour after a damning new poll on the beleaguered Labour leader.

A survey seen by The Mail on Sunday revealed that Sir Keir is now more popular with rival Liberal Democrat voters than he is with supporters of his own party.

With Lib Dem backers, Sir Keir had a net favourability rating of plus 19 compared to just plus 16 for Labour voters.

The YouGov polling, carried out earlier this month, emerged just as a separate survey by the same pollsters showed Labour taking its first lead over the Tories for two years

But it also showed that former barrister Sir Keir had little appeal with the working class, with a popularity rating of minus 27 among manual workers.

And despite being a North London MP, he fared little better with the capitals voters, with a net rating of zero.

The YouGov polling, carried out earlier this month, emerged just as a separate survey by the same pollsters showed Labour taking its first lead over the Tories for two years.

However, it also comes amid continuing concerns that Sir Keir, 18 months after succeeding Jeremy Corbyn, is still failing to cut through with many voters.

This paper can also reveal growing tensions between the Labour leader and the man widely tipped as his likeliest replacement  ex-Cabinet Minister and former MP Andy Burnham.

The Greater Manchester mayor, dubbed King of the North after standing up to Boris Johnson over Covid restrictions for his region, has made no secret of his ambitions to be party leader.

But insiders revealed that Sir Keirs office is angry at some of Mr Burnhams public interventions, branding them unhelpful.

Only last week, Mr Burnham heaped pressure on Sir Keir to make clear what was Labours alternative to hiking National Insurance to pay for social care, declaring the party could miss its biggest opportunity for some time to take on Boris Johnson.

There are also reports that plans at this months party conference for a big Labour in Power event, featuring elected mayors including Mr Burnham, have been scaled back for fear he would outshine Sir Keir.

Labour insisted last night that the event was going ahead at the Brighton conference as planned but claimed that Sir Keir had never been due to speak at it.

When he was re-elected as mayor last May, Mr Burnham sparked speculation about his future plans by saying he could one day stand once again to be Labour leader.

But last night he denied having a secret job swap deal to get back into the Commons with Labour MP Lucy Powell, in which he would inherit her Manchester Central seat and she would replace him as mayoral candidate.

Sir Keirs office declined to comment, saying it did not offer running commentaries on opinion polls

Ms Powell, a member of Sir Keirs Shadow Cabinet, dismissed the suggestion as nonsense last night.

Sir Keirs office declined to comment, saying it did not offer running commentaries on opinion polls.

But other Starmer allies dismissed the findings, claiming it was difficult to draw clear conclusions from the survey given some of the small samples.

However, Conservative MP Alexander Stafford said it was no surprise Sir Keir had higher ratings with Lib Dem voters than Labour.

The Rother Valley MP said: He is so far away from traditional, working-class Labour voters that he is now basically a Nick Clegg retread.
Marks & Spencer is poised to scale back its French business after stringent European border restrictions left its Paris shops with empty shelves.

Britains biggest high street retailer is expected to close stores and may even stop selling its popular sandwiches and chilled food in France altogether.

An announcement could be made in the next few weeks, The Mail on Sunday understands.

The forced retreat will come as a blow to M&S, which relaunched its French business to much fanfare almost exactly a decade ago

M&S has been holding talks with its French franchise partners over the drastic steps after border controls following Brexit delayed lorries and left hundreds of tons of food wasted.

The forced retreat will come as a blow to M&S, which relaunched its French business to much fanfare almost exactly a decade ago.

At the time, its bosses hailed the return with one, the former chairman Lord Rose, bemoaning a previous retreat in 2001 as tragic.

But the latest plan puts the future of the 20 stores, mostly in Paris, in doubt. The extent of closures is not yet clear, with the final decision on which stores remain resting in part on the commitment of its two French franchise partners.

Earlier this year, M&S overhauled its Czech operation, removing all its fresh and chilled foods from stores and replacing them with expanded ranges of products that have a long shelf life in order to fill gaps.

It is likely that any remaining French stores will follow suit after lengthy border delays meant food arrived past its sell-by date or was turned back to British warehouses.

In July, M&S chairman Archie Norman told The Mail on Sunday that Byzantine regulations meant only two-thirds of sandwiches were getting to stores. Most of them only have a shelf life of 48 hours, so even short delays can make them unsaleable.

M&S declined to comment on possible store closures, but a spokesman said last night: In light of the new customs arrangements, we are taking decisive steps to reconfigure our European operations and have already made changes to food exports into Czech Republic.

M&S has been holding talks with its French franchise partners over the drastic steps after border controls following Brexit delayed lorries

We operate a franchise business in France and are undertaking a review of the model with our two partners.

The diplomatic row over draconian enforcement of border controls has been branded the sausage wars. The delays have affected food arriving in Britain from the Continent and consignments shipped to Northern Ireland. The disruption has also left gaps on the shelves of stores there.

Physical copies of export and import documents are required amid reports that officials are demanding up to 700 pages of certification from drivers.

An extension to the grace period before full border checks are introduced in Northern Ireland was announced last week.

But continued delays are expected with checks already in force resulting in some goods, particularly chilled food and meats, not reaching stores.

The extension does not apply to goods passing from mainland Europe, which will be subject to even greater documentation demands from October 1.
The Holiday Guru is always on hand to answer your questions.

This week he helps a reader who is due to travel to Mallorca but has a problem with her NHS Covid Pass.

Q. I am travelling to Mallorca in a weeks time. The name on my passport is different to the one registered with the NHS. Will this cause a problem when proving I have been double-jabbed?

Janet Fielding, via email.

Know the rules: Your passport and Covid Pass names must match to visit Palma, Mallorca

A. Yes. The Government says if the name on your passport and NHS Covid Pass differ you should contact your GP to have your NHS records updated.

It advises that you should do this at least two weeks before travel. But, as you go in a week, lets hope this is speeded up. See NHS Covid Pass at gov.uk.

Q. My travel company says we need a negative Covid test or an EU Digital Covid certificate to visit Portugal. But the Portuguese government website says a printed UK vaccination certificate is sufficient. Could you clarify?

Max Dudley, via email.

A. We have had many enquiries about this. You do need a test and do not need to prove you have had the jabs.

Q. Im stuck in France after a PCR test came back positive. A second test also gave me a positive result.

What can I do? Do I just have to wait for a negative result before I can get home?

Mrs J. Crickmore, via email.

A. Unfortunately, yes. You will be unable to return home until you produce a negative test.

Q. My wife was about to board a Lufthansa flight in Frankfurt but was told her negative Covid test certificate was no good as it was written in German and Britain would not accept it. She could not board. Is this right?

Graham MacPherson, via email.

The Guru reveals you can be turned away from a flight if your Covid test is in the wrong language

A. Those are the rules, though they are ridiculous. English, Spanish and French are the only accepted languages. Others have been caught out by this, too.

Q. We are going to Lanzarote. Does Playa Blanca have clinics that do return Covid tests? Also, can I order day two return tests before leaving the UK? And is Randox officially approved?

Edwina Williams, via email.

A. There are clinics at Playa Blanca. You can order day two tests before returning. Randox is approved (randox.com).

Q. My husband and I are booked to go on a Tui holiday to Agadir in Morocco on October 7. Will we be let in?

Michael and Mary Ward, Doncaster, S. Yorks.

A reader asks the Guru for advice on whether their trip to Agadir in Morocco will go ahead

A. Currently yes. You will need to show proof that you have taken a PCR test within 72 hours of travel and received a negative result, or evidence that you have been fully vaccinated.

Q. We have booked a Carnival cruise from Miami next February. Were worried we still wont be allowed into the U.S. then. The full amount for the cruise is due soon. Will we lose our money if we cannot go due to American rules?

Stuart McDonald, via email.

A. Find Carnivals cancellation policy at help.carnival.com. You may cancel and get a full refund 90 days before travel  if you did not book a promotion. After that, there are penalties that rise closer to the departure date.

WERE HERE TO HELP

If you need advice, the Holiday Guru is here to answer your questions. Email us at holidayplanner@dailymail.co.uk.
Alan Johnson checks in to our travel Q&A

This week former Home Secretary Alan Johnson checks in to our travel Q&A.

He talks about his love for Crete, a memorable trip to Brazil and the creature comforts he can't live without on holiday.

ARE YOU ADVENTUROUS?

No, I never venture anywhere there isnt an ironing board and a restaurant. Sleeping under canvas doesnt interest me. Whats the point of a holiday if you cant enjoy the creature comforts?

EARLIEST HOLIDAY MEMORY?

Visiting New Brighton on the Wirral Peninsula in 1954, aged four. It was the first time Id been to the seaside and I went looking for cockleshells on the beach with my sister.

FIRST TRIP ABROAD?

Going to Denmark with the Childrens Country Holidays Fund, which was established in Dickenss day and sent waifs and strays from the slums on holiday. It was wondrous being in a foreign country and they even gave me ten kroner to spend.

FAVOURITE PLACE?

Crete, for the scenery, the food, the weather and the wonderful beaches.

TOP TIP IF YOURE VISITING CRETE?

See both coasts, which are well worth exploring. On my last visit, I chanced upon a ramshackle little restaurant on the west coast whose chef, Dimitri, just served up whatever he fancied cooking that evening  every dish was delicious.

MOST EXOTIC TRIP?

Going to Brazil as a government minister [during Tony Blairs administration] and being whisked off to see the final parade of the Rio Carnival. Unforgettable.

EVER HAD THE RED-CARPET TREATMENT?

On a trip to the Philippines as a junior government minister, I had a couple of machine-gunners posted at the back of my car, and a Jeep-load of soldiers behind me. I think they thought they were in a Hollywood film.

Alan says his favourite place in the world is Crete due to its beautiful beaches and fine food

CANT TRAVEL WITHOUT?

My wife, who is essential to my health, happiness and arriving properly organised. I also need Rooibos Tea, which unfortunately you cant get everywhere.

WHERE NEXT?

A literary cruise on Queen Mary 2 to New York in November, which Im very much looking forward to.

ANYWHERE YOU NEVER WANT TO RETURN TO?

Ive no great desire to go back to Afghanistan any time soon, though my ministerial visit [in the 2000s] filled me with admiration for the British troops based out there at the time.

DREAM DESTINATION?

I like islands and Sicilian food, so Id love to visit Sicily some day.
Strictly returns to our screens on Saturday, with the celebrity line-up including Olympic hero Adam Peaty, Loose Women panellist Judi Love and comedian Robert Webb.

But one professional who wont be gracing the dancefloor this year is Anton Du Beke, as the King of Ballroom will be taking on his new role as a judge. However, that doesnt mean your chances of seeing him perform live are over.

Were giving you another opportunity to join Anton and his long-term dance partner and fellow Strictly favourite Erin Boag on an exclusive eight-day Danube river cruise.

Views to a thrill: Spectacular Budapest on the Danube

A stylish Grand Balcony Suite on Emerald Cruises Star-Ship

OUR SPECIAL GUESTS You will by joined by Anton Du Beke and Erin Boag Anton Du Beke and Erin Boag have been dancing together for 20 years and are two of the nations all-time favourite ballroom stars. Their charisma, chemistry and dazzling choreography have wowed audiences around the world. Anton, known affectionately as the King of Ballroom, will this year be a judge on Strictly Come Dancing. Advertisement

After flying to Budapest, youll travel on a stylish Emerald Cruises Star-Ship, with stops at Linz in Austria and the Unesco World Heritage-listed town of Cesky Krumlov in the Czech Republic.

Youll sail past terraced vineyards and apricot orchards en route to Melk and Durnstein in Austria, after visiting three of Europes great capitals: Vienna, Bratislava and Budapest.

Youll see Anton and Erin perform at an intimate and historic venue in the Austrian capital, and the pair will take part in a dance masterclass aboard your ship.

Anton and Erin will also host a question-and-answer session, during which you can ask them about their lives and careers and find out what goes on behind the scenes on Strictly Come Dancing. One reader said of our previous trip: Its been such a wonderful experience seeing Anton and Erin perform. I cannot imagine anything better.

REASONS TO BOOK

Sail in style: Youll travel on an elegant Emerald Cruises Star-Ship which has an indoor pool with retractable roof, an open-air terrace, a cinema and a putting green, as well as beautiful staterooms and suites. You can choose indoor or outdoor dining. Your cruise will feature amazing excursions in each of the cities.

Special offer: You will enjoy a 500 per person discount, as well as 200 on-board credit per couple*.

See Anton and Erin dance: Anton and Erin will give an unforgettable one-off performance in the unique setting of Vienna, home of the waltz. You will also join them for a cocktail reception and photo opportunity.

Join a dance masterclass: Work on your waltz and finesse your foxtrot during a fun dance class on board your ship with Anton and Erin. You will also have a chance to hear them talk about their long-term partnership and love of dance during a question-and-answer session.
Seven News reporter Georgia Love was pulled from on-air duties on Friday, just days after sharing a 'racist' video of a cat behind the window of an Asian restaurant.

But this wasn't the first time the Bachelorette-turned-newsreader, 33, has landed herself in hot water with her questionable social media activity.

From mocking an expectant Married At First Sight couple to her infamous spat with AFL player Dale Thomas, here are Georgia's most controversial moments.

Reputation: Last week's cat video wasn't the first time Bachelorette-turned-newsreader Georgia Love, 33, had landed herself in hot water with her questionable social media activity

Hurtful comments about Davina Rankin

Georgia infamously copped backlash in February 2018 when she made disparaging remarks about Married At First Sight star Davina Rankin.

'I've just turned on #MAFS for the first time and I'm very confused. I don't understand Davina's face?' she tweeted at the time.

'Has something...happened...to her? Is this by choice? Why has she done this?' she added in reference to the personal trainer's appearance.

A friend of Davina's lashed out at Georgia at the time, telling Daily Mail Australia: 'Shame on her. She should know better.'

Remember this? Georgia infamously copped backlash in February 2018 when she made disparaging remarks about Married At First Sight star Davina Rankin (pictured)

Ouch: 'I don't understand Davina's face? Has something...happened...to her? Is this by choice? Why has she done this?' Georgia tweeted in reference to the personal trainer's appearance

Slamming Jessica Mauboy's Eurovision song

In March that year, Georgia raised eyebrows again when she mocked the lyrics of Jessica Mauboy's Eurovision song We Got Love, which was inspired by recent tragedies including a school shooting in Florida.

'I do love Jess Mauboy but don't try telling me "love is stronger than fire" isn't one of history's most stupid song lyrics,' she tweeted, then swiftly deleted.

'Stupid song lyrics': In March that year, Georgia raised eyebrows again when she mocked the lyrics of Jessica Mauboy's (pictured) Eurovision song We Got Love, which was inspired by recent tragedies including a school shooting in Florida

Opinion: 'I do love Jess Mauboy but don't try telling me "love is stronger than fire" isn't one of history's most stupid song lyrics,' she tweeted, then swiftly deleted

We Got Love's chorus goes: 'I know, I know what you must be thinking / That we are powerless to change things / But don't, don't give up / 'Cause we got love, 'cause we got love / I won't throw my hands up to surrender / 'Cause love is stronger than fire.'

Jessica had previously spoken about the significance of We Got Love, saying she was inspired to write the lyrics after being 'shaken by heartbreaking events including the Florida school shooting and sexual assault of a two-year-old girl in Tennant Creek'.

Whingeing about her wedding

Georgia ruffled feathers once again in August last year when she complained about having to delay her wedding for a second time due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Social media critics hit out at Georgia, claiming there were more important issues to worry about than her glamorous nuptials.

Wedding disaster: Georgia ruffled feathers once again in August 2020 when she complained about having to delay her wedding for a second time due to the Covid-19 pandemic

The Twitter firestorm ended with Georgia defending her right to grumble, insisting she'd had a difficult year and deserved to celebrate.

'I'm allowed to comment on the fact its a bit s**tty my wedding has been affected, too!' she tweeted.

'This does not take away from anyone elses pain or suffering.'

Backlash: Last December, Georgia was criticised for her humble-brag post about buying a house with fiance Lee Elliott (left) and 'launching two businesses' during the pandemic

Georgia's 'humble brag' and feud with Dale Thomas

Last December, Georgia was criticised for her humble-brag post about buying a house with fiance Lee Elliott and 'launching two businesses' during the pandemic.

Following an avalanche of backlash, Georgia returned to Twitter to complain about being trolled.

'Current situation: being trolled because I tried to celebrate buying a house,' she tweeted.

She also defended herself on Instagram, insisting she wasn't trying to brag and was just 'celebrating' the fact she and Lee had saved up enough money to buy a home.

Things then went from bad to worse when AFL star Dale Thomas responded to her tweet with a savage clapback that made reference to their 18-month-old feud.

Dale mocked Georgia for complaining about getting trolled on Twitter, reminding the reality star that she'd kicked him while he was down in 2019 when she infamously ratted him out for drinking alcohol at a charity event two days before a game.

Beef: Georgia (left) was then embroiled in a Twitter stoush with AFL star Dale Thomas (right) over comments she'd made about the sportsman drinking alcohol before a footy match

'Being trolled for having a good time and enjoying your own life sucks, aye! At least mine was for charity!' Dale wrote.

This tweet referred to an incident in May 2019 when Dale was banned from participating in a match against St Kilda after it emerged he'd chosen to drink at a charity event less than 48 hours earlier.

At the time, Georgia had gleefully tweeted that she'd been at the same event and claimed Dale had consumed more than three drinks.

'I was there and saw him. There's no way he'd only had 3 drinks,' she wrote.

Error of judgement: In May 2019, Dale was banned from participating in the crunch match against St Kilda - which Carlton ended up losing by 13 points - after it emerged he'd chosen to drink at a charity event less than 48 hours earlier

Sticking the boot in: At the time, Georgia gleefully tweeted that she'd been at the same event and claimed Dale had consumed more than three drinks

Georgia, who appeared on The Bachelorette in 2016, didn't take kindly to Dale's sarcastic commentary, hitting back with a sharply worded tweet of her own.

'[Your tweet] was calling out something that was being misreported in the news, there's a fair difference between that and trolling,' Georgia wrote.

She also claimed there was a difference between Dale's situation, as he'd admitted to drinking alcohol while she felt she was being criticised unfairly.

'You have also since come out yourself and said you had had more to drink than you'd originally said so I'm not sure why you're still on me about this?' she said.

'Being trolled for having a good time and enjoying your own life sucks, aye! At least mine was for charity!' In December 2020, Dale mocked Georgia for complaining about getting trolled on Twitter, reminding the reality star that she'd kicked him while he was down in 2019

Shaming maskless Bondi residents

In July this year, Georgia came under fire yet again after she shamed Sydneysiders for not wearing masks outdoors.

The Melbourne-based journalist was shocked at the busy scenes at Sydney's beaches at the time, tweeting a video of crowds and writing: 'Bondi right now, where masks nor social distance seem to matter.'

'Well, this is unnecessary,' Sky News journalist Laura Jayes responded.

Lockdown smackdown: Georgia came under fire in July this year for criticising Sydneysiders for not wearing masks outdoors

The news anchor continued: 'Of the more than 1000 cases in NSW - none have been proven to have transmitted outdoors. The infection is spreading in homes, workplaces, shops.'

Sunrise executive producer Michael Pell chimed in: 'And posting random videos from a different city wouldn't you just concentrate on your own lockdown?'

Pell's criticism was especially notable given both he and Georgia work for Seven.

Difference of opinion: 'Well, this is unnecessary,' Sky News journalist Laura Jayes (left, with Peter Stefanovic) responded to Georgia's tweet

Michelle Stephenson, the National News Director for Nova, also criticised Georgia for 'using camera angles that trick the eye' in the footage of the crowded boardwalk.

Georgia clapped back: 'Not sure what camera tricks you think are being used here?

'But I will also put on the record this is not my video, it was sent to me, and that filming in a public place is entirely allowed without receiving consent from individuals.'

Internal feud: Sunrise executive producer Michael Pell's criticism (pictured) was notable given both he and Georgia work for Channel Seven's news division

Nasty tweet about Bryce and Melissa

Georgia landed herself in hot water again in July after she fired off a vile tweet about MAFS stars Bryce Ruthven and Melissa Rawson's pregnancy announcement.

Posting a close-up image of Bryce from his photo shoot with New Idea, Georgia wrote: 'Siri, show me the face of "I've taken it too far".'

Her tweet played into false rumours circulating online that Bryce and Melissa's relationship was a 'showmance' and their pregnancy was a publicity stunt - claims the couple strenuously denied.

Georgia faced swift backlash for her Twitter post, with one user responding: 'Fancy being a gratuitous attention-seeking ex-reality show wannabe, and trolling another ex-reality show wannabe.'

Mean: Georgia landed herself in hot water again after she posted a vile tweet about MAFS stars Bryce Ruthven and Melissa Rawson's pregnancy announcement. Posting a close-up image of Bryce from his New Idea shoot, Georgia wrote: 'Siri, show me the face of "I've taken it too far"'

Nasty: Her tweet (pictured) played into false rumours circulating online that Bryce and Melissa's relationship was a 'showmance' and their pregnancy was a publicity stunt - claims the couple strenuously denied

'Racist' post about Asian restaurant

Her most recent controversy began on Monday when she uploaded footage of a cat sitting behind the window of an Asian restaurant in Melbourne.

She wrote across the footage: 'Shop attendant or lunch?!'

Ouch: Georgia faced swift backlash, with one Twitter user responding: 'Fancy being an attention-seeking ex-reality show wannabe, and trolling another ex-reality show wannabe

Recent saga: Her most recent controversy began on Monday when she uploaded footage of a cat sitting behind the window of an Asian restaurant in Melbourne

The 7News reporter deleted the video an hour later and apologised for causing 'offence', but at the time denied the post had any racist 'insinuation'.

'Earlier I posted a video of a cat in a restaurant window. I meant for this to be a joke about an animal being in a restaurant at lunch service time,' she wrote.

'I meant absolutely no insinuation about the type of animal nor the type of restaurant, but I see that my post did not come across like that and was offensive.

'I sincerely apologise for the oversight and offence I have caused. Thank you to those who called me out. This is what we need to make sure we are all accountable and do better.

'Again, I apologise from the bottom of my heart for the offence caused.'

Creating controversy: She wrote across the footage, 'Shop attendant or lunch?!'

Sorry: The 7News reporter deleted the video an hour later and apologised for causing 'offence', but at the time denied the post had any racist 'insinuation'

Instagram account Aussie Influencer Opinions later discovered another of Georgia's posts from February 2013 in which she made a similar joke about domestic pets and Asian restaurants.

The 2013 post showed an 'animal hospital' next to a restaurant called 'China Chef'.

Below the photo of the two storefronts was a cartoon image of a dog, alongside the text: 'That's suspicious...'

Georgia captioned the now-deleted meme at the time: 'Best.'

Georgia deleted her Twitter account the following day and limited comments on her Instagram profile.

Not the first time: Instagram account Aussie Influencer Opinions later discovered another of Georgia's posts from February 2013 in which she made a similar joke about domestic pets and Asian restaurants

Disappearing act: Georgia deleted her Twitter account the following day and limited comments on her Instagram profile

Following a workplace investigation, Seven alerted staff via email on Friday that Georgia had been 'counselled' and reassigned to an off-camera role 'effective immediately'.

A Seven spokesperson told Daily Mail Australia: 'We have addressed this matter internally and disciplinary action has been taken.

'Seven does not condone this inappropriate conduct and all of our staff have the right to work in a safe, nurturing workplace free from prejudice.'

Dropped: Following a workplace investigation, Seven alerted staff via email on Friday that Georgia had been 'counselled' and reassigned to an off-camera role 'effective immediately'

Georgia is understood to be 'devastated' and 'deeply sorry for her actions', and has personally apologised to her colleagues, reports The Herald Sun.

'I want to apologise for an inappropriate post on my personal social media account this week and for an old post which has resurfaced,' Love said in a staff email.

'I'm deeply sorry for the hurt that I've caused and, in particular, for offence to the Asian community. It certainly wasn't my intention.

'My posts were inappropriate and offensive. There is no excuse for perpetuating racist stereotypes in any forum.

'I am committed to moving forward, learning and growing in my new role and I hope that in time I can earn your trust back.'

Georgia has also been dropped as an ambassador for Chadstone Shopping Centre

Georgia's apology was forwarded to staff at Seven's Melbourne newsroom by news director Shaun Menegola, who acknowledged her social media activity had been 'inappropriate and offensive'.

'It has been a difficult week for many as a consequence of some inappropriate and offensive posts on a staff member's private account,' Mr Menegola wrote.

'Following a workplace investigation that had to follow due process, I want to let you know that Georgia has been counselled and will be reassigned to the production desk, effective immediately.'

Georgia has also been dropped as an ambassador for Chadstone Shopping Centre.

Throwback: Georgia began her career as a journalist for WIN News

Georgia began her career as a journalist for WIN News before her profile skyrocketed in 2016 when she was cast on Channel 10's The Bachelorette.

She went on to become a casual reporter for Ten Eyewitness News, later rebranded 10 News First, but was let go due to budget cuts in early 2021.

She announced she'd joined Seven News Melbourne in February.

Reality sensation: Georgia's profile skyrocketed in 2016 when she was cast on Channel 10's The Bachelorette. Pictured on The Bachelorette with winner Lee Elliott
Her ex husband Ben Affleck couldn't keep his eye off of his girlfriend Jennifer Lopez while posing up a storm at the premiere for his film The Last Duel during the Venice Film Festival on Friday.

Meanwhile, Jennifer Garner was spotted teaching two of her children how to pump gas at a gas station in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Brentwood.

Jennifer, 49, cut a casual figure as she explained to her son Samuel, nine, how to get gas, as daughter Seraphina, 12, watched on.

Doting mom: Her ex husband Ben Affleck couldn't keep his eye off of his girlfriend Jennifer Lopez while posing up a storm at the premiere for his film The Last Duel during the Venice Film Festival on Friday. Meanwhile, Jennifer Garner was spotted teaching two of her children how to pump gas at a gas station in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Brentwood

Jennifer donned a navy sweater with jeans, adding sunglasses and her brunette tresses pulled back.

Samuel paid for the gas and then was seen grabbing the nozzle to began pumping the gas.

He handed the nozzle to Seraphina who got it going, proving the siblings are team players.

The gas pumping session comes as ex Ben couldn't keep his eyes - or hands - off of girlfriend Jennifer Lopez.

Family is everyything: Jennifer, 49, cut a casual figure as she explained to her son Samuel, nine, how to get gas, as daughter Seraphina, 12, watched on

Mom life: Jennifer donned a navy sweater with jeans, adding sunglasses and her brunette tresses pulled back

Ben and Jennifer looked like the ultimate glamour couple as they posed up a storm on the red carpet at the premiere of his film The Last Duel at the Venice Film Festival.

Jennifer, 52, wowed in a low-cut white dress with a silver detail along the plunging neckline.

The stunner also showcased her legs in the high-slit number, adding silver heels.

So in love: Ben and Jennifer looked like the ultimate glamour couple as they posed up a storm on the red carpet at the premiere of his film The Last Duel at the Venice Film Festival

Ben cut a handsome figure in a black and white suit with a bow tie, opting to rock a stubble-y look.

Prior to their red carpet outing, the couple enjoyed a water taxi ride together upon arrival to the film festival.

The lovebirds cuddled up on the seat as they laughed and smiled at each other.

Affleck and Garner have maintained a healthy co-parenting relationship since ending their nearly decade-long marriage in 2015. Their divorce was finalized in 2018.

Ben has three children with ex-wife Jennifer Garner: daughters Violet, 15, Seraphina, and son Samuel.

Jennifer has two children with ex-husband Marc Anthony: twins Max and Emme, 13.

The couple's relationship came as a shock to fans, heating up again nearly 17 years after their failed engagement.

Happy: Jennifer, 52, wowed in a low-cut white dress with a silver detail along the plunging neckline

Close: Ben cut a handsome figure in a black and white suit with a bow tie, opting to rock a stubble-y look

Jennifer confirmed the end of her relationship with Alex Rodriguez, a former New York Yankee, in April after the pair dated for four years and were engaged for two years.

In mid-May, Jennifer spent some time in Los Angeles with Ben, according to a source per PEOPLE.

The couple went Instagram official with their relationship in July while on a European holiday in honor of her 52nd birthday.

Ben and Jen first started dating in 2002 after meeting on set of Gigli.

They soon became engaged and were set to get married in September 2003, but postponed their wedding and eventually broke up in January 2004.
Nadia Bartel is at the center of the year's biggest celebrity scandal after footage leaked of her snorting a white powder and breaking lockdown restrictions.

And despite losing brand deals and being publicly humiliated, it appears that the former WAG's social media star power could be increasing.

According to Social Blade , the 36-year-old's Instagram following has grown by approximately 11,000 new followers.

Superstar: Nadia Bartel has gained thousands of Instagram followers since her snorting scandal

Her following considerably spiked around September 3rd, when she issued a public apology on Instagram, and has continued to grow ever since.

The socialite now boasts an impressive 567,000 followers in total on Instagram.

Nadia was recorded snorting white powder off a $1.50 Kmart plate in a video mistakenly shared to Instagram by her friend and business partner Ellie Pearson.

Pearson had meant to send the video to her sister, but due to a cracked phone screen posted it on social media by accident and didn't delete it until 10 minutes later.

Nadia later apologised for the incident and vowed to make 'better choices in the future'.

In the aftermath of the scandal, Nadia has been dumped by a two brands in the wake of her viral video scandal.

Picture perfect: The socialite now boasts an impressive 567,000 followers in total on Instagram after picking up around 11,000 new fans after her scandal

On Monday, Hairhouse Australia, a haircare and beauty company, has confirmed that they are no longer working with Nadia.

In a statement shared to Daily Mail Australia, a spokesperson for Hairhouse Australia said: 'We can confirm that our contract with Nadia Bartel was a one-off campaign and has expired.'

Earlier on Monday, the So Dramatic Instagram account shared a statement from Hairhouse Australia that said their 'partnership with Nadia has come to an end'.

Scandal: Nadia was recorded snorting white powder off a $1.50 Kmart plate in a video mistakenly shared to Instagram by her friend and business partner Ellie Pearson

The statement went on: 'As a result of Nadia's actions, we have removed all affiliation with Nadia as an ambassador for Hairhouse'.

Nadia had last promoted the company on her Instagram on July 18, filming a hair tutorial video in a paid partnership.

On Sunday, JSHealth, a company who sell vitamins and supplements and are popular in Instagram circles, also dumped Nadia as an ambassador after she had previously endorsed the brand on her social media.

Dumped: On Monday, Hairhouse Australia, a haircare and beauty company, has confirmed that they are no longer working with Nadia

Ditched: JSHealth, a company who sell vitamins and supplements, also dumped Nadia as an ambassador after she had previously endorsed the brand on her social media

However, in a post shared to JSHealth founder Jessica Sepel's Instagram page on Sunday, the vitamin merchant went out of her way not to call Nadia by name - instead bizarrely referring to her as 'this individual'.

Sepel wrote: 'Today I've had to make a hard decision as the founder and face of my brand, and let go of a brand endorser. I have to stand for what's right.

'We are a health brand who is very serious about aligning with individuals who share the same values.'

Nadia had previously promoted the trendy vitamin and wellness company, having spruiked the brand as recently as on August 4.
Benedict Cumberbatch cut a sharp figure as he attended The Power Of The Dog premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival on Friday.

The actor, 45, looked smart in a smart black suit as he posed for pictures and chatted to press on the red carpet.

Benedict teamed his two-piece suit with a crisp white shirt and black tie, finishing off his look with shiny black shoes.

Looking good: Benedict Cumberbatch cut a sharp figure as he attended The Power Of The Dog premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival on Friday

The Sherlock star appeared in good spirits as he struck a pose in front of the camera while promoting his latest movie.

Benedict was joined on the red carpet by co-star Kodi Smit-McPhee, 25, who got the memo and also donned a black suit for the occasion.

In The Power of the Dog, Benedict plays 'sadistic rancher' Phil Burbank who strikes up a relationship with Peter (Kodi Smit-McPhee).

Chit chat: The actor, 45, looked smart in a smart black suit as he posed for pictures and chatted to press on the red carpet

While Cumberbatch isn't gay, he revealed in an interview with IndieWire that they did speak about him playing a gay character often, adding, 'It wasnt done without thought.'

'I feel very sensitive about representation, diversity, and inclusion,' he said at the Telluride Film Festival.

'One of the appeals of the job was the idea that in this world, with this specific character, there was a lot that was private, hidden from view,' he added.

Premiere: The Sherlock star appeared in good spirits as he struck a pose in front of the camera while promoting his latest movie

Film stars: Benedict was joined on the red carpet by co-star Kodi Smit-McPhee, 25, who got the memo and also donned a black suit for the occasion

While it's never specifically stated what his character's sexual preference is, the actor has played a gay man before, portraying Alan Turing in The Imitation Game.

'It wasnt done without thought. I also feel slightly like, is this a thing where our dance card has to be public? Do we have to explain all our private moments in our sexual history? I dont think so,' he added.

He also mentioned that director Jane Campion, 'chose us as actors to play those roles. Thats her question to answer.'

Kodi, 25, who plays Peter is also a straight man, but he said there was a lot about his character that he relates to.

One to watch: In The Power of the Dog, Benedict plays 'sadistic rancher' Phil Burbank who strikes up a relationship with Peter (Kodi Smit-McPhee)

He explained that he felt 'in touch with my feminine side', explaining that he was raised by his mother and sister.

Kodi added that playing the role was 'experimental' and 'beautiful'.

The Power of the Dog will debut in cinemas November 17 before arriving on Netflix December 1.
Karlie Kloss will have been a first-time mother for six months on Saturday.

And on Friday the top model decided to take a casual walk with her baby son Levi and a female friend along the bustling streets of New York City.

The Chicago native, 29, went with a casual-cool ensemble dressed in denim blue jeans, a white blouse and brown suede slip-on shoes.

Quality time: Karlie Kloss, 29, took a break from her business affairs and took a stroll with her son Levi, who turns six-months old on Saturday

Casual: The Chicago native, 29, went with a casual-cool ensemble dressed in denim blue jeans, a white blouse and brown suede slip-on shoes

The former Victoria's Secret Angel had her blonde tresses styled long, straight, and with a center part as she pushed Levi in his stroller.

She also carried her baby essentials in a Louis Vuitton bag, and made sure to have her mouth and nose covered with a protective mask amid the still surging coronavirus variants.

Her gal pal was similarly dressed in blue jeans and a dress shirt as they made their way back to the model's apartment.

Blonde beauty: The former Victoria's Secret Angel had her blonde tresses styled long, straight, and with a center part as she pushed Levi in his stroller

Designer darling: She also carried her baby essentials in a Louis Vuitton bag, and made sure to have her mouth and nose covered with a protective mask amid the still surging coronavirus variants

Casual walk: The in-demand model was joined by a gal pal for her stroll with Levi

Safety first: Kloss made sure to wear a face mask over her mouth and nose amid the still dangerous COVID-19 pandemic

Kloss and her husband, Joshua Kushner, were initially romantically linked in 2012, and they went on to establish a relationship over the next few years.

The happy pair later tied the knot in 2018, and they held a second wedding ceremony the following year.

Last October, it was reported that the couple was expecting to bring a child into their lives, which was confirmed by numerous sources.

They later welcomed Levi into their family this past March.

Light of their life: Kloss shares her son with husband and businessman Joshua Kushner

Homeward bound: The trio eventually made their way back to Kloss' Manhattan apartment

Making it official: The pair officially tied the knot in 2018 and they held a second wedding ceremony the following year

On the way: Last October, several sources reported that Kloss was expecting to bring a child into her life

Her afternoon stroll comes five days after she soaked in a proud moment and took a selfie in front of an Adidas billboard on Lafayette Street in Downtown Manhattan that's advertising her collection with the German sportswear company.

Her latest Adidas collaboration is a 32-piece collection ranging in price between $30 and $140.

Kushner was on hand to enjoy the moment, and shot video of billboard and posted it on his Insta-Story that was captioned with a heart emoji.

Caught in the act! Adidas collaborator Karlie Kloss took a selfie in front of a billboard on Lafayette Street in Manhattan on Sunday that advertises her collection with the German sportswear company

For Sunday's proud moment, Kloss wore a slinky black slip dress beneath a grey plaid blazer and she accessorized with black Gucci loafers and a matching Gucci cross-body bag.

The 6ft2in blonde carried two brown shopping bags and again practiced a safety first mentality by wearing a brown face mask amid the still dangerous COVID-19 pandemic.

That same day, the 36-year-old brother of former White House Senior Advisor Jared Kushner Instastoried a snap of their son, who turns six months-old on September 11.

Representing: The Chicago-born 29-year-old is clearly proud of her latest 32-piece Adidas collection ranging in price between $30 and $140

Proud: Supporting Karlie off camera was her husband of two years - Thrive Capital founder Joshua Kushner - who Instastoried a video of the billboard captioned with a heart emoji

Big Apple: Kloss was wearing a slinky black slip dress beneath a grey plaid blazer and she accessorized with black Gucci loafers and a matching Gucci cross-body bag

Errands: The 6ft2in blonde carried two brown shopping bags and she protected herself from the coronavirus delta variant by wearing a brown face mask

Kushner wrote: 'Levi is excited for [the] return to the office.'

He also posted a picture of the Puck Building in Nolita where he's 'in contract to purchase' a $42.5 million five-bedroom penthouse apartment, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The new parents will most likely close on the real estate deal considering the historic building was developed by Kushner Companies.

'Levi is excited for [the] return to the office!' That same day, the 36-year-old brother of former White House Senior Advisor Jared Kushner Instastoried a snap of their son

Confirmed? Joshua also posted a picture of the Puck Building in Nolita where he's 'in contract to purchase' a $42.5M five-bedroom penthouse apartment

All in the family: The new parents will most likely close on the real estate deal considering the historic building was developed by Kushner Companies (pictured in 2016)

Kloss left IMG Models after nine years in order to sign with The Society Management last Wednesday - according to WWD.

She will make 'occasional appearances' on the 19th season of Project Runway - premiering October 14 on Bravo - but she'll no longer host nor executive produce the reality show.

Project Runway #4 champ Christian Siriano returns as mentor of the 16 competing designers judged by Brandon Maxwell, Elaine Welteroth, and Nina Garcia.

New representation: Kloss left IMG Models after nine years in order to sign with The Society Management last Wednesday
Eric Bana is refusing to leave his hometown of Melbourne until the pandemic is over.

Speaking to the ABC, the actor said he feels that it's his duty to stick by his fellow Australians during these difficult times.

'This might sound weird, but I just kind ofI don't want to leave. Just in terms of what the city has gone through,' he said.

Staying put: Eric Bana is refusing to leave his hometown of Melbourne until the pandemic is over. Speaking to the ABC, the actor said he feels that it's his duty to stick by his fellow Australians during these difficult times

The former Full Frontal star even said that he had turned down job offers overseas to stay Down Under.

'But in terms of having the opportunity to go and do other things, it just doesn't feel like the right time  It just doesn't feel right to escape.

'It sort of feels like we've gotten this far, you know, and you feel like you're part of the tribe and I just want to be here until it's all over, and feel that sense of joy that everyone else will feel, at the same time.'

Eric recently recorded the Audible podcast drama The Orchard in Melbourne.

The podcast promises a 'visceral and terrifying journey with a riveting and unexpected conclusion'.

'It just doesn't feel right to escape': The former Full Frontal star even said that he had turned down job offers overseas to stay Down Under

Audible has described the series as 'a supernatural murder mystery that blends a foreboding private school, a haunting conspiracy, and unnerving teenagers'.

Eric will be joined in the series by other well-known Austrian actors and actresses.

Magda Szubanski (Kath & Kim and Babe), Gary Sweet (Police Rescue and Bloom) and Olivia Deeble (Home and Away and Secret Society of Second Born Royals) are also involved.

Eric voices police detective and struggling single parent, Adam Durwood, who is assigned to investigate the body of a teenage boy found on the grounds of the exclusive Nevermoor girls school.

At the centre of the mystery is a coven of three beguiling and manipulative teenage girls who seem to know much more than they should and are slowly drawing Adam into a web he cant see.

When Adams daughter, Lily, is secretly befriended by the three girls of Nevermoor things begin to unravel.
Chandler Powell has shared a heartfelt tribute to his wife Bindi Irwin.

On Saturday, the former professional wakeboarder shared a photo on Instagram showing himself cosied up with Bindi, 23.

Chandler, 24, joked in the caption: 'Loving photo or falling asleep standing up?'

Perfect for each other: Chandler Powell shared heartfelt tribute to his wife Bindi Irwin in an Instagram post on Saturday. He wrote that they 'make the best team together'

He said: 'I love you more than anything, @bindisueirwin, and being on this adventure together is my favourite part of life.

'We make the best team together,' the American added.

Bindi appreciated the sweet post and added a laughing emoji directed at his joke in the caption.

The Wildlife Warrior added: 'Love you babe. Forever and forever.'

Sweet: Bindi appreciated the sweet post and replied back, 'Love you babe. Forever and forever.' The young couple are proud parents to Grace Warrior who they welcomed back in March

What a cutie! Bindi shared a new heart melting picture of baby Grace Warrior on Thursday. Little Grace was sitting up on her change table, dressed in a sweet colourful outfit, including striped leggings, a rainbow T-shirt, knitted cardigan and giraffe bib

The couple's sweet exchange on social media comes after Bindi shared a new heart melting picture of baby Grace Warrior on Thursday.

Little Grace was sitting up on her change table, dressed in a sweet colourful outfit, including striped leggings, a rainbow T-shirt, knitted cardigan and giraffe bib.

'My little ray of sunshine,' the young mother captioned the picture.

First love: The couple met in November 2013 when Chandler, who hails from Florida, was touring Australia for a wakeboarding competition

The photo also gave fans a peek at Grace's stunning bunny-themed nursery, which features rabbit wallpaper and a floral change table.

Bindi first met Chandler in 2013, when the American ex-wakeboarder went on a guided tour of Australia Zoo in Queensland.

The pair married in a makeshift ceremony at Australia Zoo in March 25, last year.

They welcomed daughter Grace Warrior in March 2021.
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Fashion week has been in full swing, with celebrities rocking best looks as they attend fashion shows around the Big Apple.

And on Friday, Lucy Hale, Nicky Hilton and Chrishell Stause brought their fashion A game for alice + olivia by Stacey Bendet's presentation during New York Fashion Week.

Lucy donned a geometric patterned dress while Nicky opted for houndstooth and Chrishell picked snakeskin.

Stunners: Fashion week has been in full swing, with celebrities rocking best looks as they attend fashion shows around the Big Apple. And on Friday, Lucy Hale, Nicky Hilton and Chrishelle Stause brought their fashion A game for alice + olivia by Stacey Bendet's presentation during New York Fashion Week

Lucy, 32, showcased her legs in a thigh-grazing brown and tan mini dress, which featured a variety of geometric shapes.

The Pretty Little Thing actress added a coordinating jacket with lace up heels and a small black structured handbag.

Lucy donned a statement dusty gold necklace with her short brunette tresses sleek and center parted, opting for smokey eye makeup and nude lipstick.

Nicky, 37, chose a black and gray houndstooth high-neck dress with a chainlink belt for the presentation.

Stunner: Lucy, 32, showcased her legs in a thigh-grazing brown and tan mini dress, which featured a variety of geometric shapes

Elegant: Nicky, 37, chose a black and gray houndstooth high-neck dress with a chainlink belt for the presentation

The dress had a similar chain detail along the center of the torso; the mother of two added black heels and a quilted handbag.

Selling Sunset beauty Chrishell Stause showcased her cleavage in a low-cut snakeskin spaghetti strap dress with black heels and her tresses in a chic updo.

Chrishell, 40, arrived with her boyfriend and boss Jason Oppenheim struck a pose on the carpet as they arrived to the presentation.

Lea Michele stood out in her bold satin pink blazer dress, which she paired with coordinating heels; the mother of one and former Glee star carried a see-through multi-colored handbag, opting to put her hair in a high ponytail.

Gorgeous: Selling Sunset beauty Chrishell Stause showcased her cleavage in a low-cut snakeskin spaghetti strap dress with black heels and her tresses in a chic updo; with her boyfriend and boss Jason Oppenheim

Chic: Lea Michele stood out in her bold satin pink blazer dress, which she paired with coordinating heels; the mother of one and former Glee star carried a see-through multi-colored handbag, opting to put her hair in a high ponytail

Sistine Stallone, who is the daughter of Sylvester Stallone and Jennifer Flavin, looked stunning in a polka dot dress with black heels.

The beautiful actress, 23, wore her brunette tresses in curls with gold hoop earrings and layers of necklaces.

Chic: Bachelor nation star Rachel Kirckconnell and model Brooks Nader both opted for all white looks.

Lovely: Sistine Stallone, who is the daughter of Sylvester Stallone and Jennifer Flavin, looked stunning in a polka dot dress with black heels

Glowing: The beautiful actress, 23, wore her brunette tresses in curls with gold hoop earrings and layers of necklaces

Chic: Bachelor nation star Rachel Kirckconnell and model Brooks Nader both opted for all white looks

Bold: Braunwyn Windham Burke, Joy Corrigan, Madison Grace Reed and Chloe Fineman opted for colorful looks

Wow: Julia Michaels also chose a patterned number for the presentation

Cute: Jason Biggs shared a sweet moment with wife Jenny Mollen

Fashionably: Alexis Ren and Adrienne Bailon opted for leggy looks

Bizarre: Cuba Gooding Jr. decided to rip off his shirt after arriving at the presentation
Sydneysiders haven't been able to visit a hair salon in months due to Australia's harsh lockdown restrictions.

But the same rules don't apply to celebrity newsreaders and presenters, who have been able to enjoy the perks of professional hair and makeup artists.

A Channel Nine spokesperson told The Daily Telegraph that media and journalism has an exemption under the current health orders.

Privilege: Australia's TV presenters and journalists have been able to get their hair and makeup done throughout the country's lockdowns as they are exempt from certain restrictions (pictured: Rebecca Maddern)

'Due to the nature of productions, hair and make-up artists were considered authorised workers,' reported The Daily Telegraph.

'The hair and makeup teams are regularly tested and screened for Covid,' the spokesperson said.

'They have been supplied PPE (personal protective equipment) that they are required to wear while working.'

Lucky me! Erin Molan hasn't made any secret of her access to on-demand glam, tagging both her makeup artist and hair stylist in a post on August 21

The networks use other measures to ensure safety, such as onsite testing and swab testing 72 hours before the appointment.

Some of the A-list presenters that appear to be benefitting from the exemptions include The Project's Carrie Bickmore, The Sunday Footy Show's Erin Molan, and Australian Ninja Warrior's Rebecca Maddern.

Erin hasn't made any secret of her access to on-demand glam, tagging both her makeup artist and hair stylist in a post on August 21.

'Due to the nature of productions, hair and make-up artists were considered authorised workers,' reported The Daily Telegraph. (Pictured: Carrie Bickmore)

Tough times: Many prominent influencers have also struggled without their usual trips to the hairdresser

Carrie has also promoted her glam team on Instagram, tagging her stylist, makeup artist and hair stylist.

While TV presenters have been able to maintain their grooming, millions of Aussies in Sydney and Melbourne have gone without.

Many prominent influencers have also struggled without their usual trips to the hairdresser, including Abbie Chatfield and Jesinta Franklin.

However, Abbie was later able to get her hair dyed as a requirement for working on a television project.
The guitarist for the popular country music band Rascal Flatts has been charged with driving under the influence.

Joe Don Rooney, 45, was arrested early Thursday morning after he allegedly crashed his vehicle into a tree near Nashville, Tennessee, a spokesperson with the Williamson County Sheriff's Office confirmed to Fox News.

Rooney was subsequently booked into the Williamson County Jail just after 4AM Thursday and was released about three hours later after posting a $2,500 bond, according to online records.

Legal troubles: Joe Don Rooney, 45, was arrested for driving under the influence after allegedly crashing his vehicle into a tree near Nashville, Tennessee early Thursday morning

The musician, who helped found Rascal Flatts with second cousins Gary LeVox (lead vocals), and Jay DeMarcus (bass guitar, background vocals) in 1999, reportedly did not suffer any serious injuries.

Back in January 2020, the group announced they were going to breakup after 21 years together, and that they would head out on a farewell tour dubbed: Rascal Flatts Farewell: Life Is A Highway Tour 2020.

During the announcement on CBS This Morning, they also promised to release new music.

But then on May 19 the farewell tour was indefinitely postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Disbanding: In January 2020, Rascal Flatts announced they were breaking up after a farewell tour that has since been postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic; they are seen in 2019

They would live up to the promise of new music when they dropped the single, How They Remember You in June.

Rascal Flatts' sound has been described as a mix of country tradition with a pop spirit and arena rock.

During their two-decade run they released 10 original studio albums and a Christmas-themed album between 2000 and 2017.

They would go on to score 31 top 10 hits on Billboard's country airplay chart, including 14 No. 1 songs, resulting in more than 23 million albums sold.

Longtime couple: Rooney and wife Tiffany Fallon, the Miss USA 2001 runner-up and Playboy's 2005 Playmate Of The Year, have been married for 15 years; they are pictured in Nashville in September 2017

So far the band has not officially announced if and when they will reschedule the farewell tour before disbanding.

Rooney is married to Tiffany Fallon, the Miss USA 2001 runner-up and Playboy's 2005 Playmate Of The Year.

The couple, who celebrated their 15th wedding anniversary this past April, have three children: son Jagger and daughters Raquel and Devon.
Broadcast journalist Deb Knight has opened up about the most formative assignment of her career - the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

'I was a political journo, a very green political journo at that, and it was my first overseas posting and there I was covering it,' Deb told 9Honey.

'It really changed my career and changed my outlook. It hit me personally after the fact, I broke down a couple of times thinking of the impact it had on people's lives,' she added.

Broadcast journalist Deb Knight has opened up about the most formative assignment of her career - the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks

Despite saying that the experience was 'really difficult', the 2GB host said that she learned a lot.

'It was a really important learning experience about how to keep your head and to not panic in the face of a big evolving story,' she said.

'And when it comes to a big evolving story, you couldn't get much bigger than that.'

Back in April, Deborah revealed her shock skin cancer diagnosis.

Never forget: The World Trade Center burns after being hit by two planes September 11, 2001 in New York City

The 48-year-old spoke about her health scare on her 2GB radio show, Afternoons with Deborah Knight.

She admitted that the diagnosis is 'not the best news' before urging fans and listeners to regularly get their skin checked.

'I got my results from the bioscopy on the bump on my nose that my dermatologist was worried about,' Deb said.

'I told Ray about it when I had the big whopping band aid on my nose about this time last week well it's not the best news. It is a small basal cell carcinoma.'

Struggle: Despite saying that the experience was 'really difficult', the 2GB host said that she learned a lot

She added that she has to get it cut out, but assured listeners it is 'not spreading' and is 'not urgent.'

'So, it's a small cancer and it's nodular which means I've got to get it cut out. I've got to go under the knife.'

She finished: 'But get your skin checked, we can't afford not to in Australia. We are the skin cancer capital of the world.'
She is currently expecting her second child with boyfriend Travis Scott, a surprise announcement she made earlier this week on social media.

And Kylie Jenner gave a peek at her growing baby bump on Friday evening as she stepped out for another fun-filled night in New York City.

The 24-year-old makeup mogul rocked a cropped grey sweatshirt and a pair of matching leggings that flared at the leg.

Stylish mama: Kylie Jenner gave a peek at her growing baby bump on Friday evening as she stepped out for another fun-filled night in New York City

She layered up her look with a white floor-length coat and added some height to her 5foot6inch frame with a pair of heels with a pointed toe.

The Kylie Cosmetics founder's lengthy raven tresses flowed behind her in wavy strands.

Jenner accessorized with a pair of silver earrings and a small white designer handbag.

As for makeup, Kylie had a stunning bronze eyeshadow across her lids and appeared to mute her plump pout with some matte mauve-toned lipstick.

Cropped moment: The 24-year-old makeup mogul rocked a cropped grey sweatshirt and a pair of matching leggings that flared at the leg

Layering up: She layered up her look with a white floor-length coat and added some height to her 5foot6inch frame with a pair of heels with a pointed toe

The KUWTK star grabbed dinner at celeb-friendly restaurant Nobu with some members of her tight knit crew.

Kylie's very public pregnancy outings this week are uncharacteristic for the star, being that she famously hid her first pregnancy with daughter Stormi Webster from the public until she was born.

She confirmed she is expecting her second child in an emotional one-and-a-half minute video posted to her Instagram account on Tuesday, September 7.

Making waves: The Kylie Cosmetics founder's lengthy raven tresses flowed behind her in wavy strands

Hot spot: The KUWTK star grabbed dinner at celeb-friendly restaurant Nobu with some members of her tight knit crew

Kylie documents her first trimester in the clip, telling Travis and her mom Kris she is expecting, while also sharing the first glimpse of her blossoming baby bump.

Travis and Kylie have dated on and off since 2017, and welcomed Stormi in 2018. Kylie did not reveal the sex of her second child in Tuesday's video.

Jenner's announcement included never-before-seen footage of her getting a positive pregnancy test, attending her first two ultrasound appointments, and surprising her mother Kris Jenner with the joyous news.

She also gave fans a look at her yet to be posted maternity shoot, which shows the reality star donning a black cut-out dress while cradling her baby bump.

Baby joy: Kylie Jenner has confirmed she is expecting her second child with boyfriend Travis Scott, 30, after pregnancy speculation circulated last month

All on film: Kylie documents her first trimester in the clip, telling Travis and her mom Kris she is expecting, while also sharing the first glimpse of her blossoming baby bump and positive test

Kisses: Jenner and Scott's three-year-old daughter Stormi kissing Jenner's bump

Jenner's Instagram confirmation came just weeks after insiders revealed that she was pregnant again. Her representative declined to comment when contacted by DailyMail.com at the time of the reports.

Kylie had not been photographed publicly since attending the 72nd Annual Parsons Benefit in New York City with Travis and Stormi on June 15.

She also failed to share a single recent image of herself for her birthday on August 10, which was uncharacteristic for the social media star.

The speculation about her second pregnancy was sent into overdrive by her father Caitlyn Jenner as she campaigned for California's gubernatorial recall election in late August.

The 71-year-old Olympian claimed while visiting The Toy Store in Northern California's Quincy that her nineteenth grandchild was on the way. 'I just found out the other day that I have another one in the oven,' she remarked.

Actual footage: Taking fans along for the emotional ride, Jenner included actual footage of her ultrasound appointment

Heartbeat! An ultrasound technician can be heard telling the couple that they are just 'a couple of days away' from being able to hear their child's heartbeat

TMZ reported that Kylie was in the 'very early stages' of her pregnancy in August, while Page Six's sources revealed that the entire Kardashian-Jenner family was 'thrilled at her news.'

People reported at the time that Kylie was 'a few months along' and was 'enjoying her pregnancy in private.'

An insider also told the outlet that Kylie 'has been wanting to give Stormi a sibling for a while. She loves being a mom. She is thrilled that she and Travis are pregnant again.'

She has opened up about the possibility of welcoming another child in recent years, telling Harper's Bazaar in 2020 that she even felt 'pressure' from her own friends to continue expanding her family.

'My friends all pressure me about it,' she said. 'They love Stormi. I definitely feel pressure to give her a sibling, but theres no plan.'

Closer look: Giving fans a closer look at her burgeoning bump, Kylie posed outdoors with her cellphone camera propped up in order to capture herself from the neck down

Surprise!!! Kylie surprised her mother Kris Jenner with the big news

During an appearance from April 2020 on her close friend Stassie Karanikolaous #DoYourPart Instagram Live show, Kylie said she had plans for a considerably larger family.

'I want seven kids down the line,' she said, though she added, 'but not right now.'

She was worried about the stress and strain that comes with having a baby.

'Pregnancy is just not a joke; its a serious thing and its hard,' she continued. 'Im not ready for that just yet.'

However, with more than a year's distance from that statement, Kylie is adding another baby into the mix.
Jesy Nelson has reportedly made it her mission to crack the music industry in the US with her hotly anticipated solo career.

However according to The Sun on Friday, the former Little Mix star, 30, has suffered a major blow with collaborator Nicki Minaj, 38, pulling out of Sunday's MTV Video Music Awards at the last minute.

Reports suggested Nicki would join Jesy on stage in New York to perform her debut single Boyz - no doubt increasing her chances of success on the US charts.

'She wants Boyz to be released with a bang': Jesy Nelson's US debut has reportedly suffered a major blow as collaborator Nicki Minaj pulls out of Sunday's MTV VMAs performance

Sources reportedly told the publication Jesy flew out to the US specifically for the chance to perform Boyz alongside Nicki on stage at the MTV VMAs.

'However Nicki has now dropped out, meaning that idea is now in the bin and Jesy's big reveal has been pushed back even further,' they said.

While the single is reportedly still on track to be released later this month, sources went on to claim that Jesy is 'frustrated' by her mission to crack the US losing steam.

'Jesy is raring to go and these things are out of her control. It's incredibly frustrating as she wants Boyz to be released with a bang. And at the moment, it all seems to be losing a bit of traction,' the insider said.

Skipping this year: It was reported Nicki, 38, would join Jesy on stage in New York to perform her debut single Boyz. Nicki is pictured at the 2018 MTV Video Music Awards in New York

However a representative for Jesy told MailOnline on Saturday that Jesy and Nicki were never scheduled to perform together on stage at the MTV VMAs.

'Jesy was not scheduled to perform with Nicki at the VMAs. She is in the US completing studio writing sessions,' they said.

On Thursday, Nicki shared on Twitter that she's not performing at the award show.

She announced her sudden departure the same day that her husband Kenneth Petty, 43, pleaded guilty to failing to register as a sex offender in California.

Nicki was never among the performers announced for the VMAs, but that didn't stop her fans from asking if she would be at the award show.

Setback? Sources said Jesy flew out to the US specifically for the chance to perform Boyz alongside Nicki on stage at the MTV VMAs, but the idea is 'now in the bin'

In quoting one fan, the rapper claimed she was part of the program but had backed out at the last minute.

'I just pulled out. I'll explain another day,' she wrote while quoting the original tweet.

The Anaconda artist made it clear there were no hard feelings for any of the executives involved in the show.

'But I love those guys at MTV,' she added. 'Thank you [VMAs producer] Bruce [Gilmer]. I love you so much.'

'She's raring to go': While the single is reportedly still on track to be released later this month, sources went on to claim that Jesy is 'frustrated' by her mission to crack the US losing steam

Back next year: Nicki was never announced as a VMAs performer, but she replied to a fan on Twitter that she had 'just pulled out' on Thursday. She skipped the explanation but vowed to be there in 2022

Nicki was last featured at the award show in 2018, when she performed multiple songs from her Queen album.

Should the reports be true, Nicki's departure is a setback for Jesy's US debut.

The star left British pop group Little Mix in December 2020 after nine years, saying her participation in the group had taken a toll on her mental health.

As a foursome, they recorded six UK top 10 albums and four number one singles.
Fiona Falkiner recently shared photos of her impressive post-baby body after welcoming her son, Hunter, six months ago.

Speaking to The Daily Telegraph on Saturday, the 38-year-old said her latest weight loss journey has helped her find a new sense of control.

'My obstetrician told me I could not really train until 12 weeks post-birth so I just started gently,' Fiona who welcomed her baby with fiancee Hayley Willis in March said.

No pressure! Six months after welcoming her son, Hunter, Fiona Falkiner (pictured) told The Daily Telegraph her post-baby weight loss journey has helped her find a new sense of control

'For me, it is about having control and having structure and not putting any pressure on myself to lose a certain amount of weight.'

Fiona's candid comments come after The Biggest Loser host shared a before and after photos of her recent weight loss results.

On Thursday, she wrote in her caption: 'Look who nearly fits in to her mum jeans! Being away from home and living in hotels for the past six weeks has been a bit of a challenge.'

Fighting fit: The model, 38, revealed on Thursday that she has been on a health kick for the past six weeks and is almost back in her old jeans

Fiona added that she set herself, 'some personal fitness goals' and is 'now a big fan of working out at home'.

The beauty added, 'I'm not really one for weigh-ins these days but I can see all my hard work has paid off not just in my mood and energy levels but now I'm almost in to my mum jeans! Woohoo!'

Fiona and her fiancee Hayley Willis, who became engaged in 2019, welcomed their first child, Hunter, in March.

Work it: Fiona said that she set herself, 'some personal fitness goals' and is 'now a big fan of working out at home'

The beauty added: 'I'm not really one for weigh-ins these days but I can see all my hard work has paid off not just in my mood and energy levels but now I'm almost in to my mum jeans!'

Last month, Fiona completed hotel quarantine in Queensland with their baby son.

The TV host entered the state, moving from Sydney, to join Hayley in the state's 'AFL bubble'.

In May, the pair revealed they are ready to become second time mothers.
Maggie Gyllenhaal appeared to be in high spirits as she led the arrivals for the the final day of the city's 78th International Film Festival on Saturday.

The actress, 43, beamed from ear-to-ear as she waved at onlookers before stepping out of her taxi boat.

Arriving at an exclusive event in the City of Water, the film producer kept things casual in a V-neck T-shirt, which she layered below a loose-fitting navy floral blazer and jeans.

Happy: Maggie Gyllenhaal appeared to be in high spirits as she cut a casual figure in a navy floral blazer during Venice Film Festival's final day on Saturday

Maggie protected her eyes from the dazzling sunshine with a pair of oversized black shades and slung a heavy navy handbag over her shoulder.

The Hollywood star wore her short brown tresses in a swept-back side parting and accentuated her beauty with a polished make-up look.

Also arriving in style was Sofia Resing, 30, who posed up a storm for photographers while showing off her svelte waist in a figure-hugging black mini dress.

Radiant: For an exclusive event in the City of Water, the film producer kept things casual in a V-neck T-shirt, which she layered below a loose-fitting navy floral blazer and jeans

Cheerful: Marking the final day of the city's 78th International Film Festival, the actress, 43, beamed from ear-to-ear as she waved at onlookers before stepping out of her taxi boat

Beauty: The Hollywood star wore her short brown tresses in a swept-back side parting and accentuated her beauty with a polished make-up look

Laid back: She protected her eyes from the dazzling sunshine with a pair of oversized black shades and slung a heavy navy handbag over her shoulder

The plunging number, which she accessorised with a delicate black belt, highlighted her ample cleavage and coordinated with her slim suit trousers.

The Brazilian model wore a small stone handbag over her shoulder and framed her face with a pair of black shades.

Roberto Farnesi, 52, looked delighted as he cradled his girlfriend's baby bump after stepping foot on the red-carpeted jetty soon after.

Wow! Arriving in style was Sofia Resing, 30, who posed up a storm for photographers while showing off her svelte waist in a figure-hugging black mini dress

Sizzling: The Brazilian model wore a small stone handbag over her shoulder and framed her face with a pair of black shades

Stunning: Her gorgeous raven locks were styled in tousled waves

The Italian actor's younger woman Lucya Belcastro, 28, looked chic in a khaki midi dress while her beau dressed things down in an unbuttoned light blue shirt and navy trousers.

Lucya accessorised her outfit with a white handbag and matching heels while Roberto donned a pair of navy trainers.

They both looked lovingly into each other's eyes before puckering up for a hot and steamy smooch.

What a pair! Roberto Farnesi, 52, looked delighted as he cradled his girlfriend's baby bump after stepping foot on the red-carpeted jetty soon after

Kiss kiss: They both looked lovingly into each other's eyes before puckering up for a hot and steamy smooch

Maggie's star-studded directorial debut The Lost Daughter, based on the 2006 novel of the same name by Elena Ferrante, made its world premiere at the revered film festival last Friday.

The cast is led by Olivia Colman and Dakota Johnson and the movie tells the gripping story of Olivia's character Leda.

A college professor on a summer holiday at the seaside, she becomes obsessed with Nina (Dakota) and her young daughter as she watches them play on the beach.

United: Italian singer Gianni Morandi, 76, was flanked by his wife Anna Dan, 63, as they flashed their pearly whites for photographers

Injury: He showed off a medical cast after burning his left hand earlier this year

Waving: He was rushed to hospital in March after falling into flames he had lit to burn some brushwood

Leda is reminded of the terror and confusion she felt in early motherhood as she watches the mother-daughter duo, as well as their extended family.

Reminded of the unconventional choices she made for her own daughter, Leda begins to unravel and becomes a prisoner of her own mind, unable to explain what's happened.

It was announced earlier this month that Netflix had acquired the rights to air The Lost Daughter.

Upcoming: Maggie's star-studded directorial debut The Lost Daughter is set to premiere at the 78th Venice International Film Festival on Friday

Talented: The movie tells the gripping story of Olivia Colman's character Leda (pictured)

On the news, Maggie said: 'Im thrilled to be working with Netflix again. They have supported so much of the work I am most proud of, and this is no exception.

'Netflix has consistently championed filmmakers that excite and inspire me and Im delighted to be included in that company.'

The film is scheduled for release on the streaming platform in December.
Mariah Carey, Viola Davis and Kris Jenner were just a few of the many celebrities to honor the lives of the nearly 3,000 people who died in the Sept. 11 attacks 20 years ago.

'On this anniversary of September 11, I find myself remembering the shock and anguish we all experienced with painfully deep sadness. Vivid images of the skyline I grew up loving so much, suddenly changed forever,' Mariah Carey wrote across an image of the Tribute in Light where the World Trade center used to stand.

'Still astonished by how many innocent people were lost in an instant.. gone forever but never to be forgotten. Thinking of all the families still mourning their loved ones twenty years after that devastating and tragic moment in our history. Sending out love and prayers to my fellow New Yorkers.. and to us all.'

Nineteen men hijacked four planes, which crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and finally, a field in Somerset, County, Pennsylvania, killing a total of 2,977 people on this day 20 years ago.

'On this anniversary of September 11, I find myself remembering the shock and anguish we all experienced with painfully deep sadness. Vivid images of the skyline I grew up loving so much, suddenly changed forever,' Mariah Carey wrote across an image of the Tribute in Light where the World Trade center used to stand

Viola Davis shared a striking image of the Tribute of Light from just outside the city as she shared a host of info graphs about the attacks, with the names of the lives lost in each slide created by Instagram account @so.informed.

'Will never forget this day. Will never forget the lives lost,' she wrote. 'Sending love and prayers to the families, loved ones of the fallen.'

Kris Jenner posted a shadowed image of the towers using photos of the men, women and children that lost their lives on that day.

'Take a moment this morning to remember and honor those who lost their lives, the families and friends who lost their loved ones, and the survivors of the horrific attacks on 9/11. Well never forget the sacrifices made by the firefighters, early responders and civilians who risked everything to help others in the most incredible and unforgettable display of heroism.

'Ill never forget that day, and my thoughts are with everyone who lost someone they love. Life is so precious and today is a reminder to me to cherish every single moment I have with those I love. We must show each other love, forgiveness, grace, and be thankful for the time we have together.'

'Will never forget this day. Will never forget the lives lost,' she wrote. 'Sending love and prayers to the families, loved ones of the fallen'

Never forget: Alec Baldwin shared an image of the twin towers with the Statue of Liberty looking on in the distance

Honor: Bella Hadid took a moment away from her NYFW schedule to post a skyline shot with the Tribute in Light in the background

Alec Baldwin shared an image of the twin towers with the Statue of Liberty looking on in the distance.

Bella Hadid took a moment away from her NYFW schedule to post a skyline shot with the Tribute in Light in the background.

Mark Wahlberg, who had been scheduled to board the American Airlines Flight 11 out of Boston, shared an image of the memorial at Ground Zero.

'20 years ago but feels like yesterday. We are all forever changed,' he wrote. 'Thinking of those who are gone and their loved ones missing them now and always.'

Lindsay Lohan posted an image of the Statue of Liberty overlooking the twin towers and 'Never forget 9.11.01'

'20 years ago but feels like yesterday. We are all forever changed,' he wrote. 'Thinking of those who are gone and their loved ones missing them now and always'

Iconic: Tom Brady shared an image of NYFD raising an American flag over Ground Zero

New York strong: Lindsay Lohan posted an image of the Statue of Liberty overlooking the twin towers and 'Never forget 9.11.01'

'To all who were lost, and to all of the heroes who tried to save them  we honor you,' Jennifer Garner wrote across an image taken by Steve McCurry. 'To every family member and friend, we honor your loss and promise to never forget.'

Vanessa Bryant noted 'our hearts are with you, always' in a beautiful tribute of the towers with faces of the lives lost.

Sarah Michelle Gellar noted that everyone has a story about that day, and feeling heartache for everyone involved.

'But this is not about me. It was one of the worst days in history, but it brought out such kindness and unity. At a time when America is more divided than ever, today lets remember the thoughtfulness we showed each other. #neverforget that day, but remember the nation we were after.'

'To all who were lost, and to all of the heroes who tried to save them  we honor you,' Jennifer Garner wrote across an image taken by Steve McCurry. 'To every family member and friend, we honor your loss and promise to never forget'

Love: Vanessa Bryant noted 'our hearts are with you, always' in a beautiful tribute of the towers with faces of the lives lost

'But this is not about me. It was one of the worst days in history, but it brought out such kindness and unity,' she wrote. 'At a time when America is more divided than ever, today lets remember the thoughtfulness we showed each other. #neverforget that day, but remember the nation we were after'

Drew Barrymore shared a simple but strong 'I love New York' image

'My prayers go out to all the families that lost their loves ones on this day 20 years ago,' Reese Witherspoon shared. 'We will #neverforget'

Kate Hudson wrote that it was difficult to believe 'it's been so long since this devastating event in our history' and offered her condolences to the families of those who lost a loved one

Mandy Moore was 'thinking of all those we lost. The innocent, the heroes, the first responders.' She added that she was 'holding space for those who lost someone they love on this horrific day'

'My prayers go out to all the families that lost their loves ones on this day 20 years ago,' Reese Witherspoon shared. 'We will #neverforget.'

Kate Hudson wrote that it was difficult to believe 'it's been so long since this devastating event in our history' and offered her condolences to the families of those who lost a loved one.

Mandy Moore was 'thinking of all those we lost. The innocent, the heroes, the first responders.' She added that she was 'holding space for those who lost someone they love on this horrific day.'

Miranda Lambert shared an image of an American flag from her farm as she recalled where she was when she heard about the attack.

'Standing in choir class hearing over the loud speaker at Lindale High School that our country was under attack,' she wrote. 'I'll never be able to comprehend why. It changes us all.'

Miranda Lambert shared an image of an American flag from her farm as she recalled where she was when she heard about the attack

On her Instagram Story, Kylie Jenner shared a beautiful image taken from below the twin towers at twilight. Her big sister Kim Kardashian posted a photo of the World Trade Center, adding a white heart emoji in the sky.

She also added a timeline of the tragic day's events, beginning at 8:46am when the first plane struck the North Tower. Kardashian shared a photo of three firefighters embracing at Ground Zero in the aftermath of the devastation.

Kim went on to post a transcript of the heartbreaking last phone message that United Arlines Flight passenger Brian Sweeney left for his wife Julie, adding a broken heart emoji.

The message read: 'Jules, this is Brian. Ah listen, Im on an airplane thats been hijacked...If things dont go well, and they're not looking good, I just want you to know I absolutely love you. I want you to do good, go have good times, same to my parents and everybody. Ill see you when you get here. I want you to know that I totally love you, Bye, babe. I hope I call you.

On her Instagram Story, Kylie Jenner shared a beautiful image taken from below the twin towers at twilight

Kim Kardashian posted a photo of the World Trade Center, adding a white heart emoji in the sky

She also added a timeline of the tragic day's events, beginning at 8:46am when the first plane struck the North Tower

Kardashian shared a photo of three firefighters embracing at Ground Zero in the aftermath of the devastation

Kim went on to post a transcript of the heartbreaking last phone message that United Arlines Flight passenger Brian Sweeney left for his wife Julie, adding a broken heart emoji

Sarah Jessica Parker shared a shot of a bright light shooting upward from the middle of New York City's Financial District, and wrote that the city was her 'favorite pastime.'

Chloe Sevigny posted a photo of two couples spending time together not far from the Twin Towers, and noted that she remembered them 'like no other love.'

Norman Reedus shared a shot of the same two shining lights, and added emojis of the Statue of Liberty and a heart in his post's caption.

Rebel Wilson described New York City as 'a city thats incredible and alive in every way. Im proud to live there and know so many wonderful strong people from there.'

Dwayne Johnson also shared a composite image of all of the victims of the attacks and noted that the rest of the United States had vowed 'to live as greatly as we can in your loving and strong spirits ~ and in the spirit of Americas resiliency.'

Sarah Jessica Parker shared a shot of two bright lights shooting upward from New York City's Financial District and wrote that the city was her 'favorite pastime'

Chloe Sevigny shared a photo of two couples spending time with each other not far from the Twin Towers and noted that she remembered them 'like no other love'

Norman Reedus showed his support for the city by adding emojis of the Statue of Liberty and a heart in his post's caption

Rebel Wilson described New York City as 'a city thats incredible and alive in every way. Im proud to live there and know so many wonderful strong people from there'

Dwayne Johnson shared a composite image of the victims of the attacks and noted that the rest of the nation would remember the 'spirit of America's resiliency'

Amelia Gray took to her Instagram Story to share the transcript of Sweeney's tragic final call to his wife.

Josh Brolin shared an image of one of the hijacked airplanes during the attacks and wrote a lengthy message to express his support and gratitude for all of the firefighters who gave their lives to rescue victims at Ground Zero.

His statement partially read: 'Firefighters in my life have, by far, revealed themselves to have the greatest character, possess the most humility and compassion, and just be downright fun/good people. My heart goes out to the families and friends of those who died on that unnecessary and totally unfortunate day 20 years ago.'

Shawn Mendes reposted an image of Sweeney's final message to his Instagram Story on Saturday afternoon.

Jennifer Love Hewitt also shared an image of the iconic 'I love New York' design to her Story.

Amelia Gray shared an image of Sweeney's tragic final message to her Instagram Story

Josh Brolin shared a shot of one of the hijacked airplanes and penned a lengthy message to express his support and gratitude for the firefighters who responded to the attacks

Shawn Mendes reposted an image of Sweeney's final call to his wife on his Story
They aired their romance to the world yesterday as they made their first official red carpet debut in Venice, Italy.

And Kim Kardashian seemed to be all about the piping hot romance between Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck as she threw her support behind the rekindled pair by way of an Instagram post.

Posting a photo of her pal JLo and her on-again former fiance from their PDA packed appearance at the Venice Film Festival, Kim wrote 'Long live Bennifer.'

Here for it: Kim Kardashian throws her support behind Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck's rekindled romance

'Long live Bennifer': The KKW Beauty mogul shared a photo of the pair with the text 'Long Live Bennifer' to Instagram

The couple walked the red carpet together at the premiere of his film, The Last Duel on Friday September 10, and were not shy about their affection towards one another amid their rekindling.

The Good Will Hunting actor, 49, put on an amorous display with his 52-year-old leading lady as he threw his arm around her waist, rested his hand on her backside and planted a series of face kisses.

Kim wasn't the only fan of the red carpet debut as his ex, Gwyneth Paltrow, also commented 'Okay, this is cute' on stylist Mariel Haenn's Instagram.

And Kim seemed to be all about their love amid the fizzling of her own marriage with Kanye West, despite E! News reporting that Kim is 'open' to getting back with the father of her four children.

The SKIMS founder and Jennifer have long run in the same circle and ironically enough it was the Hustlers star's ex-fiancee Alex Rodriguez who most recently dished on their friendship in a 2019 PEOPLE interview.

Loved up: The pair's red carpet debut comes 17 years after they were first an item

Laying on the PDA: The Good Will Hunting actor, 49, put on an amorous display with his 52-year-old leading lady as he threw his arm around her waist, rested his hand on her backside and planted a series of face kisses

'We've all known each other for a long time. But Kim and Jennifer are very, very close, and she's almost like a mentee of Jennifer, and Jennifer's mentored her a lot over the years.'

'Now they just go back and forth,' A-Rod continued. 'They mentor each other, and they have this really beautiful relationship that goes back over a decade and a half, and it's nice to do anything with Kim and our family,' he said at the time.

The ladies had previously even appeared in a commercial together for Facebook Portal and have buddied up to each other at many red carpet events, with Lopez additionally being a staple on the Kardashian Christmas Party list.

'My inspiration for everything has always been Jennifer Lopez,' Kim gushed in a 2018 Instagram video. 'If you would have said to me 10 years ago, "Jennifer Lopez is coming over for your house to watch a movie and to have dinner," I never would have imagined this would have been my life! Dreams do come true.'

Got your back: The SKIMS founder and the Hustlers star have a decade that spans over a decade and a half

Friends: 'They mentor each other, and they have this really beautiful relationship that goes back over a decade and a half,' A-Rod gushed about his former fiancee's friendship with the reality star; pictured May 2019

Dream come true! 'If you would have said to me 10 years ago, "Jennifer Lopez is coming over for your house to watch a movie and to have dinner," I never would have imagined this would have been my life! Kim said in a 2018 Instagram video

Jennifer and Ben's first red carpet appearance together comes just months after the pair first gave love another shot and a whopping 17 years after they were first engaged to be married.

And as their romance continues to burn strong it has been reported that the pair are 'seriously talking about getting married' this time around, per Us Weekly and they've already begun to blend their families.

'They are both madly in love and don't want to let one another go this time,' an insider said. And both consider each other to be 'the one that got away,' and are dead set on ensuring that doesn't happen again.

Most recently it was reported that Affleck has rented a luxury condo in Austin, Texas as he prepares to shoot his upcoming film Hypnotic, with TMZ sources saying that Lopez plans to spend time there as a potential 'dry run' for living together amid their ongoing house hunt in LA.
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They went public with their romance earlier this week during their romantic trip to Italy.

And Sean 'Diddy' Combs soaked up the sun on a luxury yacht with his new model girlfriend Joie Chavis in Nerano on Saturday.

The rapper, 51, and the social media star, 33, looked like they were having a blissful day on the deck of the boat before heading out to grab some lunch via a dingy ride.

Vacation: Sean 'Diddy' Combs soaked up the sun on a luxury yacht with his new model girlfriend Joie Chavis in Nerano on Saturday after the pair went public with their romance

Joie looked stunning in a halterneck white dress and statement shades for the trip as she giggled away with her new man who wore a simple cream T-shirt and matching shorts.

Returning to the yacht after lunch Sean slipped into a pair of navy swimming shorts and appeared to be executing some kind of dance routine combined with martial arts as a pair of female companions looked on.

Joie - who shares daughter Shai, 10, with Bow Wow and a son named Hendrix, two, with Future - looked like she was having a great time as the pair left the restaurant with a basket of fresh fruit.

Having fun! The rapper, 51, and the social media star, 33, looked like they were having a blissful day on the deck of the boat

Off we go! They spent some time on the vessel before heading out to grab some lunch via a dingy ride

Moves: Returning to the yacht after lunch Sean slipped into a pair of navy swimming shorts and appeared to be executing some kind of dance routine combined with martial arts as a pair of female companions looked on

Joie boasts over two million followers on Instagram where she states she owns a shopping and retail business.

The model has a link to her business which sells workout clothing, swimwear and other merchandise.

Joie and Bow Wow welcomed their daughter Shai together back in 2011 while he announced in September 2020 he had become a father for a second time.

Speaking previously to The Shade Room, Bow Wow admitted that he learned how to be a family man from Diddy.

Style: Joie looked stunning in a halterneck white dress and statement shades for the trip as she giggled away with her new man who wore a simple cream T-shirt and matching shorts

Animated: Joie - who shares daughter Shai, 10, with Bow Wow and a son named Hendrix, two, with Future - looked like she was having a great time as the pair left the restaurant with a basket of fresh fruit

Exciting: They went public with their romance earlier this week during their romantic trip to Italy

He said: 'My children's moms  they can call me for anything and I'ma get it done. If they out of town, if they in Miami, they need something, they want to go to No matter what it is.

'If it's a function going on and they need to get in with they girls, I'ma set it up. Sections, done  bam, there it is. And we family. And I think that's important. And I got that from Puff. He taught me a lot being around him, watching how he moves.

'I'm always asking him questions like, 'How do you do it? How? How?' It's a blessing. And it works well when it's like that. It's a family thing. I love them both and I'm just happy that I got two good ones on my side. I'm done after this. No more for Bow.'

Career: Joie boasts over two million followers on Instagram where she states she owns a shopping and retail business

Success: The model has a link to her business which sells workout clothing, swimwear and other merchandise

Family: Joie and Bow Wow welcomed their daughter Shai together back in 2011 while he announced in September 2020 he had become a father for a second time

Groovy baby: The songwriter looked like he was having the time of his life on the boat as he had a little dance

Ladies: He looked to be getting to know several mystery ladies when he was on the boat

Cute: Diddy was recently seen enjoying a gondola ride in Venice alongside his daughters earlier this month after they walked in the Dolce & Gabbana fashion show

Dad: The businessman shares twins D'Lila and Jessie, 14, with the late Kim Porter, and Chance, 15, with ex-girlfriend Sarah Chapman

Diddy was recently seen enjoying a gondola ride in Venice alongside his daughters earlier this month after they walked in the Dolce & Gabbana fashion show.

The businessman shares twins D'Lila and Jessie, 14, with the late Kim Porter, and Chance, 15, with ex-girlfriend Sarah Chapman.

Diddy is a father to six children, and he welcomed his oldest son, Justin, in 1993 with his former partner, Misa Hylton.

History: Diddy also became a stepfather to Quincy Brown, 30, Kim's son with producer Al B. Sure!

He later began an on-again-off-again relationship with Kim Porter, which came to an end in 2007.

The former couple welcomed a son named Christian, 23, as well as Jessie and D'Lila during their time together.

Diddy also became a stepfather to Quincy Brown, 30, Kim's son with producer Al B. Sure!

Kim passed away in 2018 following a battle with pneumonia, and Diddy publicly mourned the loss of his former partner during an interview with Essence, where he also spoke about spending more time with his children.

Exciting: Diddy will reportedly release his fifth studio album Off the Grid Vol. 1 on September 24, and he just announced he's forming an 'all R&B label'

What's going on? He appeared to be trying out some martial arts as he worked up a sweat on the boat

Sad: Kim passed away in 2018 following a battle with pneumonia, and Diddy publicly mourned the loss of his former partner during an interview with Essence, where he also spoke about spending more time with his children

All aboard: The group all then hopped into a dingy to be taken to the restaurant

Impressive: Sean Combs, also known by the stage names Puff Daddy, P. Diddy, Puffy or Diddy, is an American rapper, record executive, record producer, and entrepreneur

Carrying the goods: It appeared the group had been given some fruit to take back with them

During the sit-down, Diddy expressed that, although he had previously placed much of his time and energy into his career, he has found himself to be much more satisfied with being a father.

'I'm just a lot more present, and, most important, now my kids come before anything else in my life,' he noted.

Diddy will reportedly release his fifth studio album Off the Grid Vol. 1 on September 24, and he just announced he's forming an 'all R&B label.'

Putting on a show: He showed off his dance moves and kung fu skills in front of a couple of ladies

Eating out: The pair relaxed as they dined out at the outdoor restaurant in Italy on Saturday
He's set to star in the next Matrix installation - 18 years after The Matrix Revolutions was released.

And Keanu Reeves looked worlds away from his original Neo character in the film as he stepped out in Berlin on Thursday.

The 57-year-old actor was spotted heading to shoot yet another movie, John Wick 4, whilst prioritizing comfort over fashion in a pair of brown suede mule slippers and a cosy beanie.

18 years later: Keanu Reeves, 57, looked worlds away from his original Thomas Anderson character in The Matrix as he stepped out in Berlin on Thursday

Otherwise, the legend cut a smart-casual figure in a grey blazer, printed black T-shirt and charcoal slim-fitting jeans.

Keanu's long black hair was poking out from underneath the hat and he was sporting a smattering of salt'n'pepper stubble.

The Canadian native beamed as he was pictured stepping into his ride, carrying his essentials in a large duffle bag.

Handsome: Keanu's long black hair was poking out from underneath the hat and he was sporting a smattering of salt'n'pepper stubble

The fourth addition to the John Wick franchise is due out May 27, 2022.

His outing comes as anticipation for The Matrix Resurrections, the surprise fourth instalment in the science-fiction franchise, has begun with a new poster teasing the release of its first trailer.

The film comes 18-years after The Matrix Revolutions, originally intended to be the final chapter in a trilogy documenting the transformation of computer hacker Thomas Anderson into cybercriminal Neo after he inadvertently discovers the ordinary world he inhabits is a simulated reality.

Throwback: The film's December 22 release will come 18 years after The Matrix Revolutions, originally intended to be the final chapter in the trilogy. Pictured in 2003

Stretching out the anticipation, fans were treated with an ad for the promotional launch featuring red and blue pills sat side by side beneath the stark message: 'The choice is yours.'

Fans of the popular franchise will recognise the pills as a decisive option given to Neo, played by Keanu Reeves, as he chooses between life in the war-ravaged real world or the 'beautiful prison' of alternate reality.

Piercing static serves as the backdrop, as tiny strings of Matrix code are seen falling down inside the pills before the entire scene melts.

'The choice is yours': Stretching out the anticipation, fans were treated with an ad for the promotional launch featuring red and blue pills sat side by side

The trailer invited fans to continue their saga on WhatIsTheMatrix.com, an interactive choose-your-own-adventure style site.

Presented with the same choice there, red takes you down a rabbit hole where you're told: 'This is the moment for you to show us what's real.'

Then scenes from the film flash, showing the thin barrier between reality and the artificial world known as The Matrix.

'This could be this is the first day of the rest of your life, but if you want it, you gotta fight for it,' the narration wraps while showing star Keanu Reeves ready to fight.

Picking the blue pill offered another path, asking viewers: 'Do you remember how you got here?'

Choose-your-own-adventure: The trailer invited fans to continue their saga on WhatIsTheMatrix.com , an interactive choose-your-own-adventure style site

'You've lost your capacity to discern reality from fiction,' the narrator says before several surreal scenes flash by.

'What's real is here and now... Anything else is just your mind playing tricks on you.'

'It becomes a problem when fantasies endanger us,' they warn as someone is seen pouring out a bottle of blue pills.

Then, ending on a sinister note, they show someone touching the computer port at the back of their head and ask: 'We don't want anyone to get hurt, do we?'

Ready for action: The Matrix Resurrections got their buzz started by teasing the first official trailer for the film online Tuesday

Though HBO offered few details about the movie's plot, they weren't lacking enthusiasm in their official description.

The network's description reads: 'Plug into The Matrix Resurrections the long-awaited fourth film in the groundbreaking franchise that blew minds, and redefined a genre.

'From visionary filmmaker Lana Wachowski, the new film reunites original stars Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss as Neo and Trinity, the iconic roles they made famous.'

The first full trailer for The Matrix Resurrections came out Thursday, September 9 at 6am PST.

The original Matrix feature was released in 1999 and was met with much critical praise upon its debut. The feature was followed up by two further films, which were both released in 2003.

The Wachowskis, who directed all of the entries in the series, initially had no plans to continue the franchise after the third picture's debut. However, rumors about a potential fourth film began to circulate in the early 2010s.

The Matrix Resurrections is set for a December 22 release.
Molly-Mae Hague and PrettyLittleThing have come under fire for sharing a tribute to the victims of the 9/11 terror attack on social media, which fans have branded 'shocking' and 'distasteful'.

The former love Island star turned creative director, 22, and the online fashion brand took to Instagram and Twitter on Saturday to share an image of the Twin Towers on the 20th anniversary of the tragedy, alongside the words 'Never Forget 09.11.01'.

But despite the seemingly good intentions, social media users hit out at them for using PrettyLittleThing's brand colour and font over the image, with one person asking: 'Are you for real?'

Uh oh: Molly-Mae Hague and PrettyLittleThing have come under fire for sharing a tribute to the victims of the 9/11 terror attack on social media, which fans have branded 'shocking' and 'distasteful'

The black and white image shared by the brand was accompanied by the caption '20 years, never forget ' in tribute to the lives lost in the 2001 atrocity, however, users took umbrage over the use of the pink and white wording over the top, which are distinctively the colours of PLT's branding

Taking to the comments on both Twitter and Instagram, people shared their thoughts, with one writing: 'Absolutely shocking by PLT this! Distasteful tweet.'

'Let's pay tribute to arguably the worst terrorist attack known to man! Oh let's also put it in our cute little aesthetic filters and fonts', fumed a second

Tribute: The former love Island star turned creative director, 22, and the online fashion brand took to Instagram and Twitter on Saturday to share an image of the Twin Towers on the 20th anniversary of the tragedy, alongside the words 'Never Forget 09.11.01'

'Terrorist attack but make it cute hun' a third sarcastically put.

A fourth person questioned: 'Are you for real?! Branding a tribute to 9/11?'

A fifth wrote: 'R u telling me you have a whole social media team and not one single person saw an issue with this.'

Backlash: But despite the seemingly good intentions, social media users hit out at them for using PrettyLittleThing's brand colour and font over the image, with one person asking: 'Are you for real?'

Not impressed: The black and white image shared by the brand was accompanied by the caption '20 years, never forget ' in tribute to the lives lost in the 2001 atrocity

Colours: However, users took umbrage over the use of the pink and white wording over the top, which are distinctively the colours of PLT's branding

With another adding: 'blows my mind these multi million $$$ companies have entire teams to discuss and plan this and theres still not a deciding member of staff to be like you know what? nah, lets not".'

However, there were some who didn't see an issue with the post and simply saw it as the brand and Molly showing their respect.

One said: 'The amount of people arguing at the point of this post is so disrespectful today is about the people that have lost lives and the people who are still to this day suffering from the trauma of this attack so stop worrying about a words or the colour on a post thats showing respect and remembering those lives lost unite together.'

Reaction: Taking to the comments on both Twitter and Instagram, people shared their thoughts, with one writing: 'Absolutely shocking by PLT this! Distasteful tweet'

Which another agreeing: 'This is a post showing respect and remembrance. It doesnt matter what font or color the texts are. The meaning behind the remembrance and date itself is whats important. That is the whole meaning.'

MailOnline have contacted representatives of Molly-Mae and PrettyLittleThing for comment.

Nineteen men hijacked four planes, which crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and finally, a field in Somerset, County, Pennsylvania, killing a total of 2,977 people on this day 20 years ago.

The tribute backlash comes just weeks after Molly-Mae announced she was PrettyLittleThing's new creative director, bagging herself a whopping seven-figure deal.

Defence: However, there were some who didn't see an issue with the post and simply saw it as the brand and Molly showing their respect

Taking to her Instagram last month, Molly announced the amazing news alongside a picture of her in a taupe trouser suit sitting in front of large PLT light up letters.

She penned: 'Im beyond ecstatic to announce that I am the new CREATIVE DIRECTOR of @prettylittlething for UK/EU. This is the biggest move in my career so far and I cant explain my gratitude to my favourite brand in the world for trusting me with this role.

'PLT have had faith in me from the VERY start and to now be a Director within the business feels like a complete dream come true. I hope youre all ready for my visions to come to life within this incredible brand

Congratulations! The tribute backlash comes just weeks after Molly-Mae announced she was PrettyLittleThing's new creative director, bagging herself a whopping seven-figure deal

'To celebrate this huge news Im bringing you without a doubt my best collection to date, Ive worked on this collection now for SO long and Im beyond proud of it! Now LIVE and available to shop. I cant wait to see you all in it!'

Molly's announcement was met with a plethora of congratulatory comments from her fans and showbiz pals, including PLT founder and CEO Umar Kamani.

He wrote: 'Well done Molly. You deserve this role and no doubt you will shine. Welcome to the family my new creative director.'

Molly also took to her Instagram stories to share a snap of her wall plaque which bore her name and new job role.

On the rise: She penned: 'Im beyond ecstatic to announce that I am the new CREATIVE DIRECTOR of @prettylittlething for UK/EU. This is the biggest move in my career so far'
She has been wowing on the red carpet for the past two weeks during Venice Film Festival 2021.

And Maggie Gyllenhaal looked as glamorous as ever as she stepped out for the event's closing ceremony on Saturday night where she accepted the Best Screenplay award for her film The Lost Daughter.

The actress and brother of Jake Gyllenhaal, 43, wowed in a plunging white gown as she worked her best angles for the camera.

Beauty: Maggie Gyllenhaal looked as glamorous as ever as she steps out for the Venice Film Festival 2021's closing ceremony on Saturday night and accepted the Best Screenplay award for The Lost Daughter

Wow: She showed off her effortlessly chic sense of style in the midi dress

Maggie added a stylish twist to her outfit by wearing a black and green patterned bandeau under her low-cut dress which was visible from the sides.

She completed her beautiful look with a pair of simple black heels and kept her accessories minimal other than a couple of silver bracelets.

The film producer wore her brunette tresses in a chic cropped do and opted for a pretty and natural makeup look complete with a slick of light pink lip.

Happy: She looked thrilled with her award

Stunning: The actress and brother of Jake Gyllenhaal, 43, wowed in a plunging white gown as she worked her best angles for the camera

Pretty: Maggie added a stylish twist to her outfit by wearing a black and green patterned bandeau under her low-cut dress which was visible from the sides

Details: She completed her beautiful look with a pair of simple black heels and kept her accessories minimal other than a couple of silver bracelets

Proud: She held the award as she posed for the camera

The 2021 Venice Film Festival has taken place from 1-11 September, and is considered one of the world's oldest awards ceremonies and one of the 'Big Five' events.

The jury is headed by Parasite frontman Bong Joon Ho, who said he is 'honoured to be woven into its beautiful cinematic tradition.

'As president of the jury  and more importantly as a perpetual cinephile  I'm ready to admire and applaud all the great films selected by the festival. I'm filled with genuine hope and excitement.'

The jury is also comprised of director Saverio Costanzo, actress Virginie Efira, star Cynthia Erivo, actress Sarah Gadon, documentarian Alexander Nanau, and director Chloe Zhao.

Exciting: The 2021 Venice Film Festival has taken place from 1-11 September, and is considered one of the world's oldest awards ceremonies and one of the 'Big Five' events

Radiant: The film producer wore her brunette tresses in a chic cropped do and opted for a pretty and natural makeup look complete with a slick of light pink lip

Pop sensation: Elsewhere Nicole Scherzinger performed at the amfAR Venice gala in a white dress

Drama: She looked great in her gown which had a strapless design and ruffled skirt

News: Oscar-winning Italian director Roberto Benigni, who helmed the acclaimed Life is Beautiful, will also be honoured with the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement

Help: This year's festival has also invited two Afgan filmmakers, Sahraa Karimi and Sahra Mani, to discuss the Taliban's takeover of the country

Back! This year's festival has also seen the grand return of its star-studded red carpet premieres, after last year's event was drastically scaled back due to the Covid pandemic

This year's festival has also invited two Afgan filmmakers, Sahraa Karimi and Sahra Mani, to discuss the Taliban's takeover of the country, with 'particular attention to the situation of filmmakers and artists,' in a panel taking place on 4th September.

The topic of the panel will be 'the dramatic situation of Afghan filmmakers and artists in general, the need for the creation of humanitarian corridors and the guarantee of the granting of political refugee status, as well as concern for their future and the need to provide for their accommodation once they arrive in Europe.'

Oscar-winning Italian director Roberto Benigni, who helmed the acclaimed Life is Beautiful, will also be honoured with the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement.

Incredible: She has been wowing on the red carpet for the past two weeks during Venice Film Festival 2021

Rules: All attendees must show proof of a negative test or vaccination to enter a screen, and masks are required indoors

In a statement he said: 'My heart is full of joy and gratitude. It is an immense honour to receive such an important recognition of my work from the Venice International Film Festival.'

This year's festival has also seen the grand return of its star-studded red carpet premieres, after last year's event was drastically scaled back due to the Covid pandemic.

Last year's occasion saw a significantly smaller number of guests in attendance, will all red carpet arrivals required to adhere to social distancing, with temperature checks and mask wearing mandatory at the event.

Dewy: She looked radiant on the big night

Pandemic: Despite its return, this year's festival is still adhering to strict Covid guidelines, following a rise in cases in Italy

Despite its return, this year's festival is still adhering to strict Covid guidelines, following a rise in cases in Italy.

Public access to the red carpet is banned, and more than 10 testing stations have been set up.

All attendees must show proof of a negative test or vaccination to enter a screen, and masks are required indoors.

Singing her heart out: The brunette beauty looked great in her dress while belting out her hits

Entertaining the crowds: She has been in Venice for the past few days

Famous: Part of the Gyllenhaal family, she is the daughter of filmmakers Stephen Gyllenhaal and Naomi Achs, and the older sister of fellow actor Jake Gyllenhaal

Career: The Lost Daughter is a 2021 psychological drama film written and directed by Maggie Gyllenhaal, based on the novel of the same name by Elena Ferrante

Having her moment: It's been a successful festival for Maggie
Ben Affleck knew how to handle a fan that got a little too close to Jennifer Lopez on Saturday.

While the duo were walking through the Marco Polo Airport in Venice, Italy, an overzealous fan rushed up trying to get a photo with the multi-hyphenate, prompting the 49-year-old actor to step in.

A video of the incident shows the Good Will Hunting star pushing the man away to protect his girlfriend, before security takes over.

Easy buddy! The 49-year-old actor stepped in to protect his girlfriend from an overzealous fan who wanted a selfie at the Marco Polo Airport in Venice, Italy

Just one day after the pair made their red carpet debut at the premiere of The Last Duel at the Venice Film Festival, they had an unexpected surprise while leaving the city.

As the pair strolled hand in hand up to the airport, a fan wearing a navy T-shirt and khaki shorts very eagerly rushed over to take a selfie with Lopez after waiting for them outside.

Without asking for permission he held his camera up while trying to get close to JLo, which caused her to instinctually flinch away before Ben immediately diffused the situation.

'Woah, woah, woah,' Affleck can be heard saying as he gently puts distance between the star-crazed fan and Jennifer by placing both hands on the man's chest.

Overeager: A man wearing a navy T-shirt and khaki shorts was waiting for the pair outside and very aggressively rushed over with a camera held high

Stepping in: Proving to have great reflexes the Good Will Hunting actor immediately stepped in

Shielding her: Lopez was seen stepping back and hiding behind Ben as he diffused the situation

Not so fast: Affleck could be heard saying 'woah woah woah' before pushing the man back

The fan seemed to not get the memo at first and continued to try and take the selfie before Ben pushed him back towards the wall.

Security took it from there and detained him so the pair could continue on without issue following the invasion of personal space.

Re-grasping JLo's hand Ben shot her an 'are you okay' as they walked but she did not let on that she was rattled by the situation.

Proving to be the utmost professional she flashed a smile and even thanked airport personnel while strutting in a polka dot sundress and heels.

Get back: The very buff actor instinctually pushed the man against the airport doors

Checking in: Re-grasping JLo's hand Ben shot her an 'are you okay' as they walked but she did not let on that she was rattled by the situation

Personal protector: Despite being in the company of personal security and airport personnel it was Ben who came to her rescue

Safe and sound: The pair continued on their way with ease

The couple  who rekindled their romance at the end of April, 19 years after they first got engaged  walked their first red carpet together on September 10.

The very loved up duo did not scale back any PDA at the premiere of Affleck's movie as they were pictured fawning all over each other.

In images he was seen throwing his arm around her waist, resting his hand on her backside, and planting a series of face kisses before they shared a couple smooches.

And the official return of Bennifer delighted fans and celebrities alike as Kim Kardashian re-posted an image to Instagram and wrote 'long live Bennifer' and Gwyneth Paltrow commented on an image 'Okay, this is cute.'

Sweet: Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck shared a kiss in Venice on Saturday

Smitten: Jennifer gazed into Ben's eyes as they chatted during their latest appearance together in the Italian city

Tender: The honeymoon period was still well and truly on for the newly reunited couple on Saturday

Back together: They split in 2003 and were pictured back together for the first time in May this year

Italian outing: The loved up couple made their first red carpet appearance in Venice on Friday

In good spirits: The 52-year-old singer oozed radiance in a summery polka-dot dress

Travelling in style: Ben helped his gorgeous girlfriend into the Venezia Turismo transport before they sped away on the water

Outing: The singer-come-actress sported chic round shades

Trip: The pair have made a number of high-profile appearances together, always packing on the PDA during their loved-up outings

Ahead of their appearance a source told PEOPLE that she was 'excited' to support him in a public way.

'Jennifer is very happy that she is able to join Ben in Venice. She is excited to be by his side and to support him. She loves the movie. They are still very happy together.'

And as the pair were said to 'have a busy fall coming up' they were 'enjoying spending as much time together as possible.'

Most recently it was reported that Affleck has rented a luxury condo in Austin, Texas as he prepares to shoot his upcoming film Hypnotic, with TMZ sources saying that Lopez plans to spend time there as a potential 'dry run' for living together amid their ongoing house hunt in LA.

The couple who began dating a mere weeks after Lopez called off her engagement to Alex Rodriguez have continued to blend their family and it's been reported that they are 'seriously talking about getting married.'

Hollywood star: Jennifer looked every inch the Hollywood star as she took to the water in Venice for a stunning photoshoot on Saturday

Hollywood star: Jennifer looked every inch the Hollywood star as she took to the water in Venice for a stunning photoshoot on Saturday

Picture-perfect: J-Lo showed off her stunning side profile in one gorgeous shot as she worked her angles while posing in the gondola

Look of love: The September 10 premiere marks the pair's red carpet debut nearly 20 years after they first dated

Smooches: The couple did not scale back any PDA during the appearance as both beamed at each other and kissed for the cameras

Romance on the water: The couple were pictured looking enamored with each other during a September 9 water taxi ride around Venice
Penelope Cruz looked effortlessly chic, while Maggie Gyllenhaal wowed in white as they led the stars on the red carpet at the closing ceremony of the 78th Venice International Film Festival on Saturday.

The Vanilla Sky actress, 47, stunned in a shimmering silver off-the shoulder gown as she posed for the cameras on the final day of the annual event.

As Donnie Darko star Maggie, 43, looked as glamorous as ever in a plunging white gown as she worked her best angles for the camera.

Penelope Cruz looked effortlessly chic, while Maggie Gyllenhaal wowed in white as they led the stars on the red carpet at the closing ceremony of the 78th Venice International Film Festival on Saturday

Penelope oozed grace and glamour as she glided across the carpet in her jaw-dropping gown which featured a metallic lace overlay, a dropped waist and a voluminous tulle underskirt.

The Vicky Cristina Barcelona star accessorised her showstopping gown with a pewter clutch back and towering silver and black heels.

Penelope left her caramel tresses to fall gracefully on her shoulders, while she enhanced her beauty with a sleek palette of make-up.

And it certainly was a magical evening for Penelope as she later picked up the Coppa Volpi award for Best Actress for her role in the film Madres Paralelas (Parallel Mothers).

A vision: The Vanilla Sky actress, 47, stunned in a shimmering silver off-the shoulder gown as she posed for the cameras on the final day of the annual event

Wow: Penelope oozed grace and glamour as she glided across the carpet in her jaw-dropping gown which featured a metallic lace overlay, a dropped waist and a voluminous tulle underskirt

Radiant: Penelope left her caramel tresses to fall gracefully on her shoulders, while she enhanced her beauty with a sleek palette of make-up

What an entrance: The Spanish beauty was sure to turned heads as she elegantly stepped out of her car as she arrived

The Spanish star, who plays Janis in the Pedro Almodovar directed film, looked delighted as she accepted her prize from jury member Saverio Costanzo.

At one point Penelope even planted a kiss on her huge trophy as she dazzled up on stage, before reading an acceptance speech.

She was later seen clutching her trophy tightly as she posed at the award winner's photocall.

Elsewhere, Maggie added a stylish twist to her outfit by wearing a black and green patterned bandeau under her low-cut dress which was visible from the sides.

Winner! It certainly was a magical evening for Penelope as she later picked up the Coppa Volpi award for Best Actress for her role in the film Madres Paralelas (Parallel Mothers)

Lovely: Penelope not only wowed on the red carpet but on the stage too as she accepted her Best Actress award

Here you go: The Spanish star, who plays Janis in the Pedro Almodovar directed film, looked delighted as she accepted her prize from jury member Saverio Costanzo

All mine: At one point Penelope even planted a kiss on her huge trophy as she dazzled up on stage, before reading an acceptance speech

Holding court: All eyes were on Penelope as she read her acceptance speech

She completed her beautiful look with a pair of simple black heels and kept her accessories minimal other than a couple of silver bracelets.

The film producer wore her brunette tresses in a chic cropped do and opted for a pretty and natural makeup look complete with a slick of light pink lip.

It proved to be a great night for Maggie as she later picked up an award for Best Screenplay for her movie The Lost Daughter.

The stunner, who directed the film, looked overjoyed as she was handed the gong by jury member Cynthia Erivo.

Dazzling: Penelope, who donned glittering diamond earrings, was glowing as she she flashed a huge smile at the cameras

Keeping it close: She was later seen clutching her trophy tightly as she posed at the award winner's photocall

Just the two of use: Penelope kept her trophy close as she posed on the red carpet once again

Bling bling: Penelope showed off her huge diamond ring as she hugged her trophy close

Look what I've got! The screen star triumphantly help her award aloft

Sarah Gadon meanwhile was sure to turn heads at the closing ceremony as she walked the red carpet in a billowing hot pink gown.

The Canadian actress, 34, shared a glimpse of her toned midriff in the cut-out number which featured spaghetti straps and a flowing skirt with a daring split.

The beauty accessorised her look with a silver chain necklace and matching silver heels, while she further upped the glam with a pop of bright red lipstick.

Meanwhile, Cynthia Erivo set hearts racing as she sizzled in a semi-sheer floral dress while posing for the cameras.

Beauty: Donnie Darko star Maggie, 43, looked as glamorous as ever in a plunging white gown as she worked her best angles for the camera

Pretty: Maggie added a stylish twist to her outfit by wearing a black and green patterned bandeau under her low-cut dress which was visible from the sides

Details: She completed her beautiful look with a pair of simple black heels and kept her accessories minimal other than a couple of silver bracelets

The actress and singer, 34, put on a very racy display in her barely-there gown which allowed her to showcase her toned legs beneath.

The backless style also saw her displaying her array of back tattoos, with the beauty, who is on the jury at the festival, flawlessly working all her best angles for the camera.

Elsewhere, Nicole Scherzinger performed at the amfAR Venice gala in a striking strapless white dress.

The Pussycat Dolls star, 43, looked great in her billowing, ruffled gown as she belted out a track on stage.

The 2021 Venice Film Festival has taken place from 1-11 September, and is considered one of the world's oldest awards ceremonies and one of the 'Big Five' events.

Radiant: The film producer wore her brunette tresses in a chic cropped do and opted for a pretty and natural makeup look complete with a slick of light pink lip

Style: The sister of Jake Gyllenhaal cut an ethereal figure as she graced the red carpet on the closing night

All white on the night: Maggie appeared in great spirits as while posing on the red carpet in her flawless dress

Congratulations! It proved to be a great night for Maggie as she later picked up an award for Best Screenplay for her movie The Lost Daughter

Proud: Maggie cheekily stuck her tongue out as she gleefully posed with her award

Recipient: The stunner, who directed the film, looked overjoyed as she was handed the gong by jury member Cynthia Erivo

Speech: Maggie put on a graceful display as she read her acceptance speech while Cynthia watched on

The jury is headed by Parasite frontman Bong Joon Ho, who said he is 'honoured to be woven into its beautiful cinematic tradition.

'As president of the jury  and more importantly as a perpetual cinephile  I'm ready to admire and applaud all the great films selected by the festival. I'm filled with genuine hope and excitement.'

The jury is also comprised of director Saverio Costanzo, actress Virginie Efira, star Cynthia Erivo, actress Sarah Gadon, documentarian Alexander Nanau, and director Chloe Zhao.

This year's festival has also invited two Afgan filmmakers, Sahraa Karimi and Sahra Mani, to discuss the Taliban's takeover of the country, with 'particular attention to the situation of filmmakers and artists,' in a panel taking place on 4th September.

Hot stuff: Sarah Gadon meanwhile was sure to turn heads at the closing ceremony as she walked the red carpet in a billowing hot pink gown

Gorgeous: The Canadian actress, 34, shared a glimpse of her toned midriff in the cut-out number which featured spaghetti straps and a flowing skirt with a daring split

Pink lady: Sarah was sure to catch the eye in her bright pink gown

Having fun: The Alias Grace star was seen having a very animated discussion with Cynthia Erivo on the red carpet

The topic of the panel will be 'the dramatic situation of Afghan filmmakers and artists in general, the need for the creation of humanitarian corridors and the guarantee of the granting of political refugee status, as well as concern for their future and the need to provide for their accommodation once they arrive in Europe.'

Oscar-winning Italian director Roberto Benigni, who helmed the acclaimed Life is Beautiful, will also be honoured with the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement.

In a statement he said: 'My heart is full of joy and gratitude. It is an immense honour to receive such an important recognition of my work from the Venice International Film Festival.'

Turning up the heat: Meanwhile, Cynthia Erivo set hearts racing as she sizzled in a semi-sheer floral dress while posing for the cameras

Work it: The actress and singer, 34, put on a very racy display in her barely-there gown which allowed her to showcase her toned legs beneath

Jaw-dropping: Cynthia looked simply amazing in her colourful, floral print number

This year's festival has also seen the grand return of its star-studded red carpet premieres, after last year's event was drastically scaled back due to the Covid pandemic.

Last year's occasion saw a significantly smaller number of guests in attendance, will all red carpet arrivals required to adhere to social distancing, with temperature checks and mask wearing mandatory at the event.

Despite its return, this year's festival is still adhering to strict Covid guidelines, following a rise in cases in Italy.

Public access to the red carpet is banned, and more than 10 testing stations have been set up.

All attendees must show proof of a negative test or vaccination to enter a screen, and masks are required indoors.

Pop sensation: Elsewhere, Nicole Scherzinger performed at the amfAR Venice gala in a striking strapless white dress

Drama: The Pussycat Dolls star, 43, looked great in her billowing, ruffled gown as she belted out a track on stage
He has endured a rather chequered love life since the end of his 28-year marriage.

And now I am sorry to report that the Duke of Rutland is once more nursing a broken heart at his Belvoir Castle estate after splitting up with society photography agent Tiggy Maconochie.

But since the couple, both 62, suddenly called time on their year-long romance, the shooting-mad Duke  David Manners to his chums  has been 'leaning on' old friend Louise Pickering for support.

However, Louise, a popular fine art dealer whose late father was journalist Sir Edward Pickering, is keen to put a stop to rumours circulating at the Duke's magnificent Leicestershire pile that the pair are romantically involved.

He has endured a rather chequered love life since the end of his 28-year marriage. And now I am sorry to report that the Duke of Rutland is once more nursing a broken heart at his Belvoir Castle estate after splitting up with society photography agent Tiggy Maconochie. (The Duke is pictured above with his daughters Eliza and Violet)

When I contacted Tiggy (above)  who was agent to Helmut Newton, the late fashion photographer known for his stark, often sado-masochistic portraits of nude women  she told me: 'My private life is private. There is nothing sad about my relationship with David'

She tells me: 'David did split from Tiggy and since then he likes to say he's been leaning on me.

'He's been to stay with me a couple of times recently and I've been to stay with him a couple of times. I am due to go to his place for a shoot soon, and I stayed at the castle for his birthday [in May].

'But I've known David since I was 21. He's been a very good friend for 40 years and you stand by your friends in times like these.'

Since Tiggy and the Duke, both 62, suddenly called time on their year-long romance, the shooting-mad Duke  David Manners to his chums  has been 'leaning on' old friend Louise Pickering (pictured) for support

The Duke's marriage to Emma, Duchess of Rutland, broke down in 2012 after he embarked on an affair with a woman who lived on his land, Brazilian-born Andrea Webb.

However, rather than go through the upheaval of a divorce, Emma continued to live at the 200-year-old Belvoir Castle  albeit in a separate wing  and carried on in her role as chief executive of the 15,000-acre estate.

The 58-year-old also embarked on a romance of her own, with estate manager Phil Burtt, and earlier this year described him as her 'partner'.

The Duke and Duchess have five children, including Violet, Alice and Eliza Manners, all stalwarts of the London social scene.

Their raucous all-night parties as youngsters earned them the nickname of the Bad Manners Sisters.

Three years ago it was disclosed the Duke had split from Ms Webb. However, nine months earlier, police had been called to Belvoir Castle following a row that flared when estate staff told the Brazilian she was excluded from a shooting party.

She had reportedly refused to leave the grounds unless the Duke himself told her to go. But she eventually relented and left, followed by the police officers.

When I contacted Tiggy  who was agent to Helmut Newton, the late fashion photographer known for his stark, often sado-masochistic portraits of nude women  she told me: 'My private life is private. There is nothing sad about my relationship with David.'

Louise, a popular fine art dealer whose late father was journalist Sir Edward Pickering, is keen to put a stop to rumours circulating at the Duke's magnificent Leicestershire pile (above) that the pair are romantically involved

The Duke's marriage to Emma, Duchess of Rutland (pictured together), broke down in 2012 after he embarked on an affair with a woman who lived on his land, Brazilian-born Andrea Webb

First there were X-rated snaps on adult website OnlyFans  now Lottie Moss has another money-making scheme.

She is following in half-sister Kate's footsteps with her own fragrance but the 23-year-old will need to flog a lot to get rich  bottles cost only 20.

First there were X-rated snaps on adult website OnlyFans  now Lottie Moss (above) has another money-making scheme. She is following in half-sister Kate's footsteps with her own fragrance but the 23-year-old will need to flog a lot to get rich  bottles cost only 20

Meanwhile, I can reveal that Kate, 47, whose own perfumes were discontinued in 2015, took a hit during Covid.

Accounts filed for Kate Moss Ltd show shareholders' funds fell by more than 3 million to 8.8 million and 'cash at the bank' dropped by just over 7 million to 4.7 million.

Once known as 'Hardcore Harbord' due to her party-loving lifestyle, Prince Harry's old chum Davina Harbord has finally settled down.

She married Old Harrovian Freddie Streeter last weekend at Clissold House, a Grade II listed, 18th Century mansion in Stoke Newington, North-East London, in front of guests who included Made In Chelsea star Ollie Proudlock.

Pilates instructor Davina, 35, whose elder sister Astrid grew close to Harry after his split from Chelsy Davy, was known for her partying streak and pals were surprised when she unconventionally proposed to Freddie, 34, on the eve of Valentine's Day this year.
Should there ever be another Harry Potter film, I think I've found someone who could replace Robbie Coltrane as shaggy-haired giant Hagrid.

Believe it or not, this is the usually immaculate Catherine Zeta-Jones doing a convincing impersonation of the Hogwarts gamekeeper.

Posting the picture on Instagram, the actress, 51, asked her 3.8 million followers: 'So, how's your hair today?'

Surprisingly, for once it's better than yours, Catherine!

Should there ever be another Harry Potter film, I think I've found someone who could replace Robbie Coltrane as shaggy-haired giant Hagrid. Believe it or not, this is the usually immaculate Catherine Zeta-Jones doing a convincing impersonation of the Hogwarts gamekeeper

Above, Robbie Coltrane as Rubeus Hagrid in the boy wizard film series

Catherine, 51 , with husband Michael Douglas in Los Angeles last January

Celebs spouting nonsense

Is Golden Globe winner Anya Taylor-Joy getting too attached to her characters?

The 25-year-old says she hates it when nasty things are said about the people she plays  even when those characters are sociopaths.

The Queen's Gambit star played a troubled socialite called Lily in the film Thoroughbreds and says: 'People would say, 'God, your character's horrible.'

Is Golden Globe winner Anya Taylor-Joy getting too attached to her characters? The 25-year-old says she hates it when nasty things are said about the people she plays  even when those characters are sociopaths

'It was as if they were insulting my little sister, and I'd say, 'You don't understand what she's going through.'

'When you're playing them, you have to be OK with their choices. You have to justify them in your mind.'

As a Hollywood star, actor James McAvoy should have had no problem bagging girlfriends.

But the Scottish star admits some romantic partners have been put off by his need for, er, physical contact.

'I need a lot of tactility. I need too much physical contact,' says X-Men star James, 42, who was married to actress Anne-Marie Duff before reportedly tying the knot with personal assistant Lisa Liberati in 2019.

'It sounds like I'm one of those guys who says, 'I need a lot of sex.'

'But it's not that  it's just physical contact.'

Whatever you say, James.
She has been taking time out to recover after an alleged assault at her home last month.

And Katie Price got back into the swing of work on Saturday as she took to Instagram to flog tickets to a makeup masterclass.

The former glamour model, 43, announced that she will visit Birmingham, Derbyshire and Manchester on September 26 for a series of classes.

Busy: Katie Price got back into the swing of work on Saturday as she took to Instagram to flog tickets to a makeup masterclass, after taking time out following alleged assault at her home

She will then head to Scotland for three dates in October where fans will learn how to recreate Katie's makeup looks and get the chance to meet her one-on-one.

Katie looked incredibly glamorous in the shots shared on her social media where she was fully made up and gave sultry poses.

The 80 classes are available to purchase by members of the public as they return after being postponed due to the pandemic.

Exciting: The former glamour model, 43, announced that she will visit Birmingham, Derbyshire and Manchester on September 26 for a series of classes

It comes after she has bowed out of several work commitments after police were called to her home in Essex last month.

She was allegedly attacked in a 1.30am assault.

Police were called to a property where Katie was staying, where a man was arrested on suspicion of assault, theft and coercive and controlling behaviour.

Class: She will then head to Scotland for three dates in October where fans will learn how to recreate Katie's makeup looks and get the chance to meet her one-on-one

Following the assault the man, 32, was released on bail.

Despite the support of her loved ones, Katie still 'doesn't feel safe', and has been beefing up the security at her home in the wake of her attack.

It was previously reported that Katie 'cannot face' the prospect of a court appearance, yet a source close to the star said friends and family have rallied around her to ensure she has the strength to pursue a conviction.

Upsetting: It comes after she has bowed out of several work commitments after police were called to her home in Essex last month. She was allegedly attacked in a 1.30am assault (pictured are her facial injuries afterwards)

An insider told MailOnline recently: 'It's not true that she is dropping the case, but she is very scared and and is feeling emotionally vulnerable.

'All her friends and family are behind her and will make sure she has the strength to pursue the case, so she is going full steam ahead.'

The day after the assault, Katie was pictured with bruises to her face and told The Sun: 'I'm still all dazed. I'm devastated. I ran away after being punched  I ran to Harvey's house nearby and have now done damage to my feet, which I previously injured.'

Katie said she was attacked as she watched TV - forcing her to flee in terror to her eldest son's nearby home.

She said the alleged assault was 'unprovoked', adding: 'I was just sitting there watching telly when the assault happened.'

An Essex Police spokesman said: 'A 32-year-old man arrested on suspicion of assault, theft and coercive and controlling behaviour has been released on bail until September 20.'
Phoebe Waller-Bridge is being tipped to replace the veteran actor as a female version of the fictional professor of archaeology in the adventure movie franchise

She is to star as Indiana Joness sidekick next year in Harrison Fords last outing as the gnarled adventurer.

Now Phoebe Waller-Bridge is being tipped to replace the veteran actor as a female version of the fictional professor of archaeology in the adventure movie franchise.

The film industry is awash with rumours that the Fleabag star will take over as the main Indiana adventurer, making her the first female lead since the Disney-made movies began in 1981 with Raiders Of The Lost Ark.

Insiders claim Kathleen Kennedy, the Hollywood producer behind the franchise, is keen to make big, bold changes  with few bigger than switching the lead character to a woman.

One said: It would be a huge statement, and a great role for Phoebe.

Ms Kennedys spokesman declined to comment on the rumours.

Others in the industry cast doubt on the suggestion, but rumours have persisted that Ms Waller-Bridge will be a future star in the role.

None of the versatile actress and writers representatives in the UK or America responded to questions about the possibility of the new role.

Disney also did not respond when given the opportunity to comment.

In July, the 36-year-old star filmed rooftop scenes alongside her American co-star Boyd Holbrook in Glasgow city centre for the fifth movie, whose title has yet to be made public.

Hot property: Phoebe Waller-Bridge is pictured with a stunt double, above, filming on a Glasgow rooftop

While the character she plays was not spelled out, Ms Waller-Bridge, dressed in a maroon corduroy jacket and blue trousers, is understood to be playing an assistant to Indiana Jones.

A source said: The gossip on the set is that this character will slot into the leading role.

In 2019, double Golden Globe winner Ms Waller-Bridge co-wrote the screenplay for No Time To Die, the 25th James Bond film, along with Neal Purvis, Robert Wade and Cary Joji Fukunaga.

Bosses said she was brought in to introduce more humour and the offbeat style of writing that has earned her a reported 22 million in less than two years.
She recently wowed fans as she made her long-awaited return to EastEnders after a seven year break.

And Charlie Brooks has revealed that there's already romance on the cards for her villainous character Janine Butcher as she confirmed she'll have a fling with resident hunk Zack Hudson (James Farrar).

The actress, 40, also teased that there are 'big fire scenes' to come as her character makes her mark on Albert Square once more.

Spilling the beans: Charlie Brooks has revealed that there's already romance on the cards for her villainous character Janine Butcher

Speaking to The Sun at the National Television Awards on Thursday, Charlie said: 'Coming up next week we have big fire scenes and there is definitely a love interest with someone who is very easy on the eye, Zack.'

Revealing that she's set to clash with other feisty characters, she continued: 'There are lots of strong female relationships when I rub up against them in the pub. Jessie Wallace who plays Kat (Slater) is an amazing actress, same with Lacey Turner - its been really fantastic.'

While Janine is happily flirting up a storm with Zack or getting into scrapes with Kat, there is set to be danger ahead as she gets caught up in a fire at Phil Mitchell's house after searching for her daughter Scarlett.

Romance: Charlie confirmed that Janine have a fling with resident hunk Zack Hudson (James Farrar)

But amid the dark and dangerous storylines, Charlie told how she's keen to show the lighter side of her character, telling how she wants her to open a drag bar.

She explained: 'I would like to see Janine running a club with load of drag queens and have little Scarlett in there with us. You know, like RuPaul.'

Speaking further of her return to the BBC soap, the actress added that when she got the call from show bosses, she was keen to explore what Janine had been up to in her absence, noting her was interested in the 'evolution of Janine'.

Explosive: The actress, 40, also teased that there are 'big fire scenes' to come as her character makes her mark on Albert Square once more (pictured as Janine)

More to come: 'Coming up next week we have big fire scenes and there is definitely a love interest with someone who is very easy on the eye, Zack'

She added that she tries to share her ideas for her character to the show producers, but the success in whether they listen varies.

It comes days after Charlie made her long-awaited comeback to Walford earlier this week.

Janine, one of the long-running soap's best-known villains, has returned to Walford for the first time since 2014.

It quickly became clear the character has not changed her ways while away from Albert Square when she posed as a doctor during Monday's instalment of the soap, tricking the unsuspecting Zack Hudson (played by James Farrar).

She's back! It comes days after Charlie made her long-awaited comeback to Walford earlier this week

Introducing herself as Judith Bernstein, Janine told Zack: 'Here I am. Meter's running, give me your worst.'

Janine last appeared in the soap in March 2014, when she left for Paris to pick up daughter Scarlett, who is also making a comeback.

Charlie's character was involved in a number of high-profile storylines, perhaps most famously the death of her on-screen husband, Barry Evans, who she pushed down a cliff in Scotland during a 2004 episode.

Janine returned to Albert Square four years later and her most recent spell on the soap ended in 2014.

Posing: It quickly became clear the character has not changed her ways while away from Albert Square when she posed as a doctor during Monday's instalment of the soap

Back with a vengeance: Janine, one of the long-running soap's best-known villains, has returned to Walford for the first time since 2014

Fans of the BBC soap were quick to praise the return of Janine, with one person tweeting: 'The world may be going to hell in a handbasket, but at least Janine is back on #EastEnders.'

'HOLY S**T. QUEEN JANINE GODDAMN BUTCHER IS BACK IN #EASTENDERS. I'VE BEEN WAITING FOREVER FOR THIS MOMENT,' shared another in disbelief.

A third viewer wrote: 'Omg Janines return has me quaking #EastEnders' while someone else tweeted: 'Yessss Janine back in #EastEnders gonna cause some carnage!'

One fan added: 'Whoever at @bbceastenders decided to revive Janines alter ego Judith Bernstein needs a Pride of Britain award. Life changing. We are so blessed #eastenders #janine #judithbernstein.'

Reaction: Fans of the BBC soap were quick to praise the return of Janine

Last month, actress Charlie hinted that viewers could be in for a fiery autumn as her iconic character stormed back into Walford.

She told MailOnline it felt 'absolutely right' to return to the character as she's always wondered whether she ever 'redeemed herself.'

Charlie added that many fans will be delighted to learn Janine hasn't changed since fleeing Walford, and viewers could be in for some explosive reveals as she reunites with some old foes.

Asked about her decision to head back to EastEnders, Charlie, who first started playing Janine in 1999, told MailOnline: 'When I first got the call my agent called and I was like instinctively straight away, like something feels absolutely right about this.

'I mean I've said in interviews I always think about where she's been she's such a gloriously layered character I always entertain myself with thoughts of where she might be and what she might be doing, it's really exciting.

'I've had so many different thoughts I've imagined her as a hippie on the beach trying to redeem herself, or really really bad she couldn't redeem herself.

'It's really interesting with her because there's a definite self-loathing within her and I think that makes her attach in ways that a human being might know.'

She added: 'I love the idea of walking in her shoes for the day, I want to go out with Janine she's going to be fun, I just get such wonderful opportunities with storylines.'

Trouble's afoot: Last month, actress Charlie hinted that viewers could be in for a fiery autumn as her iconic character stormed back into Walford
Incarcerated Dancehall star Tommy Lee Sparta, unbeknownst to many Jamaicans, is perhaps the biggest Dancehall star in Continental Europe, according to veteran Dancehall music selector Tony Matterhorn.

Speaking in an interview with Jaii Frais and Chevi on the Lets Be Honest podcast which was shared on Wednesday on YouTube, Matterhorn said that the Spartan Soldier artist, was like a magnet to many Europeans, due to his Gothic image/aesthetics.

Mi an Tommy Lee guh a Europe. Tommy Lee bigga dan half a Jamaica inna Europe because of his style  the Gothic thing, because thats originally Europe that  than our Dancehall. A pop/rock dem into and he is like pop/rock star, Matterhorn said.

Suh him woulda have a bigger clout dan anyone a dem. Nuff man weh yuh si a talk bout dem bigga, dem nuh big. Dem nuh good. Caw if dem did dat good, yuh woulda deh inna Europe every minute, he added.

Considered by many as the Gothic deejay of Dancehall, Tommy Lee Sparta made his first trip to Continental Europe in 2011.

Interestingly, Tommy Lee did his first-ever European Tour in 2013, on the heels of the release of his child-centered Captain Sparta single, which featured characters from various childrens television shows such as Dora the Explorer and Jimmy Neutron, surprising his critics with his drastic about-turn from his Uncle Demon persona.

That tour, which spanned six weeks, saw him making appearances in Holland, France, Sweden, Switzerland, Germany and England.

He also had the distinction of being the first Dancehall artist to be booked to perform at a childrens show, which took place at the Sherholmens Youth Centre in Sweden for 12 to 17-year-olds. At the time, Spartas manager Heavy D, had said that the youngsters in Sweden had been requesting Tommy Lee Sparta for quite a while.

They really love Tommy Lee, Heavy D had told The Star tabloid.

In August 2016, Sparta, while preparing for his seventh European trip which had been set for that October, told the Jamaica Observer himself, that his brand of dark Dancehall had a massive underground following there and that for the last five years he had been visiting Europe sometimes twice annually.

Every time it get bigger; more people drawn to the thing, Sparta had said at the time.

The first time mi go was 2011 an each time wi go back di thing jus get bigger, the Shook artiste had said. At that time, the Montego Bay natives two-week tour spanned Stockholm, Sweden, Belgium, The Netherlands, Finland, Austria, Germany, Switzerland and France.

In 2018, Tommy Lee Sparta made another tour of the mainland performing in places such as Amsterdam, Belgium, Germany, Sweden, France, Italy and Denmark.

Tommy Lee was arrested last December after he was found with an illegal firearm along Holborn Road in New Kingston. In March his year, he was sentenced to concurrent prison terms of three years for illegal possession of firearm and two years for illegal possession of ammunition after pleading guilty to the offences. One month later, the firearm was reportedly linked to two murders.

Prior to his arrest, he had announced that he would have been embarking on his Under Vibes Tour which was scheduled to run from March 1 to May 12, 2021, with shows in Europe in countries such as Denmark, Belgium, Germany, Netherlands, Sweden, The UK, Switzerland, and France. He was also booked to perform in African countries such as Kenya, Ghana, South Africa, Senegal, Gambia and Guinea.

Sparta came to national prominence after Vybz Kartel noticed his musical acumen during a performance in Montego Bay. He became an official member of the Portmore Empire in March 2010 where he recorded his first tracks Holding Out The Pressure on the Gangsta City Riddim, Gypsy on the Teeza riddim and Money Make Friends. His first major performance was at Reggae Sumfest 2011 alongside Kartel and other members of the Gaza Empire.
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The court said there were no sufficient reasons for extension of time and dismissed the application seeking extension. (Twitter)

Vijayawada: The High Court dismissed the Andhra Pradesh governments plea for extension of time for a period of eight weeks to clear the bills for works taken up under MGNREGS.

A single judge bench headed by Justice Battu Devanand heard recently an application filed by the AP government seeking to extend the time limit for implementation of its order to clear bills of job works.

The government submitted that the orders of the High Court were communicated to all the respondents and accordingly, engineer-in-chief, rural water supply, addressed a letter to the principal secretary, finance, on August 31, with a request to direct chief planning officer, Chittoor, to release amounts due to the petitioners. It said that the finance department was still in the process of paying the amounts and it might take a few more weeks due to administrative reasons and sought a time limit to be extended for a further period of eight weeks to enable it to clear dues to the petitioners.

The court said it was not inclined to accept the request for extension of time as it adjourned the cases for several times since June 22 and observed that after giving sufficient time to the respondents to take appropriate action and with no proper response, it passed an interim order on August 23, directing the respondents to clear the bills within two weeks by September 6.

The court said there were no sufficient reasons for extension of time and dismissed the application seeking extension.
New Delhi: The situation in Afghanistan and the terror threats from there figured prominently in the first India-Australia 2+2 talks here on Saturday. In the discussions that external affairs minister S. Jaishankar and defence minister Rajnath Singh had with Australias Marise Payne and Peter Dutton, their respective counterparts, both sides said Afghanistan must not allow its soil to be used for terrorism and it should never again become a safe haven for the breeding and training of terrorists.

The discussions also covered the humanitarian crisis and the treatment of women and minorities Afghanistan is facing since the Taliban took control in Kabul. The dialogue coincided with the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks in the United States.

Mr Jaishankar said Afghanistan was a major subject of discussion, while Ms Payne said the future of Afghanistan remains a concern for all. During the dialogue, we also exchanged views on developments in our neighbouring regions. Afghanistan was, understandably, a major subject of discussion. We agreed the international community must be united in its approach, guided by UNSC Resolution 2593 Today is the 20th anniversary of 9/11. It is a reminder -- if one is still needed -- of the importance of combating terrorism without compromise. Close as we are to its epicentre, let us appreciate the value of international cooperation, Mr Jaishankar said.

Mr Jaishankar said there are concerns over the composition of the interim Taliban Cabinet and the treatment of women and minorities in Afghanistan. Apart from terrorism, there were issues of concerns about the inclusiveness of the dispensation, concerns about the treatment of women and minorities, matters related to travel of Afghans, issues relating to humanitarian assistance. It is an evolving situation, and it was a good exchange of notes, he said.

Ms Payne said Australia has a strong interest in ensuring Afghanistan does not again become a safe haven for the breeding or training of terrorists. She added: We are very conscious about the impact of violence and breaches of human rights of the Afghan community and would call for fundamental human rights to be observed.

At the talks, the two sides also deliberated on the situation in the Indo-Pacific, South China Sea, ways to further deepen bilateral defence and trade cooperation and to effectively deal with the challenges of tackling the Covid-19 pandemic.

Mr Jaishankar specifically took up with Ms Payne the problems faced by Indian students in Australia and those wishing to go to Australia as well as the Indian origin community living there. I urged that the difficulties faced by students due to travel restrictions be sympathetically addressed as soon as possible, he said.

Elaborating on his discussions with Australian defence minister Peter Dutton, Mr Rajnath Singh said both sides had in-depth discussions on bilateral and regional issues that covered maritime security in the Indo-Pacific, and cooperation in multilateral formats, ensuring free flow of trade, adherence to international rules and sustainable economic growth in entire region. He invited Australia to engage in Indias growing defence industry.

On bilateral defence cooperation we decided to expand military engagements across services, facilitate greater defence information sharing and to work closely for mutual logistic support. In the context of defence cooperation, both sides were glad to note Australias continued participation in the Malabar Exercises. We invited Australia to engage Indias growing defence industry and to collaborate in co-production and co-development of defence equipment, Mr Singh said.
The king known as Mughal-e-Azam

Had a heart attack, almost a spasm

When told, it would seem

That his heir prince Salim

Was headlong in a romantic chasm

From The Case of the Ashamed Vahu, by Bachchoo

The only Nobel Prize winner with whom I had a profound friendship was V.S. Naipaul. I have met and socialised with Kazuo Ishiguro at literary festivals, at one of which he said: I know that people think we Japanese are boring, but I am inventing new ways to be boring!

Then again, I would tag along at Sir Vidias request, to Harold Pinters house and parties, not being invited there on my own steam.

I have over the years been in the audiences of two Nobel laureates  Linus Pauling, who told his audience that Vitamin C worked against colds, though no causal connection had been established; and Bob Dylan, whose vastly crowded gigs I attended.

The Nobel awards have at times been controversial. Literary commentators wondered whether Dylans lyrics could be classified as literature and whether these lyrics  sometimes folkish, mysterious, and littered with mixed metaphors  qualified for the supreme prize. Myself? I was a supporter of the fact that the dust had been shaken off the literature prize and Bobs constructing or rendering the zeitgeist in words had been rewarded.

Kher!

These ramblings, gentle reader, are occasioned by an article by one Rod Liddle in a right-wing weekly accusing the Nobel committee of  lets just say  wrong-mindedness. Rod, an old moaner, may on this occasion have a point. He accuses the Nobel-wallahs of giving Barack Obama the Peace Prize before he had done anything to deserve it. That may not be accurate, but the observation that follows most certainly is.

In 2019, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Abiy Ahmed, the Prime Minister of Ethiopia. He was presumably awarded this globally prestigious accolade because he made temporary peace with the northern dissidents of the Tigray Peoples Liberation Front  a pretty vicious, murderous outfit.

Since winning the prize, however, Abiy Ahmed has cancelled democratic elections, banned the Internet and imprisoned opponents and critics in Ethiopia, perpetrating his dictatorship, reversing the peace policy against the Tigrayans, sending in his army to massacre civilians and rape women as retribution for their demand of secession.

Liddle quotes a very nasty piece of humour from an address by Ahmed to Ethiopian ambassadors. Speaking about his armys raid into Tigray territory, he said: Those who went to Adwa to fight didnt just go and come back. Each of them had about ten kids The ambassadors laughed and applauded. Theres no Nobel Nastiness or Rape Prize.

Its obvious that the Peace Prize committee assesses candidates by what they have just done and not by what they may do later. None of us has a crystal ball which predicts the future, but history and culture are reasonable indicators of the way events may progress in any country or part of our troubled world.

The categories for awards set out in Alfred Nobels will are for Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Literature and Peace. In the 1960s a bank endowed a new Nobel Prize for Economics  whose one winner was our own Amartya Sen (whom I have never encountered, but to whom the closest I can claim to have got, since Im in a boasting mood, is a firm friendship with his daughter Nandana, the writer, poet and actress).

I suppose the criteria for awarding the Nobel to physicists, chemists and medical researchers are uncontroversial. A discovery that furthers human understanding of our universe or contributes to the conquest of some ill that flesh is heir to, is easy to spot and appreciate.

Linus Pauling was one of the very few individuals to have won two unrelated Nobel prizes for two absolutely unrelated (or are they?) aspects of their lives. His work in quantum chemistry and molecular biology secured the Chemistry Prize. Pauling went on to oppose nuclear weaponry, the Vietnam war and to initiate peace efforts using the influence that he had. He was later awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

The literature Nobel for Dylan would indicate that the Swedish Academy seems to accept an evolving or progressive definition of the criteria for the award. Would this apply to the Peace Prize? Physics, chemistry and medicine are pretty rigidly defined, whereas literature, peace and economics seem to have an inherent flexibility or elasticity.

Would, for instance, the economics prize be awarded to an Indian finance minister who soaked the capitalists and began a universal scheme of unemployment insurance? I am aware that no such minister exists  but theres always hope when, and if ever, the sums add up or are forced to add up?

The Nobel Peace Prize has so far been awarded to those who initiate the end of conflict. Yes, there are many wars and conflicts in our nasty world and those who attempt to put an end to them deserve the recognition such a prize bestows. But there are other forms of conflict  for instance, those between the human species and the mutating species of the coronavirus now plaguing the planet.

So, would the gift and administration of free or philanthropically cheap vaccinations which can, and have, saved millions of lives of children in Africa and Asia from all manner of disease, qualify as achievements that deserve the Nobel Peace Prize?
The Supreme Court in A.K. Gopalan v. Nordeen, 1969, held that a publication which is made after the arrest of a person amounts to contempt if it is biased to the suspect. (PTI Photo)

Article 21 of the Indian Constitution guarantees that no person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law. This due process clause underscores that every accused has a right to a free and fair trail uninfluenced by societal biases and prejudices.

The cornerstone of criminal jurisprudence going back to antiquity holds every person shall be presumed innocent until proven guilty. This presumption of innocence travels through the judicial process as appeals wind their way through the hierarchy of courts. Till the time the highest court has not spoken the above dictum remains the gold standard of both criminal and civil law.

Coupled with both the above is the rule of sub judice. The phrase res sub judice comes from a Latin maxim which means the under judgment. Matters are considered to be sub judice once legal proceedings become active. Criminal proceedings are deemed in motion once a person is arrested, a warrant for arrest or summons has been issued or a person has been charged. The principle of sub judice, therefore, until conviction or acquittal.

Publication, broadcasting or dissemination of any material that is sub judice constitutes contempt of court, a crime that is punishable by a fine and/or imprisonment. In certain foreign jurisdictions, third party costs orders have also be awarded against media organisations, enabling courts to recover the costs of any trial aborted as a result of the prejudicial reporting.

All this is necessary to ensure that any decision with regard to an accuseds life or liberty does not get influenced by any extraneous and accentuating circumstances or biased and prejudiced reportage. Originally designed to insulate jurors during jury trials, its application is all the more germane given the 24X7 media eco-system that now envelops humankind more so when social media has turned everybody and their grandmother into a broadcaster albeit without any restraint or responsibility.

Even legislative institutions, by and large, respect the rule of sub judice. Members cannot refer to any matter of fact on which a judicial decision is pending. Discussions on matters pending adjudication before courts of law are avoided on the floor of the House, so that courts can function uninfluenced by anything said outside the ambit of judicial proceedings in dealing with such matters.

However, such sacred rights have been reduced to a farce because print, broadcasting, radio and digital media are engaged in unrestricted and competitive voyeurism predicated upon bolstering their faltering financial bottom lines. They implement their own judge, jury, prosecutor and executioner templates against any hapless person that they have conveniently predetermined as the culprit. Breathless anchors and illiterate online personalities arrogate to themselves the role of the judiciary. They commence investigating the facts and hand out verdicts much before the courts get to hear even a single fact.

This trend saw in its most vulgar manifestation last year when a young actor unfortunately died of unnatural causes. Corporate business models of news channels, under the guise of news reporters swooped in like vultures distorting facts and purveying fake news. Such was intensity of sensationalism that a division bench of the Mumbai high court in a public interest litigation was constrained to observe that media trial [that happens after judicial proceedings begin] interferes with administration of justice and hence amounts to contempt of court as defined under the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971.

The problem is not limited to the pre-trial stage only. The image that the media creates, lingers even after the person has been acquitted by the courts. In case of Mrs Uma Khurana, a teacher, who on false suspicions propounded by the media, that she had allegedly forced students into prostitution, was attacked by a mob. Even though it was later proven in court that the allegations were fabricated and the lady was acquitted. However, what once becomes lore on social media is hard to take down with even unimpeachable facts or court judgments.

There is yet another problem that has become endemic today. Lynch mobs on social media with an entitled sense of self and amplified megaphones to boot regularly run down court judgments and those who have gone through exhausting and financially crippling legal proceedings just because they disagree with a particular judicial pronouncement.

It would be a trite to say that every court judgment is gospel and that is why the pyramid of appeal courts exist; however, to continue vilifying someone who has been honorably exonerated by a court of law is tantamount to victim shaming in the reverse, while subverting the majesty of the law concurrently.

The correct place to articulate such disagreements with a judgment is to approach the court above the one that has pronounced that particular order. Constructive criticism of a judgment in the public space has also never been frowned upon.

The Supreme Court in A.K. Gopalan v. Nordeen, 1969, held that a publication which is made after the arrest of a person amounts to contempt if it is biased to the suspect. Similarly, the apex court in M.P. Lohia vs State of West Bengal has pointed out that freedom of speech and expression sometimes may amount to interference with the administration of justice, and articles appearing in the media that could be prejudicial should not be permitted.

Former Supreme Court Justice Sikris prescient observation that judging is under stress in the digital era lies at the very heart of the dilemma. He said that when an issue is raised, a petition is filed, before it is taken up by the court, people start discussing what should be the outcome. Not what is the outcome but what should be and that has an influence on how a judge decides a case.

The Right to be Forgotten is now a part of the draft Personal Data Protection Bill that will allow users to de-link, limit, delete or correct the disclosure of their personal information held by data fiduciaries. Even though right to privacy is now a fundamental right the grave challenge today is how to prevent and, if necessary, proscribe both identified and invisible trolls in the virtual civilisation from launching vituperative and scandalous campaigns against court orders and the subjects of those judicial pronouncements. Does Article 19(1) (a) permit such continued abuse?

Undermining the rule of law by personalities of the Internet also constitutes a direct attack on the institution of judiciary and is subversive of democracy. The rules of engagement need to be revisited.
By Anirban Nag

IndiGo, one of Asias biggest budget airlines, is aiming at running at full capacity domestically and is targeting just over two-thirds in international routes as the virus pandemic eases and people start traveling more.

Things are improving slowly, Chief Executive Officer Ronojoy Dutta told Bloomberg Televisions Rishaad Salamat and Haslinda Amin on Friday, adding that it was hard not to be bullish as traffic is going up.

He said the current load factor for the airline is around 70 per cent and yields are likely to rise in coming months.

Current cash levels were pretty good, Dutta said, though he added that the company wanted to raise funds as an insurance buffer against a possible third wave. Indias air travel recovery could turn out to be short-lived as forecasters predict a new Covid wave may peak in October. India has suspended international flights until Sept. 30 and limited the passenger capacity on domestic services to 72.5 per cent of pre-pandemic levels.

The carrier, operated by InterGlobe Aviation Ltd., posted a loss of Rs 31,800 crore in the three months ended June 30, worse than a loss of Rs 28,500 crore a year earlier. IndiGo had imposed compulsory leave-without-pay for all its employees as passenger traffic plunged to near zero due to the deadly second Covid wave that hit India between March and May.

To combat the cash drain, Indian carriers have been raising funds. IndiGo in May said its considering raising Rs 3.000 crore by selling shares to large investors after it shelved the plan in January, saying back then that internal sources of cash would be sufficient as demand started to recover.
Hugely popular Malayalam TV star Ramesh Valiyasala was found dead under mysterious circumstances on Saturday, said industry sources.

He was found hanging in his house near here and the police have registered a case of unnatural death and commenced a probe.

Ramesh had returned from shooting from a location for his latest project two days back.

He was one of the most popular and busy TV serial actors in the state and has also acted in films.

Ramesh soon after his college days along with his friends took to the drama stage and for the past 22 years he has been a very busy actor.

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British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Friday the perpetrators of the September 11, 2001 attacks failed to destroy Western values, in a video message for the 20th anniversary of 9/11.

"We can now say with the perspective of 20 years that they (the jihadists) failed to shake our belief in freedom and democracy," he said in the message delivered ahead of the anniversary on Saturday.

"They failed to drive our nations apart, or cause us to abandon our values, or to live in permanent fear."

Johnson, who was born in New York, said the 67 Britons who died in the attacks are "a symbol of the eternal friendship between the United Kingdom and the United States".

Also Read | Ahead of 9/11 anniversary, MI5 chief warns of new terror threats

He insisted that Britain's resolve to uphold the values of freedom and democracy was not shaken by last month's withdrawal of NATO forces from Afghanistan, which saw the Taliban regain power.

The previous Taliban regime sheltered Osama bin Laden and his Al-Qaeda movement, which carried out the 9/11 attacks.

"Recent events in Afghanistan only strengthen our determination to remember those who were taken from us," Johnson said.

The fact that Britons and Americans were coming together to mourn the dead in 2001 "demonstrates the failure of terrorism and the strength of the bonds between us".

The United States presented the UK with a sculpture made of twisted metal debris from the remains of the World Trade Center in New York.

As London mayor, Johnson unveiled the sculpture in the city in 2011, but it was later removed and is now on display at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in east London.

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In the ghastly rubble of Ground Zero's fallen towers 20 years ago, Hour Zero arrived, a chance to start anew.

World affairs reordered abruptly on that morning of blue skies, black ash, fire and death.

In Iran, chants of death to America quickly gave way to candlelight vigils to mourn the American dead. Vladimir Putin weighed in with substantive help as the US prepared to go to war in Russia's region of influence.

Libya's Moammar Gadhafi, a murderous dictator with a poetic streak, spoke of the human duty" to be with Americans after "these horrifying and awesome events, which are bound to awaken human conscience.

Read | 20 years after 9/11, work of identifying remains continues

From the first terrible moments, America's longstanding allies were joined by longtime enemies in that singularly galvanising instant. No nation with global standing was cheering the stateless terrorists. How rare is that? Too rare to last, it turned out.

Civilizations have their allegories for rebirth in times of devastation. A global favorite is that of the phoenix, a magical and magnificent bird, rising from ashes. In the hellscape of Germany at the end of World War II, the concept of Hour Zero, or Stunde Null, offered the opportunity to start anew.

For the US, the zero hour of Sept. 11, 2001, meant a chance to reshape its place in the post-Cold War world from a high perch of influence and goodwill. This was only a decade after the Soviet Union's collapse left America with both the moral authority and the military and financial muscle to be unquestionably the lone superpower.

Those advantages were soon squandered. Instead of a new order, 9/11 fueled 20 years of war abroad. In the US, it gave rise to the angry, aggrieved, self-proclaimed patriot, and heightened surveillance and suspicion in the name of common defense.

Also Read | Ground zero: Selfie stop for some, cemetery for others

It opened an era of deference to the armed forces as lawmakers pulled back on oversight as presidents gave primacy to the military over law enforcement in counterterrorism. It sparked anti-immigrant sentiment, primarily directed at Muslim countries, that lingers today.

What most nations agreed was a war of necessity in Afghanistan was followed two years later by a war of choice as the US invaded Iraq on false claims that Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction.

Thus opened the deep, deadly mineshaft of forever wars." Convulsions ran through the Middle East and US foreign policy  long a force for ballast  gave way to a head-snapping change from Bush to Obama to Trump. Trust in America's leadership and reliability waned.

Other parts of the world were not immune. Far-right populist movements coursed through Europe. Britain voted to break away from the European Union. China steadily ascended in the global pecking order.

Now, President Joe Biden is trying to restore trust, but there is no easy path. He is ending war, but what comes next? In Afghanistan in August, the Taliban seized control with menacing swiftness as the Afghan government and security forces that the US and its allies had spent two decades trying to build collapsed. No steady hand was evident from the US in the disorganised evacuation of Afghans desperately trying to flee the country.

In the United States, the 2001 attacks had set loose a bloodlust cry for revenge. A swath of American society embraced the binary outlook articulated by Bush  Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists"  and has never let go of it.

Factionalism hardened, in school board fights, on Facebook posts, and in national politics, so that opposing views were treated as propaganda from mortal enemies. The concept of enemy also evolved, to include immigrants as well as terrorists.

The patriot under threat became a personal and political identity. Trump would harness it to help him win the presidency.

For the US, the presidencies since Bush's wars have been marked by an effort to pull back the military from the conflicts of the Middle East and Central Asia.

The perception of a US retreat has allowed Russia and China to gain influence in the regions and left US allies struggling to understand Washington's place in the world. The notion that 9/11 would create an enduring unity of interest to combat terrorism collided with rising nationalism and a US president, Trump, who spoke disdainfully of the NATO allies that in 2001 had rallied to America's cause.

To be sure, the succession of US presidents since 9/11 scored important achievements in shoring up security, and so far US territory has remained safe from more international terrorism anywhere on the scale of that Sept. 11.

Globally, US-led forces weakened al-Qaida, which has failed to launch a major attack on the West since 2005. The Iraq invasion rid the world of a murderous dictator in Saddam.

Yet deadly chaos soon followed his overthrow. The Bush administration, in its nation-building haste, had failed to plan for keeping order, leaving Islamist extremists and rival militias to fight for dominance.

Today, the legacies of 9/11 ripple both in obvious and unusual ways.

Most directly, millions of people in the US and Europe go about their public business under the constant gaze of security cameras while other surveillance tools scoop up private communications. The government layered post-9/11 bureaucracies on to law enforcement to support the expansive security apparatus.

Militarisation is more evident now, from large cities to small towns that now own military vehicles and weapons that seem well out of proportion to any terrorist threat. Government offices have become fortifications; airports a security maze.

But as profound an event as 9/11 was, its effect on how the world has been ordered was temporary and largely undone by domestic political forces, a global economic downturn and now a lethal pandemic.

The awakening of human conscience predicted by Gadhafi didn't last. Gadhafi didn't last.

Osama bin Laden has been dead for a decade. Saddam was hanged in 2006. The forever wars now are over or ending. The days of Russia tactically enabling the US, and China not standing in the way, petered out.

Only the phoenix lasts.

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George W Bush, who was president during 9/11, said Saturday at a service marking 20 years since the attacks that disunity today made him "worried" about the future of the United States.

"In the weeks and months following the 9/11 attacks, I was proud to lead an amazing, resilient, united people," Bush said in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where the fourth hijacked plane came down.

"When it comes to the unity of America, those days seem distant from our own," he continued.

"So much of our politics has become a naked appeal to anger, fear, and resentment. That leaves us worried about our nation and our future together."
Israeli fighter jets struck Hamas sites in Gaza in response to rocket firing towards Israel on Friday evening, an Israeli army spokesman said in a twitter post early on Saturday.

Sirens warning of incoming rocket fire sounded near Israel's border with the Gaza Strip late on Friday, the Israeli military said.

The sirens were sounded just hours after police captured two militants from Gaza's Islamic Jihad group who had escaped from a maximum-security Israeli prison earlier this week.

The recent rise in cross-border violence tests a fragile truce that ended fierce fighting in May.

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Former US president Donald Trump used the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks to slam the "inept administration" of Joe Biden for its "incompetence" over the Afghan withdrawal in a video message on Saturday.

"This is a very sad day," Trump said in the message, adding that September 11 "represents great sorrow for our country."

"It is also a sad time for the way our war on those that did such harm to our country ended last week," he continued.

Trump was referring to the end of the US war in Afghanistan, launched in the wake of Al-Qaeda's attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington DC.

Al-Qaeda had been sheltering in Taliban-held Afghanistan, and the US invasion toppled the Islamist regime in a bid to find the group's leaders.

But the Taliban soon launched an insurgency and, after two decades of war in which Afghan civilians paid an outsized price, stormed back to power last month as the US withdrew all its troops.

"The leader of our country was made to look like a fool and that can never be allowed to happen," he said.

He blamed "bad planning, incredible weakness and leaders who truly didn't understand what was happening."

Trump also lamented the deaths of 13 US troops in a bomb blast in Kabul last month during the frenzied evacuation from Afghanistan, and the billions of dollars in US military equipment that was left behind and seized by the Taliban "without a shot being fired."

"Joe Biden and his inept administration surrendered in defeat," Trump continued.

"We will struggle to recover from the embarrassment this incompetence has caused."

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It was the last known missile fired by the United States in its 20-year war in Afghanistan, and the military called it a righteous strike  a drone attack after hours of surveillance Aug. 29 against a vehicle that US officials thought contained an Islamic State bomb and posed an imminent threat to troops at Kabuls airport.

But a New York Times investigation of video evidence, along with interviews with more than a dozen of the drivers co-workers and family members in Kabul, raises doubts about the US version of events, including whether explosives were present in the vehicle, whether the driver had a connection to the Islamic State group and whether there was a second explosion after the missile struck the car.

Military officials said they did not know the identity of the cars driver when the drone fired but deemed him suspicious because of how they interpreted his activities that day, saying that he possibly visited an Islamic State group safe house and, at one point, loaded what they thought could be explosives into the car.

Times reporting has identified the driver as Zemari Ahmadi, a longtime worker for a US aid group. The evidence, including extensive interviews with family members, co-workers and witnesses, suggests that his travels that day actually involved transporting colleagues to and from work. And an analysis of video feeds showed that what the military may have seen was Ahmadi and a colleague loading canisters of water into his trunk to bring home to his family.

Read | US drone strike targets IS-K 'planner' in Afghanistan

While the US military said the drone strike might have killed three civilians, Times reporting shows that it killed 10, including seven children, in a dense residential block.

Ahmadi, 43, had worked since 2006 as an electrical engineer for Nutrition and Education International, a California-based aid and lobbying group. The day of the strike, Ahmadis boss called from the office around 8:45 a.m. and asked him to pick up his laptop.

I asked him if he was still at home, and he said yes, the country director said in an interview at NEIs office in Kabul. Like the rest of Ahmadis colleagues, he spoke on the condition of anonymity because of his association with an American company in Afghanistan.

According to his relatives, Ahmadi left for work around 9 am in a white 1996 Toyota Corolla that belonged to NEI, departing from his house, where he lived with his three brothers and their families, a few miles west of the airport.

US officials told The Times that it was around this time that their target, a white sedan, first came under surveillance, after it was spotted leaving a compound identified as an alleged Islamic State group safe house about 3 miles northwest of the airport.

Also Read | US says two 'high profile' IS targets dead in Afghanistan strike

It is unclear if officials were referring to one of the three stops that Ahmadi made to pick up two passengers and the laptop on his way to work: The latter location, the home of NEIs country director, was close to where a rocket attack claimed by the Islamic State group would be launched against the airport the following morning, from an improvised launcher concealed inside the trunk of a Toyota Corolla, a model similar to Ahmadis vehicle.

A Times reporter visited the director at his home, and met with members of his family, who said they had been living there for 40 years. We have nothing to do with terrorism or ISIS, said the director, who also has a US resettlement case. We love America. We want to go there.

Throughout the day, an MQ-9 Reaper drone continued to track Ahmadis vehicle as it drove around Kabul, and US officials said they intercepted communications between the sedan and the alleged Islamic State group safe house, instructing it to make several stops.

But the people who rode with Ahmadi that day said that what the military interpreted as a series of suspicious moves was simply a normal day at work.

After stopping to pick up breakfast, Ahmadi and his two passengers arrived at NEIs office, where security camera footage obtained by The Times recorded their arrival at 9:35 a.m. Later that morning Ahmadi drove some co-workers to a Taliban-occupied police station downtown, where they said they requested permission to distribute food to refugees in a nearby park. Ahmadi and his three passengers returned to the office around 2 pm.

As seen on camera footage, Ahmadi came out a half-hour later with a hose that was streaming water. With the help of a guard, he filled several empty plastic containers. According to his co-workers, water deliveries had stopped in his neighborhood after the collapse of the government and Ahmadi had been bringing home water from the office.

I filled the containers myself and helped him load them into the trunk, the guard said.

At 3:38 pm, the guard and another co-worker moved the car farther into the driveway. The camera footage ends soon after, when the office shut off its generator at the end of the work day, and Ahmadi and three passengers left for home.

Around this time, US officials said that the drone had tracked Ahmadi to a compound 5 to 7 miles southwest of the airport, a location that matched NEIs office. There, they said the drone observed Ahmadi and three others loading heavy packages into the car, which they believed might contain explosives.

But the passengers said that they had only two laptops with them, which they put inside the vehicle, and that the trunk had no other cargo than the plastic water-filled containers that were placed there earlier. In separate interviews, all three passengers denied loading explosives into the vehicle they were about to commute home in.

According to one of Ahmadis passengers, a colleague who regularly commuted with him, the ride home was filled with their usual laughing and banter, but with one difference: Ahmadi kept the radio silent, as he was afraid of getting in trouble with the Taliban. He liked happy music, the colleague said. That day, we couldnt play any in the car.

Ahmadi dropped off his three passengers and then headed for his home near the airport. I asked him to come in for a bit, but he said he was tired, the last passenger said.

Although US officials said that at that point they still knew little about Ahmadis identity, they had become convinced that the white sedan he was driving posed an imminent threat to troops at the airport.

When Ahmadi pulled into the courtyard of his home  which officials said was different from the alleged Islamic State group safe house  the tactical commander made the decision to strike his vehicle, launching a Hellfire missile around 4:50 p.m.

Although the target was now inside a densely populated residential area, the drone operator quickly scanned and saw only a single adult male greeting the vehicle, and therefore assessed with reasonable certainty that no women, children or noncombatants would be killed, US officials said.

But according to his relatives, as Ahmadi pulled into his courtyard, several of his children and his brothers children came out, excited to see him, and sat in the car as he backed it inside. Ahmadis brother Romal was sitting on the ground floor with his wife when he heard the sound of the gate opening and Ahmadis car entering. His adult cousin Naser had gone to fetch water for his ablutions and greeted him.

The cars engine was still running when there was a sudden blast, and the room was sprayed with shattered glass from the window, Romal recalled. He staggered to his feet. Where are the children? he asked his wife.

Theyre outside, she replied.

Romal ran out into the courtyard; he saw that his nephew Faysal, 16, had fallen from the exterior staircase, his torso and head grievously wounded by shrapnel. He wasnt breathing.

Amid the smoke and fire, he saw another dead nephew, before neighbors arrived and pulled him away, he said.

Since the strike, US military officials justified their actions by citing an even larger blast that took place afterward.

Because there were secondary explosions, there is a reasonable conclusion to be made that there is explosives in that vehicle, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Mark Milley, said last week.

But an examination of the scene of the strike, conducted by The Times visual investigations team and a Times reporter the morning afterward, and followed up with a second visit four days later, found no evidence of a second, more powerful explosion.

Experts who examined photos and videos pointed out that, although there was clear evidence of a missile strike and subsequent vehicle fire, there were no collapsed or blown-out walls, no destroyed vegetation and only one dent in the entrance gate, indicating a single shock wave.

It seriously questions the credibility of the intelligence or technology utilized to determine this was a legitimate target, said Chris Cobb-Smith, a British army veteran and security consultant.

While the US military has so far acknowledged only three civilian casualties, Ahmadis relatives said that 10 members of their family, including seven children, were killed in the strike: Ahmadi and three of his children, Zamir, 20, Faisal, 16, and Farzad, 10; Ahmadis cousin Naser, 30; three of Romals children, Arwin, 7, Benyamin, 6, and Hayat, 2; and two 3-year-old girls, Malika and Somaya.

Neighbors and an Afghan health official confirmed that bodies of children were removed from the site. They said the blast had shredded most of the victims; fragments of human remains were seen inside and around the compound the next day by a reporter, including blood and flesh splattered on interior walls and ceilings. Ahmadis relatives provided photographs of several badly burned bodies belonging to children.

Family members questioned why Ahmadi would have a motivation to attack Americans when he had already applied for refugee resettlement in the United States. His adult cousin Naser, a former US military contractor, had also applied for resettlement. He had planned to marry his fiancee, Samia, last Friday so that she could be included in his immigration case.

All of them were innocent, said Emal, Ahmadis brother. You say he was ISIS, but he worked for the Americans.

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A Buddhist monk has become an unlikely champion of Thailand's gay and transgender community by lacing his popular live-streamed talk shows with LGBT+ slang, irreverent humour and social commentary that fans say are helping to challenge taboos.

In contrast to the sombre tone of most religious teaching, Phramaha Paivan Warawanno giggles through the shows as he reads comments from viewers mocking his robes as an "orange dress" and addressing him with a term used to refer to transgender women.

"At first I couldn't understand the meaning (of these LGBT+ slang terms), but I thought they were funny and was curious to see if people would laugh if I used them," said Phramaha Paivan, 29, who has more than 2 million Facebook followers.

Read more: Love match: British Paralympians put LGBTQ issues in spotlight

"So I tried (using the words) and it has worked well," he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation from his temple in the capital, Bangkok.

Besides adopting LGBT+ slang to refer to himself and other monks, he talks about social media influencers popular with gay, bisexual and trans Thais during the shows, which are filmed at the temple in a studio adorned with pot plants and toy animals.

While his approach has drawn criticism from religious conservatives, members of the LGBT+ community say it has brought down barriers.

"I have never wanted to ask a monk questions, but this time I have the courage to ask things like whether a katoey (transgender woman) can be ordained," said Thitipan Raksasat, an LGBT+ film director who has more than half a million followers on video-sharing platform TikTok.

"He (Phramaha Paivan) knows katoey lingo even more than a katoey," she said.

Officially, only men can become monks and novices in Thailand under a Buddhist order that since 1928 has forbidden the ordination of women. The country does not recognise female monks or novices.

Speak the same language

Thai monks are increasingly using social media to communicate dhamma (religious) teachings and social issues to young people, but Phramaha Paivan's shows are unusual for their informal language and jokes.

"His acceptance towards LGBT+ and marginalised people makes him different from the typical monk who chooses to approach rich people and high-ranking government officials," said Jaturong Jongarsa, a Buddhist scholar.

"That's why he has become popular," he added.

Phramaha Paivan's shows have gone viral since LGBT+ people started sharing them on Facebook, but his social media fame has drawn the attention of religious and state authorities in the socially conservative country.

Earlier this week, a government committee summoned Phramaha Paivan and another celebrity monk with whom he hosted a live stream, asking them to increase the amount of air time devoted to strictly religious matters.

Some conservative figures have called for the pair to be defrocked, and the country's highest Buddhist governing body - the Sangha Supreme Council - is set to determine whether they have violated a code of conduct for monks.

Ordained as a novice monk at the age of 12, Phramaha Paivan first captured media attention when he urged the country's military junta to release students who were arrested after organising protests against the 2014 military coup.

But despite such incursions into political affairs, Phramaha Paivan said the aim of his shows was to draw people from all segments of society to Buddhist teachings.

"Dhamma is usually hard to understand. I want to be able to speak Thai that people understand. I want to speak the same language as all groups of people," he said.

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The CBI on Saturday filed the fourth chargesheet in the ongoing post-poll violence case in West Bengal.

According to sources in the Central agency, the chargesheet was filed before a court in Krishnanagar in Nadia district.

They revealed that the case was regarding the alleged murder of a BJP worker by Trinamool Congress (TMC) cadres after the Assembly election results were declared.

Two accused were mentioned in the chargesheet.

Also read: Mamata files nomination for Bhabanipur, TMC says will avenge Nandigram defeat

The CBI has so far filed three chargesheets before different courts in relation to incidents of alleged post-poll violence at Bhatpara in North 24 Paraganas district and Nalhati and Rampurhat in Birbhum district.

It has registered 34 FIRs in relation to post-poll violence.

Last month the Calcutta High Court stated in an order that cases of rape and murder in relation to post-poll violence will be investigated by the CBI and other cases will be probed by a Special Investigation Team (SIT).

The High Court made it clear that both investigations will be court-monitored.

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CJI N V Ramanna on Saturday termed the Allahabad high court's decision in 1975 to disqualify the then-prime minister Indira Gandhi as a "judgement of great courage" and said that it resulted in the declaration of Emergency in the country.

"In 1975, it was Justice Jagmohanlal Sinha from the Allahabad High Court who passed the judgment that shook the nation, when he disqualified Smt. Indira Gandhi. It was a judgment of great courage, which could be said to have directly resulted in the declaration of Emergency," the CJI said, while speaking on the occasion of laying of foundation stone of a new building complex of the Allahabad high court at Prayagraj.

The CJI, however, added that he did not want to "elaborate the consequences" of Emergency.

The Allahabad HC had disqualified Indira Gandhi and barred her from contesting elections for six years on a petition by socialist leader Raj Narain. Narain had lost to Indira Gandhi in the 1971 Lok Sabha polls in Raebareli.

Hailing the glorious traditions of the Allahabad High Court, which has a history of 150 years, he urged the members of the Bar and the Bench to "take a lead in protecting the rights, liberties and freedoms of the citizens".

Read | Kovind bats for increased role of women in judiciary

He said that the importance of strengthening judicial infrastructure could not be overstated. "Sufficient judicial infrastructure can help improve access to justice, by catering to the ever-rising number of cases and litigants, and their changing needs" he added.

The CJI said that the courts in India still operated from dilapidated structures, without proper facilities and remarked that such a situation was "severely detrimental to the experience of litigants and lawyers".

"We neglected and failed to focus on providing good infrastructure for the Courts in India after the British left," he added.

The CJI said that he was "championing the National Judicial Infrastructure Corporation (NJIC), which will develop concepts of the National Court Development Project and its implementation".

"The NJIC shall be along the lines of different infrastructure development statutory bodies that work towards creating national assets across the country. One of the design principles that the NJIC will follow is socially responsible and inclusive architecture," he said.

President Ram Nath Kovind, who was also present on the occasion, called for increasing the role of women in the judiciary.

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Expressing concern over the Income Tax 'surveys' conducted at the offices of two news websites, the Editors Guild of India on Saturday criticised the move saying the "dangerous trend of government agencies harassing and intimidating" independent media must stop as it undermines the constitutional democracy.

On September 10, teams of IT officials visited the offices of NewsClick and Newslaundry and conducted investigations through the day, the body noted. The Guild said it is deeply disturbed about the IT 'surveys' at the offices of the two news websites.

"The guild is deeply concerned that such indiscriminate seizure of journalists' data, which could include sensitive information such as details of sources, stories under works and other journalistic data, is in violation of free speech and freedom of press," it said in an official statement.

While they were officially labelled as surveys by the IT officials, according to the statement issued by Abhinandan Sekhri, co-founder of Newslaundry, this was a clear intermediately and latent attack on their rights and therefore press freedom, the EGI said.

Also read: IT dept 'surveys' Newsclick, Newslaundry in tax case

"It is learnt that the IT team made clones of Sekhri's mobile and laptop, as well as some other office machines, And no hash value was given to them.

"This is clearly beyond the mandate of service as defined under section 133 A of the income tax act which only allows data pertaining to the investigation to be copied, and certainly not personal and professional date of journalists. It is also in violation of procedures laid out in the Information Technology Act 2000," it said.

This was the second visit by an income tax team at the office of Newslaundry, the earlier one being in June. In case of NewsClick, the Enforcement Directorate had conducted raids at the office as well as homes of their senior journalists and officials in February.

"Both NewsClick and Newslaundry have been critical of policies and functioning of the union government," the EGI said.

"The dangerous trend of government agencies harassing and intimidating independent media must stop as it undermines our constitutional democracy," it said, adding that in July, income tax raids were conducted at the offices of the country's leading newspaper Dainik Bhaskar as well as a Lucknow-based news channel Bharat Samachar.

These raids were conducted against the backdrop of some very critical coverage by both the news organisations on the government's handling of the pandemic.

"The Guild demands that great care and sensitivity be shown in all such investigations so as to not undermine the rights of journalists and media organisations. Further, to ensure that such investigations are conducted within the prescribed rules and that they don't degenerate into instruments of harassment to intimidate independent media," the EGI said.

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Union minister Sarbananda Sonowal on Saturday said more Ayush colleges should be set up in the northeast, and the Centre is keen to support the initiative.

He also said the central government has increased financial assistance to states for establishing new Ayush colleges.

More Ayush teaching colleges are required in the northeastern states earlier under the National Ayush Mission (NAM), Rs 9 crore was given to state governments to open such colleges, but this has now been enhanced to Rs 70 crore.

Read more: Illegal wildlife trade posing ecological threat to Northeast: Activist

The states may identify the land and manpower to avail this opportunity as per the NAM guidelines, the Union Minister for Ayush and Ports, Shipping and Waterways said.

There are only a few Ayush colleges in the northeast and traditional medicines can only be popularised by making available more qualified practitioners, Sonowal said while addressing a conference on 'Diverse and Fulfilling Career Paths in Ayush Systems: Education, Entrepreneurship and Employment Focus on North Eastern States here.

He said the Ministry of Ayush has also accorded in-principle approval for upgrading the Government Ayurvedic College here as a Centre of Excellence with support of up to Rs 10 crore.

Sonowal said the Centre provides Rs 5 crore to upgrade under-graduate Ayush teaching colleges and Rs 6 crore to improve the infrastructure of post-graduate institutions in the northeast.

The Union minister announced a Panchkarma Technician Course affiliated to the Health Sector Skill Council - National Skill Development Corporation at the Central Ayurveda Research Institute (CARI), Guwahati with 10 seats for Class 10+2 students to produce skilled manpower and enhance employment opportunities in the northeast region.

Career opportunities in the Ayush sector for professionals of all disciplines have increased dramatically during recent years. Consequent to these efforts, faith in the Ayush systems has been restored among communities worldwide, Sonowal said.

Ayush has a great potential to cater to a large number of healthcare needs of people and contribute to the growth and development of the country, he added.

D Senthil Pandiyan, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Ayush, gave the opening remarks, which was followed by detailed presentations on education, career opportunities and entrepreneurial options related to the sector.

The ministry had earlier this month, too, held a conference on developing infrastructure for popularising the stream in the region.
The Sikkim government on Saturday announced that all schools and colleges in the state would be shut down after Covid-19 cases were found among students.

Education Secretary GP Upadhaya said that schools and colleges were opened on September 6. In the schools, classes were being held for students of standard 9 and above.

However, after some schools reported that at least five students were found to be Covid-positive, it was decided to shut the educational institutions again till October 31, he said.

The school and colleges were functioning with 50 per cent staff, and students were attending class only after obtaining the consent of their parents, Upadhaya said.

Covid-positive cases were reported from government schools in Namthang in South Sikkim, Rhenock in East Sikkim and Yuksom in West Sikkim, besides a private school at Mangan in North Sikkim district, he said.

"The state government is very concerned that if the schools are not closed the chances of more cases are very high," he said.

All primary contacts of the infected students were being traced and more cases could be reported, he said.

"This is a state-wide trend and we do not want to compromise with the health of the students, which is why the state government has decided to close all schools and colleges," he said.

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Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar on Saturday said the state now has the highest price of sugarcane in the country, two days after his government announced an increase of Rs 12 per quintal.

The state government has fixed the price at Rs 362 per quintal.

Khattar also took a swipe at the Amarinder Singh-led Punjab government, saying the neighbouring state raised the sugarcane price after four years because of the upcoming Assembly polls.

Whereas the Haryana government has been increasing the price of sugarcane continuously and it is not because of any state elections, he asserted here.

The Punjab government had recently raised the sugarcane price to Rs 360 per quintal following a stir by farmers.

Haryana is the state where the highest price of sugarcane is being given, said Khattar.

This year also, the government increased the price of sugarcane by Rs 12 per quintal and now the effective price has been increased from Rs 350 to Rs 362, he said.

This is not only the highest price in the country, but it is also Re 2 more than the neighbouring state, he said.

Several farmers under the leadership of Haryana BJP chief O P Dhankar on Saturday met Khattar here to express gratitude for announcing the hike in sugarcane rates, according to an official release.

The farmers honoured the chief minister by presenting bouquets made from sugarcane plants and millets. The farmers also offered sweets to Khattar.

Many farmers expressed gratitude by offering 'siropa' and a turban to the CM.

Expressing gratitude to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for declaring the minimum support price for rabi crops, Khattar said the PMs vision is to double the income of farmers by 2022.

He added that during the tenure of previous Congress governments, the MSP was usually announced when crops were already sold by farmers at very low prices.

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India and Australia on Saturday held the inaugural foreign and defence ministerial dialogue to boost overall strategic ties in the backdrop of an unsettling phase of geopolitical flux in the region.

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and Defence Minister Rajath Singh held the 'two-plus-two' talks here with their Australian counterparts Marise Payne and Peter Dutton.

Jaishankar described the in-person talks as "productive". "A productive 2+2 meeting today with Australia," he tweeted.

The talks took place at a time the global focus is on the situation in Afghanistan after its takeover by the Taliban, and the issue figured in the deliberations.

"We are meeting at a very crucial time when, along with a pandemic we have a geo-political environment which is in rapid flux and we must, bilaterally and with other like-minded partners, respond adequately to safeguard our national interests as well as ensure a peaceful, stable, and prosperous Indo-Pacific region," Jaishankar said in his opening remarks at the dialogue.

The external affairs minister said India has the "two-plus-two' format of talks with very few countries.

"I also believe that developments in Afghanistan will be an important subject of discussion between us today," Jaishankar said.

"This meeting, of course, gives us an opportunity to review and take forward the comprehensive strategic partnership as we prepare for another meeting between our prime ministers later this month in the United States," he said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is set to travel to the US later this month to attend a summit of Quad leaders.

People familiar with the 'two-plus-two' talks said the two sides held extensive deliberations on all key issues of strategic interests including the situation in the Indo-Pacific in the face of China's growing muscle-flexing in the region.

The overall focus was to ramp up the strategic ties, they said.

The outcome of the talks will be shared by the four ministers at a press conference by the four ministers.

While Singh had wide-ranging discussions with Australian defence minister Dutton on Friday, Jaishankar met foreign minister Payne in the morning ahead of the 'two-plus-two' dialogue.

During their talks, the two defence ministers discussed the fragile security situation in Afghanistan and their "common concerns" relating possible spread of terrorism from the Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.

The foreign and defence ministerial talks took place amid renewed efforts by the Quad member countries to expand cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region. Besides India and Australia, the Quad comprises the US and Japan.

At an event organised by the Observer Research Organisation, Payne on Friday said the Quad has evolved "swiftly" and very "effectively" and commended India for taking a strong leadership role in the region.

Talking about "significant challenges" facing the Indo-Pacific, the Australian foreign minister said Canberra seeks a region where rights of large and small countries are respected and that no "single dominant power" dictates the outcome for others.

The dialogue between the foreign and defence ministers was instituted as part of an overall goal to expand strategic cooperation between the two countries. India has such a framework for talks with a very few countries including the US and Japan.

The defence and military cooperation between India and Australia is on an upswing in the last few years.

In June last year, India and Australia elevated their ties to a comprehensive strategic partnership and signed a landmark deal for reciprocal access to military bases for logistics support during an online summit between Modi and his Australian counterpart Scott Morrison.

The Australian Navy was part of the recent Malabar naval exercise that also featured navies of India, the US and Japan.

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Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Saturday termed the rape and murder of a woman in Mumbai's Sakinaka as a "blot on humanity", and promised a fast-track trial in the case.

He asserted that the perpetrator would be punished severely. "The trial in the case will be done on a fast track and the victim, who succumbed to injuries today, will get justice," Thackeray said in a statement.

Read | BJP seeks capital punishment for Sakinaka rape accused

The chief minister said he has discussed the case with state Home Minister Dilip Walse Patil and Mumbai Police Commissioner Hemant Nagrale.

"I have directed the authorities to expedite the investigation into the case," he said.

The woman, 34, died in a civic-run hospital in Mumbai the wee hours of Saturday a day after she was raped and brutalised with an iron rod in a stationary vehicle parked by the roadside at Sakinaka. A 45-year-old man has been arrested in this connection, police have said.

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Minister of State for External Affairs Meenakashi Lekhi will pay a six-day visit to Portugal and Spain beginning Sunday to inject a fresh momentum into the ties with the two European nations.

Lekhi will visit Portugal from September 12 to 14 during which she will hold talks with her counterpart Secretary of State for International Affairs Francisco Andre, according to the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).

It said a bilateral agreement on the recruitment of Indian citizens to work in Portugal will be signed during the visit.

Lekhi is also scheduled to meet Foreign Minister Augusto Santos Silva, Culture Minister Graca Maria da Fonseca and Executive Secretary of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries Zacarias da Costa, the MEA said.

"India was admitted as an Associate Observer of CPLP in July and is committed to deepen its historic relations with the Lusophone countries," it said in a statement.

Lekhi will also meet members of the Indian community and attend an event marking the rich cultural heritage of India as part of the Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav celebrations, the MEA added.

It said Lekhi will hold discussions with her Spanish counterpart, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Angeles Moreno Bau and meet other senior dignitaries during her visit to Spain from 15-17 September.

"The Minister of State will also inaugurate The Beatles and India exhibition at Casa de la India, Valladolid and deliver a talk on India's development cooperation at the Spain India Council Foundation," the MEA said.

It said she will also interact with Indologists and Indophiles, including ICCR Alumni, and the Indian Community in Spain.

"India enjoys warm and friendly relations with both Portugal and Spain. The visit of MoS, which is the first in-person official engagement with both countries since the Covid-19 pandemic, is expected to provide fresh momentum to bilateral ties," The MEA said.
Senior Congress leader Pradeep Mathur on Saturday exuded confidence that the grand old party would win 100 seats in the 2022 Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls, saying miracles do happen in politics.

Mathur said a majority of Congress workers want the party's national general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra to be the face of the organisation in the upcoming polls as they see a glimpse of former prime minister Indira Gandhi in her.

"If everything goes well (in the UP Assembly polls), we think that we will get 100 seats," the senior Congress leader told PTI here.

When asked as to whether the claims made by him are a bit unrealistic, as he is talking about jumping from the current tally of seven seats to triple digits, he said, "When the BJP can increase its tally from two to a majority, then why not the Congress. What I am saying is absolutely realistic and when Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will come to UP, this could be easily achieved."

Read | Congress to take out yatra across UP ahead of polls

He said the 12,000 km-long yatra announced by the party ahead of the election will motivate party workers.

"Miracles do happen in politics and the Congress can form the government in the state. Either the Congress will form the government in the state or without the Congress, no government will be formed," said the former Congress legislative party leader in the UP Assembly.

Hitting out at the central government over the rise in fuel prices, he said when the BJP was in opposition, it used to say that it would sell petrol and diesel at Rs 30 per litre but now the prices of petrol and diesel touch almost Rs 100 per litre.

Mathur slammed the BJP for its repeated attacks against the Congress's UP in-charge Priyanka Gandhi.

"It has become the habit of the BJP high command that whenever a senior leader of the Congress comes to Lucknow they become fearful because they know the Congress is the only party, which can give a befitting reply to the BJP. It is for this reason that they try to make absurd remarks against Priyanka Gandhi," he said.

Mathur claimed that the people of the state are frustrated with the BJP government and are mulling to give mandate to the Congress in the next years elections.

"There was mismanagement during the second wave of the Covid pandemic. How can people forget about the death of their near and dear ones during the second wave?" the Congress leader said.

Expressing concern over the high number of fatalities due to dengue and viral fever in Firozabad, he said a special session of the UP Legislative Assembly should be convened to discuss the situation there.

According to government records, 57 people, mostly children, have so far died due to the diseases, while 404 people are still undergoing treatment in the medical college hospital here.

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The Congress has alleged that Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani was removed because the state government failed to perform during Covid and provide relief to the public.

Bharat Singh Solanki, former Union Minister and Congress leader said, "Rupani failed to provide relief during Covid and we demand Nitin Patel should also be removed as he has also failed to work in the interest of the people."

His removal is proof that he failed on all fronts, said Solanki.

The Congress leader alleged that it's a face-saving exercise by the BJP to divert people's attention and focus on the Prime Minister, as it cannot afford to contest elections on the basis of the performance of the state government.

Solanki said, "now Congress has the challenge and opportunity to become a viable option in the eyes of the public."

However, when asked if the Congress house is in order in Gujarat, Solanki said that the Congress is going to appoint the state In-charge and State President this month only.

The Congress leaders say that the BJP won the Municipal elections because of other factors and will not be able to win the assembly polls whether they change the captain or not.

Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani on Saturday tendered his resignation to Gujarat Governor Acharya Devvrat at his residence, Raj Bhavan in Gandhinagar.

Also read: Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani resigns

"I am resigning from the post of the Chief Minister. I thank PM Modi and the party for giving me an opportunity to work for five years," Vijay Rupani told the reporters at Raj Bhavan.

Rupani took the state's Chief Ministerial position on August 7, 2016, and is representing Rajkot West in the Gujarat Legislative Assembly. It is learnt from sources that the party will declare Rupani's replacement by Sunday. Most likely his replacement could be deputy chief minister Nitin Patel.
BJP president J P Nadda on Saturday threw an open challenge to leaders of opposition parties to give an account of work done during their respective tenures in Uttar Pradesh.

I challenge the leaders of SP, BSP and Congress to come forward with an account of their respective terms and our booth level workers are ready for an open debate with them over the same. None of the governments led by these parties did as much work as has been done in over four years of Yogi Adityanath government, he said.

He was speaking at a function to launch the party's Booth Vijay Abhiyan for the state polls next year.

Targeting the opposition parties for not extending enough support during Covid-19 pandemic, the BJP chief said, Amid the pandemic outbreak, these parties did politics only through tweets and virtual press conferences by confining themselves in closed rooms.

History will remember that when people were in trouble, they (opposition leaders) turned themselves away from the people, he alleged, adding that the Adityanath govt and BJP workers helped people not only of the state, but also the migrants who came from other states.

Also read: Congress exudes confidence of winning 100 seats in UP polls, says 'miracles do happen in politics'

Nadda said while the BJP government worked for sabka saath, sabka vikas and sabka vishwas, the governments led by the SP, BSP and Congress connived to benefit only one family as they had nothing to do with the people of UP.

Lauding the UP government for the work done by it for developing religious places like Mathura, Kashi, Chitrakoot and Ayodhya, the senior BJP leader said, "There was a time when taking the name of Lord Rama in UP was difficult, Ram sewaks were fired at, Congress had refused to accept the existence of Lord Rama and but today SP, BSP and Congress have started indulging in politics of convenience.

He asked as to why a grand temple of Lord Rama was not built during their governments and enumerated the work done during the Adityanath government like holding grand Kumbh in Prayagraj, Deepotsav in Ayodhya, Krishna Utsav in Mathura and resuming the tradition of Dev Deepawali in Varanasi.

During the previous regimes, there was crime, corruption and anarchy but now the scene is different and it is development all round, he said, adding that UP has become riot free, women are safe and there is law and order.

Also read: Congress to take out yatra across UP ahead of polls

Seva is our dharma and the target is poverty alleviation and we have zero tolerance policy for corruption and terrorism. Under PM Narendra Modis guidance and CM Adityanath's leadership, UP has written a new chapter of development by working for the progress of villages and the poor.

UP is leading in 44 development schemes, he said.

In an apparent reference to former Congress president Rahul Gandhi, Nadda said there are some leaders in the country who go abroad for vacation when parliament is in session.

In an assurance to farmers, the BJP president said there will be no change in MSP and it will remain intact and there is no need for the farmers of the country to worry.

Today the Modi government has given freedom to the farmers in the country to sell their crops anywhere at their preferred price, Nadda added.

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The controversial 'love and narcotic jihad' remarks by Pala Bishop Joseph Kallarangatt continued to trigger ripples in Kerala's political circles as the BJP accused the CPI(M) and the Congress of supporting jihadis, while the latter warned against "Sangh Parivar agenda" to destroy Christian-Muslim harmony in the state.

Amid mounting criticism, the Pala Diocese, under the the prominent Syro-Malabar Church, came out with an explanation saying that the bishop did not intend to hurt anyone and his remarks were not against any particular community.

"He only gave a warning about the dangerous trends prevalent in society," Mar Jacob Muricken, the auxiliary bishop of the diocese, said in a statement.

Read more: Kerala bishop's 'narcotic jihad' remark condemned and backed

Urging all communities to view seriously the actions of fringe elements indulging in radical and anti-social activities using the names and symbols of religion, the diocese also shared the message of going forward unitedly ending all misleading propaganda.

Lashing out at the ruling CPI(M) and opposition Congress leaders for criticising the bishop, senior BJP leader and union minister V Muraleedharan said mainstream political parties in the state should stop the practice of attacking and silencing those telling the 'bitter truth'.

He said the leaders of the Marxist party and the Congress, who had opposed his statement, should make it clear whether they were the spokespersons of ISIS and the jihadis.

"Those who attack the Catholic priest for saying that the agents of Islamic State are there in Kerala, are actually endorsing the ideology of jihadis to annihilate non-Muslims," the union minister told reporters in Thiruvananthapuram.

Extending support to Kallarangatt, he said the bishop had never blamed any particular community but only took the stand against the extreme groups within the religion.

"It is a well-known fact that drug trafficking is the main source of revenue of many terrorist groups including ISIS across the world. What is wrong in saying that it exists in Kerala also? '' he asked.

Urging the Muslim community to declare that they were not with the jihadis, the BJP leader also criticised Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan for his statement that he was coming across the term 'narcotic jihad' for the first time.

The Chief Minister should study the issues more in-depth, Muraleedharan added.

Read more: Love and narcotic jihad exists in Kerala: Catholic Bishop

However, Leader of Opposition in the state Assembly V D Satheesan continued to appeal to the representatives of the Christian and Muslim communities to refrain from making provocative statements over the issue.

He said there has been a concerted effort on social media through fake IDs to trigger clashes between two religions over Pala bishop's statement.

"Many of these were handled by the Sangh Parivar activists. The Christian and Muslim communities never get trapped in that Sangh agenda," he told reporters in Kochi.

Some people were taking out marches to the Bishop House to protest his statement and this too must be opposed, he said. The Congress leader also urged the Left government to address the complaint of the bishop with due concern and resolve it after examining the matter.

As the bishop's remarks triggered a political row, the Chief Minister on Friday said those who hold responsible positions should refrain from making statements causing division in society.

While the Congress said the bishop has crossed limits, the BJP supported him by urging society to discuss the statement. Kallarangatt had said recently that Christian girls were falling prey to the alleged love and narcotic jihad in Kerala and wherever arms cannot be used, extremists were using such methods to destroy the youth.

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President Ram Nath Kovind on Saturday said the role of women in the judiciary has to be increased in order to achieve the inclusive ideals of the Constitution.

At the foundation stone-laying ceremony of the Uttar Pradesh National Law University in Allahabad and a new building complex of the Allahabad High Court, he said history was created in the judiciary with the appointment of nine judges, including three women, in the Supreme Court said last month.

The presence of four women judges out of the 33 in the Supreme Court is the highest ever in the history of the judiciary, Kovind said, adding these appointments have paved the way for a woman Chief Justice of India (CJI) in the future.

In August, nine new judges, including three women, were appointed to the Supreme Court with Justice B V Nagarathna in line to be the first woman CJI in September 2027.

President Kovind emphasised that the establishment of a truly just society would be possible only when the participation of women increases in all areas, including the judiciary.

He, however, noted that at present the total strength of women judges in the Supreme Court and High Courts combined is less than 12 per cent.

"If we have to achieve the inclusive ideals of our Constitution, then the role of women in the judiciary also has to be increased," he said.

Referring to the Allahabad High Court's decision in 1921 to enrol India's first woman lawyer Cornelia Sorabji, the president said that was a forward-looking decision in the direction of women empowerment.

Kovind said he has seen very closely the struggle of the poor to get justice.

Everyone has expectations from the judiciary. Yet, people generally hesitate to take the help of the courts. This situation needs to be changed to further increase the confidence of the people in the judiciary, the president said.

He said that it is the responsibility of all that everyone gets justice in time.

The judicial system should be less expensive, decisions should be in the language understood by the common people and the weaker sections should get justice, Kovind said.

This will be possible only when all stakeholders bring necessary changes in their thinking and work culture and become sensitive, the president said.

"Our judicial process would be strengthened with the arrangement of adequate facilities for the subordinate judiciary, increasing the number of working judges and providing enough resources as per the provisions of the budget."

Kovind expressed confidence that the Allahabad High Court would set an example in all such areas with the cooperation of the state government.

About choosing Allahabad for setting up the Uttar Pradesh National Law University, he said that given the importance of the Allahabad High Court and the reputation of the city as a centre of education, it is the ideal place for this law institute.

The president stressed that quality legal education plays an important role in strengthening the rule of a law-based system.

"World-class legal education is one of the priorities of our society and country. In this era of a knowledge economy, the ambitious policy of becoming a knowledge super-power is being implemented in our country. The establishment of Uttar Pradesh National Law University is a step forward in this direction."

The president said a world-class institution should be built by implementing the worlds best practices in all aspects like the creation of modern facilities, selection of students, the appointment of teachers, preparation of curriculum and selection of styles of pedagogy.

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The Supreme Court has set aside a Bombay High Court order, which confirmed about Rs 120 crore penalty and duty imposed by the Central GST Commissioner on a man for "clandestinely manufacturing and clearing ghutka" with a brand name 'Aryan Guthaka' at his two properties in Ichalkaranji, Maharasthra between March 2013 to August 2018.

A bench of Justices M R Shah and Aniruddha Bose said there would be a stay on Rs 60 crore penalty but clarified that there would be no stay on recovery of Rs 60 crore duty and interest on the company.

After hearing advocate Sanjay M Nuli, the court asked the High Court to decide the issue afresh as the company challenged vires of the constitutional validity of Section 3A of the Central Excise Act, 1944 (which is the genesis of Rule 17(2) of the Pan Masala Packaging Machines Rules 2008).

"The High Court has not at all addressed the issue on vires on merits in detail. The question of vires cannot be decided by the appellate authority/tribunal in an appeal against the order in original," the bench said, remanding the matter back to the High Court for fresh consideration.

The top court further said its interim order of stay on penalty would continue till the High Court takes up the matter for further hearing.

"It is clarified that there shall not be any stay on recovery of duty and interest. It will be open for the Department to proceed further with the recovery of the duty and interest in accordance with law," it said.

In his plea, the manufacturer contended an arbitrary order was passed on August 21, 2019, demanding a payment of excise duty of Rs 59,60,68,224 and additionally a collective penalty of Rs 59,60,53,224 which was highly imaginary.

The petitioner further claimed the High Court refused to exercise its writ jurisdiction in spite of him raising the issues of the constitutional validity of the charging provision, violation of principles of natural justice, and denial of opportunity of cross examination.

Notably, the larger issue on the constitutional validity of Section 3A of the Central Excise Act, 1944 (which is the genesis of Rule 17(2) of the Pan Masala Packaging Machines Rules 2008) is still pending before the top court.
The government should iron out the issues hindering the signing of Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) with the US and the EU nations as domestic exporters are at a disadvantage due to the absence of these agreements, a parliamentary panel has recommended in a report submitted on Saturday.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Commerce chaired by YSR Congress leader Vijaysai Reddy submitted the report to Chairman of Rajya Sabha Venkaiah Naidu, wherein it has expressed concern that India's exports contracted from 2019-20, registering a negative growth rate of (-) 15.73 percent in 2020.

In view of the crucial role played by exports in the overall economic growth of a country, the Committee in the report opined that India needs to step up its effort in export promotion, expand its export baskets and penetrate new export markets to recover from its current slump and increase its share in global exports.

The panel also underlined that the Indian exporters are at a disadvantage in the US and the European markets while competing with other exporting nations due to the absence of FTAs with the US and the EU countries.

The Committee recommends the Department of Commerce to iron out the issues that hindered the signing of FTAs with our leading trade partners and enter into trade agreements that are beneficial for our country while balancing the interest of the domestic market with that of our exporters, the report stated.

The panel also expressed concern that the share of rail freight vis-a-vis road is only 35 percent whereas the trend is reversed in developed countries.

The Committee, therefore, recommends the Ministry of Railways to undertake a detailed study on the reason for low share of rail and take a concerted effort to increase the share of rail in freight traffic, the report said.

At the same time, the panel said, it is disheartening to note that the Ministry of Railways is unable to provide competitive freight rate for movement of export consignment.

The Committee feels that this will adversely affect the competitiveness of Indias exports in global markets as freight cost plays a crucial role in determining the final price of the product, as per the report.

The panel undertook an in-depth examination of export-oriented measures and held seven meetings with all stakeholders spanning over for nearly twenty hours, it said.

The panel led by Reddy, who is a noted chartered accountant and former director of Oriental Bank of Commerce, in the report recommended the government to take appropriate measures, relook its export strategies and policies to achieve a positive growth rate of exports and higher share in global exports markets.
The Kerala government is conducting a seroprevalence study to take stock of the spread of Covid-19 virus among the people in the state.

Health Minister Veena George said the study began earlier this month and is expected to be completed by the end of September.

The study would help understand the Covid seropositivity rate among various age groups including children, she told reporters here. "The Health Department is conducting the seroprevalence study. It is expected to completed by this month end. It will be carried out among children as well as adults," the minister said.

Asked about the schools reopening in the state, George said the study would help understand the seropositivity among children and the government would take further decisions about it after the study. The study report would be submitted to the CM, General Education and other concerned officials, who would take a call on the reopening of schools after that.

Read | Kerala conducts survey in Nipah containment zone

On the concerns regarding Nipah virus, reported in Kozhikode last week, she said all the samples tested so far had turned out to be negative, which is a matter of relief. "Source tracing is equally important as that of the contract tracing. A special team from the National Institute of Virology is already collecting samples from the state to identify the source of the spread of the virus infection," she said.

However, the minister said the ongoing strict vigil and the restrictions in the affected areas would continue for some more time.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Friday said his government had conducted a complete house-to-house survey within three-km-radius from the house of the 12-year-old boy who succumbed to Nipah virus on September 5 as part of is fever surveillance. He said in the survey around 15,000 houses were included from the containment zone and details were sought from around 68,000 people.

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Samajwadi Party's Lakhimpur Kheri leader whose "saree" was allegedly pulled up by BJP workers during the UP panchayat polls joined the Congress in the presence of partys national general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra here on Saturday.

Ritu Singh, who was the Samajwadi Partys (SP) candidate for the post of the block pramukh in the recent polls and and became a victim of the BJP's high-handedness, joined the Congress along with her supporters, Congress spokesperson Anshu Awasthi said.

During her visit to the state in July, Priyanka Gandhi had rushed to Lakhimpur Kheri to meet Ritu Singh after the incident.

Ritu Singh, who met Gandhi along with her family members, said only the Congress and she (Priyanka) could fight the atrocities being committed on common people, Awasthi added.

Awasthi said Singh said UP needs a Priyanka-like leader due to which she is joining the Congress.

Singh regretted that no senior leader of the SP came to meet her after the incident.

She assured that she will work wholeheartedly to ensure that the Congress forms the government in the state after the 2022 Assembly elections.

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Barely a month after completing five years in office, Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani resigned on Saturday, ending the strong speculations about his replacement for the last couple of weeks. The move is said to have been made primarily keeping in mind the Assembly polls slated to be held by the end of 2022.

Speculations are also strong that the party will replace Rupani, 65, with a leader from the Patidar, in order to "appease" the community which has been demanding the post of chief minister from their midst. BJP officials said that on Monday, a legislative party meeting has been convened where the decision to replace Rupani is likely to be taken.

Rupani tendered his resignation to governor Devvrat Acharya in Gandhinagar at around 2:30 pm. He was accompanied by deputy chief minister Nitin Patel, education minister Bhupendrasinh Chudasama, union health minister Mansukh Mandaviya among other colleagues.

Mandaviya is being reported as a possible replacement for Rupani. Praful Patel, the controversial administrator of two union territories, is also reported to be a frontrunner for the CM post.

BJP officials said that soon after the announcement of resignation, Gujarat state-in-charge Bhupendra Yadav held a meeting with Mandaviya, union fisheries and dairy minister Parsottam Rupala and BJP general secretary BL Santhosh at party headquarters.

Party sources have also not ruled out Rupala or deputy CM Nitin Patel's elevation to the CM post.

Read | Gujarat CM removed as govt failed during Covid: Cong

"I am grateful to the BJP that a worker like me was given the important post of Gujarat chief minister to lead. In the journey of Gujarat's development, I was also given an opportunity to contribute five years ago. I am grateful to the prime minister. I believe that under the leadership of the prime minister, Gujarat needs a new energetic leadership. Keeping this in mind, I have resigned from the responsibility of chief ministership," Rupani said in a press conference at Raj Bhawan in Gandhinagar.

On August 7, 2016, Rupani, a jain from Rajkot, succeeded Anandiben Patel who was made to resign in the backdrop of Patidar agitation for reservation. Rupani's ascent to the top post was considered to be a "move" to neutralise the role of caste politics dominated by the Patidar community, the most influential vote bank whose support can make or break any political equation.

Meanwhile, the opposition Congress described the development as BJP's "overall failure in managing the state." "The Rupani government was run by remote control...The change of guard is just a cover to hide its failure in preventing corruption, inflation and Covid-19 mismanagement," said leader of opposition Paresh Dhanani.

Read | Rupani BJP's fourth CM to be replaced in last 6 months

Independent MLA Jignesh Mevani reacted on this Twitter account as saying, "Gujarat CM Vijay Rupani resigns: People of Gujarat would have appreciated had Mr Rupani resigned for his monumental mismanagement of Covid crisis. This resignation comes purely to take care of electoral arithmetic keeping 2022 Assembly polls in mind."

The BJP leadership is looking at a major reshuffle in the government well in time before hitting campaigns for the 2022 Assembly elections. "Party is most likely replacing Rupani with a strong Patidar leader and will give prominent places in the cabinet to leaders from all dominant castes such as other backward castes and tribals to win 2022 polls," an insider said.

He added, "The main reason behind removing Rupani is his image as being a remote control CM, party's state president (C R Paatil) as super CM, IAS officer more powerful than the ministers, people's anger due to Covid-19 mismanagement, among others."

Another source said, "Recently the clamour for a Patidar at the helm of affairs in the state had increased." Top community leaders including Naresh Patel, President of Khodaldham, a religious and social organisation of Leuva Patels, in Saurashtra had said that the community would wish for a chief minister from Patidar. This holds importance for the fact that Leuva and Kadva Patels, two sects of Patidar community, have been "uniting" and BJP can't afford to ignore their demand.

Incidentally, the decision to remove Rupani came barely 24 hours after union minister Amit Shah left for Delhi on Friday morning after spending 24 hours in Ahmedabad during his unannounced visit.

The political drama in the state unfolded hours after Prime Minister Narendra Modi virtually inaugurated the Sardardham building in Ahmedabad constructed by Vishwa Patidar Samaj. In the event, Rupani and his deputy Nitin Patel were also present.
A day after being heinously raped and brutalised in a tempo in the Kharani Road area of Saki Naka locality in Mumbai, the victim continues to be serious and unconscious.

She is currently admitted to the civic-run Rajawadi Hospital at Ghatkopar. She is unconscious and being treated, said Mumbai mayor Kishori Pednekar.

The Saki Naka police station has the accused in custody.

Shiv Sena MLC Manisha Kayande, who visited the hospital, said that the victim is serious. The information that I got is that one surgery was conducted but she remains serious, she said.

Read | Woman raped, brutally assaulted in Mumbai

According to her, the victim is aged between 32 to 34, married with two kids. Whether the act is committed by one person or whether it was a gang rape is a matter of investigation, she said.

National Commission for Women chairperson Rekha Sharma has taken serious cognisance of the incident.

The victim was raped and a rod was inserted in her private parts. The accused has been booked under sections 307, 376, 323, and 504 of the Indian Penal Code.

Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray has taken serious cognisance of the incident. Leader of Opposition in Assembly Devendra Fadnavis expressed shock over the incident.

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A day after a woman was heinously raped and brutalised in a tempo - similar to the Nirbhaya case - in the Kharani Road area of Saki Naka locality in Mumbai, the victim passed away after battling for 33 hours on Saturday.

A special investigation team (SIT) has been formed to probe the incident and the trial of the accused would be conducted before a special fast-track court.

The accused, who hails from Jaunpur in Uttar Pradesh, has been remanded to police custody till 21 September.

It is a serious incident and a disgrace to humanity, Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray said even as his Maha Vikas Aghadi government came under criticism from opposition BJP for increase in crime against women and children.

The incident is sad and shocking, said leader of opposition in Assembly Devendra Fadnavis.

The victim was allegedly raped and brutalised inside an open tempo parked off the Rashid Compound off the Chandivali Studios in the wee hours of Friday.

A watchman alerted the Mumbai Police main control room informing the police about a man beating up a woman.

Immediately, a police team was dispatched which reached the spit within 10 minutes and found the woman in a pool of blood.

The team did not waste a moment and drove the same tempo to the Rajawadi Hospital, Mumbai Police chief Hemant Nagrale told reporters in Mumbai.

He said that the statement of the victim could not be recorded as she remained unconscious and passed away.

He also ruled out gang-rape, saying that the CCTV footage obtained by police shows the presence of the accused only. We have got the custody of the accused. The probe is underway. If there are any updates, we will come back, he said.

As far as the cause and motive is concerned, he said that it would be known only after detailed investigations. The blood-stained clothes of the accused have been seized and have been sent for investigations, he said.

The SIT would be led by assistant commissioner of police Jyotsna Rasam, an experienced lady officer.

The accused has been booked under section 302 (murder), 376 (rape) 323 (intentional hurt), 504 (intentional assualt) and of the Indian Penal Code.

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As the Sakinaka rape-muder incident snowballed into a political issue, the opposition BJP on Saturday demanded a law on the lines of the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act so that accused involved in crime against women do not get bail easily.

Both leader of opposition in Assembly Devendra Fadnavis and his counterpart in Council Pravin Darekar raised the issue and expressed concern over the increase in crime against women.

State BJP vice president Chitra Wagh lashed out at the Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi government and Woman and Child Development Minister Yashomati Thakur for the fact that the post of Maharashtra State Commission for Women is still vacant.

"I am told that the file to appoint Chairperson on women's commission has been sent back eight times by the chief minister and deputy chief minister. How is this government going to defend it?" she asked.

Read | Sakinaka rape case: Uddhav promises fast-track trial

Wagh said Thakur was now pointing fingers at similar assaults on women that had occurred in the past.

Wagh said that an act on the lines of the Atrocities Act should be enacted so that people involved in atrocities and crime should not get bail.

"There are experts, lawyers and the state judiciary department who need to come up with better measures that would work as deterrents," she said, adding that it seems that for the MVA government, the Saki Naka incident is just a number.

Fadnavis said that the accused deserves capital punishment.

"I know that awarding a sentence is in the hands of the judiciary. But I feel the culprit in the Saki Naka rape should be hanged to death," he said, adding that the incidents is akin to the Nirbhaya case.

Asked about the proposed Shakti Act, he said: Existing laws are sufficient to take tough actions against the culprits. It is the will power of the state to take tough decisions and follow it up till the logical end.

Added Darekar: The onus of this incident is entirely on the state government because there is no respect left for the law. I am deeply anguished by her death...I can not describe my feelings in words. It is not only shameful, but it has made me angry. The state needs to take some action," he said.

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Fully vaccinated people were 11 times less likely to die of Covid and 10 times less likely to be hospitalised compared to the unvaccinated since highly contagious Delta became the most common variant, US health authorities said Friday.

The data came from one of three new papers published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), all of which underscored Covid vaccines' ongoing effectiveness against severe outcomes.

For reasons that are not yet well understood, data from one of the studies suggests Moderna's vaccine has offered a slightly higher level of protection in the Delta period.

It comes a day after President Joe Biden announced an aggressive new immunisation plan that includes requiring companies employing more than 100 people to either vaccinate their workers or test them weekly.

Also Read | Biden ramps up vaccine mandates for millions in Covid-19 battle

"As we have shown in study after study, vaccination works," said CDC director Rochelle Walenksy during a press briefing on Friday.

The first study examined hundreds of thousands of cases in 13 US jurisdictions from April 4 - June 19, the period before Delta was dominant, and compared them to June 20 - July 17.

Between these periods, a vaccinated person's risk of Covid infection rose slightly: from being 11 times less likely to be infected compared to an unvaccinated person, to five times less likely.

Protection against hospitalisation and death remained more stable, but fell more among people aged 65 and above than for younger age groups.

The CDC and the Food and Drug Administration are assessing the need for booster shots, and it is likely the elderly will be among the first to receive them when the Biden administration starts to roll them out later this month.

One of the studies, which assessed vaccine effectiveness from June - August at more than 400 hospitals, emergency departments and urgent care clinics, stratified efficacy by brand.

Efficacy against hospitalisation was highest for Moderna at 95 per cent; then Pfizer at 80 per cent; and finally Johnson & Johnson at 60 per cent.

Overall efficacy against hospitalisation was 86 per cent for all age groups but this fell to 76 per cent for those over 75.

The two mRNA vaccines, Pfizer and Moderna, have always performed slightly better than the J&J adenovirus vector vaccine  possibly because the latter is administered as one dose.

It isn't clear why Moderna's vaccine appears to have a slight edge on Pfizer in the Delta period.

It could be linked to its higher dosing level of 100 micrograms versus 30 micrograms, or possibly the greater interval between the first and second shots (four versus three weeks), which might be associated with a heightened immune response.
Newly-elected 27 Congress councillors on Saturday met KPCC President D K Shivakumar in Bengaluru even as JD(S) kept everyone guessing over the formation of Council in Kalaburagi Mahanagara Palike (KMP).

As no party get a simple majority to form the body, both Congress and the BJP with 23 seats are making all efforts to secure power in the KMP with the support of JD(S) which won four seats.

Four JD(S) councillors had recently met former chief minister H D Kumaraswamy in Bidadi and held talks with him.

KPCC spokesperson Priyank Kharge accompanied the Congress councillors for the meeting with D K Shivakumar.

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Primary and Secondary Education Minister BC Nagesh said that the technical committee meeting will take a call on the commencement of classes for students of 1-5 in Karnataka.

Speaking to media persons in Shivamogga on Saturday, he said the issue would be discussed in the meeting.

Referring to the commencement of classes for sixth to PUC, he said they are going on smoothly.

As students could not attend many classes due to the pandemic, teachers are conducting bridge courses so that they would understand the syllabus of the next class easily.

But teachers may find it difficult to complete the syllabus due to the lack of time.

Therefore, discussions are going on either to reduce the syllabus or vacation. He also made it clear that no final decision has been taken in this regard.
Former Congress minister Ramalinga Reddy on Saturday dished out statistics and claimed that the BJP government was fudging Covid-19 death numbers to avoid paying compensation to people who succumbed to the virus.

Reddy, the BTM Layout legislator, also heads the Public Accounts Committee that is looking into complaints of Covid-19 mismanagement. 

According to Reddy, there is suspicion over the deaths of as many as 1.62 lakh people in Karnataka.

As per information provided by the state government, the number of people who died due to Covid-19 is 37,318. As per information from the Chief Registrar of Births & Deaths, there were 4.83 lakh deaths in 2018, 5.08 lakh in 2019 and 5.51 lakh in 2020.

"Every year, the number of deaths is increasing. In the first seven months of 2021, up to July, 4.21 lakh people have died. The number of deaths for the first seven months of 2020 was 2.64 lakh. Thats 1.62 lakh more. How did these 1.62 lakh people die? Was there a tsunami, earthquake or a cyclone in Karnataka? Or, was there cholera or plague, Reddy asked.

The Congress working president said these statistics were proof that the government was lying about Covid-19 deaths.

Also read: Experts ring alarm bells on Covid reinfections, breakthrough cases in Karnataka: Report

If coronavirus patients with comorbidities die, then they wont get a Covid-19 death certificate. Also, if patients test negative later and then die, it wont be a Covid-19 death. The 37,000-figure of the government is only for those people who had no other illness, Reddy explained.

The Congress leader claimed that the government understated the deaths as it had committed to compensating the bereaved families. The government has ordered Rs 1 lakh to be given to BPL families whose adults die of Covid-19.

The Congress, which is doggedly pursuing its claim of false death figures, will raise the issue in the legislature session that starts September 13, Reddy said.

Health Minister K Sudhakar has, earlier, denied the Congress' claim that the government lied about Covid-19 figures.

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Two men have been jailed at Derry Crown Court for an incident which resulted in a man sustaining serious stab wounds.

Jonathan Desmond Gibson, 32, of Crawford Square in Derry and Adam McMenamin,18, whose address was given as Moss Wood Park in Bangor, both admitted grievous bodily harm with intent on a man on December 31, 2019.

The court heard that the incident occurred in a block of flats in Great James Street in the city.

Passing sentence on Gibson, Judge Philip Babington, said: "This was a very serious assault and the injured party may well have had some responsibility for instigating the matter but there was absolutely no excuse for the defendant acting as he did and attacking him with a knife on three separate occasions when it was clear that neither he nor his co-defendant were under any immediate threat. "

Imposing an extended sentence of seven years on Gibson Judge Babington said this meant that after half his sentence his release would be determined by the parole commissioners and that would happen when they felt 'it is no longer necessary for the protection of the public that you should be confined.'

After release Gibson would serve a further three years on licence.

Sentencing McMenamin Judge Babington said he was 16 at the time of the offence, adding he had a record comprising of 19 previous convictions but there were 'positives' in his report.

The judge said: "It is crystal clear that he has fallen in with the wrong crowd so to speak which is particularly tragic for him."

Judge Babington said that McMenamin now realised he should not have behaved as he did.

He rejected a suggestion that McMenamin also be deemed as dangerous and said the defendant had not used a weapon although 'he willingly joined in the attack'.

He imposed a sentence of four years and eight months on McMenamin.
Film Festival aGLIFF 2021

News

The Consulate team was delighted to attend the All Genders, Lifestyles, and Identities Film Festival (aGLIFF) in Austin on Sunday 29 August. We are proud supporters of aGLIFF and were pleased to once again support the screening of Irish short films as part of the festival programme.



Thanks to GAZE Film Festival in Dublin, award-winning Irish shorts A White Horse, Outside the Box and Cailin Alainn were shown to limited numbers at in-person screenings and to virtual attendees.

We are very grateful to aGLIFF for the opportunity to celebrate Irelands commitment to the promotion and protection of the rights of LGBTI+ people with festival attendees. Support for LGBTI+ rights is a key priority for Ireland, at home and abroad and it was a pleasure to share the artistic contributions of the LGBTI+ community in Ireland with our community here in Austin.



Vice Consul Niamh Clarke, Vice President at aGLIFF Todd Hogan-Sanchez and Laura Ramsel Administrative & Consular Assistant.

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It looks like Google has finally taken a step forward and given users the option of changing the Search page. The company rolled out a bunch of Dark Mode updates to its apps and now the feature is finally available on the Search page. The feature was available on mobile but has now made its way to the desktop version of the Search page. The feature turns the entire page dark with the Google logo standing out in a shade of white. Its s nice addition, thematically.

Why I stay in Dark Mode... pic.twitter.com/HGjPVsqiWZ  Jason Wiley (@Jayd360) September 11, 2021

The update is rolling out slowly and should hit all users in the next few weeks. You can head on over to the Settings page on Google.com and select Appearance. Just remember that unless Dark Mode has been enabled on your account, the Appearance tab will not show up. Clicking on the tab will take you to a new page where you will be able to enable Dark Mode. You can also have Google switch the theme automatically.

Earlier, we reported that Google confirmed that it is testing out the feature on the Search page for Desktop. According to Google, search pages backgrounds will also appear in Dark Mode. In a statement, Google said, Were always testing new ways to improve our experience for our users, but dont have anything specific to announce right now.. So, what do you guys think about the new Dark Mode on the Google Search page?

Also Read: How to activate the dark theme on smartphones
Bitcoin is the most valuable digital asset but volatile

Bitcoin is a decentralized digital currency that uses peer-to-peer technology to operate with no central authority or banks. It was created by Satoshi Nakamoto and its ledger started on January 3, 2009. Since its inception, it has become the most valuable and popular igital asset in the world.

2021 has been a highly volatile year for Bitcoin. In April 2021, it touched an all-time high of $ 65,000 (roughly  47.7 lakhs). On May 13, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced that his company would no longer accept Bitcoin as a payment mode. In the same month, Bitcoin prices corrected by more than 50 percent from the all-time high. After a few months of consolidation, it reclaimed the $ 50,000 level (roughly  36.8 lakhs).

Bitcoin declared legal tender in El Salvador

September 7, 2021, marked the beginning of a new dawn, as El Salvador, officially the Republic of El Salvador, a country in Central America, became the first country in the world to declare Bitcoin (Code: BTC) as legal tender. Backed by President Nayib Bukele, the legislative assembly of El Salvador passed the Bitcoin law on June 8, 2021. The law took effect on September 7, 2021. With this move, Bitcoin has become an official currency for El Salvador, alongside the US Dollars (Code: USD).

Ahead of the launch, El Salvador president Nayib Bukele tweeted that the country had bought 400 Bitcoins. As per the price at the time of the tweets, the price of 400 Bitcoins totalled roughly $ 21 million (roughly  155 crores). On Tuesday morning, Bitcoin prices were close to hitting the $ 53,000 mark. However, it corrected by nearly 10 percent in the next few hours. The downtrend was visible in other cryptocurrencies as well.
The Hong Kong-based Smartphone manufacturer Infinix has confirmed the launch of Infinix Hot 11S in India next week. The phone is scheduled to launch with a blast in India on September 17. The company released the first look teaser on its official Twitter Handle. The Hot 11S is the successor to the Infinix Hot 10S launched earlier in May this year. As per the current released specs and details, it seems that the Hot 11S has many similarities to the recently launched Redmi 10 Prime.

Infinix Hot 11S: Specifications and Features

Though the company has not yet released the detailed specifications and features of the upcoming Smartphone, here is what we know and what we can expect from the Hot 11S.

As per the details released, it seems that the Hot 11S is packed with many similarities to the recently launched Redmi 10 Prime. Both the phones are powered by the MediaTek Helios G88 SoC and feature a 50MP primary rear camera. The Hot 11S is the first phone of Infinix to feature this camera sensor.

As the company has already confirmed about the processor being the new MediaTek Helios G88, the teaser released by them also unveils some other exciting features of the phone. It can be seen that the smartphone will feature a 50MP primary rear camera sensor along with two other camera sensors. The triple rear camera setup will be supported by a quad-LED flash. The secondary cameras are expected to be ultrawide or macro and a depth sensor. Also, the phone features a rear-mounted fingerprint sensor.

Infinix Hot 11S: Expected Features, Specifications and Price

Till now, these are the only known facts regarding the phone, more details regarding the display, RAM, Storage, battery capacity are yet to be revealed. Even the price is not yet disclosed but it is confirmed that the Infinix Hot 11S will be available exclusively on Flipkart.

Still, as the phone had also recently shown up on the Google Play Console, this is what we can expect based on the details shown up there on the listing.

It can be expected that the Infinix Hot 11S is packed with RAM upto 6GB and storage of about 128GB. It should also feature a 90Hz FHD+ Display. Though we don't have a clear understanding of the screen size (though it should be the usual 6.5 inches), exact display details and these features, what the company has confirmed is that the Infinix Hot 11S will support fast charging at 18W via USB Type-C.

Since, its predecessor, the Infinix Hot 10S housed a 6,000 mAh battery, the same is expected from the Hot 11S. It should run on Android 11 OS.

Infinix Hot 11S Availability

The Infinix Hot 11S will be available in at least 3 colours being Green, Purple and Polar Black and should feature a wave pattern rear panel.

The phone will be up for sale exclusively on Flipkart.

As it is expected, that the Infinix Hot 11S is being launched as a prime competitor of the Redmi Prime 10, though the exact price tag is not known, it is expected to be nearly the same as that of the Redmi 10 Prime is Rs. 12,499 or could be even priced lower than this. It can be expected to be a tough competitor in the budget smartphone range.
A ceremony took place last week to honour the late Bagatelle frontman, Liam Reilly, with a golden CD of a song in tribute to him being presented to his family.

The ceremony took place in the Dundalk School of Music on Thursday, with Mr Reillys sister receiving a copy of the song Avenue Man, which was recorded in tribute to Mr Reilly, on a golden CD.

Mr Reilly, who passed away in January 2021, was the frontman for the incredibly successful Irish band Bagatelle and was a Dundalk native. The presentation saw the golden CD being presented to Paula Mullens, Liams younger sister.

Stephen Hand, a member of the Dundalk wedding band, The Urge, said that he and Denver Rafferty created the song as a tribute to Mr Reilly, who was a friend of theirs.

We were friends with Liam from over the years, we used to have a pint with him most Mondays, said Mr Hand. Liam would have came from the Avenue [Road], thats why the song is Avenue Man.

According to Mr Hand, the family were over the moon with the tribute to Liam. They were absolutely over the moon, overjoyed Weve received a lot of thanks and gratitude from the family.

Mr Hand said that he and the band were honoured to pay tribute to Liam with a song. Were just delighted to be able to honour Liams memory with something like this, said Mr Hand.

Speaking to the Democrat, Mr Hand said that he would love to see a proper monument to Liam in Dundalk.

We do want to see a proper monument put up to Liam, as in a statue or something in Dundalk, but this is our offering in the way of a tribute.

He was one of Dundalks finest sons, theres no question of it, and his legacy will live on for many, many years.

The song itself is performed by The Urge, and features vocals from Eamonn Toal, who performed for Ireland at Eurovision in 2000.

Mr Toal has since joined the band as a full-time member, with Mr Hand saying it was great to work on the song with him and to now have him as a full-time member.
An apprentice electrician who crashed a BMW into a barrier after he had failed to stop for Gardai in north Louth, last week avoided a driving ban at Dundalk district court after Judge Eirinn McKiernan said she would exercise her discretion and not disqualify him.

Scott Carthy (19) with an address at Annies, Kilcurry, Dundalk, had originally been charged with dangerous driving at Drumnacarra, Drumnasillagh and Aghnaskeagh, and with driving without insurance or a driving licence at Dromad on March seventh last.

A previous court sitting in June heard how Dromad Gardai spotted a BMW being driven erratically and overtaking at high speed at 10.50pm. It failed to stop for them. A decision was made not to chase the car and to follow it at a safe distance instead.

The BMW crashed into a barrier and the driver got out and fled on foot.

Scott Carthy, who had no previous convictions, was arrested following a foot pursuit and was charged with dangerous driving.

The Defence solicitor said his client, an apprentice electrician in Dublin, had bought the car for 300 and had panicked.

The court was asked to reduce the dangerous driving charges to careless driving. Gardai said there was no objection to that course of action.

Judge Eirinn McKiernan said "Im not overly impressed. He doesnt even bother to turn up" but the solicitor explained he had told the defendant not to come to court.

The case was adjourned so Mr Carthy could attend in person. Last Wednesday after Judge McKiernan imposed a 300 fine for careless driving and said she would exercise her discretion and not disqualify him, the defendant replied Thank you Judge.

The defence solicitor added: He comes from a good family. He is knuckling down and you can see in the letter from his employer hes attending his apprenticeship.
Claremont, NH (03743)

Today

Thunderstorms likely. A few storms may be severe. High 81F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

Rain. Low around 60F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch.
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THE Kinsellas are a small, tight-knit crime family in Dublin, who are finding themselves increasingly at odds with a powerful drug cartel.

When the hot-headed son of Frank Kinsella gets into a violent confrontation, the cartel decide to retaliate.

That is the setting for a new eight-part crime drama called Kin that starts on RTE1 Sunday September 12 at 9.30pm, which is already drawing comparisons to the channels last smash hit crime drama, Love/Hate.

The comparisons dont end there either, as Game of Thrones star Aidan Gillen, aged 52, who played gang boss John Boy in the first two seasons of Love/Hate, before the character was shot dead, plays the head of the Kinsella family.

Early reviews of Kin have described it as an epic tragedy, an exploration of how love and grief are entwined, how a horrific loss can shape you into someone else. A before and after. Its also about how such grief can twist and warp the family as a whole, and start an avalanche that will impact much more than a familys personal relationships.

Gillen, who plays Dublin crime family patriarch Frank Kinsella, has said that the drama will feature some shocking scenes of violence but that nothing is sensationalised.

He added: Its a crime drama set in Dublin so there will be scenes that are brutal and shocking but its not in there for the sake of sensation.

I think theres always a responsibility not to glorify it.

We have a responsibility to show how it starts and also a responsibility to show how it ends and it generally doesnt end well. It ends in prison or in the grave, so Id be quite conscious of that.

Kin also stars Clare Dunne, Ciaran Hinds and Maria Doyle Kennedy.
THE Corkman who survived the 9/11 attack on the Twin Towers in New York which killed his sister and niece says the incident is still very raw 20 years on.

Ron Clifford was speaking to The Echo ahead of the 20th anniversary of the terror attack today.

He was in one of the towers of the World Trade Center in New York when one of the planes crashed into it on September 11, 2001.

He did not know until later that the other plane was carrying his sister, 45-year-old Ruth McCourt, and her four-year-old daughter Juliana.

Today, Cork-based members of the Clifford family, as well as their friends, will gather for a private ceremony in St Finbarrs cemetery, where Ruth and Juliana are buried.

Ron said: It is hard to even think about it now. It is still raw.

He added: You wish that Ruth and Juliana were still here. David [Ruths husband] is gone now too and that family is now all gone.

The plane which crashed into the tower he was in was carrying Ruths best friend, Paige Farley Hackel. She had planned to link up with Ruth and Juliana when their flights arrived in California. They had been planning to visit Disneyworld during the trip.

Ron had been attending a meeting at the World Trade Center when the terror attack occurred. He went to the assistance of a woman who was badly injured in the attack, who later died.

Ron said he feels completely overwhelmed by the 20th anniversary and is thankful for the many good wishes he has received from people across the world ahead of it.

He was interviewed last year for a documentary series by National Geographic with survivors of the 9/11 terrorist attack. He does not plan to watch it but says it will be important for generations to come.

The series, 9/11: One Day In America, aired from Sunday on National Geographic, with episodes now available on Hulu.
Plumbers pay was described by a Circuit Court judge as second only to that of brain surgeons as he questioned why a young man only raised 500 for the victim of an assault.

Judge Sean O Donnabhain made the comments at Cork Circuit Criminal Court in the course of sentencing Josh Arnopp for assault.

The judge was told that the young man had brought 500 to court to compensate his assault victim. When the judge commented about the earnings of plumbers, defence barrister Dermot Sheehan said Arnopp was not fully qualified and was in the fourth year of his apprenticeship.

The judge said, 500 for bating a fella around the road in Kinsale  not on. I have no idea what is going through his (defendants) mind. He must have known what was going to happen.

The victim takes a very serious view of what happened. His confidence is shattered. It is not a pleasant thing to have yourself clattered around Kinsale. The man who was assaulted deserves to be compensated, not insulted. Sentencing was adjourned until September 24 for more compensation.

Arnopp of An Guagan, Barrack Street, Kinsale, County Cork, pleaded guilty to a charge of assault causing harm to the other man at Short Quay in the town on January 26, 2020.

Garda Fergal Dowling said the injured party was out socialising with his girlfriend. The defendant was out since 3 p.m. that afternoon watching a Liverpool match on TV. Arnopp said he had eight pints but was not legless.

The 24-year-old defendant alleged to gardai that the injured party called him names and there was some dispute about the nature of the exchanges between them.

When the sum of 500 was first mentioned in court, Judge ODonnabhain asked, Is that by was by way of compensation or aggravation? A plumber is only less well remunerated than a brain surgeon.
WHEN we were teenagers, my friends and I, we used to go to discos in jeans and a nice shirt and runners.

Imagine that! It took me all of 15 minutes, including a shower, to get ready and climb into the car to be dropped off in town by my father.

That was the routine a few Saturday nights a month when I was 14, 15 and 16. (At barely 17, believe it or not, but those were the times that were in it, Id already started my first year of college in a different city.)

When I was 10, 11, 12 and 13, I ran around outside a lot with friends and siblings, played catch, bickered, climbed trees and read books. My body shape and looks were not remotely important to me or anyone else. I dont recall any awareness of whether I was attractive or not, or whether bits of me may not have matched someones ideal of perfection. That kind of stuff didnt even occur.

As I moved into my mid-teens, my school-friends and I would meet in town at the bus stop or right outside the disco on a Saturday night. Wed tell each other that we looked nice and then wed join the queue, pay our money and head in for a night of dancing to the music of the late seventies.

Personally, I wasnt aware that there was an ideal shape for the nose, let alone consider the possibility that my nose did not meet it. My nose was something I merely breathed through unless there was a spot on it. I didnt think about my chin either, unless thered been an eruption, and the line of my eyebrows was a foreign country altogether. In fact, to be truthful, as I recall it, the only time I looked at myself in a mirror in my early to mid-teens was to worry about my spots and make them worse by picking at them. The idea of changing a photograph because I didnt look nice enough for other people, simply did not exist.

I dont, in fact, recall even putting on make-up until my early 20s, and only after Id started working and my summer tan had faded. I was so bad at it that I just clogged my pores, gave myself more spots and got makeup all over my hands and clothes.

But that was before smart-phones. Before the internet. Before social media. Before photo-editing apps. Long before parents captured and posted and commented on every move their child made. Back before the concept of even thinking about how you looked could potentially be a bad thing.

So the findings from Doves new study of girls aged 10-17 left me feeling, not shocked exactly, but sad.

I always thought ordinary families had it tough in the seventies, eighties and nineties; families were big and there wasnt much money around, Cork city was dilapidated, unemployment caused difficulties for many and if you were lucky enough to land paid employment there was no MeToo outrage to help you deal with the creeps at work.

But, it seems, the 2020s are hell on earth for young girls, given this new research by Dove into how they view themselves. The findings show that most girls between 10 and 17 dont feel good about how they look and experience negative body image issues. The research revealed that digital distortion on social media plays a large part in this and that its having a direct impact on their confidence and body image.

Ive no doubt that if I had spent much of my childhood and teenage years on a screen Id have had similar worries. By age 12 these days, about 40% of young girls have used a photo editing app to change how they look. Nearly 80% of girls between 10 and 17 years spend more than an hour a day on social media. They compare themselves with others on social media and seek validation from others via likes and comments - always a bad idea, because the world is chock-a-block with people who love having the power to make you feel bad. What a feeding ground for all emotional vampires who thrive on our daughters sense of inferiority about how they look.

But yet, what do parents do? They buy girls ever-smarter phones at an ever earlier age, they often dont supervise them, and often either dont know or dont care what theyre doing online. So shoot me but its time to fight back - and this fight has to be fought by parents and by the State itself in terms of both regulating the use of tech devices by children and establishing an effective complaints system. Please lets not offload this responsibility on the usual easy scapegoats; school-teachers and the HSE.

Parenting is hard and getting ever harder, primarily I believe, because of social media and screens and because of the lack of any real regulation around their usage by children.

Meanwhile, think about this. If you, as a parent, allow your young child to spend unsupervised time online while you yourself spend much of your free time on social media looking at images of yourself and others, posting images and commenting about the way people look, what do you think your daughter will perceive to be important?

Dove has launched its Self-Esteem Project designed to help give children the tools they need to grow up enjoying a positive relationship with the way they look. They have workshops, online articles, digital games and more, all aimed at increasing childrens self esteem and help them navigate social media in a healthier way. Education is a lot. Real information is important. But role modelling is crucial too. Theres no point trying to talk an image-obsessed teenager into spending less time on social media, if youve spent their childhoods on your own phone posting pictures of yourself and them on social media.

Fifteen years after the iconic Evolution film which addressed the manipulation of images in advertising, Dove is again tackling the issue of digital distortion with a film called the Reverse Selfie which reveals the extent to which young girls are distorting their appearance for social media.

Personally Im not a great believer in corporates trying to selflessly help anyone but the Dove Self-Esteem Project genuinely seems to be trying. Theyre offering a free programme of resources for everyone  just check out the online learning hub at https://www.dove.com/uk/dove-self-esteem-project.html.

Might be worth a shot, guys. And in the meantime start watching how much time your daughter spends online and what shes doing there.
Valerie Battle Kienzle, center, shows attendees the finishing on a vintage dress during her presentation Ready to Wear: A History of the Footwear and Garment Industries in St. Louis Sept. 9 at the Washington Public Library.
COVID-19 booster shots may be coming for at least some Americans but already the Biden administration is being forced to scale back expectatio
Desiree Bouchat, a survivor of the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center, looks at photos of those who perished, in a display at the 9/11 Tribute Museum, Friday, Aug. 6, 2021, in New York. While Sept. 11 was a day of carnage, it also was a story of survival: Nearly 3,000 people were killed, but an estimated 33,000 or more people evacuated the World Trade Center and Pentagon. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan)
Louthene Chambers Elmore, 80, of Athens, died Sunday, September 12, 2021, in Athens-Limestone Hospital. Services will be 2 p.m. Saturday at Spry Funeral Home Chapel in Athens with burial in Myers Cemetery. Alan Gandy is officiating, visitation is from noon until service time Saturday at Spry
Google vowed that it would no longer directly respond to Hong Kong authorities' data requests after the Chinese government imposed a security law in June 2020, but it appears the company made a handful of exceptions. The Hong Kong Free Press reports Google provided "some data" for three out of 43 requests from Hong Kong authorities in the second half of 2020. One was for an emergency where life was at risk, while another two concerned human trafficking.

The internet firm stressed that neither of the trafficking requests were linked to national security, and were backed by signed search warrants as well as Google's worldwide policy on requests. None of the three handovers involved content. However, they also weren't made under a treaty with the US Justice Department that Google said would be necessary for requests going forward.

The responses aren't completely unexpected. Attempts to pursue cases through the treaty could take months. It just wouldn't be realistic to feed urgent, non-security requests through that system.

Nonetheless, this illustrates the problems Google and other tech giants (including Facebook and Twitter) have while trying to disengage with China over the security law and, more recently, privacy law changes. While the companies can stall requests, an absolute refusal to comply may be difficult without leaving Hong Kong entirely.
If Tesla's last big Full Self Driving beta was about enabling more semi-autonomous features off the highway, its newest release is focused more on helping you trust those features. Electrek notes Tesla has started rolling out a Full Self Driving 10 beta that, from early reports, appears to make smarter and more confident decisions off the highway. It won't necessarily "blow your mind," as Elon Musk claimed, but it appears to deliver smoother turns, roundabouts and merges. One driver found that it finally navigated San Francisco's twisty Lombard Street without requiring intervention.

Users have also noticed improved visuals. You won't always see as many stats as before, but they appear to be more accurate and stable without as much twitchiness. You'll have a better idea of what the car is seeing, and possibly trust its decisions more as a result.

Highway driving hasn't changed, but that's intentional. Musk said the production-level, non-beta highway navigation is still "more polished" than the Full Self Driving equivalent at the moment. You might not see a truly harmonized approach until the 10.1 release.

It's not clear when regular Tesla owners might see FSD 10. It could be easier to try pre-release versions before long, however. Musk hoped a public option to request the beta would be available along with the 10.1 release that might arrive in as little as two weeks. The improvements won't necessarily justify the steep prices for the FSD package, but you may well be happier with the purchase  if just because you can rely on not-quite-driverless features more often.
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The services celebrating and honoring the life of Phyllis Caywood, of Enid, are pending under the direction of Brown-Cummings Funeral Home. Condolences and special memories may be shared with the family online at www.Brown-Cummings.com.
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Cesar Millan faces lawsuit charges from gymnast Lidia Matiss after his violent dog allegedly mauled her legs several times to the point of destroying her career.

This incident is not the first time the "Dog Whisperer" star got into trouble because of Pit Bull Junior. According to sources, Cesar attempted to hide that the trainer's pet had brutally killed Queen Latifah's dog and several other puppies.

The plaintiff reported that the incident with Queen Latifah's pet had happened in Millan's Dog Psychology Center in Santa Clarita and was included in the lawsuit.

Allegedly, Junior was allowed to roam without a leash inside the building even after having a history of violent behavior. Cesar then instructed his staff, including Matiss' mother, an employee at the center, to tell the actress her puppy had been struck by a car instead.

Lidia Matiss Files a Lawsuit

Lidia Matiss is not only suing Cesar for covering up his dog's previous attacks but also for jeopardizing her professional career in gymnastics.

Daily Mail reported that the athlete had also been a victim of Junior's aggressive behavior. In 2017, Lidia had gone to Millan's Los Angeles center to visit her mother when the pit bull suddenly mauled her, and she was bitten several times on her legs.

Based on the court documents, Matiss suffered excruciating pain from the attack, including a big mark on her left calf.

Her attorneys Omar G. Qureshi and Brian M. Adesman claimed that the injuries had hindered her from participating in any competitions, which had "derailed her gymnastics hopes." The timing of the incident coincides with recruitment and scouting season.

Had my first training session for my new babies with @cesarmillan! Already learning So much!!! pic.twitter.com/jM0LcdJshB  Queen Latifah (@IAMQUEENLATIFAH) January 14, 2018



READ ALSO: Jaheim Arrested For 'Starving' Dogs: Shocking Details Of Animal Abuse Revealed

Cesar Millan's Response

The complainant's lawyers emphasized that before attaining trauma in her legs, Lidia performed at the highest level of competition in the USA Gymnastics Junior Olympics Programs.

Therefore, the youth is suing the dog whisperer for unspecified damage and continuous physical and emotional distress. Lidia claims that the damages for her disfigured legs and the trauma are still ongoing even after four years have passed.

Hollywood's famous dog trainer responded to the accusations by blaming the victim and labeled her negligent. Cesar contended that the teenager risks being bitten as she was aware of the potential consequences.



READ MORE: Josh Homme's Children File Protective Order Against Him Over 'Scary' Acts
In the present sociopolitical context, it would be trite to state that the challenge of majoritarianism has raised existential questions about the future of secular democracy in India. This challenge can be explicated by analysing the overtly ethnic functioning of the state institutions and vilification and otherisation of minorities in the socio-cultural sphere (Khosla and Vaishnav 2021; Dhawan and Kohli 2020). While the majoritarian clamour for attaining the Hindu Rashtra has been led by the so-called fringe right-wing groups in the past, in recent times, this has become shriller and sophisticated. Academic and legal articulations about a new idea of India, the Hindu Rashtra, the civilisational state have sought to grant legitimacy to the naked democracy capture that majoritarian politics has accomplished. Against this backdrop, journalist Aakar Patels recent book Our Hindu Rashtra: What It Is. How We Got Here provides a cogent response to this phenomenon. Based on his activism and journalism, Patel aims to help readers understand the meaning of Hindu Rashtra, its long political and institutional genealogy, and signal how it can still be prevented.

Divided in 14 chapters, the book surveys historical documents, government committee reports, court judgments, media archives, and records personal anecdotes on a range of issues that denude Indias secular credentials. To the credit of the author, he engages with Sangh and its texts with all seriousness and provides a comprehensive outlook of foundational ideologies. Writings on Sangh have oscillated from outright derision to attempts at mainstreaming (unwittingly at times) to hagiography. The book maintains the proportion very well by not falling into any of the three. At the same time, it juxtaposes the vacuity of Hindu majoritarianism with the experiences of Indias neighbours, namely Bhutan, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh.

Chapter 1, on partition history, has many strengths. It agrees with the pantheon of scholarly literature that is epitomised by Ayesha Jalals work to seek a fairer apportionment of blame for partition. In other words, it highlights those historic instances where the strong Congress assumed an intransigent position and the weak Muslim League was left recourse-less. It also includes indictment of M K Gandhis overtly religious politics that many Pakistani scholars have highlighted. However, this narrative is slightly simplistic, and the tone is slightly deterministic even if the point on the use of communal majority by the Congress is well-made. The blame apportionment can never be certain, and it remains a debate that must finally be had. Thus, the alternative narrative and interpretation provided by partition scholars like Ishtiaq Ahmed and Venkat Dhulipala is thus conspicuous by its absence (Ahmed 2020; Dhulipala 2014).

The chapters that follow provide a brilliant elucidation of Sanghs founding texts, their relevance today for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and a powerful takedown of their ideology. He deftly demonstrates how the dynamics of exclusions and simplifications embedded in this ideology render it empty of content, besides the defence of caste and hatred of Muslims. He demonstrates how ideologies, like integral humanism, have lacked interest in the lived cultures of the subcontinent. Furthermore, he exposes this ideologys obsession with national and social unity by citing M S Golwalkars viscerally hateful statements against Indias social minorities. He further shows how this empty ideological agenda is politically furthered with sheer shrewdness and caprice that enabled the political formations like the BJP to respond and adopt to dominant currents of day. This marks the evolution of BJP/Jan Sanghs approach towards Muslims from passive-aggressive (in Jan Sangh era) to aggressive but apologetic (under L K Advani) to unapologetic (under Narendra Modi).

Sectarian Lawmaking

Chapters 2 and 3 provide relevant historical background for birth of religious majoritarianism in Pakistan. The analysis and interpretation of Pakistans constitution-making process provide rich insights into the regressions of M A Jinnahs Islamic Republic towards the legal disenfranchisement of religious minorities through conservative Islamic politics. The analysis of this majoritarian gaslighting of members of religious minorities is instructive for understanding the state of Pakistan today.

For instance, the fate of minorities amendments to blatantly Islamic incantations and imagery in the objective resolution bring to light that constitution-making in the postcolonial sub-continental state was not a consociational exercise but the enactment of the tyrannical will of the majority. It explicates the steep fall of secular moralism and minority vanguardism by Islams high priests.

While it does not mirror what happened in Delhi, it has striking similarities to the containment of minority rights after partition (Gauba 2016). In a similar vein, Chapter 7 on the debates in the Indian Constituent Assembly about the controversial issue of conversions provide imperative perspectives to understand the effective criminalisation of religious conversion in the BJP-ruled states (Karwa and Dhawan 2020). He notes the statement of the Constituent Assembly member, Loknath Misra, who opined that Hindus had already obliged Indian minorities by not declaring India a Hindu State. In his words, by choosing secularism, the maximum of generosity that a Hindu-dominated territory could give its minorities was given. This generosity was being abused by making propagation a Fundamental Right, said Misra, asking that Hinduism be given a fair deal, if not restored to its legitimate place after a thousand years of suppression.

This critique of political and religious majoritarianism being translated into law extends to Patels analysis of the triple talaq question (in Chapter 11) and the cattle slaughter laws (in Chapter 13). These chapters provide a relevant repertoire of the translation of brutal majoritarianism into the legal order and highlight the tyranny of targeted over-criminalisation and incarceration.

The real-life impact of these tyrannical laws is brought out in the chapter on Apartheid Ahmedabad where Patel draws on his vast journalistic reportage on the post-Godhra ghettoisation in Gujarat. He shows how the state mandates separation and ghettoisation through legal prohibitions against the sale of property to Muslims by the application of the controversial Disturbed Areas Act to vast parts of the state. Beyond the strident political and intellectual critique of legal majoritarianism, Patel expresses his personal pain as an inheritor of the cosmopolitan and composite Gujarati identity. This pain at the loss of Gujarats syncretism and cultural pluralism is expressed eloquently in Chapter 10 where he mentions his failed attempt to seek reconstruction of Sufi saint Wali Dakhanis mazar in Ahmedabad.

Myth of Appeasement

Chapter 6 ably demonstrates the myth of Muslim appeasement and brings out the pertinent observations of the Sachar Committee report regarding the marginalisation, under-representation, and backwardness of Muslims in the public life as well as formal employment. The emphasis on the challenges of Dalit Muslims and Other Backward Classes to access reservation notwithstanding, the chapter is deficiently critical of the United Progressive Alliances approach towards the implementation of the Sachar Committee report. Reference to scholarly works on that question could have enriched this discussion on this issue (Kim 2019; Islam 2019). Nevertheless, his discussion ably establishes the irrationality of exclusion of religious converts belonging to lower and backward castes from seeking social justice benefits. This raises questions about the framework of affirmative action policies and jurisprudence.

Patels project is distinctive for its courageous take down of patently unreasonable and biased court opinions. In Chapter 9, he discussed the Supreme Courts deficient and compromised position on secularism. While this critique has become clearer after the Courts inaction on various human rights violations in recent times and its judgment on the Ayodhya issue, his contribution to the critique is in providing a genealogy of the judicial complicity in Hindu majoritarianism (Tew 2018). His discussion focuses on the various cases relating to the use of religion and its symbols in political campaigns. He critiques the Court for [holding] forth on theology, and [defining] Hindutva not as the exclusionary ideology that Hindutvas inventors and adherents say it is, but

as a benign way of life. He further questions the Hindu exceptionalism and double-standards in these judgments by observing

this idea that religion could not be associated with any specific symbols was true, according to the Supreme Court, only for Hinduism. The court said its observation could not apply to other faiths: If they are told that they should cast their vote for a particular candidate whose election symbol is associated with a particular religion just as the cross is with Christianity, that will be using a religious symbol for obtaining votes.

But, in the case of the Hindu religion, it is not possible to associate a particular symbol with religion, the use of a symbol even when it is associated with some deity, cannot, without something more, be regarded as a corrupt practice within the meaning of the Act.

New Political Constitutionalism

In the final analysis, this book provides a great understanding of how we got here by honestly identifying the presence of a lurking majoritarianism in the Indian polity. There is increasing acknowledgement of the reality that liberal-democratic constitutionalism in India, in other words, has been living on borrowed time. This breakdown of the grand liberal vision has underscored the pertinence of a popular reclamation and radical political rethinking of the ideas and practices from which constitutional and institutional orders ultimately emerge (Khosla and Vaishnav 2021). If the Indian Constitutions protection has to become a matter of popular struggle and democratic politics, Patels work is crucial as it avoids constitutional idolatry and engages in truth talking.

However, the exploration of how the distinctive malevolence of the present moment came to be is a noticeable omission. The book does go beyond the contempt for Hindutva, something that became a credo of the post-1991 secular politics. However, the attempts to scratch the surface of Hindu prejudice and hegemony do not lend themselves to analysis that aids social theory. The idea that Hindutva is a primitive idea has definitely been junked, and its wide popular appeal and institutional buy-in has been exposed. However, the lack of emphasis on counter-hegemonic strategies that invert the idea of nationalism, challenge the monopoly over Hinduism, and rethink the future of religion in the public sphere have not been touched upon.

Nevertheless, the book alerts one to the urgency of crafting a new political constitutionalism that acknowledges the founding dilemmas and limitations to the achievement of democracy of the rule of law at the social level. Thus, the elite tendency to ignore social relations and reforms would have to be abandoned in the favour of strident attempts to nurture fraternity without which,

to quote B R Ambedkar, equality and liberty do not become the natural course of things. How does this fraternity emerge from on the ongoing popular resistance against the hegemonic power is something that remains unexplored.

References

Ahmad, Ishtiaq (2020): Jinnah: His Successes, Failures and Role in History, Penguin.

Dhawan, Prannv and Pranav Kohli (2020): Bollywood: Othering the Muslim on Screen, Frontline, 27 March, https://frontline.thehindu.com/arts-and-culture/cinema/article31007504.ece.

 (2020): Covid-19 and Indias Hindu-Fascism Outbreak, Newsclick, 22 March, https://www.newsclick.in/covid-19-and-indias-hindu-fascism-outbreak.

Dhulipalia, Venkat (2014): Creating a New Medina: State Power, Islam, and the Quest for Pakistan in Late Colonial North India, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Gauba, Kanika (2016): Forgetting Partition Constitutional Amnesia and Nationalism, Economic & Political Weekly, Vol 51, No 39, pp 4147.

Islam, Maidul (2019): Indian Muslim(s) after Liberalisation, New Delhi: Oxford University Press.

Karwa, Surbhi and Prannv Dhawan (2020): Uttar Pradeshs Love Jihad Law Is Sexist, Unconstitutional Article 14, 3 December, https://www.article-14.com/post/uttar-pradesh-s-love-jihad-law-is-sexist-unconstitutional.

Khosla, Madhav and Milan Vaishnav (2021): The Three Faces of the Indian State, Journal of Democracy, Vol 32, No 1, pp 11125, https://www.journalofdemocracy.org/articles/the-three-faces-of-the-india....

Kim, Heewon (2019): The Struggle for Equality: Indias Muslims and Rethinking the UPA Experience, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Sen, Ronojoy (2018): Articles of Faith: Religion, Secularism, and the Indian Supreme Court, New Delhi: Oxford University Press.

Shankar, Shylashri (2019): The Polarizing Face of Law: Religious Conversion Judgments and Political Discourse in India, The Qualified Hope, Sudhir Krishnaswamy et al (eds), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Tew, Yvonne (2018): Stealth Theocracy, Virginia Journal of International Law, Vol 58, No 31, https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3287923.
Public goods are provided by a welfare state to enable communities to enhance their socio-economic conditions and to live a self-sustained life. India has numerous economic and organisational barriers that hinder the supply of public services to various social groups. The development process reaches the ground level only after crossing the many barriers. In addition to it, the local-level social realities and norms, such as caste, patriarchy, religion, and other belief systems dilute the intended objective of the service provided and also exclude several social groups from accessing the services.

Tajima et al (2018) argue that spatial distribution of ethnic communities impacts the decision-making process. This is because of the competitive advocacy efforts of the other segregated communities at the local level. This local-level advocacy increases the bargaining power of segregated ethnic communities to demand their public goods through collective action. On the contrary, Indian ethnic (caste) segregation leads to a significant blockade in the provisioning of the public goods for the Dalits, tribes, and other marginalised groups. It leads to ethnic favouritism and strategic discrimination through the legal channels itself in villages. Besley et al (2007) have documented the allocation of public goods by the village head to her co-ethnics or panchayats headquarter village, which is a clear case of ethnic favouritism done through the partially decentralised administrative structure in the third-tier of the government. Betancourt and Gleason (2000), who analysed district-level data, had found that systemic region-specific discrimination is happening in the allocation of education and health facilities in the areas where the marginalised sections, namely Dalits and Muslims were living. Latika Chaudhary (2006) gives compelling evidence on how the socially unequal setup impacts the decentralised provision of public goods and enables the elites to capture the public goods since colonial times. She stresses the need for introspection to assess the reasons for the lack of expenditure in quasi-public goods like education in the areas where diverse communities with less social power reside.

Social heterogeneity is considered as an impediment for effective public goods allocation and provisioning. According to Miguel and Gugerty (2005), if the supply of public goods is positively associated with an increase in group size (within a group), the supply of public goods reduces across ethnic groups. Munshi and Rosenzweig (2018) in their study supplement this argument with empirical evidence by applying it to caste in India. For them, caste is the relative social unit under which the central cooperation is organised in India. They found that the undersupply of public goods is due to group-specific cooperation, that is, reduced diversity of groups. Banerjee and Somanathan (2007) also established the fact that caste plays a crucial role in determining the provisioning of public goods and impedes collective action.

Political power does impact the allocation of public goods provisioning and in his notable work in Africa, Bates (1981) has shown how the evolution of political power in the ethnic groups is reflected in the way the public resources are used. Bharathi et al (2018), in their notable work in India, have argued that even segregated places are not equal when the steep hierarchy is acting over the groups, by taking into account the ethnic segregation and diversity. It is a comprehensive work that acknowledges the mutually reinforcing three distinctive channels, namely ethnic segregation, ethnic diversity, and hierarchy. They say that political power and lobbying of an ethnic group is per their relative position in the social hierarchy.

The strong relation between social structure and public goods provision is a matter of significance. India, with its traditional social hierarchy built upon numerous divides based on caste, religion, and gender is an ideal place to understand this relationship as pointed out by Banerjee and Somanathan (2007). Their study adds a new dimension to this relationship by analysing the spatial experience of a social structure in a physical space and how it impacts the adequate provisioning and utilisation of different social groups.

All these literatures concentrate on the macro-level aspects of public goods segregation, such as inequality in public goods provisioning or accessing, and the influence of the power of social groups in mobilising the public goods. The micro-level complexities of this public goods provision and access mechanism in the Indian village are to be studied contextually. This article intends to study the patterns of public goods segregation at the local level and their access by various social groups, and the factors associated with these social groups that help them to access the public goods.

Research Setting

The study is an explorative micro-ethnographic one in a village selected at random. Micro-ethnography is concerned with the local and situated ecology obtained among the participants in face-to-face interactional engagements constituting societal and historical experience (Garcez 1997). It describes how interaction is organised socially and culturally in particular situational settings. It is the study of a smaller experience or a slice of everyday reality.

Participatory research tools were primarily used by the researcher to understand the environment of public goods accessibility. The researcher visited the village once each week for five months (one semester) to interact with various stakeholders of the public goods considered in this study. The primary data from the field was collected using participatory research tools, such as transect walk, participatory observation, semi-structured interview, and resource mapping. Various local government records available in institutions, such as the village panchayat office, anganwadis (a type of rural childcare centre), and public school are the sources of secondary data in the study. Insights were developed based on the field experience and the literature review.

The selected village, situated amid a special economic zone, has been affected by the rapid industrialisation around it and also is located close to the ChennaiBengaluru national highway. As a result, the employment pattern of the villagers have undergone significant changes in recent times. According to the 2011 Census, there are 291 households with a total population of 2,610 out of which 1,066 (40.8%) are female. The overall literacy rate is 79.4%, and for women, it is only 28.3%. The Scheduled Caste population stands at 37.5%, and Scheduled Tribes comes to around 3.1% of the total population. The working population is 23.8% in the village. There are around 12 physically challenged people and the 06 child population is 179, amongst which the girl child population is 91 (50.8%).

Public Goods Segregation

Status of the public goods in the study village is observed based on three characteristics: spatial location of the public good, the physical condition of the public good, and the accessors of the public good.

Households of the village are segregated based on their caste. There is also a separation of households at the sub-caste level within the caste Hindus and the Dalits. However, the separation is explicit and rigid between caste Hindus and Dalits. The division of a village spatially is known as oor and cheri, that is, village and colony. The residential area of the caste Hindus is called the village, and the area resided by Dalits is called a Dalit colony. In contrary to Article 19 of the Indian Constitution that gives rights to every Indian citizen to reside and settle in any part of the country, it is not possible for a Dalit to buy land or house in the caste Hindus locations, only 500 metres away. The community highly restricts it. It is also hard to find a caste Hindus residence in the Dalit colony. Caste Hindus residing in Dalit areas are looked down and lose their status. Dalits do not allow caste Hindus to buy land in their area as a precaution to protect their land. Selling their land raises the threat of their area being occupied by other groups, thus leaving them landless. These details indicate how spatial location plays an essential role in the study village.

The government built two anganwadis (location numbers two and five in the above map) in different times in different locations, and the records of the anganwadis revealed that anganwadis are being used by the caste Hindus and Dalits separately. Although it is not a policy decision of the government, it does lead to the perpetuation of social exclusion. Moreover, the condition of both the anganwadis are not laudable. The restrooms in both anganwadis are not child-friendly and is lacking in necessary facilities like water.

The village has one public library (location number 6 on map), built in the Dalit-populated area. The library is accessed by some students from the Dalit colony, and no one from the caste Hindus use it. This explains the significance of a social groups residence in rural India being a reason for not accessing public goods. Although people from caste Hindus are hesitant to use the library, their need for procuring necessary food supplies leads them to the access the public distribution system (PDS) by securing subsidised foodgrains from the ration shop in the same area.

There are no playgrounds for children in the area, except for one school ground (location number 1 on map). However, this school groundsituated in the caste Hindu areais only accessible by the children of the same community. The children of the Dalit community use the nearby area and agricultural land for playing. Students from both communities access the school, whereas the usage of ground, particularly during the non-school time, is not allowed to the Dalit students.

No governance process has intervened in the village, which has separate ponds for Dalits (location number 4) and caste Hindus (location number 3) located in their respective areas for generations. The ponds are a significant water source, for both the communities, including for drinking and cleaning their cattle. The usage of water in the above manner is a health concern, and it is ironic that people let animals use water from the same pond but not fellow villagers from a different community.

The graveyard in the outskirts of the village has a partition within the same compound wall. There are two cremation stages, one of which is used by the caste Hindu community (location number 7) and the other by the Dalit community (location number 8). This depicts the direct untouchable line showcasing the sharp divide between the Dalits and caste Hindus. The social exclusion or alienation takes place in many ways, right from childhood in the anganwadis till the graveyard, and enables the inequalities to prevail despite developmental efforts by the government.

The study area has a considerable number of senior citizens. However, there are no special arrangements for them in almost all public goods, such as the PDS or ration shop, health centre, and library. Similarly, the ration shop, panchayat office, middle school, and all other important public places in the village are not disabled-friendly. The restrooms in both anganwadis are not child-friendly and lacks even necessary facilities like water. The youth, especially young girls, are reluctant to use the government health centre in the village for many reasons; a notable one being the lack of privacy due to the improper spatial design of the outpatient room. These physical attributes, if modified with small changes in the already existing spatial infrastructure, would increase the public access. The lack of such physical attributes, result in the underutilisation of public goods, especially which of the library, school, and health centre by locals, irrespective of their social groups and the location of public goods.

Patterns of Access

From the field observations, we could understand that multiple factors determine how people access public goods. The spatial location of the public goods plays a significant role, but access is not solely determined by the location. The quality and the visual appeal of public goods also play a decisive role in accessing public goods by certain people. Some people do not access public goods due to their location in a place where they feel unsafe or are forbidden to go or feel like an excluded or sinned place to enter. The level of need/want of public goods for their consumption also determines its usage. To highlight this clearly, a framework was developed in which all the factors are categorised under three characteristics, namely the level of need, the severity of norms, and the physical characteristics of public goods (see Figures 1 and 2). A vertical hierarchy is found in each specific factor.

Need hierarchy refers to the level of need for the particular public good to the person. This does not necessarily follow Abraham Maslows need hierarchy. Need hierarchy is not the same for all. It varies from person to person and is contextual. It depends on the socio-economic condition of the person and his awareness about public goods. If the need of the public goods is high, then the chance of a person accessing the public good is higher. No matter what kind of barrier keeps them from accessing the public goods, they put forth their maximum effort to break the barrier and satisfy their need. If the level of the need is low, they would show low interest and make little effort to access the public good.

Culture, norms, and rules of society impact the behaviour, attitude, and actions of the people and control their day-to-day life. In a country like India, norms followed by people or those imposed on them decide their attitude in almost every walk of human life; from how to behave, where to go, how to act, to what to eat. Norms lay certain expectations on the individual to follow. Severity in the implementation of these norms varies from time to time, place to place, and people to people. Hence, in a particular time at a particular place for a particular person or social category, based on the level of severity, the hierarchy of norms is formed. Suppose norms became a hindrance in accessing public goods, the level of severity determines the level of risk the person needs to take to access the public goods. The level of severity of the norms increases or decreases the level of risk the person takes to bypass the norms to access the public good. Hence, the hierarchy of the severity of norms go from mild to severe.

We define the location of the public goods, its quality, and consumer friendliness (child-friendly, disabled friendly) as a physical attribute. In a society where spatial access gets regulated by norms and beliefs of the various social groups, particularly for Dalits and women, the location of the public goods and its environment is highly relevant in the decisions on utilising the public goods. The hierarchy of physical attributes goes from attractive to repulsive for an individual, and the amount of tolerance towards repulsion varies from person to person based on their other spatial experiences.

While each specific hierarchy of these three factors impacts the decision-making of the individual, it also interacts and impacts on each other. Hence, an internal hierarchy occurs among these three factors, and it also plays a decisive role in an individuals choice in accessing the public goods. The degree to which a specific factors essentiality affects the decision of the individual is accountable. Individual need, culture, and the physical characteristics of public goods dominate one another in different aspects, marked as the horizontal hierarchy. One can overrule the other in any possible combination depending on the individual. Overall, an individual makes a choice or decision based on the net result considering all the factors affecting various forms of hierarchies. The reactionary process of union and contradiction among these horizontal and vertical hierarchies result in the net characteristics that decide the usage or non-usage of the product. However, the contribution of these three elements in the process of decision-making varies across individuals.

Every community in the village accesses the ration shop despite being it being located at the Dalit colony. In contrast, the public librarys access by the caste Hindus is nil, being located in the Dalit area. Whereas, the study village has one middle school run by the union panchayat, which is accessed by students belonging to both areas. The middle school has a ground that is the only playground available in that area. Hence, the ground is used even after school hours (non-working time) to play various recreational games. However, only the kids from the caste Hindu residential area use this ground. Dalit students do not prefer to play or are not allowed to play there. Although both the ground and school are in the same location, based on need one is accessed by both the communities, and the other is not. Since education is a fundamental need, people from the Dalit community take the risk to send their kids to school and also the caste Hindu community accepts it.

In contrast, playing is not considered as a dire need and is seen as unworthy of taking a risk by the parents in the Dalit community. Likewise, people from caste Hindus do not like children from the Dalit community occupying the play area, as playing is considered a luxurious activity by them. The hierarchy of need intertwined with the norms of the community play a prominent role here.

Nevertheless, the library located in the Dalit colony is not properly utilised by the people from the Dalit colony. The low maintenance and the quality of the library restrain people from using it. However, those who do not use the library and school because of its nature and area of location, do not restrain themselves from accessing the ration shop, which portray similar condition like the others. In these cases, even though there is no cultural hindrance, dialectics between the level of importance of need and nature of the public goods plays a significant role in decision-making

Senior citizens hesitate to go to the ration shop because of the lack of facilities like a place to sit, a ramp, or a roof which are necessary for them to ease their access. Youngsters hesitate to go to the government hospital, citing privacy concerns due to the physical design of the hospital rooms. These cases explain how small physical arrangements or lack of small things affect the utility of public goods.

Schools and ration shops are essential institutions whose importance is being felt by the downtrodden communities and regardless of ones spatial location, every community tries to access it. Whereas, in the case of libraries, the lack of awareness about the importance of the library, together with the repulsive physical attributes, makes it an unutilised public good. Although caste Hindus understand the importance of the anganwadis, the high anti-norm/cultural resistance to send their kids to a Dalit colony at a very early age is visible, which in turn led to the opening of a separate one. Thus, public goods provision and access mechanism are customised in a manner as mentioned above in the study village by three attributes, namely the level of need, the severity of norms, and the physical characteristics of public goods.

FormalInformal Interactions

Along with this interaction of vertical and horizontal hierarchy of needs, norms, and physical attributes, we could find another pattern evolving in the village setting, which is, the mutual impact between the government intervention and the tradition of the people.

Here, we considered government plans and services as government intervention. Every plan or service, especially of public goods, have their own goal, vision, and mission to improve the living standard of people and provide social justice for different groups. The common goal of these programmes/plans, although targeted on different social groups, which is implemented through different government agencies (state, central, and local government institutions), is social welfare and justice. Furthermore, government intervention is a formal system.

Culture, norms, tradition, practices, rules, and regulation, which are not constitutionally recognised but followed by the people, constitute the informal system. It is contextual, as some are universal or national, some of them are regional, while there are some practices followed only in a particular village.

The informal system, being the norms and culture of the people, changes the nature of government intervention (formal system). The same way the government intervention, taking the position of the formal system with a top-down approach over the people, intervene in the norms/informal system of the people. The above two systems influence the current utility status of public goods. Thus, there is a process of dialectics between the formal and informal systems in negotiation to alter each other.

The study of the evolution of graveyard, ponds, and anganwadis in the area explains the pattern mentioned above. Among these, the pond is a natural resource used by them for generations. However, the caste Hindus and Dalit community were not using the same pond for generations. The rigid cultural practices of the people from a historical perspective are visible in the usage of the pond. The study area has about 40% Dalit population and is therefore significant. During the 1990s, under the leadership of a Dalit local leader, Jagan Moorthi, there occurred a Dalit uprisal in this region that includes our study area. Hence, the politicisation of Dalits is noticeably high in the area. Moreover, the president post of the panchayat was also reserved for Dalits for a certain period and it affected the allocation of public goods too. These circumstances led to the building and management of the first anganwadi in the Dalit area.

The interview of anganwadi workers, who have been in employment for about 15 years, sheds light to the fact, that caste Hindus had hesitated to send their children to the anganwadi located in the Dalit area. Even with the constant advocacy by the workers, who were under pressure to increase the number of beneficiaries, the caste Hindus could not be convinced to send their children to the anganwadi. The employees added the names to the registry and took the beneficial supplements like food to the houses of caste Hindus as they had no other choice. The anganwadi extension plan in 2007 led to the opening of a new anganwadi in the village, that was sanctioned in the area of caste Hindus. The records of the enrolment register of anganwadis displays the fact that 100% of the beneficiaries of the respective places belong to the respective caste populated in the area. The exclusive use of ponds, which were traditionally divided by the caste, has now also been extended to the anganwadis. The cultural elements are thus twisting the nature of public goods.

However, the space where the public goods try to grab hold or influence the cultural elements is in the matter of the PDS or ration shop. The village area, with the highest number of working-class people, has a vital need for public goods. The cultural norms are adjusted and relaxed by the people to fit the nature of the public goods. In essence, the formal elements have induced a change to the informal elements in this case. This need makes the caste Hindus, who had ignored the anganwadis, to relax their cultural norms and enter the Dalit area to access the goods from the ration shops.

The graveyard situated in the outskirts of the village was used separately by the different communities for years before the government intervention. The government modernised the graveyard by building a compound and a road in the middle to ease accessibility. The people of the village used this road like a wall of separation between the communities. Furthermore, they themselves started to cremate the bodies on both sides of the roads separately. Furthermore, the government, also built two cremation stages on either side of the road for both the communities separately, thus letting the caste difference stay in place.

However, the schools in the area are limited, and the economic condition of people does not allow them to afford private schools. Hence, the people who are hesitant to relax their cultural elements for cremation use the same school out of choice. Thus, we find that the formal and informal elements are trying to change one another according to their belief and comfort.

Conclusions

We could identify two patterns in the study. First, is that the vertical and horizontal hierarchy of the three factors, namely needs, norms, and physical attributes of the public goods, interact with each other in the process of decision-making of an individual to access the public goods. Furthermore, there is an evolution observed between the informal system like norms or practices and the formal system of government intervention, policies, and services. Both impact each other, thus influencing the nature of one another. Some of this interaction results in the exclusion of specific social groups and reduce the utilisation of public goods. Some of them result in harmony between the social groups and increase the utilisation of public goods.

Hence, contextual understanding of these patterns is required for a policymaker at any level to ensure that the public goods reach the end beneficiary. The efficiency of utilisation of public goods is at its best when the objectives that are framed and implemented suit the beneficiaries. The lack of contextual knowledge about the village compromises the ways to reach out to the target group, whereas, with contextual knowledge, the success rate of the project is most likely to be high as all areas and all ways to reach out are covered.

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Tajima, Y, K Samphantharak and K Ostwald (2018): Ethnic Segregation and Public Goods: Evidence from Indonesia, American Political Science Review, Vol 112, No 3, pp 63753.
One of the lesser discussed health-related issues concerns the sexual and reproductive health (SRH) of women in Bihar. SRH indicates

a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity, in all matters relating to the reproductive system and to its functions and processes. (WHO 2010: 4)

This definition of SRH moves beyond physical health, includes the right to healthy, respectful relationships as well as the right of access to health services. In the recent past, it has been argued that sexual health is not the only component of reproductive health, and in fact, several other important social and institutional determinants affect SRH significantly (Malarcher 2010; UNPF 2019).

The social and institutional determinants which affect SRH include aspects of laws, public policies and human rights; educationthat intends to end discrimination, gender bias and stigma, by providing appropriate knowledge and understanding about sex and related aspects; society and culture, that is, the notion of gender as a social construct and the different associated roles, responsibilities and expectations among men and women in a traditional society, and how these different roles create unequal access to resources and power relations, which greatly impact womens SRH; the economy, and how poverty and economic inequality are intricately linked to poor SRH where, often these links operate in both directions, that is, the poor, vulnerable and marginalised people experience worse SRH, but also that poor SRH itself contributes to poverty; and health systems and the need to bring in affordable, extensive, integrated and comprehensive healthcare systems to fight against ill health and poor SRH (WHO 2010). These social and institutional determinants, at different stages of life, critically affect womens SRH, including menstruation, fertility, use of contraception, pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), infections, other chronic health problems and menopause.

The NITI Aayog (2019) under the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), includes 17 indicators/goals to assess womens overall health conditions, which includes no poverty, zero hunger, good health and well-being, quality education and gender equality. If we take the issue of good health and well-being (SDG3), Bihar was among the worst performing states and was placed third from the bottom (the last two being Uttar Pradesh and Nagaland) (NITI Aayog 2019). In this context, the status of health and well-being, especially the reproductive health of women in Bihar, deserves

urgent attention.

Reproductive Health Status

To provide a glimpse into the situation of womens reproductive health in Bihar, we have taken the fourth and fifth rounds of the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) data for which surveys were conducted during 201516 and 201920, respectively.

Early marriage and fertility: Marriage of a woman, before the legal age, significantly influences not just fertility, but also raises serious health concerns. Various social determinants contribute to early marriage, such as poverty, lack of education, gender inequality and patriarchy, traditional perceptions regarding unmarried womens insecurity in the society, financial insecurity as well as the failure to enforce the legal age of marriage strictly, owing to the reluctance on the part of authorities, as well as societal complicity. In Bihar, more than 40% women get married before the age of 18 years (Table 1, p 18). Among the 1519 age group, 12.2% women in Bihar were already mothers or pregnant in 201516, which slightly declined to 11% in 201920. Marriage at an early age, increases the total reproductive span which gets reflected in a higher total fertility rate (TFR) of women. The TFR per woman in Bihar was 3.4 in 201516, though it declined to three in 201920, but was still the highest among all the states in India.

Maternal health: Maternal health is also considered as an important aspect of reproductive health. Data on antenatal check-ups availed by women in Bihar during their entire pregnancy period show that there was improvement in these check-ups in 201920 compared to 201516, although even now almost half of the pregnant women do not avail

antenatal check-ups in the first trimester, and 75% women do not avail the necessary four antenatal check-ups1 during their entire period of pregnancy (Table 1). The NFHS data for Bihar show that around 58.3% pregnant women were anaemic in 201516, which further increased to 63.1% in 201920. These anaemic pregnant women should have been prescribed iron and folic acid tablets but around 75%80% of these women, in both the rural and urban areas, could not get these folic acid tablets to consume in 201920 (Table 1). It is also evident that in 201920, as compared to the 201516 level, there was a slight decline in the proportion of pregnant women in both rural and urban Bihar who were inoculated against neonatal tetanus. Postnatal care (care given to mother and her newborn immediately after birth and for the first six weeks of life) has increased from 52.6% to 62.6% in urban areas, whereas this has increased from 41.1% to 56.5% in rural areas, for two consecutive NFHS rounds, respectively. Despite this increase, the data also reflects that more than 40% women who became mothers are not attended by doctors, nurses, auxiliary nursing midwives (ANMs) or any other health personnel.

Not having proper maternity care results in higher maternal mortality.2 It is a bare fact that an astonishingly higher number of women in the reproductive age span die due to complications during and following pregnancy, childbirth or abortion. According to the Registrar Generals Sample Registration System3 (SRS) data, the maternal mortality rate (MMR) per 1,00,000 live births in Bihar was 149 in 201618, which was much higher than the national average of 113. The United Nations SDGs, however, aim to reduce the MMR below 70 per 1,00,000 live births. However, early marriage, longer reproductive period and higher TFR, quite often bring unwanted complications during and post pregnancy, which cause a higher MMR. In a state like Bihar where institutional health facilities are insufficient, healthcare unawareness is rampant, and insufficient nutrition and negligence in treatment are common, high rates of MMR are a stark reality.

Delivery care: Institutional care at birth and delivery by skilled birth attendants (SBAs) reduces the risk of maternal and neonatal deaths caused by prematurity, intra-partum (the period from the onset of labour to the end of the third stage of labour) and post-partum (first 6 to 12 hours after delivery) complications (Joe et al 2018). The NFHS data show that the share of institutional births has increased in Bihar from 63.8% in 201516 to 76.2% in 201920, but it also reflects that around one-fourth of the remaining deliveries do not take place under institutional care. Of the total institutional births, around 47.6% took place in public health facilities in 201516, which increased to 56.9% in 201920 (Table 2, p 19). The rest of the institutional births took place in private healthcare facilities. Around 70% to 80% of the total births in Bihar were assisted by doctors, nurses, ANMs and other health personnel. But, around one-fourth of the total births took place in non-institutional facilities, like the home. Of the total births that took place in non-institutional facilities, 6% were assisted by skilled health personnel like nurses and midwives.

A significant proportion of births were taking place through caesarean section. Of the total births, around 6.2% was through caesarean section in 201516, which increased to 9.7% in 201920. Of the total caesarean section births in 201920, a contrasting higher percentage (39.6%) took place in private health facilities in comparison to public health facilities (3.6%) (Table 2). Though, caesarean section births can prevent maternal and perinatal mortality and morbidity, however, there is sufficient evidence to suggest that if proper procedures4 are not followed, caesarean section also has short- and long-term risks, mainly higher MMR and IMR, ureteral injury, vaginal bleeding, abdominal pain and neonatal respiratory morbidity, etc, which may affect the health of the woman, her child and future pregnancies (WHO 2015). The political economy of caesarean section births shows that women of the economically well-off families prefer to go to private hospitals (Golandaj and Hallad 2019). An analysis of deliveries by the wealth index in India for 200506 shows that 26% women from richer families undergo caesarean section, while for the poor women, this rate was merely 1.5%. These figures are also a reflection of the incessant trend of privatisation and commercialisation of medical facilities (Ghosh 2010).

Out-of-pocket expenditure: Due to insufficient health infrastructure at public healthcare facilities, pregnant women are forced to go to private healthcare facilities and incur higher expenditure on ultrasonography, blood tests medicines and for caesarean section. The average out-of-pocket expenditure (OOPE) per delivery in a public health facility was `1,784 in 201516, which increased to `2,848 in 201920, a rise of 60% in just four years (Table 2). The OOPE per delivery in a public health facility increased around 56% in rural areas, whereas in urban areas, it increased by 91% in the same period. For the fourth round of NFHS (201516), the average OOPE per birth in private facilities was `10,638 and `12,303 for urban and rural areas, respectively. The OOPE indicate that per delivery, women who prefer or are forced to go to private health facilities end up paying a higher amount than what they would pay in public health facilities.

Family planning: Female sterilisation which increased from 20.7% in 201516 to 34.8% in 201920 was the most highly adopted method for family planning (Table 2). On the other hand, male sterilisation in the same period was almost insignificant. This reflects societal behaviour that places the burden of family planning on women (Rathi and Tandon 2019). Other important methods of family planning like intrauterine device (IUD) or postpartum intrauterine contraceptive devices (PPIUCD), pills, condoms and injectables are also used, but the data shows that its use is not so common in Bihar.

Nutritional indicators: Access to nutritious food is a very basic human right, as well as one of the social determinants of SRH. If pregnant women face conditions of malnutrition, it might cause them serious health issues like maternal mortality, severe bleeding, infections and diseases, anaemia, giving birth to underweight child, etc. The body mass index (BMI) which indirectly signifies condition of food insecurity and malnutrition shows that at least one in four women has a lesser BMI than normal in 201920 in Bihar (Table 2). A large proportion (63.5%) of pregnant women in the age group of 1549 years are anaemic. A lower BMI and severe conditions of anaemia are a reflection of lower access to nutritious food for women in Bihar. There is emphatic evidence of household-level distributive inequality in food and nutrition security even when women bear higher work responsibilities in the family (Parthasarthy and Choudhary 2007). Even in absolute terms, there are studies which show that a major proportion of people do not consume the mandatory standard of per day calorie consumption. An estimate suggests that 70% to 80% of the rural and urban population were not fulfilling the mandatory calories per capita per day norm in 201112 (Ram 2017). Therefore, lesser access to minimum mandatory calorie norms pushes women to be exposed to lower BMI, become anaemic as well as making them prone to other diseases, resulting in overall poor reproductive health.

Health Expenditure in Bihar

As shown, OOPE in a private facility per delivery in Bihar is several times higher than in a public health facility. Such a scenario demands better and adequate public healthcare facilities. This is intricately linked to womens access to better healthcare, and more importantly, more robust SRH outcomes.

The precarious condition of public health services in Bihar as well as throughout India can be understood with the fact that per capita real expenditure on these health services is very low. In 200506, the union government was spending `84.3 per capita (in real terms) on health services, whereas the same was `108.9 in Bihar. In the next one and half decades, the union governments expenditure was just `253.4, and Bihars expenditure was `427.3. The combined union and states real expenditure on public health services was `234.6 per capita, which in 201920 was merely `972.4 per capita (Figure 1, p 20).

Such low levels of public expenditure push the public to incur out-of-pocket (OOP) health expenditure to access health services in the private sector, where they are forced to pay higher costs for treatment and care. According to World Bank estimates, this OOP health expenditure constitutes around 62%65% of the total health expenditure in 201518 in India (World Bank 2020). There is a need to increase public health expenditure. Otherwise, such a high proportion of OOP health expenditure may reduce spending on food, education and other basic necessities, creating nutritional and other vulnerabilities as well as resulting in a limited capacity to afford quality healthcare leading to various diseases and morbidities (Ram 2019). In fact, an analysis of the impact of OOP health expenditure on poverty estimates in India (through unit-level data of National Sample Survey Office from 199394 to 201112) shows that due to increasing OOP health expenditure, the poverty ratio has gone up roughly around 4.5%5% in rural areas and 2.5%3% in urban areas (Ram 2019).

Conclusions

Social and institutional determinants play a vital role in womens precarious SRH. The NFHS data show that a higher proportion of women in the age group of 1549 years are anaemic, do not visit a doctor during pregnancy, do not consume iron and folic acid tablets, a significant proportion of mothers are not attended by midwives, ANMs and doctors, face problems of lower BMIs due to nutritional disparity and largely bear the burden to avoid pregnancy through sterilisation. Social determinants like gender discrimination, code of conduct forced on women under a patriarchal social structure, lesser asset holdings, poverty, less education among women and prevalent cultural norms, etc, affect the SRH adversely. Women, especially those in the reproductive age, do not have access to better health facilities owing to the precariously low real public healthcare expenditure by the central and state governments. This low public expenditure on health in Bihar in the last many decades has resulted in a weak public health infrastructure (Kumar and Kumar 2020), forcing people to avail private health facilities where they are made to pay several times more than what they pay in the public health facilities. The government clearly needs to spend more on health services, both on infrastructure in rural areas to provide better health facilities to women, and to spend more on free medicines/inoculations and other health necessities to cut the OOP health expenditure, to ensure better SRH outcomes for women.

Notes

1 For effective maternal health interventions during the antenatal period, it is necessary for pregnant women to receive antenatal care at least four times. It is one of the indicators in the Global Strategy for Womens, Childrens and Adolescents Health (201630) Monitoring Framework and is a part of universal health coverage under the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

2 As per the WHO, if a woman during pregnancy or within 42 days of termination of pregnancy, irrespective of the period or site of the pregnancy, from any cause related to or aggravated by the pregnancy or its management, but not from accidental or incidental causes, dies is reported as maternal mortality.

3 The registration of births and deaths in India is known as Sample Registration System (SRS). It was initiated by the Office of Registrar General, India in 196465 on a pilot basis and on full scale from 196970.

4 For caesarean section births, a proper procedure is required to be followed. Many a times, in the rural and distant areas, due to unavailability of skilled birth attendants (SBAs), not having proper hygiene in the OT and faulty use of caesarean equipment, birth through caesarean section can cause fatal injuries to a woman and her newborn.

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Muzaffarnagar, a district town in Uttar Pradesh (UP), recently witnessed the Samyukt Kisan Morchas mahapanchayat, where reports suggest that between 1 lakh and 4 lakh farmers came together in one of the single largest gatherings since the farmers protests took centre stage in 2020. This also follows the recent brutal lathicharge in Karnal, Haryana against farmers who were protesting a public visit by the states chief minister. For the last nine months, the farmers remain steadfast in their call to repeal the three farm acts passed by Parliament in September 2020. Despite 10 rounds of talks with the farmers, the government appears to be content in letting the agitation fade away, unwilling to accept any call for repeal, instead offering a pale compromise through specific amendments to the laws. However, the massive turnout at the mahapanchayat indicates that the momentum has not waned, and with the elections in UP due in 2022, this show of strength assumes significance. Farmers from west UP, Punjab, Haryana, and Rajasthan, along with representatives from other states, have announced a Bharat bandh on 27 September and an aggressive campaign to publicise their demands at the district level across the country. How this nationwide campaign will turn out is difficult to gauge owing to the current uncertainty on the pan-national character of the farmers movement; but the direct announcement of the Mission UPUttarakhand directed at ousting the incumbent Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government, especially in UP in 2022, demands attention.

The Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) in UP, led by Rakesh Tikait who has been the face of the current protests, is primarily concentrated in the Jat-dominated sugar belt in west UP, in the districts adjoining Delhi. The infrastructure of agricultural markets and state procurement in west UP is not as elaborate as in Punjab and Haryana, and farmers are forced to take their wheat produce across the Yamuna into Haryana to claim minimum support price (MSP). Unlike the MSP, sugar grown in this region is procured by the state government on a fixed price based on the fair and remunerative price set by the union government, which leaves farmers dependent on the vagaries of sugar prices in the market. Hence, many farmers in the region have suffered due to unpaid dues from sugar cane mills. Further, under the current state government, farm electricity rates have seen a massive spike that has hurt households.

Therefore, the demand to repeal these laws comes from a genuine thrust to expand the MSP regime as well as alleviate rural distress and articulate a grammar of resistance that resonates with the electorate. This is required to tap into areas beyond west UP, mainly central and east UP, as well as marginalised social groups within west UP who have historically been agrarian workers. The integration of the agrarian workforce into the movement has been incomplete and fragmented, and caste and religion seem to complicate this further. Interestingly, immediately after the mahapanchayat, the state government in coordination with the union government announced a pilot scheme for a farmers database to coordinate immediate welfare benefits for farmers. How will this be taken forth, and who will benefit? In fact, this raises the question of how these farmers protests reveal a diverse set of contextual demands that seem to emerge as different states go in for elections.

The mahapanchayat also saw calls for communal and social harmony with slogans of different religions being raised, with the local leadership aware of the need to showcase a broader social unity considering the looming memory of the tragic Muzaffarnagar riots of 2013. In fact, one of the prominent Muslim leaders of the farmers movement addressed the gathering which is seen as portraying a spirit of reconciliation and unity. Irrespective of whether this strong anti-communal stance will bring together the Muslim vote, one cannot exclude the need to acknowledge the deeply divided caste and socio-economic profile in the region and how it underlines who suffered most during the riots.

Notwithstanding these generous overtures, the electoral arithmetic as projected seems to focus on ensuring a consolidated Jat vote in the elections. The Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) has been trying to take the mantle of this leadership and have supported successive mahapanchayats. In fact, the first meeting for reconciliation under a call for bhaichara (brotherhood) was overseen by the late Ajit Singh of the RLD. However, if the task is to challenge the social calculus that the BJP has stitched over the last few elections, both the BKU and the RLD would need to manage and harness non-Jat communities to rally around a possible Jat consolidation which entails reaching out to Dalits and backward castes.

The slogans and momentum that the mahapanchayat generates need to be recognised. The call for farmers unity that has sustained at the protest sites at the Delhi border points at a steadfastness in retaining the momentum of the existing protest. Engaging in a direct political contest is ripe with possibilities. There is an obvious clamour and scrutiny as regards these developments. What does the entry of farmers groups into the political game in UP entail? And, whether this would mean a direct political entry or else which political forces will they rally behind? If the horrors of the 2013 riots are an indication of this deeply challenging situation, there is now an overtly communal political dispensation ruling the state. Any attempt at covering this communal and caste divide needs to acknowledge a politics of deliberation and accommodation. Recognition of fissures is as much a part of such political moves as showcasing unity. The announcement by the mahapanchayat will seek to balance this, and the coming days will give us a sense of how this will unfold.
In April 2018, I was invited to the University of Rajshahi, Bangladesh, to deliver a talk at an international seminar on the Bangladesh Liberation War. While preparing for the talk, as an Indian youth born 15 years after the war in a village near Indias border with Bangladesh, I wondered what qualified me to speak on the war and that too in Bangladesh.

I learnt from my father that my grandfather, along with his elder brothers, came to Nadia district in India from Kushtia district in present-day Bangladesh in the early 1940s, a few years before partition. Interestingly, pre-partition Kushtia was a small mufassal town in Nadia district; that means, my ancestors moved from one mufassal to another within the same district. But what was the rationale behind this? My grandfathers elder brother, who was a village priest, came to know that the country would be divided soon and the river that flowed through their village would be considered the border for HindustanPakistan. However, the joint chairperson of the two boundary commissions, Cyril Radcliffes pencil mood did not draw the line on the paper map the way that my ancestor had conceived the desh. And so, my ancestors found shelter and peace from the anticipated disturbances of partition in the same district, walking just a few miles after crossing the river. Incidentally, they found a Muslim family afraid of the same. And so, both these families engaged in binimay (exchange) of their property and rebuilt their lives on opposite sides of the river.

In popular narratives of partition, people originally from West Bengal are called Ghati and those from East Bengal, now settled in West Bengal, are called Bangal. This GhatiBangal discourse is dominant in defining urban Bengali culture, but for some reason my family never subscribed to it. Nor did they consciously believe that they were part of partition. However, words and phrases that referred to partition moved around in family stories about our East Bengal roots: HindustanPakistan, otha-pada (displaced from one place and settled in another) and binimay (exchange of residential property).

But it wasnt only our family. There are many people from either side of the border, who found their motherland in India and related emotionally to being Indian, who do not subscribe to grand narratives of partition. This is, perhaps, because of three critical and interesting aspects of their immediate political history: one, their movement within the same district (Nadia); two, their willing and voluntary displacement before the formal partition; and three, the undefined and undecided nature of Nadia district for twothree days in independent India. Nadia became a part of India between 17 and 18 August 1947, and Kushtia became an independent district in East Pakistan.

In 1971, during the Bangladesh Liberation War, many people left East Bengal and ran towards India. In the words of my father, They were running so fast and so desperately that it seemed their legs were always in the air, not touching the road. Many of them died on the way. The military brought all the dead bodies to a designated place near our village for mass burial. Despite such a large number of burials, we never heard any ghost stories in the 50 years since then. Perhaps even ghosts and ghost stories need a kind of attachment with the storytellers for stories of their life or death to be told, which these unidentified refugee bodies couldnt claim.

All these years later, while describing the war and the life of the refugees, my grandmother still gets emotional. She remembers the many young girls who were quickly sent to relatives on this side of the border as a safe home until they got married. She tells me of a young girl from Bangladesh who wept endlessly when her parents went back to Bangladesh after seeing her off. And my grandmother, between tears, tells me: I used to lament that she does not have parents in spite of having parents.

At the time of the war, the Indian Army installed a cannon in the yard of our house. Once the independent Bangladesh was announced, my father and his friends set off on bicycles to see the new country, only to see broken bridges, gun-powder, and used cartridges all the way. Once they reached the place that my grandfather left a few decades ago, they were welcomed by the locals who offered them food and great hospitality. My father was astonished when some Muslim neighbours said to him, Let me offer a pranam to you. You are from the land of the Ganga. If I offer a pranam to you, I also will find the Ganga after my death. Here was a rooted cultural syncretism that surprised the urban, university-educated me.

After the war, the cannon in our yard was removed and in its place came up a new jackfruit treethe playground of my childhood. It was said that the road that goes through our village was built by a chandal, an untouchable, as a challenge to the upper castes; this way, they could not escape his touch, so to speak, every time they used the road. An old mango tree acted as a milestone or road marker with its shed and came to be known as Nambari-Amtala (marked mango tree shed). This road goes straight to Bangladesh, to the Meherpur subdivisionthe same subdivision that our mufassil was in the pre-partition era. As a child, I would accompany my grandfather on his morning walks along this road. I cant help but wonder if he thought Ah! I wont be permitted to go any further! after a few kilometres, when we approached the border.

Sometimes, an old sweet seller would sell sweets in our pada or mahalla, with two handis hanging on either end of a bamboo stick carried on his shoulders. One hundi with rasgulla and the other with gulab jamun. We penniless children would ask him for sweets, but instead were treated to a performance of war. The sweet-dadu, as we referred to him, had a permanent wound on his right leg, which made him dependent on a walking stick. He would put the bamboo stick with the hundis on the ground, turn the walking stick in his other hand into a rifle, and run around in circles, uttering war cries against Pakistani sena and singing war songs as we stared at him in silence, transfixed. Young and not entirely sure of what was going on, we still understood the emotion or rasa of the performance, and later learnt that he was a soldier who fought in the Bangladesh Liberation War.

Every year since 2000, International Mother Language Day21 Februaryis remembered as a tribute to those martyred during the Bengali language movement in 1952 in Dhaka. Language identity on either side of the border is closely associated with a secular love for the desh. Some years ago, as if we unknowingly anticipated the Hindutva political wave that would soon engulf India, many of us Bengalis, staying outside of West Bengal, felt the need to promote this ethos of love towards ones bhasha and desh, locating it above any narrow vision of caste, religion, or communal hatred.

The renowned revolutionary Bengali poet, Subhash Mukhopadhyay, wrote in a personal essay entitled Bhoy Nei (Kshama Nei, 1971) that we will win the revolution in Bangladesh too, as we have in North Vietnam and the Soviet Union too. This we were the people, the international redefined beyond narrow national borders. And Mukhopadhyay was absolutely right. Revolution is like a record, and its resonance continues to resound in different modes and manners in the hearts of people well into the future. As we stand at the threshold of 50 years since the formation of Bangladesh, we must dwell on what it means to us as Indians. In the grand narratives of history, the contributions of thousands of ordinary Indians might seem insignificant, but we must not let our micro histories be swallowed by larger narratives written by those in power. Our parents and grandparents are great storytellers and have stories of our history. As academics and conscientious citizens, we must learn to listen to them and weave nuanced historical narratives.

Neither my father nor I was craving a trip down memory lane, but his timely realisation that he has something worthy to share with his highly educated son, in turn, made me realise that our small voices of history, to borrow from Ranajit Guha, are importantthat mere displacement cannot make us departed.
As the global population ages, the provision of focused health services for older persons has become integral to broader development goals. This is especially so in the case of low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) that face the demographic challenge of an ageing population caused by increasing life expectancies and low fertility rates. The health and economic burden of chronic diseases among the ageing population further exacerbate these needs, creating new demands on healthcare systems, communities, and families. Older persons1 have complex health needs that necessitate planning integrated care interventions that provide a continuum of care. The World Health Organization (WHO), in the World Report on Ageing and Health (2015), recommends building an age-friendly world and transitioning health systems from curative models to integrated care that is centred on the needs of older persons. The WHO defines integrated care as

health services that are managed and delivered in a way that ensures people receive a continuum of health promotion, disease prevention, diagnosis, treatment, disease management, rehabilitation and palliative care services, at the different levels and sites of care within the health system, and according to their needs, throughout their whole life. (WHO 2016: 2)

Even in high-income countries, there is a lack of integrated care for older persons, and the situation is even worse in low-income and resource-poor countries that have limited healthcare capacities. Health services for older persons are mostly focused on disease-specific interventions rather than the management of complex needs in an integrated way, which is crucial for maintaining their functional ability and dignity.

Expanding on the WHOs guidelines on integrated care for older persons, Araujo de Carvalho et al (2017) observe that care can be integrated at three levelsthe macro (systems or policy and sectoral) level; meso (organisational or service delivery) level; and the micro (clinical or interventional) level. At the macro level, policies on financing should be aligned with the goals of universal health coverage.2 Joint funding across the health and social care sectors could help ensure coordination and efficiency, which is important for older person care. At the meso level, service delivery for older persons requires a multidisciplinary health workforce with the requisite skills and competencies and oriented towards geriatric care and deployed in a manner consistent with the objective of providing person-centred, integrated care for older persons. It also requires organising and sharing information and data across levels of care and providing healthcare infrastructure, technology, essential medicines, and assistive devices that are accessible and age-friendly. The micro level of clinical care for older persons should include comprehensive assessments; a common treatment or care goal based on the individuals capacity and functional ability; and a care plan that is shared by all care providers (Araujo de Carvalho et al 2017). Given the heterogeneity of contexts, needs, and interventions, there is no singular model of integrated care for older persons. There are various pathways through which integration might be imagined, implemented, and achieved.

This scoping review provides an overview of the available research on the extent of integration of health services for older persons in urban contexts in India and identifies gaps in this integration. The urban context is important due to the rapid urbanisation of LMICs and the increasing number of older persons in urban areas who require organised health services to address their needs. Further, primary healthcare tends to be less developed in urban settings than in rural areas globally. In response to these needs, many innovative practices and new experimental initiatives have emerged in social service delivery; thus, the urban focus provides a good vantage point to identify and analyse these emerging best practices. Our review provides a macro picture of the epidemiological and demographic profiles of older persons in India; policies and programmes that aim to integrate health services; health service arrangements; and policy recommendations.

Methodology

The scoping review maps the available studies and grey literature. We performed a systematic search using three databasesPubMed, JSTOR, and Google Scholarfor published articles and books. For the grey literature, we focused largely on reports and monographs by national and international agencies, including the WHO, World Bank, Asian Development Bank (ADB), United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), the media, and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). Our inclusion criteria were English-language articles/reports specific to India published during 200919 that referred to the 60+ years population and discussed varied aspects of care and the role of various stakeholders in providing healthcare for older persons in urban contexts. We excluded articles that focused on disease profiles, clinical management, and treatment protocols for older persons.

Data synthesis included qualitative assessment based on a combination of narrative synthesis and content analysis.

Context and Emerging Themes

Most of the articles we reviewed dealt with demography, epidemiology, and policies and programmes for older persons. These were all at the macro level. We also found many micro-level cross-sectional studies on care interventions for older persons. These were either specific to a health condition or an institution of care.

Epidemiological and demographic profile: The main data sets for the study were the 2011 Census (GOI 2011a); National Sample Survey (NSS) 75th Round, 201718 (GOI 2019); Sample Registration Scheme (SRS) (GOI 2013); Building a Knowledge Base on Population Ageing in India (BKPAI) by UNFPA (2012); WHOs 2013 Study on Global Ageing and Adult Health (SAGE); and the Longitudinal Aging Study in India (LASI), implemented by the International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS) (Arokiasamy et al 2012). According to the UNFPA survey (2012), the seven states in India whose share of the 60+ years population is higher than the national average are Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Maharashtra, Odisha, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, and West Bengal. On an average, these states have seen a steady increase in the percentage of older persons from 5.6% in 1961 to 8.6% in 2011. This increase in the proportion of older persons is true for both rural and urban areas across the seven states. Kerala has the highest proportion of older persons in the country at 12.6%, followed by Tamil Nadu, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, and Maharashtra at around 10% each (UNFPA 2012).

In India, life expectancy at birth is higher for women and, therefore, the proportion of women among older persons is higher. The age-specific death rate (per 1,000) of older persons steadily increases with age and is highest for the 85+ years age group. The death rate is also considerably lower for women than for men and is higher in rural than in urban areas (GOI 2013). A majority of older persons fall in the young and middle categories, across the categories of young (6574 years), middle (7584 years) and old (85+ years) (UNFPA 2012).

The major cause of death among older persons in India is non-communicable diseases (NCDs), including heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes, and cognitive impairments. The major diseases prevalent in the country among older persons include hypertension, cardiovascular diseases, asthma, diabetes, stroke, chronic lung disease, cataracts, and depression (WHO 2013). Commonly self-reported morbidities and chronic illnesses in urban areas include heart disease, followed by urinary problems, cancer, hypertension, and diabetes. Among men, the most prevalent chronic illnesses are heart disease, urinary problems, and diabetes. In the case of women, heart disease, hypertension, and joint problems are chronic illnesses. Studies have found that the prevalence of cancer is equal among both men and women in the older population (GOI 2019). Given the high morbidities due to chronic illnesses, with an increase in age, there is also a higher prevalence of disabilities. Surprisingly, the prevalence of disabilities is highest among the youngest old category (6069 years) and gradually decreases with age. Among this cohort in urban areas, locomotor disabilities are most common, followed by visual disabilities. However, in the 8089 years age group, locomotor disabilities are followed by speech disabilities and then visual disabilities. In the 90+ age group, speech disabilities are the most common, followed by locomotor disabilities. In this age group, visual and multiple disabilities are equally common (GOI 2011a).

The WHO (2013) SAGE survey highlights that a fairly significant percentage of older persons living with stroke, lung disease, arthritis, and cardiovascular disease have unmet needs in terms of health services. In a highly unequal society like India, these unmet needs vary across social groups and wealth quintiles. Those belonging to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and lower wealth quintiles have more significant unmet needs both in terms of preventive and curative services. Indeed, age, class, caste, gender, ethnicity, education, marital status, support networks, and living arrangements all have a bearing on older persons healthcare access (Alam et al 2015; Smith and Majumdar 2012; High Level Expert Group [HLEG] Report 2011).

The UNFPA survey provides insights on older persons access to and utilisation of health services for acute (communicable and non-communicable diseases) and chronic morbidities. Notably, over 90.9% of older persons undergo treatment for acute morbidity. Gender and place of residence are not significant as far as treatment-seeking behaviour is concerned. It also found that the proportion of older persons seeking treatment is more or less evenly distributed between public (41.1%) and private facilities (39.7%). Further, it found that a greater share of older persons from rural areas prefer to seek treatment from public facilities (42.5%) than urban older persons (36.1%).

The survey also sought to empirically explain why some older persons did not seek treatment for acute morbidities. It found that, overall, financial insecurity was the most commonly reported reason (55.1%) for not seeking treatment, followed by the belief that the ailment was not serious (24.5%) and a lack of facilities (10.7%). It also found that in urban areas, the most prominent reason why older persons did not seek care was that they considered their ailment not serious (42.9%) followed by financial insecurities (30%). The survey also revealed that common chronic ailments like arthritis, hypertension, and cataracts were more prevalent among older women than older men, while the reverse was true for asthma and heart disease. Older persons in urban areas reported a higher prevalence of common lifestyle diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, and heart disease.

Most older persons had sought treatment for common chronic ailments other than cataracts, which was relatively less common, with 43.9% of older persons stating that they had sought treatment for the ailment. The survey found that treatment-seeking behaviour was marginally more common in urban areas than in rural areas. It was more prevalent among men with heart disease (90.7%) and arthritis (76.1%) and marginally more among women with hypertension, cataract, and diabetes. For asthma, rates of treatment-seeking were similar for both men and women. Older persons in India with chronic illnesses largely preferred private hospitals. However, financial insecurity was found to be a major impediment to treatment-seeking for all diseases except cataracts and asthma, for which improvement in the condition was the reason they did not seek treatment.

The LASI pilot study, which focused on the well-being of ageing Indians, reported that a large number of older persons live with undiagnosed hypertension. It also examined socio-economic gradients across a variety of health domains, including self-rated health, disability, and cognitive functioning. It showed that a significant proportion of older persons lived in households with no access to running water and proper sewer systems. Further, older persons who were poor, uneducated, and had poor access to healthcare under-reported health conditions that did not seem severe. The studys findings also showed that poor older persons were dependent on their family for support, because of complex medical needs and low income (Arokiasamy et al 2012).

Expenditures incurred on health by older persons: What emerges from the UNFPA survey and the 75th round of the NSS (GOI 2019) is that older persons incur high out-of-pocket (OOP) expenditures due to both acute and chronic morbidities. The 42nd, 52nd, 60th, and 75th rounds of the NSS show that an increasing number of older persons are using private/non-governmental services over public health services, both for hospitalisation and outpatient care (GOI 1987, 1998, 2006, 2019). The high costs associated with healthcare put individuals at risk of slipping below the poverty line (BPL) after hospitalisation. This risk is greater among older persons because of the high cost of treating multi-morbidities and the complexity of the health problems that are typically associated with old age. Figure 1 shows that the proportion of ailing persons is higher in urban areas, which increases with age. Figure 2 shows a high reliance on inpatient care, more so among men than women, and which increases in prevalence with age. For out-patient care too, utilisation is higher in urban areas and increases with age.

The health systems response falls short of the health and medical care needs of older persons at the primary, secondary, and tertiary levels (HLEG Report 2011). Over 83% of healthcare expenditure in India is private OOP spending. The risk of this high expenditure becomes clear when OOP expenditure for healthcare is juxtaposed with the economic instability of older persons. A study by Mohanty et al (2014) showed that the monthly per capita health spending of households with older persons is 3.8 times higher than that of households without older persons. For households made of only older persons, health spending accounted for 13% of the total consumption expenditure, while this reduced to 7% for households with a combination of older and non-older persons. It further dropped to 5% among households without older persons. It is well known that inpatient care results in a greater income loss for older persons belonging to poorer households (Loutfi et al 2018). Evidence from a study on insurance and OOP expenditure indicates that if OOP payments for medicine and outpatient care were not included, only 0.5% of people would fall into the poverty trap due to health spending (Shahrawat and Rao 2011).

Falls and diabetes among older persons: Several microstudies specific to falls and diabetes emerged in our review. Here, we present our broad findings from these.

Falls: Falls are emerging as a significant public health problem with an increase in age. Studies indicate that cohort studies need to be conducted on sufficiently larger samples to better estimate the burden and risk factors for fall-related injuries. Social- and health-related quality-of-life outcomes for falls should be investigated to determine their true socio-economic burden. Our review shows that at the macro level, as many as 30% of older persons have experienced a fall. More women report falls than men (Jamkhandi and Bhattacharji 2016). Our review suggests that there are a few cross-sectional studies that look at the epidemiology of falls in urban areas. These studies were mostly conducted in select cities in Punjab and in Delhi. These included urban centres in Ludhiana; urban slums and rural areas in Chandigarh; and old age homes in Delhi. In most cases, older persons who experienced falls had co-morbidities that may have impaired body structure and function. Further, medications used for the management of co-morbidities may have affected body balancea predisposing factor for falls. Most falls did not result in serious injury, but they had an impact on quality of life. They also resulted in post-fall syndromelack of confidence and immobility. Some falls were serious, leading to injuries, including fractures (David and Samuel 2014; Tripathy et al 2015; Jamkhandi and Bhattacharji 2016; Pathania et al 2018). People living in slums had a higher incidence of falls. The increased risk in slums and rural areas was caused by poor home environments, undernutrition, and poorer health status.

Diabetes care and management: Diabetes is a chronic condition that affects older persons daily living and increases their dependency (UNFPA 2017). NCDs like diabetes have a higher incidence in urban centres. Our review examined a few studies from India that focus on diabetes care and management in older persons to investigate the extent of integration of care. A study conducted in a poor urban neighbourhood in Bengaluru, Karnataka, captured the constraints adults faced in accessing care for type-2 diabetes. It recommends strengthening primary care services, with a special focus on improving the availability and integration of health services for diabetes at the community level to enhance patient-centredness and continuity of care. The reasons for constraints in access listed by the study include financial hardships, inadequate communication, poor attitude of health providers, and a fragmented health services system (Bhojani et al 2014). Another study on the older population in urban Mysore, Karnataka, focused on diabetes, hypertension, and the need for a continuum of care from community to health services. The prevalence of diabetes was found to be 11.2% in the older, urban southern population, higher than the average of 9.5% across regions in India (Krishnamurthy et al 2019). Public facilities often lack diagnostics and specialist services, while care in the private sector is expensive. Qualitative data from the study also revealed the fears and cultural myths that affect treatment adherence. Evidence suggests that for chronic disease control programmes to have a high impact, action is required at three levels, that is, at the level of population-wide policies, health services, and community activities, with an emphasis on community involvement and responsive health services (Krishnamurthy et al 2019). Another qualitative in-depth study illustrated the contrast between the everyday management of diabetes among two older women in Chennai. It highlighted the difference in the social and economic status of the two women and their subsequent unequal access to healthcare facilities and treatment structures and the effects of this on everyday coping. The availability of a suitable support structure was found to be an important factor in the management of the disease (Arutselvi 2018).

Programmes and Policies for Older Persons in India

Although the Integrated Programme for Older Persons began in 1992, the National Policy on Older Persons (NPOP) (1999) was the first major policy initiative to ensure the welfare and safety of older populations in India. The policy was revised in 2011 in response to emerging demographic, socio-economic, and technological trends in the country and a new draft has been submitted for finalisation. A special scheme particularly targeting health within the overall vision and domain of NPOP is the National Programme for Health Care of the Elderly (NPHCE) (GOI 2011b).

Policies and programmes in India aimed at supporting the older population are largely influenced by global discourses and international initiatives. Prominent among these are the Macau Plan for Action on Ageing for Asia and the Pacific (Macau POA 1999) by the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UN ESCAP 2016) and the Madrid International Plan of Action on Ageing (MIPAA 2002). Both these declarations have played an influential role in directing policymaking in LMICs (Shankardass 2011).

The WHO has also advocated for providing integrated services for older persons with the 2015 World Report on Ageing and Health detailing evidence-based guidelines for integrated care for older people (ICOPE). The ICOPE guidelines support the WHOs core objective of aligning health systems to the needs of older populations and have been adopted by policies in LMICs in Asia (WHO 2017: 13).

Health Service Arrangements in India

National sample surveys on the utilisation of health services for acute and chronic morbidities in India suggest a high level of unmet healthcare needs (GOI 2006, 2019). These are related to the lack of availability, accessibility, and affordability. World over, and particularly in LMICs, healthcare services are inadequate and often not congruent with the felt needs of older persons (WHO 2015). Indias public sector healthcare system largely focuses on curative care with limited preventive, promotive, and rehabilitative care.

Private healthcare services have been proliferating in India over the last few decades. During 201718, nearly three-quarters of ailments in urban areas (71.6%) were treated in the private sector, which includes private hospitals and individual practitioners, while in rural areas, only 62.2% were treated in the private sector, as shown in Figure 3. The UNFPA BKPAI study indicated a similar resultonly a quarter of older persons in India seek medical care for diseases, such as hypertension, diabetes, and asthma at public sector institutions, while a higher proportion of older persons seek healthcare for other diseases (42% for cataract and 30% for arthritis) from public sector institutions; the report further shows that these diseases are more prevalent among older persons in urban areas (UNFPA 2012).

There are several reasons for the lack of access to healthcare. The most significant are economic unaffordability, infrastructure inadequacies, and had unsatisfactory experience with healthcare facilities. These hamper healthcare access for older persons in low- and middle-income settings, as shown in Table 1.

Table 1 shows the shortfall in infrastructure and human resources dedicated to the care of older persons in public healthcare services (NITI Aayog 2019; UNESCAP 2016). For instance, information from geriatric centres based on affidavits filed by HelpAge International indicate that 12 states in India have less than 10 geriatric beds per district, and six states/union territories have 10 beds per district (HelpAge India 2018).

In the private health sector in India, dedicated services for older persons are rare. One reason for this is that older patients require longer hospital stays. Due to the higher costs associated with patient care in the private sector, older patients are often discharged before full recovery from private hospitals. In contrast, public and not-for-profit hospitals are usually under no such pressure to discharge patients quickly, and thus older patients prefer these if they can access them (UNESCAP 2016).

A study in Ranga Reddy district, an urbanising rural area in Telangana, observed that frailty, lack of transport, and dependence on others are factors that impact older persons healthcare access (Bhan et al 2017). The study found that older persons perceived existing public health systems as overburdened and insensitive towards them. The study offers recommendations to strengthen the health services infrastructure in India, with a particular focus on integrating outreach services and lifestyle counselling with programmes for the care of older persons. It also recommends that community institutions play a more prominent role in health and social services delivery among older persons. It proposed that further research on the multidimensional influences of urbanisation on the health and well-being of older persons is required to design effective social policy interventions (Bhan et al 2017).

A study sponsored by the Indian Council on Medical Research (ICMR) at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, revealed that 70% of patients died after receiving emergency care at home. This finding highlights the importance of follow-up care at home for older persons after they are discharged from the hospital (ICMR 2013). Institutional long-term care is virtually non-existent in India due to cultural and economic factors. In India, intergenerational relationships and care of ailing memberswhich are considered private issuesare generally kept within the confines of the family. Thus, long-term care is mostly home-based. The family, with or without paid help, provides physical care, whereas the local health provider is the main source of medical care at the community level (ICMR 2013).

Discussion

Our scoping review provides insights into the state of knowledge on the integration of health services; it does this by examining the demographic and epidemiological profiles of older persons in India and the policies, programmes, and health services available to them. It has also identified many research gaps in this important field. We demonstrate the dominance of reports published by national and international agencies. Most of these reports draw upon big data sets to analyse the demographic and epidemiological status of older persons in India. The major data sets that pertain to older persons in India include the WHO, SAGE, UNFPA BKPAI, and NSS data sets; studies employing these have analysed the relationship between socio-economic conditions, morbidities, and health service utilisation. There are a few independent studies that have dissected the big data to understand the interaction and intersection of socio-economic variables, health experiences, and gaps in health service integration. Big data provide ample evidence of how social and economic inequalities influence older persons living arrangements, financial status, and access to and experience with health services. The policy documents are all in the form of central and state government reports. These reports are descriptive in nature and enumerate policies, programmes, and plans of action. There have been no assessments, evaluations, or policy analyses of the plethora of programmes. Similarly, there have been no studies on the working of these programmes and their uptake at the ground level. While the legislation of the policy is a step in the right direction, its timely implementation requires monitoring and evaluation.

It is interesting to note that there have been virtually no studies on health service arrangements in relation to the needs of older persons in general and across particular socio-economic groups, which address complexities at the intersection of caste, class, ethnicity, and gender. Quantitative studies using large data sets throw light on problems such as availability, accessibility, and affordability, but beyond that, there have been no studies that highlight structural constraints in health services integration for older persons. There is a clear lack of empirical research and micro studies on older persons experiences with the health service system and the barriers they face when dealing with chronic and acute conditions. Similarly, studies on policies and programmes designed to benefit older persons are descriptive and derived from readings of government documents. Interestingly, there is a near absence of studies that focus on the implementation of these policies and programmes, gaps in implementation, and the experiences of older persons as beneficiaries. The available reports and studies are inadequate to assess the extent of health service integration for older persons and its responsiveness to their needs.

Our review demonstrates that there is a predominance of macro studies that are mostly descriptive. There are very few meso and micro studies that can help us assess health service integration at the national and subregional levels. The few studies on specific medical conditionslike falls and diabetesoffer insights into the importance of an interdisciplinary approach that spans epidemiology, health service preparedness, and quality of life of older persons. Since microstudies are small-scale and focused on a particular place, they are limited. What this scoping review also reveals is that most reports and policy documents tend to focus on rural areas. The predicament of older persons in urban areas is another missing piece in this scholarship.

The National Policy for Senior Citizens 2011 is yet to be ratified. The 12th Common Review Mission (CRM) report for the National Health Mission (2018) observed that states have made little progress in terms of achieving the goals of the NPHCE. The report indicates that there is limited community awareness of the accessibility of healthcare services for older persons in Bihar, Maharashtra, Telangana, Uttarakhand, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan. This also leads many patients to seek care from private institutions, thereby increasing their OOP expenditure and chances of sliding into poverty (GOI 2018). The report also indicates that front-line workers and district and block administrations in many states have an inadequate understanding of the programmes under the NPHCE. It raises questions regarding the coverage, scope, and depth of these programmes, which determine the availability, accessibility, affordability, and acceptability of healthcare among the older population. Big data show that a high proportion of unmet medical care needs can result in high OOP expenditure. The data also shows that older patients prefer private medical institutions in the case of hospitalisation. Although public health insurance schemes cover older persons, there have been no studies regarding their uptake.

Our review of the policy documents shows that two different ministriesthe Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment and the Ministry of Health and Family Welfareadminister programmes and the NPHCE. The big data sets clearly show the high prevalence of NCDs. The NPHCE highlights that it will operate through the NCD cells constituted under the National Programme for Prevention and Control of Cancer, Diabetes, Cardiovascular Diseases and Stroke (NPCDCS) at the state and district levels to ensure convergence between the two programmes. According to the policy document, state cells are to implement the NPHCE (GOI 2011b). There have been no studies that describe the mechanisms for the administrative coordination and convergence of the two programmes in the various districts. A few microstudies on specific medical conditions, such as falls and diabetes, provide insights into the gaps in access to care: fragmented health services, financial vulnerability, and lack of supportive institutions for home-based care.

There have been no studies on the structure and implementation of health and welfare programmes for older persons neither on the experiences of administrators, providers, and users. In addition, there is a paucity of studies relating to budget outlays, adequacy of budgets, budgeting, and costing relating to programmes for older persons. The policy emphasises family care and remains silent on institutional structures required for older persons. The big data shows that there is considerable variation in the extent of family support available to older persons across rural and urban areas as well as across gender, caste, class, and regional lines. However, no study has explored these complexities.

The scoping review also reveals that there has been little engagement within the social science disciplinessuch as psychology, sociology, anthropology, policy studies, political science, and economicswith the concerns of older persons and the policies around them. There is a lack of multi/interdisciplinary approaches to understanding the complex interactions between epidemiology, health services, politics, and lived experiences.

In general, our scoping review shows that there is a paucity of studies that focus on the complexities of old age, health needs, health services, and a range of supportive services, particularly in the urban context.

Policy Recommendations

 There is a need for systematic studies to identify gaps in the conceptualisation of policies for older persons and to develop a comprehensive approach to designing programmes for older persons. These would include operational research, evaluation studies, budgetary audits, and social science research.

 Even based on the thin evidence that our scoping review provides, we can conclude that there is a need for greater synergy within and between health and social sector programmes and policies for older persons.

 There needs to be some debate on whether there should be a separate department or ministry that administratively integrates the different needs of older persons.

 We need a holistic assessment of the extent of preparedness of health services at all levels of care to address the needs of older persons in urban contexts.

 There is a need to define the role of the private health sector in providing preventive, curative, and rehabilitative healthcare services. Regulation of the private sector, which includes informal and formal providers, is essential.

 Innovations in health service integration need to be documented along with the challenges faced by administrators, providers, and users.

 While on the one hand, there is a need for active campaigning and advocacy to garner support for better implementation of existing policies and programmes for older persons, on the other, there is also a need for support from other actors like academia, civil society, NGOs, and political advocates to promote legislation, influence public policy, conduct research, and provide public education on wide-ranging issues of concern to older persons and their caregivers.

Notes

1 We use the term older persons to refer to those aged 60 years and above over other terms like elderly, old, and aged, except where these terms appear in policy titles or within quotes. The Human Rights Commission of the United Nations has also outlined clearly in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights why the term older should be used to describe people above 60 years (Falconer and ONeil 2007: 316).

2 Universal health coverage is defined as ensuring that all people have access to the health services they need, when and where they need them, without financial hardship. It includes the full range of essential health services, from health promotion to prevention, treatment, rehabilitation, and palliative care (WHO 2021).

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Pathania, Abhishek, Partha Haldar, Shashi Kant, Sanjeev Kumar Gupta, Chandrakant S Pandav and Damodar Bachani (2018): Prevalence of Fall, and Determinants of Repeat Incidents of Fall in Older Persons Living in Old Age Homes in the National Capital Territory of Delhi, India, National Medical Journal of India, Vol 31, No 6, pp 32933.

Rajan, Irudaya S and Gayathri Balagopal (2017): Caring India: An Introduction, Elderly Care in India: Societal and State Responses, Irudaya S Rajan and Gayathri Balagopal (eds), pp 136, Singapore: Springer.

Shahrawat, R and K D Rao (2011): Insured Yet Vulnerable: Out-of-pocket Spending and Indias Poor, Health Policy and Planning, Vol 27, No 3, pp 21321.

Shankardass, Mala K (2011): Policy Initiatives on Population Ageing in Select Asian Countries and Their Relevance to the Indian Context, BKPAI Working Paper No 6, UNFPA, New Delhi.

Smith, James P and Malay Majumdar (eds) (2012): Aging in Asia: Findings From New and Emerging Data Initiatives, Washington: National Academies Press.

Tripathy, Nalini K, Jagnoor Jagnoor, Binod K Patro, Mandeep S Dhillon and Rajesh Kumar (2015): Epidemiology of Falls among Older Adults: A Cross Sectional Study from Chandigarh, India, Injury, Vol 46, No 9, pp 180105, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.injury.2015.04.037.

UNESCAP India (2016): Long-term Care of Older Persons in India, Bangkok: United Nations ESCAP, https://www.unescap.org/resources/long-term-care-older-persons-india.

UNFPA (2012): Building a Knowledge Base on Population Ageing in India: Report on the Status of Elderly in Select States of India, 2011, United Nations Population Fund, New Delhi, https://india.unfpa.org/sites/default/files/pub-pdf/AgeingReport_2012_F.pdf.

 (2017): Caring for Our Elders: Early Responses India Ageing Report, United Nations Population Fund, New Delhi, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.arth.2015.06.012

WHO (2013): Study on Global Ageing and Adult Health (SAGE) Wave 1: India National Report, World Health Organization, Geneva.

 (2015): World Report on Ageing and Health, World Health Organization, Geneva.

 (2016): Framework on Integrated, People-centred Health Services, World Health Organization, Geneva, https://apps.who.int/gb/ebwha/pdf_files/WHA69/A69_39-en.pdf?ua=1&ua=1.

 (2017): Global Strategy and Action Plan on Ageing and Health, World Health Organization, Geneva, https://www.who.int/ageing/WHO-GSAP-2017.pdf.

 (2021): Universal Health Coverage: Overview, World Health Organization, Geneva, https://www.who.int/health-topics/universal-health-coverage#tab=tab_1.
UK GDP growth was held to 0.1% for July after a 1.0% increase the previous month and below consensus forecasts of 0.5%.

GDP remained 2.1% below the pre-pandemic level of February 2020.

The data was weaker than expected, but Sterling was resilient with expectations that supply-side issues would maintain upward pressure on prices and have to keep the Bank of England on alert over a potential policy tightening.

Services Growth Stalls, Construction Output Dips Again

There was a recovery in industrial production with a 1.2% monthly increase with a rebound in oil production, but construction output declined 1.6% and is now below pre-pandemic levels as supply-side issues undermined activity.

All sectors of the economy were hurt by workers being forced to isolate due to the pingdemic.

Services sector output was broadly unchanged on the month as a rebound in the leisure sector was offset by a dip in retail sales with consumer-facing services posting the first decline since January.

ONS Deputy National Statistician commented; After many months during which the economy grew strongly, making up much of the lost ground from the pandemic, there was little growth overall in July.

Athow added; The service sector saw no growth overall with growth in IT, financial services and outdoor events offsetting large falls in retail and law firms.

CBI lead economist Alpesh Paleja, commented: The UKs economic recovery continued in July against the backdrop of the pingdemic gathering pace. Labour shortages and supply chain disruption have continued since, and are likely to have taken the edge off growth as we head into autumn."

Ed Monk, associate director at Fidelity International expressed concerns over the outlook

Whats concerning is that these numbers may not yet be showing the full effect of sustained supply-chain bottlenecks. The problem spans multiple sectors, with concerns growing over shortages in manufacturing and construction materials, as prices of concrete, aluminium, steel, timber, and fuel continue to rise.

Paul Dales of Capital Economics was also concerned over supply-side issues; Theres no such glimmer of hope for construction, where the 1.6% m/m fall in output in July was the largest of four falls in four months. Part of that is surely due to shortages.

Kitty Ussher, chief economist at the Institute of Directors was more optimistic over the outlook;

Going forwards, we expect the economy to continue its upward trend: the vaccine roll-out has allowed schools to start the new term with less curbs on their activity, there is every reason to think that the autumn will also be strong.

Samuel Tombs at Pantheon Macroeconomics noted that overall forecasts will have to be revised down even with a rebound; "Encouragingly, most real-time indicators we track have picked up since. But the MPC's forecast for 3% q/q growth in Q3 and Q4 now is out of reach - markets' faith in a Q2 2022 rate hike is misplaced.

Trade Reservations Continue

The overall trade deficit widened to 4.9bn from 3.4bn the previous month.

Ana Boata, head of macroeconomic research at trade credit insurer Euler Hermes, noted: UK exporters are losing their competitive advantage.

Since its peak in 2017, financial services  the UKs biggest exporting sector  has steadily lost its market share. The UK is the only one of the 10 biggest countries to see this happen, with Brexit exacerbating the decline.

The Pound briefly retreated after the data, but quickly recouped losses with the Pound to Dollar (GBP/USD) exchange rate around 1.3860 from 1.3840 with the Pound to Euro (GBP/EUR) exchange rate holding above 1.1700.

The FTSE 100 index opened 0.3% higher as global markets moved higher.
From: Expert Click Radio -- Radio Interview Service For Immediate Release: Dateline: Georgetown , DC Saturday, September 11, 2021

published on 2021-09-11T18:03:39Z Kevin Schewe, Author of 'Bad Love Medicine,' Featured on Talk with Audrey Radio Show: From Russian spies to Nazi plots, to alien planets, to true love, Kevin L. Schewe has penned another action-packed romp in his critically acclaimed 'Bad Love' series that will have you wishing for more. Bad Love Medicine takes readers from the deep-space beauty of Planet Azur back to a WWII Europe riddled with danger and espionage, bringing the Bad Love Gang face-to-face with one of historys greatest villainsAdolf Hitler himself.Part history lesson, part sci-fi adventure, Schewes engaging Bad Love Gang (based on his own friends in high school) once again set out to save historythis time, by stopping the Nazis from creating a time machine of their own.In Bad Love Strikes, the Gang discovered The White Hole Project, a time machine created by President Franklin Roosevelt in case the atomic bomb failed. In the exciting sequel, 'Bad Love Tigers,' the gang used the White Hole Project to travel back to 1945 to thwart Russian spies and protect the secrets of Area 51. In 'Bad Love Beyond,' the gang traveled not just through time but through space as well to learn the reason behind Blue Nova Ones mysterious visit to earth. Now, in 'Bad Love Medicine,' the gang has a two-fold mission: reunite a love-struck couple (while saving one of them from a future fate of cancer) separated by time and stop the Nazis from creating a time machine of their own.Schewe continues to draw accolades for his screenplay based on the first book in the series, Bad Loves Strikes. The screenplay recently drew its 4th award, the Prix Royal Paris Silver Screenplay Award. His screenplay has also won the South Florida International Film Festival for Best Original Screenplay for Young Adults, the L.A. Film Awards Best Sci-Fi Screenplay, and a Gold Script Writing Award for Sci-Fi Adventure from the Depth of Field International Film Festival. Great writing needs to be savored and rewarded, say the Prix Royal judges. Readers of all ages will love 'Bad Love Medicine,' which also contains a soundtrack to guide you on your journey. Schewe, a lifelong WWII aficionado, has spent years researching the topics included in his books, including the nuclear physics behind the time and space travel, which makes the story that much more immersive.These stories just come to life in such an organic way, says Schewe. They combine my childhood memories with my love of history, music, military aviation, WWII, science fiction and time travel.Whether youre a history aficionado, a time-travel buff, a sci-fi lover, or are just in need of a fun book to cheer you up, 'Bad Love Medicine' is the adventure youve been waiting for. Grab your copy today! Genre Entertainment License: cc-by-nc-sa Listen Now! Open the Expert Radio SoundCloud Channel Here: https://soundcloud.com/expertclickradio


New York, NYScott Shay, author of Conspiracy U: A Case Study, was featured on the Mark Bishop Radio Show in his Nothing Like a Good Book segment.

During the interview Shay and Bishop discussed fake news and hype and what distinguishes theories from conspiracy theories. Shay states that certain issues and rhetoric, such as anti-Zionism, receive a protected platform on university campuses around the United States. Shay revealed an anti-Jewish bias in academia and the problems that creates in other areas of society.

Shay gave an in-depth analysis demonstrating that both his alma mater and academia in general have sacrificed academic integrity and trustworthy scholarship in favor of conspiracy theories. Some countries unfriendly to the USA have donated hundreds of millions of dollars to American universities in an attempt to influence policy and curriculum.

The 36-minute interview is remarkable in the scope of issues discussed and must be heard to be appreciated.

Expert Click Radio  Scott Shay, Author of 'Conspiracy U: A Case Study" Interview on Mark Bishop Radio Show

"Conspiracy U is a devastating and clear-minded deep dive into the phenomenon of conspiracy theoriesIt's a Masterclass in identifying and weeding out conspiracy theories wherever they exist." John Kelly, Detroit Free Press, 5-Stars

"Conspiracy U is at once moving and maddening while inviting thinking and motivating actionThis is a must-read not just for those interested in Israel but for anyone trying to understand the broad cross currents that are buffeting society." Mark Mellman, President and CEO, Democratic Majority for Israel

"Powerful, well researched and documented, CONSPIRACY U is a call to action - we all should read, absorb and commit to the changes Shay suggests. Highly recommended." Grady Harp, Amazon Hall of Fame Top 50 Reviewer, 5-Stars

Conspiracy U: A Case Study, 288 pgs, Wicked Son Publishing, October 2021, ISBN 1637580924 available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and quality independent bookstores.

About Scott Shay: Scott A. Shay is a leading businessman, thought leader, and author of two widely read books. Scott is the co-founder and Chairman of Signature Bank, well known as one of the best banks in New York for private business owners and as a leader in the emerging digital currency ecosystem. Scott earned a BA in Economics and a Masters in Management from Northwestern University, a valuable experience due to the commitment of his professors to high academic standards and the ideals of the university's motto. He is a distinguished leader in the Jewish community and an avid student of religion and its application to the world outside of the synagogue, church, or mosque. These interests are reflected in Conspiracy U, as well as his previous two books, In Good Faith: Questioning Religion and Atheism and Getting Our Groove Back: How to Energize American Jewry. Scott lives in New York City, NY.

Learn more about Scott and Conspiracy U: A Case Study at scottshay.com.

Media Contact: For a review copy of Conspiracy U: A Case Study or to arrange an interview with Scott Shay, contact Scott Lorenz of Westwind Communications Book Marketing at scottlorenz@westwindcos.com or by phone at 734-667-2090. Reach Lorenz on twitter @abookpublicist
President Joe Bidens forceful move to have many private sector employers require workers be vaccinated or submit to COVID-19 testing may alter how some local businesses operate.

Longtime restaurateur Bill Lyons isnt comfortable subjecting unvaccinated workers at his Casa Rio on the River Walk to Bidens mandate, a requirement if his workforce tops 100. The establishment currently has 90 on staff but employed 170 before the pandemic.

So Lyons might keep staffing at its current level  even if demand warrants additional hiring  to avoid being subject to the mandate. He said he doesnt want to play the role of enforcer to his employees, whom he considers family.

I just hate to force the vaccine on people that have some really strong feelings against it or could receive serious medical complications from getting a shot, Lyons said.

On ExpressNews.com: Returning to office amid COVID-19 surge, San Antonio businesses hold off on vaccine requirements

Exasperated by almost 80 million Americans who havent gotten the jab, Biden came out Thursday with the mandate for private employers. The measure would apply to about two-thirds of all U.S. employees.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is drafting a rule that will require those employers with more than 100 workers to ensure they are vaccinated or produce a negative COVID-19 test result on a weekly basis before going to work.

Some will wait and see

Some major San Antonio employers  including USAA, Frost Bank and Rackspace Technology  indicated they are taking a wait-and-see approach on how to respond.

There are a lot of details to be forthcoming regarding the announcement and mandate, including timing for compliance, reporting and more, Rackspace spokeswoman Natalie Silva said. We are actively investigating the options in order to make the best plans for meeting the requirements and for our workforce.

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The cloud computing company has more than 6,000 employees.

Similarly, USAA spokesman Christian Bove said the big financial services company is waiting for more details. It employs more than 35,000 people, including roughly 19,000 in San Antonio, where it is one of the citys largest employers.

Bidens directive would affect about 3.4 percent of Bexar County businesses, based on 2019 data from the census. It showed there were 1,242 establishments with 100 or more employees out of 36,838 businesses in the county.

It couldnt be determined how many workers are employed by those 1,242 businesses. At both the state and national level, 48 percent of workers are employed by a business with 100 employees or more.

While Casa Rios business started building back from the pandemic in the past few months, like other tourist-oriented businesses it has not been able to find all the workers it needs. The staff shortage has led owner Lyons to close the restaurant 2 days each week.

As many as 30 of Lyons employees have not been vaccinated, he said. Some who refuse to get vaccinated suffer from medical conditions and are afraid the vaccine will aggravate their conditions, while others object to the government intruding into their lives.

Some of them feel the whole thing is political, and theyre balking for that reason, Lyons said. They feel theres some political plot behind it. The progressive liberals, the Democrats are trying to control their soul.

Lyons, 82, received the vaccine months ago and credits it with helping him recover from a recent case of COVID-19 without long-term complications.

Organizations weigh in

The conservative Texas Public Policy Foundation on Friday called on businesses to ignore Bidens unconstitutional vaccine mandate.

The federal government has neither authority nor justification for this outrageous intrusion into the personal lives of working Americans, foundation CEO Kevin Roberts said in a statement. TPPF encourages individuals, business owners and everyone who believes in fundamental liberties to stand up for your rights and stand against this authoritarian action by the federal government.

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The San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce counts about 900 businesses as members, of which as many as 20 percent employ 100 or more workers. Chamber CEO and President Marina Gonzales spoke cautiously about what the presidents mandate might mean for those members.

Were not necessarily opposed to Bidens requirements, she said. What we want to do is carefully review the guidance that I believe is coming out within the next seven days. We want to ensure that our businesses have the resources and flexibility to promote the vaccine without experiencing negative consequences.

Chamber officials main concern is the potential fines businesses may face if they dont comply with the mandate, Gonzales added. OSHA reportedly intends to impose fines of nearly $14,000 per violation for those companies that defy the mandate.

We already have a workers shortage thats been something ongoing, she added. So we would be concerned that being too restrictive in these guidelines would result in employees quitting. Were really looking for that middle ground.

S.A. nonprofit may benefit

The mandate may be a boon for at least one San Antonio concern.

Officials at Community Labs, a local nonprofit started last year to test for the coronavirus, expect their phones to be ringing as companies call to schedule testing for their employees.

I definitely imagine that more companies are going to call us in the next few weeks, Community Labs President Sal Webber said early Friday. We havent taken any calls yet, to my knowledge. But I would expect it to start ringing today and Monday and Tuesday.

Bidens push to get more people vaccinated appears to come at a fortuitous time for Community Labs. Currently, it has the capacity to perform about 14,000 COVID-19 tests a day. Starting Wednesday, that figure will increase to about 50,000 a day. Currently, its averaging 40,000 to 45,000 tests a week.

Weve got room, if people need us, Webber said. Were here to help.

Staff writers Diego Mendoza-Moyers and Steven Santana contributed to this report.

pdanner@express-news.net

randy.diamond@express-news.net
Ana Conejo / Tyler Morning Telegraph /Ana Conejo / Tyler Morning Telegraph

(Bloomberg) -- Salesforce.com Inc. Chief Executive Officer Marc Benioff told employees on Friday that the company will help them leave Texas if they wish in response to the states approval of a controversial anti-abortion law.

If you want to move well help you exit, Benioff said in a tweet directed at Ohana, the Hawaiian term for family that Salesforce uses to refer to its corporate community. CNBC previously reported on the news.
When Arturo Ortiz Gonzales Jr.  a man of few words  had something to say, people stopped to listen.

Friends and family tried to recall those words and the lessons he taught them on Friday afternoon at his funeral.

Many wore blue shirts and face masks at Mission Park Funeral Chapels South to honor the lifelong Dallas Cowboys fan affectionately known as Pops or Grandpa.

He was also called Mr. Miyagi by his grandchildren and great-grandchildren for his resemblance to the fictional karate master. TV screens at the chapel flipped through photos of a family man with a thick white mustache. He often dressed as Santa Claus for the children on Christmas.

Gonzales, 76, died Aug. 27 after being hospitalized for three weeks with complications from COVID-19. He is one of the more than 4,035 San Antonio residents whose lives were ended by the coronavirus. And like the vast majority of those whove died, he was not vaccinated.

He is survived by his common-law wife Melinda Hernandez, sons Anthony Gonzales, Andrew Gonzales and Allen Gonzales, daughter-in-law Troylyn Gonzales, sisters JoAnn Martin and Carmen Sanchez, 16 grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren.

He also left behind another tight-knit family  his co-workers at Churchs Chicken.

He was always there and always on time, said Monica Ramos, who worked with him for years at the fast-food restaurant on Goliad Road. He was like our Pops.

On ExpressNews.com: San Antonio surpasses 4,000 COVID-19 deaths

Arturo Gonzales started working at Churchs at the age of 16 and was a dedicated employee for six decades, working nearly every position. He was still working at Churchs as a shift manager when he got sick.

He never wanted to call in or take off. Thats him. He was a workaholic, said Melinda Hernandez, who was introduced to her love through her daughter, who also worked at Churchs.

Jessica Phelps /San Antonio Express-News

Family members believe thats why he wasnt vaccinated. He was busy working.

I didnt know that he hadnt had the shot, his son Anthony Gonzales said. Im still having a hard time with it.

The last few weeks of his fathers life were spent at the hospital, where his condition improved only to deteriorate again.

Currently, there are more than 1,100 COVID-19 patients in San Antonio-area hospitals.

Before catching the virus, Arturo Gonzales had diabetes but was active and healthy. It wasnt his time to go, his family said.

Jessica Phelps /San Antonio Express-News

Troylyn Gonzales said the family was fortunate that his nurse would FaceTime them so they could see him before he died. COVID-19 restrictions at hospitals prevented the family from seeing him in person.

His goddaughter Annette Butler said she hopes that people will hear his story and consider getting vaccinated. She believes thats why she and more than a dozen other family members were able to survive after getting infected this summer.

In addition to being vaccinated, Butler received monoclonal antibody infusion therapy, which is meant to reduce the likelihood of COVID-19 patients with mild to moderate symptoms going to an emergency room. She credits the free treatment for helping her beat the virus.

This virus is a beast. It felt evil, she said.

laura.garcia@express-news.net
AUSTIN, Texas (AP)  Republicans in America's largest conservative state for years racked up victories under the slogan Keep Texas Red, a pledge to quash a coming blue wave that Democrats argued was inevitable given shifting demographics.

Now, those population transformations have arrived, with the 2020 census confirming that the state got bigger, more suburban and far more diverse. Yet a more apt state GOP rallying cry for today might be Make Texas Even Redder."

Faced with increasingly dire demographic threats to their partys dominance, Texas Republicans have championed a bevy of boundary-pushing conservative policymaking that dramatically expands gun rights, curbs abortions and tightens election laws  steering a state that was already far to the right even more so.

Far from tiptoeing toward the middle to appease the Democratic-leaning Texans driving population growth, the party is embracing its base and vowing to use a new round of redistricting to ensure things stay that way through 2030  becoming a national model for staying on the offensive no matter how political winds may eventually shift.

Texas, obviously, is a national leader as it concerns the laws that we pass and other states follow, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, who is fond of vowing to make Texas the freedom capital of America, said Tuesday.

Abbott, who is up for reelection next year and often mentioned as a possible 2024 presidential contender, signed voting legislation Tuesday that empowers partisan poll watchers and prohibits a host of measures that made casting ballots easier in heavily Democratic cities amid the coronavirus pandemic. Republicans argue that the new rules boost election security and charged ahead to pass them, even as Democratic state lawmakers fled the state for weeks to block them.

The voting law was nearly overshadowed by national debate over another new Texas law  the nation's toughest set of abortion restrictions. By banning the procedure in most instances and leaving no exceptions for cases of rape and incest, the state has mounted perhaps the strongest threat yet to Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision establishing a woman's right to an abortion.

Another new law allows virtually any Texan age 21 and older to carry guns without licenses. Other legislation banned schools from teaching about institutional racism and limited the states own cities from making decisions on police funding, environmental budgeting and mask mandates. And on Tuesday, Abbott instructed lawmakers to once again try passing restrictions on transgender student athletes when the Legislature convenes later this month to begin drawing new voting maps.

These policy victories are poised to become cemented for the foreseeable future. Because Republicans control both chambers of the Legislature, the party will decide new congressional and statehouse districts based on 2020 census figures  seeking to make the boundaries as favorable as possible so the GOP can hold statehouse majorities for the next decade and beyond.

The new maps will have to counteract what looks to be unfavorable census data for Texas Republicans. The state's Hispanic population grew by nearly 2 million, according to 2020 census figures, accounting for half of Texas' total population increase. Even as the GOP made gains with Hispanic voters, about 6 in 10 Hispanics in Texas chose Democrat Joe Biden over Republican Donald Trump in November, according to AP VoteCast, a survey of the electorate.

Republicans also see warning signs in the suburbs. The state is home to four of the nations 10 fastest-growing cities, fueled by booming communities outside Houston, Dallas and Austin. After years of GOP advantages in these places, Biden split suburban voters in Texas with Trump, AP VoteCast found, and won the state's five largest counties.

Democrats blame the unfettered conservativism on Trumpism. The former president ushered in a new Republican Party that is more feisty. Its more fringe," said Democratic state Rep. Ron Reynolds, vice chair of the Texas Legislative Black Caucus.

The cows left the barn, and its hard to put it back, said Reynolds, whose district includes booming suburban Houston. They have to entertain and they have to appease because these are the people that are excited about voting in Republican primaries.

Democrats like Reynolds warn there will be voter backlash. But they have little history to back that up: Republicans haven't lost a statewide race in 27 years and say it is a fierce commitment to conservativism, not pragmatic compromise, that has preserved the nation's longest electoral winning streak.

If anyone expected that, their head is way too far up their, uh, philosophy, Corbin Casteel, the Trump campaigns Texas director in 2016, joked about any notion that census figures might make the state's Republicans move to the center.

Even more moderate Texas Republicans say past pronouncements about changing demographics helping Democrats were overblown. The rumors of our demise have been greatly exaggerated, said state Rep. Travis Clardy of Nacogdoches in east Texas.

We keep winning with really strong numbers, Clardy added. I dont think weve had strident, extreme, right-wing positions. I think weve governed conservatively.

Still, the party has shown a capacity for moderation in the not-too-distant past. After a Democratic wave swept Texas and the nation in 2018, the GOP had an exceedingly quiet legislative session, focusing on traditional issues like property tax cuts and public education.

It was only after the party held the Legislature and gained seats in Congress last November that it turned hard right  anticipating that its members' biggest electoral threat going forward is primary challenges rather than being unseated by Democrats.

Ive heard that all this demographic change is going to catch up to the party of the old white people, but I dont think its happened, Clardy said. The numbers may be changing, but they may not be trending the way they think that they are.

The move to the right is perhaps best illustrated by Abbott, a former state Supreme Court justice who was once considered to have a more measured and deliberative, business-friendly approach to the job but has lately gone even further right than the Legislature  particularly on immigration.

The governor recently ordered state police to arrest people suspected of being in the country illegally and directed a state agency to pony up $25 million for 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) of wall along Texas nearly 1,200-mile (1,930-kilometer) border with Mexico.

No major Democrat has yet announced a candidacy against Abbott, though former presidential candidate Beto ORourke  who came within 3 percentage points of upsetting Texas Sen. Ted Cruz in 2018  still might. The governor has already drawn a primary challenge from former congressman Allen West, a onetime tea party darling known for likening Democrats to Nazis.

Casteel said doubling down on conservative values is working for Republicans in Texas and beyond. He pointed to Abbott and another governor and possible 2024 presidential candidate, Republican Ron DeSantis of Florida. Both have gained national followings by being willing to combat unpopular policies like universal mask mandates. That's despite Democrats in both states insisting the governors' failure to more strenuously battle the pandemic could ultimately jeopardize their aspirations for reelection  not to mention the White House.

Hes faced circumstances that few governors have, with the pandemic and all sorts of other things that put conservatives in a tough bind, Casteel said of Abbott. Its safety versus liberty and he  and folks like Gov. DeSantis  theyve threaded that needle very nicely. And I think the results are speaking for themselves.

___

Weissert reported from Washington.
Charitable groups, faith organizations and the city of San Antonio have teamed up to create an online resource for people seeking to help Afghan refugees.

Afghansinsa.org is a clearinghouse for information in four languages  English, Pashto, Dari and Spanish  about ways to help Afghan evacuees by volunteering, doing advocacy work or donating beds, household supplies and other items.

The site includes links to government and humanitarian agencies involved in trying to help Afghans escape their homeland. It also has information about how faith congregations can help evacuees find and furnish housing, enroll children in school and access medical care.

Elected officials, advocates and community organizers met at City Hall on Friday afternoon to mark the launch of the site.

We are a welcoming community as a city that has not only declared itself a compassionate city, but demonstrates it through policy and action, said Mayor Ron Nirenberg,

The website is a collaborative effort between the city and numerous charities, faith groups and advocacy organizations.

Marisol Girela, associate vice president of social programs for the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services (RAICES), said the group expects to assist about 200 Afghan evacuees. The group wants to partner with apartment complexes and real estate managers to secure housing for them.

Margaret Costantino, director of the nonprofit Center for Refugee Services, noted that the newcomers lack jobs here or credit histories. They dont have the necessary credentials to just go to an apartment complex and rent like you and I, she said.

caroline.tien@hearst.com
Update:

New Braunfels police have arrested 29-year-old Bradley Knight in connection with the fatal hit-and-run Saturday on Interstate 35 near Texas 46.

Authorities have also identified the man who was killed as 54-year-old Jim Newcomer from Dale, Texas. Police said Newcomer died while standing outside his tractor-trailer that he pulled over along the shoulder of the interstate.

Officials said tips from the public helped lead to Knight's arrest.

He was arrested Saturday afternoon at his home in the 100 block of Granite Run in New Braunfels.

Knight has been released on a $25,000 bond, police said.

Original:

New Braunfels police are asking for the publics help in identifying the vehicle that killed a tractor-trailer driver during a hit-and-run crash Saturday morning.

Around 8:30 a.m., a 54-year old man from Dale was struck and killed by a vehicle while he was standing outside his tractor-trailer that was pulled over along the shoulder of northbound Interstate 35 near Texas 46, according to a news release. Police have not released his identity yet.

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Authorities believe he was hit by a silver, four-door Dodge Neon, which could be a 2001 to 2005 model. According to police, the driver of the sedan served to avoid the tractor-trailer but ended up crashing the rear passenger side of the Neon into the man and the back of the tractor-trailer.

The driver of the sedan didnt stop or try to help the crash victim, according to police. They say the Dodge Neon will have significant damage to the rear of the cars passenger side.

Police are asking anyone with information about the car or its driver to call 9-1-1 or the New Braunfels Police Department at 830-221-4100.

marina.riker@express-news.net | Twitter: @MarinaStarleaf
Twenty years ago, first responders from San Antonio scoured the rubble of the World Trade Center for survivors. The team forged a bond based on one thought: Never forget the lives taken on 9/11.

Mayor Ron Nirenberg began Thursdays City Council meeting with a ceremony in their honor.

Firefighters from San Antonio are an excellent example of the courageous public servants who put their lives on hold to do their part for our nation and fellow Americans, Nirenberg said.

There to receive the gratitude of city leaders were Texas Division of Emergency Management Chief Nim Kidd, retired San Antonio fire Capt. Dennis Meier, fire Engineer Shane George, Rene M. Garcia Jr. and retired fire Capt. Frank Willborn.

On ExpressNews.com: 9/11 Remembrance

Jerry Whitley, head chaplain at the Fire Department, prayed for peace as the ringing bells of San Fernando Cathedral echoed through the chamber. He prayed for the 2,977 people killed in New York City, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania. He prayed for the 343 firefighters and 60 police officers who died.

A 250-pound piece of rusted steel from ground zero, donated to the Fire Department in 2011, was propped on a lectern. All in the sunlit hall bowed their heads in silence. On the bagpipes, police Bike Patrol Officer Michael Gonzalez played Amazing Grace, a solemn melody that 20 years ago joined the church bells and sirens on the streets of New York.

Kidd, 52, served the Alamo City for many years. He rose from firefighter to district fire chief, then served as city emergency manager from 2004 to 2010. Applause rang out when he called on fellow team members to stand and be recognized for their service 1,800 miles away in New York.

As we remember 9/11, I hope we will always remember and never forget those families and individuals who put themselves in harms way, Kidd said.

Forgetting isnt on the table, Police Chief William McManus said.

On ExpressNews.com: Cary Clack: September 11 attacks reverberate 20 years later

You try to put this thing out of your mind, but its almost impossible, he said. I am humbled and honored to be a first responder and be in the room today with brother and sister firefighters.

After the ceremony, Kidd, Garcia and Meier reunited with George at his workplace near downtown. At Fire Station No. 11 on Frio, the team recalled watching two airplanes, hijacked by al-Qaida terrorists, strike the twin towers and alter the Manhattan skyline forever. A third plane struck the Pentagon. Passengers rushed the hijackers of a fourth, causing it to crash in rural Pennsylvania before they could steer it toward their target.

It was a privilege and honor to be able to go to Ground Zero, said George, 49. Every firefighter in the United States wanted to be there. Without the support of the city and state, we wouldnt have been able to go.

A solemn sight

They grabbed their bags and drove to College Station to join a task force of 72 men and women and four dogs. Six days after the attack, they boarded a military flight to McGuire AFB in New Jersey. Kidd woke at 3 a.m. as a bus took them across the George Washington Bridge, revealing a sight that brought a long silence: dark columns of smoke rising from smoldering ruins.

A pile of concrete slabs and twisted steel rose several stories above the ground. The team worked 12-hour shifts with sophisticated equipment that included a device sensitive enough to hear the ticking of a wristwatch.

Asked whether he heard anything, Kidds eyes filled with tears. No.

On ExpressNews.com: Stay strong, mijo - A reporter reflects on his 9/11 coverage

Garcia, then a USAA computer technician, recorded handwritten reports in a central database he said is still in use.

I was happy to help, said Garcia, 56. There are people who lost their lives that day and people who lived through it, and in my opinion they are the heroes.

Meier, 71, recalled that they watched where they stepped for fear of treading on remains.

Most of what we were doing was supporting search dogs, the retired captain said. It was a whole different ballgame.

On Sept. 26, 2001, the team returned to Austin and cheers from family, friends and co-workers. Unseen were the sights, sounds and smells from Ground Zero the team members will carry with them always.

Its easy for us to say never forget, Kidd said. I wonder how we get that message to those who werent even born. I would ask that we find a way to take better care of our families and communities in memory of those we never met, who lost their lives that day.

vtdavis@express-news.net
A man drowned in the River Walk after getting pushed in during an argument with two other people Friday night, San Antonio police reported.

Pedro Medina, 32, was arrested overnight on a charge of manslaughter.

Police were called to the 100 block of North River Walk shortly after 10 p.m. for a possible drowning. When they arrived, they found several good Samaritans trying to revive the man.

The witnesses told police the man had been arguing with two other people when one of them had deliberately pushed the man into the river. The man, unable to swim, went underwater, spurring witnesses to jump in and pull him out, police said.

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Although CPR was performed for several minutes, the man was pronounced dead at the scene. He has not been identified.

The two people seen arguing with him fled the scene before police arrived, according to a report. Police set up a quadrant to find them.

Park officers stopped Medina and another person in the 100 block of Main Plaza, near San Fernando Cathedral, according to the report. Both were taken to police headquarters and interviewed.

Medina was booked on the manslaughter charge with bail set at $100,000. The status is of the second person, who has not been identified, is unknown.

The investigation is ongoing.
Lyle Larsons anticipated exit from the Texas House should open the floodgates for San Antonio Republicans with political ambitions.

After all, these kinds of opportunities dont open too often for local Republicans.

Only one of San Antonios 10 City Council seats is currently held by an avowed conservative, and that council member, Clayton Perry, doesnt appear to be in a hurry to relinquish his seat. Only one of five Commissioners Court seats belongs to a Republican, and that Republican, Trish DeBerry, just got there this year.

When it comes to the Texas House, only two of San Antonios 10 districts are held by Republicans, and Larsons District 122 is the only one that could be described as completely secure for the GOP.

The potential for an opening in District 122 already has attracted the interest of a prominent local Republican whose name hasnt been on a ballot in years: former North Side Councilwoman Elisa Chan.

Chan, 55, says shes definitely running if Larson steps aside.

Several people approached me about this race, and I have also spoken to grassroots leaders, including people from the Republican Party, she said. I think they would be favorable about me running if Lyle doesnt.

Larson has been harshly critical of his fellow Republicans during this years legislative session and has repeatedly touted the potential of an independent, third-party movement in Texas. He is publicly championing the idea of former House Speaker Joe Straus, a fellow San Antonian and fellow disaffected Republican, challenging either Gov. Greg Abbott or Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick.

Larson isnt talking about his own plans but is believed to be interested in taking on Patrick. Larson recently encouraged his old friend, former Councilman Jeff Webster, to run in District 122, a clear indication that the state rep has no intention of seeking re-election.

For Chan, it would mark a return to electoral politics seven years after her last campaign and eight years after a bumpy exit from the City Council.

In August 2013, three months after Chan easily won a third term on the council, San Antonio Express-News reporter Brian Chasnoff reported on a secretly recorded conversation between Chan and her staff members.

The discussion centered on how Chan should frame her opposition to a proposed ordinance that would extend nondiscrimination protections to gays, lesbians and transgender individuals.

On the audio recording, Chan referred to same-sex relationships as disgusting, said gay men are identifiable because they shave, and added, I never bought in that you are born, that you are born gay. I cant imagine it.

The leaked recording shifted Chans position in local politics. The Taiwan-born president of Unintech Consulting Engineers had come to the council as the champion of entrepreneurship and economic growth. She had decried wasteful government spending and advocated for low taxes and a business environment with few regulatory constraints.

But her homophobic comments, and her stubborn refusal to disavow them, recast her as a culture war martyr to social conservatives and a pariah to supporters of LGBTQ rights.

Less than two months later, she bolted from the council to run for the state Senate. In her failed Senate campaign, she tried to return to the economic message that got her on the council, accusing then-President Barack Obama of policies that stalled job creation and prosperity, gradually destroying the middle class  the heart of our nation.

She couldnt out-conservative Donna Campbell, however, and lost by 31 percentage points in the 2014 GOP primary.

Her political activity has been limited since then, largely confined to backing other candidates, such as North Side council contender Marco Barros in 2017.

I think when you get older, hopefully you get wiser, Chan said. Hopefully, thats my case.

My father passed away last year. He had a good life, but that also puts you closer to home, in terms of mortality. So it got me thinking, What is the important thing in life? and What would you like to do to be impactful? I have a passion for public service, and I have been very involved in the community, even after the council. So if this is the opportunity to serve again, I would like to give it a try.

While Larsons district could be altered by the forthcoming state redistricting process, Chan pointed out that under its current configuration, District 122 contains most of her old council district.

I think it would be great, she said, if I have the same opportunity to represent the same constituency again at the state level.

Former District Attorney Nico LaHood and trucking industry executive Adam Blanchard have also expressed interest in running for Larsons seat. Others are surely waiting in the wings.

ggarcia@express-news.net | Twitter: @gilgamesh470
President Joe Biden has offered help to the people in Louisiana in the wake of Hurricane Ida. He declared, We are going to have your back.

I can only hope the people of Louisiana dont count on that, judging by the mess Biden made out of the withdrawal from Afghanistan. Leaving people behind, not just Americans, but also Afghans who worked for our country. Biden and his administration cannot be trusted.

Sabine Maytum

Wake-up call

Re: A botched withdrawal from a general catastrophe, Other Views, Sept. 3:

I find this piece by New York Times columnist Ross Douthat to be his best. Not only an excellent description of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistanfilled with such irony, delicious sarcasm, and sad truths, but a call to every American to wake up and smell the humiliation.

My advice to Douthat is to make this his first chapter in a revelatory book on this subject. I love every time he writes out $2,000,000,000,000! Keep up the good work.

Patricia A. Ireland

Heroes all

The decision to withdraw our troops from Afghanistan by Aug. 31 was the correct one. And the number of Afghans and Americans evacuated exceeded expectations.

Despite the initial claims from armchair generals who dont have the facts, our government had extensive plans in place for a variety of contingencies, including the rapid fall of the Afghan government per Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Our military did a great job in an unstable and dangerous environment.

The cost of 13 Americans killed and 18 injured, plus many more civilian casualties, to a suicide bomber showed the risk our soldiers bravely faced while they executed their mission with compassion and professionalism. Heroes all.

John Fehlauer
A verbal attack on Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff last weekend at an H-E-B  the second time hes been confronted in a store over his support for local mandates to slow the spread of COVID-19  elicited concerns for public officials safety.

Unlike the prior incident, which occurred in a Lowes in June 2020, the recent one was recorded and posted on Instagram by the instigator, who followed and berated Wolff from inside the grocery store to his car.

But while the video prompted mostly reproach with some characterizing the episode as harassment and even stalking, a law school instructor specializing in criminal law said such behavior is within legal limits and that police are right to take a cautious approach. Doing so, she said, is in the communitys long-term interest.

I wouldnt charge it, said Donna Coltharp of St. Marys University School of Law, who reviewed the video with the San Antonio Express-News.

In the video, a woman who identifies herself on social media as Ashley Rocks chastised Wolff for about three minutes as he pushed a cart to his vehicle on Sept. 5 at a North Side H-E-B.

You are going to go to jail. They are going to hang you, Rocks said in the video. Treason and crimes against humanity. You are going down. Better enjoy your freedom while it lasts, buddy. Then you have to answer to God.

Rocks vitriolic use of words such hanging spurred some people to equate her language to a threat and question whether criminal charges are appropriate.

On ExpressNews.com: They are going to hang you: Woman harasses County Judge Nelson Wolff at H-E-B over mask mandate

The Bexar County Sheriffs Office has not announced charges, saying it is reviewing the incident.

Deputy Johnny Garcia, a sheriffs office spokesman, said that while he cannot comment on Wolffs security, the department is aware that the social media post could incite others to confront Wolff.

Rocks said in a statement to the Express-News, which reached her via social media, that she wanted to encourage others to follow her example.

Having been a public defender in federal court, Coltharp has seen charges filed following expressions deemed threats against high-level elected officials such as Sen. Ted Cruz and Presidents Barack Obama and George Bush.

Theyre always kind of wobblers, Coltharp said. Is this person really threatening? Did they have the intent to make this person afraid? Or were they just exercising their amazingly broad free speech rights in as many childish ways as they can?

Rocks tirade, Coltharp said, lacks key elements of a terroristic threat, such as specifically stating where such a threat would come from. And while Rocks invoked hanging, it was in the context of being judged by others rather than by her.

Shes really speaking in a common vernacular: Lets put somebody we dont like on trial, Coltharp said. If she said, Im carrying or People like you make me so grateful Texas lets everybody and their dog have a gun, then she would be closer to a chargeable threat.

Context, she said, is important when law enforcement determines whether words or behavior warrant charges.

Social media has many videos like Rocks, with people all over the political spectrum verbally assaulting and accusing public figures they disagree with.

Everyone is talking about impeaching someone else or trying to lock them up, Coltharp said.

Its also notable, she said, that Wolff did not show fear, laughing at one point as he turned toward Rocks and continuing to his vehicle.

Wolff said hes undeterred when asked about the incident during a televised COVID-19 briefing on Tuesday.

Im going to continue going to the grocery store by myself and live a normal life and not feel intimidated or be scared by some of the things that people say, Wolff said.

On ExpressNews.com: BCSO: Judge Nelson Wolff involved in altercation that turned physical at Northwest Side Lowes

In the June 2020 incident, which occurred in a store checkout line, a man named Terry Toller, upset about the countys mask mandate at the time, batted a business card out of Wolffs hand after the judge offered to discuss the matter later.

Toller was charged with assault on a public servant, a felony, which was reduced to disorderly conduct, a misdemeanor punishable by a fine up to $500.

During Tuesdays briefing, Wolff said Rocks actions were the result of hatred and anger that festers on social media.

People pick up those terrible views over the internet, and then they espouse the same views that they pick up, he said.

Mayor Ron Nirenberg said during the briefing that incivil behavior such as Rocks needs to be called out and corrected.

That is as big a disease right now in our community and our nation as anything else, he said.

Rocks is a local hair stylist who owns AK Lounge on the North Side, according to the salons website. While the incident at H-E-B appears to be her most overt political action, her Facebook page shows her views about measures to slow the spread of COVID-19. The top of the page features an image of Rosie the Riveter with Trump written on her arm and I have an immune system. You have one too added to the graphic.

Rocks declined a request from the Express-News for an interview.

Rocks video had been viewed more than 21,000 times as of Saturday morning Soon after she posted it, many comments showed support for her.

By midweek, however, the tide of social media sentiment appeared to turn as more of those commenting found her actions ill-informed and distasteful.

And while often messy, the opportunity for such public discourse is among the reasons that Coltharp said law enforcement should err on the side of not intervening in people expressing themselves.

As despicable as I think her behavior was, thats how I would want the law to work, Coltharp said. Its striking the balance its supposed to strike.

Staff writer Taylor Pettaway contributed to this report.

jbeltran@express-news.net


Croatia Airlines is considering expanding its flight offering on the Macedonian market following this weeks talks with the operator of the countrys airports TAV Macedonia, as well as the Macedonian Chamber for Tourism, the Croatian Chamber of Commerce, and the Croatian National Tourist Board. The carriers CEO, Jasmin Bajic, said, If there is interest from Macedonian tour operators and partners, we are ready to expand our cooperation onto routes other than Zagreb and Skopje, like perhaps Ohrid and Split. Mr Bajic also noted that talks with Slovenian authorities could result in better connectivity between Skopje and Ljubljana as well. Croatia Airlines is considering expanding its flight offering on the Macedonian market following this weeks talks with the operator of the countrys airports TAV Macedonia, as well as the Macedonian Chamber for Tourism, the Croatian Chamber of Commerce, and the Croatian National Tourist Board. The carriers CEO, Jasmin Bajic, said, If there is interest from Macedonian tour operators and partners, we are ready to expand our cooperation onto routes other than Zagreb and Skopje, like perhaps Ohrid and Split. Mr Bajic also noted that talks with Slovenian authorities could result in better connectivity between Skopje and Ljubljana as well.





TAV Macedonias Marketing and Revenue Manager, as well as the President of the Macedonian Chamber of Tourism, Vladimir Gramatikov, noted that talks with their Croatian counterparts began several months ago with the aim of improving connectivity between the two countries. Road connectivity is not satisfactory, which is why new airline routes would be a big step forward. I believe flights between Ohrid and Split would be of interest to tourists, so they could visit both countries within a few days in one go. Based on OAG data, over 3.000 passengers flew indirectly between Skopje and Split in the pre-pandemic 2019. The route was briefly served by Croatia Airlines in 2015 but was ultimately cancelled.





Croatia Airlines had a strong presence in Skopje up until the coronavirus pandemic and was the dominant carrier from the former Yugoslavia serving the Macedonian market. Contributing to its high passenger count and growth was capacity, a consistent product and Star Alliance membership. The carrier handled 74.590 passengers between Zagreb and Skopje in 2019, operating a total of 996 flights (both directions included). It deployed all aircraft types in its fleet on the route, including the Airbus A319 and A320, the Dash 8 turboprop and the Mitsubishi CRJ1000 jet, which it was wet-leasing at the time.





Zagreb - Skopje - Zagreb passenger performance





The Croatian carrier sees a notable number of transfer traffic on the route, primarily to and from destinations such as Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Brussels and Zurich. Its Star Alliance membership also provides benefits for passengers connecting through Zagreb onto Germany for long haul flights. It is the Star Alliance membership that also saw a number of travellers migrate from Adria to Croatia Airlines following the Slovenian carriers collapse in late 2019. Passenger volumes decreased significantly in 2020 due to the pandemic, as well as Skopje Airports subsequent closure for commercial traffic and an entry ban into the European Union for the majority of Macedonian nationals. The airline was later forced to temporarily suspend operations to the Macedonian capital in the winter of 2020/2021 due to low demand, however, it remained a popular choice for transfer passengers once operations were restored this spring. The carrier currently plans on operating between two and three weekly flights between the two capital cities for the majority of the winter season, which begins on October 31, with all aircraft types in its fleet to be deployed.








AUSTIN, Texas (AP)  The Biden administration is suing Texas over a new state law that bans most abortions, arguing that it was enacted in open defiance of the Constitution and asking a judge to quickly declare the law invalid. The case filed Thursday by the Department of Justice is almost certainly destined to reach the Supreme Court, perhaps within a matter of weeks.

The high court has already been asked to weigh in on the law once. The justices voted 5-4 not to intervene to prevent it from taking effect, but they said further challenges were possible.

Here are some questions and answers about the law and the case:

WHAT EXACTLY DOES TEXAS' LAW DO?

Texas' law, Senate Bill 8, prohibits abortions once medical professionals can detect cardiac activity, usually around six weeks. That's before some women know theyre pregnant. Courts have blocked other states from imposing similar restrictions, but Texas law is different because it leaves enforcement up to private citizens through civil lawsuits instead of criminal prosecutors. That novel wrinkle made the law hard to challenge before it went into effect.

The law allows any private citizen to sue Texas abortion providers who violate it, as well as anyone who assists a a woman getting the procedure, including someone who just drives her to a clinic. Patients themselves, however, cannot be sued.

The law offers no exceptions in cases of rape or incent, which Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has defended by falsely saying women still have at least six weeks" to get an abortion. Six weeks of pregnancy does not mean a woman has six weeks to make a decision.

WHAT HAS BEEN THE IMPACT SO FAR?

Just the threat of being sued for violating the law has meant some abortion providers in Texas have stopped offering abortions altogether, even those before six weeks. Other providers have continued to offer abortions but only those that comply with the law. That means they've had to turn patients away who are further along in their pregnancies or try to get them assistance outside of the state. Clinics in neighboring Oklahoma, and in nearby Kansas, have reported an influx of patients from Texas.

At a Trust Women clinic this week in Oklahoma City, around two-thirds of patients were from Texas, spokesman Zack Gingrich-Gaylord said. And Texas patients accounted for half of the 40 appointments this week at another location farther away in Wichita, Kansas. Appointments are booked through September.

Texas Right to Life, a group that helped push the law and set up a tip line to receive information about potential violations, said they've received no credible information that anyone is violating the law.

WHAT DOES THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT WANT?

The Justice Department wants a federal judge to declare the law invalid and prohibit its enforcement. That would allow clinics to return to the situation before the law took effect where they could provide abortions after the six-week mark.

The judge assigned to the case is Robert Pitman, who was appointed by President Barack Obama. Pitman got assigned the case because he had previously presided over a challenge to the law filed by abortion rights activists. That case was still at a preliminary stage when it was appealed and reached the Supreme Court. Pitman can be expected to rule quickly.

WHY DID THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT GET INVOLVED?

Pressure had been mounting on the Justice Department from the White House and Democrats to take action in Texas. Attorney General Merrick Garland said the enforcement model in the Texas law could set a troubling precedent where states empower any private individual to infringe on anothers constitutionally protected rights.

The model of Senate Bill 8 is essentially a massive scale up of local abortion bans that began popping up in small Texas cities starting in 2019. But those bans had little immediate impact in most places that passed them because most weren't cities with abortion providers. Other Republican-led statehouses are already moving to follow Texas lead.

The lawsuit marks the most aggressive involvement by the Justice Department during a decade of Texas passing increasingly strict anti-abortion measures. The most sweeping one in 2013  which put stringent regulations on Texas abortion clinics  was ultimately overturned by the Supreme Court. But not before more than half of Texas 40-plus abortion clinics wound up shuttering. Today, the state has roughly two dozen clinics.

WHEN WILL THE PUBLIC KNOW WHETHER THE TEXAS LAW CAN STAND?

Pitman is far from the last word on the law. The case can be appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, where a three-judge panel would weigh in, and then on to the Supreme Court. The case could move quickly, possibly reaching the Supreme Court within weeks.

In the previous challenge to the law before Pitman, the appeals court halted proceedings before he could decide whether the law should be barred from taking effect. The Supreme Court, for its part, declined to disturb the appeals courts actions.

The high court, where conservatives hold a 6-3 majority, already planned to tackle the issue of abortion when the justices return from their summer break and begin hearing cases again in October. The court had previously agreed to hear a case out of Mississippi in which the state is asking to be allowed to ban most abortions at the 15th week of pregnancy. That ban looks modest by comparison to the Texas law.

HAS THE LAWSUIT HAD AN IMPACT?

Abortion rights groups have been among those cheering the Biden administration's decision to step in, but the filing of the lawsuit hasn't changed anything on the ground. Without any additional court action at this point, the law remains in effect.
CHALMETTE, La. (AP)  Darkness set in for Natasha Blunt well before Hurricane Ida knocked out power across Louisiana.

Months into the pandemic, she faced eviction in New Orleans. She lost her banquet-hall job. She suffered two strokes. And she struggled to help her 5-year-old grandson keep up with schoolwork at home.

Like nearly a fifth of Louisianas population  disproportionately represented by Black residents and women  Blunt, 51, lives below the poverty line, and the pandemic's economic fallout sent her to the brink. With the help of an aid group and grassroots donors, she moved to Chalmette, a few miles outside New Orleans, and started settling into a two-bedroom apartment. Using a cane and taking a slew of medications since her strokes, she couldn't return to work. But federal benefits kept food in the fridge for the most part.

Then came Hurricane Ida.

Ida was the fifth-strongest hurricane to ever hit the U.S. mainland, wiping out Louisiana's power grid before marching up the coast and sparking devastating Northeast flooding. Among survivors of the deadly storm, the toll has been deepest in many ways for people like Blunt  those who already lost livelihoods to the pandemic in a region of longstanding racial and social inequality. Advocates say the small wins theyd made for marginalized communities and people of color since the pandemic began have been quickly wiped out.

The government is really disconnected from what its like for people who have little to no safety net, said Maggie Harris, a grassroots organizer who created a fundraiser for Blunt. You marginalize people, you dont pay them enough, they have health problems and arent insured, you offer little cash assistance or rent assistance, and you allow them to be evicted.

"The message that people get is their lives are expendable.

As Ida approached, Blunt evacuated to a hotel. She could afford only a short stay and had to return to Chalmette, despite warnings not to go back to humid cities without power.

Her apartment was pitch black. Ida had blown in the windows of her upstairs bedroom. Beds, clothing and furniture were waterlogged. Shed spent her last dollars getting to the hotel.

Its like Ive got to start all over again, Blunt said, sobbing as she surveyed her first floor, where she sleeps since the bedroom is uninhabitable. Every time I get a step ahead, I get pushed back down. And Im tired. I dont see no way out.

Blunt faces eviction for the second time in a year. Her only hope, she said, is Social Security and other disability benefits. She applied before Ida, she said, but hasn't heard back  safety-net programs are often disrupted in disasters' wakes.

Blunt wants to move, perhaps away from the storm-battered Gulf Coast  somewhere grandson Kamille can resume schooling without worrying about power outages. But shes far from optimistic.

This is the end of the road; I cant go on much longer, she said. Kamille put down a worksheet to rub his grandmas leg.

Dont cry, he told her. She managed a tender reply: Do your ABCs, baby.

____

Anti-poverty advocates in Louisiana bemoan links between being Black or brown, living in impoverished areas, and being underserved by governmental disaster response. Available aid from anti-poverty programs often fails to meet storm victims' heightened needs.

That's what happened during Ida, advocates say. In Louisiana, where 17 storms that caused at least $1 billion in damage have hit since 2000, nonprofits see some of the most dire need and starkest divide along socioeconomics lines.

One of the things that we get really frustrated about," said Ashley Shelton of the nonprofit Power Coalition for Equality and Justice, "is people saying, Ugh, Louisiana is so resilient.'

We dont want to be resilient forever, she said. When you force people to live in a constant state of resilience, its just oppression. Fix the systems.

It doesnt help that Louisianas poverty rate is higher than the national average, according to the Census Bureau 's American Community Survey. Poverty makes the prospect of relocation precarious for people who were already struggling before disaster struck, said Andreanecia Morris of HousingNOLA, a program of the Greater New Orleans Housing Alliance.

Housing is a foundational issue for all of these catastrophes, Morris said. Our failure to address racial bias, gender bias and poverty bias in housing impedes all of those things.

After Ida hit, Morris canvassed areas of New Orleans. In the Lower Ninth Ward, a neighborhood that suffered immensely after Hurricane Katrina, 57-year-old Lationa Kemp found herself cut off from most aid. She'd been relying on neighbors with cars for ice, meals and water. She was without power, with roof leaks and fence damage.

Kemp had disputes with her landlord over the homes condition. The threat of eviction loomed. Morris wants to get Kemp moved elsewhere permanently. In the meantime, Morris suggested a cooling center.

Thank you, baby, but Im fine, Kemp told her, explaining that shed rather stay in a dilapidated home  past experiences make her fear the shelter system. Im praying that when I leave out of here, Im going to a better house.

____

Blunt has survived her share of storms  starting with her birth, during the fallout of Hurricane Camille in 1969. As she tells it, her pregnant mother had been moved to a naval medical ship. Today, Blunt chuckles over the coincidence of her grandsons name, Kamille.

Remembering Katrina is scarier. Blunt evacuated, then returned to a damaged home. But Ida's been worse.

This here was my worst-ever life experience, coming back to this, coming back to darkness, she said.

Blunt has considered leaving, as many Louisianans do in the wake of storms. No matter where she ends up, though, she knows she'll survive. Even in the darkness, she finds some light by helping her community  seeking a power source for a neighbor's breathing machine, sharing her car for charging cellphones. She tells herself: "Im still standing.

She wants more not just for her, but for her grandson. I want us to go somewhere better," Blunt said, helping Kamille with the TV remote, the power finally restored at home.

"Somewhere I can be stable. I just want to be stable.
FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP)  More than 8,000 Kentuckians have died from COVID-19, Gov. Andy Beshear announced Friday, calling the new record another grim milestone.

These are a lot of grieving families, and it looks like the coming weeks are going to be really hard, Beshear said in a video posted to social media.

The Bluegrass state reported 32 new virus-related deaths Friday, including the loss of a 19-year-old. Per capita, the states death toll is the 30th-highest in the nation, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

The fast-spreading delta variant continues to surge throughout the state, with Kentucky recording 5,197 more coronavirus cases Friday. Some 2,541 Kentuckians are currently hospitalized with COVID-19.

The state's test positivity rate is 14.00%, an alarmingly high rate that indicates that the virus is widespread.

Friday's state report said that 193 intensive care beds are available statewide, up from 90 on Thursday.

Beshear pleaded with the state's residents to get vaccinated, insisting that it was one of the best ways to prevent more hospitalizations and deaths from the virus, in addition to masking.

Please wear a mask when youre outside of the home, but otherwise indoors. This is killing a lot of people, and we can prevent it, he added.

Kentucky's education department will use up to $8.8 million in federal pandemic relief funding to reward school employees with a one-time $100 payment for getting vaccinated against COVID-19.

The federal money will be used to reimburse Kentucky school districts choosing to offer the incentive to employees who get fully vaccinated, the department said Friday.

All full- and part-time public school district employees are eligible. The incentive applies to employees already vaccinated as well as those who receive full vaccinations by Dec. 1. There's enough funding to reimburse districts for payments to about 88,000 employees.

Getting people vaccinated is one of the main ways were going to be able to get out of this pandemic and get back into our classrooms as usual, Education Commissioner Jason Glass said. We hope this will encourage people to get vaccinated in order to protect their students, colleagues and themselves.

Districts must first pay employees to receive the reimbursement, the department said.

The incentive program was announced a day after the Republican-led legislature ended a statewide mask mandate for K-12 public schools. The state school board issued the emergency mask regulation last month. The delta variant has forced dozens of school districts to close classrooms because of COVID-19 outbreaks.

Roughly 70% of Kentucky adults have received at least a first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.

___

Hudspeth Blackburn 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.
VATICAN CITY (AP)  Pope Francis is making his first foreign trip since undergoing intestinal surgery in July, a four-day visit to Central Europe that will not only test his health but also provide one of the most awkward moments of his papacy  a meeting with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, the sort of populist, right-wing leader Francis typically scorns.

Francis is only spending seven hours in Budapest on Sunday before moving on to a three-day, hop-scotch tour of neighboring Slovakia. The lopsided itinerary suggests that Francis wanted to avoid giving Orban the bragging rights, political boost and photo opportunities that come with hosting a pope for a proper state visit.

Trip organizers have insisted Francis isnt snubbing Hungary, noting that the Hungarian church and state only invited him to close out an international conference on the Eucharist on Sunday. If I am only invited to dinner, I cannot spend the night, said the Rev. Kornel Fabry, secretary general of the Eucharist conference.

But the message being sent is clear, and Francis even hammered home the point in a recent interview with the COPE broadcaster of the Spanish bishops conference. In the interview last week, Francis said he didnt even know if hed meet with Orban while in Budapest. Vatican officials have said he will, of course, meet with the prime minister along with the Hungarian president in a scheduled meeting.

Botond Feledy, policy expert for the Institute of Social Reflection, a Hungarian Jesuit organization, said it was clear Francis and Orban disagree on some fundamental issues  migration topping the list  but said the aim is not to escalate differences or conflicts.

It is quite clear that the 30 minutes that Pope Francis has in his program to meet with the head of state, the head of government and the bishop is a very, very short time, Feledy said in an interview. This shows that he is not really coming for a political visit, but to give a Mass at the congress after having a protocol greeting with the Hungarian politicians.

Francis has long expressed solidarity with migrants and refugees  he once brought a dozen Syrian Muslim refugees home with him during a trip to a refugee camp in Greece  and criticized what he called national populism advanced by governments like Hungarys.

Orban is known for his hard-line stance against immigration and frequently depicts his government as a defender of Christian civilization in Europe and a bulwark against migration from Muslim-majority countries. In 2015, he rejected proposals to settle refugees from the Middle East and Africa in Hungary and erected a fence along Hungary's southern border to keep out EU asylum-seekers.

Asked in 2016 about Donald Trumps border wall with Mexico, Francis famously quipped that anyone who builds a border wall is not Christian.

The start of the closed-door meeting will not be filmed live  one of the few moments of interest that the pope will be off-camera during the trip. It's a visit that is being closely watched given it marks Francis' first big and prolonged public outing since he underwent scheduled surgery in July for what the Vatican said was a severe narrowing of his large intestine.

Francis, 84, had 33 centimeters (13 inches) of his colon removed and spent 10 days in the hospital recovering. He has recently resumed holding public and private audiences and says he is now living a totally normal life." But he is still on medication and cannot stand for long periods of time.

Papal trips are grueling under ordinary circumstances, with back-to-back meetings, multiple transfers and lengthy liturgical services, all covered around-the-clock by live television cameras. After his last one  a trip to Iraq in March before the surgery  Francis admitted he might have to slow down, given his age and fatigue.

But the Hungary-Slovakia program bears no evidence of an aging pope or of one the mend and in fact harks back to the frenzied scheduling that was the hallmark of St. John Paul IIs many foreign trips. Francis is due to deliver 12 speeches over four days, kicking off with a 6 a.m. flight to Budapest on Sunday and ending the day in the Slovakian capital, Bratislava, after nine separate events.

Maybe in this first trip I should be more careful, because one has to recover completely, Francis said in the COPE interview. But in the end it will be the same as the others, you will see.

Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said no extra health care measures were being taken for the trip, just the usual caution. Francis personal doctor and nurses would be traveling with him in the Vatican delegation, as usual, he said.

Bruni, too, stressed that the main focus of the Hungary leg of the trip was spiritual and noted that Francis has made other quick trips for specific events without fulfilling the protocol trappings of a proper state visit. The pope went to Strasbourg, France, on a one-day visit in 2014 to deliver speeches at the European Parliament and Council of Europe, but didn't stay.

After the brief stop in Budapest, Francis heads to Slovakia where the highlight of the trip will be his visit Tuesday with members of the countrys Roma minority, who were persecuted during World War II and continue to face racism, discrimination and abject poverty today.

The pope of the peripheries has long sought to visit the most marginal during his foreign trips, insisting on stops at slums, prisons or drug rehabilitation centers. His visit to the Lunik IX settlement in Slovakias second city, Kosice, is in keeping with that: Parts of the settlement dont have running water, gas or electricity.

Francis will also meet with Slovakias Jewish community and hear the testimony of a Holocaust survivor before he finishes up the visit with a Mass on Wednesday in Sastin, the site of an annual pilgrimage each Sept. 15 to venerate the patron of Slovakia, Our Lady of Sorrows.

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Spike reported from Budapest, Hungary.
KABUL, Afghanistan  More than 250 foreign nationals have left Afghanistan in the past three days, says Zalmay Khalilzad, Washingtons special envoy and the architect of an often criticized deal with the Taliban.

The deal signed last year provided for the safe withdrawal of U.S and NATO troops but say his critics was heavily weighted in favor of the hardline-Islamic movement.

In a series of tweets Khalilzad praised both the Middle Eastern State of Qatar, whose national airline carried out the flights and the Talibans cooperation in this important effort, for the recent departure of foreign nationals from Afghanistan.

We will continue to engage the government of Qatar, the Taliban, and others to ensure the safe passage of our citizens, other foreign nationals, and Afghans that want to leave, Khalilzad tweeted.

However, hundreds of Afghans, including U.S. citizens and green card holders, remain stranded in northern Afghanistans Mazar-e-Sharif waiting to be evacuated but stopped by Taliban rulers demanding travel documents.

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MORE ON AFGHANISTAN:

 Flight takes about 200, including Americans, out of Kabul

 Pentagon chief: al-Qaida may seek comeback in Afghanistan

 Analysis: Taliban hard-line path worsens Afghanistan dilemma

 As flights resume, plight of Afghan allies tests Bidens vow

 Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/afghanistan

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UNITED NATIONS -- The United Nations chief says all countries should engage with the Taliban and deliver the same message: The Afghan people should live in peace under an inclusive government that respects basic human rights including for women and girls, and Afghanistan should not be a sanctuary for terrorism anymore and should play a constructive role in international relations.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told a news conference Friday its important that independently of different strategies, of different forms of contact, all countries are able to convey the same message and to engage with the Taliban in an effective way.

He said the U.N. is permanently engaging with the Taliban and we believe that a dialogue with the Taliban is absolutely essential at the present moment.

Guterres said humanitarian aid is also essential and efforts must be made to prevent an economic meltdown in Afghanistan.

He said the countrys financial situation is very difficult and it is essential to find ways, through some waivers or some mechanisms to inject cash in the economy to avoid a meltdown.

Looking ahead, Guterres said, what would be positive is to have simultaneously the formation in Afghanistan of an inclusive government that respects previous international commitments by the Afghan state and takes into account concerns about terrorism, human rights and other issues leading to a normalization of the relations of the international community with Afghanistan.

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ANKARA, Turkey  The U.N. refugee agency chief said Friday the UNHCR will engage with the Taliban in order provide assistance to millions of displaced Afghans.

Filippo Grandi, the United Nations high commissioner for refugees, also said his agency has so far not observed large numbers of Afghans trying to cross into other countries but warned that the situation could change if conditions in the country deteriorate.

The priority number one for my organization is to step up, scale up our humanitarian work to help those displaced... Winter is coming. It is very cold in Afghanistan during winter, Grandi said.

He said: And in order to do that, UNHCR, like other humanitarian organizations, will engage, will discuss with the Taliban. We will discuss with anybody that controls an area where there are people in need.

The UNHCR chief made the comment in the Turkish province of Gaziantep, near the border with Syria, at the end of a four-day visit to the Turkey.

Turkey, which already hosts some 3.7 Syrian refugees and some 300,000 Afghan migrants, has expressed concern over the potential of large numbers of Afghans heading its way.

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ISLAMABAD  Pakistans foreign minister says the international community is not in a hurry to recognize the Taliban government, although it has a desire to engage with it.

Shah Mahmood Qureshi spoke at a joint news conference after holding talks with his Spanish counterpart Jose Manuel Albares in the capital, Islamabad.

Qureshi said that he had come to this belief after having meetings with diplomats from various countries. He said that people are watching, they are waiting, they are looking at the unfolding events of Afghanistan.

Qureshi said I see a desire to engage but not a rush to recognize the Taliban.

In his remarks, Albares said Spain wants to see a stable and peaceful Afghanistan.

He also said Spain wanted safe transit for those who wanted to leave Afghanistan to travel to Spain.

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MOSCOW  Russias top diplomat says the foreign is not recommending that an official delegation be sent from Moscow to a ceremony inaugurating a new government in Afghanistan.

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov this week appeared to suggest that Russia could send high-level representation to such a ceremony if the Taliban formed a government that sufficiently represented the countrys ethnic groups.

But on Friday he was quoted by Russian news agencies as saying he envisioned only representation by Russias ambassador.

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BERLIN  German international broadcaster Deutsche Welle says 10 of its correspondents in Afghanistan have left the country for Pakistan, after it was previously unable to get them out of Kabul by air.

Deutsche Welle said in a statement Friday that the journalists, including its only female correspondent in Afghanistan, were able to leave on Thursday.

It didnt detail how exactly they got out of Afghanistan, but said that due to a variety of reasons an evacuation by air had not worked out. The group had waited unsuccessfully outside the Kabul airport for days.

As a result, the broadcaster said, all options were explored to get the group out of the country by another route.

Deutsche Welle director general Peter Limbourg thanked the German government, without whom this evacuation would not have been possible, and Qatar, which he said made an enormous effort. He said authorities in Islamabad had granted permission for the evacuation of the families on humanitarian grounds.

The evacuated correspondents are to be taken to Bonn, Germany. The broadcaster said it is in talks with authorities to bring relatives of the employees of its Dari and Pashto services to Germany, as well as two correspondents and their families who had returned to their hometowns after weeks of waiting in Kabul.

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MADRID  Spains foreign minister is in Islamabad for talks with Pakistani officials aimed at easing the transit of Afghan people who worked with Spain before Afghanistans fall into the hands of the Taliban.

Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares is scheduled to hold meetings with Pakistans Prime Minister Imran Khan and his counterpart, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, among other officials.

In a video released by the Spanish ministry, Albares said that the goal was to hold talks with one of the main key players in the region and find ways to leave no one behind. The minister said he would give assurances to the Pakistani government that Spains embassy would deal fast with Afghans who worked for the country in order for them not to become a burden for Pakistan.

Albares is the first trip by a Spanish foreign minister to Pakistan in 70 years of diplomatic relations.

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ISLAMABAD  Pakistans foreign minister says it is the collective responsibility of the international community to help Afghanistan to avert a humanitarian crisis.

In a statement Friday, Shah Mahmood Qureshi said that despite having limited resources, Pakistan a day earlier sent a plane carrying food and medicines to Kabul. Qureshi said more such aid will be dispatched to Afghanistan via land routes.

Qureshi made his comments ahead of the visit of his Spanish counterpart, Jose Manuel Albares, who was expected to arrive in the capital, Islamabad, later Friday, for talks on Afghanistan.

Qureshi said that a humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan wouldnt be anyones interest  in the region or in the world.

Pakistan wants the international community to unfreeze Afghanistans assets to enable Kabul use its own money to avert a worsening humanitarian crisis.

The Taliban government currently does not have access to the Afghanistan central banks $9 billion in reserves, most of which is held by the New York Federal Reserve. These reserves were blocked amid last months political turmoil in Afghanistan.

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UNITED NATIONS  The United Nations development agency says Afghanistan is teetering on the brink of universal poverty which could become a reality in the middle of next year unless urgent efforts are made to bolster local communities and their economies.

It said the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan has put 20 years of steady economic gains at risk.

The U.N. Development Program outlined four scenarios for Afghanistan following the Talibans Aug. 15 assumption of power that predict the countrys GDP will decline between 3.6% and 13.2% in the next fiscal year starting in June 2022, depending on the intensity of the crisis and how much the world engages with the Taliban. That is in sharp contrast to the expected 4% growth in GDP before the fall of the government.

Afghanistan pretty much faces universal poverty by the middle of next year, Kanni Wignaraja, UNDPs Asia-Pacific Director, told a news conference Thursday launching its 28-page assessment. Thats where were heading -- its 97-98% (poverty rate) no matter how you work these projections.

Currently, the poverty rate is 72% and Wignaraja pointed to many development gains after the Taliban were ousted from power in 2001: Per capita income more than doubled in the last 20 years, life expectancy at birth was extended by about nine years, the number of years of schooling rose from six to 10, and we got women into university.

But she said Afghanistan now faces a humanitarian and development disaster resulting from political instability, frozen foreign reserves, a collapsed public finance system, a crush on local banking because of this, as well as the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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UNITED NATIONS  The United States has a message for the Taliban: If it lives up to all its commitments, brings greater stability to Afghanistan and the region, demonstrates widespread inclusion, and protects the gains of the last 20 years well work with it.

But U.S. deputy ambassador Jeffrey DeLaurentis, who delivered the message at a U.N. Security Council meeting on Thursday, stressed that any legitimacy and support will have to be earned.

He said the standards the international community has set are clear and include facilitating safe passage for Afghans and foreign nationals who want to leave Afghanistan and respecting the countrys obligations under international humanitarian law including those related to the protection of civilians.

Were watching closely to see that those standards are met, he said.

DeLaurentis told the council that following the U.S. withdrawal and the Taliban takeover, Afghanistan needs the United Nations and the U.N. political mission in the country more than ever.

He said the United States remains committed to the people of Afghanistan, and as the countrys largest humanitarian donor it is helping partners on the ground provide assistance, but the needs are vast.

With the diplomatic footprint in the country reduced, DeLaurentis said, the U.N. has a vitally important role to play not only in coordinating aid but in preventing human rights violations and abuses and pursuing accountability for those that have occurred, and in protecting children and civilians.
KABUL, Afghanistan  Afghanistans first 2001 post-Taliban president Hamid Karzai marked the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on America with a meeting of tribal elders at his high-walled compound in the Afghan capital where he has remained with his family since the August return of the Taliban to Kabul.

In a tweet, Karzai called for peace and stability and expressed the hope that the new caretaker Cabinet that included no women and no non-Taliban would become an inclusive government that can be the real face of the whole Afghanistan.

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MORE ON SEPT. 11:

 From 9/11's ashes a new world took shape. It did not last

 Surviving 9/11 was just the first piece of the journey

 9/11: As the decades pass, the act of remembering evolves

 How 9/11 changed air travel: more security, less privacy

 Two decades after 9/11, Muslim Americans still fighting bias

 20 years later, fallout from toxic WTC dust grows

 They were some of 9/11s biggest names. Where are they now?

 From election to COVID, 9/11 conspiracies cast a long shadow

 Read these stories and more AP coverage of the Sept. 11 anniversary at: https://apnews.com/hub/9-11-a-world-changed.

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WELLINGTON, New Zealand  New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said she was in the U.S. 20 years ago on Sept. 11 and its a day shell never forget.

I still have the front pages of the newspapers from that time because it instantly felt like a moment from which everything would change, she said. I saw firsthand the shock and fear that goes hand in hand with terrorism.

She said that after New Zealand experienced an attack at two mosques by a white supremacist gunman in 2019, which killed 51 and was livestreamed on Facebook, New Zealand had decided to play a leading role in combating online extremism.

She said New Zealand wanted to express unity with all the victims, families and loved ones affected by the Sept. 11 attacks.

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NEW YORK  At sundown, two vertical beams of bright blue light shot upward through the darkened New York City sky, evoking the twin towers in an annual tribute visible for miles.

The Tribute in Light public art installation first shone six months after the Sept. 11 attacks and has been repeated each anniversary since, with the twin columns reaching up to four miles into the sky from dusk to dawn.

The beams are comprised of 88 xenon light bulbs, each 7,000 watts, positioned into two 48-foot squares on the roof of a parking garage south of the 9/11 Memorial. They can be viewed from a 60-mile radius.

The 9/11 Memorial and Museum presents the display to honor those who were killed and celebrate the spirit of the city.

For the 20th anniversary, buildings throughout New York also planned to light up their facades and rooftops in blue.

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WASHINGTON  President Joe Biden is ending his day of remembrance by paying his respects at the National Pentagon 9/11 Memorial.

Biden and wife Jill took a moment of silence before a wreath studded with white, purple and red flowers on display in front of the memorial benches that mark the 184 victims of the attack on the Pentagon.

Vice President Kamala Harris and her husband, Doug Emhoff, also took a moment of silence at the memorial. All four listened as a uniformed bugler played taps.

It was Bidens third and final stop of the day, after visiting the National September 11 Memorial in New York City and the Flight 93 Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania earlier in the day. He is slated to spend the rest of the weekend at his home in Wilmington, Delaware.

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BOSTON  The body of a U.S. Marine killed in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan has returned home to Massachusetts on the 20th anniversary of the attacks that led to the war.

Sgt. Johanny Rosario Pichardo, 25, was among the U.S. service members and Afghans killed in the Aug. 26 bombing near the Kabul airport.

Gov. Charlie Baker, Boston Mayor Kim Janey and U.S. Sen. Edward Markey paid their respects to her family as the body arrived Saturday at Bostons Logan International Airport.

In Rosario Pichardos hometown of Lawrence, people lined the streets and waved flags at the vehicle procession of police, firefighters and others that accompanied her casket. A Marine honor guard carried the flag-draped casket into a funeral home.

Shes coming home on the date, the 20th anniversary of the date, that created the war that cost her life, Francisco Urena, former state veterans commissioner, told The Boston Globe.

She served with the Naval Amphibious Force, Task Force 51/5th Marine Expeditionary Brigade.

A private funeral Mass will be held Monday. A public wake is planned for Tuesday at a stadium in Lawrence, with burial at Bellevue Cemetery.

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NEW YORK  Former President Donald Trump commemorated the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks by visiting a fire station and police precinct in New York, where he criticized his successor for the way he pulled out of Afghanistan last month.

Trump skipped joining President Joe Biden and other past presidents at official 9/11 memorial ceremonies Saturday at the World Trade Center and in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Instead, he traveled several blocks from his Trump Tower building in Manhattan to the 17th police precinct and the neighboring fire station. Speaking to officers, Trump criticized the withdrawal from Afghanistan and expressed surprise about why it hadnt come up in other 9/11 memorial speeches. It was gross incompetence, he said of the exit.

Trump was asked by the officers whether he plans to launch a comeback run for the White House in 2024 -- or for mayor of New York. He said it was an easy decision that would make them happy.

If I catch COVID its because of you, Trump said as he posed for photos with police officers.

Trump planned to end the day in Florida, where he is providing commentary on a boxing match.

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SHANKSVILLE, Pa.  President Joe Biden made the second of his three Sept. 11 stops, visiting the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, not long after Vice President Kamala Harris and former President George W. Bush spoke at a remembrance.

Biden placed a wreath at Memorial Plaza, home to the Wall of Names, where the names of the passengers and the crew from that flight are inscribed in marble.

The president and first lady Jill Biden then walked with relatives of the crash victims into the grassy field when the jet came to rest.

Biden made no public comments during his time at the memorial.

Biden arrived in Pennsylvania after joining former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama and other dignitaries, as well as Sept. 11 victims family members, at Saturdays World Trade Center ceremony of remembrance in New York City.

The New York ceremony concluded with taps after victims relatives read the names of nearly 3,000 people who were killed in the 2001 attacks.

SHANKSVILLE, Pa.  Former President George W. Bush told people at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Pennsylvania that Americans learned much about themselves on Sept. 11.

We learned that bravery is more common than we imagined, emerging with sudden splendor in the face of death, Bush said Saturday at a ceremony on the 20th anniversary of the attacks.

Bush, who was president during the attacks, commended the courage of the Flight 93 passengers and crew who are believed to have foiled an attack on the U.S. Capitol by leading the plane to crash in rural Pennsylvania.

The 33 passengers and seven crew of Flight 93 could have been any group of citizens selected by fate. In a sense, they stood in for us all, Bush said. The terrorists soon discovered that a random group of Americans is an exceptional group of people.

He encouraged Americans to put aside their political differences in the spirit of what he saw after 9/11.

So much of our politics has become a naked appeal to anger, fear and resentment, Bush said. On Americas day of trial and grief, I saw millions of people instinctively grab their neighbors hand and rally to the cause of one another.

Vice President Kamala Harris began her remarks at the Flight 93 memorial with words for those who lost loved ones on Sept. 11.

So many in our nation -- too many in our nation -- have deeply felt the passage of time these past 20 years, she said. Please know your nation sees you and we stand with you and we support you.

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SHANKSVILLE, Pa.  The victims and heroes of Flight 93 are being commemorated at a ceremony at the site where the plane crashed in a field on Sept. 11, 2001.

President Joe Biden was making an appearance, and Vice President Kamala Harris, former President George W. Bush and Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf were also speaking.

Wolf said the passengers and crew of Flight 93, whose actions are believed to have led the hijackers to abandon their mission of targeting the U.S. Capitol, offered a lasting lesson of courage and hope.

This story and this place remind us each day what it means to be an American, said Wolf, a Democrat. In times of strife, we Americans, we come together. We comfort each other. We protect each other and we stand up for each other. This memorial is a powerful reminder of what we have lost. But its also a powerful reminder of the strength of the American spirit.

Larry Catuzzi, father of Flight 93 passenger Lauren Catuzzi Grandcolas, said in an interview that he talks to her every day.

I say something that kind of reminds me of her, and Ill talk to her. Or something good happens to me and i thank her for her being with me, said Catuzzi, whose 38-year-old daughter was pregnant when she perished.

The family started a foundation in her name that has distributed college scholarships to more than 100 girls, funded three neonatal units and built a park in Houston memorializing the victims of Flight 93.

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ARLINGTON, Va.  Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin says that we remember not just who our fallen teammates were, but the mission that they shared.

Austin made the prepared remarks at a Pentagon ceremony Saturday marking the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

He continued, We recall their common commitment to defend our republic  and to squarely face new dangers.

Austin noted that almost a quarter of the citizens who we defend today were born after 9/11, including many of the 13 American service members killed in the recent attack in Afghanistan.

He says that as the years march on, we must ensure that all our fellow Americans know and understand what happened here on 9/11  and in Manhattan  and in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

The Pentagon chief says that it is our responsibility to remember. And it is our duty to defend our democracy.

He says, We cannot know what the next 20 years will bring. We cannot know what new dangers they will carry.  But we do know that America will always lead.

And to the audience at the Pentagon commemoration, the defense secretary said, We still work here. We still remember here. We still uphold our values here. With clear heads and fearless hearts.

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NEW YORK  Bruce Springsteen has performed at the World Trade Center memorial plaza during a ceremony marking the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

The audience of dignitaries and family members of people killed in the 2001 attacks applauded after Springsteen performed his song Ill See You In My Dreams while accompanying himself on guitar and harmonica.

Victims relatives then resumed their reading of names of the fallen, a tradition since the first anniversary of the attacks that leveled the trade centers twin towers.

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NEW YORK  The 9/11 anniversary commemoration at ground zero has begun with a tolling bell and a moment of silence, exactly 20 years after the start of the deadliest terror attack on U.S. soil.

President Joe Biden, former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, members of Congress, and other dignitaries joined a crowd of victims relatives Saturday on the Sept. 11 memorial plaza in New York. The memorial stands where the World Trade Centers twin towers were rammed and felled by hijacked planes.

Observances are also planned at the two other sites where the 9/11 conspirators crashed their hijacked jets: the Pentagon and a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Biden is scheduled to pay respects at all three places, and former President George W. Bush is to speak at the Pennsylvania ceremony.
The federal government is moving forward with oil and gas leasing on 6,277 acres of Bureau of Land Management property in Montana following a judicial order directing the Department of the Interior to resume lease sales on federal lands.

The BLM Montana/Dakotas State Office is asking for public feedback on leases involving 14 parcels in Montana that had been considered for auction before President Joe Bidens pause on new lease sales went into effect. The moratorium was initiated with a Jan. 27 executive order directing the Interior Department to complete a comprehensive review of the leasing program including potential climate and other impacts associated with oil and gas activities.

The same day Biden signed the order, it was challenged with a lawsuit filed by Western Energy Alliance, an oil and gas industry group representing 200 member companies. The lawsuit sought to reverse the moratorium by arguing that Biden exceeded his presidential authority in issuing it.

In March, Montana joined a coalition of 12 other states in another lawsuit seeking to overturn the moratorium. Western District of Louisiana Judge Terry Doughty sided with the states in a June ruling granting a preliminary injunction. Doughtys order directed the government to resume the federal leasing program.

On Aug. 16, the Interior Department said it had appealed Doughtys ruling, but would comply with the order while the departments appeal is pending.

In a press release about the resumption, BLM said a review of the agencys oil and gas leasing program is ongoing, and that the agency will continue analyzing changes necessary to meet the presidents goals of cutting greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030 and achieving net zero greenhouse emissions by 2050.

The resumption appears to have pleased neither industry groups nor environmentalists. The former say the federal government is dragging its feet. The latter say the Biden administration is reneging on its commitment to aggressively curtail greenhouse gas emissions.

Western Energy Alliance President Kathleen Sgamma said the auctions again under consideration wont occur until February 2022 and those parcels are ready to put on the calendar this year, not six months from now.

The environmental analysis was already completed for these parcels, Sgamma said. Doing new scoping and analysis is a stalling tactic.

She said she hopes her groups lawsuit progresses quickly enough to compel the department to dispense with the stall tactics.

Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen, who was party to the states lawsuit, was similarly unimpressed with the governments announcement.

Slow walking compliance with this federal court order that resulted from our lawsuit is just the latest example of Bidens war on energy produced in America, all while he begs foreign nations like Venezuela, Russia, and Iran to pump more oil, he said in a statement emailed to MTFP.

For their part, conservation groups questioned the integrity of the leasing system and expressed frustration with its impact on climate goals. Aubrey Bertram, staff attorney for Helena-based nonprofit Wild Montana, said resumption of the leasing program undermines Montanas outdoor recreation economy and weakens conservation work necessary to fight climate change.

It returns us to a broken leasing system that created the absurd circumstances were in today, whereby industry is sitting on 36 years worth of leases in Montana at a moment when the market is favorable and yet not a single rig is currently operating in the state.

According to reporting by KTVQ, two horizontal drilling rigs set up shop in eastern Montana last month, representing the first time there have been operational rigs in the state since the start of the pandemic.

These new plans to sell public lands for fracking are nothing but a shattered promise from the Biden administration to put climate, justice and health first, Wild Earth Guardians Climate and Energy Program Director Jeremy Nichols said in an emailed statement. We simply cant frack our way to a safe climate and [we] cant afford to keep selling lands to the oil and gas industry.

The public has until Oct. 1 to comment on the potential sale of the new Montana leases. Portions or all of more than 20 sections of land in the state totalling 6,277 acres are being considered for leasing.
Its been 20 years since Norm Teed Jr. drove all night to serve as a chaplain and disaster relief volunteer in the 114th Precinct of New York City. Teed, a Phelps native and a pastor for only three years by Sept. 11, 2001, remembers the experience vividly.

A senior pastor at the time with First Assembly of God in Seneca Falls, he and his family had only just returned from their first visit to the city that summer.

It was a ministry trip, he recalled. We worked with the homeless through the New York School of Urban Ministry in Queens.

NYSUM, which focuses on intercity, homeless, and pastoral ministry, provides training to short-term mission teams that wish to better meet cross-cultural needs. It was through this program that Teed made acquaintance with the Rev. Steve Coulish, who was involved in the intercultural ministry.

When the worst happened weeks later on 9/11, Coulish was Teeds first call.

I remember watching the evening news and just trying to get through to Reverend Kulish. I couldnt do so because of all the damage to the city, so it took a few days to finally get through to him. When I did, I just said, Steve, were praying for you guys. What can we do to help? And he said, Norm, we just need pastors who can help us.

Kulish explained that his team had been going down to the 114th precinct (Long Island City, Queens) twice a day to bring food and ministers to first responders, and they were struggling to keep up.

Teed acted immediately, calling on two fellow ministers the next morning to join him. With work arrangements made and families hugged goodbye, they hit the road.

By that afternoon we loaded up my van with some work boots, hard hats, and camping gear and we drove all night to NYC, he recalled. Upon arrival, Teed and his friends dove right into serving people, assisted by Rev. Coulish. The need was great. It was a very chaotic place, Teed explained. At first we would just pray and talk with people, and help with food, but it wasnt very long when they would drop us off in the mornings that we eventually got asked to go in on rescue teams.

One day in particular stands out in his mind.

I remember going into the precinct, and the officers asked us to pray with them. One of the senior officers turned to us and said, We need you to go with them today. Teed and the team boarded a Greyhound bus with the officers to what was called the Frozen Zone, an area of blocks around Ground Zero. They went through military and NYPD checkpoints along the way. I remember getting there, it was well before daylight still. When we got off the bus we were in front of a school, and by that point they had a huge American flag. It was lit up and provided a staging area for officers and first responders.

Beacons of hope stood strong amid the wreckage.

There was a Catholic church right there in the Frozen Zone at Ground Zero, where if you needed a break, you could go in and pray. There was no electric or anything, so it was candlelit, Teed remembered.

It was a welcome respite amid the citys constant turmoil, personified by the piles of supply and debris on its street corners.

There was a cemetery down there behind the Episcopal church, Teed shared with emotion, and it was piled high with documents and things that had blown out of the towers. You would find things that would say, like, Jim Smith, 102nd Floor, Trade Center One. And you always wondered, Did they make it? Did they make it?

When he shares his story, Teed has almost more to say about the courage and selflessness of first responders than his own experience. On-site, before they took us in rescue and recovery, was mainly what chaplaincy does a lot: to be there, to listen and pray with them if they would like you to, and support. As we went through those couple weeks, we began to develop connections with the officers.

He continued, Any NYPD officer or firemen that wasnt on duty, they were there. Those men and women, they just never left because it was their family that was in there.

Teed spent around three weeks going back and forth from Upstate to the city, with the pastors returning home to preach each Sunday and collect supplies to bring back with them. Though this year marks the 20th anniversary of the tragedy, the memory of those weeks has stayed fresh for him.

Every time September comes around, its kind of a hard time for me. And I think about all the men and women that weve lost since then. The folks lost werent restricted to those days and weeks following. There were many of the folks that Ive served with that I know have passed from respiratory things. I can remember as we all woke up in the morning you couldnt breathe and you felt sick and that would continue. They didnt know everything that was in the air.

Respiratory impairment is common among first responders who answered the call on 9/11, due to residual jet fuel fumes, building treatments, and pulverized debris made airborne. This, combined with Teeds background in construction, led him to a career in code enforcement.

I thought, this is something I can do to help keep folks safe. Over the years, its been a big priority for me, along with the spiritual. If I can go into a building before theres an emergency, and I can identify things that could be a hazard to a firefighter, police officer, or occupant, it might save someones life. said Teed, who currently lives in Branson, Missouri and continues to work in building and fire code.

In his service as a chaplain to first responders during those weeks, Teed noted that, though tragedy often causes people to seek the spiritual, its faith independent of circumstance that kept them going. It made me realize how important it is that our faith is who we are, not something we do when things get difficult, and I pray that our country gets back to that. There was not a person down there that was not praying, that wasnt hoping. Never let your faith become a going through the motions thing. Make sure its something that you realize needs to be foundational to your life. That is what got us through.

When asked what he most took away from his time serving at Ground Zero, Teed emphasized the need for a return to national unity.

I just hope as a country we dont lose the folks that are willing to go and willing to serve. All the divisiveness that we see, its very rare anymore you hear someone talk about being an American. Were not a stronger country for that [lack] in the least little bit.
Northern California-based publishing group Weeklys has launched a new weekly publication for the Silicon Valley communities of Los Gatos and Monte Sereno. Called Los Gatan, the 36-page inaugural issue was distributed to homes and businesses on Wednesday, Sept. 1.

Were thrilled to be back in Los Gatos again and are very encouraged by the community response, said Executive Editor and CEO Dan Pulcrano. People are stepping forward to purchase subscriptions and advertising because they appreciate the original reporting that our team is delivering.

Pulcrano founded the original Los Gatos Weekly shortly after his graduation from UC Santa Cruz and eight years later bought its 110-year-old competitor to create the Weekly-Times. That nameplate survives as a publication of the San Jose Mercury News under the umbrella of Alden Capitals Digital First Media.

Los Gatan is the 14th newspaper in the Weeklys group, previously known as Metro Newspapers, after its flagship Metro Silicon Valley.

In addition to the print edition, Los Gatan will publish stories on its LosGatan.com website, in its weekly e-edition, in its email newsletters and on social media channels under the handle @losgatan.

The new publications launch follows a string of acquisitions over the past seven years in communities adjacent to Weeklys core markets. In 2014, along with the purchase of Santa Cruzs Good Times, the alt weekly publisher expanded into traditional community publishing with the purchase of the Gilroy Dispatch, Morgan Hill Times and Hollister Free Lance.

Since becoming part of the publishing group, the Gilroy Dispatch won the states top journalism award - General Excellence - from the California News Publishers Association, as did Good Times - two years in a row.

In 2019, Weeklys purchased Watsonvilles Pajaronian, Aptos Life and an affiliated group in the Salinas Valley. The next year, it acquired the Press Banner, based in Scotts Valley, which is adjacent to Los Gatos.

Also in 2020, Weeklys added the East Bay Express alternative weekly to the group, which also includes the Pacific Sun and Bohemian in the North Bay. In July 2020, the East Bay team unveiled a home delivered glossy, East Bay magazine.

We are seeing a post-pandemic resurgence in our print properties, Pulcrano said. I know print was supposed to disappear, but in recent years, cognitive psychologists and neuroscientists have released studies explaining how the human brain absorbs written information, and print media appears to have some advantages over digital media in terms of comprehension and recall.

Pulcrano said his Silicon Valley publishing company will also continue to invest in digital media.

Weeklys is privately held and based in the SoFA District of San Jose, California.
(The Center Square)  Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte called President Joe Biden's sweeping new COVID-19 vaccine mandate 'unlawful and un-American' and vowed to protect the state's residents from what he termed "gross federal overreach."

"President Bidens vaccination mandate is unlawful and un-American," Gianforte said on Twitter. "We are committed to protecting Montanans freedoms and liberties against this gross federal overreach. "

Biden announced the new mandates Thursday. Though they are expected to be challenged in court, if enacted the mandates will force millions of unvaccinated Americans to receive the vaccine, undergo weekly testing or lose their jobs.

According to the president, all private employers with 100 or more employees would be required to ensure their employees are vaccinated or get tested weekly.

The White House estimates this rule, which will be enforced by the Department of Labors Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), will impact more than 80 million Americans.

Gianforte told RealClearPolitics we are already having enough trouble getting people back to work, and here is one more thing that makes it harder.

Businesses, nonprofits and other employers across the U.S. have been unable to fill millions of jobs in recent months, in part they say because of enhanced unemployment benefits from the federal government that expired last weekend. Gianforte was one of two dozen Republican governors who opted their state out of the federally enhanced benefits before they were set to expire because he said they disincentivized people returning to the workforce.

The Montana governor also signed into law a bill that makes it illegal for private employers to require vaccines as a condition of employment, which runs counter to Biden's new executive order.

This edict from the Biden administration is unlawful in Montana, he told RealClearPolitics, promising to fight the mandate.

Gianforte joins Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and other Republican elected officials across the country in vowing to fight against the mandate.

"So now, President Bidens plan is to shut down freedom, Ducey said in a statement. These mandates are outrageous. They will never stand up in court. We must and will push back.
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Montana is required to refund nearly $10 million based on its allocation of expenses over the past three years. The average reimbursement is $623.

Nearly 16,000 Montanans who purchased Blue Cross Blue Shield insurance through the marketplace are set to receive partial reimbursement for premiums paid between 2018 and 2020.

The Affordable Care Act requires insurers selling plans on the marketplace to spend a certain percentage of the premiums they collect on medical or health-related expenses like doctor visits, drug prescriptions and hospital stays. If an insurance company doesnt meet that requirement, it must issue premium reimbursements to its customers.

That threshold, known as a Medical Loss Ratio standard, is 85% for members who have insurance through the large group market and 80% for members who have insurance through the individual market. Regulators evaluate an insurance companys spending over a rolling three-year period to determine the companys Medical Loss Ratio. If more than 15% of premiums (for the large group market) or 20% of premiums (for the individual market) go toward administrative costs or profits, the insurer is required to issue a premium reimbursement equal to the percentage by which it exceeded the threshold. In 2020, BCBS spent 72.3% of the $127 million it received in Montana premiums on health care and activities to improve health care, falling shy of the 80% standard by 7.7%.

A total of 15,782 Montanans who purchased BCBS insurance through the individual marketplace between 2018 and 2020 are set to receive a reimbursement, which BCBS is required to issue no later than Sept. 30. Reimbursement will be issued as a check mailed to members or as a credit for future premium payments. The average reimbursement is $623.

John Doran, vice president of external affairs for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Montana, said eligible insurance consumers dont have to do anything to receive the reimbursement, but can call the number on the back of their insurance card for guidance if they dont receive a notice in the mail or misplace the check.

Doran said the company sets premium rates based on the previous two years of data on the cost of, and demand for, medical services. He said that while BCBS tries to align premiums with these calculations, variabilities can make it difficult to stay within the Medical Loss Ratio. When that happens, as it did this year, the company is required to issue reimbursements.

Doran said BCBS issued a reimbursement last year as well. He said that was the first time the company had to issue one since it started selling plans on the Affordable Care Act marketplace in 2014.

When we project ahead, there are a lot of variables that can change the amount that we either pay or dont pay in a given year. Variations in the actual claims may result in some group  or in this case, individual  policies not meeting the Medical Loss Ratio standards and therefore receiving a reimbursement, Doran said. The Medical Loss Ratio rule is intended to protect consumers from some of those uncertainties in the rate-setting process. The simple fact that we are making reimbursements this year is just a signal that the system is working as intended.

Doran said the pandemic created volatility in the insurance marketplace, with people acquiring new coverage, losing coverage due to layoffs, or switching insurance providers. He said there were similar disruptions to health care delivery.

We saw a lot of disruption to a normal health care year, if there is ever such a thing, last year. In the height of the pandemic, most hospitals across the state, and even across the country, were so overwhelmed with COVID patients that they had to stop doing traditional elective surgeries like knee replacements and hip surgeries.

He said he expects disruptions seeded by the pandemic to continue into 2022.

Doran said about 22,000 Montanans currently have BCBS coverage under the individual exchange marketplace. Another company, Mountain Health Co-op (formerly Montana Health Co-op) provides coverage to 19,257 Montanans who purchased plans on the individual marketplace. Mountain Health Co-op was not required to issue reimbursements this cycle, nor has it had to in the past. PacificSource, the only other company offering Montanans health insurance through the ACA exchange, was not required to issue reimbursements for the 2018-2020 period, though it did for the 2017-2019 period. PacificSource insures 9,300 members who obtained coverage through the ACA exchange, according to spokesperson Lee Dawson.

Montana Commissioner of Securities and Insurance spokesperson Sam Loveridge echoed Doran in saying that 2020 was a volatile year and most insurers spent less on claims than projected, likely due to the pandemic. In an email, he said he expects that those disruptions factored into insurers performance on the Medical Loss Ratio standard for the 2018-2020 period.

For the 2017-2019 cycle, the most recent period for which full data is available, Montana insurers issued more than $15 million in reimbursements to 29,135 customers, according to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
HELENA - Fall burning season starts Sept. 1. While burning is allowed year-round, September through February there are restrictions and requirements to help protect air quality throughout the state of Montana. As always, burning should comply with air quality rules and the Montana Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) [https://deq.mt.gov/air/Programs/burning#accordion1-collapse2] encourages good judgement to prevent wildfires.

Follow these steps before striking the match on your burn pile:

 Obtain a permit from your local fire control authority.

 DEQ issues time, elevation and county restrictions for open burning. Check for restrictions at Open Burning | Montana DEQ (mt.gov) or by calling the ventilation hotline at 800-225-6779.

 Check with your local air quality program for restrictions in Missoula, Cascade, Yellowstone, Lincoln and Flathead counties.

 On the day of your burn, activate your county permit.

 Be aware of local conditions and burn smart.

 Check back Dec. 1 for winter burn season requirements. During winter burn season, DEQ air quality approval is required.

To obtain a permit, go to: deq.mt.gov/air/programs/burning

If your county is not listed on the website, call your local fire control authority to obtain one.

Only clean, untreated wood and plant material can be burned. Do not burn: food wastes, plastics, wood that has been coated, painted, stained, or treated, dead animals or animal droppings, rubber materials, chemicals, asphalt shingles, tar paper, hazardous wastes or structures containing these materials. A full list of prohibited materials can be found on DEQs open burning website: https://deq.mt.gov/air/Programs/burning#accordion1-collapse5
For the past 17 months, its been my great honor to serve on the local Covid Task Force. Local leaders from all walks of life  health care, business, government, non-profits, churches, first responders, and more  work together so that we can better respond to the real world effects of the 
Oak Leaf Festival director Saundie Smith, right, introduces Danley Band prior to a concert at Saturday's festival in Oak Hill. The Fayette County Health Department revealed Sunday that several workers and volunteers for the Oak Leaf Festival tested positive for Covid-19. Smith said Monday she was one of those associated with the festival who tested positive for Covid-19 this past weekend, although she's unsure if her exposure occurred during the event.
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Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - September 10, 2021) - Kure Technologies, Inc. (TSXV: KUR.H) (the "Company" or "Kure") is pleased to announce the re-election of Alex Dolgonos, Igor Keselman and Nicholas Macos to the board of directors of the Company at the Annual General Meeting which was held earlier today.

Following the meeting, Alex Dolgonos was reappointed as Chief Executive Officer and Igor Keselman as Chief Financial Officer.

The board of directors looks forward to continuing their efforts to provide value to shareholders.

About Kure Technologies, Inc.

Kure's shares are listed on the NEX under the symbol "KUR.H". More information on Kure can be found at www.sedar.com.

The corporate information contained in this release includes forward-looking statements regarding future events and costs that involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. Assumptions used in the preparation of such information, although considered reasonable by Kure at the time of preparation, may prove to be incorrect. The actual results achieved may vary from the information provided herein and the variations may be material. Consequently, there is no representation by Kure that actual results achieved will be the same in whole or in part as those forecast.

Neither the NEX nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the NEX) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

For additional information, please contact:

Jacqueline Logan

(905) 660-8100

NOT 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/96208
Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - September 10, 2021) - Firestone Ventures (TSXV: FV.H) (FSE: F5V1) ("Firestone" or the "Company") reminds shareholders of the upcoming annual meeting to be held on September 15, 2021 at 11:00am, EDT. At the meeting, shareholders will be asked to vote on a special resolution authorizing the sale of the Company's wholly owned subsidiary, Fuego Estrella, Sociedad Anonima (the "Sale"), as more particularly described in the information circular dated August 16, 2021. Management believes that the Sale is in the best interests of the Company and encourages shareholders to vote by proxy prior to the meeting.

* * *

About Firestone

Firestone is a junior exploration mining company engaged in the identification, evaluation, acquisition and exploration of mineral property interests, with a focus on zinc, lead, silver and copper. The Company is currently permitted to advance exploration on its Torlon project in Guatemala, should conditions become more favourable to resume operations. In the meantime, Management continues to review other potential prospects as industry conditions are creating opportunities for companies such as Firestone, to expand their asset base.

Information on Firestone is available at www.firestoneventures.com and www.sedar.com.

For further information, please contact:

Keith Barron

President and CEO

Firestone Ventures Inc.

(416) 583-1430

E: info@firestoneventures.com

Donna McLean

CFO

Firestone Ventures Inc.

(416) 417-8349

E: donna@firestoneventures.com

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 release.

CAUTIONARY STATEMENT

This news release may contain forward-looking information that involves substantial known and unknown risks and uncertainties, most of which are beyond the control of Firestone. Forward-looking statements include estimates and statements that describe Firestone's future plans, objectives or goals, including words to the effect that Firestone or its management expects a stated condition or result to occur. Forward-looking statements may be identified by such terms as "believes", "anticipates", "expects", "estimates", "may", "could", "would", "will", or "plan". Since forward-looking statements are based on assumptions and address future events and conditions, by their very nature they involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Although these statements are based on information currently available to Firestone, Firestone provides no assurance that actual results will meet management's expectations. Risks, uncertainties and other factors involved with forward-looking information could cause actual events, results, performance, prospects and opportunities to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking information. Forward-looking information in this news release includes, but is not limited to, Firestone's company's objectives, goals or future plans. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from such forward-looking information include, but are not limited to, those risks set out in Firestone's public documents filed on SEDAR. Although Firestone believes that the assumptions and factors used in preparing the forward-looking information in this news release are reasonable, undue reliance should not be placed on such information, which only applies as of the date of this news release, and no assurance can be given that such events will occur in the disclosed time frames or at all. Firestone disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, other than as required by law.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/96156.
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - September 10, 2021) - Minfocus Exploration Corp. (TSXV: MFX) ("Minfocus" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that on September 3, 2021 it entered into a definitive Share Sale Agreement (the "Agreement") with Mining Projects Accelerator Pty Ltd. ACN 629 011 196 ("MPX"), a private Australian company, pursuant to which the Company will acquire MPX's ownership of 80% of the outstanding common shares (each, a "Big Hill Share") of Big Hill Gold Mining Company Pty Ltd. ACN 081 474 179 ("Big Hill") on the terms and conditions of the Agreement (the "Proposed Transaction"). Big Hill holds a 100% interest in an exploration permit and two mining licenses comprising the Big Hill Gold Property located in Queensland, Australia (the "Big Hill Gold Property").

Big Hill Gold Property

The Big Hill Gold Property consists of a single Exploration Permit ("EPM") EPM 18255 covering 24 sq km and includes two discrete granted mining leases owned by Big Hill ("ML") on the EPM. The EPM covers the historic mines of Big Hill (ML50287), Queenslander, Monte Cristo and Sultan & Taylor (ML50286) of the Talgai Goldfield within the EPM and is an excluded small ML held by an unrelated third party.

The Talgai Goldfield is one of eight historical Goldfields in the broader Warwick-Texas District active in the late 19th century, which include Canal Creek, Thanes Creek, Leyburn, Palgrave, Pikedale, Lucky Valley and MacDonald Goldfields. The bulk of production in the historical mines of EPM18255 and the broader Warwick-Texas District occurred from initial discovery in 1864 until the early 1900s. Small-scale activity continued during intermittent periods in the 20th century with many of the larger historic mines remaining under mining leases and which have had limited modern exploration over the main lode deposits to date.

Parts of EPM18255 have been covered by exploration permits almost continuously since 1980 as part of gold exploration programs within the broader Texas-Warwick district. The work programs involved varying amounts of mapping, stream sediment, soil and rock chip sampling.

Recent exploration over the EPM completed by MPX in 2020 comprised surface geochemical sampling including rock chips and soils, a ground magnetic survey and 2 diamond drillholes. Data compilation, including surface mapping, is in progress with the aim of generating a 3D geological model for the gold mineralisation. The outcomes will be used to generate further drill targets and the knowledge gained from exploration programs conducted in the initial focus areas of the two mining leases will be applied to targeting within the broader EPM.

The Big Hill Gold Property is located near the town of Pratten approximately 35km northwest of Warwick and 160km southwest of Brisbane, the capital of the state of Queensland, Australia.

A technical report is being prepared on the Big Hill Gold Property in accordance with National Instrument 43-101 "Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects" and will be filed in connection with the closing of the Proposed Transaction.

Acquisition of Majority Interest in Big Hill Gold Mining Company Pty Ltd.

Pursuant to the terms of the Agreement, and subject to approval of the TSX Venture Exchange (the "Exchange"), Minfocus will acquire all of the shares that MPX owns of Big Hill, which is equal to 80% of the outstanding Big Hill Shares (the "Sale Shares") and assume all of the rights and obligations of MPX as a shareholder of Big Hill.

In consideration for the purchase of the Sale Shares, Minfocus will issue 17,500,000 common shares of Minfocus (the "Payment Shares") to MPX and pro rata to its shareholders at a deemed price of $0.125 per Payment Share. The Payment Shares will be subject to a statutory hold period for four months and one day from the date of issuance, and in addition, the MPX shareholders have agreed that the Payment Shares shall be subject to a contractual escrow and released from escrow as follows: (i) 40% of the Payment Shares shall be released from escrow four months and one day following the date of issuance; (ii) 20% of the Payment Shares shall be released from escrow 180 days after issuance; (iii) 20% of the Payment Shares shall be released from escrow 270 days after issuance; and (iv) the remaining 20% of the Payment Shares shall be released from escrow one year from the date of issuance.

Following closing of the Proposed Transaction, Minfocus will have the right to acquire an additional 15% of the outstanding Big Hill Shares and increase its shareholdings to 95% of the total outstanding Big Hill Shares by paying AU$300,000 to the minority shareholder of Big Hill. The remaining 5% of the shares of Big Hill may be acquired from the minority shareholder for AU$700,000. On closing of the Proposed Transaction, there will be a 2% net smelter royalty on the exploration permit and mining licences as well.

Following the completion of the Proposed Transaction, it is anticipated that Minfocus will change its name to "Australian Gold Hills Corp.," or such other name as may be acceptable to regulatory authorities.

The Proposed Transaction is an arms-length transaction and remains subject to certain closing conditions, including the approval of the Exchange. There can be no assurance that the Proposed Transaction will be completed as contemplated, or at all.

Private Placement

In connection with the Proposed Transaction, Minfocus has arranged for a non-brokered private placement of up to 17,000,000 units (each, a "Unit") at a price of $0.125 per Unit for gross proceeds of up to $2,125,000. Each Unit will consist of one common share of Minfocus (each, a "Share") and one half of one common share purchase warrant (each whole warrant, a "Warrant"). Each Warrant exercisable into one additional Share at a price of $0.19 for two years after the date of issuance (the "Offering"). Closing of the Offering is subject to the approval of the Exchange. Minfocus intends to use the proceeds of the financing to acquire an additional 15% of the Big Hill Shares from the minority shareholder, for exploration and development of the Big Hill Gold Property and for general working capital purposes.

All securities to be issued under the Offering will be subject to a statutory hold period expiring four months and one day from the date of issuance. Minfocus anticipates that the majority of the subscriptions will be from arm's length parties, although insiders may participate in the Offering. Minfocus may pay finders' fees on the Offering, as permitted by applicable securities laws and the Exchange.

Appointment of New Director

Minfocus is pleased to announce the appointment of Blair Way to the Board of Directors. Mr. Way is an experienced international executive with over 35 years' experience within the resources and construction industry throughout Australasia, Canada, the United States, South America and Europe. A highly respected project developer in the most challenging of environs, Mr. Way's experience spans the complete mineral development cycle from early-stage exploration to project definition and studies culminating in implementation, commissioning and operations of mining projects. He started his career with major resource companies advancing late-staged projects, however the last decade has been focused on the earlier stage projects of public mid-tier and junior mining companies. Mr. Way has experience in a wide range of commodities including gold, copper, nickel, zinc, magnesium, graphite, cobalt, and lithium. Mr. Way holds a Bachelor of Science (Geology) from Acadia University in Nova Scotia, Canada, an MBA from the University of Queensland, Australia, and is a Fellow of the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy.

Debt Settlements

Minfocus and certain creditors have agreed to settle an aggregate of $191,414 of debt by accepting payment on account of $67,907 through the issuance of Shares at a deemed price of $0.125 per Share for an aggregate of 543,256 Shares, subject to the approval of the Exchange (the "Debt Settlement"). The remaining $123,507 of the settled debt owing will be forgiven. Of the Debt Settlement Shares to be issued, 460,000 Shares are being issued to two directors and an officer of Minfocus for management fees owing. All Shares to be issued under the Debt Settlement will be subject to a statutory hold period expiring four months and a day from the date of issuance.

Qualified Person

Simon Tear, BSc (Hons), PGEO, MIOM3, EurGeol., Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101, supervised the preparation of the technical information in this news release.

About Minfocus Exploration Corp.

Minfocus is a Canadian mineral exploration company currently advancing a portfolio of North American precious and base metals projects, including precious metals in Nevada, USA and three Mississippi Valley-type zinc projects in B.C. and Newfoundland, Canada. Minfocus is led by an unparalleled technical team with a track record of successful exploration worldwide.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT:

Alicia Milne, President and Director

Telephone: 1 (800) 482-7560

E-mail: info@minfocus.ca

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

This news release contains forward-looking statements and forward-looking information (collectively, "forward-looking statements") within the meaning of applicable Canadian legislation. Forward-looking statements are typically identified by words such as: "believes", "expects", "anticipates", "intends", "estimates", "plans", "may", "should", "would", "will", "potential", "scheduled" or variations of such words and phrases and similar expressions, which, by their nature, refer to future events or results that may, could, would, might or will occur or be taken or achieved. Accordingly, all statements in this news release that are not purely historical are forward-looking statements and include statements regarding beliefs, plans, expectations and orientations regarding the future including, without limitation, any statements or plans regard the geological prospects of the Property or the future exploration endeavours of Minfocus, the Proposed Transaction, the Offering, the Debt Settlement and other matters in connection with the aforementioned items. Although the Company believes that such statements are reasonable and reflect expectations of future developments and other factors which management believes to be reasonable and relevant, the Company can give no assurance that such expectations will prove to be correct. Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of the Company to differ materially from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking information. Such risks and other factors include, but are not limited to, the risk that the Proposed Transaction, the Offering, resulting name change and the Debt Settlement may not be completed as set out herein or at all, and the inability of the Company to execute and raise funds necessary to complete its planned future activities and proposed business plans.

This press release does not constitute an offer to sell or solicitation of an offer to buy any of the securities in the United States. The securities 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 state securities laws and may not be offered or sold within the United States or to a U.S. Person unless registered under the U.S. Securities Act and applicable state securities laws or an exemption from such registration is available.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

THIS NEWS RELEASE IS NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION TO U.S. 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/96213
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - September 10, 2021) - Golden Spike Resources Corp. (CSE: GLDS) (the "Company" or "Golden") is pleased to announce that it has closed its initial public offering of an aggregate of 6,000,000 units of the Company (the "Units") at a price of $0.25 per Unit (the "Offering Price") for aggregate gross proceeds of approximately $1,500,000. Each Unit consists of one common share of the Company (each, a "Common Share") and one-half of one Common Share purchase warrant (each whole warrant, a "Warrant"). Each Warrant entitles the holder thereof to acquire one Common Share at an exercise price of $0.50 until September 10, 2023.

Pursuant to an agency agreement dated August 6, 2021, Leede Jones Gable Inc. (the "Agent") acted as agent on a commercially reasonable efforts basis in respect of the Offering and received a cash commission in the amount of $135,000 and a corporate finance fee consideration for its services. In addition, Golden issued to the Agent and certain of its sub-agents an aggregate of 540,000 non-transferable compensation options to purchase Common Shares (the "Compensation Options"). Each Compensation Option is exercisable until September 10, 2023, at an exercise price of $0.25 per Common Share.

Proceeds of the Offering will be applied to finance the Company's exploration work and for working capital purposes.

Golden is also pleased to announce that it has received approval of its application to list its Common Shares on the Canadian Securities Exchange (the "Exchange"). Golden's Common Shares were listed on the Exchange on September 9, 2021 and immediately halted pending closing of the Offering. The Common Shares are expected to commence trading on the Exchange on or about September 13, 2021 under the trading symbol "GLDS".

Additional information on the Company and the Offering can be found in the Company's final prospectus dated August 6, 2021 as filed on SEDAR at www.sedar.com.

About Golden Spike Resources Corp.

Golden Spike Resources Corp. is a mineral exploration company engaged in the identification, acquisition and exploration of mineral projects in North America. The Company's material property is the Camping Lake Project, consisting of 5 contiguous mineral claims covering an area of approximately 2,132.4 Ha northwest of Ear Falls in the Province of Ontario.

Contact Information

Golden Spike Resources Corp.

Keith Anderson, Chief Executive Officer

Email: info@goldenspikeresources.com

Telephone: (604) 786-7774

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.

This press release includes "forward-looking information" that is subject to a number of assumptions, risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond the control of the Company. Statements regarding trading of the Common Shares on the Exchange are subject to all of the risks and uncertainties normally incident to such events. Investors are cautioned that any such statements are not guarantees of future events and that actual events or developments may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements represent management's best judgment based on information currently available.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/96225
Geneva, NY (14456)

Today

Thunderstorms with locally heavy downpours. A few storms may be severe. High 68F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Cloudy early with some clearing expected late. Low 54F. Winds light and variable.
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This is one of the marijuana grows that was shut down by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department. (Contributed photo by San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department)
FOLEY Ala, (WALA) The Baldwin County Major Crimes Unit (BCMCU) has released a statement regarding its investigation into a shooting involving an officer with the Foley Police Department early Saturday morning.

The statement reads as follows:

"On Saturday September 11, 2021, the Baldwin County Major Crimes Unit (BCMCU) was requested by the Foley Police Department to conduct an officer involved shooting investigation.

At approximately 3:00 a.m. a male, later identified as John Waldhauer (32- year-old from Georgia), was observed by a civilian employee loitering around the back of the Foley Police Department. The civilian employee offered Waldhauer assistance, but Waldhauer left the police department. Officers were dispatched to the area of the police department to investigate.

After arriving on scene, officers located and contacted Waldhauer on the walking trail to the West of the police department. The officers determined that Waldhauer was armed with a knife and officers gave Waldhauer verbal commands to stop and drop the knife. He did not comply. Waldhauer was eventually tased, but it was ineffective.

Waldhauer ran from the officers and they caught up with him after a short foot pursuit. As they tried to take Waldhauer into custody, he swung the knife at an officer and one of the officers responded by shooting Waldhauer. Waldhauer was transported to a hospital in Pensacola, Florida. He was alert and his injuries are not believed to be life threatening.

Members of the BCMCU will continue an independent inquiry into this incident. The investigation is still in its initial stages and crime scene investigators will be working in the area of Highway 59 and East Section Avenue in Foley, Alabama. Part of the scene is on the walking trail. We ask that everyone avoid the area of the shooting until we clear the scene.

More information will be released at a later time."
(AP) -- Hoping to prevent another school year from being upended by the pandemic, President Joe Biden visited a Washington middle school Friday to push his new COVID plan, accusing some Republican governors of being cavalier with the health of children.

Biden's plan, announced a day earlier, would require vaccinations for up to 100 million Americans and seek to ramp up virus testing. With those measures in place, he said, schools should present little risk for transmission of the coronavirus.

I want folks to know that were going to be OK, Biden said during an appearance at Brookland Middle School, a short drive from the White House. We know what it takes to keep our kids safe and our schools open.

But as the surging COVID-19 delta variant casts uncertainty over the start of a new school year  in some cases prompting schools to shut down after a few days  its unclear whether Bidens plan will go far enough to prevent mass disruption. Biden has little direct authority over most schools, which are generally governed at the local level, and his plan faces sharp resistance from Republicans.

Under his expanded vaccine mandate, all employers with more than 100 workers must require them to get shots or test for the virus weekly. A separate provision requires vaccines for workers in Head Start programs and at schools operated by the federal government, affecting about 300,000 workers.

The plan does not explicitly require vaccines for teachers in locally governed schools, but some education leaders believe the employer rule will effectively amount to a teacher vaccine requirement in many states.

That part of the plan is being enacted through a forthcoming rule from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. And in states with OSHA plans, teachers will be among those required to get the vaccine or face testing, according to an interpretation by AASA, an association of school superintendents.

It's expected to apply to 26 states, including several with Republican governors who opposed Bidens plan, such as South Carolina, Tennessee and Arizona.

Biden did not address that aspect of his plan on Friday. Instead, he urged states to issue their own vaccine requirements for school workers.

About 90% of school staff and teachers are vaccinated  we should have that at 100%, Biden said. Im calling on all of the governors to require vaccination for all teachers and staff.

Governors in a few states have already ordered teachers to get vaccinated, including in California, Oregon, New Jersey and New York. But most leave it up to school districts, and some Republican-led states have barred vaccine mandates.

Biden on Friday rebuked Republican governors who vowed to fight his new rules.

I am so disappointed that, particularly, some Republican governors have been so cavalier with the health of these kids, so cavalier with the health of their communities, he said. Were playing for real here. This isnt a game.

But most of his remarks struck a more conciliatory tone than a Thursday speech in which Biden vented his own frustrations with those who remain unvaccinated. He returned to a message of unity on Friday, insisting that weve got to come together to beat the virus.

Speaking to students at Brookland, Biden applauded those who had already been vaccinated. If all of them get shots, Biden promised to invite them to a special visit at the White House.

He also held up Washington, D.C., as a model. The city has hosted vaccine clinics at its public schools, and 65% of children age 12 to 17 have gotten at least their first shot, a rate that Biden said is among the highest in the nation.

In a plea to Americas families, Biden urged parents to get teenagers and other eligible children vaccinated as soon as possible. He argued that its no different than standard vaccinations for measles, mumps, rubella and other diseases.

Among the greatest threats to his plan, however, is the large population of children who are still too young to get the shot. Most elementary and middle schools have children below age 12 who have not been approved to receive the coronavirus vaccines.

Speaking to those concerns, Biden said he supports an independent scientific process to review the shots but he also promised to make them available to younger children as soon as its safe.

I will do everything within my power to support the Food and Drug Administration in its efforts to do the science as safely and as quickly as possible, he said.

The expanded vaccine mandate does not apply to students, but some districts have moved to require shots for students. The Los Angeles district this week became the first major district to enact a mandate for students ages 12 and up.

In addition to vaccines, Bidens plan aims to ramp up virus testing in schools.

Testing policies vary widely by school and state. Some districts regularly test all students, including in the Los Angeles district, while some forgo any testing. And for many, its getting harder to find testing supplies amid a nationwide shortage in rapid tests.

As part of the White House plan, the government is working to increase the supply of virus tests and make them available at retailers including Walmart and Amazon. Biden said it will lead to 300 million more coronavirus tests, including some for schools.

I want all schools setting up regular testing programs to make sure we detect and isolate cases before they can spread, Biden said.

The plan drew support from the countrys two largest teachers unions, the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers. Both groups have also endorsed vaccine mandates for all teachers and school staff.

Other education groups that support the plan include the National School Boards Association, which said it comes at an extremely critical time. The group said it welcomes Bidens support even as education leaders face threats, abuse and harassment over their public health measures.

Speaking alongside Biden on Friday, first lady Jill Biden praised educators as heroes for their work over the past year. A longtime community college professor, the first lady said Americans have a duty to protect students as they return to the classroom.

We owe them a promise to keep their schools open as safe as possible, she said. We owe them a commitment to follow the science  we owe them unity so that we can fight the virus, not each other.
CLARIFIES DATELINE AS FORT BLISS' DONA ANA VILLAGE IN NEW MEXICO, NOT FORT BLISS, TEXAS, AS BASE SPANS AREAS OF BOTH TEXAS AND NEW MEXICO - An aerial view of Fort Bliss' Dona Ana Village in New Mexico is seen Friday, Sept. 10, 2021. The Biden administration provided the first public look inside the U.S. military base where Afghans airlifted out of Afghanistan are screened, amid questions about how the government is caring for the refugees and vetting them. (AP Photo/Farnoush Amiri)
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In the face of threat or loss, we can choose to follow the dark path of fear that leads to hopelessness, or we can focus on the life-giving possibilities of renewal and transformation. We can lift our thoughts above terror and do good, as these brave women did. We can learn from experience and from increasing our spiritual understanding of eternal truths much bigger than ourselves. Jesus said, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you. Thats a tall order! But St. Paul assures us were not in this alone: For God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.
Both the wars in Afghanistan and in Vietnam were protracted conflicts against guerrilla groups who were deeply entrenched in the country and in the communities that U.S. forces were deployed in. The fall of Kabul, Afghanistans capital, is similar to the fall of Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, in that the taking of both cities by opposing forces signaled a defeat of the United States forces in the region.

Both conflicts spanned multiple presidential administrations.

Started after the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, during the George W. Bush presidency, the U.S. presence in Afghanistan was tied to a commitment to rooting out terrorist organizations and bringing them to justice.

The effort to pull out of the country was started by President Trump, particularly after a February 2020 agreement with the Taliban that agreed to a halting of military actions against the Taliban and a full withdrawal of U.S troops and personnel. That agreement originally stated that U.S. forces would leave the country by May of this year, but the deadline was extended to August under the Biden administration.

It didnt take long for the Taliban to reassert its dominance over the region and over the local populace. Every region where American troops were pulled from fell to the Taliban in a matter of days.
Jaguar, Wildcat and Husky elementary schools have been renamed after three influential women of color following more than a year of discussion. All three renaming resolutions were passed unanimously at the Corvallis School District board meeting Thursday evening.

This is a conscious choice to celebrate all students and communities, said board chair Sami Al-AbdRabbuh. It is a decision to celebrate women, especially Native and Black women, and reaffirm that in our schools, no matter their identity or background, every student belongs and is worthy of celebration and recognition.

Husky Elementary School is now Bessie Coleman Elementary School, named after the first Black woman and first Indigenous woman to earn a pilots license. Once she learned enough French to attend flight school in France, she flew back to the U.S. and advocated for civil rights.

Were choosing a figure that communicates that every child can fly, said board member Vince Adams on this renaming.

Jaguar Elementary School will be renamed Kathryn Jones Harrison, a member of the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde Community of Oregon and a resident of Benton County. Board member Luhui Whitebear spoke about how much this school renaming means to the Native communities here.
In Oregon, there were 32,665 new doses of COVID-19 vaccine administered, with the seven-day running average now sitting at 7,549 daily doses. Statewide, a little more than 67% of adults have been fully vaccinated, with another 6.3% with their vaccination series in progress.

There were 2,657 breakthrough cases reported during the week of Aug. 29 to Sept. 4, representing about 19% of the total caseload. A table in OHAs breakthrough cases report from this week shows that the percentage of breakthrough cases has held around 17-20% of total new cases since July.

The largest percentage of breakthrough cases are occurring in people who are 65 or older, leading the Oregon Health Authority to recommend third-shot booster vaccinations for the elderly and other vulnerable groups. To date, 4.9% of breakthrough cases have been hospitalized and less than 1% have died. The median age of breakthrough patient deaths is 80, with a range of 43 to 101.

Benton County has recorded 309 breakthrough cases, while Linn County has recorded 466, per the OHA breakthrough report.
Watching the reaction of Americans to the tragedy befalling the people of Afghanistan, I cant help wondering where their compassion and outrage were during the 30-year U.S. occupation.

Around 170,000 Afghans died as a direct result of war-related violence, and countless more succumbed to disease, famine, exposure, lack of clean water and other consequences of the destruction. Manning, Assange, Hale and others suffered imprisonment, bankruptcy and even torture for revealing the awful truths our government concealed from us. We should also weep for them and their devastated families.

What will be the lesson of Afghanistan? To listen to the pundits, its that we should have stayed there forever, despite the fact that the U.S. never succeeded in establishing a truly democratic government. Its precipitous fall was due to corruption and lack of popular support, a familiar story to anyone alive when the puppet government of Vietnam fell in 1975.

Meanwhile, the War on Terror continues unabated throughout the Mideast, Africa and Asia. Dont kid yourself that the U.S. bears no responsibility for the violence in Libya, Syria, Yemen and elsewhere just because U.S. troops are not in those places in force. There are many ways to bring about regime change. Now we are turning toward confrontation with Russia, China and Iran while building a new Space Force.
Josh Blose, Littlestown Boys' Soccer: Josh scored 7 goals in a pair of wins for the unbeaten Bolts, improving his total to 12 goals in 4 games.

Anya Rosenbach, New Oxford Girls' Tennis: Anya dropped only 1 game in three wins at No. 1 singles last week for the Colonials.

Ricky Pacana, Bermudian Springs Football: Ricky rushed for a TD, caught 2 TD passes and recorded 2 interceptions in a win over Susquehannock

Bailey Oehmig, Bermudian Springs Girls' Soccer: Bailey scored 2 goals and had 4 assists in a pair of wins last week.

Xavier Benner, Littlestown Football: Xavier passed for 228 yards and 2 TDs, and ran for a TD in a loss to Annville-Cleona

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Gillette, WY (82718)

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Washington, Sept. 10, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The U.S. Small Business Administrations 2021 National Small Business Week celebrations will officially commence next week with a three-day virtual summit. SBA Administrator Isabella Casillas Guzman will kick off the national event on Monday, September 13, addressing nearly 30,000 registered participants during the educational, training, and networking event.

This years free event will spotlight the resilience of Americas entrepreneurs and the renewal of the small business economy as they build back better from the economic crisis brought on by a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic. National Small Business Week events will continue through September 15, inviting small businesses to participate in educational webinars, presentations, and conversations with Administrator Guzman and leaders from other federal agencies and industries.

President Joe Biden, in his proclamation declaring September 12-18 as National Small Business Week, stated, The American entrepreneurial spirit is a defining quality of our Nation which time and again has lifted us to new heights and carried us through our greatest challenges. Small businesses are not only the engines of our economic progress  they are the heart and soul of our communities. During National Small Business Week, we celebrate our Nations small businesses  the pillars of their neighborhoods.

When the COVID-19 pandemic first struck last year, it posed a historic challenge to Americas small businesses. From coast to coast, in big cities, small towns, rural enclaves, and Tribal communities, small business owners and workers demonstrated remarkable courage and resilience, adapting to sudden changes in our way of life and stepping up to serve their communities. Across the country, small businesses extended helping hands to their neighbors during the pandemics darkest hours, all while entrepreneurs and employees worked tirelessly around the clock to keep their businesses afloat, make payroll, and ensure the safety of their teams and customers.

To ensure that these community pillars have a fighting chance to reopen and stay open, my Administration is delivering the loans and support that our Nations more than 30 million small businesses and innovative startups need. The American Rescue Plan delivered billions of dollars in economic relief to millions of small businesses  including programs targeted to the hardest-hit industries such as restaurants and performing arts venues. We revamped the Paycheck Protection Program to reach our smallest businesses, with more than 95 percent of the nearly $300 billion in loans made during my Administration supporting small businesses with less than 20 employees, reaching a higher share of businesses in rural and low- or moderate-income communities than in the previous two rounds of the program. Through our Restaurant Revitalization Fund, we provided an essential lifeline to more than 100,000 businesses across the country, delivering $28.6 billion in direct support. Last week, my Administration began accepting applications for an improved COVID-19 Economic Injury Disaster Loan program, which will put more than $150 billion in funding to work offering long-term, low-interest loans that small businesses can use to retain workers, make rent, and pay down more expensive debt. In the American Rescue Plan, we established the Community Navigator Pilot program to create a network of trusted organizations, local governments, and community champions to help underserved small businesses navigate resources at all stages of their growth.

My Administration is also committed to nurturing small businesses that have faced historic barriers in rural and urban America, including businesses owned by veterans, women, and people of color  especially Black, Latino, and Asian American businesses. These entrepreneurs continue to face persistent barriers to the capital, markets, and networks they need to start and grow their businesses, and many were left out of early rounds of relief in the earlier days of the pandemic.

To help ensure that small businesses in every community benefit from the Build Back Better agendas landmark investments in our infrastructure, we are strengthening our contracting programs for underserved small businesses. As part of this effort, I announced a government-wide goal to grow Federal contracting with small, disadvantaged businesses by 50 percent, translating into an additional $100 billion over 5 years. By ensuring that more disadvantaged small businesses can compete for and win federal contracts, we can boost job opportunities and economic prosperity in every corner of America.

The Presidents proclamation closes with 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 September 12 to September 18 as National Small Business Week. I call upon all Americans to recognize the contributions of small businesses to the American economy, continue supporting them, and honor the occasion with programs and activities that highlight these important businesses.

This years National Small Business Week virtual conference will offer free educational webinars, free business advice, and an opportunity to network with fellow business owners. Registration is required; individuals interested in the conference can register here .

###

About the U.S. Small Business Administration

The U.S. Small Business Administration makes the American dream of business ownership a reality. As the only go-to resource and voice for small businesses backed by the strength of the federal government, the SBA empowers entrepreneurs and small business owners with the resources and support they need to start, grow or expand their businesses, or recover from a declared disaster. It delivers services through an extensive network of SBA field offices and partnerships with public and private organizations. To learn more, visit www.sba.gov .

Cosponsorship Authorization #SBW2021 SBAs participation in this cosponsored activity is not an endorsement of the views, opinions, products, or services of any Cosponsor or other person or entity. All SBA/SCORE programs and services are extended to the public on a nondiscriminatory basis.
Covington, Kentucky, Sept. 11, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Covington Latin School (CLS) is a co-educational Catholic college-preparatory high school, specializing in advanced and accelerated instruction in Covington, Kentucky. Covington Latin School is considered a sister school to Thomas More University with shared diocesan leadership. On Sunday, September 12th, 2021 the Covington Latin School will open their hall to host a Founders Day reception in honor of the Universitys 100th anniversary upon the conclusion of 10:00 AM mass at the Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption, celebrated by Bishop Foys.

The mass will include acknowledgement by Bishop Foys of the Thomas More University Centennial Celebration and honor the administration, board, leaders, staff and students of the University. Bishop Foys will furthermore recognize September 12th, 2021 as Founders Day of Thomas More University.

We are grateful to Covington Latin Headmaster, Dr. John Kennedy, and the Latin School staff for their generous hospitality and willingness to help host our Founders Day reception, said Dr. Joseph Chillo, Thomas More University President, Covington Latins connection with Thomas More University goes as far back as the early 1920s when Villa Madonna College began admitting men. It is truly fitting that we would celebrate our centennial anniversary alongside them.

Immediately following the conclusion of mass, all parties are invited to a reception in honor of Founders Day and in celebration of Thomas More Universitys Centennial at the Covington Latin School. There Thomas More University President Chillo will welcome guests and share brief remarks on the importance of this anniversary, the Universitys Covington roots and the connections with Covington Latin School. Dr. Judith A. Marlowe 69 Thomas More University graduate and Chair of the Universitys Board of Trustees will lead those gathered in a toast to the first 100 years for Thomas More University and the second century to come.

On behalf of the staff, faculty and students of Covington Latin School, we are honored to host this reception in celebration of Thomas More Universitys Centennial, said Amy Darpel, Director of Advancement at Covington Latin Schools and 94 graduate of Thomas More University, The ties between our two institutions stem from both of our very beginnings, they are everlasting and incredibly important to the advancement of our entire community.

###

About Covington Latin School: www.CovingtonLatin.org | #CovingtonLatin

Covington Latin School is a co-educational, Roman Catholic, accelerated, college preparatory middle and high school that offers 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 accredited by both the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (S.A.C.S.) and Cognia Global Educational Accreditation Commission, and is certified by the US Department of Education as a Blue Ribbon School. Covington Latin School ranked as the #1 private school in Northern Kentucky by Cincinnati Magazine, and was named as a Top 3 school in the state of Kentucky.

Learn more and access enrollment at www.CovingtonLatin.org.

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VICTORIA, British Columbia, Sept. 11, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Support Network for Indigenous Women and Women of Colour (SNIWWOC) is hosting a riveting town hall debate on September 13 at 6 -7:30 p.m., with candidates running for a seat in the upcoming election. We will be joined by Devyani Singh and Cheryl Matthew (to be confirmed) from the B.C. Greens and Anjali Appadurai from The NDP.

As more women make their way into the political realm, Indigenous women and women of colour are still faced with intense scrutiny and backlash, often having to endure racism and microaggressions on the public stage.

Women of colour are changing the face of Canadian politics. Their voices are needed and Canada will be better for it. This virtual event is free and open to the public. It will feature panel questions posed to candidates, followed by a chance for attendees to ask questions. Please join us to hear from these local candidates about their stance on important issues including: post-pandemic planning, environmental challenges, Indigenous-sovereignty, antiracism, affordable childcare, the housing crisis and more.

Sources, background information, links:

SNIWWOC's mission is to support and help Black, Indigenous women, women of colour, youth and children take greater control of their lives, providing culturally appropriate services in different languages. All of the programming is developed and delivered by BIPOC women. SNIWWOC offers: One-on-one free therapy, career planning, virtual workshops, wellness classes, peer support, free dental hygiene and much more.

Communications & Campaigns Manager

Support Network for Indigenous Women and Women of Color

203-2722 Fifth Street

Victoria BC V8T 4B2

info@sniwwoc.ca

250-277-2545

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NEW YORK, Sept. 11, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- WHY: Rosen Law Firm, a global investor rights law firm, reminds purchasers of the securities of RenovaCare, Inc. (OTC: RCAR) between August 14, 2017 and May 28, 2021, inclusive (the Class Period) of the important September 14, 2021 lead plaintiff deadline.



SO WHAT: If you purchased RenovaCare 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 RenovaCare class action, go to http://www.rosenlegal.com/cases-register-2123.html or call Phillip Kim, Esq. toll-free at 866-767-3653 or email pkim@rosenlegal.com or cases@rosenlegal.com for information on the class action. A class action lawsuit has already been filed. If you wish to serve as lead plaintiff, you must move the Court no later than September 14, 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, resources or any meaningful peer recognition. Be wise in selecting counsel. 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 firms 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) at the direction of the Companys Chairman, Harmel Rayat, RenovaCare engaged in a promotional campaign to issue misleading statements to artificially inflate the Companys stock price; (2) when the OTC Markets inquired, RenovaCare and Rayat issued a materially false and misleading press release claiming that no director, officer, or controlling shareholder had any involvement in the purported third partys promotional materials; (3) as a result of the foregoing, RenovaCares disclosure controls and procedures were defective; and (4) as a result, defendants statements about RenovaCares business, operations, and prospects were materially false and misleading and/or lacked reasonable basis at all relevant times. When the true details entered the market, the lawsuit claims that investors suffered damages.

To join the RenovaCare class action, go to http://www.rosenlegal.com/cases-register-2123.html or call Phillip Kim, Esq. toll-free at 866-767-3653 or email pkim@rosenlegal.com or cases@rosenlegal.com 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 investors 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, 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

lrosen@rosenlegal.com

pkim@rosenlegal.com

cases@rosenlegal.com

www.rosenlegal.com
Gloucester, MA (01930)

Today

Sun and clouds mixed. High around 80F. Winds SSW at 15 to 25 mph..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms early, then mainly cloudy overnight with thunderstorms likely. Low 64F. Winds W at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 70%.
If You Go

What: Rockport Fall Town Meeting.

When: Monday, Sept. 13, at 6 p.m.

Where: In the gymnasium or outside in a tent at Rockport High School, 24 Jerden's Lane.

Note: Masks are required at all times in the building.
A normally busy Main Street is deserted as the small businesses that line the business district remain closed after the governor instituted a shelter-in-place order in an attempt to curtail the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) on March 24, 2020 in Rockton, Illinois. Rockton is a town of about 7,500 people along the banks of the Rock river in Northern Illinois.
MONGO [mdash] Ida Mae Christner, 94, Mongo, died at her home Sept. 9. Mrs. Christner was born July 28, 1927, in Topeka, to Martin W. and Lovina (Yoder) Yoder. Living her lifetime in LaGrange County, she was a homemaker and loved to cook and bake. She was a volunteer for many years at Miller'
Kathryn Jean Lopez is senior fellow at the National Review Institute, editor-at-large of National Review magazine and author of the new book A Year With the Mystics: Visionary Wisdom for Daily Living. She is also chair of Cardinal Dolans pro-life commission in New York.
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top story

9/11  20 Years Later

'The world stopped'

TNS file photo Smoke pours from the twin towers of the World Trade Center after they were hit by two hijacked airliners in a terrorist attack Sept. 11, 2001 in New York City. TNS file photo The time  9:03:02 a.m.  that United Airlines Flight 175 crashed into Tower Two of the World Trade Center is embedded in the walkway at the Flight 93 National Memorial near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

As a 911 dispatcher, Hope Brege is used to hectic shifts with the phone ringing nonstop.

But the thing she remembers most about the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, was the eerie silence.

In a 911 center, you get calls for medicals, you get calls because someones dog is barking, said Brege, who worked for Ottawa County Dispatch Authority for nine years. But it was the strangest thing in the world  it just stood still. The world stopped. It was like people stopped having emergencies. They were stuck to the TV, watching everything that was going on.

At that time, the countys central dispatch was located at the bottom of the Grand Haven Fire Department, Brege said.

We didnt have a TV at the time, but we got a phone call from one of the police officers upstairs, Are you watching TV? Youve got to turn on the TV, Brege recalled. So we called our supervisor to turn the TV on. At that point, the second tower hadnt been hit yet. Everybody was watching in shock. This cant be true. This cant be real.

I remember us sitting there, and a few minutes later, the second plane hit the tower, and thinking, this kind of stuff does not happen in the United States. A lot of us were getting on the phone. I called my husband and my mom; neither of them had their TVs on at that point.

Brege said that by noon or 1 p.m., a few phone calls began to trickle in, but that morning still stands out to her as one of silence.

Ill never forget it  everyone stopped doing their normal life, she said.

Police Perspective

Jeff Hawke was a patrol sergeant in the Cadillac Police Department in 2001. On the morning of Sept. 11, he was sitting in the 84th District Court, participating in a trial.

When the planes hit the towers, the judge postponed the trial, and everybody ended up in the back room of the court, watching it on TV, Hawke said.

Hawke is now director of Grand Haven Department of Public Safety. Like Grand Haven, Cadillac is a fairly small town  not one that would typically be targeted by a terrorist attack.

Still, the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon had an effect on every law enforcement team across the country.

I think every police agency in the country went into a heightened state of alert, Hawke said. We just had the basic information, and everyone was reacting to that. Back at the department, we reviewed everything that had happened and made plans from there.

Hawke recalled that in the days following Sept. 11, the nation was gripped in fear. One of those fears was of attacks using anthrax powder.

There were numerous white powder scares all over the country, and we had numerous scares in the time after 9/11, he said. It was mostly false alarms, suspicious packages, but the public was very on edge. I remember that pretty clearly, being on patrol and reacting to those, and figuring out how to deal with them safely and effectively.

Hawke also remembers the devastation of learning that 343 members of the New York City Fire Department, along with many other police officers and paramedics, were among the nearly 3,000 people who lost their lives that day.

When you think about what happened, and you think about the firefighters and officers and the medical responders, EMTs and paramedics who were willing to go to that incident, to do their job, to do whatever they could do at that point try to save lives, not knowing the buildings were going to collapse  to be willing to go into that unknown, it does instill a sense of pride in the profession, Hawke said. It was a huge loss felt both the fire side and the police side fire side. It was very emotional for the profession. Im just grateful Ive been able to serve for 34 years with people who are willing to do that willing to go, still serving with people who are willing to go.

We asked others to share their memories of Sept. 11, 2001, on our Facebook page. Here are their responses:

Cynthia Timmerman

Watching the phones light up at City Hall immediately after the buildings came down from frightened citizens. Trying to be calm when I too was shaken while talking with people in those few hours after.

Cynthia Fritz

I was working at the Battle Creek Federal Center and they locked the place down and we were told to close the drapes on the windows.

Maria Matos Penno

9.11 is my bday and im always sad for all the lives we lost, I have friends that lost loved ones in one of the planes that hit the tower... we went to New York a year later and it was heart breaking to see all those pics of the people that died.
Wabtec, a leading global provider of equipment, systems, digital solutions and value-added services for the freight and transit rail industries, as well as the mining, marine and industrial markets, signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) which formalizes their joint aim to create technologies that will decarbonize freight rail transport, improve freight safety, and generate greater rail network utilization.

In addition, Wabtec announced an MOU with Genesee & Wyoming Inc. (G&W), the largest owner of short line and regional freight railroads, to pursue zero-emission battery and hydrogen freight strategies, as well as increase rail utilization across North America.

The announcements, which are based on a joint vision of building a more sustainable freight transportation network, were made during a ceremonial gathering on Carnegie Mellons campus. This vision consists of two parts.

One consists of powering locomotive fleets with alternative energy sources, such as batteries, and eventually, hydrogen fuel cells for a zero-emissions freight rail network pilot. The second focuses on advancements to current signaling systems and digital technologies to increase rail network capacity, utilization and safety across the US.

To accelerate this effort, Carnegie Mellon University, Genesee & Wyoming and Wabtec aspire to create the Freight Rail Innovation Institutea first-of-its-kind effort to create zero-emission locomotives, develop technology that increases freight rail utilization and improve safety by 50%, and create 250,000 jobs by 2030.

To maximize utilization across the nations mainline rail network, which is the cleanest, safest and most efficient way to move goods over land, Carnegie Mellon University will play a leading role in developing the engineering technologies that bring together the data, logistics and intelligence needed to optimize rail operations, while reducing emissions.

The time is right to accelerate the application of emerging technologies to transform the rail industry. Advances in digital technologies and artificial intelligence will revolutionize freight rail by driving dramatic improvements in safety and network capacity, while simultaneously increasing efficiency across the nations supply chain. As these emerging technologies converge with clean energy breakthroughs, we also see a tremendous opportunity to enable the decarbonization of freight rail. CMU looks forward to bringing our research capabilities and our proven track record of success with industry partners to this important effort. Farnam Jahanian, President of Carnegie Mellon University

G&Ws Buffalo & Pittsburgh Railroad will pilot technologies developed by the Freight Rail Innovation Institute, including a zero-emissions battery and hydrogen-powered train that is planned for revenue operation over 200 miles of track between Pittsburgh and Buffalo, NY within the next three years.

While already the most environmentally friendly mode of surface transportation, freight railroads have a critical role to play in our nations decarbonization strategy. Through this partnership, we plan to transform the next generation of freight rail transportation by adopting advanced technologies that can eliminate emissions and increase rail utilization without requiring significant new rail infrastructure. The end result will be a cleaner environment, more competitive transportation for our nations industrial producers, and a freight rail system that remains the most efficient in the world. Jack Hellmann, CEO of G&W

The gathering also featured the inaugural display of Wabtecs FLXdrive, the worlds first heavy-haul battery-electric locomotive. Earlier this year, the FLXdrive demonstrated its capabilities in revenue operations during a three-month pilot in California, covering more than 13,000 miles of track. (Earlier post.)





The 2.4 MWh FLXdrive successfully reduced the overall fuel consumption by more than 11% across the entire locomotive consistsaving more than 6,200 gallons of diesel fuel and reducing approximately 69 tons of CO 2 emissions.





The second generation of the FLXdrive locomotive, which is in development and will operate with more than 7 MWh capacity, will reduce fuel consumption by up to 30% across the train. Looking to the future, Wabtec will accelerate the shift to alternative clean energy solutions, through zero-emission hydrogen-powered locomotives.
Green River Police Department reports for Aug. 31

At 11:21 a.m., Animal Control officers responded to a report of a dog off-leash that pulled an individual off of their bike at Expedition Island. Officers were able to locate the dog and owner, and issued a citation to Westley Bingham, 63, of Green River, for alleged animal at large. The case is still under investigation, with a report to follow.

At 2:09 p.m., officers responded to a report of multiple parking violations on Faith Drive. Officers observed the vehicles in violation, tagged, and contacted owners of the vehicles and completed a report of the incident.

At 6:27 p.m., officers responded to a report of a two-vehicle collision. It was reported two vehicles were traveling west on Riverview Drive approaching Birch Street. As one vehicle slowed to initiate a right-hand turn onto Birch Stree, another vehicle struck the rear of the turning vehicle. Officers issued the driver, Shanda Schultz, 21, of Green River, a citation for following too closely. Officers completed a report of the incident.

At 6:59 p.m., officers responded to a report of property damage at Upland Way and Iowa Circle. Officers met with an individual who reported accidental damage caused to the mirror of their vehicle. Officers completed a report of the incident.

Sept. 1

At 8:25 a.m., officers responded to a report of found property suspected to be drugs. Officers made contact with the individual who found the property and took possession of the item. Officers completed a report of the incident. The GRPD did not release the address officers responded to.

At 8:49 a.m., officers conducted a traffic stop on a vehicle at the intersection of Uinta Drive and East Flaming Gorge Way and issued the driver, Wendi I, 30, of Green River a citation for an alleged compulsory auto insurance violation.

At 10:45 a.m., officers responded to a report of nuisance property on Adams Street. Officers observed the property to be in violation of city ordinances due to the accumulation of trash and other debris. Officers issued a notice to abate and completed a report of the incident.

At 3:37 p.m., officers responded to a report of a two vehicle collision at Ace Hardware. One vehicle was stopped waiting to make a right hand turn when a second vehicle approached directly behind the first and rolled forward, rear ending the first vehicle. No damage was reported to either vehicle. The driver of the second vehicle, Jane Barrera, 82, of Green River, was issued a citation for alleged failure to provide proof of liability insurance.

At 6:16 p.m., officers responded to a report of reckless driving on Monroe Avenue. Officers were able to locate the vehicle and the suspected driver. Through the course of the investigation officers discovered the vehicle had been reported as stolen. Officers conducted an investigation and completed a report of the incident. This incident is still under investigation.

At 6:44 p.m., officers responded to a report of an aggressive animal on South 5th West Street. The owner, Mary Schuck, 70, of Green River, was issued a citation for alleged vicious animal.

At 9:22 p.m., officers observed a vehicle that had struck a guardrail at Taco Bell. Officers made contact with the driver who appeared to be intoxicated. Officers subsequently placed the driver, David Anderson, 49, of Green River, under arrest for alleged DWUI of alcohol .08 or greater. Officers transported Anderson to the Sweetwater County Detention Center and completed a report of the incident.

Sept. 2

At 12:48 a.m., officers responded to a report of vandalism. Officers met with the reporting person who advised the tires of their vehicle had been slashed by a known individual after an altercation with the individual. Officers located the suspect and completed a report of the incident. The GRPD did not release the address officers responded to.

At 3:48 a.m., officers responded to a report of a stolen vehicle on Hutton Street. Officers met with the reporting party who advised their truck had been stolen from their driveway. Officers completed a report of the incident. The case is still under investigation.

At 10:27 a.m., officers responded to a report of a two-vehicle collision. It was reported one vehicle was traveling south on E Teton Blvd. A second vehicle was traveling northbound on E Teton Blvd. The first vehicle initiated a U-Turn and the front passenger side of the vehicle struck the drivers side of the second vehicle. Officers issued the driver Graig Robert, 73, of Green River, citations for alleged vehicle registration - valid title, registration, plates or permits violation and limitations on turning around safely. Officers completed a report of the incident.

At 10:55 a.m., officers responded to a report of trespassing on Crossbow Drive. Officers met with an individual who requested an individual be issued a trespass warning from their property. Officers met with the individual, issued the trespass warning and completed a report of the incident.

At 1:30 p.m., officers responded to a report of a found wallet at Ace Hardware. Officers attempted to contact the owner, booked the wallet in for safekeeping, and completed a report of the incident.

At 1:52 p.m., officers responded to a report of a larceny on River View Drive. Officers met with an individual who reported their car that had been parked and unoccupied appeared to have been rummaged through.

No items were reported missing. Officers completed a report of the incident.

At 8:07 p.m., officers responded to a report of a vehicle that struck a deer at Monroe Avenue and East Teton Boulevard. Officers met with the individual who reported they had struck a deer while traveling on East Teton Blvd. Officers observed the deer to be severely injured and would need to be euthanized. Officers dispatched the deer and completed a report of the incident.

Sept. 3

At 3:15 p.m., officers responded to a report of a violation of court order at Blue Rim Road. Officers met with an individual who reported a no contact violation. Officers completed a report of the incident.

At 6:49 p.m., officers responded to a report of domestic violence. Officers met with an individual who reported a physical altercation. The other involved party had left prior to officer arrival and at the time the report was completed was not located. The case is still under investigation. The GRPD did not release the address officers responded to.

At 7 p.m., officers responded to a report of a suspicious circumstance on West Flaming Gorge Way. Officers met with an individual who reported a broken window of a residence. Officers contacted the owner of the residence and completed a report of the incident. The case is still under investigation.

At 7:39 p.m., officers responded to a report of threats/harassment. Officers met with an individual who reported threatening statements made by another individual. Officers completed a report of the incident. The GRPD did not release the address officers responded to.

At 7:57 p.m., officers responded to a report of a suspicious circumstance on East Teton Boulevard. Officers met with an individual who reported items that had been left in their trailer that did not belong to them. Officers collected the items and completed a report of the incident.

At 9:57 p.m., officers responded to a report of a citizen assist on South 5th East Street. Officers met with an individual over concerns about a no contact order. Officers completed a report of the incident.

Sept. 4

At 7:37 a.m., officers responded to a report of a subject removal. Officers met with an individual and ascertained the individual had two active warrants. Officers confirmed the warrants out of Arizona and placed Shaun Curley, 29, of Arizona, under arrest per the extraditable warrant for alleged unlawful distribution of images. Officers transported Curley to the Sweetwater County Detention Center and completed a report of the incident. The GRPD did not release the address officers responded to.

At 12:20 p.m., Animal Control Officers had a stray dog turned into the animal shelter. Officers met with the owner and issued a citation to Robert Cline, 44, of Green River, for alleged animal at large.

At 6:55 p.m., officers responded to a report of a two-vehicle crash at Smiths. It was reported one vehicle was parked and unoccupied in the parking area, when another vehicle pulled into the parking space directly in front of the first vehicle. The second vehicle pulled through the parking space into the parking space of the first vehicle and the front bumper of the second vehicle struck the front bumper of the parked vehicle. Officers met with the drivers involved and detected the odor of an alcoholic beverage emitting from the drivers breath and subsequently placed Michael Anson, 61, of Green River, under arrest for an alleged DWUI - alcohol of 0.08% or more - 2nd offense within 10 years. Officers transported Anson to the Sweetwater County Detention Center and completed a report of the incident.

At 8:45 p.m., officers responded to a report of a larceny on Idaho Street. Officers met with an individual who reported a bicycle was stolen from their property. Officers completed a report of the incident.

Sept. 5

At 2:07 p.m., officers responded to a report of a missing juvenile. The juvenile, 15, was later located and turned over to a parent/ guardian. Officers completed a report of the incident. The GRPD did not release the address officers responded to.

At 2:35 p.m., officers responded to a report of two individuals entering a residence on Indian Hills Drive and making threatening comments. The two identified individuals had left prior to officer arrival. Officers met with reporting individuals who reported finding damage to their vehicle and a previous burglary where items were taken. Officers were unable to make contact with the suspected individuals at the time the report was completed. The case is still under investigation.

At 5:01 p.m., officers responded to a report of found property on West Flaming Gorge Way. Officers collected the items, booked in the items, and completed a report of the incident.

At 5:04 p.m., officers responded to a report of suspicious persons on West Teton Boulevard. Officers met with an individual who reported three individuals loitering in the area. Officers later located three individuals matching the description of the reported individuals and made contact. Officers completed a report of the incident.

At 10:29 p.m., officers responded to a report of harassment. Officers met with an individual who reported a known trespassed individual was banging on their door and causing damage to their property. Officers completed a report of the incident. No contact was made with the suspected individual. The GRPD did not release the address officers responded to.

Sept. 6

At 1:49 a.m., officers responded to a report of a disturbance at The Brewery. Officers met with the bartender who reported that an individual was causing a disturbance and refusing to pay their tab. The individual attempted to leave the establishment and caused an altercation. Officers met with the individual and placed Douglas Shipwash, 38, of Texas, under arrest for alleged disorderly conduct. Officers transported Shipwash to the Sweetwater County Detention Center and completed a report of the incident.

At 11:04 a.m., officers responded to a report of found property at FMC Park. Officers booked the property in for safekeeping and completed a report of the incident.

At 12:13 p.m., officers responded to a report of property damage on Chugwater Drive. Officers met with an individual who reported finding damage to their vehicle. Officers completed a report of the incident.

At 5:04 p.m., officers responded to a report of a scam on Hopi Circle. Officers met with an individual who reported being contacted by someone whom he thought was a known individual asking for money. The individual was instructed to purchase prepaid cards and send the info. Monetary losses were reported. Officers attempted to contact the number provided and completed a report of the incident.

At 8:21 p.m., officers conducted a traffic stop on a vehicle for a headlight violation at the intersection of East Teton Boulevard and Colorado Drive. Officers issued the driver, a juvenile, 16, of Green River, a citation for alleged failure to provide proof of liability insurance.

At 10:10 p.m., officers responded to a report of a subject removal on Bridger Drive. Officers met with an individual who requested to have an individual that was refusing to leave the property removed. Officers met with the individual and ascertained the individual had an active warrant out of Uinta County. Officers confirmed the warrant and placed Ty Adair, 28, of Utah, under arrest per the warrant for alleged theft: deprive - under $1,000. Officers transported Adair to the Sweetwater County Detention Center and completed a report of the incident.

Sept. 7

At 5:30 a.m., officers responded to a report of a barking dog on Essex Street. Officers located the dog and made contact with the owner, advised of the complaint, and completed a report of the incident.
U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyoming) has an extensive foreign policy record.

As a member of the House Armed Services Committee, Cheney is among a small group of lawmakers with outsized influence on the Department of Defenses purse strings. Before she ran for office, she was a ranking official in the U.S. Department of State, serving as one of the Bush Administrations top diplomatic officials at the height of Americas wars in the Middle East and Afghanistan. Her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, played a major role in the United States presence in the region. She has maintained a preventionist stance on Afghanistan in the years since, stating that the United States presence in the country is necessary to prevent a resurgence in terrorist activity from groups like the Taliban.

Now, as fallout mounts around the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan  and the death of a Marine from northwestern Wyoming who was killed last week in Kabul  some of Cheneys political opponents are wielding her foreign policy record against her.

Wyoming Sen. Anthony Bouchard (R-Cheyenne)  the fundraising leader among Cheneys challengers in the U.S. House race  has referred to Cheney as a warmonger in campaign materials, and has maintained that any long-term military engagement in the region was a mistake. Wyoming Rep. Chuck Gray (R-Casper) blamed Cheney directly for the scenario in Afghanistan, saying in a statement that she and other radical socialists undermined former president Donald Trumps efforts to negotiate with the Taliban last year.

The Taliban would not have double-crossed President Trump, because they understood he would not allow it, Gray wrote in a statement. What happened in Afghanistan is another result of Cheney voting to impeach President Trump to strengthen Biden and Pelosi. (Gray declined to be interviewed.)

Through it all, Cheney has remained steadfast, insisting withdrawal  while politically popular  was a losing strategy. You dont end wars by surrendering, Cheney tweeted earlier this week.

Cheney has blamed both Trump and President Joe Biden for a withdrawal strategy that resulted in the Taliban-led takeover of the country and the deaths of hundreds, including 13 Marines. One of those troops, 20-year-old Lance Cpl. Rylee McCollum, hailed from Bondurant. She has also supported the idea of leaving a limited force of American troops in the country to stabilize relations there, a plan advocated for by many former members of the Bush administration.

Allowing our policy to be set around political slogans is extremely dangerous, Cheney said during a Q&A at the Commonwealth Club of California in San Francisco on Aug. 17. Weve had now three presidents essentially  Obama, Trump and now Biden, all of whom said oh we have to end the endless wars. (Cheney was not available for an interview for this story.)

Our leaders should have done a better job at explaining to the American people why we need to deploy and why [a troop presence] is important for counterterrorism efforts and our counterintelligence efforts, she added. The notion that youre going to simply announce were withdrawing was wrong. I think it reflects a misunderstanding about Americas role in the world.

Using Cheneys foreign policy track record against her is nothing new. Opponents from Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz to former President Donald Trump have painted the Cheney family as the symbol of Americas modern foreign policy failures, and have attacked her stances as Democrats and Republicans alike began to sour on forever wars like the 20-year conflict in Afghanistan.

Some, like Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio) have alleged Cheney worked to undermine Trumps de-escalation efforts, though those allegations have since been debunked.

Among her challengers, the positions on Americas role in the country vary widely.

Denton Knapp, an army veteran who served at Bagram Air Base near the Afghan capital of Kabul, has focused his public criticisms on the Biden administration while defending Cheneys position. Knapp, like Cheney, has also expressed support for a limited troop presence in the country for counterterrorism efforts.

The two differ on one key point, however: Knapp does not blame Trumps pledge to withdraw all troops from Afghanistan by May 1 for the chaos surrounding Americas exit from the country.

I think [the Taliban] knew very clearly from our State Department as well as with Trump as Commander-in-Chief that they could not do what they did this past week while Trump was president, Knapp said.

Foreign policy can be a touchy topic for candidates trying to align themselves with the former president, who earned a higher percentage of the vote in Wyoming than in any other state. Cheney challenger and Cheyenne attorney Darin Smith, for example, faced early attacks in Wyoming and in the conservative press for statements he made during his 2016 Congressional bid regarding American intervention overseas, in which he appeared to criticize Trumps calls to withdraw from the Middle East.

Smith, who did not respond to several interview requests, later challenged that narrative in a statement on his website.

The diversity of perspectives in the race help to illustrate the conservative movements evolving view of American involvement in foreign countries, according to University of New Haven political science professor Chris Haynes, who studies political framing and public opinion. Once a minority opinion in Republican politics, anti-interventionism grew into a mainstream facet of conservatism with the rise of candidates like libertarian Ron Paul and later, Trump, Haynes said.

The traditional DNA for Republicans are to be kind of the Reagan Republican, sort of internationalist pro-democracy, all that other stuff, but it really clashes right with Trumpism and its anti-war stance. The trend nowadays is to be pro-Trump if youre on the Republican side just to save your own skin and to win elections, and thats why it becomes very difficult, Haynes said.

The complexities are enough that Bouchard wonders whether its still worth running against Cheney on Afghanistan policy.

Its not even an issue, he said. People are done listening to her. Shes been part of the problem. Her dads been part of the problem  The Democrats used to hate Dick Cheney. And I was on the same side as Democrats. Now everything is flip-flopped around. I cant make sense of what the Democrats are thinking.

Haynes said running on foreign policy may not be a worthwhile strategy for the candidates. At this point, he said, Bidens sliding poll numbers are likely attributable to temporary distaste from Democratic voters, and that Afghanistan policy is unlikely to play a significant role in Republican races.

Then again, Haynes said, the current political climate is unprecedented in American history. It remains to be seen if Cheneys ideological view of America as the worlds policeman is one that aligns with that of a plurality of conservative voters, he said.

[Some Republican candidates] are willing to bend or reshape what conservatism used to be as long as they can win, Haynes said. Liz Cheney is not willing to do that, and well see at the end of the day whether her principled approach is going to get her kicked out of office, or whether her movement either grows or gets completely overwhelmed by the more pragmatic approach.

WyoFile is an independent nonprofit news organization focused on Wyoming people, places and policy.
For many people, the morning of Sept. 11, 2001 will be a moment frozen in time.

Everyone alive and aware of their surroundings that day has a story. Maybe they were stepping off the school bus and suddenly being ushered into a library or gym to watch the news, all the while teachers, counselors and other school workers attempted to calm the student body while they were processing the events themselves. Some may have been suddenly grounded and were stranded at airports after the attacks. Of course, anyone in New York or Washington, D.C., would have a very harrowing experience no one outside those cities would understand.

Over the next 20 years, the U.S. participated in armed conflicts in two countries, with a full-scale withdraw from Afghanistan only taking place recently. Two decades is a long time and it isnt far-fetched to say an entire generation has grown up within that time span, never knowing a time when the country wasnt involved in military action overseas.

The day those planes collided into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon was a watershed moment for the United States. Afterward, we got used to the sight of military jets making flyovers during sporting events. TSA continues to search our belongings anytime we want to board an aircraft, despite some evidence the procedures in place amount to little more than ineffective security theater. Perhaps the best result of all is the value weve placed on those who serve in the armed forces. Their service and sacrifices are much more widely acknowledged now than they were prior to 9/11.

9/11 had a tremendous impact on the United States, socially and politically, and it is unlikely the changes spurred from that moment in time will be undone anytime soon.

We will never forget 9/11.
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GREENWICH  Plans by the Greenwich Historical Society to honor trailblazing women in Greenwich and the home of Mary Tyler Moore were delayed last spring due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Now, the effort to bring attention to renowned women who lived in Greenwich will take place in a Sept. 30 ceremony that will also honor the late David Ogilvy for his work to preserve local landmarks.

Four homes and buildings, which were designed, owned or dedicated to renowned women, will be highlighted through the Greenwich Historical Societys annual Landmarks Recognition Program. The buildings slated to receive plaques are the Mary Tyler Moore home, the Innis Arden Cottage in Old Greenwich, the YWCA Greenwich and the Woolley Huntzinger House, a Tudor residence in the Rock Ridge neighborhood.

Ogilvy, a longtime real estate executive, will be posthumously honored for his work to recognize the advancement of historic preservation in Greenwich. The Greenwich Historical Society will give the first annual David Ogilvy Preservation Award named in his honor.

The award will be presented to his wife, Anne Ogilvy, and his family at the historical societys annual meeting. Ogilvy died in February 2020 at the age of 77.

It is a privilege to acknowledge Davids tremendous contribution to preserving Greenwichs unique architectural heritage by creating this award in his honor, said Debra Mecky, executive director at the Historical Society. His relentless efforts to ensure Greenwich maintains its distinctiveness and high quality of life, especially at time when historic homes and other notable structures are fast disappearing, has set a high bar and an admirable example for the community. He was a cherished friend who left a very large footprint in Greenwich.

The Greenwich Historical Society also will honor recipients of the Landmarks Recognition Program at the meeting. The recognition of local landmark status had originally been planned to coincide with commemorations of the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment, which granted women the right to vote across the United States in 1920.

The midcountry home of Mary Tyler Moore, an actress famous for her starring roles in The Mary Tyler Moore Show and The Dick Van Dyke Show, will be recognized. She lived there with her husband, Dr. S. Robert Levine, until her death in 2017.

The Innis Arden Cottage in Old Greenwich, affiliated with philanthropist Maria Tod, will be honored, as well as Woolley Huntzinger House, home of Ada Huntzinger, the wife of a prominent music publisher. The YWCA Greenwich will also be recognized.

For more information and to buy tickets, visit greenwichhistory.org/landmarks/. The David Ogilvy Presentation Award and the 90th annual meeting will be held from 5:45 to 8 p.m. Sept. 30 at the Belle Haven Club.

rmarchant@greenwichtime.com
GREENWICH  At a 9/11 memorial ceremony Friday evening outside the Glenville Fire Station, the speakers urged the gathered crowd to remember the 33 people with ties to the town who died in the terror attacks that day and to remember the first responders who put their lives on the line to help.

But they also challenged the crowd of over 150 people to remember the sense of community that brought the country together in the days after the terror attacks.

Twenty years have gone by, and its a day that changed Americans forever, said Glenville Volunteer Fire Company Chief Mike Hoha, with a giant American flag unfurled behind him from a fire truck.

We have not forgotten those who perished that day, Hoha said. But today is also a day of remembrance. Remember how our Glenville community, our town, our state, our country came together and supported each other after the dark days of 9/11?

First Selectman Fred Camillo also reflected on the terror attacks two decades ago on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., calling it a solemn day for us all.

Its been said many times over the last 20 years that those who attacked us did so to break our spirit  but exactly the opposite happened, Camillo said. Americans came together with a resolve to never forget that day or those attacks and never take for granted our freedoms. They served notice to all that Americans will always fight to protect our freedoms. The resolve that was born on Sept. 11, 2001, will remain for as long as people gather to remember in venues like this.

U.S. Rep. Jim Himes, a town resident who was heading to work just a few blocks away from the World Trade Center when the attacks occurred, reflected on what it means to never forget.

He spoke about never forgetting the thousands of innocent Americans who lost their lives in the attacks and said it was enough to shake your sense of justice. Himes spoke about never forgetting the first responders and said the firefighters who were in full gear about to head upstairs in the World Trade Center after the planes hit didnt know they were living the last hours of their lives.

Thats the world that our first responders, our police officers and our firefighters live in, and we cant just remember them and the nobility of their mission on anniversaries of 9/11, said Himes, D-4th District. We remember that every day. We never forget that.

Himes also spoke about remembering the selfless service of those in the U.S. military all over the world.

And he reminded the crowd to remember how the country felt on Sept. 12, 2001. That is what Himes said he will work hardest to remember. He recalled how even in a tough town like New York, on Sept. 12, everyone was thinking about donating blood, taking food to firefighters, reassuring police officers and helping others.

In that moment when we were attacked, we remembered that we are family, Himes said. We have our disagreements, but fundamentally, when horrible things happen, were there for each other.

Were in a very angry time right now. Ill be angry later and youll be angry later because of the pandemic and masks and vaccines and Biden this and Trump that. Were in a very angry time, he said.

So maybe the legacy we can all undertake on behalf of those lives lost and those first responders and our military service people is that tonight or tomorrow when we get angry, stop a second and remember Sept. 12, Himes said. Remember that feeling that we had, and well be better people and worthy of the sacrifices that all of those people made for us.

U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn. and a town resident, echosed that theme.

We can still recover that spirit of Sept. 12, Blumenthal said. It is in us as Americans. We are here, regardless of what our differences are, because were reaffirming those values and that spirit of that day.

Bluementhal noted the work of the thousands of firefighters, police and first responders who went to ground zero after the attacks to recover victims. Many became sick, and now more people have died from the effects of the toxic material at ground zero than were killed in the attacks, he said.

We owe them justice and should never forget them, Blumenthal said.

The crowd gathered near a piece of steel from the World Trade Center that has been turned into a Sept. 11 memorial outside the fire station. Hoha and Susan Wohlforth, a town resident whose husband, Martin Wohlforth, was killed in the attacks, placed a wreath by the memorial.

Volunteer fire company member Frank Napolitano, who served as master of ceremonies, paid tribute to the memory of company life members Carl Peck and former town fire chief and Emergency Management Director Dan Warzoha, who recently passed away.

Both of them were our twin towers, Napolitano said. They were the heart and soul of Glenville.

Other town officials at the ceremony included state Sen. Ryan Fazio, R-36; state Reps. Kimberly Fiorello, R-149, Stephen Meskers, D-150, and Harry Arora, R-151; Selectwoman Lauren Rabin; Selectperson Jill Oberlander; former Selectman John Toner; Chief of Police James Heavey; Fire Chief Joseph McHugh; and GEMS Executive Director Tracy Schietinger.

The memorial was built with private fundraising and with the support of the families of the local victims. It was then given as a gift to the town and erected in the park, overlooking the harbor.

Saturdays ceremony in Cos Cob follow the time frame of the attacks, beginning exactly at 8:46 a.m., with a cannon shot and a bell ring to mark when the first plane hit the World Trade Center.

Another bell rang at 9:03 a.m., when the second tower was hit, followed by another one on 9:37 a.m., when the plane hit the Pentagon. Bells also rang at 10:03 a.m. for the plane crash in Shanksville, Pa., and at 10:28 a.m., when the first tower collapsed.

Those in attendance placed flowers at the base of the memorial, an annual tradition.

The names of the 33 people connected to Greenwich who were killed in the terror attacks were read aloud at the ceremonies in Cos Cob and in Glenville.

kborsuk@greenwichtime.com
As part of the celebration of its 125th anniversary, the Greenwich Police Department will step off in a parade down Greenwich Avenue this month.

The GPD is organizing the parade in cooperation with the Greenwich Police Emerald Society and The Combined Organizations of Police. It has been in the works for seven months.

The parade will begin at 1 p.m. Sept. 19 from Town Hall and move down Greenwich Avenue, following a similar route to the towns annual St. Patricks Day Parade. It will be held rain or shine.

According to police Capt. James Bonney, a total of 10 bagpipe bands from Connecticut and New York will take part, along with police motorcycles, honor guards and a team of horses. Police helicopters will fly overhead and lead the parade from Town Hall, up Field Point Road, onto West Putnam and then down Greenwich Avenue.

In addition to Greenwich residents, the parade will feature other police departments from Connecticut and New York.

The parade will also celebrate essential workers and their service throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. There will be a salute to police officers and other first responders as well as to doctors, nurses and hospital workers, representatives from Neighbor to Neighbor as well as others who worked during the pandemic, including supermarket employees.

During the early days of the pandemic, I was amazed when I saw grocery store employees coming to work every day despite all the potential threats to their health, Bonney said. And I saw the GEMS ambulance staff risking their lives and picking up infected patients and transporting them to the hospital in the back of ambulances.

There you had doctors, nurses and other staff at Greenwich Hospital experiencing heart-wrenching scenes while caring for our residents and trying to save their lives. This parade is a celebration of those people and all of the essential workers.

And since the event also marks the anniversary of the GPD, Bonney said, What better way to celebrate, than to have the citizens of Greenwich enjoy a huge parade with bagpipes, cool cars and music?

After the parade, the pipe bands will perform at Havemeyer Field, capping off the event with a large band performance. Other Celtic-themed performances will be part of the show.

Greenwich

There are several vacancies on the Representative Town Meeting, and eligible residents are invited to step forward and serve on the body.

There is one opening each in District 1, which covers the south center of the town; District 7, which is the towns north center; District 8, which covers Cos Cob; and District 10, which is the Northwest section of town.

To qualify for a seat, you must be a resident of the districts and a registered voter. But because the RTM is a nonpartisan body, the political party affiliation does not matter.

If more than one person steps forward for a seat, the districts membership in its RTM caucus will hold an election to decide between the candidates.

Each person will finish the rest of the RTMs term, which runs through December. They can also choose to run for reelection in the November municipal election.

The RTM next meets on Sept. 21 in its first meeting since June. The districts will all hold meeting before Sept. 21 in an attempt to fill the vacancies.

For more information, including how to contact the district chairs, visit www.greenwichct.gov/721/Representative-Town-Meeting-RTM.

Old Greenwich

An international coastal cleanup and environmental fair will be held at Greenwich Point from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sept. 18.

Attendees will collect nonbiodegradable trash in the entire beach area. The amount gathered will be tallied and reported to Save the Sound and the Ocean Conservancy, which is working with organizations worldwide to analyze pollution in the Earths waters.

Greenwich Green & Clean, Skip the Straw Greenwich and other local groups are organizing the event.

This is a very important thing for people to get involved in, said Mary Hull, Greenwich Green & Cleans executive director. This is vital for our town and for our environment. Weve been doing this for many years, and we always get such a good turnout of volunteers.

To register for the event, visit www.greenwichgreenandclean.org. Walk-ins will be welcome. Beach cards are not required; tell the gate you are participating in the cleanup.

A check-in table will be set up at the parking lot across from the first concession stand.

Volunteers are encouraged to bring gloves and buckets, but some will be available. The event will follow all town and state health and safety protocols to protect against COVID-19.

The volunteers will receive community service certificates and daffodil bulbs to plant at home.

Downtown

The community is invited to visit the Boys & Girls Club of Greenwich and get a closer look at its programs.

The club, located at 4 Horseneck Lane, will host an open house from 6:30 to 8 p.m. Sept. 17. Attendees can meet the staff, tour the facility and learn more about its after-school, evening, enrichment and school vacation programs.

This event is free and open to all. A light dinner and refreshments will be served. The club will have a supervisor on hand to watch young children.

Don Palmer, the clubs vice president of programs and youth development, said that previous open houses have been successful in signing up new members.

We want people to come in and meet our staff and see the facility and see our learning center and our pool, Palmer said. We want them to learn about all our programming and see for themselves that this is the kind of place they can bring their kids.

Programs at the Boys & Girls Club of Greenwich serve children ages 6 to 18.

To make a reservation to attend the event, visit www.bgcg.org/what-we-do/parent-zone.html.

kborsuk@greenwichtime.com
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP)  Gov. Doug Burgum said Friday that Joe Bidens directive that large companies require COVID-19 vaccinations is overreach, and he said he's asked North Dakota's attorney general to look at legal options to challenge it.

Burgum, a Republican, said the mandate steers our country down a dangerous path away from states rights and the freedom of private businesses to make their own decisions on vaccinations.

Biden immediately pushed back at Republican governors on the issue, calling them cavalier with the health of children and communities.

Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem said he met by teleconference with fellow GOP attorneys general Friday to look at legal options.

I'm adamantly pro-vaccination, but I'm also pro-federalism, Stenehjem said. This is federal overreach.

Biden's directive would mandate that employers with more than 100 workers require them to be vaccinated or be tested for the virus weekly, affecting about 80 million Americans. And the roughly 17 million workers at health facilities that receive federal Medicare or Medicaid also will have to be fully vaccinated.

North Dakotas Legislature overwhelmingly passed a law this year that was signed by Burgum prohibiting the state from issuing vaccine mandates, unless the vaccine is fully approved by the Food and Drug Administration or during a public health emergency or disaster. The FDA has since given full approval to the Pfizer vaccine.

Jim Poolman, a former state lawmaker and state insurance commissioner, now is part owner of three restaurants in Bismarck, West Fargo and Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

Poolman said the restaurants collectively have more than 100 employees, about half of whom are vaccinated.

Im pro-vaccinations. Im vaccinated, my family is vaccinated and most of the management is vaccinated, Poolman said. "But Im also pro letting people decide for themselves.

Poolman said the restaurant industry has just begun recovering from shutdowns due to the coronavirus.

The industry is having a hard time attracting and retaining employees anyway, and now this comes down the pike, he said.
WASHINGTON (AP)  President Joe Biden has a simple message for fellow Democrats about his plan to raise taxes to remake large swaths of the American economy: look beyond the bottom line.

Biden is trying to persuade Democrats to embrace a more emotional argument, namely that the plan is fair, that it increases taxes on those who can afford to pay more and spends money on programs targeting children and the middle class.

The president has proposed more than $3 trillion worth of revenue increases, primarily through higher taxes for corporations and the country's richest households as well as greater IRS enforcement that would target the wealthy. But key lawmakers voiced doubts this past week about the size and possible impacts on the economy as congressional committees considered the measures and a wide array of business groups sifted through the details to highlight what they oppose.

Interviews with three administration officials suggest the White House is comfortable with settling for a lower price tag as part of the negotiating process, so long as the end result produces a tax system that voters judge as fair. The officials, who were not authorized to publicly discuss ongoing negotiations and spoke on condition of anonymity, said Democrats are united on this front.

If the playbook of appealing to voters sounds familiar, it was the same strategy used by Biden to cement a bipartisan infrastructure deal earlier this year.

This is a commonsense thing that people agree with, said Kate Berner, White House deputy communications director. They dont understand why companies can park profits overseas and pay no money in taxes. They dont understand why a hedge fund manager pays a lower tax rate than a pipefitter. It's something that people think of as fundamentally broken.

But in a sign of uncertainty, the administration has also stayed publicly quiet about how low Biden is willing to go in slimming down the package. The administration also finds itself grappling with interest groups that the White House views as intentionally misrepresenting its tax plans in hopes of eroding support. Officials say that claims of job losses by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other groups are overblown and fail to consider investments in family leave, children, child care, health care and the environment that they believe will help the economy.

The president outlined his tax plans in his budget proposal, setting a baseline for congressional committees. But some Democratic lawmakers, including West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, have already objected to the amount of spending and the taxes being raised. Manchin early on raised concerns about Biden's proposal to increase the corporate income tax rate from 21% to 28%.

If you're going to be a leader in the world and the superpower of the world, you better have a competitive tax rate, period," he said.

While Manchin and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., both voted for the budget blueprint that allowed Democrats to begin crafting the social programs package, they have made it clear they will not support the proposed topline spending figure of $3.5 trillion over 10 years.

Establishing an artificial $3.5 trillion spending number and then reverse-engineering the partisan social priorities that should be funded isnt how you make good policy," Manchin wrote in The Wall Street Journal.

On the House side, Democrats can afford to lose only three votes and still pass the spending bill if the GOP unanimously opposes it, as expected. There have already been early signals of unrest, with Rep. Stephanie Murphy, D-Fla., voting against two sections of her party's bill during a committee hearing this past week, and Rep. Ron Kind, D-Wis., joining her in voting no on one of those votes.

I dont know how much were spending, how much were raising, how were spending some of the money and how were raising any of the money, Murphy complained.

Under Biden's initial proposal, changes to corporate taxes would raise roughly $2 trillion over a decade, with about 70% of that sum coming from putting the corporate rate at 28% and revising a global minimum tax on profits. An additional $755 billion would come from higher individual taxes on the wealthiest Americans, including an increase to the rate charged on profits from the sale of capital assets such as stocks or real estate.

Increased enforcement by the IRS would yield roughly $460 billion. But a Treasury Department analysis indicates that figure would grow to $1.6 trillion in the following decade as more IRS employees were fully trained, one of the key arguments for saying that the budget would be fiscally responsible.

Part of the challenge for Democrats is the memory of voter backlash against proposed tax increases during the 1984 presidential election against Ronald Reagan nearly four decades ago.

Many older Democrats and those from more conservative areas fear that voters will penalize them if taxes increase by too much, even if Biden and advocacy groups push the argument that voters are now rejecting Reagan-ism and will reward Democrats for raising taxes on companies and the wealthy.

Were in a generational struggle within the Democratic Party, said Frank Clemente, executive director of the advocacy group Americans for Tax Fairness. Were in a very different era, and these Democrats havent caught up with the era were in.

Americans for Tax Fairness is among the organizations trying to persuade Democratic lawmakers to back Bidens tax proposals. The groups have commissioned a national polls and six battleground state polls and mobilized 97 national groups and 620 state organizations to back the plans on the premise that they are popular.

Even if business groups oppose parts of the plan, their objections can vary by industry. The Chamber of Commerce has emphasized its dislike of higher rates for corporations and capital gains, while the American Bankers Association sent a letter to lawmakers on Tuesday voicing concerns about the increased reporting requirements to the IRS on customers' accounts.

The Retail Industry Leaders Association, whose members include Target, Best Buy and other major retailers, urged congressional leaders Thursday not to raise corporate tax rates, but to boost IRS enforcement and ensure that all companies pay at least a minimum tax before an increase in the corporate tax rate is considered.

We are doing a lot of meetings educating members on this issue and making sure they understand how a rate increase will harm retail and the importance of ensuring all profitable companies contribute, said Melissa Murdock, a vice president with the trade group.

The American Petroleum Institute, the largest trade group representing the U.S. oil and gas industry, is lobbying to beat back a proposed fee on methane emissions that supporters contend would slow climate change and dramatically improve air quality in communities located near oil and gas facilities.

The group is running a $1 million-plus ad campaign that tells viewers when it comes to energy, Washington wants to chart an extreme course that could make energy more expensive and less reliable.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent, spoke about the full-court press to reshape or even kill the tax increases.

Youve got all of the big money interests of the country fighting us day after day after day, Sanders said. At the end of the day, in my mind, what we are trying to do is to restore the faith of the American people that their government can work for them, not just for lobbyists on Capitol Hill or the big money interests. And we are going to prevail.

But even as trade groups focus on individual details of a complex budget, the topline proposal to fund $3.5 trillion in additional spending over the next decade is the main obstacle. Neil Bradley, executive vice president and chief policy officer at the Chamber of Commerce, said the proposed tax increases are unprecedented but also inadequate to pay for all the programs while complying with Senate rules on budgeting.

'I've been doing this for 25 years, Bradley said. Based on that experience, its my belief that a package of this size collapses under its own weight.
There is something wrong at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Greenwich. It is a hotel that should serve our business community by providing a place where important meetings can happen over dinner or a drink; it is a place where groups should celebrate special events. There is an extraordinary atrium filled with fancy water features and a variety of tree species. Its restaurant has become part of families annual traditions. But while guests are continuing to pay luxury hotel prices, the hotels restaurant is shuttered. As Connecticuts hospitality industry gears up for bailout funds from the state of Connecticut, the Hyatt Regency Hotels management is requiring that guests forgo a full-service hotel with cost-cutting measures that detract from our tourism industry and eliminate good union jobs. We deserve better.

Fortunately, bar and restaurant workers, who have served guests in this hotel for decades, are now fighting back for themselves, their families, the guests, the hotel and our community.

I had the opportunity to hear from bar and restaurant workers at the Hyatt Regency Hotel as they delivered a petition to Hyatt management asking for the hotel restaurant to reopen so they can get back to work. When the Hyatt first closed in March 2020, these workers were laid off, and theyve struggled through a stagnant economy for the past year and a half, waiting to be recalled to their jobs. Even though the Hyatt has returned to full occupancy, the restaurant has remained closed.

Many of the hotel workers I spoke to have worked at the Hyatt for decades and are devastated that the hotel they dedicated their careers to is now treating them so disrespectfully. One worker remarked that a family who comes to the Hyatt every Christmas asks for her by name. Another described feeling frustrated by news reports about laid-off workers not wanting to return to their jobs; on the contrary, hes spent the last year and a half waiting for the hotel to call him back to work. After years of service to the Hyatt, these employees are still out of work, while the hotel welcomes more guests every day.

Even as these workers struggle with unemployment, they also worry about the damage that these cost-cutting measures are having on a hotel where they have committed so much of their careers. Bar and restaurant workers have built relationships with guests over years of service. One worker has friends who are asking when the hotel will reopen the restaurant. Others fear that guests could give up on the hotel and cease making it a part of their family trips.

Nothing about the pandemic was normal. During a time of fear and uncertainty, we all made sacrifices to protect ourselves and our communities. But with reopening underway, the sacrifices should not become standardized. When a hotel like the Hyatt Regency is successfully recovering, dedicated workers who have struggled through a year and a half of layoffs should be able to come back to the jobs they depend on, and hotel guests should be able to enjoy full services when they visit our city.

We now need a just recovery, instead of cost-cutting and jobs-eliminating schemes from an industry that is also pleading for public money. Leisure and hospitality workers were among the hardest hit by the pandemic. Nearly 40 percent lost their jobs at the peak of the pandemic. These workers are disproportionately female and non-white. Decisions made by hotel managers will influence whether we come out of this crisis more divided and more unequal.

Recently, Connecticut Lodging Association Executive Director Virginia Kozlowski cited an expert saying that 35 percent of the people in the hospitality sector who have lost their jobs have moved onto other sectors. She suggested that Hospitality needs to be more proactive in offering hospitality as a career, not just as a job. You can call it a good job or a career, but we now have an opportunity where the hotel industry can put Ms. Kozlowskis suggestion into practice. Bar and restaurant workers, who have been out of work for months, are fighting to get their good jobs back and are fighting for a full recovery of the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Greenwich. Will the hotel industry pass up the temptation for more destructive cost-cutting measures in favor of providing good union jobs and restoring a service that brings families back to the hotel every Christmas? Will it stick with austerity measures that leave workers unemployed and a city with one less amenity that made it a destination for business and leisure travel?

David Michel is a state representative for Stamford.
Clarence Brooks gives the University of Guam Trident symbol while he waits to receive his bachelor of science in nursing diploma at the universitys commencement ceremony in May at Paseo Stadium in Hagatna.
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Haiti - Insecurity : Barbecue announces a truce to allow the supply of fuel





Friday, less than 24 hours after the announcement of a truce on the social networks of the former policeman Jimmy Cherizier, aka "Barbecue" the leader of the Gang "G9" coalition, in order to allow the supply of fuel to the stations services, the access roads to the Varreux oil terminal were cleared of barricades and the bandits respected a ceasefire.



From 7 am on Friday, activities at the Varreux terminal (70% of the storage of Haitian petroleum products) had resumed normally. 160 trucks full of fuel (diesel and gasoline) left the terminal throughout the day to supply gas stations across the country. Saturday and Sunday activities in Varreux will continue without interruption and according to officials by Tuesday the entire metropolitan area will be supplied.



Since September 1st, most gas stations in the metropolitan area have been closed due to the inability of oil companies to supply them due to armed gangs in the Varreux area and blocked road accesses.



Friday, Marc-Antoine Nesi, the spokesperson for the National Association of Service Station Owners (ANAPROSS) of Haiti, denounced on a radio station in the capital the control exercised by armed gangs over fuel supply. The gangs would demand 100,000 dollars to allow the resumption of the operations of distribution "The bandits impose their law on the persons in charge of the oil companies."



Let's recall that on September 7 the Association of Petroleum Professionals (APPE) in a letter addressed to Rockefeller Vincent, the Minister of Justice had underlined to the Minister "the situation of insecurity which compromises the loading of trucks in the oil terminals". Recall that the Martissant terminal has been closed since July 5, "when bandits shot the propane boat while it was unloading" and that of Thor is frequently out of stock because it is often the the only one able to distribute fuel throughout the city...



See also :

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34608-haiti-flash-the-pnh-at-the-the-offensive-hecatomb-among-bandits-40-arrests.html

https://www.icihaiti.com/en/news-34356-icihaiti-politic-gang-leader-barbecue-promises-to-avenge-the-death-of-president-moise.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34122-haiti-insecurity-the-pnh-strengthens-the-security-devices-and-takes-out-its-armored-vehicles.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34103-haiti-flash-armed-gangs-threaten-the-water-supply-of-port-au-prince.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34065-haiti-flash-1-3-of-port-au-prince-serves-as-a-battlefield-for-nearly-95-gangs.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34053-haiti-flash-barbecue-affirms-that-the-g9-is-now-a-revolutionary-force-video.html



PI/ HaitiLibre






















Haiti - News : Zapping...





Arrest of a rapist on underage

Thursday September 9, the police of Arcahaie proceeded to the arrest of Roilucson Joseph aka "Jetly" for having participated in a gang rape on two minors on the night of September 6 in Mahotte, a locality located not far from Saintard. Law enforcement officials are instructed to apprehend all perpetrators of this heinous act.



578 aftershocks after the August 14 earthquake

The latest seismic bulletin from the Technical Unit of Seismology (UTS) and the Bureau of Mines and Energy (BME) reports 595 earthquakes during the month of August 2021, including 578 aftershocks after the magnitude 7.2 earthquake on the Richter scale on August 14, 2021 https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34681-haiti-earthquake-latest-assessment-of-civil-protection.html . Geological engineer Claude Prepetit director of the BME indicates that other aftershocks can still occur but at low magnitudes



The Anti-Corruption Unit in action

The Anti-Corruption Unit (ULCC) celebrates its 17th anniversary. The Director General praised the titanic work carried out by the Institution's investigators, stressing that no less than ten investigation reports on corruption cases involving several personalities have just been sent to the Public Prosecutor's Office for prosecution and 65 former mayors were sent to the Criminal Court for non-declaration of assets...



See also :

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34410-haiti-flash-initiation-of-public-action-against-dozens-of-businessmen-officials-and-former-officials.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34406-haiti-corruption-ulcc-handed-70-lawsuits-against-former-mayors-and-personalities.html



EDH : Employees on strike

Felix Pierre Michel, Vice President of the Federation of Haitian Electricity Unions (EDH), confirms that EDH employees are on strike to obtain the payment of fees for the start of the school year, eliminated by the previous administration. But ensure that the minimum service is guaranteed and that it is not the strike that is responsible for the blackouts



Justice : UNDP alongside the Ministry

Friday September 10, Rockefeller Vincent had a fruitful working meeting with Fernando Hiraldo, the Resident Representative of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP-Haiti) to advance several important issues and projects for the country including : the reform of the Code Criminal, the relocation of the courthouse of Port-au-Prince, the construction of the Ganthier prison according to international standards (capacity 800 prisoners) and the support of the UNDP to the steering committee for the implementation of the strategic plan of fight against prolonged preventive detention.



Consulate of Haiti in New York, note of sympathy

The Consulate General of Haiti in New York learned with sorrow of the death of singer Isnard Douby https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34710-haiti-obituary-isnard-douby-the-myhic-singer-of-the-system-band-is-dead-video.html . "His disappearance is a great loss for the Haitian cultural sector. The passing of this fabulous artist creates memories in each of us that go back generations. His beautiful songs to the rhythm of 'Kompa Direk', considered as works of art, will be engraved in the Haitian cultural heritage. His powerful voice will resonate with us for eternity. Haiti is in mourning, the death of one of the biggest Haitian stars plunges the Haitian Community of New York into sadness. The Consulate would like to extend its sincere condolences to the Douby Family and to the various members of the System Band group !"







HL/ HaitiLibre


















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Korean Movie | 2020

 Drama  Fantasy

Directed by Lee Jang-hoon-I ()

117min | Release date in South Korea: 2021/09/15

Started filming: 2020/08/02

Synopsis

In 1988, a 17-year-old genius teenage boy named Joon-kyeong (Park Jung-min), lives in a village where there is no train station when the only way to get in and out is by train.

Dreaming of making a way station for his sister and the villagers who have no choice but to commute along the dangerous train tracks every day, Joon-kyeong sends many letters to the President, but with no reply. Ra-hee (Yoona), who has a crush on Joon-kyeong, does everything she can to help him meet the President.



Will Joon-kyeong and Ra-hee be able to build a way station in the village and protect the villager?

Source
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Cloudy this morning. A few showers developing during the afternoon. High 77F. Winds ENE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Showers early, then cloudy overnight. Low 71F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
Mary Lou Montgomery, retired as editor of the Hannibal (Mo.) Courier-Post in 2014. She researches and writes narrative-style stories about the people who served as building blocks for this regions foundation. Books available on Amazon.com by this author include but are not limited to: "The Notorious Madam Shaw," "Pioneers in Medicine from Northeast Missouri," and "The Historic Murphy House, Hannibal, Mo., Circa 1870." She can be reached at Montgomery.editor@yahoo.com Her collective works can be found at www.maryloumontgomery.com
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Dr. Thoreau Redcrow

Dr. Thoreau Redcrow, an American geopolitical analyst, offers up a review of Turkeys burgeoning alliance with the Taliban in Afghanistan, and how it will be driven by Erdogans jihadist worldview and labyrinth of domestic extremist allies.

In August of 2020, a video went viral on social media, showing men wearing Afghan attire in Istanbul, Turkey, unfurling a Taliban banner inside the Hagia Sophia, which had recently been converted by the Erdogan regime into a mosque. The men shouted Allahu Akbar inside the once historical center of Orthodox Christianity, which lead the researcher Noor Dahri to opine that the gesture was, a motivational message of the Muslim Brotherhood to the worlds Islamist extremists and terrorists, adding that soon, pro-ISIS activists will raise their flag too.

A year later, as Turkeys autocrat Tayyip Erdogan seeks to form an alliance with the triumphant Taliban, one has to wonder if that symbolic act was more prophetic than anyone realized. Indeed, the line of predictive breadcrumbs strewn from the caves of Pashtunistan to the 1,100 gilded rooms of Ankaras Sultanic Palace, provide ample evidence that Turkey will attempt to weaponize the Taliban into their latest takfiri proxy militia (a la ISIS), leaving terror in their wake and Turkish geostrategic gains amidst the turmoil.

Erdogan is tipping his hand early

The Turkish state is seeking to position themselves as a guarantor, mediator, facilitator, intermediary, and international credibility voucher for the Talibans upcoming theocracy. But the most surprising aspect of this maneuver, is how transparent Erdogans regime has been in pursuing it.

For instance, Turkey continues to keep its embassy in Kabul open and did not evacuate the core of its diplomatic staff, including their ambassador. Relatedly, Erdogan has said he would like to meet with the Talibans supreme leader in an attempt to help secure peace. Although, recent history from the torture centers of occupied Afrin, to the bombed villages of Iraqi Kurdistan, to the destroyed Armenian churches of Artsakh, show the world exactly what Erdogan means when he speaks of peace.

The central mechanism of Turkeys desire to exert influence and utilize the Taliban for their objectives will be running Kabuls strategic Hamid Karzai Airport. This will essentially make Ankara the gatekeepers of land-locked Afghanistan and allow them to control the tap of incoming and exiting jihadist fighters, in a similar way to how MIT Turkish intelligence devised their jihadi highway for global ISIS militants travelling from Istanbul to Gaziantep and into Syria.

Of course, Erdogan cannot admit this openly, so his official reason that he gave in an August 18, 2021, interview is that giving Turkey the keys to Afghanistans air space will strengthen the Talibans position in the international arena. No doubt, Turkey will also repay their Taliban allies by helping smooth over their image, in a similar way to how Turkey has led the charm offensive for al-Qaedas offshoot Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), the US-designated terrorist group running Turkish-protected Idlib.

An added benefit of Erdogans desire to get in bed with the Taliban is that it will not require any approval from the Turkish Parliament, as he intends to cynically use a bilateral partnership they ratified in 2018, entitled the Strategic Partnership and Friendship Agreement, based on a deal he signed with Afghanistans now overthrown President Ghani back in 2014.

Article 2 of that ten-year agreement vaguely addresses security cooperation, citing training, experience sharing, information sharing, personnel exchanges and grants between Turkey and the Afghan Government, which Erdogan will undoubtedly use as legal cover for trying to militarily transform Afghanistan into one of his neo-Ottoman vilayets, akin to his recent moves in Libya, northwest Syria, northern Cyprus, Azerbaijan, and Somalia.

The recipe for this devious exercise will involve a range of ingredients, such as generous Qatari financing, Pakistani ISI intelligence control over key Taliban leaders, and Turkey manipulating American fears of them drifting into Russias orbit, in order to play Washington and Moscow off of each other.

In an allusion to Islamabad already getting to work on their role, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan recently met with Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar, and dutifully proclaimed, We will be talking to the Taliban, to use our influence on them, to have a face-to-face talk with Turkey. And to fully understand how well ISI has pulled those puppet strings, one only needs to look at the recent statements of admiration by the Taliban towards the Turkish state.

The Taliban on Turkey

Due to its prior non-combatant role in Afghanistan and the fact that Turkey is a NATO member in name only, the Turkish military does not face any built-up bad will from Afghans from helping the Western coalition over the last twenty years. In fact, driving through Kabul one is met with a barrage of billboards promoting Turkey-Afghanistan relations as a form of Islamic solidarity. The Turkish television drama Resurrection: Ertugrul is also a blockbuster hit in Afghanistan and Pakistan, which has helped culturally manipulate public opinion in Ankaras favor.

Yet, the Taliban has likely even made Erdogan blush with their odes of admiration since seizing power. For example, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid made their position very clear, declaring We want good relations with Turkey, the Turkish government and the Muslim people of the Turkish nation. Mujahid then went on to decree The Turkish public and state are our friends, before stating We need Turkeys support in the field of education, just as before.

Of course, other NATO states might wonder why the misogynistic Taliban who previously banned girls and women from attending school or university, is seeking scholastic help from Turkey, but one look at Erdogans increasingly Salafist Sultanate makes that question a rhetorical one.

Not to be outdone, another Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen upped the ante, declaring We will rebuild Afghanistan in all areas, and we need Turkey the most to do that. For emphasis he then added, Turkey is a very important actor for us. Its a respectable and strong country in the world and has a special place for the Muslim community. Turkeys bond with Afghanistan cant be compared with any other country.

Shaheen, then closed out his remarks by referring to our Turkish brothers, before asking for Turkeys help in areas beyond education, namely health, economy, construction, energy, as well as the processing of underground resources. And with up to $3 trillion USD in mineralsincluding vital lithium deposits the world needsembedded within Afghanistans mountains, his last remark is perhaps the most significant. As such rare earth elements could be the financial rocket fuel for propelling Erdogans desired quasi-caliphate of allies stretching from the Balkans to Baku and into the Turkic Steppe of central Asia.

Turkey on the Taliban

The verbal love affair between the Taliban and Turkey has not only been a one-sided courtship, as the Turkish state has made sure to reciprocate their feelings of mutual admiration. In fact, on the same day that ISIS-K was being waved through a Taliban checkpoint to blow up thirteen American troops (and 180+ Afghans), Erdogans team was spending over three hours meeting with the Taliban.

For his part, Erdogan has made no secret of his support for the Taliban, lauding their moderate tone and statements, before throwing the Americans under the bus by remarking, the Taliban held some talks with the US, it should hold these talks with Turkey much more comfortably. Because Turkey has nothing that contradicts their beliefs.

Of course, Erdogan declaring that Turkey is in full agreement with the Talibans ideology should be enough for full NATO expulsion, that is if the organization actually believed in any of their stated principles. But alas, the last decade and piles of dead Kurds, Arabs, Armenians, and Assyrians across the Middle East and North Africa has shown that the Turkish military can act with impunity and free from international repercussions.

Erdogans personal jihadism

To fully understand Turkish foreign policy under Erdogan, one must consider that he is essentially a Salafi jihadist driven by pan-Islamist delusions of grandeur, although chameleonically beardless and wearing a designer suit. And since past is prologue, it should be noted that while mayor of Istanbul, Erdogan referred to himself as the Imam of Istanbul and a servant of Sharia.

More recently, Erdogan made his mission known at an August 26, 2020, speech honoring the Battle of Manzikerts 949th anniversary. It was there that he unequivocally defined his idea of conquest, summarizing that, It is establishing the dominance of the justice that Allah commanded in the [conquered] region.

As to any nations seeking to defy his wishes, Erdogan then threatened that, Turkey will take what is its right in the Mediterranean Sea, in the Aegean Sea, and in the Black Sea If there is anyone who wants to stand against us and pay the price, let them come. If not, let them get out of our way, and we will see to our own business.

Of course, that business of recent years has meant plundering all of Aleppos factories, arming ISIS to carry out genocide on Yazidis, assassinating leaders of the Kurdish freedom movement, expanding the illegal occupation of Cyprus, threatening to steal Greek islands and gas rights, antagonizing Egypt with the Muslim Brotherhood, supporting the beheading of cartoonists in France, flooding Libya and Artsakh with head-chopping mercenaries, and invading Rojava to steal half a million olive treeswhile committing mass rape, murder, kidnapping, torture, archaeological looting, and vandalism of Alevi worship sites.

Then again, Erdogan made no attempt to conceal his aims, ending that aforementioned Manzikert speech by quoting the Turkish poet Yahya Kemal, reciting This storm breaking out is the Turkish army, oh Lord!... May your renowned and strengthened name be raised up with the calls to prayer! Make us the victor, because this is the last army of Islam!

The company Erdogan keeps

There are a wide range of jihadist figures outside and inside of Turkey with personal ties to Erdogan and his AKP party, that give observers insight into the worldview and strategic positioning he will bring to his new alliance with the Taliban.

For starters, old photos and video of a younger Erdogan and Gulbuddin Hekmatyarthe Afghan mujahideen known as the butcher of Kabul and warlord founder of Hezb-e Islamihave surfaced in Turkish media. Hekmatyar, who was flown to Turkey in 2018 aboard a Turkish air ambulance to be treated in an Istanbul hospital and welcomed by Erdogan, is now positioning himself to be one of the non-Taliban members of the new cabal ruling over the new Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.

Within Turkey, there is a cast of al-Qaeda jihadist figures who have enjoyed AKP protection. Three of these notable ones are: Ibrahim Sen  an al-Qaeda recruiter and former Gitmo detainee, who has been utilized by Turkish intelligence to funnel jihadists into Syria since 2011; Mehmet Dogan (aka Mullah Muhammed el-Kesri)  who led the Turkish al-Qaeda group Tahsiyeciler and has called for the decapitation of Americans; and Yusuf Selami Cakaroglu  an al-Qaeda cleric who Erdogan recently released from prison so he could preach his views on Turkish state television.

Outside the al-Qaeda militant arena, Erdogan is aligned with extremist religious figures inside Turkey such as: Nureddin Yldz  a radical cleric who praised sharia to his 700,000 social media followers on the day the Taliban took over Kabul; Mehmet Akif Can  a theologian and state TV presenter who hailed the Talibans victory because Allah is with those who are patient; Ihsan Senocak  a jihadist imam who applauded the obligatory burqa returning to Afghanistan; and Mehmet Boynukaln  the former chief imam of the Hagia Sophia Mosque, who tweeted if the Taliban or anyone else declares their loyalty to Islam, we consider them brothers.

Lastly, Erdogans Islamist pro-Taliban support base within Turkey includes public figures, such as: Ersan Ergur  a strategist allied with the SADAT mercenary organization, who has called for adding Afghanistan into a future Near East Regional Islamic Federation; Ali Sahin  an AKP politician with ties to Pakistan, who has called for incorporating a special Chechen unit of jihadist mercenaries into the Turkish military; Faruk Beser  a columnist for Erdogans Yeni Safak news daily, who compared the Taliban capture of Kabul to the Prophet Muhammads return to Mecca and tweeted we rejoice in their victory; and Dogu Perincek  an ultra-nationalist politician who compared the Talibans victory to Ataturks war of independence, while calling for a Eurasianist recalibration of Turkish foreign policy towards Russia and China.

In a diagnosis on why Erdogans AKP supporters are predisposed to be Islamists, Professor Ahmet Kasm Han, a specialist on Afghan relations at Istanbuls Altinbas University, has theorized, They consider Turkey as a country with a manifest destiny  an exceptional position within the Muslim world. It is based on Turkeys past and its Ottoman heritage as the seat of the caliphate.

A foreshadowed epilogue

What is undeniable is that Turkey is seeking a larger role on the world stage and Erdogans regime is emboldened from a series of military excursions into Libya, Syria, Rojava, Southern Kurdistan, and Artsakh, where the international community has allowed the Turkish military to murder with impunity.

Now the next domino to fall in Ankaras plans for a neo-Ottoman restoration could be Afghanistan, an arterial state at the heart of central Asia where Turkey can both collaborate with their jihadist brethren in the Taliban and utilize ISIS-K as a false flag proxy to carry out advantageous geopolitical terrorist attacks around the globe (including upon themselves).

Presciently, Turkey is set to construct a massive Pentagon-esque military headquarters in Ankara, which will house their Defense Ministry alongside 15,000 personnel and be shaped like a crescent moon and star. Erdogan recently announced that this Crescent Star complex will instill fear in enemies and trust in allies and be completed by the Turkish Republics centennial in 2023. The only question for other nations around the world, and especially the West, is whether they will be an enemy or complicit ally going forward.

ANHA
The Kentucky Technology Student Association (KYTSA) will implement sixteen new high school chapters this fall thanks to a generous donation from Stan and Karen Pigman. All sixteen schools are in the southeast region of Kentucky and will receive funding to start and maintain an active KYTSA chapter. Each school will be known as a KYTSA Pigman Scholars Program and KYTSA will develop a new regional conference specifically for these chapters. The Technology Student Association (TSA) is a national Career and Technical Student Organization (CTSO) made up of students engaged in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Open to students enrolled in or who have completed STEM courses, TSAs membership includes over 250,000 middle and high school students across the United States. Kentuckys TSA state delegation has over 3,300 members in 54 middle and high schools across the Commonwealth. TSA chapters take the study of STEM beyond the classroom and give students the chance to pursue academic challenges among friends with similar goals and interests. Together, TSA chapter members work on competitive events, learn and apply leadership skills, and attend conferences at the regional, state, and national levels.

Each high school will receive funding to offset student expenses including dues, conference transportation, and state conference registration. In addition, each associated chapter advisor will receive a stipend to manage their TSA high school chapter. In total Stan and Karen Pigman will donate over $100,000 annually in each of the next four years if schools fulfill their responsibilities. Funding for dues, conference transportation, and registration has long been an issue for TSA chapters, but even more so for rural southeastern Kentucky schools. This generous donation from Stan and Karen Pigman is transformational for the regions students, said Mark Harrell, KYTSA State Advisor. This donation allows these high schools to further expose students to STEM careers through hand-on competitions and leadership opportunities. KYTSAs goal is to create a future STEM workforce ready for high-demand high-wage careers in Kentucky.

Pigman KYTSA Scholars Program Schools in the area include:

 Johnson Central High School

 Pikeville High School

 Belfry High School

 Floyd County School of Innovation

 Perry Central High School

Stan and Karen Pigman are no strangers to giving in southeastern Kentucky  they have funded approximately 200 Pigman Scholars at the University of Kentucky College of Engineering. However, they do not just write a check; they counsel and mentor the scholarship recipients themselves. Together with Karens parents, Earl and Kathryn Congdon, they provide significant scholarships for 70 UK engineering students each year, including 20 incoming freshmen in 2021.
On Sept. 1, as part of National Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month, Lt. Gov. Jacqueline Coleman, former first lady Jane Beshear, Kentucky House Democratic Caucus Leader Joni Jenkins and Rep. Cherlynn Stevenson joined UK HealthCare to highlight the long-running work of the University of Kentucky (UK) Markey Cancer Centers Ovarian Cancer Screening Program. The program, said officials, is an ongoing, 34-year research study showing that annual ultra-sound screening continues to detect ovarian cancer at an earlier stage than is possible with a clinical examination.

Last Wednesday, Gov. Andy Beshear proclaimed September Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month in Kentucky. The Ovarian Cancer Outreach Program at UK provides thousands of Kentucky women with free, easy screenings every year, giving them peace of mind about their health or the best fighting chance at recovery through early detection, said Gov. Beshear. I am pleased to support this effort and others as we work to bring high-quality, equitable care to all of our citizens.

Lt. Gov. Coleman said the work being done through UK's program is vital. UK, UK HealthCare and UKs Markey Cancer Center are indispensable Team Kentucky partners when it comes to a major goal of the Beshear-Coleman administration: making sure health care is accepted as a basic human right and is accessible to everyone in the commonwealth, said Coleman.

Coleman said this year, the Governor supplemented the $500,000 General Fund appropriation for the Ovarian Cancer Outreach Program at UK with another $300,000 from the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement funds.

Markeys Ovarian Screening Program was initiated in 1987 by Markey oncologist Dr. John R. van Nagell, Jr. and his colleagues. The goal was to determine whether transvaginal sonography could be an effective means of early ovarian cancer detection.

For more than 50 years, ovarian cancer has remained the leading cause of gynecologic cancer mortality in the United States. This year, the American Cancer Society estimates that approximately 13,770 deaths from ovarian cancer will be reported in the United States, making it the fifth leading cause of cancer mortality in women.

When it is detected early, women often can be cured with existing treatment methods. However, most women have no symptoms until the disease has progressed to an advanced stage. As the disease progresses, survival rates drop sharply. In 2018, Dr. van Nagell published a study in Obstetrics and Gynecology that shows that annual ultrasound screening of at-risk asymptomatic women increases the survival rates of women with type I and type II epithelial ovarian cancer.

While regular pelvic examinations are important and can detect many other abnormalities, including cervical cancer, they are not effective in detecting ovarian cancer in its earliest and most treatable stages, Dr. van Nagell said. Early detection is vital to saving lives. In fact, the five-year survival rate of women whose cancer was detected by screening is 86 percent  thats twice as high as those who do not get screened.

Transvaginal sonography is painless, radiation-free and can be completed in less than 15 minutes. During the examination, a small vaginal probe is used to take a sonographic picture of the ovaries, and to measure ovarian volume. This procedure is able to detect ovarian tumors even when they are too small to be diagnosed during an annual examination.

So far, nearly 345,230 free screening examinations have been provided to more than 49,358 Kentucky women, and women from every county in the state have participated in this program. Through the screenings, 632 ovarian tumors and 110 ovarian malignancies have been detected, as well as 23 non-ovarian malignancies. Currently, screenings are being performed at four locations throughout the state, including Lexington, Elizabethtown, Somerset and Paducah.

At present, more than 5,800 women have already scheduled a screening from Sept. 1, 2021 to Jan. 1, 2023.

Right now, its more important than ever for people to remain vigilant about their health, including keeping up their regular schedule of health screenings, said Mark F. Newman, M.D., UK executive vice president for health affairs. We know that many cancer screenings have been postponed or skipped over the past 16 months due to the pandemic, but its vital to stay on top of your screenings to prevent future health problems. Ovarian cancer screening is not widely available across the country, so I encourage Kentucky women to take advantage of this unique opportunity to take control of their own health by joining the UK Ovarian Screening Program when theyre eligible.

The initial funding for the program came from the Telford Foundation and the Kentucky Extension Homemakers Association (KEHA). The late Virginia McCandless, a Barren County Extension Homemaker started the ovarian cancer research fundraising effort with Dr. van Nagell in 1977. Their goal was to raise $1 from each member of KEHA. Her idea took off, and KEHA members have supported it by participating in regular screenings and challenging each county to donate at least $1 per member annually.

We are extremely proud of the KEHAs dedication to this life saving program, said Nancy Cox, dean of the UK College of Agriculture, Food and Environment. Their fundraising efforts have raised more than $1.5 million, but their work really goes beyond fundraising. They routinely participate in the screening program, organize trips to screening sites from around the state, promote ovarian cancer awareness and host educational events regarding ovarian cancer. This program positively impacts Kentucky women and represents the kind of research that should be conducted by a state's land-grant university.

The Ovarian Cancer Screening Program is open to women age 50 or older, or women over the age of 25 who have a family history of ovarian cancer. Screening is free. For more information, call, (859) 323-4687, or, (800) 766-8279.
This is How Common Hate Crimes are in Kentucky Compared to Other States
Community remembers Sept. 11 victims and heroes

Firefighters salute as the Henderson County Honor Guard retires the colors.

The sky was blue and the air crisp, much like that morning 20 years ago, when an audience made up mostly of first responders gathered at the Historic Courthouse plaza at 8:30 Saturday morning.

As if on cue, a passenger jet streaked across the sky. A coincidence, to be sure, but one that had everyone thinking back to where they were on Sept. 11, 2001.

Theres a lot Ive tried to forget about 9/11, said Chief Blair Myhand, who was a Washington, D.C., Metro Police officer called to respond to the Pentagon crash 20 years ago and a U.S. Army National Guard veteran who served a combat tour in Afghanistan. If memory serves me correctly, at least in Washington, it was a day like today. That day changed American forever and it will never be the same as it was then. Our nation went to war, the longest war this country has ever fought.

He expressed thanks that his career path had brought him to Hendersonville.

This is a job that Im thankful God has called me to do and I cant imagine doing anything else and all the folks standing out here are the same way, he said. Sen. Chuck Edwards had said earlier, no one gets rich being a first responder.

Chuck said this isnt a well-paying job and you dont do it for the glory, he said. You do it because youre called to do this job and thats the only way youre going to get through times like these. Im so very thankful that I live in a community that will come together on a day like today and honor all the Americans that were killed that day. Its by the grace of God that were here today and that were able to honor those men and women.

In brief remarks wrapping up the remembrance, Jimmy Brissie, the countys Emergency Services director, recalled feeling overwhelmed at the magnitude of the task of honoring the victims and the heroes of Sept. 11.

As Mr. Mitchell and I were starting to discuss the program for this solemn 20th anniversary of 9/11 we kept coming back to this idea of how can we even begin to memorialize the losses from that day and then the sacrifices that have been made every day since then that allow us to be here today, he said. We can do that by celebrating those freedoms. We can serve others and we can continue to living our lives to our fullest potential. Were in a unique time now that for some of us in public safety  some of you  they dont remember 9/11. We have firefighters, we have police officers, that hadnt been born. They werent able to experience that pain, that loss, that tragedy of that day. But they also werent able to experience the resiliency, the hope and the unity of Sept. 12.

Brissie quoted President Reagan, speaking on the 40th anniversary of D-Day: We will always remember, we will always be proud, we will always be prepared so we may always be free.

I believe this statement holds true for 9/11.We remember it, we are proud of who we are as a nation and we will continually strive to be better prepared so we may remain be free.

Friday, Brissie noted, marked the one-year anniversary of the death of Henderson County Deputy Ryan Hendrix in the line of duty.

Sheriff Lowell Griffin, who was unable to be at the Sept. 11 ceremony, told Brissie that he encouraged his team to spend time this weekend doing exactly what Ryan would want them to do on this anniversary  celebrate their lives and celebrate their freedom with their family.

Brissie urged everyone throughout the day to find time to revere, remember and reflect on the patriots who died on Sept. 11 and those who continue to serve on the front lines as first responders.

Following the playing of Taps, the Henderson County Honor Guard, led by retired State Highway Patrol Sgt. John Dunn, retired the colors and marched to the south away from the Historic Courthouse plaza under a bright blue sky that was so much like the one 20 years ago.
Today

Thunderstorms likely. High 77F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 90%.

Tonight

Cloudy skies early, followed by partial clearing. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 66F. Winds light and variable.

Tomorrow

Partly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High near 85F. Winds E at 5 to 10 mph.
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Henry, Clayton counties to honor 20th anniversary of 9/11 Saturday

McDONOUGH  The heartbeat of millions of Americans will sync in honor Saturday morning as the nation collectively pauses in memory on the 20th anniversary of Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

Moments of silence will be held across the country  the first at 8:46 a.m. when American Airlines Flight 11 was deliberately crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center, followed by the second crash into the South Tower at 9:03 a.m.

At 9:37 a.m. American Airlines Flight 77 hit the Pentagon and minutes later at 9:59 a.m. the South Tower collapsed.

At 10:03 a.m. Americans will honor the heroes of Flight 93 as they launched a plan to take down terrorists who hijacked their flight. The plane crashed into an empty field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania taking the lives of all souls on board.

Twenty-fives minutes later at 10:28 a.m. the World Trade Centers North Tower collapsed.

Nearly 3,000 victims died as a result of the terrorist attacks.

Residents of Henry and Clayton counties will do their part to honor the victims from memorial ceremonies to a fundraising 5K. The following is a list of events planned for Sept. 11.

City of Stockbridge

The city of Stockbridge has partnered with Henry County public safety organizations and the Stockbridge High School Navy Junior Reserve Officers Training Corps will hold a memorial ceremony in honor of the victims of 9/11.

The event will be held from 8 a.m. to noon. The intersections of North Henry Boulevard and East Atlanta Road will be blocked off during the ceremony.

For more information, visit www.cityofstockbridge.com.

City of McDonough

The Tunnel to Towers Foundation McDonough 5K Run and Walk will be held Saturday in honor of first responders and military service members. A 9/11 Memorial Ceremony will also be held featuring guest speakers. Vendor booths and food trucks will also be on site.

The event will begin at 8:30 a.m. at 43 Lawrenceville St. across from the McDonough Police Department.

The cost to participate is $35 for adults, $25 for first responders and military, $20 for children ages 13-17 and $10 for children ages 12 and under. Virtual runners and walkers can also participate for $35.

To register, visit https://dogood.t2t.org/event/2021-tunnel-to-towers-5k-run-and-walk-mcdonough-ga/e339233.

City of Riverdale

The city of Riverdale and Veterans Helping Veterans are hosting a 20th Anniversary 9/11 Memorial on Saturday from 2-4 p.m. at the Riverdale Amphitheater, 7210 Church St. in Riverdale.

For more information, call 770-909-5300 or visit www.riverdalega.gov.

Clayton State University

Clayton State Universitys Campus Events Council is holding a balloon release in honor of the 20th anniversary of 9/11.

The event will be held at the Student Activities Center, 2000 Clayton State Blvd. in Morrow from 10-11 a.m.

Clayton County Police

Clayton County Police Department is hosting a 9/11 Remembrance Ceremony in honor of the 20th anniversary of the attacks. The event will be held on Facebook Live starting at 8:15 a.m. at

City of Forest Park

The city of Forest Park and the Forest Park Ministers Association will hold a 9/11 Remembrance Ceremony on Saturday starting at noon. The event will be held at Starr Park, 5301 Park Ave in Forest Park.
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Fredrick Lee Woodson, of Hugo, Oklahoma, died Sept. 9, 2021, and was born in Greenville, Texas on Feb. 3, 1952 to Ott and Aline Woodson. He married Kathie Thomas on Oct. 5, 1993 in Nashobia, Oklahoma. Fredrick enjoyed tinkering on motors and loved the outdoors. Fredrick also loved taking car
Bob Franken

"Responsibility" seems to be a forthright word, but it is certainly less impactful than "blame." Blame is something Biden spreads around to others, particularly the Afghan army that surrendered faster than you could say "turned tail and ran."
Rich Lowry

There is no sugar-coating our defeat in Afghanistan and the abject position we put ourselves in during the final days. The withdrawal is a blow to our counterterrorism capabilities, our prestige and our geopolitical position
Yes, I love all of them!

I like the Antiques & Collectibles Show

I go to the Arts & Crafts Fair.

I love the Antique Car Show.

I leave town, I dont care for crowds.

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Multimedia Video Journalist

Buffalo native trying to get her news on! Im a Multimedia Journalist here at Your Hometown Stations and I love what I do. Have a cool story idea? Im in! Just email me at ashelton@wlio.com or message my Facebook page.
Q. While working on nothing unusual yesterday, I got a sudden message that warned of computer failure. It had all the appearance of a legitimate message from Microsoft with the Windows logo. A phone number was provided and an urgent directive to call for help. As the machine was frozen to that screen I did call. I was transferred to a company that tried really hard to sell me a firewall. What should I have done, rather than call the number?

A. This is a very common scam. What happens is you visit a website that pops up a message window like this. When the window pops up, your screen basically freezes and your mouse and keyboard stop working. The message in the window indicates that your computer has a problem and directs you to call the number on the screen.

The phone number is not the phone number for Microsoft, nor is it the phone number for any legitimate company that wants to help you with your so-called computer problem.

It is a number to a scammer who will, at best, try to sell you something you dont need and at worst, try to gain access to your PC and steal your data.

You should never, ever call a number that just pops up on your computer screen offering help with your PC. Companies like Microsoft have no interest in marketing or supporting their software in this way. It is always a scam.

If you see something like this and you cannot get your computer to respond, unplug it. Then plug it back in and you should be able to regain control.

In most cases, this will be all you need to do. These popups are embedded in the site you were visiting and probably not caused by anything on your PC.

But just to be safe, you may want to perform a quick scan for malware with something like Malwarebytes or Hitman Pro just in case.

This type of scam can come from people impersonating Norton, Microsoft, Apple or any number of tech companies, and they dont just show up in a popup. They can come in the form of email, text messages and phone calls.

If you think you have a computer problem, find a local tech to help you. Dont trust anyone who comes to you unsolicited and out of the blue.

Q. I use Outlook for my email. Sometimes when I send an attachment, the recipient only sees a file called winmail.dat which they cannot open. How can I fix this?

A. Outlook, like most email applications, has the ability to embed images and format text so the message look more interesting than just plain text. The problem is that not all email applications understand Outlook formatting. When a message is received by one these applications, they just convert all the embedded information into a single file called winmail.dat.

To keep this from happening, change the format of your email from Rich Text to either plain text or HTML.

For instructions on how to do this, check out the article How to Fix Winmail.dat Attachments in Outlook at tinyurl.com/helplinewinmail.

helpline@chron.com
Energy companies that compensate employees by the day - be it $200 or $1,000 - must still pay those people overtime because they are not considered exempted salaried personnel under the strict wording of the Fair Labor Standards Act, the 5th U.S. Court of Appeals ruled late Thursday.

The federal appeals court ruling, which was 12 to 6, is a blow to energy companies that have relied for decades on the idea that they could escape paying overtime to certain higher-level workers by paying them an extra-high daily wage.

Six judges dissented, stating that the majority decision overturns decades of standard practices within the energy sector and will have a devastating impact on the oil and gas industry. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and other original supporters of the Fair Labor Standards Act, the dissenters wrote, are turning over in their respective graves in reaction to the en banc majoritys [decision].

But Judge James Ho, who wrote the majority opinion, said none of that matters when it comes to deciding case law.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Case leads to more oil field companies labeling workers contractors

Our job is to follow the text  not to bend the text to avoid perceived negative consequences for the business community, Judge Ho wrote in his 17-page decision. That is not because industry concerns are unimportant. It is because those concerns belong in the political branches, not the courts.

Houston lawyer Ed Sullivan, who represents the plaintiff, Michael Hewitt, in the litigation, said Helix Energy needs to pay his client the overtime it owes him with interest, which he estimates is in the six figures.

Despite what the energy industry argued, this is not a controversial issue to anyone who litigates FLSA (Fair Labor Standards Act) cases, Sullivan said. Almost every disinterested labor and employment lawyer knows that an employee who is paid purely by the day is not paid a salary under the FLSA. Helix rolled the dice in hopes that the 5th Circuit would substitute its subjective policy preferences in favor of settled law. 

Norton Rose Fulbright partner Carter Crow, who represents Houston-based Helix, declined to comment on the decision.

In the case, Hewitt v. Helix Energy Solutions Group, Hewitt tool pusher Hewitt sued his employer in 2017 for overtime he worked offshore on an oil rig.

Helix Energy lawyers argued that Hewitt, who oversaw the drill and deck crews and the subsea department, was not an hourly laborer under FLSA because he was considered exempt by being highly compensated.

Helix paid Hewitt a day rate of at least $963 for every day that he worked, regardless of the number of hours worked in a given day. His earnings totaled more than $200,000 in 2016.

The federal court in Houston rejected Hewitts lawsuit. Hewitt appealed to the 5th Circuit.

In writing for the majority, Ho wrote that Helix admits Hewitts compensation is computed on a daily basis, rather than on a weekly, monthly, or annual basis.

In arguments, Helix lawyers pointed out that Hewitts compensation was a far cry from the wage practices against which the FLSA was created to protect.

A majority of the appellate judges were unmoved.

But it should go without saying that we are governed by the text of the FLSA and its implementing regulations, not some unenumerated purpose, Ho wrote. And Congress has never amended the text of the FLSA to categorically exempt highly paid employees from overtime  to the contrary, as previously noted, it has repeatedly rejected efforts to do so.

More: Read the latest oil and gas news from HoustonChronicle.com

The Independent Petroleum Association of America and the Texas Oil and Gas Association told the judges that a ruling against Helix could have devastating effect on energy companies and that these kind of overtime disputes should be rejected because they are mathematically illogical.

The two energy industry trade groups propose a formula that should decide whether an employee meets certain income thresholds to be paid overtime.

Ho did not think much of the idea.

Ive heard of using dictionaries to discern the plain meaning of legal texts, the judge wrote. Ive never heard of using a calculator.

In dissent, Judge Jacques Wiener said a more common sense and a reasonable reading of the law should lead to a win for Helix Energy. The judge wrote that Hewitt was among supervisors, who from the outset have been excluded from overtime. As a tool pusher, Hewitt actually pushed no tools.

Hewitt never got his hands dirty  only the 12 or 13 roughnecks whom he supervised dirtied theirs, Judge Winer wrote. I imagine that the original proponents of the FLSA  including President Franklin D. Roosevelt, during whose term the FLSA and other Great Depression measures were enacted  are turning over in their respective graves in reaction to the en banc majoritys interpretation of the regulatory text to undermine how the FLSA is supposed to operate.
Fire Chief David Langenberg has announced the development of a brand new fire station for the city of Humble, as well as a brand new fire truck recently come into possession by the Humble Fire Department last week at the monthly Humble Bizcom virtual meeting.

The new station will be located approximately one block north of the Humble Civic Center off Will Clayton Parkway. The station will replace the senior activity center that was previously in its location, with the center instead moving right next door.

Looking at the future growth of city neighborhoods and commercial development, I came to the conclusion that South Houston and Will Clayton is the ideal location for the new fire station, stated Langenberg.

The Humble Fire Department was awarded a $4.5 million grant for construction through the Texas General Land Office, as well as the US Department of Housing and Urban Development.

This fire station will be the first built since 1990, making it the third fire station to be built in the city. According to the chief, this was necessary, as Station 2 houses only a single ambulance and is only a mile away from Station 1, serving more as an EMS station.

It only has one ambulance there right now, explained Langenberg. The firetruck thats supposed to be at that station is actually at Station 1.

He also explained that Station 2 was simply too small to house its own fire truck, and as a result it was moved to the much larger Station 1. Langenberg predicts however, that once Station 2 is able to house its own fire truck again, that the department will see much faster response time overall.

With the new station still in its design phase, its unclear when the station will reach completion, with even Langenberg saying that construction may take longer than usual. Despite this, Langenberg has also stated that himself, along with assistant chiefs and even the mayor have gone to several stations across Houston to solidify a design.

In the meantime, Langenberg also briefly spoke on the fire truck recently acquired by the Humble Fire Department. The 2021 Pierce Velocity is a 107-foot aerial apparatus that will replace the previous apparatus that he said was purchased around 21 years ago.

We went with a quint concept as opposed to a straight ladder truck, explained Langenberg. What that means is that its a hybrid truck that operates as a typical ladder truck you might see going down the streets of Houston.

He goes on to say that the quint truck is also equipped with a water tank and pump, all of which he says will ultimately help save taxpayer money, as well as ensure the appropriate apparatus is more often available for potential incidents.

He then said that trucks now come with a Cost Collision Mitigation System, which will alert cars using certain systems such as Apple CarPlay to the presence of approaching emergency vehicles, giving drivers extra time to maneuver out of the way.

Chief Langenberg urges those with questions about anything related to the fire department to send their emails to his address at dlangenberg@cityofhumble.net.
Travis Hamilton has created a love story for New York Fashion week.

His Spring/Summer 2022 collection, aptly named "Love Story," for his brand Negris LeBrum will be showcased at New York Fashion Week on Sept. 11. It also will feature 15-year-old Nicole Mayberry, a Houston native, who is the youngest in his show.

The Love Story collection showcases plaids, colorful lightweight tweeds and even sequins.

Negris LeBrum has been generating buzz over the last few seasons. Last fall, the brand's virtual runway show, entitled "Homecoming," was held at Gus S. and Lindall F. Wortham Park near the Texas Medical Center. "I wanted to bring a piece of New York Fashion Week to the South this season," Hamilton said at the time. He is the founder and creative director of the brand and weaves his Louisiana roots into his designs.

Mayberry, a junior at Ridge Point High School, was crowned the first Teen Universe Pre-Teen Texas in 2020 at age 14. The pageant is for teenagers making a difference. The animal-rights advocate is also passionate about her work with young children, refugee youth and anti-bullying.
Will Chesney was a senior in high school contemplating a career in the military when the terrorist attacks of 9/11 occurred. Like most Americans, he watched in horror as the events unfolded on television. Unlike most Americans, however, Chesney would one day go on to be part of the elite Navy SEAL Team Six that stormed the compound where Osama Bin Laden, the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks, was hiding.

Chesney was the canine handler on the team, partnered with his beloved K-9 soldier, Cairo. After retiring from the military, Chesney and Cairo reentered civilian life together, and Chesney even authored a book No Ordinary Dog: My Partner from the SEAL Teams to the Bin Laden Raid about Cairo. No Ordinary Dog is available for purchase on Amazon.com.

Twenty years after watching the terrorist attacks of 9/11, Chesney still thinks back on the day and how the worst terrorist attack on American soil led him to the team that took down the terrorist behind it.

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What was your experience like on September 11, 2001? What were you doing when it occurred?

I was in high school, going into the library to watch it on television. And it was terrible. It just made me want to join the military even more and do my part. Id known I wanted to serve my country, but at that moment I was even more certain that it was what I wanted to do.

Ill never forget it. I can vividly remember all of it. I cant believe its been 20 years.

You knew you wanted to go into the military, but this solidified your decision. What was that like?

After what happened, we obviously knew we were going to be going to war. I already wanted to be a Navy SEAL and serve my country, and knowing we were going to be going to war made me want to do it even more.

Moving forward in time, what went through your mind when you learned that you were going to be involved in the Bin Laden raid? Did it have an impact on you that you would be taking down the person responsible for 9/11?

I joined the military right out of high school, so not long after 9/11 occured. I never got to visit the World Trade Center until I was out of the military. But I definitely thought about it all the time. After seeing what happened on 9/11- it never left my mind that we had an important reason for doing what we were doing.

When you were sent on dangerous missions- not just the Bin Laden raid, but any dangerous assignment- were you spurred on by a sense of purpose?

We knew that we were there to do an important job. It was a dangerous job, but it was important, and someone had to do it. We knew the reasons we were there, and we never forgot that. I loved the job, because I was around a great group of guys and we had an important job to do.

Whats it like, knowing you played a major part in taking down the person that was responsible for orchestrating 9/11?

It was an honor to be such a big part of history. I like to talk about Cairo- his job was way more important than my job. I worked really hard to be able to be put in that position. Im glad it paid off and we were able to complete the mission successfully.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Good news: Houston's COVID transmission rates are down. Bad news: Maybe not for long.

Has your perspective on 9/11 changed because you were so involved in the war on terror?

I would say definitely. I was 17-years-old when I joined the Navy, and I'm 37 now, so my perspective has changed over time. I think that was a moment in time in my life that made me realize I had a purpose. Its kind of hard to find purpose these days, because the job I was doing in the SEALs was so important.

As far as the war, we were there to stop bad people from doing bad things. And that hasn't changed.

Despite being part of what many would say was one of the most significant military operations of all time, your book is about your K-9 partner, not you or even the mission itself, really. Tell us about him and how you came to write a book about him.

I was the dog handler for the Navy SEALs as part of a Naval Special Warfare development group. The book is not called No Ordinary Dog, and it's about Cairo. Cairo was my working dog, and it's basically about our story together. I wanted the book to be just about him and

I don't think a lot of people know what these dogs can do for us and that these dogs save lives. Cairos is just one story to tell. There are lots of stories out there that are really amazing. I just want to bring attention to all that.

What do you think about the military and the war on terror now that all these years have passed since 9/11?

It's just hard to believe it's been 20 years. Things might not be the best right now as far as the military is concerned, but everybody keeps their heads up and no matter what happens, we'll get through it, and we'll be able to fix the problem like we always do. The time that I served overseas was spent doing what needed to be done, and it was an honor to be able to do it.

NEWSLETTERS Join the conversation with HouWeAre We want to foster conversation and highlight the intersection of race, identity and culture in one of America's most diverse cities. Sign up for the HouWeAre newsletter here.

claire.goodman@chron.com
When news of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks broke, President George W. Bush was at Emma Booker Elementary School in Sarasota, Fla., on a tour to promote the No Child Left Behind Act. So were Education Secretary Rod Paige and his chief-of-staff, Terry Abbott, who now serves as Spring Branch ISDs executive director for communication and community engagement.

Several years later, Abbott wrote an essay detailing his memories and experiences from that day, which he posts every year on his Facebook page on the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. He also talks to school children about his experiences on that day.

I just want to remind people about everything that happened, and I think its so critically important that we never forget, Abbott in a phone interview.

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Abbott, Bush and Paige were walking into the school that morning when they first heard that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center.

We, of course, all thought that it must have been a small plane that somehow went off course and hit the building by accident, Abbott said.

While Bush was in the classroom reading to students, Abbott was in the schools library helping to set up for the presidents remarks. Abbott and the other people in the library kept their eye on the television to try to get more information about what had transpired when the second passenger plane crashed into the World Trade Center at 9:03 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, 17 minutes after the first plane had hit.

That was the moment that the entire world knew that we were under a terrorist attack, Abbott said. When the second plane hit, that could be nothing other than an attack on the country. To say it was startling is a gross understatement. It was one of those moments that shocks you to the point that you cant even feel the world around you; you cant even breathe. Its like nothing that Ive ever experienced before or since.

Abbott was sitting about 10 feet from Bush about 30 minutes later when he spoke to the people gathered and to a national television audience. Instead of his prepared remarks about education, Bush delivered brief remarks about the terrorist attacks that had just happened.

Today, weve had a national tragedy, he said. Two airplanes have crashed into the World Trade Center in an apparent terrorist attack on our country.

Terrorism against our nation will not stand, he continued before asking for a collective moment of silence.

Abbott remembers every emotion he felt that morning  fear, anger and tremendous sorrow for the immense loss of life he knew had taken place  bubbling up during those moments.

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Abbott, who had flown to Florida from Washington the previous day with Bush and Paige, stayed in Florida while the president returned to Washington, where he delivered a speech to the nation from the Oval Office that evening.

Paige and Abbott were taken to an office building in Tampa, where they were given Secret Service protection and kept informed by a military aide.

One thing that sticks out to Abbott from the remainder of that day is how much of the early information was wrong.

I had always heard about what they call the fog of war, where things get so confusing during wartime and in battle, he said. I saw that that day.

He recalls Paige receiving information from the military aide that a plane had crashed into the National Mall and that a plane had crashed into the U.S. Capitol, both of which turned out to be inaccurate.

He also remembers hearing from the aide that the military had shot down a plane over Pennsylvania. While it later came to light that United Flight 93 crashed near Shanksville, Pa., after the passengers overpowered the hijackers, thwarting a larger terrorist attack, Abbott was convinced for a couple hours that the military had felt the need to shoot down a passenger plane.

Abbott and Paige received word that next morning from the White House that a C-130 military transport plane was at the Sarasota airport and that they would be able to fly back to Washington on it, though they would be flying into Marine Corps Base Quantico because Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport was closed.

Abbott recalls the fear of flying through the sky at a time when there were no other planes in the air because all air traffic had been grounded.

I told the Secretary, I hope somebody knows that were up here and that were supposed to be up here, because I had these visions of a missile coming out of the ground and blowing us out of the sky, he said.

He also recalled how fearful people were in the days and weeks after air traffic resumed, when people would flinch and duck anytime a plane flew overhead.

There are no current Spring Branch ISD students who were around on Sept. 11, 2001, and Abbott is concerned about the fact that there are people growing up who have no personal memories from 9/11, even though the United States recent withdrawal from Afghanistan served as a reminder of the two decades of war that ensued.

Abbott believes that even some people who were alive that day tend to forget the significance of what happened.

Every year, as the anniversary comes around, I find all these emotions flooding right back to me, Abbott said. Its like you go right back to that day, and I feel all the same things I felt then. I feel fear. I feel tremendous anger at the terrorists who did what they did. Its just amazing how all of those feelings come rushing back on that day. Its a terrible but important day at the same time.

I try to remember that there were about 3,000 people who lost their lives on that day, Abbott said, referring to the 2,977 people who died in the attacks on and collapse of the World Trade Center in New York City, the attack on the Pentagon outside Washington, D.C., and the crash of the hijacked flight in Pennsylvania. Those were all people whose only crime that day was getting up and going to work, and they lost their lives. For no other reason, we cant ever forget those people.

elliott.lapin@hearst.com
Faculty and staff across Lone Star College campuses around the greater Houston area are excited to be back in school, with many new programs and projects underway.

Kimberlee Ball, LSC-North Harris faculty senate president, gave a presentation on the goings on at the systems north Harris County campuses during the Lone Star College System Board of Trustees meeting Thursday night.

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At North Harris, our faculty, staff and administration are excited about the new buzz around campus, Ball said. We find this year we are grateful for things we used to take for granted. The sound of students in the hallway is a beautiful noise.

LSC-Tomball was able to enroll an additional 500 students during an event the previous weekend, she said. The schools theater program will begin hosting plays again, first only streaming them virtually in the fall semester and then bringing back live performances in the spring. The art department has also been decorating sidewalks with chalk art displays around campus.

The Tomball campus was also able to secure funds to buy simulators for their veterinary program.

In other programs, such as nursing, they have simulated figures for the new students to work with but theres nothing like that for the veterinarians, Ball said. Now, our veterinary students will have models of actual animals with cuts and bruises needing to be fixed.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Lone Star College primed to offer three bachelor's degree programs this fall

Ball said the Montgomery campus would begin showing plays again as well, starting with an adaptation of The 39 Steps this fall. The campus art department will also be participating in Empty Bowls, a grassroots movement by artists raising money to help fight hunger, and making ceramic bowls to represent the empty bowls around the world.

At LSC-Houston North, Ball said they were able to host a student prep event, with representatives from career services to provide tips on interviews and resume writing, as well as the financial aid department and the mentoring program.

Another big focus for this year is mental health, Ball said, which the LSC-Kingwood campus will be focusing on with professional development opportunities and student events.

Mental health has always been an important issue for everyone but after COVID, faculty, staff, administrators and students are suffering new stresses and mental health has become an even more important issue, she said.

LSC-CyFair has an archaeology project they are continuing at Freedmens Town, she said, a historical site in the fourth ward of Houston which served as a destination for former slaves following the Civil War. Students have found a range of artifacts there such as ceramic pieces, iron and stoneware and bone fragments.

The Cy-Fair campus is also assembling a team for an annual Lunabotics competition, shorthand for lunar robotics, she said.

Their annual Lunabotics competition is a full going engineering exercise where students receive practical experience in the engineering life cycle, form, concept, development to system close out, Ball said.

paul.wedding@hcnonline.com
JACKSON, Calif. (AP)  Authorities in Northern California say deputies responding to reports of shots fired found a woman and two men dead inside a rural home.

Amador County Sheriff deputies who went to the home in Pine Grove on Wednesday were met by a 45-year-old woman who told them she saw her 46-year-old boyfriend shoot his father and flee the scene, the Amador County Sheriff's Office said in a statement Thursday.
SANTA FE, N.M. (AP)  The superintendent of one of New Mexicos larger school districts has resigned after spending months on paid leave during an investigation into his handling of sexual abuse allegations at a previous job.

The Espanola school board accepted Fred Trujillos resignation on Tuesday, board members confirmed Thursday.

Trujillo was hired to lead Espanola in February of 2020, when he was head of the smaller Pecos school district thats also in northern New Mexico.

The board put Trujillo on leave in May 2021 after a lawsuit claimed he failed to respond to sexual misconduct and abuse complaints against his staff in Pecos. Some complaints were later substantiated and led to criminal prosecutions.

Were moving the district forward and he resigned and thats all I can tell you. The rest is a personnel matter, said board president Gilbert Serrano.

Serrano has previously said that Trujillo was vetted and "his credentials checked out. The board named another superintendent in June.

Former board member and Espanola doctor Yolanda Salazar said the lawsuit contained no information the board hadn't considered when they hired him. Salazar believes Trujillo followed proper protocols in Pecos, and resigned in June in part over her opposition to opening the investigation.

The district said in a statement that it wont release the new investigations findings.

I feel that the Board wants to force me to resign, and I have no other choice, Trujillo wrote in his resignation email.

Trujillo said in the letter he resigned this week because the board had denied requests for bereavement leave.

He did not respond to text and cell phone messages left Thursday afternoon.

Salazar said the bereavement request was due to the death of a close relative of Trujillo's.

She said she had opposed the investigation when she was a board member because she didn't believe it could uncover new information, and she questioned the cost of paying two superintendent's salaries for months. The board had named an interim superintendent in June.

Salazar credited Trujillo for bringing the school through the pandemic and questioned the board's decision keep him on leave.

If they would have found anything damaging they could have fired him and not paid him, Salazar said.

___

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.
AUBURN, Maine (AP)  An infant whose father is charged with her murder suffered injuries consistent with shaken baby syndrome, a prosecutor said Friday.

The 2-month-old victim had a skull fracture and hemorrhaging, said Assistant Attorney General Lisa Bogue, who described the infant's death as a very violent event.
KEARNEY, Neb. (AP)  The production schedule has looked a bit like Swiss cheese lately at Kearneys Blueprint Engines.

The 190 employees at the manufacturing plant in east Kearney frequently have had their schedules jumbled as their company copes with supply chain disruptions. Parts from foreign suppliers have been weeks late in arriving, so Blueprints management has had to be creative.

Weekly schedules that normally would begin Monday have been pushed to Tuesday, or until the components finally arrive.

Supply chain disruptions are making it difficult for many U.S. manufacturers. Some have taken drastic actions, such as shutting down parts of their factories.

Blueprint has a different strategy. The plant is staying open, and employees are working 40 hours per week.

They could have easily laid people off or took us down to 30 hours, said Matt Kloepping, a packaging lead who is grateful for his companys commitment to 40-hour weeks. Kloepping told the Kearney Hub that he has child support obligations, so Blueprint is helping him stay current.

Committing to 40-hour schedules has required some creativity on the part of management and flexibility from employees.

The employees will work 40 hours, but it might not be their primary job. They might be shifted to another part of the plant to help coworkers catch up after long-awaited components arrive and they can finish work on partially built engines.

The 40-hour week also might involve cleaning and organizing workspaces. Some Blueprint employees have been painting and sprucing up parts of the plant.

Its basically putting together different ways to stay at 40 hours, said Matt Tappan, another Blueprint employee with children at home.

He said that it might be more comfortable working at your primary responsibility  his is leading a group that builds engines for irrigation pumps  but having a steady paycheck trumps those kinds of inconveniences.

Kloepping and Tappan said that in addition to the 40-hour paychecks, a key to employees positive attitudes has been communication. Management has worked hard to inform employees about the companys challenges and invite ideas from workers. Their ideas might address the current unknowns, or prepare Blueprint to emerge from the pandemic stronger than before.

Kloepping said Josh Saldivar, Blueprints director of manufacturing, has been meeting regularly with employees.

Recently, he met with small groups on the floor and showed workers a photo of a cargo ship stacked high with containers. Somewhere in those hundreds of metal boxes were parts destined for Blueprint.

According to Kloepping, the containers were going nowhere because off-loading is stalled in some U.S. ports. Also, neither railroads nor trucking companies are moving the freight, Kloepping said.

We knew the pandemic was hard on manufacturers, but Saldivar said its going to get tough. I was glad he had those visuals, Kloepping said. He said it became clear after the group meetings that supply chain problems are everyones problems.

Lacking components  crankshafts, connecting rods, air cleaners, etc.  means dozens of engines may be undeliverable. Somewhere customers are waiting for engines theyve ordered.

Were 30-45 days late, Saldivar said last week. Some containers with the components Blueprint needs have been sitting at the port since June. They got to Seattle on July 2. Some of them left our vendors in May, three months ago.

Keeping employees informed is paying off, Saldivar said, and so is the companys commitment to 40-hour weeks. Saldivar said many employees are offering ideas to address short-term problems. Tappan and Kloepping both said coworkers are excited to share their suggestions because they want to be part of the solution.

Thats important, Tappan and Kloepping said. Blueprints reputation is built on its commitment to quality and customer satisfaction.

Every engine must meet customer specifications and pass a dyno horsepower test, so the challenge is meeting or exceeding standards in spite of supply chain disruptions.

While containers of imported components are delayed in distant harbors, waiting for railroads and trucks to carry them to Kearney, the crew at Blueprint  from top to bottom  has gotten creative.

Kloepping and Tappan said theyre grateful that management has tried hard to maintain 40-hour paychecks. They said theyre excited that management welcomes everyones ideas so they can boost quality and efficiency, shave costs and increase customer satisfaction  all keys to maintaining Blueprints growth.

Solving supply chain problems has become a large challenge, said Saldivar and Blueprint owner Norris Marshall.

Weeks ago when the first problems surfaced it was difficult finding anyone who could answer Blueprints urgent questions. Were the shipments still aboard ships or were they taken off the ships? If so, where were they and who was in control?

Marshall said the detective work created a trickle of containers, but enlisting help from Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts and U.S. Sen. Deb Fischer may have freed more containers. Blueprint wont ever know for certain, Marshall said, but it was soon after Ricketts and Fischer were contacted that Blueprint learned more containers are on the way.

The supply chain wont be fixed for an extended time, Saldivar said, but the situation has exposed or created new strengths among Blueprint employees.

The workforce really has been stepping up, seeing what they can do to help out. In the big picture its bringing people closer together, Saldivar said. It (Labor Day) is a good time to reflect on the team we have and how everybody is trying to come together to work on these challenges together.
SEATTLE (AP)  A Kirkland, Washington, man arrested after firing 15 shots toward a uniformed police officer in Renton this week is believed to have previously shot at a state trooper, investigators said.

Frankie Taijon Robertson, 24, was arrested after a car he was riding in fled the shooting Tuesday. King County prosecutors charged him Friday with felony charges of drive-by shooting, assault with a firearm and unlawful gun possession. It was not immediately clear if Robertson had obtained a lawyer.

No one was hurt, but Renton police said surveillance video showed Robertson firing at a patrol car stopped at an intersection after waving at two female bystanders to get out of the way. None of the 15 shots from the .40-caliber handgun struck the cruiser, but one did hit another car.

According to a probable cause statement filed by Renton police, Robertson was also suspected of shooting at a Washington State Patrol trooper in March. Trooper Rick Johnson, a patrol spokesman, said Friday that shooting occurred on the northbound Interstate 5 ramp onto Interstate 405; the troopers vehicle was not hit.

The gunmans hat fell off as he leaned out the window of a vehicle to shoot at the trooper, the probable cause statement said; investigators recovered the hat and linked DNA taken from it to Robertson.

Troopers also later found the vehicle involved in that case, with a gun inside that also had Robertson's DNA on it, the statement said.

The King County Prosecutor's Office requested during a court appearance Thursday that his bail be set at $1 million; pro-tem District Court Judge David O set it at $50,000  an amount that was increased to $500,000 when charges were filed Friday.

Tuesday's shooting occurred as a veteran officer drove her patrol car out of a car wash and was waiting to turn left onto South Grady Way. The officer thought a shell casing struck her driver's side window, and she ducked down and radioed for help as the barrage continued, according to the police report.

When the shooting stopped, witnesses pointed out a red Kia fleeing from a Chevron gas station. Officers responding to an unrelated incident at Renton City Hall heard the shots, saw the fleeing car and stopped it after a brief pursuit in which it drove in the lane of oncoming traffic, the report said.

They arrested Robertson and the Kia's driver, Lamonta Joseph Steward, 23, of Seattle. Steward was charged Friday with rendering criminal assistance and attempting to elude police. It was not clear if he had an attorney.

Washington State Patrol detectives responded to the scene to question Robertson about the earlier shooting, the report said.
KANKAKEE, Ill. (AP)  After 50 years of teaching geology at Olivet Nazarene University, Dr. Max Reams is continuing to take his knowledge outside of the classroom and is sharing it with readers everywhere.

Just this year, the Bourbonnais resident has added three new titles to his bookshelf, and his writings do not stop at the topic of geology. He also writes on couple counseling and has penned a few mystery and detective novels, The Daily Journal of Kankakee reports.

When asked how he juggles so many varying genres, he said he has an insatiable desire to learn things. The book topics and ideas hes generated over his years of teaching have created a backlog in my brain that is now becoming a collection of published works.

In 2013, Reams released Geology of Illinois State Parks, a book that was at least six years in the making. It was written with assistance from his traveling companion, field assistant and wife, Carol, to whom he has been married for 60 years.

The book is a guide to geological wonders that make up the state of Illinois. This year, he released another guidebook in a similar realm called Waterfalls in Illinois  Hidden Beauty at Your Doorstep: An Interpretive Guide to the Geological Side of Illinois Waterfall Wonders.

A year after (the 2013 book) came out, I started having ideas for novels, so those began to occupy my time, Reams said, adding he didnt complete a book at that time due to teaching. After I retired, I began to put together other concepts and ideas.

Additionally this year, Reams released My Mine or Yours: A Novel from the Files of Eric Bonfield, Private Detective-Geologist. The book is a sequel to the 2019 Oil On My Hands, which introduced the character of Detective Eric Bonfield. Bonfield is also the subject of another title released this year, Diamonds: Friend or Foe.

Two years ago, Reams released study guides for married and soon-to-be-married couples, titled On the Journey: A Married Couples Study Guide and Before the Journey: A Premarital Study Guide, respectively.

Reams shared that he has worked with hundreds of married couples over the years, which gave him the knowledge and interest to create the study guides. Because of the aforementioned backlog of ideas that hes had for years, it only took him a few weeks to write these books.

It was only a matter of how fast I could type, he said.

As far as the mystery novels are concerned, he has three other books in various stages of the writing process.

He said that Carol is a great idea generator for his books, as she often poses him with questions that make him think about the trajectories of the novels.

When she says those sorts of things, then it begins to cause a cascade in my brain to say, OK, heres a couple of thoughts I have not worked on before that would be great to do.

Hes also currently working on more nature-related books, including a book on Ice Age animals of the Midwest, and Missouri state parks. His nature books are not written for geology experts, but for anyone looking to learn more about the subject.

Reams has not only completed the fieldwork for these books but has completed drafts as well. The books are currently out to readers for feedback.

Fortunately, I have a lot of wonderful people that serve as my readers and they give me lots of great constructive criticism, shared Reams. That lets me know if Im being clear or not.

Reams taught his last ONU class this past spring and now focuses his time on writing. He and Carol also do volunteer work with Riverside, and host religious services there twice per month.
Republicans have discovered their love of personal liberty, not to mention the legislative process  and all it took was a little help from President Joe Biden.

Biden on Thursday announced a new plan to require more Americans to be vaccinated. He said he would sign an executive order requiring all federal employees to be vaccinated and one setting the same requirement for federal contractors. Hes also mandating that Americans who work in hospitals, home health care facilities and other medical facilities get shots to protect them and those they come into contact with from COVID-19.

And, Biden continued, he wants corporate America to get off the fence: the Department of Labor is developing a new rule that will require employers with 100 or more employees to require that those employees be vaccinated or show proof of a negative COVID test at least once a week.

He made a few points to unvaccinated Americans. The vaccine is safe. Its free. Its widely available. The Pfizer version, at least, is FDA-approved. And most eligible Americans  roughly 200 million people  have already gotten at least one vaccine dose.

Weve been patient, but our patience is wearing thin, the Democratic president said. And your refusal has cost all of us.

The following morning, he shrugged off the threat of lawsuits from officeholders in GOP-led states such as Texas.

Have at it, Biden said.

I am so disappointed that, particularly, some Republican governors have been so cavalier with the health of these kids, he added.

He didnt name names, but there was no need. A couple of GOP governors  Larry Hogan of Maryland, Charlie Baker of Massachusetts  have taken a hard line against the coronavirus since the outset of the pandemic. Others, including Texas Greg Abbott, prefer to tailor their message to a GOP base. Abbott faces two Republican primary challengers next year, both of whom have sought to stake out positions to his right.

Texas is already working to halt this power grab, Abbott predictably tweeted Thursday evening after Bidens address, describing it as an assault on private businesses.

Go get em, Governor!

Only hours earlier, Abbott had signed a new law barring big social media companies, which are private companies, from banning users based on their political viewpoints. But as Friedrich Hayek often observed, its different when Republicans do it.

What happens now? Employers across Houston were trying to figure that out Friday. Some were secretly happy about Bidens order, which takes a potentially contentious decision out of their hands. Others were exasperated about the prospect of setting up a weekly testing regime for employees who might otherwise quit. In a new Washington Post/ABC Poll, 72 percent of unvaccinated respondents said they would quit their job rather than be vaccinated if their employer imposed such a requirement and they couldnt get a religious or medical exemption.

Lawyers, too, were at work. There will be litigation. Lots of litigation, predicted Josh Blackman, a professor at the South Texas College of Law Houston, in an article for Reason magazine laying out his initial thoughts. One of those lawsuits, he continued, will probably work, in the sense that a judge will agree that Bidens moves exceeded his authority. But this is a risk worth taking, from the administrations perspective: In the interim, millions of people will get vaccinated.

Millions more will face a tough choice, potentially  or a choice that involves real consequences. But unvaccinated Americans affected by Bidens order shouldnt count on our states Republican leaders to spare them the trouble of making it.

The courts may ultimately side against Biden. But he also knows that most Americans want to bring an end to this nightmare.

More than 70 percent of American adults are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, and many of them are losing patience with adults who are not. An AP-NORC poll conducted in August found that 50 percent of Americans were in favor of vaccine mandates at their own workplaces, with an additional 23 percent being neither for nor against. Similarly, a Gallup poll from August, which presented respondents with a binary choice, found 56 percent of respondents in favor of vaccine requirements at their offices or work sites and 44 percent against.

And Bidens announcement marks a turning point in our approach to this pandemic. As recently as July, the administration was rejecting calls from Democrats to issue any sort of national vaccine mandate. Thats not the role of the federal government, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said at the time.

If Bidens now taking a more aggressive approach to the pandemic, theres a reason for that. As he said, leaders of red states have been disappointingly cavalier when it comes to the health of their constituents.

Across Texas, more than 20 percent of hospital beds are currently occupied by COVID patients, according to the Department of State Health Services. Since August, 5,500 Texans have died of this disease, most of them unvaccinated. And then there are the tragic cases of those too young to be vaccinated who die, such as 4-year-old Kali Cook, who passed away Tuesday morning, just weeks after starting preschool.

The overall official death toll from the pandemic, in Texas, stands at 58,332, according to state figures. And that figure is incomplete, in a sense: Last month Daniel Wilkinson, a Houston veteran who served two tours in Afghanistan, died of gallstones after surgeons were unable to find him an ICU bed.

We can debate the merits of Bidens latest strategy, but hes at least trying to do something. Its unclear what Abbotts plan is, but he seems wholly indifferent, preferring to hold bill signings touting election integrity rather than confront the runaway delta variant thats claiming the lives of more than 200 Texans a day. The governor, who already issued an executive order banning state or local vaccine mandates, has also asked legislators to pass a law to that effect in the special session that begins later this month.

So unvaccinated Texans shouldnt be surprised by the presidents new moves, or by the frustration he expressed. If you still dont want to get vaccinated, thats your choice. But for some time now, weve been living with the consequences: Should we choose to ignore that?

erica.grieder@chron.comw
Jay R. Jordan / Jay Jordan, Staff

A deceased man was found floating in Brays Bayou just east of Mason Park, according to the Houston Police Department Friday evening.

Eastside officers pulled the adult male body out of the bayou near the area of 100 Layton in the Magnolia Park neighborhood.
Jay R. Jordan / Jay Jordan, Staff

Three men were arrested during a traffic stop after stealing thousands of dollars in lumber last Saturday, according to the Harris County Precinct 4 Constable's Office.

Agustin Menchaca, Juan Menchaca and Juan Gonzalez were arrested and charged with theft greater than or equal to $2,500 but less than $30,000 for stealing 273 pieces of lumber and 30 sheets of plywood from a construction site, court documents state. Constable deputies found the men with the stolen items during a traffic stop early Saturday.
A 6-year-old Salvadoran boy was found by himself at a Brownsville Walmart on Thursday night, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Border officials believe the boy is an unaccompanied migrant from El Salvador, meaning he likely arrived in the U.S. without a parent or legal guardian.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said Friday he has sued six school districts, including Spring and Galveston ISDs, for implementing mask mandates in defiance of an order from Gov. Greg Abbott prohibiting such requirements.

Paxton said in a statement that his office filed six lawsuits against the following districts: Richardson, Round Rock, Galveston, Elgin, Spring and Sherman ISDs.

The Texas Education Agency has said in guidance that it will not enforce Abbotts order until other pending litigation is resolved.

Not only are superintendents across Texas openly violating state law, but they are using district resources  that ought to be used for teacher merit raises or other educational benefits  to defend their unlawful political maneuvering, Paxton said. If districts choose to spend their money on legal fees, they must do so knowing that my office is ready and willing to litigate these cases. I have full confidence that the courts will side with the law  not acts of political defiance.

Public health officials including Dr. Anthony Fauci have endorsed mask mandates as a way to prevent the spread of COVID-19. The emergence of the delta variant has led to a sharp increase in hospitalizations and deaths across the country.

President Joe Biden has criticized Republican officeholders who have vowed to fight newly announced federal mask rules.

I am so disappointed that, particularly, some Republican governors have been so cavalier with the health of these kids, so cavalier with the health of their communities, he said. Were playing for real here. This isnt a game.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

This is a breaking news story.

alejandro.serrano@chron.com
A man was taken by Life Flight to a hospital early Saturday after swerving off a road and plowing his SUV into Top Dog Halloween store. The man, who was driving a GMC Sierra, sustained serious but nonfatal injuries, police said.

Witnesses said the man was speeding westbound on the feeder road of the Highway 290 when he veered off the road and into the giant building at 20432 Northwest Freeway, said an official from the Harris County Sheriff's Office. He was the only person in the car.
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A constable's deputy from Harris County's Precinct 4 was rushing to a north Houston scene Friday evening with his vehicle's lights and siren on when his patrol car struck another vehicle, injuring three people and setting off a series of collisions, officials said.

The injured people were taken to the hospital in stable condition, according to police.
Two women, possibly sisters, were shot around 5:30 a.m. Saturday at the entrance gate to an apartment complex on Homestead Road, according to ABC 13.

A Houston Police homicide detective said the man was waiting at the gate at the Villas on the Green in 9600 block of Homestead Road near Tidwell Road, when he shot into the women's SUV. The passenger was dead when police arrived. The driver, who officials believe was the girlfriend of the shooter, sustained injuries and was taken to the hospital and was expected to survive.
On Sept. 11, 2001, I was in the Persian Gulf, flying F-14s off the USS Enterprise. We had just enforced the no-fly zone in Iraq. We were transiting off the coast of Oman, getting ready to be relieved by the next battle group, when the first planes hit the Twin Towers. The aircraft carrier came to a dead stop, and our captain announced, We are awaiting orders from the President.

By the next morning, we were busy planning missions and establishing our new station in the Arabian Sea south of Pakistan.

We soared over Kabul, hit our targets, avoided their attempts to shoot us down, and then we flew again and again, every night, performing the missions of interdiction of the enemy network until we were relieved in November. We were fighting to punish not just the perpetrators of the attacks but also those who harbored them. It was a mission we believed in. We were making sacrifices. We were making them for the good of all Americans.

One of the things I remember most vividly is the response of Americans  not just those in the military but also civilians at home. Our family and friends sent us pictures of flag-lined streets across the country, and stories of heroic acts of generosity and support. It was obvious that we were at war, and largely united. We rallied around a common cause: ensuring terrorists would not strike our nation again.

I think often of the sacrifices made in Afghanistan  sacrifices Americans made as a means of protecting other Americans. I think of the men and women who served with distinction and honor, never deviating in their commitment to meeting their missions and always ready to sacrifice for those on the line. They are the most honorable, dedicated people I will ever meet.

Then, my mind shifts to the present and to the invisible enemy: COVID-19.

Protests over masks or vaccinations juxtapose against images of Americans fighting for their lives on ventilators. Im jolted by the sacrifices we are refusing to make for our fellow Americans. If I am angry about the rapid fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban, I am even angrier about the battles we are not engaging in on the home front: The war should be against COVID-19.

Why are we unwilling to unite to wage a battle that can absolutely be won? We have become so disenchanted with unity that we are even unwilling to endure minor discomforts or inconveniences, like wearing a mask and social distancing, in order to protect the lives of fellow Americans.

The cost of our divided response is staggering. In less than a tenth of the time we spent in Afghanistan weve lost more than 100 times as many Americans  and rising.

Our lack of community and compassion astounds me, especially when the solution is so evident, and the sacrifices needed to prevent more deaths are so minuscule.

In Afghanistan, men and women did everything they could to be prepared for battle. I think of the medics who rushed to save a comrade, and the heroic measures they took to save lives. I imagine how mad I would be if that medic had to turn away one person because they were treating someone with a preventable disease instead. Yet here we are, turning people away from hospitals filled with COVID cases.

The sacrifices we are demanding are discomforts: wearing a mask, social distancing and using hand sanitizer. The vaccine is the best weapon we have against COVID-19, yet millions of Americans remain unvaccinated. These acts are literally lifesavers. The life saved may be mine. It may be yours. It may be our childrens, or it may be the hope of generations yet to come.

For 20 years, we sacrificed in Afghanistan for a war on terror. Today, we must go further. Never before have Americans had the opportunity to defend so many others at so little cost.

We must unite.

To all who are vaccinated and mask up to protect others, thank you for your service.

To all who are unvaccinated, I ask you now to stand up and defend your neighbors, your friends and your country. Please serve and protect Americans in what has become a war on our own land. This is a war we absolutely can win.

DelaCruz is the CEO of Team Rubicon, an international nonprofit that responds to disasters, health crises and humanitarian emergencies.
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Smoke rises from the site of the World Trade Center Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001.

Recollections of 9/11: Chief Wynn, Katherine Yon, Officer Hunt

iBerkshires has gathered some local recollections about the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Below are some questions we asked of Pittsfield Police Chief Michael Wynn, Pittsfield School Committee Chairwoman and longtime educator Katherine Yon, Pittsfield Police Officer Steven Hunt and iBerkshires reporter Brittany Polito.

Chief Michael Wynn

Q: Where were you when the 9/11 attacks first happened? How did you find out about it? What was your initial response?



A: So ironically, I was a newly promoted sergeant in 2001. So as a newly promoted sergeant, I had been pushed back to work the night shift so I actually was just gotten off duty, it was on my way home.



At the time I was living on the Pittsfield/Dalton line, and I was actually sitting in the middle of the Coltsville intersection in my vehicle when I heard on the radio about the first plane hitting the tower.



I got home, I immediately called into the station to find out what was being reported officially turn the news on and I was watching the live broadcast from New York when the second plane hit the tower.

I was a newly appointed sergeant and I was also a team leader of the Special Response, too. My fellow team leader was the relief, he was the sergeant on duty at the time.



So I called him because, in my mind, he was one of the people that could get the information possibly for deployment down to the city.



So I spent the bulk of that morning on the phone back and forth with my partner watching the news and packing a to-go bag and probably about 10:30, actually exactly the point at the Pentagon, because I had a friend and mentor who was with the Drug Enforcement Administration, he was in the Justice towers in D.C., I was on the phone with him when he told me he had to go because he just watched the plane hit the Pentagon.



And it was right after that that I found out from my partner that we were not being deployed to the city, as a matter of fact, the Fire Department and the Sheriff's Department were preparing a team to go, but our team members were not allowed, because we were being held close to home because we didn't know if it's over yet.



And so once I got over my initial anger that I was being held back, at that point, I knew when that team got sent, I knew that we were going to have to backfill for them, and we're going to be busy.



So once that call was made I went to bed.



Q: What was it like to be a police officer that day, or in the time after it happened?



A: So, right after, I mean, obviously, like everybody else that day was just pure shock.



Nothing in my professional life up to that point, I had been a police officer for about six years, nothing had been directed at that, we just didn't have that type of counterterrorism and security mindset.



After that, it was what's next, like we didn't know.



We didn't know what to expect. And so it was a scramble within the department. We actually, the department formed our first internal Homeland Security unit.



They were tasked with identifying and evaluating critical infrastructure targets and putting plans together for that.



You know, it was surely there. We're talking about a very short period of time after the actual Sept. 11 attacks.



Our guys were at Ground Zero, and they were trying to figure out how to get them back home and get them relief. So there were some conversations around that.



Then we had the follow-ons with Capitol anthrax scares.



So all of a sudden, we were bouncing from suspicious powder call to suspicious powder call all the time.



I was recently telling somebody a story that we had, we had a wave of suspicious powder calls. I don't remember exactly when it was in 2001. And it turned out that some national marketing company with complete just, you know, cluelessness had decided that this would be an appropriate time to mail, laundry detergent samples.



They were breaking open in the mail.



We just kept going on these calls, call after call after call for these suspicious packages in the mail that turned out to be laundry detergent.



Q: How has 9/11 changed policing?



A: That was the first time as a police officer, I had heard the concept of Homeland Security. And it was the first time that you know, we were being directed to take a role in counterterrorism.



And so it was a mission pivot there, but one of the things I talked about at community meetings, up until that point, all the federal Department of Justice money that was coming into our communities was for community policing and after that, it all shifted to counterterrorism.



Community policing went away, and everything became counterterrorism and stayed that way for a long time.



Q: Even though Pittsfield isn't close to New York City, were we concerned that it wasn't over and worried about being a possible target?



A: Not the city of Pittsfield so much, but the county immediately saw an influx of residents.



A lot of people who, at that time have been very similar to what happened at the beginning of the pandemic, a lot of people who were second homeowners who had homes, particularly down in South County, they fled Manhattan. And they got up here.



And I remember talking to my counterpart at the time, Chief McGarry, Jim McGarry, who was the chief of Sheffield, and things that you couldn't have anticipated, like the general stores and the small convenience stores in South County, ran out of milk and paper towels and toilet paper because it was after Labor Day, and they were stocked for their residents, not for their summer visitors. And everything disappeared.



Town water systems were overwhelmed, because houses that normally would be occupied, 50 percent of the houses that would be occupied every other weekend, were 100 percent occupied every day so water tables dropped and stuff like that.



There are cultural institutions, and venues and General Dynamics has a presence here. Raytheon has a presence here. So we had to be concerned that we were secondary targets.



I think, you know, we were putting watches on reservoirs, the city reservoirs aren't in the city but we were patrolling them.



I mean, there was there were immediate impacts.



I don't know how many of our firefighters went down with that initial convoy we sent out. We have firefighters at the time who were on the Urban Search and Rescue teams, and so they were activated in phases for months to go back down there.



Q: What was the community like that day?



A: I don't have any personal recollections because like I said, I was on patrol until I went to sleep and I had to go back to work. Right. And then, in the days after, it was just, for days, it was somber, and American flags were popping up everywhere.



It was the first, probably week, we had a large memorial at Wahconah Park and everybody wanted to be there. Everybody wanted to be with their neighbors.



Those guys from the Fire Department, the Police Department, the Sheriff's Department, that went down they're still carrying those images and those memories with them.



Our guys used to get together every year on the 11th just so they could share the experience and talk to one another, Sheriff [Thomas] Bowler was a police officer with us at the time and he was on that relief column.



Also, then, every police department, fire department, sheriff's department was trying to set people down there really was like a national call to arms.



In hindsight, there were some valuable lessons learned because a lot of agencies ourselves included, we self-presented, we left before the official calls went out.



And I know like our guys when they got down there, they actually couldn't get into the city.



And they had to take boats across to the city to get to the site because they blocked off the city.

Katherine Yon

I was teaching my second-period Grade 10 English class at Pittsfield High on Sept. 11, 2001.

One of my students arrived a little late, and he seemed rather agitated. He said something to the effect that the towers had been hit and were burning. I, of course, figured he was just fooling around so I told him to sit down, take out his homework, and prepare for his vocabulary quiz. However, he insisted that something was terribly wrong. He said a television was on in the library, and that's how he knew what had happened. I immediately rushed down to the library to see what had happened. The librarian verified that the Twin Towers in New York City had been hit by a plane. She invited me to bring my class in to see what was going on.

That's what I remember clearly. Watching the events play out in front of us was rather unnerving, but we, the adults, had to maintain our composure to keep the students calm.

In the days that followed, I did discuss with my classes the events that occurred. As I always told my students, good literature is about life and makes an attempt to understand human nature. Now we were seeing the nature of people unfold before our very eyes. They brought in newspaper clippings that we discussed. They had horrific pictures of death and destruction. However, what eventually emerged were incredible photos and stories about the heroes who were risking their lives to find survivors and save lives  incredible goodness, courage, kindness, and love within the rubble and debris of hatred that precipitated such a despicable desire to kill.

Ever the teacher, I immediately invoked "Romeo and Juliet," which most of them had studied last year. One of the major themes exemplified in the play is the paradox of love and hate coming from the same source. This is clearly highlighted in the powerful love story of "Romeo and Juliet," a story that springs from a senseless feud filled with hate that causes much death and destruction.

For example, this was spoken by Friar Laurence, who was out in the early morning picking flowers and herbs. He muses that:

"Within the infant rind of this sweet flower poison/ hath residence and medicine power;/ For this being smelt, that part cheers each part;/ Being tasted, slays all senses with the heart./Two such opposed kings encamp them still/ in man as well as herbs, grace and rude will/And where the worser is predominant/ Full soon the canker death eats up that plant." (Act II, Scene iii, ll. 23-30)

Shakespeare demonstrates that plants and herbs can be a strange mixture of opposites as well. They can look beautiful, smell lovely, yet, if eaten, they can be deadly. He goes on to make the direct connection to people. He concludes by suggesting that if the "worser" is predominant, the plant will be "eaten up and die, much the same way the people who get embroiled in hate and revenge will ultimately be "eaten alive" as they succumb to evil.

Shakespeare also does some wonderful things with light and dark imagery to accentuate this divide in human nature. When Romeo sees Juliet on her balcony, he says, "But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks?/ It is the east and Juliet is the sun," (Act II, Scene ii, ll. 2-3) a powerful light image. However, the play ends in darkness with the dead bodies of Romeo and Juliet, as Shakespeare says, "The sun for sorrow shall not show his head/ For never was there a tale of more woe/ Than this of Juliet and her Romeo." (Act V, Scene iii, ll. 306, 309-310)

Great literature captures truth. It gives us insight into human nature. It can help us as we try to make sense out of those who are so filled with hate they would even kill themselves to kill us. However, it can give us hope on a day like Sept. 11 when we think of the light coming through the darkness of the thick dust of crumbling cement, light in the form of those heroes that put other lives first as they rushed into a crumbling building.

In the words of former President George W. Bush, who addressed the nation on Sept. 11, 2001, "America was attacked because it's the greatest beacon for freedom and opportunity in the world. And no one will keep that light from shining. Today we saw evil  the very worst of human nature  and we responded with the best of America."

I write this in appreciation for "the best of America" who give us hope that light can shine through the darkness and save us all.

Officer Steven Hunt

Pittsfield Police Officer Steve Hunt was deployed to the city right after the attack. This reporter attended school with his daughter and remembers he and Lt. Glen Decker coming to the school to talk about what happened.



Q: How did you feel when you first found out about the 9/11 attacks on Sept. 11, 2001? What was your response? And what was that first day like?



A: I was actually working patrol that day and when I saw it on television, I just couldn't believe what I was seeing.



And the first thing they did was, they had me go over and cone off the federal building, and we evacuated the federal building over on Center Street.



And then we just sort of waiting, like everybody else, to see what was going to happen next, if anything.



And then when I went back into the building four o'clock, I found out there was an opportunity for some of us to get supplies and load up the mobile command post and go down to New York to assist whatever we could do.



And so that night, I don't know, probably about seven o'clock, we got supplies from Berkshire Medical Center, and Walmart, and we loaded up the command post and went down to, I think it was called the Meadowlands area [in New Jersey] where the Giants played.



And we got redirected over to Liberty Park, which is right across from Ground Zero, it's an old like train station, and that's where they had put all the ambulances and all the first responders.



And that actually set up the old train station as a triage, so I think I think they thought that they were going to have survivors, but as it turned out, you know how that worked out.



They had all these, IV bags hanging in the terminal, and they were set up for, you know, massive casualties, and it just didn't happen.



And then we got settled and we met up with a commander from the New Jersey State Police. He connected us with a Jersey City or Jersey shore police boat.



And that's when we got ferried across the river and we got right near the American Express building.



Just ...



It was like walking on the moon. It was the concrete from the World Trade Towers. Just went back to sand.



So when we get off the boat, it was dark and they had all the ambient lighting.



It was like walking on the moon. And we had on the helmets and the goggles and the double breathers. And we just walked through that. And we were trying to get to the, to the site where the towers had actually fallen.



And we walked through, I think it was the American Express building, and there was about an inch of water on the floor.



As you looked into Starbucks, you could see like, half-eaten bagels, and half-drank coffee because everyone just ran.



it was just, it was just too much to really comprehend what you're seeing.



It was terrible. And then we wound up when they put us to work, we were actually digging because there was just so much of that concrete dirt. And I just remember we did a bucket line.



They had like, you know, a pickle bucket.



And people would shovel debris into the bucket, which was sand. There were like office things like pencils, orange pencils, just, whatever was in the building when it came down, we would pass that down and they would dump it into a bucket like an excavation machinery and then they would dump that in into a dump truck, big dump trucks.







We stayed down there from actual the night of 9/11 through Friday, and, you know, one day we actually uncovered, it was these big walkways that went from the World Trade Center over across the six-lane highway and the firemen had parked underneath those to protect the trucks and the one we were in actually fell on the truck and I think what happened was the firemen were trapped under there and didn't make it.



I remember the day that we actually uncovered the fire truck and then and they rescued the firemen that were under there. I'm not sure exactly how many there were.



And then Friday, they declared it a crime scene and we loaded up into the command post and four other people had come down, they were going to take over for us and we could go back but they actually sent all eight of us home that Saturday.



I was so upset for about a year, I couldn't even talk about it and every 9/11 it just hits me right in the chest.



Q: Do you get together with other first responders to talk about 9/11?



A: We usually go out and we try to go to one of the less crowded restaurants, bar-type places. And we always pick the corner and you know, watch the events, played back from 911.



I remember talking to my dad from the scene, standing in the middle of the debris.



And I was just so angry. And my dad called me. And I talked to him for a minute. And, you know, he said on 9/11 he felt just like he did the day of Pearl Harbor, which had to say I wasn't old enough for that. But he was.



So now here we are in a 20-year reunion.



It's funny, but going down there, I thank God for that opportunity. Because it was a chance of a lifetime. I mean, everybody was pulling together, why can't we go back to there?



Our country is so divided.



How do we get back to that point? I mean, there was every walk of life in there trying to find survivors. And you know, I remember they had these big steelworkers, they're great big burly guys and they were going up and like a lift and they were cutting up the walkway. And they would come back down with tears in their eyes.



Everywhere we went, people gave us coffee, wouldn't take money. Just a different time I guess. I was actually working patrol that day and when I saw it on television, I just couldn't believe what I was seeing.And the first thing they did was, they had me go over and cone off the federal building, and we evacuated the federal building over on Center Street.And then we just sort of waiting, like everybody else, to see what was going to happen next, if anything.And then when I went back into the building four o'clock, I found out there was an opportunity for some of us to get supplies and load up the mobile command post and go down to New York to assist whatever we could do.And so that night, I don't know, probably about seven o'clock, we got supplies from Berkshire Medical Center, and Walmart, and we loaded up the command post and went down to, I think it was called the Meadowlands area [in New Jersey] where the Giants played.And we got redirected over to Liberty Park, which is right across from Ground Zero, it's an old like train station, and that's where they had put all the ambulances and all the first responders.And that actually set up the old train station as a triage, so I think I think they thought that they were going to have survivors, but as it turned out, you know how that worked out.They had all these, IV bags hanging in the terminal, and they were set up for, you know, massive casualties, and it just didn't happen.And then we got settled and we met up with a commander from the New Jersey State Police. He connected us with a Jersey City or Jersey shore police boat.And that's when we got ferried across the river and we got right near the American Express building.Just ...It was like walking on the moon. It was the concrete from the World Trade Towers. Just went back to sand.So when we get off the boat, it was dark and they had all the ambient lighting.It was like walking on the moon. And we had on the helmets and the goggles and the double breathers. And we just walked through that. And we were trying to get to the, to the site where the towers had actually fallen.And we walked through, I think it was the American Express building, and there was about an inch of water on the floor.As you looked into Starbucks, you could see like, half-eaten bagels, and half-drank coffee because everyone just ran.it was just, it was just too much to really comprehend what you're seeing.It was terrible. And then we wound up when they put us to work, we were actually digging because there was just so much of that concrete dirt. And I just remember we did a bucket line.They had like, you know, a pickle bucket.And people would shovel debris into the bucket, which was sand. There were like office things like pencils, orange pencils, just, whatever was in the building when it came down, we would pass that down and they would dump it into a bucket like an excavation machinery and then they would dump that in into a dump truck, big dump trucks.And then that all went out to I think it was called Fresh Kills [on Staten Island]. It was an island where they actually comb through everything, you know, and they found badges and all kinds of stuff.We stayed down there from actual the night of 9/11 through Friday, and, you know, one day we actually uncovered, it was these big walkways that went from the World Trade Center over across the six-lane highway and the firemen had parked underneath those to protect the trucks and the one we were in actually fell on the truck and I think what happened was the firemen were trapped under there and didn't make it.I remember the day that we actually uncovered the fire truck and then and they rescued the firemen that were under there. I'm not sure exactly how many there were.And then Friday, they declared it a crime scene and we loaded up into the command post and four other people had come down, they were going to take over for us and we could go back but they actually sent all eight of us home that Saturday.I was so upset for about a year, I couldn't even talk about it and every 9/11 it just hits me right in the chest.We usually go out and we try to go to one of the less crowded restaurants, bar-type places. And we always pick the corner and you know, watch the events, played back from 911.I remember talking to my dad from the scene, standing in the middle of the debris.And I was just so angry. And my dad called me. And I talked to him for a minute. And, you know, he said on 9/11 he felt just like he did the day of Pearl Harbor, which had to say I wasn't old enough for that. But he was.So now here we are in a 20-year reunion.It's funny, but going down there, I thank God for that opportunity. Because it was a chance of a lifetime. I mean, everybody was pulling together, why can't we go back to there?Our country is so divided.How do we get back to that point? I mean, there was every walk of life in there trying to find survivors. And you know, I remember they had these big steelworkers, they're great big burly guys and they were going up and like a lift and they were cutting up the walkway. And they would come back down with tears in their eyes.Everywhere we went, people gave us coffee, wouldn't take money. Just a different time I guess.

Brittany Polito, iBerkshires staff writer in Pittsfield

I was in second grade at Allendale Elementary School when the first plane hit the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. During Miss Sommer's art class there was an announcement over the loudspeaker explaining, in child's terms, that a bad event happened involving a plane crashing into a building and we were all sent home.

When I arrived home my parents were extra happy to see me and didn't want me to play outside. I didn't understand.

Together, my family watched the event unfold on the news in the living room.

As a 7-year-old I knew what happened was terrible but did not understand the concept of terrorism. Years later I watched the anniversary specials on television and truly saw the gravity of the situation.
Recollections of 9/11: North County

iBerkshires has gathered some local recollections about the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, including from our own staff, here in North County.

Jack Guerino, iBerkshires community editor

I was in fifth grade at Brayton Elementary School. Truthfully my recollection of the school day is that it was quite normal. I believe we were sent home early, but I do not recall an explanation why.

I know when I stepped off the bus I was excited to be home so early. It was sunny and still felt like summer. My mom had the news on in the living room. She explained what was going on the best she could. All I really understood was that two planes hit some buildings in New York City.

I did not grasp the enormous loss of life or the concept of terrorism. I thought they were just buildings; we could rebuild them.

The next day in school I remember talking about it with a friend. I gave my perspective, still working with the ridiculous idea that two empty planes hit two empty buildings. My friend corrected me right away.

I dont think the number of casualties was even then clear to me. It was hard to fathom how many people could be in such large buildings. I did have a looming sense of impending doom. This glimpse of real human darkness made me sick to my stomach. I was sitting in the back row. I remember I was thankful that I could fade out of the morning conversation.

It was hard to grasp what was happening in the Middle East. These things seemed so far away from Berkshire County, but the fear became more localized as new concerns arose like would the terrorists attack North Adams? I remember being terrified of nuclear war.

I saw that my parents were afraid, struggling to make sense of things and what it meant for Americans, what it meant for our family. The news was on a lot more than it had been in years past. There were new words: al-Qaeda, hijack, anthrax, weapons of mass destruction, Ground Zero.

This was a pivotal moment and it was clear to me, even at age 11, that nothing would be the same.

Dennis St. Pierre

St. Pierre, former American Legion commander in North Adams, and owner of State Street Tavern, said he was on his way to work when he heard the news. He was dropping a friend off at work when the news came on the radio

We were coming down Route 8 right by the bowling alley, the radio was on. It didn't sound like a big deal on the radio. It said a light plane crashed into a building. We had a chuckle and just thought some asshole hit a building. It was either tough luck for somebody or some screwball was having a bad day. We took it pretty lightly.

I dropped my friend off and when I got to the bar the TV was on. That is when I saw what was really going on. It was a sick feeling, a lump in your throat and in your gut. As more came out it was more of a pissed-off feeling as we found more information. It was sad, too. Reminded me of the day JFK was assassinated.

More and more people started coming out. There were a couple of guys who came down that haven't drank in a long time. They came down in disbelief. Everyone was together and they wanted to be together. It was a come-together moment. No political bull, everyone was an American.

James Brosnan

Brosnan is superintendent of the Northern Berkshire Vocational Technical School District and retired as a colonel from the Army Reserve.

I sat in my office here I turned on the television and the rest was disbelief. As a member of the United States Army Reserve, I knew what that would mean, and sure enough, by July of 2002, I was sent to Kuwait for six weeks. I returned for the opening of school and in December of that year, I was deployed to Kuwait and Iraq.

I know personally where I was and how it affected me

I had friends and family that were killed in Sept. 11 so that is something that is always going to be remembered. It is a day for us to remember those souls but also for us to understand the resolve that all Americans showed on that day and continue to show in the future as we go forward.

Rebecca Cellana, iBerkshires business manager

I was commuting to Rhode Island three days a week, and that morning in Newport, R.I., I saw an airliner that was strangely low in the sky taking the turn to fly toward New York. I didnt think much of it until the first plane hit the World Trade Center. All I could think was those poor pilots losing control of their plane like that while other people in the office were talking about it being done on purpose. I said of course not, who would ever do something so horrendous?

Then the second one hit and the reports started coming in about the Pentagon and the crash in Pennsylvania. Everyone in the office was so distraught and started leaving, they all lived nearby.

All I could think was what else is going to happen and how was I going to get home to my family in North Adams. I jumped in the car and flew home and mourned along with the rest of the country.

The next day I remember packing up blankets and water and bringing them down to Main Street where an 18-wheeler was packing donations to drive straight down to Manhattan. The country truly came together in the following days and weeks, it was something to see.

Melanie Rowland, North Adams resident

On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, I was walking home from Conte Middle School in North Adams with my best friend, Kaitlyn. As per the norm, it was the first week of school, which meant half days all week. Being in the 8th grade, we felt like the big kids on campus. Eager for days ahead, facing the world with excitement and anticipation of a great year. Walking home we casually run into Kaitlyn's father delivering water on Main Street. A bit surprised to see us out of class so early, he asked, 'did the school let you out because of the bombing?'

Um. What???

"Someone bombed the Twin Towers"

Instantly, my world began to crumble. You see, I didn't always live in Berkshire County. I was born on Long Island. My family moved here (my mom is a former Adams resident) in 1997 to have a better community to raise their family. My father was a former telecommunications worker in the World Trade Center. For the first three years of my Berkshire County life, my father commuted on weekends back and forth to Long Island. He loved his job in the city and he was able to provide for his family better than many opportunities here in the Berkshires.

My father had left his job about a year prior to the horrific events of that day. Nonetheless I felt hit hard by what was happening. Kaitlyn and I rushed home to find not a bombing, but pure chaos. As the towers fell, I felt my heart shatter. As a young child, not much older than my own daughter is now, I had gone to work with my Dad a couple of times. I had the amazing opportunities to see the cool insides of the building, ride the incredibly fast elevators that made your ears pop, the breathtaking views of the city from the upper levels, the massive computers in the basement. A witness to what was then top of the tech world that is now completely obsolete. When the attacks hit, they not only destroyed buildings, airplanes, or fields; they destroyed lives. Twenty years later people are missing a family member at the table. We're left wondering the "what ifs" and "who would you have become?" I found myself missing a piece of my childhood.

Memories with my father suddenly ripped to become just that: memories. Something fun and exciting to visit with my own family in the future now demolished to a smoldering pile of rubble. That big 8th-grader that felt so big now feeling smaller like a grain of sand. My mind went to my father's former colleagues and a woman named Betty that worked up near the floor where the towers were struck. (Betty had a soft spot for me and even had a photo of me in her cubicle.) I felt my world come to a screeching halt.

I remember my mom coming home and hugging my dad. The first words out of her mouth to my father 'Thank God you're not there." Later as an adult, I had found that there had been some hardships between my mother and grandmother for moving so far away. That day there was solitude. There was mending among the broken. There was thankfulness and gratitude. The days to come were filled with many tears. I felt alone. Misunderstood. Hollow. Broken and empty. I felt that no one could understand the connection that I developed with a city that was such a big part of my childhood.

Now 20 years later, I have not forgotten. I pray for those missing their loved ones. The hurt and pain and sorrow that so many are wrapped in as the reminders of the events unfold. For years, you could see a flag that previously hung in the World Trade Center outside of my parents' home, now weathered in age and time. A reminder of the unity our nation felt in the days, weeks, and months to follow. A time where race, social status, religion, and political stance didn't matter. We were One Nation. We were all together to support and love one another through what felt like a personal attack to not one but all of us.

I'm reminded of this as we as a nation are beginning to feel more and more divided with each passing day than we've felt since the civil war, if not the birth of our country. I pray that as we approach this anniversary, that we as a nation can begin to heal again. That we may once again be One Nation. And may choose not to focus on the horrific tragedies of that day, but return to be a nation that lifts one another up in support, love, compassion, friendship, and unity. May we never forget, but once again be One Nation, Under God, Indivisible with Liberty and Justice for all.
Jessica Chastain warns her 'Scenes from a Marriage' remake will "bring out the darkness"
Celebrities from across the world of culture have paid tribute to the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the 20th anniversary of the event.

Mariah Carey, Mark Wahlberg and Kaley Cuoco are among those to mark the occasion with mournful posts on social media.

On this anniversary of 9/11, I find myself remembering the shock and anguish we all experienced with painfully deep sadness, wrote Carey on Twitter. Vivid images of the skyline I grew up loving so much, suddenly changed forever.

In a follow-up tweet, she continued: Still astonished by how many innocent people were lost in an instant, gone forever but never to be forgotten.

Thinking of all the families still mourning their loved ones 20 years after that devastating and tragic moment in our history. #NeverForget.

Actor Reese Witherspoon wrote: My prayers go out to all the families that lost their loves ones on this day 20 years ago.

We will #neverforget. Forever in our hearts.

On Instagram, actor Rita Wilson wrote: God bless America. Never forget, alongside a picture of the memorial.

Rock outfit U2 shared the message: An honour to honour such a moment and the 2977 souls stolen from the arms of AmericaBono, Edge, Adam and Larry.

Bruce Springsteen also gave a moving musical performance at the memorial service at Ground Zero, as part of a ceremony that was attended by dignitaries and relatives of the victims of 9/11.

You can follow live updates about the 9/11 anniversary here.
The Taliban has executed the brother of Amrullah Saleh, the former Afghan vice president and a leading figure in the resistance movement against the Islamists, his nephew has said.

Rohullah Azizi was shot dead by militants from the group after stopping at a checkpoint in the Panjshir valley, it is claimed.

They executed my uncle, Ebadullah Saleh said in a text message to the Reuters news agency. They killed him yesterday and would not let us bury him. They kept saying his body should rot.

He told the Associated Press it was unclear where his uncle was driving to when he was killed. The Urdu language account of the Taliban information service Alemarah said that according to reports Mr Azizi had been shot dead .

Amrullah Saleh remains at large though his exact location is unclear. Since the fall of Kabul, he has declared himself the acting president of Afghanistan and has been leading a band of fighters from the National Resistance Front in Afghanistan (NRF) in the Panjshir valley.

He told Euronews last week that the resistance was not over despite the Talibans formal declaration of an Islamic emirate and its formation of a government. Mr Saleh stressed he would not flee the country like former president Ashraf Ghani, who has since apologised for the manner of his retreat.

I am a soldier of [mujahideen leader] Ahmad Shah Massoud and, in his dictionary, there was no such thing as fleeing, exile and leaving the nation in bad moments, he told the broadcaster. If I had escaped, I might have been physically alive, but as soon as I reached any corner of the globe, I would have died instantly.

Mohammad Zahir Akbar, Afghanistans ambassador in neighbouring Tajikistan, told reporters on Wednesday that Mr Saleh had remained in the Panjshir province following the Talibans takeover of Kabul and was temporarily performing the duties of president.

The NRF has disputed the Talibans claim to have taken control of the entire country, insisting that they remain all over the Panjshir valley despite the capture of regional capital Bazarak on 6 September.

The sparse, mountainous region has traditionally been a focal point for rebel groups in recent history. The Northern Alliance, a coalition of military groups that operated during the previous era of Taliban rule, used the area as a base between 1996 and 2001.

Last week, the NRF denounced the Talibans new interim government as illegitimate and called for a nationwide uprising against the countrys Islamist rulers.

The narrative of a modern Taliban is over. There is no Taliban in favour of an inclusive government, the groups spokesperson Ali Maisam Nazary told the Agence France-Presse news agency. This is going to become a pariah government, an illegitimate government.

Additional reporting by agencies
Pretty Little Thing has been accused of branding a tribute to the victims of the 9/11 terror attacks.

The fast fashion company posted a black and white photograph of the World Trade Centre twin towers in New York City, with the words Never Forget in the companys signature shade of pink.

Social media users were quick criticise Pretty Little Thing for the post, which remains on the brands Twitter and Instagram accounts.

Many said the use of Pretty Little Things branding colour on a post paying tribute to the almost 3,000 people who died in the attacks 20 years ago today was in bad taste and had zero relevance to the brand.

One person wrote on Twitter: What stage of capitalism have we reached when fast fashion brands are using tragedy and loss of life as marketing?

Another said the post was an extremely good example that not every social media post needs to be branded.

Some people joked that Pretty Little Thing would release 9/11-themed discount codes to commemorate the day marking the deadliest terrorist attack in human history.

Former Love Island contestant Molly-Mae Hague, who was named creative director of Pretty Little Thing last month, faced criticism for the post, although it is unknown if she was involved in its creation.

Molly-Maes first act as creative director??? To put the PLT brand stamp on 9/11, wrote one person.

Another said: What fresh capitalist hell is this? Oh wait. You have a new cReATive DirEcToR and it shows.

Others were annoyed that the brand, which is owned by the British Boohoo Group and is headquartered in Manchester, used the America dating system in the post instead, which reads 09.11.01.

The US is one of the few countries that uses a month-day-year format, rather than the day-month-year format the UK and most other countries around the world uses.

One person said: It does slightly wind me up that a Manchester-based company has decided to use the American dating system.

Saturday marks 20 years since four commercial airliners travelling from the northeastern United States to California were hijacked by al-Qaeda terrorists. Two of the aircraft were crashed into the World Trace Centre twin towers, one into the west side of the Pentagon, and another in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

The Independent has contacted Pretty Little Thing for comment.
Britons who are vulnerable to Covid-19 are thanking anti-vaccine protesters who are calling for a boycott of Morrisons for making the supermarket safer.

It comes after Morrisons said it would cut sick pay for unvaccinated workers who need to self-isolate, in order to mitigate the biblical costs of the coronavirus pandemic of profits dipped.

The decision, first reported by The Guardian, was among other strategies Morrisons is using to deal with sustained supply chain cost increases from the nationwide HGV driver shortage, supply chain disruption and the increase of wholesale prices of commodities.

David Potts, the chief executive of Morrisons, said in a financial update to the City on Thursday that the move was also intended to encourage workers to get vaccinated.

A spokesperson for the company confirmed with City AM: From 1 October, following government confirmation that all adults have had the opportunity to get double-vaccinated, we will no longer be paying full sick pay for pinged colleagues who have chosen not to be vaccinated.

The pay change will not apply to workers who have not been given the chance to get two vaccine doses, or those who have Covid-19 symptoms.

The decision has sparked backlash, with lawyers and union chiefs warning that the grocer risks facing legal action. Rob Miguel, national health and safety adviser at Unite, described it as strong-arm tactics that would result in issues around equalities, human rights and ethical breaches.

Anti-vaccine campaigners have also joined in the backlash and created the hashtag #BoycottMorrisons to encourage people who disagree with the move not to shop at the supermarket.

Some people accused Morrisons of discrimination, while others who are vaccinated have pointed out that the retailer is setting themselves up for a legal battle.

But vulnerable shoppers have used the hashtag to thank those who are opposed to the Covid vaccine for making Morrisons a safer place for them to shop.

One person wrote: Anti-vaxxers are going to #BoycottMorrisons apparently. Excellent. Ill feel safer in there tomorrow evening when I do my shopping. Well done @Morrisons.

Another said: Id be happy for the anti-vaxxers to boycott all supermarkets, be a far more pleasant and safer environment for the rest of us.

See everyone trying to boycott Morrisons for their stance on the vaccine, added another person. As far as Im concerned, the lack of anti-vaxxers is just one more reason to shop at Morrisons.
The royal family were lucky to have had the Duke of Edinburgh for nearly 100 years, says Prince Charles in a trailer for a new TV tribute.

Interviews with members of the royal family filmed before and after Prince Philips death in April will feature in the tribute, Prince Philip: The Royal Family Remembers, which will air later this month on BBC One.

In the programme, Prince William describes his grandfather as a huge presence while Prince Harry says he was unapologetically him.

The short trailer shows Charles, William, Harry and the dukes granddaughter Zara Tindall talking about Philip over a montage of family pictures and video clips.

One video shows Philip and his children riding bicycles as the Queen runs behind them and another shows him drinking from a trophy and laughing.

The trailer begins with William saying: Hes always been a huge presence behind everything we have done really.

Harry follows, saying: What you see is what you got with my grandfather. He was unapologetically him.

Zara, whose mother is the Princess Royal and Philips only daughter, says: You never really prepare yourself for losing him because he was always there.

The clip ends with a quote from Philips eldest son Charles who says: We were lucky to have him for nearly a hundred years.

More than a dozen royals including all of the Queen and Philips children  the Prince of Wales, the Princess Royal, the Duke of York and the Earl of Wessex  and their adult grandchildren, the dukes of Cambridge and Sussex, princesses Beatrice and Eugenie, Peter Phillips and Zara Tindall, have taken part in the one-hour programme.

The Queen has not been interviewed for the programme but granted special access to her private cine-film collection.

The documentary makers went inside Buckingham Palace to meet the dukes long-serving staff and to capture his study, private office and library as they were during his seven decades of public service.

The programme, which will air on Wednesday 22 September at 9pm on BBC One, was originally conceived to mark the dukes 100th birthday in June, but the nations longest-serving consort died two months before his centenary.

The BBC described it as an unrivalled portrait of a man with a unique place in royal history  by those who knew him best.
President Joe Biden and his team are promoting an agreement reached with the U.S. airline industry to cut aircraft greenhouse-gas emissions 20% by decade's end, but the deal might not fly.

In an announcement Thursday, the White House unveiled an array of measures to reduce climate-changing emissions. The administration is also setting a goal of replacing all of today's kerosene-based jet fuel with cleaner or sustainable fuel by 2050.

Climate experts say that while the effort is laudable, the administration's approach is aspirational and unrealistic. The targets are voluntary, and robust government support will be needed to offset the higher cost of sustainable fuel  up to three times more than regular fuel.

Airlines in fact have talked up sustainable jet fuel for years and even made small investments in it, but it may prove to be a vision beyond Biden's promised reach. Airline executives have expressed concern in particular that flight shaming  famously advocated by Swedish activist Greta Thunberg  could catch on in the U.S. if the companies are seen as uncaring about the environment.

WHITE HOUSE, touting Biden's steps to involve the government, aircraft makers, airlines and fuel suppliers to boost the use of cleaner fuels: The measures will result in the production and use of billions of gallons of sustainable fuel that will enable aviation emissions to drop 20% by 2030 when compared to business as usual.

THE FACTS: That's a giant step that will be highly difficult, if not impossible, to achieve.

Only 2.4 million gallons of sustainable aviation fuel, or SAF, were produced in the United States in 2019, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. In contrast, airlines burned 21.5 billion gallons of regular fuel that year. That means just over 0.01% of the nations supply currently comes from sustainable fuel.

The airline industry says bridging the gap will require bold steps including grants and tax credits for producers, government support for research, and more. Biden is seeking a SAF tax credit as part of a $3.5 trillion spending bill being pushed in Congress by Democrats, but its outcome remains uncertain. Even with that money, it's not clear all those things would be enough to meet the administration's ambitious goals, according to aviation experts.

Aspirational goals like this dont move markets, says Dan Rutherford, who oversees aviation research at the International Council on Clean Transportation, an environmental group based in Washington.

Without a government mandate or very strong incentives, Rutherford says, I doubt that much SAF will be generated. He notes that the International Air Transport Association, a global trade group for airlines, had a voluntary goal of 10% sustainable fuel by 2017 and the federal government had a target of 1 billion gallons per year by 2018, and neither came anywhere close.

Liz Jones, a climate-law attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, says the administration plan largely relies on biofuels aspirations that simply arent based on reality.

Airlines have been announcing promises to become carbon neutral around the middle of the century, and some have invested in sustainable fuel as they defend against criticism over aviations role in climate change. Airplanes produce only around 3% of the worlds heat-trapping emissions, but their share is growing rapidly.

Jones says, however, that nothing in the administration's plan would force airlines to live up to their promises.

And even the best-case scenario doesnt cut climate pollution fast enough, she says. "The Biden EPA needs to set strong airplane emissions standards now, not get mired in the myth of sustainable airline fuels.

The White House and airline trade groups are counting on tax credits to produce three billion gallons a year by 2030. Airline trade groups are pushing Congress to enact a tax credit of $1.50 to $2 per gallon, depending on how much the fuel reduces greenhouse gas emissions when burned.

Airlines for America a trade group for the biggest U.S. airlines, had previously set a goal of producing 2 billion gallons of sustainable fuel in 2030. This week, the group agreed to back the White House goals.

The airline group's president, Nicholas Calio, said the airlines are proud of our record on climate change, but we know the climate change challenge has only continued to intensify, and so it raised its goal for sustainable fuel.

Airlines are also placing orders and making investments in startups that are designing aircraft powered by electricity or hydrogen. Some of the manufacturers aim to have small electric planes of up to 19 seats in service by the end of the decade.

We want to operate aircraft that are very good for the environment in the long run," Andrew Nocella, the chief commercial officer of United Airlines, said this week. How they come to be and when they come to be is still a little bit TBD (to be determined)."

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Associated Press writer Hope Yen contributed to this report.

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EDITOR'S NOTE  A look at the veracity of claims by political figures.

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Find AP Fact Checks at http://apnews.com/APFactCheck

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Albanias new parliament members were formally sworn in and elected a new speaker Friday, in the houses first session after an April 25 election.

Serving its third consecutive mandate, the left-wing Socialist Party of Prime Minister Edi Rama has 74 of parliament's 140 seats, while the main opposition center-right Democratic Party has 59.

The Socialists Lindita Nikolla, a former education minister, was elected parliament speaker.

Rama has already named a 17-member Cabinet 12 of whose members are women. Parliament is expected to approve it next week.

His main challenges will be coping with the pandemic and its impact on the economy, while fighting corruption and drug trafficking, boosting growth and lowering unemployment.

Albania, with its population of 2.8 million, has been a NATO member since 2009 and hopes to launch full membership negotiations with the European Union later this year.
Former Colombian soldiers arrested in Haiti in the assassination of President Jovenel Moise have accused local authorities of torture, saying theyve been burned, stabbed and hit in the head with a hammer, among other things.

Details of the alleged torture are contained in a Sept. 6 letter addressed to Colombias president and other high-ranking officials as well as the Interamerican Court of Human Rights and the International Committee of the Red Cross. It was signed by the 18 former soldiers arrested in the slaying.

Relatives of the soldiers provided a copy of the letter to The Associated Press but asked not to be identified for their safety, saying only that they received the letter electronically.

In the letter, the soldiers accuse Haitian police officers of shooting at them with powerful weapons when they tried to turn themselves in with their hands raised just hours after Moise was killed at his private home on July 7.

We were deceived by people and companies in the United States and Haiti that seek to accuse us of acts for which we are not responsible. Dont let an injustice be committed, they wrote.

Several days after the killing, Colombian President Ivan Duque said the majority of the former soldiers arrested were duped and thought they were traveling to Haiti for a legitimate mission to provide protection. He said only a small group of them knew it was a criminal operation.

In the letter, the ex-soldiers describe how police tortured and then executed one of their colleagues who was injured after being shot by Haitian officers while trying to turn himself over. He was one of three former Colombian soldiers killed. The letter also accuses police of kicking some ex-soldiers in the testicles and even burned one of them in their groin, allegedly while saying that human rights dont exist in Haiti and that they could whatever they wanted.

The ex-soldiers alleged that other colleagues were thrown against walls, one had his foot burned with hot oil, another was kicked in the mouth and suffers from two broken teeth and that police released at least three of them to a crowd that attacked with machetes or stabbed them.

They also accused authorities of keeping all of them handcuffed for 24 days, and that they didnt receive food or water in the first two days after their capture. They wrote that the bathrooms in the cell they were being held at in police headquarters werent working, so feces filled the area and caused their wounds to become infected.

The lack of timely medical attention also was denounced by the Colombian Ombudsmans Office, a state entity in charge of ensuring human rights, after a July 26 visit with the ex-soldiers. In its report, the office warned that three of the detainees had considerable injuries and needed specialized medical treatment.

Once they were transferred to a penitentiary, the ex-soldiers said there were no bathrooms and no potable water, which they either have to buy or wait for a good Samaritan to bring them some. They noted that they get fed only once a day and that some of the ex-soldiers have lost up to 44 pounds (20 kilograms).

The United Nations and other organizations have long denounced prison conditions in Haiti, noting that they are severely overcrowded and that inmates are often ill-treated, sometimes tortured and can spend more than a decade behind bars without going to a single court hearing or being charged with anything.

In their letter, the ex-soldiers added they dont have an attorney, dont know what charges they face and that theyre barred from calling their families: We find ourselves completely isolated.

The ex-soldiers also said that Haitian authorities already had prepared written statements before interviewing them and ordered them to sign the documents drafted in a language they didn't understand.

Torture has been employed as a way to obtain statements, they wrote.

The ex-soldiers said one of the main officials overseeing the case was responsible for the torture, calling him a professional in torturing humans. They did not identify him.

We thank you in advance for your attention and prompt response to this cry for help and complaints, they wrote.

Neither the office of Colombias president nor the foreign ministry immediately returned messages for comment. A spokeswoman for Haitis National Police did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Haitian authorities have detained more than 40 suspects in the killing of Moise during an attack in which his wife, Martine Moise, was injured. Meanwhile, court clerks investigating the case have gone into hiding after being threatened with death if they didnt change certain names and statements in their reports.

In addition, a Haitian judge assigned to oversee the investigation stepped down last month citing personal reasons. He left after one of his assistants died in unclear circumstances. A new judge has been assigned, but the former Colombian soldiers have yet to appear in court.

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Associated Press writer Danica Coto in San Juan Puerto Rico contributed to this report.
Mikis Theodorakis, who has died aged 96, was a Greek composer of symphonies, cantatas, ballets and operas, but remembered worldwide for his Zorba the Greek and Serpico film scores.

He was also politically active throughout his life after joining the Greek resistance against the Axis powers during the Second World War, later becoming an MP.

When dictatorship arrived following a military coup in 1967, he was imprisoned as a political opponent of the new regime and spent several years in exile before the fascist junta collapsed in 1974 and he returned to his homeland. Later, the Marxist composer was back in the Hellenic parliament.

Always, I have lived with two sounds  one political, one musical, he once said.

Zorba the Greek, a 1964 comedy-drama starring Anthony Quinn as the peasant musician of the title whose lust for life changes Alan Batess uptight Englishman of Greek descent, put Theodorakis firmly on the international map.

The New York Times remarked that his score rollicks and wails hauntingly. Most memorable was Zorbas Dance, played on the bouzouki and mandolin, the soundtrack to the pair dancing on a Cretan beach, arms outstretched and hands on each others shoulders. Its style, a Greek form of line dancing, became known as sirtaki.

As well as various versions of the tune appearing in the singles charts  Marcello Minerbi and his orchestra reached No 6 in Britain in 1965  it went on to become a staple of piped music at Greek tavernas around the globe and Quinn even went through his steps again in guest appearances at Theodorakiss concerts.

During the composers years of incarceration, Greek-French director Costa-Gavras approached him to write the score for his satirical thriller Z, an Oscar-winning, fictionalised account of a Greek anti-war politicians assassination in 1963 that resonated in the new climate. The storyline was smuggled to Theodorakis, who suggested suitable past works of his to use.

Then, in 1973, came his soundtrack for Serpico, a film directed by Sidney Lumet and starring Al Pacino as a New York police officer going undercover to expose corruption in his own force.

Michael George Theodorakis was born on the Aegean island of Chios in 1925 to Aspasia (nee Poulakis), who fostered in him and his younger brother a love of Greek folk music, and Georgios Theodorakis, a lawyer.

He began composing as a child and, after writing his early choral works, gave his first concert aged 17.

Always, I have lived with two sounds  one political, one musical, Theodorakis explained (Getty)

At the same time, following Greeces occupation by German and Italian forces, he joined ELAS, the Greek Peoples Liberation Army, whose guerrillas mounted attacks on them.

Within two years, he was a captain and had met Myrto Altinoglou, a medical student and fellow member. They eventually married in 1953, after he had finished his music studies at the Athens and Paris conservatories.

Back in Greece in the early 1960s, he led a revolution in blending the countrys traditional folk music with the new language of political rebellion and defiance. He said his works were a result of European, Greek and Cretan musical influences.

Alongside a dozen symphonies, chamber music and other works, Theodorakis left his mark with anthems of resistance and political persecution.

In 1970, after three years of imprisonment following the military coup in Greece, international pressure  including protests from composer-conductor Leonard Bernstein and playwright Arthur Miller  led to Theodorakis being released and sent into exile in France, although his music was still banned in his home country.

Theodorakis (right) arrives in the UK in 1970 (Getty)

Just months later, he was conducting the London Symphony at the Royal Albert Hall for a performance of his triumphant March of the Spirit, with lyrics from poetry by Angelos Sikelianos. It began four years of concerts around the world to raise funds in support of Greek democracy.

Later, Theodorakiss Mauthausen Trilogy, a cycle of four arias, was a haunting elegy for those who died in the Holocaust. With lyrics based on the works of Greek poet Iakovos Kambanellis, who was imprisoned at the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp, it received its world premiere there in 1988.

Hymns were another outlet for his political flag-waving: Hymn for the Socialist Movement in Venezuela; ...for the Students; ...of the French Socialist Party; of PLO.

Between 1950 and 1960, I composed exclusively symphonic music, he reflected. Between 1960 and 1980, only folk music. It is only since 1980 that I have renewed my endeavours to combine the two.

One example was Zorba, the story of a Greek traveller who loves life and is adored by women, and the last of more than half a dozen ballet works he wrote.

At its 1988 premiere in Verona, he was so overwhelmed at seeing his name on banners alongside others of great Italian composers that he resolved to write operas dedicated to Verdi, Puccini and Bellini.

Medea (1991), Electra (1995) and Antigone (1998), which he described as lyrical tragedies about three ancient Greek figures, followed.

This body of work coincided with Theodorakiss final term in the Hellenic parliament. He was first elected in 1964 as a member of the left-wing EDA and was later back for the KKE, the Greek communist party (1981-86).

Then, he switched to the centre-right New Democracy Party, first from 1989-90, then serving as a minister from 1990 to 1992 in a coalition government. He insisted he was still left-wing but had opposed the previous corrupt socialist government of Andreas Papandreou, whom he described as intemperate and power-hungry.

Theodorakis is survived by his wife and their son and daughter, Yorgos and Margarita.

Mikis Theodorakis, composer, born 29 July 1925, died 2 September 2021
The U.S. has removed its most advanced missile defense system and Patriot batteries from Saudi Arabia in recent weeks, even as the kingdom faced continued air attacks from Yemen s Houthi rebels, satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press show.

The redeployment of the defenses from Prince Sultan Air Base outside of Riyadh came as America's Gulf Arab allies nervously watched the chaotic withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, including their last-minute evacuations from Kabul's besieged international airport.

While tens of thousands of American forces remain across the Arabian Peninsula as a counterweight to Iran, Gulf Arab nations worry about the U.S.'s future plans as its military perceives a growing threat in Asia that requires those missile defenses. Tensions remain high as negotiations appear stalled in Vienna over Iran's collapsed nuclear deal with world powers, raising the danger of future confrontations in the region.

Perceptions matter whether or not theyre rooted in a cold, cold reality. And the perception is very clear that the U.S. is not as committed to the Gulf as it used to be in the views of many people in decision-making authority in the region, said Kristian Ulrichsen, a research fellow at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University.

From the Saudi point of view, they now see Obama, Trump and Biden  three successive presidents  taking decisions that signify to some extent an abandonment.

Prince Sultan Air Base, some 115 kilometers (70 miles) southeast of Riyadh, has hosted several thousand U.S. troops since a 2019 missile-and-drone attack on the heart of the kingdom's oil production. That attack, though claimed by Yemen's Houthi rebels, appears instead to have been carried out by Iran, according to experts and physical debris left behind. Tehran has denied launching the attack, though a drill in January saw Iranian paramilitary forces use similar drones.

Just southwest of the air base's runway, a 1-square-kilometer (third-of-a-square-mile) area set off by an earthen berm saw American forces station Patriot missile batteries, as well as one advanced Terminal High Altitude Air Defense unit, according to satellite images from Planet Labs Inc. A THAAD can destroy ballistic missiles at a higher altitude than Patriots.

A satellite image seen by the AP in late August showed some of the batteries removed from the area, though activity and vehicles still could be seen there. A high-resolution Planet Lab satellite picture taken Friday showed the batteries' pads at the site empty, with no visible activity.

A redeployment of the missiles had been rumored for months, in part due to a desire to face what American officials see as the looming great powers conflict" with China and Russia. However, the withdrawal came just as a Houthi drone attack on Saudi Arabia wounded eight people and damaged a commercial jetliner at the kingdom's airport in Abha. The kingdom has been locked in a stalemate war with the Houthis since March 2015.

Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby acknowledged the redeployment of certain air defense assets after receiving questions from the AP. He said the U.S. maintained a broad and deep commitment to its Mideast allies.

"The Defense Department continues to maintain tens of thousands of forces and a robust force posture in the Middle East representing some of our most advanced air power and maritime capabilities, in support of U.S. national interests and our regional partnerships, Kirby said.

In a statement to the AP, the Saudi Defense Ministry described the kingdom's relationship with the U.S. as strong, longstanding and historic even while acknowledging the withdrawal of the American missile defense systems. It said the Saudi military is capable of defending its lands, seas and airspace, and protecting its people.

The redeployment of some defense capabilities of the friendly United States of America from the region is carried out through common understanding and realignment of defense strategies as an attribute of operational deployment and disposition, the statement said.

Despite those assurances, Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal, the kingdom's former intelligence chief whose public remarks often track with the thoughts of its Al Saud ruling family, has linked the Patriot missile deployments directly to America's relationship to Riyadh.

I think we need to be reassured about American commitment, the prince told CNBC in an interview aired this week. "That looks like, for example, not withdrawing Patriot missiles from Saudi Arabia at a time when Saudi Arabia is the victim of missile attacks and drone attacks  not just from Yemen, but from Iran.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, on a tour of the Mideast in recent days, had been slated to go to Saudi Arabia but the trip was canceled due to what American officials referred to as scheduling problems. Saudi Arabia declined to discuss why Austin's trip didn't happen after the withdrawal of the missile defenses.

Saudi Arabia maintains its own Patriot missile batteries and typically fires two missiles at an incoming target. That's become an expensive proposition amid the Houthi campaign, as each Patriot missile costs more than $3 million. The kingdom also claims to intercept nearly every missile and drone launched at the kingdom, an incredibly high success rate previously questioned by experts.

While Greece agreed in April to lend a Patriot missile battery to Saudi Arabia, the timing of the U.S. withdrawals comes amid wider uncertainty over the American posture in the region. Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab countries have renewed diplomacy with Iran as a hedge.

I think we saw in Bidens statements on Afghanistan, the way he said things that hes clearly going to put U.S. interests first and obviously that came as quite a disappointment to partners and allies around the world who maybe hoped for something different after Trump, said Ulrichsen, the research fellow. "He sounds quite similar to an America First approach, just sort of a different tone.

___

Associated Press writers Lolita C. Baldor in Washington and Aya Batrawy contributed to this report.

___

Follow Jon Gambrell on Twitter at www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP.
Lawyers for Prince Andrew have raised questions about how legal papers were served in the sexual assault case being brought by Virginia Giuffre.

Ms Giuffres legal team claimed it had served papers on him relating to a case in America by handing them to a Metropolitan Police officer on duty in Windsor last month.

Documents filed in a New York court said this was consistent with the provisions for service upon an individual defendant, under Section 6 of the Civil Procedure Rules, as required by the Supreme Court of Judicature in England and Wales.

However, Blackfords, who said they represented the Duke of York in certain UK matters, queried that assertion in a letter on 6 September. They wrote: We reiterate that our client reserves all his rights, including to contest the jurisdiction of the US courts (including on the basis of potentially defective service).

They added that Ms Guiffres claim may not be viable, citing a 2009 release in a separate court case in Florida. Ms Giuffres lawyers called this an erroneous suggestion.

Ms Giuffre alleges the Queens second son sexually assaulted her when she was a teenager. She claims she was trafficked by Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted sex offender and Andrew's former friend, to have sex with the duke when she was 17 and a minor under US law. Andrew has strenuously denied all the allegations.

In documents filed to the US district court for the southern district of New York on Friday, Ms Giuffres lawyers said there was a first attempt to serve the papers on the duke on 26 August, when an agent went to Windsor Great Park.

They state that a Metropolitan Police officer at the Royal Lodge, who was the head of security, told the agent that officers were not able to accept service of any court process, or let anyone trying to serve legal papers into the property.

The agent returned the next day and was told the court process could be left with the police officer at the main gate and that this matter would then be forwarded on to the legal team.

The document said the complaint, the summons and other papers were packaged together in a plastic sleeve and then in an A4 envelope, addressed to the said defendant, Prince Andrew, Duke of York, at the address and then given to the police officer.

It said that within 21 days of the summons, the plaintiff must be served an answer to the complaint, and if you fail to respond, judgment by default will be entered against you for the relief demanded in the complaint.

On Friday, ABC News reported apparent further details of Blackfords 6 September letter. Gary Bloxsome, a partner at the firm, wrote that a number of attempted services of the papers by Ms Giuffres team had been irregular and in at least one case accompanied by a media representative, the broadcaster reported. He called this regrettable.

Mr Bloxsome reportedly wrote that in his view, requests for cooperation from British courts must be made by an American judicial or diplomatic officer, not the plaintiffs lawyer.

A US judge will ultimately determine whether the papers were properly delivered. Judge Lewis Kaplan will hold the first pre-trial conference in the case via teleconference on Monday.

Andrew has stepped back from public duties amid the fallout from his relationship with Epstein. His withdrawal came after a 2019 Newsnight interview which saw him attempt to draw a line under his relationship with Epstein, who died in prison two years ago, but which only resulted in more negative headlines.

Reports said Andrew was currently staying at Balmoral, the Queens Scotland retreat.

A representative of the duke declined to comment when contacted by The Independent.

Buckingham Palace declined to comment.

Additional reporting by agencies
A statue has been unveiled in north London to commemorate the efforts of Windrush and Commonwealth NHS nurses and midwives, following a successful crowd-funding campaign.

Commissioned by heritage organisation Nubian Jak, in collaboration with Islington Council and the Whittington Health NHS Trust, the monument was unveiled to an audience that included Islingtons mayor councillor Troy Gallagher, the areas MP Jeremy Corbyn, NHS staff and former nurses and midwives on Friday afternoon.

Around 40,000 nurses and midwives from around the Commonwealth came to the UK from 1948 to 1973to help the fledging NHS, which was facing problems recruiting enough staff. The dedication and service of these nurses was exemplary, and it has been said that the NHS would have collapsed without their contributions.

Dr Jak Beula, founder of Nubian Jak, said: Unveiling this statue has been a culmination of three years of hard work and a dedicated team effort. Thank you to Whittington Health NHS Trust, Islington Council, and those who supported this commemoration through donations and sponsorship

But above all, everyone at Nubian Jak and our project partners would like to express our thanks and gratitude to the dedicated Windrush and Commonwealth NHS staff who have served Britains health services before and since the foundation of the NHS, and to whom this statue is dedicated.

This is just the third public sculpture dedicated to Black females in London.

The statue, which represents a stylised nurse, was created using the proceeds of Nubian Jak fundraising campaign that raised nearly 100,000. As part of its commitment to celebrating the contribution of Windrush and Commonwealth nurses, and to challenging inequality, the council contributed more than 16,000 to the fundraiser through the Local Initiatives Fund.

.I hope that the memorial will encourage everyone to find out about the history of nursing and to give a sense of pride to the nurses and midwives who work at our Trust as well as those across the country, Michelle Johnson, Chief Nurse at Whittington Health NHS Trust said (PA)

Cllr Una OHalloran, Islington Councils Executive Member for Community Development, said: The contribution of this generation of nurses and midwives to this country and our health system cannot be overstated, and its vitally important that they are commemorated appropriately.

There are far too few monuments to this extraordinary generation, and we are proud, as part of our ambition to tackle inequality in our borough, to have supported the creation of this statue outside the Whittington Health.

Michelle Johnson, Chief Nurse at Whittington Health NHS Trust said: We are delighted to be able to symbolise our gratitude for Windrush and Commonwealth nurses and midwives and the immeasurable way they have contributed to the NHS.

"I hope that the memorial will encourage everyone to find out about the history of nursing and to give a sense of pride to the nurses and midwives who work at our Trust as well as those across the country.

In addition to the statue, a book by Jak Beula titled Nursing a Nation was also launched on Friday. The book tells the stories and lived experiences of this generation of nurses and midwives.

This comes after an exhibition set up to commemmorate the Windrush generation was vandalised this week, in what has been described as a hate crime, at the Port of Tilbury in Essex.

Tilbury Bridges Walkway of Memories is the only public artwork dedicated to the Windrush arrival in 1948.
Boris Johnson wants to remain as prime minister for longer than Margaret Thatcher as he seeks a decade in power, his colleagues have said.

Mr Johnson is hoping to win multiple elections in order to address the catastrophic economic mistakes of the past 40 years and use Brexit to rectify inequalities across the country, according to The Times.

Boris will want to go on and on, a cabinet minister told the newspaper. The stuff Dom [Dominic Cummings] was saying about him going off into the sunset was nonsense. Hes very competitive. He wants to go on for longer than Thatcher.

Mr Cummings, a former top adviser to the PM, said earlier this year that Mr Johnson planned to leave office within two years after the next election so he could make money and have fun.

Setting out his pitch for the 2024 election for the first time, Mr Johnson said voters would be able to see his great, great project of levelling up making progress across Britain. Its going to take a while, its going to take 10 years, he said.

The next general election is scheduled to take place in May 2024  although the government is planning to abolish the UKs fixed-term parliament legislation, allowing it to bring forward the date.

The report also suggested that Mr Johnson would attempt to frame the next election around Brexit, like he did in 2019, by warning that the UK would return to EU laws and regulations if Labour wins.

Mr Johnson was quoted by the newspaper as saying, in an upcoming book by the Financial Times journalist Sebastian Payne: I do think the risk is if we were to be stopped, if we were to be pushed out, the whole thing will slump back.

We will be back into half of the things of the European Union before we could say it.

It came as Labour recorded its first poll lead since January after the Conservatives slumped to its lowest level since the general election following the announcement of the governments plan to pay for social care reform by raising National Insurance.

YouGovs latest poll showed that support for the Tories had fallen to 33 per cent, down by five points, while Labours share had increased to 35 per cent, up by one point.

In its 2019 manifesto, the Conservative Party pledged to pursue a strategy of levelling up every part of the UK by investing in towns, cities, and rural and coastal areas that have been underfunded in recent decades.

However, MPs have criticised the idea for lacking detail and a clear plan, with a senior Commons committee warning in July that Mr Johnsons government had failed miserably in translating a political soundbite into a deliverable programme.

A report by the Business, Environment and Industrial Strategy Committee said that the lack of definition to the agenda could lead to a failure to deliver meaningful change for people across the country.

As it currently stands, levelling up risks becoming an everything and nothing policy, not owned by a particular minister or department, and without any means in place of evaluating its impact or efficacy as policy in improving everyday life and life chances, the report said.
The government is poised to abandon key elements of its radical and necessary overhaul of Englands planning laws  which ministers argued would help us build the homes our country desperately needs  following a backlash from Tory MPs and voters in the south, according to a report.

More than a year ago, the housing secretary Robert Jenrick announced his intention to replace the planning system in use since just after the Second World War with reforms which would provide secure housing for the vulnerable, bridge the generational divide and recreate an ownership society.

With a target of building 300,000 new homes a year in England, the government had intended in its Planning Bill  first mooted in the Queens speech this year  to scrap the planning application process and replace it with a zonal system, denoting land either for growth, for renewal or for protection.

But The Times reports that the government is now likely to drop proposals for a zonal system, which would have left homeowners unable to object to new developments in person, and plans to introduce mandatory housebuilding targets for councils.

The paper pointed to Tory concerns that the proposed reforms played a role in the partys shock defeat at the hands of the Liberal Democrats in the Chesham and Amersham by-election in June.

The Conservative Party co-chair had described the defeat as a warning shot to the government, arguing in the Daily Telegraph that voters concerns about the Planning Bill and HS2 were loud and clear.

Leaflets from the Lib Dems at the time attacked the policy and included quotes from prominent Tories such as former prime minister Theresa May and former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith criticising the reforms.

Detractors  including more than 350 Conservative councillors  had been vocal in warning that the plans would undermine local democracy by removing the publics right to be heard in person.

One open letter signed by more than 2,000 councillors and campaigners had also warned the zonal system could significantly reduce protections for nature, local green spaces and place pressure on greenfield sites, ultimately harming the governments bid to tackle the climate crisis.

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But Mr Jenrick had argued that the current system excludes residents who dont have the time to contribute to the lengthy and archaic planning process, whereas under the reforms he said that local democracy and accountability would now be enhanced by technology and transparency.

Writing in The Sunday Telegraph last year, he insisted the reforms would place a higher regard on quality and design than ever before, drawing inspiration from the idea of design codes and pattern books that built Bath, Belgravia and Bournville. Mr Jenrick added: We are cutting red tape, but not standards.

In addition to concerns about electability, The Times also reported that the need for wholesale reform has been questioned after developers set new records for housebuilding, with the 244,000 homes built between 2019 and 2020 marking a nearly 30-year high.

A Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government spokesman said the department would not comment on speculation, adding: Our response to the consultation will be released in due course.

Additional reporting by PA
Greece's economy will grow 5.9% during 2021, far more than the original 3.6% estimate, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said Saturday.

Mitsotakis gave the keynote address at the Thessaloniki International Fair, where heads of government traditionally announce the coming year's economic policies.

Mitsotakis noted that despite there are about 70,000 more people employed than before despite the pandemic; 46,000 additional businesses, and bank savings increased by 35 billion euros ($41 billion), of which 20 billion ($23 billion) were from additional household savings.

The faster growth gave the prime minister the fiscal space to announce a range of tax reductions and spending targeted at young people, small businesses and the middle class. Small businesses are encouraged to merge with tax breaks and new entrants in the job market will be subsidized. There was even something for 15- to 17-year-olds who will be vaccinated, in the form of 50 gigabytes of free data for their smartphones.

Our announcements have one main goal: to increase households' disposable income, Mitsotakis said.

The prime minister put special emphasis on climate change.

This tragedy of overheating will be avoided only if the planet reduces (carbon) emissions to zero by 2050, he said, adding that his government will effect a swift transition away from the heavily polluting lignite, or brown coal, into renewable energy.

To help with the transition and also to counteract rising electricity prices, the government will set aside a 150 million-euro ($177 million) fund to help consumers absorb the price rises. In addition, about 24 billion euros ($28 billion) will be invested in environmentally-friendly projects, with the help of EU funds.

While Mitsotakis was touting the achievements of his government despite the pandemic emergency, around 3,500 people protested against vaccine mandates, especially for health workers, and other restrictions including the requirement for those who are not vaccinated to show coronavirus test results at certain places.

The protesters clashed with riot police near the venue, throwing firebombs, firecrackers and stones at police, who responded with tear gas and stun grenades and gave chase to the protesters. The clashes lasted about an hour, and there were four arrests.

There were also protest marches by unionists and the extreme left. Participants in the latter burned a U.S. and a European Union flag, as well as electricity bills, but there was no confrontation with police.

Police put the total number of protesters at 21,000.



Demetris Nellas reported from Athens
A Conservative minister has refused to apologise for swearing at the Stop Brexit Man during an altercation outside parliament.

Nigel Adams, the MP for Selby and Ainsty in North Yorkshire and a junior minister in the Foreign Office, was accosted by Steve Bray, a famous anti-Brexit campaigner, on Wednesday as he left the House of Commons.

When Mr Bray tried to draw Mr Adams into conversation about the new tax announced by the government to fund the NHS and social care, the MP said he wasnt interested in talking to an odd bloke with a top hat on chasing me down the street, a reference to Mr Brays eccentric blue and yellow EU-inspired costume.

When the Remainer persisted however, Mr Adams said: Why dont you talk to your MP and f**k off?

A video of the exchange, taken by a supporter of Mr Bray, was posted by the campaigner on Twitter later that day.

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But a spokesperson for the MP, who was first elected in 2010, said Mr Adams was unrepentant.

"Mr Bray has spent the last few years harassing, following and hurling abuse at elected Parliamentarians as well as interrupting journalists, preventing some from doing their job of reporting the news and conducting interviews, they said.

"Mr Adams remarks no doubt reflect those of many democratic representatives trying to deliver on the will of the people and others seeking to go about their business who have been harassed or had their work disrupted by this individual and his handful of followers."

Mr Bray, a 52-year-old coin dealer from Wales, has become famous for his longstanding anti-Brexit one-man-protest in Parliament Square.

Throughout the protracted Brexit Westminster drama from 2016, he continually interrupted TV interviews with politicians by bellowing Stop Brexit at the top of his voice and waving larger and larger placards in the background.

In the video with Mr Adams, he reacts with incredulity and outrage after the minister tells him to f**k off and of getting on my nerves.

Oh ok, this is a very nice MP, Mr Bray says, before accusing the MP of having too much to drink. Yet you can tell me to f**k off in the street?

Im annoying because I want to hold you to account, and you dont like it. Hang on a minute, Im a citizen of this country. We elect people like you, so were going to hold you to account.

Later, Mr Bray denied he harassed MPs and was simply trying to quiz them about their policies and votes in parliament.

"You should be able to ask an MP a question without being told where to go, he told BBC Radio York.

"This is at Parliament, its not as if Im on his doorstep at his house, this is the seat of power  if you write to these MPs, half of them dont reply.

"I dont harass MPs, I ask them questions and I like to think Im speaking for other people who cant be there to ask those questions."
People often ask: Where were you on 9/11?

For a generation, the day has acted as a marker: in an individual sense, but also in a collective one, by the nature of its inclusivity. Everyone remembers where they were, in the way that other generations recall the moment they learned of the assassination of president John F Kennedy.

Around 3,000 people were killed by al-Qaeda hijackers, who seized four passenger planes and flew them into World Trade Centres twin towers, the Pentagon, and a field in Pennsylvania.

Much of our memory of that day is centered on New York City, its familiar skyline ravaged by explosions and fireballs; of people falling to their deaths, and of vast buildings transformed into ash. We remember courageous firefighters rushing in to help as dust-caked New Yorkers watched in dazed horror.

The Independents New York correspondent David Usborne, having hurried to the scene, found himself among those running for safety when the towers fell that morning. At dawn the following day, he walked through the area that was being called ground zero. If I ever need to imagine what a nuclear hell must look like, I have seen it today, he wrote.

Yet the al-Qaeda attacks, like a dropped crystal wine glass shattering into a thousand splinters, reverberated globally. They certainly changed America, and its then president, George W Bush, who launched a so-called war on terror and green-lit the use of torture to try to counter the al-Qaeda militants. And they instantly affected the way we travel and board planes.

As our international correspondent Borzou Daragahi writes, one of the sharpest impacts was felt in the Middle East, where civilians watched the news, fearful the attack would prompt a rapid and overwhelming American military response. They were correct. Within a month, the US and its allies invaded Afghanistan, and later Iraq.

So while it is correct that we remember the 3,000 killed in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania  among them 70 Britons  it is essential, too, that we devote time to telling the stories of the hundreds of thousands killed in the military response that followed, be they families lost in the shock and awe bombing of Baghdad or a Pakistani teenager killed by a drone strike.

By doing so, we can connect their stories with those of the families who, every year, leave flowers and American flags alongside the names inscribed in the dark granite at the 9/11 Memorial Museum in Lower Manhattan.

A challenge for journalists trying to trace the arc of 9/11 is that the narrative is still moving. As defence correspondent Kim Sengupta reports from Afghanistan, 20 years later, the Taliban is once again in charge of Kabul. However, already we see young women protesters determined to stand up to the Talibans strictures, insistent that, for them, history will not simply play on a loop.

As the US made its final evacuation of troops and civilians from Afghanistan last month, Isis suicide bombers struck, underscoring the fact that the threat from terrorism remains largely unchecked. It was also striking that several of the US marines who were killed by the bomb alongside more than 100 Afghans were born in 2001. They were of the generation that grew up after 9/11, and yet even they are now part of its story.

(Andrew Buncombe)

... America

By Andrew Buncombe

Ellen Saracinis final words to her husband  and his to her  could not have been simpler: I love you. Saracinis husband, Victor Saracini, was a pilot with United Airlines, and that morning he was in the cockpit of UA flight 175 from Boston to Los Angeles. As everyone would later reflect, it started out as a stunning, cloudless, blue-sky day.

It was September and we had a pool in the back yard and the pool wasnt closed. He was telling me All right, remember to do this, remember to do that. He travelled all the time. I did that stuff all the time, she told a CBS reporter years later. His parting words and my parting words were, I love you.

The couple did not fight often, she said. And she was very glad they did not that morning, when he called her at their home in Lower Makefield Township in Pennsylvania. Saracini and his 65 passengers did not make it to Los Angeles, or to whatever they hoped the future held for them that day. Thirty minutes into the flight from Logan international airport, al-Qaeda hijackers stormed the cockpit, killed Saracini and the first officer, and took control of the Boeing jet. At 9.03am, they flew it into the south tower of the World Trade Centre in New York City.

 20 years of conflict and terror since 9/11

Of all the moments of horror and anguish that played out so publicly on 11 September 2001, first to the residents of Americas largest city and thence rapidly to the world, the attack on the south tower perhaps marked the moment people were forced to forgo any notion that this was anything other than a terror attack.

As it was, another hijacked plane, American Airlines flight 11, had already struck the north tower 17 minutes earlier. Yet amid the confusion, and in light of initial reports that the first incident had involved a much smaller plane, there was the perception  or the hope, at least  that it was an accident. When a second plane hit the south tower, any doubt disappeared. As Victors plane struck, we realised we were a nation at war, his widow tells The Independent.

Twenty years on, seeking to trace the shuddering impacts of the attacks, which involved four hijacked planes and killed around 3,000 Americans, is a challenge on many fronts. Partly that is because they affected people differently: the experience of someone watching on television in Omaha, Nebraska will have been different from that of any of the thousands of emergency responders and firefighters who rushed to the scene, gulping in toxic dust and smoke  some of which, even now, remains embedded in their bodies.

Then there is the fact that, even a generation on, the reverberations of the day are still being felt. It has affected domestic politics as well as the way in which America engages with the world. It was striking that several of the 13 US marines killed last month in a suicide attack at Kabul airport  among the last of more than 100,000 troops first dispatched to Afghanistan a month after 9/11  were born in 2001. They are part of a generation that has no where were you on 9/11 experience to recount.

Amid the grief, the desire for revenge by some was palpable (AFP via Getty Images)

The people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon

Some of the stuff is easy enough to narrate. Grieving, vulnerable and seeking revenge, the US rapidly responded with its military might. President George W Bush, bullhorn in hand as he toured the rubble of Lower Manhattan three days after the towers fell, vowed that the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon. His vice-president, Dick Cheney, warned that in pursuing al-Qaeda, America would have to operate on the dark side.

Within days, Congress, with a solitary no vote coming from Democratic congresswoman Barbara Lee, granted Bush the war-making powers that would allow him to order the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq. Bush took these powers and ran with them, launching what became known as the war on terror: not simply a series of military operations and a demand for vassalage from nations such as Pakistan  Youre either with us or youre against us  but a green light to torture for the CIA, and a network of bases and prisons outside the US, most notoriously Guantanamo Bay, where human rights and the rule of law mattered for little.

Hundreds of thousands of civilians, in countries ranging from Iraq to Libya, as well as thousands of US and coalition troops, lost their lives.

Congress passed other laws, too, with scant or little scrutiny, including the Patriot Act, which was used by the government to spy on its own citizens, very often Muslims, with minimal oversight. (In the following years, the New York City Police Department, which on 9/11 was under the control of mayor Rudy Giuliani, would pay out many thousands of dollars to settle lawsuits brought in respect of surveillance operations against Muslims.)

At the time, the vast majority of Americans supported what Bush did: his approval rating soared to 86 per cent, and Republican strategist Karl Rove would use the war on terror to ensure Bushs re-election three years later. Yet in many ways, the country did not feel any safer. In November 2001, American Airlines flight 587 crashed in the New York borough of Queens after taking off from JFK international airport. All 260 people on board were killed. A decade later, recalling the incident, the Associated Press reported that, despite the tragedy, once terrorism had been ruled out as the cause, the country breathed a sigh of relief.

Steel Standing

Antony Whittaker saw defiance and strength in the piece of wreckage (Antony Whittaker)

Antony Whitaker was among the thousands of New Yorkers who rushed to help that day. He was not a firefighter or a medic, but a specialist sent to the still-burning ruins by the utility company Con Edison to make safe live electrical wires that were exposed and sparking. Amid scenes he still finds hard to describe, there was something in particular that caught his eye: it was part of the south tower, the one into which UA flight 175 had been flown. Somehow, around 18 storeys of the building, or at least its steel frame, still stood.

Whitaker, now aged 57, says he could see the outline of the structure lit up by the arc lights being used by emergency teams. Somehow, amid the misery and death, that piece of battered debris projected a sense of defiance and even hope. As he says, it was literally steel still standing. A week later, Whitaker, who is also an artist, had the opportunity to go back and take a photograph, using his Canon EOS 620. A week after that, the structure was pulled down.

Whitaker, who has a son and lives in Harlem, used the photograph, which he called Steel Standing, as a vehicle through which to promote a message of unity. He raised funds for a foundation, and even helped push for the wearing of masks during the pandemic. He has presented copies of the photograph to everyone from Colin Powell, Bushs secretary of state, to Ban ki-Moon.

How does Whitaker think America has most changed since he took the image? The world  and America with it, he says  has shrunk. Social media has brought the opportunity to connect, but has also forced people to think about places such as Afghanistan in a way they did not in 2001. Were not as isolated as before, and I think thats a major thing, he says. [They were places] we wouldnt pay that much attention to. Today I think people pay a lot more attention, because of the potential terrorist situation.

George Bushs ratings soared after attacks and much of media became largely unquestioning in rush to war (Getty Images)

Whitaker, who is African American, says one aspect of America that has been too resilient is racism. Another constant  a positive one  is his belief that artists have a duty to respond, whether to events such as 9/11 or, a generation later, when rioters, some decked in the confederate flag, stormed the US Capitol. Art, he says, is the alchemy that transforms peoples experiences and presents them in a way that can be processed and considered: All tragedy has to be responded to artistically, he says.

There are reminders to all Americans that they need to watch what they say

In the first anguished days and weeks following the al-Qaeda assault, America often felt feverish. In New York, people posted Missing posters containing the hopeful and unknowing faces of loved ones lost in the twin towers, who in all likelihood were dead. At the Pentagon  and in the rural town of Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where the last of the hijacked planes came down  officials sought to locate and preserve any remaining piece of debris. Much had been turned to ash.

Quickly, the drums for war sounded  and there were unlikely cheerleaders. On David Lettermans Late Show, CBS journalist Dan Rather wept with the host, saying that he himself wanted to join the military. As Rather later conceded, such unquestioning patriotism did perhaps not best serve the country  let alone the media. It would later make it much easier for Bush to push for war in Iraq on false intelligence. Yet in the weeks and months after the attacks, few journalists questioned the governments actions, and even cartoonists who dared not to pursue a pro-war line found themselves in little demand by commissioning editors.

Comedians such as Bill Maher, who suggested that, whatever else one called the hijackers, they were not cowards, received a rebuke from White House spokesperson Ari Fleischer. There are reminders to all Americans that they need to watch what they say, watch what they do, he said from the briefing room podium. This is not a time for remarks like that. There never is.

We wanted to turn some tragedy into at least something good

Some Americans sought to learn more about the region of the world from where the attack against them had been launched, and wondered whether the USs own actions in the world had played some role in triggering the terrorists. Twenty years ago, Eugene Steuerle lost his wife Norma, a clinical psychologist, when the plane on which she was traveling  the hijacked American Airlines flight 77  was flown into the Pentagon.

A generation of Afghan girls has been educated since the 9/11 attacks (AFP via Getty Images)

On the same day, Joyce Manchester and David Stapleton lost four close friends, all members of the same family, who were on the plane. All of the passengers were killed, along with 125 people who had been at work at the Department of Defence headquarters. Steuerle, Manchester and Stapleton, all of them economists from Washington DC, wanted to identify a positive way to remember those they had lost.

In time, they established the Safer World Fund, which, with the help of the online crowdfunding platform Global Giving, raised and spent more than $2m on education for girls in Afghanistan and Pakistan. In August, the trio watched open-mouthed as the Taliban swept back to power in the country, threatening the work in which they had invested so much effort.

After [my wife] died, we came into this money that came out of a 9/11 fund, and my kids and I didnt really feel like we needed it, or necessarily deserved it, Steuerle says from Alexandria, Virginia. We werent being critical of others [who took the money]. He says that in additional to establishing a foundation in Alexandria, he worked with Stapleton and Manchester, whom he knew from economics forums, to turn some tragedy into at least something good.

Like many in Afghanistan itself, the three are now anxious as to whether their work will be permitted to continue. Either way, they have no regrets. Manchester says she was very disappointed and frustrated, and upset that [the takeover] happened so quickly, having expected  like many observers  that resistance to the Taliban might have been more stubborn. She adds: I will say, I believe that women and girls are better off, because theyve had the chance to be educated, and receive health care, and be out and about in the world.

If you have a lap top, take it out of your bag

The security staff who failed to stop the 19 al-Qaeda hijackers were privately contracted by individual airports. One of the most enduring changes triggered by the attacks was an overhaul of airline safety, and the creation of a new agency, the Transportation Security Agency (TSA). Nowadays it can come as a surprise to remember that baggage checks back then were cursory, and that passengers could carry on bottles, knives and even cigarette lighters in their hand luggage.

When flight UA Flight 175 struck South Tower we knew we were a nation at war says pilots widow (Getty Images)

The changes have been largely successful. Once common, the hijacking of planes has dwindled in the years since 2001. There have been no such incidents in the United States, according to charity the Aviation Safety Network. Manufacturers strengthened cockpit doors to make it harder for potential hijackers to access controls. They did so under pressure from campaigners, among them Ellen Saracini.

She was hosting a meeting for volunteers at her childrens school in Pennsylvania, when word reached them as to what was happening in New York. Somebody told her a small plane had flown into the north tower. Someone else said an American Airlines passenger plane was involved. So she cancelled the meeting and went home and saw it on TV.

At around 10.30am that day, she says, it was confirmed that her husband, a former navy aviator who loved his family and also loved to drive his Corvette and his motorcycle, had been killed. A week later, Saracini and her daughters, Brielle and Kirsten, attended a memorial mass for her husband, where the 51-year-old pilot received a US navy honour guard. At its conclusion, Saracini was handed a tightly folded US flag.

Ellen Saracini, with daughters Brielle, (L), and Kirsten, (R), in 2001 says final words to husband United Airlines pilot Victor Saracini were I love you (AFP via Getty Images)

She says she did not know then that she would dedicate herself to improving airline safety, or that the government, or the industry, would be so slow to act. It was only when she learned that cockpits were so vulnerable to being attacked  something she says airlines such as Israels El Al realised long ago, and acted to counter  that she launched a campaign that continues today.

In 2019, she was permitted some small cheer when Congress passed the Saracini Aviation Safety Act, requiring all new aircraft to be fitted with a second cockpit door. Yet Saracini says her work is not done. The 2019 law only applied to new aircraft; she says given the Federal Aviation Administration has acknowledged that cockpit doors remain vulnerable, all operating planes should be required to have a second door.

She is working with her congressman, Republican Brian Fitzpatrick, to push through a new measure. We can agree that September 11 changed the world. And there are things about September 11 that havent been answered yet, havent been disclosed, havent been protected again, she says. So thats my part of standing up to right the wrongs. And I wont stop. You know, the flight crews, Victors brothers and sisters, are still in the air flying. And theyve become my brothers and sisters. We cant leave them vulnerable up there.

... Afghanistan

By Kim Sengupta

The anniversary of 9/11 will be marked by the humiliating retreat of the US and UK from Afghanistan, the country their forces invaded in response to the New York attacks, and the triumphant return of the Taliban two decades after its rule was overthrown. The defeat was the result of US president Joe Bidens disastrous decision to carry out a hasty withdrawal of troops, which became a signal for the Islamists to launch their offensive, bringing about the swift collapse of the Afghan state.

Twenty years of hard-won gains in the country on a range of issues, including human rights  especially womens rights  are now under threat, with the Afghan people and society being dragged back under harsh, primitive and brutal Islamist rule. The narrative of the New Taliban, reformed and no longer like its predecessor, has been severely dented, with its first government drawn from members of the old regime or their sons: all male and all Pashtun, with every other community excluded.

Among their first acts, the Taliban have told working women to stay at home, banned women from taking part in sports, segregated education, banned music, and banned protest marches against these measures. People have sought to vote with their feet. The evacuation of those offered refuge abroad, a horrendously chaotic process, has seen an exodus of the skilled and the educated, while others, trapped, are seeking desperately to escape.

Afghans struggle to reach the foreign forces to show their credentials to flee the country outside the Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan (EPA)

There have been a series of arrests and disappearances, despite the Talibans assurances that they would not seek retribution against their opponents. One of the broader strategic reasons given by the Biden administration for the pullout  that the US would be better placed to counter the challenge from China and Russia without distractions in Afghanistan and the Middle East  has not stood up to its first test. Instead, Beijing and Moscow have been clear winners from the wests departure from Afghanistan, with both countries pledging to enlarge their footprints.

The new Taliban regime has declared that China will be its principal ally

A potent symbol of the influence of these new players is the plan to base Chinese troops and engineers at Bagram. US troops slunk away from the airbase, one of the centres of the wests counter-insurgency missions, without informing their Afghan allies.

Biden had originally chosen 9/11 as the symbolic date for the troops withdrawal. He was not to know, of course, that the ending would be so inglorious. But the US president seemed to be in denial as the scale of what was going on unfolded. I want to talk about happy things, man, Biden complained at the 4 July press conference when asked about rapid Taliban advances. Five days later, he declared, in answer to another Afghan question: The likelihood theres going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely.

The war need not have ended so embarrassingly for the US, or so painfully for the Afghans. The security presence for the last six years  around 2,400 Americans, just under a thousand from Nato and 750 from the UK  was an insurance against the insurgents as well as the elements of Pakistans military and its intelligence service, ISI, that fed and watered them.

This was thrown away by the Trump administration at the ineptly handled talks in Qatar that resulted in the shoddy Doha Agreement. Biden is now busy claiming that he inherited the bad deal from former president Donald Trump, despite the fact that throughout the US presidential campaign, he had repeatedly affirmed that he would not reverse the pullout decision.

But Biden had done nothing since getting to the White House about the repeated breaches of the agreement by the Taliban, which could have allowed the US to review its own position.

The US troops left before the end of August, with Biden refusing to extend the deadline for evacuation. This effectively meant that other countries had to end their airlift as well, as the airport could not be held without the American military. The result is that hundreds of those in danger from the Islamists had to be left behind and, at the moment, have little chance of getting out.

The evacuations ended with horrific violence: a suicide bombing by Isis-K that killed 170 people, including 13 US troops. The killings were a reminder that the Taliban are not the only violent Islamists in the country. The Haqqani network, now in government, has links with al-Qaeda. Isis-K has been carrying out massacres for the last few years, but their victims were Afghan and thus the group was only of passing interest to the west.

 Afghanistan: Who are ISIS-K ?

Biden may well find that abandoning Afghanistan does not actually take him to a happy place for long. The west has walked away from Afghanistan before, after using the mujahideen against the Russians. We know what happened then: from ungoverned space emerged terrorist camps, al-Qaeda, and 9/11.

The overthrow of Taliban rule following 9/11 was a time of great hope and expectation. Some of us who have been in Afghanistan in the last two months, witnessing the traumatic end of Americas longest war, were also there then, seeing the rebirth of a nation. Colour and light broke through the suffocating, joyless years of Islamist rule. There was music, shops opened, bright posters appeared, women threw off their hijabs. Girls schools and language schools sprang up, while modern subjects were introduced into colleges and universities.

People who had fled to Pakistan, Iran and further afield began to return to help rebuild the country. Osama bin Laden had fled to Pakistan after the Americans failed to kill or capture him in Tora Bora, as had the Taliban leadership. There was, at the time, an attempt by some in the Pakistani leadership to hold talks with the US and the UK, but they were rebuffed.

George W Bush assured the Afghans at the time, You can count on the United States: we shall be staying to ensure security. Tony Blair declared that this time we will not walk away, acknowledging what had happened after the mujahideens war with Russia. But the US and the UK walked away again, this time into the disaster of the Iraq war in 2003. Funds for reconstruction were switched over: thinly spread forces were denuded even further. The Taliban, backed by their Pakistani sponsors, moved back into the security vacuum, taking over rural districts and carrying out attacks in the cities.

American and British politicians appeared oblivious to what was happening. Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary at the time, told us in Mazar-e-Sharif that the war was over: The Taliban are finished, they are marginalised, they will have no future role to play in Afghanistan. In 2006, with the security situation fraying, the west and its allies were back in Afghanistan with the establishment of Isaf (the International Security Assistance Force). At the request of the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, British troops in Helmand were sent to small towns to set up bases, effectively challenging the Taliban to a fight.

US Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld (Reuters)

Soon Helmand was aflame, as was Kandahar next door where a Canadian force was now in place. The Americans were fighting elsewhere, and the French, Italians and Germans faced varying degrees of violence in the regions where they were based. The conflict spread across the country; there were troop surges under US generals David Petraeus and Stan McChrystal. Biden, as the then president Barack Obamas vice-president, was strongly opposed to sending in extra forces, but he lost the argument.

Biden visited Kabul to hector Karzai and other politicians on governance. He was right to do so. Massive amounts of international money had poured in, and corruption had become endemic, taking place on a massive scale in the senior ranks. The heroin trade was flourishing among politicians and warlords, often with the connivance of the Taliban. Huge garish buildings, narcotecture, sprang up in Kabul, some of them rented out to international organisations.

The war continued. The insurgents were driven out of areas they had occupied, but there were never enough troops to hold the ground. In any event, it was impossible to defeat an insurgency as long as it had sanctuary and support across the border. Isaf ended its military mission in 2013, with a relatively small force staying on. A stalemate had been reached, with the Taliban holding swathes of the countryside, while the government held cities and towns. Western casualties were minimal.

Then Trump, who had pledged to bring to troops home, began negotiations with the Taliban, excluding the Afghan government, and signed the Doha deal  which gave the Taliban virtually everything they wanted  and Biden went along with the withdrawal of forces, with the consequences we now see. Afghanistan, from where the 9/11 attacks were planned, has become the place, 20 years on, where the reputation of the US has become tarnished, leaving allies deeply worries and adversaries emboldened.

... the Middle East

By Borzou Daragahi

Like the rest of the world, the people of the Middle East and North Africa were mesmerised and horrified by the spectacle of 9/11 as they watched it unfold that Tuesday evening on their televisions. But even as the wreckage of the Twin Towers in lower Manhattan smouldered, they faced a unique terror.

American newspapers were decrying the attack as a day that would live in infamy, echoing US President Franklin D. Roosevelts call to arms after the 7 December 1941 Japanese attacks on Pearl Harbour. And very quickly, there was a fear that al Qaedas attack would prompt a muscular, potentially devastating American military response in the Middle East.

In Baghdad, as news of the attacks spread, shops and roadways emptied, and residents stayed inside their homes. I was traveling to my house, and nobody was moving on the groundthere were only security patrols, recalls one Iraqi who lives in the capital. Everybody was expecting an attack in seconds.

The dread was well-founded. Within hours of the 9/11 attacks, while he was still helping survivors of the wreckage at the Pentagon, then US Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld began agitating his underlings to come up with ways to link the attacks planned by Osama bin Laden to Iraq and others, according to notes taken by the aide and obtained by CBS News.

Go massive, the notes quote him as saying. Sweep it all up. Things related and not.

Lukman Faily, now Iraqs ambassador to Germany, was living in exile in the United Kingdom at the time and sensed right away that a day of reckoning had arrived. I know Americans and how America works and what happens if you are on the wrong side of them, he says in an interview. It was clear to me from day one that this was a Pearl Harbour moment. It was a Middle East moment.

Americans and the UK had already been regularly bombing Iraq since the 1991 Gulf War, meant to reverse President Saddam Husseins annexation of Kuwait. A punishing 1998 four-day bombing campaign codenamed Desert Fox had taken out much of Saddams air defences.

The newly elected Bush had brought on a clique of hawkish, ambitious Washington foreign policy fixtures obsessed with the Middle East and the Muslim world. They saw Iraq as a place to implement their vision. 9/11 becomes the Pearl Harbour that that group was looking for, that says now we can move against Iraq, the noted historian of war and war culture John W. Dower said in a lecture at MIT.

In the 18 months between the 9/11 and the ultimately disastrous 2003 US invasion and occupation, the dread only grew as US policymakers made tortured cases to the world trying to connect Saddam to 9/11 and to the secret accumulation of weapons of mass destruction.

French President Jacques Chirac, who had served as an officer in the French occupation of Algeria, urged President George W. Bush to stay away. Arab League secretary general Amr Moussa predicted that a US invasion would open the gates of hell. German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder warned the war would lead to the deaths of thousands of innocent children, women and men.

The quick, violent shock and awe invasion was compounded by the disastrous aftermath. Americans attempted to occupy and administer a nation they knew next to nothing about, and on the cheap. Looting continued for weeks. Fires burned. The entire Iraqi state unraveled, then collapsed after US viceroy Paul Bremer disbanded the Iraqi army, a flawed institution that nonetheless held the nation together.

Theres a firm understanding that it was not managed very well, says Faily, who also served as Baghdads envoy to Washington and has met with the senior US and Iraqi officials over the last 20 years. Reckless may not be the right word, but not really calculating. The Americans did not do their homework, and the Iraqis suffered from it.

No weapons of mass destruction were found. Bush finally admitted in 2006 that Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11 and his enablers never made a persuasive case that he had any operational ties to Al Qaeda.. But by then, Iraq had become a magnet for Al Qaeda, with a growing insurgency as well as a sectarian civil war.

The invasion by the West of an Arab land inspired jihadis from all over the world as well as angry Iraqis to take up arms against an occupier holed up behind fortresses made of blast walls and barbed wire. The incompetence and mismanagement left ungoverned spaces that allowed armed extremist groups to flourish, especially after the collapse of government control in neighbouring northern Syria gave birth to the Al Qaeda offspring, Isis, which prompted yet another war in Iraq.

A misbegotten and poorly planned war in response to an attack by al Qaeda cost tens of thousands of lives, and tragically, actually gave al Qaeda and its cousins far more potential recruits and spaces to grow.

Few Iraqis now care about 9/11, reflecting an apathy even resentment about the commemoration that is widespread throughout the Middle East and the Arab world. In Baghdad the big worries are getting enough electricity and water, as well as a recent spike in terrorism, including a suspected Isis attack near the northern city of Kirkuk last week that killed 13 people.

All I can say, says Heba Fahed, 34, a mother of four, is that on September 11, 2001, we were living much more safely and securely than today.

... American values

By Richard Hall

It was just four months after the September 11 attacks that the first prisoners arrived at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Some 20 prisoners from the battlefields of Afghanistan were led from a cargo plane in handcuffs, their faces and eyes covered, to a new kind of detention facility.

A photograph released a week later by the US navy of those same prisoners in distinctive orange jumpsuits, on their knees and watched over by their captors, would endure for years after. The number of prisoners would swell and the facility would become synonymous with torture, rendition and human rights abuses  those images were a potent symbol of it all, of a changing America, one that had forgotten its own values as it set out on a quest for vengeance.

Barack Obama summed up the feeling shared by many on the campaign trail in 2007, shortly before he won the presidency. In the dark halls of Abu Ghraib and the detention cells of Guantanamo, we have compromised our most precious values, he said.

The Bush administrations decision to use torture began with the capture of a man US officials described as the first high-value detainee of the War on Terror. Abu Zubaydah, a Palestinian national captured in Pakistan in March 2002, was said to have been a senior al-Qaeda operative  an accusation that later turned out to be false. He was accused of having information about future attacks against the US and so was handed over to the CIA. He would become the first person to face the enhanced interrogation techniques deployed by the CIA.

Waterboarding, sexual harassment and abuse, physical abuse and sleep deprivation were all approved by the US government for use against detainees. Guantanamo Bay became the lightning rod for the torture programme, but most of the abuses took place at so-called CIA black sites around the world  secret jails outside the rule of law. Some 50 sites in 28 countries were thought to have been used for the programme.

Most of the torure took place behind closed doors in these highly secretive sites, but the world was given an insight into the kind of abuses taking place in US jails overseas with the explosion of the Abu Ghraib scandal in May 2004. The jail outside Baghdad had been a notorious torture centre under Saddam Hussein, and became so again when the invading US forces reopened the facility to hold captured fighters and terror suspects.

Former prisoners first alleged serious abuses by US forces in 2003. Investigations were launched quietly and charges were filed against the perpetrators, before images of the abuses were leaked to The Washington Post the next year. They revealed US soldiers engaged in the dehumanising abuse of detainees. Prisoners were stripped naked and photographed piled on top of each other. They were covered in human excrement and set upon by dogs, while US soldiers stood alongside them and smiled for the camera.

The war on terror became synonymous with torture. The initial outpouring of sympathy for the US following the 11 September attacks began to fade as the excesses of that global campaign began to take hold. According to Pew Research, a median of 50 per cent across surveyed nations said the US torture programme against suspected terorrists was not justified, while only 35 per cent said it was.

At home in the US, it was a different story. Opinion polls found significant support among Americans for the kind of interrogation and torture used by the CIA around the world in pursuit of terror suspects. In a Pew Research poll in July 2004, 43 per cent of Americans agreed that the torture of suspected terrorists to gain important information is often or sometimes justified  that number has now grown to a slight majority.

The 9/11 attacks also led to a shift in Americas values regarding liberty and the relationship of citizens with the state. The share of Americans who believed it was necessary for the average person to give up civil liberties in order to curb terrorism rose from 39 per cent in 1997 to 55 per cent in 2002, according to Pew Research. The attacks also changed how Americans treated each other. Islamophobia spiked across the US in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, and hate crimes against Muslims rose by 500 per cent between 2000 and 2009, according to data from Brown University.

The US torture programme was consistently justified by its defenders, inside and outside government, as a necessary evil and a strategy to balance the security of US citizens and the values that they hold dear. But it later became clear that the underlying premise of those extraordinary measures  that they provided actionable intelligence that saved American lives  was flawed.

A Senate report on the programme, released in 2014, found that it was more brutal and far less effective than the CIA had claimed. Senate intelligence committee chair Dianne Feinstein said that torture regularly resulted in fabricated information and that the CIA was often unaware the information was fabricated. In a summary of the findings, she said that the torture programme had been found to be morally, legally and administratively misguided.

As the years went by, prisoners who were held for years without charge at Guantanamo Bay were quietly released or transferred to third countries. Many of them were never convicted.

By the time of the release of the torture report, the perception that the US had abandoned its principles in the quest for revenge was no longer controversial. Addressing the findings of the report, Senator John McCain, who was tortured by the North Vietnamese after his plane was shot down during the Vietnam war, echoed the words of his former opponent, Barack Obama: But in the end, tortures failure to serve its intended purpose isnt the main reason to oppose its use. I have often said, and will always maintain, that this question isnt about our enemies: its about us. Its about who we were, who we are and who we aspire to be. Its about how we represent ourselves to the world, he told the Senate floor

"We have made our way in this often dangerous and cruel world, not by just strictly pursuing our geopolitical interests, but by exemplifying our political values, and influencing other nations to embrace them. When we fight to defend our security we fight also for an idea, not for a tribe or a twisted interpretation of an ancient religion or for a king, but for an idea that all men are endowed by the Creator with inalienable rights. How much safer the world would be if all nations believed the same. How much more dangerous it can become when we forget it ourselves even momentarily.

... The GOP

By Eric Garcia

In the summer of 2001, US president George W Bushs administration considered allowing more than 3 million undocumented immigrants from Latin American countries to secure legal status in the United States.

But when terrorists attacked the United States at the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, and had their plot thwarted in Pennsylvania, it changed the trajectory of how the Bush administration and the Republican Party would approach immigration. In the 20 years following 9/11, the Republican Partys response would change the makeup of its party coalition, and subsequent events would fundamentally alter the party into becoming more nativist and exclusionary towards immigrants, all culminating in the current iteration of the GOP.

Julian Zelizer, a professor of history at Princeton University, says that 9/11 in some ways proved politically beneficial for Republicans, as it led to increasing electoral success for the GOP and solidified their majorities in Congress. In 2002, Republicans broke the traditional trend of the party in power losing seats when it gained seats in both the house and the Senate. It did so largely by portraying Democrats as being soft on national security. Perhaps most infamously, in Georgia, Saxby Chambliss beat Sen Max Cleland, who had lost both his legs and his right forearm serving in Vietnam, largely on the back of an ad that opened with Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.

The election also marked the final chapter of the Republicans takeover in southern states, which had begun in the 1960s and accelerated in earnest in the 1980s, as they won over the remaining white formerly Democratic voters, defeating incumbent Democrats in states like South Carolina, Georgia and Alabama. Democrats have since failed to win governorships in any of these states.

The sorting of the parties, which was under way in 2001, is now complete, says John Pitney, a professor at Claremont McKenna College. Mr Pitney adds that the party has become far more conservative: There are no liberals in the Republican Party. But after Mr Bushs re-election in 2004, American dissatisfaction with the war in Iraq would lead to Barack Obamas election. Mr Obama, who was a Democrat, frequently criticised the war, saying the United States took our eye off the ball. Mr Obama would also later order the operation that killed Bin Laden.

In turn, Donald Trumps campaign in 2015 vocally criticised the war in Iraq and frequently used it as a point to knock Mr Bushs brother Jeb Bush, who was his opponent for the GOP nomination. Politicians learn right away that they can openly question what was hereto seen as Republican doctrine, says Suhail Khan, who served in the Bush administration. And not only that, but they can succeed And there was an appetite to reassess and withdraw with some degree from these military forays.

Similarly, Mr Zelizer notes that the GOP response to 9/11 bred an appetite for the nativism within the Republican Party that would animate its members.

While Mr Bush supported immigration reform, his administration also created the Department of Homeland Security, and would face a revolt from the party in trying to find a path to legalisation for undocumented workers. In 2007, his proposed legislation, which would have offered legal status to undocumented immigrants, died in the Senate, with all but 12 Republicans voting against it. Sen Jeff Sessions of Alabama was one of the leading voices against the legislation, and when it failed he told The New York Times that supporters wanted to pass the bill before Rush Limbaugh could tell the American people what was in it.

Eventually, Donald Trumps administration would use the Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department, now led by Mr Sessions, to implement some of his most draconian measures on the US-Mexico border, such as the so-called zero-tolerance policies and the separation of families.

Similarly, while Mr Trump at least rhetorically rejected the concepts of the war on terror, such as nation-building in Iraq and Afghanistan, he capitalised on the growing nativism within the party. In the days following the terrorist attacks, Mr Bush was quick to say that the United States was not at war with Islam, a claim repeated by Mr Obama after the Bin Laden raid. But during that time, Mr Trump, then a reality television star, hinted that Mr Obamas birth certificate might reveal that the president himself was a Muslim.

Mr Trump would go further when he ran for president in 2015, calling for a ban on Muslims entering the United States and saying he thought Islam hated the United States. But he could not have found much cache if there hadnt already been fomenting anti-Muslim sentiment within the GOP. In the months after 9/11, the Pew Research Centre found that Republicans were only slightly more likely than Democrats to say that Islam encourages violence more than other religions. But that proportion would mushroom over the years.

When Mr Trump became president, he implemented a travel ban from countries with large Muslim populations, and repeatedly attacked Muslim members of Congress.

But while the GOP was almost entirely unified on how to confront the terrorist attacks on 9/11, it has been left split in the wake of the 6 January would-be insurrection. On that day, Rudy Giuliani, who after 9/11 was hailed as Americas mayor by the media, addressed a crowd of Trump supporters in support of what he called trial by combat, shortly before they raided the Capitol in an attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Meanwhile, Rep Liz Cheney  the daughter of Dick Cheney, who was vice-president in 2001  voted to impeach Mr Trump for inciting the insurrection. Mr Giuliani is still widely welcomed within the party; Ms Cheney has been all but exiled.

... Travel

By Sunshine Flint

Gone were the Gothic arches at the base of the towers that echoed the ones in stone on the Brooklyn Bridge; gone was the steel tracery that drew a bow across the bridges soaring strings from the tip of Manhattan  a favourite tableau for snap-happy tourists, until that day. Gone were the red carpets in the lobbies where visitors took express lifts to the Top of the World observatory on the 107th floor of the south tower, or to a glamorous lunch at Windows on the World in the north tower, a restaurant so lofty that diners gazed at the curve of the earth from their table. The mourning was for the lives lost, of course, not for a tourist destination. But the destruction of these icons created a massive shock that was felt around the world.

In the immediate aftermath, that shock generated a massive change across all aspects of travel, most obviously seen in aviation and airport security. August 2001 had seen a record high of 65.4 million airline passengers. It took nearly three years for air travel to rebound, with that number being surpassed only in July 2004. Those passengers faced a very different experience from what the flying public had known before. Immediately, security lines at the airport became hours long, while the creation of the Transportation Security Administration in the US codified a way of flying that is now the norm.

Travellers today doff their shoes and jackets at security, pack no more than 100ml of liquid in their carry-ons, endure invasive pat-downs and enhanced body-scanners, all as a matter of course. Surveillance and tight visa restrictions are de rigueur, and international passengers flying into JFK and other US airports have their fingerprints placed on file and are subjected to more questioning by customs and immigration agents. Air travel was transformed, practically overnight, into something frustration-filled and complicated.

Meanwhile, in New York, nearly every institution, sporting event and cultural site had to rethink its security operations, from installing metal detectors and using bomb-sniffing dogs to banning water bottles. Some, like the Statue of Liberty, closed for years, while others, like the Metropolitan Museum of Art, reopened almost immediately, directed by the city to be open as a place of solace to New Yorkers.

We reopened on the Thursday morning, says John Barelli, chief security officer at the museum from 1986 to 2015 and author of Stealing the Show: A History of Art and Crime in Six Thefts. We always had enough staff covering our entrances and galleries, we just retrained them. We instituted bag checks and electronic wanding at the entrances, for metal and weapons, at the three public entrances, and inspected every vehicle coming into the public garage. We did a lot more with the CCTV. Like other major institutions, the museum also started receiving regular briefings from the FBI and NYPDs Joint Terrorism Task Force.

Airport security ramped up in the wake of 9/11 (Getty Images)

Hotels had to make similar security assessments. Hotels had drills with the task force and the FBI, and ramped up security in their lobbies, with some of the larger ones installing metal detectors, recalls Vijay Dandapani, president and CEO of the Hotel Association of New York City. The detectors were scrapped quickly as hotels realised they sent the wrong message to guests about the safety of the city.

Air travel was transformed, practically overnight, into something frustration-fuelled and complicated

But as New York recovered, with its new security measures in place, fewer international tourists were there to see it. In 2000, there were more than 35 million visitors to New York City and, of those, 6.8 million were international tourists. In 2002 that number declined to 5.1 million and didnt reach pre-2001 levels again until 2006.

International visitors are incredibly important to New Yorks tourism industry, with the four top countries of origin being China, the UK, Brazil and France. Crucially, they spend more than domestic tourists. While international travellers account for 20 per cent of visitors, they account for 50 per cent of spending, says Christopher Heywood, EVP of global communications for NYC & Company. They stay longer and they spend more while theyre here.

In 2006, the Bloomberg administration and the city made a big push for travel and tourism, and NYC & Company opened offices around the world and launched global campaigns promoting the city. We now have 17 international outposts and we highlight all five boroughs, says Heywood. Travel to all of them went up, particularly to Brooklyn and also Queens.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art reopened to provide solace for New Yorkers (Getty Images)

Two decades later, the numbers have not only rebounded, but in 2019 the city had an all-time record high of 66.6 million visitors, 13.5 million of whom were international  double the 2000 numbers. Hotels also had a record 129,000 rooms in March 2020 and occupancy was at nearly 90 per cent, compared with the 9/11 dip to 65 per cent. International visitors make up 25 per cent of our guests, and UK guests make up the largest percentage of revenue in that group, says Dandapani.

As the city recovered, new hotels staked out territory across Manhattan. Firmdale Hotels opened the Crosby Street Hotel in 2009 in SoHo, its first in New York. By the time we started that project, New York had bounced back, in particular downtown and SoHo, says Craig Markham, director. We always felt that it would be the perfect location for our first New York hotel, with its neighbourhood style similar to our London hotels.

Hotels also opened across the river in Williamsburg, downtown Brooklyn and Queens, cool boroughs that foreign travellers wanted to explore. The international market as a general rule is more intrepid than domestic travellers, says Heywood. They want to get on public transport and go deep into Brooklyn, to Coney Island, to the Rockaways. The Brits in particular are adventurous and want to explore the city.

Now we need the resilience that got us through 9/11 and rebuilt our city

But underneath the record number of visitors, new hotel openings and discoverable neighbourhoods, a permanent change has come to the city. Some of it is visible, like the signs on the subway  If you see something, say something, and Si ve algo, diga algo  but some is less so, like the increased surveillance by intelligence and police. But the biggest change is the feeling that New York and New Yorkers will always have to live with the threat of terrorism and terrorist attacks. Polls over the last decade show that terrorism fears havent waned, and have even gone up at times.

Today, with Covid and the global pandemic, the citys tourism has taken a harder hit than it did after 11 September. A number of hotels have permanently closed, reducing the number of rooms by 20,000; Broadway went dark for 18 months; Midtown restaurants are empty.

We were the epicentre of Covid in the US and it just wiped out tourism in New York, says Heywood. Now we need the resilience that got us through 9/11 and rebuilt our city.

But if 9/11 proved anything, its that New York will always be a place for travellers and tourists. And that, while its tragedies are a matter of fact, it remains an outward-looking city, a seaward-facing city  lamp lifted in perpetual and enduring welcome.
The remains of three Marines who were among the 13 US service members killed in the Kabul Airport attack by Isis-K last month have been returned to their home states of Texas, Nebraska, and Wyoming.

At least 169 Afghans also died in the attack on 26 August.

Thousands lined the streets of Omaha, Nebraska to pay their respects as the hearse carrying the remains of 23-year-old Corporal Daegan Page rolled through the city, The Omaha World-Herald reported.

Omaha residents honoured the Marine as the vehicle travelled from Epply Airfield to Braman mortuary after arriving from Dover Air Force Base in Delaware where President Joe Biden attended the dignified transfer of the remains of the 13 service members.

Cpl Pages remains landed at Epply Airfield at around 1.20pm on Friday, the paper reported.

Omaha, you never looked better, the family said in a statement. It was an amazing honour to bring Daegan home to the open arms of his hometown today.

We wish we could have stopped and thanked every person who took time out of their day to pay their respects, they added. We saw you all.

Dean Mathisen, a U.S. Army veteran, salutes, as Omaha Fire and Police Department officials raise an American Flag before Marine Cpl. Daegan Page's procession passes by (AP)

The plane carrying the remains of Lance Corporal David Lee Espinoza, 20, landed in Laredo, Texas at 2.32pm on Friday, The Laredo Morning Times reported.

He was greeted by his family along with Bishop James Tomayo of the Roman Catholic Diocese, who marked the solemn moment with a prayer.

Constantina Cantu watched the motorcade go past.

Just like the mother of this young man, I am a mother as well, and this is very sad to see, she told the paper. We see that these young people go leave their homes because they want to serve, and unfortunately some lose their lives during these deployments.

I also brought my child to look and see how a true hero  because he truly was a hero  is returned back home, she added.

This afternoon is one to remember, Laredo resident Priscilla Pantoja told the paper. Men and women, boys and girls of all ages flooded the sidewalks in a sea of American flags. You could feel the outpouring of love from the entire community as we anxiously awaited the arrival of our local American hero. It was quite an emotional moment to see the procession go by. Our hearts are only full of pride and gratitude toward this young man.

The feeling was so surreal, but the feelings of everyone around you could be felt so strongly, Scott Roberts, a father of a former Marine, added. I had some time to reflect on what the mother must be feeling at this moment, and it reminded me of how my wife and I felt during every deployment our son had during his time with the US Marine Corps.

Thousands also lined the streets of Jackson, Wyoming to honour Lance Corporal Rylee McCollum, 20, according to WyoFile. Police estimated that between 7,000 and 10,000 people came out.

Lance Cpl McCollum was from Bondurant in western Wyoming. He was met at the Jackson Hole airport by his family and elected officeholders, Jackson Hole News and Guide reported.

The plane carrying the Lance Corporal landed at 4.07pm on Friday.

Graduating High School in 2019, he was about to become a father and had recently been married when he was killed in Afghanistan.
A man who was killed by a US drone strike in Kabul may have been targeted as the result of faulty intelligence, and may not have been carrying a bomb as the Pentagon alleged, according to an in-depth visual investigation of the strike.

US officials initially said a drone followed the car, thought to be carrying explosives and posing a threat to US forces at Kabul airport, for hours before striking it on 29 August.

But The New York Times reported on Friday that analysis of video footage and interviews at the site of the drone attack suggest that the vehicle may not have been carrying a bomb.

The paper also said that there are doubts that the driver of the car had any connection to Isis-K and whether a second explosion occurred after the missile hit the vehicle, as suggested by the US military.

Military officials have said that when the missile was fired, they didnt know the identity of the driver of the vehicle. But they thought he was suspicious because of what he had done during that day. He could have visited an Isis-K safe house, officials posited. He loaded something into the car that officials thought could have been explosives.

According to The New York Times, the family of the driver said Zemari Ahmadi worked for a US aid group and had no links to any terror group.

Using CCTV footage from a number of locations, the newspaper suggested that his movements on that day consisted of driving coworkers from to and from the workplace. Video footage that the US military may have relied on shows Mr Ahmadi and a colleague putting what could be water containers into the vehicle.

The US military has said that three civilians could have been killed, but The New York Times suggest that the number could have been as high as ten, including seven children.

Emal Ahmadi shows a photo of his family member who was killed during a US drone strike on their home (AP)

Mr Ahmadi, 43, an electrical engineer, had worked for Nutrition and Education International (NEI) since 2006. The aid group is based in California.

According to the report, Mr Ahmadi received a phone call from his boss at around 0845 local time [1245 GMT] on 29 August, asking him to pick up his laptop.

I asked him if he was still at home, and he said yes, the country director told The New York Times at the groups office in Kabul. Mr Ahmadis coworkers asked to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals for working for an organisation with US connections.

Relatives said Mr Ahmadi left for work around 0900 [1300 GMT] on the morning of the strike in a white Toyota Corolla. The vehicle was owned by NEI. Mr Ahmadi lived a few kilometres west of Kabul Airport in a house with his three brothers as well as their families.

According to The Times, US officials said it was at this point that the white Sedan first came under their purview as the vehicle left a compound that was seen as an alleged Isis safe house, located about five kilometres northwest of Kabul Airport. Its not clear if the American officials were speaking about one of the three stops he made on his way to his workplace  picking up two passengers and his bosss laptop.

The home of the country director of NEI is close to where a rocket attack that Isis said they were behind would be launched towards the airport the next morning. The rocket was launched from the trunk of a Toyota Corolla, the same model as that of Mr Ahmadis vehicle.

The country director told The Times in his home that his family had lived in the house for 40 years.

We have nothing to do with terrorism or Isis, he told the paper. We love America. We want to go there, the country director, who has a US resettlement case, added.

The drone tracked Mr Ahmadis car during the day, and US officials have said that they picked up communications between the car and an alleged Isis safe house and that the driver was instructed to stop several times.

But the passengers say that it was just a regular workday. Following a breakfast pit stop, the trio arrived at the NEI office. Surveillance footage shows them arriving at around 0935.

Mr Ahmadi later drove coworkers to a police station taken over by the Taliban. They say they visited the station to ask for permission to give out food to refugees in a park.

Mr Ahmadi and the three passengers in the vehicle got back to the office at around 1400.

Surveillance footage shows Mr Ahmadi emerging from the building around 30 minutes later with a water hose, filling some water containers with the help of a guard. Coworkers say he had been bringing water home from the office as water deliveries had ceased when the Afghan government fell.

I filled the containers myself, and helped him load them into the trunk, the guard told The Times. The guard and a coworker moved the vehicle further into the driveway at 1538, with the surveillance footage coming to an end soon afterwards as the office turned off its generator at the end of the workday. Mr Ahmadi drove home along with three passengers.

US officials have said that at this point, the drone had followed Mr Ahmadi to a compound that was between eight and 12 kilometres southwest of Kabul airport  matching the location of the NEI office. US officials have said that it was at this point that they saw Mr Ahmadi load heavy items into the car along with three others. They thought the packages could be explosives.

Passengers say that the only items in the car were two laptops and plastic water containers.

One of the passengers told The Times that Mr Ahmadi kept the radio off to avoid the ire of the Taliban. He liked happy music. That day, we couldnt play any in the car, the coworkers told the paper.

After ferrying his three passengers home, Mr Ahmadi started driving back to his own place near the airport. I asked him to come in for a bit, but he said he was tired, the last passenger in the car with Mr Ahmadi said.

US officials said that at this time, they were certain that the vehicle was a threat to US forces at the airport.

The tactical commander made the decision to strike the car as Mr Ahmadi drove into his home courtyard, which was a different building than the alleged Isis safe house, US officials said.

The missile was launched around 1650. US officials said that the operator of the drone made the assessment with reasonable certainty that no women, children, or non-combatants would be killed in the strike.

But Mr Ahmadis relatives said that his children and his brothers children came outside to see Mr Ahmadi when he got back home. The car engine was still running when the blast sent shattered window glass into the ground floor of the house.

Because there were secondary explosions, there is a reasonable conclusion to be made that there was explosives in that vehicle, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen Mark Milley, said last week.

But The Times reported that there was no evidence of a second explosion.

The US military has said that three civilians died, but Mr Ahmadis relatives said 10 members of their family were killed, seven of them children. The victims, apart from Mr Ahmadi, ranged from two to 30 years old.

Mr Ahmadis brother Emal told The Times: All of them were innocent.

You say he was Isis, but he worked for the Americans, he said.

Responding to questions about the report, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said US Central Command continues to assess the results of the airstrike in Kabul on August 29.

We wont get ahead of that assessment. However, as we have said, no other military works harder than we do to prevent civilian casualties. Additionally, as chairman Milley said, the strike was based on good intelligence, and we still believe that it prevented an imminent threat to the airport and to our men and women that were still serving at the airport, he added.
The state of Arizona has sold off $93m in Unilver bonds because Ben & Jerrys stopped selling its ice cream in Israeli-occupied territories.

Arizona is the first of 35 states with Israeli anti-boycott laws to make the move, and officials also plan on selling the remaining $50m it has invested in the consumer products company.

The ice cream company, which is based in Vermont and has an independent board, announced in July that maintaining its presence in the occupied territories as inconsistent with our values.

Unilever, which is based in London and says it has never supported any boycotts of Israel, says that Ben & Jerrys is free to make its own decision on the companys social mission.

Arizona treasurer Kimberly Yee announced last week that officials had to take action under a 2019 state law that prevented government agencies from holding investments or doing more than $100,000 in business with any company that boycotted Israel or its territories.

Officials in Illinois and Florida have also warned Ben & Jerrys that they will take similar action.

Ben & Jerrys decision was condemned by Israel, which said that it would act aggressively and urged governors to punish the company under the anti-boycott laws.

Ms Yee, a Republican who is running for governor, wrote to Unilvers investor relations department earlier this month warning them of the sell-off.

I gave Unilever PLC, the parent company of Ben & Jerrys, an ultimatum: reverse the action of Ben & Jerrys or divest itself of Ben & Jerrys to come into compliance with Arizona law or face the consequences. They chose the latter, she said.

Arizonas law was first introduced in 2016, and revised in 2019 with bi-partisan support and signed by Governor Doug Ducey.

Arizona will not do business with a company that boycotts Israel  in 2016 and 2019, I signed bills to make sure of it. Arizona stands with Israel, he tweeted.

The head of J Street, a pro-Israel organisation in Washington DC that supports a two-state solution, said punishing the company was a gravely dangerous move.

Its not anti-semitic to criticise Israeli policy or to not sell ice cream in illegal settlements,President Jeremy Ben-Ami tweeted in July.

Its actually a truly pro-Israel decision.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
A judge killed himself moments before he was to have been arrested on allegations he had a hidden camera that captured images of naked boys in his bathroom.

Jonathan Newell, 50, had been on leave from his role as a circuit judge in Marylands Caroline County since July after allegations were made against him.

When FBI agents arrived at his home in Henderson, Maryland, on Friday morning to arrest him on a federal criminal complaint they found him suffering from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound.

The Maryland US Attorneys Office confirmed that the judge had been pronounced dead at 6.43am.

Maryland State Police will lead the investigation into the apparent suicide, prosecutors said in a statement.

A neighbour, Kimberly Keith, posted on Facebook that FBI agents had been stationed outside the judges home, demanding over a loudspeaker for him to come out.

She stated that gunshots had been heard and an ambulance arrived shortly after.

Prosecutors were set to charge Mr Newell on federal charges of exploitation of a child.

The criminal complaint, which was unsealed on Friday, stated that Maryland State Police had been called in July after a minor boy claimed to have found the video camera in the bathroom of the judges cabin.

Investigators interviewed two boys, both minors, who said they had found the hidden camera as they spent the night at the cabin with Mr Newell.

One of the boys told investigators that he was undressing in the bathroom when he saw that the camera was on and facing the shower in a corner of the room.

(Maryland.gov)

The boys reported the incident to their parents, who contacted law enforcement, the complaint states.

Mr Newell denied knowing anything about the camera, and said that another adult male and four boys had used the cabin the day before.

But when being interviewed, Mr Newell allegedly chewed and swallowed a camera memory card, and a CT scan later showed he had ingested a foreign object, according to the complaint.

When authorities carried out searches of Mr Newells cabin, home and office they seized multiple digital devices, including a hard drive they allege contained multiple videos of young men showering, dating back to September 2014.

Mr Newell, a Republican, was appointed as a judge by Maryland Governor Larry Hogan in 2016, and started a 15-year term in 2018.
Ellen Saracinis final words to her husband  and his to her  could not have been simpler: I love you. Saracinis husband, Victor Saracini, was a pilot with United Airlines, and that morning he was in the cockpit of UA flight 175 from Boston to Los Angeles. As everyone would later reflect, it started out as a stunning, cloudless, blue-sky day.

It was September and we had a pool in the back yard and the pool wasnt closed. He was telling me All right, remember to do this, remember to do that. He travelled all the time. I did that stuff all the time, she told a CBS reporter years later. His parting words and my parting words were, I love you.

The couple did not fight often, she said. And she was very glad they did not that morning, when he called her at their home in Lower Makefield Township in Pennsylvania. Saracini and his 65 passengers did not make it to Los Angeles, or to whatever they hoped the future held for them that day. Thirty minutes into the flight from Logan international airport, al-Qaeda hijackers stormed the cockpit, killed Saracini and the first officer, and took control of the Boeing jet. At 9.03am, they flew it into the south tower of the World Trade Centre in New York City.

Of all the moments of horror and anguish that played out so publicly on 11 September 2001, first to the residents of Americas largest city and thence rapidly to the world, the attack on the south tower perhaps marked the moment people were forced to forgo any notion that this was anything other than a terror attack.

As it was, another hijacked plane, American Airlines flight 11, had already struck the north tower 17 minutes earlier. Yet amid the confusion, and in light of initial reports that the first incident had involved a much smaller plane, there was the perception  or the hope, at least  that it was an accident. When a second plane hit the south tower, any doubt disappeared. As Victors plane struck, we realised we were a nation at war, his widow tells The Independent.

Twenty years on, seeking to trace the shuddering impacts of the attacks, which involved four hijacked planes and killed around 3,000 Americans, is a challenge on many fronts. Partly that is because they affected people differently: the experience of someone watching on television in Omaha, Nebraska will have been different from that of any of the thousands of emergency responders and firefighters who rushed to the scene, gulping in toxic dust and smoke  some of which, even now, remains embedded in their bodies.

Then there is the fact that, even a generation on, the reverberations of the day are still being felt. It has affected domestic politics as well as the way in which America engages with the world. It was striking that several of the 13 US marines killed last month in a suicide attack at Kabul airport  among the last of more than 100,000 troops first dispatched to Afghanistan a month after 9/11  were born in 2001. They are part of a generation that has no where were you on 9/11 experience to recount.

 9/11 survivors remember

The people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon

Some of the stuff is easy enough to narrate. Grieving, vulnerable and seeking revenge, the US rapidly responded with its military might. President George W Bush, bullhorn in hand as he toured the rubble of Lower Manhattan three days after the towers fell, vowed that the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon. His vice-president, Dick Cheney, warned that in pursuing al-Qaeda, America would have to operate on the dark side.

Within days, Congress, with a solitary no vote coming from Democratic congresswoman Barbara Lee, granted Bush the war-making powers that would allow him to order the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq. Bush took these powers and ran with them, launching what became known as the war on terror: not simply a series of military operations and a demand for vassalage from nations such as Pakistan  Youre either with us or youre against us  but a green light to torture for the CIA, and a network of bases and prisons outside the US, most notoriously Guantanamo Bay, where human rights and the rule of law mattered for little.

Amid the grief, the desire for revenge by some was palpable (AFP via Getty Images)

Hundreds of thousands of civilians, in countries ranging from Iraq to Libya, as well as thousands of US and coalition troops, lost their lives.

Congress passed other laws, too, with scant or little scrutiny, including the Patriot Act, which was used by the government to spy on its own citizens, very often Muslims, with minimal oversight. (In the following years, the New York City Police Department, which on 9/11 was under the control of mayor Rudy Giuliani, would pay out many thousands of dollars to settle lawsuits brought in respect of surveillance operations against Muslims.)

At the time, the vast majority of Americans supported what Bush did: his approval rating soared to 86 per cent, and Republican strategist Karl Rove would use the war on terror to ensure Bushs re-election three years later. Yet in many ways, the country did not feel any safer. In November 2001, American Airlines flight 587 crashed in the New York borough of Queens after taking off from JFK international airport. All 260 people on board were killed. A decade later, recalling the incident, the Associated Press reported that, despite the tragedy, once terrorism had been ruled out as the cause, the country breathed a sigh of relief.

Steel Standing

Antony Whittaker saw defiance and strength in the piece of wreckage (Antony Whittaker)

Antony Whitaker was among the thousands of New Yorkers who rushed to help that day. He was not a firefighter or a medic, but a specialist sent to the still-burning ruins by the utility company Con Edison to make safe live electrical wires that were exposed and sparking. Amid scenes he still finds hard to describe, there was something in particular that caught his eye: it was part of the south tower, the one into which UA flight 175 had been flown. Somehow, around 18 storeys of the building, or at least its steel frame, still stood.

Whitaker, now aged 57, says he could see the outline of the structure lit up by the arc lights being used by emergency teams. Somehow, amid the misery and death, that piece of battered debris projected a sense of defiance and even hope. As he says, it was literally steel still standing. A week later, Whitaker, who is also an artist, had the opportunity to go back and take a photograph, using his Canon EOS 620. A week after that, the structure was pulled down.

Whitaker, who has a son and lives in Harlem, used the photograph, which he called Steel Standing, as a vehicle through which to promote a message of unity. He raised funds for a foundation, and even helped push for the wearing of masks during the pandemic. He has presented copies of the photograph to everyone from Colin Powell, Bushs secretary of state, to Ban ki-Moon.

How does Whitaker think America has most changed since he took the image? The world  and America with it, he says  has shrunk. Social media has brought the opportunity to connect, but has also forced people to think about places such as Afghanistan in a way they did not in 2001. Were not as isolated as before, and I think thats a major thing, he says. [They were places] we wouldnt pay that much attention to. Today I think people pay a lot more attention, because of the potential terrorist situation.

George Bushs ratings soared after attacks and much of media became largely unquestioning in rush to war (Getty Images)

Whitaker, who is African American, says one aspect of America that has been too resilient is racism. Another constant  a positive one  is his belief that artists have a duty to respond, whether to events such as 9/11 or, a generation later, when rioters, some decked in the confederate flag, stormed the US Capitol. Art, he says, is the alchemy that transforms peoples experiences and presents them in a way that can be processed and considered: All tragedy has to be responded to artistically, he says.

There are reminders to all Americans that they need to watch what they say

In the first anguished days and weeks following the al-Qaeda assault, America often felt feverish. In New York, people posted Missing posters containing the hopeful and unknowing faces of loved ones lost in the twin towers, who in all likelihood were dead. At the Pentagon  and in the rural town of Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where the last of the hijacked planes came down  officials sought to locate and preserve any remaining piece of debris. Much had been turned to ash.

Quickly, the drums for war sounded  and there were unlikely cheerleaders. On David Lettermans Late Show, CBS journalist Dan Rather wept with the host, saying that he himself wanted to join the military. As Rather later conceded, such unquestioning patriotism did perhaps not best serve the country  let alone the media. It would later make it much easier for Bush to push for war in Iraq on false intelligence. Yet in the weeks and months after the attacks, few journalists questioned the governments actions, and even cartoonists who dared not to pursue a pro-war line found themselves in little demand by commissioning editors.

Comedians such as Bill Maher, who suggested that, whatever else one called the hijackers, they were not cowards, received a rebuke from White House spokesperson Ari Fleischer. There are reminders to all Americans that they need to watch what they say, watch what they do, he said from the briefing room podium. This is not a time for remarks like that. There never is.

We wanted to turn some tragedy into at least something good

Some Americans sought to learn more about the region of the world from where the attack against them had been launched, and wondered whether the USs own actions in the world had played some role in triggering the terrorists. Twenty years ago, Eugene Steuerle lost his wife Norma, a clinical psychologist, when the plane on which she was traveling  the hijacked American Airlines flight 77  was flown into the Pentagon.

A generation of Afghan girls has been educated since the 9/11 attacks (AFP via Getty Images)

On the same day, Joyce Manchester and David Stapleton lost four close friends, all members of the same family, who were on the plane. All of the passengers were killed, along with 125 people who had been at work at the Department of Defence headquarters. Steuerle, Manchester and Stapleton, all of them economists from Washington DC, wanted to identify a positive way to remember those they had lost.

In time, they established the Safer World Fund, which, with the help of the online crowdfunding platform Global Giving, raised and spent more than $2m on education for girls in Afghanistan and Pakistan. In August, the trio watched open-mouthed as the Taliban swept back to power in the country, threatening the work in which they had invested so much effort.

After [my wife] died, we came into this money that came out of a 9/11 fund, and my kids and I didnt really feel like we needed it, or necessarily deserved it, Steuerle says from Alexandria, Virginia. We werent being critical of others [who took the money]. He says that in additional to establishing a foundation in Alexandria, he worked with Stapleton and Manchester, whom he knew from economics forums, to turn some tragedy into at least something good.

Like many in Afghanistan itself, the three are now anxious as to whether their work will be permitted to continue. Either way, they have no regrets. Manchester says she was very disappointed and frustrated, and upset that [the takeover] happened so quickly, having expected  like many observers  that resistance to the Taliban might have been more stubborn. She adds: I will say, I believe that women and girls are better off, because theyve had the chance to be educated, and receive health care, and be out and about in the world.

If you have a lap top, take it out of your bag

The security staff who failed to stop the 19 Al-Qaeda hijackers, 15 of the from Saudi Arabia, were privately contracted by individual airports.

When flight UA Flight 175 struck South Tower we knew we were a nation at war says pilots widow (Getty Images)

The changes have been largely successful. Once common, the hijacking of planes has dwindled in the years since 2001. There have been no such incidents in the United States, according to charity the Aviation Safety Network. Manufacturers strengthened cockpit doors to make it harder for potential hijackers to access controls. They did so under pressure from campaigners, among them Ellen Saracini.

She was hosting a meeting for volunteers at her childrens school in Pennsylvania, when word reached them as to what was happening in New York. Somebody told her a small plane had flown into the north tower. Someone else said an American Airlines passenger plane was involved. So she cancelled the meeting and went home and saw it on TV.

At around 10.30am that day, she says, it was confirmed that her husband, a former navy aviator who loved his family and also loved to drive his Corvette and his motorcycle, had been killed. A week later, Saracini and her daughters, Brielle and Kirsten, attended a memorial mass for her husband, where the 51-year-old pilot received a US navy honour guard. At its conclusion, Saracini was handed a tightly folded US flag.

She says she did not know then that she would dedicate herself to improving airline safety, or that the government, or the industry, would be so slow to act. It was only when she learned that cockpits were so vulnerable to being attacked  something she says airlines such as Israels El Al realised long ago, and acted to counter  that she launched a campaign that continues today.

Ellen Saracini, with daughters Brielle, (L), and Kirsten, (R), in 2001 says final words to husband United Airlines pilot Victor Saracini were I love you (AFP via Getty Images)

In 2019, she was permitted some small cheer when Congress passed the Saracini Aviation Safety Act, requiring all new aircraft to be fitted with a second cockpit door. Yet Saracini says her work is not done. The 2019 law only applied to new aircraft; she says given the Federal Aviation Administration has acknowledged that cockpit doors remain vulnerable, all operating planes should be required to have a second door.

She is working with her congressman, Republican Brian Fitzpatrick, to push through a new measure. We can agree that September 11 changed the world. And there are things about September 11 that havent been answered yet, havent been disclosed, havent been protected again, she says. So thats my part of standing up to right the wrongs. And I wont stop. You know, the flight crews, Victors brothers and sisters, are still in the air flying. And theyve become my brothers and sisters. We cant leave them vulnerable up there.
The leader of the Maoist terrorist group Shining Path, which waged a decades-long insurgency to overthrow the government of Peru, has died in prison.

Abimael Guzman, who was captured in 1992, died on Saturday in a military hospital after an illness, the Peruvian government said.

The former philosophy professor, who founded the brutal rebel group in 1980, was 86 and had been suffering from an infection, Perus justice minister Anibal Torres said.

Inspired by Mao Zeodongs Cultural Revolution in China, Guzman returned to his native Peru in 1980 determined to use violence to implement his vision of a Marxist society.

He led the Shining Path guerrillas for 12 years as they used bombings, assassinations and massacres of civilians in an effort to defeat Perus democratically elected government and install a dictatorship of the proletariat.

Mostly active in Perus Andean highlands, Shining Path did attract some support from poor peasant farmers, especially through vicious kangaroo courts known as popular justice which dispensed the death penalty to supposed enemies of the people in show trials.

At its height in the early 1990s, the guerrilla group controlled last swathes of the countryside in central and southern Peru, and has also carried out numerous deadly terrorist attacks in the countrys urban centres too, targeting politicians, trade unions, other rival leftist groups and aid workers.

Some 10,000 militants were believed to be fighting for the Shining Path at the time and two-thirds of Perus citizens were living under some kind of emergency martial law as the state battled against the insurgency.

But in September 1992, an elite special forces unit of the Peruvian police tracked Guzman down to a comfortable house in the capital Lima and arrested him.

A year later Guzman was calling for peace talks, but by this time his 13-year insurgency had claimed the lives of tens of thousands of Peruvians  mainly the rural peasants Shining Path claimed to be fighting for  and displaced as many as 600,000 people.

Although Shining Path continued to wage sporadic war against the state after Guzmans arrest, the loss of the man known to his followers as Presidente Gonzalo hollowed out the rebels and the group was gradually defeated in region after region by Perus security forces.

Some of Guzmans acolytes built a political movement calling for amnesties for all political prisoners detained during Perus bloody internal conflict, but it drew very limited support from the public.

Some armed remnants of Shining Path persist to this day, occasionally attacking police or military units in remote jungle areas and working as security for drug cartels.

Guzman was imprisoned for life in a special maximum security prison constructed for him on the shore of the Pacific Ocean. In 2010 he married his second wife, Elena Iparraguirre, who was Shining Paths second in command and jailed alongside him.

Few Peruvians are likely to mourn the man responsible for launching a vicious civil war which claimed so many lives.

The Shining Path "murdered thousands of innocents and undermined the peace of the country. We do not forget the horror of that time, and his death will not erase his crimes," Economy Minister Pedro Francke said, after Guzmans death was announced.
In the summer of 2001, US president George W Bushs administration considered allowing more than 3 million undocumented immigrants from Latin American countries to secure legal status in the United States.

But when terrorists attacked the United States at the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, and had their plot thwarted in Pennsylvania, it changed the trajectory of how the Bush administration and the Republican Party would approach immigration. In the 20 years following 9/11, the Republican Partys response would change the makeup of its party coalition, and subsequent events would fundamentally alter the party into becoming more nativist and exclusionary towards immigrants, all culminating in the current iteration of the GOP.

Julian Zelizer, a professor of history at Princeton University, says that 9/11 in some ways proved politically beneficial for Republicans, as it led to increasing electoral success for the GOP and solidified their majorities in Congress. In 2002, Republicans broke the traditional trend of the party in power losing seats when it gained seats in both the house and the Senate. It did so largely by portraying Democrats as being soft on national security. Perhaps most infamously, in Georgia, Saxby Chambliss beat Sen Max Cleland, who had lost both his legs and his right forearm serving in Vietnam, largely on the back of an ad that opened with Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.

The election also marked the final chapter of the Republicans takeover in southern states, which had begun in the 1960s and accelerated in earnest in the 1980s, as they won over the remaining white formerly Democratic voters, defeating incumbent Democrats in states like South Carolina, Georgia and Alabama. Democrats have since failed to win governorships in any of these states.

The sorting of the parties, which was under way in 2001, is now complete, says John Pitney, a professor at Claremont McKenna College. Mr Pitney adds that the party has become far more conservative: There are no liberals in the Republican Party. But after Mr Bushs re-election in 2004, American dissatisfaction with the war in Iraq would lead to Barack Obamas election. Mr Obama, who was a Democrat, frequently criticised the war, saying the United States took our eye off the ball. Mr Obama would also later order the operation that killed Bin Laden.

In turn, Donald Trumps campaign in 2015 vocally criticised the war in Iraq and frequently used it as a point to knock Mr Bushs brother Jeb Bush, who was his opponent for the GOP nomination. Politicians learn right away that they can openly question what was hereto seen as Republican doctrine, says Suhail Khan, who served in the Bush administration. And not only that, but they can succeed And there was an appetite to reassess and withdraw with some degree from these military forays.

Similarly, Mr Zelizer notes that the GOP response to 9/11 bred an appetite for the nativism within the Republican Party that would animate its members.

While Mr Bush supported immigration reform, his administration also created the Department of Homeland Security, and would face a revolt from the party in trying to find a path to legalisation for undocumented workers. In 2007, his proposed legislation, which would have offered legal status to undocumented immigrants, died in the Senate, with all but 12 Republicans voting against it. Sen Jeff Sessions of Alabama was one of the leading voices against the legislation, and when it failed he told The New York Times that supporters wanted to pass the bill before Rush Limbaugh could tell the American people what was in it.

Eventually, Donald Trumps administration would use the Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department, now led by Mr Sessions, to implement some of his most draconian measures on the US-Mexico border, such as the so-called zero-tolerance policies and the separation of families.

Similarly, while Mr Trump at least rhetorically rejected the concepts of the war on terror, such as nation-building in Iraq and Afghanistan, he capitalised on the growing nativism within the party. In the days following the terrorist attacks, Mr Bush was quick to say that the United States was not at war with Islam, a claim repeated by Mr Obama after the Bin Laden raid. But during that time, Mr Trump, then a reality television star, hinted that Mr Obamas birth certificate might reveal that the president himself was a Muslim.

Mr Trump would go further when he ran for president in 2015, calling for a ban on Muslims entering the United States and saying he thought Islam hated the United States. But he could not have found much cache if there hadnt already been fomenting anti-Muslim sentiment within the GOP. In the months after 9/11, the Pew Research Centre found that Republicans were only slightly more likely than Democrats to say that Islam encourages violence more than other religions. But that proportion would mushroom over the years.

When Mr Trump became president, he implemented a travel ban from countries with large Muslim populations, and repeatedly attacked Muslim members of Congress.

But while the GOP was almost entirely unified on how to confront the terrorist attacks on 9/11, it has been left split in the wake of the 6 January would-be insurrection. On that day, Rudy Giuliani, who after 9/11 was hailed as Americas mayor by the media, addressed a crowd of Trump supporters in support of what he called trial by combat, shortly before they raided the Capitol in an attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Meanwhile, Rep Liz Cheney  the daughter of Dick Cheney, who was vice-president in 2001  voted to impeach Mr Trump for inciting the insurrection. Mr Giuliani is still widely welcomed within the party; Ms Cheney has been all but exiled.
Federal judges have blocked abortion restrictions in Tennessee which banned the procedure if prompted by a prenatal Down syndrome diagnosis or the race or gender of the fetus.

The ruling also kept the block of a six-week abortion ban in place.

Tennessees Republican Governor Bill Lee introduced limits on reproductive rights last year. The law gained notoriety as one of the harshest abortion rights restrictions in the US.

The Sixth US Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati upheld earlier rulings that blocked the states ban on abortion after six weeks of pregnancy, a time when most are unaware that they are pregnant.

Judge Martha Craig Daughtrey wrote: We take note that state legislatures recently have passed more anti-abortion regulations than perhaps at any other time in this countrys history. However, this development is not a signal to the courts to change course.

It is, in fact, just the opposite. The judiciary exists as a check on majoritarian rule, she added.

Down syndrome is a genetic condition that leads to setbacks in development as well as medical issues such as heart defects, respiratory and hearing problems.

The National Down Syndrome Society says that around 6,000 babies a year are born with the condition  around one in every 700 babies.

The US Department of Justice has sued the state of Texas over its ban on abortions after six weeks following the US Supreme Court majority decision not to act and allow the law to take effect on 1 September.

The law allows private citizens to sue anyone who helps facilitate an abortion, with the incentive of a $10,000 payout.

The restrictions in Tennessee include felony-level penalties for abortion providers.

Deputy director of the ACLUs Reproductive Freedom Project, Brigitte Amiri, said: The court of appeals today rightly respected nearly 50 years of precedent by blocking these dangerous laws. With all eyes on the devastating effect of Texas abortion ban, this is welcome news for Tennesseans and the rule of law.

The Supreme Court case of Roe v Wade set the precedent in 1973 that abortions should be legal until the point when a fetus can survive outside the womb, which is usually after around 24 weeks of pregnancy.

Samantha Fisher, a spokesperson for Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery, said his office was disappointed with the ruling and will seek further review.

Both the six-week ban and the so-called reasons ban were blocked by a lower federal court just hours after Governor Lee signed the package of anti-abortion measures into Tennessee law in 2020.

A panel of judges on the Sixth Circuit later ruled that the state of Tennessee could still enforce the reasons ban even as it was being fought in court.

The ruling on Friday was made by a three-judge panel, two of whom were not part of the previous ruling.

The most recent decision states that the reasons ban doesnt provide providers with a reasonable opportunity to know when they are permitted to perform an abortion.

As a result of this ambiguity and uncertainty, many abortion providers might well choose to steer clear of anything that could possibly be construed as prohibited conduct, effectuating the inaccessibility of a right deemed fundamental under the Constitution, Judge Daughtrey wrote.

The Sixth Circuit allowed a similar ban, also based on a Down syndrome diagnosis, to go into law in Ohio in April. It reversed two previous decisions by the court that blocked the enforcement of the law first put in place in 2017.

In the Friday opinion, the panel of judges said the split outcomes were due to differences in the Ohio law and the facts of each case.

The Ohio law doesnt touch upon reasons of sex and race, the opinion says.

The full panel agreed to keep the block of the six-week abortion ban in Tennessee. Judge Amul Thapar disagreed on the reasons ban, but also commented more broadly on abortion.

The courts should return this choice to the American people - where it belongs, Judge Thapar wrote.

The state legislatures can do what we cant: listen to the community, create fact-specific rules with appropriate exceptions, gather more evidence, and update their laws if things dont work properly. And if the public is unhappy, it can fight back at the ballot box.

The Independent has reached out to the office of Governor Lee for comment.

Associated Press contributed to this report
Justice Stephen Breyer has spoken out against the Supreme Courts decision not to block the Texas law that bans abortion once a heartbeat is detected.

In an interview with NPR, Mr Bryer was asked why the Supreme Court deserves respect after the 5-4 decision handed down in the dead of night.

Look, I thought the last decision you mentioned was very, very, very wrong. Ill add one more very, Mr Breyer replied. And I wrote a dissent and thats the way it works.

In his dissenting opinion, Mr Breyer recognised that Texas delegates the power to prevent abortions not to the state but any single private citizen.

But I do not see why that fact should make a critical legal difference. That delegation still threatens to invade a constitutional right, and the coming into effect of that delegation still threatens imminent harm, he wrote.

The Texas Heartbeat Act, or SB 8, bans abortion once the heartbeat of the fetus is detected, which can be as early as six weeks into the pregnancy.

The unsigned order said there were serious questions regarding the constitutionality of the Texas law, but that the court may lack jurisdiction due to procedural technicalities.

Mr Breyer said it should not have been decided on procedural grounds, and that "well see what happens in that area when we get a substantive matter in front of us".

We thought that that particular case should not be decided just on an emergency basis, Breyer said, adding the majority decision was very, very wrong.

Its a procedural matter, so well see what happens in that area when we get a substantive matter in front of us, he added.

Attorney General Merrick Garland, however, is not waiting for the issue to return to the Supreme Court. The Department of Justice announced on Thursday it would sue Texas to block the law, which it called clearly unconstitutional under longstanding Supreme Court precedent.

A spokeswoman for Texas governor Greg Abbott dismissed the legal challenge as a political ploy.

The most precious freedom is life itself, said the governors press secretary Renae Eze in an emailed statement to The Hill.

Unfortunately, President Biden and his Administration are more interested in changing the national narrative from their disastrous Afghanistan evacuation and reckless open border policies instead of protecting the innocent unborn. We are confident that the courts will uphold and protect that right to life.
Queensland in Australia may be plunged into a snap coronavirus lockdown following the detection of a cluster of new infections.

The state, which is home to some 5 million people, logged five new cases over the last 24 hours in a family who tested positive.

Authorities say the situation will be monitored closely over the critical next few days in case a new lockdown is warranted.

The family lives in Brisbane, the capital of Australias third most-populous state. It was not clear whether a lockdown would be limited to some parts of the state like previous orders.

"If we start seeing any seeding, then we may have to take very quick, fast action. But at the moment, its contained to the family," said state premier Annastacia Palaszczuk.

It comes after Australia as a whole notched a new one-day record infection tally, with 2,077 new cases. More than 1,500 were in New South Wales alone, while Victoria saw 450.

Sydney is under lockdown and authorities have warned people to keep to social-distancing rules, but hot weather on Saturday persuaded many to hit the beach.

New South Wales health minister Brad Hazzard said police would be out checking whether people were within 3 miles of their homes, as permitted under emergency rules.

Police and military personnel have for weeks been patrolling the streets of Sydney, issuing fines to those breaking health rules including by not wearing masks.

One person fined was former prime minister Tony Abbott, who confirmed on Saturday he had been ordered to pay $500 (266) after being pictured without a face covering.

"I believe that I was well within the law, reasonably interpreted. But I'm not going to challenge the fine because I don't want to waste the police's time any further," Mr Abbott told reporters in Sydney.

"I never thought that dobbing and snitching was part of the Australian character and I think that the sooner we can leave this health police-state mindset behind us, the better for everyone."

Australia has now recorded nearly 73,000 Covid-19 cases and a death toll of 1,084.

Additional reporting by Reuters
At least two people have died after an apocalyptic tornado hit the Sicilian island of Pantelleria on Friday evening.

A further nine have so far been identified as injured in the Campobello area of the volcanic island, although these numbers are still provisional and a search mission is underway.

Four of those injured remain in serious condition.

The tornado hit at around 7pm Friday night, uprooting poles, damaging roofs and blowing down trees, the fire service said on Twitter.

Speaking to Italian newspaper la Repubblica, an unnamed paramedic called the disaster a truly apocalyptic scene

At the moment there are two confirmed deaths, but searches are continuing, and we are making sure there are no missing, the paramedic said. The tornado came from the sea and in a few seconds it ripped houses and cars that were travelling along the coastal road.

Among those who were killed in the disaster is a firefighter and an 86-year-old man, local news agency ANSA reported.

According to the news agency, the two died after being thrown from their respective vehicles as around ten cars were flipped.

One victim landed on a low wall and the other on the ground.

Pictures posted online show one car flipped completely upside down and another covered by rubble.

A number of buildings have also been damaged.

Pantelleria Mayor Vincenzo Vittorio Campo told Sky TG24 TV that no one appeared to be missing on the island currently.

Tornados are not a common in Europe. The incident came after Sicily saw more extreme weather last month, when the island endured heat of 48.8C - the highest-ever temperature recorded in Europe.

The region was also engulfed by a series of wildfires, which destroyed homes and businesses.

At the time, firefighters said they had fought 500 blazes overnight across Sicily and Calabria, requiring five planes and 3,000 firefighters to contain the fires.
Like the rest of the world, the people of the Middle East and North Africa were mesmerised and horrified by the spectacle of 9/11 as they watched it unfold that Tuesday evening on their televisions. But even as the wreckage of the Twin Towers in lower Manhattan smouldered, they faced a unique terror.

American newspapers were decrying the attack as a day that would live in infamy, echoing US President Franklin D Roosevelts call to arms after the 7 December 1941 Japanese attacks on Pearl Harbour. And very quickly, there was a fear that al-Qaedas attack would prompt a muscular, potentially devastating American military response in the Middle East.

In Baghdad, as news of the attacks spread, shops and roadways emptied, and residents stayed inside their homes. I was traveling to my house, and nobody was moving on the ground  there were only security patrols, recalls one Iraqi who lives in the capital. Everybody was expecting an attack in seconds.

The dread was well-founded. Within hours of the 9/11 attacks, while he was still helping survivors of the wreckage at the Pentagon, then-US Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld began agitating his underlings to come up with ways to link the attacks planned by Osama bin Laden to Iraq and others, according to notes taken by the aide and obtained by CBS News.

Go massive, the notes quote him as saying. Sweep it all up. Things related and not.

Lukman Faily, now Iraqs ambassador to Germany, was living in exile in the United Kingdom at the time and sensed right away that a day of reckoning had arrived. I know Americans and how America works and what happens if you are on the wrong side of them, he says in an interview. It was clear to me from day one that this was a Pearl Harbour moment. It was a Middle East moment.

Americans and the UK had already been regularly bombing Iraq since the 1991 Gulf War, meant to reverse President Saddam Husseins annexation of Kuwait. A punishing 1998 four-day bombing campaign codenamed Desert Fox had taken out much of Saddams air defences.

The newly elected Bush had brought on a clique of hawkish, ambitious Washington foreign policy fixtures obsessed with the Middle East and the Muslim world. They saw Iraq as a place to implement their vision. 9/11 becomes the Pearl Harbour that that group was looking for, that says now we can move against Iraq, the noted historian of war and war culture John W Dower said in a lecture at MIT.

In the 18 months between the 9/11 and the ultimately disastrous 2003 US invasion and occupation, the dread only grew as US policymakers made tortured cases to the world trying to connect Saddam to 9/11 and to the secret accumulation of weapons of mass destruction.

French President Jacques Chirac, who had served as an officer in the French occupation of Algeria, urged President George W Bush to stay away. Arab League secretary general Amr Moussa predicted that a US invasion would open the gates of hell. German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder warned the war would lead to the deaths of thousands of innocent children, women and men.

The quick, violent shock and awe invasion was compounded by the disastrous aftermath. Americans attempted to occupy and administer a nation they knew next to nothing about, and on the cheap. Looting continued for weeks. Fires burned. The entire Iraqi state unraveled, then collapsed after US viceroy Paul Bremer disbanded the Iraqi army, a flawed institution that nonetheless held the nation together.

Theres a firm understanding that it was not managed very well, says Faily, who also served as Baghdads envoy to Washington and has met with the senior US and Iraqi officials over the last 20 years. Reckless may not be the right word, but not really calculating. The Americans did not do their homework, and the Iraqis suffered from it.

No weapons of mass destruction were found. Bush finally admitted in 2006 that Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11 and his enablers never made a persuasive case that he had any operational ties to al-Qaeda. But by then, Iraq had become a magnet for al-Qaeda, with a growing insurgency as well as a sectarian civil war.

The invasion by the West of an Arab land inspired jihadis from all over the world as well as angry Iraqis to take up arms against an occupier holed up behind fortresses made of blast walls and barbed wire. The incompetence and mismanagement left ungoverned spaces that allowed armed extremist groups to flourish, especially after the collapse of government control in neighbouring northern Syria gave birth to the al-Qaeda offspring, Isis, which prompted yet another war in Iraq.

A misbegotten and poorly planned war in response to an attack by al-Qaeda cost tens of thousands of lives, and tragically, actually gave al-Qaeda and its cousins far more potential recruits and spaces to grow.

Few Iraqis now care about 9/11, reflecting an apathy even resentment about the commemoration that is widespread throughout the Middle East and the Arab world. In Baghdad the big worries are getting enough electricity and water, as well as a recent spike in terrorism, including a suspected Isis attack near the northern city of Kirkuk last week that killed 13 people.

All I can say, says Heba Fahed, 34, a mother of four, is that on September 11, 2001, we were living much more safely and securely than today.
Gone were the Gothic arches at the base of the towers that echoed the ones in stone on the Brooklyn Bridge; gone was the steel tracery that drew a bow across the bridges soaring strings from the tip of Manhattan  a favourite tableau for snap-happy tourists, until that day. Gone were the red carpets in the lobbies where visitors took express lifts to the Top of the World observatory on the 107th floor of the south tower, or to a glamorous lunch at Windows on the World in the north tower, a restaurant so lofty that diners gazed at the curve of the earth from their table. The mourning was for the lives lost, of course, not for a tourist destination. But the destruction of these icons created a massive shock that was felt around the world.

In the immediate aftermath, that shock generated a massive change across all aspects of travel, most obviously seen in aviation and airport security. August 2001 had seen a record high of 65.4 million airline passengers. It took nearly three years for air travel to rebound, with that number being surpassed only in July 2004. Those passengers faced a very different experience from what the flying public had known before. Immediately, security lines at the airport became hours long, while the creation of the Transportation Security Administration in the US codified a way of flying that is now the norm.

Travellers today doff their shoes and jackets at security, pack no more than 100ml of liquid in their carry-ons, endure invasive pat-downs and enhanced body-scanners, all as a matter of course. Surveillance and tight visa restrictions are de rigueur, and international passengers flying into JFK and other US airports have their fingerprints placed on file and are subjected to more questioning by customs and immigration agents. Air travel was transformed, practically overnight, into something frustration-filled and complicated.

Airport security ramped up in the wake of 9/11 (Getty Images)

Meanwhile, in New York, nearly every institution, sporting event and cultural site had to rethink its security operations, from installing metal detectors and using bomb-sniffing dogs to banning water bottles. Some, like the Statue of Liberty, closed for years, while others, like the Metropolitan Museum of Art, reopened almost immediately, directed by the city to be open as a place of solace to New Yorkers.

We reopened on the Thursday morning, says John Barelli, chief security officer at the museum from 1986 to 2015 and author of Stealing the Show: A History of Art and Crime in Six Thefts. We always had enough staff covering our entrances and galleries, we just retrained them. We instituted bag checks and electronic wanding at the entrances, for metal and weapons, at the three public entrances, and inspected every vehicle coming into the public garage. We did a lot more with the CCTV. Like other major institutions, the museum also started receiving regular briefings from the FBI and NYPDs Joint Terrorism Task Force.

Air travel was transformed, practically overnight, into something frustration-fuelled and complicated

Hotels had to make similar security assessments. Hotels had drills with the task force and the FBI, and ramped up security in their lobbies, with some of the larger ones installing metal detectors, recalls Vijay Dandapani, president and CEO of the Hotel Association of New York City. The detectors were scrapped quickly as hotels realised they sent the wrong message to guests about the safety of the city.

But as New York recovered, with its new security measures in place, fewer international tourists were there to see it. In 2000, there were more than 35 million visitors to New York City and, of those, 6.8 million were international tourists. In 2002 that number declined to 5.1 million and didnt reach pre-2001 levels again until 2006.

International visitors are incredibly important to New Yorks tourism industry, with the four top countries of origin being China, the UK, Brazil and France. Crucially, they spend more than domestic tourists. While international travellers account for 20 per cent of visitors, they account for 50 per cent of spending, says Christopher Heywood, EVP of global communications for NYC & Company. They stay longer and they spend more while theyre here.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art reopened to provide solace for New Yorkers (Getty Images)

In 2006, the Bloomberg administration and the city made a big push for travel and tourism, and NYC & Company opened offices around the world and launched global campaigns promoting the city. We now have 17 international outposts and we highlight all five boroughs, says Heywood. Travel to all of them went up, particularly to Brooklyn and also Queens.

Two decades later, the numbers have not only rebounded, but in 2019 the city had an all-time record high of 66.6 million visitors, 13.5 million of whom were international  double the 2000 numbers. Hotels also had a record 129,000 rooms in March 2020 and occupancy was at nearly 90 per cent, compared with the 9/11 dip to 65 per cent. International visitors make up 25 per cent of our guests, and UK guests make up the largest percentage of revenue in that group, says Dandapani.

Now we need the resilience that got us through 9/11 and rebuilt our city

As the city recovered, new hotels staked out territory across Manhattan. Firmdale Hotels opened the Crosby Street Hotel in 2009 in SoHo, its first in New York. By the time we started that project, New York had bounced back, in particular downtown and SoHo, says Craig Markham, director. We always felt that it would be the perfect location for our first New York hotel, with its neighbourhood style similar to our London hotels.

Hotels also opened across the river in Williamsburg, downtown Brooklyn and Queens, cool boroughs that foreign travellers wanted to explore. The international market as a general rule is more intrepid than domestic travellers, says Heywood. They want to get on public transport and go deep into Brooklyn, to Coney Island, to the Rockaways. The Brits in particular are adventurous and want to explore the city.

But underneath the record number of visitors, new hotel openings and discoverable neighbourhoods, a permanent change has come to the city. Some of it is visible, like the signs on the subway  If you see something, say something, and Si ve algo, diga algo  but some is less so, like the increased surveillance by intelligence and police. But the biggest change is the feeling that New York and New Yorkers will always have to live with the threat of terrorism and terrorist attacks. Polls over the last decade show that terrorism fears havent waned, and have even gone up at times.

The art of 9/11 Show all 4 1 /4 The art of 9/11 The art of 9/11 644096.bin City of ruins: artist Todd Stone's painting of the 9/11 attacks, just one of the pieces of art inspired by the events AP The art of 9/11 644097.bin The art of 9/11 644094.bin The art of 9/11 644095.bin

Today, with Covid and the global pandemic, the citys tourism has taken a harder hit than it did after 11 September. A number of hotels have permanently closed, reducing the number of rooms by 20,000; Broadway went dark for 18 months; Midtown restaurants are empty.

We were the epicentre of Covid in the US and it just wiped out tourism in New York, says Heywood. Now we need the resilience that got us through 9/11 and rebuilt our city.

But if 9/11 proved anything, its that New York will always be a place for travellers and tourists. And that, while its tragedies are a matter of fact, it remains an outward-looking city, a seaward-facing city  lamp lifted in perpetual and enduring welcome.
The anniversary of 9/11 will be marked by the humiliating retreat of the US and UK from Afghanistan, the country their forces invaded in response to the New York attacks, and the triumphant return of the Taliban two decades after its rule was overthrown. The defeat was the result of US president Joe Bidens disastrous decision to carry out a hasty withdrawal of troops, which became a signal for the Islamists to launch their offensive, bringing about the swift collapse of the Afghan state.

Twenty years of hard-won gains in the country on a range of issues, including human rights  especially womens rights  are now under threat, with the Afghan people and society being dragged back under harsh, primitive and brutal Islamist rule. The narrative of the New Taliban, reformed and no longer like its predecessor, has been severely dented, with its first government drawn from members of the old regime or their sons: all male and all Pashtun, with every other community excluded.

Among their first acts, the Taliban have told working women to stay at home, banned women from taking part in sports, segregated education, banned music, and banned protest marches against these measures. People have sought to vote with their feet. The evacuation of those offered refuge abroad, a horrendously chaotic process, has seen an exodus of the skilled and the educated, while others, trapped, are seeking desperately to escape.

There have been a series of arrests and disappearances, despite the Talibans assurances that they would not seek retribution against their opponents. One of the broader strategic reasons given by the Biden administration for the pullout  that the US would be better placed to counter the challenge from China and Russia without distractions in Afghanistan and the Middle East  has not stood up to its first test. Instead, Beijing and Moscow have been clear winners from the wests departure from Afghanistan, with both countries pledging to enlarge their footprints.

The new Taliban regime has declared that China will be its principal ally

A potent symbol of the influence of these new players is the plan to base Chinese troops and engineers at Bagram. US troops slunk away from the airbase, one of the centres of the wests counter-insurgency missions, without informing their Afghan allies.

Biden had originally chosen 9/11 as the symbolic date for the troops withdrawal. He was not to know, of course, that the ending would be so inglorious. But the US president seemed to be in denial as the scale of what was going on unfolded. I want to talk about happy things, man, Biden complained at the 4 July press conference when asked about rapid Taliban advances. Five days later, he declared, in answer to another Afghan question: The likelihood theres going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely.

Taliban fighters sit in a pickup truck at the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Sept. 9, 2021. (Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

The war need not have ended so embarrassingly for the US, or so painfully for the Afghans. The security presence for the last six years  around 2,400 Americans, just under a thousand from Nato and 750 from the UK  was an insurance against the insurgents as well as the elements of Pakistans military and its intelligence service, ISI, that fed and watered them.

This was thrown away by the Trump administration at the ineptly handled talks in Qatar that resulted in the shoddy Doha Agreement. Biden is now busy claiming that he inherited the bad deal from former president Donald Trump, despite the fact that throughout the US presidential campaign, he had repeatedly affirmed that he would not reverse the pullout decision.

But Biden had done nothing since getting to the White House about the repeated breaches of the agreement by the Taliban, which could have allowed the US to review its own position.

The US troops left before the end of August, with Biden refusing to extend the deadline for evacuation. This effectively meant that other countries had to end their airlift as well, as the airport could not be held without the American military. The result is that hundreds of those in danger from the Islamists had to be left behind and, at the moment, have little chance of getting out.

The evacuations ended with horrific violence: a suicide bombing by Isis-K that killed 170 people, including 13 US troops. The killings were a reminder that the Taliban are not the only violent Islamists in the country. The Haqqani network, now in government, has links with al-Qaeda. Isis-K has been carrying out massacres for the last few years, but their victims were Afghan and thus the group was only of passing interest to the west.

 Afghanistan: Who are ISIS-K ?

Biden may well find that abandoning Afghanistan does not actually take him to a happy place for long. The west has walked away from Afghanistan before, after using the mujahideen against the Russians. We know what happened then: from ungoverned space emerged terrorist camps, al-Qaeda, and 9/11.

The overthrow of Taliban rule following 9/11 was a time of great hope and expectation. Some of us who have been in Afghanistan in the last two months, witnessing the traumatic end of Americas longest war, were also there then, seeing the rebirth of a nation. Colour and light broke through the suffocating, joyless years of Islamist rule. There was music, shops opened, bright posters appeared, women threw off their hijabs. Girls schools and language schools sprang up, while modern subjects were introduced into colleges and universities.

People who had fled to Pakistan, Iran and further afield began to return to help rebuild the country. Osama bin Laden had fled to Pakistan after the Americans failed to kill or capture him in Tora Bora, as had the Taliban leadership. There was, at the time, an attempt by some in the Pakistani leadership to hold talks with the US and the UK, but they were rebuffed.

George W Bush assured the Afghans at the time, You can count on the United States: we shall be staying to ensure security. Tony Blair declared that this time we will not walk away, acknowledging what had happened after the mujahideens war with Russia. But the US and the UK walked away again, this time into the disaster of the Iraq war in 2003. Funds for reconstruction were switched over: thinly spread forces were denuded even further. The Taliban, backed by their Pakistani sponsors, moved back into the security vacuum, taking over rural districts and carrying out attacks in the cities.

American and British politicians appeared oblivious to what was happening. Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary at the time, told us in Mazar-e-Sharif that the war was over: The Taliban are finished, they are marginalised, they will have no future role to play in Afghanistan. In 2006, with the security situation fraying, the west and its allies were back in Afghanistan with the establishment of Isaf (the International Security Assistance Force). At the request of the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, British troops in Helmand were sent to small towns to set up bases, effectively challenging the Taliban to a fight.

US Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld (Reuters)

Soon Helmand was aflame, as was Kandahar next door where a Canadian force was now in place. The Americans were fighting elsewhere, and the French, Italians and Germans faced varying degrees of violence in the regions where they were based. The conflict spread across the country; there were troop surges under US generals David Petraeus and Stan McChrystal. Biden, as the then president Barack Obamas vice-president, was strongly opposed to sending in extra forces, but he lost the argument.

Biden visited Kabul to hector Karzai and other politicians on governance. He was right to do so. Massive amounts of international money had poured in, and corruption had become endemic, taking place on a massive scale in the senior ranks. The heroin trade was flourishing among politicians and warlords, often with the connivance of the Taliban. Huge garish buildings, narcotecture, sprang up in Kabul, some of them rented out to international organisations.

The war continued. The insurgents were driven out of areas they had occupied, but there were never enough troops to hold the ground. In any event, it was impossible to defeat an insurgency as long as it had sanctuary and support across the border. Isaf ended its military mission in 2013, with a relatively small force staying on. A stalemate had been reached, with the Taliban holding swathes of the countryside, while the government held cities and towns. Western casualties were minimal.

Then Trump, who had pledged to bring to troops home, began negotiations with the Taliban, excluding the Afghan government, and signed the Doha deal  which gave the Taliban virtually everything they wanted  and Biden went along with the withdrawal of forces, with the consequences we now see. Afghanistan, from where the 9/11 attacks were planned, has become the place, 20 years on, where the reputation of the US has become tarnished, leaving allies deeply worries and adversaries emboldened.
The exact transport and dining arrangements of the travel correspondent of The Independent are, naturally, a closely guarded secret. But it can now be revealed that Simon Calder travelled incognito from his North Devon hideaway by Megabus via Taunton and Weston-Super-Mare to Bristol for this weeks Ask Me Anything.

Living the dream did not end there: he then installed himself in Pret a Manger in Queens Road to tackle your pressing questions for an hour. These are the greatest hits.

Bristol fashion

Q: I am also in Bristol but hoping to be in Rhodes by tomorrow night. Do you think well be safe from the red list on the traffic light review next week? And Im 100 per cent correct as well that Greece dont require a negative test to get in? Just a PLF?

Mel G

A: How lovely to be heading for Rhodes. There is zero chance of red listing for mainland Greece and its islands. Fully vaccinated? No need to do anything other than complete that passenger locator form by midnight Athens time, 10pm UK tonight.

Cruise news

Q: My husband and I (both double vaccinated) are on a cruise in October from Barcelona to Trieste. All of the countries we call at are green or amber except Montenegro  just added to the red list.

The port of call is Kotor. We have been before and know that its a tender port. So if we stay on the ship does this affect our status when we return to the UK? In other words, do we have to quarantine just because we have been in Montenegrin waters? I know things may change before we are due to go, but what would your advice be at the moment?

Sue Mill

A: An intriguing and important question  thank you. Suppose you do stay on board. As you say, large cruise ships anchor in the deep bay and passengers are taken into town by tender.

Now, you might imagine that if you simply stay on board, as you have not set foot on Montenegrin soil that would mean you have not visited a red list nation. Therefore, you might conclude you escape hotel quarantine on return to the UK. But the transit rules set out by the UK government for stops made in red list nations indicate otherwise.

Making a transit stop would not affect what you have to do on arrival in England if, during the stop: no new passengers, who are able to mix with you, get on; no-one on-board gets off and mixes with people outside; passengers get off but do not get back on.

Sadly I think that the second criterion means you are scuppered. Undoubtedly other nationalities of passengers  as well as some of the crew  will go ashore and mix with the friendly locals.

But dont at this stage feel obliged to book that 11-night stay in a quarantine hotel at the end of your trip, at a cost of 4,000.

There are three things that could happen.

1 Montenegros status might change, though evidence suggests once you are on the red list you tend to stay there for a good while.

2 More likely, the whole 62-country red list will be reappraised and shrink to a few really risky locations (not including Montenegro.

3 If neither of these things happen, then the cruise operator is likely to alter the itinerary if a significant number of passengers are British  which would be a great shame because Kotor is a spectacular, beautiful and fascinating port of call.

Red alerts

Q: Same question you get every time, but what do you think Turkeys chances are for a move to the amber list?

Rachel H

A: Thats tricky  case numbers have been rising recently, which is unfortunate timing. But as above, I expect the red list to start shrinking pretty soon  it is unsustainable and some of the countries on it are by any measure less risky than some members of the amber list. So Turkey could be a beneficiary of this shrinkage.

Q: We are due to fly to the Maldives for our honeymoon on 19 September. What is the likelihood of Maldives moving from red to amber on this review? From what Ive read the Maldives narrowly missed out on the last review. Also, I assume if it does change that this wouldnt come into effect until the following Monday (20 September). Would we still have to follow red rules as we depart before the official change in status?

A Smith

A: The Maldives are my top choice for exiting the red list. While nothing can be taken for granted, I am 90 per cent confident the islands will be moved to the amber list. The fact that you will be there what are the remains on the red list is, perhaps surprisingly, irrelevant. All that counts is the status of the country at the moment you arrive in the UK. And that means the wheels touching the runway.

Q: With all the talk of scrapping the traffic light system, what do you expect to happen with the red list? Ive booked a flight to South Africa for January 2022, as I havent seen my mother who is in her early 90s for almost three years. The flight has been rebooked at least twice.

Doc Bean

A: So sorry you have been separated for so long. It is increasingly untenable for the government to maintain that arrivals from South Africa present a significant public health threat to the UK. So I will be amazed if South African arrivals are still required to go into hotel quarantine by next year. If I am wrong, then I suggest you launder your red list status somewhere lovely such as Spain, Portugal, Italy or Greece.

Q: We are due to go to the Dominican Republic on 10 October for our wedding. What are the chances of it going ahead  and whats the criteria for the DR being on the red list? I have been following all the details online: cases, deaths, vaccination rates, etc.

It looks like the Dominican Republic should be on the green list by the details available to the public. Your comment?

Aurimas

A: I share your frustration: the beautiful Dominican Republic, which looks increasingly alluring with every day of dismal weather here, looks to be one of the more unfortunate members of the club nobody wants to belong to  the UK red list.

While case numbers and vaccination rates are relevant, the Joint Biosecurity Centre  on whose advice ministers say they act  may also have concern over the testing rates and the presence of any worrying variants.

Q: How is Jamaica looking in the next review??

Miss N D

A: Infection rates have been increasing in Jamaica, and a move to red list status cannot be ruled out. However I hope the government is fully aware of the severe impact that such a change would have. Besides being a wonderful holiday destination, of course there are very strong family links with Jamaica. So my view  which is pure speculation  is that it will remain on the amber list.

Proving trip

Q: I am double vaccinated and am due to travel to Switzerland in about ten days time. As I understand it, my Covid Pass to travel will suffice for me to enter the country. My issue is my NHS records are in my maiden name while my passport is in my married name.

The UK government advice is to ask your GP to change your name registered with them so they match the passport. I have a complicated medical history and dont want to risk elements of my medical records going astray in a name change and also, it is perfectly legal to use both names in whatever contexts I choose (I checked with a solicitor).

I can carry my marriage certificate with me to prove I am the same person, but I have no way of knowing if this will work, and dont want to risk it. I cant be the only person encountering this issue. Can you offer any advice please?

Name supplied

A: The accounts I have seen of people who are in this unfortunate position indicate that carrying proof of marriage  and that means the original marriage certificate  should be sufficient.

You could also, for example, take an old passport in your maiden name to show that you are one and the same person.

Q: Im looking to book a weekend in Marrakesh for 17-20 September. The entry requirements on the UK government website say Morocco accepts double vaccinated travellers with no test but that Morocco havent yet confirmed it will accept the UK solutions to demonstrate vaccine status. So they advise travellers to follow guidance for alternative entry requirements  ie a pre-departure PCR test.

Im not keen to book with the hassle, risk and cost of a PCR test. Have you heard of whats actually happening at the border?

Julia

A: As far as I can see, the UK is on Moroccos A List and all you need is a vaccination pass or certificate of vaccination to enter Morocco.

The Health Ministry in Rabat says: The vaccines authorised in Morocco are : AstraZeneca, Sinopharm, Sputnik, Pfizer/BioNTech, Janssen, Covishield, Moderna, Sinovac.

I suggest you apply today for the NHS Covid Pass letter (link here) which, I believe, is available in French.

Q: I have two teenage boys, ages 13 and 15, who due to their age are unable to get vaccinated. As more and more countries are asking travellers over the age of 12 to be double vaccinated is anything being done to overcome this problem?

Frances1974

A: Frances, I believe we are moving towards a situation where key tourism destinations will actually be bending over backwards to make their testing and vaccination requirements easier, not tougher. Therefore even if country A demands proof of vaccination, nations B and C will not.

Testing times

Q: Im double vaccinated but unfortunately just received a positive Covid test. Were due to fly to Spain in 14 days time. Can I still travel and if I can, how do I negotiate re-entry to the UK?

Karen E

A: I am sorry to hear about your diagnosis. By the time you travel to Spain, you should be fully recovered, and then as you indicate the main issue is testing to fly back to the UK. Assuming you follow government advice for those who have recently recovered from Covid, and take a lateral flow test rather than a more sensitive (and possibly false-positive generating) PCR, you should be good to fly home. And then, if the mandatory post-arrival PCR is positive, you can demonstrate your recovered status for the satisfaction of NHS Test & Trace. Get well soon and have a great trip.

Q: I would like to go to France for the weekend to visit my mum but I dont really want to have to pay out for expensive PCR tests on our return. Do you think PCR tests for short trips like this will still be necessary by the end of the month or in October. As far as Im concerned we will be driving straight to her house not even getting out the car until we arrive at her house and then staying in her house and then back home again

Kerry A

A: The UK is in the absolutely bizarre position of having the highest Covid rates of any major European country, and at the same time the toughest arrival rules.

This makes no sense, and is simply sapping demand for travel, outbound and inbound.

I expect the governments opposition to international travel to change quite quickly, not least because as soon as furlough ends the awful state of the travel industry will become evident. Ministers might at last show some interest in rescuing what is left of it.

Q: We travel to Greece next week for seven days. Its tempting to get the (expensive) Welsh Day 2 PCR test ordered before going as its easier and probably more secure than doing it from Greece. But with rumours of change to the test requirements for vaccinated people, would you advise us to delay booking the tests until two or three days before we return to the UK?

Fairly sanguine

A: Please dont book that test! You can book it from the airport in Greece before you fly home. Which is when I would be doing all the pre-departure nonsense. Things can only get better.

American adventures

Q: Do you think a trip to the US will be allowed by December this year?

STR 7

A: I give you odds of 80:20 that it will be possible. At present Joe Biden has no particular enthusiasm for opening up to Continental Europe, let alone the UK, as he battles with soaring coronavirus rates in the US and anti-vaxxers.

But by winter, when the travel industry in the US may be more vocal about the loss of European visitors, I expect the president to pay more attention and remove the bizarre presidential proclamation first imposed by Donald Trump.

Please bear in mind that I am often over optimistic.

Anyway, when the US finally accepts UK arrivals, I am optimistic that a reasonable regime will be in place for children. After all, families make up the vast majority of visitors to Florida.

Q: We have a package holiday to Las Vegas due to depart 23 October. The online travel agents have told us this week, the trip will go ahead, but should US borders be closed in October, approximately 10 days prior the airline will offer a refund in the way of a voucher. The hotel money would be refunded to us in cash.

Can we ask for a full cash refund for both parts of this trip?

Nikki Staffs

A: Under the Package Travel Regulations, if UK visitors are still banned from the US, then your trip cannot go ahead and you would ordinarily be entitled to a full cash refund within two weeks. However, it might prove a bit of a battle to secure your money back. So the short answer to your question is: yes, you can ask for a full cash refund  so long as it is legally impossible for you to make the trip. But if you know that you will be flying that way again soon, it might be just easier to accept the voucher.

Q: A lot of questions are being asked about the US opening up to travellers from the UK but what would be the chances of the UK government adding the US to the red travel list, given the high case numbers there at present?

Tom H

A: Almost zero. Short of an eruption of a new and extremely dangerous variant  in which case almost all international travel will be off  I cannot envisage any circumstances in which the US would be added to the red list. The same, by the way goes for all our most popular European destinations, including France, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Greece.

In fact, I expect the red list to start shrinking pretty soon  it is unsustainable and some of the countries on it are by any measure less risky than some members of the amber list.

Trans-European escapes

Q: Due to fly to Slovakia later this month, and they currently require a PCR test no older than 72 hours to enter from the UK? Could you advise whether this is 72 hours before departure time of the outbound flight, or 72 hours before arrival time in Slovakia?

Jonny O

A: The Foreign Office says, slightly unhelpfully: You must also be able to show a negative PCR test result no older than 72 hours, regardless of your vaccination status. It is not entirely clear whether that is before arrival or departure from the UK.

If it were feasible, I would urge you to organise a test at the airport before you depart  Heathrow has just got a facility with a three hour turnaround for PCR tests.

I appreciate there are zero flights from Heathrow to Bratislava or anywhere else in Slovakia, unfortunately. So I fear you must assume it is 72 hours before arrival in Slovakia  and time your test accordingly.

Q: Were in Italy for a couple of weeks, we are driving. We want to go back through Switzerland, without stopping to get into France and then to the UK. We will not have been in the UK for over ten days, having been in France and Italy. My understanding is that as we are both fully vaccinated we dont need to do anything else. Am I right?

Stevie C

A: I predict you will be able to be to drive straight through without a problem. But just in case, I suggest you pause at the Swiss border and, if you can see any officials there, just double check you are entitled to drive through (in the very unlikely event they say no, Im afraid you will need to swerve west and cross from Italy into France).

I am hearing occasional reports of people with British number plates transiting miscellaneous European countries being stopped and questioned about their travel history  make sure you keep evidence of your absence from the UK, perhaps including hotel or restaurant receipts.

Q: Do you think that Germany will be moving back to the amber list in the next weeks review? Cases have risen since last review but the vaccination rate is quite high. Thanks!

LBR

A: No. Germany is managing things pretty well. Indeed, for a lot of last autumn it was the last major European nation standing.

Q: We are planning a multi centred trip in December from Hungary to Krakow. We will have unvaccinated members of our group and we specifically chose this as it seems we can get from UK to Hungary to Poland and back to UK all with just tests, no jabs necessary. Am I right in thinking that we will be able to pull this off?!

Tudorfan

A: Sorry I cant predict what the rules will be three months from now. But I hope and expect they will be relaxed.

Q: Are we safe to book a trip to Crete?

Sarah Anne

A: The main risk I can see concerns the local transport in Crete  driving standards, unfortunately, are poor relative to the UK. Clearly, accidents in water are also a danger.

But if your question is more of Will Greece or its islands be added to the red list? the answer is no. Have a great trip.

Sunnier skies

Q: Myself and family are desperate for some Christmas sun and would love to go to Hurghada in Egypt. Do you think this will be possible, as we are itching to book? If not, where would be your best destination bet for us to go for some warm weather and a much-needed break?

Jo Carroll

A: I am absolutely with you in yearning for winter sun in Egypt  my absolute top choice between November and February. As you know it is on the red list.

Although the official case numbers are low, so too are testing rates. And so I am afraid that you and I may not be able to get there for Christmas. Next best choice, as always, is the ever reliable archipelago of the Canary Islands.

Q: We enjoy our big holiday at Christmas & New Year, Caribbean, SE Asia and such. Given the current situation, where would you predict this year is likely to be open and accessible to UK tourists?

Lenny G

A: As mentioned earlier, I am pretty sure that South Africa will be off the red list by the end of the year. Thailand, too. But my top choice is South America. Currently all arrivals from that wonderful continent to the UK must go into hotel quarantine. I think, though, there is a good chance that Chile and Peru will be off the red list very soon.
Two decades after 9/11, the role of Saudi Arabia in the attack remains in dispute despite unrelenting efforts by the US and Saudi governments to neutralise it as a live political issue.

The Saudi Arabia embassy in Washington this week issued a statement detailing its anti-terrorist activities and ongoing hostility to Al-Qaeda. This was briskly rejected by the lawyers for the families of the 9/11 victims who said that, what Saudi Arabia desperately does not want to discuss is the substantial and credible evidence of the complicity [in the attack] of their employees, agents and sponsored agents.

Saudi Arabia claims that the 9/11 Commission Report, the official American inquiry published in 2003, cleared it of responsibility for the attacks. In fact, it found no evidence that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials as individuals had funded Al-Qaeda. But this is not an exoneration since the Saudi government traditionally retains deniability by permitting Saudi sheikhs and wealthy individuals to finance radical Sunni Muslim movements abroad. A former Taliban finance minister, Agha Jan Motasim, revealed in an interview with the New York Times in 2016 that he went to Saudi Arabia several times a year to raise funds from private donors for his movement .

The evidence has always been strong that at various points the hijackers, who flew the planes into the twin towers and the Pentagon, had interacted with Saudi state employees, though how much the latter knew about the plot has never been clarified. What is impressive is the determination with which the US security services have tried to conceal or play down intelligence linking Saudi officials to 9/11, something which may be motivated by their own culpability in giving Saudis a free pass when suspicions about the hijackers were aroused prior to 9/11.

In Sarasota, Florida, the FBI at first denied having any documents relating to the hijackers who were living there, but eventually handed over 80,000 pages that might be relevant under the Freedom of Information Act. Last week President Joe Biden decided to release other documents from the FBIs overall investigation.

A striking feature of 9/11 is the attention which President George W Bush gave to diverting blame away from Saudi Arabia. He allowed some 144 individuals, mostly from the Saudi elite, to fly back to Saudi Arabia without being questioned by the FBI. A photograph shows Bush in cheerful conversation on the White House balcony a few days after 9/11 with the influential Saudi ambassador to Washington, Prince Bandar bin Sultan.

Senator Bob Graham, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee at the time, told me in an interview with The Independent in 2014 that, there were several incidents [in which US officials] were inexplicably solicitous to Saudis. This solicitude did not ebb over the years and it was only in 2016 that the wholly redacted 28 pages in the 9/11 Report about the financial links of some hijackers to individuals working for the Saudi government was finally made public.

I have never been a believer in direct Saudi government complicity in 9/11, because they had no motive and they usually act at one remove from events. When the Saudi state acts on its own  as with the murder and dismemberment of journalist Jamil Khashoggi by a death squad at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018  the operation is commonly marked by shambolic incompetence.

Conspiracy theories about 9/11 divert attention away from two areas of Saudi culpability that are beyond dispute. The first is simply that 9/11 was a Saudi-led operation through and through, since Osama bin Laden, from one of the most prominent Saudi families, was the leader of Al-Qaeda and 15 out of the19 hijackers were Saudi nationals. The 9/11 attacks might have happened without Afghanistan, but not without Saudi participation.

Another kind of Saudi government culpability for 9/11 is more wide-ranging but more important because the factors behind it have not disappeared. A weakness of the outpouring of analyses of the consequences of 9/11 is that they treat the attacks as the point of departure for a series of events that ended badly, such as the war on terror and the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq. This is very much a western viewpoint because what happened in New York and Washington in 2001 was not the beginning, but the midpoint in a struggle, involving both open and covert warfare, that began more than 20 years earlier and made Saudi Arabia such a central player in world politics.

This preeminent status is attributed to Saudi oil wealth and partial control over the price of oil. But more than 20 years before 9/11 two events occurred which deepened the US-Saudi alliance and made it far more important for both parties. These genuine turning points in history, both of which took place in 1979, were the overthrow of the Shah of Iran and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. These together generated 40 years of conflict and war which have not yet come to an end, and in which 9/11 was but one episode and the Taliban victory in Afghanistan last month another.

Saudi Arabia and the US wanted to stop communism in Afghanistan and the rise of Iran as a revolutionary Shia power. The former motive vanished with the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 (though not the permanent crisis in Afghanistan), but the Saudi aim to build a wall of fundamentalist Sunni movements in the 50 Muslim majority states in the world did not.

Saudi policy is to bet on all players in any conflict, so it can truthfully claim to be backing the Afghan government and fighting terrorism, though it is also indirectly funding a resurgent Taliban. The US was not blind to this, but only occasionally admitted so in public. Six years after 9/11, in 2007, Stuart Levy, the under secretary of the US Treasury in charge of putting a stop to the financing of terrorism, told ABC news that regarding Al-Qaeda, if I could somehow snap my fingers and cut off funding from one country, it would be Saudi Arabia. He added that not a single person identified by the US and the UN as a funder of terrorism had been prosecuted by the Saudis.

Most candid admissions by senior US officials were classified and are only known because of leaks. In a cable published by WikiLeaks, for instance, the then US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, wrote that, Saudi Arabia remains a critical financial support base for Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, LET [Lashkar-e-Taiba in Pakistan] and other terrorist groups.

Many US politicians and officials came to feel over the years that the price paid by the US for its alliance with the Saudi rulers was too great because their interests had come to diverge too radically. Senator Graham told me that, I believe that the failure to shine a full light on Saudi actions, and particularly its involvement in 9/11 had damaged the US and opened the door to violent jihadis. A direct line connects exonerating Saudi Arabia over 9/11 and the Taliban victory in Afghanistan 20 years later.
Its been 20 years since the September 11 attacks, and Islamistterrorism and the goal of countering it have become a useful framework for governments across the globe to justify foreign and domestic policies and serve geopolitical goals, especially in the context of the Middle East.

Governments around the world have found in the notion of Islamistterrorism a convenient way to present themselves as a force of good in the face of the evil terrorists  and sometimes to justify pragmatic yet problematic behaviour.

For the west, Islamist terrorism became the greatest evil of them all in the Middle East, and countering it trumped many other foreign policy concerns in the region. Alliances between countries with few shared values were formed or strengthened in the name of security cooperation against the perceived threat.

The United States turned a blind eye to illicit arms shipments to dictators like the late Ali Abdullah Saleh of Yemen on the basis that he was an ally in the fight against al-Qaeda. Saleh ended up eventually allying himself with al-Qaeda against US partners.

Sometimes Islamist terrorism was used to brush difficult policy options under the rug. Syria came to be a victim of this as western countries, especially the US and the UK, chose to focus on fighting Isis there rather than on trying to resolve the Syrian conflict. Echoing their rally for public support for the war on terror in the aftermath of 9/11, it was easier for the American and British governments to promote countering Isis to their respective constituents as their main goal in Syria, than to get buy-in from the same constituents for military action against the regime of Bashar al-Assad, although the Assad regime itself also coordinated with Isis to crush its opponents.

For governments in the Middle East, Islamist terrorism became a convenient excuse to crack down on political dissent. Bashar al-Assad labelled all his political opponents in Syria terrorists, while other countries in the region, such as in the Gulf, persecuted activists they accused of being affiliated with Islamist terrorist groups, even if this accusation was baseless.

Iran found in the spread of Sunni jihadism a convenient way of rebranding its own Shiite jihadism as counterterrorism. Iran-backed militant groups in Arab countries like the Popular Mobilization Units (PMUs) and Hezbollah got involved in battles against Sunni Isis in the name of national defence. This won the PMUs political and economic status in Iraq, increasing Irans influence there. The Lebanese group Hezbollah sent fighters to Syria in aid of the Assad regime, but justified this as being about protecting Lebanon from Sunni jihadists and used this framework to increase its own control in Lebanon.

The rebranding of Shiite jihadism was a deliberate effort by Iran to deflect attention from the destabilising activities Iran-backed groups were involved in. Some of these activities, like sectarian-based violence, have also ended up being used by Sunni jihadists to rally support for themselves.

The tragic developments in Afghanistan show that the selective use of Islamist terrorism continues beyond the Middle East. The Talibans behaviour has many similarities with that of Isis, and yet the US has declared the latter as being the enemy of choice in the country.

Many Arab countries have kept silent about the Talibans takeover of Afghanistan because of worry about its links with al-Qaeda and the prospect of provocation leading to retaliation by terrorist cells that remain present across the Middle East. This is because of the expectation of soon having normal diplomatic relations with the Taliban as the new rulers of Afghanistan, and also because the Taliban and Isis are enemies and the former says it wants to crush the latter. Irans projected hostile stance towards Sunni jihadism is in stark contrast to its own pragmatic, accommodating behaviour towards the Sunni Taliban.

At the height of the Cold War, the US supported the Afghan mujahideen which eventually fostered the very terrorists that attacked the US on 9/11. Today, the US is choosing not only to overlook the similarities between the Taliban and Isis in the name of American national interest, but also to frame the Taliban as the local force best suited to fight the branch of Isis in Afghanistan. Islamist terrorism is in the eye of the beholder.

Lina Khatib is director of the middle east and North Africa programme, Chatham House
Our patience is wearing thin. And your refusal has cost all of us. Joe Bidens message to Americas army of unvaccinated citizens was stark. And he backed his tough words with actions. Vaccines are being mandated for healthcare workers, federal contractors and the vast majority of US federal government workers.

They could face disciplinary measures if they refuse and the hard line extends into the private sector. All companies with more than 100 workers are going to have to require vaccination or institute weekly testing.

The UKs response looks tepid by comparison. A six-week consultation was announced on Thursday over a similar mandate for frontline healthcare workers. Those who fail to comply could face redeployment. There is already one in place in social care with deadlines looming.

However, it should also be said that the UKs vaccination rate is appreciably higher. According to government statistics, 88.9 per cent of eligible Britons have had their first dose. Some 80.4 per cent of us are fully vaccinated.

In the US, figures from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention show that just 73 per cent of eligible Americans have received a first dose while 63 per cent are fully covered.

We are not comparing like with like here, given that Americans aged 12 and up are able to receive shots whereas in Britain, it is 16-plus. But its safe to say that the refusal rate is considerably higher across the Atlantic, especially in southern states where the pandemic of the unvaccinated is at its worst and hospitals are being overrun.

This explains Bidens urgency, and his willingness to stare down critics, which include some erstwhile allies in unions, as well as his nations loopy conservatives. His moves will surely be made subject to legal challenge. But experts think hell win.

The UKs much more limited squeeze on the unvaccinated is creating rumblings of discontent too. Frances OGrady, the director general of the TUC, spoke to me this week of her discomfiture with the bullying of minorities, who have good reason to feel mistrustful of a government that frequently mistreats them and is led by a man who infamously penned racist newspaper columns in a former life.

OGrady, and other unions Ive talked to in this country, are steadfastly pro-vaccine but stress the virtues of persuasion over compulsion. And persuasion is indeed better.

But what happens when persuasion fails? Whose rights take precedence? Those refusing to take a safe and effective vaccine? Or those being put at risk from a killer disease as a result of the choice of the unvaccinated?

I feel a certain queasiness about mandating a health procedure (masks are a different matter). I understand the unhappiness of unions both in the US and the UK.

Unison has spoken eloquently on behalf of care workers, noting that there is already a staffing crisis in that sector which this may exacerbate. Mandatory vaccines would be a lot more palatable if some of the sectors employers paid staff better and treated them with a great deal more respect than they do at present. When people talk about the social care crisis, they rarely mention the issues facing its workforce.

And yet, as someone classified as clinically vulnerable, I find myself more and more inclined towards Bidens view. My life is potentially at risk from encountering a new variant of the virus through type 1 autoimmune diabetes, if it cuts through my AstraZeneca shield (Ive already had the original). I have friends and loved ones with suppressed immune systems. They are at even greater risk.

The vaccines are not perfect. Breakthrough infections are possible. Breakthrough hospitalisations are also possible. The unvaccinated are the most likely sources of them.

The rights and needs of people with disabilities and health conditions, on whom the virus has taken its greatest toll, have been largely ignored throughout the pandemic. Weve been left on our own. Britain is reopening but many people are still left asking themselves if they are safe to go and see a movie, have a meal or go out for a drink with friends. Or if they may be putting their loved ones at risk if they do so. This is terribly unfair.

There are various official figures for the number of Britons who have died from Covid. The most commonly quoted is 133,841, which is the number of deaths within 28 days of a positive test. I think the better figure is 156,888, referring to the number of fatalities with Covid-19 on the death certificate. The latter is roughly equivalent to the entire population of Swindon, or of Reading, or of Mansfield.

The actual number claimed by the virus is probably a fair bit higher than either. Not all of them have disabilities or health conditions. But more than half of them do. By any estimation those numbers are horrible. The flip side is that the government estimates 100,000 people have been saved as a direct result of the vaccination campaign.

Im heartily sick of feeling fear. I want to see the latter number increasing and the former number kept as low as possible. So, much as it offends my liberal instincts and as uncomfortable as it makes me feel, my sympathies are with Biden. My patience too is wearing thin.
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1. AIADMK Leader Wants 'Non-Factual' Scenes On MGR, Jayalalithaa Deleted From Kangana's Thalaivii

Twitter

He said that the movie is well-crafted, except for a few scenes on former Chief Minister and AIADMK founder-leader, late M.G. Ramachandran, fondly known as MGR, as also on Jayalalithaa.



2. 'This Is End Of The World': Priyanka Chopra's 'Activism' Reality Show Trolled For Its Concept

Twitter

A newly-announced reality show featuring Priyanka Chopra, Usher, and Julianne Hough has sparked a debate on social media. The show is described as a competition series that features six inspiring activists teamed with three high-profile public figures working together to bring meaningful change to one of three vitally important world causes: health, education, and environment.



3. 'What A Shame!': Javed Akhtar Slams Countries Willing To Shake Hands With Taliban

Twitter

Javed Akhtar also urged civilized society and world leaders to condemn the repression of Afghan women and the Taliban-led government in Afghanistan.



4. After Saki Naka Rape Victim's Death, Pooja Bhatt & Urmila Matondkar Demand Strict Action

Agencies

Reacting to the heinous crime and how it took an innocent life, celebrities shared their views on Twitter.

5. Bigg Boss OTT: After Shamita's Volatile Outburst, Fans Don't Want Raqesh To Trust Her Again

Voot Select

Amidst all the drama, a clip showcasing Shamita's violent outburst at Raqesh is going viral.
India has reported 33,376 new COVID-19 cases, 32,198 recoveries and 308 deaths in last 24 hours, as per Health Ministry.

Total cases: 3,32,08,330

Active cases: 3,91,516

Total recoveries: 3,23,74,497

Death toll: 4,42,317

Kerala Adds 25,010 New COVID-19 Cases, 177 Deaths

Kerala on Friday logged 25,010 new COVID-19 cases and 177 deaths, taking the caseload to 43,34,704 and the death toll to 22,303.

BCCL

State health minister Veena George said 1,51,317 samples were tested in the last 24 hours and the test positivity rate was 16.53 per cent.

Kerala To Complete Vaccination Of All Above 18 Years By September 30

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Friday said the state government aims to complete the first dose of vaccination to all above 18 years by September 30.

BCCL

Vijayan said till now, 78.03 per cent of the population above 18 years received the first dose of vaccination, while 30.16 per cent received both doses.

Maharashtra Reports 4,154 New COVID-19 Cases

Maharashtra has reported 4154 new COVID-19 cases, 4524 recoveries and 44 deaths in the last 24 hours.

Reuters

As per the state health department, the total count of cases has gone up to 64,91,179.

COVID-19 Recovery Rate In Assam Crosses 98%

Assam on Friday reported 396 new COVID-19 cases, which was 41 less than that of the previous day, while the recovery rate from the viral infection crossed 98 per cent, the National Health Mission bulletin said.

BCCL

Kamrup Metropolitan district continued to account for the highest number of new cases with 70 detected during the day, followed by Golaghat and Sivsagar with 31 cases each, and Jorhat with 25 cases.

PM Modi Chairs Review Meeting On COVID-19 Situation In India

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday chaired a high-level review meeting on COVID-19 situation and vaccination in the country.

PTI

As per the Prime Minister's Office (PMO), the meeting was done to review India's present situation regarding the pandemic and the vaccination drive.

India's Cumulative COVID-19 Vaccination Coverage Reaches Nearly 73 Crores

In the ongoing nationwide COVID-19 vaccination drive, 72.97 crore vaccine doses have been administered to eligible beneficiaries till date, informed the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

BCCL

With the administration of 56,91,552 vaccine doses in the last 24 hours, India's COVID-19 vaccination coverage has surpassed the cumulative figure of 72,97,50,724 as per provisional reports till 7 pm Friday.
Bollywood actor Sonu Sood has shown his generosity yet again and gifted smartphones to students in Alappuzha in Kerala. Ensuring that they are able to continue studies, the actor told them to "keep sim cards ready", putting an end to their struggle of attending online classes.

Twitter

Sood Foundation got smartphones for students

Sood took to Twitter to say, "All students will get their phones by tomorrow, keep your sim cards ready."

All students will get their phones by tom,

keep your sim cards ready. @SoodFoundation  https://t.co/GMjCrUwU2h pic.twitter.com/Sy1MDj4lxU  sonu sood (@SonuSood) September 11, 2021





"Big giant hug of gratitude to Sonu Sood"

This came two days after a doctor reached out to the actor on the microblogging site, asking him to help students of Alappuzha get back to their studies. Dr Radhika Batra who also has been working for those hit by the COVID pandemic, tweeted, "These 10 students in Alappuzha, Kerela urgently need a smart phone to continue their online education. Kindly requesting Sonu Sood & Sood Foundation to please help them! Thank you so much"

These 10 students in Alappuzha, Kerela urgently need a smart phone to continue their online education. Kindly requesting @SonuSood & @SoodFoundation to please help them ! Thank you so much @vishallamba20 @ManavJ7 @DuaPrashika @amalsajikerala https://t.co/ApNjQe8ymu pic.twitter.com/B93ZQm43uW  Radhika Batra, MD | DM for Covid Help (@DrRadhikaBatra) September 8, 2021

Later, she took to Twitter to thank the actor and his charitable organisation.

'ShikshaHarHaath' initiative

In January 2021, Mi India collaborated with actor Sonu Sood to launch the 'ShikshaHarHaath' initiative. Financial Express reported that the brand plans to empower thousands of students across the country by donating Redmi smartphones.

AFP

The initiative also allows people to be a part of bettering a child's future by donating their smartphones which are in working condition at the Mi Centres. These second-hand phones would then be refurbished before they are donated. A microsite has been launched so that the consumers can pledge their smartphones.
A creature that lived 500 million years ago was recently discovered by scientists in Canada's Burgess Shale - a large deposit bearing different types of fossils and considered one of the earliest fossil beds on Earth.

The gigantic crab-like creature is considered a pre-historic relative of the horseshoe crab, according to a paper published in the Royal Society Open Science. The strangest bit? The creature would have been one of the largest crabs of its time, trumping all similar crabs discovered from the same time in terms of size.

Imagine half a metre long crab

The creature has been named "Titanokorys gainesi" by palaeontologists at the Royal Ontario Museum who also dated the creature to have existed between 485-541 million years ago.

With a length of over half a metre, the size of this crab has been termed "mind-boggling" by Jean-Bernard Carob from the Royal Ontario Museum said in a press release.

Giant crab from 500 million years ago | Royal Ontario Museum

Also read: Climate Change Forcing Animals To Change Their Shape And Size In Race To Survive

This is particularly is compelling because most ocean organisms from this era were roughly the size of our pinky finger - about an inch.

What did the gigantic crab look like?

Classified as "radiodonts", the prehistoric arthropods (creatures without a backbone) possessed a series of ghoulish features including "multifaceted eyes".

Giant crab from 500 million years ago | Royal Ontario Museum

The creature looks like a sliced pineapple at first sight. In addition, the crab had a pair of claws right beneath the head to capture prey. To help with swimming, the creature had multiple flaps.

Also read: Hummingbirds Have A Superpower: They Can Smell Danger Like No Other Bird Species



The odd body shapes and sizes of marine animals from this time period continue to perplex scientists, with researchers hoping to establish a link between these erratic evolutionary traits and feeding habits.

Giant crab from 500 million years ago | Royal Ontario Museum

The head-to-body ratio is insanely disproportionate. In fact, a co-author of the study - Joe Mysiuk from the University of Toronto in a press release claimed that the creature looks just like a swimming head.

Can you imagine jumping into the ocean for a swim and stumbling upon this eerie-looking crab? Let us know what you think of this discovery in the comments below.

For the latest in science and tech, don't forget to read Indiatimes.com daily.
A Norwegian company is currently developing multi-turbine technology to generate five times the energy as single wind turbines produce in a whole year.

Wind energy is considered the cheapest and quickest way to generate renewable energy. Current wind turbines are built on a single pole design with three gigantic blades. But the new turbines developed by Wind Catching Systems could mark a radical shift in how turbine technology is understood.

Wind Catching Systems/Fast Company + Unsplash

Meet the Wind Catcher

Just changing the design was able to elicit these groundbreaking results. The new "Wind Catcher" is designed in a square grid with over 100 small blades. This helps the turbine reach heights of 1,000 feet - thrice as high as traditional turbines.

A floating platform of sorts supports the turbines which are then affixed on the ocean floor and a prototype of this ambitious design could appear before next year. Wind energy is a gamechanger, but 80 per cent of the world's wind blows in deep water bodies, where setting up turbines is difficult.

Wind Catching Systems/Fast Company + Unsplash

Also read: World's Biggest Wind Turbine Powers 20,000 Homes, Covers 46,000 Sq Metre

This radical design change could fix that problem. Offshore wind farms are basically wind farms that are silted into water bodies, to take advantage of high speed winds in these regions. And the trend has caught on.

According to FastCompany, 162 such offshore wind farms are currently operational around the world. But it's not easy to set up such wind farms, for the turbines cannot be installed deeper than 200 feet in the water.

Unsplash

Also read: World's Most Powerful Offshore Wind Turbine Can Power A House For 2 Days With Just One Rotation



Due to this, the farms have to be built closer to shores. But winds are the strongest farther away from shores. Floating wind farms have attempted to provide a viable solution. The first farm of this kind opened in Scotland back in 2017, situated 40 kilometres away from the coast of Aberdeen.

Do you think wind energy should be harvested more creatively to help solve our energy woes while choosing environmental friendly methods? Let us know in the comments. For the latest on science and tech, don't forget to read Indiatimes.com daily.
The Suez Canal got blocked again! This time a bulk carrier vessel became wedged in Egypt's artificial sea-level waterway and briefly blocked traffic, Egyptian authorities said.

In an official statement, the Suez Canal Authority said that the Panama-flagged Coral Crystal ran aground in a double-lane stretch of the canal and forced the authorities to redirect other vessels in the convoy to the other lane.

Meaww

The canal transits two convoys everyday; One north-bound to the Mediterranean and the other south-bound to the Red Sea.



The statement also said that the canal's tugboats managed to float the south-bound vessel which carries cargo weighing 43,000 tons. The Coral Crystal then resumed its voyage, the canal said.

Admiral Ossama Rabei, head of the Suez Canal, said that the inconvenience was very brief grounding, and resolved in a professional manner.

Geoge Safwat, the canal spokesman, said 61 vessels, carrying a total of 3.2 million tons of cargo, transited in the Suez Canal on Thursday. Traffic (at the canal) was not negatively impacted in anyway," since it was redirected to the other lane of waterway, he said.

Officials have not disclosed what caused the vessel to run aground.

Articlepedia (Ever Given)

The ship was built in 2012 with a length of nearly 738 feet and a width of over 104 feet. It was on its way to Port Sudan on the Red Sea.
The annual Waves of Flags display and remembrance at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, on Sept. 9, 2021 commemorates those who lost their lives and their loved ones in the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 by flying nearly 3,000 American flags, including international flags for each foreign country that lost a citizen in the 911 attack. Indian American commentator writes: Time takes nothing away, enabling pain to live on despite ones best efforts. (Al Seib/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
Flutter 2.5, the latest version of Googles UI toolkit for native application development, offers better performance as well as full-screen enhancements for Android.

Introduced September 8, Flutter 2.5 improves frame rasterization by wiring up shading precompilation via Metal rendering. Proponents of Flutter stressed this move as another step toward reducing iOS jank. Also, frame processing now takes priority over processing other asynchronous events, eliminating jank from this source in testing of Flutter. A further move to reduce jank involves the garbage collector (GC), which has suffered from jank when the GC pauses the UI thread to reclaim memory; now, memory for unused images is reclaimed eagerly, considerably reducing GCs.

Another performance improvement involves latency when sending messages between Dart and Objective-C/Swift (iOS) or Dart and Kotlin/Android. As part of tuning up message channels, removing unnecessary copies from messaging codecs reduces latencies by as much as 50% depending on message size and device.

Another performance improvement pertains to targeting iOS. Flutter apps built on Apple Silicon M1 Macs run natively on ARM iOS simulators. Thus, there is no Rosetta translation between Intel x86_64 instructions and ARM, which increases performance during iOS app testing and allows developers to avoid subtle Rosetta issues. This is a step along a path for full support in Flutter for Apple Silicon.

Flutter 2.5 was announced as stable on September 8. Installation instructions can be found at flutter.dev. Also in Flutter 2.5:
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Susan Carroll has been named the new president of Inova Loudoun Hospital.
For foraging nerds like me, there are treasures to be found year-round. We found a few wild mushrooms in the fields  our buckthorn berries are ripening and Ive picked lots of rowan berries to make jelly to serve with pork, lamb or game when it comes into season.

There are oodles of wild blackberries this year so you can satisfy your inner hunter gatherer or just have a trip down memory lane.

We have tons of blackberries on the briars in the hedgerows around the school, an extra bonus from rewilding areas on the farm to provide extra habitats for birds, wild animals, bees and other pollinating insects. This year they are really fat and juicy, with a more intense tart flavour than the cultivated blackberries, and, of course, they are free. Organise a bramble picking expedition with your children and grandchildren. You will need to show them how to pick the best ones and how to judge if they are infested with tiny maggots  rather than a pale, creamy green centre, the core will be stained with blackberry juice.

We buy kilos of blackberries for jam from local children who love to earn some pocket money and continue the tradition that has endured in many families for generations.

Blackberries freeze brilliantly  they also dry well. If you have a dehydrator, its really worth experimenting with blackberries: add them to scones, muffins, muesli. Try folding some into Champ or Colcannon to serve with roast duck.

They are at their best at present but will gradually deteriorate depending on the weather. Older people used to tell us children not to pick blackberries after Halloween, some say Michaelmas (September 29) cos the puca will have spit on them. This was a brilliant deterrent to stop hungry kids from eating over-ripe blackberries years ago.

Have fun with blackberries: they are deliciously versatile  think of adding them to both sweet and savoury dishes as well as scattering over breakfast granola, muesli, yoghurtPop one into an ice cube with a mint leaf to add to cordials and aperitifs.

They are packed with Vitamin C and are supposed to improve both motor and cognitive functions and couldnt we all do with that. They also make delicious wine if you are into home brewing but creme de mure is even easier  try this recipe which I originally came across in one of my favourite cookbooks of all time, Jane Grigsons Good Things. Its a brilliant base for a cordial or a blackberry Kir.

All of the hedgerows around us here are still full of fluffy meadowsweet so hope you've been picking some and experimenting with the fragrant blossoms  see my article of August 7, 2021.

Blackberry, blueberry, raspberry and mint pavlova recipe by:Darina Allen Pavlova, the dessert named after prima ballerina Anna Pavlova has to be in here  a base for so many delicious ripe berries and fruit Servings 6 Preparation Time 10 mins Cooking Time 55 mins Total Time 1 hours 5 mins Course Dessert Ingredients 4 egg whites

225g caster sugar

1 tsp cornflour

1 tsp white wine vinegar

1 tsp vanilla extract or the zest of 1 lemon

For the filling:

300ml cream

400  450g mixture of whole and sliced blackberries, raspberries, blueberries mixed with fresh mint

To garnish:

Fresh mint leaves Method Preheat the oven to 150C/300F/Gas Mark 2. Line a baking tray with parchment paper. Check that your bowl and whisk are dry and free of grease or any residue of detergent. Using a food-processor, whisk the egg whites until stiff, then add in half the caster sugar, continue to whisk until the mixture is stiff and shiny. Fold in the rest of the caster sugar with the cornflour, vinegar, vanilla extract or lemon zest. Spread the meringue mixture onto a 23cm (9 inch) round or oval on the silicone paper. Make a well in the centre and push the mixture to the side to form walls. Bake in the centre of a preheated oven for 1- 1  hours or until very pale brown, crisp on the outside and dry underneath but soft and marshmallow in the centre. Remove from the oven, turn the pavlova upside down on a wire rack and peel off the paper. If its still a little sticky in the centre, replace in the oven for 5-10 minutes longer. Allow to get quite cold. To serve, transfer the pavlova carefully onto a serving plate. Whip the cream softly, fill the centre of the pavlova with cream and berries. Garnish with fresh mint.



Note: This quantity makes 6 individual 10cm (4 inch) pavlovas which take 20 minutes to cook.

Blackberry, apple and geranium jam recipe by:Darina Allen Blackberries are a bit low in pectin, so the tart Bramley apples help the jam to set as well as adding extra flavour. This makes 9-10 450g jars Preparation Time 20 mins Cooking Time 6 mins Total Time 26 mins Course Dessert Cuisine Traditional Ingredients 2.3kg (5lbs) blackberries (wild or cultivated)

900g (2lbs) cooking apples (Bramley Seedling in season)

1kg  scant 1.1kg (2lbs 4oz  2lbs 6oz) granulated sugar

8-10 sweet geranium leaves (optional), alternatively use the finely-grated zest and juice of an organic lemon

Method Wash, peel, core and slice the apples. Stew them until soft with 300ml (10fl oz) of water in a stainless steel saucepan; beat to a pulp. Pick over the blackberries, cook until soft, adding about 150ml (5fl oz) of water (or water and lemon juice) if the berries are dry. If the blackberries are frozen, omit the water. Put the blackberries into a wide stainless steel saucepan or preserving pan with the apple pulp and heated sugar. Destalk and chop the sweet geranium leaves (or zest of the lemon if using) and add to the fruit. Stir over a gentle heat until the sugar is dissolved. Boil steadily for about 15 minutes approximately. Skim the jam, test for a set and pot into warm spotlessly clean jars. Seal, store in a dark place or share with friends.

Lemon curd recipe by:Darina Allen Easy peasy, this recipe makes two 200ml jars of lemon curd Servings 8 Cooking Time 10 mins Total Time 10 mins Course Dessert Ingredients 50g butter

100g caster sugar

grated zest and juice of 2 lemons

2 organic eggs and 1 organic egg yolk whisked (keep white aside for meringue Method Melt the butter on a very low heat. Add the caster sugar, lemon zest and juice and then add the whisked eggs. Stir carefully over a gentle heat with a straight ended wooden spatula until the mixture coats the back of it. Remove from the heat and pour into a bowl or sterilized jar (it will thicken further as it cools.) Cover when cold and refrigerate.

Lemon curd cream with blackberries and toasted almonds recipe by:Darina Allen Tangy, sweet and moreish, the almonds in this recipe add a perfect crunch Servings 4 Preparation Time 10 mins Total Time 10 mins Course Dessert Ingredients 4 tbsp lemon curd

3-4 tablespoons softly whipped cream

175g (6oz) wild blackberries

a squeeze of freshly squeezed lemon juice

a sprinkling of sugar or a drizzle of honey (optional)

2 tablespoons toasted flaked almonds

shredded mint leaves plus a couple of whole mint leaves for garnishing Method Taste the blackberries, if they are very tart, add a squeeze of lemon juice and a generous sprinkling of sugar or honey. Allow to macerate for 4-5 minutes. Fold the whipped cream into the lemon curd. Taste and add a more of either depending on the intensity of the lemon curd. Toast the flaked almonds in a dry pan to a rich golden colour (watch them as they burn really easily) and cool. To serve, put two generous tablespoons of lemon curd cream into each shallow bowl. Spoon some of the macerated blackberries over the cream. Scatter with flaked almonds and sprinkle on some shredded mint plus a few fresh mint leaves for garnish.

HOT TIPS

Artisan Bakeries

Artisan bakeries are popping up all over the country. The worse the commercial bread becomes (and much of it is truly shocking now), the greater the opportunity. I reckon that before too long, most small towns and villages will be able to support a bakery that sells natural sourdough and slowly proved yeast and rye breads. During a recent visit to the brilliant Borris House Festival of Writing and Ideas, I discovered The Fermentary, opposite the playground on the main street. Local people were queuing patiently for 48-hour natural sourdough and rye loaves, gorgeous almond or coconut and raspberry croissants, morning buns, pain au chocolat  and really good coffee too from La Cabra coffee roasters in Copenhagen or Calendar in Galway, Kombucha on tap from a stylish copper dispenser. Another place thats worth a detour. thefermentary.ie

Eight Degrees Brewery  Best in Ireland World Beer Awards

Congratulations to Eight Degrees Brewing's Seisiun IPA and Sunburnt Irish Red Ale which have been named Best in Ireland at this years World Beer Awards. Seisiun IPA took the win in the session category while Sunburnt Irish Red Ale was the winner in the amber category.

Clean Coasts Ballynamona

Bravo Clean Coasts Ballynamona who have just launched a 2022 calendar with stunning imagery of the East Cork Coastline. 100% of the profits from the sale of the calendar go back into protecting our coast and managing meadows for pollinators under their care.

The calendars can be purchased online at SeaAndLandTrust.org for 13.75 which includes postage anywhere within Ireland. They are also available for purchase via the Farm Shop at the Ballymaloe Cookery School and other local shops/outlets in East Cork.
At the outset of Between Two Hells: The Irish Civil War, Professor Diarmaid Ferriter explains that it was not his intention to cover the military fighting in detail.

It is not the duty of the historian to lecture the people of the past on how they should have done better, he insists. The quest should be to understand and contextualise their positions, the lights that guided them and to humanise their dilemmas and the deadly consequences of their decisions.

It is certainly a historically valuable approach, because many of those most involved in the conflict were later reluctant to deal with the issues publicly.

Terrible things were done by both sides, the future taoiseach Sean Lemass told journalist Michael Mills in 1969. But that was all he would say.

The war was fought over the Free States acceptance of the Anglo-Irish Treaty of December 1921. The majority of the Irish people apparently endorsed that decision.

Rory OConnor, who was described by the author as the most high-profile spokesman of the anti-Treaty officers, told a press conference on March 22, 1922, that the Republican Army could prevent an election. When asked if he was proposing a military dictatorship, OConnor pointedly replied: You can take it that way if you like.

Any doubts about the acceptance of the Treaty by a majority of the electorate were clearly removed by the results of the Dail general election of June 16, 1922. Pro-Treaty Sinn Fein won 58 seats with 38.5% of the vote, while anti-Treaty Sinn Fein won just 36 seats (with 21.2%). The Labour Party, which supported the Treaty, won 17 seats. Thus the Free State element and the Labour Party had 75 seats, or more than double the anti-Treatys 36 seats.

The actual catalyst leading to the civil war was the murder, outside his London home, of field marshal Henry Wilson on June 22, 1922. Lloyd George, the British prime minister, told Michael Collins that the British had evidence linking the two killers to the IRA.

The prime minister said his government could no longer ignore the ambiguous position of the IRA force occupying the Four Courts in Dublin. They had to be cleared out. If the Free State did not do it, the British would obviously do so themselves. Collins therefore directed his men to seize the Four Courts on June 28, and this essentially ignited the Irish civil war.

Executions

Between Two Hells: The Irish Civil War.

By late August, the Free States two recognised leaders, Arthur Griffith and Michael Collins, were both dead. Griffith died of natural causes, and Collins was killed 11 days later in an ambush at Beal na Blath. The author suggests that Collins was the worst for wear with drink at the time, and it was this which led him to make the stupid military blunder by stopping to return fire.

One of the more distinctive aspects of the civil war was the executions of 77 Republican prisoners by the Free State side. The first of those executions took place at Kilmainham Jail under the Public Safety Act, which made the possession of a gun a capital offence. Four men  aged 18 to 22  were executed by firing squad on the morning of November 17, 1922.

Thomas Johnson the Labour Party leader decried the action, because of the absence of public trials and legal aid for the accused. A week later Erskine Childers was executed for the possession of a small pistol that had ironically been given to him by Michael Collins.

The Republicans retaliated for these executions by killing the pro-Treaty Dail deputy Sean Hales in Dublin on December 7, 1922. The Free State responded, next day, by summarily executing four prominent Republican prisoners  Rory OConnor, Liam Mellows, Richard Barrett, and Joe McKelvey.

They were executed without trial for acts committed by others, Dr Ferriter concluded. Moreover, all four had been prisoners since before the Public Safety Act had been introduced.

Kevin OHiggins, the minister for justice, had been a close friend of Rory OConnor, who was best man at OHigginss wedding little over a year earlier. But Dr Ferriter notes that OHiggins stoutly defended the executions on the grounds that the safety and preservation of the people is the highest law.

Many people were surprised that the Catholic Hierarchy seemed to have nothing to say

about desecration of a Church holiday, as the executions of the four men was on December 8, 1922.

Free State propaganda suggested that even those most sensitive...to the excesses of executive government, accepted the executions as inevitable if Ireland was to be saved from a descent into Bolshevism.

The Free State government obviously had no qualms about the executions, because it increased their pace. They executed 34 men in January 1923, even though there had been no further killing of any government deputy.

Cosgrave stated that his government was persisting with the executions in order to save the country. If we have to exterminate ten thousand republicans, the three millions of our people is bigger than this ten thousand, he insisted.

Difference in leadership

Historian Diarmaid Ferriter.

The Free State came under intense emotional pressure from some outspoken women, such as Mary MacSwiney, a sister of the late Lord Mayor of Cork, Terence MacSwiney, who had died In October 1920 on a protracted hunger-strike protesting against his imprisonment by the British.

Referring to him as my sainted brother, Mary traded heavily on his memory, and took part in a massive hunger strike of republican prisoners that began in October 1923. It initially involved 7,003 of the 8,207 Republican prisoners. By early November, the number on hunger strike was down to 3,067, and it eroded to 315 by mid-November.

Dr Ferriters book shows a distinct difference between the leadership of each side during the conflict. The Free State authorities appeared to know what they wanted and were determined to have their way. The republicans, on the other hand, often seemed rudderless and confused.

Eamon de Valera was the recognised leader of the anti-Treaty side, but at times he provided little leadership. In fact, on his opening page Dr Ferriter quotes from a letter that de Valera wrote to Mary MacSwiney in September 1922. It basically suggested that he did not know what to do.

For the sake of the cause I allowed myself to be put into a position which it is impossible for one of my outlook and personal bias to fill with effect for the party, he wrote. Every instinct of mine would indicate that I was meant to be a dyed in-the-wool Tory, or even a Bishop, rather than the leader of a revolution.

As the conflict continued de Valera was blamed as solely responsible for the recent destruction of the country. This, Dr Ferriter convincingly dismisses as a wild exaggeration. In contrast with his earlier confusion, de Valera played a significant part in helping to end the conflict.

After the death of IRA chief of staff Liam Lynch in April 1923, the IRA executive agreed among themselves that peace should be negotiated. Military victory must be allowed to rest for the moment with those who have destroyed the Republic, de Valera declared. Mercifully, he helped to end the conflict shortly afterwards.
Some years ago, Siobhan Macdonald took a taxi ride from Long Island to the airport with a taxi driver who seemed out of sorts. When she told him that she was a technical writer, in New York on a course for her work, he practically hijacked her.

He started telling me about Vietnam, and friends of his who, left behind in Laos needed help; stories of the drugs war, the corrupt American government, and of someone who had tried to poison him. The stories got wilder - he clearly wasnt rational - and he wanted to pull over, find somewhere quiet, and work on a book from this huge stack of papers piled on the front passenger seat. He said, you can help me write my book. Ill pay you.

She managed to talk him down and get to the airport but he lost his temper, kicking the tyres as she ran for the terminal.

A year or so later, renovating a basement apartment in Edinburgh with her soon-to-be husband, she got to know the very grand, elegant woman who lived in the apartment above her. She drove a black cab and had all kinds of stories about the people she had met. Siobhan was intrigued.

And when she was planning her latest crime novel, she thought she would set it around a woman taxi-driver.

I didnt want a traditional police procedural, she tells me on Zoom from her home in Limerick. I wanted an amateur with a nose for crime. Taxi drivers are in a position to know peoples business. They are called on by gardai when theres been a traffic accident where there was no CCTV; they see altercations in the street; they bring people to and from hospital, and children to and from school. They have insight.

And they have to be good at reading peoples behaviour. All they can go on is a phonecall, or how the customer approaches the cab. They have got to be able

to handle people and make a judgement that they are safe.

In The Bride Collector, Ellie, who once lived in style, has fallen on hard times. Shes driving a taxi in a small tourist town in Co Kerry where secrets thrive. The novel opens on a March evening when Ellie is driving a bride-to-be home after her hen night before dropping her more sociable friends at a nightclub. The talk is all about murder and the two women recently found dead in the town, left decked out in their wedding dresses.

When, the next day, Ellie learns that the woman she drove home has become the murderers latest victim, she is as horrified as she is intrigued. She shares her suspicions with an investigative journalist Cormac Scully, and, not trusting the local gardai, who have their own reasons for wanting to keep the investigation quiet, they decide to do some digging of their own.

Open secrets

The idea stemmed from Siobhans fascination with small rural towns.

When people are living cheek by jowl, there can be open secrets, things people dont want to talk about, she says. Secrets that people know about that which dont make it to the paper. In my fiction, the garda has his own agenda and doesnt want big wigs coming from the capital telling him how to do his job.

Luckily for Cormac and Ellie, the gardai have a whistleblower in their ranks; someone who has seen what can happen, and who wants to see justice done; and

he happens to be a good friend of Cormacs.

A traditional whodunnit, with lots of warmth and humour, and little blood and guts, The Bride Collector is a brilliant character-based story that zips along at a

ferocious pace.

There are lots of red herrings and twists, including a breathtakingly whopping one towards the end. The author cleverly drip-feeds information and the more we learn about Ellie, an unreliable narrator with a mysterious past, the more fascinating she appears.

The author, who grew up reading Agatha Christie, was always writing as a child.

I entered language and poetry competitions in school, and I wrote dramatic duologues for myself and a friend to act out on stage.

But when she left her Limerick Colaiste in the middle of the 80s recession, electronics were deemed to be the next big thing. Siobhan studied Electronic Engineering at NUI Galway, but, finishing her degree, realised it was not the career for her.

Figuring how she could use her degree to write, she answered an advertisement for technical writing and went to Dundee in Scotland to be trained up as she worked.

I couldnt believe how cold it was, she said, but I met a brilliant group of people there, including my husband, who all had different degrees; they trained me well, and it was fun!

After two years she opted to work in the south of France, and then it was back to Scotland as a technical writer for internet start-ups. All this time her grandmother had been posting her Irish jobs pages, trying to tempt her back to Limerick, and in the mid- 90s, her Scottish husband said: Lets give it a go, and see what happens.

We did, and were still here.

Research

All this time she has been writing creatively. I sent short stories to competitions and to Scotland on Sunday, but I didnt have much luck. Then, in 2010, I had an idea for a novel. I sent it to agents and publishers and got positive feedback, but it was a novel of two halves  half romantic and half a gritty thriller. They said I had to decide which genre I wanted to write.

She decided on crime, and her first novel, Twisted River, came out in 2016. There have been two other books since  The Blue Pool and Guilty  which examined the shenanigans around politics in a small Irish town.

These last two books have taken a great deal of research. And it's not just the authenticity of her plot and characters she needs to get right, but the political correctness of language too.

Language moves on so fast, she says. For example, my sister, at birth was called mentally handicapped, but you cant say that anymore. Then it was brain damage, but thats no longer acceptable. And the other day, a parent received an avalanche of abuse on Twitter for saying his, much-loved, child had special needs.

I did so much research. It put me in my comfort zone, but I only needed an eighth of it. Next time, I think Ill follow Ian Rankins advice. He used to spend so much time on research that he then discarded, that he now writes the story first.

What that next book will be, is not yet clear.

I have an idea for another standalone book; I know the story; I know four or five main characters and how they will interact, but I dont yet know the structure. But I can imagine at least one sequel to The Bride Collector. Ill have to chat it through with my agent, Jo Bell.

Next time around, Siobhan is determined to avoid a big structural edit. Because last November, when one came her way, she was struck down with Covid 19.

It was rotten. I didnt end up in hospital, but for two or three weeks I had no interest in reading, and I could not look at the news because it scared me. I didnt want to know where my illness might go.
The heartbroken granddaughter and 'best friend' of one of Ireland's oldest women said her gran died peacefully at home, after being reunited with her son who hadn't been home for two years due to Covid-19 restrictions.

Nancy Stewart from Clonard, Co Meath died peacefully early on Friday morning, aged 107.

The much-loved woman, who was older than the State, left people smiling over the pandemic when she appeared across social media alongside her granddaughter Louise Coghlan with messages of hope and positivity.

Nancy made surprise phone calls to people around the world while in isolation and received many calls from celebrities including Daniel and Majella O'Donnell.

She survived two World Wars, the War of Independence and two pandemics and had been cocooning at her home where she has lived for the last 83 years.

Nancy Stewart. Picture: Seamus Farrelly

It is believed she was Ireland's oldest woman who still lived in her own home. Her granddaughter Louise said her gran had been in terrific health in recent weeks and had even discarded her glasses and hearing aid.

"She was in great form. She didn't need her glasses and her hearing aid went in the bin.

"In the last week, two friends that she hadn't seen since before Covid-19 and were precious to her visited and her son came home from England and he hasn't been home either because of the restrictions.

"I think myself she was holding on for those moments.

"She had her tea on Thursday and was as high as a kite. Later that night she felt uneasy but didn't know what was wrong. She died peacefully later.

"She was delighted with all the cards and parcels she received from all over the world because of the social media posts and videos that we created."

In a Facebook post, Louise wrote: "I'll never be able to put into words how broken my heart is yet, how full of love and gratitude it is for one human who gave me all I need to see the world in a forever kind and generous way.

"You were my world for so long and for so many others, but now we much let God, my dad, and all the angels and saints be blessed with your presence.

"Forever the other half of my heart, forever my reason to smile, even when I feel low. The world doesn't seem half as bright without you in it, but I know you will help me find my sparkle when the time is right.

"We will meet again and when we do, I know you will have the kettle on. All my love from here to eternity. Don't worry, I'll turn the lights off before I close my eyes tonight. My best friend forever. Lou."

In the last 18 months, Nancy issued a letter to all parishes asking people to look out for each other. On her birthday on October 16 last year, she said:

"I don't feel 107. I feel half that to be honest. It's all about good food, good friends and always looking on the bright side of life. I think that's the secret to a good life.

"I can't believe I'm the oldest person in Ireland living in my own home. I don't feel that old. When God wants me, he will come and take me but for now, I will keep enjoying my life, I'll keep loving my family and I'll keep saying my prayers day by day, oh, and not to forget eating lots of good wholesome food is my tip.

Good food and lots of tea is my secret to a long life as well as keeping positive as best we can. We must always look forward and hope for the best.

Nancy, who was born in 1913, lost her husband Bob in a car crash in 1989 and her twin daughters Margaret and Anne passed away in the last ten years.

She has three daughters Kathleen, Mary, and Olive, one son Finian and 84 grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and great-great-grandchildren.

Nancy's funeral Mass takes place on Sunday at 2pm in St Finian's Church, Clonard followed by burial in the adjoining cemetery.

Due to Government advice, the capacity of the church is limited to 50% capacity.
The Rotunda Hospital has said it very much regrets any upset or anxiety caused by the broadcasting of a TV series filmed at the location during the pandemic.

It comes as the Minister for Health called on bosses at the maternity hospital to explain why an RTE camera crew was allowed to film a programme while partners of pregnant women faced restrictions.

The RTE show, The Rotunda, which films the maternity hospital, aired this week. It sparked huge public backlash after fathers and partners were prevented from attending their child's birth and other pregnancy-related appointments due to Covid-19 restrictions, while a camera crew was granted access.

A spokesperson said: The Rotunda very much regrets any upset or anxiety that the broadcast of this important documentary has caused, as none was ever intentioned.

The Rotunda will continue to support and care for its patients and staff to the best of its ability, throughout both good times and challenging conditions.

We will continue, in good faith, to always do our best for our patients and our families.

However, the spokesperson also defended the decision to record the series.

They said: Management at the Rotunda consider the series to be an important platform that enables patients to share their experiences, both good news stories and those that are heartbreaking.

The Rotunda believes that it is important to hear these challenges and stories, and to acknowledge the experiences of patients and staff during the difficult time created by the Covid-19 pandemic.

They also noted the strong positive reaction (including from very senior politicians) to the RTE Investigates: Inside Irelands Covid Battle documentary series which was broadcast in July 2020.

That documentary was filmed at the height of the pandemic inside St James Hospital Intensive Care Unit, when even more restrictive conditions than have ever applied at the Rotunda were in place the statement said.

The Rotunda management team were reassured to note that some of the same production staff involved in that much-lauded documentary were involved in series three of The Rotunda.

Both RTE and the Rotunda have faced widespread criticism after a film crew was permitted on site when partners of expectant mothers were forced to wait outside maternity hospitals because of Covid restrictions.

Earlier, the Minister for Health said he is looking into the issue but has called for answers from the master of the Rotunda.

"I think we certainly deserve an explanation, a statement from the Rotunda on this," Mr Donnelly said.

There's been an awful lot of very difficult cases, day-to-day access obviously for partners but what for me what has been particularly distressing is cases where there have been emergencies and partners haven't been able to get in.

"We've been working really hard with the HSE, and to get this sorted out a lot of work has been done."

Taoiseach Micheal Martin added that partners should not be facing restrictions.

"I don't think it's appropriate that partners were denied access that a TV crew should be allowed in," he said.

Fianna Fail senator Lisa Chambers, who gave birth during the pandemic, said she personally 'was disgusted' to see the programme air. File picture: Leah Farrell/RollingNews.ie

"I think there has to be consistency in terms of decision-making, but I'm not privy to the decision-making.

"I fully understand why people would be angry."

Fianna Fail senator Lisa Chambers, who gave birth during the pandemic, said she personally "was disgusted" to see the programme air.

"That camera crews had access when mums were left alone and dads were left alone in the carpark," she said.

"It is just compounding the hurt that many parents across the country feel when they remember the experience that they've been through, and I can attest to that.

"To say that you're angry probably is an underestimation of the feelings of the public have expressed."
TODAY, at sunset, two beams of light will shoot up from lower Manhattan, and will be visible for miles across New York City as it remembers what happened on this day 20 years ago.

The twin lights represent the Twin Towers. The lights are impossible to miss, haunting the sky and forcing a reckoning with what happened on September 11, 2001 and everything that came afterward.

At home and abroad, the reaction to the actions of the 9/11 bombers reverberates. That day irrevocably changed the course of many New Yorkers lives, in ways impossible to quantify or know.

One such life is that of Adama Bah, a 33-year-old immigrant rights advocate, who knows more than most about the repercussions.

If 9/11 never happened, this would have never happened to us. Most people forget that we are victims, too.

In 2005, Adama became the youngest person, and the first woman, to be arrested and accused of terrorism by the US in their in-country War on Terror.

The case was bogus and she was never charged: Adama was targeted because she was Muslim, she was black, and she was an immigrant.

We spoke this week and she recalled the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks and the changing mood of the nation.

The whole thing, we were all mourning as a country. Then, we went from mourning to targeting, to targeting people who were innocent.

We spoke about the architecture of US government surveillance that grew exponentially and which targeted an unknown number of Muslim Americans under the auspices of the War on Terror after 9/11.

These were decent people, with no connection whatsoever to terrorism, profiled as suspects because of their religious faith.

Anecdotal evidence from targeted Muslims  of civil and human rights abuses  was mounting for years before the combined efforts of community groups, FBI whistleblowers, and investigative reports in the media confirmed that lawmakers and federal agencies had ramped up racial and religious profiling, and increased domestic spying, in their cack-handed pursuit of imagined enemies inside their own borders.

Put into a cell alone, without access to a phone, a family member, or a lawyer, Adama was questioned about her immigration status and about her links to terrorism.

On the morning of March 24, 2005, 16-year-old Adama, her parents, and her little sister and brothers slept, oblivious to the armed forces outside their apartment door. Then, the men barged in: Some had FBI jackets, and others were from the New York Police Department and the DHS (Department of Homeland Security). The officers were yelling threats at the family and Adamas father was handcuffed.

Adama says: It was the scariest thing you could ever see: I had never seen my father so powerless.

Then, she, too, was handcuffed and driven with her father to 26 Federal Plaza, a massive building in downtown Manhattan and home to many federal offices, including those of the FBI, DHS, and ICE (Immgration and Customs Enforcement).

Put into a cell alone, without access to a phone, a family member, or a lawyer, she was questioned about her immigration status and about her links to terrorism. Both of these lines of questioning stunned the teenage Adama.

She knew her father had issues with his immigration status, but like many undocumented children, she wasnt aware that she was not legally in the country.

Even more shocking to her was the realisation that the FBI was accusing her of being a potential suicide bomber, telling her that she and another girl from her mosque were on a list of radical Islamists.

Again, this was not true and she was never charged with anything like it.

Yet Adama was kept in detention for more than six weeks and subjected to racist comments and repeated strip searches by her guards.

She was released on condition that she wear an ankle monitor and obey a curfew.

The only charge against her was of overstaying her visa, which she had done as a two-year-old, having emigrated from Guinea.

It is difficult to grasp how the US authorities did this to Adama without understanding the context and the time.

Even Adama bought into the narrative they created. In the past, if I heard on the news that we caught a terrorist, I believed it. Little did I know that they were just targeting people, arresting them, accusing them of terrorism, and then deporting them.

"They plastered their stories all over the news and you think, Oh, Im glad that they did that, Im glad they caught this bad guy. Then, it happens to you and you think, Wait a minute, they werent bad all along? They were creating a negative narrative just to scare us, and they were targeting innocent people.

Adamas father was deported, and the family fell into poverty. Adama left school to find work and support her mother and siblings.

Lawyers working pro bono helped her to apply for asylum, on the grounds that if she were deported to Guinea she would be faced with genital mutilation, as her female relatives had been.

She won her asylum case and began the slow, hard road to getting US citizenship.

Last month, Adama found herself back in 26 Federal Plaza and it could not have been more different to her first time there.

Now, instead of being a terrified, handcuffed teenager, accused of plotting an attack on the US, she was a glamorous and smiling woman in a golden dress, there to pledge allegiance to the US flag as part of her citizenship ceremony.

That was the irony for me, Adama says. In the same building I was arrested in, interrogated in, at 16? That was the same building I was given the highest status in this country. I was excited, but it was such a long journey.

I really wanted to scream; there were different emotions going on, because I was held and interrogated in that building. So, I wanted to go to the floor I was interrogated in and say, Eff you guys, I got my citizenship.

Adama begins to laugh at the memory. And I dont curse, but I was ready to curse that day.

I asked her about the dress she wore for the citizenship ceremony, which Id seen on her social media. I was trying to stand out on purpose. I fought so hard for this! I wanted to hit pots and pans, but, you know, I wondered if that would be a federal crime.

Laughing again, she says: I didnt want to commit a felony, so I thought, OK, let me just wear a bright dress.

That choice she made, to wear a bright dress in a place that caused her so much misery in the past, is emblematic of how she chooses to spend her days.

Adamas work now is with her community, helping immigrants to navigate a perilous system and campaigning for immigration reform.

I dont want anyone to go through what I went through, Adama says. I feel like I have a long way to go before I can say that my work is done.

Adama is just one person in a vast and varied community of Muslims in the US, people who have been ruthlessly surveilled by their own government, placed on terrorist watch lists and no-fly lists, innocent people targeted, detained, and even deported, despite not having done anything.

Its been 20 years since the terrible morning of September 11, but for many, it is not over yet.
This newspapers headlines on this day 20 years ago spoke of a standard day in the news cycle for our journalists in Academy Street, Cork and Harcourt Street, Dublin.

Billions had been wiped off the value of Irish pensions in one of the markets periodic slumps; Tipperary was celebrating the homecoming of the Liam MacCarthy Cup after a barren decade; there was a two-year delay and a costs overshoot running into millions for an Iarnrod Eireann signalling upgrade; Westport won the Tidy Towns competition for the first time in its history.

The opinion writer was concerned with problems of the Heuston kind and also called for improved building site safety after a horrible accident killed a young boy in Rochestown. But by 1.45pm on that day in Ireland, everything changed in the world, and would remain changed. And not for the better.

Firefighters walk through smoldering debris at the site of the World Trade Center in New York.

The events which scarred that terrible Tuesday are well-known. They became visible at 8.45am American time, on a clear blue sky day when a Boeing 767 operated by American Airlines out of Boston and carrying 20,000 gallons of jet fuel plunged into the north tower of New York Citys World Trade Center.

The next day the Irish Examiner declared Armageddon in 180pt san serif capitals on page one and recounted the main details across 18 pages of its two editions. Osama Bin Laden was named chief suspect; the initial estimates were of 10,000 dead.

The attack on America was an attack on world order, said this newspapers leader column. Veteran columnist Ryle Dwyer warned ominously that American reaction is likely to be terrible.

The aftermath of 9/11 commanded our front pages for a month until the first manifestation of The Bush Doctrine, which held that countries that provided safe haven for terrorists would be regarded as terrorist states, fell onto Afghanistan.

The opening blows of the War on Terror took place on the first Sunday in October. By December the Taliban was beaten, and Bin Laden had escaped from the Tora Bora caves and into Pakistan where he was shot down by US special forces more than a decade later.

Freedoms and intrusions

Whether the responses to 2001 and afterwards have rendered the world a safer place is scarcely even debatable. It is not.

Personal freedoms continue to be extinguished and curtailed; official intrusion into our lives has accelerated and been enabled by the unrestrained rise of Big Tech. Powers have accreted to the surveillance society.

Precious liberties have been rolled back: free speech; freedom from invisible oversight; ease of movement; the privacy of untapped phone calls and email correspondence; suspension of habeas corpus; scrutiny over financial transactions under money-laundering legislation; mass transfer of personal information across borders; biometric passports; global positioning systems; face recognition technology; passenger locator forms.

All such measures were stepped up after 2001 and many were given further momentum during pandemic controls of the past 20 months.

The prospects for a new and humane Age of Enlightenment, so bright at the Millennium, seem further away than ever, obliterated, paradoxically, by the actions of both neocons and jihadists. Trillions of dollars have been wasted and many lives lost in the quicksands of a conflict that had no quantifiable objectives.

How will we know when we have won? asked the soldiers. There was no good answer.

In a round of 20th-anniversary interviews, George W Bush II said he was comfortable with the decisions he made, not least because there have been no other attacks on the American homeland.

He didnt separate, as many others might, the legitimate right to respond to an outrage against the United States from the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The casus belli for Operation Iraqi Freedom was the existence of weapons of mass destruction. No convincing evidence was ever produced that they existed.

Taliban fighters arrive inside the Hamid Karzai International Airport after the U.S. military's withdrawal, in Kabul.

No flag of UN legality could be applied to military action, setting back the causes of legitimacy, justice, and honour.

Last weeks retreat from Afghanistan and abandonment of many allies and friends reinforced the opinion of a substantial number of radical Islamists that, in the long run, history will favour them. And vindicate bin Laden.

In New York victims are still being identified through painstaking DNA sequencing. In Guantanamo Bay, the war crimes proceedings against the 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four co-conspirators have, incredibly, not even gone through pre-trial hearings some 15 years after they were apprehended.

As a contrast, the Nuremberg Trials were established within two months of the end of the Second World War and returned verdicts against 24 leading members of the Third Reich, 12 of whom were executed, within 11 months.

Lack of closure

This lack of closure is another open wound in the reputation of Western democracy. Since the televisual event of

9/11, a drama staged for a globally connected network, the odds have increased of citizens being killed in hyper-local actions. Commuters in Madrid or London, club-goers in Bali or Paris, sun worshippers in Sharm El Sheikh and Tunisia, youngsters watching Ariana Grande at the Manchester Arena, have been the preferred targets of fundamentalists.

People observe a minute's silence in St Ann's Square, Manchester, to remember the victims of the terror attack in the city in 2017.

Cars, knives, and lorries are the workaday weapons rather than jumbo jets. At his trial this week, Salah Abdeslam, who prosecutors say is the sole surviving attacker of the grisly sequence which included the Bataclan nightclub, set a defiant tone when asked to describe his job. I abandoned all professions to become a fighter for the Islamic State, he said.

Most people have not observed or experienced death as it happens in front of us. It has been in private, and not a shared tragedy. That altered with 9/11.

And something also changed later, after Iraq: the reputation and image of the United States as the shelter for immigrants, as a bulwark against totalitarianism, and as the saviour of old nations bent on mutual destruction.

Abu Ghraib and its torture regimes, extraordinary rendition, and indefinite detention damaged the idealism and nobility which many ascribed to the New World.

There is no consensus over who said the price of liberty is eternal vigilance be it Jefferson, or Thomas Paine, or Lincoln. What we can conclude 20 years on is that we have less of the former, and much more of the latter.

Western democracy must put behind it two decades of delusion and defeat.

The faith in the future and in our broken political systems must be restored. Extremism of all kinds must be buried with the grey silt which turned one of the worlds greatest cities into a scene from Dante.
Six men have been arrested off the coast of Plymouth in the UK after authorities seized more than two tonnes of cocaine worth around 160 million.

The UK's National Crime Agency (NCA) said an operation involving its personnel as well as the Australian Federal Police (AFP) and the British Border Force arrested a British man and five Nicaraguans aboard a Jamaican-flagged yacht 80 miles out to sea.

Border Force Maritime Commands 42-metre cutter Searcher and 19-metre coastal patrol vessel Alert had covertly identified and monitored luxury yacht Kahus movements.

Kahu, which was sailing from the Caribbean, was intercepted and boarded by specialist highly-skilled Border Force and NCA officers in international waters north of Guernsey.





The yacht was then escorted back to an undisclosed location on the UK mainland where a team carried out a deep rummage search and discovered the enormous haul of Class A drugs.

The men, whose ages range from 24 to 49, were arrested on suspicion of drug trafficking and remain in custody awaiting interviews, the NCA added in its statement.

Theres no doubt these drugs would have been sold on into communities across the UK in such ways as County Lines fuelling more crime and misery," said NCA deputy director Matt Horne.

Organised crime groups (OCG) are motivated by money.

The deprivation of these drugs will smash a hole in the OCGs plans and ability to operate.





Also, the arrests of the men transporting the drugs means the crime group has lost trusted offenders who would have been key to their operation.

We continue to work with partners at home such as Border Force and those abroad such as the AFP to protect the public from the Class A drugs threat.

The NCA said the arrests demonstrate the strength of its international partnerships, working with the AFP who as part of the operation used evidence from their Operation Ironside, the countrys investigation into the AnOm encrypted comms platform.

Intelligence from Operation Ironside had enabled the AFP to assist international enforcement partners in disrupting an alleged sophisticated criminal network," said AFP assistant commissioner Lesa Gale.

The Jamaican-flagged yacht Kahu at an undisclosed location (NCA/PA)

Operation Ironside has opened the door to unprecedented collaboration across law enforcement agencies around the globe.

This result highlights the importance of the AFPs partnership with the NCA to combat offshore transnational organised crime that impacts both of our countries.

The AFP and NCA have a strong, historic relationship and both agencies recognise the significant threat to national security posed by transnational organised crime.




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This Week in Review

A weekly review of the best and most popular stories published in the Imperial Valley Press. Also, featured upcoming events, new movies at local theaters, the week in photos and much more.
FILE - In this Thursday, July 1, 2021, file photo, coast guard boats patrol in front of the partially collapsed Champlain Towers South condo building, ahead of a planned visit to the site by President Joe Biden, in Surfside, Fla. A Miami Beach apartment building owned by Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett has given his tenants 45 days to vacate the building so extensive repairs can be completed. In addition, he said the Lois Apartments will also undergo the required 40-year inspection early, due to the Champlain Towers South collapse.
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Alexander has reported on courts and crime since June 2021. A fan of all things outdoors, he came to Teton County after studying journalism at Northwestern University.
Shirley Kay Hemby, of Pittsburg, KS, passed on September 13, 2021 at Via Christi Hospital in Pittsburg, KS. She was born on May 8, 1948, in Pittsburg, KS, the daughter of Henry F. Nannie (Brown) Johns. Shirley was a graduate from Pittsburg High. On April 7, 1968, Shirley married Robert Walla
This photo of Donn and Shelley Marshall and their children, Drake and Chandler, was taken the weekend before the attack on the Pentagon that took Shelleys life.
Opinion Columnist

Chris Powell has worked for the Journal Inquirer since 1967, first as a reporter, then as an editor, and now as a columnist. He was managing editor from 1974 until retiring from that position in 2018.
Lafayette Parish - One local business teamed up with a local non-profit to give someone in the community a brand-new roof.

In south Louisiana, having a strong up-to-date roof is vitally important - especially during hurricane season.

For one local vet, he blessed the country with his service and now he was blessed with a new roof.

"Were blessed to be in this situation, were blessed to be able to help somebody in need," said the owner of Lafayette Roofing Darren Domingue.

"Its a privilege to be able to help people and to be able to give back," said AVA co-founder Levi Kastner.

Lafayette roofing in partnership with the Acadiana Veteran Alliance came together to install a brand-new roof for local military veteran, Murray Johnson.

"He had no clue what was coming when we showed up to measure his roof, he was speechless," said Domingue.

Lafayette roofing has been giving away a free roof every year for the past decade. Darren Domingue says when they were made aware of the state of Mr. Johnsons roof, blessing him with a new one was a no brainer.

"After talking to him, we knew that this was a guy that wanted to work hard, he didnt want a handout," Said Domingue. "We tried to tell him this is a helping hand and its our way to say thank for your service and fighting for our freedoms."

Unfortunately, Mr. Johnson was not home and when News 15 tried to give him a call, he was unavailable because like many veterans., he was working hard to provide for he and his family.

Domingue said "it wasnt about having him here while were doing this. We just had Hurricane Ida. We know were in the midst of storm season. We wanted to get this done before something else worse happened to him. That way when he gets home, he can lay his head on his pillow and have a good nights sleep."

The AVA is a local nonprofit aimed at assisting Acadiana veterans. Co-founder Levi Kastner who is a veteran himself says theyre all about leaving an impact on the lives of the men and women who fought to protect our freedoms.

"To impact change on those guys. A lot of those guys are going through mental health issues," Kastner said. "Anything we can do to position those guys to have a better future for them and their families is important to us."

With all the uncertainty over the past year-and-a-half, Billy Sauvely junior says one thing is always for certain.

"This is such an uncertain environment that were in lately and economically. So, the one certain thing that we do know is we can always give back," Sauvely Jr. said.
KU Student Body President Niya McAdoo received criticism surrounding a retweet on the KU Student Body President's account. Nonetheless, McAdoo stands by the message, which they say was a commentary on America's racist foundation.
On Tuesday morning, Raes Cafe was open. Pork chops and eggs were on special. What was attracting the most attention, however, was a piece of paper out front reminding customers of the mask mandate and the medical exemption.
tvN's mystery-suspense drama "The Road: The Tragedy of One" finally closed its curtains on Thursday, September 9.

Although the mystery drama recorded a low rating during its finale, main actors Ji Jin Hee, Yoon Se Ah, and Kim Hye Eun still expressed their gratitude to their viewers and fans.

'The Road: The Tragedy of One' Finale Recap: The Huge Unspeakable Truth Has Been Revealed

In the 12th and final episode of the mystery suspense drama, the huge and unspeakable truth has been revealed.

In the finale, Seo Eun Soo (Yoon Se Ah) was eaten alive by her immense guilt after Choi Jun Yeong (Nam Ki Won), Seo Eun Soo's husband, Baek Soo Hyun (Ji Jin Hee), and his mistress Cha Seo Yeong's (Kim Hye Eun) child, passed away.

When Choi Jung Yeong witnessed Seo Jung Wook (Cho Seong Jun) and Choi Se Ra (Lee Seo) doing drugs at their party, he ran away due to shock. However, his life was put to waste when he was accidentally hit by Hwang Tae Seop's (Kim Roe Ha) car.

Choi Jung Yeong struggled but he did all his best to call his home, but fell down in the railing and died.

At the end of the drama, it was revealed that Seo Eun Soo was the one who killed the poor child, and had accomplices who helped her cover up the crime.

Later, Baek Soo Hyun heard from detective Shin Seok Hoon (Kim Seong Soo) that his wife was brain-dead after an accident.

The tragic story of the elite people of South Korea, which sent viewers to the edge of their seats with a fast heart rate, closed its curtains with twelve episodes.

'The Road: The Tragedy of One' Ends With Unfaltering Low Ratings

tvN's mystery-suspense drama "The Road: The Tragedy of One" was based on Rintaro Norizuki's Japanese novel of the same name, which was well-known for its tragic ending that raised expectations on how the story would play out.

However, the South Korean drama was below expectations. Regardless of the main and supporting actors, their characters were rather ambiguous as if they were the real culprits, which blurred the story's focus.

Also, the male protagonist Baek Soo Hyun's story, who puts his job first before his family and dead son, as well as his ungodly affair with his co-workers did not fit the South Korean's sentiments and philosophies.

"The Road: The Tragedy of One" did not jive well with the viewers, recording an average of 3.099% and a nationwide rating of 2.856% during its final broadcast.

It surpassed its previous episode's recorded rating of 1.957%, which was lower than the lowest recorded rating of 1.900% in its fifth episode.

Ji Jin Hee, Yoon Se Ah, Kim Hye Eun Bid Goodbye + Share Thoughts on 'The Road: The Tragedy of One' Ending

Experienced actors Ji Jin Hee, Yoon Se Ah, and Kim Hye Eun, who led the mystery-suspense drama on television for a month, expressed their gratitude to the viewers who supported them and their drama.

Actor Ji Jin Hee shares his deepest thanks to the viewers who supported them throughout the drama's broadcast. "I want to express my gratitude to the viewers who watched the drama diligently. I will return with a new role and even better acting performance soon."

Meanwhile, Yoon Se Ah, who portrayed the role of Ji Jin Hee's wife, also shared her sentiments. "To the director, the writer, and the staff who has been with me throughout the filming, thank you. Also, to everyone who enjoyed the show."

Finally, Kim Hye Eun said that the drama was dedicated to the children of the young generation. "The drama followed the stories of adults who lost their lives, who showed extreme selfishness and greed. It was intense but life lessons and great wisdom were instilled in the show."

The main cast of "The Road: The Tragedy of One" hope to be remembered for a long time with their performances as actors. Also, the main actors promised to return to the small screen and asked for the viewers' support once again.

Follow KDramastars for more Kdrama, KMovie, and celebrity news updates!

KDramastars owns this article.

Written by Elijah Mully.
HOLLAND, Ore.  Multiple law enforcement agencies served search warrants at a pair of properties in the Illinois Valley on Thursday, reportedly busting an illegal marijuana grow operation and a cannabis extraction lab.

Members of Josephine Marijuana Enforcement Team (JMET) partnered with Rogue Area Drug Enforcement (RADE), the Bureau of Land Management, and Josephine County Code Enforcement in serving the two warrants  one for a property in the 6000-block of Caves Highway, and another in the 5000-block of Holland Loop Road.

According to the Sheriff's Office, investigators seized and destroyed 7,600 marijuana and hemp plants, 5,000 pounds of processed marijuana, and 200 pounds of cannabis extract. Investigators also seized 19 guns and roughly $210,000 cash.

The seized cash will be subject to forfeiture, the Sheriff's Office said, but can only be used for training and equipment and not personnel.

At the Caves Highway property, investigators reported finding a "closed-loop cannabis extraction lab."

"Due to the explosive/flammable nature of these extraction labs, a specialized HAZMAT team responded for the safe removal of 2,000 gallons of solvent and other hazardous materials," the Sheriff's Office said.

Investigators made two arrests in the pair of raids. 50-year-old Barry Greenwalt was arrested and lodged in the Josephine County Jail for Unlawful Manufacture of a Marijuana Item. 33-year-old Mitchell Seguin was charged with multiple counts for manufacture, possession, and delivery of marijuana, in addition to possession of a marijuana extract.

Another 19 subjects were detained "due to safety concerns," the Sheriff's Office continued. The investigation is still ongoing.
PORLAND, Ore. -- Special Agent in Charge of the FBI's Portland Field Office, Kieran Ramsey released a statement recognizing the courage of FBI personnel during the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Ramsey said, "The attacks in New York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania shocked all Americans in the days and weeks that followed 9/11. For some, time and distance would allow those events to fade into history. For others, the sights and sounds of that day and those that followed are as vivid and impactful now as they were twenty years ago."

"Almost 3,000 people died on that day, and more have perished over time as a result of injuries and associated illnesses. In addition to losing New York Special Agent Leonard Hatton on 9/11, we have since lost seventeen other FBI employees to diseases brought on by exposure to toxic materials."

"The FBI had countless employees who served as first responders on 9/11 and thousands who deployed to the scenes over the next weeks and months. The resulting counter-terrorism investigation was the largest in the history of the Bureau. Most people alive at the time can remember that exact moment they first heard about the attack. They remember seeing the images of the planes crashing into the World Trade Center. The gaping hole in the Pentagon. The crater in Pennsylvania"

"For some, these images are just memories - memories not forgotten, but perhaps muted by time. For others, this 20th anniversary is a very personal event marked by powerful recollections from time spent on the front lines. These aren't easy memories to relive, but they are an important touchstone for who we are and why we do the work we do."

"I offer to you the stories of four FBI Portland employees, including myself, who responded to the 9/11 scenes or who were inspired to find a way to join in service to our country. You can view those videos here: (https://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices/portland/news/stories/remembering-911-portland-fbi-employees-share-their-experiences). As we head into this anniversary weekend, I encourage all Oregonians to take a moment both to reflect on the lives lost and to consider how each of us can, in our own way, make a positive difference in our countrys future."
PORTLAND, Ore.  In the immediate wake of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the rubble left behind by the collapse of the twin World Trade Center towers  soon dubbed "Ground Zero"  quickly became a search, rescue, and clean-up operation of historic proportions.

Mike Lohrey and Mike Ferris were at that time both living in Oregon and working for the US Forest Service. Lohrey was incident commander and Ferris public information officer for the PNW National Interagency Incident Management Team 2.

This team, a Type 1 team, is the sort most qualified to manage major disasters anywhere in the US. In our part of the world, that's most likely to mean a major wildfire. But after 9/11, Lohrey and Ferris soon learned that they would be headed to New York City in order to take part in the efforts at Ground Zero.

"There was a lot of excitement, but also on my behalf, there was quite a bit of apprehension and anxiety because I really wasn't sure what I was walking into," said Ferris. "It was rather intimidating, also, to think that we were going to be part of something that was so massive, and had just occurred . . . and of course the country itself was still in a lot of shock."

"It was an honor to serve, a privilege, because I know every other incident commander wanted to be there to do that very first day," said Lohrey.

Lohrey described it as a strange experience. Ordinarily, an incident management team would take command of an entire disaster, like a wildfire, and lead the response. But the task in Manhattan was so huge that his Team 2 was just one component of a highly complex machine.

Twenty years is no short amount of time, but both Mikes said that there are particular things about Ground Zero they will never forget.

"Walking out onto the site was memorable. I'll probably never be able to get the images nor the smell out of my mind, out of my head. The smell especially was pretty ominous," said Ferris. "It had a very electrical, burning . . . heavy metallic odor to it and you know  nothing that I had ever smelled in my life could I describe it or compare it to, it was very unique."

"My first impression was that . . . looking at pictures, looking at TV screens, does not do the site justice," Lohrey said. "The smell, and just the dust . . . "

Lohrey recalled that, well after the towers fell, there were fires burning incredibly hot deep beneath the rubble. Firefighters dumped everything that they possibly could into the ruins, to no avail. He said that he thought to himself "we're gonna be here for years," meaning that the clean-up operation would take that long. But he was ultimately surprised at how quickly the work went.

"You're running on adrenaline the whole time you're there, and you just . . . go," Lohrey said. "You get back, there's still a lot of that adrenaline rushing  you don't have time to really digest what it was that you were doing and where you were. And I didn't realize the emotional toll that it took on everyone who was there until, you know, two or three months after the assignment."

New York City at that time was like a city prepared for war, Lohrey said, as people scarred by the horror of the World Trade Center attacks braced for the potential of more to come.

Team 2's primary mission in New York was to sort out the supply chain for the recovery and clean-up operation at Ground Zero. Ferris said that they discovered upon arrival that supplies of all kinds were being crammed haphazardly into a warehouse up the road from the site.

"It was just packed with stuff. You can say something and it was in that room  whether it was dog food, or diapers, or caskets, or food, or blankets," Ferris said.

They worked to organize the warehouse and then set up distribution points for crews working in the rubble. Once that was done, they could get personal protective equipment (PPE), tools, and body bags to the people who needed them.

"We knew when there was a call to us at the warehouse for body bags and flags, that was indicative of something that was going on at the pile  that they had recovered a body or remains of someone," Ferris said. "So that was also kind of hard to witness when that was going on, because everybody would stop and there would be that respect shown for that individual who was being removed from the site."

The 9/11 attacks and the resulting emergency response has forever changed emergency management in the US, Lohrey said. The incident management system that his team already employed became much more prevalent across the country because of the work they did, ensuring that agencies like the New York Fire Department could take produce their own command structure if disaster were to strike again.
Vaccination clinics have been set for six Kelowna area schools, three Penticton schools, and three Vernon schools. Children between the age of 13 and 17 won't need their parents' consent to get vaccinated.
Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, left, and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, take part in the federal election English-language Leaders debate in Gatineau, Que., on Thursday, Sept. 9, 2021. Federal leaders have not focused on addressing systemic racism during the campaign, despite the urgency of the issue after findings of unmarked graves at former residential schools and rising hate against minority communities during the COVID-19 pandemic, says the founder of an anti-hate group. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang
Conservative Leader Erin O'Toole waves as he gets off his bus at a campaign announcement in Whitby, Ont., Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. Canadians will vote in a federal election Sept. 20th. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn
KENOSHA  Details of the Uptown neighborhoods next chapter is coming into sharper focus as developers gave their latest pitch on a new mixed-use project set to replace a heavily damaged building that was consumed in the flames of the unrest a year ago.

On Thursday, Oregon, Wis.-based Gorman and Company received hearty support from the city Plan Commission for Uptown Lofts, a hybrid retail and residential complex set to take root on 63rd Street, between 22nd and 23rd avenues.

Gorman and Milwaukee-based architecture firm Korb + Associates first went before commissioners last fall with their visions for the new development, which is to be spread across two buildings.

At Thursdays meeting, commissioners cast several affirmative votes, including a favorable recommendation to amend the citys long-range land-use plan and a rezoning of the parcels to accommodate the anticipated work.

A few tweaks have been incorporated into plans since the first go-around, including an increase in the number of apartment units  from the originally proposed 104 to the new count of 107.

Commercial/residential mix
In 1957, when Kenosha Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Milton Wittenberg learned that Carthage College in Illinois was looking for a location for their campus, he wasted no time alerting other community leaders to the opportunity.

One of the sites chosen here for offering to the college was part of Alford Park and the college leadership knew this location topped the other sites under consideration.

The groundbreaking event took place on Sept. 24, 1960, with over 3,000 people in attendance. The first date stone was laid on the building containing the library on Oct. 31, 1961. The first public event held on the new campus was a dinner during a session of the Northwest Synod spring convention the following year.

The campus was ready for students in the fall of 1962. Enrollment reached 300 students that the first semester: they had been recruited for a campus that had yet to be built.

Parkside established The UW-Parkside newspaper announces plans for buildings on the news campus in Somers. Courtesy of the Kenosha History Center.

1967

Land purchases secure UW-Parkside establishment

When Senate Bill 38 passed the State Legislature on April 21, 1967, it was another step in the process of establishing the University of Wisconsin-Parkside campus in Somers. Bill 38 allowed Kenosha County to buy land and transfer it to the state.
Twenty years ago, Phillip Jahnke, a 1996 graduate of Central High School in Paddock Lake, was driving on Interstate 395 in Washington, D.C., a route that took him right by the Pentagon.

That morning, he had heard the news about a plane crashing into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City, and had watched the live coverage of a second plane striking the South Tower. The sobering images were understandably distracting.

I looked at the clock, and oh sh, Im late to work, Jahnke said, recalling that morning.

Jahnke was 23 at the time, and right out of college. After graduating from Michigan State University, he took a job as an assistant manager at the Palm Restaurant in D.C., just two miles from the Pentagon.

As he was driving, he said he saw a plane flying over the highway. This by itself wasnt unusual, Reagan National Airport was right next to the highway, and he had seen numerous planes taking off and landing during his commute to work.

But this one was lower and going the wrong way, coming towards him.

I remember saying, it seems to be off course, Jahnke said. It did a hard bank left and down.

Traffic comes to a halt
I wanted to publicly thank Dan Boring and everyone at the Southern Wisconsin All Airborne Chapter for the kindness and hospitality this past weekend.

I attended the car show hosted by him and other members of this wonderful organization. I was warmly welcomed by everyone in the community, and enjoyed speaking to those in attendance.

I grew up in northern Wisconsin, joined the Army, and I lost both of my legs to an IED in Afghanistan nine years ago.

I first met Dan when he visited me, and many other wounded warriors, at Walter Reed Hospital in Bethesda, Maryland. I could tell right away that he was a veteran and Wisconsinite with a heart of gold.

The Southern Wisconsin All Airborne Chapter provided me and my family with assistance while we recovered at the hospital, and continued to help me with my rehabilitation over the years. For example, Dan and his colleagues brought me skydiving, and have always stood by me during tough times.

Dan's group of veterans is an organization that Kenosha should be very proud of.
Gov. Evers is leading Wisconsin forward through bipartisanship and sound economic investments.

Evers signed a bipartisan budget  yes, bipartisan!  something that hasnt happened in our state since 2007. His budget included the largest tax cuts in state history, bringing relief to Wisconsin taxpayers during difficult economic times.

Wisconsin begins this fiscal year with the largest general fund surplus in our states history  a fact the non-partisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau says is due to Evers smart decisions during the pandemic and efforts to stabilize Wisconsins economy.

Evers vaccine roll-out has led the Midwest and the nation for delivering shots in arms, helping drive our states economic recovery.

Evers restored Wisconsins two-thirds funding commitment to public schools, recognizing our children are our future and an important investment. He committed additional funds beyond the budget to make sure Wisconsin schools could open as safely as possible during the pandemic.

Evers has made historic investments in Wisconsins antiquated unemployment system, infrastructure, small businesses, entrepreneurship and expanding broadband.
Ketchikan, AK (99901)

Today

Partly cloudy this morning. A few showers developing during the afternoon. High 57F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Cloudy with occasional showers overnight. Low 47F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
Ketchikan, AK (99901)

Today

Mostly cloudy skies with a few showers this afternoon. High 56F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Considerable cloudiness. Occasional rain showers after midnight. Low 47F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
A man who was shot by a police officer after allegedly trying to take a bailiff's weapon inside a North Carolina courtroom has died, state investigators said.

The shooting occurred Thursday inside the Person County Courthouse in Roxboro, according to a statement from the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation.

Christopher Thomas Vaughan, 35, was on trial for false imprisonment after being accused of trying to coerce a woman from a Walmart, Louisburg attorney Boyd Sturges told The News & Observer.

Following a guilty verdict, Sturges said, Vaughan threw a chair and ran for the judge's bench, where two deputies subdued him, according to The News & Observer.

Vaughan tried to grab a bailiff's weapon, the SBI said. Vaughan was shot by a Roxboro police officer, according to information shared with the SBI by local authorities. Vaughan was taken to Duke University Hospital, where he died, according to the SBI statement.

The bailiff had a gash on his head and scratches on his neck, while the officer had a broken hand, the SBI said. They were treated at medical facilities and released.

The-CNN-Wire

 &  2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved.
EUGENE, Ore. -- There's been some controversy since President Joe Biden announced new vaccine mandates that could affect over 100 million Americans.

Attorneys in the Eugene area said Biden does in fact have the legal authority to require all employers with 100 or more employees to get vaccinated or submit to weekly testing if they don't get the shot. This mandate would also require all federal workers to get vaccinated or tested weekly.

RELATED: Biden's six-step COVID plan, explained

The Department of Labor is in charge of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA. The Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 covers most private sector employers and their workers, as well as some public sector employers and their workers. It states that employers must provide a safe and healthy working environment for their employees, free of hazards that could cause death or harm.

Andrew Lewinter, a Eugene employment attorney, said Biden and employers are within their right to mandate the COVID-19 vaccine under the OSHA act.

"If an employee is coming to work and the employer is allowing unvaccinated people to get them sick, then that employer, I think, is failing to provide their workers with a safe and healthy work environment. So it's certainly within OSHA and President Biden's authority to mandate this, " said Lewinter.

Lewinter also told KEZI 9 News he has already received phone calls from potential clients seeking legal counsel regarding Biden's new mandate.

Civil rights issues have also come into question with the new mandate.

Brian Michaels has been a civil rights attorney in Eugene for nearly 20 years. He said civil rights shouldn't be a question when it comes down to the health and safety of everyone.

"People stop at red lights, they wear seatbelts, they obey no smoking signs. So I don't really understand the civil rights in the context of this world-wide humanities pandemic," said Michaels.

Michaels also said the COVID-19 pandemic has become a worldwide issue, so civil rights shouldn't even be an issue for people.

But what if someone wanted to sue their employer on the grounds of the vaccine mandate being illegal? Would they be able to make a case? Lewinter said "no."

"You can't discriminate on a certain basis, you have to pay the minimum wage, and you have to provide employees a safe and healthy work environment. And that legal obligation employers have is enforced by OSHA," said Lewinter.

There isn't a set date on when companies need to get their employees vaccinated.
SPRINGFIELD, Ore. -- Dozens of community members gathered at the Springfield Elks Lodge Saturday morning to thank local first responders in observation of the 20th anniversary of 9/11.

About 30 classic cars paraded by several police and fire stations, as those inside honked their horns and waved.

"We're into classic cars. We like our cars, and what a fun day to do a ride plus pay our tributes all the first responders," Jim Emery who organized the ride said.

The tragic events of September 11, 2001 touched the lives of Americans across the country.

For Emery, this event takes on personal meaning. He was living in Arlington, Virginia when the attacks happened. Emery said he saw the plane that hit the Pentagon fly right over his house.

"It was scary. My wife was putting our daughters in the car. They were screaming because the noise was so loud from the jet engines right above us. I mean, literally you could read the writing on the bottom of the plane."

Like many other Americans, Emery said he will always remember what happened that day.

"I never want to forget that day. I can't. If I think of that day, the hair goes up on the back of my neck. It's just an incredible scary thought that our country could be attacked like that," Emery said.
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After two years living in New Zealand, in the summer of 2001, I returned to Ireland. But I was taking the long way 'round. First, I stopped in New York to visit two of my brothers, Jack and Eamonn. And then I went to Jamaica for a month, fulfilling a dream to travel to a country that had long held a fascination for me, in both musical and historical terms.

I flew into Kingston, and after a few full-on days, I escaped to Treasure Beach  a quiet fishing village, where I could really began unwinding.

Within hours of arriving I met a middle-aged American lady, called Berry. She had been living there for six years with her local partner, Coot. We became instant friends and Berry invited me to her home every morning. She taught me yoga, and after a swim we would find somewhere cool where we would write and chat.

Berry told me about her late husband, Tony, and their wonderful but challenging life together: Tony had hidden his homosexuality from her and their children until he got Aids, and he died a few years later. My own recent marriage break-up didnt compare.

Berry and I made plans to meet again in New York that September to begin working and travelling together. She had been a professional photographer back in Hollywood, and she was writing her autobiography. I had begun my own mothers memoirs, so I was thrilled at the prospect of returning to the States to help out, and learn what I could from her.

High on my list of countries to travel to was India. Berry handed me the novel, A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry. If I still wanted to visit the country after reading it, she said, then we would go.

On my final night in Treasure Beach, Typhoon Barry made its imminent arrival felt, as Berry and I took shelter and watched TV. A movie with Anthony Perkins came on, and I said how much I admired him as an actor, as well as finding him sexy. Berry said: Thanks, Tony would be happy to hear that.

And that was when it clicked  Berry was his widow. I recalled how the locals always spoke of her sweetness and boundless generosity, and of how they had grown to love this famous Hollywood person in their fiercely close-knit community.

It was August when I got home to Kilkenny, and I picked up some festival work. I wrote to Berry that life was busy, but that, when my job finished, I looked forward to meeting again and travelling with her.

Like much of the world, I watched in numbed horror when the 9/11 attacks on the Twin Towers happened. My mother and I frantically tried to reach Jack and Eamonn in New York, but after failing to make contact, we began a trance-like waiting game. For four hours, we answered calls from my other siblings and acted out the roles of calm contact for the clan.

Eventually Jack phoned to say that he and Eamonn had been working in downtown New York that day, but that they were safe and well. Although, they were anxious for their Irish friends who worked in construction in and around the World Trade Centre.

For my family, the worst was over. Selfishly, my relief shadowed my interest in the horror story. Yet I felt compelled to watch the news, not understanding why. It gave me nightmares for weeks after.

When the shock subsided, I wrote to Berry saying that I was now free to travel again, and that I hoped she hadnt known anyone involved in the September eleventh disasters. I got no reply.

The following summer I was talking on-air to Dave Fanning about famous people that listeners to the radio show had met. Through my festival work, I ran into lots of well-known people. Then I mentioned how Id met Anthony Perkins widow. Dave, being a film critic, was particularly interested in this movie icons connection.

After our chat, a programme researcher phoned me back: a listener had called the station to inform us that Berry had been on the first plane to hit the Twin Towers. I froze to the spot, my mind erupting in confusion, sorrow, and then anger. I thought everyone I loved had escaped the attacks.

And remembering the plans wed made, it struck me that I could have been sharing that flight with Berry. I felt ill.

Soon after, I returned to New Zealand, where I attended the first anniversary of nine-eleven. The memorial listed the nearly three thousand victims, and it was only when I saw Berry Berensons name that I really believed my friend was dead.

To have briefly known and then lost such a special person served only to encourage me to experience as much of life as possible.

Two years later, I sat on a rock at the edge of Indias coast, watching the sunset after a yoga session. As I shed tears into the Arabian Sea, I told Berry that she had made it to India inside my heart.
ROCHESTER, Minn. - On the eve of one of the darkest days in American history, Med City community members gathered at the Soldiers Field Veterans Memorial to remember the nearly 3,000 lives lost on 9/11.

The ceremony also honored the first responders and veterans who protect us every day. Speaking to those in the audience who served or supported operations in Afghanistan, Rochester Fire Chief Eric Kerska, who served three tours in Iraq, had this message.

"You are not to blame for what happened these past few weeks. You could have gotten out of going had you really tried. But you didn't. You protected those who could not protect themselves." Chief Kerska continued, "many veterans from all conflicts are having a hard time emotionally these last few weeks. It's just not Afghanistan veterans. I believe veterans are struggling because they're asking themselves the eternal question of Was it worth it?"

Reverend Phil Shaw, a well-known veterans supporter and former Minnesota Senate Chaplin, also addressed community members.

"I hope, veterans, that the sound of freedom always rings from your hearts, and that your hearts are united." The pastor continued, "don't let the differences that come between you in today's climate, don't let those differences destroy your unity for our country. We need you. God's blessed our nation. Be united. Stand tall. Have one voice."
FRANKLIN COUNTY, Mo. (KMOV.com) -- The Franklin County Commission passed a resolution on Tuesday to reject President Joe Biden's new sweeping vaccine mandate.

In a press release Friday, the commission said they "will not allow the Federal Government to force us to go against the Constitution we've sworn to uphold."

Sweeping new vaccine mandates for 100 million Americans President Joe Biden on Thursday is announcing sweeping new federal vaccine requirements affecting as many as 100 million Americans in an all-out effort to increase COVID-19 vaccinations and curb the surging Delta variant.

President Biden's mandate will require all private-sector businesses with 100 or more employees to require vaccines or weekly testing. The mandate also requires federal employees and contractors to be vaccinated, without the option to opt-out for regular testing.

The commission says no vaccine should be mandated by law and people have the right to refuse getting the COVID-19 vaccine. The commission also said private health information on vaccines shouldn't be requested or required as it is an invasion of privacy.

"The County Commission .. expresses its opposition in the strongest possible terms to COVID-10 vaccine mandates and any other similar legislation, order, ordinance, or regulation by any local, state or federal government that affects citizens rights to make their own health care choices," the resolution reads.

The resolution does not require any vaccinations for county employees who are hired and managed by the commission. County officials said they hope other counties and state leaders do the same.
With Covid-19 case numbers surging across the United States and many unvaccinated Americans falling ill, the number of available hospital beds has been dwindling in parts of the country. Some hospitals now report their intensive care units, which are usually reserved for the most critically ill patients, are full.
Paul and Juanita Hurd pose for a photo at Veterans Freedom Park in Logansport on Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021. The pair were part of a bus tour in New York City on 9/11.
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HELENA, Mont. (AP)  Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen promised Friday to fight the new federal vaccine mandate in court.

President Joe Biden announced on Thursday the vaccine mandate, which could affect as many as 100 million Americans. Among other measures, the mandate tells all private businesses with 100 or more employees to require workers to get vaccinated against COVID-19 or get tested weekly for the respiratory virus. The requirement will be enforced by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which has yet to release its exact guidelines for implementing the rule.

Once his administration releases its rule, Montanans can expect to see me file a lawsuit to strike it down, said Knudsen, a Republican, in a statement.

Knudsen joined Gov. Greg Gianforte in calling the new mandate unconstitutional. Several other Republican governors have also questioned the legality of the mandate.

The new mandate appears to conflict with a Montana law passed earlier this year that makes it illegal for private employers to discriminate between employees on the basis of their vaccination status. That law, known as HB702, also made it illegal for employers to require vaccines as a condition for employment. The Montana Department of Labor and Industry has not provided updated guidelines on navigating the conflict.

The state law was opposed by the Montana Hospital Association and other health care organizations in Montana. The association said on Thursday that their legal counsel will evaluate the new federal regulations when they are released to clarify the conflict between federal and state law.

But federal law will like take precedent over state law if the two directly conflict, said University of Montana Constitutional law professor Anthony Johnstone on Friday.

In the end it does come down to the supremacy clause, Johnstone said. If a state like Montana has a contrary law, that law must give way."



This story has been corrected to reflect the spelling of University of Montana Constitutional law professor Anthony Johnstone, not Johnston.
Tropical Weather-Pacific for Friday, September 10, 2021



Eastern Pacific:

Olaf moves west

Olaf continues to lose wind intensity as it moves to the west of Baja California. Additional tree damage with some structures sustaining damage as well, particularly any temporary or poorly built

structures, will remain possible into this evening.

Heavy rain is beginning to come to an end across Baja California Sur, as an additional 2-4 inches of rain is possible tonight with an AccuWeather Local StormMax of 10 inches. The runoff

will cause water levels on some normally dry creeks and rivers to rise out of their banks. Flooding will likely lead to some property damage.

Olaf will continue to push westward and eventually turn southwestward by Saturday. This will bring it over cooler waters and lead to Olaf losing all tropical characteristics by Sunday.

Another disturbance will move off the coast of Central America into the East Pacific late this weekend into early next week and may develop into another organized tropical system along or just off

the southwestern coast of Mexico. This disturbance could track close enough to the coast to bring some impacts to the southern and southwestern coast of Mexico.

Western Pacific:

Conson nears Vietnam, Chanthu north of the Philippines

As of Friday evening, EDT, Severe Tropical Storm Conson, known as Jolina in the Philippines, is located in the western South China Sea moving towards central Vietnam. Conson is tracking toward the

west, and it will continue to do so in the next couple of days. Conson will make landfall in central Vietnam late Sunday, local time, with heavy rains and locally damaging winds. This will lead to

regional power outages along with river and street flooding.

Farther east, Typhoon Chanthu, known as Kiko in the Philippines, has winds near the threshold of a Category 5 hurricane equivalent on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale. Chanthu continues to be

designated as a super typhoon by the Joint Typhoon Warning Center. The storm is moving to the northwest off northern Luzon but is forecast to turn more toward the north over the Luzon Strait on

Saturday.

Chanthu will track northward near the east coast of Taiwan and the southwestern-most Ryukyu Islands this weekend, local time, unleashing heavy flooding rain and damaging winds that would lead to a

moderate to significant flooding threat and possibly widespread power outages. During the early to midweek, Chanthu will move slowly for a time off the coast of east-central China, bringing strong

winds and heavy rains nearby. The storm may eventually go on to impact southern Japan later next week.

Southern Pacific:

No new information for this time period.



Copyright 2021 AccuWeather
CASPER, Wyo. (AP)  Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon said Thursday that he has asked the state's attorney general to be prepared to challenge President Joe Biden's new COVID-19 vaccine mandate, which he called an egregious example of big government overreach.

I have asked the Attorney General to stand prepared to take all actions to oppose this administrations unconstitutional overreach of executive power. It has no place in America. Not now, and not ever, Gordon said in a statement on the mandate, the Casper Star-Tribune reported.

Gordon and his wife are both vaccinated, which he has talked about, but he has stressed that vaccination is an intensely personal decision.

While he issued a statewide mask mandate during the winter COVID-19 surge, Gordon has vowed not to issue any vaccine mandates. Earlier this year, he issued an executive order barring state agencies or facilities from requiring vaccine passports.

It's not clear how Biden's mandate could impact a draft bill aimed at prohibiting businesses from requiring vaccinations. It requires employers to make reasonable accommodations" for unvaccinated workers like those included in the Americans with Disabilities Act.

About 36% of the state is fully vaccinated. Hospitalizations and active cases in Wyoming are near where they were during the winter peak of the disease.
Reed reportedly began yelling at police again saying that the kids in the vehicle needed to pee.

Officers ordered Reed to exit the vehicle and attempted to place Reed in handcuffs. Reed reportedly physically resisted attempts to be detained. Police tried to place her in the back of the squad car but she continued to resist.

Police made contact with the passenger inside the vehicle who claimed that they were on their way to Timber Ridge Waterpark and were in a hurry because one of the four children in the car had to use the bathroom.

Officers report that the four children in the back of the vehicle were not properly buckled and the vehicle was believed to not have four rear seatbelts.

Police report that Reed's eyes were glassy and bloodshot and they could reportedly smell the odor of intoxicants coming from Reed. Officers asked Reed if she had been drinking but she said no. Reed submitted a preliminary breath test and the result was .135.

Officers placed Reed under arrest and attempted to put her in the squad car but she continued to resist. She then reportedly began kicking police. Officers had to restrain her legs to avoid being kicked.
The investment is part of the $550 million Congress allocated to the second round of the ReConnect Program and will provide broadband service in rural areas in New York without sufficient access to broadband.
U.S. President Joe Biden said that he is disappointed in the Republican governors trying to refuse the recent vaccine mandate he announced.

Some Republican governors had threatened to sue over the pandemic plan of the president, according to a Fox News report.

Biden said that it was disappointing, especially since some governors have been so cavalier with the health of these kids and communities.

GOP governors have been criticizing the president after he declared a sweeping vaccine mandate, dubbing the move as an overreach and unconstitutional, according to a CBS News report.

The Republican National Committee has also vowed to file a lawsuit. However, it added that it will not take any legal action until Biden's new executive orders go into effect.

READ NEXT: TSA to Double Fines for Passengers Who Refuse to Wear Masks

Republicans Refusing Vaccine Mandate

Republican governors from Texas, Missouri, and Georgia had threatened to fight back, with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott calling the mandates an "assault on private businesses." Abbott said that the state is already working on something to stop "this power grab," according to The Washington Post report.

Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon also noted that his state's attorney general has been asked to prepare for all actions to oppose the Biden administration's "unconstitutional overreach of executive power."

South Dakota Gov. Kristi L. Noem also said that they will see the administration in court, with Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp promising that he will use every legal option available to stop the said mandate.

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster said that the American Dream has turned into a nightmare under Biden's leadership and the "radical Democrats." McMaster also vowed to fight back to protect the liberty and livelihood of those living in South Carolina.

Meanwhile, the Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration has yet to develop the rule that will affect private companies.

Biden's Vaccine Mandate

Biden announced that federal employees and contractors that work with the government will no longer have the option of regular COVID testing. The president said that if these people want to work with the federal government and do business with them, they have to get vaccinated, according to a CNBC report. Health care workers were also left with no testing option, particularly healthcare facilities that receive federal Medicaid or Medicare.

The new rules that the president had announced will affect more than 17 million workers at over 50,000 hospitals and healthcare facilities.

An August poll showed that most Americans support vaccine mandates in the workplace, garnering 62 percent support. Meanwhile, 29 percent of the U.S. voters are still unvaccinated, with 83 percent of them saying they do not plan to get the shots.

Biden also questioned why 80 million Americans are still unvaccinated, noting that they have been patient, but their patience is wearing thin. Biden had also asked physicians in the country to reach out to the unvaccinated population and make a personal appeal to them to get a vaccine shot.

The president said that it is not about freedom or personal choice, but it's about protecting yourself and those around you.

READ MORE: American Airlines Cancels Almost 400 Flights Over Staff, Maintenance Issues

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Written by: Mary Webber

WATCH: 'This Isn't A Game': Biden Responds To Governors Challenging Vaccine Mandate - from MSNBC






Dozens of lightning strikes had sparked 11 new fires in the Sequoia National Forest as thunderstorms rumbled across California, officials said. However, they added that there was no immediate threat to residents, according to an ABC 30 report.

Forecasters with the National Weather Service had also projected that the combination of possible dry lightning, as well as strong winds with the dry fuels, could become a critical fire weather condition.

The Forest Service said that when it comes to making assessments, any fires could be a danger to firefighters and local communities. Those are deemed top priority.

California's national forests were also closed ahead of Labor Day to reduce new wildfires that could spark. The forest closure is in effect until September 17.

READ NEXT: Caldor Fire Moves Closer to Lake Tahoe as Blaze Continues to Spread in Northern Part of California

Lightning Strikes in California

Lightning was responsible for the start of the August Complex fires last year. It is also particularly dangerous in the state's dry climate.

The National Interagency Fire Center had warned for possible extreme fire behavior, including massive creations by smoke and heat that can reach miles into the sky, according to The Guardian report.

Pyrocumulonimbus clouds can even stir up winds and cause thunder and lightning and create their own weather.

The department noted that the plume-dominated wildfire behavior and pyrocumulonimbus development are also possible on active large fires in the Sierra, central Oregon, and central Idaho.

The National Weather Service noted that there were more than 1,100 cloud-to-ground lightning strikes in California between Thursday night and Friday morning.

Meanwhile, out of the total lightning strikes that the state has recorded, 110 were seen in Bay Area, according to a U.S. News report.

Thunderstorms with rains also moved through parts of Southern California on Thursday and early Friday.

California Wildfires

Scientists claimed that weather will continue to be more extreme, with wildfires more frequent, destructive, and unpredictable.

More than 13,000 firefighters were working to control 13 major fires, with over 12,700 residents still waiting to return to their evacuated homes.

The Caldor Fire was 53 percent contained. It is the 15th largest in state history.

It has already burned more than 341 square miles and destroyed more than 1,000 structures, including hundreds of homes.

Meanwhile, the Dixie Fire continues to be active through the northern Sierra Nevada and southern Cascades region.

It is considered the largest single blaze California has ever seen and has managed to evade containment attempts.

The Dixie Fire has already ravaged more than 927,320 acres, and more than 4,840 people have been deployed to fight the fire.

It has already claimed the life of the first responder and has injured three others.

Cal Fire announced that a fire has destroyed 142 structures in Sierra last month and was said to be human-caused.

However, investigators were still working on the details of the said fire.

Meanwhile, U.S. President Joe Biden is set to visit the state of California next week for a fire damage survey. He was also set to campaign for Gov. Gavin Newsom.

READ MORE: California Wildfire Smoke Causes Drop in Solar Energy Production

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Written by: Mary Webber

WATCH: Dozens of lightning strikes hit Bay Area - from ABC 7 News Bay Area






A U.S. drone strike in Kabul, Afghanistan that targeted ISIS-K bombers on August 29 appeared to have killed at least 10 civilians, including an innocent aid worker and seven children.

The New York Times reported that the drone strike in Kabul victimized Zemari Ahmadi, an aid worker for a charity group based in Pasadena, California. Ahmadi was the apparent target of the strike.

He was believed to be an ISIS terrorist who loaded explosives in a car to strike Kabul airport, where the U.S. military was attempting to evacuate.

Navy Capt. Bill Urban, spokesman for U.S. Central Command, earlier said they "successfully hit" the target vehicle that carried multiple suicide bombers from the ISIS-K.

READ NEXT: [BREAKING] U.S. Military Launches Airstrike Against ISIS-K in Afghanistan, Killing Intended Target

Kabul Drone Strike Kills 10 Afghanistan Civilians Instead of ISIS-K Bombers

The drone strike that was supposed to be for the ISIS-K bombers killed Ahmadi and nine members of his family, including seven children, in a dense residential block.

U.S. officials previously admitted that there were three civilian casualties in the strike, but the New York Times reported that the actual number is 10.

"All victims were part of my family: my brother, my nephews, my children," the aid worker's brother, Romal Ahmadi, told the New York Times.

Ahmadi reportedly worked as a technical engineer for 14 years in Afghanistan for the California-based charity group Nutrition and Education International that feeds hungry Afghans. His family said the aid group had already applied for him to move to the U.S. as a refugee.

U.S. officials have also claimed that the targeted Toyota Corolla was loaded with "a substantial amount of explosive material."

However, security footage from Ahmadi's workplace obtained by the Times revealed that he only loaded his car with water containers at around 2:35 p.m., shortly before he returned home, as his neighborhood was reported to have unreliable water service. The Times has also photographed fire-damaged containers consistent with the water canisters.

Kabul Drone Strike: Second Explosion Did Not Happen

The Times report has also disputed the U.S. officials' claim that the second explosion indicated that explosive materials were ignited by the U.S. Reaper drone's Hellfire missile. Urban has said that a second explosion happened after the drone strike, signifying the explosives in the target vehicle.

However, three weapons experts told the Times that there was no evidence of a second explosion since there were no toppled walls or damaged vegetation near the targeted car. The experts said the small crater under the vehicle was consistent with a Hellfire missile.

According to Insider, the use of drones in counterterrorism operation were among the most controversial aspects of the U.S. global war due to its association with civilian casualties.

Since January 2004, the U.K.'s Bureau of Investigative Journalism estimated between more than 4,000 to 10,000 people killed by U.S. drone strikes in Afghanistan, including 300 to 909 civilians.

The recent U.S. drone attacks in Afghanistan have been carried out after an ISIS-K attack in Kabul airport that killed as many as 170 people, including 13 U.S. service members.

READ MORE: Afghanistan: Pres. Joe Biden Vows to Hunt Down Those Responsible for Kabul Attacks That Killed 13 U.S. Service Members

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Written By: Joshua Summers

WATCH: Did a U.S. Drone Strike in Afghanistan Kill the Wrong Person? - From The New York Times
Prince Andrew has been served with legal papers regarding a civil lawsuit accusing him of raping Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who was also one of Jeffrey Epstein's victims.

Court documents revealed that the security chief at his Windsor home accepted the court papers after weeks of reportedly avoiding officials, Daily Mail reported.

However, Prince Andrew's lawyers claim that the papers were not properly served and intend to boycott Monday's court hearing. The legal team is also hoping to get the case thrown out over a technicality.

Prince Andrew's solicitor Gary Bloxsome said the document Giuffre had signed in 2009 may make her action invalid. According to reports, a confidential settlement was reached between Virginia Roberts Giuffre and Jeffrey Epstein in Florida in 2009.

It contains a release of claims against others associated with her allegations against Epstein, potentially including Prince Andrew. However, Giuffre's legal team said there was no evidence Prince Andrew was intended to be covered by the previous legal agreement.

The Duke of York has continued to deny all claims made by Giuffre. According to BBC, a U.S. district judge must determine whether the papers were "served" before any case can proceed. The initial hearing is on Monday via a conference call before a Manhattan judge.

Roberts' legal team claimed that the service was successfully completed by leaving the papers with the officer. The security team of the Duke of York has been reportedly told not to accept any service of any court process.

Court documents had shown that a response is due from Andrew by September 17, and if he fails to respond, "judgment by default will be entered" against him for the relief demanded in the complaint.

READ NEXT: Queen Elizabeth II Warns British Media to Stay Away From Balmoral - And Her Son Prince Andrew

Virginia Roberts Giuffre's Rape Case Against Prince Andrew

Virginia Roberts Giuffre has filed a lawsuit in federal court in Manhattan on August 9 against Prince Andrew. She claimed that he sexually abused her while inside the home of socialite Ghislaine Maxwell in London when she was 17 years old, The Guardian reported.

The Duke of York said he has no recollection of ever meeting her and insisted that he had never had sex with Giuffre. Buckingham Palace called Giuffre's claims false and "without foundation."

The lawsuit also claims that Andrew knew how old Giuffre was at the time and "that she was a sex-trafficking victim."

Prince Andrew was earlier considered a "person of interest" in the investigation into Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. Jeffrey Epstein, a convicted sex offender, has died in jail in 2019, while Ghislaine Maxwell remains incarcerated for sex trafficking charges.

The lawsuit noted that Giuffre feared death or physical injury if she disobeyed Prince Andrew, Jeffrey Epstein, and Ghislaine Maxwell due to their connections and wealth.

The complaint filed on August 9 included a picture of 17-year-old Giuffre and Prince Andrew, who has his arm around her waist, Buzzfeed News reported.

Last September 4, the judge handling Maxwell's case has ordered prosecutors to disclose the identities of the British socialite's alleged co-conspirators to her defense team.

Prosecutors argued that revealing the identities of the alleged co-conspirators could damage the case. However, U.S. District Judge Alison Nathan wrote that they had not provided an explanation for the said harm, and "none is apparent to the court."

Prosecutors have been given until October 11 to hand over all the co-conspirator statements.

READ MORE: Prince Charles Won't Allow Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's Kids to Receive Royal Titles When He Becomes King

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WATCH: Prince Andrew Served With Legal Papers at Gates of Royal Lodge in Windsor - From ITV News




At least one person is dead, and 10 others are missing after a landslide buried several homes on a hillside area at Tlalnepantla in Mexico on Friday afternoon.

A section of a mountain on the outskirts of Mexico City collapsed, plunging rocks the size of small homes onto a densely populated neighborhood, Associated Press reported.

Mexico Landslide

Rescue workers and firefighters climbed up a three-story pile of rocks that seemed to be resting on three houses in Tlalnepantla, a part of Mexico state, which surrounds Mexico City on three sides.

Tlalnepantla Mayor Raciel Perez Cruz said in a video message that at the moment, their priority is focused on rescuing the individuals, who unfortunately were surprised at the site of the incident.

Perez Cruz added that authorities had evacuated surrounding homes and asked people nearby to avoid the area so rescue workers could work. Based on the released statement of the Mexico state Civil Defense agency, at least 10 people were reported missing.

Journalists present on the site witnessed rescuers carrying a body on a stretcher covered with a sheet. Officials suspected that the enormous rocks dislodged from the Cerro de Chiquihuite hill due to heavy rainfall in recent days.

Three days ago, a resident of the area noticed that six waterfalls had formed on the hill during heavy rains, and hours later, the powerful earthquake occurred, Mexico Daily reported.

Heavy equipment and trucks responded to the scene shortly after the incident to remove debris and assist emergency personnel in the search operations for possible survivors.

READ NEXT: Mysterious Blue Lights Seen in Mexico Sky During a Powerful Earthquake Set off Apocalyptic Speculation

Heavy Rain and Earthquake in Mexico

Rescuers who climbed the pile of debris occasionally raised their fists in the air as a signal for silence to listen for individuals trapped below their location.

Authorities and volunteers formed bucket brigades to pass five-gallon containers of smaller debris away as part of the excavation process. Among the local volunteers were construction worker Martin Carmona and his son.

"They organized us in a chain to take out buckets of sand, stone, and rubble. A co-worker lives there. He has a wife and two young children under the debris," the 30-year-old worker told AP.

Carmona and his 14-year-old son arrived at the debris before government rescuers responded. He said his friend was already there digging for his wife and kids.

Carmona noted that rescuers initially heard children, but after two hours of removing debris, authorities told the local volunteers to vacate the area. Only relatives were allowed to stay to help in the search and rescue operations.

Mexico state governor Alfredo del Mazo tweeted that authorities from the state and federal were already coordinating to secure the area in case of more slides and to remove the debris and locate possible victims.

According to Del Mazo, authorities believe that four homes were destroyed in the landslide, and another 80 homes were evacuated as a precaution.

Mexican National Guard troops and rescue teams carrying lengths of rope have already made their way through narrow streets after authorities started to receive reports of looting and stealing from the destroyed homes.

The landslide came days after heavy rain in central Mexico and a 7.0-magnitude earthquake on Tuesday night near Acapulco that also shook buildings in Mexico City.

READ MORE: Centuries-Old Mexican Colonial Ruins Damaged by Truck, Followed by Heavy Rain

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Written By: Jess Smith

WATCH: At Least 1 Dead, 10 Missing in Landslide Near Mexico City - From KVIA ABC-7
A Texas baby was found dead on Thursday after her mother left her inside a hot car for nearly 10 hours, authorities said.

The one-year-old girl, who was not identified by authorities, became the second child in Texas to tragically die inside a hot car this year. The infant was reported to have been left inside the vehicle from 8:30 a.m. until 6 p.m.

READ NEXT: Lightning Strike Burns Down New Home of Single Mom, 11-Year-Old Daughter; Offers of Help Pour In

Texas Baby Dies Inside a Hot Car

The Harris County Sheriff's Office said the Texas baby was left in the back seat of the hot car when her mom dropped the infant and two older children, 3 and 5, off at daycare at around 8:30 a.m., The Daily Mail reported.

The unidentified mother then allegedly returned to her home in the Crescent Park Village subdivision, switched cars, and went to exercise, thinking that she dropped all her children in the daycare facility.

When she returned to the daycare to pick up her children, police said the mom was told that the school only recorded the 5- and 3-year-old children.

The mom returned home together with a daycare worker to look for the infant. Police said the daycare staff member did not initially see the baby inside the car but later discovered the girl on the back floorboard of the four-door car.

The mom told the police that she took the baby to the daycare to bring her along while running errands. But she also planned to drop the infant at the daycare later in the day.

The sheriff's office confirmed that the baby was left in the car's back seat, and the girl was pronounced dead at the scene. Police officers responded to the scene at around 6:30 p.m.

According to Daily Mail, Thursday's temperatures in the Houston area reached as high as 90 degrees. However, authorities claimed that the car's interior could have made the temperatures reached up to over 120 degrees.

The death of the Texas baby prompted an investigation from the Harris County Homicide Unit. However, the police noted that the death appears to be accidental at this point of the investigation.

The mom of the Texas baby has been detained at the Lockwood facility as they attempted to get her statement. The case will be presented to the District Attorney's Office to determine whether any charges will be filed.

Hot Car Deaths Across the U.S.

The death of the Texas baby girl marks the 20th child hot car death this year. In July, a three-year-old boy from Texas died as he was also left inside a hot car. He became the state's first child case of hot car-related death in 2021.

Earlier this month, 20-month-old twin boys were found dead inside a hot car parked in a South Carolina daycare. The said twins reportedly spent more than nine hours inside the vehicle.

Another set of three-year-old twin boys were also found unresponsive in Minnesota earlier this summer. One of the Minnesota twins survived, but the other was pronounced dead after being brought to a hospital.

KidsAndCars.org recorded nearly a thousand child hot car deaths across the U.S. in the past 30 years. Among all the states across the U.S., Texas ranked first with the highest number of hot car deaths at 145 since 1991.

READ MORE: Portland to Ban Travel, Trade on Texas in the Wake of the State's Abortion Law

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Written By: Joshua Summers

WATCH: Tips to Prevent a Child Hot Car Death from Happening - From The Doctors
Twenty years after the September 11 attacks, a former American Airlines ticket agent spoke about the guilt he feels for allowing 9/11 terrorists to board flight 77.

Guilt tortured Vaughn Allex for years, and even 20 years later, there are still some things he'd rather not discuss. The former American Airlines ticket agent told ABC News that he blamed himself for allowing two 9/11 terrorists to get onto flight 77 despite being late.

"I blame myself, I thought, you know, if I had done something different, if I'd not let them on, if I just said to the agents, these two guys are late, let them get the next flight," the former ticket agent said.

Over the years, Allex said his friends and colleagues told him that he was only doing his job.

September 11 Attacks: 9/11 Terrorists on American Airlines Flight 77

On September 11, 2001, Vaughn Allex met the two men at Dulles International Airport in Virginia, where he worked as an American Airlines ticket agent.

At the time, the former American Airlines ticket agent recalled that brothers Salem and Nawaf Al-Hazmi, who appeared lost, ran into the terminal and approached his counter.

Allex said the two full-fare, first-class passengers arrived late that day. However, he made sure they made it to flight 77 instead of rebooking them.

The former American Airlines ticket agent has lived with that decision for the past 20 years. He said the check-in of the two brothers was odd. Allex noted that one of the brothers looked "gruff," while the other "was almost dancing, he was moving from foot to foot and grinning and looking around."

At the time, he said his thought was it was the guy's first time on an airplane, and he was just excited. Allex said the guy was totally unresponsive despite being asked to read. He said the guy only "smiled and danced and was oblivious to what was going on."

"That's the image I have, is the two of them standing there and the one just dancing, it was the oddest thing," he noted.

Allex said he marked the men's tickets for additional security after they could not answer basic security check-in questions.

READ NEXT: Pres. Joe Biden's Administration Praises Taliban Days Before 9/11 Anniversary, Says Militant Group Is a "Professional" in Dealings

Former American Airlines Ticket Agent Vaughn Allex Deals With Another Guilt

Twenty-four hours before the check-in of the alleged 9/11 terrorists, Vaughn Allex's longtime co-worker and close friend MJ Booth asked him for advice about her possible flights regarding her trip to Las Vegas.

MJ considered taking a flight to Chicago or even Dallas to connect to Las Vegas. However, the former American Airlines agent encouraged her co-worker to take flight 77 to Los Angeles with a connecting flight back to Las Vegas.

Allex, unaware of what would happen hours later, advised his friend that it was a better flight because it was a transcontinental flight with a meal and a movie.

Allex also shared that he started to feel better about his role in the deadly flight after purchasing the 9/11 Commission report.

The report has detailed missteps by government agencies that failed to uncover the plot of the militant Islamist terrorist group Al Qaeda. He said the turning point for him was when the 9/11 Commission had interviewed him.

Allex noted that he also bought a book that contained hundreds and hundreds of pages, and his on page three. The former American Airlines agent said he had "a little paragraph and a footnote, footnote number 12."

Vaughn Allex added that knowing so many other people were also involved set him free of the guilt he has been carrying with him.

"That's when it started to get better. That's when I went - oh my gosh... There were so many other people involved. There were so many innocent people that just touched on this. And I had just such a small, tiny five-minute part of it. But before that, it was terrible," Allex said.

The September 11 attacks, often referred to as 9/11, were a series of four coordinated terrorist attacks by Al-Qaeda against the U.S. on September 11, 2001.

On that morning, four commercial airliners traveling from the northeastern U.S. to California were hijacked by 19 Al-Qaeda terrorists.

The first plane, American Airlines flight 11, was flown into the North Tower of the World Trade Center complex in Lower Manhattan. The World Trade Center's South Tower was hit by the second plane, United Airlines flight 175.

The American Airlines flight 77 was the third plane, and it was deliberately crashed into the Pentagon. It killed 125 people inside the Pentagon and all 64 passengers and crew, including the five hijackers on board the plane.

The last plane, United Airlines flight 93, was flown in the direction of Washington, D.C. The plane crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania because its crew and passengers fought back against the hijackers, ultimately diverting the flight from its intended target of either the U.S. Capitol or the White House.

Almost 3,000 people lost their lives during the September 11 attacks.

READ MORE: 2 More People Killed in the 9/11 World Trade Center Attack Identified Days Ahead of 20th Anniversary

This article is owned by Latin Post

Written by: Jess Smith

WATCH: Former Ticket Agent Grapples With Guilt After Allowing Hijackers on 9/11 Flight - From ABC News
Kate Beckinsale has reportedly been rushed to hospital in Las Vegas.

The 48-year-old actress had been staying at The Signature at MGM Grand while in Vegas to film her new movie, Prisoners Daughter, and was reportedly taken to hospital on Friday (10.09.21) after suffering an injury at the hotel.

According to TMZ, Kate threw her back out at around 10:30am on Friday and was in so much pain she had to be rushed to hospital.

The publication claims Kate is currently still in the emergency room, and her condition is unclear as of the time of writing.

Meanwhile, the Underworld star previously said she was once planning to retrain as a doctor instead of pursuing an acting career.

She said: "I went to the Orange Tree Theatre, a youth theatre. So I did that from about 15.

"I had a crisis at 31, thinking, I wish Id been a doctor.

I retain medical things. I feel like Id be quite good. Listen, what I am is an actress who people phone up and say, I think I might have a haemorrhoid. I cant tell you the amount of times people come to me.

"Im obviously not going to perform a digital rectal exam, but I will go through symptoms. So far, touch wood, it has only ever really been chafing. Should you get any chafing, call me.

And Kate also said she isn't concerned about the ageing process, especially after her father, Richard Beckinsale, died of a heart attack at the age of just 31.

She explained: Ive been so aware of the possibility people can drop dead at any time  People started trying to worry me about turning 40 when I was turning 33. If you overload it like that, youre going to make the person not give a s***.
The Toyota Yaris, the European Car of the Year for 2021 is taking to new heights, with the impending arrival of the new Yaris Cross SUV self-charging hybrid, available in four grades and priced from just 27,260 or 200 per month on Toyota Finance PCP.

The cars will be available at Toyota dealerships nationwide from the end of October and interested customers can get a sneak peak at the nationwide roadshow running from August 26th through to September 16th. Interested parties can contact their local dealer for dates and more information. With demand expected to be high there is likely to be a limited supply for Q4, 2021, so buyers are encouraged to get in touch with their dealers early to arrange a test drive.

The Yaris Cross is the car for an adventure and is suitable for life beyond urban streets, time can be spent exploring and enjoying the great outdoors on open roads. The new models essential ruggedness can be seen in the front under-run and a lower bumper protection plate at the rear. The specification also includes a set of silver roof rails as standard and 18-inch alloy wheels with a dark grey finish.

Safety First

The all-hybrid Yaris Cross range is designed to be the worlds safest compact car with a segment first centre airbag which protects passengers from bumping into each other in the event of a side impact. Yaris Cross owners will also enjoy the peace of mind that the new collision mitigation features which provides increasing safety at intersections and emergency steering assist.

As with all Toyota New Global Architecture (TNGA) platform models the Yaris Cross highly rigid body provides added passenger and cabin protection in the event of a collision. Other key safety features, pedestrian detection that works in both daylight and night time conditions, and cyclist detection that works in daylight. The renowned Toyota Safety Sense and is the only compact hybrid SUV to offer the intelligent all-wheel drive system (AWD-i) which automatically switches from front-wheel-drive to all-wheel-drive depending on road conditions, offering customers an enhanced layer of safety. Furthermore, the intelligent all-wheel-drive system comes standard with a manually-selected mode to enhance vehicle stability in tricky road conditions.

Exciting Driving Dynamics

With high body rigidity, a low centre of gravity and a well-balanced chassis, motorists will enjoy agile, nimble and sure-footed handling along with excellent ride comfort.

The all-new hybrid B-segment SUV has a distinctly different character, shown at the models world premiere in 2020. The Adventure grade emphasises the cars suitability for life beyond urban streets, for time spent exploring and enjoying the great outdoors and open roads. The new models essential ruggedness can be seen in the front under-run and a lower bumper protection plate at the rear. The specification also includes a set of silver roof rails as standard and 18-inch alloy wheels with a dark grey finish.

In the cabin, the Yaris Adventures features piano black trim details and a black headlining. The supportive leather-like seats are upholstered in an Adventure grade design and there is a deco line across the black, soft-touch instrument panel and inner door mouldings, finished in Yaris Cross signature Brass Gold colour. Leather is used for the steering wheel and shift lever gaiter.

Yaris Cross  All Urban, All SUV

Although built on the same GA-B platform -- part of the modular TNGA platform, Yaris Cross has a higher driving position and increased ground clearance than the latest Yaris, and true to its genuine SUV status which sits impressively alongside Toyotas RAV4 -- the worlds original and best-selling recreational SUV, and Toyota C-HR compact crossover.
A WOMAN who is suspected of murdering a young boy in Limerick earlier this year has been released after she was arrested for a second time.

The woman, whose aged in her 20s, was one of two people who were questioned and released without charge last month pending further investigation and directions from the DPP.

She was re-arrested yesterday morning on foot of a warrant issued by a District Court Judge under the provisions of Section 10 of the Criminal Justice Act, 1984. This legislation allows for a suspect to be re-arrested when new information comes to light.

The woman was detained and questioned at Roxboro Road garda station and has since been released without charge.

"A file will now be prepared for the Director of Public Prosecutions," confirmed a garda spokesperson this Thursday morning.

The four-year-old boy sustained serious head injuries following an incident at a house at Rathbane in the city on March 13, 2021.



Having been initially treated at University Hospital Limerick, he was transferred to Children's Hospital Ireland at Temple Street in Dublin where he died a number of days later.

A full garda investigation was launched following his death and it was formally upgraded to a murder inquiry over the summer.
Sugar Sugar written by Treasa Nealon will be streamed online for FREE on Culture Night, Friday, September 17.



I felt stuck and ignorant and useless and I watched them tie awomen like my sister to a stake and light the match. They wanted to see us all burn. - A quote from the film.

Tara gets ready to return home to Ireland after living in Australia alone. She packs her bags, she finds her passport, she checks off her to-do list and she ignores the voicemails on her phone. She only has a few hours before she must board her flight. She is running away. She is running towards something. She is finally ready to tell you her story.

Sugar Sugar is a one woman show about emigration, loneliness and raising money for abortion rights through unconventional means.

This online and free event will be streamed on YouTube at 7pm on Culture Night, Friday September 17, and will be available for viewing and ordering a ticket until Sepmember 19.

The script of Sugar Sugar was commissioned by the Leitrim Abortion Rights Campaign in Spring 2021 and written by playwright Treasa Nealon.

It is performed by Rebecca Malone, directed by Sonia Norris and the film is created by Jonas Dellow.

It is produced by award-winning The Rabbits Riot Theatre Company.

The Rabbits Riot Theatre Company have produced over 25 different projects, most recently the experimental audio show The Five Stages written and performed by Treasa Nealon.

Funded by Leitrim County Council and the Arts Council. Tickets can be pre booked through www.eventbrite.ie.
A new award to help women restart their education has been launched in memory of the late broadcaster, Marian Finucane.

The fund, which is worth 20,000, will allow women with financial and/or social barriers to access higher education.

The late Mrs Finucane, who was passionate about education, presented her weekend radio programme 'The Marian Finucane Show' for two decades before her death in January 2020.

Her husband, John Clarke, spoke at the launch of the bursary fund and said, There is a simple basic truth  if you educate a woman, you educate a family. If you educate a man, he gets a job. This has been proven time and time again.

The Community Foundation for Ireland has donated 10,000 to the fund, which was then matched with a further donation from a private donor. It's hoped the fund will grow over time.

Donations to the fund can be made here.
LIMERICK City and County Council are continuing to monitor the bacterial pollution of Askeatons River Deel.

Swimming has been prohibited on the waterway for a number of weeks now and a special meeting of Adare/Rathkeale councillors took place in relation to what is being done.

They were told by the executive that testing will continue and the local authority will set out to try to the best of their ability to identify the sources.

Its understood testing at the Lep and below the bridge is ongoing.

And district leader Cllr Kevin Sheahan has repeated his call for a new treatment plant pipe for Askeaton town.

Irish Water is responsible for not putting in a new treatment plant pipe in Askeaton which has tripled in population since the 1940s system was installed, he said.

There was criticism of Irish Water and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for what was described as its neglect of duty over the River Deel and the sewage issue in Askeaton.

Independent councillor Emmett OBrien, also a member of the district, said: Irish Water need to be held to account for this. Its time this was addressed once and for all.

Askeaton has been left in a serious situation, said Cllr Sheehan.

He added: I have used the expression that the Deel is poisoned. If I go to the estuarial part where people swim, boat and fish, there is signage advising people not to bathe in the river. Its a sad sight to see in my town. For the River Deel I love so much to be allowed to get into that state.

The councillor has pointed out that local angling groups have complained about fish being absent from the river.

People who walk the river banks who may not be fishermen to tell me that normally at this time of year in the evening, you would have small trout jumping for flies.

But at the moment, there is no evidence of that in the river, he added.

Councillor Sheehan previously has looked for a copy of an EPA notice served on Limerick County Council before the merger, in which he said the EPA threatened to prosecute the council if it did not deal with the inadequate sewage treatment plant in the town.

No new treatment plant has been built but Cllr Sheahan wants to know, where has the EPA gone? Why has the EPA abandoned the River Deel? he demanded.
THE team at the Irish Aviation Authority Control Centre is responsible for managing the safe passage of over 1,000 aircraft flying to and from the USA into Irish airspace for their destinations in Ireland, UK, Europe and Asia. They arrive in Irish Airspace from 3am and return flights start from 11 am.

After lunch, on September 11, 2001, colleagues called out  Did you see this? a plane has hit The World Trade

Centre, not sure what type. We then heard. Every Air Traffic Controller over to Ops room immediately.

The dilemma was that by 2pm, hundreds of aircraft were in Irish airspace and over the Atlantic and we didnt know what effect this would have. Instructions were quite clear, 3 people per sector.

I was on the SOTA sector, a rectangle piece of airspace, that includes the Atlantic Ocean. There was a controller on radar screen, and planner on a PC and the strip board.

The controller had less than a years experience, but she did something that I had the utmost respect for her. She said: Im out of my comfort zone, can you sit in.

I was now the planner sitting beside Jim, an experienced controller and nothing phased him. I was reassured.

At that time, we didnt know this was a hijack scenario. Our training in 1999 for the possibility of system failures due to the Y2K bug. Was this happening now? Were aircraft navigation systems failing and somehow flying into buildings?

Pretty soon, pilots were getting information, via company messages, about what was happening in New York. They were calling us asking if we had any information. We had none.

I could hear in their voices that there was real concern. Were they thinking that their planes may start descending or turning without their control?

News came from the top desk that a third plane has gone down in the US, later were told: It looks likes multiple hijacks and US airspace is closed.

Did the coordinator just say: The US is closed??

We were in the middle of a busy westbound traffic flow, our sector was full of aircraft all heading one way, in the direction of the ocean and mostly for the US.

Jim turned to me and in his wisdom, he said: Remember this moment Aidan, this day will go down in history.

Jim did a general broadcast on the frequency: All stations on frequency, be advised the US is closed to all traffic, standby for further instructions.

One question came through from a pilot that started a chain reaction: Is Canada still open?

The response: Yes Canada is still open.

Within minutes, the frequency became blocked with aircraft wanting reroutes to Canada, I dont remember any airport being mentioned, just that most of the aircraft now wanted to land in Canada.

I was sure, like them, we could sort out those minor details of a destination later.

Our colleagues in Shanwick advised that: Anybody that wanted to go to Canada had to route 51n and north to enter the ocean.

And Shannon, we have aircraft on the ocean who are less than halfway and they are turning around and returning to the departure aerodrome, more details to follow.

Aircraft were re-routed to 51n and north as their new oceanic clearance came in. Some aircraft wanted to route there in anticipation of receiving a clearance.

The chain reaction had started, all the aircraft in the sector. A few minutes previous they were routing pretty much westbound. Now they were all turning right to aim for 51N, like a flock of starlings that had been spooked by a predator, all the leader line vectors were all now diagonal.

Then word came down: Canadian airspace is closed.

Another general broadcast was issued and another chain reaction of all aircraft now turning left to head south west, this time the destination requested was the Caribbean.

That didnt last too long, when the word came through .Ocean is closed.

Not something I ever heard before, but that day everybody was experiencing something never experienced before.

London and Brest control centres were told to send us no more aircraft unless they were landing in Ireland. Within minutes the first calls started coming in giving details of returning aircraft off the Atlantic ocean.

We quickly reminded ourselves of the turnback procedure for an aircraft experiencing an emergency on the ocean: Offset by half a degree and come in 500ft below your previously assigned oceanic route.

The first unknown callsign came on frequency. It was a returning aircraft coming back off the ocean via the same point and same level that it had just exited Irish airspace. Thats like turning around on the M1 and driving back up the motorway you just came down. This wasnt a day for giving out to the pilot.

The instruction was immediately given: Change your level by 500ft and offset by half a degree as published. We couldnt see him on radar, but we were glad of the early call and the aircraft retuned safely.

Next instruction was to the conflicting westbound aircraft routing to the same point and same level as the returning aircraft to orbit left and hold.

With the Ocean closed, many aircraft returned to their departure airport. Because such a scenario was never envisaged, our system struggled with getting information to London and Brest control centres as they were also dealing with their own turnbacks.

Soon, every turnback was now declaring a fuel emergency and emergency PAN PAN acknowledgements were heard.

Not many returning aircraft could make it back to their point of origin. So, they diverted to Shannon and other Irish airports. I heard that Shannon airport was running out of room for the aircraft.

Our shift went on way past its normal hours that day. Nobody complained. All aircraft were able to land safely having come back from a Closed Ocean.

The TV was still on as I walked out, but I had heard all the emotions in the pilots voices, I knew it was bad.

I checked my phone. I had one voice mail. It was from my uncle, a priest, who got me interested in ATC, 10 years previously.

He was thinking of me and my colleagues.

With the lump in my throat, I thought, yep, we are all in this together.

Aidan McEnroe, 44, lives in Newcastle West with his wife Joanne.

He joined the Irish Aviation Authority in 1997 as a trainee air traffic controller and has been with the Authority ever since. He is now an Air Traffic Control Expert and assists in the on-the-job training for students.
Sisters Izzy and Ailbhe Keane from Galway, have announced their longed for collaboration with Disney.

Their company, Izzy Wheels, inspired by Izzy, who was born with Spina Bifida and is paralyzed from the waist down, was created to help bridge the gap between disability and style.

Izzy says that although her wheelchair is a symbol of freedom to her, it never reflected her personality. This motivated her sister Ailbhe to design a range of wheel covers, as part of her final-year project at the National College of Art and Design, in 2016.

The collaboration with Disney will see the sisters create a range of bright and colourful spokeguards for wheelchair users, which include characters from Frozen, The Lion King, Disney classics Mickey and Minnie Mouse along with superheroes from fan favourites, The Avengers.

This is huge! The Disney x Izzy Wheels collection is available now at https://t.co/uvSh1t9xGI!



As if that wasnt exciting enough already, 10% of proceeds from all Disney-themed wheelchair covers will be donated to Whizz-Kidz!



A BIG thank you to @izzywheels & @disney https://t.co/sWuSIy4KbU September 8, 2021

Its been my long-time aim to challenge the perception of people who use wheelchairs and encourage people to look beyond the chair, says Ailbhe, who is the companys chief executive and creative director. I want people to feel that their wheelchair is an extension of their personal style and a form of self-expression, which is why Disney is a fantastic partner.

The covers, which now ship worldwide, are designed for all ages with 10% of the proceeds from the Disney range going to Whizz-Kid, a charity focused on transforming the lives of disabled children in the UK.

The company has also pledged to help Disney's Make-a-Wish foundation by designing customisable wheelchair covers.
THE recent death of mother-of-five Lil Stack, nee Danaher, Tieraclea, Tarbert, (91) and formerly of Loughill evoked a great deal of sympathy in North Kerry and West Limerick.

Her death marked the end of an era, as she was the last surviving member of the seven strong Danaher family in Knocknaboula, Loughill.

In 1930. Lil was born on a dairy and mixed farm in Knocknaboula. She was one of five, which included her brother, Jimmy, a farmer, three sisters  Anna, Emilian and Roberta, who became religious sisters in the Little Company of Mary, working in the medical sector throughout Ireland and abroad.

Speaking at her Funeral Mass in St Marys Church Tarbert, the chief celebrant, Ballybunion parish priest, Sean Hanafin, said Lil had led a very fruitful life and was a caring mother to five children and 14 grandchildren.

Fr Hanafin was joined at her Funeral Mass by retired Tarbert priest, Fr John OConnor.

In line with the local custom at the time, Fr Hanafin recalled a few weeks after Lil was born, she was brought to Our Lady of the Wayside Church, Loughill and baptised into the Catholic Church.

He said Lil went to her local school and went to London after she became ill where she was looked after by her uncle, Fr Joe Danaher.

When Lil got well, he said she came home and went to Moyvane where she helped a cousin who was just after having a baby.

While she was in Moyvane, she met her future, husband, Mick Stack, a local butcher, and this relationship blossomed, which resulted in marriage and a new home in Tieraclea, Tarbert.

The couple had five children, but experienced the devastating blow of losing their infant son in tragic circumstances.

Fr Hanafin pointed out this happened at a time when there wasnt much personal help available for anybody such as counselling or other therapy.

Lil lived for her family. She was a fantastic home maker and cook. Everything was home made, the bread, scones, the tart. I believe the hospitality in Bayview has been mentioned with great fondness to you (family members) since she died.

Lil loved her style and her clothes. She looked after her inner self very well. She was grounded in the book of the psalms, and attended a lot of self-development programmes with Fr Pat Murray.

Saying the daily rosary and attending Mass every day gave Lil a deep spirituality.

Mick, who was a managing director of Listowel Livestock Mart, died 22 years ago. This loss, Fr Hanafin said, left Lil even more committed to her four children and 14 grandchildren.

It also gave her time to pursuing one of her passions exploring different countries, travelling extensively to numerous locations in New Zealand, Australia, the United States of America, Africa and Cuba.

Addressing the congregation at her Funeral Mass, her son, Edward, said it was his mothers expressed wish, there would be no eulogy, having stated before she died anyone who knows me well enough doesnt need to be reminded of my personality or the values that I stood for.

On behalf of all her immediate and extended family, suffice to say she was a wonderful wife, mother, and grandmother who was dearly loved and who we will miss very much.

We were privileged to have her caring influence for such an extended period of our lives. We were lucky to be able to care for her in our homes over the last number of years. I would like to thank Cathriona, Pat and family for looking after our mother for the last 20 months of her life, he said.

She is survived by her children, Edward, Marie, Cathriona and Don, grandchildren, Darragh, Philip, Marie Louise, Michael, Will, Mick, Ellen, Anna, Jack, Peter, Robert, Michael, Edward and Rebecca, daughters-in-law Claire and Niamh, sons-in-law John O'Callaghan and Pat Clifford, sister-in-law Patricia Danaher, brother-in-law Eddie Stack, nieces and nephews, relatives and her many dear friends.

She was predeceased by her sisters - Sr Emilian, Sr Roberta and Sr Anna, Little Company of Mary, and her brother, Jimmy.

Burial took place in the cemetery adjoining St Marys Church.
It's the weekend and Ronan O'Meara has been scouring the TV schedules to find movies to watch over the next seven days...starting tonight.

Here are 17 to choose from....enjoy!

Vice Squad: Saturday, Talking Pictures TV @ 9pm

A sex worker called Princess is coerced into working for the rule breaking vice squad of the LAPD to take down a murderous pimp and wouldn't you just know it, things go wrong and she finds herself in a lot of danger. This is b-movie heaven, sleazy, funny, violent as hell and powered along by a terrifying turn from a vicious Wings Hauser. Season Hubley creates a heroine you want to see make it to the end credits.

Take This Waltz: Saturday, TG4 @ 9.40pm

Margot meets Daniel on a plane. Their attraction is instant and obvious. However Daniel not only turns out to be Margot's neighbour but Margot is also married to a man called Lou. Sarah Polley's 2011 drama is a frank and mature look at the highs and lows of living and loving. Michelle Williams as always is splendid and a surprisingly restrained turn from Seth Rogen will make you wish he'd lay off the fart and drug jokes he's known for more often.

The China Syndrome: Saturday, RTE One @ 11.45pm

Jane Fonda leads an all star cast in this 70's set tale of a near catastrophic failure in a nuclear plant and the reporter who wants to get the information about it out to the wider world. Yet another 70's thriller full of post Vietnam & Watergate paranoia which has always made for intriguing cinema. Fonda and Jack Lemmon are excellent in this thought provoking and chilling little drama.

Britt-Marie Was Here: Sunday, BBC Two @ 12.20am (midnight)

Life takes a wild twist for Britt-Marie when her marriage that's taken up most of her life crumbles and she finds herself alone, in her mid 60's, in a new town and about to take up a new and exciting job. A heartwarming watch from Sweden about having the guts to step away from what makes you miserable and the bravery to step into the great beyond. Pernilla August, who Star Wars fans might recognise, does fine work in the title role.

Johnny Guitar: Sunday, TCM @ 8.55am

Vienna owns the town saloon & maintains a love/hate relationship with the ranchers and railroad workers that frequent it. One day a false accusation brings all manner of trouble to her doorstep. A unique western, one of the first headlined by a woman and one that's kind of unusual and oddly poetic while still hitting the beats you'd expect. Joan Crawford is a blistering lead and watch out for those craggy genre faces like Ward Bond and Royal Dano in the background.

Sorry To Bother You: Sunday, BBC Two @ 11pm

A black man in Oakland, California gets a job as a telemarketer and realises he's much better at his job when he pretends to sound like a white man. With success however comes responsibility and with responsibility comes a hell of a lot of weirdness. Boots Riley's 2018 film is a hard one to categorise but it's certainly the wackiest film you'll see this week. It's a lot of fun too, don't worry. LaKeith Stanfield and Tessa Thompson do well leading a stacked cast.

Seraphim Falls: Monday, Great! Movies @ 12.55am (midnight)

The American civil war is coming to an end but the violence is far from over. A knifesman named Gideon is wounded and being chased across the wilderness by a gang of men out for revenge. Why are they chasing him though? Liam Neeson and Pierce Brosnan have gone on record saying this was the best time they ever had making a film and it shows. It's an entertaining watch, laced with dark humour and a welcome side of weirdness. Angelica Huston & Tom Noonan add to the stew.

Molly's Game: Monday, TG4 @ 9.30pm

Everything Molly Bloom puts her mind to works out swimmingly and when she starts an illegal high stakes poker game in Los Angeles she's soon the talk of the town. The law even starts to take notice. Carried by a powerhouse turn from Jessica Chastain this is a compelling if overlong watch that delves into the underground of tinseltown and that makes it tick. Idris Elba and Kevin Costner offer solid support.

The Final Girls: Monday, The Horror Channel @ 11pm

A young woman brings her friends to see a tribute screening of her late mother's most famous horror movie. She's ashamed of her mother's career but must get over it fast when they are magically transported into what's happening onscreen. Yes it sounds silly but it's actually a really funny and affectionate spoof of 80's horror that laced with a surprising amount of heart. Taissa Farmiga, Alia Shawkat, Adam Devine and Thomas Middleditch play their parts well

The Girl On A Motorcycle: Tuesday, Talking Pictures TV @ 12.35am (midnight)

Rebecca's done with her husband. She wants out and decides to zip off to Germany on her motorcycle to see the other big love of her life. On the way she indulges in all manner of mischief. Mischief that caused this film to be the film film ever rated X in America. It's tame now but it's still an interesting and watchable curio and a real insight into the late swinging 60's era it was made in. Marianne Faithfull and Alain Delon are perfect for their parts.

The Naked Truth: Tuesday, Film4 @ 3pm

The editor of a gossip magazine has a nice sideline in blackmail involving the names appearing in print. If they give him money he'll keep schtum about them. Eventually a group have had enough and decide to quieten him properly. This is an amusing watch, seeing prim and proper 1950's genteel Englishness fly out the window as scores need to get settled. Dennis Price, Joan Sims, Peggy Mount, Peter Sellers and the always hilarious Terry Thomas add nicely to the mix here.

Awakenings: Tuesday, Great! Movies Classic @ 10pm

For almost 5 decades the victims of a encephalitis epedemic have been locked away in their own bodies and minds, catatonic, ignored, forgotten. Until a new doctor appears, with new ideas and new drugs that have astounding results. Penny Marshall's true life drama from 1990 will kick the heart right out of your chest but it will also make you smile and give you hope. Robert De Niro, Penelope Anne Miller and the much missed Robin Williams do superlative work.

Wild Rose: Wednesday, Film4 @ 9pm

Rose is fresh out of jail and she has a plan to ensure she stays out. She has an astounding voice and wants to use it to become a Nashville star. The only problem is she lives in the ropey end of Glasgow and no one believes in her. Ireland's own Jessie Buckley is astounding in the lead role of a film about never giving up and never ever backing down. Even if you aren't a country and western fan this film will get you in the feelings.

Gunda : Mother Pig: Wednesday, BBC4 @ 10pm

A simple story of a mammy pig, her little baba's, a couple of moo cows and a one legged chicken. In black and white. With no dialogue. No, wait, why are you running away?? Come back. This 2020 documentary from Norway is a mesmerising watch, moving in a way you'll only understand if you watch it and even funny in places. Trust me on this one.

Pet: Thursday, The Horror Channel @ 10.45pm

Seth fancies Holly. She has no interest in him whatsoever. Instead of moving on he decides to kidnap her but oh man has he made a huge, huge mistake. From the off you'll think this is going to head down the Saw/Hostel route but it's thankfully a different beast with a story trajectory you'll never guess. It's disgusting in places but it's twisty turns and dark comedy will keep you watching. Ksenia Solo and Dominic Monaghan do nice work as the leads.

Youth: Friday, Film4 @ 1.30am

70 year old Fred's taken a much deserved holiday with his daughter and his best friend in a spa in the the Swiss Alps. Life is good and laughs are plenty until a job offer arrives and makes both men reminisce on what's gone and think about what's to come. There's an air of pretension around Paolo Sorrentino's 2015 drama but there's tenderness and humanity there too and effortless turns from Michael Caine and Harvey Keitel make it sing in places.

Law Abiding Citizen: Friday, Virgin Media One @ 10pm

Tragedy strikes a family and a grieving father takes justice into his own hands. Another father, on the other side of the law has to deal with the fallout but what he thinks is the end is just the beginning. This graphically violent 90's throwback was scoffed at on release for it's far fetched storyline but it's a really satisfying watch. If you can stomach it that is. Gerard Butler, Jamie Foxx and the great Colm Meaney bring a nice heft to their roles.

As always visit hamsandwichcinema.blogspot.com/ for more film and tv chat.
The sea levels are rising at an accelerating rate due to climate change. Several countries which have coastal borders and the islands are looking for solutions fearing they might get submerged.

One such country that is adapting to this challenge in the Netherlands, where more than a quarter of the area already lies below sea level.

Residents of the Netherlands's capital Amsterdam have created a visionary floating neighbourhood called Schoonschip, means clean ship" in Dutch.

An architect from Space&Matter, a firm that has designed Schoonschip, said that population and climate change increasing rapidly. Therefore the company decided to make us of space on the water.

As per the World Economic Forum, climate change is predicted to put 800 million city dwellers at risk by 2050.

With Schoonschip we want to set the example, and show how living on the water can be a great and better alternative for people and our planet," one of the architects told the WEF.

What is Schoonschip?

In Amsterdam's Schoonschip neighbourhood over 100 people live in 46 floating homes.

Amsterdams Schoonschip is home to 105 residents who live in 46 homes on 30 water plots.

All homes have green roofs which help in collecting rainwater. The water is pre-heated by the sun by circulating water through solar collectors. Only rainwater is used for the flushing of the toilet.

Solar panels are connected to a smart grid where residents can trade energy, submersed heat exchangers for heating and cooling. The water treatment technologies are used to recollect energy and nutrients from wastewater.

In this floating village, residents have agreed to renounce their cars and instead share electric cars.

According to space&matter, living on water offers a great solution for places where climate change and a rise in sea levels rise are a looming hazard.

Floating communities is nit a new concept, it has been around for generations in some parts of the world. For example, the Bajau people of Southeast Asia, live on small houseboats off the coasts of Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines. In Cambodia, the Tonle Sap lake houses hundreds of floating villages.

In recent times, interest in water living has grown as the world seeks solutions to the twin pressures of population density and rising sea levels.

On the other hand, there are other cities which are looking underground to find a solution. For example, Finlands capital Helsinki has created a host of underground facilities including sports venues and an emergency shelter, and Montreal in Canada has an underground city including shops and hotels beneath its streets.

The UN-Habitat estimated that by 2030, three billion people, about 40% of the worlds population, will need access to adequate housing.

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India and Australia on Saturday began a high-level foreign and defence ministerial dialogue to boost the overall strategic cooperation between the nations.

External affairs minister S Jaishankar and Union defence minister Rajnath Singh held the two-plus-two talks with their Australian counterparts Marise Payne and Peter Dutton.

Describing the endeavour as productive", Jaishankar wrote on Twitter: A productive 2+2 meeting today with Australia."

A productive 2+2 meeting today with Australia. pic.twitter.com/wVorRj4rks  Dr. S. Jaishankar (@DrSJaishankar) September 11, 2021

As democratic polities, market economies and pluralistic societies we have a natural bonding that has assumed contemporary relevance in a changing world," the minister later said in a joint statement.

It was during the first India-Australia virtual leaders' summit on 4 June 2020 that our PMs agreed to elevate our relations to a comprehensive, strategic partnership. This '2+2' format is a direct outcome of that summit & is pursuant to the comprehensive, strategic partnership," he added.

The talks come in the backdrop of an unsettling phase of geopolitical flux in the region when the global focus is on the situation in Afghanistan after its takeover by the Taliban last month.

The issue also came up in discussions on Saturday and the two sides discussed the security situation in Afghanistan.

In their talks, Singh and Dutton focussed on their "common concerns" relating possible spread of terrorism from the Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.

Later, Jaishankar said: We agreed that international community must be united in its approach, guided by UN Security Council Resolution 2593."

The two sides also held extensive talks on the situation in the Indo-Pacific in the face of China's growing muscle-flexing in the region, people familiar with the development said.

Efforts for cooperation

The foreign and defence ministerial talks took place amid renewed efforts by the Quad member countries to expand cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region.

Besides India and Australia, the Quad comprises the US and Japan.

In an address at an event organised by the Observer Research Organisation, Payne on Friday said the Quad has evolved "swiftly" and very "effectively" and commended India for taking a strong leadership role in the region.

Talking about "significant challenges" facing the Indo-Pacific, the Australian foreign minister said Canberra seeks a region where rights of large and small countries are respected and that no "single dominant power" dictates the outcome for others.

The dialogue between the foreign and defence ministers was instituted as part of an overall goal to expand strategic cooperation between the two countries.

India has such a framework for talks with a very few countries including the US and Japan.

The defence and military cooperation between India and Australia is on an upswing in the last few years.

In June last year, India and Australia elevated their ties to a comprehensive strategic partnership and signed a landmark deal for reciprocal access to military bases for logistics support during an online summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Australian counterpart Scott Morrison.

The Australian Navy was part of the recent Malabar naval exercise that also featured navies of India, the US and Japan.

With inputs from agencies.

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Trying to give some students a taste of foreign affairs, Colorados Regis Jesuit High School applied for credentials to attend the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women.

This spring, the U.N. committee that accredits such groups emailed the school. It said there was a hiccup: Regis Jesuits website used incorrect terminology for Taiwan, the democratically governed island. The committee suggested modifying it to Taiwan, Province of China."

Beijing has long used its rising clout to challenge governments and multinationals over its claim that Taiwan is part of China. Its also increasingly pushing around the runts of global diplomacy, like Regis Jesuit, over the issue.

We are small potatoes," said Christina Vela, the Spanish teacher in charge of the Aurora, Colo., schools application.

China sits on the U.N. Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations, which authorizes groups big and small to participate at U.N. functions. At its publicly held meetings, any representative can hold up an application. Chinese bureaucrats scour each group that comes before the committee, scrutinizing every nook and cranny of their websites for references to Taiwan, say researchers whove studied the committee. If groups dont include Beijings preferred language, China asks the committee to request changes.

At a committee meeting in May, China requested that Regis Jesuit change how it refers to Taiwan. Soon afterward, the committee emailed the school to point out a year-old article on its website about a student joining the Girl Up Teen Advisory Board, alongside youths from countries including Taiwan, Ms. Vela said.

No one was ever going to randomly stumble upon that webpage," Ms. Vela said.

She found the request odd but added Province of China" to the article as requested. A week ago, the U.N. committee endorsed her application.

During the committees summer session, scheduled to end Friday, China cited improper Taiwan terminology to stall applications from at least six other groups, including the World Bicycle Industry Association, a French nature society called the Association of 3 Hedgehogs and For All Moonkind, a volunteer team of space lawyers trying to preserve lunar landing sites so they dont become tourist traps in the far-off future.

They are consistent and bullish about it," said Eleanor Openshaw, whose nonprofit, the International Service for Human Rights, closely follows the committee. And they will not sleep until an NGO makes a change that they seek."

Taiwan has governed itself since 1949, when Chinas then-government fled the mainland to the island after losing the Chinese civil war to the Communists. The U.N. recognized the government in Taiwan as Chinas ruler until switching to Beijing in 1971. Taiwan hasnt had U.N. membership since.

The U.N. has since adopted Beijings characterization. A U.N. spokesman said participants should refer to the territory as Taiwan, Province of China," and the committee asks NGOs to respect U.N. terminology for all geographical names." The Chinese delegation of the U.N. Committee on NGOs has taken on the job of making sure everyone wanting to do business at the U.N. knows that.

Many organizations seeking U.N. credentials, including Regis Jesuit, dont attend committee meetings and learn about the name request via email, which doesnt identify which country asked for the change. Oblivious or indifferent to the political dispute, many do as asked to expedite their applications, said Rana Siu Inboden, a fellow at the University of Texas Strauss Center for International Security and Law, who studied the committee.

Iain Patton, chief executive of the U.K.s Environmental Association for Universities and Colleges, had Province of China" added to a couple of the groups more obscure webpages after being asked by the committee.

We did it because were intent on getting in and influencing that [U.N.] system from within," he said.

In a committee hearing in May, Chinese representative Zhang Zhe asked that the World Yoga Community, which promotes a yogic lifestyle globally without any discrimination," change the Taiwan terminology on its website. At a subsequent meeting, Mr. Zhang asked Dileepkumar Thankappan, the organization founder who attended in person, whether he had resolved the issue.

We already took the Taiwan name out," Mr. Thankappan replied, according to the meetings online broadcast. He said the oversight was because his webmaster forgot to press the button to upload the latest version of the site.

He told Mr. Zhang the mistake was fixed. Gone were Claudia Lins headshot, name and title: Youth Ambassador Taiwan." The U.N. committee endorsed the application.

Ms. Lin said Mr. Thankappan didnt tell her before deleting her from the website. She said she was fine with the change and didnt want to get involved in geopolitics. Mr. Thankappan declined to comment.

Last year, the U.S. representative on the committee challenged China over the practice. Groups should be able to refer to Taiwan however they want, said Courtney Nemroff, and insisting on terminology in support of particular political positionswould have the effect of censoring organizations online presence."

Chinas Mr. Zhang responded that sovereignty and territorial integrity of U.N. member states" is a core U.N. principle, so using correct terminology is one of the most basic criteria for submitting applications."

Watching the committees online broadcast last week, For All Moonkind co-founder Michelle Hanlon saw China query groups over Taiwan terminology. I thought, Oh, wow, jeez, " said Ms. Hanlon, who runs the University of Mississippi Center for Air and Space Law.

Then it happened to us," she said. I had no idea we even referenced Taiwan."

The next day, the committee emailed her to direct her toward her sites donation webpage, where a dropdown menu of countries listed Taiwan and the Chinese-controlled territories of Hong Kong and Macau. The email suggested dubbing Taiwan a Chinese province, as well as appending Special Administrative Region of China" after both Hong Kong and Macau.

Wanting to resolve the issue quickly so her organization could make statements at the U.N. Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space, she deleted the webpage.

Honestly, we dont get that many donations through the website," Ms. Hanlon said. She hopes the committee will approve her application at its next session.

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Not all caterpillars grow up to be beautiful butterflies. Some become living milkshakes for their dads, who guzzle caterpillar body fluids to attract the ladies.

Recently, scientists reported the first evidence of butterflies sipping from the bodies of caterpillars  dead and alive. They observed adult milkweed butterflies in North Sulawesi, Indonesia, using tiny claws on their feet to scratch wounds in caterpillars' bodies so they could lap the liquid that oozed out.

Male butterflies seek certain compounds produced by milkweed (flowering plants in the family Apocynaceae), which repel predators and help the butterflies produce pheromones that attract females. Since caterpillars are stuffed with juices from chewed-up plants, they make an easy target for butterflies looking to chemically boost their attractiveness to females.

Related: Photos: Butterflies snag goo from unwitting ants

"The caterpillar larvae would contort their bodies rapidly in what appeared to be futile attempts to deter the persistent scratching of adults," said the researchers who observed the butterfly baby-drinking. They described their observations in a study published Sept. 8 in the journal Ecology .

Butterflies in the Danainae family are known as milkweed butterflies because most of the caterpillars in this group feed on milkweed plants, which contain toxic alkaloids that are absorbed by the caterpillars and then processed into useful chemicals that protect them from predators. Another use for these alkaloids is in mating pheromones, which are transferred to females in the males' sperm packet "as a nuptial gift," the scientists wrote.

Most milkweed butterfly species are found in Asia, but four species live in North America, one of which is the colorful monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus), according to the Digital Atlas of Idaho . Male butterflies in this family are known for a unique behavior called leaf-scratching, in which adults supplement the plant sap they absorbed as hungry caterpillars by scraping at milkweed leaves with their tiny claws to release alkaloid-loaded sap for drinking through their long proboscis. Sometimes males gather by the hundreds to scratch and sip on milkweed leaves, according to the study.

But on Dec. 9, 2019, lead study author Yi-Kai Tea, a doctoral candidate in the University of Sydney's School of Life and Environmental Sciences, and co-author Jonathan Soong Wei, a naturalist in Singapore, saw milkweed butterflies in Indonesia's Tangkoko Batuangus Nature Reserve that were scratching at a different sap-loaded source: live milkweed caterpillars.

Danainae butterflies drink from dead and living caterpillars. A: Parantica agleoides agleoides feeding on an arctiine moth carcass in Singapore. B to F: Various species of danaine observed in Tangkoko Batuangus Nature Reserve, North Sulawesi scratching and imbibing from living and dead caterpillars of Idea blanchardii blanchardii. Caterpillars are dead in panels C, D, and F, but alive in B and E. (Image credit: Photographs by Akio Takatsuki, Goran Pettersson, Yi-Kai Tea, Jonathan Soong Wei, and CheongWeei Gan)

"Multiple adults were observed scratching many caterpillars along a stretch of coastal vegetation" that spanned more than 1,600 feet (500 meters), the researchers reported. They then saw the butterflies actively drink "from the wounded and oozing caterpillars" for hours, with the butterflies sometimes gathering in mixed-species groups. So intent were the butterflies on drinking from the caterpillars that not even the touch of a human observer could distract them, the study authors wrote. To describe the behavior, the scientists coined the term "kleptopharmacophagy," which means "consuming stolen chemicals."

"The alternative neologisms 'kairopharmacophagy' (feeding on defensive chemicals from wounded caterpillars detected via 'eavesdropping') or 'necropharmacophagy' (feeding on defensive chemicals from dead caterpillars) might also be appropriate," the researchers reported.

Over three days, the scientists counted seven species of milkweed butterflies that scraped and sipped living and dead caterpillars (it is unknown if the dead caterpillars were drunk to death or died of their wounds). One possible explanation for why the butterflies find caterpillars so delicious is because milkweed alkaloids accumulate in the caterpillars' bodies from the leaves that they eat, making their internal "juices" a more potent, alkaloid-rich brew  and thereby more attractive to thirsty males, the scientist suggested.

It's likely that the butterflies are drawn to milkweed leaves that are already damaged from caterpillar chewing; those caterpillars would be close by when the adults start scratching. If a butterfly accidentally scrapes a caterpillar, the wound would release a heady chemical scent that would attract the butterfly and encourage it to scratch the caterpillar even more, according to the study.

Many questions remain about this unusual (and ghastly) behavior, such as which specific plant compounds attract the butterflies to the caterpillars and do butterflies in other parts of the world also practice baby-drinking, Tea said in a statement .

"These simple observations raise questions about the ecology of these well-known butterflies, providing numerous opportunities for future studies," he said.

Originally published on Live Science.
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Its been a while since Italian cinema has raised a major enfant terrible, but the countrys film industry firmly believes it has a pair in twin brothers Damiano and Fabio DInnocenzo. Hot off a co-writing credit on Matteo Garrones Dogman, the duo (billed onscreen as The DInnocenzo Brothers) made a splash and won a prize at last years Berlinale with their sophomore feature, the sleek, bleak, nihilistic suburban nightmare Bad Tales. Its themes were pretty well-worn, but its darkly chic styling was arresting enough to ensure plenty of chatter trailing their swiftly delivered third film America Latina.

Sadly, the hype is unfulfilled by this minor, tricked-out study of extreme midlife crisis, which shows little advancement in the brothers storytelling instincts, while underlining their knack for surly mood-building and elegantly sinister imagery. If anything, its thin, oblique blend of arch character study, dreamlike psychodrama and spindly mystery is less cohesive than Bad Tales. America Latina may frequently look and sound terrific, but a Ferrari spinning its wheels is spinning its wheels just the same: Its hard to see much of a hook here for international distributors once the glow of the films Venice competition premiere wears off, but the sense that the twins could yet wow us remains.

Lest the films perplexing title have you thinking these eminently Italian directors have hopped across the Atlantic, America Latina finds the DInnocenzos returning to Bad Tales terrain: the swampy, featureless suburban outskirts of Rome, their home city. Latina, it turns out, is an undistinguished satellite town 40 miles from the capital, and its where wealthy dentist Massimo (Elio Germano, returning after Bad Tales) has built a life of luxury perched above squalor. Where the America comes in is less obvious. Perhaps it refers to the capitalist ideal  the American dream, exported  that Massimo and his beautiful nuclear family appear to embody with a pronounced Italian accent. Perhaps its an allusion to the manifold American influences, from pulp noir to David Lynch, on the brothers latest. Theres an awful lot of perhaps in America Latina.

If Latina seems an uninviting setting, a series of gliding car-view shots over the opening credits eventually prove the worth of Massimos decision to settle there. A pretzel of scabby highways and exits finally curves into the long driveway of his rather magnificent house: an angular modernist beauty, all floating curves and sun-bleached terrazzo, that nonetheless has a telling air of decay to it. The external walls are cracked and weather-marked; the small, fin-shaped swimming pool has turned a citrusy green. Nevertheless, Massimo appears to live a comfortable life there with his servile wife Alessandra (Astrid Casali) and their two daughters (Carlotta Gamba and Federica Pala), both mini-mes of their mother, clad like her in identical pale, fluttery dresses.

If The Shining comes fleetingly to mind, thats probably no accident. For Massimos serenely bourgeois, if somewhat creepy, domestic idyll is soon shattered by an unwelcome discovery in the cellar  a young, unidentified girl (Sara Ciocca), gagged, beaten and bound to a pillar, who issues a feral, ceaseless scream when he undoes her gag. Massimo neither frees her nor notifies anyone  even his family  of her presence as he attempts to figure out how she got there. His genial relationship with local drinking buddy Simone (Maurizio Lastrico) takes a sour, wary turn, though his suspicions should probably turn inward, as America Latina drifts into vague reality-versus-delusion limbo: This is the kind of film where the protagonist does a Google search for hallucinations, just in case we werent sure.

The more blurry ambiguity the film builds around questions of what happened to who, why and when, the less interested we become in specific answers, since they all plainly fall under the broader thematic pull of Massimos midlife ennui. Despite Germanos clenched, committed performance, Massimo never emerges as a particularly compelling character. Rather, hes a handsomely sculpted symbol of all the social ills that America Latina only glancingly addresses in the first place.

Theres little about the film that isnt handsomely sculpted, as it happens, from the splintery editing to the needling score by Italian rock band Verdena, with its occasional swarms of bristling static. Photographers before they were filmmakers, the DInnocenzos and cinematographer Paolo Carnera know their way around making an image that stops you in your tracks, even if it stops the film in its tracks too: One lovingly extended shot of Massimo in the shower at night, water somehow whooshing sideways and turning near-fluorescent, makes you pause first over its beauty, and then over what it might remotely be suggesting  beyond, well, that very beauty again.

Reviewed at Venice Film Festival (Competition), Sept. 9, 2021. Running time: 92 MIN.

Running Time: Running time: 92 MIN.

Production

(Italy-France) A Vision Distribution, The Apartment production, in co-production with Le Pacte. (World sales: Vision Distribution, Rome.) Producers: Lorenzo Mieli. Executive producer: Valeria Licurgo.

Crew

Directors, writers: The DInnocenzo Brothers. Camera: Paolo Carnera. Editor: Walter Fasano. Music: Verdena.

With

Elio Germano, Astrid Casali, Sara Ciocca, Maurizio Lastrico, Carlotta Gamba, Federica Pala, Filippo Dini. (Italian dialogue)

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In the final weekend of the California gubernatorial recall campaign, political ads are everywhere. The last push before the voting period ends on Sept. 14 has brought out Democrat A-listers to defend Gov. Gavin Newsom while some of the Republican challengers have turned to shock and outrage to stretch their limited dollars further.

The campaign to defend Gov. Gavin Newsom is spending millions of dollars on ads from a series of prominent Democrats  Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and, biggest of all, Barack Obama. The ads note that one of the key funders is Reed Hastings, the Netflix co-CEO who gave $3 million to the support the anti-recall effort. Mail-in ballots and drop-off ballots must be returned and polls will close at 8 p.m. on Tuesday.

The Republican candidates have less money than the incumbent, and so have to work harder to attract attention with their spots. John Cox brought back Tag, the Kodiak bear who has served as a campaign mascot, for an ad that ends with the line: Does a bear sh*t in the woods?

The blurb is the handiwork of Fred Davis, the Republican consultant known for bizarro attention-grabbers, most notably the demon sheep ad for Senate candidate Carly Fiorina in 2010.

But in this election, the weirdest ads have come from a committee associated with Larry Elder. One in particular, starring Los Angeles resident Brent Gold, has attracted a lot of attention for its opening line.

Brimming with rage, Gold addresses Newsom directly: You remind me of the guy in high school who took my girlfriend, then went onto the next girl. You still think youre better than everyone else.

Said the Washington Post: There may be no more memorable opening to a political commercial this year.

When the ad was first posted on Twitter on Wednesday, several commenters suggested that Gold seek therapy.

In an interview with Variety on Thursday, Gold said that the ad-makers actually had to tone down his anger at the governor.

I would have gone with perhaps stronger wording, he said. They wanted to have a calmer presentation.

Gold is a former drug and alcohol counselor and a longtime listener of Elders radio show. He said the stolen girlfriend line is based on a true story, but he did not want to go into the details, other than to say it was not in high school.

It was in college, if Im not mistaken, he said. It was a long time ago. Its an irrelevancy for me.

Gold said the point is that he considers Newsom to be an elitist.

It goes back to the age of lords and kings and queens, he said. Were the peasants. We really dont matter. Were just the peasants.

The same committee has also produced an ad in which a small dog chases its tail, as the narrator vents frustrations about taxes and homelessness.

Were going around in circles! Why are we keeping this guy!? the narrator shrieks. STOP!!!

Newsom has a sizable lead in the most recent polls.

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A usurper melodrama by any other name is still a usurper melodrama, and Fabrice du Welzs latest doesnt really try to cloak its genre conventions: Inexorable might just as well be titled Single White Female Nanny or Fatal Domestic. Still, if this isnt the most surprising or original among the Belgian helmers character-driven thrillers to date, it does compel attention with its elegantly crafted tale of a wealthy family infiltrated by a young woman with a hidden agenda. The mix of art-house bona fides and pulp satisfactions should put the Toronto fest world premiere in a position to attract sales in various formats around the globe.

Having appeared in the directors last film Adoration, Benoit Poelvoorde (still best known to many from his feature debut in 1992s notorious serial-killer mock-doc Man Bites Dog) is back, as the central figure this time. His Marcel is a celebrity veteran writer whose titular breakthrough novel was discovered by editor Jeanne (Melanie Doutey). Theyve been married for the twenty-five years since, and are now moving into the vast country estate shes inherited from her publishing-house tycoon father with their only child Lucie (Janaina Halloy Fokan) and a newly-acquired Great Pyrenees.

Theyve got their careers to attend to as well as a full renovation of the palatial premises, so apparently it has occurred to no one that a new dog requires some training. Ergo, when big white Ulysses goes missing on the property, everyone is very grateful that hes found by passing stranger Gloria (Alba Gaia Bellugi), who seems handy with dogs  and children. She provides the couple with a sob story that draws their sympathy. Soon they are offering her pay as a sort of playmate/babysitter, then a place to stay, then a permanent position. It does not occur to them that Gloria, if that is even her name, has carefully orchestrated all of this. Let alone that she has beaten herself to claim being attacked (and prompt the offer of safer housing), or stolen money to get the pre-existing housekeeper dismissed on suspicion of theft.

You might ask why these intelligent, worldly people entrust their child to a total stranger, or accept her word as truth over anyone elses. Particularly since Gloria seems nervous and furtive even before she begins driving a wedge between each family member (including the dog) in earnest. Marcel is the first to truly notice her irrational behavior, which both attracts and frightens him. That is apt, since it turns out that for complicatedly scandalous love/hate reasons we only eventually grasp, he is the reason she is here.

Poor Ulysses aside, no one here is exactly an innocent party  even young Lucie is a bit of a pampered handful. Still, its a functional-enough nuclear unit until their new helper starts yanking on every last frayed seam in their relationships. In particular, she knows where the bodies are buried in Marcels past, even as she professes to being his biggest fan.

The disbelief Inexorable requires audiences to suspend gets easier as the film gains momentum, growing increasingly stylized towards a high 1970s giallo level of luridly colorful presentation as events become more outre. Still, the film is arguably more defined by the moneyed splendor of its leading figures surroundings than the mad malevolence of their interloper. Without caving to decadent caricature, du Welzs co-writers and actors create full-blooded characters whose privilege has fed their foibles  indeed, we get rather more vivid a glimpse of the literary couples role-playing sex life than we may have wanted. Yet somehow it is wee Lucie who reveals the freakiest hidden side in a birthday-party set-piece that goes way over-the-top, but a neat conceptual flourish nonetheless.

Poelvoorde delivers an expert descent from pompous jerk to desperate prey, Bellugi ceding to him the films most flamboyant notes even as Gloria gets ever more glam in her craziness. Douley is also formidable as a spouse who can only be pushed so far, making Marcels eventual panic even more understandable. Only fluent French readers, however, will be able to absorb (along with Jeanne) the untranslated backstory secrets that scroll behind the films final credits.

An accomplished production package makes great use of the imposing location (Chateau de Roumont near Champs, Libin in Belgium) as showcased by both cinematographer Manu Dacosse and production designer Emmanuel de Meulemeester. Also of note is Vincent Cahays original score, which utilizes a discrete mix of minimalist music, ambient sounds, and one memorable blast of thrash metal.

Reviewed online, Sept. 7, 2021. (In Toronto Film Festival  Special Presentations.) Running time: 99 MIN.

Running Time: Running time: 99 MIN.

Production

(Belgium-France) A Frakas Productions, The Jokers Films production, in association with One Eyed. (World sales: Playtime, Paris.) Producer: Jean-Yves Roubin. Co-producers: Manuel Chiche, Violaine Barbaroux. Executive producer: Christophe Hollebeke.

Crew

Director: Fabrice du Welz. Screenplay: Fabrice du Welz, Aurelien Molas, Josephine Darcy-Hopkins. Camera: Manu Dacosse. Editor: Anne-Laure Guegan. Music: Vincent Cahay.

With

Benoit Poelvoorde, Alba Gaia Bellugi, Melanie Doutey.

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Sean Bakers Red Rocket won a pair of prizes at the 47th Deauville American Film Festival where Blue Bayou, Down With the King, Pleasure and John and the Hole also picked up awards during the closing ceremony. Michael Shannon, who was previously at Deauville with 99 Homes and Take Shelter, received the honorary Talent Award from French helmer Bertrand Bonello, who sat on the jury, during the event.

Red Rocket stars Simon Rex as a retiring porn star who returns to his small Texas hometown where no one is eager to see him back. The movie, which world premiered in competition at Cannes, won the jury prize (shared with Ninja Thybergs Pleasure) and the critics awards. Both Baker and Rex were on hand in Deauville to receive the awards. Baker said there were fewer and fewer filmmakers directing indie films in the U.S. Franchises and series will always be there but lets keep making cinema, said Baker on stage. He was joined by Rex, who said he was struggling to get an audition when Baker called him to offer him the part.

The jury prize was shared by Ninja Thybergs Pleasure, which stars Sofia Kappel as a Swedish girl who moves to Los Angeles to break into the adult film industry.

Diego Ongaros Down With the King, meanwhile, won the the grand prize. The film stars American rapper Freddie Gibbs as Money Merc, a famous, jet-jaded rapper who moves to a small-town farming community to find himself. Ongaro, who was there to receive his award, said he had almost given up on filmmaking after struggling to raise the financing for Down With the King and had lined up a few jobs in construction and gravestones before he managed to make the movie.

This years jury was presided by Charlotte Gainsbourg and included French actor Denis Podalydes, novelist Delphine Le Vigan, actors Fatou NDiaye, Garance Marillier, director Mikhael Hers, musician Sebastian and screenwriter Marcia Romano.

Other awards went to Pascual Sistos coming-of-age psychological thriller John and the Hole, which won the Louis Roederer prize of the Revelation jury. The movie was previously part of Cannes 2020s official selection. It follows a kid who holds his family captive underground. The Revelation jury was presided by French actor Clemence Poesy.

Blue Bayou, directed by Justin Chon who also stars alongside Alicia Vikander, won the prize of the City of Deauville. The film, which opened at Cannes in Un Certain Regard, follows a Korean-American man raised in the Louisiana bayou who discovers that he could be deported.

As previously announced, Vincent Mael Cardonas feature debut Les Magnetiques won the dOrnano-Valenti prize for best French film. The movie opened at Cannes Directors Fortnight.

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Three mercenaries on the run with a plane full of gold and a dark secret in their past are the starting point for Jean Luc Herbulots Senegalese genre-bender Saloum, which has its world premiere in the Midnight Madness section of the Toronto Film Festival.

The film centers on the Bangui Hyenas, a mythic trio of mercenaries whose plane is shot down as theyre fleeing a coup in Guinea-Bissau. Transporting a bounty of stolen gold and a kidnapped drug lord, theyre forced to take refuge in a remote and mystical region of Senegal.

But as they lay low in the Saloum Delta waiting to repair and refuel their plane, a mysterious secret from the past emerges, unleashing dark ancestral forces that threaten to consume them all.

Saloum is the first production from Lacme Studios, a Dakar-based production company that Herbulot and co-founder Pamela Diop hope will reshape narratives and create a stronghold for myths and monsters and heroes on the continent, according to Herbulot.

The writer-director says the studios first feature is an attempt to illustrate how we can make something new that were not used to seeing in Africa, adding: Were all quite frustrated about the fact that we dont have a lot of African heroes on screen.

Citing films such as Sergio Leones Westerns, Akira Kurosawas Samurai films, Jean-Pierre Melvilles noirs, and George Millers post-apocalyptic actioners as inspiration, Herbulot says he was looking to find a distinctive visual style for his kinetic, genre-shifting supernatural thriller. We wanted to give the African genre movie a signature, he says.

Saloum was filmed on location in Senegals remote Saloum Delta, with what producer Pamela Diop describes as a deeply immersive and collaborative process that involved cast and crew living in the same encampment throughout the five-week shoot. It stars Yann Gael, Roger Sallah, Mentor Ba and Evelyne Ily Juhen.

The film draws heavily on local folklore and spirituality, something that Diop credits with grounding it in the unique character of a region where her family has roots. We take all of our energy from the Saloum, she says.

The Congo-born Herbulot was schooled in Paris and spent six years living in Los Angeles. In 2014 he shot his first feature, Dealer, which was acquired by Netflix. Three years later he returned to Africa, where he created, directed and served as showrunner on the Dakar-set TV series Sakho and Mangane. Produced for Canal Plus Afrique, it would go on to become the first series from French-speaking West Africa to be picked up by Netflix.

In 2019 Herbulot and Diop joined forced to launch Lacme Studios. The duo has a broad slate of nearly 20 projects in development, including a body-swap comedy series set in Ivory Coast and a historical biography about the great Carthaginian general and statesman Hamilcar Barca, and is in post-production on the Senegal-set action thriller Zero.

Produced in partnership with Hus Miller of Tableland Pictures, who along with Douglas Jackson shares an executive producing credit on Saloum, Zero is the first in what is expected to be a number of collaborations between the U.S. producers and Lacme. Herbulot says the partnership is in keeping with the philosophy that spurred he and Diop to launch their production outfit in Senegal.

It was always about [how to] take something local and transform it to be global, he says. We have some strong IPs on our side. Now its about finding the right partners and people who want to invest in Africa.

And people who want to make movies, adds Diop.

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Its an arthouse take on a sci-fi computer thriller, revolving around A.I. and parenthood. But its not set in the future; its set in the now, says the award-winning Swiss director, Simon Jaquemet, about his next project Electric Child.

One of 57 projects that took part in the three-day Gap-Financing Market at the Venice Production Bridge  the Venice Film Festivals match-making centric film-mart  the Electric Child team scheduled 35 meetings to help raise Euro 700,000 to complete a budget of Euro 4.6 million.

Its Jaquemets highest budget to date, and his first English-language feature. The young helmer has notched up multiple awards and top fest engagements to date. Jaquemets first feature War (2014) won the Max Ophuls Award, among other prizes, and premiered in San Sebastian. His second feature, The Innocent, premiered at Torontos prestige Platform section in 2018.

Jaquemet is presenting Electric Child in Venice with Olga Lamontanara, one of the films producers. Both are from the 8horses production company that Jaquemet founded with 10 other creatives in Zurich, where the film is set.

Its kind of set in Zurich but it could just be another European city. Its like this A.I. bubble, he says.

The film will shoot in Switzerland, Germany and The Philippines.

The story revolves around a couple whose child develops an unusual illness. While the mother and baby drift into their own world, the computer-science professor father develops a pact with an A.I. character on a virtual island to save his child.

Jaquemet has been developing the project for the past three to four years. It has a possible premise of how A.I. could advance to a super power, but I tried to tell the story in a super realistic way. Im quite into all this stuff, and follow whats going on, he says.

One layer of the film shows whats going on inside the experiment where a young person is trying to survive on a tropical island, adds Jaquemet of the planned Philippines shoot, which comes with tax incentives.

The team started to raise finance at the Berlinale 2020, and then attended markets online, during the pandemic.

Weve been to a few already, including Fantasia and the Macau film markets. We have a couple more lined up. Its been challenging and interesting, says Jaquemet.

Weve raised a lot of the financing through government funds, says Lamontanara. Those include the Swiss Federal Office of Culture, Zurich Film Foundation, Filmstiftung NRW, as well as TV channels SRF and ARTE.

Ascot Elite is the Swiss distributor with Port au Prince distributing for Germany, and Epic Media in the Philippines. We plan to begin filming in May 2022 for a nine-week shoot, says Lamontanara.

The idea is to complete financing by the end of this year. We hope to have the film ready by Spring 2023. Post production will take quite some time because we will have quite a large component of FX, adds Lamontanara.

As for the Venice event: Its been great to try to find the missing money for this project and also to meet people for future projects, says Jaquemet. No one comes here and writes you a check. Its more like you meet and follow up, but its also so great to see our partners again for the first time since the pandemic began.

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Today marks the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks which brought the country and the world to a standstill.

Laredoans both young, old and in-between continue to remember that day and how it impacted them personally and the nation as a whole. Clearly, the attacks marked a turning point for many people and is something that many still remember as if it happened yesterday.

I remember vividly where I was that day, Laredoan Scott Roberts said. I was at work and was told by a coworker that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center, I rushed to the television in the front office to see what was happening without realizing at the time that America was being attacked. Most of us thought it was an accidental crash. No more than 30-45 minutes later, we all watched in horror as the second plane crashed into the second tower. It felt so unreal that two planes could have crashed by accident.

Roberts recounts how he felt numb and useless, because he could not do anything to help the people involved as he was thousands of miles away.

I felt so helpless and vulnerable because I wanted to do something, but all I could do was watch in total disbelief, and when the towers fell, I felt devastating sadness, anger, betrayal and a sense of helplessness, Roberts said. 9/11/2001 is a day I will never erase from memory, and this weekend is a time for reflection not only individually but as a nation. How is it that we have become so divided since 9/11 on basic principles?

Edgar De Leon was 14 at the time of the attacks. He remembers many firefighters valiantly involved in the rescue process. That led him to wanting to be a firefighter, which he now does in El Cenizo on a volunteer capacity.

I remember watching all the firefighters just running in, and me asking why are they doing that if there is no fire? But thats when I learned that these men and women save people from all kinds of dangers, and I wanted to become one of them, De Leon said. Though many firemen died during that day, another was born in me, and it is something that I attribute to that sick and horrible day.

Other locals remember waking up to the news and reflecting on how their whole world had changed. From the time they fell asleep to the time they awoke, the country where they lived and felt safe in had been under attack.

I remember that my husband and I were actually in San Antonio, and we got awaken by the news and got a call from my mom as we were in the hotel, WBCA President Natalie Hernandez said. She told us to watch the news, turn it on, and right within minutes is when the second plane hit the second tower. And it has been something that has been with us as a country, to have something like that happen is unbelievable, and it is something that changed us dramatically. And we all changed in so many ways because of the events of Sept. 11.

According to Hernandez, this Sept. 11 she simply wants to state a prayer in honor of all those that lost someone. That includes those who died directly from the attack as well as others including first responders who have perished or had their lives affected during the rescue efforts.

Another woman recounted how Sept. 11 was a hard day for her as she was having trouble with her first pregnancy. Constantina Cantu said she went to the doctor to get a checkup and saw everything unfolding on television as she waited for her own news about her child.

I saw the large television screen at the doctors office and noticed people throwing themselves from a building, and I remember asking my mother-in-law, What movie was that? Cantu said. An elderly coupled asked the same question. ... To our surprise, thats when several nurses came to us and told us that that it was not something out of a movie but rather something real, as the Twin Towers in New York were under attack and they were collapsing.

According to Cantu, she has never forgotten that day. She was going to be told whether her first pregnancy was going to be successful following some troubles early on, and also because all of her children  including her youngest child, Luis Antonio Cantu  have shown interest in serving the military.

The fact that we are burying one of our own this weekend (in Laredo Marine Lance Cpl. David Lee Espinoza) and it is Sept. 11 as well shows how deaths because of freedom and to fight terrorism continues to this day, Cantu said.

Even people who lived in Mexico at the time expressed how they were very interested in what was happening and quickly informed students about the attacks.

I was studying in Monterrey, Jose Angel Gutierrez recalled. ... All of a sudden that day, the teachers told us to all go to the auditorium and see what was happening. At first, we were like what do we care for what happens in New York? But years later, we realized that magnitude of this event, as it was not just something that affected the USA but also the whole world. It continues to affect us all today.

Ultimately, some people see the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks as an opportunity to once again unite and find common ground honoring Americans who died two decades ago. They hope to let go of the things that divide each other and bond together as Americans.

"United we stand, one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all, Roberts said. To me, the words have a much greater meaning today than ever before. As Americans, we must come together and stand proudly for our nation, our flag, our brothers and sisters. This is how we remember and honor those who gave their lives for the freedoms we at times fail to appreciate.

jorge.vela@lmtonline.com
Sept. 11, 2001 continues to be a date remembered by all throughout the United States. However, many have different views on how it continues to be viewed and whether the date should be considered a holiday.

LMT spoke to a pair of leading academics in the community who experienced the Sept. 11 in different ways, however, each believe that its legacy is one that will continue to stand the test of time.

Texas A&M International Associate Professor of Criminal Justice Dr. Kate Houston was in Scotland when the attacks happened. She saw how her school went to watch the news once confirmation of the attacks was made. Meanwhile, TAMIU Associate Vice President for Research and Sponsored Projects and Sociology Professor Dr. John Kilburn was in Connecticut when the attacks occurred and saw several people who he worked with be indirectly affected.

I think the true legacy of 9/11 is something thats going to be debated by historians for a long time to come, Houston said. However, from a security studies perspective, I think that 9/11 and the War in Afghanistan can teach us something about the limits of violence when it comes to spreading ideology.

People who are familiar with the history of U.S. foreign policy in Afghanistan know that our struggle with extremists there goes back to way before 9/11  to 1979, the early 80s and the Carter and Reagan administrations. At that time, we were allies to the Mujahedeen fighters who would later become the Taliban in their struggle against Soviet Communism.

Houston said that she believes that another legacy from 9/11 and the events that proceeded it are the fact that foreign policy and wars should also be better understood. She believes that the end of the War in Afghanistan demonstrates that the solution to the ongoing problem of terrorism is unlikely to be a purely military affair.

When we look at the way that the Afghan military crumbled during the US withdrawal, it becomes clear that liberal democracy cant be delivered with military force, Houston said. So when we think about how best to defend liberal democracy, we want to avoid becoming a relic of history, the way Soviet communism ultimately did.

Houston states that 9/11 shows us that terrorism doesnt work; if anything it can lead to greater resistance. And another professor continues to state that the threat of terrorism continues to remain as high today as it was 20 years ago.

We continue to live our lives in a state of vigilance because global terrorism continues, Kilburn said. We have certainly not gotten past the need for continued protective and safety measures with regards to travel. The 9/11 legacy has taken a bit of a twist in that technological availability means that cyberterrorism continues to increase.

Houston agrees with this as well, as she believes that despite the end of the Afghanistan War in recent days, this does not mean that the fight against terrorism at the international and even domestic scale is over.

Were going to see the U.S. and its allies trying different solutions, some of them diplomatic, some may be economic, Houston said. I think were just at the beginning of this experimental phase. And theres no question that the end of the Global War on Terror is a long way off.

The fact that just days prior to leaving the War in Afghanistan, American troops and Afghan civilians were attacked by terrorists shows how the threat of terrorism is still very real in the area and around the world and against American interests.

Increasingly in recent years, there has been talk by various people to make 9/11 a federal holiday in honor of the victims and first responders as well that gave their lives and then suffered from health-related complications years later after the attacks.

I think its a good idea, Houston said. The soldiers who gave their lives in Afghanistan  as well as the emergency responders who helped rescue people from the towers  deserve that recognition, and their families will certainly benefit from a gesture of national appreciation. Also, when it comes to succeeding generations of Americans, its important to have holidays dedicated to the major historic events which impact our national identity.

According to Houston, forgetting 9/11 would be like forgetting Pearl Harbor or the fall of the Berlin Wall as she believes that it is too integral to the identity of the country to be excluded from the national story and civic practices. However, not all agree with this view including here in Laredo.

According to Kilburn, while what happened in 9/11 is a tragic historical event meriting reflection and respect, he does not see any benefit by making it a federal holiday.

While 9/11 will be an important date, each generation usually has less of a direct emotional connection to the events and a smaller percentage of our population will reminisce about where they were when the news was broken, Kilburn said. I was born shortly after John F. Kennedys death. While a solemn event that deeply affected my parents generation, I only knew the historical version of the story.

Ultimately, Houston states that people and future generations should learn about these events just to now know what happened, how it happened and the aftermath of them, as well as to know what worked and what did not. By learning this, she believes that better solutions can achieved to solve the continuing problems of these threats.

Learning about these events can teach us important lessons about who we are and what were capable of when we learn about Pearl Harbor we should also learn about the Japanese Internment Camps, when we learn about 9/11 we should also learn about Guantanamo, Houston said. Having an appreciation for our history as a source of national wisdom is important if were going to be able to meet the challenges of tomorrow, and avoid repeating the mistakes of the past.

jorge.vela@lmtonline.com
Five people have been arrested in relation to a recent firearms investigation, according to arrest affidavits filed simultaneously in a Laredo federal court.

The case unraveled on Aug. 25 when Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives special agents with the assistance of local law enforcement conducted surveillance at the residence of Jesus Guadalupe Covarrubias in the 11000 block of Sierra Gorda Drive.

Authorities observed Covarrubias, Roberto Carlos Zamora, Felipe Jesus Melendez-Bravo, Alejandro Rene Sanchez and Jose Gerardo Amaro Jr. move in and out of the house and the garage.

Moments later, Amaro drove the truck away followed by Zamora riding the motorcycle, Covarrubias riding another motorcycle and Sanchez in a blue Mercedes. Zamora, Covarrubias and Amaro arrived at a home in the 1100 block of Quail Hollow Loop in the same vehicle they left the Sierra Gorda address.

ATF agents then observed Amaro take two rifles and a rifle in a black rifle case from the white pickup truck and place them into a safe located inside a garage at the Quail Hollow address, states the affidavit.

Authorities seized the following firearms after detaining Zamora, Covarrubias and Amaro:

SIG Sauer M400 Snakebite, 5.56 NATO rifle.

ZRO Delta Range Ready, .223 caliber rifle.

Occam Defense ODS-1775, 7.62x39 caliber rifle.

Amaro then allegedly admitted that he made several false statements on the firearms transaction records in connection with the three firearms purchased which were then seized by law enforcement. He provided a different address and purchased the firearms for Covarrubias, according to court documents.

Amaro admitted that Covarrubias provided him a credit card in Amaros name, which Amaro used to make the purchases, and Amaro personally delivered each firearm to Covarrubias home, states the arrest affidavit.

Amaro was charged with knowingly making false statements in connection with the purchase of a firearm.

Covarrubias, a felon convicted of theft in 2014, was prohibited from receiving or possessing a firearm or ammunition because of his prior conviction or other federal firearms disability

Covarrubias was charged with possession of a firearm and ammunition by a prohibited person (convicted of a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year).

Zamora was later determined to be a felon convicted of possession of a prohibited weapon. He too allegedly admitted to being in the country illegally. Zamora also admitted that while at the Sierra Gorda address, he moved the three firearms from the garage to the truck Amaro was driving to help move them to another location.

Zamora was charged with possession of a firearm by a prohibited person (convicted of a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year) and possession of a firearm by a prohibited person (A migrant illegally and unlawfully in the United States).

Melendez-Bravo and Sanchez were arrested following traffic stops.

Laredo Police Department officers pulled over a green GMC Yukon driven by Melendez-Bravo for a traffic violation near the intersection of Sanders Avenue and Galveston Street. A consensual search of the vehicle yielded a silver bag containing assorted ammunition and two firearms: A 9mm Shadow Systems MR918 and a 9mm Beretta 92X. With assistance from the U.S. Border Patrol, authorities then determined that Melendez-Bravo was in the country illegally.

Melendez-Bravo was charged with possession of a firearm and ammunition by a prohibited person, a migrant illegally and unlawfully in the United States.

Sanchez was driving a blue Mercedes when he was pulled over for a traffic violation near the intersection of Las Cruces Drive and Old Santa Maria Avenue. Police impounded and searched the vehicle. LPD contacted the ATF after finding a loaded 9mm Glock 43.

In a post-arrest interview, Sanchez admitted being under indictment for aggravated robbery out of the 341st District Court.

Sanchez also admitted to knowing that he cannot possess a firearm while under indictment, states the affidavit.

The affidavit adds, Sanchez further admitted to recently receiving the Glock from Jesus Guadalupe Covarrubias, who lives at a residence on 11000 block of Sierra Gorda 

According to court documents, Covarrubias had the Glock in his waistband, removed it and gave it to Sanchez. Covarrubias also gave him an extra magazine with 9mm ammo. Sanchez further told special agents he is a habitual marijuana user and is addicted to crack cocaine, states the affidavit.

Sanchez was charged with possession of a firearm and ammunition by a prohibited person (an unlawful user of a controlled substance) and illegal receipt of a firearm and ammunition by a person under indictment.
JERUSALEM (AP)  Israeli police on Saturday said they have arrested four of the six Palestinians who broke out of a maximum-security prison this week  including a famed militant leader whose exploits over the years have made him a well-known figure in Israel.

Late on Saturday, the four re-captured prisoners appeared separately in court where prosecutors are pushing terrorist attack charges against them following their escape.

The arrests moved Israel closer to closing an embarrassing episode that exposed deep flaws in its prison system and turned the fugitive prisoners into Palestinian heroes. Late on Friday, Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip fired a rocket into Israel in an apparent sign of solidarity, drawing Israeli airstrikes in reprisal.

The four wanted men were caught in a pair of arrests in northern Israel.

Early on Saturday, police said they had caught two men, including Zakaria Zubeidi, hiding in a truck parking lot in the Arab town of Umm al-Ghanam.

The Israeli Haaretz news site, quoting an unidentified defense official, said Zubeidi and fellow fugitive Mohammed Aradeh had been hiding outdoors for some time. The source said the two escapees appeared to have received no help following their escape and had no planned route on where to go.

Zubeidi was a militant leader during the second Palestinian uprising in the early 2000s.

While he has been linked to attacks on Israelis, he also was well known for giving frequent media interviews and for a friendship he once had with an Israeli woman. Zubeidi over the years had received amnesty and taken college courses and was active in a West Bank theater movement before he was re-arrested in 2019 on suspicions of involvement in attacks.

Photos released by police showed Zubeidi, handcuffed and wearing a white head band, being led away by two police officers.

In a statement, police said that Israeli security forces, including the military, have been working around the clock to catch the fugitives.

All of the forces were deployed at full strength, searched in open areas, collected every piece of information until they succeeded in solving the puzzle to locate these two fugitives," including Zubeidi, police said. The search for the final two prisoners was continuing.

Earlier, two other prisoners were arrested in Nazareth, an Arab city in northern Israel just west of Umm al-Ghanam.

A video circulating on social media showed Israeli police shackling one of the prisoners, Yakub Kadari, into the backseat of a police vehicle and asking him for his name. The man, wearing jeans and a green T-shirt, calmly identifies himself as Kadari and answers yes when asked whether he is one of the escapees. Kadari was serving two life sentences for attempted murder and bomb planting.

According to Israeli media reports, local residents in both towns had turned in the prisoners.

In a statement issued late Saturday, Israel's Prime Minister, Naftali Bennett, praised the Israeli security forces for the arrest of the four fugitives, describing the search operation as determined and persistent.

We have to maintain heightened readiness and continue until the mission is complete, Bennett said.

In Gaza, Hamas armed wing pledged to include the six prisoners on the top of any future prisoner swap deal between the militant group and Israel.

The heroes of the freedom tunnel will come out with heads held high and the Qassam command has decided that there will be no exchange deal without freeing those heroes, said the spokesman, Abu Obaida, using the name of Hamas' military wing.

Hamas is believed to be holding two Israeli civilians and the remains of two Israeli soldiers who were killed during the 50-day Gaza war between the two sides in 2014. There have been no serious negotiations on brokering a swap. In 2011, Israel retrieved a soldier who had been kidnapped and held for five years by Hamas in exchange for over 1,000 Palestinian prisoners.

The six Palestinians tunneled out of the Gilboa prison on Monday, setting off a furious manhunt across Israel and in the West Bank.

For the Palestinians, the fugitives won praise for succeeding in freeing themselves from multiple life sentences. Fighting against Israel and taking part in attacks against the Israeli military or even civilians is a source of pride for many, and Palestinians consider prisoners held by Israel to be heroes of their national cause.

In the Gaza Strip as well as in the West Bank, Palestinians had organized sit-ins and joyful gatherings to celebrate the prison break.

While Zubeidi was a member of the secular Fatah group, the others belonged to the Islamic Jihad militant group, including four serving life sentences. All of the prisoners are from the nearby city of Jenin in the Israel-occupied West Bank.

As soon as the news about the capture of the two fugitives was confirmed Friday, a flurry of bitter posts expressing disappointment and shock filled Palestinian social media.

Israel said late Saturday that Palestinian militants in Gaza fired a rocket toward Israel that was intercepted by Israeli air defenses. The Israeli military said it responded with airstrikes on a series of Hamas targets in Gaza. Israel says it holds Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, responsible for all rocket fire emanating from the territory.

There was no immediate reaction from the Palestinian Authority, but Abdeltaif al-Qanou, a spokesman for the Gaza-ruling Hamas movement, said despite the re-arrest, the prisoners have scored a victory and harmed the prestige of the Israeli security system.

The escape has exposed major flaws in Israels prison service and set off days of angry criticism and finger-pointing. The men escaped through a hole in the floor of their shared cell, tunneled through a hole outside the prison and according to media reports, escaped past a sleeping prison guard.

It has also increased tension between Israel and the Palestinians.

Earlier on Friday, Hamas had called for a day of rage to protest Israeli crackdown against imprisoned Palestinians, but the day passed without major confrontation. In Jerusalem, a Palestinian suspected attacker died shortly after being shot by Israeli police in the volatile Old City, where he had reportedly tried to stab officers. Police said one officer was lightly wounded in the leg.
JERUSALEM (AP)  Israeli media reports say two more of the six Palestinian who broke out of a maximum-security prison this week have been arrested at dawn Saturday, leaving two prisoners at large.

The prisoners captured included Zakaria Zubeidi, a well-known militant leader from the second Palestinian uprising in the early 2000s. Photos showed Zubeidi and another unidentified man sitting on the ground, blindfolded and handcuffed. Armed Israeli soldiers in civilian uniforms posed behind them.

There were no immediate details where the latest two escapees had been caught. It came hours after Israeli police said they had caught two of the six Palestinians whose daring escape has captured the countrys attention.

Shortly afterward, Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip fired a rocket toward Israel that the Israeli military said was intercepted by air defenses. No Palestinian group claimed responsibility for the rocket attack, which is believed to be linked to the re-arrest.

On Friday night, police said the first two were caught in the Arab-majority city of Nazareth in northern Israel. The announcement identified them as Mahmoud Aradeh and Yakub Kadari  members of the Islamic Jihad militant group who were both serving life sentences. They showed no resistance. Israeli media reports said a civilian alerted police to two suspicious figures.

A video circulating on social media showed Israeli police shackling a man from his feet into the backseat of a police vehicle and asking the suspect for his name. The man, wearing jeans and green T-shirt, calmly identifies himself as Kadari and answers yes when asked whether he is one of the escapees. Kadari was serving two life sentences for attempted murder and bomb planting.

The six Palestinians tunneled out of the Gilboa prison on Monday, setting off a furious manhunt across Israel and in the West Bank.

For the Palestinians, the fugitives were heroes who succeeded in freeing themselves from multiple life sentences. Fighting against Israel and taking part in attacks against the Israeli military or even civilians is a source of pride for many.

In the Gaza Strip as well as in the West Bank, Palestinians had organized sit-ins and joyful gatherings to celebrate the prison break.

They escapees included four members of the militant group Islamic Jihad who were serving life sentences as well Zubeidi. All of the prisoners are from the nearby city of Jenin in the occupied West Bank.

As soon as the news about the capture of the two fugitives was confirmed Friday, a flurry of bitter posts expressing disappointment and shock filled the Palestinian social media sphere. There was no immediate reaction from the Palestinian Authority, but Abdeltaif al-Qanou, a spokesman for the Gaza-ruling Hamas movement, said despite the re-arrest, the prisoners have scored a victory and harmed the prestige of the Israeli security system.

The escape has exposed major flaws in Israels prison service and set off days of angry criticism and finger pointing. It has also increased tension between Israel and the Palestinians.

Earlier Friday, Hamas had called for a day of rage to protest Israeli crackdown against imprisoned Palestinians, but the day passed without major confrontation. But in Jerusalem, a Palestinian suspected attacker died shortly after being wounded by Israeli police gunfire in the towns Old City, where he had reportedly tried to stab officers.
LIBERTY, Mo. (AP)  Thieves in the Kansas City area have in the past month have taken two churches' fruit harvests.

Hosanna! Lutheran Church in Liberty had planned to harvest grapes it grows after a Sunday worship service earlier this month, WDAF-TV reports. But members discovered that all 1,500 pounds of grapes had been stolen, apparently cut off their vines.
Jay R. Jordan / Jay Jordan, Staff

A man found dead outside a north Houston house late Friday had reportedly been peeking into a woman's bedroom when she shot him through the wall with a rifle, police said.

Houston Police responded to a call shortly after 11 p.m. in the 890 block of Irvington Boulevard to find the man's body at the side of the house with gun shot wounds to the torso, said Lt. R. Willlkens.
Lockport, NY (14094)

Today

Generally cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High around 70F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low near 55F. Winds light and variable.
The beginning of the school year when you got to show off your new duds, new cars, new looks!

Sports! Playing, cheering, watching high school athletics.

The arts: Dramatic arts, musical groups and shows, graphic arts groups, debate, etc.

The prom! No dancing the night away or punch bowl antics.

The daily interactions. Just being with the group, hanging with friends and classmates.

Access to college recruiters and advisors  its harder to line up higher education.

Walking onstage to get a diploma while all the family is watching with everyone elses family.

Vote

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A group of 25 friends will take on the challenge of a lifetime as they run all along the banks of the Royal Canal in aid of mental health charity A Lust for Life.

Kick-starting in Greystones, County Wicklow on Thursday, September 9, the group will run the length of the canal, including the entire county Longford and Longford town spur, finishing up in Tarmonbarry on Saturday, September 11.

A mammoth challenge in its own right, the 200km Mindfulwest run also encompasses the importance of nurturing friendships through fitness in order to mind your mind; something important now more than ever.

With a focus on community, the group all live and train in Greystones and the surrounding area. They will bring this community element into their run by gifting the village of Tarmonbarry a unique stainless steel sculpture by Greystones artist David OReilly, who donated the piece.

Commissioned especially for the run, this 3ft sculpture depicts a figure holding a steel ball, representing the weight we all carry. The idea of the Mindfulwest run came to the run co-founder Andrea Splendori and his friends who were running together last year.

They all believed running had helped them hugely with their mental health and to be more mindful in their lives, and set a target to complete a 240km run from Greystones to Galway last year over three days. This year, they hope to achieve similar success with a brand new, equally gruelling route.

Whilst this may sound like a superhuman effort, in fact the magnitude is in recognition of the challenges faced every day by those dealing with mental health issues in our community, says run founder and coordinator Andrea Splendori.

He added, Based upon the philosophy of taking things one step at a time we will break down the 200km run into 3 days of manageable chunks. The entire route will be run, but each participant can choose their own challenge on a daily basis, i.e. 5km, 10km or even 70km!

To emphasise community involvement, the group are encouraging people to join them on any of the days or run with them virtually by signing up online.

The group will run through Longford on day three, Saturday, September 11, setting out from Mullingar at approximately 8am.The run will take them along the Royal Canal through Abbeyshrule, Ballymahon, Kenagh, Killashee, Longford Town, Clondra and into Tarmonbarry.

For further information or if you would like to join them for any stretch of the run, follow them on social media @Mindfulwest_run.

To sign up virtually or to make a donation to the cause visit www.alustforlife.com/ mindfulwestrun

A Lust for Life is an award-winning Irish wellbeing movement created to transform how we talk about and treat mental health.
CANNABIS ordered on the internet was found in the direct provision centre in the midlands, a court has heard.

Judge Catherine Staines was told last week that Irvin Lewis Casanova Sierra, a 32-year-old man with an address at Room 15, Shannon Lodge Hotel, Main Street, Banagher, had left the jurisdiction and would not be present for prosecutions alleging possession of cannabis at the hotel and at Harbour Road in the town on February 2 last year.

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After Judge Staines ruled that the hearing of the case could go ahead in Mr Sierra's absence, Garda Jerry Sheehy outlined how he had observed the defendant hanging around the side of a vacant building.

When the garda spoke to Mr Sierra he smelled cannabis and when he was searched the accused handed over a small amount of the drug.

The man told the garda it was CBD flower cannabis he had for himself and said he had more cannabis in his hotel room.

Garda Sheehy said Mr Sierra was 100% co-operative and invited the guards to the hotel room and there he handed over two more small plastic tubs of cannabis.

The contents were sent to the laboratory at Forensic Science Ireland and certificates for cannabis were returned for both containers.

Three days later Mr Sierra was formally interviewed at Banagher Garda Station where the accused detailed that the tubs contained CBD cannabis plant buds which he used for inhalation with a water pipe and vaping for medical purposes.

The defendant said it helped him with his anxiety, autism, stress disorder and schizophrenia. He said he bought the items for 60 on an online website two weeks earlier and that was his first order in Ireland.

The tubs contained California small buds mix which is known as haze, a strain of cannabis known as indica which the accused said is legal because it has a minimum amount of THC [Tetrahydrocannabinol ], less than 0.2%.

The man said he used it medically because of its 22% CBD content and he believed it was legal according to EU regulations.

His understanding was that if the THC was over 1% it would be illegal and he said he neither sold it or supplied it to anybody.

When Judge Staines was told the man had no previous convictions she said that because he had left the jurisdiction there was no point in imposing a fine. She applied the Probation Act.
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Today

Considerable cloudiness with occasional rain showers. High 84F. Winds ESE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 60%.

Tonight

A steady rain this evening. Showers continuing overnight. Low 72F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%. Rainfall around a quarter of an inch.

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The Balearic Government has announced that it will take out subsidies totalling more than 41 million euros, to promote renewable energy in the Islands.

Government Vice President, Juan Pedro Yllanes; Energy General Director, Pep Malagrava and Consell de Mallorca President, Catalina Cladera, held the first of a series of meetings with Councils, Town Councils, Employers, Unions and Business owners in Inca on Friday to outline the aid package.

To combat climate change and reach the best possible scenario, we need everyone's involvement, from administrations to individuals, SMEs and companies from all economic and productive sectors, said Yllanes.

In the second half of September 5.6 million euros will be used to promote self-consumption and storage for companies, 4.8 million for self-consumption for individuals and public administrations and 2.3 million for investments in renewable thermal systems for the residential sector.

Energy saving and efficiency efforts are focused on reducing the consumption of individuals, companies, administrations and the industrial and agricultural sectors.

The third line of action is the promotion of electric mobility with the implementation of public access recharging points and the replacement of combustion vehicles with electric ones.

The vast majority of resources to subsidise the promotion of renewable energy will come from the Central Government's Recovery, Transformation & Resilience Plan, which includes investments until 2026 and the possibility of extending credit if resources are exhausted.

Some of the lines of aid that were presented on Friday, such as the MOVESIII electric mobility support programme, are already underway.
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Manchester, TN (37355)

Today

Rain showers this morning with overcast skies during the afternoon hours. High 78F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%..

Tonight

Cloudy skies early, then partly cloudy after midnight. Low 63F. Winds light and variable.
Mayfield, KY (42066)

Today

Mostly cloudy skies this morning followed by thunderstorms during the afternoon. High around 80F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Partly cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 64F. Winds light and variable.
Atlanta, GA (30303)

Today

Cloudy with occasional light rain throughout the day. High near 75F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

Rain likely. Low 66F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%. Rainfall around a quarter of an inch.
Marietta, GA (30060)

Today

Cloudy with occasional rain showers. High 78F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

Rain showers early will evolve into a more steady rain overnight. Low 66F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 80%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch.
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Patients were assessed using the DASS-21 screening tool, a 21-question survey divided into three sectionsdepression, anxiety, and distress.The mean DASS-21 score was 10.45 with women reporting higher levels (11.41 vs 9.08) than men. Almost a third of the patients reported they experienced anxiety during the pandemic, followed by depression and distress in equal proportions (18 %). Nearly a quarter of patients (23.9 %) reported a change in treatment and 78.6% said those changes were due to reasons pertaining to the pandemic. Delays ( 7 days) were the most frequent treatment change in 41.9%, followed by treatment suspension at 37.4%."After we adjusted for age and gender, we found that patients with lung cancer and depression were 4.5 times (95% CI 1.53 to 13.23, p=0.006) more likely to experience delays in their lung cancer treatment," Dr. Arrieta reported. Similarly, patients with stress had 3.18 higher odds of experiencing delays (95% CI 1.2 to 10.06, p= 0.006). Anxiety was not associated with delays in care.Dr. Arrieta also found that patients who reported no changes or delays in treatment had a more prolonged progression-free survival and overall survival [HR 0.21, p<0.001] and [HR 0.28, p<0.001].Source: Eurekalert
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According to Muhammad Ittefaq - co author "As social scientists, we observe behaviors on topics such as health, and we often see how people are chiming in or reacting to certain health issues. When we started to see people posting vaccine selfies on social media, we also saw the debate whether it is a good idea to share them or not,"Scholars say that social media acts as a catalyst where misinformation on vaccines are spread. They say that theThe people who post selfies have several key motives like; to indicate to others that they are vaccinated and to invite loved ones to get vaccinated.Abwao said "When you put your picture out there and people can see your face, it's a sign to your friends, family, social circle and people who trust you that you are vaccinated," We've seen many times social media as a place where trends are set, especially with people mimicking behavior. It's much like fashion. Everybody wants to have the latest. It doesn't matter when you got it. People in many places around the world are still excited and posting these selfies. The conversation will be relevant for a long time."Researchers have cautioned regarding posting the photos, not to share personal information, and location on social media.Source: Medindia
Actress Priyanka Chopra Jonas will be seen next in her upcoming reality show The Activist, which will also feature Usher and Julianne Hough, which has received major backlash for the theme of the show.



The theme revolves around the theme where six activists will be pitted against each other as they take on challenges to promote their cause. The success of the activists will be measured via online engagement social metrics, and the inputs from the celebrity hosts.

The official description of the show CBS reads as, One thing seems more clear than ever: Planet Earth is a singular village, demanding if not relying on individual engagement. From the Global Citizen movement comes an awe-inspiring look at what can come of it. The Activist pairs advocates from the worlds of health, education, and the environment with famous figures in a series of competitions thatll take the winners -- and their ideas for seismic world change -- to the G20 Summit in Italy."

Recently, many celebrities slammed Priyanka and the other two judges for making a game out of social work.

Actress Jameela Jamil tweeted, "Couldnt they just give the money its going to take to pay this UNBELIEVABLY expensive talent and make this show, directly to activist causes? Rather than turning activism into a game and then giving a fraction of the much-needed money away in a prize? People are dying"

Couldnt they just give the money its going to take to pay this UNBELIEVABLY expensive talent and make this show, directly to activist causes? Rather than turning activism into a game and then giving a fraction of the much needed money away in a prize? People are dying. https://t.co/GLCUZcGgfb  Jameela Jamil (@jameelajamil) September 10, 2021

Naomi Klein took to Twitter and wrote, I'm confused: Is this an advanced Marxist critique to expose how competition for money and attention pits activists against each other + undermines deep change? Or just the end of the world?



I'm confused: Is this an advanced Marxist critique to expose how competition for money and attention pits activists against each other + undermines deep change?



Or just the end of the world?



https://t.co/zyjLUMUPaP  Naomi Klein (@NaomiAKlein) September 9, 2021

Heres what people have to say about it-

The good news is that no actual activists would be caught dead on this show. https://t.co/V2iW8AKQMm  fatima bhutto (@fbhutto) September 9, 2021

The perfect way to undermine the work of activists doest exis https://t.co/YzMWZiHwML  RAFAEL CASAL (@RafaelCasal) September 10, 2021

The reason dystopian stories can be uncanny is that we know that they can be real. They just often precede reality.



Such obscene shows make total sense in a disconnected, elite world where activists are nothing more than enterpreneurs-to-be. It's dehumanising. https://t.co/HYKdVw82uS  joey ayoub #AbolishKafala (@joeyayoub) September 10, 2021

I'll take a guess: People who would like to compare their zeal for their own pet causes to the zeal of others so they can feel a sense of satisfaction that they care more about important stuff than the people on their TV.  Professor Dalrymple (@ProfDalrymple) September 10, 2021

what is global citizen, what do they do, how do they have every celebrity on lock like this https://t.co/csPp2ylMP4  Matthew Zeitlin (@MattZeitlin) September 9, 2021

the activist and this is deadass one of the hosts? https://t.co/aNji3CCEl2 pic.twitter.com/YSlRJ4lDX7  rose SKY DAY (@russodelos) September 9, 2021

Global Citizen is an astroturf NGO that primarily exists to direct resources and media attention away from actual activists into safe, pro capitalist pseudo solutions based on charity. Theyre funded by the IMF, World Bank, Bill Gates, Google, Coca Cola, CitiBank, Unilever, etc https://t.co/fHFsh1j2ns  Adam H. Johnson (@adamjohnsonNYC) September 10, 2021

What do you think? Let us know in the comments section below!
Meridian, MS (39302)

Today

Periods of rain. Potential for heavy rainfall. High 71F. Winds E at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near a half an inch..

Tonight

Cloudy with showers. Low 67F. Winds E at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%.
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In summer 2020, The New York Times coordinated a nationwide project to document the lives of Americans out of work because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The study involved collaborating with 11 other local newsrooms around the U.S. The Messenger-Inquirer was the only newspaper from Kentucky in the collaboration. The resulting collection of stories was published Oct. 23, 2020, in the New York Times print edition and at nytimes.com/outofwork. The following list is the Messenger-Inquirer's local unemployment coverage from that time period; read more by clicking the "New York Times Project" header. Click on "Out Of Work In America" to go to the full
Miami, FL (33127)

Today

Partly cloudy with a slight chance of thunderstorms. High near 90F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms early, then partly cloudy after midnight. Low 76F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 40%.
In a singular planned motion, four airplanes overtaken by 19 hijackers brought the country to its knees, and spurred a series of change that still impacts communities such as Huron County today.

Huron County Sheriff Kelly Hanson reflected on Sept. 11, 2001, a time before he was a sheriff and instead was working part time with the sheriffs office and Bad Axe Police Department as a patrol officer.

I remember watching the towers fall that morning on TV, Hanson said. I remember it like yesterday.

In addition to his work as a part-time patrol officer, Hanson said he was working part-time as a commercial pilot.

Watching it as it was developing I wondered what else was in store for us, Hanson said.The FAA grounded all the airplanes. No one could fly and that was something we had never seen before in the country.

What was going to be next? he continued.

However, as the country assessed the damages, and evaluated how an attack like those on Sept. 11 could happen on U.S. soil, the federal government formed the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Hanson said after the formation of Homeland Security, money was granted to communities to enhance protection.

The federal government was making grant opportunities available to update equipment in law enforcement, Hanson said. Money was coming available to assist with equipment, training, information sharing and regional assets. Over the years, as time went on, a lot of money became available on the homeland security side of things.

With more than 93 miles of shoreline, it should be no wonder that one aspect Huron County sees a benefit from is Homelands support of border patrol. Hanson said a large portion of shoreline patrol is paid through Homeland Security funding.

It is basically border patrol, Hanson said. There have been several occasions that we have sent a crew out to spend their time on the border of Canada and Michigan.

Hanson said the border patrol includes patrolling connected waters, such as the several harbors in the county.

Hanson didnt have an exact number, but he estimated his department was on the receiving end of millions in grants during his time as sheriff.

The total of all the grants that have come about in the last 13 years I am sure exceeds $2 million in our office, he said. That isnt taking into account what the hospitals, schools and fire departments may have gotten.

Hanson said residents of the county have benefited from the additional funding the sheriffs department secures from Homeland Security, because it allows for the purchase and acquisition of equipment the department might otherwise not have. Hanson said the sheriff departments airboat for instance has been vital in rescues.

That airboat has been the difference between life and death more than a dozen times, Hanson said.

In addition to utilizing the funds for better equipment, funds have been used for enhanced training opportunities, such as active shooter training. Hanson said the attacks also prompted sharing of intelligence information that otherwise would have never happened.

Information sharing has improved by leaps and bounds, he said. Some of the information we get now you wouldnt ever begin to think about getting 20 years ago.

Hanson said the crash of Flight 93 in rural Pennsylvania made the reality of what could happen in a rural community all the more real.

As time goes on you get complacent doing everyday routines, Hanson said.

Fortunately we havent had any major incidences come about, but it makes us all more aware of what could happen, he said.

Hanson estimated his office would have about one-third of the equipment it now has, if not for the grants made possible following Sept. 11.

We are in a better way and we have been given more opportunities for equipment because of it, Hanson said. What we have, we have utilized and we have made things a lot safer for us and be able to be more self contained.

Hanson said his department has 15 marked patrol vehicles, five patrol boats, several unmarked vehicles, a couple HUMVEEs, and more, much of which has been paid for through homeland security grands, forfeiture funds, or donations from municipalities, service and civic clubs.
As Americans prepare to observe the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, the Tribune asked readers to share their memories of that day.

Some were in school, barely old enough to understand what was happening. Some were home, watching events unfold on television. Most were at work, trying to make sense of what they were hearing on truck radios or seeing on portable TVs as they huddle together with co-workers.

The following is a collection of remembrances of 9/11 from current and former residents of the Upper Thumb.

I was working at D&J garage in Unionville at the time. I remember hearing what was happening on the radio. We were listening to Joe and the Poor Boy on Z-93 at the time. All of us there couldnt believe what had happened. I remember leaving work that day trying to get fuel and the gas stations were jammed with people panicking to get everything they could. We were all kind of in shock from what happened.  Jason Hemerline, Unionville

Like everyone, I remember that day very clearly. I was a senior at Bad Axe High School on 9/11. I was sitting in Mr. Varners AP Biology class when another teacher, Mrs. Howard, unexpectedly rushed into the room with a terrible expression, said something about a plane crash, and told him to turn on the classroom television. He did immediately, and we all were amazed to see that a plane had crashed into one of the twin towers. I thought it must have been an awful accident until, unbelievably, a second plane flew into the second tower as we all watched. I honestly couldnt wrap my head around what I was looking at. I remember feeling stunned looking at the black smoke pouring out of the building, seeing people jumping out of windows, and watching as the towers crumpled one after another. I knew I was watching thousands of people dying in front of my eyes, but it felt surreal to think that anyone could have done this on purpose, or that anyone could hate us that much. Mr. Varner was almost always smiling in class; I think the look of shock on horror on his face is probably the thing I remember most about that day. I enjoyed a safe childhood, and at 17 years old that may well have been the first time I saw adults openly afraid and too taken by surprise to hide it. That same look was on every teachers face, and I knew things were even worse than I realized.  Briynne McCrea, Bad Axe

I was working in my office as director of guidance for USA Schools when I heard a commotion in the outer high school office. I walked out to find our office staff and a couple visitors looking at a breaking story on the old Channel One TV monitor. They were replaying footage of the first airplane strike on the tower and, as we watched, we saw the second plane come in live and hit the second tower. A short time later, the next two planes hit the Pentagon and the field in Pennsylvania, and I remember thinking that war was breaking out before our eyes, and on our own soil. I called my wife and made plans to pick up supplies after work, really just having no idea what to expect next. The rest of that day was a mixture of conversations with staff and students about the events that were unfolding and an eerie silence as we imagined all the loss of life at the towers and the first responders who were risking their lives in the rescue effort. I recalled my dad saying exactly where he was when news of JFK being shot broke across the airwaves, and I had a sense that this would be that same kind of event in my life. Years later, I can say that is certainly true.  W. Brian Keim, Bay Port

I remember I was driving a truck south on M-53 and heard on the radio that an airplane had hit the trade center. I was thinking some little two-passenger plane, but it wasn't long  from the commotion on the radio  I figured it was larger than the average little personal airplane. As I pulled my truck into Scotts Quick Stop to get fuel, my brother-in-law Jack Lautner was in the truck behind me. I shut the truck off, kept the radio on and (jokingly) said to Jack, Maybe its a terrorist attack. Let me make myself very, very, very clear: I had never, for a second, thought it was a terrorist, and in a minute or two when the second plane flew into the other tower and I suddenly realized it was a terrorist attack, I was in disbelief, a sudden feeling of how vulnerable we actually are. We were working near the metro Detroit area. I wasn't sure if we should continue south or turn around and go back home. Everything seemed to stop for a bit. I remember looking around, wondering what and where the next attack would be, then learning about the plane that struck a wing of the Pentagon. The one that went down In a field in Pennsylvania, and again in disbelief, wondering what is next. Also wondering, why? What would make anyone want to do this? I still have not figured out the answer to that. Why?  Todd Talaski, Caseville

I had dropped my oldest daughter off at school and was on my way to SVSU, where I was taking classes. While driving down M-25 around Quanicassee, I was listening to Bob and Tom, a morning radio show. They mentioned a plane hitting the World Trade Center and sort of made light of it, believing that it was a small plane being flown by someone who had apparently screwed up. They continued with their show until moments later when the second plane hit the second tower. Everything changed on their show and in the world. Morning humor became somber fear. The rest of the ride into Saginaw was quiet and unlike any drive, I had or would ever take. The rest of the day was spent with the nation wondering if there were more attacks to come and just what was going to happen. It was a tragedy on a scale that most of us had never witnessed. What I can say about the following days, weeks, and months, though, is that the United States was never more united. Everyone was suddenly on the same team. Red states and blue states changed to purple for a little while. The silver lining to a very dark cloud. I miss that silver lining these days.  Chad Knoblock, Kinde

I was teaching at a school in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and when we heard the news, we were all watching in disbelief. I was concerned for a few of my friends who lived and worked in NYC.  Aaron Mueller, Ubly

I was standing in the Huron Daily Tribune newsroom, along with my fellow HDT colleagues. We all stood in shock. In the normal hustle and bustle of a busy newsroom, there was silence. There were reporters on the phones and printers going, but overall, silence. We watched it on the monitors and at first, I was thinking, how could a plane hit the Trade Center? Then as I watched the rest of the events unfold, I just felt sick to my stomach. Such a sad day in American history. I was very fortunate to receive an award from the Hearst Corporation and traveled to New York the following May. The country was still in a Code Orange. The whole travel experience was different. There was extra military security everywhere. I was able to visit ground zero. They were cleaning up the site. It was very humbling. As you walked into the fenced-off area, the busy New York City became quiet. Everyone standing at the fence was quiet. There was still debris on some of the streets. And there was big equipment in the big hole cleaning up. For me, time just stopped for the 20 to 30 minutes we stood there. Just to think of how many lives were ready to start their day and in a blink of an eye everything changed for so many families.  Agnes Kosinski, Elkton

It was my first year of college at Central Michigan University. I had just gotten out of my 8 a.m. English 101 class. I had a few errands to run at Walmart after class, and thats when I first heard of what had happened. The workers in Walmart were talking about it, so I rushed back to my dorm to turn on the TV. Its one of those moments in time that is forever etched into your mind. Fear, anger, questions of why, when, and where will they strike next all flooded my thoughts. Ill never forget returning to that same English class on Thursday that week. My teacher was at her desk crying as we all walked into class. It was silent. No one spoke. We just sat there for the first 10 minutes of class in silence.  Pam Klee, Decker

I was home, it was my day off. We watched news coverage in disbelief as our country was attacked by Islamic terrorists. Another infamous day in American history.  Thomas Scott

I was a library aide for second period at North Huron and I was putting away books when the principal came on the PA system telling us two planes had hit the towers. All the classrooms turned on their TVs and we watched it for the rest of the day.  Matthew Murawski, Battle Creek

I was living in Elkton at the time. I didn't have television due to having very little income. I was also on the verge of giving up in life that day. But something inside me had told me to keep going and not give up and throw everything away. I remember walking to the Hitching Post Inn when the original owners wife still owned it, and I just couldn't believe what I saw on TV. It no doubt was one of worst days of my life, not only for the attack on the twin towers but what I was going attempt to do that day because of being in a bad state of mind mentally. But looking back 20 years ago until now, I have learned never take anything for granted because it can be all gone on the flip of a coin. I am happily enjoying life being self-employed doing what I always wanted to do and doing better both physically and mentally.  Jay Charles Hill, Sandusky

I was in Mrs. Kervins English class and we turned on the TV and watched the towers come down. All classrooms had it on.  Darnell M. Beedle

(I was) at work at Dow Chemical. Our leadership team was in a global meeting in Japan. All company TVs were playing the attacks. It was awful.  Karen McCoy Resmer, Midland

It was my first year at CMU, too. I was woken up by my Nextel phone two-way. I turned on the TV in my dorm in Merrill Hall and had to get ready for my first college exam in Psych 100 at 11 a.m. The professor gave us an extra 10 points later for taking the exam with that on our mind.  Jordan Robinson, Columbus, Ohio

I was sitting on my sofa watching the Today Show when (TV host) Matt Lauer said (it) "looks like theyre filming a movie. Little did we all know that moment changed our world.  Angie Smith

I had turned the TV on for background noise and thought it was a movie playing. It wasnt until I got into my car and heard it all over the radio too that I realized what was happening.  Beth Arndt Gornowich, Harbor Beach

I was in Ms. Ventlines second-grade class. We were going outside and the business secretary at the time came running into the door as we were walking out telling us the trade centers were on fire. I didnt know what that all meant, but we spent the rest of the day watching TV.  Darcy Lipskey, Minden City

I was in Mr. Hollingsworth's ninth-grade math class attempting to copy my boyfriend's quiz when the phone rang. Mr. H. never really showed emotion and his voice was in shock, we all knew it couldn't be good by his tone. He then walked to the front of the class and told us the news while our computer teacher put the projection TV up in our auditorium. We were then walked down by class. Typically, we were the loud-and-rowdy, everybody-talked-during-an-assembly kind of group. Not one sound was made that day, nobody was talking or being loud, there was not one chair empty in that auditorium. The teacher stood around in the back of the auditorium as we all watched in shock. Looking around some of the other kids were crying, where others just sat in silence. It was a day I'll never forget.  Dorthea Jordan

I was in Mrs. Varner's history class in high school. I remember every single classroom had the news channel turned on. We watched the aftermath live in the classroom.  RaeAnn Roehrig

I was on a field trip in third grade at the fairgrounds. We all had to load up onto the hot buses because there were bees. Sat on the buses for a long time before heading back to the school, cutting our field trip short.  Evanne Lehrke, Bad Axe

(I was) working at the phone directory in Pigeon. Word spread fast, we turned on our radios to listen. My best friend worked two blocks from the twin towers. I was afraid for her safety. She was looking out the window on the 52nd floor and saw the second plane hit the tower. Eventually a peace came over me, God let me know she was safe. We spoke when cell service was restored and realized the timing of my relief and her safety coincided.  Sandy Lanuzza, Pigeon

I was walking into the music building at Asbury College. I remember seeing a TV in the lobby, and students were just standing around. There was complete silence. Shock, panic, tears, confusion were what I remember seeing on all of the faces. We just stood there and watched as the second tower went down. I kept thinking, I just stood on those towers two years earlier on a Bad Axe band trip to NYC. There was so much confusion, I'm not sure I could have thought of much else. At that time, no one was sure of what was happening.  Cat Hilgars-Emard

I was at home with my youngest son getting new kitchen floors when all the news stations even Nickelodeon went on live TV. I literally saw the second plane hit the tower. I will never forget my fear.  Stacy Johnson Hiller

I was on my way to work and they interrupted programing on the radio. When I got work my employer's son called and asked if I heard what was going on. We were on the phone when the second tower was hit. I still remember what the sky looked like that morning driving in to work and later in the day seeing jets flying low in the sky.  Heidi Gleason Mausolf

I was at my apartment during my junior year at Ferris. Woke up, turned the TV on, grabbed a cup of coffee, and thought it was a movie I havent watched before. Watching the horror or the first tower burning and then the second plane hit.  Nathan Brandenburg, Saginaw

I was working for Booms Construction at a church by Oxford. We had the radio on when all hell broke loose.  Michael Bambach

I had the day off work. I had the Today Show on the TV. It was unbelievable. I couldnt take my eyes off the TV as I called my boss whose son worked in NYC.  Cindy Carson

I was home alone with my baby (he turned 1 three days later) and they interrupted Disney/Nickelodeon with the news. It was on literally every channel. No cell phone to call anyone. I just sat alone in shock holding my baby alone not really knowing what to do.  Pricilla Tietz

My husband and I were at the Caseville dock, wondering if we should go out fishing. The sky was a beautiful blue with puffy clouds. The winds were picking up. We had the radio on when the announcer said the first plane had hit the tower. We were in shock. Not knowing if it was an accident. It had to be, right? We decided to go home. When we turned the TV on, we witnessed the second plane hit. We knew then it wasn't an accident. Then it went on that day with the plane hitting the Pentagon. We became numb by then. Then the plane in Pennsylvania. Thanks to all those brave people on that plane that they took back with their lives. No one could sacrifice more. They shut all air travel down for days. High alert everywhere. Afraid they were going to hit nuclear plants, etc.  Norma Jaskowski

I was in first grade.  Krystal Marie McCarty, Bad Axe

Mrs. Jarochs eighth-grade English.  Renee Shatto

Fourth grade, Mrs. Loves class.  Tanisha Peyerk
MANISTEE COUNTY  The following includes reports made to the Manistee County Sheriffs Office from Aug. 24-26.

All calls may not be reported. This is part of a lengthy report and is compiled by assistant editor Arielle Breen.

Aug. 24

 A noise disturbance was reported at 4:16 a.m. in Manistee Township.

 A vehicle-deer accident was reported at 3:48 a.m. in Maple Grove Township

 A vehicle-deer accident was reported at 8:07 a.m. in Manistee Township.

 Drug activity was reported at 6 a.m. in Eastlake.

 A person was reported to have been driving without a license, insurance and registration at 11:52 a.m. in the county.

 Illegal dumping was reported at 10:35 a.m. in Manistee Township.

 Breaking and entering, larceny and malicious destruction of property worth $20,000 was reported in Norman Township.

Aug. 25

 Animal control was called to Bear Lake Township at 3:12 p.m.

 Deputies assisted Manistee City Police with an attempt to locate a person or vehicle at 11:24 a.m. in Bear Lake Township.

 Animal control was called to Bear Lake Township at 7:06 a.m.

 A vehicle-deer accident was reported at 6:50 p.m. in Manistee Township.

 Larceny was reported at 7:45 p.m. in Springdale Township.

 A person was reported as being unwanted at a location at 11:09 p.m. in Springdale Township.

 Deputies assisted with a domestic incident at 10:39 p.m. in Cleon Township.

Aug. 26

 Larceny was reported at 2:39 p.m. in Stronach Township.

 Deputies assisted Manistee City Police Department with a missing juvenile report at 11:47 a.m. in Norman Township.

 Threats were reported at 2:15 p.m. in Manistee Township.

 Property was reportedly found at 9:08 a.m. in Manistee Township.

 Animal control was called to Bear Lake Township at 6:39 p.m. in Bear Lake Township.

 Deputies assisted with a fire in Onekama Township.

 Deputies transported an individual for a mental evaluation at 7 p.m. in Manistee Township.
Among the nearly 3,000 people killed in the 9/11 terror attacks, Mychal Judge, a Catholic chaplain with New Yorks fire department, left a uniquely complex legacy that continues to evolve 20 years after his death.

Some of his many admirers point to Judge  a gay man who devoted himself to serving vulnerable populations  as a reason for the U.S. Catholic Church to be more welcoming to LGBTQ people.

And some argue passionately that Judge should be considered for sainthood, with a new initiative to be launched in the coming days. Though Judges religious order has not embraced that cause, a Rome-based priest who helps the Vatican investigate possible candidates for canonization is urging Judges supporters not to give up the effort.

Judge died two decades ago after hurrying with firefighter colleagues to the burning World Trade Center. As he prayed in the north towers lobby for the rescuers and victims, the 68-year-old priest was crushed by debris from the falling south tower.

Mychal Judge shows us that you can be gay and holy, said the Rev. James Martin, a Jesuit priest who advocates for greater LGBTQ inclusion in the church.

Father Judges selflessness is a reminder of the sanctity that the church often overlooks in LGBTQ people, Martin said via email. Heaven is filled with LGBTQ people.

The son of Irish immigrants, Judge grew up in Brooklyn and decided while still in his teens to join the Franciscan religious order. He was ordained as a priest in 1961, battled alcoholism with the help of Alcoholics Anonymous and developed a passion for ministering to marginalized communities.

After serving in localities across the Northeast, Judge became a pastor at St. Francis of Assisi Church in New York City in 1986. At a peak in the AIDS crisis in 1989, he founded one of the first Catholic HIV/AIDS ministries, recruiting a handful of volunteers to visit hospitalized patients and their families.

In 1992 he became a chaplain with the citys fire department, a post he held until his death.

During those decades, only a few friends knew Judge was gay. It became more widely known after his death, when some in his inner circle wrote about it and passages from his diaries were disclosed. Yet according to friends and biographers, he honored his vow of celibacy.

Many of Judges admirers took heart in 2017 when Pope Francis proclaimed a new pathway to sainthood, recognizing those who sacrifice their lives for others.

After that announcement, the Rev. Luis Escalante, who has investigated possible sainthood cases for the Vaticans Congregation for Causes of Saints, began receiving testimonies supporting Judges canonization.

Those accounts depicted Judge as the best icon of humanity, Escalante told The Associated Press via email this week. But there was a hitch: The Franciscans  who would be expected to lead a sainthood campaign on behalf of someone from the order  declined to do so for Judge.

We are very proud of our brothers legacy and we have shared his story with many people, the Rev. Kevin Mullen, leader of the Franciscans New York-based Holy Name Province, told AP via email, We leave it to our brothers in the generations to come to inquire about sainthood.

Escalante hopes supporters persevere and form a viable organization that could pursue sainthood in the coming years. Among the tasks: building a case that a miracle occurred through prayers to Judge.

The negative decision of the Friars cannot be seen as a preclusion to going ahead with Fr. Judges cause, Escalante wrote. Its just a challenge to American people.

Francis DeBernardo, leader of the LGBTQ Catholic advocacy group New Ways Ministry, was among those providing Escalante with favorable testimonies about Judge.

DeBernardo told AP hell soon announce plans to form an association promoting Judges sainthood, ideally with help from firefighters, LGBTQ people and other communities he ministered to.

It would be a testimony to Fr. Judges legacy if these diverse sectors of society came together to work for the canonization of a man that they all already know is a saint, DeBernardo said via email.

Sal Sapienza, now a Protestant minister in Michigan, was a 20-something wavering Catholic in New York in 1989 when he saw an ad in a gay publication seeking volunteers to do AIDS/HIV outreach. Answering the ad, Sapienza met Judge at St. Francis of Assisi.

Throughout their collaboration, Sapienza marveled at Judges faith and generous spirit.

What is a saint? Sapienza asked. Part of it is they inspire us to want to rise higher along our spiritual path, to be the best versions of what God wanted us to be. Mychal was the best example of that.

Particularly striking, Sapienza said, was how Judge interacted lovingly with others, whether they were homeless people or wealthy celebrities.

The macho group of fire department guys, they kind of claimed him for their own, Sapienza said. The Catholic gay community also claimed him, thinking, Father Mychal is our guy, because he was really able to connect with everybody.

Sapienza had joined the Marist Brothers, a Catholic order, and took a pledge of celibacy after leading an active gay social life. But within a few years, he left the church, no longer able to reconcile his faith with a disapproving view of homosexual relations as intrinsically disordered.

He remains grateful to Judge for supporting that decision.

To whatever extent he was saintly, Judge is remembered for earthly traits  a vibrant sense of humor, a willingness to critique the church hierarchy. According to Sapienzas biography of Judge, the priest awoke one morning early in his career after a night of heavy drinking to discover hed acquired a shamrock tattoo on his buttocks.

In 1974, long before settling in New York, Judge was pastor of St. Joseph Church in East Rutherford, New Jersey.

John Barone, then a youthful truck driver and now the 68-year-old owner of an engineering firm, was impressed by Judges caring ministry to his family when his mother-in-law became seriously ill. Sometimes in church, Barone recalled, Judge would become so impassioned that hed descend from the pulpit and preach from the aisle.

He was genuine  you knew he truly walked in Christs shoes, Barone said. If someone was an underdog, he was their champion.
The annual "College Counts - A Road to Success" workshop for high school seniors will take place on Saturday, Sept. 25, 2021 at the Huron Area Technical Center.

This free workshop is offered to all Huron County high school seniors and their parents to provide information on paying for a post-secondary or college education. Topics include: Different Types of Financial Aid; FAFSA; Understanding and Interpreting Financial Aid Award Letters; Finding and Applying for Scholarships and What to Expect in College.
NEW YORK (AP)  From an urban memorial to a remote field to the heart of of the nation's military might, President Joe Biden on Saturday paid tribute at three hallowed places of grief and remembrance to honor the lives lost two decades ago in the 9/11 terror attacks.

The solemn day of commemoration offered frequent reminders for Americans of a time when they united in the face of unimaginable tragedy. That fading spirit of 9/11 was invoked most forcefully by the president at the time of the attacks, George W. Bush, who said, That is the America I know, in stark contrast to the bitterly divided nation Biden now leads.

Biden left the speech-making to others, paying his respects at the trio of sites in New York, Pennsylvania and outside Washington where four hijacked planes crashed on Sept. 11, 2001, killing nearly 3,000 people, shattering the nations sense of security and launching the country into two decades of warfare.

Biden wiped away a tear as he stood in silence at the site where the World Trade Center towers fell, and looked up at the haunting sound of a jet plane under clear blue skies reminiscent of that fateful day.

In a grassy field in Pennsylvania, Biden comforted family members gathered at a stone boulder near Shanksville that marked where passengers brought down a hijacked plane that had been headed for the nation's capital. At the Pentagon, Biden and his wife, Jill, took a moment of silence before a wreath studded with white, purple and red flowers on display in front of the memorial benches that mark the victims of the attack at the military headquarters.

Delivering Bud Light and appreciation to the Shanksville Volunteer Fire Department, which responded to the crash of United Flight 93, Biden praised Bush's comments in his only public remarks of the day, saying the Republican made a really good speech today  genuinely," and wondered aloud what those who died that day would think of today's rancor.

Gesturing to a cross-shaped memorial made of steel from the twin towers adjacent to the firehouse, Biden reflected: Im thinking what, what what would the people who died, what would they be thinking. Would they think this makes sense for us to be doing this kind of thing where you ride down the street and someone has a sign saying f- so-and-so?

It was a reference to an explicit sign attacking Biden last week in New Jersey as he toured storm damage that was displayed by supporters of former President Donald Trump. Biden expressed incredulity at recent comments by Trump, whom he accused of abandoning the nation's ideals during his time in office.

Everyone says, Biden, why do you keep insisting on trying to bring the country together? the president told reporters. Thats the thing thats going to affect our well-being more than anything else.

In a frequent refrain of his presidency warning of the rise of autocracies, he added, Are we going to, in the next four, five, six, ten years, demonstrate that democracies can work, or not?"

At ground zero in New York City, Biden stood side by side with former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton at the National September 11 Memorial as the names of the dead were read aloud by their loved ones. Each man wore a blue ribbon and held his hand over his heart as a procession marched a flag through the memorial before hundreds of people, some carrying photos of loved ones lost in the attacks.

Bush, delivering the keynote address in Shanksville, lamented that so much of our politics have become a naked appeal to anger, fear and resentment.

On Americas day of trial and grief, I saw millions of people instinctively grab for a neighbors hand, and rally for the cause of one another, Bush said. That is the America I know.

Alluding to domestic turmoil, including the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol, Bush said that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders but from violence that gathers within. He added that while they have little cultural similarity to the 9/11 attackers, they are children of the same foul spirit, and it is our continuing duty to confront them.

Vice President Kamala Harris also spoke at the Flight 93 National Memorial, echoing the theme of unity as she praised the courage of those passengers and the resilience of Americans who came together in the days after the attacks.

In a time of outright terror, we turned toward each other, Harris said. If we do the hard work of working together as Americans, if we remain united in purpose, we will be prepared for whatever comes next.

Biden was a U.S. senator when hijackers commandeered four planes and carried out the attacks. He was Obamas vice president in 2011 when the country observed the 10th anniversary of the strikes. Saturdays commemoration was his first as commander in chief.

It is now Biden who shoulders the responsibility borne by his predecessors to prevent another strike. He must do that against fears of a rise in terrorism after the hasty U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, where those who planned the Sept. 11 attacks were sheltered.

In remarks at the firehouse Biden defended the withdrawal, which culminated with a massive airlift to evacuate more than 110,000 Americans and allies  but still resulted in many being left behind for an uncertain future under Taliban rule.

Could al-Qaida come back? Yeah. But guess what, its already back other places," Biden said. "Whats the strategy? Every place where al-Qaida is, were going to invade and have troops stay in? Cmon.

Rather than deliver formal remarks, Biden released a taped address late Friday about the anniversary in which he spoke about the true sense of national unity that emerged after the attacks, seen in heroism everywhere  in places expected and unexpected.

To me thats the central lesson of Sept. 11, he said. Unity is our greatest strength.

Biden became the fourth president to console the nation on the anniversary of that dark day, one that has shaped many of the most consequential domestic and foreign policy decisions made by the chief executives over the past two decades.

Trump skipped the official 9/11 memorial ceremonies and instead visited a fire station and police precinct in New York, where he laced into Biden over his withdrawal from Afghanistan and repeated lies about the 2020 election as he paid tribute to New Yorks first responders.

Bush was reading a book to Florida schoolchildren when the planes slammed into the World Trade Center. He spent that day being kept out of Washington for security reasons  a decision then-Sen. Biden urged him to reconsider, the current president has written  and then delivered a brief, halting speech that night from the White House to a terrified nation.

The terrorist attack would define Bush's presidency. The following year, he chose Ellis Island as the location to deliver his first anniversary address, the Statue of Liberty over his shoulder as he pledged, What our enemies have begun, we will finish.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were still deadly when Obama visited the Pentagon to mark his first Sept. 11 in office in 2009.

By the time Obama spoke at the 10th anniversary, attack mastermind Osama bin Laden was dead, killed in a May 2011 Navy SEAL raid. Though the nation remained entangled overseas, and vigilant against threats, the anniversary became more about healing.

Trump pledged to get the U.S. out of Afghanistan, but his words during his first Sept. 11 anniversary ceremony in 2017 were a vivid warning to terrorists, telling these savage killers that there is no dark corner beyond our reach, no sanctuary beyond our grasp, and nowhere to hide anywhere on this very large earth.

___

Jaffe reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Jill Colvin in New York and Aamer Madhani in Wilmington, Delaware, contributed to this report.
GARFIELD TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP)  A prosecutor has filed criminal complaints against two northern Michigan men in connection with an attack on a newspaper reporter covering a meeting by a group opposing masks and vaccination mandates.

Court records show misdemeanor assault or assault and battery complaints were authorized against Michael Adams, 55, of Kingsley, and Joseph Welsh, 51, of Traverse City, the Traverse City Record-Eagle reported Saturday.

The charges were authorized Friday by Grand Traverse County Prosecutor Noelle Moeggenberg.

Record-Eagle education reporter Brendan Quealy said he was punched in the face Aug. 26 while covering an anti-mask event at a public recreation area just outside Traverse City in Garfield Township. Quealy said an event organizer pointed him out and told him to leave.

Citizens Liberating Michigan organizer Heather Cerone can be heard on an audio recording challenging the reporters presence and asking attendees to stand in front of him, according to the newspaper.

Quealy told investigators he was attacked when he refused to leave.

In this case I had more than one witness that talked about what happened and we obviously have the video and the audio, Moeggenberg said.

The issue is people are so passionate about their feelings about Covid and masks and mandates, it is leading to violence in some cases, Moeggenberg added. By me charging this case, it speaks for itself.

The newspaper reports that Cerone did not return calls seeking comment.

The Associated Press was unable to find telephone numbers Saturday for Adams or Welsh. AP also left messages seeking comment from an attorney listed as representing Adams.
An anniversary celebration to honor famed veterinarian Jan Pol is set for this Saturday, Sept. 11, at the Isabella County Fairgrounds in Mount Pleasant.

This year marks Pol's 50th year in veterinary medicine.

His interested in animals came at a young age at his family's dairy farm in the Netherlands. He graduated from the Utrecht University Veterinary program in 1970 before immigrating to the United States in 1971. In 1981, he and his wife moved to Weidman and founded Pol Veterinary Services out of his garage, according to the Morning Sun.

From humble beginnings to fame, Pol has his own show called "The Incredible Dr. Pol." The program shows Pol traveling to different farmlands in central Michigan to care for different pets and animals and can be found on Nat Geo WILD and Disney+.

The free anniversary celebration "Dr. Polooza" features a meet and greet with Pol and his wife Diane, and various local vendors, food trucks and displays. At 1:30 p.m., there will be a memorial for 9/11 and a special presentation with Pol. Also, pictures and things collected by Pol will be set up for viewing at the event, according to the Morning Sun.

"We try to give back to the local community as much as we can," Diane Pol said in a statement. "The main purpose is to celebrate."

According to the event's Facebook page, 563 people are interested in attending and 117 have RSVPed.

Address: 500 N. Mission Road, Mount Pleasant, MI 48858.

Hours: noon. to 4 p.m.

Find Pol's Facebook page here.
Two decades later, Midlands Chief of Police Nicole Ford said the memory of Sept. 11, 2001 is still vivid in her mind.

Which, she said, was unlike any other incident that shes been involved with throughout her 24 years in law enforcement.

Ford began her career in Northfield Township, which is home to larger cities like Ann Arbor located in Washtenaw County. She said her former police department always had television news channels on in the squad room.

Twenty years ago, On Sept. 11, Ford walked into the squad room, looked up and witnessed the first plane crash into the Twin Towers.

I stopped in my tracks and I watched it, Ford said.

She recalled her initial thoughts while seeing the plane crash. Ford said there were thoughts such as what a terrible accident and the pilot must have had a medical emergency, similar to the stories of many Americans who saw the attack before 911 as we know it unfolded.

Minutes later, Ford witnessed a horrifying reality as the second plane crashed.

At which point, I remember hollering to my (police chief) and I was like Chief, you might want to come watch this, she said. He came (into the squad room) and the rest of the staff watched the replays of it. But we still had to function that day.

After witnessing the 2001 New York terrorist attacks, Ford said she had to go back to patrolling Northfield Township roads.

It was so eerie, she said. People were driving around and honking horns  and there was no air traffic. It was just such a surreal feeling from that point on for the rest of my shift.

Its a feeling that many Americans still experience 20 years later.

911 prompted industry improvements

Those moments from Fords early career shaped the rest of her career along with other first responders who play a role of protecting citizens.

Some of our local first responders say the use of technology would largely help first responders ability to effectively respond to tragedies nationwide.

I dont think anything is limited just to Midland County, Sheriff Myron Greene said. I think our whole country  as far as law enforcement is concerned  changed after that day. But certainly here locally, I can attest that there are several areas where improvements have been made.

Greene and Ford said one of the biggest improvements since 911 was in communication.

Greene explained sharing information between local, state and federal law enforcement agencies creates a unified front. And Ford said there was a nationwide effort to better connect local law enforcement and fire departments.

One of the changes was interoperability, which she explained as different emergency responders having the ability to better communicate through systems, like a radio, at the same incident.

Another improvement thats come overtime is sharing information. Because of federal jurisdictions, Ford explained, certain agencies operated without sharing information to neighboring organizations.

They didnt often share and 911 was an excellent example of the necessity to share information, Ford said. I think most local agencies (incorporate) that into their local jurisdictions to make sure that we are doing a better job.

In addition, Ford said 911 prompted a push for incident command training. She said Midland City Police department requires Incident Command School (ICS) training, which teaches personnel efficient operations during an event.

With agencies shifting the focus on sharing information, Greene said citizens are more likely to communicate with police departments, and officers recognize the importance of providing information back to communities.

More people have cell phones now than ever, Greene said. So, more citizens are becoming more involved in reporting suspicious activity or something that just doesnt look right. We get a lot more calls (to) check on vehicles that are parked in an area that might seem odd."

Were always looking to share information with the public to make them more aware of situations that could potentially be an unsafe situation, Greene continued. But, certainly being involved in the community and allowing the public to be involved with your agency creates a good dialogue for information sharing.

Recalling unity after tragedy

Theres been industry changes to advance police response to major tragedies. And the communitys perception of those industries and the world evolved with that.

As time has passed, communities across the country continue to hold observances to unite citizens again on Sept. 11. Even if it is only for one day in todays political climate.

It was really refreshing to see the unity and patriotism that followed 911, Ford said. Then, the support for police and fire was unmeasurable and like I've never seen it again in my career.

And Greene said people working in first responder professions, like himself, have the desire to protect others.

(Sept. 11) was an attack upon all of us as Americans, he said. Early on, definitely, people were more patriotic and took more pride in our country  they made it personal. For me, personally as a law enforcement official, I always have that commitment to keeping our community safe, regardless of whether it's somebody committing a retail fraud or somebody that would want to (commit) a major incident that would involve a number of community entities or the public in general.
In August, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) presented its proposed scope, estimated costs and projected timeline for a hydrologic/hydraulic study of the Tittabawassee River Watershed to representatives of the County of Midland and the Midland Business Alliance (MBA) Advisory Committee on Infrastructure.

At the Midland County Board of Commissioners meeting on Sept. 7, both the Administration & Operations Committee and the Finance Committee recommended the approval of the agreement between USACE, the MBA Foundation and the County of Midland to begin this study.

This study of the hydraulics and hydrology of the watershed  what we refer to as the flood study  will give us current data that can be used to create a comprehensive plan to improve the frequency and severity of flooding in Midland County and surrounding areas, said Lee Ann Keller, co-chair of the MBA Advisory Committee on Infrastructure. The data and analysis will allow the engineers to suggest, for example, the locations and amounts of floodwater retention that would be needed to mitigate future flooding.

The data collection, analysis and resulting recommendations are likely to take two years to complete, according to the USACE. The first step was the agreement and signed contract between the County, MBA and USACE.

The projected cost of the study is $861,000. USACE will pay for half of the study, with the other half falling to local support. Through the donations of local businesses and foundations, the MBA Advisory Committee on Infrastructure has pledged to cover this 50% cost-share.

This ability to fund the study is thanks to our supportive community donors: Charles J. Strosacker Foundation, Corteva, Dow Company Foundation, Fisher Companies, Hemlock Semiconductor Corporation, Midland Area Community Foundation, MidMichigan Health, Patricia and David Kepler Foundation, Rollin M. Gerstacker Foundation, and Three Rivers Corporation, said Keller.

Part of the local cost-sharing can be through in-kind services, such as the needed surveying and geographic information system (GIS) mapping. After the Midland County Board of Commissioners approved the USACE agreement, the MBA Advisory Committee on Infrastructure sent out requests for proposal (RFPs) to companies that provide surveying and GIS services. The RFPs solicit bids and qualifications from these firms.

With almost 60 miles of waterways that need to be surveyed and mapped, this is a big job, said J.W. Fisher, co-chair of the MBA Advisory Committee on Infrastructure. But we can drive the surveying and provide that data to the Corps of Engineers to launch the project. Getting this done right away should help move the project along significantly. We plan to select the surveying firm soon and have that firm complete the fieldwork by the end of December and the delivery of the data to USACE by the end of January.

The committee is also discussing hiring an engineering firm to work in tandem with the USACE during the study. We would like the engineering firm to start looking for what we call low-hanging fruit  projects that might be easy and fast to implement and could have positive impacts on flood mitigation and building resilience in the region, said Fisher.

This is an exciting time while we move forward on the study, said Keller. As we make progress, we will continue to keep the community updated at www.MBAmi.org/floodstudy.

Formed in 2021 by the Midland Business Alliance Board of Directors, the MBA advisory Committee of Infrastructure's structure is made up of MBA board members, members of the community at large, an MBA staff representative, and ex officio representatives from the Four Lakes Task Force, Midland County and City of Midland. In addition to communicating with stakeholders and collaborators, the committee also reports back regularly to the MBA President and CEO, who will keep the full MBA Board of Directors updated at regular intervals.

Visit www.MBAmi.org/floodstudy for more information.
LONDON (AP)  Queen Elizabeth II marked the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks by offering her sympathies to the victims, survivors and families affected by the atrocity.

In a message to U.S. President Joe Biden, the British monarch remembered the terrible attacks" on New York and Washington, D.C.

My thoughts and prayers  and those of my family and the entire nation  remain with the victims, survivors and families affected, as well as the first responders and rescue workers called to duty, she said.

My visit to the site of the World Trade Center in 2010 is held fast in my memory. It reminds me that as we honor those from many nations, faiths and backgrounds who lost their lives, we also pay tribute to the resilience and determination of the communities who joined together to rebuild.''

The ties between the two nations were marked with a special Changing of the Guard ceremony at Windsor Castle in which The Star Spangled Banner was played. Hundreds gathered inside and outside the walls of the castle to watch.

The U.S. national anthem had also been played at Buckingham Palace 20 years ago on Sept. 12, 2001, a mark of solidarity with the United States.

U.S. Charge d'Affaires Philip Reeker thanked the queen for the gesture.

Speaking for the United States, we have no closer ally and no closer friend, in good times and in bad times, and we are very much reminded of that today ... through the enduring relationship between our two countries, he said.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has also remembered the attacks, issuing a statement ahead of the anniversary saying that the terrorists had failed to shake our belief in freedom and democracy."

They failed to drive our nations apart, or cause us to abandon our values, or to live in permanent fear.

Sixty-seven British nationals were among the almost 3,000 people killed when hijacked planes crashed into New Yorks World Trade Center, the Pentagon in Washington and a field in Pennsylvania.
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP)  South Dakota lawmakers are being asked to call a special session to consider impeaching Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg for his conduct in a car crash last year that killed a pedestrian.

In a joint statement released Thursday, the House Speaker, House Republican leader and House Democratic leader laid out a process to evaluate impeaching the Republican attorney general, but it would require two-thirds support from both the House and Senate to move forward.

House Republican leader Rep. Kent Peterson said he is proposing a special session in November. If that call receives the necessary support, House Speaker Spencer Gosch would then appoint a committee to investigate the conduct of the attorney general, whose term in office runs through 2022.

The process will be fair, thorough, and transparent, Gosch said in a statement.

Gov. Kristi Noem, who has called for Ravnsborg's resignation, last week delivered a hard drive containing the crash investigation to Gosch. The governor's office also released a letter from Secretary of Public Safety Craig Price saying he believed that Ravnsborg should have faced manslaughter charges.

But Gosch said the House would not be retrying criminal matters.

The attorney general pleaded no contest to a pair of misdemeanors last month, while a third misdemeanor was dropped by prosecutors. He avoided jail time but was sentenced to fines totaling over $4,500 for making an illegal lane change and using a cellphone while driving. Investigators said his car veered onto the shoulder of the rural highway where the man was walking late on Sept. 12 last year and that Ravnsborg had been on his cellphone about a minute before the crash.

Peterson, along with House Democratic leader Rep. Jamie Smith, supported a move to impeach Ravnsborg in February, but that quickly stalled while Ravnsborg's trial played out. They argued at the time that Ravnsborg, the state's top law enforcement officer, should be removed from office for his crimes or misdemeanors in office causing the death of 55-year-old Joseph Boever.

A spokesman for Ravnsborg did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The attorney general has repeatedly insisted he will not resign.
On Monday, Sept. 13, United Way of Midland County will kick off its 2021 campaign with a goal of raising $4.7 million.

Many organizations will officially kick off their campaigns in the coming weeks, but some are already reporting early progress.

We are off to a strong start, already reporting pledges of $394,362, shared Holly Miller, President and CEO of United Way of Midland County. This represents an impressive 8% of our $4.7 million goal.

She went on to share that the last 18 months have been a time of uncertainty, change and challenge, but that it also demonstrated the power of people helping people.

I am so inspired by the way our community continues to show up for our neighbors in need, Miller said. We worked together last year, showing that when we unite we are stronger together. This year, we are asking our community to join us in demonstrating whats Possible Together.

The aftermath of the 2020 dam failure and then continued pandemic hardships have our community facing a steep increase in health and human services. Many people are asking for help  some for the very first time.

The United Way Board of Directors are committed to ensuring our neighbors have the help they need to reach their full potential, shared Mike Sharrow, board chair. We are confident that our community will come together to meet the increasing needs through the 56 programs run through our 25 partner agencies.

Sharrow added that United Way is positioned to drive impact forward. Leveraging their strength around accountability, outcomes and non-profit capacity building, they have the system to ensure dollars being invested have the biggest impact.

As our community moves forward into a space of hope and healing, its important that we continue to show up, shared Miller. Many of our hardworking families are one crisis away from falling into poverty, and that crisis became a shocking reality for so many of our neighbors, friends, families and coworkers over the last 18 months. The number of people needing help is increasing.

As a community, we have learned that when we join together, real and lasting change happens. This year, United Way has a dynamic duo taking the lead as campaign co-chairs: Mary and Todd Draves.

We are so honored to have the opportunity to lead this years United Way Campaign, shared Mary Draves, chief sustainability officer at Dow and Todd Draves, owner, Draves Auto Center. Our community is an incredible representation of what it means to Live United. Were surrounded by so many caring people who dont hesitate to lend a hand when our neighbors need help. Its inspiring to be a part of something much bigger than us as individuals, and our hope as campaign chairs is that we can help inspire others to join in.

Miller added that Mary and Todd Draves co-chair partnership is a symbol of the strength in numbers.

We are thrilled to have Mary and Todd leading the way this year, Miller said. They are both incredibly passionate and caring people who are committed to helping us create visible and measurable change in our community.

United Way brings everyone together to improve lives by amplifying individual passion to take on our toughest challenges together. The campaign will continue through Friday, Oct. 29.

For more information about how you can help improve lives in our community or to donate, visit unitedwaymidland.org.
LANSING, Mich. (AP)  Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on Friday vetoed a Republican-sponsored bill that would have restricted state officials' ability to use the Public Threat Alert System to announce new laws or executive orders.

The Democratic governor, whose veto had been expected, said the system has only been activated once in the five years since it was created, for an active-shooter situation. The state used a different, federal system last year to send alerts to wireless devices about Whitmer's stay-at-home and mask orders due to the coronavirus pandemic. That angered GOP lawmakers who said it should only be activated for immediate threats. That system would not have been affected by the state legislation.
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP)  At a taxi stand by a bustling market in Kampala, Uganda's capital, traders simply cross a road or two, get a shot in the arm and rush back to their work.

Until this week, vaccination centers were based mostly in hospitals in this East African country that faced a brutal COVID-19 surge earlier this year.

Now, more than a dozen tented sites have been set up in busy areas to make it easier to get inoculated in Kampala as health authorities team up with the Red Cross to administer more than 120,000 doses that will expire at the end of September.

All of this we could have done earlier, but we were not assured of availability of vaccines, said Dr. Misaki Wayengera, who leads a team of scientists advising authorities on the pandemic response, speaking of vaccination spots in downtown areas. Right now we are receiving more vaccines and we have to deploy them as much as possible.

In addition to the 128,000 AstraZeneca doses donated by Norway at the end of August, the United Kingdom last month donated nearly 300,000 doses. China recently donated 300,000 doses of its Sinovac vaccine, and on Monday a batch of 647,000 Moderna doses donated by the United States arrived in Uganda.

Suddenly Uganda must accelerate its vaccination drive. The country has sometimes struggled with hesitancy as some question the safety of the two-shot AstraZeneca vaccine, which is no longer in use in Norway because of concerns over unusual blood clots in a small number of people who received it.

Africa has fully vaccinated just 3.1% of its 1.3 billion people, according to the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Public health officials across Africa have complained loudly of vaccine inequality and what they see as hoarding in some rich countries. Soon hundreds of millions of vaccine doses will be delivered to Africa through donations of excess doses by wealthy nations or purchases by the African Union.

Africa is aiming to vaccinate 60% of the continent's population by the end of 2022, a steep target given the global demand for doses. The African Union, representing the continent's 54 countries, has ordered 400 million Johnson & Johnson doses, but the distribution of those doses will be spread out over 12 months because there simply isn't enough supply.

COVAX, the U.N.-backed program which aims to get vaccines to the neediest people in the world, said this week that its efforts continue "to be hampered by export bans, the prioritization of bilateral deals by manufacturers and countries, ongoing challenges in scaling up production by some key producers, and delays in filing for regulatory approval.

Uganda, a country of more than 44 million people, has recorded more than 120,000 cases of COVID-19, including just over 3,000 deaths, according to official figures. The country has given 1.65 million shots, but only about 400,000 people have received two doses, according to Wayengera. Uganda's target is to fully vaccinate up to 5 million of the most vulnerable, including nurses and teachers, as soon as possible.

At the Red Cross tent in downtown Kampala, demand for the jabs was high. By late afternoon only 30 of 150 doses remained, and some who arrived later were told to come back the next day.

I came here on a sure deal, but it hasn't happened, said trader Sulaiman Mivule after a nurse told him he was too late for a shot that day. I will come back tomorrow. It's easy for me here because I work in this area.

Asked why he was so eager to get his first shot, he said, They are telling us that there could be a third wave. If it comes when we are very vaccinated, maybe it will not hurt us so much. Prevention is better than cure."

Mivule and others who spoke to the AP said they didn't want to go to vaccination sites at hospitals because of they expected to find crowds there.

Bernard Ssembatya said he had been driving by when he spotted the Red Cross's white tent and went in for a jab on the spur of the moment. Afterward, he texted his friends about the opportunity.

I was getting demoralized by going to health centers, he said. You see a lot of people there and you don't even want to try to enter.

Yet, despite enthusiasm among many, some still walked away without getting a shot when they were told their preferred vaccine was not yet available.

The one-shot J&J vaccine, still unavailable in Uganda, is frequently asked for, said Jacinta Twinomujuni, a nurse with the Kampala Capital City Authority who monitored the scene.

I tell them, of course, that we don't have it, she said. And they say, Okay, let's wait for it.'
BRIDGEPORT  A Bridgeport man pleaded guilty in federal court Friday for attempting to kill members of an alleged rival gang outside the Bridgeport courthouse in January 2020, according to the office of the United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut.

Officials believe Marquis Garf Isreal, 25, was a member of the Original North End, or the ONE gang, which is based in the Trumbull Gardens area in Bridgeport.

The gang is known for selling narcotics, laundering funds from narcotics sales, robbing drug dealers, stealing cars from inside and outside the state and using them to commit crimes as well as tampering with witnesses who might testify against them, the U.S. Attorneys office said.

On Jan. 27, 2020, Isreal and his associates shot at a black Chevrolet Impala, attempting to kill members of a rival gang, the East End gang, in front of the Bridgeport courthouse, according to the U.S. Attorneys office.

Police responded to the area around 12:11 p.m., finding four people had been shot while sitting inside a black Chevrolet Impala, the U.S. Attorneys office said.

Four people were shot, leaving one paralyzed. The vehicle had about 23 bullet holes in the drivers side and windshield, according to the U.S. Attorneys office.

Just a few months before, Isreal had been shot and seriously wounded by one of his victims at a restaurant, officials said.

Isreal has been in custody since Aug. 6, 2020.

On Wednesday, Isreal was faced with the choice to accept a plea deal that expired Friday or prepare for trial.

Isreal pleaded guilty Friday to one count of attempted murder and aiding and abetting, as well as one count of conspiracy to commit murder. His sentencing is scheduled for Dec. 3 and he faces a maximum term of 20 years in prison, according to the U.S. Attorneys office.

Charges against seven other co-defendants of Isreals in the case remain pending as of Wednesday.
NEW HAVEN  Zaire Luciano, with energy, joy and humor, was the one who brought his family together, made them laugh and enlivened their lives, according to his loved ones.

Luciano, 30, was killed last Sunday on Chamberlain Street.

Abby Cruz, a relative, expressed her anger and sadness this week, as she reckoned with the loss of her brother  a humble guy who always had a smile on his face.

Its not fair. Its hard right now, said Cruz. My familys never going to be the same.

Cruz said Luciano lived with tremendous love for his family; he was outgoing, willing to speak his mind, and inclined to raise the spirits of those in need  women doubting themselves would routinely hear youre beautiful from him.

He was always the light of the party; he made everybody in that room laugh, said Cruz. He never wanted to see people sad.

Luciano and his partner settled a medical malpractice case involving their child, federal records show.

Luciano was not tied to the street life, Cruz said.

In the future, he wanted to open a fencing company and succeed for his family, she said. He had professed his faith in God for the first time in recent weeks, she said.

Im just very angry. My brother was a good guy; he was never in the streets, said Cruz. He made us happy. He made us happy.

Brunilda Lopez, Lucianos aunt, said he was always concerned about what was going with the family, and was the one who pulled them together. He was the jokester of the group, the one that comforted others, she said.

I cant fathom that hes gone. Hes a piece of our family bond thats gone, she said. He was the rock.

Uncommonly free in the way he expressed himself, Luciano had a quick wit, she said. He wanted to do stand-up comedy.

Zaina Lopez, Lucianos mother, said her son woke up every day with a smile.

The family received an outpouring of love after his passing, she said. She knew he had an impact on others, but the response still was surprising.

Everybodys taking it very hard. He was the sweetest guy, said Zaina Lopez. This mom, right here, is going to make a lot of noise  a lot of noise  because my sons life was not in vain.

Cruz and Brunilda Lopez asked people to meet love with love in Lucianos memory.

Enjoy the love that people give you and give it back, said Lopez. This world would be so beautiful (if that happened). This world would be awesome.

They took somebody so good away from this Earth, said Cruz. They took somebody away from a lot of people.

Police are continuing to investigate the circumstances surrounding Lucianos death.

Officer Scott Shumway previously asked that any witnesses who have not yet spoken with the department contact the New Haven Police Department Investigative Services Division at 203-946-6304.

Family members gathered with the Rev. Boise Kimber Friday. Through Kimber, they noted that others in the city have lost loved ones recently, expressing solidarity with those families.

Kimber and activist Rodney Williams urged the community to stand together against gun violence. In other communities, Williams said, the loss of life would prompt more resources and attention. He called for the deaths of New Haven residents to garner the same sort of focus from police.

He said callers may remain anonymous or submit tips anonymously by calling 1-866-888-TIPS(8477), or texting NHPD plus your message to 274637 (CRIMES).

Luciano death was the 20th homicide victim of the year in New Haven.

Before his death, Alfreda Youmans, Jeffery Dotson, Jorge Osorio-Caballero, Marquis Winfrey, Joseph Mattei, Kevin Jiang, Angel Rodriguez, Dwaneia Turner, Alessia Mesquita, Jack Hopeton, Tashawn Brown, Mariyah Inthirath, Adrian Barwise, Miguel Ramos, Richard Whitaker Jr., Ciera Jones, Kevan Bonilla, Kevin Mills and Tyshaun Hargrove had been killed in the city to date in 2021.

Since Lucianos death, Luis Fernando Gonzalez-Sandoz and Trequon Lawrence have been killed in the city.

Editors note: This story has been edited since it was first posted.

william.lambert@hearstmediact.com
ESSEX  The board of directors of Essex Savings Bank has promoted Diane Arnold, the banks former senior vice president and chief lending officer, to president and CEO.

Arnold, who started her new position on Aug. 1, began her banking career in 1983 and she worked in a variety of departments at two different banks before joining Essex Savings Bank in 2002. During her 19 years at the bank, she has been particularly influential in developing the commercial loan portfolio and in mentoring many individuals, according to a press release.

Arnold has been involved in a number of community organizations for many years and in 2017, she received a Women of Fire Award, recognizing key female leaders in the finance, insurance and real estate sectors.

Change acquires Meadowbrook Manor

MIDDLETOWN  Change Inc., a Connecticut provider of non-medical home care and behavioral health services, announced that it recently acquired Meadowbrook Manor, a residential care home for 25 individuals in Essex.

This is the fourth acquisition in the last three years for Change Inc. and the third residential care home, the announcement said.

Free sandwiches for heroes

CROMWELL  DAngelo Grilled Sandwiches in Cross Roads Plaza donated sandwiches and chips to the Cromwell Police Department and Waters Edge Center for Health and Rehabilitation earlier this summer through the sandwich shop chains EveryDAy Heroes program.

The shop sought out community heroes and delivered to them free sandwiches as a sign of appreciation, a company announcement said. From the start of the program last year until early this summer, DAngelo shops across New England donated 8,450 sandwiches and bags of chips to 178 organizations.

Dragons and cats and frogs, oh my!

CLINTON  Dragons, cats and frogs have been spotted this summer at Henry Carter Hull Library, where the reading program theme this season has been Tails & Tales. Young artists made the magical creatures or dragons with help from educator and artist Kristin Cafferty at Splash Into Art, a library recap of the event said, lauding the childrens creativity.

Rising second-sixth graders made cat creations with the help of the artist.

A state wildlife biologist from the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection took part in a reading of The Frightened Frog.

For information, call 860-669-2342 or visit hchlibrary.org.

Its Billys Birthday book reading

MIDDLETOWN  Growing up in Middletown and Portland in the 1980s and 1990s, Derrick Chester wrote music and short stories, rapped and break danced, and performed in many plays and the Childrens Circus at Oddfellows Playhouse, according to a press release.

Today he lives in Atlanta, has his own small business, acts in community theater, and participates as an extra in films like Coming to America 2. He has just published his first book, Its Billys Birthday, a picture book for young children. The book has a Black perspective on a classic childhood fear, that grownups will forget a birthday.

Chester is coming to Middletown to read the book at the Russell Library Story Hour Friday at 10:30 a.m. on the South Green during the weekly farmers market. To register, visit russelllibrary.

Later this month, Chester will return to Middletown via Zoom as the guest reader for Middletowns Parents of Preschoolers evening Story Time. The Middletown Racial Justice Coalition is a co-sponsor supporting the purchase of books for families.
A team of U.S. Green Berets on a recent training mission in the West African nation of Guinea needed local security forces help to make it through a chaotic street scene after the countrys president was ousted, U.S. Africa Command confirmed Friday.

A video circulating on social media this week shows three U.S. soldiers in a car that is surrounded by people jumping up and down as its making its way to the U.S. Embassy in the Guinean capital of Conakry. Armed Guinean troops are seen providing security.

Guinean security forces provided an escort to Conakry to ensure the safe passage of the team, U.S. Africa Command said in a statement.

The soldiers were part of an Army special operations team that was forced to cancel planned training activities after a military seizure of power Sunday, AFRICOM said. It added that they had been moved to the U.S. Embassy.

The video appears to depict part of that relocation, AFRICOM said. During the video, the soldiers car is surrounded by a crowd, which appears to be more excited than threatening.

The soldiers dont appear to be overly concerned. One Green Beret in the video is smiling and holding his arm out the window to shake hands with passers-by.

U.S. special operations units routinely conduct small training missions with local forces in Africa and other countries known as Joint Combined Exchange Training events, or JCETs.

A military team led by Guinean Col. Mamady Doumbouya seized control over the weekend and deposed the countrys president. Doumbouya had received extensive training in France, served for a time with the French military and took part in various international missions, including in Afghanistan, according to the BBC.

The U.S. government and military are not involved in this apparent military seizure of power in any way, AFRICOM said. The United States strongly condemns these actions in Guinea and any attempts at forceful seizures of power or unconstitutional actions.
LIMASSOL, Cyprus (AP)  Members of the U.S. navys elite special forces SEAL unit joined Cypriot underwater demolition soldiers on Friday in a joint drill to hone skills in countering terrorist hijackings at sea.

The exercise involved teams of U.S. and Cypriot special forces re-taking a ship controlled by terrorists.

Cypriot Defense Minister Charalambos Petrides said after the drill that Cyprus and the U.S. are on the same strategic path to ensure security and stability in a turbulent region.

He said close cooperation between the two countries special forces in the past two years aims to achieve peak preparedness in order to deal with asymmetrical threats and emerging crises.

U.S. Ambassador to Cyprus Judith Garber said more joint drills will follow in the near future.

The U.S. decided for the first time last year to provide military education and training funding to Cyprus following Congressional approval as part of Washingtons push to enhance ties with countries in the region in order to boost security.

The funding is part of the Eastern Mediterranean Energy and Security Partnership Act that U.S. legislators approved in 2019. The legislation underscores U.S. support for a partnership between Greece, Cyprus and Israel founded on recently discovered offshore gas deposits in the region.

The Act also partially lifts a 1987 U.S. arms embargo on Cyprus that was imposed to prevent an arms race that could hamper efforts to reunify the ethnically divided island nation.
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The Red Sox announced a series of roster moves before this evenings game against the White Sox. As expected, shortstop Xander Bogaerts has been reinstated from the COVID-19 injured list. Hard-throwing reliever Darwinzon Hernandez has been activated from the 10-day IL, while the club selected fellow bullpen arm Kaleb Ort. In corresponding moves, starter Chris Sale was placed on the COVID-19 IL after testing positive for the virus and reliever Austin Davis was placed on the paternity list. Additionally, infielder Jonathan Arauz has been placed on the COVID IL. Hes experiencing virus-like symptoms but has continued to test negative, relays Chris Cotillo of MassLive (Twitter link).

Ort is up to make his major league debut. The right-hander went undrafted out of Aquinas College in 2016. He signed with the Diamondbacks but was released not long after and then latched on with the Yankees. Ort spent the past few seasons in the New York system, but the Red Sox added him in the minor league phase of last offseasons Rule 5 draft.

Assigned to Worcester, Ort has pitched well at the minors top level to earn the call. The 29-year-old has worked 43 1/3 innings of 3.12 ERA ball with the WooSox, striking out a very strong 30.4% of batters faced. Ort has had issues with his control throughout his pro career, but his 10.3% walk rate this season is only marginally above the league average for relievers.

Hernandez is back after missing a little more than five weeks with a right oblique strain. The southpaw has a 3.44 ERA in 34 frames of relief despite an elevated 16.9% walk percentage. Thats largely thanks to his quality 29.9% strikeout rate, a continuation of Hernandezs lofty punch out and walk totals throughout his big league career.
Such a parody! At one end, there is the special protection group (SPG), a paramilitary force whose sole objective is to provide proximate security to the prime minister (PM) of India. At the other, the PMO (prime minister's office), where visitors records need not be kept! This is revealed through a reply given under the Right to Information (RTI) by the central public information officer (CPIO) of the PMO, which states, the Prime Minister meets people from all walks of life, not necessarily upon formal request, which too may or may not be recorded. The chief information commissioner YK Sinha in his order on 7th September, ordered, It has no element of public interest, and observed that it was a vague requisition for information from the RTI applicant.

RTI applicant Naresh Sharma sought information on 16 January 2019 on details of all visits to the PMO made by Dr Mustansir Barma from the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR). He asked for detailed information regarding each visit, such as time, purpose, and the officials in the PMO that Dr Barma interacted with.

The CPIO of the PMO strangely replied, The Prime Minister `meets people from all walks of life, not necessarily upon formal request (which too may or may not be recorded). This office does not maintain a separate record of the number of times a particular individual has requested an appointment with the Prime Minister since he took over office.

Isnt it enough to raise eyebrows, considering the PM and PMO is an utterly sensitive precinct? The first appellate authority (FAA) with whom Mr Sharma filed his first appeal supported the CPIOs reply.

Mr Sharma then filed a second appeal with the CIC, which was heard on 7 September 2021. Mr Sharma, during the audio hearing, argued that since Dr Barma was the head of a premier scientific institution, the information regarding his visit to the PMO should be available with the CPIO. However, during the hearing, he went beyond what he had requested in the RTI application and argued that he did not seek details of visits to the current PM but to previous PMs as well, going back to the past 20 years.

That, indeed, surprised the CIC because of which he found his request for information vague.

The CPIO, Parveen Kumar, who also participated in the hearing through the audio conference, stated that a categorical reply was provided to Mr Sharma informing him that their office does not maintain a separate record of the number of times a particular individual has requested an appointment with the PM since he took office.

Furthermore, the CPIO says the RTI application was vague, loosely worded and a generic query, on perusal of which it could only be surmised that he was seeking information regarding the total number of visits made by Dr Mustansir Barma to the PMO during the tenure of the current PM, the record of which is not consolidated or collated by the PMO.

CIC Mr Sinha observed that the query by the RTI applicant is indeed vague, and part of a roving and fishing expedition, information regarding which is not held by the public authority in the form in which it is sought.

To support his observation, Mr Sinha referred to the decision of the High Court of Delhi in the matter of Shyam Kunwar vs CIC and Ors., W.P. (C) 5099/ 2016 dated 30 May 2016 wherein it was held as under: Upon perusal of the RTI application filed by the petitioner in which information of attendance of all teachers have been asked for the years between 1993 and 2001, this Court is of the opinion that the information asked for is stale and no element of public interest is involved. It seems to this Court that the petitioners queries are at best a fishing and roving enquiry to challenge Mr. Arun Aryas meteoric rise from UDC to the youngest ever Principal.

CIC Mr Sinha disposed of the second appeal. While the CIC came to the logical and correct conclusion after hearing both the parties, the fact is that the PMO not keeping a record of visitors to the office is surprising.

Former central information commissioner and RTI activist, Shailesh Gandhi, observed that from the order, it appears the query is regarding the total number of visits made by Dr Mustansir Barma to the PMO during the tenure of the current PM, the record of which is not consolidated or collated by the PMO. A register of visitors would certainly be maintained. Still, it may be difficult to count the number of visits over five years, unless maintained on a computer. I would expect that it should be on a computer, in which case it should be easy to count the number of visits. However, if it is a manual register, it would require going through the registers of five years. Unfortunately, the order does not mention this.

Observes RTI activist Vijay Kumbhar, I feel it is very strange that the PMO does not keep all records of visitors considering that it is a very sensitive office in terms of national security and the Prime Minister is the most important person of this country.
In another embarrassment for Union MSME Minister Narayan Rane, the Pune police's Crime Branch has issued 'Lookout Circulars' against his wife and legislator son in alleged loan default cases of over Rs 65 crore.

The LOCs have been authorised by three parties, including the Union Home Ministry, the lender, and the financial institution (Dewan Housing Finance Ltd), followed by a complaint by Maharashtra government on August 20.

However, there is no FIR, or any other court proceedings shown in the matter of issuing the LOCs against Rane's wife, Nilam Narayan Rane and son and Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Nitesh Narayan Rane.

The LOCs mention Nilam Rane as a co-borrower of a loan amount of Rs 25 crore in the name of Artline Properties Pvt Ltd and Nitesh Rane as a co-borrower of a loan amount of Rs 40 crore in the name of Neelam Hotels Pvt Ltd, both companies in Mumbai.

Referring to the NPA outstandings, the LOCs said: "In the aforesaid circumstances, there is an apprehension and fear that the said co-borrower may leave the country anytime with a malafide intention to evade repayment of the loan granted by DHFL and escape the legal actions that may be taken against (them) civil/criminal by the DHFL."

It directed the Mumbai Airport authorities to open the LOCs, and whenever the co-borrowers are intercepted at the airport, their arrival/departure it should be intimated to the Pune police Crime Branch.

Both these loans accounts stand with the DHFL, Mumbai, but were subsequently classified as 'non-performing assets' (NPAs), as per the norms of the National Housing Bank and the Reserve Bank of India, say the police notices.

With the dues now standing at Rs 27,13,18,931 and Rs 34,09,61,771, respectively, the Pune Crime Branch has issued the LOCs against the mother-son duo, to the Assistant Director, Look Out Cell, at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (CSMIA).

Confirming to IANS that the circulars were issued on September 3, Deputy Commissioner of Police Shrinivas Ghadge, however, flatly declined further comments in the matter.

Flaying the developments, Nitesh Rane told media persons that since the loan accounts and the lenders are in Mumbai, how come the Pune police has stepped into the picture.

"Moreover, five months ago, we had agreed to settle the loans availed from the DHFL," he added.

Later, he launched a direct attack on State Tourism Minister Aditya Thackeray demanding a LOC against him, triggering yet another political row between the BJP and Shiv Sena.

"Nandkishor Chaturvedi who is apparently missing for months now or rather absconding has been a partner with Min Aditya T. Shouldn't Pune crime branch where this person is? A LOC should be issued here too so Aditya T doesn't fly out of the country What's the mystery??" he said in a tweet.

The two LOCs come barely 15 days after Narayan Rane "created history" on August 24 by becoming the first Union Minister from Maharashtra to be arrested by the state police, and getting sent to magisterial custody for 10 days but later securing conditional bail from the same court.

The arrest capped a massive political drama in the wake of "tight slap slur" against Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, which sparked a furore in Shiv Sena circles.

Disclaimer: Information, facts or opinions expressed in this news article are presented as sourced from IANS and do not reflect views of Moneylife and hence Moneylife is not responsible or liable for the same. As a source and news provider, IANS is responsible for accuracy, completeness, suitability and validity of any information in this article.
The Madurai Bench of Madras High Court has issued a notice to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and Union finance ministry on a public interest litigation (PIL) petition filed against challenging the mandatory positive pay system in the country.

The litigant K Krishna, an advocate from Madurai, has challenged the RBI notification and claimed that the positive pay system defeats the purpose of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881.

The positive pay system is a new process for reconfirming key details of high-value cheques.

As per this positive pay system, the issuer of the cheque needs to submit specific details of that cheque (such as date, name of the beneficiary or payee, and cheque amount) to the drawee bank electronically through channels such as SMS, mobile application, internet banking, or automated teller machine (ATM). The details are then cross-checked with the cheque presented by the cheque truncation system (CTS). The system sounds an alert to both the drawee bank and the presenting bank in case of any discrepancy. A redressal mechanism is in place at both ends to resolve the matter.

Mr Krishna pointed out that because of the new RBI notification, the system, which was optional, has now been made mandatory by all banks for payments above Rs50,000. Though the systems objective is to prevent cheque fraud, the lawyer expressed a fear that this would lead to more fraud.

It would be very easy for fraudulent persons to issue the cheque and then submit wrong details through positive pay system so that the payee would not receive the amount, he said while requesting the HC to quash RBIs notification.

A division bench of justices M Duraiswamy and K Murali Shankar, who heard the petition, issued the notice and adjourned the case hearing until November.

National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) created the positive pay system to revalidate essential details of large value cheques.

The Indian government implemented the positive pay system from 1st September to hedge against forgery with cheque-based transactions. The RBI introduced the mechanism to beef up the security of high-value financial dealings. It has made it mandatory for the banks that customers must be informed about the procedure.

All account holders issuing cheques for Rs50,000 and above will be able to use it, depending on the banks. While it is up to the account holder whether or not to use this service, the banks may consider making it mandatory for cheques of Rs5 lakh or more, as suggested by RBI.

Some banks are informing customers that if the details of large-value cheques are not pre-registered, the cheque will be returned. On issuance of a high-value cheque, customers should confirm details are submitted within the time frame suggested by the banks for faster clearance. RBI has informed that only cheques registered within the PPS will be accepted under the dispute resolution mechanism. Customers would get an SMS on whether the cheque is accepted or rejected for any reason.
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September 11, 2021

Some Thoughts On 9/11

Twenty years ago I was chief technology officer for a major news website. It was after lunch and I was testing new productivity tools for the news room. Someone came into my office and said that a plane had hit the WTC in New York City. I walked into the news room where several TV screens were filled with pictures of a smoking tower.

The news folks were busy writing their first takes. Some of it was speculation. I mentioned that this was not the first plane to hit a skyscraper in NYC and called it an accident. That made it into one of the first take stories.

Still - even as an accident it was spectacular news and the page views per minute on the website went towards our capacity limits. Then the second plane hit and it was immediately clear to everyone that these were no accidents. The web traffic went through the roof.

We had had ample capacity to cover news peaks but this was way too much traffic for our normal site to handle. I told the server administrator to take down all side processes on the web-server machines we were using. We then started to minimize the content of the site. Everything that was generated dynamically was switched off. We minimized the numbers of pictures. We stopped all advertisement delivery. Other major news sites I tested were already dead - overwhelmed from the enormous amount of traffic. We were still up - but even loading the much cleaned up front page took more than 30 seconds.

I phoned up a number of IT guys I knew who administered public web sites for other purposes. I asked them to mirror our site through a side channel we had opened for that purpose. We then fiddled with the domain name servers to reroute a part of our traffic to those mirror sites. With those finally up and running we barely made it through the evening traffic peak without crashing everything.

The traffic stayed above our nominal capacity for over a week. I stopped my news room productivity project and set down to design a new content delivery system which allowed for a dynamic addition of capacity. The design was quite expensive but three month later we implemented it.

9/11 touched a bit on my job but I was lucky to avoid its other deadly consequences.

Before working for that news site I had long worked with Americans on a daily basis. I had been to the U.S. over a dozen times during the previous years. It was immediately clear to me that its people would want revenge. They would not care much against whom it would be waged. That private prediction turned out to be right.

Little has changed since. The catharsis that 9/11 should have brought never happened. Most people still don't care about the wars of terror and who gets killed in them. I blame the media for that.

Today the New York Times and the Washington Post both report on the recent 'righteous' drone strike in Kabul:

Times Investigation: In U.S. Drone Strike, Evidence Suggests No ISIS Bomb

U.S. officials said a Reaper drone followed a car for hours and then fired based on evidence it was carrying explosives. But in-depth video analysis and interviews at the site cast doubt on that account. . Examining a righteous strike

Expert analysis of deadly U.S. drone strikes aftermath in Kabul suggests no evidence of explosives in targeted vehicle

Ten innocent persons, including 7 children, were killed in that strike.

I applaud those reports. But there have been some 15,000 other drone strike since 2007. Most of those have hit innocent people but there was little reporting about them.

Three days before the drone strike happened a much bigger massacre took place.

A suicide bomber hit at the gate of Kabul airport. The bomb killed several dozen people including U.S. soldiers. But what happened immediately after the bomb went off made the incident much deadlier. Those who guarded the airport opened fire on the large crowd that had hoped to be let in to catch a flight to somewhere. In total more than 170 people died, some of them were British citizens, others were Taliban guards, most were Afghan civilians.

Local Afghan news, a BBC report on Twitter, Russian public TV (at about 3 min, German translation), China's major news agency and other reporters all spoke to eye witnesses who all confirmed the story: "Most of those dead were killed by bullets."

But 'western' media have buried that story. The sole mention of it I could find is deep down in a long NYT report about the evacuations from Kabul:

For the first time, Pentagon officials publicly acknowledged the possibility that some people killed outside the airport on Thursday might have been shot by American service members after the suicide bombing. Investigators are looking into whether the gunfire came from Americans at the gate, or from the Islamic State.

'Officials publicly acknowledged the possibility ...' Do they call THAT 'reporting'?

There were quite obviously no ISIS shooters at the gate.

Why ain't U.S. media all over a story during which the U.S. side killed more than 100 innocent people? Is it hyping the drone attack, which killed 10, to cover for the more embarrassing act during which troops under U.S. control massacred many more than that? Because those troops were the CIA's Afghan death squads who may soon be your neighbors?

Before 9/11 U.S. intelligence knew of Al-Qaeda sleeper cells and of plans for new attacks. Then came 9/11. I am by now one of those who thinks that they let it happen on purpose. That is because all the wars that followed had long been prepared for.

Following 9/11 the U.S. wars of terror displaced 37 million people and killed at least a million foreigners. The U.S. wars of terror are still going on today in Somalia, Yemen, Iraq, Syria, Libya and elsewhere.

Shouldn't 20 years be long enough to end those wars? To find some closure? To suppress the urge for revenge? To change the rather aggressive general U.S. mentality?

Unfortunately the answer to all those questions seems to be "No".

Posted by b on September 11, 2021 at 17:52 UTC | Permalink

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OCKLAWAHA [mdash]Elizabeth Lynn Keigans, 55, of Ocklawaha, formerly of Moultrie, died Wednesday, August 18, 2021 at her home. Born on December 20, 1965, in Moultrie, she was the daughter of the late Joe Ellis Keigans, Sr. and Ruby Lynette Conger Keigans. She is survived by her daughter, Cara
On that Sept. 11 morning in 2001, the images of the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and that field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, were beamed into the homes and offices of Permian Basin oil and gas operators as they were around the globe.

Though the terrorist attacks occurred before the shale revolution, 9/11 would catapult the Permian Basin into global prominence as a world-leading energy producer, they colored how the world operated.

The first impact of 9/11 was to raise security concerns for the global oil industry to a level never before seen in modern times, Daniel Yergin, vice chairman at IHS Markit and author of The New Map: Energy, Climate and the Clash of Nations, told the Reporter-Telegram by email.

It put a new emphasis on energy security and highlighted the jihadist risk to the Middle East and global oil supply. 9/11 led directly to the invasion of Iraq and the toppling of Saddam Hussein, which opened Iraq up, although with continuing stress along the way, to the international industry, he continued. For the United States, 9/11 renewed the clarion call for energy independence  but that remained a goal that seemed unattainable for another decade until the shale revolution delivered it, Yergin said.

Todd Staples, president of the Texas Oil and Gas Association, sees todays oil and gas workers helping honor those lost in the attacks.

Honoring the memory of the victims of the attacks and heroes who paid the ultimate sacrifice to save others should reignite the passion of what America stands for: Strength, hope and determination. The oil and natural gas industry is proud to do its part - today and every day - to help keep America secure through reliable, affordable and sustainable energy, he told the Reporter-Telegram by email.

Economist Ray Perryman observed that the attacks did not have a huge, immediate impact on energy markets.

On the actual day of the attack, prices spiked to about $31 per barrel  they had been in the low $20s  but then fell into the high teens immediately after, he told the Reporter-Telegram by email. I remember thinking at the time that everybody must have rushed out and filled their tanks that day and then stayed home for three weeks. Much of this immediate impact occurred because of the shock effect and the sharp  but very temporary - reduction in air travel. The market recovered quite quickly, however, and, by early 2002, both prices and rigs were on a decidedly upward trend.

He said the attacks changed the world in many ways and today would likely be different if it had never happened, but the discernible effects on the energy sector were short-lived, although the ebb and flow of the subsequent war in Iraq did cause disruptions from time to time.

Perryman did not list the attacks as among the biggest influences on energy markets over the last 20 years. He cited three, beginning with the ongoing revolution in technologies such as hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling, which he predicted will be one of the major events of this century when historians write about it in the future. Next will be the pandemic because the disruptions have persisted for so long, and, finally, the emerging discussions and policies surrounding climate change.

Odessa oilman Kirk Edwards, president and chief executive officer of Latigo Petroleum, told the Reporter-Telegram by email he sees two impacts from the day.

First, it showed us that countries we thought were our friends, like Saudi Arabia, actually had people that harbored and cultivated hate against our country. The reaction by President Bush and other countries was swift and powerful, but to me it showed the people of the United States that we need to think inwardly first about who our friends and enemies are, especially on the energy security side of that equation.

He added, The actions taken since then to fortify our strategic energy complexes were an important step in that process and those fortifications are still being upgraded today -- especially on the cyber side.

On the 20th anniversary, Michele Flournoy, a former U.S. Undersecretary of Defense for Policy under President Obama, is currently chair of the Center for a New American Security (CNAS) and the co-founder and managing partner of WestExec Advisors, told CERAWeek Conversations that the nation needs to go back to first principles and examine what are its vital interests.

Keeping Iran from becoming a nuclear weapon state is a vital interest. We need to build a necessary coalition to do that, she said. Even though our energy situation has changed, and most Americans think that we no longer need to rely on the Middle East as a source, this is a global market, an integrated market. What happens in the Middle East can have very profound effects on energy prices and that affects all of us.
As the new Biden Administration considers new regulations that aim to protect the environment, The Environmental Partnership highlighted the energy industrys progress in environmental stewardship.

The partnerships third annual report included the first results from its new flare management program, which found a 50 percent reduction in flare volumes and intensity from 2019 to 2020 even as the nations oil and gas production remained consistent.

Tackling methane emissions is a top priority, said Mike Sommers, president and chief executive officer of the American Petroleum Institute, in a press call discussing the report. He said the API encourages member companies to adopt no routine flaring plans and said companies have taken considerable action to reduce flaring and emissions.

We realize theres more work to be done to achieve our environmental goals while providing affordable energy, he added.

Sommers said the API is interacting with the Biden Administration as it crafts new regulations to stem methane and other greenhouse gas emissions, expressing hope the industrys best practices and technological advancements will be taken into account during the process.

The industry is committed to reducing emissions, and the best way is through cost-effective regulations, combined with industry efforts like the partnership, he said.

He pointed out that the API recently released a letter signed by more than 130 producers, manufacturers, industry associations and labor union protesting a possible fee on methane emissions. Sommers called it a tax on production, not emissions, saying such a fee would cost $14.4 billion in additional energy costs and 155,000 jobs.

Vanessa Ryan, manager of the carbon and climate policy team at Chevron and chair of The Environmental Partnership, pointed to the expansion of the partnerships efforts in the last year despite the impact of the pandemic. She reported that the partnership is funding operations and research at Colorado State Universitys Methane Emissions Test and Evaluation Center to develop new emissions detection technologies. Participating companies will be providing sites for field tests of those technologies later this year. The partnership also conducted aerial surveys of the Permian and Denver-Julesberg basins this year as part of a pilot project testing different detection technology.

Among the partnerships 94 members are several midstream operators, who implemented emissions-reduction technology on more than 2,000 compressors and during more than 400 pipeline blowdown operations.

Partnership members conducted 430,000 leak detection surveys on 86,000 sites, he said. Thats a survey every three minutes of every day, Todd said. Surveys found leak occurrences at a rate of 0.04 percent or less than one in every 2,000 components.

Todd also said flaring mitigation efforts have resulted in the diversion of 17 billion cubic feet of gas that would have been flared, removing 9.4 million metric tons of emissions from the atmosphere.

Part of the mitigation efforts include removing pneumatic controllers, with nearly 20,000 additional gas-driven controllers replaced or removed between 2018 and 2020 and nearly 7,600 high-bleed pneumatic controllers replaced, retrofitted or removed from service. More than 5,600 zero-emission pneumatic controllers have been installed in the past two years.
More than 18 months after it was established, the Texas Methane & Flaring Coalition has issued the first edition of its Methane & Emissions Report.

The report serves as a primer, seeking to fully explain and clarify emissions sources, regulatory oversight and industry best practices and recommendations.

In this inaugural report, the coalition says the percentage of natural gas flared  out of all the natural gas produced in Texas  fell by 72 percent between June 2019 and May 2021, according to data from the Railroad Commission. In addition, the volume of gas flared fell by about 73 percent. Beyond Texas, methane emissions from five of the largest energy-producing regions across the US has fallen by nearly 70 percent, even as production in those regions tripled from 2011 to 2018.

Thure Cannon, president of the Texas Pipeline Association  one of seven trade associations, along with 40 operators that make up the coalition  said the report confirms the progress the industry, including pipelines, has made.

Coalition members comment "PPROA is an active participant of the Texas Methane & Flaring Coalition which includes Texas oil and gas allied trade associations who share a goal of developing and providing information on methane and emissions. The Coalition, after months of substantial work, has prepared an extensive report offering industry best practices and analyzing the critical necessity of flaring while controlling and managing emissions to protect the environment."

- Judy Stark, president, Panhandle Producers & Royalty Owners Association

"PBPA members have been working aggressively to eliminate flaring as a matter of routine operations while successfully producing more hydrocarbons than ever before. Operators have also been doing so with an unparalleled health and safety record. We will continue to work with others in the regulated community to safely and responsibly develop natural resources in the Permian Basin to make America more energy and economically secure."

- Ben Shepperd, president, Permian Basin Petroleum Association

"The oil and natural gas industry's focus on advancing and pioneering technologies has been and will continue to be the driving force of continued environmental progress. South Texas communities are stronger than ever because of it."

- Teddy Carter, chair, South Texas Energy & Economic Roundtable Advisory Council

"The results are clear - clean fuels produced right here in Texas are reducing emissions in the United States and abroad. With the rapid improvements documented in this report, American producers can continue to meet the nation's demand for affordable, abundant energy."

- Jason Modglin, president, Texas Alliance of Energy Producers

"In Texas, we hold ourselves to a higher standard when it comes to emissions, and that truly shines through in this report. The men and women who work to ensure Texans and the world have reliable, affordable energy necessary for everyday life are focused on innovations to improve our emissions footprint. Those efforts contribute directly to the Texas Methane and Flaring Coalition's work and the important progress the industry is making."

- Ed Longanecker, president, Texas Independent Producers & Royalty Owners Association

"Initiatives like the Texas Methane & Flaring Coalition have been bold in their efforts to end routine flaring and reduce methane emissions even further, and data confirms their endeavors are successful. The oil and natural gas industry is and will continue to be the cornerstone of a cleaner, stronger, better future with lower emissions and less carbon intensity. Unmatched investment, innovation and collaboration will deliver this future with the energy needed to maintain and improve modern life."

- Todd Staples, president, Texas Oil & Gas Association See More Collapse

Methane is our product, so we have every incentive to prevent leaks of methane to the atmosphere, he told the Reporter-Telegram by email. Investing in domestic natural gas pipelines would help to make even more headway in reducing emissions, because if we have more pipeline capacity to handle the gas that is being produced, there is less need for the gas to be flared. In fact, a recent report from Columbia Universitys Center on Global Energy Policy highlighted the beneficial role played by natural gas pipelines, concluding that investing more in the US natural gas pipeline network could help the US reach net-zero emission goals more quickly and cheaply in the future. Increasingly, however, the pipeline industry faces regulatory challenges in getting new pipelines built, even while it is clear that expanding this critical infrastructure is the blueprint for continued environmental progress.

The report states that, While methane is a common gas produced by the decay of organic material, the coalition recognizes the environmental and economic benefits of minimizing methane emissions. Industry has made and continues to make great strides in reducing methane emissions resulting from oil and natural gas operations.

It listed six best practices being used by industry to address emissions:

 ELIMINATE HIGH-BLEED PNEUMATIC CONTROL DEVICES Industry has taken voluntary efforts in eliminating high-bleed pneumatic control devices and replacing them with either low-bleed or no-bleed devices that can reduce emissions.

 CONDUCT VOLUNTARY INSPECTIONS Operators can conduct inspections in many different ways, including conducting LDAR (leak detection and repair) or AVO (audio/visual/olfactory) inspections using OGI (optical gas imaging), Method 22 visual determination of fugitive emissions, aerial inspections or other new or innovative technologies to help pinpoint fugitive emissions sources and allow operators to quickly address them.

 VOLUNTARY BEST EMISSIONS MANAGEMENT PRACTICES Beyond state and federal requirements, operators equip facilities with emissions reduction equipment and utilize voluntary use of emissions reduction equipment. For example, operators strive to voluntarily optimize and utilize vapor recovery towers  which aid in the process of reducing flash gases being sent to the storage tanks, vapor recovery units  which help send gas to the sales line instead of being vented or combusted, and combustion devices, such as thermal oxidizers, vapor combustion units, or flares  which are combustion devices used to burn gases, such as volatile organic compounds and hazardous air pollutants for environmental, operational, and safety reasons.

 VOLUNTARILY REPLACE COMPRESSOR ROD PACKING Where reasonably practicable, replace rod packing on reciprocating compressors where not required by federal regulation, at least every 26,000 hours of operations or 36 months. Leaks from compressors can be reduced through proper monitoring and cost-effective scheduling for replacing packing rings and piston rods.

 BEST PLANNING AND MANAGEMENT PRACTICES Implement good planning and management practices to ensure gas transportation and utilization are available and adequate before a well is brought online. These proactive practices help minimize the need to flare and is in line with the coalitions stance on ending routine flaring.

 FLARE OPTIMIZATION When flaring is necessary, reduce or prevent incomplete combustion by optimizing combustion efficiency and operation of flares. Managing emissions when flaring is necessary via auto igniters, remote or on-site monitoring, use of automation, redundant ignition, and maintenance programs.
Cory Ray Brannan, a former jailer with the Midland County Sheriffs Office, was arrested and charged Tuesday for allegedly attending and participating in riots at the U.S. Capitol building on Jan. 6, according to court documents.

Brannan was photographed outside the Capitol with other rioters, according to an arrest affidavit that was unsealed on Thursday. Hes seen in the photo wearing a Trump 2020 hat, camouflage clothing and a tactical vest with a III% patch. The Three Percenters are an extremist far-right militia movement.

Other photos show Brannan inside the Capitol building, according to the affidavit. Hes allegedly seen in security footage entering the Capitol by climbing through a window. The affidavit states that the footage shows him walking around the building for several minutes before exiting through the Senate Wing Door.

FBI investigators spoke with MCSO Captain Adam Hilliard on Aug. 12, according to the affidavit. Hilliard allegedly identified Brannan in multiple photos inside and outside the Capitol.

RELATED: FBI documents: Jenny Cudd and Eliel Rosa seen on Capitol security footage

The FBI also obtained a search warrant of Brannans phone number, which allegedly showed he had contact with several individuals inside the Capitol on Jan. 6, the affidavit states.

Brannan is facing charges of knowingly entering or remaining on restricted grounds, disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building, violent entry or disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds and parading, demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building. Those charges are class A and B misdemeanors punishable by a total of up to three years in prison.

Brannan had an initial appearance in the Western District of Texas before Judge Ronald C. Griffin after his arrest on Tuesday. He was released on a personal recognizance bond the same day, court records show.

Sheriff David Criner did not immediately respond to a Reporter-Telegram request for comment regarding when Brannans employment with MCSO ended and the circumstances of the end of his employment.

Brannan is the third Midlander to be arrested in connection to the Capitol riots, following the indictments of Jenny Cudd and Eliel Rosa in February. Rosa entered a plea agreement on July 29, agreeing to plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge of parading, demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building; he has not yet been sentenced. A status hearing is scheduled for Cudd on Oct. 13.
WARSAW, Poland (AP)  German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Saturday that she found it unacceptable that refugees were being used to apply pressure to Poland and other European Union members on the border with Belarus.

Speaking at a news conference during what she said she expected to be her last official visit to Poland as chancellor, Merkel appealed to Belarus, but also to Poland, to help people in difficult humanitarian conditions caught between the border of Poland and Belarus.

She stressed that she found it completely unacceptable that such hybrid attacks were being carried out with the use of people seeking to reach the EU, recalling that it was also a message she delivered to Russian President Vladimir Putin during a recent meeting.

Poland, Lithuania and Latvia have seen a rise in crossings by Iraqis, Afghans, Syrians and Africans from Belarus in recent months. The three EU countries accuse Belarus of pushing the migrants across their borders and say they view that as an element of hybrid warfare against the EU.

Merkel spoke at a news conference with Polish President Mateusz Morawiecki in front of a palace in Warsaw's Royal Baths park.

The two said they discussed the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, security issues in light of recent developments in Afghanistan, as well as new threats coming from cyber attacks.

European issues also came up, including climate policy and an ongoing dispute between Warsaw and Brussels over changes to the judicial system in Poland which the EU considers to violate the rule of law.

Merkel said she hoped the issue can be solved through dialogue. Merkel, who has been chancellor since 2005, plans to step down after an election later this month.

A meeting between Merkel and President Andrzej Duda, which was originally announced by the German government, isn't taking place after all, and political observers in Warsaw interpreted that as a snub.

Dudas office said Duda would instead be in the southern Polish city of Katowice for celebrations marking the anniversary of Solidarity, the anti-communist trade union.

Relations have sometimes been strained under Poland's government because it has often said it plans to demand reparations from World War II, an issue that resonates with older Poles. Germany often voices remorse for its wartime occupation of Poland, but says the issue of reparations has already been dealt with.

Morawiecki said that despite some disagreements, the Polish-German relationship has developed well during Merkel's time at the helm, and thanked her for her cooperation.

We have very often discussed difficult topics, but our solid political coordination has also led to the fact that our economic relations are very good, he said.

He said that despite various differences, we are able, above all, to emphasize what unites us."

Merkel also commemorated the victims of World War II in Warsaw by laying a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The war began with Germany's invasion of Poland. Tens of millions of people were killed in the war, with some 6 million killed in Poland.
Alex_Schmidt

A Midland man was one of two from Midland-Odessa killed in a vehicle crash Tuesday morning on New Mexico Highway 128 near Loving, New Mexico State Police said.

Jesse Godfrey, 39, of Odessa and Aaron Moreno, 24, of Midland, were pronounced dead on scene by the Office of the Medical Investigator around 6:36 a.m. near mile marker 21, State Police said in a news release.
Legislation seeking to ban high-level nuclear waste from the state of Texas is now law, with Gov. Greg Abbott signing the law Thursday after it passed both houses of the Texas Legislature with wide margins of bipartisan support during the second special session.

House Bill 7 by Rep. Brooks Landgraf (R-Odessa) was filed in response to an effort to bring the nations high-level radioactive waste to a low-level radioactive material disposal facility in Andrews County  with strong opposition from residents and local elected officials demanding the legislation to ban the material be filed.

The Texas House gave final approval of the legislation with 119 representatives voting in favor.

That, combined with the unanimous support the bill received in the Senate allowed the legislation to go into effect immediately upon receiving the governors signature. As of Friday, Abbotts office has not issued a statement on the bills signing.

Waste Control Specialists, which currently operates the low-level waste facility in Andrews, has been seeking a federal permit from the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission to import and store multiple types of nuclear waste that are significantly more radioactive than what the facility is currently allowed to store.

Opponents say the waste WCS seeks to dispose of presents both a danger to the environment and the oil industry, as well as creates a significant national security threat.

While opponents have been receptive to Landgrafs stated intent to ban high-level radioactive waste, some say his legislation has significant loopholes that need to be addressed, loopholes that have caused multiple clashes between Rep. Tom Craddick of Midland and Landgraf over the issue.

Background

The Andrews waste facility formally began the application process back in 2015, with WCS sending a letter to the NRC indicating its intent to seek licensure to store nuclear waste derived from power plants from around the country.

It was originally stated the intent of the permit was to seek authorization to store up to 40,000 tons of waste, mainly spent nuclear fuel rods, that would be transported and stored at the facility for 40 to 100 years.

At the time, Landgraf took a neutral position on the issue, stating that he looked forward to working with residents and officials in Andrews to be sure that the health and safety concerns of everyone in the area were accounted for throughout the discussion surrounding the application.

Landgrafs recent predecessor at the time, Tyron Lewis, opposed the effort and stated that he didnt think that (high-level waste) is what the site was meant for.

Opponents have pointed out it was originally promised that the site would only ever be a low-level waste facility.

Past Controversy

Landgraf has had an active relationship with WCS over the years, with the waste facility and its senior officials have given thousands in campaign contributions directly to Landgraf in the past. WCS has also spent hundreds of thousands in lobby fees to influence the legislature.

In turn, Landgraf has filed multiple pieces of legislation to the benefit of WCS that have drawn controversy, including two similar recent examples.

In 2019, Landgraf reportedly had former state Rep. Poncho Nevarez (D- Eagle Pass) to carry an amendment described as a financial giveaway to WCS to an unrelated bill intended to help domestic violence victims.

The legislation, Senate Bill 1804 by Sen. Lois Kolkhorst (R-Brenham) would have given law enforcement tools to track domestic abusers who were released on bail, providing greater protection to their victims.

Landgrafs amendment to the bill, which would have given WCS a reduction in state fees to the tune of an estimated $4.2 million, caused the domestic violence victim protection legislation to die after Abbott vetoed the legislation, citing the addition of the amendment as the reason.

Senate Bill 1804 was a laudable effort to address domestic violence until someone slipped in an ill-considered giveaway to a radioactive waste disposal facility, Abbott wrote in his official veto statement. Unfortunately, the bill authors good idea about domestic violence has been dragged down by a bad idea about radioactive waste.

Fast forward to this year, Landgraf once again included the fee reduction provisions buried in the details of his controversial legislation that he headlined as banning high-level nuclear waste (HB 2692).

The legislative analysis on HB 2692 estimated that Landgrafs latest attempts at reducing state fees on WCS would constitute a loss of $798,000 in general revenue to the state, and a loss of $2.3 million to the Environmental Radiation and Perpetual Care Account, to the total benefit to WCS of just nearly $3.1 million.

The Environmental Radiation and Perpetual Care Account that Landgrafs bill would have defunded is an account that was established to retain a portion of WCSs profits to ensure clean-up efforts can be funded should there ever be a leak that WCS is unable to pay for.

Instead of being celebrated by opponents of the high-level nuclear waste, the legislation was opposed.

The bill ultimately died after Craddick called a point of order on the legislation, pointing out the multiple provisions in the bill violated the Texas Constitutions single-subject rule and wrote that he had grave concerns regarding the bill.

Second Special Session

With the NRC posed to announce whether it is granting the high-level waste permit to WCS on Monday, those opposed to the license, including Abbott, added the issue on the agenda for the second special session of the Texas Legislature.

Landgraf was once again tapped to file the legislation addressing the issue, this time filing legislation (HB 7) that only speaks to prohibiting high-level radioactive waste and excluding the financial breaks to WCS.

But the controversy surrounding this bill continues.

Fasken Oil and Ranch, as well as the Permian Basin Coalition and Craddick, argued that Landgrafs HB7 used the term high-level in the context of the federal regulatory definition, which is narrower than the broader concept of high-level nuclear waste.

WCS is seeking Greater Than Class C (GTCC) that comes out of operating and decommissioned reactors. It is referred to as reactor-related-greater-than-class-C waste, and it is more radioactive than anything Andrews County has ever agreed to store, explained Monica Perales, an attorney with Fasken Oil and Ranch.

There is no room for error by the Texas Legislature, Craddick wrote in a statement he issued after Landgraf killed an amendment by Craddick that sought to include reactor-based GTCC in Landgrafs latest bill.

[T]he Landgraf bill is nothing more than an error that fails to block spent nuclear fuel and reactor-related Greater Than Class C waste, Craddick stated, The message must be clear: Texas is not the storage grounds for this highly toxic waste.

In defending the scope of his legislation, Landgraf wrote on Facebook saying that the viewpoint of the Andrews community was officially reflected by the Andrews County Commissioners Court resolution and that he filed legislation in accordance with the clear will of the people. He also stated that the legislation does not provide a mirror ban on the pending NRC permit nor was it intended to, rather he claimed it does mirror the county commissioners resolution.

Landgraf went on to say reactor-related GTCC is not high-level radioactive waste under federal or state definitions, and that if the Andrews community wants it banned, he will take action to do so in the future, despite having rejected Craddicks amendment.

An NRC staff report issued in July recommended the NRC approve the pending application to allow spent nuclear fuel, GTCC, and small quantities of mixed oxide fuel (MOX) to be transferred from existing reactor sites and stored for the 40-year license term before a permanent repository is available.

The state of Texas has formally made a statement of opposition against WCSs federal application as it pertains to the storage and transportation of high-level waste with the passage of HB7.

What remains to be seen is what action the Nuclear Regulatory Commission takes this next week regarding the issuance of the license for WCS considering the states position against high-level waste. The NRC is reportedly set to announce its decision on Monday.

--

Online: https://odessaheadlines.com/
I really dont know what to say about the 20th anniversary of 9/11.

Of course, it was a horrific day in our nations history, and a reminder of what evil persists in our world. There are people out there that want to bring harm to Americans and others who enjoy the freedoms that we take for granted in the United States. Those terrorists will go to places we cant even imagine and demonstrate an unbridled hatred, including the unprecedented suicide missions of flying of aircraft into buildings that were symbols of our American excellence.

Those extremists will lure us into endless wars on their soil and take advantage of the naivety of our leaders, who believe it is possible to force our morals, standards and even our democracy onto places that have existed for centuries without them. If the fall of communism taught us anything, that type of change must come from the grassroots and not appear to be forced on anyone.

I dont know what to say 20 years later, because as much as our leaders wanted to manufacture a mission accomplished moment over the past two decades, there wasnt one. The truth is 9/11 wasnt my generations Pearl Harbor, because the Greatest Generation celebrated victories across the globe to ease the pain of what happened on American soil. Just a couple weeks ago, we gave the Taliban its country back.

It is hard on Patriot Day to come up with the words, because in the end, it is difficult  if not impossible  to pinpoint how the other side was held accountable for the damage caused on 9/11 or in the 20 years afterward. Gold Star Families in West Texas and across the state and nation still mourn the deaths of their brave sons and daughters. Midlands Jake Young was killed in an al-Qaida engineered bombing in Bali in 2002. I want to say thank you to those people who served and their families, but I feel absolutely horrible because those leading them  Republican and Democrat  put them in unwinnable situations with no apparent end game.

Yes, we killed Osama bin Laden  the face of evil after 9/11  but where al-Qaida left off, there are other extremist groups ready to wreak havoc. We have the dead bodies of 13 American service members to prove it.

At home, are we better off than we were on Sept. 10, 2001? Its hard to make that argument. We were unified long enough to sing God Bless America, but it didnt take long for the opinion-makers and self-centered politicians to poison that country-first spirit. Social media made the competition between the left and right to be more divisive, more outrageous, more controversial, more deplorable. The person who disagrees with me online  even on such apolitical things as bond issues, school names, COVID, guns, abortion or Donald Trump -- is no longer a friend but my enemy. Facebook conversations have become the ultimate litmus test of Are you with me or against me.

I will spend time on Saturday remembering 9/11, the shocking images of planes flying into towers, people falling off buildings, smoke billowing from sites of destruction in three states and the aftermath of the declaration of war on America. I will think about how we can do better  not to be more conservative or progressive  but to be better Midlanders, Texans and Americans.

This newspaper will celebrate those who have and continue to put their lives on the line for our freedoms. It will continue to be there for military organizations that want to make use of our space to honor those that have made the sacrifice to protect you and me. We will attempt to be better moderators of civil discussions about whats best for our community, region, state and nation. We will attempt to call for more accountability from our elected leaders and representatives, who put us in these situations that are unwinnable, bring death or injury to those we love, rack up debt this country cant afford, turn our attention away from home and leave our collective spirit broken.

Heres hoping that after you take time to remember, you join us. We hope you arent so entrenched in our current adversarial condition that you take part in the rebuilding of communities, states and this country. We will disagree, but we can certainly also do a world a good.

Thank you again to those who served, and God bless our nation on Patriot Day.
Retired Muskogee teacher Effie Milam says she smiles when she looks at a picture of her grandson, Ronald Milam Jr.

"He looks just like his daddy, kind of nonchalant," she said. "Just kind of laid back and smiling."

Major Ronald D. Milam was killed Sept. 11, 2001, when a terrorist crashed a plane into the Pentagon, where he worked. At the time, the major's wife was pregnant with his son. Ron Milam Jr. is now a college sophomore in San Antonio.

Effie Milam's other son, Steven Milam, also sees the similarities between the two men.

"Ron Junior looks like a clone of his father," he said. "Facial features. Some of his demeanor, even his laugh in some ways reminds me of Ron."

Steven Milam, who lives near Dallas, recalled visiting his brother often before the terrorist attacks.

+4 Community celebrates Milam's life Every five-year anniversary of 9/11, former Muskogee High School teacher Effie Milam would r

"I used to ride the train on weekends from Philadelphia to DC," Milam said. "I looked forward to going to visit him."

Milam recalled getting an email from his brother the morning of 9/11.

"He had emailed me asking if I had seen what just happened," Milam recalled. "I emailed him back, saying 'yeah, I just saw.' And I never got a response from him."

Minutes later, the Pentagon was attacked, he said.

"I remember walking through downtown Philadelphia not knowing if he was alive or not," Milam said, recalling that he rode trains and metro transit to where Major Ron Milam worked.

"It took me to the parking lot where he normally parked his Jeep, and his Jeep was the only Jeep in the parking lot," Steven Milam said.

"Seeing that was  you know, yeah," he said, choking on his words. "I went to his house with his wife and Myejoi, his daughter.

He said he didn't hear what happened to his brother for a week.

"I guess in our hearts we knew," he said.

Effie Milam, who also lives near Dallas, said the pain of losing a son is not as great after 20 years.

"It's not as hard as it was, just the fact I have God in my life, and he was a Christian man," she said. "It really gives me great peace. And I also have so many people surrounding me and praying for me during this time."

She said she's been blessed to be able to keep in touch with her daughter-in-law and two grandchildren from Ron. She said she also is happy to live near her other two children and can talk to them every day. And they still talk about Ron, she said.

"We laugh about the things he did and how he would come home and change his appearance so we wouldn't now who he was at the reunion," she said. "He'd disguise himself and we would laugh about that."

Milam said she has stacks of letters, now in storage, from people who wrote about Ron's helpfulness and kindness.

"One lady was telling me she was trying to go to school and she had a little boy who was crying and Ron would step up and say, 'I'll keep him while you go to class.' She finished up her class," Milam said. "They were saying he was always so kind, he'd always say, 'do you mind doing this.' He was a major, and he'd say 'would you do this please.'"

She said she focuses on the joy.

"He brought a lot of joy to our family and he was a great guy," she said. "I find a lot of joy thinking about him and how he lived his life."
Timothy Joel Murr, Passed away on August 23rd, 2021 at the age of 67. Funeral services will be at Keefeton Free Will Baptist Church on Saturday, September 18th, 2021 at 2pm.
With a majority of colleges in Illinois requiring students to be vaccinated for COVID-19 before attending classes, one organization is pushing back.

Young Americans for Liberty is coordinating with student leaders at 23 public campuses around the country, including at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana, to speak out against the mandates.

Spokesman Eric Brakey said the organization is not anti-vaccine but, rather, anti-vaccine mandate at taxpayer-funded academic institutions.

That is not what America is supposed to be, Brakey said. Those are the kind of policies we saw in the Soviet Union that we used to make fun of a generation ago.

Brakey said the movement was born at Rutgers, the first university to mandates COVID-19 vaccines for its students. In particular, one student was locked out of his school email and other accounts because he is unvaccinated, despite taking only virtual classes at home miles away from campus.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced vaccine requirements in August for educators, health care workers and college students. Before the order, Illinois colleges and universities made their own rules regarding vaccinations.

Brakey said there are boots on the ground in Champaign-Urbana.

Our activists at the University of Illinois are making fellow students aware there is a religious exemption for COVID vaccination, ensuring they have the paperwork needed to file for that exemption, and petitioning the administration to extend the deadline for filing. We are proud of the work being done by our young activists in the fight for medical freedom, Brakey said in a statement.

YAL leaders said they also have influenced policymaking at the state level. Members of the groups Hazlitt Coalition, the organizations network of more than 170 legislators from nearly 40 states, have filed 25 bills defending American citizens rights against what they call COVID-19-related infringements.

Individuals should be free to make their own health care decisions with their doctors, Brakey said. Instead, taxpayer-funded college administrators are imposing one-size-fits-all vaccine mandates on every student, regardless of disability or natural immunity status.
The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, changed a lot of things about daily life in America, but firefighters have seen their jobs impacted on a daily basis by that days events.

Jacksonville Fire Department crews say 9/11 reshaped many aspects of the department, from policies and practices to the way firefighters are viewed in the community.

Capt. Mike Griffitts was a hoseman who had been with the department just three years when 9/11 made him and others consider the true role of firefighters.

At the beginning it made us question the role we had and services we provide, Griffitts said.

Firefighters were known to respond to fires and car accidents, Griffitts said, but 9/11 shed light on some of the true dangers of the job.

This opened everyones eyes, he said. It was one of those low-frequency, high-hazard events. It was really dangerous.

While firefighters put themselves into dangerous situations every time they respond to a fire, Griffitts said many of the incidents to which they respond are low-risk. Truly high-hazard events are pretty uncommon, he said, but 9/11opened firefighters eyes to the need to be prepared.

Though the events were tragic, many good things have come from it, such as the understanding of the need for funding and training.

Coming back to the department the next day, and for months afterwards, the topic was about training and how we prepare for this type of stuff, Griffitts said. We had guys who were loading up to go help out and got about halfway before being told to turn back.

At the time, many departments were sending personnel to New York to help, but many were ordered to return home because there were too many people and not enough accountability.

Fire Chief Doug Sills said a big focus since has been on inter-department cooperation and communication, and cooperation among communities.

National systems have been put into place to help coordinate efforts and resources at local, state and national levels in cases of emergency.

Locally, there have been a lot of advances in cooperation between various response agencies, including police and EMS, Sills said.

We still struggle some locally with communication, but there is a project in the works to bring interoperability and communication together, Sills said.

Sills was a lieutenant with 12 years experience with the department on 9/11.

The fire service prior to that was a lot different, he said. There were different parameters. We were looked at in certain aspects. After that, we became an all-response hazard agency. We broadened our responses.

Capt. Matt Summers said the events of 9/11 motivated him to continue on a path he was already on. He joined the department about a year after Sept. 11, 2001, but he had already tested and was on the waiting list when the terrorist attacks happened.

It motivated me to want to be here that much more, Summers said. Im lucky to have gotten on here and be a part of this department.

Just because its been 20 years doesnt mean its over. Beyond the big, initial loss of life, people still are dying because of that days events, Summers said, noting that many emergency personnel who responded to the World Trade Centers on that day since have died because of health complications they developed in its aftermath.

It brought other things to light, Summers said. It brought a lot of focus to the health and safety of firefighters.

Funding was another huge change following the events of 9/11, Griffitts said.

They gave out millions (of dollars) globally to help with training and equipment, Griffitts said. It has helped out tremendously.

The types of events and responsibilities for which firefighters train have changed, Sills said.

People realize now that law enforcement, firefighters, EMS, we are the first line of defense for a community, Sills said.
BARCELONA, Spain (AP)  Catalan separatists held their first major mass gathering since the start of the pandemic on Saturday, trying to offer a display of unity despite the divisions in their ranks over upcoming talks with the Spanish government.

Tens of thousands waved pro-independence flags and wore T-shirts with messages for their cause in downtown Barcelona. People used face masks for the event, which went ahead after regional authorities dropped restrictions on the number of people who could gather with COVID-19 cases dropping.

There was a brief clash when a large crowd pelted a police station with toilet paper, trash and other objects before scuffling with National Police officers. That prompted Catalan police in riot vans to roll in and clear them out.

The meeting between representatives of the Catalan and central governments doesn't have a date yet, but it is supposed to be soon. This second meeting between the two sides is supposed to advance negotiations toward the eventual finding a solution to the political crisis that has festered since the failed 2017 bid by Catalan's secessionists to force a breakaway.

Expectations remain extremely low for a quick fix because the Catalan separatists demand an authorized referendum on independence. The central government says a vote would have to be on a proposal to improve the relationship of the northeast region with the rest of Spain.

Catalonias voters have for several years been roughly equally divided over the secession question, with half in favor and half wanting to remain in Spain.

The difference of opinion within the separatist camp on the usefulness of the negotiations marked Saturdays rally.

Catalan regional president Pere Aragones and his Republic Left of Catalonia party defended the negotiations with Spains government.

Catalonia is on the brink of doing something that it has never achieved before: opening a negotiation with the Spanish state, government to government, to tackle how we resolve this conflict, Aragones said. And we do so with the commitment from both sides that the result of this negotiation will be put to the Catalan citizenry for a vote.

The other two main pro-secession parties and the movements leading grassroots groups, however, see the negotiations at best as a waste of time, and at worst a betrayal of the mandate for independence that they claim to already have from the illegal referendum held four years ago that most unionists boycotted.

The National Catalan Assembly, the powerful group that organized Saturdays rally, sees the talks as a ruse to defuse their momentum. The official slogan of the rally was Fight and We Will Win Independence.

Jordi Sanchez, the general secretary of Together for Catalonia, also sees the talks as futile.

We are deeply skeptical of the attitude of the Spanish government and the outcome of this negotiation," he said.

Sanchez is one of nine high-profile separatists who were pardoned in June by Spains left-wing government led by Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez for their roles in instigating the failed breakaway attempt.

Let the spirit of reunion, mutual affection and concord be our guides on this (Catalan holiday), the Spanish leader said in a message on Twitter written in Catalan. We are advancing toward that which unites us.
Its been 20 years since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and teachers are remembering the day.

Erin Tighe, a fifth-grade teacher at Lincoln Elementary, was a student when the attacks happened.

Its a hard day, its difficult, she said.

Vicky Tabeek, now a reading specialist at Lincoln, was a elementary school teacher in the Springfield school district on 9/11.

Tabeek was on her way to teach in Springfield when she heard the World Trade Center had been hit by a plane.

When I was teaching in Springfield and got off the (highway) exit and heard it on the radio, I went right to school, Tabeek said.

Tabeek and Tighe, who have been teaching together for six years, can relate to how it feels to have lost someone that day. Tabeek lost her sister-in-law and Tighe lost her aunt.

Tighes aunt worked on the 92nd floor of the North Tower. Tabeeks sister-in-law also worked in the North Tower.

Now Tighe teaches her class the history of 9/11, starting with teaching them to stand up for whats right.

That lesson relies on the actions of passengers on United Airlines Flight 93, who attempted to regain control of the plane as it was hijacked. The plane ended up crashing into a field in Somerset County, Pennsylvania.

When you talk about it, it is real to them, Tabeek said.

Tighe shows video clips from Sept. 11 to her students every year, she said.

Tighe said she also talks with students about the pride of being an American.

For Jenny Barker-Devine, a history professor at Illinois College who focuses on U.S. history, watching the news that day was difficult.

I think I just felt startled and stunned, very uncertain about what to do next, she said. I knew I had some friends in New York City, so I was concerned about them. I was concerned about all the people I knew that would be affected by this.

Barker-Devine said she did not expect to react as she did.

It made you pause and think about everything, Barker-Devine said.
SKOPJE, North Macedonia (AP)  North Macedonia's health minister resigned late Friday, nearly two days after a fire tore through a COVID-19 field hospital killing 12 patients and two visiting relatives.

Venko Filipce made the announcement shortly after his deputy minister and two senior hospital administrators also stepped down.

There was no immediate reaction from the office of Prime Minister Zoran Zaev.

The fire broke out late Wednesday in the western town of Tetovo, destroying the facility within a few minutes. Twelve people were also injured. The blaze is believed to have started by accident, although an investigation is still under way. Witnesses and officials have said an explosion preceded the fire.

The public prosecutors office said eight women and six men aged between 29 and 78 were killed.

Nineteen field hospitals, funded by a World Bank loan, have been set up across North Macedonia over the past year to tackle surging coronavirus hospitalizations and a shortage of hospital beds. Health authorities say all 19 were constructed according to the specifications and standards laid out by the World Bank as a condition for the loan.

North Macedonia has said it is accepting an offer from other NATO allies to send fire experts. The government announced that a team from Germanys Federal Criminal Police Office will join the investigation.

President Stevo Pendarovski has said the investigation would be completed within five days, and that indications are the fire was not set deliberately.

It all lasted three to five minutes, said Gzim Nuredini, head of Tetovos COVID-19 center, adding that medical staff and patients relatives who were outside all tried to help extinguish the flames.

Prosecutors from Tetovo and the capital, Skopje, were gathering video material from inside and around the hospital, and have hired an electrical engineering expert to help determine how the blaze broke out.

Medical staff and witnesses have also been questioned, and prosecutors have ordered the confiscation of all documentation on the construction of the facility to check for potential omissions.

North Macedonias government has declared three days of mourning from Thursday.

Fires in COVID-19 hospitals or wards have cost dozens of lives in other countries, including Iraq and Romania.
WALLA WALLA, Wash. (AP)  A corrections officer at a Washington state prison accused of having a leadership role in a violent motorcycle gang has been arrested on various charges.

Corrections officer Dustin Wendelin was arrested at the prison at 6 a.m. Thursday by the Walla Walla County Sheriffs Office with help from regional law enforcement partners, The Tri-City Herald reported.

A second accused outlaw gang leader, Charles Montgomery, was arrested later Thursday at his home nearby in Umatilla County, Oregon, according to a news release from the sheriff's office.

Intelligence generated from traffic stops in Walla Walla County led to a joint investigation into two local members of the Pagans 1% Outlaw Motorcycle Gang, the news release said.

Attempts to reach lawyers who could comment for the men were not immediately successful on Friday.

Sheriffs officials collaborated on the investigation for several months with the Spalding County Sheriffs Office in Griffin, Georgia, and with federal law enforcement partners.

The Pagans frequently participate in violent crime, trafficking and racketeering, according to the sheriff's office. In the last several months, Pagan members across the country are suspected of participating in bombings, shootings, felonious assaults, and homicides, according to sheriffs officials.

Both Wendelin and Montgomery are indicted in Georgia on charges of aggravated assault, aggravated battery and three counts each of violations of the Street Gang Terrorism and Prevention Act.

Sheriffs officials said Wendelin and Montgomery hold leadership positions in a local Pagans chapter.

Prosecutors will seek their extradition to Georgia as the first step in a joint investigation into the West Coast Pagans gang, officials said. Multiple local, state and federal agencies are involved in the case, and officials said other charges are possible.
A collection of random thoughts and comments from the Journal-Couriers afternoon subscriber newsletter.

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When I first trekked from Florida to Jacksonville in March 2009, a few things stood out upon arrival: Sometimes it snows in March in the north, a stop at Walgreens would be required to buy some sweatpants to cover the goosebumps on my shorts-wearing legs, and Jacksonville had a unique arts community usually not seen in a town its size.

I was no stranger to smaller towns, but I wasnt sure what to expect after more than eight years in a city of more than 1 million people. There were a lot of things that attracted me to this city, but the vibrancy of its arts sealed the deal.

One of the first stops I made after interviewing for the editors position was the David Strawn Art Gallery. Since 1915, the Art Association of Jacksonville has hosted art exhibits at the building Dr. David Strawn deeded to it with the condition it be used as an art gallery. Its a sometimes-overlooked gem of the city.

For the past year or more, its been difficult to enjoy the arts much. Live plays and concerts essentially were shut down, and many museums went virtual during the pandemic. Seeing paintings through a 1920-by-1080-pixel screen cant capture the nuanced strokes of the artists brush; a computer monitor cant make you feel the same emotions that come from losing yourself in the pastels and watercolors.

Science feeds the brain. Art feeds the heart.

Starting Sunday (after an opening from 6 to 8 p.m. Saturday), there is a chance to experience the works of two artists the way it was meant to be enjoyed. The oil-on-wood paintings of by Amy Denny and acrylic-on-wood paintings of Kevin Veara will be displayed 1 to 3 p.m. Sundays and 4 to 6 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays through Sept. 26.

Its a welcome oasis, a chance to experience beauty in these ugly times.

Feed your heart. It deserves it now more than ever.

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Mark Twain was mostly right. Everybody talks about the weather, but no one ever does anything about it.

Some are willing to try, though.

A survey by Smiths Pest Management released today shows Illinoisans believe the extreme weather of the past few years  think droughts, wildfires and triple-digit temperatures  is unlikely to change. Almost 65% of Illinoisans say its the new normal, according to the survey, with 42% of those saying they are more worried about weather changes than another pandemic.

Although nearly half (48%) think its up to the government to determine what needs to be done to effect a change, 86% of people surveyed said they would be willing to take at least one green action a day  taking shorter showers, for example  if it could help.

Thats the thing about going green: Its sometimes mistaken with environmental activism, which can be a dirty phrase. It doesnt have to be a competition over who loves the planet the most.

Want to try? Start simple: Recycle those items that normally would get pitched in the trash can; keep your car well-maintained (and tires properly inflated) and group errands to avoid unnecessary driving; install a programmable thermostat or low-flow shower heads; turn off your computer at night when not in use; change to energy-saving light bulbs.

See  not that hard, and more impact than you can imagine.

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Were happy. Really.

Maybe not that Facebook friend from high school who you suspect now is living in an underground bunker (and you are a little afraid to unfriend), but the majority of us have made it through more than a year of pandemic with a fairly optimistic attitude. More than half of U.S. adults have a favorable view of life during the coming six to 18 months, according to a study commissioned by the Contact Lens Institute.

Perhaps its a side effect of so much being taken away that, as it slowly returns, we realize just how much we missed out. Apparently, that is eating out  52% say so  followed closely by getting together with friends and traveling. Interestingly enough, it drops to 24% for those who miss physical activities such as personal fitness.

Its encouraging that, with all the division and problems beyond the obnoxiously omnipresent pandemic, were looking for the bright spots and clutching them close. Were certainly not Pollyannas and are a long way from breaking into singing The sunll come out tomorrow, but were bullishly sanguine about what lies ahead.

Given what weve been through, thats pretty good.

David C.L. Bauer is editor and publisher of the Journal-Courier.
Popes Central Europe visit tests his health and diplomacy View Photo

VATICAN CITY (AP)  Pope Francis is making his first foreign trip since undergoing intestinal surgery in July, a four-day visit to Central Europe that will not only test his health but also provide one of the most awkward moments of his papacy  a meeting with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, the sort of populist, right-wing leader Francis typically scorns.

Francis is only spending seven hours in Budapest on Sunday before moving on to a three-day, hop-scotch tour of neighboring Slovakia. The lopsided itinerary suggests that Francis wanted to avoid giving Orban the bragging rights, political boost and photo opportunities that come with hosting a pope for a proper state visit.

Trip organizers have insisted Francis isnt snubbing Hungary, noting that the Hungarian church and state only invited him to close out an international conference on the Eucharist on Sunday. If I am only invited to dinner, I cannot spend the night, said the Rev. Kornel Fabry, secretary general of the Eucharist conference.

But the message being sent is clear, and Francis even hammered home the point in a recent interview with the COPE broadcaster of the Spanish bishops conference. In the interview last week, Francis said he didnt even know if hed meet with Orban while in Budapest. Vatican officials have said he will, of course, meet with the prime minister along with the Hungarian president in a scheduled meeting.

Botond Feledy, policy expert for the Institute of Social Reflection, a Hungarian Jesuit organization, said it was clear Francis and Orban disagree on some fundamental issues  migration topping the list  but said the aim is not to escalate differences or conflicts.

It is quite clear that the 30 minutes that Pope Francis has in his program to meet with the head of state, the head of government and the bishop is a very, very short time, Feledy said in an interview. This shows that he is not really coming for a political visit, but to give a Mass at the congress after having a protocol greeting with the Hungarian politicians.

Francis has long expressed solidarity with migrants and refugees  he once brought a dozen Syrian Muslim refugees home with him during a trip to a refugee camp in Greece  and criticized what he called national populism advanced by governments like Hungarys.

Orban is known for his hard-line stance against immigration and frequently depicts his government as a defender of Christian civilization in Europe and a bulwark against migration from Muslim-majority countries. In 2015, he rejected proposals to settle refugees from the Middle East and Africa in Hungary and erected a fence along Hungarys southern border to keep out EU asylum-seekers.

Asked in 2016 about Donald Trumps border wall with Mexico, Francis famously quipped that anyone who builds a border wall is not Christian.

The start of the closed-door meeting will not be filmed live  one of the few moments of interest that the pope will be off-camera during the trip. Its a visit that is being closely watched given it marks Francis first big and prolonged public outing since he underwent scheduled surgery in July for what the Vatican said was a severe narrowing of his large intestine.

Francis, 84, had 33 centimeters (13 inches) of his colon removed and spent 10 days in the hospital recovering. He has recently resumed holding public and private audiences and says he is now living a totally normal life. But he is still on medication and cannot stand for long periods of time.

Papal trips are grueling under ordinary circumstances, with back-to-back meetings, multiple transfers and lengthy liturgical services, all covered around-the-clock by live television cameras. After his last one  a trip to Iraq in March before the surgery  Francis admitted he might have to slow down, given his age and fatigue.

But the Hungary-Slovakia program bears no evidence of an aging pope or of one the mend and in fact harks back to the frenzied scheduling that was the hallmark of St. John Paul IIs many foreign trips. Francis is due to deliver 12 speeches over four days, kicking off with a 6 a.m. flight to Budapest on Sunday and ending the day in the Slovakian capital, Bratislava, after nine separate events.

Maybe in this first trip I should be more careful, because one has to recover completely, Francis said in the COPE interview. But in the end it will be the same as the others, you will see.

Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said no extra health care measures were being taken for the trip, just the usual caution. Francis personal doctor and nurses would be traveling with him in the Vatican delegation, as usual, he said.

Bruni, too, stressed that the main focus of the Hungary leg of the trip was spiritual and noted that Francis has made other quick trips for specific events without fulfilling the protocol trappings of a proper state visit. The pope went to Strasbourg, France, on a one-day visit in 2014 to deliver speeches at the European Parliament and Council of Europe, but didnt stay.

After the brief stop in Budapest, Francis heads to Slovakia where the highlight of the trip will be his visit Tuesday with members of the countrys Roma minority, who were persecuted during World War II and continue to face racism, discrimination and abject poverty today.

The pope of the peripheries has long sought to visit the most marginal during his foreign trips, insisting on stops at slums, prisons or drug rehabilitation centers. His visit to the Lunik IX settlement in Slovakias second city, Kosice, is in keeping with that: Parts of the settlement dont have running water, gas or electricity.

Francis will also meet with Slovakias Jewish community and hear the testimony of a Holocaust survivor before he finishes up the visit with a Mass on Wednesday in Sastin, the site of an annual pilgrimage each Sept. 15 to venerate the patron of Slovakia, Our Lady of Sorrows.

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Spike reported from Budapest, Hungary.

By NICOLE WINFIELD and JUSTIN SPIKE

Associated Press
Colombian ex-soldiers in Haiti accuse police of torture View Photo

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP)  Former Colombian soldiers arrested in Haiti in the assassination of President Jovenel Moise have accused local authorities of torture, saying theyve been burned, stabbed and hit in the head with a hammer, among other things.

Details of the alleged torture are contained in a Sept. 6 letter addressed to Colombias president and other high-ranking officials as well as the Interamerican Court of Human Rights and the International Committee of the Red Cross. It was signed by the 18 former soldiers arrested in the slaying.

Relatives of the soldiers provided a copy of the letter to The Associated Press but asked not to be identified for their safety.

In the letter, the soldiers accuse Haitian police officers of shooting at them with powerful weapons when they tried to turn themselves in with their hands raised just hours after Moise was killed at his private home on July 7.

We were deceived by people and companies in the United States and Haiti that seek to accuse us of acts for which we are not responsible. Dont let an injustice be committed, they wrote.

Several days after the killing, Colombian President Ivan Duque said the majority of the former soldiers arrested were duped and thought they were traveling to Haiti for a legitimate mission to provide protection. He said only a small group of them knew it was a criminal operation.

In the letter, the ex-soldiers describe how police tortured and then executed one of their colleagues who was injured after being shot by Haitian officers while trying to turn himself over. He was one of three former Colombian soldiers killed. The letter also accuses police of kicking some ex-soldiers in the testicles and even burned one of them in their groin, allegedly while saying that human rights dont exist in Haiti and that they could do whatever they wanted.

The ex-soldiers alleged that other colleagues were thrown against walls, one had his foot burned with hot oil, another was kicked in the mouth and suffers from two broken teeth and that police released at least three of them to a crowd that attacked with machetes or stabbed them.

They also accused authorities of keeping all of them handcuffed for 24 days, and that they didnt receive food or water in the first two days after their capture. They wrote that the bathrooms in the cell they were being held at in police headquarters werent working, so feces filled the area and caused their wounds to become infected.

The lack of timely medical attention also was denounced by the Colombian Ombudsmans Office, a state entity in charge of ensuring human rights, after a July 26 visit with the ex-soldiers. In its report, the office warned that three of the detainees had considerable injuries and needed specialized medical treatment.

Once they were transferred to a penitentiary, the ex-soldiers said there were no bathrooms and no potable water, which they either have to buy or wait for a good Samaritan to bring them some. They noted that they get fed only once a day and that some of the ex-soldiers have lost up to 44 pounds (20 kilograms).

The United Nations and other organizations have long denounced prison conditions in Haiti, noting that they are severely overcrowded and that inmates are often ill-treated, sometimes tortured and can spend more than a decade behind bars without going to a single court hearing or being charged with anything.

In their letter, the ex-soldiers added they dont have an attorney, dont know what charges they face and that theyre barred from calling their families: We find ourselves completely isolated.

The ex-soldiers also said that Haitian authorities already had prepared written statements before interviewing them and ordered them to sign the documents drafted in a language they didnt understand.

Torture has been employed as a way to obtain statements, they wrote.

The ex-soldiers said one of the main officials overseeing the case was responsible for the torture, calling him a professional in torturing humans. They did not identify him.

We thank you in advance for your attention and prompt response to this cry for help and complaints, they wrote.

Neither the office of Colombias president nor the foreign ministry immediately returned messages for comment. A spokeswoman for Haitis National Police did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Haitian authorities have detained more than 40 suspects in the killing of Moise during an attack in which his wife, Martine Moise, was injured. Meanwhile, court clerks investigating the case have gone into hiding after being threatened with death if they didnt change certain names and statements in their reports.

In addition, a Haitian judge assigned to oversee the investigation stepped down last month citing personal reasons. He left after one of his assistants died in unclear circumstances. A new judge has been assigned, but the former Colombian soldiers have yet to appear in court.

___

Associated Press writer Danica Coto in San Juan, Puerto Rico contributed to this report.

By ASTRID SUAREZ

Associated Press
Drop off box at VotDrop off box at Tuolumne County Elections Office in Sonora View Photo

Sonora, CA  In-person voting centers are open for a second weekend to make it easy for voters to cast their ballots in the Governors Recall Election.

There are five centers including one in Sonora, Twain Harte, Jamestown, Tuolumne, and Groveland. All are open from 8:30 to 4:30 p.m. for in-person voting. Click here for the schedule and here for the ballot drop box locations across the county.

On Friday, California Gov. Gavin Newsom voted to keep himself in office, days before the recall election against him ends. The Democratic governor cast his ballot at an early voting center in Sacramento and stated, Im just focused on doing the job, encouraging folks to turn out and to get our base out at this critical juncture.

The recall of Newsom was spurred shortly after he was spotted dining at the exclusive French Laundry restaurant with a large group, while also calling on Californians to avoid that situation. He also enrolled his children in a private school at a time when most public schools were doing distance learning.

The last day to vote is Tuesday, and at least a third of Californias 22 million registered voters have already cast ballots. Tuolumne County has been running well above that number sometimes even double the states average on ballot returns. County Clerk and Auditor-Controller Debi Bautista details, Weve received a little less than 19-thousand ballots. Were really close to about 56%. Weve never had these kinds of numbers before an election and especially four days before one. She added it shows that voters are really engaged. When asked about the breakdown according to political parties, Bautista says her office does not run those types of reports.

Most of the voting has been done through mail-in votes. Bautista noted that election day is when the county receives about 10% of the vote, typically. Trying to avoid that crush and noting the only slow area has been at the voting centers, three opened last weekend, she disclosed, Were hoping that we get a lot of turnout at the vote centers this weekend because so far in seven days weve only had 34 people vote at the centers.

The Governors main challenger is Republican and conservative radio host Larry Elder, who yesterday stated that he is worried about possible voter fraud. He reported that he has an integrity board, with lawyers ready to look into questions about possible fraud or other irregularities.

Elder alleged, I believe that there might very well be shenanigans, as there were in the 2020 election. Referring to former President Donald Trumps claims of fraud in his loss to Joe Biden.

Bautista takes issue with the fraud claims, stating, Im tired of being called names. Im tired of being called a fraud (due to her position). Regarding those views expressed, she contends. Theres just too many checks and balances. Theres the manual one percent count that you have to count by hand, the signature verification, and volunteers versus using just staff. Theres a lot of checks and balances so fraud doesnt happen.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP)  Police in California would no longer be able to arrest anyone for loitering with the intent to engage in prostitution under a bill approved by state lawmakers on Friday amid debate over whether the move would help or harm sex trafficking victims.

But Sen. Scott Wiener then used a procedural move to withhold the bill from the governors consideration until next year.

The delay until January gives supporters more time to make the case about why this civil rights bill is good policy that should be signed into law and why this discriminatory loitering crime goes against California values and needs to be repealed, Wieners office said in a statement.

Wiener, a Democrat from San Francisco, argued that the crime too often depends on an officers perception and results in disproportionate arrests of transgender, Black and Latino women.

His bill would repeal that portion of California law. It was approved in the Assembly on a 41-26 vote and by the Senate on a 26-9 roll call.

It would also allow those who are currently serving sentences or who were previously convicted to ask a court to dismiss and seal the record of the conviction.

Similar legislation became law in New York in February. Wiener said the measures are part of an effort to end discrimination against and violence toward sex workers.

The current law harms public safety and trafficking victims by increasing the mistrust of police particularly among targeted communities, which means people will not engage with law enforcement when they need it, said Democratic Assemblywoman Rebecca Bauer-Kahan during the Assembly debate.

Criminalizing the victims and leaving them with criminal records that create further barriers to seeking employment, housing and relief is not the answer, she said.

Opponents rallied at the state Capitol on Tuesday, arguing that the measure essentially legalizes the most dangerous form of prostitution. The measure endangers those who are forced into sex trafficking, they argued.

It would severely undermine the ability of law enforcement to investigate trafficking crimes, numerous opponents said in a letter to lawmakers last month. The bill assumes that sex work is voluntary, when the opponents contend that many are coerced.

Supporters of the bill made it seem like this group simply gets judged and targeted because they are minding their own business and standing on corners, and thats just simply not the case, sex-trafficking survivor Sable Horton said in a statement.

Bauer-Kahan took offense when Assemblyman Jim Cooper, a fellow Democrat and former Sacramento County sheriffs captain, said officers should be allowed to presume that women who are provocatively dressed like that and carrying a purse full of condoms are street walkers.

Its not rocket science, Cooper said. You know who the players are and who they arent.

I know Im probably not the only woman on the floor that was triggered when one of our colleagues said, Well, theyre dressed that way, Bauer-Kahan responded. Being dressed that way is not a crime, and it will never be OK to be victimized because you were dressed in any manner.

The bill had support from both a former public defender, Assemblyman Ash Kalra, and a former prosecutor, Assemblyman Al Muratsuchi, both Democrats.

Law enforcement can help people without threatening to arrest them, Kalra said.

This simply eliminates this vague provision in the penal code that allows for abuses for people that they simply be profiled for the wrong reasons, Muratsuchi said.

Wieners bill has support from the American Civil Liberties Union as well as groups representing LGTBQ individuals and sex workers.

The ACLU said the measure eliminates a law that allows police to rely on bias rather than evidence to criminalize otherwise legal activities like walking, dressing or standing in public.

Also Friday, lawmakers approved a bill responding to the 2019 mass shooting at a synagogue in Poway, California. The underage gunman was able to buy his assault weapon because his lack of a valid hunting license wasnt verified, a loophole the bill aims to close.

The same bill would broaden a new mandate that the state attorney general investigate all fatal shootings by police of unarmed civilians to include instances where there is a reasonable dispute whether that civilian was armed.

Lawmakers also approved another Wiener bill ending mandatory minimum prison or jail sentences for nonviolent drug offenses, giving judges more discretion to impose probation or other alternative sentences.

Legislators also sent the governor a bill increasing the minimum age to become a police officer to 21 and requiring state regulators and education experts to develop a modern policing degree program.

By DON THOMPSON

Associated Press
(Editors note: This project is a collaboration between the Plainview Herald and Saint Francis Ministries to showcase kids who are cleared for adoption.)

Janessa is a very silly and sassy 10-year-old girl. She is always fashion-forward and coming up with the latest clothing trends.

The 10-year-olds favorite thing to do is to make her family laugh while putting on fashion shows. This girly girl loves to be the center of attention and is a social butterfly.

She is very passionate and opinionated about the things she feels are important.

Janessa hopes to be a clothing designer when she grows up and would love to be in gymnastics or dance. Janessa is ready to strut her stuff, could your home be her runway?

---

Janessa is among the children listed on the Texas Adoption Resource Exchange (TARE) website. Visit https://www.dfps.state.tx.us/Application/TARE/Home.aspx/Default for more details.

Saint Francis Ministries is a nonprofit organization and a community-based care provider for the Texas Department of Family Protective Services Region 1. This region includes 41 counties across the Panhandle and South Plains.

To learn more about fostering or adopting, those interested are encouraged to attend one of the monthly virtual meetings hosted by Saint Francis Ministries and other child placing agencies. The meetings provide information about how to get started, the basic qualifications and more, in addition to providing opportunity for attendees to ask questions.

Those interested can visit Saint Francis Texas on Facebook @SFMtexas to register for the online meetings, which can also be found below:

The meetings are scheduled for the second Thursday of the month (Lubbock area  https://lubbock-area-foster-care-adoption.eventbrite.com) and the third Thursday of the month (Amarillo area  https://amarillo-area-foster-care-adoption.eventbrite.com).

For more information, please contact Erin Baxter at (806) 317-5631 or email texasinfo@st-francis.org. Visit Saint Francis Ministries online at https://saintfrancisministries.org.
The deadline is quickly approaching for eligible former foster youth to apply for PanAid.

Those interested in applying for funding must do so by Wednesday, Sept. 15.

The funding is coming from the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services to partner organizations like Texas Alliance for Children and Family Services and Monarch Family Services. Its part of a federal aid package passed in December 2020 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, said Jamie McCormick, vice president of public affairs for Texas Alliance of Child and Family Services. States began disbursing the funding over the summer.

This is aid that is specifically to target youth that have aged out of care or young adults aged out of foster care, she said. Former foster youth between the ages of 18 to 26 could be eligible.

Applicants can receive up to $1,000 to help with living expenses like rent or groceries, phone bills or any financial hardship experienced within the last 18 months.

An estimated 9,000 individuals in Texas within that age group could be eligible to receive this funding, McCormick said.

As the deadline approaches, the organizations offering distributing the funding are making one last push to get the word out about its availability.

I do think this population needs a lot of support, McCormick said. Many times, they might not have the same network that other young adults might have.

She noted that now is a particularly challenging time.

If anybody knows somebody, share this information, she said. We want to make sure it reaches as many Texans as possible that might be eligible.
The new Plainview City Hall location will officially open to the public at 9 a.m. on Sept. 20.

The current City Hall location, the Finance Office and Main Street office will all be closed Sept. 16 and 17 for the move to the new central location at 202 W. 5th Street.

We are working to move to the new building as quickly as possible in order to create as little disruption in City services as possible, said City Manager Jeffrey Snyder.

Moving City Hall was one of the six bond projects approved by citizens in 2017. City Hall will move to a building that was donated by Centennial Bank in February 2019. The last two years since the acquisition of the building have been spent remodeling the inside with the aid of a $6 million bond.

The new 44,000-square-foot building allows space so most city offices and departments are in one location as opposed to being spread out across the downtown district.

The City Council approved a furniture package for the new location back in April and city leaders had been waiting for it to arrive to begin the transition.

While city offices will be closed Thursday and Friday, there are still ways for citizens to make various payments.

Utility bills and municipal court tickets can be paid via online payment options or through the secured automated telephone system. Phone payments can be made with Mastercard or Visa. Any utility bills can be paid by calling (866)277-1446 and municipal tickets can be paid by calling (866)279-4737. They can also be paid online at www.plainviewtx.org by clicking the Quick Pay and Account Management links.

Those who need immediate assistance including building inspects can also call (806)296-1100.

Moving City Hall will also allow the city to begin the transition of the Police Station  another bond project  to 901 Broadway.
Citizens gathered at the flag pole at Kidsville on Sept. 11, 2021 for a special ceremony marking the 20th anniversary of 9/11.
WALLINGFORD  A tenured teacher at Lyman Hall High School alleges that school officials discriminated against him due to his physical disability by not letting him teach remotely.

Jason Sorensen, an English teacher who taught at Sheehan High School for seven years until making a crosstown transfer to Lyman Hall this year, filed a complaint with the state Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities in October 2020.

Sorensen and Attorney Peter Goselin are preparing to file the complaint in federal district court after the mandatory mediation step with CHRO failed to resolve the complaint.

Hes currently teaching in person. The school year began Aug. 30 with all students and staff returning to school.

In his CHRO complaint, Sorensen said he was denied an accommodation to teach remotely in the 2020-21 school year, which he requested due to his weakened immune system.

School Superintendent Danielle Bellizzi, who was Wallingfords assistant superintendent for personnel before stepping into the top position July 1, declined to comment on Sorensens complaint specifically, but shared a general statement regarding the layered mitigation strategies that are currently in place district-wide.

Wallingford Public Schools takes all requests for workplace accommodations from staff members very seriously and each situation is handled on a case by case basis, she said.

Sorensen, 46, was diagnosed in July 2019 with acute myeloid leukemia  a form of blood cancer.

He received a bone marrow transplant in late October 2019 that left him immunocompromised with a high risk of infection.

He was placed on a long term leave of absence, under the terms of his union contract and the Family and Medical Leave Act, for the rest of the 2019-20 school year.

In March 2020, COVID-19 struck and Gov. Ned Lamont issued an executive order closing all public schools. For the remainder of the school year, all instruction in Wallingford was conducted remotely.

In May 2020, Sorensen said that he began to prepare to return to work from his leave of absence and resume teaching full time.

According to his CHRO complaint, school officials claimed that Sorensen had no right to his former position and that if he chose to return, it would be either as a part time teacher or a full time assignment in coding  a completely different subject area.

They considered me to be retired and (that) I resigned from my position, Sorensen said last week. I feel like they didnt want me to return. They put up some roadblocks.

Sorensens leave of absence was approved through the Connecticut Teachers Retirement Board. It included one month of paid leave, but he received disability benefits from the board.

According to a letter from Bellizzi dated May 22, 2020  when she was still the head of personnel  school districts are not required to hold a position for a teacher who is receiving Teachers Retirement Board disability benefits and may consider such a teacher to be retired.

The letter further stated that the district was willing to permit his return to work in Wallingford for the 2020-21 school year as a courtesy.

The typical process seemed to be a little bit strained, in terms of negotiating what would happen, Sorensen said. It took over a month to get to a point where they even said that I had a position.

According to a letter from an unnamed nurse practitioner in the adult stem cell transplant program at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, Sorensen remained at high risk for infection due to immune suppression in August 2020.

He submitted the letter with his request to teach remotely for the 2020-21 school year, but he continued to find resistance from school officials, the complaint stated.

For the current school year, Sorensen returned to the classroom. Another letter from Dana-Farber stated that he suffered a complication from the bone marrow transplant, Graft-versus-Host disease, which necessitates ongoing immune suppression medication.

The letter, dated Aug. 23, states that because Sorensen is at high risk for infection, it is medically advisable for him to continue off-site remote teaching ... If remote teaching is not possible, then strict adherence to proper ventilation, mask-wearing, and physical distancing would be required.

A second letter from Dana-Farber, dated Aug. 27, recommended that his classroom (have) an operational HEPA filter, as well as an air conditioning unit in his room to further filter the air and improve his ability to wear an N95 mask for the duration of the day.

Bellizzi said the school district complies with the requirements and guidelines set forth by local, state and federal health officials for all staff and students.

These measures include the requirement for all staff and students to wear a mask while indoors, adherence to social distancing protocols, compliance with ventilation and water system protocols, disinfecting and cleaning protocols, hand sanitizer throughout the school, promotion of frequent hand washing, personal protective equipment (PPE) upon request for staff such as gloves, face shields, masks, and gowns, student desk and teacher desk shield if requested, sick isolation room in every building for students who are feeling sick during the day, frequent reminders to all staff and students to stay home if they are feeling sick, contact tracing and adherence to quarantining protocols.

Bellizzi also said that if an employee requests additional accommodations specific to their unique health circumstances, an interactive process is engaged to determine eligibility for accommodations and, if appropriate, to develop a plan of reasonable accommodations for the employee.

Sorensen said that even though its been a tough experience, the community and the staff of Lyman Hall have been great as Ive reintegrated.

Its been great to have that overwhelming support from those people who are close and working with me on a daily basis, he said, and knowing that theres support from the community. Its been nice to have that for sure.

LTakores@record-journal.com203-317-2212Twitter: @LCTakores
During the four years of Donald Trump's presidency, the 9 p.m. hour on Fox News hosted by Sean Hannity was the go-to spot for tame interviews with the administration's key players and top cheerleaders, including many sit-downs with Trump himself.

The man in the White House has changed, but the bookings on "Hannity" have not. In the 7 months since Joe Biden was inaugurated as president, Hannity's show has begun to resemble a sort of Trump administration-in-exile, featuring regular interviews with former administration officials, members of Trump's family and occasionally the former president. The perennial topics: how the Biden administration is messing up, and how Trump would do things better.

Of the approximately 160 episodes of "Hannity" that have aired since Jan. 20, more than 60 percent have included at least one former Trump administration official, and often more, according to a Washington Post tally. Nearly 30 percent of those episodes featured a member of the Trump family. A Trump appears on "Hannity" every night for some consecutive stretches: Lara Trump was on the show Friday, Aug. 13, and returned the following Monday. Trump himself appeared the next night, and Donald Trump Jr. the night after that. And on two occasions since Biden's inauguration, the "Hannity" set was packed with four former Trump aides on the same night.

The sheer volume of Trump content suggests that Hannity, who was noticeably downcast after Trump's electoral loss in November, has increasingly aligned himself with the former president, who is teasing the possibility that he'll run again in 2024. It also suggests that the host views Trump and his associates as the future of the Republican Party, in contrast to some colleagues at Fox who have argued that the party should move on to less-divisive candidates.

Lara Trump is one of Hannity's favorite guests, accounting for 25 of 47 appearances by Trump family members since he left office. On Tuesday night, Hannity prompted her to talk up her father-in-law's mental abilities ("He does not need notes," she affirmed) and to blast Biden ("Let's take this guy out," she said. "He can't run the country. He's an embarrassment.")

Like many of the former administration officials who appear on Hannity's show, Lara Trump is on the Fox News payroll, having signed a contract as a paid commentator in March in a deal that helped cement the close bond between the former president's entourage and the cable news network. Trump's former press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, also has a contributor contract with Fox. She has made 26 appearances on "Hannity" since January.

But "Hannity" seems to welcome former Trump aides regardless of their current affiliations. Stephen Miller, who was Trump's longest-serving White House aide, has made 21 appearances over Hannity's last 163 episodes. So has Richard Grenell, Trump's former acting director of national intelligence. Former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows has made 17. And Trump himself has sat for six interviews with Hannity since leaving office.

"It very much is like a nightly kind of missive from the Trump campaign," said Robert Thompson, a professor of television and pop culture at Syracuse University. "That show reminds me of a rally every night at 9."

On Wednesday's episode, Hannity handed the floor to the former president's oldest son, Donald Trump Jr., and asked him to weigh in on the chaotic evacuation of U.S. troops and allies from Afghanistan. "What would your dad do?" he asked.

"Sean, the only thing these animals respect and understand is strength, and Joe Biden exudes nothing but weakness," Trump Jr. said, referring to the Taliban and terrorist groups. "Donald Trump exuded strength. . . . Donald Trump also had the brainpower to actually negotiate like a real businessman, not a bureaucrat politician with no real-world experience."

Sometimes, Hannity gushes about Trump before his guests can.

"Your dad has more energy than a thousand men that I know," the host told the former president's son Eric Trump on Aug. 30. "We need Donald Trump today more than we've ever needed him before," replied Eric, who like his brother Trump Jr. has been on "Hannity" eight times since Inauguration Day.

And just as when Trump was in office, Hannity's guests face sympathetic questioning. Former secretary of state Mike Pompeo (yet another paid Fox News contributor) appeared on "Hannity" for the 10th time since Biden's inauguration on Tuesday night. The topic was once again last month's troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, which the U.S. committed to when Trump was president, in an agreement with the Taliban that Pompeo helped forge.

But Hannity assured his audience that the Trump team would have avoided the violence and confusion that plagued the evacuation mission under Biden.

"Mr. Secretary, you never would have allowed it to get to this point," Hannity told Pompeo before asking him any questions. All his guest had to do was agree.

"We would have made very clear that if you touch an American, threaten an American, you don't allow an American to get on an airplane and get home, we're going to make your life miserable," Pompeo said. "Instead, it seems like legal niceties, statements, news releases - this is the stuff of American power under President Biden."

Fox News representatives did not respond to a request for comment on Hannity's booking decisions, or on the network's practice of hiring former Trump administration officials as paid analysts.

Nikki Usher, an associate professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's College of Media, said the buffet of Trump officials had multiple purposes. They help Hannity hold the interest of his conservative viewers, and help Trump's team test out political messages in front of a large, devoted audience.

"You're not just seeding attention for a potential Trump run, but you're also helping make and solidify the political careers of everyone who comes on," Usher said. "I wouldn't be surprised to see some of these political figures go and run for senator and governor."
Howard Stern was reflecting this week on the coronavirus deaths of four conservative talk-radio hosts who had espoused anti-vaccine and anti-mask sentiments when he took aim at those who have refused to get vaccinated.

"I want my freedom to live," he said Tuesday on his SiriusXM program. "I want to get out of the house. I want to go next door and play chess. I want to go take some pictures."

The shock jock, who advocated for the coronavirus vaccine to be mandatory, then turned his attention to the hesitancy that has played a significant role in the U.S. spread of the virus, leading to what Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has called a "pandemic of the unvaccinated." He pointed to unvaccinated people who are "clogging" up overwhelmed hospitals, calling them "imbeciles" and "nut jobs" and suggesting that doctors and nurses not treat those who have not taken a coronavirus vaccine.

"I'm really of mind to say, 'Look, if you didn't get vaccinated [and] you got covid, you don't get into a hospital,' " he said. "You had the cure and you wouldn't take it."

Stern's comments come after several other celebrities expressed to their large social media audiences their frustration with the ongoing lag in vaccinations when hospitals are being pushed to their limits by the highly transmissible delta variant.

More than 185,000 coronavirus infections were reported Wednesday across the United States, according to data compiled by The Washington Post. Nearly 102,000 people are hospitalized with covid-19; more than 26,000 are in intensive care units. A slight decline in hospitalizations over the past week has inspired cautious optimism among public health leaders.

While there is not a nationwide vaccine mandate, President Joe Biden is expected to sign an executive order Thursday requiring that all federal employees be vaccinated, without an alternative for regular coronavirus testing to opt out of the mandate, The Post reported. The order affecting the estimated 2.1 million federal workers comes as Biden plans to outline a "robust plan to stop the spread of the delta variant and boost covid-19 vaccinations," the White House said.

Health officials, doctors and nurses nationwide have urged those still hesitant to get vaccinated - and some have gone a step further. Jason Valentine, a physician in Mobile, Ala., informed patients last month that he would not treat anyone who was unvaccinated, saying there were "no conspiracy theories, no excuses" preventing anyone from being vaccinated. Linda Marraccini, a doctor in South Miami, said this month that she would not treat unvaccinated patients in person, noting that her office would "no longer subject our patients and staff to unnecessary risk."

The summer surge also has led celebrities to use their platform to either call on unvaccinated people to get vaccinated or to denounce them for not doing so. Actor and activist Sean Penn said the vaccine should be mandatory and has called on Hollywood to implement vaccination guidelines on film sets. Actors Benicio Del Toro and Zoe Saldana were part of a vaccine video campaign this year to help debunk misinformation about coronavirus vaccination. When actress Melissa Joan Hart revealed her breakthrough coronavirus case last month, she said she was angry that the nation "got lazy" about getting vaccinated and that masking was not required at her children's school.

Late-night talk host Jimmy Kimmel suggested Tuesday that hospitals shouldn't treat unvaccinated patients who prefer to take ivermectin - a medicine long used to kill parasites in animals and humans that has soared in popularity despite being an unproven covid-19 treatment and the subject of warnings by health officials against its use for the coronavirus. After noting that Anthony Fauci, the chief medical adviser to Biden, warned that some hospitals might be forced to make "tough choices" on who gets an ICU bed, the late-night host quipped that the situation was not difficult.

"That choice doesn't seem so tough to me," Kimmel said. "Vaccinated person having a heart attack? Yes, come right in; we'll take care of you. Unvaccinated guy who gobbled horse goo? Rest in peace, wheezy."

Stern has featured front-line workers on his show and has advocated for people to get vaccinated against the coronavirus. In December, the host interviewed Cody Turner, a physician at the Cleveland Clinic, about how the front-line doctor struggled with his mental health while treating infected patients when a vaccine was not widely available.

"We are drowning and we are in hell, and people don't understand, not only what's happening to people, you know, but patients across this country," Turner said.

Stern was a fierce critic of President Donald Trump's response to the pandemic, saying last year that his former friend was "treasonous" for telling supporters to attend large rallies, despite the risk of infection, in the run-up to the presidential election.

On his eponymous program this week, Stern referred to four conservative talk-radio hosts who bashed the vaccine and eventually died of the virus: Marc Bernier, 65; Phil Valentine, 61; Jimmy DeYoung, 81; and Dick Farrel, 65. In the weeks and months leading up to their deaths last month, all four men had publicly shared their opposition to mainstream public health efforts when coronavirus infections were spiking.

"Four of them were like ranting on the air - they will not get vaccinated," Stern said Tuesday. "They were on fire . . . they were all dying and then their dying words were, 'I wish I had been more into the vaccine. I wish I had taken it.' "

After he played a clip of Bernier saying he would not get vaccinated, Stern suggested that the coronavirus vaccine be considered as normal as a measles or mumps vaccine.

"When are we going to stop putting up with the idiots in this country and just say it's mandatory to get vaccinated?" he asked.
Southtown restaurateurs Emily and Houston Carpenter are preparing to add a heavyweight to South Alamo's food scene scale.

The husband-wife duo says Up Scale is undergoing finishing touches and is due to open "early fall." Houston Carpenter has a tentative opening date in mind, but considering the setbacks the hospitality industry has been dealt during the pandemic, from staff shortages to COVID-19 surges, he doesn't want solidify a date in haste.

Up Scale marks the Carpenters' second restaurant opening in under a year. They added a pop of pastels last winter when Southtown went seaside with the opening of Little Em's Oyster Bar.

"We opened Little Em's in December, so two restaurants in one year," Emily Carpenter says. "We're really excited, we feel really blessed."

The Carpenters previously described Up Scale as Little Em's grown and "sexy" sister. The menu will expand on Little Em's seafood offerings with a sushi bar serving rolls, nigiri and, sashimi, as well as scallops, branzino, and halibut. Steaks will also have a spot on the menu. While Little Em's serves beer and wine, Up Scale features a full bar menu with some signature cocktails.

Up Scale will also give the Carpenters an opportunity to serve more people at once. The 2,500-square-foot space is able to seat 160 guests, as opposed to their more intimate digs at Little Em's, which can host 50 inside.

The speedy opening of their second concept was not typical. Construction began in mid-March. Houston Carpenter, who owns a construction company, says all of the in-house work cut the time in half. While expedited, the Carpenters did not cut corners. San Antonians may remember the building as previously housing Feast. Houston Carpenter says there are no traces left of the bygone restaurant.

"When we found this spot, it was in really, really bad shape," he adds. "We completely gutted it, installed all new plumbing, all new electrical, all new. HVAC. It's a whole new restaurant."

The couple hired New York City-based designer Crystal Sinclair, who is currently an HGTV Designer of the Year nominee, to give Up Scale its signature aesthetic. The Carpenters shared preview photos showing a blush midcentury modern banquette, sleek black terrazo floors, and a polyhedral chandelier that Sinclair describes as a "vintage glam throwback of glimmering goodness."

In other words, it's a space worthy of that outfit you've been saving for a good night out.

"I would say Little Em's is very cute and fresh," Houston Carpenter says. "Over here, I would say it's a dark, sexy vibe. It's more posh."

The couple credits their staff with holding down the fort at Little Em's during the first year of business to allow them to open Up Scale.

"We've gone after those talented in the industry, and we're letting them shine," Houston Carpenter says. "We very much attribute our success to them."

As for the inspiration to steam roll into another venture, the couple says they're pulling flavor from their foodie adventures. They say Up Scale will be an infusion of their dining experiences in Beverly Hills and New York City.

"From the finishes, to the food, to the cocktails, both East and West Coast will shine at Up Scale," Houston Carpenter says.

Now with two restaurants under their belt, the Carpenters are teasing more concepts they hope to add to their new formed hospitality group, Carpenter and Carpenter. Houston Carpenter says there are plans for a wine bar and more, though they're keeping them under wraps for now.

"We just thought Emily would sell a couple of oysters a day and that would be the end of it," Houston Carpenter says. "A year ago, I was like, 'I'm a construction guy,' but now I say I'm in hospitality. We've fallen in love with the industry."

"The talk is how Little Em's transformed King William, and everyone's excited to have the same hospitality from Little Em's, but in an Up Scale form across the street," he adds. "Everyone knows that we're not from out of town, trying to make a quick buck, we live two blocks away from both restaurants. So we're emotionally and spiritually invested in this neighborhood."

Like its sister restaurant, Up Scale will be open Wednesday through Sunday. Wednesday through Saturday hours will be 4:30 to 10:30 p.m. and 10:20 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. for Sunday brunch.

"I always hear 'One is lucky, two is good,'" Houston Carpenter says. "So, those that think Little Em's is lucky, we're about to show them that we're good."

Up Scale is located at 1024 South Alamo Street.
JACKSON, Miss. (AP)  Physicians who spread misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccine could now have their license to practice medicine suspended or completely revoked, according to a new policy adopted by the Mississippi State Board of Medical Licensure.

The policy, adopted on Sept. 7, says that doctors have an ethical and professional responsibility to practice medicine in the best interest of their patients and share factual and scientifically-grounded information with them.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP)  An offshoot of the Republican Attorneys General Association that sent a robocall urging patriots to support then-President Donald Trump at the Jan. 6 rally that preceded the storming of the U.S. Capitol held a special war games meeting weeks before the election to discuss its strategies if Trump lost.

The two-day conference in September 2020 was among more than 20 meetings that the Rule of Law Defense Fund held in the four months before the November election for senior aides to Republicans who were their states' chief law enforcement officials. But unlike the others, it was held in-person despite coronavirus cases surging and the vaccine still months from coming to market, and the group paid attendees' travel costs.

The Defense Fund, which is a branch of the Republican Attorneys General Association, gained notoriety for its robocall the day before the Jan. 6 insurrection, when pro-Trump demonstrators stormed the Capitol in an attempt to thwart the certification of Joe Biden's victory.

Emails from the offices of the Republican attorneys general in Kansas and Missouri show that the Defense Fund held weekly calls for senior staffers in state offices, a virtual roundtable with senior corporate attorneys in July and the in-person summit in September. It also held a Zoom strategy session eight days after the election and a Dec. 1 call to discuss immigration policy.

A Sept. 24 email from the Republican Attorneys General Association executive director, addressed to Generals, called the Atlanta event WAR GAMES and a series of conversations planning for what could come if we lose the White House.

It was a fast paced, productive series of war games, which hopefully will not have to be utilized in November," then-Executive Director Adam Piper said in an email the next day, again addressed to Generals.

Piper resigned from the attorneys general association five days after the violence in Washington and after the Defense Fund's robocall came to light. The call did not advocate violence or suggest invading the Capitol.

Taken together, the meetings and robocalls underscore how deeply elements of the Republican Party were invested in trying to keep Trump in office or to challenge the incoming Biden administration. Seventeen Republican state attorneys general, including those from Kansas and Missouri, also joined the Texas attorney general in a separate lawsuit seeking to overturn the presidential election results based on unfounded claims of voter fraud; the Supreme Court ultimately rejected that effort.

An agenda for the Defense Fund's Atlanta summit listed three policy sessions and a set of breakout sessions over two days. An email two days before the event from the Defense Fund's executive director said, All the policy conversations are off the record.

While the Defense Fund also allowed people to participate virtually, the emails said more than 30 people attended in person.

In a written statement Thursday to The Associated Press, RAGA spokesperson Johnny Koremenos said the September 2020 meeting was strictly focused on administrative law and preparing attorneys general teams for a potential Biden Administration or a second term of President Trump  common practice in an election season.

Koremenos said GOP attorneys general have filed more than 40 lawsuits against Biden's policies since he took office in January. That continues a tactic they used during former President Barack Obama's administration  and an approach used by their Democratic counterparts regularly during Trump's four years in office.

Were going to continue to fight back against the most radical and irresponsible agenda America has ever seen, Chris Nuelle, a spokesperson for Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, said Thursday in an email.

Koremenos did not answer questions asked in multiple emails about whether Defense Fund videoconferences last year addressed possible challenges to the election results.

The Defense Fund said in tax filings with the Internal Revenue Service that its mission is to share best practices among states' top lawyers, provide a forum for them to discuss state and federal policy issues, help them develop policy and engage federal officials regarding the interests of the states.

In Missouri, contacts between the Defense Fund and state Solicitor General John Sauer, who is under Schmitts office, became public this year through a records request from a government transparency group.

Schmitt said in January that he didnt know about the Defense Fund robocall, and his spokesperson said Thursday that he wasnt going to rehash issues raised early this year. Schmitt is running for the U.S. Senate in 2022.

Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt's office sent two staffers to the September war games summit  Chief Deputy Attorney General Jeff Chanay and Communications Director Clint Blaes. Their pre-event travel authorization forms showed that the Defense Fund would cover their expenses  as it did  and listed the purpose of their travel as Training.

Chanay said in an email to himself and Blaes that Schmidt had concluded the event serves a legitimate state purpose and interest and that the office otherwise would have covered their expenses  making it legal under Kansas law for them to accept the Defense Fund's hospitality.

Their participation was first reported this week by the Kansas Reflector, which obtained 15 pages of emails through an open records request. The Associated Press also obtained the emails through an open records request.

Another email showed that Eric Montgomery, Schmidt's chief of staff, registered for online sessions.

Schmidt, first elected in 2010, is running for Kansas governor in 2022. He served as a director of the Defense Fund but left its board in August 2020. After the Jan. 6 insurrection, he publicly condemned the violence as sickening and told The Topeka Capital-Journal that he hadn't known of the robocalls beforehand.

Schmidt's spokesperson, John Milburn, said in an email that the September event was to discuss possible responses to regulations or other actions from a potential Biden administration that Schmidt worried might have "devastating consequences for Kansas.

"There was no discussion about challenging the results of an election that was still six weeks away," Milburn said.

___

Associated Press writers Summer Ballentine in Columbia, Missouri; Meg Kinnard in Houston; and Geoff Mulvihill in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, contributed to this report.

___

Follow John Hanna on Twitter: https://twitter.com/apjdhanna
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. (AP)  A Connecticut man was sentenced Friday to 10 years in prison for setting fires including the 2019 blaze that destroyed a well-known Shakespearean theater in a shoreline town.

Christopher Sakowicz told the judge at his sentencing that wants to work as a welder following his release from prison, Hearst Connecticut Media reported.

I want to take the bad and use it for good. I want to work on the buildings I destroyed, Sakowicz said.

Sakowicz, 20, of Stratford, pleaded guilty in June to setting the fire that burned the American Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford to the ground on Jan. 13, 2019.

The theater, built in 1955, was modeled after Londons Globe Theatre. Its stage was graced by the likes of Katharine Hepburn, Christopher Plummer and James Earl Jones. A group of theater and business professionals said last year that it is hoping to rebuild the theater.

Defense lawyer Joseph Bruckmann told the judge that Sakowicz has a long history of mental illness.

He had issues that were beyond his control, Bruckmann said.

In addition to the prison time, Bridgeport Superior Court Judge Kevin Russo ordered Sakowicz to undergo psychiatric treatment and be placed on 15 years of special parole.

Two other teens were charged in connection with the theater fire and other blazes. Police said the teens admitted on Snapchat that they set the theater fire and posted an incriminating video that was circulated around their school, Bunnell High School.
SANTA FE, N.M. (AP)  Native American communities across New Mexico are putting the finishing touches on proposed redistricting maps aimed at greater self-determination in future public elections, as competing plans wind their way toward the Legislature for consideration.

Participants in a redistricting commission for New Mexico's Indigenous pueblo communities said Friday that map proposals may be finalized as soon as next week.

The maps will be submitted to a seven-member Citizen Redistricting Commission that is reviewing and vetting redistricting maps for the Legislature, which can adopt recommendations or start from scratch. The seven-seat commission has no Native American representation.

New Mexico is home to 23 federally recognized tribes, whose growing political clout is reflected in the election of Laguna Pueblo tribal member Deb Haaland to Congress in 2016 and her promotion this year to Secretary of the Interior.

Attorney Joseph Little is working with a broad alliance of Native American communities to turn redistricting principles into action using results of the 2020 census to track population changes.

He said the census numbers were only provided recently because of a federal delay that held up their release for months. Major redistricting changes are most likely in the heavily Native American northwest region of the state and an oil-producing region in the southeast.

Its important that we get these maps in early, Little said. We didnt have the census numbers until recently."

The share of New Mexico residents who identify themselves as Indigenous by race or by combined ancestry was 12.4% according to census results announced in August. Alaska was the most predominantly Native American state, followed by Oklahoma and then New Mexico.

At the same time, Native American politicians have ascended to top legislative leadership posts on committees overseeing taxation, Indian affairs, agriculture and elections, though some frustrations persist about the distribution of state resources to tribal communities.

In April, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, signed a bill that funnels more federal impact aid to schools in Native American communities to offset property tax losses on tax-exempt federal and tribal lands.

State Rep. Georgene Louis of Acoma Pueblo on Friday commended tribal communities for their engagement in the redistricting process.

In New Mexico, I think were very fortunate, where the tribes are very active in looking at how we can ensure that were involved in the process about selecting our own representatives that will then hold the state accountable," she said.
HELENA, Mont. (AP)  Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen promised Friday to fight the new federal vaccine mandate in court.

President Joe Biden announced on Thursday the vaccine mandate, which could affect as many as 100 million Americans. Among other measures, the mandate tells all private businesses with 100 or more employees to require workers to get vaccinated against COVID-19 or get tested weekly for the respiratory virus. The requirement will be enforced by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which has yet to release its exact guidelines for implementing the rule.

Once his administration releases its rule, Montanans can expect to see me file a lawsuit to strike it down, said Knudsen, a Republican, in a statement.

Knudsen joined Gov. Greg Gianforte in calling the new mandate unconstitutional. Several other Republican governors have also questioned the legality of the mandate.

The new mandate appears to conflict with a Montana law passed earlier this year that makes it illegal for private employers to discriminate between employees on the basis of their vaccination status. That law, known as HB702, also made it illegal for employers to require vaccines as a condition for employment. The Montana Department of Labor and Industry has not provided updated guidelines on navigating the conflict.

The state law was opposed by the Montana Hospital Association and other health care organizations in Montana. The association said on Thursday that their legal counsel will evaluate the new federal regulations when they are released to clarify the conflict between federal and state law.

But federal law will like take precedent over state law if the two directly conflict, said University of Montana Constitutional law professor Anthony Johnstone on Friday.

In the end it does come down to the supremacy clause, Johnstone said. If a state like Montana has a contrary law, that law must give way."

__

This story has been corrected to reflect the spelling of University of Montana Constitutional law professor Anthony Johnstone, not Johnston.
Frank Augstein/AP

LONDON (AP)  The Sept. 11 attackers failed in their aim of making people in open societies live in permanent fear, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said as he marked the 20th anniversary of 9/11.

In a video message due to be played at a ceremony on Saturday, Johnson said the U.S. was the worlds greatest democracy, and it was a reflection of its openness that people of almost every nationality and religion were among almost 3,000 people killed in the attacks. Sixty-seven British nationals were among those killed when hijacked planes crashed into New Yorks World Trade Centre, the Pentagon in Washington and a field in Pennsylvania.
Ronald Cortes/Contributor

San Antonio has made it easier to help Afghan families coming into the Alamo City seeking refuge.

The Department of Human Services launched AfghansInSA.org, a comprehensive website that brings together resources from 16 local nonprofits under one URL. Roland Martinez, spokesperson for DHS, said the website's launch kicked off Welcoming Week 2021.
Alex Wong/Getty Images

Texas governor Greg Abbott signed a bill Thursday night that takes aim at large social media companies over what he dubbed "wrongful" political censorship of conservative users on their platforms.

Amid claims that these platforms are directly and wrongly targeting the Right, the language in House Bill 20, now law, makes it illegal for social media behemoths with more than 50 million monthly users to ban accounts "for their political viewpoints," per The Texas Tribune. The law also calls for platforms such as Facebook and Twitter to make content moderation policies public and to create systems of appeals for users who believe they've been wrongfully moderated, among other provisions.
Yves here. I am impressed that a UK think tank was able to do the heavy lifting to document the spending differences between elite and public schools as well as give examples of the outcomes, such as vastly better ability to adapt teaching approaches to Covid limitations. It would be revealing to see a similar study in US. Admittedly we have more types to consider: public schools, charter schools, and no bones about it private schools. But hint, hint, perhaps readers can provide anecdata in the meantime.

By Sol Gamsu, a geography PhD student at Kings College London. His research examines social and spatial inequalities in post-16 education in and outside of London, focussing in particular on unequal patterns of entry to university. Twitter: @SolGamsu. Originally published at openDemocracy

COVID-19 revealed the depth of economic, social and educational inequality in England. State schools had to deal with rising levels of child poverty and inadequate provision of laptops. In response, the government promised state school catch-up funding worth only 50 per pupil  which is pretty palty compared with the 12,866 per pupil average advantage enjoyed by private schools.

In 2017-18, state schools in England had a median income of only 5,782 per pupil, while the figure for private schools was nearly four times that  18,648  my recent report for the Common Wealth think tank found.

Its little wonder then that throughout the pandemic, private schools had an advantage over their state sector peers. They were able to provide more online teaching than state schools  a gap that actually widened between the first and the second lockdown  and emerged the winners of two summers of chaotic exams.

Private schools claim to be independent from the state. But many of their sources of income are protected by the state, with favourable tax and regulatory regimes safeguarding their charitable status, business rates exemptions, tuition fee income, stock market investments, property rents and spin-off businesses.

Meanwhile, state school spending per pupil is lower than it was in 2010, and will remain so despite increases announced in 2019 that will run to 2023, according to new figures from the Institute for Fiscal Studies.

The crucial question is, not just why state school funding has fallen, but why are children in private schools always worth more, and protected more, than their state-educated peers?

Over the last 150 years, acts of parliament and legal judgements have created a system that reinforces the financial advantage for schools of the elite and middle classes. The land and stocks that imbue private schools with much of their wealth and income were often donated with the intention of providing free education for local children. But legislation passed in the 1860s allowed schools to ignore the original charitable intentions of their founders and use the money for the education of the middle and upper classes.

The Social Democratic Federation argued that this wealth was the rightful inheritance of the people and should be used to build an education system for the majority. In the late 19th and early 20th century, the early trades union movement demanded the return of the economic wealth held by the likes of Eton and Harrow, as well as Oxford and Cambridge.

Given the woeful state of education that most children in this country are forced to endure, isnt it time to return to these demands?

At the apex of the private school system rests organisations with simply astronomical levels of wealth. Thirty-seven private schools in my Common Wealth study enjoy incomes of more than 30,000 per pupil. Heading the list are Marlborough (64,427 per pupil), Eton (55,712), Christs Hospital (49.765), Wellington (49,405) and Winchester (47,646). As my study shows, Englands largest gap between the private and public sector is in the wealthy rural shires.

Among the day schools that predominate in cities, the capital  particularly West London  has the wealthiest schools and thus the biggest inequalities, although inequalities in the provincial cities can still be significant. The countrys wealthiest day school is St Pauls Girls School in Hammersmith, with an income of 27,721 per pupil. Eight other day schools in the capital had incomes of more than 20,000 per pupil.

Faced with widening educational inequality due to the pandemic, ministers have floated the idea of state school pupils and teachers having shorter holidays and longer school days. Prominent former private school heads such as Antony Seldon backed the latter suggestion, saying it would help bridge the gap between the state and independent sectors.

But such claims are laughable. They serve only to distract attention from the huge economic inequalities between private and state schools that create these gaps, and that underpinned the different experience of privately educated pupils both before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. Why should state school teachers and pupils be made to work harder and longer to reduce inequalities that private schools create?

Rather than accepting these inequalities as inevitable, requiring harder work on the part of those already disadvantaged to catch up, or indeed level up, its time to lay out a roadmap to reduce these inequalities, in both education and throughout society at large.

Private Schools, State Support

The Common Wealth report that I wrote earlier this year does just that. (You can explore the full data from the report here.) As a practical first step, voluntary donations, in the form of payments towards business rates or donations to local state schools, could be campaigned for through local petitions or open letters signed by residents and politicians. The aim would be not only to win money but to build consciousness and debate towards a longer-term aim of wholesale integration of private schools into the state sector.

Another key proposal is using the investment and endowment income of private schools in England (upwards of 81m per year) to create a peoples educational endowment, in which pupils, education workers and parents could vote on how to distribute funds in their area, alongside a well-funded state system.

The original capital that many of the now elite schools benefited from was originally donated for free local educational provision. It has been used for the education of the elite and middle classes for long enough.

During the summer, the Department for Education enthusiastically supported suggestions for children to sing that they are one Britain, one Nation united in one great team. But schools are not united, and no amount of appeals to a dystopian nationalism can disguise that.

The previous Labour leadership seemed serious about tackling educational inequalities, including the unfair advantages enjoyed by private schools. But maintaining the hope that many of us campaigners felt back in 2019 has been hard as the double blows of COVID-19 and the current government have worsened matters.

We need both optimism and a more practical strategy to engage, enthuse and keep our campaign for change alive, amid the day-to-day struggles in schools, colleges and universities. Education is the best way to give all children a fair start in life, and so our school system needs an urgent overhaul to tackle the increasing inequalities created by capitalism and COVID.
(Natural News) The government of South Australia is running a trial for a system that could eventually force citizens to take a photo of themselves via a government app to report their location on demand within 15 minutes of authorities requesting it, or face a police investigation.

(Article by Paul Joseph Watson republished from Infowars.com)

Yes, really.

The revelation was highlighted in an Atlantic piece by Conor Friedersdorf which questions whether Australia can still call itself a liberal democracy in light of the crippling restrictions it has placed on its own population.

With no end in sight for the lifting of the countrys brutal lockdown, Aussies could face even more invasive state intrusion into their private lives under the justification of stopping the spread of the virus.

The South Australian government is preparing to roll out an app that will contact people at random asking them to provide proof of their location within 15 minutes, according to reports.

If people refuse to report their location or are unable to do so, police are then dispatched to hunt them down.

We dont tell them how often or when, on a random basis they have to reply within 15 minutes, said Premier Steven Marshall.

This is barely much different from literally fitting people with electronic ankle bracelets that track their every movement like prisoners under home arrest, a policy that was actually considered by Australian authorities earlier this year.

No matter your views of COVID, what's happening in Australia is alarming, extreme and dangerous. https://t.co/Ep7fOqiHUJ  Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) September 2, 2021

No matter your views of COVID, whats happening in Australia is alarming, extreme and dangerous, remarked journalist Glenn Greenwald.

As we have exhaustively highlighted, Australia has enforced one of the most draconian lockdowns in the world in an effort to pursue a disastrous zero COVID strategy.

Last month, the Premier of Victoria asserted that authorities wont hesitate to go door-to-door to carry out mandatory COVID tests on Australians.

Aussies were also ordered not to talk to each other, even while wearing masks, while people who merely post anti-lockdown information online could also face fines of up to $11,000 dollars under an absurdly authoritarian new law.

Read more at: Infowars.com and Tyranny.news.
(Natural News) Medical authorities in Australia have suspended a doctor in Sydney because of his social media posts that criticized how medical authorities were treating COVID-19 patients and questioned the effectiveness of vaccines and lockdowns.

Dr. Paul Oosterhuis, an Australian anesthetist who has been practicing medicine for over 30 years, had to present himself to the Medical Council of New South Wales (MCNSW) for questioning. The medical council works with the Ministry of Health of New South Wales to receive and manage complaints regarding individual doctors and other medical practitioners in the state. (Related: Woman in Australian quarantine camp harassed by cops for removing face mask to drink tea.)

Oosterhuis criticized vaccines, COVID-19 treatments and lockdown

On Sept. 2, the medical council released a statement confirming that it received at least two anonymous complaints regarding Oosterhuis social media activity.

According to the organization Doctors For COVID Ethics, Oosterhuis posted information on his social media accounts regarding COVID-19.

Over the last 18 months, I have been increasingly concerned about the misinformation and censorship creeping into science and medicine, said Oosterhuis.

In one of the posts, Oosterhuis urged medical authorities to tell COVID-19 patients to take vitamin D, zinc and to treat their patients with ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine.

In other posts, Oosterhuis questioned the evidence used by the Australian government to justify its repressive lockdowns and mask mandates. He called lockdowns totalitarian, and said they were causing massive damage society-wide.

Finally, Oosterhuis also posted content on his social media accounts that pointed out that vaccines have low effectiveness and there are serious risks and harms to taking them. One of the dangers he pointed out was the possibility of antibody-dependent enhancement. This is when antibodies produced by vaccines are insufficient at dealing with the disease. Instead of defeating the disease, the antibodies help it become deadlier.

The risk of antibody-dependent enhancement of disease  driven by immune escape from the selective evolutionary pressure of vaccinating with a non-sterilizing agent is a real and present danger and needs to be discussed, wrote Oosterhuis. The danger to millions is distressing me, and discussing that danger is, I believe, unarguably in the public interest.

The MCNSW flagged Oosterhuis social media activity. They asked him to attend an immediate action panel on Sept. 3. This is one of the most serious panels the council can call up. This action is only used when the council believes a complaint or notification prompts serious concerns about risk to public safety or the need to otherwise act in the public interest.

On Sept. 3, the MCNSW released a statement confirming that the council had met with Oosterhuis and that it has decided to suspend the doctors medical registration.

In its statement, the council said it suspended Oosterhuis in order to protect the health and safety of the public and to maintain confidence in the medical profession.

The medical council has the power to suspend medical practitioners in New South Wales under the Health Practitioner Regulation National Law (NSW). But the council pointed out that this law does not grant it punitive powers and it does not have the ability to de-register Oosterhuis and take away his medical license. But the suspension already prevents him from practicing medicine.

The MCNSW refused to make any further public statements on the matter. It has referred Oosterhuis suspension with the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA).

AHPRA confirmed that it had received concerns regarding medical professionals who failed to meet the agencys code of conduct obligations.

Experience tells us that most practitioners, when concerns are raised directly with them, modify their behavior to become compliant, wrote a spokesperson to The Epoch Times. In a small number of cases, national boards are likely to take action to ensure the actions of the practitioner do not place the public at risk of harm.

Oosterhuis has indicated he will not change his behavior to be more compliant. He said he plans to appeal the suspension.

I am very disappointed by the Medical Councils decision to suspend my registration, he wrote on his social media accounts. The material I submitted in support of my evidence-based concerns was not considered. I intend to appeal the decision.

Learn more about doctors like Oosterhuis who strive to inform people about scientifically proven ways to combat the pandemic at Pandemic.news.

Sources include:

TheEpochTimes.com

Downloads.MCNSW.org.au 1 [PDF]

Doctors4CovidEthics.org

Downloads.MCNSW.org.au 2 [PDF]
(Natural News) Theres no question in many peoples minds that there was significant vote fraud in last years presidential elections, and now video footage shows how ballot boxes in one state were systematically stuffed by teams of ballot traffickers.

On the War Room radio show, radio host John Fredericks explained to Steve Bannon how investigators now have videos showing hundreds of leftist operatives dumping thousands of ballots into drop boxes in Georgia in the middle of the night.

Fredericks said that Heather Mullins of Real Americas Voice has seen the video footage, which depicts ballot traffickers going to drop boxes throughout the state in the middle of the night, emptying backpacks full of ballots into the ballot boxes with gloved hands. Theyve identified 240 individual suspects who hit an average of 23 ballot boxes each.

Mullins also tweeted that there is now a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for the communications between the Department of Justice and groups and individuals such as Southern Poverty Law Center, Stacey Abrams, Campaign Legal Center and others challenging SB202.

Similar voter fraud seen in other states

Its a problem that is not confined to Georgia. The conservative election integrity group True The Vote has been investigating this type of voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election for several months. One document obtained by Breitbart News describes how cell phone GPS ping data from key election hot spots throughout the country has been used to uncover patterns in potential fraud.

The group has pored over 27 terabytes of temporal and geospatial data from a total of 10 trillion cell phone pings collected from October 1 to November 6. This data includes geofenced points of interest, such as select government and NGO facilities and ballot drop box locations. Some of the states involved include Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Georgia.

The True The Vote document states: From this we have thus far developed precise patterns of life for 242 suspected ballot traffickers in Georgia and 202 traffickers in Arizona. According to the data, each trafficker went to an average of 23 ballot dropboxes.

In addition to the surveillance videos they collected from drop boxes in Georgia, they are working on gathering video from drop boxes in other states. They have 2 million minutes of video so far, which they say they will release soon. Their footage depicts people going to the same drop boxes multiple times to deposit stacks of ballots. At least three teams of analysts are currently looking through the raw data and surveillance videos to identify trends, and they have already reached out to law enforcement at the state and federal level to share their findings.

The idea of several suspected ballot harvesters making multiple trips to a significant number of drop boxes raises serious legal questions in many of these states as some have laws restricting drop box use to the individual voter who cast the ballot in question or a close family member.

Meanwhile, a lawsuit organized by VoterGA claims that data analysis shows that the mail-in ballot images that were made public under Open Records Requests do not match the results of the hand count audit carried out in the state last November. They found that 923 of 1,539 mail-in batch files had votes that were inaccurately reported in the official results of Fulton County, for an error rate in the hand count of 60 percent. There were also lots of duplicate votes, with 3,390 going to Biden and 865 going to Trump.

Although one might chalk this up to human error, VoterGA noted that there were seven falsified audit tally sheets with fabricated vote totals.

With so much questionable activity surrounding ballots in Georgia and throughout the country, is it any wonder that so many Americans have such little faith in the election results?

Sources for this article include:

CitizenFreePress.com

Breitbart.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) RENFREW, ONTARIO  A 61-year-old woman is unable to walk and in serious pain, with her condition unlikely to improve anytime soon.

(Article republished from TheCOVIDBlog.com)

Mrs. Bonnie Keefe received her second Pfizer mRNA injection early this summer, according to the Ottawa Citizen. She told reporter Elizabeth Payne that the adverse effects started a few days thereafter. Mrs. Keefe developed painful red, blistering spots all over her legs. The pain got so bad that she is unable to walk and now in a wheelchair.

She checked into a hospital and was diagnosed with cutaneous vasculitis  inflammation of capillaries (blood vessels) in her legs.

Introduction of new medicines in the body is one of the main causes of hypersensitivity vasculitis in adults. Doctors told Mrs. Keefe that her condition was most likely associated with a COVID-19 vaccination.

(August 23, 2021)

Mrs. Keefe said she cries every night and wishes she was in less pain. We almost never knew about her story at all. Mrs. Keefe said the first doctor she saw told her not to speak to media about her condition. That doctor later apologized once the Ottawa Citizen story was published. But this practice is modus operandi in Canadian healthcare.

We wrote about 39-year-old Fred Pye in July. The Nova Scotia man is still to this day suffering from convulsions and other neurological events caused by to the Moderna mRNA injection. Mr. Pye was told by paramedics not to mention the vaccine at all to doctors if he wanted the best possible medical help. Meanwhile Mrs. Keefe is on several medications, hoping the adverse effects run their course so she can get back to normal.

Mrs. Keefe said she did her job by receiving the mRNA injections. But now look at me. I am suffering because of it, she said. The Ottawa Citizen report says Mrs. Keefe doesnt want to discourage people from getting vaccinated. But there is no direct quote from her insinuating that position.

Trifling Trudeau

The entire globe, except the Africa Continent, is full of premiers who are bought and paid for by the pharmaceutical industry. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is no exception. He told a crowd in Markham, Ontario on August 17 that injections are mandatory for all federal workers, including politicians. Trudeau warned that there will be consequences for anyone refusing the injections.

Health Canada is also spreading disinformation about Ivermectin. They not only repeated tropes about Ivermectin being solely a horse drug, but also blatanntly lied and said it was dangerous and ineffective against COVID-19. The only semi-positive news coming out of Canada is that the government finally ended that dystopian hotel stopover rule. Anyone arriving in Canada was required to book a room at a government-authorized hotel and quarantine for three days.

Death and blood clots are by far the most talked-about adverse events caused by the government-coerced injections. But were seeing more skin diseases like this every day. Just remember  a job, education or trip overseas is no good to you dead or severely maimed. Keep that in mind. Stay vigilant and protect your friends and loved ones.

Read more at: TheCOVIDBlog.com and VaccineInjuryNews.com.
(Natural News) Author and conservative personality Daniel Bobinski dubbed the chaotic evacuation of U.S. military forces in Afghanistan a fiasco beyond compare. He also talked about how the mainstream media concealed truth about the Biden administrations handling of the matter in his program The Voice of Conservative Values (TVOCV). Bobinski was joined by Wendi Strauch Mahoney from Uncover DC in the shows Sept. 2 edition on Brighteon.TV.

He began his program by quoting former President John Adams. The second U.S. president who succeeded George Washington wrote in 1798 that avarice would be the downfall of the country. The quest for money  and the quest for wealth would precede the nations collapse, Bobinski said. He added that the Constitution was not set up to stop this pursuit of wealth at the expense of others.

Bobinski continued: We have companies that are trying to stop people from speaking truth because they want their wealth. [There] are people who [got] canceled because of all of that. He mentioned the Health Ranger Mike Adams as one example of those canceled by big companies. Adams was banned from YouTube in 2014, which led to the creation of the Brighteon Network  which Brighteon.tv is a part of.

He then continued that TVOCV viewers can look forward to in-depth stuff  [with] a little more truth as the Brighteon.tv program was not constrained by Federal Communications Commission rules compared to a radio program.

The key is always to focus on the truth. Jesus said He is the Way, the Truth and the Life, no one comes to the Father but by Him. So therefore, we want to seek the truth. As I said, a lot of organizations out there dont want us to know the truth, Bobinski said.

Bobinski talks Afghanistan with an Uncover DC journalist

Bobinski remarked that TVOCV will see investigative journalists from Uncover DC in the program sharing their thoughts on the latest issues. He then welcomed Mahoney, who proceeded to talk about the U.S. militarys chaotic evacuation from Afghanistan.

Mahoney cited an article she wrote for the website regarding the evacuation. Her article noted that of the 122,000 people evacuated from the country, 5,400 of the evacuees were Americans. The situation on the ground there has [not] been, by any means, a perfect one, she said.

The Uncover DC journalist acknowledged that many people have been pointing their fingers at President Joe Biden and his administration for the botched evacuation in Afghanistan. Mahoney continued: I think the distinction here is that everybody wanted to get out of Afghanistan, everybody wanted to get out of there. But it was the way that he did it. I think thats what people are quarreling [about] at this point. (Related: Steel Truth: Ann Vandersteel talks Afghanistan and vaccines  Brighteon.TV.)

Mahoney pointed out two issues about the Biden administrations response to the Afghanistan situation. First, she mentioned that administration chose to protect the Hamid Karzai International Airport in the capital Kabul  leaving the Bagram Air Base unprotected. The airfield fell to looters before security personnel managed to evict them, the New York Post reported.

Second, she mentioned that the administration was prioritizing the special immigrant visas (SIVs) for Afghan refugees  including those who served the U.S. government for two decades. These refugees were seemingly prioritized at the expense of military personnel who claimed the current administration did not give them enough focus.

Going back to the first point, Mahoney noted that the U.S. left lots of military equipment behind at the Bagram. She commented that these items left behind by the fleeing forces should have been decommissioned to avoid them falling into enemy hands.

Bobinski agreed with her, saying: Basically, our enemies have access to all our equipment. [They] can look at how things operate, look at the safeties and how to disarm them and how to disable our aircraft and our weaponry. This is just a fiasco beyond compare. (Related: Taliban seized billions worth of US weapons in Afghanistan was it all staged on purpose?)

The TVOCV host then asked Mahoney if the rumors of the Afghanistan evacuation being planned were true. She confirmed hearing about the rumors but was only able to confirm that the Biden administration had planned the move for some time now. Mahoney said the administration started planning for the evacuation and the issuance of SIVs for Afghans back in April 2021.

Bobinski pointed out the silence of mainstream media outlets regarding these issues. Im surprised that the  traditional media out there hasnt been more vocal. If  [former] President [Donald] Trump would have done this, there would have been non-stop pounding of the drums. The timpani would have been slamming, and wed have been hearing it from coast to coast, you know, at 120 decibels.

Watch the full TVOCV episode with Bobinski and Mahoney by clicking here.

Honest.news has more articles about the Afghanistan situation that the mainstream media refuses to report.

Sources include:

Brighteon.tv

NYPost.com
(Natural News) The Health Ranger Mike Adams recently saw down with Brad Harris of Full Spectrum Survival to talk about prepping for the budget-conscious. During his appearance on the Health Ranger Report at Brighteon.TV, Harris emphasized the importance of prepping amid the collapse the U.S. is facing right now. He told Adams that Americas woes are set to become worse as the days pass.

The Brighteon.TV founder started his program by saying that compared to other preppers, Harris put an emphasis on community-level prepping where people help each other in times of need. According to the Health Ranger, preppers who pull off a lone Rambo instead of collaborating with others often found that it did not work very well.

Harris then proceeded to elaborate on the Full Spectrum Survival channel that he ran. His channel focuses on events around the world and how these affected people, their independence and their lifestyles.

There are so many things that are happening right now  from our financial crisis that each one of us is facing differently in our own households, to the totalitarian overreach that we are seeing in every aspect of our life. We try to meld that into some sort of forward motions so that we can each work toward some sort of preparedness for whats coming tomorrow, Harris said.

Adams then asked how Harriss channel managed to bypass YouTube censorship and still get modest view counts despite the lack of keywords in his videos. He continued: I know youve been shadow-banned, but they havent de-platformed you yet. How do you accomplish that? The Health Rangers ban from the Google-owned video-sharing platform led to the creation of the Brighteon Network  and later, Brighteon.TV. (Related: Health Ranger lawyers issue demand to YouTube: Show justification for termination or reinstate video channel.)

Harris gave three steps he and his team did to avoid YouTubes ban. First, they took apart and analyzed videos that were taken down to see what caused the censorship. Second, they listed down keywords that YouTube and the powers that be do not like people saying or hearing about and took note of these. Third, they used alternative terms in their videos when talking about certain things. Harris used security tools or security implements to refer to guns in his videos.

[So] far, weve navigated those waters safely. But you never know, because this world is changing very quickly, he added.

Americans will see a future where they are living poor

The Full Spectrum Survival channel owner shared how he and his wife were introduced to prepping. He grew up in Tampa, Florida which had a million people living in it. Seeing where the world was going, and the fact that he was spending $1200 every month for rent, made him decide to move.

Harris and his wife reached out to people about nice areas where people can live poor. They then packed up all of their belongings and went to northern Alabama  a move Harris called the best move [he and his family] could ever make. Alabama was an open carry state, and their neighbors were more than willing to help them out. (Related: Is your state a good place for homesteading?)

[That] move to that sort of environment really showed us that this is the change  individuals are going to need to make, and its a change that were really happy to make as well, Harris said. True enough, an April 2019 article in Bio Prepper noted Alabama as one of the best states for setting up a homestead.

However, Harris acknowledged that their move to Alabama to build their own homestead made it more difficult for other Americans to do the same. He said: [That] is the future everyone is being pushed toward  its living poor. [Unfortunately], the separation between the haves and the have-nots has only gotten worse since we made that move  and made it harder for other people to follow those steps.

Despite this, Harris remarked that those who do not have a lot of things tend to survive serious crises. [At] the end of the day  If you have something to eat, shelter over your head, a way to keep you and your family safe and drinkable water, youre going to survive most events this world has to throw at you, he told Adams.

Harris continued: You dont have to have so much to begin with. Just do what you can each and every day and get a little bit ahead, so when the hammer does strike down  you know what to do.

Survival.news has more articles about prepping on a budget before SHTF.

Sources include:

Brighteon.com

YouTube.com

BioPrepper.com
(Natural News) Rolling Stone magazine is leading the charge on a fake news campaign against the anti-parasite drug ivermectin amid reports more Americans are turning to it to treat COVID-19.

(Article by Jamie White republished from Infowars.com)

The publication ran a story entitled, Gunshot Victims Left Waiting as Horse Dewormer Overdoses Overwhelm Oklahoma Hospitals, Doctor Says on Friday following reports that Joe Rogan included the drug in his COVID treatment regimen.

In the article, a person called Dr. Jason Elyea told local media his Oklahoma hospital emergency rooms were over capacity due to a huge influx of patients who supposedly overdosed on ivermectin to treat COVID.

The problem is, Northeastern Health Systems Sequoyah branch thats the focus of Rolling Stones article released a statement on its website claiming Dr. Elyea does not work at the hospital, and has not treated any patients in at least two months.

Furthermore, the hospital itself claims it hasnt treated a single patient for ivermectin overdose.

Although Dr. Jason McElyea is not an employee of NHS Sequoyah, he is affiliated with a medical staffing group that provides coverage for our emergency room. With that said, Dr. McElyea has not worked at our Sallisaw location in over 2 months, the NHS statement reads.

NHS Sequoya also refuted Elyeas claim that its hospital was overwhelmed with patients who overdosed on ivermectin and had not turned any patients away as a result.

NHS Sequoyah has not treated any patients due to complications related to taking ivermectin. This includes not treating any patients for ivermectin overdose.

All patients who have visited our emergency room have received medical attention as appropriate. Our hospital has not had to turn away any patients seeking emergency care.

There you have it  fake news.

Why would publications like Rolling Stone and Newsweek run these hoax stories about alternative COVID treatments like ivermectin?

Likely the same reason why the CDC counts anybody who dies within two weeks of receiving the mRNA injection as unvaccinated: to shape a narrative that coerces people into getting the experimental jab.

Why else would the CDC provide ivermectin to incoming Afghan migrants but not recommend it for American citizens?

Read more at: Infowars.com and NewsFakes.com.
(Natural News) Dr. Michael Segal, a neurologist and neuroscientist, explained in a recent article published by the Wall Street Journal why people vaccinated against the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) are still contracting and spreading the disease at a high rate.

Segal wrote that the vaccines only stimulate internal immunity but do nothing to address mucosal immunity. Internal immunity protects the inside of the body while mucosal immunity provides the first line of defense by protecting the nose and mouth, and by doing so also reduces spread to others.

He said that all COVID-19 vaccines are largely ineffective at stimulating the secretion of a particular form of antibodies called Immunoglobulin A (IgA) into our noses that occurs after actual infection with a virus. Meanwhile, those who have contracted and recovered from the disease have both mucosal and internal immunity. They have what they call a natural immunity from the disease.

A recent study in Israel proved that natural immunity is better than getting vaccinated. The researchers found that vaccinated people were 13 times as likely to become infected and 27 times as likely to have symptomatic infections as people with natural immunity. (Related: COVID-19 natural immunity vs vaccine-induced immunity guide.)

Recovered COVID-19 patients retain broad and durable immunity to the disease

An Emory University study published in the journal Cell Reports Medicine found that most people who have recovered from COVID-19 retain a broad and durable immunity to the disease, including some degree of protection against its variants.

Rafi Ahmed, the lead author of the paper, said that the findings disproved early reports during the pandemic that protective neutralizing antibodies did not last in COVID-19 patients.

The study serves as a framework to define and predict long-lived immunity to SARS-CoV-2 after natural infection. We also saw indications in this phase that natural immunity could continue to persist, Ahmed said. SARS-CoV-2 is the virus that causes COVID-19.

After people recover from infection with a virus, the immune system retains a memory of it. Immune cells and proteins that circulate in the body can recognize and kill the pathogen if its encountered again, protecting against disease and reducing illness severity.

The study involved 254 COVID-19 patients between 18 to 82 years old, who provided blood samples at various points for a period of over eight months beginning April last year. About 71 percent of the patients had mild disease, 24 percent experienced moderate illness and five percent had severe disease.

Ahmed and his team found that most of the patients who recovered mounted a strong and wide-ranging immune response to the virus for at least the 250-day duration of the study.

Long-term immune protection involves several components. Antibodies recognize foreign substances like viruses and neutralize them. Different types of T cells help recognize and kill pathogens. B cells make new antibodies when the body needs them.

All of these immune system components have been found in people who recovered from COVID-19. But the details of this immune response and how long it lasts after infection have been unclear. Scattered reports of reinfection with SARS-CoV-2 have raised concerns that the immune response to the virus might not be durable.

A study published on Jan. 6 in Science analyzed immune cells and antibodies from almost 200 people who had been exposed to SARS-CoV-2 and recovered.

Drs. Daniela Weiskopf, Alessandro Sette and Shane Crotty from the La Jolla Institute for Immunology led the study. It was funded in part by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and the National Cancer Institute (NCI).

Time since infection ranged from six days after symptom onset to eight months later. More than 40 participants had been recovered for more than six months before the study began. About 50 people provided blood samples at more than one time after infection.

The researchers found durable immune responses in the majority of people studied.

Antibodies against the spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 were found in 98 percent of participants one month after symptom onset. As seen in previous studies, the number of antibodies ranged widely between individuals. But their levels remained fairly stable over time, declining only modestly at six to eight months after infection.

Experts recommend that coronavirus be allowed to circulate throughout population

Some experts are now recommending that the virus be allowed to circulate throughout the population, with precautions taken for vulnerable individuals.

We dont have anything that will stop transmission, so I think we are in a situation where herd immunity is not a possibility and I suspect the virus will throw up a new variant that is even better at infecting vaccinated individuals, Andrew Pollard, director of the Oxford Vaccine Group, told a parliamentary panel last month.

Pollard argued that if mass testing was not stopped, the UK could be in a situation of continually vaccinating the population. He said that only those with symptoms should be tested while others should go about their daily lives.

Icelands state epidemiologist voiced similar sentiments.

We really cannot do anything else but allow the virus to take its course in order for the population to achieve herd immunity, said Porolfur Gudnason, chief epidemiologist of Icelands Directorate of Health. (Related: Study: 2 in 3 Indians have natural immunity against coronavirus, meaning herd immunity is already achieved.)

We need to try to vaccinate and better protect those who are vulnerable but let us tolerate the infection. It is not a priority now to vaccinate everyone with the third dose.

Mass vaccinations need to stop

Governments need to stop mass vaccination drives to get a shot at herd immunity.

In March, vaccine expert Dr. Geert Vanden Bossche said in an open letter that ongoing mass vaccination drives are likely to further enhance adaptive immune escape as none of the current vaccines will prevent replication or transmission of viral variants.

Immune escape is a term used to describe when the host is no longer able to recognize and counter a pathogen such as a relevant variant or mutant of SARS-CoV-2.

The more we use these vaccines for immunizing people in the midst of a pandemic, the more infectious the virus will become, Vanden Bossche wrote. With increasing infectiousness comes an increased likelihood of viral resistance to the vaccines.

Under this scenario, manufacturers will be forced to refine or improve the vaccines, which will then increase the selection pressure.

Selection pressure is a term used to describe the process that helps an organism or pathogen to evolve in ways that make it better adapted to its changing environment. An antibiotic resistance, which is caused by overuse of antibiotic drugs, is a good example of selection pressure.

The virus will effectively outsmart the highly specific antigen-based vaccines that are being used and tweaked. Vanden Bossche said the much more infectious viral variants are already examples of immune escape from our innate immunity.

Follow Pandemic.news for more news and information related to the coronavirus pandemic.

Sources include:

TheOrganicPrepper.com

TheEpochTimes.com

NIH.gov

TheNewAmerican.com

Dryburgh.com
(Natural News) Police officers in Seattle are organizing themselves to fight against city officials who want them to comply with a Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine mandate.

On Aug. 9, Democrat Mayor Jenny Durkan announced a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for all city employees, including members of the Seattle Police Department (SPD). Durkan made her announcement in lockstep with Washington Gov. Jay Inslees vaccine mandate for state employees and healthcare and childcare workers.

Vaccines are safe, effective and save lives, wrote Durkan in a tweet. [City government employees] must be fully vaccinated by Oct. 18 to help us reopen safely while protecting employees and the public. We will evaluate plans based on science and King County Public Health guidance.

In response to the vaccine mandate, SPD officers across the citys precincts are organizing and encouraging one another to not comply with the vaccine mandate. They are even petitioning other officers to not hand over their vaccination records to the city government.

The pushback against the vaccine mandate is being led by a group of officers called SPD United. According to sources that spoke with The Post Millennial, SPD United is made up of both vaccinated and unvaccinated police officers that believe in the right of SPD officers to make their own choices regarding their health.

SPD United has put up posters in police precincts all over the city encouraging officers to unite against the vaccine mandate.

Unite! Do not give your vaccination status! reads one poster. Hold this line. We rise and fall together. The poster had a QR link to a petition signed by police officers who are against the vaccine mandate.

SPD United has received a lot of pushback from their higher-ups within the SPD. At least one police captain has been reported ordering officers to take down SPD United posters in his precinct.

Despite this opposition, SPD United has not been deterred from continuing efforts to fight back against the mandate. According to one officer involved, the group is vowing to hold the line.

This mission is one of human rights, constitutional rights, civil liberties and freedom of choice, reads SPD Uniteds mission statement on the groups website. The statement further reads:

The freedoms of police officers have been and continue to be stripped away, one by one [The city has] demanded private medical information so they can divide the department by those who are vaccinated and those who are not (for legal and religious medical reasons). This is medical apartheid, and as it actively tears our society apart, it will certainly do the same for SPD.

SPD Uniteds website features a disclaimer that the anti-vaccine mandate effort is not endorsed by the Seattle Police Officers Guild (SPOG), the main police union that represents rank-and-file SPD officers. But back in August, SPOG President Mike Solan warned that the mandate could lead to terminations.

If you are advocating for more police officers because you know crime is on the rise, you need more cops because of what the City Council did, he said during an interview. Why are you threatening us with our jobs [if] you dont get this vaccination? Its unbelievable to me, it doesnt make any sense. (Related: Oregon firefighters, police officers sue Gov. Brown over covid vaccine mandate.)

SPD could lose 1o% to 20% of uniformed officers over vaccine mandate

If the vaccine mandate for Seattle city employees continues, over 200 SPD officers could lose their jobs because they are currently not vaccinated.

One of The Post Millennials sources within the SPD believes the number of officers who could get terminated over the mandate is closer to 300. The nearly 100 other officers who will also be fired are the vaccinated officers who do not want to submit their private medical data to the city.

This means the SPD could lose anywhere between 10 to 20 percent of its current uniformed officers due to the vaccine mandate.

This is already on top of the 300 officers who quit or were fired after the Seattle City Council defunded the SPD.

The massive and sudden loss of police officers is expected to cause a domino effect, with more officers leaving the SPD because of the expected unsafe number of police officers on the streets to effectively keep the community and themselves safe.

The SPD is already staffed at record lows not seen since the 1980s. On most nights, only about 70 officers are patrolling the city. This helped spur on the surge in violent crime. Seattle is already set to break the 26-year-high homicide rate set in 2020.

Learn more about the disastrous consequences of vaccine mandates by reading the latest articles at Vaccines.news.

Sources include:

ThePostMillennial.com

FoxNews.com

MyNorthwest.com
(Natural News) Former Google senior engineer turned whistleblower Zach Vorhies exposed Googles plan to enslave humanity in favor of artificial intelligence. He told the Health Ranger Mike Adams of this plan when he appeared in an episode of the Health Ranger Report on BrighteonTV. Vorhies added that Google is indeed complicit in a plot to bring down America.

Vorhies first gained prominence in 2019 when he resigned from the Big Tech company with a trove of internal documents in tow. He delivered more than 950 pages of these files to the Department of Justice and leaked them through Project Veritas. Vorhies said he leaked the internal documents to inform the public about Googles extensive censorship.

Vorhies later wrote a book titled Google Leaks: A Whistleblowers Expose of Big Tech Censorship alongside co-author and attorney Kent Heckenlively. The former Google employee wrote in the book about how the companys censorship awakened him to the coup thats happening to humanity and how his workplace seemed to play a role in it.

Google seems to be in this colluder circle, the network of people  basically going from a really great libertarian organization to one thats building the Ministry of Truth, Vorhies said, borrowing a concept from George Orwells 1984.

He told Adams how Google gaslighted and hid information from the public. Vorhies said: They told investors that they were going to organize the worlds information to make it universally accessible. But as soon as the wrong president was democratically elected, they turned a full 180 and said we have to start censoring fake news.'

To this end, Google created the Machine Learning Fairness algorithm and implemented it in Google Search, Google News and YouTube. Vorhies explained that the algorithm was released for three reasons: To manipulate the information landscape, to take control of elections and to push America toward Googles corporate values.

Vorhies experienced an attack of conscience upon finding out the algorithms true purpose. When I found this out, I realized that I couldnt live with myself, Mike. I couldnt live with myself walking into work every single day knowing that  this same megacorporation was actively subverting America, he told the Health Ranger. (Related: Google whistleblower Zack Vorhies discusses his new book in debut episode of Uncovering the Truth With Matrixxx Groove on Brighteon.TV.)

Google subverting humanity for an AI-powered future

Adams then pushed Vorhies further, asking what Googles actual values were. The erstwhile software engineer replied that the Big Tech firm was not pushing any particular values at all. Instead, Vorhies said Googles moves had similarities with the concepts of active measures and ideological subversion explained by former Soviet journalist Yuri Bezmenov.

Bezmenov said in an interview: About 15 percent of the time, money and manpower is spent on espionage as such. The other 85 percent is a slow process which we call either ideological subversion, active measures or psychological warfare. What is basically means is  [changing] the perception of reality of every American that despite the abundance of information  no one is able to come to sensible conclusions in the interest of defending themselves, their families, their community and their country.

Vorhies then posted a question: Who is the enemy and why are they destabilizing America? While he admitted that he did not know the exact answer, he pointed his finger at globalists. Vorhies continued that these globalists used the transgender movement and racism as wedges to divide the U.S. and turn Americans against each other. The Health Ranger followed up and named other candidates  including communist China, aliens from another planet and demons from another dimension.

Vorhies then mentioned that investment firms Vanguard Group and BlackRock Inc. were the biggest Google stockholders. According to rumors, Vanguard also owned majority of BlackRock  which then led to the question of Vanguards ownership. Interestingly, Vorhies mentioned Blackwater  a private military contractor  to refer to the investment firm backing Google.

Regardless of who owned which, the former Google engineer noted a grim future for humanity if Big Tech succeeds. It may be like a slave future, but with universal basic income so it doesnt feel like slavery. But you wont be able to challenge the system. Youll be given some allotment, he said.

He continued that in the future totalitarian system, there will be complete equity where everyone is treated the same  because of artificial intelligence (AI) and robot labor. Both of these rendered humans unnecessary, leading to the problem of what to do with humans given that AI already surpassed them. (Related: Google worshipers applaud their own total enslavement as Google AI unveils near-perfect human voice mimicry tech.)

The answer that I hope is that we [should discuss] it. This is the total sum of humanitys knowledge that these technocrats are appropriating for their AI. We should have, as the generators of that data, a say in how this AI is [going to] be used in the future of humanity, Vorhies said. While he remained optimistic, he expressed doubt that anyone of real importance would consider his message.

EvilGoogle.news has more articles about the Big Tech firms nefarious plans for humanity.

Sources include:

Brighteon.com

ProjectVeritas.com

USNavyVet2002.Blogspot.com
(Natural News) The Associated Press was forced to issue a correction after it falsely claimed that 70 per cent of calls to the Mississippi Poison Control Center were about people ingesting ivermectin to treat COVID-19.

(Article by Paul Joseph Watson republished from Infowars.com)

The actual number was 2 per cent.

Whoops!

From the AP:

In an article published Aug. 23, 2021, about people taking livestock medicine to try to treat coronavirus, The Associated Press erroneously reported based on information provided by the Mississippi Department of Health that 70% of recent calls to the Mississippi Poison Control Center were from people who had ingested ivermectin to try to treat COVID-19. State Epidemiologist Dr. Paul Byers said Wednesday the number of calls to poison control about ivermectin was about 2%. He said of the calls that were about ivermectin, 70% were by people who had ingested the veterinary version of the medicine.

As Chris Menahan notes, NPR also amplified the fake news, reporting that, The department said that at least 70% of recent calls to the state poison control center were related to people who ingested a version of the drug that is formulated to treat parasites in cows and horses.

NPR has yet to issue a retraction of the fake story, which was circulated countless times, while the retraction will only be seen by a fraction of those who read the original.

The only reason Rolling Stone is calling this an "UPDATE" as opposed to what it so plainly is  a RETRACTION  is because liberal outlets know that their readers don't care at all if they publish fake news as long as it's done with the right political motives and goals. https://t.co/2nRaD5EbXk  Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) September 5, 2021

Over the weekend, Rolling Stone faced massive humiliation after it asserted that there were so many patients overdosing on ivermectin that Oklahoma hospitals were being overwhelmed and gunshot victims were going untreated.

They were forced into an embarrassing walk back after the Northeastern Hospital System Sequoyah issued a statement clarifying that it has not treated any patients due to complications related to taking ivermectin, which includes not treating any patients for ivermectin overdose.

Once again, the original story went viral while the revelation that it was fake news largely only trended in conservative news circles.

The Rolling Stone article appeared to be part of an effort to smear podcast host Joe Rogan, who said he had used ivermectin as part of a cocktail of treatments to successfully fight off a COVID-19 infection.

Read more at: Infowars.com
(Natural News) Top American infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci has announced that his new book will be released in November 2021. The eighty-page book entitled, Expect the Unexpected: Ten Lessons on Truth, Service and the Way Forward contains wisdom that Fauci says he wants to share with the world. But many are criticizing the doctor for reportedly profiting from the ongoing Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

A now-deleted Amazon listing described the book as offering an intimate view of one of the worlds greatest medical minds. Barnes and Noble also lauded Faucis book, saying: Those looking to live a more compassionate and purposeful life will find inspiration in his unique perspective on leadership, expecting the unexpected, and finding joy in difficult times. It also said that the book offers a universal message on how to lead in times of crisis and find resilience in the face of disappointments and obstacles.

The book, priced at $18 for a pre-order copy, is set to hit bookstore shelves on Nov. 2. But ahead of its release date, many took to social media to share their sentiments toward the infectious disease doctor. Three U.S. representatives from the Republican Party tweeted a salvo of criticism aimed at Fauci.

North Carolina Rep. Dan Bishop noted how Fauci never missed a paycheck while advocating that people lose theirs. He also said that Faucis lockdown mandates destroyed livelihoods and threatened childrens futures. Reports suggest that Fauci is the highest-paid employee in the federal government, with an annual salary of more than $400,000 as of January 2021.

Meanwhile, Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan posted: Dr. Fauci took away your First Amendment rights during the pandemic, [but] relied on the First Amendment to write his new book.

Arizona Rep. Andy Biggs kept it short with a one-sentence tweet: Profiting from the pandemic with a book deal is truly a new low.

Faucis flip-flopping decisions on public health are not wisdom

The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) has been on the receiving end of criticism for his inconsistent advice, which, according to his critics, only served to muddle the waters when it came to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Back in October 2020, Fauci advised Americans to wear face masks both indoors and outdoors. Responding to a question by Hawaii Lt. Gov. Josh Green about contracting the coronavirus in public places like the beach, Fauci said: [You wouldnt want] to be wearing a mask when you jump in the water. But when you come out [and] when [you are] congregating [with other people], put a mask on.

But just last April, Fauci acknowledged that outdoor COVID-19 transmission is actually very low. During an appearance on This Week with George Stephanopoulos on ABC, he said people have a very low risk of contracting the Wuhan coronavirus outdoors. Many, on the other hand, pointed out that a month prior to this interview, Fauci warned that it was risky business for states to lift mask mandates. (Related: Flip-flopping? Fauci now insists Wuhan coronavirus outdoor transmission is low.)

Fauci also flip-flopped when it came to the issue of double-masking. Back in January, Fauci insisted that wearing two masks to protect against COVID-19 was common sense. He explained during an interview with TODAY: If you have a physical covering with one layer [and] you put another layer on, it just makes common sense that it likely would be more effective. Thats the reason why you see people either double masking or doing a version of an N95 [respirator.]

But days later, Fauci contradicted his advice during a virtual fireside chat sponsored by the National Education Association. Speaking to the heads of two teachers unions who joined him in the chat, he said: There is nothing wrong with wearing two masks, but there is no data that indicates that it makes a difference. He also said that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention itself does not recommend people wear two masks. (Related: Newly uncovered emails show Fauci admitting the truth about masks: They DONT work.)

Visit Conspiracy.news to read more stories about Faucis corrupt deeds amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Sources include:

WesternJournal.com

Twitter.com 1

Twitter.com 2

Twitter.com 3

AJC.com

DailyMail.co.uk

CNBC.com

NEA.org
(Natural News) On the latest Freedom Force Battalion episode, Melissa Redpill talked about Hebrew High Holy Days, starting with Rosh Hashanah, which is one of two new year celebrations in the Jewish faith, and the beginning of a year-long observance known as Shmita.

In her channel, Melissa also talked about the power of the Shofar as an instrument of healing.

Rosh Hashanah began on the evening of September 6. The two-day holiday commemorates the beginning of the universe and is observed with special worship services and the sounding of the shofar, an instrument that is made of rams horn, on the mornings of the holiday.

This holiday is considered to be the beginning of a cycle of fall holidays. It starts with the sunset on the night of the new moon, and continues with the day of fasting for Yom Kippur. The holidays will then culminate with Sukkot, which starts on the full moon of the harvest month of Tishrei.

Families celebrate Rosh Hashanah with several traditions, including lighting candles in the evening and eating sweet treats such as challah bread with raisins and apple slices dipped in honey.

Individuals also greet each other Ishana tova, which translates to for a good year.

There are others that observe Rosh Hashanah with a Tashlich ceremony at a body of water. This ceremony symbolically casts away ones sins, and some people throw things like bread into the water as a representation of such casting away of sins.

The first day of Rosh Hashanah is the beginning of ten holy days  High holidays that are set as a time for repentance for Jews.

At this time, many congregate in synagogues to worship, particularly on Rosh Hashana and on the tenth day, which is the fast of Yom Kippur.

Yom Kippur is the day of atonement, and it involves 25-hour fast beginning sundown on Wednesday, September 15, until nightfall on Thursday, September 16.

The blowing of the shofar from the synagogue must be heard by congregants at the new year service as well as at the end of Yom Kippur.

Why these festivals are celebrated

The origins and reasons for the festivals are found in the bible and in religious cultures. As part of the Jewish tradition for millennia, the festival presents itself in ways that go beyond biblical texts.

Rosh Hashanah celebrates renewal. It also includes the blowing of the shofar horn, which is connected to the ram which was sacrificed instead of the son of Abraham, as he was commanded to do. Important activities such as attending the synagogue to hear the shofar, as well as eating apple slices with honey.

Yom Kippur, repentance and forgiveness are highlighted. Its origins were found in the Hebrew Bible, where it describes a day in a year in which premeditated and intentional sins were forgiven.

The biblical description of Yom Kippur involves a series of sacrifices and rituals that are designed to remove the sins from the people. Yom Kippur is the holiest and most somber day of the Jewish calendar. As a time for repentance, it focuses on fasting and prayers.

Religious calendars and festivals can encourage people to encounter certain ideas. It also provides avenues to reflect on the events of the past year and to find the courage to live differently when necessary.

In structuring the celebration of the new year, there is a profound recognition of the complexity of relationships and experiences in life.

High Holy Days mean to remember that time in itself is healing and restoration, and such, it helps mark the year in meaningful ways and highlights moral responsibility of individuals toward one another.

Melissa Redpill shares more information about Hebrew High Holy Days and other news on her show, Freedom Force Battalion, Wednesdays at 11 AM on Brighteon.TV.

Sources include:

Brighteon.com

ManchesterEveningNews.com

TheConversation.com
(Natural News) Dr. Scott Lively talks about the True Church of Satan, as a Satanic Temple in Texas challenges the Heartbeat Bill.

The religion does not have or believe in gods; however, it filed a letter with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, requesting its members to be able to have access to abortion pills on the grounds of freedom of religion.

This comes after the state of Texas passed the most restrictive abortion laws in the nation. Under what is now called the Heartbeat Bill, abortions after six weeks of pregnancy are banned.

This is met with controversy as many dont even realize theyre pregnant during the first six weeks.

There are also no exceptions to the new law, not even for rape or incest. Further, the Texas law allows anyone to file a lawsuit against someone who helped another get an abortion, with fines that could amount to $10,000.

Fetal heartbeat is defined in the new law as cardiac activity or steady and repetitive rhythmic contraction of the fetal heart within the gestational sac. It claims that pregnant women could use that signal to determine the likelihood that her unborn child can survive to full-term birth.

Previously, abortions in Texas were prohibited after about 20 weeks, while pill-induced abortions were barred 10 weeks down. Records showed that more than 56,600 abortions were performed on Texas residents in 2019.

The Satanic Temple is based in Salem, Massachusetts, and it says that its members hold bodily autonomy sacred. Its co-founder, Lucien Greaves, also said in a statement that abortion rituals are an important facet of its belief. (Related: Vaccine mandates similar to forcing people into taking the Mark of the Beast, warns Scott Lively  Brighteon.TV.)

Inviolable, subject to ones own will

The third tenet of the Temple is that Ones body is inviolable, subject to ones own vill alone. This claims that the obstacle of abortion restrictions that impose on procedures should not apply to its members as it violates their beliefs.

Greaves said, Weve ritualized and centralized the abortion process so that beforehand somebody needing an abortion can come to us for preliminary counseling in which theres these affirmations that attest that they made their choice within their understanding of the best available options and that this is the right choice for them, and that they did it in line with their religious tenets, which are our own.

He also said in an interview that there is a similar counseling process after the abortion takes place.

According to the churchs reproductive rights spokeswoman, No Christian would tolerate a law that insists state counseling is necessary before someone can be baptized. Our members are justly entitled to religious liberty in order to practice our rituals as well.

The Satanic Temple wants to retain access to abortion pills using its Religious Freedom Restoration Act rights. The Texas legislation made it all the way to the U.S. Supreme court after a group of abortion clinics and advocates requested the law to be blocked.

It is using religious liberty to exempt its members from abortion laws. The argument is similar to that of Hobby Lobby, which refused to provide contraceptive coverage to its employees despite mandates through the federal Affordable Care Act.

The Satanic Temple plans on continuing its work, even if the FDA disallows distribution of abortion pharmaceuticals on religious grounds.

Greaves also acknowledged that the matter will likely continue beyond Texas, as other states are looking to adopt similar bills.

The Texas Right to Life called the bills signing a landmark victory, but added that more comprehensive measures are still waiting for a vote in Legislature.

Texas Right to Life reminds our elected officials of their solemn duty to protect the lives of their citizens, especially the most vulnerable and innocent Texans in the womb. The signing of the Texas Heartbeat Act marks a historic step in the battle to protect Life, the organization said in a statement.

Listen to Dr. Scott Livelys commentary on the Heartbeat Bill and his take on abortions in general at the Prophecy & Politics program on BrighteonTV, which airs Wednesdays at 4:00 PM/

Sources include:

Brighteon.com

RollingStone.com

Boston.com

TexasTribune.com
(Natural News) Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the American people have been told to follow the science. Yet for a year and a half, theyve heard contradicting messages from self-appointed prophets of the science like Dr. Anthony Fauci and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

(Article by Helen Raleigh republished from TheFederalist.com)

We learned that politicians who claimed their decisions were science-driven often ignored scientific findings that didnt fit certain political narratives. We discovered that scientists are fallible human beings, and some would let personal interests and political views cloud their judgment.

Is science itself one of the victims of the COVID-19 pandemic? I asked Dr. Scott Atlas at the 13th annual Freedom Conference hosted by the Steamboat Institute, a Colorado-based nonprofit organization. Formerly a professor and chief of neuroradiology at Stanford University Medical Center, Atlas is now a senior fellow in health policy at the Hoover Institution.

Atlas has been under constant attacks by the left and the corporate media since he served as a special adviser to former President Trump and a member of the White House coronavirus task force from August to November 2020. The New York Times and the Washington Post ran hit pieces on Atlas, questioning his qualifications despite his distinguished career and scholarship.

Google-owned YouTube also removed a 50-minute video of Atlass interview with the Hoover Institute. Twitter took down his tweet that questioned the effectiveness of masks.

Science Destroyed Its Own Credibility

Atlas has refused to be silenced. He has a lot to say about how the scientific field and Americans trust in it have been tremendously harmed during the COVID-19 pandemic. Science has been not just a victim, he told me, but actively participated in the self-destruction of its credibility.

To prove his point, Atlas referred to the now infamous letter published in Lancet, which denounced the lab-leak theory as a conspiracy that created fear, rumors, and prejudice. Facebook fact-checkers used the letter to censor discussion of the lab-leak theory for more than a year.

It then surfaced in The Daily Mail that Peter Daszak, president of Eco Health Alliance, orchestrated a group of scientists to write the letter without disclosing the EHAs close financial ties to the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). Now many scientists accept that the WIV lab-leak theory is just as probable as the natural origin theory.

Atlas also faulted leading scientific publications such as Nature and Lancet for playing important roles in enabling, encouraging, and enforcing the false narrative. In June, journalist Ian Birrell cited one source who estimated the publisher of Nature had sponsorship agreements worth millions of dollars from Chinese institutions.

Science is not supposed to be about intimidating, countering interpretation of data, or abusing, or censoring data, Atlas said. Science is not supposed to have a view. Science is only about data and the scientific process. There is never supposed to be an accepted view of science.

Stop Censoring the Scientific Process

Politicians and pundits also lost peoples trust by advocating regulations that were not based in fact. The phrase follow the science should never be uttered again by people who do not know actual data. They must stop, Atlas said. They have no credibility whatsoever when they get up and say, follow the science. Its clear many of them dont know the science, dont understand the science, and they are not using the science to make the recommendations.

How can science and scientists recover from this trust deficit? It depends on only one thing  the visibility of the scientific process, which by definition is about the visibility of the data, Atlas said. There should be no censorship of views and interpretation of different data. Do not intimidate or issue harsh condemnations of people just because you disagree with them. Let the truth prevail by the data.

He has received hundreds of emails from other scientists who have encouraged him to remain outspoken while afraid to speak up themselves. The saving of science really depend[s] on scientists to come forward and to be unafraid to say that the objectivity of science and [the] scientific process itself has been contaminated and impeded, he continued. When more scientists come forward, there hopefully will be a reversal of that [trust deficit]. There is no such thing as science without the evidence being visible and debates being current. Science doesnt exist in any other way.

How can we do a better job of fighting back the next time our ruling class tries to send us into crisis mode? We have to recognize what the data revealed about this current pandemic, Atlas said, citing several recent studies (including one by Eran Bendavid and other scientists of Stanford University) showing that lockdowns didnt work to keep COVID-19 from spreading while imposing their own severe additional costs.

Never Let Lockdowns Destroy Lives Again

Lockdowns destroyed people, Atlas said, by shutting down medical care, stopping people from seeking emergency medical care, increasing drug abuse, increasing death by suicide, more psychological damage, particularly among the younger generation. Hundreds and thousands of child abuse cases went unreported. Teenagers self-harm cases have tripled.

Atlas also noted the increase of other deaths like tuberculosis, caused by the worlds focus on COVID-19. The World Health Organization warned in 2020 of up to an additional 400,000 deaths from tuberculosis because of the diversion of resources to COVID-19. Mortality data showing that anywhere from a third or half of the deaths during the pandemic were not due to COVID-19, Atlas said. They were extra deaths due to the lockdowns.

Besides causing health issues, the lockdowns have enormous economic costs, especially for poor people and developing countries. The Bangladesh economys shutdown during the pandemic, Atlas noted, was forecast to wipe out about $3 billion and close to 900,000 jobs off the nations economy with a devastating effect on the nations poor.

We can never use the lockdown strategy again, Atlas emphasized. Instead, we should offer targeted protections for high-risk people but no lockdowns of low-risk people. Other scientists, such as the authors of The Great Barrington Declaration, have advocated for the same approach.

Atlas offers additional advice on how to prepare for the next pandemic based on lessons learned from COVID-19 in his upcoming new book, A Plague Upon Our House: My Fight at the Trump White House to Stop COVID from Destroying America, which is available for preorder now.

Ultimately, Atlas said, the most important lesson to learn from the COVID-19 pandemic is that individuals must take responsibility for their own health-related decisions. We should never surrender our autonomy and capability to assess our risk tolerance to bureaucrats or the so-called expert class.

Read more at: TheFederalist.com
(Natural News) Republican Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul believes that new documents about research at the Wuhan lab in China prove his accusations that Dr. Anthony Fauci lied to Congress.

(Article by Carmine Sabia republished from ConservativeBrief.com)

Fauci has continuously denied that the National Institutes of Health paid for gain-of-function research at the Wuhan lab.

Surprise surprise  Fauci lied again And I was right about his agency funding novel Coronavirus research at Wuhan. Read this thread and the papers released, he said attached to a thread from Rutgers professor of chemistry and chemical biology, Richard H. Ebright explaining a story at The Intercept.

Surprise surprise  Fauci lied again And I was right about his agency funding novel Coronavirus research at Wuhan. Read this thread and the papers released. https://t.co/zQizKXLdbd  Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) September 7, 2021

NEWLY RELEASED DOCUMENTS provide details of U.S.-funded research on several types of coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China. The Intercept has obtained more than 900 pages of documents detailing the work of EcoHealth Alliance, a U.S.-based health organization that used federal money to fund bat coronavirus research at the Chinese laboratory. The trove of documents includes two previously unpublished grant proposals that were funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, as well as project updates relating to EcoHealth Alliances research, which has been scrutinized amid increased interest in the origins of the pandemic.

The documents were released in connection with ongoing Freedom of Information Act litigation by The Intercept against the National Institutes of Health. The Intercept is making the full documents available to the public.

This is a road map to the high-risk research that could have led to the current pandemic, Gary Ruskin, who serves as the executive director of the U.S. Right To Know group that has been investigating to origins of the pandemic, said.

But where it gets interesting is where the story showed that the United States Government gave $3.1 million to EcoHealth Alliance, an American company, to support bat coronavirus research at the Wuhan lab.

Around $600,000 of that was used by WIV to find and alter bat coronaviruses that could infect humans.

It also showed research was done on genetically altered mice with human cell receptors was conducted at the Wuhan University Center for Animal Experiment, not at the WIV as was previously believed.

The documents make it clear that assertions by the NIH Director, Francis Collins, and the NIAID Director, Anthony Fauci, that the NIH did not support gain-of-function research or potential pandemic pathogen enhancement at WIV are untruthful, professor Ebright said.

The documents make it clear that assertions by the NIH Director, Francis Collins, and the NIAID Director, Anthony Fauci, that the NIH did not support gain-of-function research or potential pandemic pathogen enhancement at WIV are untruthful.  Richard H. Ebright (@R_H_Ebright) September 7, 2021

If it is true that Fauci lied to Congress he could be in a serious jam, as 18 US Code 1621 explains the penalty for perjury.

That code explains that if a person is guilty of perjury and shall, except as otherwise expressly provided by law, be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both. This section is applicable whether the statement or subscription is made within or without the United States.

And 18 US Code 1001 explains that anyone who makes any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation could be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 5 years.

Paul and Fauci, both doctors, have had a contentious and combative relationship, as was shown during Dr. Faucis most recent hearing before Congress where Paul accused him of lying.

It happened in July when Fauci was before the Senate and Paul accused him of lying about gain of function research at the Wuhan, China lab being financed by the United States, Fox News reported.

Fauci and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Rochelle Walensky are also likely to face questions on whether the U.S. should bring back health measures like mask mandates as the delta COVID variant spreads around the country.

In his questioning of Fauci, Paul stepped close to the line of accusing Fauci of lying to Congress in previous testimony in which he said that the NIAID had never funded gain-of-function research in China. Citing a paper on research about bat coronaviruses, Paul said that U.S. money had essentially gone to the hazardous and controversial research  an assertion Fauci strongly objected to.

Paul asked Fauci if he wanted to retract his previous statement before Congress that the NIH never funded gain of function research in Wuhan, citing that lying to Congress is a crime

I have never lied before the Congress, and I do not retract that statement, Fauci said, noting that the research Paul talked about was judged by qualified staff up and down the chain as not being gain of function.

When you take an animal virus, and you increase its transmissibility to humansyoure saying thats not gain-of-function research? Paul saidTop of Form

Senator Paul, you do not know what you are talking about, and I want to say that officially, Fauci said.

It says that scientific research that increases the transmissibility among animals is gain-of-function, he said. The Wuhan researchers took animal virusesthen increased their transmissibility to humans. How you can say that is not gain-of-functionits a dance, and youre dancing around this, because youre trying to obscure responsibility for four million people around the world dying from a pandemic.

How can you say thats not gain-of-function? Its a dance and youre dancing around this because youre trying to obscure responsibility for 4 million people dying around the world from a pandemic, the senator hit back, cutting Fauci off.

Fauci was livid with the senator.

If the point that you are making is that the grant that was funded as a subaward  created SARS-COV-2, thats where you are getting, he said as Paul cut him off again.

We dont know  but all the evidence is pointing that it came from the lab and there will be responsible for those that funded the lab, including yourself, the senator said, noting that while nobody is saying what was created in the Wuhan lab caused the pandemic the lab was still doing gain of function research that was, in part, paid for by the NIH.

I totally resent the lie you are now propagating, senator, the epidemiologist said, noting that it is molecularly impossible the research that the NIH funded was responsible for the creation of SARS-CoV-2.

You are implying that what we did was responsible for the deaths of individual[s], I totally resent that and if anybody is lying here, senator, it is you, he said.

Read more at: ConservativeBrief.com
(Natural News) No matter what the media tries to get you to think, the fact remains that there is no such thing as a Delta variant, at least not as far as the currently available tests are concerned.

Besides the fact that PCR tests are completely fraudulent to begin with, hospitals are now refusing to show patients who supposedly test positive for the latest Delta variant their actual test results, which means there is no way to prove that anyone actually has it.

The reason, of course, is because the Delta variant does not exist and is merely a figment of peoples imaginations. And there certainly is not a test for something that does not exist because how could there be?

If anything, what they are calling the Delta variant or even covid in general is just vaccine damage and/or 5G poisoning under a different name. The real disease in all this is the drug, in other words  and the more people get that drug, the more disease there is going to be.

Doctors are just guessing about the Delta variant

Patty McMurray from 100percentfedup.com looked into this further by reaching out to her primary care physician to find out how medical personnel are supposedly testing for the Delta variant. This is what the doctor said:

Were just guessing thats what it is because the Delta variant is so contagious.

The mainstream media openly admits that American patients are not even allowed to know which variant they supposedly have. Health care workers are simply making things up and filling in the data sheets accordingly.

Thats because sequencing tests have to be federally approved for results to be disclosed to doctors or patients, and most are not yet, McMurray says.

Lab scientists say the process of validating the tests for approval is too costly and time-consuming.

A musician from San Francisco by the name of Sam Reider who is fully vaccinated learned this the hard way back in early summer when the California Department of Public Health notified him that he tested positive for Chinese Germs.

Reider was asked to take a second test at a local Kaiser Permanente facility and was later declared to have the Delta variant. When Reider asked to see proof, however, doctors told him that they could not provide this information.

When I got the follow-up from Kaiser, they said its positive, but they didnt have any of the sequencing information, Reider told Business Insider. That felt odd to me, he added.

A New Jersey man named Ryan Forrest, also fully vaccinated, says he experienced much the same thing after testing positive following his attendance at a wedding.

It would have been nice to know just for curiosity more than anything else, Forrest told the media after being refused proof to show that he really contracted the Delta variant.

Many others have had similar experiences after supposedly testing positive for Delta. When they asked for proof, the testing facilities could not, or would not, provide the requested information.

The fact that so few people are asking questions about this is concerning but expected, seeing as how most people seem to just be going along with all the plandemic nonsense, no matter how crazy it is.

Are vaccinated patients being denied information from tests performed on their bodies because medical experts dont want them to know they have the same type of COVID they were vaccinated against? asks McMurray.

Or is it because it would blow up the propaganda machines narrative that every American needs to be vaccinated to prevent becoming infected with the newest variants of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus?

To keep up with the latest news about Chinese Virus deception, visit Pandemic.news.

Sources for this article include:

100percentfedup.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) Fake president Joe Biden is threatening to get out of the way all governors who refuse his latest Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) vaccine mandate.

In a teleprompter speech, Pedo Joe said that he plans to use his power as president to remove every state governor who defies his regimes imposition of medical fascism against federal, contract and large-scale corporate employees that they all get jabbed for Chinese Germs.

If theyll not help, Biden mumbling during his announcement, if these governors wont help us beat the pandemic, Ill use my power as president to get them out of the way.

Were someone to say this same thing about Biden, the Secret Service would likely intervene to try to prevent a possible assassination. When Biden says it against state governors, though, liberals apparently cheer with excitement.

The reaction from state governors made it clear that a major line in the sand has been crossed, and civil war is now officially brewing, wrote Hal Turner from the Hal Turner Radio Show.

JUST SAY NO to mandatory Biden vaccines!

Hunters dad pitched a fit after numerous state governors, including South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, tweeted that they will not be complying with Bidens vaccination demands.

The American Dream has turned into a nightmare under President [sic] Biden and the radical Democrats, McMaster wrote.

They have declared war against capitalism, thumbed their noses at the Constitution, and empowered our enemies abroad. Rest assured, we will fight them to the gates of hell to protect the liberty and livelihood of every South Carolinian.

Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas called Bidens decree an assault on private businesses, reiterating the fact that his own executive order protecting Texans right to choose whether they get the COVID vaccine blocks any and all vaccine mandates coming from the feds.

The Biden Administrations recent announcement seeking to dictate personal freedom and private business decisions is an insult to our American principles of individual liberty and free enterprise, added Gov. Michael Parsons of Missouri to the conversation.

This heavy-handed action by the federal government is unwelcome in our state and has potentially dangerous consequences for working families. Vaccination protects us from serious illness, but the decision to get vaccinated is a private health care decision that should remain as such. My administration will always fight back against federal power grabs and government overreach that threatens to limit our freedoms, he added.

China Joe really has crossed a line by declaring himself to be some kind of medical dictator.

The gall of this man thinking that he holds any power to force chemical injections into peoples bodies under duress is off the charts. And yet it all makes sense that a pedophile like himself would seek to medically rape Americans, including underage Americans, with dangerous Big Pharma needles.

The good news is that Americans now know where this tyrant truly stands. There are still tens of millions of patriots in this country who have no plans to ever concede to the Pedophile-in-Chief under any circumstances.

We should be celebrating this moment of clarity, for Bidens audacious actions have just turned half of America into a powerful new vaccine resistance movement, says Mike Adams, the Health Ranger.

This is, of course, an act of treason and war against the United States of America, and it opens the window for the white hats in the U.S. military to remove Biden from office and declare his rule to be an unconstitutional occupation, the Health Ranger adds, speculating as to what might happen next in this nightmare saga.

The latest news about faux president Bidens assault on American civil liberties can be found at Fascism.news.

Sources for this article include:

HalTurnerRadioShow.com

NaturalNews.com
(Natural News) As NewsBusters reported earlier this week, Gold Star fathers of two of the Marines killing at the Kabul airport during the Afghanistan evacuation spoke out against President Biden in outrage of him disrespecting their sons and looking at his watch during the dignified transfer. Well, on Wednesday, a Biden sycophant at USA Today named Daniel Funke decided he was going to try to drag those grieving families through the mud with a so-called fact-check about their story, but he was forced to retract his smear the very next day after it was proven false.

(Article by Nicholas Fondacaro republished from NewsBusters.org)

New fact check: A viral photo makes it look like President Biden checked his watch during a ceremony honoring U.S. service members killed in Kabul. But thats misleading, Funke proclaimed in a tweet. Adding in another: The way Biden honored the 11 caskets presented at Dover Air Force Base on Sunday was similar to how Trump paid respects to fallen service members during his presidency[.]

He would also claim that the only time Biden checked his watch was AFTER the ceremony and never during it.

Footage from the 45-minute ceremony shows Biden bowing his head and placing his hand over his heart as 11 caskets are carried off a plane and into gray vans, he wrote in the supposed fact-check. A video from C-SPAN shows Biden checking his watch once, near the end of the dignified transfer ceremony.

The way Biden honored the 11 caskets presented at Dover Air Force Base on Sunday was similar to how Trump paid respects to fallen service members during his presidency https://t.co/F6bjQFYVbC  Daniel Funke (@dpfunke) September 1, 2021

His initial designation was that the claims Biden had disrespectfully looked at his watch multiple times were partly false. But yet, the next day, USA Today was forced to issue a correction in the face of overwhelming evince they were lying. Of course, they only issued a half-hearted revision, suggesting the claims were missing context:

Corrections & Clarifications: This story was updated Sept. 2 to note that Biden checked his watch multiple times at the dignified transfer event, including during the ceremony itself. The rating on this claim has been changed from partly false to missing context.

Meanwhile, the piece still tried to portray those Gold Star families as liars:

As my son and the rest of our fallen heroes were being taken off the plane yesterday I watched you disrespect us all five different times by checking your watch, Shana Chappell, mother of Marine Lance Cpl. Kareem Nikoui, wrote in an Aug. 30 Facebook post. Darin Hoover, father of Marine Staff Sgt. Darin Taylor Hoover Jr., and Mark Schmitz, father of Marine Lance Cpl. Jared Schmitz, told Fox News Sean Hannity that Biden checked his watch multiple times during the dignified transfer. Hoover said it happened after each casket was presented.

USA TODAY was unable to independently verify exactly how many times Biden looked at his watch, Funke asserted.

Instead of trying to sully Gold Star families, Funke should have been fact-checking Biden himself as Fox News Channel White House correspondent Peter Doocy did on Thursdays Special Report, calling out Bidens Afghanistan lies (Click expand):

DOOCY: Still, the President claims he felt global support. BIDEN: I have seen no question of our credibility from our allies around the world.

More of Doocys fact-checks are in the transcript below.

Obviously, Funke flunked doing his job.

The transcript is below, click expand to read:

Fox News Channels Special Report

September 2, 2021

6:27:51 p.m. Eastern BRET BAIER: President Biden facing increasing criticism tonight, for what some critics say is clearly a broken promise about getting Americans and thousands of Afghans who helped America out of Afghanistan. White House correspondent Peter Doocy looks at the controversy tonight. [Cuts to video] PETER DOOCY: Afghanistan policy has not played out as advertised. PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: If there is American citizens left were going to stay until we get them all out. DOOCY: Turns out all out meant 9 out of 10. BIDEN: 90 percent of Americans in Afghanistan who wanted to leave were able to leave. DOOCY: So, even though the administration initially claimed. PRESS SEC. JEN PSAKI: Its irresponsible to say Americans are stranded. They are not. DOOCY: Pentagon later clarified. JOHN KIRBY (Pentagon spokesman): We have Americans that get stranded in countries all the time. DOOCY: Then there are knows who helped the U.S. in wartime. GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS (ABC): How about our Afghan allies, does the commitment hold for them as well? BIDEN: The commitment holds to get everyone out that in fact we can get out and everyone who should come out. DOOCY: That didnt happen either. PSAKI: Are there more people that want to leave Afghanistan? Absolutely. DOOCY: Early on, the President was confident in thinks plan. BIDEN: The likelihood there is going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely. DOOCY: But they did in just 11 days. BIDEN: Afghanistan political leaders gave up and fled the country. The Afghan military collapsed. Some time without trying to fight. DOOCY: Still, the President claims he felt global support. BIDEN: I have seen no question of our credibility from our allies around the world. DOOCY: Yet, criticism was heard, including in the British parliament where one MP took major issue with the U.S. President criticizing the Afghan army. TOM TUGENDHAT (British parliament member): To see their commander-in-chief call into question the courage of men I fought with, to claim that they ran, shameful. DOOCY: However, this President stands by the way he ordered the withdrawal. BIDEN: I give my word with all of my heart, I believe this is the right decision, a wise decision, and the best decision for America. [Cuts back to live] DOOCY: As a candidate, President Biden once claimed that if he won other countries would have reason to trust and respect the word of an American president again. But so far, on foreign policy, his word and the way things have gone have been different. Bret? BAIER: Peter Doocy in the White House briefing room. Peter, thanks.

Read more at: NewsBusters.org
During the dinosaur era, iconic tyrannosauroids like T. rex notoriously controlled the top of the food web. However, the T-Rex was not always the king.

Uzbekistan Giant

Ulughbegsaurus uzbekistanensis, a new dinosaur from the lower Upper Cretaceous of Uzbekistan, was named based on a single maxilla specimen. According to the study team, this carcharodontosaurian weighed over 1000 kg and reached 7.5--8.0 meters in length, far larger than previously documented predators from the same deposit.

In addition, the age, locality, and co-occurrence of the specimen with the smaller tyrannosaurid Timurlengia provide insight into the transition from carcharodontosaurians to tyrannosaurids apex predators.

A research team led by the University of Tsukuba has reported a new genus and species of Carcharodontosauria, a group of medium- to large-sized carnivorous dinosaurs that predated the tyrannosauroids as apex predators, in a recent study published in Royal Society Open Science.

Related Article: Scientists Named Recently Discovered "4-Legged Whale" After Egyptian God of Death



Discovering the Ulughbegsaurus Uzbekistanensis

Ulughbegsaurus uzbekistanensis was discovered in the Kyzylkum Desert in Uzbekistan's lower Upper Cretaceous Bissekty Formation, indicating that it lived around 90 million years ago.

Two different evolutionary studies confirm the new dinosaur's categorization as the first definite carcharodontosaurian in Central Asia's Upper Cretaceous. Assistant Professor Kohei Tanaka, the study's primary author, adds:

"We described this new genus and species based on a single solitary fossil, a left maxilla, or upper jawbone. Because the size of the maxilla corresponds with femur length, a well-established indication of body size in theropod dinosaurs, it may be used to determine the animal's size. As a result, we may estimate that Ulughbegsaurus uzbekistanensis weighed about 1,000 kilograms and measured 7.5 to 8.0 meters in length, which is longer than a full-grown African elephant."

Gigantic Tyrannosauroids

This is far larger than any other carnivore known from the Bissekty Formation, including the tiny tyrannosauroid Timurlengia from the same formation. As a result, the newly named dinosaur most likely ruled the early Late Cretaceous food chain.

Ulughbegsaurus, the genus's namesake, is named after Ulugh Beg, a 15th-century mathematician, astronomer, and ruler of the Timurid Empire of Central Asia. The species takes its name from the nation where the fossil was found.

Carcharodontosaurians like Ulughbegsaurus vanished from the paleocontinent that comprised Central Asia before the Late Cretaceous. This extinction is linked to the emergence of tyrannosauroids as apex predators, but due to the lack of relevant fossils, this shift has remained poorly understood.

Locating the Giant Reptiles

Professor Yoshitsugu Kobayashi, the senior author of the Hokkaido University Museum, states, "Ulughbegsaurus uzbekistanensis fills a significant gap in the fossil record, demonstrating that carcharodontosaurians were found all over the continent, from Europe to East Asia.

Furthermore, this big predator's cohabitation with a smaller tyrannosauroid indicates important limitations on the transition of the apex predator niche in the Late Cretaceous as one of the last surviving carcharodontosaurians in Laurasia."

Also Read: Prehistoric Evidence Shows Mammals Evolved Rapidly When Dinosaurs Went Extinct

For more prehistoric news, don't forget to follow Nature World News!
EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. (AP)  Three people suspected in a shooting that wounded seven people in southern Illinois were arrested early Friday, hours after a wild incident that included a getaway car crashing into a commuter train, police said.

The shooting occurred Thursday afternoon in East St. Louis, across the Mississippi River from St. Louis. No details were released about the condition of the seven victims, which included a child, or a possible motive.

East St. Louis Chief Kendall Perry, during a Friday afternoon news conference, would not speculate on what led to the shooting but said some innocent bystanders were among those shot.

They had a target. I dont know what their motive was, but they werent shooting just randomly, Perry said.

Perry said the city would impose a midnight to 6 a.m. curfew, increase police presence and pretty much just close all businesses down,.

Stephen Pierce said he was waiting for a bus with his wife and two children when he heard boom, boom, boom. He said his wife was wounded in the arm.

Our backs were turned and the next thing you know they just started shooting and it came at the back of my head and I didnt know what to do but to get up and run, Pierce told KMOV-TV.

After the shooting, a vehicle collided with a MetroLink train, and the people in the car fled, Illinois State Police said. Video at the scene showed the car on tracks. KMOV said some train passengers were treated for injuries.

Finally, at 2:30 a.m. Friday, three suspects were arrested in the basement of a partially demolished building in East St. Louis. Further information wasn't immediately available, police said.

Pierce was emotional as he described what happened.

I hope you go to jail for the rest of your life. You can't be shooting people up like that, man, get out of here, he said.
New Castle, PA (16103)

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Scattered showers and thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. High 74F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

Cloudy skies early, then partly cloudy after midnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 54F. Winds light and variable.
In this Sept. 11, 2001, file photo, the south tower of the World Trade Center, left, begins to collapse after a terrorist attack on the landmark buildings in New York.
The global pandemic waxes and wanes, but it has not slowed the massive digitization of data, often referred to as digital transformation, that is now challenging large enterprises and government organizations that are attempting to deploy new digital strategies. Since 2016, the digital transformation phenomena have generated 90% of the worlds data and this astonishing growth shows no sign of slowing.

Digital transformation is rapidly increasing requirements for larger technology stacks to store, compute, analyze and connect the data. All of this requires more power as evidenced by the Valuates Report, which projects the global data center market for power increasing 43% from $15 billion in 2020 to $21.5 billion by 2026.

This increase in demand for power is commensurate with increases in data center space and connectivity required to accommodate expanding compute and storage environments in colocation data centers.

Bigger is Better

As a result, the ability of an organization to scale  to easily add or subtract compute and storage resources, in different data centers and geographies  has become a significant competitive advantage.

For on-premises data centers, scaling requires purchasing more power and building more space, which is costly, slow, and difficult to manage. Thats why large enterprise and government organizations are choosing to move out of their on-premises data centers into large, modern, third-party data centers that offer flexible and scalable data platforms and can accommodate rapid changes in the growth of data.

According to an IDC survey, "72 percent of respondents indicated their usage of colocation will increase over the next 12 months" to accommodate a new normal that is taking shape for enterprise IT.

While most on-premises data centers are relatively small, the average multi-tenant data center occupies approximately 100,000 square feet of space. A handful of providers manage mega-scale, one million+ square feet facilities with ample power, robust connectivity and innovative service delivery platforms utilizing advanced technologies to optimize the digital infrastructure of their enterprise customers.

Enterprise digital infrastructure deployments are expanding and starting to take on junior hyperscale-like requirements for scalable space, power, and sophisticated connectivity ecosystems in multiple data centers and in multiple markets.

QTS continues to observe a significant increase in requests for proposals from enterprises across verticals with rapidly escalating requirements. What used to be normal enterprise requests for 250-500 KW environments are now requests for multi-megawatt, multi-site, multi-geography engagements.

As a result, there are a shrinking number of data center providers that are capable of accommodating the increasing enterprise requirements for scalable space, power and robust connectivity. They are unable to compete for large enterprise deals because the requirements are too demanding  both from the data centers ability to physically scale (power, space, connectivity) but also its ability to provide data center services across multiple sites and geographies.

And while the overall number of on-premises data centers may be going down as enterprises consolidate into large, multi-tenant data centers, the overall data center growth forecasts are rising. Gartner forecasts that end-user spending on global data center infrastructure in the US alone is projected to climb to $200 billion in 2021, up 6 percent from 2020.

Creative New Requirements Emerging

As data center deployment size and investment increases, the selection of a data center provider becomes a much more scrutinized process by stakeholders. As a result, todays data center must demonstrate it can enable a pristine business experience from content to end user in a constantly scaling environment. The strategic enterprise buyer recognizes that if they are able to grow beyond their initial deployment, they are not likely to succeed. Only through having a scalable data center platform can an organization be prepared for its inevitable data growth.

Ideal colocation data center providers deliver a cloud-like experience when it comes to scalability. They have ample space, power, connectivity and advanced technologies that allow enterprises to focus on executing their digital strategy rather than trying to replicate the cost and expertise advantages of a major data enter operator. The best providers will collaborate to understand your digital strategy and help scale your environment accordingly, ensuring you always have enough resources without over-provisioning and wasting your IT budget.

The increasing need to scale is a direct result of digital transformation and massive data growth that continues to increase exponentially. QTS experience with large enterprise, hyperscale and government organizations has given us unique perspective into serving this new dynamic. We have mega-scale data centers in all the major U.S. markets and can support the largest space and power requirements. We are also unique in our commitment to provide and grow connectivity ecosystems in all of our buildings across geographies. This translates to a combination of mega-scale data center infrastructure with access and connectivity to the worlds largest cloud providers, the worlds largest IP networks, Internet Exchanges, fiber providers, diverse transport paths and subsea cables.

To learn more about scalable digital infrastructure, contact QTS Data Centers.

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Newburyport, MA (01950)

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Scattered thunderstorms. High 84F. Winds SSW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 60%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms early, then variable clouds overnight with still a chance of showers. A few storms may be severe. Low 64F. Winds W at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 90%.
Sean Kilpatrick/AP

TORONTO (AP)  Candidate controversies over vaccines and Islamophobia dogged the leader of Canadas opposition Conservative party on Saturday ahead of the Sept. 20 election.

A Conservative candidate in Nova Scotia apologized for social media posts that weighed in on sharia law and backed banning the burqa worn by some Muslim women. And on Friday the Conservative party confirmed they had dumped Beaches-East York candidate in Toronto after the ridings Liberal incumbent, Nate Erskine-Smith, highlighted Islamophobic tweets from 2017.
CHALMETTE, La. (AP)  Darkness set in for Natasha Blunt well before Hurricane Ida knocked out power across Louisiana.

Months into the pandemic, she faced eviction from her New Orleans apartment. She lost her job at a banquet hall. She suffered two strokes. And she struggled to help her 5-year-old grandson keep up with schoolwork at home.

Like nearly a fifth of the states population  disproportionately represented by Black residents and women  Blunt, 51, lives below the poverty line, and the economic fallout of the pandemic sent her to the brink. With the help of a legal aid group and grassroots donors, she moved to Chalmette, a few miles outside New Orleans, and tried to settle into a two-bedroom apartment. Using a cane and taking a slew of medications since her strokes, she was unable to return to work. But federal benefits kept food in the fridge for the most part.

Then came Hurricane Ida.

The storm ravaged Louisiana as the fifth-strongest hurricane to ever hit the U.S. mainland, wiping out the power grid before marching up the coast and sparking devastating flooding in the Northeast. Among survivors of the deadly storm, the toll has been deepest in many ways for people like Blunt  those who already lost livelihoods to the COVID-19 pandemic in a region of longstanding racial and social inequality. Advocates say the small wins theyd made for marginalized communities and people of color since the pandemic began have been quickly wiped out.

The government is really disconnected from what its like for people who have little to no safety net, said Maggie Harris, a documentarian and grassroots organizer who last year created a fundraiser for Blunt and other women economically devastated by the pandemic. You marginalize people, you dont pay them enough, they have health problems and arent insured, you offer little cash assistance or rent assistance, and you allow them to be evicted.

"The message that people get is their lives are expendable.

As Ida approached Louisiana, Blunt knew it was intensifying rapidly. She evacuated to a hotel in Lafayette, more than two hours west of her new home, a day ahead of landfall. But she could afford only a short stay, and the hotel was booked with other evacuees. She had to return to Chalmette, despite officials warnings not to go back to hot, humid cities with boil-water advisories and no power.

Her apartment was pitch black. Idas Category 4 winds had blown in the windows of her upstairs bedroom. Her few possessions  beds, clothing, furniture  were waterlogged. Shed spent her last dollars getting to the hotel, with no federal aid to evacuate.

Its like Ive got to start all over again, Blunt said, sobbing as she surveyed the first floor of her apartment, where she sleeps now that the bedroom is uninhabitable. Every time I get a step ahead, I get pushed back down. And Im tired. I dont see no way out.

Now, Blunt faces eviction for the second time in a year. Her only hope, she said, is Social Security and other disability benefits. She applied before the storm, she said, but has yet to hear back  social safety net programs are often disrupted in the wake of disasters.

Blunt wants to find a new home, preferably far from the storm-battered Gulf Coast  a place where grandson Kamille can resume schooling without worrying about power and Internet outages. But shes far from optimistic.

This is the end of the road; I cant go on much longer, she said. Kamille put down his kindergarten worksheet to gently rub his grandmas leg.

Dont cry, he told her. She managed a tender reply: Do your ABCs, baby.

____

Anti-poverty and housing advocates in Louisiana bemoan links between being Black or brown, living in impoverished areas, and being underserved by governmental disaster response. Available aid from anti-poverty programs often fails to meet the heightened needs of storm victims in states of emergency.

And that, the advocates say, is what happened during Ida. In Louisiana, where 17 storms that caused at least $1 billion in damage have hit since 2000, nonprofits see some of the most dire need and the starkest divide along socioeconomics lines.

One of the things that we get really frustrated about, in terms of the narrative, is people saying, Ugh, Louisiana is so resilient, said Ashley Shelton of the Power Coalition for Equality and Justice, a statewide nonprofit that provides resources and encourages civic participation in underserved communities of color.

We dont want to be resilient forever, she said. Yes, were beautiful and resourceful people. But when you force people to live in a constant state of resilience, its just oppression. Fix the systems that are structurally broken.

It doesnt help that Louisianas poverty rate is higher than the national average, according to the Census Bureau 's American Community Survey. High poverty makes the prospect of temporary or permanent relocation precarious for people who were already teetering on the edge before disaster struck, said Andreanecia Morris of HousingNOLA, a program of the Greater New Orleans Housing Alliance.

Housing is a foundational issue for all of these catastrophes, whether that be COVID, economic crisis, criminal justice, or education, Morris said. Our failure to address racial bias, gender bias and poverty bias in housing impedes all of those things. There is nowhere that is more clear than in our governments response to disasters. And this one is no different.

Less than a week after Ida hit, Morris spent a day canvassing areas of New Orleans where her organization helps the neediest cases. In the Lower Ninth Ward, a New Orleans neighborhood that suffered immensely after Hurricane Katrina, 57-year-old Lationa Kemp found herself cut off from most aid.

Kemp said she had been relying on neighbors with cars to get ice, hot meals and bottled water. To stay cool, Kemp left her front door open for fresh air. Shed gone days without power, and Ida had caused roof leaks and fence damage.

To Morris, the situation was urgent. Kemp had disputes with her landlord over the homes condition, and the threat of eviction loomed. The landlord listed on her eviction notice did not respond to APs calls for comment.

Morris wants to get Kemp and her 25-year-old son, Alvin, moved elsewhere permanently. In the meantime, Morris suggested a cooling center.

Thank you, baby, but Im fine, Kemp told her, explaining that shed rather stay in a dilapidated home  past experiences make her fear the shelter system. I already told the Lord, Im praying that when I leave out of here, Im going to a better house. Ill have better income so I wont have to go through this anymore.

The Biden administration set aside nearly $50 billion for rental assistance during the pandemic, but the money has been slow to get out the door. Advocates in Louisiana say they hoped those COVID-19 funds could be transitioned for storm aid, too, but that it hasn't been so easy. And, for people like Blunt and Kemp, the technological savvy needed to apply online can be a hurdle.

Eventually, the Kemps will probably get the help they need, but it takes time, said Cynthia Wiggins, a tenant and property manager at New Orleans public housing development Guste Homes, one of just a few resident management corporations left in the U.S., where tenants share the responsibilities that landlords typically shoulder.

Theres nothing that we can do to get around the process, Wiggins said. We have the available units, but we paused processing applications when the storm hit.

____

Like many in Louisiana, Blunt has survived her share of storms  starting with her birth, during the fallout of Hurricane Camille in 1969. As she tells it, her pregnant mother had been moved to a naval medical ship to give birth. Today, Blunt can chuckle over the coincidence of her grandsons name, Kamille.

Its like the storms keep coming for me, she said, laughing.

The memory of Katrina is scarier. Blunt evacuated to Alabama and then Chicago. When it was safe, she and Kamilles grandfather returned to their home in New Orleans seventh ward to find floodwater damage. But even with the horror stories of Katrina, Blunt said, Ida has been worse for her.

This here was my worst-ever life experience, coming back to this, coming back to darkness, she said. Im mad enough, Im sick and scared as it is. Now, Im tossing and turning at night.

It might be enough for the lifelong Louisiana resident to leave for good. As she finds herself trashing her storm-damaged belongings, she said she sees no way to find peace in the state.

Shes not alone. Many people have fled the state after major storms, data show. In metro New Orleans, and even in Chalmette in particular, the U.S. Census Bureau recorded signification population loss from its 2000 to 2020 counts. After Katrina, in 2006, nearly 160,000 Louisiana residents in total moved to Texas, Georgia and Mississippi. Louisiana's population rebounded as people returned to rebuild, but it's been in decline again since 2016.

For families who stay in spite of natural disasters, it seems each new generation learns new lessons of survival, said Toya Lewis of Project Hustle, a New Orleans nonprofit that organizes Black and brown street vendors who work in the informal economies.

No one was prepared to be without power in New Orleans for more than eight days, Lewis said. Were taking all of this lived experience and organizing to thrive. We must begin organizing around our survival.

And Blunt knows that no matter where she ends up, shell survive. Even in the darkness, she finds some light by helping her community  trying to secure a power source for a neighbor's breathing machine, sharing her car as a way for folks to charge cellphones. She tells herself: Im going to be OK. ... I do good. I dont hurt nobody. Im still standing.

There's solace in the glimmers of light, but she wants more  not just for her, but for her grandson. I want us to go somewhere better," Blunt said, helping Kamille with the TV remote, the power finally restored in their apartment.

"Somewhere I can be stable. I just want to be stable.

___

AP writers Seth Borenstein in Kensington, Maryland, and Michael Schneider in Orlando, Florida, contributed to this report.

___

Morrison is a member of the APs Race and Ethnicity team. Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/aaronlmorrison.
Christian Abraham / Hearst Connecticut Media

BRIDGEPORT  Officials released the identities of the victims who were killed by gunfire in a Platt Street home early Thursday.

The victims were identified as Stratford resident Candace Goodwin, 19, and 59-year-old Austin Burgher of Jamaica, according to the Bridgeport Police Department.
Vietnam and Taiwan are bracing for powerful twin storms which are expected to make landfall over the weekend.

Super Typhoon Chanthu is expected to bring damaging winds and extremely heavy rainfall to Taiwan, while Tropical Storm Conson is forecast to bring flooding rains to Vietnam.

Taiwan issued a sea and land warning for Pingtung and Taitung Country on Friday ahead of Super Typhoon Chanthu. Chanthu is one of the strongest storms this year, with sustained winds of 260 kph (160 mph) as of Friday evening -- equivalent in strength to a Category 5 Atlantic hurricane.

Chanthu formed on September 6, according to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center. The storm then underwent one of the most extreme bouts of rapid-intensification ever recorded, by increasing 80 knots in wind speed in just 24 hours on September 7. Rapid intensification is when a storm gains at least 30 knots (35 mph) in wind speed within 24 hours.

Chanthu is the second storm of the year to reach super typhoon status, after Surigae in April.

The super typhoon is passing just to the east and north of Luzon in the Philippines early Saturday morning, bringing with it heavy rainfall, severe winds, and coastal inundation.

As of 8 a.m. local time Saturday, the Philippine weather bureau said Chanthu -- known locally as Kiko in the Philippines -- was about to make landfall over Batan and Sabtang islands in Batanes with maximum sustained winds of 215 kph (133mph) near the center and gusts of up to 265 kph (164 mph).

Portions of Luzon can expect torrential rainfall, typhoon-force winds of 171 to 220 kph, and a storm surge of 1 to 2 meters through Saturday morning as the typhoon tracks to the north.

Throughout the day on Saturday, Chanthu is forecast to track north of Luzon and toward Taiwan while weakening some. The typhoon is forecast to have sustained winds of about 220 kph (135 mph) prior to impacting Taiwan Saturday night into Sunday.

Weather conditions are expected to greatly diminish across Taiwan on Saturday as the storm approaches the southern coast. The island can expect widespread heavy rain of 200 to 300 millimeters with isolated totals of over 300 millimeters possible.

Speaking to Taiwan's state-run Central News Agency on Thursday, Central Weather Bureau forecaster Wu Wan-hua said she expected to see torrential rain across the southern part of the island.

This amount of extreme rainfall could lead to flash flooding and mudslides in Taiwan's high terrain.

As Chanthu tracks along the east coast of Taiwan, the land interaction could weaken the system even further. However, the storm is expected to maintain winds of above 180 kph (111 mph) through the weekend.

The official forecast has the system weakening as it tracks north toward China into early next week. Chanthu could stall just off the coast of Shanghai by Monday or Tuesday, which would bring heavy rain to this region as well.

Conson brings flood threat to Vietnam this weekend

At the same time, in the South China Sea, Tropical Storm Conson is due to make landfall near Da Nang, Vietnam, overnight Saturday into Sunday morning. Vietnam has put 500,000 soldiers on standby ahead of its arrival.

The outer bands of the storm are already bringing thunderstorms and gusty winds to the region on Friday and weather conditions will continue to deteriorate across Vietnam on Saturday as the storm approaches the coast.

Although it is a much weaker storm than Super Typhoon Chanthu, Conson is still expected to have sustained winds of 75 kph (45 mph) prior to landfall this weekend.

The Vietnamese government has also ordered vessels to stay in port and prepared evacuation plans, Reuters said, quoting state-run media. As many as 800,000 people in Vietnam's northern provinces could be affected by the storm's arrival -- the fifth to make landfall in the country this year.

Conson is forecast to bring widespread rainfall of 100 to 200 millimeters to the region through Monday with isolated totals above 250 millimeters possible. This amount of rain could lead to flash flooding and mudslides across the mountainous terrain.

Earlier this week, Conson brought heavy rain and gusty winds to the Philippines. The storm traversed the central Philippines Monday afternoon through Wednesday before emerging into the South China Sea early Thursday morning.

As the storm moved west into the South China Sea, all warnings were lifted for Luzon.

This story has been updated with the latest developments.

The-CNN-Wire

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Richard J. Leskosky taught media and cinema studies at the University of Illinois and has reviewed films for more than 30 years. He can be contacted at filmcritic@comcast.net. Follow him on Twitter (@Richard

Leskosky).
Film Critic

Chuck Koplinski is The News-Gazette's film critic. His email is chuckkoplinski@gmail.com and you can follow him on Twitter (@ckoplinski).
'On Sept. 18, 2004, we had two suicide bombers blow up themselves and their cars on the main road between the airport and Green Zone in Baghdad. My unit was patrolling it at the time and the first bomber blew himself up 50 yards in front of me.'
With the 20th anniversary of the deadliest terrorist attacks on U.S. soil now 20 days away, community members present and past share their 9-11 memories in an N-G miniseries. First up: Angela Urban, Damir Krupalija, Judy Fraser, R. Turner-Winston, Vashoune Russell, Jeff Wooten, Sandra Casserly, Rabbi Dovid Tiechtel, Rachel Schroeder, Rick Shields and Becky Preston.
I heard about the attack first, so I left my office (at NYU) and went outside to the street to find out. It was the most difficult moment because I saw the World Trade Center collapsing in front of my eyes while I was standing looking at it.'
Reporter

Mary Schenk is a reporter covering police, courts and breaking news at The News-Gazette. Her email is mschenk@news-gazette.com, and you can follow her on Twitter (@schenk).
One of Editor & Publishers 10 That Do It Right 2021
Which concept should the city use for an entryway monument in South Longview?

You voted:
Worship the Lord your God, and his blessing will be on your food and water. I will take away sickness from among you.

Exodus 23:25
Sandrine V. Pierre, Ph.D., associate professor of biomedical sciences at the Marshall University Joan C. Edwards School of Medicine and interim director of the Marshall Institute for Interdisciplinary Research (MIIR), has been awarded a Research Project Grant (R01), one of the most competitive grants issued by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Pierre was awarded the $1.36 million, four-year grant (R01DK129937) from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases to study the regulatory mechanism of salt handling by the kidney and malfunction of this mechanism that compromises the body's ability to remove salt. The new study will draw upon the renowned expertise of Marshall investigators on the signaling and scaffolding function of the Na/K-ATPase protein and its impact on cardiovascular function.

The mishandling of salt balance by the body contributes to the development and progression of many common diseases, including hypertension and organ damage due to failure to remove excess amount of salt. Therefore, the proposed investigation has profound basic and clinical implications and may also provide new targets for developing better therapeutics." Sandrine V. Pierre, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Biomedical Sciences, Marshall University Joan C. Edwards School of Medicine

Pierre will work with a team of researchers across the Joan C. Edwards School of Medicine with expertise in renal physiology and preclinical studies of Na/K-ATPase receptor function.

Pierre joined the Marshall faculty in 2014. She has a doctorate in cellular and molecular endocrinology from Aix-Marseille II University in France. Prior to joining Marshall, she was on the faculty of the University of Toledo College of Medicine. A large part of her research has focused on the signaling function of the Na/K-ATPase and its therapeutic applications in cardiovascular diseases with support from the American Heart Association and the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.

The R01 is the original and historically oldest grant mechanism used by NIH. The R01 provides support for health-related research and development based on the mission of the NIH.
More than 70 percent of breastfeeding women take some form of medication, but 90 percent of those medications are not appropriately labeled for pregnant or lactating women. This means the drugs are taken "off-label" or without Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval, largely because they have never been tested in this population. Even less is known about whether these drugs enter the mother's breast milk or are safe for the baby to consume that way.

To address these issues, researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine have received a $6.1 million grant to launch a new Center of Excellence in Therapeutics (CET). The CET will study the effects of medications on human milk and infant health.

UC San Diego joins Vanderbilt University, Indiana University and Ohio State University to form the new Maternal and Pediatric Precision in Therapeutics (MPRINT) Hub funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The three institutions will work together to serve as a national resource for knowledge and expertise in maternal and pediatric pharmacology.

While MPRINT will investigate a variety of therapeutics, initial studies at the UC San Diego center will focus on antibiotics. Antibiotics are some of the most frequently used medications by breastfeeding women, and are necessary treatments for many infections. However, their effects on child development via breast milk exposure remain largely unknown.

UC San Diego's CET will bring together basic and data scientists, pharmacologists and clinical researchers to study the most commonly prescribed antibiotics and their impact on breast milk and pediatric health." Adriana Tremoulet, MD, professor of pediatrics at UC San Diego School of Medicine and lead principal investigator for the project

"We are particularly excited about the specific focus on breastfeeding and human milk," said Lars Bode, PhD, professor of pediatrics and director of the Larsson-Rosenquist Foundation Mother-Milk-Infant Center of Research Excellence at UC San Diego School of Medicine, who will lead the MPRINT Milk Analytics Core. "Human milk plays such a vital role at the interface of maternal and infant health. Yet, we know so little about the effects of therapeutics in this critical space."

The team will investigate how antibiotics alter the composition of breast milk and impact the infant microbiome, metabolome and immune response. They will also assess whether the components of breast milk influence the effectiveness of therapeutics given to the breastfed babies.

"Antibiotic resistance is a huge emerging problem," said Bode. "We also realize how important the microbiome is for short- and long-term health, so you can imagine if you go in with antibiotics that disrupt the baby's microbiome, it may do more harm than good."

While it is important to understand the potential consequences of antibiotic use, Bode notes that it is equally important to determine if and when taking these medications is actually safe.

"My biggest concern is that when a woman is prescribed medications, often the default recommendation is to stop breastfeeding, out of fear of the unknown," said Bode. "We have learned so much in recent years about the many benefits of breastfeeding for both the infant and the mother. Infants who receive human milk have fewer infections and are also less likely to become obese or suffer from allergies later in life. Women who breastfeed are less likely to develop breast or ovarian cancer. So ideally, we don't want physicians to have to make that recommendation to stop breastfeeding simply because of a gap in knowledge."

"We always try to protect pregnant and breastfeeding women in the drug development process, but we need research on them in order to protect them," said Christina Chambers, PhD, MPH, professor at UC San Diego School of Medicine and Herbert Wertheim School of Public Health and Human Longevity Science. "Fortunately, there has been a dramatic change in the last several years in attitudes towards inclusion of pregnant and lactating women in research, and this is one example." Chambers will lead clinical studies at the CET and co-direct the Administrative Core with Tremoulet.

In addition to these studies of mothers and infants, the center will also conduct computational data science studies and basic research in mice.

The funding comes as a result of years of collaboration between physicians and scientists at UC San Diego School of Medicine, as well as Rady Children's Hospital-San Diego where several team members also treat patients.

"This team of researchers has a long track record of working together on successful projects," said Bode. "UC San Diego has a highly collaborative environment, and these center grants are only possible when people from different disciplines come together. That intersection is where innovation lives, and I believe it's an absolute strength of our academic medical center."
University of Montana researcher Angela Luis has been awarded a National Science Foundation grant to study how diversity of competitor species affects infectious disease transmission in wildlife  specifically hantavirus in deer mice.

Luis earned the five-year, $2.5 million grant from NSF's Ecology and Evolution of Infectious Disease Program. She is an associate professor of population and disease ecology in the University's W.A. Franke College of Forestry and Conservation.

The goal of the study is to learn more about how to predict increases in hantavirus in rodents, and, ideally, help prevent its spread to humans, Luis said. While transmission to humans is rare, hundreds have died from the infection in the U.S., and hantaviruses have killed tens of thousands of people worldwide.

The study's underlying principles also could apply to other wildlife-based human diseases. Luis said this is especially important as biodiversity disappears rapidly and infectious diseases increasingly spill over from wildlife to humans.

The big question for this study is how do competitors affect transmission of disease." Angela Luis, Researcher, University of Montana

Within an ecosystem, species interact with one another. In Montana, for example, a mountain lion might prey on an elk calf. Other species  called competitors  jockey for resources. Deer mice, say, compete with montane voles for habitat and food.

Changes in biodiversity  how many species and what species are on the landscape  can affect all sorts of things, including how disease is spread among animals and from animals to humans. How exactly that works, though, is still up for debate.

Luis said there is debate among disease ecologists centered around the ideas of "dilution" and "amplification"  whether increased species diversity decreases or increases disease risk, respectively  and, specifically, when to expect one process or the other.

In some ecosystems, increasing competitor diversity decreases disease risk. This is called the dilution effect because higher species diversity dilutes out infection.

"The idea is that if you have a more diverse community, you'll have less disease transmission," Luis said. "It's a nice public health message, right? If we are protecting biodiversity, we are protecting ourselves."

However, as Luis explains, that's not always the case.

"You don't always see that correlation. You sometimes see the opposite," she said.

A more diverse community also sometimes can increase disease risk  the amplification effect.

"Sometimes if you have more wildlife around, you have more wildlife around that could infect humans," she said. "The dilution effect is not universal."

Current scientific research hasn't fully uncovered when to expect one effect over another, and it's unknown how these competing forces may work within one disease system.

Luis' new project will examine potential causes of dilution and amplification and how they interact to help move beyond the debate and instead clarify which mechanisms are most important in determining disease transmission. It also will identify any patterns about when one process might occur over the other.

"We're starting to say, it depends, and that's what I'm trying to get at," she said. "What does it depend on? Why do you sometimes get more of one than the other? Let's look at what's driving the pattern."

Luis will study three ways that competitors could affect hantavirus transmission rates in deer mice:

First, competitors can reduce host density, reducing the number of mice across the landscape.

Second, they can impact contact rates by changing the way mice interact with one another.

Finally, they can impact immunity by stressing mice. When mice are stressed out, their immunity generally drops, leaving them more vulnerable to disease.

The project will consist of three phases.

In the first phase, Luis' team will monitor natural populations of deer mice at three long-term field sites. This involves trapping deer mice and competitors to understand what the community looks like and how many of those animals are infected with hantavirus.

The second phase involves manipulating populations.

"We built these six big enclosures at Bandy Ranch that are about 30 meters by 30 meters," Luis said. "We can put a certain number of deer mice in there and a certain number of competitors in there and see how they are changing the deer mice's behavior and immunity."

The third component involves analyzing long-term datasets from Montana and from the Southwest spanning 25 years, showing how competitors have affected deer mice populations.

At the end of the study, researchers also will conduct a broad analysis, fitting all of the research findings together to come up with mathematical models that predict when you might expect dilution or amplification in certain scenarios.

Amy Kuenzi, a professor at Montana Tech, is co-principal investigator on the grant. The grant also will help fund three UM doctoral students, a postdoc position, a lab manager position and a number of undergraduate field technician roles.

"The landscape is changing  largely from humans  through all these different anthropogenic things like habitat loss or conversion, climate change," Luis said. "All of these things that people are doing affect the wildlife communities on the landscape, which can affect transmission of nasty things back to them.

"As we've seen with the pandemic, zoonotic disease outbreaks  outbreaks that are moving from animals to humans  have only become more common over the last 30 to 40 years," Luis said. "This is not the last pandemic. We need to understand how what we are doing leads to these outbreaks."
Did you know Governor Holcomb issued a proclamation declaring Sept. 13  17 as Small Business Week in Indiana? To celebrate we visited Schimpff's Confectionery, which has been in business for 130 years. Full story at the 2:45 mark.
(Newser)  Campaign appearances by Democratic stars, as well as an intensified focus on the contrast in the two parties' values, has lifted California Gov. Gavin Newsom into a comfortable lead against the effort to recall him from office. A poll released Friday found that 60.1% of likely voters oppose the recall, while 38.5% support removing Newsom, the Los Angeles Times reports. And their minds appear to be made up, which bodes well for Newsom: Not 2% of likely voters didn't give an answer or said they're still undecided. The poll was conducted between Aug. 30 and Sept. 6 by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies. The election is Tuesday; mail-in ballots have been sent out, and voting has begun.

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In July, another poll by the institute found the voters almost evenly split. The factors driving Newsom's turnaround include:

COVID success . Newsom's opponents cited his unpopular handling of the pandemic when launching the recall attempt. But now, new infections are dropping, per the Hill. "By the time the ballots arrived, his pro-vaccine mandate, pro-mask mandate policies were popular with a majority of voters, including 40% of Republicans," said Rob Stutzman, a GOP strategist.

. Newsom's opponents cited his unpopular handling of the pandemic when launching the recall attempt. But now, new infections are dropping, per the Hill. "By the time the ballots arrived, his pro-vaccine mandate, pro-mask mandate policies were popular with a majority of voters, including 40% of Republicans," said Rob Stutzman, a GOP strategist. Democratic support. Vice President Kamala Harris and Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Amy Klobuchar, and Bernie Sanders were among the big names who appealed to California voters to keep Newsom. A GOP strategist working to recall Newsom said the effort might have come just in time. "You wouldn't have President Obama here on TV in the final week if you weren't worried about your base," he said.

The rise of an opponent. Early in the campaign, the only issue was Newsom. Then Larry Elder broke away from the GOP field. Many of the talk show host's views, including his positions on masks and vaccinations, conflict with those of the majority of Californians. The new poll found 89% of likely Democratic voters and 64% of independent voters65% overallsaid electing a conservative Republican governor would endanger California's progressive policies on climate change, immigration, health care and abortion. Democrats were able to focus on Elder, "framing it as 'Look at what youll get if you vote for this guy,'" the poll director said, per the Times. "I think that really won the day."

(Read more Gavin Newsom stories.)
(Newser)  Video footage and interviews in Kabul have raised questions about the Pentagon's account of the final, fatal US drone attack of the Afghanistan war. The drone struck a vehicle in a residential neighborhood on Aug. 29 that the military said carried explosives and was "an imminent ISIS-K threat" to American troops at the Kabul airport. A second explosion was evidence of explosives in the vehicle, a Pentagon spokesman said at the time. But it's not clear that there was a second blast, or that explosives were aboard, or that the driver was connected to ISIS, the New York Times reports. Ten civilians apparently were killed, seven of them children, though the Pentagon suggested the toll was three civilians.

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US officials said they thought the driver and another man near the vehicle had militant ties and were the only people in the area when the strike was launched. But in the roughly 30 seconds it took the drone to reach its target, three children approached the car, per the Washington Post. They were killed, as were the two men and five others. Experts who examined the evidence for the Post saw no indications that the vehicle had explosives; they said a second blast could have been caused by the sparking of fuel tank vapors. A senior military official said that the Pentagon's review isn't complete, but that the first analysis found a better than 50% chance the vehicle had explosives. "But 'likely' doesnt 'mean for sure,'" the official said.

A drone had tracked the driver's movements all day. Military officials said that they didn't know who he was but that he raised suspicions by possibly going to an ISIS safe house and putting what might have been explosives in the vehicle. He was Zemari Ahmadi, and he worked for a California-based aid organization. Video showing him loading canisters of water into the vehicle for his family might have been misinterpreted, per the Times. Ahmadi's co-workers said that water deliveries had stopped in his neighborhood after the Afghan government fell and that he'd been taking water home from his office. (Read more Afghanistan war stories.)
(Newser)  Pope Francis is making his first foreign trip since undergoing intestinal surgery in July, a four-day visit to central Europe that will not only test his health but also provide one of the most awkward moments of his papacya meeting with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, the sort of populist, right-wing leader Francis typically scorns. The pope is only spending seven hours in Budapest on Sunday before moving on to a three-day, hopscotch tour of neighboring Slovakia. The lopsided itinerary suggests that Francis wanted to avoid giving Orban the bragging rights, political boost, and photo opportunities that come with hosting a pope for a proper state visit, the AP reports.

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Trip organizers have insisted Francis isn't snubbing Hungary, noting that the Hungarian church and state only invited him to close out an international conference on the Eucharist on Sunday. "If I am only invited to dinner, I cannot spend the night," said the Rev. Kornel Fabry, secretary general of the Eucharist conference. But the message is clear, and Francis hammered home the point in a recent interview with the COPE broadcaster of the Spanish bishops' conference. In the interview last week, Francis said he didn't know if he'd meet with Orban while in Budapest. Vatican officials have said he will, of course, meet with the prime minister along with the Hungarian president.

Botond Feledy, a policy expert for a Hungarian Jesuit organization, said that Francis and Orban disagree on issuesespecially migrationbut that the aim is not to escalate conflicts. "It is quite clear that the 30 minutes that Pope Francis has in his program to meet with the head of state, the head of government and the bishop is a very, very short time," Feledy said in an interview. "This shows that he is not really coming for a political visit, but to give a Mass at the congress after having a protocol greeting with the Hungarian politicians." Francis has long expressed solidarity with migrants and refugeeshe once brought a dozen Syrian Muslim refugees home with him from a refugee camp in Greeceand criticized what he called "national populism" advanced by governments like Hungary's.

(Read more Pope Francis stories.)
(Newser)  The Texas abortion ban, and the recent Supreme Court ruling keeping it in place, is drawing plenty of reaction, from everyone from Justice Stephen Breyer to Attorney General Merrick Garland weighing in. Add Salesforce.com into the mix, with the company informing employees this week that it would pay for them to relocate if they're worried they or family members won't be able to access reproductive care due to the ban. "These are incredibly personal issues that directly impact many of usespecially women," Salesforce told staff in a Friday Slack message seen by CNBC. "We recognize and respect that we all have deeply held and different perspectives. As a company, we stand with all of our women at Salesforce and everywhere."

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The message then revealed the company's offer: "With that being said, if you have concerns about access to reproductive health care in your state, Salesforce will help relocate you and members of your immediate family." Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff reinforced that message, later tweeting on Friday: "If you want to move we'll help you exit TX. Your choice." Salesforce isn't the only company stepping up to the plate to help those who may be affected by the ban: Uber and Lyft announced earlier this month they'll pay for any legal fees that may be incurred by their drivers if they get sued for transporting women to abortion clinics, per NBC News.

"We want to be clear: Drivers are never responsible for monitoring where their riders go or why," Lyft says in a statement. "Imagine being a driver and not knowing if you are breaking the law by giving someone a ride. ... Imagine being a pregnant woman trying to get to a health care appointment and not knowing if your driver will cancel on you for fear of breaking a law." Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi agreed with Lyft's move and announced his company would follow suit. "Drivers shouldn't be put at risk for getting people where they want to go," Khosrowshahi tweeted in response to Lyft CEO Logan Green's Sept. 3 announcement. "Team @Uber is in too and will cover legal fees in the same way." (Read more Salesforce.com stories.)
(Newser)  The 9/11 anniversary commemoration at ground zero began Saturday with a tolling bell and a moment of silence, exactly 20 years after the start of the deadliest terror attack on US soil. The anniversary comes under the pall of a pandemic and in the shadow of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, now ruled by the same militants who gave safe haven to the 9/11 plotters. The attacks killed nearly 3,000 people and marked the start of a new era of fear, war, politics, patriotism, and tragedy, per the AP. "It's hard because you hoped that this would just be a different time and a different world. But sometimes history starts to repeat itself and not in the best of ways," says Thea Trinidad, who lost her father in the attacks and was set to read victims' names at the ceremony at ground zero in New York. More on the somber tributes and messages as the day progresses:

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President Biden: The commander in chief joined victims' families and first responders, as well as former presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, at the site in New York City where the twin towers fell on Sept. 11, 2001. Later in the day, Biden is set to also visit the Pentagon and Shanksville, Pa., where Flight 93 crashed. He put out a taped message calling for "unity" on Friday night.

The commander in chief joined victims' families and first responders, as well as former presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, at the site in New York City where the twin towers fell on Sept. 11, 2001. Later in the day, Biden is set to also visit the Pentagon and Shanksville, Pa., where Flight 93 crashed. He put out a taped message calling for "unity" on Friday night. George W. Bush: No. 43, who was president at the time of the attacks, spoke from Shanksville, where Vice President Kamala Harris also spoke. "The world was loud with carnage, and sirens," he told the crowd gathered there. "And then quiet with missing voices that would never be heard again."

No. 43, who was president at the time of the attacks, spoke from Shanksville, where Vice President Kamala Harris also spoke. "The world was loud with carnage, and sirens," he told the crowd gathered there. "And then quiet with missing voices that would never be heard again." Donald Trump: In a video statement released Saturday morning, the most recent former president called it a "very sad day," one "that represents great sorrow for our country." He lauded the "bravery" of 9/11 first responders, then launched into a minute-long attack on the Afghanistan withdrawal, in which he said Biden was "made to look like a fool." Trump also issued a statement congratulating ex-NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani "(for the 20th time!) ... for having shown such leadership and doing such an incredible job during and after the attack on our Nation!"

In a video statement released Saturday morning, the most recent former president called it a "very sad day," one "that represents great sorrow for our country." He lauded the "bravery" of 9/11 first responders, then launched into a minute-long attack on the Afghanistan withdrawal, in which he said Biden was "made to look like a fool." Trump also issued a statement congratulating ex-NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani "(for the 20th time!) ... for having shown such leadership and doing such an incredible job during and after the attack on our Nation!" Obama: "9/11 reminded us how so many Americans give of themselves in extraordinary waysnot just in moments of great crisis, but every single day," No. 44 said in a statement.

"9/11 reminded us how so many Americans give of themselves in extraordinary waysnot just in moments of great crisis, but every single day," No. 44 said in a statement. Clinton: GWB's predecessor honored 9/11 victims and "those whose lives were forever changed" in his own statement, adding: "We owe it to all of them to come together again with unity, hope, compassion, and resolve."

GWB's predecessor honored 9/11 victims and "those whose lives were forever changed" in his own statement, adding: "We owe it to all of them to come together again with unity, hope, compassion, and resolve." Jimmy Carter: The oldest living ex-president was said to be honoring the day in private, with no public appearances scheduled, per People.

The oldest living ex-president was said to be honoring the day in private, with no public appearances scheduled, per People. At the Pentagon: Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin remembered those who lost their lives in DC, noting that "as the years march on, we must ensure that all our fellow Americans know and understand what happened here on 9/11," per the AP.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin remembered those who lost their lives in DC, noting that "as the years march on, we must ensure that all our fellow Americans know and understand what happened here on 9/11," per the AP. A performance from The Boss: With guitar and harmonica in hand, Bruce Springsteen performed his song "I'll See You in My Dreams" for victims' families at the NYC's 9/11 Memorial Plaza.

With guitar and harmonica in hand, Bruce Springsteen performed his song "I'll See You in My Dreams" for victims' families at the NYC's 9/11 Memorial Plaza. From across the pond: "My thoughts and prayers ... remain with the victims, survivors, and families affected, as well as the first responders and rescue workers called to duty," Queen Elizabeth said in a message to Biden, per Reuters. Prime Minister Boris Johnson added in a video message that the terrorists behind the 9/11 attacks "failed to drive our nations apart, or to cause us to abandon our values, or to live in permanent fear."

"My thoughts and prayers ... remain with the victims, survivors, and families affected, as well as the first responders and rescue workers called to duty," Queen Elizabeth said in a message to Biden, per Reuters. Prime Minister Boris Johnson added in a video message that the terrorists behind the 9/11 attacks "failed to drive our nations apart, or to cause us to abandon our values, or to live in permanent fear." Check out our gallery above for pictures from the day.

above for pictures from the day. Follow along with the #NeverForget hashtag for commemorations from people across America and the world.

(Read more September 11 stories.)
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Milton Steel workers recall role in ground zero recovery efforts

Kevin Mertz/The Standard-Journal From left, Brad Reynolds and Greg Solomon look at a copy of The Standard-Journal from 2003, highlighting a visit to Milton Steel by members of the New York City Fire Department. Provided by Milton Steel Ground Zero workers salute as firefighters prepare to walk up an Acrow bridge, secured in place by components manufactured in Milton. Provided by Milton Steel The steel components, used to hold in place a bridge which was central to ground zero recovery efforts, were manufactured at Milton Steel. More photos, Page A6. Provided by Milton Steel Representatives from the New York City Port Authority and New York City Fire Department visited Milton Steel in May 2003 to thank the company for its assistance in recovery efforts. Milton Steel president Chris Holcombe stands third from left.

MILTON  Looking through a scrapbook filled with photos from 20 years ago, Greg Solomon paused as he came across the image of individuals saluting as firefighters in the distance prepared to walk up a 460-foot-long ramp situated at ground zero.

Every time you see this, it makes you stop and think about it, said Solomon, plant superintendent at Acrow Bridge-Milton Steel Co.

Brad Reynolds, the companys shop clerk, said although it wasnt clear in the photo, the firefighters were most likely carrying the body of a fellow first responder who lost their life in the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attack.

The 30-foot wide ramp, or bridge, was delivered to ground zero from Acrow Bridge in New Jersey as responders continued to sift through the rubble in the weeks following the attack.

Acrow, we are the sole manufacturer of the Acrow bridge, Solomon said.

At the time of the attack, he noted that Acrow Bridge did not yet own Milton Steel.

In January 2002, Solomon and Reynolds said Milton Steel was tasked with making specialty components to connect the bridge to steel supports provided by their company for the bridge.

Reynolds noted the steel lining the sides of the bridge came from Milton as well.

The two said the specialty components were needed to be manufactured due to the unique angle at which the bridge had to be placed in order to allow recovery workers to reach an area known as the pit at ground zero.

It was constructed to allow trucks to climb in and out of the seven-story pit at ground zero.

That (bridge) had to go into the debris of the South Tower, where a lot of the firefighters had lost their lives when the tower collapsed, Reynolds said.

In the weeks following the attack, Solomon said officials from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey visited Milton Steel with Acrow Bridge representatives to see if the company could readily produce the special components needed to secure the bridge in place as recovery efforts continued.

The custom steel members (to secure the bridge in place) were made in 11 days, Solomon said. The custom pieces were fabricated (in Milton) and shipped to New York City.

Reynolds said two or three trucks were used to ship 80,000 pounds of steel products from Milton to ground zero.

As he watched the news on Sept. 11, 2001, Solomon didnt realize at the time Milton Steel would play a part in recovering from the tragedy.

We never dreamed in any way that we would be able to help, he said.

The bridge was prominently featured in national news coverage of the recovery efforts.

According to a Standard-Journal article from the time, installation of the bridge at ground zero took one month to complete.

Solomon said the recovery efforts lasted nine months.

Reynolds was able to visit ground zero as the bridge was in place and the recovery efforts continued.

It was moving to be able to be there and see everything, he said.

Although somber in reflecting on the reasons the specialty components needed to be manufactured, Solomon said Milton Steel employees took pride in the role they played.

The company operated 24 hours per day to make the components. Approximately 50 employees were involved.

Every single employee, they felt it was bigger than a project, it was more than a bridge, Solomon said. Its something were very proud of.

There was unity here with all of the employees volunteering to work overtime, he continued. We could help ease the pain. In our own way, we got an opportunity to help.

In May 2003, Solomon and Reynolds noted that members of the New York City Fire Department and Port Authority of New York and New Jersey visited Milton Steel to thank employees for their efforts.

Like the companys work in assembling the bridge components, the two will also always remember the visit by those from New York City.

A lot of (the visitors) were having serious health issues from what they were exposed to, the toxins at ground zero, Solomon said. It was moving to hear their stories.

Contained within a scrap book of various Milton Steel projects are photos and newspaper articles from the companys work on the steel use at ground zero.

Reynolds and Solomon both said they occasionally look through the book, and reflect on the companys assistance with the recovery efforts.

In addition to the 460-foot-long bridge, Reynolds noted the company also provided a smaller bridge which was also used at ground zero during the recovery efforts.

While the long bridge remained in place as reconstruction of the World Trade Center complex started, Reynolds said all of the steel from Acrow Bridge-Milton Steel Co. used at ground zero has since been repurposed for other uses within the industry.
Shamokin, PA (17872)

Today

Thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. High 83F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms early, then variable clouds overnight with still a chance of showers. A few storms may be severe. Low 61F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected.
Shamokin, PA (17872)

Today

Thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. High 84F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

Heavy thunderstorms early, then variable clouds overnight with still a chance of showers. A few storms may be severe. Low 62F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 100%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected.
The Stars of Liberty Quilt currently on display at the Pentagon Quilts memorial in Washington, D.C., Aug. 20, 2021. The quilt is a collective project by the Black Forest Quilt Guild, a group Diane Murtha, a former Marine Corps spouse, and more than 70 German and Americans participated in while stationed in Stuttgart, Germany.
Fairbanks, AK (99707)

Today

Mainly sunny to start, then a few afternoon clouds. High 58F. Winds light and variable..

Tonight

Mostly cloudy skies this evening will become partly cloudy after midnight. Low 34F. Winds light and variable.
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Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan, left, met with Secretary of Defense Austin Lloyd III, center, at Fort Wainwright Saturday, July 24, 2021, during the secretarys stop in Fairbanks while en route to Asia. Courtesy Sen. Sullivans office
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DANBURY  After a summer COVID wave that saw what appeared to be a peak in last weeks state data, COVID-19 infection numbers are looking better for most Danbury-area towns.

Even with the start of school, overall rates have declined slightly. Leaders are cautiously optimistic the summer surge has subsided.

Earlier this month, Sherman was reporting a case rate of 21.6 cases per 100,000 residents for the two-week period ending Sept. 2. New Fairfield reported a case rate of 19, and Newtown reported 17.2. These three towns had some of the highest case rates in the Danbury area.

Last week, Shermans case rate dropped by nearly half to 11.8, with Newtowns down to 15.1. New Fairfield, however, climbed to a case rate of 21.1.

Two weeks ago, the Danbury area COVID-19 map was a sea of red, indicating the worst and highest case rate on the states color-coded map system. Now, Newtown and New Fairfield remain the only two Danbury-area towns in the red zone, indicating they have more than 15 cases per 100,000 residents over a two-week period.

The state has been using this color-coded system since last fall to show where cases are improving or worsening.

Understanding the COVID-19 case rates

Newtown First Selectman Dan Rosenthal said the towns Achilles heel with cases was summer travel. He said although the town is still in the red zone, it is on the cusp of orange.

We may be red, he said, but were talking about one case making us red versus making us orange at this point.

At New Fairfields Board of Selectmen meeting Thursday, First Selectman Pat Del Monaco addressed the towns high case rate and emphasized the importance of getting vaccinated.

We are in the red zone. We are the only town in the area that is in the red zone. All of the towns surrounding us are back in the orange zone. That also corresponds to our low vaccination rate in comparison with those other towns, she said.

New Fairfield is reporting around 65 percent vaccinated with at least one dose compared with surrounding towns hitting 70 percent or higher, she said. Only Sherman is lower at 63.7 percent.

We are making some progress with our vaccination vans, but not the kind of progress we would like to see, she said.

Redding, Ridgefield and Bethel went from the orange zone last week to the yellow zone in the states weekly report, indicating fewer than 10 cases per 100,000 residents.

Redding First Selectman Julia Pemberton said she wants to see their town case rate of 8.2 per 100,000 residents even lower.

New Milford has seen a dip in its case rate  13.9 to 10.9  but still remains solidly in the orange zone. The towns mayor, Pete Bass, said the cases have been mostly related to summer travel and family gatherings.

Were continuing to watch and just holding course, he said.

The towns health director has shown Bass that infection patterns match closely with patterns seen in October of 2020. Hes expecting numbers to generally follow the same trend and said they may fall when booster appointments are made available.

Were happy that the numbers are continuing to trend down, but continue to tell people to get vaccinated, Bass said.

New Milford and Brookfield are already offering third doses to immunocompromised people.

Danbury stays steady, mayor points to mask mandates

Unlike some other communities that reached the red zone at the end of August, Danbury has stayed in the orange zone or lower since the delta variant hit the state.

The city has averaged 11.4 new daily cases per 100,000 people over a two-week period, according to Thursdays report. This is below the previous weeks rate of 12.6, but slightly more than the Aug. 26 reports rate of 11.2.

This fluctuation has made it hard to predict what the spread of the virus could look like in the future, Mayor Joe Cavo said. But hes focused on hospitalization numbers, which show vaccinated people largely avoid being hospitalized for COVID-19.

Im encouraged by the data, Cavo said. Im also encouraged by our local data from wearing masks. Here in Danbury our numbers have stayed lower than other areas where there arent mandates. That tells me thats working.

Cavo imposed a mask mandate last month, leading neighboring towns to follow suit. He didnt want to but knew it was needed to prevent the virus from spreading.

But its the right thing to do, he said. The numbers in Danbury are showing that.

The same sentiment was echoed by Pemberton in Redding, where rates are also low enough to move the town from the orange zone to the yellow zone.

I can attribute that to very high compliance with mask-wearing, she said, adding neighboring towns patronized by Redding residents have mask mandates that are keeping the public safe and rates low.

Its too soon to say how long Danburys mask mandate will last. Cavo said he hopes the delta variant has stopped spreading as rapidly in the state, but he needs more time and data to feel comfortable that its gone. Hes also concerned cooler weather could drive up cases as people move indoors.

In Ridgefield, advisers are telling First Selectman Rudy Marconi another surge is likely this winter.

No one should relax too soon, he said.

Staff writers Julia Perkins and Kendra Baker contributed to this report.
ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP)  Walking into the Annapolis State House recently became a bit like time travel as several national founding documents from the 18th and 19th centuries were unveiled Thursday night as part of a Founding Freedoms exhibit.

Early and immediate newspaper printings of the Declaration of Independence, Constitution and Bill of Rights, as well as historic engravings of the declaration, are on display, free to the public, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily until Nov. 14.

Labels accompanying the newspaper printings describe a race to print nation-changing text.

The copy of the Constitution, appearing in the Pennsylvania Packet and Daily Advertiser two days after it was ratified in 1787, was a re-pressing of type set for copies sent to Congressional Convention committees.

There are also beautiful vellum and paper engravings sent as gifts to politicians; one 1823 copy of the Declaration of Independence is more commonly used in textbooks than the original.

The collection, era-accurately and ornately framed and enclosed in dark wood displays, is on loan from Maryland native and billionaire philanthropist David Rubenstein.

Rubensteins Americana Collection adviser Mazy Boroujerdi said the documents were collected over several years for the purpose of exhibition. Before they were on display, these historical artifacts were carefully conserved, he said to a Capital News Service reporter in an email.

The tricky part of doing an exhibition in the Maryland State House is also the reason the setting has such promise. The building is less of a museum than an artifact itself, Boroujerdi said.

The display revolves around an original letter George Washington penned: his 1783 resignation as commander in chief of the Continental Army, complete with crossed-out words and darker writing where he re-inked his quill.

Washington read the letter to the Senate in the same State House that stands today.

To walk through the old Senate chamber is to feel as the members of Congress did when Washington resigned as commander in chief of the Army, Boroujerdi continued.

The letter connects the exhibit to the State House and is situated chronologically between the declaration and the Constitution.

The letter, owned by the Maryland State Archives, has been on display in the building since 2015.

When Deborah Dixon arrived at the State House this morning for training to lead Historic Annapolis tours through the exhibit, she expected the documents to be already visible. Instead, all but the letter were covered in thick, black sheets, which were pulled off and folded before orientation began.

Annapolis was the national capital for 10 months. Its so neat that these documents are coming back to us, she said.

As sunlight streamed through the State House windows to fall on the cabinets and the protected documents, tour-guides-to-be talked in hushed, awed tones about bleached colors, pointing through where they would lead their groups through the building.

Janet Hall, who is organizing the Historic Annapolis guided tours, said even todays First Maryland Regiment re-enactors, who dress in period clothing and educate the public, are to tour the exhibit tomorrow, turning the State House into a bubble from the past.

What Hall called an iconic and unique exhibit isnt just for the knowledgeable. This is something that every child, every adult should go see, Hall encouraged.
DANBURY - Students, police, firefighters and others gathered Friday morning to mark the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

The ceremony at St. Joseph School included musical performances and a prayer from Father Sam Scott, pastor of St. Joseph Church and chaplain at the school. Students planted flags in memory of the victims.

Across the city at Danbury High School, students gathered outside to raise the American flag as they sang the National Anthem.

These were some of several ceremonies planned Friday and Saturday in honor of 9/11 across the Danbury area. Official in Danbury will gather again at 10 a.m. Saturday at Elmwood Park for another ceremony.
GATINEAU, QC, Sept. 9, 2021 /CNW/ -

Electors can vote by mail or in person at an Elections Canada office if they will be away from their riding on advance polling days or on election day or if it's more convenient for them. Deadlines apply.

office if they will be away from their riding on advance polling days or on election day or if it's more convenient for them. Deadlines apply. We strongly encourage electors who are self-isolating, or experiencing symptoms of COVID-19, who have been in contact with a confirmed COVID-19 case or who cannot wear a mask to apply to vote by mail.

Voting by mail

Electors who want to vote by mail should apply for a special ballot voting kit as soon as possible. They need to allow time for their kit to reach them and for them to return their completed ballot to Elections Canada by election day.

as soon as possible. They need to allow time for their kit to reach them and for them to return their completed ballot to Elections Canada by election day. Once electors have applied to vote by mail, they cannot change their mind and vote in person at advance polls or on election day.

Electors can complete an application online . They can also call Elections Canada to request a paper form, print one from the website or get one at any Elections Canada office. Electors must include proof of their identity and address with their application.

. They can also call Elections Canada to request a paper form, print one from the website or get one at any Elections Canada office. Electors must include proof of their identity and address with their application. The deadline to apply to vote by mail is Tuesday, September 14 , 6:00 p.m. , local time .

, , . After approving an elector's application to vote by mail, Elections Canada sends them a special ballot voting kit.

Each special ballot voting kit includes a pre-addressed return envelope with prepaid postage.

Electors whose return envelope is addressed to their local Elections Canada office must return their completed special ballot either by mail or in person to that office. They can also return it in person at their polling station by dropping it in a ballot box specifically set up for that purpose before polls close on election day, that is, Monday, September 20 .

. Electors whose return envelope is addressed to 440 Coventry Road in Ottawa, Ontario must make sure their completed ballot arrives at that address by 6:00 p.m., Eastern time, on election day.

Voting at an Elections Canada office

Electors can also vote at any Elections Canada office using the special ballot process. The offices are open seven days a week.

office using the special ballot process. The offices are open seven days a week. Electors who apply to vote by special ballot at an Elections Canada office may vote there at the same time. They have until Tuesday, September 14 , 6:00 p.m. , to do so.

, , to do so. Electors who apply at an office outside of their riding and who do not vote there at the same time must make sure their ballot arrives at Elections Canada headquarters in Ottawa by 6:00 p.m., Eastern time , on election day.

by 6:00 p.m., , on election day. Electors who have concerns about voting in person can vote by mail. They can also call 1800-463-6868 or visit elections.ca for information about the measures in place to make voting safe at Elections Canada offices or at their assigned polling station on advance polling days and election day.

To provide a safe environment for electors and election workers, Elections Canada strongly encourages electors to wear a mask, even in places where a province, territory or region does not require them. We will require electors to wear masks where they are required by the province, territory or region or by the landlord leasing the space to Elections Canada. Electors who cannot wear a mask for medical reasons will not be required to wear one.

Elections Canada is an independent, non-partisan agency that reports directly to Parliament.

For election updates, subscribe to our news service at elections.ca .

SOURCE Elections Canada

For further information: Elections Canada Media Relations, 1-877-877-9515, elections.ca

Related Links

https://www.elections.ca/


Commented Kiran Sidhu, CEO and Founder of Halo, "Our team has stepped up efforts to focus on higher-quality sales throughout the summer and this is driving continued strong revenue growth in August. The expected improvement in gross margins from these initiatives combined with a significant reduction in corporate overhead over the coming quarters should accelerate our path toward profitability as we progress toward our stated goal of being a West Coast operator focused on Oregon and California. As Halo opens dispensaries in Southern California in the later part of 2021, we expect our revenue growth to continue to accelerate."

____________________________________ 1 These preliminary and unaudited financial results are subject to customary financial statement procedures by the Company and its auditors. Actual results could be affected by subsequent events or determinations. While the Company believes there is a reasonable basis for these preliminary financial results, the results involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially. These preliminary fiscal results represent forward-looking information. See "Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Information and Statements" and "Financial Outlook".

About Halo Collective Inc.

Halo is a leading, vertically integrated cannabis company that cultivates, extracts, manufactures, and distributes quality cannabis flower, oils, and concentrates, and has sold approximately eleven million grams of oils and concentrates since inception. The Company continues to expand its business and scale efficiently, partnering with trustworthy leaders in the industry who value Halo's operational expertise in bringing a host of quality products to market.

Halo currently operates in the United States in Oregon and California, Canada, Southern Africa in the Kingdom of Lesotho, and the United Kingdom. The Company sells cannabis products principally to dispensaries in the U.S. under its brands Hush, Winberry, Mojave, and Exhale, and under license agreements with Papa's Herb, DNA Genetics, Terphogz, and FlowerShop*, a cannabis lifestyle and conceptual wellness brand that includes G-Eazy as a partner and key member.

As part of continued expansion and vertical integration in the U.S., Halo boasts several grow operations throughout Oregon and two planned in California. In Oregon, the Company has a combined 11 acres of owned and contracted outdoor cultivation, including East Evans Creek, a six-acre grow site in Jackson County with four licenses owned and operated by Halo and two third-party licenses under contract to sell all of their product to Halo; Winberry Farms, a one-acre grow; and William's Wonder Farms, a three-acre grow site in Applegate Valley, under contract to sell all of its product to Halo pending the closing of Halo's acquisition of its licenses and business assets.

In California, the Company is building out Ukiah Ventures, a planned 30,000 sq. ft. indoor cannabis grow and processing facility, which will include up to an additional five acres of industrial land to expand the site. Recently, Halo partnered with Green Matter Holding in California to purchase a property in Lake County, developing up to 63 acres of cultivation, comprising one of the largest licensed single-site grows in California. Halo also plans to expand its operations in California by opening three dispensaries in North Hollywood, Hollywood, and Westwood, one of which may house a FlowerShop* branded experience.

In Canada, Halo acquired three KushBar retail cannabis stores located in Alberta as a first in its planned entry into the Canadian market, leveraging its Oregon and California brands. With the KushBar retail stores as a foundation, the Company plans to expand its foothold in Canada.

Halo has also acquired a range of software development assets, including CannPOS, Cannalift, and CannaFeels, as well as a discrete sublingual dosing technology, Accudab. The Company intends to spin-off these assets, and its intellectual property and patent applications into its subsidiary Halo Tek Inc. Halo expects to complete a distribution to shareholders on a record date to be determined by Halo.

Halo has recently announced its intention to reorganize its non-U.S. operations into a newly formed entity called Akanda Corp., whose mission will be to provide high-quality and ethically sourced medical cannabis products to patients worldwide. Akanda will seek to deliver on this promise while driving positive change in wellness, empowering individuals in Lesotho, and uplifting the quality of the lives of employees and the local communities where it operates, all while limiting its carbon footprint. Akanda will combine the scaled production capabilities of Bophelo Bioscience & Wellness Pty. Ltd., Halo's Lesotho-based cultivation and processing campus located in the world's first Special Economic Zone (SEZ) containing a cannabis cultivation operation, with distribution and route-to-market efficiency of Canmart Ltd., Halo's UK-based fully approved pharmaceutical importer, and distributor that supplies pharmacies and clinics within the U.K. With a potential maximum licensed canopy area of 200 hectares (495 acres), Bophelo has scalability that is arguably unmatched in the world today.

For further information regarding Halo, see Halo's disclosure documents on SEDAR at www.sedar.com

Connect with Halo Collective: Email | Website | LinkedIn | Twitter | Instagram

Non-IFRS Financial Measures

Organic Revenue is a non-IFRS financial measures that the Company uses to assess its operating performance and does not have any standardized meaning prescribed by IFRS. Management defines Organic Revenue as Revenue excluding revenue from Halo Winberry Holdings, LLC and Halo KushBar Retail Inc. This data is furnished to provide additional information and is a non-IFRS measure and does not have any standardized meaning prescribed by IFRS. The Company uses this non-IFRS measure to provide shareholders and others with supplemental measures of its operating performance. The Company also believes that securities analysts, investors and other interested parties, may use this non-IFRS measure in the evaluation of companies, many of which present similar metrics when reporting their results. As other companies calculate this non-IFRS measure differently than the Company, this metrics may not be comparable to similarly titled measures reported by other companies.

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Information and Statements

This press release contains certain "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation and may also contain statements that may constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the safe harbor provisions of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking information and forward-looking statements are not representative of historical facts or information or current condition, but instead represent only Halo's beliefs regarding future events, plans or objectives, many of which, by their nature, are inherently uncertain and outside of Halo's control. Generally, such forward-looking information or forward-looking statements 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 may contain statements that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will be taken", "will continue", "will occur" or "will be achieved". Forward-looking information may relate to anticipated events or results including, but not limited to the expected results of operations and changes to operating expenses currently expected by management, the number of stores to be added by the end of the year, management's plans regarding its portfolio of cannabis businesses, revenue outlook, the expected size and capabilities of the final facility planned at Ukiah Ventures, the size of Halo's planned cultivation facility in Northern California, and the ability of Bophelo and Canmart to serve the U.K. market, the proposed spin-off with Halo Tek Inc. and Halo's proposed plans to re-organize its non-U.S. operations via Akanda Corp.

By identifying such information and statements in this manner, Halo is alerting the reader that such information and statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such information and statements. In addition, in connection with the forward-looking information and forward-looking statements contained in this press release, Halo has made certain assumptions. Although Halo believes that the assumptions and factors used in preparing, and the expectations contained in, the forward-looking information and statements are reasonable, undue reliance should not be placed on such information and statements, and no assurance or guarantee can be given that such forward-looking information and statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such information and statements. Among others, the key factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking information and statements are the following: inability of management to successfully integrate the operations of acquired businesses, changes in the consumer market for cannabis products, changes in the expected outcomes of the proposed changes to Halo's operations, delays in obtaining required licenses or approvals necessary for the build-out of Oregon operations, dispensaries or Canadian operations, the proposed spin-out with Halo Tek Inc. or the proposed re-organization with Akanda Corp., delays or unforeseen costs incurred in connection with construction, the ability of competitors to scale operations in Northern California, delays or unforeseen difficulties in connection with the cultivation and harvest of Halo's raw material, changes in general economic, business and political conditions, including changes in the financial markets; and the other risks disclosed in the Company's annual information form dated March 31, 2021 and other disclosure documents available on the Company's profile at www.sedar.com. Should one or more of these risks, uncertainties or other factors materialize, or should assumptions underlying the forward-looking information or statements prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those described herein as intended, planned, anticipated, believed, estimated or expected.

The forward-looking information and forward-looking statements contained in this press release are made as of the date of this press release, and Halo does not undertake to update any forward-looking information and/or forward-looking statements that are contained or referenced herein, except in accordance with applicable securities laws. All subsequent written and oral forward-looking information and statements attributable to Halo or persons acting on its behalf is expressly qualified in its entirety by this notice.

Financial Outlook

This press release contains a financial outlook within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities laws. The financial outlook has been prepared by management of the Company to provide an outlook for the sales of the Company during August 2021 and may not be appropriate for any other purpose. The financial outlook has been prepared based on a number of assumptions including the assumptions discussed under the heading "Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Information and Statements" above and assumptions with respect to market conditions, pricing, and demand. The actual results of the Company's operations for any period will likely vary from the amounts set forth in these projections and such variations may be material. The Company and its management believe that the financial outlook has been prepared on a reasonable basis. However, because this information is highly subjective and subject to numerous risks, including the risks discussed under the heading "Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Information and Statements" above, it should not be relied on as necessarily indicative of future results.

Non-Solicitation

This press release shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any of the securities described herein, nor shall there be any sale of these securities in any state or jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such state or jurisdiction.

SOURCE Halo Collective Inc.

For further information: Halo Collective Inc., Investor Relations, [email protected]; www.haloco.com/investors

Related Links

https://haloco.com/


The Westwood Dispensary is strategically located on Santa Monica Blvd within a mile of the University of Los Angeles California ("UCLA") campus and blocks away from Century City. There is daily traffic of over 161,000 vehicles within three blocks, primarily on Santa Monica Blvd. and Westwood Blvd. This prime location features ample parking on the street front and an adjacent parking lot. Westwood is a central regional district for shopping, dining, movie theaters, and other entertainment, and Century City is one of the most prominent employment centers in the Los Angeles metropolitan area, boasting a workforce of approximately 244,000. In addition, the Westwood Dispensary is within a mile from the boutiques on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, well-positioned to attract tourist traffic. The address of the Westwood dispensary site is 10461 Santa Monica Blvd.

The Westwood Dispensary represents a critical step in the vertical integration for Halo in its "Seed to Sale" strategy in California. Upon opening, Halo expects to commence direct-to-consumer retail sales of its own branded and white-labeled cannabis products, as well as a curated selection of coveted brands and products available in the California market.

"Halo is committed to entering the large and growing Southern California retail market and is proud that our first operating dispensary will be the closest dispensary to Century City and the tourist sections of Beverly Hills," said Kiran Sidhu, CEO and Co-Founder of Halo Collective. "We are simultaneously developing two other locations in Hollywood and North Hollywood, that are both ideally situated, which we expect to open later this year or early next. With these three stores, we are building a key element of our vertically integrated seed to sale model, which we expect to drive strong returns for Halo shareholders."

About Halo Collective Inc.

Halo is a leading, vertically integrated cannabis company that cultivates, extracts, manufactures, and distributes quality cannabis flower, oils, and concentrates and has sold approximately eleven million grams of oils and concentrates since inception. The Company continues to expand its business and scale efficiently, partnering with trustworthy leaders in the industry who value Halo's operational expertise in bringing top-tier products to market.

Halo currently operates in the United States in Oregon and California, Canada, Southern Africa in the Kingdom of Lesotho, and the United Kingdom. The Company sells cannabis products principally to dispensaries in the U.S. under its brands Hush, Mojave, and Exhale, and under license agreements with Papa's Herb, DNA Genetics, Terphogz, and FlowerShop*, a cannabis lifestyle and conceptual wellness brand that includes G-Eazy as a partner and key member.

As part of continued expansion and vertical integration in the U.S., Halo boasts several grow operations throughout Oregon and two planned in California. In Oregon, the Company has a combined 11 acres of owned and contracted outdoor and green house cultivation, including East Evans Creek, a six-acre grow site in Jackson County with four licenses owned and operated by Halo and two third-party licenses under contract to sell all of their product to Halo; Winberry Farms, a one-acre grow site located 30 miles outside of Eugene in Lane County with a license owned and operated by Halo; and William's Wonder Farms, a three-acre grow site in Applegate Valley, under contract to sell all of its product to Halo pending the closing of Halo's acquisition of its licenses and business assets. Halo has recently signed a Definitive Agreement to acquire Food Concepts. Food Concepts LLC is the master tenant of an approximately 55,000 sq.ft. indoor cannabis cultivation, processing, and wholesaling facility in Portland, Oregon operated by the Pistil Point entities (the "Pistil Point Acquistion").

In California, the Company is building out Ukiah Ventures, a planned 30,000 sq. ft. indoor cannabis grow and processing facility, which will include up to an additional five acres of industrial land to expand the site. Recently, Halo partnered with Green Matter Holding in California to purchase a property in Lake County, developing up to 63 acres of cultivation, comprising one of the largest licensed single site grows in California. Halo also plans to expand its operations in California by opening three dispensaries in North Hollywood, Hollywood, and Westwood, one of which may serve as the first FlowerShop* branded dispensary.

In Canada, Halo acquired three KushBar retail cannabis stores located in Alberta as a first in its planned entry into the Canadian market, leveraging its Oregon and California brands. With the KushBar retail stores as a foundation, the Company plans to expand its foothold in Canada.

Halo has also acquired a range of software development assets, including CannPOS, Cannalift, and, more recently, CannaFeels. In addition, Halo owns the discrete sublingual dosing technology, Accudab. The Company intends to spin-off these assets and its intellectual property and patent applications into its subsidiary Halo Tek Inc. and expects to complete a distribution to shareholders on a record date to be determined by Halo.

Halo has recently announced its intention to reorganize its non-U.S. operations into a newly formed entity called Akanda Corp., whose mission will be to provide high-quality and ethically sourced medical cannabis products to patients worldwide. Akanda will seek to deliver on this promise while driving positive change in wellness, empowering individuals in Lesotho, and uplifting the quality of the lives of employees and the local communities where it operates, all while limiting its carbon footprint. Akanda will combine the scaled production capabilities of Bophelo Bioscience & Wellness Pty. Ltd., Halo's Lesotho-based cultivation and processing campus located in the world's first Special Economic Zone (SEZ) containing a cannabis cultivation operation, with distribution and route-to-market efficiency of Canmart Ltd., Halo's UK-based fully approved pharmaceutical importer, and distributor that supplies pharmacies and clinics within the U.K. With a potential maximum licensed canopy area of 200 hectares (495 acres), Bophelo has scalability that is arguably unmatched in the world today.

For further information regarding Halo, see Halo's disclosure documents on SEDAR at www.sedar.com

Connect with Halo Collective: Email | Website | LinkedIn | Twitter | Instagram

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Information and Statements

This press release contains certain "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation and may also contain statements that may constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the safe harbor provisions of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking information and forward-looking statements are not representative of historical facts or information or current condition, but instead represent only Halo's beliefs regarding future events, plans or objectives, many of which, by their nature, are inherently uncertain and outside of Halo's control. Generally, such forward-looking information or forward-looking statements 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 may contain statements that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will be taken", "will continue", "will occur" or "will be achieved". Forward-looking information may relate to anticipated events or results including, but not limited to Halo's future plans regarding its Westwood Dispensary, other dispensaries in the City of Los Angeles, Halo's expectations regarding the expansion of processing, production and distribution operations and the financial performance thereof, the closing of the Pistil Point Acquisition, the expected size and capabilities of the final facility planned at Ukiah Ventures, the size of Halo's planned cultivation facility in Northern California, the ability of Bophelo and Canmart to serve the U.K. market, the proposed spin-off with Halo Tek Inc. and Halo's proposed plans to re-organize its non-U.S. operations via Akanda Corp.

By identifying such information and statements in this manner, Halo is alerting the reader that such information and statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such information and statements. In addition, in connection with the forward-looking information and forward-looking statements contained in this press release, Halo has made certain assumptions. Although Halo believes that the assumptions and factors used in preparing, and the expectations contained in, the forward-looking information and statements are reasonable, undue reliance should not be placed on such information and statements, and no assurance or guarantee can be given that such forward-looking information and statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such information and statements. Among others, the key factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking information and statements are the following: the inability of management to successfully integrate the operations of the acquired businesses, changes in the consumer market for cannabis products, changes in the expected outcomes of the proposed changes to Halo's operations, delays in obtaining required licenses or approvals necessary for the build-out of Oregon operations, the proposed spin-out with Halo Tek Inc. or the proposed re-organization with Akanda Corp., delays or unforeseen costs incurred in connection with construction, the ability of competitors to scale operations in Northern California, delays or unforeseen difficulties in connection with the cultivation and harvest of Halo's raw material, changes in general economic, business and political conditions, including changes in the financial markets; and the other risks disclosed in the Company's annual information form dated March 31, 2021 and other disclosure documents available on the Company's profile at www.sedar.com. Should one or more of these risks, uncertainties or other factors materialize, or should assumptions underlying the forward-looking information or statements prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those described herein as intended, planned, anticipated, believed, estimated or expected.

The forward-looking information and forward-looking statements contained in this press release are made as of the date of this press release, and Halo does not undertake to update any forward-looking information and/or forward-looking statements that are contained or referenced herein, except in accordance with applicable securities laws. All subsequent written and oral forward-looking information and statements attributable to Halo or persons acting on its behalf is expressly qualified in its entirety by this notice.

Non-Solicitation

This press release shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any of the securities described herein, nor shall there be any sale of these securities in any state or jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such state or jurisdiction.

SOURCE Halo Collective Inc.

For further information: Contact Information: Halo Collective: Investor Relations: [email protected], www.haloco.com/investors

Related Links

https://haloco.com/


OTTAWA, ON, Sept. 10, 2021

/CNW/ - The Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) continues to monitor COVID-19 epidemiological indicators to quickly detect, understand and communicate emerging issues of concern. The following is a summary of the latest national numbers and trends.

Since the start of the pandemic, there have been 1,533,466 cases of COVID-19 and 27,134 deaths reported in Canada. These cumulative numbers tell us about the overall burden of COVID-19 illness to date, while the number of active cases, now at 38,134, and 7-day moving averages indicate current disease activity and severity trends.

The latest national 7-day average of 3,774 new cases reported daily (Sep 3-9) is an increase of 8% over the previous week. Following weeks of rising case counts, national severity trends are also increasing, primarily involving unvaccinated people. The latest provincial and territorial data show that an average of 1,600 people with COVID-19 were being treated in Canadian hospitals each day during the most recent 7-day period (Sep 3-9), which is 27% higher than last week. This includes, on average, 597 people who were being treated in intensive care units (ICU), 23% more than last week and an average of 18 deaths were reported daily (Sep 3-9).

During this fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada, infections and severe outcomes have several key features:

Nationally, the highly contagious Delta Variant of Concern (VOC), accounts for the majority of recently reported cases, is associated with increased severity, and may reduce the effectiveness of vaccines

Most reported cases, hospitalisations and deaths are occurring among unvaccinated people

Virus spread in areas with low vaccination coverage presents an ongoing risk for emergence of and replacement by new VOCs, including a risk of VOCs with the ability to evade vaccine protection.

Regardless of which SARS-CoV-2 variant is predominating in an area, we know that vaccination, in combination with public health and individual measures, continue to work to reduce disease spread and severe outcomes. In particular, evidence continues to demonstrate that a complete two-dose series of Health-Canada approved COVID-19 vaccines provides substantial protection. Based on the latest data from 12 provinces and territories for the eligible population, 12 years or older:

from December 14, 2020 to August 21, 2021 , 0.06% of fully vaccinated people became infected, with the majority of recent cases and hospitalizations occurring in unvaccinated or partially vaccinated people.

to , of fully vaccinated people became infected, with the majority of recent cases and hospitalizations occurring in unvaccinated or partially vaccinated people. In recent weeks ( July 25  August 21, 2021 ):

 ): the average weekly rate of new COVID-19 cases in unvaccinated people was 12 times higher than in the fully vaccinated.

times higher than in the fully vaccinated.

the average weekly rate of hospitalized cases in unvaccinated people was 36 times higher compared to fully vaccinated people.

As of September 9, 2021, provinces and territories have administered over 54 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines, with the latest provincial and territorial data indicating that over 85% of people aged 12 years or older have received at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine and over 78% are now fully vaccinated. Age-specific vaccine coverage data, as of September 4, show that from 75% to 96% of people in the eligible age groupings have received at least one dose and from 64% to 94% are fully vaccinated. As we head into the fall, covering this last stretch to reach very high vaccine coverage across all eligible age groups, especially those aged 18-39 years, could prove crucial to reducing the impact of the Delta-driven wave. We must strive to have as many eligible people as possible fully vaccinated as quickly as possible to protect ourselves and others, including those who may not mount a strong immune response or who cannot get vaccinated.

Today, the National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) provided updated advice regarding an additional or third dose of a COVID-19 vaccine for some immunocompromised individuals following their 1- or 2-dose primary series. Research has shown that some immunocompromised individuals (those with a weakened immune system due to disease or treatment) have a lower immune response to COVID-19 vaccines, compared to the general population. Recent research has shown that some moderately to severely immunocompromised individuals can have an increased immune response after a third dose of an mRNA vaccine. These recommendations are based on current scientific evidence and NACI's expert opinion. Importantly, NACI notes that: "the additional or third dose being considered for moderately to severely immunocompromised persons should be distinguished from that of a booster dose. The intent of a booster dose is to restore protection that may have waned over time in individuals who responded adequately to an initial 1- or 2-dose primary vaccine series. Additional doses beyond the standard primary vaccine series, such as discussed in this statement, provide an opportunity for individuals who may not have achieved an adequate level of protection from the standard primary vaccine series to develop a better immune response."

For additional information regarding vaccination in your area, reach out to your local public health authorities, healthcare provider, or other trusted and credible sources, such as Canada.ca and Immunize.ca. Canada.ca provides a broad range of COVID-19 information and resources to help Canadians understand the benefits of being vaccinated against COVID-19 and find guidance on life after vaccination.

While COVID-19 is still circulating in Canada and internationally, core public health practices remain crucial: stay home/self-isolate if you have symptoms; be aware of risks associated with different settings; follow local public health advice and maintain individual protective practices. In particular, physical distancing and properly wearing a well-fitted and well-constructed face mask provide additional layers of protection that further reduce your risk in all settings. Canadians are advised to continue avoiding non-essential travel outside of Canada; if you must travel, be aware of the requirements for visiting other countries and for returning to Canada.

Canadians can also go the extra mile by sharing credible information on COVID-19 risks and prevention practices and measures to reduce COVID-19 in communities. Read my backgrounder to access more COVID-19 Information and Resources on ways to reduce the risks and protect yourself and others, including information on COVID-19 vaccination.

SOURCE Public Health Agency of Canada

For further information: Media Relations, Public Health Agency of Canada, 613-957-2983, [email protected]
On the occasion of International Day for peace, during the 48th Session of United Nations Human Rights Council, Afghans in Europe will organise an international protest in front of UN Headquarters in Geneva.

Afghans will organise a protest outside the UN office in Geneva on International Day of Peace on September 21 against illegal takeover of Afghanistan and persecution of religious and ethnic minorities by the Taliban regime, a rights activist said. Afghan human rights activist in France Fazal ur Rehman Afridi said in a tweet on Wednesday, On the occasion of International Day for peace, during the 48th Session of United Nations Human Rights Council, Afghans in Europe will organise an international protest in front of UN Headquarters in Geneva.

Afridi added that the protest will be held against the illegal takeover of Afghanistan, gross human rights violations, blatant foreign interference and persecution of religious and ethnic minorities by Taliban regime.

The Taliban formed the interim Islamic Emirate on Tuesday appointing hardliners in its new government. The list announced by chief spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid was dominated by members of the groups old guard, with no women included.

Taliban entered Kabul on August 15 after an aggressive and rapid advance against government forces amid the withdrawal of US and NATO troops from the country.
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP)  Several hundred people line up every morning, starting before dawn, on a grassy area outside Nairobis largest hospital hoping to get the COVID-19 vaccine. Sometimes the line moves smoothly, while on other days, the staff tells them theres nothing available, and they should come back tomorrow.

Halfway around the world, at a church in Atlanta, two workers with plenty of vaccine doses waited hours Wednesday for anyone to show up, whiling away the time by listening to music from a laptop. Over a six-hour period, only one person came through the door.

The dramatic contrast highlights the vast disparity around the world. In richer countries, people can often pick and choose from multiple available vaccines, walk into a site near their homes and get a shot in minutes. Pop-up clinics, such as the one in Atlanta, bring vaccines into rural areas and urban neighborhoods, but it is common for them to get very few takers.

In the developing world, supply is limited and uncertain. Just over 3% of people across Africa have been fully vaccinated, and health officials and citizens often have little idea what will be available from one day to the next. More vaccines have been flowing in recent weeks, but the World Health Organizations director in Africa said Thursday that the continent will get 25% fewer doses than anticipated by the end of the year, in part because of the rollout of booster shots in wealthier counties such as the United States.

Bidian Okoth recalled spending more than three hours in line at a Nairobi hospital, only to be told to go home because there weren't enough doses. But a friend who traveled to the U.S. got a shot almost immediately after his arrival there with a vaccine of his choice, like candy, he said.

Were struggling with what time in the morning we need to wake up to get the first shot. Then you hear people choosing their vaccines. Thats super, super excessive," he said.

Okoth said his uncle died from COVID-19 in June and had given up twice on getting vaccinated due to the length of the lines, even though he was eligible due to his age. The death jolted Okoth, a health advocate, into seeking a dose for himself.

He stopped at one hospital so often on his way to work that a doctor got tired of seeing me and told Okoth he would call him when doses were available. Late last month, after a new donation of vaccines arrived from Britain, he got his shot.

The disparity comes as the U.S. is moving closer to offering booster shots to large segments of the population even as it struggles to persuade Americans to get vaccinated in the first place. President Joe Biden on Thursday ordered sweeping new federal vaccine requirements for as many as 100 million Americans, including private-sector employees, as the country faces the surging COVID-19 delta variant.

About 53% of the U.S. population is vaccinated, and the country is averaging more than 150,000 new cases of COVID-19 a day, along with 1,500 deaths. Africa has had more than 7.9 million confirmed cases, including more than 200,000 deaths, and the highly infectious delta variant recently drove a surge in new cases as well.

The head of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, insisted Wednesday that rich countries with large supplies of coronavirus vaccines should hold off on offering booster shots through the end of the year and make the doses available to poorer countries.

John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told reporters Thursday that we have not seen enough science to drive decisions on when to administer booster shots.

Without that, we are gambling, he said, and urged countries to send doses to countries facing vaccine famine instead.

In the U.S., vaccines are easy to find, but many people are hesitant to get them.

At the church in northwest Atlanta, a nonprofit group offered the Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer vaccines for free without an appointment from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. But site manager Riley Erickson spent much of the day waiting in an air-conditioned room full of empty chairs, though the group had reached out to neighbors and the church had advertised the location to its large congregation.

Erickson, with the disaster relief organization CORE, said the vaccination rate in the area was low, so he wasnt surprised by small turnout. The one person who showed up was a college student.

When you put the effort into going into areas where theres less interest, thats kind of the result, he said. His takeaway, however, was that CORE needed to spend more time in the community.

A second vaccination site run by county officials  this one in downtown Atlanta  had a little more foot traffic around lunchtime, but not enough to cause even the slightest delay.

Margaret Herro, COREs Georgia director, said the group has seen an uptick in vaccinations at its pop-up sites in recent weeks amid a COVID-19 surge fueled by the delta variant and the FDA's full approval of the Pfizer vaccine. It has administered more than 55,000 shots from late March through the end of August at hundreds of sites around the state, including schools and farmers markets. It also has gone to meatpacking plants and other work locations, where turnout is better, and it plans to focus more on those places, Herro said.

We definitely dont feel like its time to let up yet, she said.

In Nairobi, Okoth believes there should be a global commitment to equity in the administration of vaccines so everyone has a basic level of immunity as quickly as possible.

"If everyone at least gets a first shot, I dont think anyone will care if others get even six booster shots, he said.

___

Thanawala reported from Atlanta.
VANCOUVER, Wash. (AP)  Protesters returned to the grounds of a Vancouver, Washington high school Friday despite a judges attempts to quash demonstrations there.

At Skyview High School protesters including Joey Gibson, founder of the Vancouver-based far-right group Patriot Prayer, were among a crowd of about 40 people, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP)  The Saudi Arabia of today is far different from the Saudi Arabia of Sept. 11, 2001.

All but four of the 19 hijackers on 9/11 were Saudi citizens, and the Saudi kingdom was the birthplace of Osama bin Laden, the head of al-Qaida and mastermind of the attack 20 years ago. In the two decades since then, Saudi Arabia has confronted al-Qaida on its own soil, revamped its textbooks, worked to curb terror financing and partnered with the United States to counter terrorism.

It wasn't until the last five years, though, that the kingdom began backing away from the religious ideology upon which it was founded and which it espoused within and outside its borders  Wahhabism, a strict interpretation of Islam that helped spawn generations of mujahedeen.

For countless numbers of people in the United States, Saudi Arabia will forever be associated with 9/11, the collapse of the World Trade Towers and the deaths of nearly 3,000 people.

To this day, victims families are trying to hold the Saudi government accountable in New York and have pushed President Joe Biden to declassify certain documents related to the attacks, despite Saudi government insistence that any allegation of complicity is "categorically false. Victims of a 2019 shooting at a Florida military base and their families are also suing Saudi Arabia for monetary damages, claiming the kingdom knew the Saudi Air Force officer had been radicalized and could have prevented the killings.

Saudi Arabia's close partnership with the United States, including the presence of American troops in the kingdom after the first Gulf War, made its leadership a target of extremist groups.

It is important to realize that the terrorists who struck the U.S. on September 11 have also targeted Saudi Arabias people, leadership, military personnel and even our holiest religious sites in Mecca and Medina on multiple occasions, Fahad Nazer, the Saudi Embassy spokesperson in Washington, told The Associated Press. He said Saudi-U.S. counterterrorism work has saved thousands of lives.

Yet even as Saudi Arabia battled al-Qaida and later attacks by the IS group, the Al Saud rulers continued to give ultraconservative clerics monopoly over preaching and influence over society in exchange for their staunch backing of the monarchy.

That decades-old pact unraveled before a roomful of foreign investors in 2017 when Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman declared a return to moderate Islam. A year earlier, with backing from his father the king, the prince had clipped the powers of the country's religious police  the ones who would chase young Saudi men and women out of parks for mingling, go after cars playing music and force stores to close during the five daily prayers.

Its a new country. It is a country in the making," says Raghida Dergham, founder of the Beirut Institute think tank and a longtime columnist in Saudi papers. What has happened over the past 20 years in Saudi Arabia, Dergham says, has amounted to a major cleanup of extremism ... and it has not been easy."

The crown prince doubled down in April of this year in remarks to Saudi TV. He said Saudi identity is built on its Islamic and Arab heritage. His words appeared to equate the two, and pointed to the broader effort the state has embarked on to affirm a national Saudi identity that is no longer tied to pan-Islamic causes nor the religious ideologies of Sheikh Mohammed Ibn Abdul-Wahhab, whose ultraconservative teachings of Islam in the 18th century are widely referred to by his name.

If Sheikh Mohammed Abdel-Wahhab came out of his grave and found us adhering to his text and closing our eyes to independent reasoning (ijtihad) or deifying him, he would be the first to oppose such a thing, Prince Mohammed said.

Ali Shihabi, who has ties to the royal court, says the kingdom's new tone signals to any fence-sitting clerics" that moderation is the only path to take going forward.

Moderation, though, goes only so far. As Saudi Arabia works to alter perceptions and control the narrative of its past for new generations of Saudis two decades after 9/11, it remains politically repressive.

Prince Mohammed's rapid changes are part of a hurried effort that have coincided with him amassing power by sidelining rivals, like the countrys former counterterrorism czar, and clamping down hard on critics, including the killing of Saudi writer Jamal Khashoggi in Turkey by agents who worked for the prince.

Bruce Riedel, a Brookings Institution scholar who served at the CIA for 30 years, says the U.S.-Saudi relationship has gone through fundamental changes over the years, but that even in the best of times its a tough sell to portray Saudi Arabia as Americas best friend.

While Saudi Arabia remains far from an open society, the cloud of social restrictions that loomed over generations in the kingdom is dissipating. No longer are eye-popping concerts, movie theaters and women driving impossible or illegal.

My own perspective is that theres envy of the younger generation that get to have these opportunities, says Hisham Fageeh, a 33-year-old Saudi filmmaker, actor and writer working in Los Angeles who grew up in the shadow of 9/11.

But there are questions about where this new path will lead.

Theres multiple doors that people can walk through, Fageeh says. The challenge is going to be, how do we integrate all our parts  our past, our present and our future?"

In the two decades since 9/11, Saudi Arabia and the world have been reshaped by social media, the internet and global connectivity. In Saudi Arabia, though, there is also a massive generational shift taking hold. Well over a third of the population of Saudi Arabia is under 14, born years after 9/11. More than 60% are under 35.

All came of age in the aftermath of the Sept. 11th attacks. They, like the 36-year-old crown prince, were not even born when the Shah of Iran was toppled in 1979 and replaced by an anti-U.S. and anti-Saudi Shiite regime. That same year, Sunni Muslim extremists laid siege to Mecca, Islams holiest site.

Saudi rulers responded to the events of that year by empowering the states hardliners and allowing Wahhabism to further shape life in Saudi Arabia. A struggle for power between Saudi Arabia and Iran emerged, one that has continued to play out in sectarian proxy wars across the Middle East.

As recently as the still-current Syrian civil war, Saudi Arabia and other Arab Gulf states either encouraged or turned a blind eye to the arming, financing and recruitment of jihadi fighters who battled Shiite militias and Iran-backed fighters.

But it was the shared effort of the United States, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan in the 1980s that may be reverberating loudest today. Years before being stripped of his Saudi citizenship, bin Laden and other mujahedeen were armed and financed by the CIA and the kingdom to defeat the Soviets in Afghanistan during the Cold War.

Years later, bin Laden would plot the 9/11 attacks from al-Qaida's base in Afghanistan, sheltered by the Taliban  the group that, as of a few weeks ago, are back in power.

When judging Saudi Arabia, Dergham says, look at the wider strategic interests that have long underpinned U.S.-Saudi relations. Americans just think Saudi Arabia equals 9/11, she said. You know, wake up and smell the roses. This has been a partnership, an alliance with the United States for years and years.

___

Dubai-based Associated Press journalist Aya Batrawy covers Saudi Arabia. Follow her on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ayaelb
NEW HAVEN  There were tears, raised voices and emotional testimony as residents came together to address the spike in killings and listen to officials who told them they were targeted, rather than random, homicides, much of it tied to drugs.

There have been 21 homicides in the city this year, one more than all of 2020, which has impacted several neighborhoods with the most recent emphasis on Fair Haven killings and shootings.

At the height of the two-hour meeting at the Family Academy of Multilingual Exploration in the Fair Haven neighborhood there were some 200 in attendance.

Some 60 community members, mainly from Fair Haven, had also come together Thursday on Zoom to strategize before Fridays citywide meeting.

From officials, the message to the public Friday was clear.

We are working extremely hard, but we need your help. That is the element we are missing, Assistant Police Chief Karl Jacobson said. The community is the most important part of this. We cannot do this without you.

Jacobson said they are following 26 cases as part of the Shooting Task Force where they are able to put in evidence and get results back on connections between cases from a state lab within 24 to 48 hours.

Based on intelligence, they have seized 143 guns and made 135 gun arrests this year, where 142 guns were confiscated in all of 2020, Jacobson said.

He said they were able recently to seize seven guns from a house in the Fair Haven neighborhood allegedly connected to group and gang activity. In the Hill neighborhood they have arrest warrants for two alleged shooters, he said, and two more guns were confiscated Friday morning.

At a vigil for a teen who was recently killed in Fair Haven, Jacobson said they were able to stop a car and arrest four people and seize two weapons before they arrived at the vigil.

There are a lot of success stories. There is still too much violence, but we are doing things, the assistant chief said. If you are a leader in this community, ask your community to help the police. ... Many of these crimes we are this close. We just need to get over the finish line.

Fair Haven District Manager Lt. Michael Fumiatti said after the meeting that historically there has been significant drug and gun violence in and around a Fair Haven parking lot where a recent shooting took place.

Mayor Justin Elicker said stopping the violence is the No. 1 priority, while for individuals seeking help, the city has a multi-prong strategy of programs that have been successful in the past.

We are making progress, Elicker said. He said police are seeing domestic-related and gang-related violence, as well as individuals involved in fights and solving them with guns.

But there is not evidence that people are going around the city shooting people. These are people who know each other, he said.

Jacobson said the answer to alleged prostitution and drug activities is a return to the walking beat as the ranks are refilled.

The Police Department has 318 officers out of 406 budgeted personnel with five just added, but at least six retirements expected this year. Jacobson said they want candidates from New Haven but the biggest recruiters are you in the room.

We cannot come out of two years of telling everybody publicly, especially in the media, that the police are bad and then ask them to become police. We need to tell everybody that the police are here to help you, Jacobson said, to which the audience clapped.

Elicker said the violence is citywide, citing the Hill and Newhallville, in addition to Fair Haven as problematic. He said he has gone to every homicide and talks to the families who have lost members to violence, as well as to the wakes and funerals.

He mentioned problems in the Hill, Winthrop and Whalley avenues and lower Church Street. There are sites around the city that are problematic and frankly they are not easy, Elicker said.

He said a house was identified as a site of alleged illegal activity in the Hill some time ago, but it was not raided until this week. It takes time. We live in a society of laws. You dont want police just knocking down your doors.

For business owner George Carranzo at New Haven Grand Apizza, any successes in tracking the shooters is coming too late for him.

He said he is planning to leave Grand Avenue given the drop in business, which has been impacted negatively by the pandemic and the closure of the Grand Avenue Bridge for repairs, in addition to the violence.

He said he witnessed a police raid on a recent night at a local plaza and said police were back the next day .

Ten minutes later (someone was allegedly) slinging dope right in front of the restaurant, Carranzo said.

Karen DuBois-Walton, who was opposing Elicker for mayor, but dropped out before the primary, helped organize Thursdays meeting with Sarah Miller and Kica Matos that drew some 60 people on Zoom.

She said the illegal activities in Fair Haven would not be tolerated in other communities.

I am dismayed that I dont hear a strategy that impacts what is happening in Fair Haven, DuBois-Walton said.

She said she drove the five blocks to FAME, because walking home at the end of the meeting would be too dangerous.

She said if there are social service workers addressing the issues, they are not out there at 7 p.m. and into the wee hours of the night ... I am asking for the department to share with us what is a real policing strategy that impacts what is going on in our community every day.

Apostle Loria Morrison made an impassioned speech to add programs for city youths and jobs and pinpointed poverty as the real problem.

Elicker said they will be investing funds from the federal American Rescue Plan into building equity for disadvantaged communities with programs and jobs for young people.

Shirley Lawrence, one of three candidates running for alder in Ward 20, said she was tired of the quiet conversations with city officials on solutions to violence.

Im really ready to scream, she said.

We are all in a state of emergency, Lawrence said, before breaking down in tears. Where we come from, the pandemic is nothing new ... In Newhallville we had four murders in less than four months.

We are living in the darkness. I am sick of it, she said, asking that the state building that was rejected for conversion to a worker-owned commercial laundromat, be opened for youth programs.

It needs to be opened, like yesterday ... and I am pleading with everyone of you here, she said.

She said there are social workers and nurses who will volunteer to do it.

When you talk to 14-year-old boys who say they dont want to go outside - that is not normal. That is what we are facing ... Every night you go home or you are waking up to gunshots, sirens and ambulances, she said.

We have been traumatized for years, she said. This is a plea for all of us, Black, white, Latino.

Elicker said Clifford Beers and Yale Child Study Center work closely with the Police Department to deal with the trauma.

He conceded people are missed, but said residents have to help refer children who need help. We want to give that help, the mayor said.

Another resident said in the past 25 years nothing has been done to educate youths in the trades to give them the job skills to get out of poverty. He said too many graduate without basic academic skills.

Elicker defended the commitment and work of the non-profits and city staff.

We are all trying. We cant solve poverty in a couple of years. I will work with you. We are doing our best, Elicker said, who agreed with the need to train non-college bound youth in sustainable employment.

Trel Morrison said the police, government, clergy and educators cant do it alone. It takes all of us. It is time we put our words into action and hit these streets to work with children, Morrison said.

Doug Bethea, an activist, lost his 19-year-old son to gun violence in 2007. He said there have been several mayors and police chiefs since then, but there continue to be homicides.

Bethea said putting children on the right path starts at home.

If we dont do it, it aint going to be done ... What are we going to do, to save our community? ... We have to work together with the police. It has to be a team effort - juvenile probation, adult probation, with the alders. We have to work together, Bethea said.

Magaly Caijas, who grew up in the Hill and now lives elsewherewith her family, said she fears for her elderly parents.

My heart hurts for seniors right now. Everyone should be able to sit outside on your....porch and enjoy the evening without worrying about a bullet hitting you ... Caijas said. We shouldnt live like this.

Caijas said unfortunately the problem of gun violence is not new as she remembers it when she went to college and lived with an aunt in Buffalo, N.Y. She said she felt safer there than New Haven.

Like Bethea, Caijas said it did not matter who the mayor or police chief was.

It starts at home. We need to start walking, we need to start marching. ... The message also needs to go to the streets, Caijas said.

She said those persons perpetuating violence, They are influencing the younger folks and their message is, if your family is not working for you, my family will.
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Niagara Falls, NY (14301)

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The decision of some governors in the north-west to close markets in the region is reportedly taking a toll on bandits. Three governors in...





The decision of some governors in the north-west to close markets in the region is reportedly taking a toll on bandits.

Three governors in the region ordered the closure of markets in their states to check the activities of bandits that have led to abductions and loss of property.

Zamfara, Katsina and Sokoto are the states that have taken this measure.

Last week, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) also asked telecommunications companies to suspend services in Zamfara over the spate of banditry in the state.

The move by the NCC is aimed at stopping communication among the bandits and to enable the security agencies to undertake operations to flush out the criminals.

According to Daily Trust, the bandits in Sokoto are now demanding food for the release of their captives.

The newspaper quoted a resident of Sabo Birni who said a neighbours ward was released after food items were given to the bandits.

They abducted a daughter of one man in our village and when he could not raise the money, they asked him to bring 10 measures of rice to collect the girl and they kept their promises, the resident said.

Another resident of Sokoto said bandits requested food items and drinks to release a driver they had abducted.

They initially demanded N15 million before later agreeing to accept N600,000, he reportedly said.

They asked his employer, who is my friend, to use the money to buy bags of rice, crates of energy drinks, cartons of spaghetti, cigarettes and bring the remaining change to them.

The man is still trying to raise the money.
Presidential candidate, Omoyele Sowore, says his younger brother, Olajide, will not die in vain. He stated this in a Facebook post on Thur...

Presidential candidate, Omoyele Sowore, says his younger brother, Olajide, will not die in vain.

He stated this in a Facebook post on Thursday night hours after the burial of Olajide in the Kiribo area of Ondo State.

My brother Olajide Sowore will never die in vain, thank you Nigeria! Though I am shackled, I am not in chains, I refuse to be held down! #RevolutionNow, the elder Sowore wrote.

It can be recalled that the remains of Olajide were laid to rest in the presence of his wife, four kids, family members, friends and associates.

The elder Sowore, in a Facebook post, also shared photos of the burial with the caption, My kid brother Olajide Sowore who was brutally murdered by yet-to-be-identified gunmen reportedly referred to as herdsmen/kidnappers on Ore-Benin Road was finally laid to rest today at Kiribo!

The Sahara Reporters publisher had in a tribute described his brother as an out-of-the-box thinker who decided to go back to school when he was about clocking 50.

The deceased was a Pharmacy student at the Igbinedion University in the Okada area of Edo State. He was returning from school when he was shot dead by suspected herdsmen around 6am on Saturday along the Lagos-Benin Expressway.

Police Public Relations Officer in the state, Kontongs Bello, had told newsmen the late Sowore was killed when gunmen kidnapped about five persons.

A woman, Emmanuella Anyanwu, who escaped from the hoodlums who killed late the Olajide had also said the gunmen demanded a ransom of N10m shortly before she escaped from the camp where she was kept with four others.

Anyanwu had also identified them as herdsmen, saying, I believe they are Fulani because on that Saturday afternoon, they released their cows and came to where we were being held.

I saw a mast far away and I started trekking towards it. After one hour or more, I got to a road and saw an elderly man on a motorcycle. I asked him to take me to a police station, which he did.

Many eminent Nigerians including Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo, SAN; Edo State Governor, Godwin Obaseki; and his Ekiti State counterpart, Kayode Fayemi, amongst others, had condemned the killing of Olajide but many Nigerians want security agencies to quickly bring the perpetrators to book and end the menacing trend of criminality that has turned some Nigerian highways to killing fields.
The Lagos State Police Command has grilled Ms. Uzoamaka Ohiri, ex-wife of comedian Chinedu Ani, a.k.a Nedu, for three days and had also as...

The Lagos State Police Command has grilled Ms. Uzoamaka Ohiri, ex-wife of comedian Chinedu Ani, a.k.a Nedu, for three days and had also asked her to stop posting comments on social media about her ex-husband.

The investigation of Ohiri, it was learnt, was sequel to a petition against her by her ex-husband, Nedu.

In a letter of invitation with reference letter CR:3000/LSX/D10/Vol.3/71 which was signed by Fayoade Adegoke, the Deputy Commissioner of Police in charge of the State Criminal Investigation Department, Panti, the comedians ex-wife was asked to see CSP Margaret Ighodalo.

In the letter dated September 7, 2021, Uzoamaka was informed that the invitation was merely for fact-finding.

The PUNCH reports that on getting to the SCID on Wednesday, Ohiris photographs were taken by the Police and she was grilled for six hours before being granted administrative bail and asked to return the next day.

On Thursday, on her return, she was warned against making comments about Nedu on social media and was also made to return to the SCID on Friday.

A relative of Ohiri said, My cousin is seriously being harassed, humiliated and intimidated by the Police because of the status of her ex-husband.

How does a family and civil matter concern the Police? The Commissioner of Police needs to caution his men.

When contacted, the spokesman for the Lagos State Police Command, Adekunle Ajisebutu, said that he was unaware of the invitation and promised to get back to our correspondent.

He, however, did not respond to subsequent calls.

The comedian and his ex-wife have been trending on social media for the past one week over allegations of infidelity and domestic violence.
Femi Fani-Kayode, a former Minister of Aviation, has described controversial Islamic cleric, Sheikh Ahmad Gumi as an unrepentant lover of ...

Femi Fani-Kayode, a former Minister of Aviation, has described controversial Islamic cleric, Sheikh Ahmad Gumi as an unrepentant lover of bandits.

Fani-Kayode made the remark while criticizing Gumi for defending bandits and herders despite their criminal activities.

He accused the Kaduna-based Islamic scholar of being the spokesman of foreign Fulani terrorists.

Sharing a video of Gumi on his Twitter handle, Fani-Kayode wrote: Listen to Sheik Ahmad Gumi, the unrepentant and unapologetic lover of bandits and the Chief Spokesman for the foreign Fulani terrorists that come into our country from other shores and kidnap, torture and slaughter our men, women and children.





He continues to demand that the terrorists must be paid huge ransoms and must be granted amnesty. My question: which of the seven circles of hell did this creature come from?

Recall that Gumi had urged the Federal Government to create a Ministry of Nomadic Affairs.

Gumi said the ministry would address the challenges surrounding herders.

He pointed out that bandits in the North are going nowhere.
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After Hurricane Ida took out power in New Orleans on its tear across the state and country, area restaurants were left without refrigeration and plenty of food on hand. Many put it to good use by giving out meals or just offering groceries en masse to people in need.

Some restaurants donated their food to relief efforts such as World Central Kitchen, celebrity chef Jose Andres mobile relief effort. Working in coordination with Culture Aid NOLA at the New Orleans Culinary and Hospitality Institute on Howard Avenue, they shipped meals from there to distribution points in the city and outlying parishes.

Former Gambit Editor Kevin Allman, from his home in southern California, noticed the efforts. Besides sharing the info to help hungry residents find food, he created an online map, so people can remember and support the restaurants who were generous in a time of need. He dubbed the effort Map of Restaurant Excellence, or MRE.

The map of area restaurants is below, along with an alphabetical list by area. Allman continues to update the map, which you can find online.

MRE Q&A with Kevin Allman

Kevin Allman spoke with Gambit about his MRE.

Gambit: What spurred you to compile the map and list of places?

Kevin Allman: Like so many people, I was following Hurricane Ida and the immediate aftermath by doomscrolling through social media. One of the few bright spots was seeing chef Jose Andres and his nonprofit World Central Kitchen were in New Orleans before the storm hit, prepping free meals for what was to come.

Then I saw a couple of restaurants doing the same thing  either cooking food for the neighbors, for free, or giving away their inventories. Someone wrote, "I hope someone is making a list of all these places that are being so generous." There's not much I could do in California, but I thought, "I can do a Google map, so when things get back to what we laughingly call normal these days, people can visit these places and pay it back."

Gambit: How did you find places and what kinds of things did you include? Free cooked meals, food giveaways, non-food giveaways?

Allman: Well, first, if a place was cooking and charging for food  that's fine, no shade. Times are tough and tight. But I wanted to highlight the places that were saying "Come get a meal," or "We've got these ingredients if you want them." The meal part was important because, besides the kindness, it gave people a place to come together and commiserate, to have a comforting food ritual that wasn't like the MRE situation after Hurricane Katrina and the federal levee failures.

I got most of my info from social media, texts, and emails. Some of the things I came across I couldn't include because they were temporary, but they were beautiful. Neighbors setting up a "free store" on card tables with canned goods, diapers and such. One woman had put a massage table on the sidewalk to provide a few minutes' relief for her neighbors. People that got power back ran extension cords to their front fences, offering free phone charges. Musicians providing the sound of the city, as always. Even at a time that was so miserable, it seemed everyone was trying to think of how to help their neighbors.

Gambit: Did you get any feedback from chefs, restaurateurs and service industry people?

Allman: Not yet. I expect they're all pretty busy! But I'll keep adding to the map as I get more information. I'd really like to hear more about the restaurants on the Westbank, in Jefferson Parish, and on the Northshore that were feeding people.

The weeks after Katrina and the levee failures were so hopeless  I think this time New Orleanians were collectively ready to do something helpful.

That's what I wanted to record for the better times  a restaurant guide based on generosity.

Map of Restaurant Excellence

Compiled by Kevin Allman

After Hurricane Ida struck, these restaurants cooked for their neighbors free of charge or gave away the contents of their pantries, fridges and freezers. When things get back to whatever normal might be in the future, please support these generous places that already were suffering from the pandemic.

MRE Restaurants by area

Arabi

Pirogue's Whiskey Bayou

Bywater/Marigny

Bar Redux

Bywater Bakery

Horns Eatery (catering offered)

The Joint

Kebab

Morrows

Pizza Delicious

SukhoThai

Sundae Best

CBD/Warehouse District

Barcadia New Orleans

Cochon Butcher

Empire State Delicatessen

The Howlin' Wolf

Johnny Sanchez

La Boca Steakhouse

Nesbits Poeyfarre Street Market

Singleton's Mini Mart

Willies Chicken Shack

World Central Kitchen at NOCHI

Carrollton/Riverbend

Ajun Cajun

Boucherie

Carrollton Station

Live Oak Cafe

Louisiana Pizza Kitchen

Seafood Sallys

Z'otz Cafe

French Quarter

Beachbum Berry's Latitude 29

Doris Metropolitan

Manolito

Palm & Pine

Gretna

Banana Blossom Thai Restaurant

Island Paradise Restaurant & Grill

Hammond

Punjabi Dhaba Indian Cuisine

Lakeview

Juniors on Harrison

Metairie

Moe's Original BBQ - Metairie

Mid-City/Treme

Backatown Coffee Parlour

Bevi Seafood Co.

Blue Oak BBQ

Cafe Degas

Coffee Science

Felipe's Mexican Taqueria

HEY Coffee Co.

Juan's Flying Burrito

Marjies Grill

Mayhew Bakery

Mr. Potato

Mopho

Toups Meatery

Trilly Cheesesteaks

New Orleans East

VEGGI Farmers Cooperative

River Ridge

Rosemary & Roux Cafe & Catering

Uptown

Atchafalaya

Barracuda

The Courtyard Brewery

Coquette

Creole Creamery

The Daily Beet

Del Fuego Taqueria

El Pavo Real

Gracious Bakery

Juan's Flying Burrito

Lilette

Mr. Tequila Bar and Grill

Origami Restaurant

Rahm Haus

Saba

Saffron NOLA

Slim Goodies Diner

Surrey's Cafe & Juice Bar
Particularly in the bayou and River Parishes, recovery from Hurricane Ida is still in its early stages. A small army of mutual aid groups, churches, nonprofits, individuals and even bands have begun ramping up their efforts to help survivors of the storm. From Gentilly to Grand Isle, these groups have been working tirelessly for days, often using personal funds to secure needed supplies.

Below is a by no means exhaustive list of these groups. Because of the uncertain and often in-flux nature of providing relief, we have provided websites for most non-governmental or church organizations, and if you are in need, please reach out to them. We also have included specific links to donate to these groups for those who are able to help.

Region Wide Groups

World Central Kitchen

wck.org

Chef Jose Andres international food assistance organization, which is cooking food in New Orleans and helping feed folks throughout the area.

Donate: donate.wck.org/give/236738/#!/donation/checkout

The Mutual Aid Response Network

imaginewaterworks.org/mutual-aid-response-network

Led by Imagine Water Works and organizing mutual aid groups across south Louisiana. Will support relief and recovery efforts as well as preparation for the rest of hurricane season.

Donate: Donorbox.org/ida

Southern Solidarity

southernsolidarity.org

Distributing aid, meals and water to the areas unhoused population.

Donate: southernsolidarity.org/donate

Mutual Aid Disaster Relief

Mutualaiddisasterrelief.org

National network focused on grassroots mutual aid relief work. Contributions will aid in supplies collected from across the country and distribution in areas impacted by Hurricane Ida.

Donate: Mutualaiddisasterrelief.org/donate

Catholic Charities

catholiccharitiesusa.org

Catholic Charities is one of the oldest, largest nonprofit aid groups in the world.

Donate: https://bit.ly/3mW7UfU

Louisiana Bucket Brigade

labucketbrigade.org

The Louisiana Bucket Brigade is organizing aid and relief efforts in the New Orleans area, the River Parishes and other parts of southeast Louisiana.

Donate: labucketbrigade.salsalabs.org/standwithus/index.html

Orleans Parish Organizations

To find daily locations for food and other supplies or assistance, Nola Ready has also created a special site to track them, trumba.com/calendars/hurricaneida.

Committee for a Better New Orleans

cbno.org

An organization of community, business and political leaders in New Orleans. CBNO has been providing food in the wake of Hurricane Ida.

Donate: cbno.org/donate

Feed the Second Line

feedthesecondline.org

An initiative started during the COVID-19 pandemic by the Krewe of Red Beans, Feed the Second Line provides food for members of the cultural community, frontline workers and others in need.

Donte: feedthesecondline.org/donate

Culture Aid Nola

cultureaidnola.org

The organization provides assistance to underserved members of the hospitality and culture communities of New Orleans

Donte: cultureaidnola.org/support

Musicians' Clinic

neworleansmusiciansclinic.org

Provides health care and other services to musicians, performing artists and culture workers in New Orleans.

The clinic has put together a list of Ida-related health services, including mental health, at neworleansmusiciansclinic.org/ida

Donte: neworleansmusiciansclinic.org/get-involved/donate

House of Tulip

houseoftulip.org

House of Tulip provides services to the transgender and gender-nonconforming community in New Orleans.

Donate: houseoftulip.org/make-a-donation

Nola Ready Oxygen tanks

ready.nola.gov/home

For New Orleanians in need of oxygen tanks, the city is providing sites where they can be obtained for free.

2920 Magazine St., 5403 Read St., 2500 General de Gaulle Drive

(504) 658-2558, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.

GLBL WRMNG Relief Aid

linktr.ee/glblwrmng504

New Orleans hip-hop collective GLBL WRMNG is providing direct financial relief to BIPOC artists, musicians and creatives displaced by Hurricane Ida.

Donate: via PayPal at GLBL WRMNG

Mutual Aid  New Orleans Facebook group

facebook.com/groups/MutualAidNOLA

Though the group does not normally use or solicit cash donations, given the extraordinary circumstances caused by Ida, organizer Alex Anderra has asked for donations to provide communal gas, solar chargers, tarps, water and other supplies free to the community.

Donate: via Venmo at @caminocreative, via Cash App at $alexem9

Black Man Rising

facebook.com/blackmanrisng

Antonio Travis organized the group to help give aid to the young Black New Orleanians it serves.

Donte: via Cash App at $tonytee10

New Orleans Mutual Aid Group

Supporting New Orleans-based recovery efforts.

Donate: via Venmo at @NolaMutualAid

Bvlbancha Collective

Bvlbanchacollective.com

Provides mutual aid and information for Indigenous peoples.

Follow updated information on Instagram, @bvlbanchacollective

Second Harvest Food Bank

No-hunger.org

Distributes immediate food assistance across south Louisiana.

Donate: no-hunger.org/ida

Aid Groups Outside of Orleans Parish

Jefferson Parish oxygen tanks program

Jefferson Parish officials have set up two sites residents can get free oxygen tanks.

Fire Station 81, 808 MacArthur Ave., Harvey

Fire Station 20, 4110 Hudson St., Metairie

Lost Bayou Ramblers

instagram.com/p/CTQ2e4MrcEQ

The legends of Lost Bayou Ramblers are collecting supplies for residents in Houma, Golden Meadow and the New Orleans area.

Donate: via Paypal or Venmo at @nouveauelectric

Inclusive Louisiana

facebook.com/InclusiveLA

Inclusive Louisiana describes its mission as creat[ing] a fairer and more inclusive society and to protect the heavens and earth for the generations to come. They are gathering supplies including generators.

Donate: labucketbrigade.salsalabs.org/inclusivedonate/index.html

The Descendants Project

thedescendantsproject.com

The Descendants Project focuses on supporting the Black families and descendants of the River Parishes.

Donate: via Venmo at @thedescendantsproject

Down The Bayou Mutual Aid Fund

instagram.com/dtb_mutualaidfund

Operated by Caroline Guidry, describes itself as No hoops to jump through, no middleman bullshit, just neighbors helping neighbors. Serving Lafourche communities.

Donate: via Cashapp at $dtbmutualaidfund, via Venmo at @DTBMutualAidFund

St. Charles Parish Small Black Neighborhood Ida Relief

Thomjana' Ferguson has started an effort to provide assistance to small black neighborhoods in St. Charles Parish.

Donate: gofundme.com/f/ida-relief-for-small-black-neighborhoods

Another Gulf Is Possible

anothergulf.com/ida/

A women-of-color led, grassroots collaborative of organizations along the Gulf Coast. Its site includes a list of resources for Hurricane Ida response.

Donate: anothergulf.com/ida

RISE St. James

facebook.com/risestjames

An environmental justice organization based in St James Parish.

Donate: secure.acceptiva.com/?cst=aYnMTV

Faithpointe Family Fellowship Anglican Relief

An Anglican church in Covington providing food, showers and other support.

71429 Seeger Road, Covington

(985) 801-9113

There also are several First Nations in southeastern Louisiana whos lands and people were hit hard by Ida.

United Houma Nation

unitedhoumanation.org

Donate: unitedhoumanation.org/donate

Isle De Jean Charles Band of Biloxi Chitimacha Choctaw

Isledejeancharles.com

Donate: Isledejeancharles.com/donate

Gran Caillou/Dulac Band

Gcdbcc.org

Donate: gcdbcc.org/support

Pointe-Aux-Chien Indian Tribe

Pactribe.tripod.com

Donate: pactribe.tripod.com

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As Hurricane Ida moved into southeast Louisiana, Nate Cameron and his family were in Little Rock, Arkansas, keeping a close eye on the news. At the same time, musician Pell was doing the same thing in Los Angeles.

The two New Orleanians were calling and texting each other and the other members of GLBL WRMNG, the collective of rappers, songwriters and producers theyd formed early this year, to make sure people had funds and what they needed to either get out of town or weather the storm. They dipped into personal funds and money GLBL WRMNG had earned from a few recent live events to help out. But as the storm walloped Louisiana, they knew the need was going to be immense.

We were just like, what can we do? How can we use our influence, our connection to this demographic of creatives in the region and also our connection to some bigger companies and businesses? Cameron says. A music industry professional, Cameron is the tour manager for Tank and the Bangas and the board president of the Music and Culture Coalition of New Orleans.

GLBL WRMNG started collecting donations  both from the public and companies Cameron and Pell have worked with  to turn right back around and send to Black and Brown musicians and artists impacted by Ida. They set up a minimal Google form asking for a name, phone number, how many people in the household and what is needed, and have so far raised about $5,500 and given out more than $6,000 directly to more than 70 people.

Folks have really been responsive, Cameron says. So many New Orleanians have given. Its emotional to see that people who are going through the same thing but are in places of even temporary privilege saying, Look I dont have much but I want to give this.

Adding to the GLBL aspect, people in four countries outside the U.S. have donated, Cameron adds.

In Idas wake, New Orleans musicians have stepped up for one another and the region. The hurricane is only the latest disaster to hit the cultural community: COVID-19 wiped out months of gigs and the 2020 festival season, and then the Delta variant surged and wiped out a whole second season. Musicians have had to learn the hard way how far a dollar stretches  but theyre jumping at the chance to help.

+2 Still, We Dance When the lights went out after Ida, the heart of New Orleans shone bright

Like GLBL WRMNG, Boyfriend and Louis Michot (read more about his efforts here), musicians are using their platforms to raise donations either to offer direct help or to support an organization offering mutual aid. The Music and Culture Coalition of New Orleans has relaunched its micro-grants program an initiative created in the early days of Covid to give low-barrier financial help to the citys culture bearers  as has the Preservation Hall Foundation with its own Musician Relief Fund. Both programs are currently asking for donations to help fund grants.

And the New Orleans Musicians Clinic and Assistance Foundation has been on the ground to support elders and clients with supplies and mental and physical health check-ins. NOMC also has been working with The Howlin Wolf and Culture Aid NOLA in their food distribution efforts.

The biggest needs among the artists GLBL WRMNG has helped have been funds for gas and lodging, Cameron says. His wife, Krystle Sims-Cameron, also has been directing mutual aid for Black women, youth and the LGBTQ community.

For the elders NOMC works with, ice to store medicines while the power was out amid oppressive heat has been one of the biggest needs, says Erica Dudas, the managing director of the New Orleans Musicians Assistance Foundation.

We thought water would be the major problem  we didnt think that electricity would be [out this long], Dudas says. But we were ready. The day after the storm we were calling our elders to figure out what their status was.

The list of elders the organization regularly checks on in the wake of the storm has grown to more than 150, with NOMC delivering grocery boxes and other essentials. The group also is accepting donations to help with providing health care as well as funding a financial relief program.

Its been a real endurance test for our musicians who have already been tapped out so much  If its not Covid and the inability to gig, its the City Hall debate at Congo Square, Dudas says. All of our elders are so tired, and they just need some love right now.

In the immediate aftermath of the hurricane, the Music and Culture Coalition of New Orleans worked to share information about the mutual aid groups working in the region. The immediate move was to direct peoples donations to the organizations working on the ground here, says MaCCNO Executive Director Ethan Ellestad. Last week, MaCCNO decided to restart its micro-grants program to provide any assistance it can.

In the past 18 months, there hasnt really been a space where people could truly get back up on their feet. I think thats one of the real challenges  resources have already been slim, Ellestad says. I think one of the most important things is this comes right after the governor canceled the supplementary unemployment insurance that helped gig workers.

The regions musicians quickly stepped up to help one another and their communities at large. But long-term recovery  and getting people ready before the next storm  is going to require real investment from the city and state in the cultural community.

Every time theres a disaster, you put in some money and then you turn around and do something else, Ellestad says. The safety net, youve got to do some long-term support.

+5 Ramblers to the rescue: Musicians bring aid to hard-hit Cajun towns post-Hurricane Ida HOUMA, LOUISIANA  Louis Michot is soaked in sweat, showing the early signs of a sunburn as he hands out to-go boxes of freshly smoked meat an
To our readers:

Its been 13 days since Hurricane Ida hit Louisiana. For most of those days, it was hard to feel lucky in any meaningful way. Power was out for much of the time, it was unbearably hot, and it took several days for official aid resources to get up and running.

Although the city of New Orleans itself was spared some of the worst physical damage Ida had to offer, lives were still lost, homes were severely damaged and all of our lives have been upended. In Jefferson, Terrebonne and other parishes, the storm brought much greater devastation: whole towns have been destroyed, most of the region remains without power or reliable drinking water and the recovery process is only beginning.

Like you, many of the names on Gambit's masthead remain displaced by Ida, are helping elderly or sick family members cope without power or adequate medical assistance and are simply trying to, well, recover. Putting this issue of Gambit together was not easy, but we felt it necessary, both for ourselves but also to highlight something remarkable that has happened.

Since first light after the storm, we have seen countless acts of kindness and community in fellowship. Literally within hours of the storm pulling out of New Orleans, volunteers from Culture Aid Nola and Jose Andres World Central Kitchen were hard at work prepping meals for anyone in need. Neighbors were checking on one another and assessing the damage for those whod fled.

Kindness and empathy are very much a hallmark of New Orleans, and its often too easy to simply say thats how we do and brush pass the remarkable good of this city, and this region. Which is why this weeks issue of Gambit is special. In it, weve collected stories and images of New Orleanians who saw a need and stepped in to help. Musicians who saw the suffering of our neighbors and did what they could. Restaurants who fed a weary city for free. Strangers who came to help save our furry friends in their time of need.

The struggle to recover continues in our beloved city  and the challenges will likely grow greater in the bayou and river parishes as the weeks go by and national attention wanders to the next tragedy. So, there remains work to be done.

But for now, we celebrate you. In the darkest moments of the last two weeks and for the many weeks it will take to rebuild our entire region, New Orleanians have been, and will continue to be, a shining light of hope, love and laughter.

We can think of no better family to have than you.

 The Staff of Gambit Weekly

+4 Commentary: How We Do, South Louisiana As of press time, electrical power had been restored to most of New Orleans and other parts of the metro area. However, huge swaths of south L

Hurricane Ida Mutual Aid and Relief Groups Particularly in the bayou and River Parishes, recovery from Hurricane Ida is still in its early stages. A small army of mutual aid groups, chu

New Orleans restaurants that gave food away following Hurricane Ida When Hurricane Ida knocked out power in New Orleans, many restaurateurs knew it would be a while before they could reopen for business, but th

+2 Stormy Relief: Stormy Daniels and her Apocalypse Crew form their own relief efforts post-Ida Ask Stormy Daniels how shes doing on day nine of Idas aftermath, and shell respond in the only reasonable way: by blowing a raspberry.

+2 Protecting our pets: International animal welfare nonprofit comes to help pets in Ida's wake When the Louisiana Department of Agriculture and Forestry saw Ida was coming, they knew local animal shelters would need some extra help rescu

+5 Ramblers to the rescue: Musicians bring aid to hard-hit Cajun towns post-Hurricane Ida HOUMA, LOUISIANA  Louis Michot is soaked in sweat, showing the early signs of a sunburn as he hands out to-go boxes of freshly smoked meat an

Blakeview: New Orleans nonprofits that help people in need As Hurricane Ida relief efforts continue, were spotlighting the history of two nonprofits whose work has been a lifeline for storm victims.

Heres what to know about FEMA assistance South Louisianans are going to be cleaning up from Hurricane Ida for a while  and its going to cost money.

+14 Blacked Out But Unbroken A photo essay of New Orleans in the days following Hurricane Ida.
Its only been a week since 843 nursing home residents were rescued from a partially flooded warehouse in Tangipahoa Parish where they were living in squalor after Hurricane Ida, but the lawsuits are already piling up.

At least four separate lawsuits have been filed this week in Orleans, Jefferson and East Baton Rouge parishes over the ordeal, each of them naming Bob Dean and the seven nursing homes he owns as defendants. The suits make a number of claims against Dean, but a persistent theme across them is that Dean violated the bill of rights thats enshrined in state law for nursing home residents.

Those rights include receiving adequate care, privacy, being treated with the fullest measure of dignity, being free from abuse and having family members notified of significant health status changes.

The Louisiana Department of Health has revoked Deans seven nursing home licenses and terminated his Medicaid waivers after finding a series of failures on those fronts. Residents were neglected in the warehouse, calling out for help, lying in feces and urine for days at a time, LDH inspectors documented on their site visits. They said some were either nude or nearly nude inside of the warehouse with hundreds of others, and that COVID precautions were all but forgotten. Meanwhile, relatives have largely said they had received no notice that their loved ones were being evacuated for Hurricane Ida  let alone that they were living in inhumane conditions and in need of rescue.

Financially, I think its going to be devastating to him, said the ubiquitous trial lawyer Morris Bart, who filed a lawsuit against Dean this week in Orleans Parish on behalf of four nursing home residents. And I hope it is.

The suit from Barts law firm names as plaintiffs Ella Mae Alario, Diana Williams, Wade Heaton, and Felix Winchester, all of whom were evacuated to the warehouse. Bart said that one of them remains in intensive care as a direct result of the inhumane conditions inside the warehouse. The suit says its claims are separate from those that would come up in a medical malpractice lawsuit.

Knowing that feces should be cleaned from a residents body, that water should not stand on the floor, that adequate shelter must be afforded, that facilities must be properly evacuated in advance of a hurricane, and that residents are entitled to human dignity do not relate to the level of expertise required to trigger application of the Louisiana Medical Malpractice Act, it states.

Bart said he has signed up 30 clients so far, and that he expects to file separate lawsuits for each of them, rather than trying to pursue one larger class action suit.

+6 State revokes nursing home licenses for owner who sent 800 residents to warehouse for Ida Louisiana health officials announced Tuesday that they are revoking Bob Dean's seven nursing-home licenses after he evacuated more than 800 nu

Stephen Garcia, whose law firm specializing in elder and nursing home abuse has offices in five states, including Louisiana, also filed a lawsuit Friday against Dean and his companies. He is representing Hercilia Hurtado on behalf of her brother Catalino Hurtado, a resident of Deans Maison DeVille nursing home in Harvey. Garcia is seeking class action status for the lawsuit, which alleges that Dean failed to execute his evacuation plan, failed to ensure the warehouse was properly equipped to take care of so many residents, and failed to notify their families.

On Aug. 27, 2021, the day of the mass transfer, the Dean Warehouse rapidly deteriorated into an unsafe, unsanitary and unhealthy condition, at which time Petitioner  began making emergency 911 calls requesting help for medical emergencies, malnutrition, changing soiled linens and clothing, general poor conditions, and/or staff abuse occurring at the Dean Warehouse, the lawsuit states.

Garcia estimated he already has 30 active lawsuits in Louisiana targeting nursing home owners. His local legal team includes former federal prosecutor Matt Coman, who was the lead lawyer in the governments case against former Mayor Ray Nagin.

Garcia said some of his existing suits target Dean, and he said problems at Deans nursing homes were apparent well before Ida threatened.

+2 Problem with nursing-home evacuation was execution, not plan itself: Louisiana health officials The ghastly problems that festered after residents of seven New Orleans-area nursing homes were evacuated to a warehouse in Tangipahoa Parish 

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This guy is out there getting the sickest people he can find, because they have the highest reimbursement rates, and his staffing is ridiculously low, Garcia said. This dynamic predates Ida by a long shot. You throw any little monkey wrench into this, and seven people die unnecessarily.

New Orleans attorney Madro Bandaries also filed suit against Dean this week in Orleans Parish on behalf of Bridges Jan Edmonds, a patient at Maison DeVille Nursing Home in Harvey who was among the hundreds taken to the Independence warehouse.

She had no advance warning. Naturally, it was confusing and confounding to be put on a bus with absolutely nothing other than, Were evacuating, get on the bus, Bandaries said.

Bandaries described the state as very lax in regulating nursing homes and assisted living homes, while arguing that Dean was negligent in failing to provide required services at the warehouse.

Plans to evacuate nursing homes to warehouse, where 7 have since died, were OK'd by state When news broke that nearly 850 frail nursing-home patients were crammed into a warehouse in a remote corner of Louisiana during Hurricane Ida

He said the state had since placed Edmonds in a nursing facility in a small town in north Louisiana

Shes doing OK, much better, Bandaries said. But she was terribly dehydrated, and the lack of food, all the other things that go with being stuck in a warehouse in Tangipahoa Parish.

Fraud, conspiracy and a failure to exercise reasonable care or to follow state law are among the claims against Dean in the lawsuit, which seeks damages for an alleged failure to provide reasonable food, water, shelter, security or staffing.

The first lawsuit to be filed against Dean was in Jefferson Parish, with family members filing the suit on behalf of four nursing home residents: Leona Anderson, Joseph Manguno, Catherine Roussell and Malvina Songy. They are being represented by Donald Massey of New Orleans-based Couhig Partners LLC.

+4 Nurses horrified by nursing home's treatment of evacuees at Louisiana warehouse; 'We tried' Two nurses who worked inside the Tangipahoa Parish warehouse where more than 800 nursing home residents have now been rescued from squalid con

Defendants have just overseen one of the most despicable and tragic evacuations imaginable, the court documents say. Eschewing compassion in favor of greed, Defendants conduct has resulted in at least seven deaths, staggering physical and mental harms to legions, and deep shame to an entire state.

Massey also asked the courts to issue a temporary restraining order to Dean that prevents him from any further violations of the Nursing Home Residents Bill of Rights, destroying any documents or communications about the evacuations and destroying any of the residents personal items. A judge signed off on the temporary restraining order late Friday, and set a hearing on it for Sept. 20.

Massey said that most of his clients still have possessions either left inside of Deans nursing homes or that they brought with them when they evacuated to the warehouse, and that they have not been able to get them back yet. Massey said many of them are missing possessions with deep symbolic value to them: wedding photos mementos from their children and more.

While its probably not a lot for a guy like Bob Dean or his companies, for most of these people, its all that they have, Massey said.
For the first few, dark days after Hurricane Ida, the New Orleans Sewerage & Water Board was producing more electricity in the city than the electric company.

That observation was made by City Council member Joe Giarrusso, who normally rides herd on the agency about the many failures at the agencys Carrollton power plant. They have led to flooding in the streets and boil advisories for drinking water in recent years.

Considering they lost Entergy power, it's pretty remarkable. One of my big concerns as the storm was approaching was whether or not we were going to lose power to the system, Giarrusso said. The fact that they were able to be a little bit over the 50 megawatts throughout this is, I think, something that many of us did not expect.

This time, it was Jefferson Parish and other surrounding communities that issued boil water advisories - not New Orleans.

This time, it was Entergy that suffered a total power failure, while the Sewerage & Water Boards in-house power kept up pressure for the drinking-water system and kept down stormwater levels. Only a few sections of the city in New Orleans East and Lakeview had standing water that couldnt be pumped down within a day of the Aug. 29 storm.

S&WB reports isolated issues but no systemic drainage problems during Ida The New Orleans Sewerage & Water Board was struggling Monday with an extreme spike in water usage and was facing difficulty powering its s

For its sewer system, however, the Sewerage & Water Board relies entirely on Entergy power. The loss of all Entergy transmission lines into the New Orleans area left all 84 sewage lift stations without power to pump raw sewage to treatment plants in the Lower 9th Ward and Algiers. Sewerage & Water Board Executive Director Ghassan Korban used emergency approval from the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality to divert raw sewage into the Mississippi River.

Because the alternative is sewer backing up into people's homes, which obviously creates public health-related issues, Korban said. And obviously no one wants sewage in their home. So it was a very tough decision. But given the two options, I had to do the diversion and let the sewage flow into the Mississippi.

The dumping of raw sewage into the river continued until Monday, eight days after Ida passed. Korban said the total amount of diverted sewage will be reported to the state and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, but the totals havent been calculated yet.

S&WB generators fail at wastewater treatment plant, forcing discharge into river The Sewerage & Water Board was forced to dump untreated sewage in the Mississippi River and Bayou Bienvenue after backup generators that h

The sewage treatment plant also flooded during Ida, which limited the staffs ability to use some of the treatment equipment when they had power, Korban said. The effect is still being felt at the treatment plant, and the Sewerage & Water Board tweeted Thursday that operations there were just starting to normalize.

Korban also deployed 33 vacuum trucks to sewage lift stations and sewer mains to unclog them.

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The very loss of Entergy power that caused the sewer problems might also have reduced the volume of wastewater, and ultimately saved New Orleans from a serious public health crisis.

+4 New Orleans lost power in Hurricane Ida after tower collapsed in river; fix could take days, longer A massive failure of the transmission system that brings electricity to New Orleans and the east bank of Jefferson Parish left the city comple

The fact that some people left the city, many people who stayed did not have power so they could not run their washing machines and what have you - that certainly helped reduce the volume, Korban said.

Giarrusso said hell be asking the Sewerage & Water Board to answer questions about the power sources for the sewer system. Korban said he and his team are looking into ways to provide some backup power for the lift stations, potentially using mobile generators to deploy as needed. He said backup generators for all 84 stations would be too expensive.

The expensive work in recent years of fixing the broken Carrollton power plant turbines has often been a fools errand, but it paid off in Ida. Turbines 4 and 5, which have cost upwards of $70 million to repair, both pulled through in the clutch.

Those are not the machines we want to rely on for the future, but for this event they served us well." Electro-Motive Diesel generators "kicked in, and they did their part. Backup generators ... in many cases did their part as well. And there was a lot of prep work that that took place. And we put people in the right places, and we were just all hands on deck.

It meant the drainage pumps were able to clear most streets of stormwater by the morning of Aug. 30, except in sections of New Orleans East, where Pump Stations 15 and 18 had problems, and in a portion of Lakeview, near Pump Station 12, where the only pump was already broken before Hurricane Ida.

+3 After Hurricane Ida led to Lakeview flooding, councilman says drainage 'post-mortem' needed As Lakeview dried out Tuesday from Hurricane Idas localized floods, City Councilman Joe Giarrusso said the flooding pointed to a bigger need 

Im proud of how the utility overall performed with the exception of these localized issues here and there, Korban said.

Theres some debate about what caused the Lakeview flooding. Giarrusso and Korban both suspect it was not Pump Station 12 but some blockage in the drainage pipes or culverts. Giarrusso said he based his assessment on the fact that the area near the pump station flooded in May 2019 even while the pump at Station 12 was functioning properly.

The fact there was retention of water two years ago and 12 was up makes it harder for me to believe that 12 being down was an issue this time, he said.

Giarrusso is asking the Sewerage & Water Board to answer questions about its systems performance in Ida during a City Council public works committee meeting Sept. 30.
Curtis C. McKnight, 76, passed away on Sept. 11 in Norman. Services are pending at First Christian Church. In lieu of flowers please make donations to First Christian Church in Norman. Please sign the online guestbook at www.primrosefuneralservice.com
Bill Scanlon is a former Ward 6 city council member who volunteers in support of the Norman Police Department and Norman Fire Department, and serves multiple city committees. Prior to his work in Norman, Scanlon served 26 years in the U.S. Air Force  where he last worked as chief of mission analyses under the assistant chief of staff for the Air Force, Studies and Analyses at the Pentagon  and worked for Northrop Grumman in Washington, D.C.
Susquehanna University and Pennsylvania Highlands Community College have partnered to make it easier for western Pennsylvania students to continue their education and earn a bachelors degree.

Susquehanna University President Jonathan Green and Penn Highlands Community College President Steve Nunez signed a transfer agreement that will offer Penn Highlands graduates guaranteed admission to Susquehanna.

There are few, if any, investments that have a greater impact on our nation and our economy than providing an affordable pathway to higher education for students of all socioeconomic backgrounds, and Susquehanna University has been identified among the top 10% of higher education institutions for return on investment, Green said.

We are proud to provide our students with a high-quality, transformative education and look forward to ensuring a seamless transition for Penn Highlands graduates to complete their bachelors degree in preparation for a successful future.

Students at Penn Highlands who submit a letter of intent to attend Susquehanna University prior to completing 30 transferable credit hours will have the following benefits:

Guaranteed admission into a bachelors degree program with third-year (junior) status at Susquehanna University upon completion of an Associate of Arts or an Associate of Science degree.

Eligibility for an academic scholarship from Susquehanna University of up to $32,000 per year based on their grade point average at Penn Highlands during the application phase.

Eligibility for an additional $5,000 scholarship from Susquehanna University per year if students are members of the Phi Theta Kappa honor society.

The mission of Pennsylvania Highlands Community College is to provide the students of western Pennsylvania with cost-effective and favorable opportunities. This collaboration with Susquehanna University paves the way for our students to have a positive experience and achieve success through the transfer of credits, Nunez said.

Students will receive a top-notch education from two great institutions through this agreement. It is a win for Penn Highlands Community College, Susquehanna University, and the communities that we serve.




Williamsport, Pa.  Thursday night's Williamsport City Council meeting was heated at times as Williamsport continues to struggle with financial issues stemming from the former administration's 2019 and 2020 budgets.

Some of the tension last night centered around the scoreboard project at Bowman Field. The city has yet to sign off on the project because it is unwilling to use American Rescue Plan funds to foot the bill.

Williamsport received a $600,000 grant with part of that money being budgeted for the scoreboard.

Mayor Derek Slaughter, who wants the project finished, has argued the city cannot appropriate grant funding for the project until a state and federal investigation into city finances is completed.

When I took over in 2020 as mayor, I uncovered numerous discrepancies related to the finances of the city, Slaughter said. We have been under an Attorney Generals investigation for well over a year and a half now. Having said that, I cannot confidently say what is in each of the financial accounts of the city until we have the 2019 audit and the 2020 audit that will give us a baseline into whats in each account. Until then, my hands are tied.

Williamsport City Council made a motion to amend that in two weeks, to revisit the funding issue for a scoreboard and foundation project at Bowman Field. The motion passed, but the issue of using ARPA (American Rescue Plan Allocation) money is still very real.

Several members of council, including Liz Miele and Adam Yoder, both members of the finance committee, expressed concern over where the money would ultimately come from.

We passed this with the caveat we cant use Rescue Plan money, Yoder said. The administration had multiple months to come up with the money. My concern is using Rescue Plan money for projects that have been in progress and need funding, with or without the availability of Rescue Plan money.

City Council once again felt the administration expected them to come up with funds for a project in Williamsport.

When we go over the budget, I dont even know what money we are working with, Slaughter said. I take great offense to that with everybody on this call knowing what we have been dealing with related to the finances.

Miele and Slaughter exchanged heated words over the scoreboard funding.

The administration has known since May it was going to need to fund the foundation for Bowman Field, Miele said. The administration has not found the funding. I expected when the item came, we would have a source for the funds.

Williamsport has financial issues that run deep, according to Slaughter. This, he said, makes it difficult to come up with funding for projects that had already been given the go-ahead before he took office. The results of this very real investigation could reveal that the city owes money, which makes Slaughter hesitant to spend any on the project.

City Engineer Jon Sander informed the council the scoreboard project at Bowman Field is set to start on Sept. 13.

There are so many times when things come to us like this and its always a time crunch, Councilwoman Bonnie Katz said. It really is a shame everybody is put into this position.

Sander argued he alerted the city several times since May but has not received any updates for funding.

I did bring two viable options to you, Sander said about the scoreboard deal.

You brought one non-viable option and one potential option, Miele said in response. All were waiting to do is see if the potential option can be ironed out.

The project was eventually given the go ahead, but Council stressed the importance of locating funding outside of the Rescue Plan funds.

Both sides seemed to calm down after the initial spark, which allowed the project to pass, but with the guarantee different avenues of income would be investigated before the next meeting in two weeks.

We want the administration to be aware that we feel they should be more responsible looking for things, not us, Katz said. We should not have to go looking.
Fifteen years after a deadly mass shooting, the primary suspect is still on the run. On Wednesday, Sept. 9, the FBI of Milwaukee added Octaviano Juarez-Corro to their Top Ten fugitive list.

The FBI is offering a reward of up to $100,000 for information leading directly to the arrest of Juarez-Corro.

Juarez-Corro is wanted for double homicides and multiple attempted homicides after allegedly shooting and killing two individuals, and wounding three others, during a large, holiday picnic in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

On May 29, 2006, Juarez-Corro entered South Shore Park on the banks of Lake Michigan where hundreds of people -- and many families -- were gathered for a Memorial Day picnic, according to FBI reports. Authorities say he approached his estranged wife and demanded to see his three-year-old daughter. His wife refused him, demanding in return that he leave.

Juarez-Corro became visibly agitated and then pulled out a handgun before shooting at his estranged wife, her family, and friends. A total of five people were injured in the shooting, two of whom were fatally wounded on scene.

Juarez-Corro left the park after the shooting. He remains at large and FBI considers him armed and dangerous.

If you have information concerning Juarez-Corro, the FBI recommends you take no action yourself, but immediately contact the nearest FBI office or local law enforcement agency.

All information can remain anonymous and confidentiality is guaranteed. Individuals calling from outside of the United States should contact the nearest U.S. Embassy or Consulate.

The FBI's "Ten Most Wanted Fugitives" list has been in existence since March 14, 1950. A reporter for the International News Service (the predecessor to United Press International) asked the Bureau for the names and descriptions of the "toughest guys" the Bureau would like to capture.

The resulting story generated so much publicity and had so much appeal that late FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover implemented the "Ten Most Wanted Fugitives" program. The first person to be placed on the list was Thomas James Holden, wanted for the murder of his wife, her brother, and her stepbrother.

Since its inception, 525 fugitives have been on the Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list, and 490 have been apprehended or located.

Did you know:

* 162 fugitives have been captured/located as a result of citizen cooperation.

* 2 fugitives were apprehended as a result of visitors on an FBI tour.

* The shortest amount of time spent on the Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list was two hours, by Billy Austin Bryant in 1969.

* The longest amount of time spent on the Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list was 32 years, by Victor Manuel Gerena.

* Nine fugitives were arrested prior to publication and release, but are still considered as officially on the list.

* The oldest person to be placed on the list is 80-year-old Eugene Palmer, who was added in May of 2019.

* The youngest person to be placed on the list was David Sylvan Fine, who was 18 years, 5 months, and 17 days old when added in September of 1970.

This program relies heavily on the assistance of citizens and the media. Publicity from coast to coast and around the world is important.
Williamsport -- Virginia Mary MacKenzie (Ginny), 96, passed away on September 9, 2021 in Williamsport.

Ginny was born in Philadelphia on October 2, 1924 to the late Virginia (Jean) Campbell and John Kehoe. Ginny was raised in West Philadelphia and graduated from West Catholic Girls High School, where she was a proud member of the chorus. Her beautiful singing voice led her to sing with a local band during and after high school. She met Ronald MacKenzie, the love of her life, while she was a senior in high school, at the local skating rink in 1941.

Ginny and Ronnie (Ginnys nickname for Ron) were married in Philadelphia on January 16, 1943. While Ronnie was stationed in Alaska during World War II, Ginny moved to Seattle to be near him and gave birth to their first child, Little Ginny, in August of 1945.

Ginny and Ron would go to raise five more children in the Philadelphia area. She was a wonderful caring and loving mother to each of them. Their homes were always filled with music and Ginnys singing. Ginny and Ron hosted parties many throughout their life, and they particularly enjoyed dancing at the Antlers and other venues. Ginny was known for style and design in both clothing and accessories and the beautiful homes she created.

In 1976, the family moved to Williamsport where Ginny and Ron made many friends and led a very happy and active life. While Ron worked for J.B. Gibbons, Ginny continued to raise the family and was active on numerous volunteer committees with St. Boniface Roman Catholic Church. Both Ginny and Ron were very active at the Bridge House and reached the masters level in bridge. They enjoyed attending tournaments throughout Pennsylvania.

In January 1993, they celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary with a huge party in the ballroom of the Genetti Hotel. Guests came from as far as California, Colorado, New York, New Jersey and, of course, Pennsylvania.

Ginny was pre-deceased by Ron, her husband of 70 years; her mother, Jean France; her father, John Kehoe; her step-father, Edward France; her sister, Rita Nimmer; and her daughter Virginia MacKenzie Axtell.

Ginny is survived by her five children, Randy MacKenzie and Robert MacKenzie of Williamsport, Mary Mackenzie of Lakewood, Colo., and Linda MacKenzie Kennerly and Theresa MacKenzie of Golden, Colo. She is also survived by her beloved grandson, River MacKenzie of Lakewood, Colo., and her brother, Edward France Jr., of King of Prussia, Pa. She is also survived by numerous nieces and nephews.

A Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated for Ginny at St. Boniface Roman Catholic Church, 326 Washington Blvd., Williamsport, PA 17701 on Tuesday, September 14, 2021, at 10 a.m. Her visitation is scheduled at the Church prior to the Mass at 9 a.m. Interment will follow in the St. Boniface Cemetery, Williamsport.

Ginny will be sorely missed by her family. Her energy and love of life will never be duplicated. Thank you, Ginny, for a wonderful 96 years.

Funeral arrangements have been entrusted to the Crouse Funeral Home, 133 E. Third Street, Williamsport, PA 17701.

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Joe Phillips writes his Dear me columns for several small newspapers. He can be reached at joenphillips@hotmail.com.
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Honor 9/11 heroes by remembering

NWS file photo The Wauseon Fire Department was able to procure a piece of steel from the World Trade Center a few years after the attacks of 9/11. Here it is on display at Northwest State Community College in 2011. It is the showcase of a memorial in Wauseon.

Emergency responders and their families know their lives can change in an instant, and that was never more apparent than Sept. 11, 2001.

That was the date terrorists took over and crashed two jet airliners into New York Citys World Trade Centers. A third crashed into the Pentagon, and a fourth was believed headed for the Capitol but passengers aboard the plane charged the cockpit and forced the jet down before hitting its target.

The damage to the World Trade Centers left thousands trapped inside, and emergency personnel rushed inside to help.

Within two hours, the buildings collapsed, killing 2,753 people, including 343 members of the New York Fire Department working rescue missions.

When we reflect on 9/11 as firemen, the first thing is just never forget, said Napoleon Fire Chief Clayton OBrien. One of the most sincere things we can do as a fireman is never forget the 343 men and women who sacrificed their life that day.

Events like this constantly remind us that our jobs in an instant can change, he added. It happens very quickly.

OBrien was 17 when the attacks occurred, but he was planning on following in his fathers footsteps and becoming a volunteer fireman.

I didnt know at that time that you could make it a career, he added.

As chief of the Napoleon department, OBrien said another way of honoring those fallen heroes of 9/11 is to make sure his firefighters are as well trained as possible.

When you think about how quickly things can change, the only thing we can rely back on is our training, OBrien said.

He said 9/11 is also a chance to reflect on how much he, and others in the profession, love their chosen career.

Personally, I think I have the best job in the world, OBrien said. And I think if you ask my staff, theyd give you the same response.

But its not just a job, he added. We do feel like its a calling, its something that we take a lot of pride in. The fire service as a whole is what we call a brotherhood.

He said this brotherhood extends to others in the service, including those killed that day, even though they never met one another.

When we reflect its also having a little of that feeling of what their family was going through at that time, OBrien said. And also knowing those first responders, maybe what their feelings are going up the stairs, they are going in while everybody else is trying to get out. Thats what we do.

He added first responders dont think of what could happen while they are in the moment.

Were in the moment, its a protocol, this is our job, OBrien said. We are there and put in the situation to be able to handle it.

OBrien had a special request for everyone on this 20th anniversary of those attacks, as well as in the future.

This Saturday (today) if I could ask everyone to take a few minutes out of their day and think about our brothers and sisters that lost their life on the devastating attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, OBrien said.
Andy Schmookler is a prize-winning author. Many of his works can be found at www.ABetterHumanStory.org.
A hazardous waste disposal firm in East Chicago was fined $30,000 by the state of Indiana for safety violations.

The Indiana Department of Labor founded that Merrillville-based Tradebe Environmental Services committed serious and repeated safety violations at its facility at 4343 Kennedy Ave. in East Chicago.

The Indiana Occupational Safety and Health Administration did inspections at the site between May and August and found Tradebe did not ensure that workers only handled stable or safely arranged loads in a non-hazardous shredder area.

The state is imposing a $5,000 fine for the serious safety violation.

"Employees were exposed to struck by-hazards when they walked and/or worked in the area around the shredder," IOSHA inspectors said in a safety order. "Pallets were raised with the forklift to dump 55-gallon drums into the shredder without the drums secured to prevent them falling to the floor below prior to placement in the shredder."

Inspectors also found Tradebe did not ensure that every powered industrial truck operator in the non-hazardous shredder area was properly trained and competent.
"It's a place that was built on a bedrock of optimism and artistic integrity and when it thrived, for 50 years, it thrived on positivity and hard work and dedication to that original vision. And people sense that. It's why they come to us," he said. "People need that independent spirit. They need to be reminded that it still exists and that it can exist for them, too."

Shloss has worked there since 2011 when he biked to work next door at Renwald's, which runs ice cream trucks around neighborhoods.

"The florist had a 'now hiring stock and delivery' sign outside, so on a lark I went in and applied and I was hired on the spot to do basic unskilled labor to take delivery orders," he said. "And everything just kind of went from there, and the years unfolded and now I am managing all aspects of the shop, and it feels like home to me. And my son works here too, now, in the capacity I used to fill. So it's just very familiar and it feels right. And the store is hugely successful ... and I like being successful. I like working at a place that brings money in. It's much more entertaining than failing. Plus, it allows you to keep the Netflix subscription paid."

He said there was a period of adjustment as the longtime store transitioned to new ownership.
CROWN POINT  A judge granted the state's motion Friday for an order prohibiting a U.S. Veterans Affairs police officer from having any contact with the wife and child of a Navy veteran he's accused of murdering.

Timothy R. Thomas, 40, of Highland, previously objected to the no-contact order because it could have prevented him from legally carrying a handgun for work.

Lake County Deputy Prosecutor Keith Anderson said Thomas' license to carry a handgun in Indiana was suspended July 9, so Thomas' concerns about work were no longer relevant.

Jessika Lile, whose husband, Nicholas Lile, was allegedly shot to death by Thomas on Jan. 3, still fears for her safety while Thomas is free on bond, Anderson said.

Thomas has pleaded not guilty to charges of murder, aggravated battery and battery with a deadly weapon in the Jan. 3 homicide of Nicholas Lile, 42, at Lile's home near Lowell. Thomas also is facing a firearm enhancement.

Thomas told police he shot Lile, but claimed it was in self-defense, court records show. He initially was charged with voluntary manslaughter, but prosecutors upgraded the charge to murder.
CROWN POINT  A 76-year-old man must wait at least another week to learn if a judge will grant his request to be released from jail while he awaits trial on child molesting charges.

William B. Barclay, of New Chicago, was arrested Aug. 4 and is being held without bail at the Lake County Jail.

He's accused of violating conditions associated with a GPS-equipped monitor he was ordered to wear July 16, when Lake Criminal Court Judge Salvador Vasquez placed him on house arrest.

Barclay initially posted an $8,000 cash bond, but Vasquez put him on house arrest and ordered him to report to ICU Monitoring after finding he violated a no-contact order.

A relative of one of the girls Barclay is accused of molesting testified in July that Barclay attempted to call him, sent letters to him and visited his family's home in June.

In the letters, Barclay wrote he wanted property returned to him, including firearms. Barclay is not permitted to have firearms under the no-contact order he voluntary signed after his charges were filed.

Barclay's attorney, Timothy Bianco, asked Vasquez to place Barclay back on the monitor.

Lake County Deputy Prosecutor Tara Villarreal objected to the request.
EAST CHICAGO  A Minnesota man died in an East Chicago hospital after being shot in the head, police said.

The victim was identified as Emannuel Hall, 18, of Minneapolis, Minnesota, according to a report from Lake County Coroner Merrilee Frey.

At 3:45 p.m. Friday police were alerted of a gunshot victim dropped off in the ER of St. Catherine Hospital at 4321 Fir St., said East Chicago Deputy Police Chief Jose Rivera.

When officers arrived at the hospital, security staff told them a young black male driving a red Chevrolet Impala dropped the victim off at the ER and left the area.

The victim, who suffered a gunshot wound to the left side of his head, was unresponsive. He was pronounced dead at the hospital and the Lake County coroner's office responded.

East Chicago Police Department Criminal Investigation Division is investigating the death.

The red Chevrolet Impala and a person of interest were located, police said. The vehicle was impounded for evidence purposes.

No further information was available pending further investigation.
LAKE COUNTY  Authorities across Lake County have reportedly been cracking down on former out-of-state residents who have not registered their vehicles with the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles.

From public schools to neighborhoods, officers are sweeping through and issuing citations for those violating state law.

New residents in Indiana must register their vehicles with an Indiana BMV no more than 60 days after moving, police said. Residents must have a current Indiana license plate on display.

St. John Police officers have been working their way through neighborhoods searching for vehicles with out-of-state plates.

"If there are no extenuating circumstances, a resident may, at the discretion of the officer, receive a written warning and be given a short period of time to comply with the law," the St. John Police Department said. "A resident who fails to comply may face fines and a court appearance."

Hammond police, in cooperation with the School City of Hammond, have also been issuing warning citations at public schools throughout the city. Most recently, officers were at Jefferson Elementary School enforcing this law.
We want to lead by example and give back, the instructor said. We want to also remember all those who lost loved ones.

9/11 resulted in 343 firefighters killed in the line of duty.

Meier, a four-year member of the force, was in second grade at Johnson Elementary in Highland on 9/11. I remember everyone being really quiet and sad. Very somber, she recalled. It was definitely a weird feeling.

Coming off a torn tendon, Meier said taking part in the exercise means a lot. Were definitely not dressed (for the gym), but they came prepared and were dressed this way. That makes this more intense.

Gonzales said the Saturday morning event memorializes those who lost their lives. This is the least I can do.

Gonzales daughter Sara, 12, accompanied her father to the procession. Im proud of him, said the Hobart Middle School seventh grader, who learned that 9/11 is tragic, and a lot of lives were lost.

In all, 2,977 lives were lost that day.
VALPARAISO  Valparaiso Fire Department Lt. Danny Dever wanted to make sure the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, were commemorated, so he organized a service himself at Saturdays Popcorn Festival.

Exactly 20 years ago, at nearly this very moment, the United States experienced what we now know as the Sept. 11 attacks, Mayor Matt Murphy said at the 9 a.m. ceremony. Since that tragic day, we have all reminded ourselves to never forget. Many of the lives lost were emergency workers. Those who faced danger to help others."

The Valparaiso Fire Department bell service was modeled after the one in New York City, where 343 firefighters died as a result of their response to the World Trade Center that day. Two commercial airline planes were flown into the Twin Towers, destroying the buildings.

Counting the attacks in New York, the Pentagon and Flight 93 that passengers forced to crash-land in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, rather than strike a building, 2,977 lives were lost that day.

Dever explained the bell tradition.

We utilize these bells as a symbol, he said, to honor those who served so well.

Dever saluted as the bell was rung while a crowd of more than 100 stood in silence.
After an especially violent 2020 when nearly 800 people were killed, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot started the new year with an email expressing support for police leadership and a pledge to reduce crime.

I think we all know that we must do exponentially better in this new year, and I am confident we will. My confidence is grounded in many things, but fundamentally it is grounded in my confidence in all of you, Lightfoot wrote in the Jan. 1 email to Superintendent David Brown and other police officials.

You now have many months under your belt as a senior leadership team at CPD. And your bond will only grow, Lightfoot wrote. You will chart the course not just for CPD, but you will be in the vanguard for our city  our hopes and aspirations for living a safe and peaceful life must be part of your daily prayers and missions because all eyes look to you.

As another violent summer in Chicago comes to a close, however, the city has not done exponentially better on crime. In many ways, Chicagos chronic problem with street violence has worsened. City statistics show the number of shooting victims is up year-to-date through Sept. 6, from 2,781 in 2020 to 3,043 in 2021. Homicides are up, from 526 in 2020 to 540.
Submitted ideas are judged, with winners given a basket of plastic-free products.

Named a Tree City USA community, the village also holds a tree competition each spring that encourages residents and businesses to find the largest tree of any species.

Once the nomination window closes, our environment committee members visit the nomination sites and verify the dimensions of the trees, King said. A tree is a winner if it is the largest that has been found, to date, per species.

Promoting an event like this aligns with the villages tree preservation ordinance that prevents the clear cutting of properties proposed for development and creates financial incentives to save large, mature trees, she said.

The village believes that promoting an event like this gets the residents out into the community on a hunt for large trees, helping to cultivate a love for the beauty of trees and the value of the ecosystems where the trees are found, King said. The goal, she said, is to encourage residents to want to protect these trees

The village is also the first to be designated as a Dark Sky Community in Illinois and east of the Mississippi River.
Lina Gopaul, Akomfrahs long-term collaborator and partner, who was with the collective from the start, said the group wanted to explore these questions of identity, how race is formed and who fixes it. As well as making films, the group organized screenings, distributed other artists work and put on symposiums.

David Lawson, who was also in the collective, said its members absorbed diverse influences, including French New Wave cinema and the works of Akira Kurosawa and Andrei Tarkovsky. The collective wanted to show that there were different ways of making Black cinema, that were not just didactic or angry, but could be more poetic, more reflective, more meditative, Lawson said.

Its 1986 documentary essay Handsworth Songs, about riots that broke out the previous year in London and Birmingham, England, offered an insightful take on the complexities of race relations in Britain. Through newsreel and original footage, overlaid with a sound montage, it told of immigrants from Britains former colonies arriving here full of hope, only to face police harassment, economic hardship and a willful amnesia about the countrys violent imperial past.

Tina Campt, a professor of media and modern culture at Brown University who studies the African diaspora in Europe, said in a phone interview that Akomfrahs films challenge an official narrative about Britains empire as a source of comfort and security. When you look at how unstable that actually is, and on whose backs that stability was waged, earned, perpetrated, that is the most terrifying thing, Campt said. And he does it very gently, in a way that seduces us.

Black Audio Film Collective works played at the Cannes and Berlin Film Festivals and were broadcast on British television, yet the London art world showed little interest. For many years, Akomfrah worked primarily on television documentaries: first with the collective, until it dissolved in 1998, then with its successor, Smoking Dogs Films, made up of Akomfrah, Gopaul, their son Ashitey and Lawson. A turning point in how Akomfrahs works are regarded came when Okwui Enwezor, the Nigerian curator of the 2015 Venice Biennale, commissioned Akomfrah to make the immersive video installation Vertigo Sea for the exhibition.
17A: My background is definitely showing when I say that any reference to Buddhism makes me think of Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac; their work, and an introductory college course in Eastern religion, inform what little I know. Kerouac wrote a biography of Siddhartha GAUTAMA, called Wake Up (after many title changes), that really spoke to me at a point in my life. I still think of certain elements, and delight in their everyday appearances, like in this puzzle.

23A: I think my problem sometimes with a particular clue/constructor/puzzle is rooted in ego, a subliminal desire to outsmart what I imagine must be a devious clue and entry combination. When I read Meets and eats, I thought of praying mantises and spiders, not Hollywood agents, with whom one DOES LUNCH.

2D: I got caught so flat-footed by this entire quadrant that its hard to find a root cause, but this clues turning into a computer reference took me by surprise. You can be off grid or in the woods; UNSAVED work is, I must concede, liable to be lost. Figuring this word out got me KEVLAR, which is obvious in retrospect, and that sort of got the ball rolling. (By the time I even pondered this clue I had figured out FILE MENU and DATA SET, so my mind should have been warmed up to computer speak.)

24D: This is a much gentler tech clue, a deducible term for a program that helps create the light and shadow in 3-D renderings: SHADERS. This entry debuted in 1942, clued just as intuitively as Parasols.

28D: Im so glad that this clue is featured in the Constructor Notes today, and Im glad that Mr. Sivakumar got some transgender voices to weigh in. To DEADNAME transgender people is to refer to them by their given names, usually their born names, rather than acknowledging their new names and identities. In everyday life, we know that its a matter of respect to refer to people as they prefer to be known, and were letting go of gender binaries (as we watch the nonbinary revolution expand across borders). Academia, journalism and the broader business world are still getting there.
Still, some experts cautioned that results from the administrations plan would take many weeks to unfold. It is not clear when the new requirements will be finalized or how the promised legal challenges from Republicans will play out in courtrooms. Moreover, while the administration said the mandates would cover 100 million American workers, no one knows how many of them have already been vaccinated.

In any event, immunization is not an instant process  at least six weeks for a two-dose vaccine. The administration did not emphasize measures that work more quickly to stop the virus: masking and widespread rapid testing, for example.

The nation will need every tool at its disposal to fend off the Delta variant, a far more formidable foe than the original version of the virus. The variant became the dominant version of the virus in the United States only in mid-July, and the consequences have been beyond anything experts predicted.

Reassuringly low numbers of cases and hospitalizations in June have risen inexorably for weeks to nearly 10 times their previous levels. About 1,500 Americans, the vast majority of them unvaccinated, are dying each day.

Much of the misery could be prevented, the new C.D.C. research found. An analysis of 32,867 patient visits in nine states found that even as the Delta variant predominated, the vaccines had an overall effectiveness rate of 86 percent at preventing hospitalizations, though they were less protective for adults aged 75 and over.

Moderna vaccines had the highest efficacy rate, at 95 percent, compared with 80 percent for Pfizer-BioNTech and 60 percent for the Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

The shots effectiveness at preventing infection declined somewhat, from 91 percent to 78 percent, as the variant spread. The Moderna vaccine had an effectiveness rate of 92 percent against infection, compared with 77 percent for the Pfizer-BioNTech shot and 65 percent for Johnson & Johnson.
The unvaccinated are beginning to feel discriminated against, she said while eating a salad outside the Fairfax Whole Foods. When you start to mandate people put something in their body, people get upset about limiting their personal choice and freedoms.

Some Republican strategists say that Mr. Bidens push will only prompt their voters to dig in their heels and become even more resistant to vaccination.

The right thing healthwise is to get more people vaccinated of their own volition, said Brad Todd, a consultant whose clients include Senators Josh Hawley of Missouri and Rick Scott of Florida. The right of the country wants to make its own decisions and will do a lot of things to prove that.

But Democrats believe that mandates are necessary to slow the spread of the coronavirus, and that they are also good politics. How Mr. Biden handles the pandemic now, they argue, will set the tone for the midterm elections, which many party strategists believe will be won or lost over how Americans feel about the lingering impact of the virus on their pocketbooks, schools and jobs.

Democrats also see a political advantage in running against Republican governors who rejected public-health measures like masking and vaccine mandates  much as they sought to depict Republicans as extreme and unreasonable during the Trump administration and came away from the 2020 election with control of the White House and Congress.

Have at it, Mr. Biden said on Friday when asked about Republican threats to sue his administration over the mandates. I am so disappointed that particularly some of the Republican governors have been so cavalier with the health of these kids  so cavalier for the health of their communities.

For some voters, Mr. Biden is simply channeling their own exasperation.

I spent the first year of Covid scared that we were going to kill my dad. Now that hes fully vaccinated, Im scared that Im going to hurt my kids, said Ravi Grivois-Shah, a family physician and school board member in Tucson, Ariz., who lives with his 74-year-old father and three children. Im sick of being scared. Im sick of having to go through this again.
WASHINGTON  The Biden administration halted flights carrying Afghan evacuees to the United States from military bases overseas after discovering a few of the new arrivals had measles, the latest hurdle in a haphazard effort to assist allies hoping to flee the Taliban.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention requested that the evacuation flights be temporarily suspended out of an abundance of caution after four Afghans were found to have measles after arriving in the United States, the White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, said on Friday.

As of Wednesday, the administration had evacuated more than 60,000 people from Afghanistan since Aug. 17, according to the Department of Homeland Security, most of them Afghans seeking sanctuary in the United States.

The suspension follows a chaotic evacuation that has left American citizens and thousands of Afghans in limbo after the U.S. military completed its withdrawal from Afghanistan and the Taliban seized Kabul, sealing their control of the country. Thousands of Afghans hoping to reach the United States are waiting at military bases in other countries, including a site in Doha, Qatar, where diplomats and military officials have reported worsening conditions and some health issues among evacuees.
But across the country, the more urgent worry for many businesses was how to carry out and enforce new rules that the president estimated would affect 100 million Americans.

Businesses wondered: How would they verify a workers vaccination status or track the weekly tests required for workers who do not get vaccinated? How would the rules be enforced? What would happen to workers or companies who refused to comply?

Still, the new mandates could take some pressure off businesses and iron out the current jumble of vaccine requirements. Many companies, including United Airlines and Tyson Foods, were already moving toward requiring vaccines. Business Roundtable, a powerful lobbying group, released a statement supporting the administrations new orders.

Business Roundtable welcomes the Biden administrations continued vigilance in the fight against Covid, said the group, whose members include leaders of General Electric, Amazon, Goldman Sachs and dozens of other large companies. Americas business leaders know how critical vaccination and testing are in defeating the pandemic.

For months, Molly Moon Neitzel, the founder and chief executive of Molly Moons Homemade Ice Cream, which has several locations in Washington State, has debated whether to require her 180 employees to be vaccinated. On Friday, she felt like the new mandates gave her some cover to do so.

I was honestly just relieved, she said. We have six to 10 who have chosen not to be vaccinated yet. I know it makes people on their teams nervous.

Hospital workers in Houston and Detroit who opposed earlier vaccine requirements sued over their employers rules, and face covering rules have put employees on the front lines of sometimes-violent confrontations with customers who refuse to wear masks.
Taking stock of this war is difficult because it is inseparable from the twin calamities of Afghanistan and Iraq. In those countries, the United States reached beyond the tactics of counterterrorism for a more ambitious, ill-fated project to remake fractured, tribal societies into American-style democracies.

Those failures are etched in the shameful images of prisoners at Abu Ghraib in Iraq or of desperate Afghans falling from the belly of an American plane. They are documented in the deaths of more than 7,000 American service members, hundreds of thousands of civilians and trillions of squandered American dollars.

The counterterrorism war, much of it waged covertly, defies such metrics. More and more of it involves partners. Large parts of it occur in distant places like the Sahel or the Horn of Africa. American casualties, for the most part, are limited. And success is measured not by capturing a capital or destroying an enemys army, but by breaking up groups before they have a chance to strike the American homeland or overseas assets like embassies and military bases.

By that yardstick, say counterterrorism experts, the war on terror has been an undisputed success.

If you had said on 9/12 that wed have only 100 people killed by jihadi terrorism and only one foreign terrorist attack in the United States over the next 20 years, youd have been laughed out of the room, said Daniel Benjamin, the State Departments coordinator for counterterrorism in the Obama administration.
With few options other than taking precautions like mask-wearing, some parents have even sought, through their pediatricians, off-label shots that are adult doses, a practice the F.D.A. discouraged on Friday. The agency warned that children are not small adults, and that the adult doses now in wide use have not been fully studied for potential safety risks in younger children.

Theres no question that this summer has been particularly trying for parents, especially after public health experts warned that the Delta variant was highly transmissible  even from vaccinated household members. Although children still are less likely than adults, especially older adults, to be hospitalized or die from Covid, nearly 30,000 children were admitted to hospitals with Covid in August, the highest levels to date during the pandemic.

The hospitalization rate in mid-August for children and adolescents with confirmed Covid was nearly five times the rate in late June, according to a study released earlier this month by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That rate climbed nearly tenfold among children newborn to 4 years old, the report found.

Covid-related emergency room visits and hospital admissions also increased among children in mid-August, according to a second C.D.C. study.

Geography played a role, the researchers found. Those visits and admissions occurred 3.4 and 3.7 times more in the states with lower vaccination rates.

Parental anxiety has fueled the demand for slots in childrens vaccine trials and made appointments scarce. Pfizer, for instance, is fully booked in its clinical trial, a spokesperson said.

So Ms. Vong Reiff most likely nabbed a cancellation slot in Nebraska.
The handwritten doctors order was just eight words long, but it solved a problem for Dundee Manor, a nursing home in rural South Carolina struggling to handle a new resident with severe dementia.

David Blakeney, 63, was restless and agitated. The homes doctor wanted him on an antipsychotic medication called Haldol, a powerful sedative.

Add Dx of schizophrenia for use of Haldol, read the doctors order, using the medical shorthand for diagnosis.

But there was no evidence that Mr. Blakeney actually had schizophrenia.

Antipsychotic drugs  which for decades have faced criticism as chemical straitjackets  are dangerous for older people with dementia, nearly doubling their chance of death from heart problems, infections, falls and other ailments. But understaffed nursing homes have often used the sedatives so they dont have to hire more staff to handle residents.
An astronaut paid tribute from space on the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

Shane Kimbrough, a NASA astronaut from expedition 65, remembered the monumental day with remarks from the International Space Station that were shared via Twitter. To the victims and their families, survivors and first responders: we remember, he said. The horrifying images of that day are still present in so many of our minds.
Survivors, labor leaders and politicians came together on Saturday afternoon to commemorate the 73 employees of a World Trade Center restaurant who died on 9/11, and to call for improved conditions in the service industry nationwide.

The ceremony was as much a rally for workers rights as a solemn memorial for those who died at Windows on the World, which occupied the top floors of the North Tower.

On 9/11 I lost three precious things, said Fekkak Mamdouh, who worked at Windows on the World and is now senior director for One Fair Wage, the advocacy group that hosted the event.

I lost my brothers and sisters that work with me. I lost my sense of security and safety as an Arab Muslim, he said, and I lost a good paying job.
During her first commemoration of the Sept. 11 attacks as governor, Kathy Hochul spent time with the families of victims at the 9/11 Memorial & Museum in Lower Manhattan, attended a Fire Department Mass and paid tribute to the New York National Guard.

It had been an emotionally draining day, she acknowledged as she spoke to the Guard members at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center  and, she said, a remarkable and humbling reminder of the profound loss 20 years ago.

We all have to remember that behind every number, theres a person who is loved, who was loved, said Ms. Hochul, who took office less than a month ago.

The governor announced on Saturday that she had signed bills intended to help provide emergency workers with better access to state benefits after they took part in rescue, recovery and cleanup efforts at the World Trade Center in 2001.
Abimael Guzman, the founder and leader of the Shining Path guerrilla movement, which spread terror across much of Peru in the 1980s and 90s, died on Saturday in Peru. He was 86.

Mr. Guzman died in a maximum-security prison in the Callao naval base in Peru, where he was serving a life sentence, prison officials said. They did not specify a cause.

An estimated 70,000 Peruvians were killed during the decade-long peak of the Shining Path insurgency, at least one-third at the hands of guerrillas. Shining Path advocated a violent reordering of society away from the vices of urban life. Its leaders echoed Cambodias Khmer Rouge with warnings that rivers of blood would flow after their victory, and that as many as one million Peruvians might be put to death.

Shining Path was almost entirely Mr. Guzmans conception, and for a time he seemed poised to seize power in one of Latin Americas most important countries. His avowedly Maoist movement was one of the most violently radical in the hemispheres modern history, and his fertile mind and extraordinary powers of persuasion laid the basis for an intense personality cult.
When I moved to Washington, D.C., in 2002 we all lived in 9/11s shadow. We waited for bombs in the Metro, for more anthrax envelopes, for a sequel to the previous autumns terror. We watched planes headed for Reagan Airport fly low over the Potomac, always half-expecting them to veer.

Everything in my profession revolved around the War on Terror. And everyone I knew who was even the least bit conservative (a category that included many Democrats) was ready to invade Iraq  and probably Syria and Iran for good measure.

Everyone except one college friend, Elbridge Colby, then newly planted at the State Department. His politics in those days were severely conservative (to borrow a phrase from the political taxonomist Mitt Romney), but he expected George W. Bushs strategy to end in disaster. Nightly in our unkempt apartments he argued with the hawks  which is to say with all of us  channeling the realist foreign policy thinkers he admired, predicting quagmire, destabilization and defeat.

In almost every way the rest of the post-9/11 era vindicated his arguments  not just in the Iraq war but also in our chaos-sowing Libya intervention and our failed attempt at nation-building in Afghanistan.
It would be reasonable to hear the term volcanic bomb and presuppose that such an object tends to explode. But a specific type of volcanic bomb rarely lives up to the second half of its name: These objects get blasted into the air, crash into the ground and disappointingly fail to detonate.

These volcanic bombs  plasticky, partly molten blisters of magma no smaller than a peach  are shot out of a volcano submerged by a shallow body of water, like a lake or the sea close to shore. In the process, the bombs acquire plenty of water. That trapped water encounters the bombs scorching-hot innards and gets vigorously boiled into steam.

The sudden accumulation of steam within the projectile should blast the bomb apart in midair. Rocks cannot survive in the face of that pressure, said Mark McGuinness, a mathematician at Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand. And yet so many of these bombs become duds, hitting the ground with an anticlimactic thud.

Solving this riddle would do more than scratch a longstanding scientific itch. Volcanic bombs, a fundamental part of many explosive eruptions, are also a lethal hazard. If more of them blew up midflight, that would be preferable to their clonking someone on the head.
The 9/11 Memorial & Museum in Lower Manhattan, the host of this mornings ceremony, is no stranger to controversy, whether before its 2014 opening or in recent days.

This week, as they have in years past, local Muslim advocates called for the removal of one of the museums trustees, Debra Burlingame, calling some of her comments Islamophobic.

Ms. Burlingames long history of making bigoted remarks about Islam and Muslims are simply antithetical to the purpose of the 9/11 Museum, said Afaf Nasher, executive director of the New York chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a large Muslim civil rights and advocacy group.

Ms. Burlingame, whose brother, Charles Burlingame, was killed when the plane he was piloting, American Airlines Flight 77, was hijacked and crashed into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, was an outspoken critic of a onetime plan to build a mosque and cultural center two blocks from ground zero.
An Alaska lawmaker has asked to be excused from legislative sessions until next year, saying she has no way to fly to the state capital after she was barred from Alaska Airlines for violating mask policies.

The lawmaker, Lora Reinbold, a Republican state senator, was captured on video in April arguing with employees at Juneau International Airport about mask rules.

After the confrontation, Alaska Airlines said it had notified Ms. Reinbold that she was not permitted to fly with us for her continued refusal to comply with employee instruction regarding the current mask policy.

Ms. Reinbold had previously complained about Alaska Airlines on Facebook, saying it was part of mask tyranny.
SACRAMENTO  As the campaign to oust him heads into its final weekend, Gov. Gavin Newsom of California is hammering home the choice he has presented to voters since the start of the recall  Donald J. Trump or him.

We defeated Trump last year, and thank you, but we havent defeated Trumpism, the governor has repeated for the past two weeks in a blitz of campaign stops and Zoom calls. From vaccine resistance to climate denial, he says, everything that terrified California liberals about the last president is on the ballot. And far more than his own personal future hangs in the balance: This is a matter of life and death.

His opponents dispute that. The governor, they say, is the problem, and the recall never would have come to an election had a critical mass of the state not resented his pandemic restrictions on businesses and classrooms, even as his own finances were secure and his own children got in-person instruction. The former president, they note, is not a candidate. Newsom is scaremongering, David Sacks, a Silicon Valley venture capitalist supporting the recall, tweeted recently.

Only three governors have faced recall votes in the United States before Mr. Newsom, and he and the Democratic establishment are going all-out in presenting the effort as a radical power grab, with some partisans even comparing it at one point to the violent Jan. 6 attempt to block President Bidens election.
Just a few months ago, when it seemed as though the worst of the coronavirus pandemic was behind us, Republican supporters of the recall felt vindicated and optimistic. The fact that so many people were out and about would only embolden the argument that Gov. Gavin Newsom had been too tough in his lockdown orders last year.

Then came Delta.

For a moment, Mr. Newsoms political future looked bleak: He had only recently proclaimed the start of the California comeback, and counties were instead bringing back mask mandates.

Amid a resurgence of cases across the country, Covid deaths spiked in Republican-led states, where restrictions and vaccine mandates were rare. But California, where Mr. Newsom was quick to mandate masks in schools and to require health workers to be vaccinated, saw less dramatic increases.

Now, Mr. Newsom and his supporters have turned the recall into a kind of referendum on pandemic management tactics. In other words, the Delta wave effectively galvanized his voters.
WASHINGTON  As they traveled the country laying wreaths, strolling through crash sites in pastoral meadows and comforting families whose wounds are ripped open anew each year, two living presidents used the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks to urge Americans to come together in an effort to weather deep political and cultural divisions.

On Americas day of trial and grief, I saw millions of people instinctively grab for a neighbors hand and rally to the cause of one another, former President George W. Bush said from the United Flight 93 memorial outside Shanksville, Pa. That is the America I know.

But on Saturday, both he and President Biden acknowledged that what has happened in the years since has only challenged the notion that Americans prized coming together over choosing to grow hostile to one anothers differences. Mr. Bushs decisions as president two decades ago led to a war in Afghanistan and another in Iraq, and he equated the ensuing rise of domestic extremism in the United States to the same poisonous beliefs that had inspired the hijackers.

Shortly after Mr. Bush spoke, Mr. Biden, whose drawdown of the war in Afghanistan has been criticized for its haphazard and violent end, arrived near Shanksville to lay a wreath and visit a boulder where, in 2001, a plane filled with passengers and crew members, who had wrestled control from hijackers, had hit the ground.
A Georgia man who had an assault rifle and was headed to Washington for the Jan. 6 pro-Trump rally at the U.S. Capitol pleaded guilty on Friday to sending threatening text messages about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

The man, Cleveland Grover Meredith Jr., wrote to an acquaintance the day after the violent attack on the U.S. Capitol that he would put a bullet in her noggin on Live TV and included a purple devil emoji, the federal authorities said. In other messages, he said he would run over Ms. Pelosi.

I predict that within 12 days, many in our country will die, he wrote.

Mr. Meredith had been staying at a Holiday Inn in Washington and had weapons in his camper-style trailer, including a Glock handgun, a Tavor X95 assault rifle and thousands of rounds of ammunition, according to court records.

Mr. Meredith was one of the first 13 people charged in federal court after a mob in support of former President Donald J. Trump stormed the Capitol. He was charged in January with transmitting a threat in interstate commerce, possession of an unregistered firearm and unlawful possession of ammunition, according to court records.
Gov. Gavin Newsoms bid to fend off a recall in California has been bolstered by an infusion of tens of millions of dollars from big donors in recent months that delivered him an enormous financial advantage over his Republican rivals in the races final stretch.

There had been moments over the summer when Mr. Newsom, a Democrat, had appeared vulnerable in public polls, as Californias unique recall rules seemed to provide an opening to conservatives in one of the most reliably Democratic states in the nation. But Mr. Newsom raised more than $70 million this year into an account to battle the recall, much of it in July and August, allowing him and his allies to dominate the television airwaves and out-advertise his opponents online.

California has no limits on donations to recall committees, and Mr. Newsom has taken full advantage of those loose rules. His contributions have included an early $3 million from Reed Hastings, the chief executive of Netflix; $500,000 from the liberal philanthropist George Soros; and $500,000 from the Hollywood producer Jeffrey Katzenberg. Dr. Priscilla Chan, a philanthropist and the wife of the Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, contributed $750,000, and the real estate magnate George Marcus gave $1 million.

Millions of dollars more have come from interest groups with business before the state, including labor unions representing service workers, teachers and prison guards, the real estate industry and Native American tribes that operate casinos.
As the United States marks the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, memorials have been held around the world, and tributes have been paid by global leaders, in memory of the victims, survivors and families affected.

In Britain, Prime Minister Boris Johnson paid tribute to the victims of the attacks in a video address played at a memorial event at the Olympic Park in East London.

Mr. Johnson said that while the threat from terrorists remained, the last 20 years had shown that they failed to shake our belief in freedom and democracy; they failed to drive our nations apart, or cause us to abandon our values, or to live in permanent fear.
A 19-year-old woman who participated in the nearly fatal stabbing of a friend, a crime she said was carried out to gain the favor of a sinister fictional character called Slender Man, will be released from a psychiatric hospital on Monday, a Wisconsin judge ruled on Friday.

The 2014 attack, in which two 12-year-old girls from Waukesha, Wis., lured a classmate to a park and stabbed her 19 times, shocked parents in the upper-middle-class suburb of Milwaukee.

In 2017, the woman, Anissa Weier, pleaded guilty to being a party to attempted second-degree intentional homicide, and she was sentenced to 25 years in the Winnebago Mental Health Institute. In March of this year, she asked the court to release her from the institution.

I have exhausted all the resources available to me at the Winnebago Mental Health Institute, Ms. Weier wrote in a letter requesting her release. If I am to become a productive member of society, I need to be a part of society. Ms. Weiers lawyer did not immediately respond to request for comment on Saturday.
Ms. Garcia, whose sprawling 30-acre ranch is called La Paloma, has grown accustomed to the sight of desperate and thirsty migrants  many of them fleeing violence and poverty in Central America  wandering in her backyard. They are human beings, she said. A wall is not going to deter anyone.

When the men in construction hats and measuring tape arrived at her home last summer, while Mr. Trump was still president, she balked  but also worried. The federal government was intent on building on her property, she said, and it initiated an eminent domain case to take the property if she would not willingly give it up.

But then Mr. Trump lost the 2020 election and Ms. Garcia felt relief, as President Biden had vowed to pause construction of a wall. We thought Biden was going to give us our land back, she said.

But eight months after Mr. Biden took office, 100 lawsuits remain open against Texans who own land along the border, according to the Texas Civil Rights Project, a civil rights group.

Pam Rivas, who owns property in Los Ebanos but lives several miles away in the more populated city of Edinburg, said she had little hope that her land would be returned until the government abruptly began steps to do just that last week to owners like her. Her case is ongoing and was scheduled to go to court this month. At issue was not whether the government has the authority to build a wall along seven acres of her property, but how much she would be compensated for it, said her lawyer, Ricky Garza.
When Crisann Holmess employer announced last month that it would require all employees to be vaccinated against Covid-19 by Nov. 1, she knew she had to find a way out.

She signed a petition to ask the company to relax its mandate. She joined an informal protest, skipping work with other dissenting employees at the mental health care system where she has worked for two years. And she attempted a solution that many across the country are now exploring: a religious exemption.

My freedom and my childrens freedom and childrens childrens freedom are at stake, said Ms. Holmes, who lives in Indiana. In August, she submitted an exemption request she wrote herself, bolstered by her own Bible study and language from sources online. Some vaccines were developed using fetal cell lines from aborted fetuses, she wrote, citing a remote connection to a practice she finds abhorrent. She quoted a passage from the New Testament: Let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit.

Major religious traditions, denominations and institutions are essentially unanimous in their support of the vaccines against Covid-19. But as more employers across the country begin requiring Covid vaccinations for workers, they are butting up against the nations sizable population of vaccine holdouts who nonetheless see their resistance in religious terms  or at least see an opportunity. Vaccine-resistant workers are sharing tips online for requesting exemptions to the requirements on religious grounds; others are submitting letters from far-flung religious authorities who have advertised their willingness to help.
Notably absent from the 9/11 memorial ceremonies on Saturday was former President Donald J. Trump, a native New Yorker who built much of his political brand in the divisive aftermath of the attacks.

He had the option to attend but decided to honor the day with different stops, his spokeswoman, Liz Harrington, said.

President Biden, former President Barack Obama and former President Bill Clinton all attended the somber name-reading ceremony in Lower Manhattan. Former President George W. Bush spoke at a memorial near Shanksville, Pa., where Mr. Biden attended a wreath-laying ceremony.

But instead of appearing at one of the ceremonies, Mr. Trump released a series of aggressive statements that criticized Mr. Bidens handling of the troop pullout in Afghanistan and praised his allies, including Rudolph W. Giuliani, his personal lawyer and the mayor of New York on the day of the Sept. 11 attacks.
SEOCHEON, South Korea  On a recent overcast morning, a village on South Koreas west coast showed no sign of human stirring until five older residents slowly emerged through the fog that shrouded lush, green rice paddies.

The group were waiting for what would once have been an unaffordable luxury in this rural corner of the country  a taxi to take them shopping and to doctors appointments in the county seat 20 minutes away.

But even the poorest among them could easily afford this ride. Each passengers share of the total fare would be measured not in dollars but in cents.

Its a godsend, said one of the passengers, Na Jeong-soon, 85.

Their village is in Seocheon County, the birthplace of the Taxi of Hope, better known as the 100-won taxi. A hundred won is about 9 cents.
Hundreds of women, many wearing full-length robes, their faces obscured by black veils, filled the auditorium of a Kabul university on Saturday holding signs  many of them in English  in support of the Taliban and its strict interpretation of Islam, including separate education for men and women.

The Taliban said the demonstration at Shaheed Rabbani Education University, which followed anti-Taliban protests last week by Afghan women demanding equal rights, was organized by female university lecturers and students.

Reporters on the street near Saturdays march were kept away from the protesters by Taliban fighters armed with automatic rifles and were not allowed to speak with any of the women. Later attempts to reach the participants through social media or the university went unanswered.

The demonstration, held on the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, served as a stark reminder of how despite two decades and more than $780 million spent promoting women's rights, after the departure of American forces last month, the women of Afghanistan could be thrown back decades, if not centuries.
BUDAPEST  Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary portrays himself as the defender of Christian Europe against migrants and multiculturalism. After years of his weakening of democratic institutions, the far-right strongman has prepared for coming elections in Catholic-majority Hungary by strengthening his links to Catholic traditionalists in Europe and the United States.

On Sunday, Mr. Orban will get a visit from the leader of the Roman Catholic world himself when Pope Francis drops into town to celebrate Mass. Allies of Mr. Orban, who is increasingly isolated and rarely receives high-profile visits from Western leaders, desperately sought to ensure face time with the pontiff, and the Vatican has confirmed a private courtesy meeting before the Mass.

But it is also possible, people close to Francis say, that Mr. Orban might get more than he asked for when he meets with perhaps the globes leading champion of migrants and a clear voice against creeping authoritarianism and nationalism in Europe.

One of my ways is not to go around with a script, Francis said in an interview with Spanish radio network COPE last month when asked what he expected to say to Mr. Orban. When I am in front of a person, I look him in the eyes and let things come out.
JERUSALEM  A gripping political thriller swept across cinema screens in Israel this summer, with the movie prompting impassioned debate and striking a particularly resonant chord with Israels precarious new government.

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, a right-winger, urged lawmakers to see the film during a recent, stormy session of Parliament. The new president, Isaac Herzog, a former leader of the center-left Labor Party, said that if he could, he would screen it for every child in the country.

The epic, animated drama, Legend of Destruction, is being widely cast as a cautionary tale for a profoundly polarized society. The movies impact is all the more surprising given that it depicts calamitous events in Jerusalem 2,000 years ago.

At that time, the first Jewish revolt against the Romans had devolved into a bloody civil war between rival Jewish factions, culminating in the sacking and destruction of the Second Temple by the Romans and their reconquest of the holy city.
United Nations membership affords a countrys government the opportunity to speak and be heard not only in the General Assembly but to participate in a range of other U.N. agencies like the World Health Organization and Human Rights Council. So the credentialing of a countrys ambassador to speak on its behalf is enormously important.

How does credentialing work?

Verifying who represents each country at the United Nations falls to the Credentials Committee, a nine-member group appointed at the beginning of each years General Assembly. Its work is normally routine, checking each envoys bona fides to ensure compliance with procedural rules.

The process gets more complicated when the legitimacy of the envoys government is at issue, and disputes sometimes are referred to the General Assembly.

It seems this years Credentials Committee will be called upon to consider not just one, but two, questions of government legitimacy, Rebecca Barber, an Australian research fellow at the University of Queensland, wrote in the Blog of the European Journal of International Law.

How quickly the committee will make decisions remains unknown  it could be weeks or months. But many diplomats and U.N. experts expect that for now, the committee will defer any decisions concerning Myanmar and Afghanistan, leaving in place the Myanmar ambassador, U Kyaw Moe Tun, and the Afghan envoy, Ghulam M. Isaczai, both of whom were chosen by now deposed governments.
In slightly plainer English, it can work like so: You go to a bank or a mortgage company. It sizes you up and tries to figure out whether Fannie would buy your loan. (In most instances, this determines whether you can get a mortgage in the first place  banks generally want to sell their loans quickly to get money to underwrite more loans, so they may not underwrite one that Fannie wont take.)

If Fannie would not buy your loan  but that engine determines that a record of rent payments might help change Fannies mind  you can give a third party that works with the various entities permission to examine 12 months of bank statements. (Only people who have not owned a home in the last three years qualify.) Then the bank and Fannie search for proof of your making the rent. If its there, you may clear the bar after all.

What constitutes proof? A regular payment you made with a check or electronically, say through some kind of landlord payment portal. Payments through Venmo and other apps are fine, too.

Regular payments to a roommate or relative should be readable as well. And the various parties wont snoop on your other spending and make judgments about that, according to Fannie. There doesnt seem to be any way for it to know that youre in some kind of illegal sublet, either.

One crucial factor is this: The new system is supposed to only help, not hurt. Missed or irregular payments wont lower the odds of qualification, unless they are the rare ones that have somehow hit an applicants credit history. That is useful now that eviction moratoriums have expired or are about to.

Fannies general counsel, in a pointed post on LinkedIn, made sure to note that when rent payments do turn up on a credit report, its often in a negative context instead of the positive-only one that Fannie is using. That can happen if a landlords collection agency has placed a black mark on a report.

If this all sounds too good to be true, it almost certainly is, at least a little. Fannie is deploying its systems in new ways, so there will be bugs and errors. Mortgage applicants have to respond to texts and emails to grant permission, and some may miss those cues, blow them off or dismiss them as spam or worse. Mr. Creighton of the Consumer Data Industry Association, who would very much like it if Fannie used additional data and systems that included his members, called it jury-rigged. That doesnt seem inapt.
[explosion] In one of the final acts of its 20-year war in Afghanistan, the United States fired a missile from a drone at a car in Kabul. It was parked in the courtyard of a home, and the explosion killed 10 people, including 43-year-old Zemari Ahmadi and seven children, according to his family. The Pentagon claimed that Ahmadi was a facilitator for the Islamic State, and that his car was packed with explosives, posing an imminent threat to U.S. troops guarding the evacuation at the Kabul airport. The procedures were correctly followed, and it was a righteous strike. What the military apparently didnt know was that Ahmadi was a longtime aid worker, who colleagues and family members said spent the hours before he died running office errands, and ended his day by pulling up to his house. Soon after, his Toyota was hit with a 20-pound Hellfire missile. What was interpreted as the suspicious moves of a terrorist may have just been an average day in his life. And its possible that what the military saw Ahmadi loading into his car were water canisters he was bringing home to his family  not explosives. Using never-before seen security camera footage of Ahmadi, interviews with his family, co-workers and witnesses, we will piece together for the first time his movements in the hours before he was killed. Zemari Ahmadi was an electrical engineer by training. For 14 years, he had worked for the Kabul office of Nutrition and Education International. NEI established a total of 11 soybean processing plants in Afghanistan. Its a California based NGO that fights malnutrition. On most days, he drove one of the companys white Toyota corollas, taking his colleagues to and from work and distributing the NGOs food to Afghans displaced by the war. Only three days before Ahmadi was killed, 13 U.S. troops and more than 170 Afghan civilians died in an Islamic State suicide attack at the airport. The military had given lower-level commanders the authority to order airstrikes earlier in the evacuation, and they were bracing for what they feared was another imminent attack. To reconstruct Ahmadis movements on Aug. 29, in the hours before he was killed, The Times pieced together the security camera footage from his office, with interviews with more than a dozen of Ahmadis colleagues and family members. Ahmadi appears to have left his home around 9 a.m. He then picked up a colleague and his bosss laptop near his house. Its around this time that the U.S. military claimed it observed a white sedan leaving an alleged Islamic State safehouse, around five kilometers northwest of the airport. Thats why the U.S. military said they tracked Ahmadis Corolla that day. They also said they intercepted communications from the safehouse, instructing the car to make several stops. But every colleague who rode with Ahmadi that day said what the military interpreted as a series of suspicious moves was just a typical day in his life. After Ahmadi picked up another colleague, the three stopped to get breakfast, and at 9:35 a.m., they arrived at the N.G.O.s office. Later that morning, Ahmadi drove some of his co-workers to a Taliban-occupied police station to get permission for future food distribution at a new displacement camp. At around 2 p.m., Ahmadi and his colleagues returned to the office. The security camera footage we obtained from the office is crucial to understanding what happens next. The cameras timestamp is off, but we went to the office and verified the time. We also matched an exact scene from the footage with a timestamp satellite image to confirm it was accurate. A 2:35 p.m., Ahmadi pulls out a hose, and then he and a co-worker fill empty containers with water. Earlier that morning, we saw Ahmadi bring these same empty plastic containers to the office. There was a water shortage in his neighborhood, his family said, so he regularly brought water home from the office. At around 3:38 p.m., a colleague moves Ahmadis car further into the driveway. A senior U.S. official told us that at roughly the same time, the military saw Ahmadis car pull into an unknown compound 8 to 12 kilometers southwest of the airport. That overlaps with the location of the NGOs office, which we believe is what the military called an unknown compound. With the workday ending, an employee switched off the office generator and the feed from the camera ends. We dont have footage of the moments that followed. But its at this time, the military said that its drone feed showed four men gingerly loading wrapped packages into the car. Officials said they couldnt tell what was inside them. This footage from earlier in the day shows what the men said they were carrying  their laptops one in a plastic shopping bag. And the only things in the trunk, Ahmadis co-workers said, were the water containers. Ahmadi dropped each one of them off, then drove to his home in a dense neighborhood near the airport. He backed into the homes small courtyard. Children surrounded the car, according to his brother. A U.S. official said the military feared the car would leave again, and go into an even more crowded street or to the airport itself. The drone operators, who hadnt been watching Ahmadis home at all that day, quickly scanned the courtyard and said they saw only one adult male talking to the driver and no children. They decided this was the moment to strike. A U.S. official told us that the strike on Ahmadis car was conducted by an MQ-9 Reaper drone that fired a single Hellfire missile with a 20-pound warhead. We found remnants of the missile, which experts said matched a Hellfire at the scene of the attack. In the days after the attack, the Pentagon repeatedly claimed that the missile strike set off other explosions, and that these likely killed the civilians in the courtyard. Significant secondary explosions from the targeted vehicle indicated the presence of a substantial amount of explosive material. Because there were secondary explosions, theres a reasonable conclusion to be made that there was explosives in that vehicle. But a senior military official later told us that it was only possible to probable that explosives in the car caused another blast. We gathered photos and videos of the scene taken by journalists and visited the courtyard multiple times. We shared the evidence with three weapons experts who said the damage was consistent with the impact of a Hellfire missile. They pointed to the small crater beneath Ahmadis car and the damage from the metal fragments of the warhead. This plastic melted as a result of a car fire triggered by the missile strike. All three experts also pointed out what was missing: any evidence of the large secondary explosions described by the Pentagon. No collapsed or blown-out walls, including next to the trunk with the alleged explosives. No sign that a second car parked in the courtyard was overturned by a large blast. No destroyed vegetation. All of this matches what eyewitnesses told us, that a single missile exploded and triggered a large fire. There is one final detail visible in the wreckage: containers identical to the ones that Ahmadi and his colleague filled with water and loaded into his trunk before heading home. Even though the military said the drone team watched the car for eight hours that day, a senior official also said they werent aware of any water containers. The Pentagon has not provided The Times with evidence of explosives in Ahmadis vehicle or shared what they say is the intelligence that linked him to the Islamic State. But the morning after the U.S. killed Ahmadi, the Islamic State did launch rockets at the airport from a residential area Ahmadi had driven through the previous day. And the vehicle they used   was a white Toyota. The U.S. military has so far acknowledged only three civilian deaths from its strike, and says there is an investigation underway. They have also admitted to knowing nothing about Ahmadi before killing him, leading them to interpret the work of an engineer at a U.S. NGO as that of an Islamic State terrorist. Four days before Ahmadi was killed, his employer had applied for his family to receive refugee resettlement in the United States. At the time of the strike, they were still awaiting approval. Looking to the U.S. for protection, they instead became some of the last victims in Americas longest war. Hi, Im Evan, one of the producers on this story. Our latest visual investigation began with word on social media of an explosion near Kabul airport. It turned out that this was a U.S. drone strike, one of the final acts in the 20-year war in Afghanistan. Our goal was to fill in the gaps in the Pentagons version of events. We analyzed exclusive security camera footage, and combined it with eyewitness accounts and expert analysis of the strike aftermath. You can see more of our investigations by signing up for our newsletter.
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The Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) has introduced an optional course on counter-terrorism for its engineering students. A section of academia tried to create needless controversy about it.



The Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan praised the Jawaharlal Nehru University Vice-Chancellor M Jagdesh Kumar for introducing a new course on counter-terrorism.

The minister said if the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) can discuss counter-terrorism, why cant an Indian university. He was speaking at a meeting of central universities vice-chancellors on Friday (September 3).

Our engineers today are not just engineers. They are involved in building social products. So if a course helps engineering students understand the kind of hindrances they could face in the development of social products, then I congratulate JNU for introducing such a course, said Minister Pradhan.

Earlier, as reported by the Organiser, JNU VC M Jagdesh Kumar had defended the decision.

The JNU Vice-Chancellor Prof M Jagadesh Kumar defended the universitys decision to introduce a new optional course, Counter-Terrorism, Asymmetric Conflicts and Strategies for Cooperation Among Major Powers for its engineering students.

During the past few days, there was a needless controversy without going into the academic merits of the course. The objective of the course, Counter-Terrorism, Asymmetric Conflicts and Strategies for Cooperation among Major Powers, is mainly to have an in-depth understanding of the challenges emanating from terrorism to Indias national security and how India can get equipped with adequate responses in the case of any eventuality Prof Kumar said in a statement.

He had added, The way things have unfolded in Indias neighbourhood are proving highly detrimental to Indias national security. It is imperative that an academic institution like JNU takes the lead and builds a good set of counter-terrorism specialists. India urgently needs a critical mass of such specialists in this field.

He had also said the curriculum was designed keeping in mind the terrorist activities at the global level and Indias experience in handling them.

"There is a need to further evolve Indias perspective in a balanced and objective manner. This course has the potential to build a strong narrative for India. An in-depth understanding of various global and regional terrorist networks is a part of the curriculum of this course. How India has witnessed the rise of religious fundamentalism and radicalisation through perverse ideologies in its neighbourhood is an area where a lot of knowledge is needed to deal with emerging situations, the VC Prof Kumar said.

Commenting on the nature of the curriculum, the VC had said The curriculum is holistic and also contains sections on the role of intelligence information and counter-terrorism cooperation among major powers. There is a section on best practices of counter-terrorism and the major global and regional efforts in counter-terrorism. Science and Technology to counter-terrorism will also be taught to students. This course will give a broad-based knowledge to engineering students.




Dalit history and modern history are not two different things, said RSS Sarkaryavah Shri Dattatreya Hosabale at a book launch of Makers of Modern Dalit History in Delhi on August 10.

Speaking at the launch of the book authored by Guru Prakash Paswan and Sudarshan Ramabadran, Shri Hosabale said, The great personalities (mentioned in the book) are not only the leaders of a particular community or a section of society but we have to declare proudly that they made history of India. They have contributed in the development, social change and transformation of the country.

Underlining Indias history, Shri Dattatreya Hosabale ji said that without mentioning the contribution of the Dalit community, the political, economic, social, cultural, and spiritual history would be incomplete, dishonest, and untrue.

Referring to the caste-based reservation as an instrument of affirmative action that has an important role in social justice and equality, RSS Sarkaryavah said that reservation and reconciliation (between communities) have to go hand in hand.

I and my organisation have been strong supporters of reservation for decades. In 1980 when anti-reservation movement were going on the university campuses, we (ABVP) passed a resolution and organised an all India seminar in Patna about reservation. Time and again we declared that reservation is the historic necessity for many more decades as long as there is inequality being experienced by a particular section and segment of societyIt is not anybody is giving them as grace; it is their right to decline or deny the reservation at any point of time in future, said Shri Hosabale.

RSS Sarkaryavah went on to say that social harmony and social justice were not political strategies but articles of faith for RSS.

On the occasion, he mentioned the second Sarsanghchalak of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) Guruji Golwalkarjis letter of 1969.

In 1969, a resolution was passed declaring that untouchability has no place in our religion & society and it has no sanctity. Many prominent Shankaracharya and heads of different sects passed the resolution. The purpose of mentioning these things is that society discusses many things but often, who says what is more important. When it comes from the people who have occupied the religious seats from where these things have been interpreted rightly or wrongly in the past, it will go a long way when they say certain things.

After the resolution was passed, Guruji wrote a letter to an important functionary the resolution on untouchability which is supported and blessed by all our Acharyas, Dharmacharyas, etc..., all that holds a pious expression merely cannot be played in actual life. Century of old prejudices do not disappear only by superior sense, wishful thinkings and passing by some resolutions. Only hard work and right propagation has to be taken town to town, village to village house to house and people to people; and have to accept and practice what has been resolved. It should not be presented as a dispensation to the pressure of modern times but by abiding principle and way of life in a humble spirit of atonement of our past mistakes.

While the opponents of the RSS have accused it of opposing caste-based reservation that allows quotas for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes communities in government jobs and educational institutions, Shri Hosabale reiterated that the RSS has been at the forefront of denouncing casteism.

Addressing the gathering, Shri Millind Kamble, Chairman, Dalit Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DICCI), emphasised the role of SCs and STs in nation-building. He said that Dalits has been the drivers of the rural economy. This section of society has played a significant role in ancient architecture, temple building, and even historical Indian texts.

Dalits has been the service providers of the society and if we talk about current Indias GDP, this section of society contributes a lot. 80 per cent of the construction industry belongs to Dalit community, said Kamble.

He appreciated the authors for recognising Dalit Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industrys work and suggested that authors incorporate more Dalit icons in the book's second edition.

The book Makers of Modern Dalit History features several inspirational Dalit leaders like BR Ambedkar, Babu Jagjivan Ram, Gurram Jashuva, Rani Jhalkaribai, Savitribai Phule and many more who tirelessly battled divisive forces all their lives. This book seeks to enhance present-day Indias imagination and shape its perception of the Dalit community.


Dainik Bhaskar, in its investigation, found that the centre had a fixed rate for arranging an Aadhaar card for Bangladeshi and Nepali immigrants.

An Aadhaar centre based in Surat has been involved in carrying multiple illegalities in the Aadhaar card registration and rectification process.

The centre had a fixed rate for carrying such illegalities. Dainik Bhaskar investigation found that MP/MLA/Gazetted officers letterheads could also be managed for a rate.

The centre, Adajan Galaxy Centre, issued an Aadhaar in Hindu name to a Bangladeshi female immigrant.

The Gujarat police said more than ten centres are under investigation for flouting norms in processing Aadhaar card requests.

The Aadhaar card programme, which is a very important document of identification, is used by the Union and state governments for the effective implementation of multiple welfare schemes.

Recently, the Uttar Pradesh ATS had busted a gang that was using fake Aadhaar and other documents for helping Rohingyas and other illegal immigrants.

Once identification documents are arranged, its very difficult to identify them for their real identity. Because of the deteriorating security situation in the neighbouring countries, its suspected that the terror elements may use this method to get entry into the country and spread all over.
Union Minority Affairs Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi on Saturday slammed Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and said that Congress should apologize to Kashmiri people instead of selling fake dreams.



"Kashmir is known as the 'heaven on the Earth', they(Congress party) should apologize to the Kashmiri people for ignoring the development just because of their political game but instead of that, they are selling fake dreams," said Naqvi.

This comes after Congress leader Rahul Gandhi who was in Jammu alleged that BJP was ruining the love and brotherhood that exists amongst the people.



Commenting on Rahul Gandhi's visit to Jammu and Kashmir, the Union Minister said "The party that had opposed the development of Jammu and Kashmir are now selling a new dream that they will make a comeback in the state."



Without mentioning Rahul Gandhi's name, Naqvi attacked him for obstructing the work of development in the UT and luring people using the Gandhi legacy.



"The party should understand that the state is recovering and developing and again you are going to the state to put hurdles and trying to lure them back with using the name of your family is an old formula that is now expired," he said.

ANI


The States Division in MEA has been created specially at the behest and directives of the Prime Minister to facilitate the international outreach efforts of all States and Union Territories.

New Delhi: In a first of its kind, an interaction between Resident Commissioners of North-Eastern Region and Minister of State for External Affairs, Dr Rajkumar Ranjan Singh, was held in Delhi on Friday, September 10. The deliberations dwelt at length on how the Ministry of External Affairs can facilitate their international engagement.

"This is especially significant in the context of realising the vision of Prime Minister Narendra Modi articulated during his address to the Nation on August 6, 2021, MEA release said.

The meeting was attended by Residential Commissioners and Nodal Officers from eight North-Eastern States - Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Tripura Nagaland and Sikkim.

In his welcome remarks, C. Rajasekhar, OSD (States), reiterated MEA's focus on the North-Eastern Region, as it is key to the nation's security and prosperity. He recalled the Prime Minister's exhortation of the States to prepare an action plan to boost exports in their respective states.

MoS External Affairs, Dr Rajkumar Ranjan Singh, in his address, urged the states in the North-East region to proactively harness the goodwill for India around the world in promoting export and attracting foreign investment into the region. The government has set a target of 400 Billion dollars export per annum.

Secretary (Eastern Region) in MEA, Dammu Ravi, summed up the productive deliberations and guided the meeting on the next steps. A North East Round Table is to be launched for the first time in Manipur capital later this year.

The release said that senior officers from the Government of India and the MEA also enriched the session with their insightful contributions.

The States Division in MEA has been created specially at the behest and directives of the Prime Minister to facilitate the international outreach efforts of all States and Union Territories. Recently, Naga Mirchi (chilli) were exported to London. Similarly, all north-eastern states have their unique and specialised potentials. While states such as Tripura have immense scope for trading with bamboo products, Sikkim is the country's organic state.

Sources said the government of India's Act East Policy focuses on the extended neighbourhood in the Asia-Pacific region. The policy, originally conceived as an economic initiative, has gained political, strategic and cultural dimensions, including establishing institutional mechanisms for dialogue and cooperation. India has upgraded its relations to a strategic partnership with Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia, Japan, Korea, Australia, Singapore and the Association of Southeast Asia Nations (ASEAN).


The Group of Intellectuals and Academicians (GIA) has petitioned over 50 universities that are sponsoring hatred against Hindus by supporting Dismantling Global Hindutva: Multidisciplinary Perspectives.

The GIA, a group of empowered professional Indian women, has petitioned over 50 universities that are sponsoring hatred against Hindus by supporting Dismantling Global Hindutva: Multidisciplinary Perspectives.

This Hinduphobic conference is sponsored by 70 plus centres or departments at over 50 universities globally.

The petition notes that The website of the event (https://dismantlinghindutva.com/ ) says that Hindutva is an authoritarian political ideology that historically drew inspiration from Nazi Germany and Mussolinis Italy. Its guiding principle is to transform India from a secular democracy to a religious state where Muslims, Christians, and other religious minorities are relegated to second class citizenship.

The GIA calls it a dangerous and un-substantiated social labeling of an entire indigenous population on the basis of religion with no basis in literature or research.

Through such efforts of vested interests, hatred is being built by equating the symbols of Hinduism i.e. the Tilak (red forehead mark), the Om and Swastika (ancient sacred Hindu symbols), the color saffron (a color of the entire Dharmic population of India including Buddhists, Sikhs) with fascism and casteism. This has led to unprecedented lynchings and targeted attacks at Hindus adopting these symbols.

The petition emphasizes that The conference on Dismantling Global Hindutva claims a distinction between Hinduism and Hindutva. In the guise of this banal argument, it is building a narrative of hate against Hindus by targeting Hindu symbols, beliefs and persons adhering to the faith. We once again reiterate that a base is being laid for genocide of Hindu populations globally.

The Hinduphobic conference spreads multiple lies, like the current regime in India has instituted discriminatory policies, but doesnt explain factually which policies are discriminatory and how.

The petition of the GIA points out that the 50 plus universities that are sponsoring the event on Global Hindutva are laying open their campuses for a hate campaign against the Hindus that will, in time, surpass anti-Semitism seen in Europe. Hindus are an indigenous cultural group with well-established codes of dharma. They are being exposed to a vicious hate campaign by a global radical network. Universities supporting this insidious effort need to be held responsible.
33,376 New Cases reported in the last 24 hours, with Recovery Rate currently at 97.49%. India's Active Caseload (3,91,516)is 1.18% of Total Cases and Weekly Positivity Rate (2.26%) less than 3% for the last 78 days.

With the administration of 65,27,175 vaccine doses in the last 24 hours, the country's COVID-19 vaccination coverage surpassed the cumulative figure of 73 Cr landmark milestone (73,05,89,688) as per provisional reports 7 am today. This has been achieved through 74,70,363 sessions.

The Union Government is committed to accelerating the pace and expanding the scope of COVID-19 vaccination throughout the country.

The recovery of 32,198 patients in the last 24 hours has increased the cumulative tally of recovered patients (since the beginning of the pandemic) to 3,23,74,497. Consequently, India's recovery rate stands at 97.49%.

Sustained and collaborative efforts by the Centre and the States/UTs continue the trend of less than 50,000 Daily New Cases that is being reported for 76 consecutive days now. 33,376 new cases were reported in the last 24 hours. The Active Caseload is presently 3,91,516. Active cases presently constitute 1.18% of the country's total Positive Cases.

The testing capacity across the country continues to be expanded. The last 24 hours saw a total of 15,92,135 tests being conducted. India has so far conducted over 54.01 Cr (54,01,96,989) cumulative tests. While testing capacity has been enhanced across the country, Weekly Positivity Rate at 2.26% remains less than 3% for the last 78 days now. The Daily Positivity rate reported to be 2.10%. The daily Positivity rate has remained below3% for the last 12 days and below 5% for 96 consecutive days now.

Courtesy: PIB
New Delhi: Holding the first 2+2 meet with Australia on September 11, Saturday, was definitely a diplomatic milestone in the India-Australia bilateral relationship.

In a press statement at the end of the meeting attended by Marise Payne, Foreign Minister and Peter Dutton, Defence Minister of Australia besides Rajnath Singh, External Affairs Minister Dr S Jaishankar said, "Today is the 20th anniversary of 9/11. It is a reminder- if one is still needed- of the importance of combating terrorism without compromise".

He also said: "Close as we are to its epicenter, let us appreciate the value of international cooperation"  making India's missive pretty clear.

Of course the parleys between two sides came in the backdrop of an unsettling phase of geopolitical turmoil in the region.

Dr Jaishankar also tweeted to say that the deliberations were "productive".

India-Australia relations have experienced unprecedented momentum in the last seven years, he said. "The 2+2 Dialogue reflects the comfort that we have attained in our bilateral relationship, especially in strategic and security spheres, based on the growing convergence with Australia on security issues and our shared commitment for a free, open, prosperous and rules-based Indo-Pacific region," Dr Jaishankar said.

Australian foreign minister Ms Payne said, Australia and India share a positive vision of a free, open, secure, inclusive Indo-Pacific We have shared views on challenges of the South China Sea and East China Sea.

Notably, other than India and Australia, the Quad comprises the US and Japan.

Sources say Australia has been always concerned about Chinas growing assertiveness in the South China Sea, including its new law forcing foreign vessels to submit to Chinese supervision in its territorial waters.

The two countries have also been keen to ink a trade deal but issues of high tariffs, especially on agricultural products, have proved to be a sticking point. Acknowledging that terrorism is a major threat, Australian Defence Minister Dutton said: Australia-India defence relationship is at a historic high.

He held a separate round of talks with Indian counterpart Rajnath Singh on Friday.

As the four Ministers came together for the first time on Saturday, both sides discussed experiences and further collaboration in responding to the COVID 19 challenges.

Decentralized globalization, strategic autonomy and a sharper sense of national security are some of the relevant outcomes.

"We also underlined our commitments to creating secure and resilient global supply chains. We welcomed the renewed vigour with which both sides are now engaging on trade issues to fully expedite the complementarities between us," Dr Jaishankar said.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said, both the countries have common interest in the region.

"We have discussed various institutional frameworks for wide ranging collaboration including defence cooperation and fight against global pandemic. We exchanged views on Afghanistan, Maritime Security in the Indo-Pacific, cooperation in multilateral formats and other related topics" Rajnath Singh said.

Both the countries emphasised on their shared vision of a free, open and inclusive Indo-Pacific region, and also the importance of combating terrorism.

Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said addressing a virtual meeting at Ahmedabad that, "We have to remember the lessons taught by such terror attacks and simultaneously strive to implement human values that India represents".

Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne said in an address at the Observer Research Foundation, that there were "significant challenges" facing the Indo-Pacific.

Her comments are seen as an oblique reference to China.

"We commend India for taking a strong leadership role in the region," she said.




3days conference of tribal leaders of North East titled "Voice of North East" at Tepesia.

Guwahati: The tribal art and culture has greatly enriched the Indian culture and civilization, and it is very important to protect, preserve and promote tribal art & culture, chief minister of Assam Dr. Himanta Biswa Sarma said this on Friday (September 10) while attending the "Voice of North East" conference in Tepesia near Guwahati.

The Chief Minister urged the people to take leadership in preserving and promoting tribal art & culture. He was speaking at the inaugural programme of the three-day conference of tribal leaders of North East titled "Voice of North East" organized by Janajati Faith & Culture Protection Forum at Rani Lakshmi Bai National Institute of Physical Education, Tepesia.

Speaking as chief guest during the occasion, the Chief Minister said that along with the tribal people, the non-tribals must also take leadership in its promotion, and the state government would continue extending all needful support in this regard.

Chief Minister Sarma further said that considering the significance of tribal art, culture, faith, customs and traditions in the growth of India's civilization, the state government established a new department named "Indigenous Faith & Culture". He further informed that 100 crores has been earmarked for the department in the current budget, and the government intended to increase budget allocation up to 500 crores in the next five years.

Chairman of Akhil Bharatiya Vanavasi Kalyan Ashram Ramchandra Kharadi and chairman of the National Commission for Scheduled Tribes Harsh Chauhan were also present at the inaugural programme.
Dismantling global Hindutva is bound to fail just like previous similar experiments. Distorted and motivated political interpretations cant obliterate the truth, As Supreme Court said in its Judgment: Hindutva is a way of Life

These Hindus and Sikhs are Afghan citizens for generations and centuries. As their faith is different, it was tough for them to seek refuge in any border-sharing countries of this landlocked country. Finally, they found a safe home in their land of ancestors Pitrubhu and the holy land of their faith and cultural practicesPunyabhu. This is a classic example of Hindutva within and beyond the borders of India.

The deep roots of this timeless civilisation took care of its branches, widely spread beyond its borders. It has always been a policy of the Government of India to protect the Indian diaspora. Ministry of External Affairs of India estimates about 13-Million Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) and about 186-Million People of Indian Origin (PIO). Carnegie Endowments report, titled, INDIAS EXPATRIATE EVACUATION OPERATIONSBringing the Diaspora Home, 2016, mentions that India has conducted more than thirty evacuation operations across Africa, Asia, and Europe, including its largest-ever civilian airlift of 110,000 people from the Persian Gulf in 1990.

Hindu, Hinduism, and Hindutva

The word Hinduism is used to suit the western lens of dogma-based prophetic religious practices. But it fails to convey the profound and unique historical and philosophical understanding that it represents in practice. There is no similar word to the Sanskrit word Dharma in English or other Western languages.

Mahatma Gandhi once clarified, Hinduism is not a codified religion. The great freedom fighter Veer Savarkar popularised the word Hindutva and described it as Hindutva is not a word but a history. Not only the spiritual or religious history of our people as at times it is mistaken to be by being confounded with the other cognate term Hinduism, but a history in full. Hinduism is only a derivative, a fraction, a part of Hindutva.From the Essentials of Hindutva, by V.D. Savarkar, 1922

In Indian MuslimsThe Need For A Positive Outlook by Maulana Wahiduddin Khan (1994), it is said: The strategy worked out to solve the minorities problem was, although differently worded, that of Hindutva or Indianisation. This strategy, briefly stated, aims at developing a uniform culture by obliterating the differences between all of the cultures coexisting in the country. This was felt to be the way to communal harmony and national unity. It was thought that this would put an end once and for all to the minorities problem.

While citing the above-quoted statement, the Supreme Court of India, in 1995, noted earlier court decisions from 1994 that observed Hindutva and Indiansation are Synonyms. And based on this and several other observations, Supreme Court of India said in its judgment, Hinduism or Hindutva is a way of life.

For centuries, people from the subcontinent were identified globally as Hindus. But compelling examples come from the iconoclastic Communist ideology In 1953, Communist dictator Stalin called the Indian language Hindu while talking to the then Indian Ambassador.

Started as an open-minded newspaper over 140 years ago, The Hindu, despite later shifting the gears toward Communist thinking and having editor-in-chief close to the Communist Party of India, never changed the newspaper name. When it came to losing an identity, even the radical Indian left-woke culture never demanded to cancel The Hindu name.

Hue and cry against Hindus and Hindutva

Historically, anti-human rights Communist ideology thrived in India on social division, opposing the free economy and fostering violence. Those who never thought to change their newspaper name/identity keep giving sermons to Indians about not associating with nationality and culture. But as democracy matured and the economy liberalised, Indian Communism coated as Leftism (far different from the American left) lost its steam and public support both politically and socially. So, opposing Hindutva and Hindus became an act of desperation with the hope of gaining attention to survive.

Such disparaging activism has been desperately tried again and againsometimes by collecting and publicising 100s of intellectuals signatures for one protest; 100s more later by celebrities for some other protest; and nowby falsely declaring some American Universities as sponsors of some anti-Hindutva conference that doesnt even have as of now, any conference organiser.

Ironically, the Communist thoughts that love to hate America and the freedom it represents are desperately trying to seek their support to validate their acts. This will only help such groups gain momentary publicity that will be followed by ongoing self-dismantling of their ideology, Communism.

If such activists really want to be part of the socio-political success story of India, they should read about Hindutva from Savarkar to the Supreme Court of Indias judgment and adopt the deeply rooted Hindu civilisation, culture, and ethos that they, like it or not, are part of. Understand it well and stay away from following copy-pasted and recycled biased political interpretations. It is challenging to change such old habits. Till then, the outcome will be, as the old saying goes, Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results.
The article, written by AMU professor Ali Nadeem Rizvi, was published in Frontline and shared on Twitter by S. Irfan Habib. After multiple factual inaccuracies were pointed, Habib deleted the post.

Ali Nadeem Rizvi, professor of medieval India at Aligarh Muslim University, wrote an article about the naming of Aligarh, which was published in The Hindu group's magazine Frontline. The piece went viral on Twitter after Delhi-based professor S. Irfan Habib shared it on Twitter.

Bharadwaj, who goes by the handle @BharadwajSpeaks on Twitter, pointed to many factual inaccuracies in the article. Later, Habib deleted his post.

The thread is as follows:

He is an "eminent" historian. He quotes another "eminent" historian from AMU. In a single article, they make several BLUNDERS. They cannot even get their basic dates right. Their claims are factually incorrect and FAKE. This thread is a FACT CHECK of their claims.

The heading of @Rezavi's article says "Historical records show it was Marathas who came up with the name of Aligarh. Their governor Najaf Ali Khan renamed it as Aligarh."

This is the central claim of the article. And it is a FAKE claim.

Najaf Ali khan was NOT Maratha commander.

Unlike these "eminent" historians @irfhabib and @Rezavi, I have sources.

Here is a snippet from "Aligarh Statistics" by collector JR Hutchinson (1856).

It clearly mentions that Najaf Ali Khan was a "Mughal general" and NOT a Maratha general.

He renamed Ramgarh to Aligarh.

In fact, Najaf Ali Khan was the sword arm of Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II. Najaf Ali Khan was NOT a Maratha governor. In fact, no Maratha governor ever existed by the name "Najaf Ali Khan" in the ENTIRE 18th century. Snippet from "The Fall of Mughal Empire" by Jadunath Sarkar.

Who was Najaf Ali Khan?

A Persian, Najaf, came to India along with his sister, who married a Mughal official. He joined the Mughal service.

Far from being a "Maratha governor", he fought battles AGAINST Marathas (English waged wars against Marathas in the name of Mughal emperor).

In this article, @rezavi says

"Madhav Rao Scindia captured Aligarh in 1759 along with French commander De Boigne".

Ha ha. De Boigne was an 8year old kid in 1759. And he was in France. He did not come to India until 1778.

This is the level of these eminent AMU historians.

Fake quotes, fake dates, fake claims. This is the reality of these eminent historians. They have no knowledge, but they pose as scholars.

But at the core, they are political propagandists. "Marathas named it Aligarh, so don't change its name" is their argument. FAKE premise.

Here is another factually incorrect claim of @Rezavi.

He claims that it was Jats who named it as Ramgarh in 1753. This is FALSE.

It was known as Ramgarh even before Jat Conquest. The Hindus addressed it as "Ramgarh" since at least the 16th century and possibly much earlier.

I challenge @irfhabib and @Rezavi to refute my thread.

If they are too scared to do that, they should at least make corrections to their FAKE article. But I am pretty sure they won't do either.

I have a simple question for eminent historians @irfhabib @Rezavi

Who on earth is "Madhav Rao Scindia"? Madhav Rao was Peshwa, NOT Scindia. Mahadji was Scindia.

Even a school student knows the difference between Scindia and Peshwa. And you call yourselves historians? SHAME!

You say -"De Boigne worked for Madhav Rao"

Wrong. He did NOT. Madhav Rao died BEFORE De Boigne even came to India. This is ELEMENTARY!

A simple google search could have saved you from such embarrassment. But these eminent historians are hell-bent on exposing their ignorance.
Stating that the appointment of three women judges in the Supreme Court last month was a 'historic' decision towards women empowerment, President Ram Nath Kovind on Saturday said that to achieve the inclusive ideals of the Indian Constitution, the role of women in the judiciary needs to be increased.



"If we have to achieve the inclusive ideals of our Constitution, then the role of women in the judiciary also has to be increased," said President Ram Nath Kovind at the foundation stone laying ceremony of Uttar Pradesh National Law University and new building complex of Allahabad High Court at Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh today.

He noted that the presence of four women judges out of the total 33 judges appointed in the Supreme Court is the highest ever in the history of the judiciary.



Referring to the Allahabad High Court's historic decision to enrol India's first woman lawyer, Cornelia Sorabji in 1921, the President termed that decision a forward-looking decision in the direction of women empowerment.



He said that last month, a new history was created of the women's participation in the judiciary with the appointment of nine judges, including three women judges, in the Supreme Court. He said that these appointments have paved the way for a woman Chief Justice of India in future.



President Kovind emphasized that the establishment of a truly just society would be possible only when the participation of women increases in all areas including the judiciary.



He noted that at present the total strength of women judges in the Supreme Court and High Courts together is less than 12 per cent. He said that if we have to achieve the inclusive ideals of our Constitution, then the role of women in the judiciary also has to be increased.



The President said that he had seen closely, the struggle of the poor for getting justice.

"Everyone has expectations from the judiciary, yet, generally people hesitate in taking the help of the courts. This situation needs to be changed in order to further increase the confidence of the people in the judiciary," said President Kovind.


At the Worlds Parliament of Religions, Chicago, September 11, 1893

Sisters and Brothers of America,

It fills my heart with joy unspeakable to rise in response to the warm and cordial welcome which you have given us. I thank you in the name of the most ancient order of monks in the world; I thank you in the name of the mother of religions; and I thank you in the name of the millions and millions of Hindu people of all classes and sects.

My thanks, also, to some of the speakers on this platform who, referring to the delegates from the Orient, have told you that these men from far-off nations may well claim the honour of bearing to different lands the idea of toleration. I am proud to belong to a religion which has taught the world both tolerance and universal acceptance. We believe not only in universal toleration, but we accept all religions as true. I am proud to belong to a nation which has sheltered the persecuted and the refugees of all religions and all nations of the earth. I am proud to tell you that we have gathered in our bosom the purest remnant of the Israelites, who came to southern India and took refuge with us in the very year in which their holy temple was shattered to pieces by Roman tyranny. I am proud to belong to the religion which has sheltered and is still fostering the remnant of the grand Zoroastrian nation. I will quote to you, brethren, a few lines from a hymn which I remember to have repeated from my earliest boyhood, which is every day repeated by millions of human beings: As the different streams having their sources in different places all mingle their water in the sea, so, O Lord, the different paths which men take through different tendencies, various though they appear, crooked or straight, all lead to Thee.

The present convention, which is one of the most august assemblies ever held, is in itself a vindication, a declaration to the world, of the wonderful doctrine preached in the Gita: Whosoever comes to Me, through whatsoever form, I reach him; all men are struggling through paths which in the end lead to Me. Sectarianism, bigotry, and its horrible descendant, fanaticism, have long possessed this beautiful earth. They have filled the earth with violence, drenched it often and often with human blood, destroyed civilization, and sent whole nations to despair. Had it not been for these horrible demons, human society would be far more advanced than it is now. But their time is come; and I fervently hope that the bell that tolled this morning in honour of this convention may be the death-knell of all fanaticism, of all persecutions with the sword or with the pen, and of all uncharitable feelings between persons wending their way to the same goal.


About 300 women -- covered head-to-toe in accordance with strict new dress policies for education -- was seen sitting in rows at a Kabul university lecture theatre Saturday, pledging commitment to the Taliban's hardline policies on gender segregation. They waved Taliban flags as speakers railed against the West and expressed support for the Islamists' policies.

Most wore black niqabs covering most of the face apart from the eyes.

Women's rights in Afghanistan were sharply curtailed under the Taliban's 1996-2001 rule, but since returning to power last month they have claimed they will implement a less extreme rule.

The Taliban's education authority has said that women will be allowed to attend university as long as classes are segregated by sex or at least divided by a curtain.




Its time to Revisit Swami Vivekanandas Chicago address in correlation with Hinduphobic Dismantling Global Hindutva conference

A group will be organising a conference on September 9, 10 and 11 in over 40 universities of USA. The theme says Dismantling Global Hindutva and the promotional depicts that Hindutva needs to be rooted out by any means. Since the last day of conference is also coinciding with Swami Vivekanandas great speech in Chicago in the conference of Parliament of world religions, it is in the fitness of things to highlight his aphorism.

Swami Vivekananda says: I am proud to belong to a religion which has taught the world both tolerance and universal acceptance. We believe not only in universal toleration, but we accept all religions as true. I am proud to belong to a nation, which has sheltered the persecuted and the refugees of all religions, and all nations of the earth. I am proud to tell you that we have gathered in our bosom the purest remnant of the Israelites, who came to Southern India and took refuge with us in the very year in which their holy temple was shattered to pieces by Roman tyranny. I am proud to belong to the religion, which has sheltered and is still fostering the remnant of the grand Zoroastrian nation. I will quote to you, brethren, a few lines from a hymn which I remember to have repeated from my earliest boyhood, which is every day repeated by millions of human beings: As the different streams having their sources in different paths which men take through different tendencies, various though they appear, crooked or straight, all lead to Thee.

The organisers of the conference this year needs to study Hindutva to the core and change their perception towards Hindutva as narrated by Swami, which holds true even today. The current regime in India led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who happens to be a RSS volunteer before entering politics. Since the inception of his government in year 2014, more than 80,000 people have been rescued from different parts of the world which was not an easy task and that too without looking into religion of any person, not only people from different religions of India but also citizens of 26 countries from war affected zone including USA. One more example of following principles of Hinduism, during the Corona pandemic Phase 1 and 2, the Modi Government had given necessary medicines to all the countries requested for without selfish motive. Vaccinations helptoo many countries forgetting criticism at home shows how deep principlesof Hinduism are imbibed and followed.

Hinduism not only just believes in Vasudhaiv Kutumbakam (The whole world is my family) and Lokah Samasta Sukhino Bhavantu (All living beings be in peace, happy and in harmony) but also imbibes in reality.

I would like to ask professionals from different parts of the world, many Indian spiritual and social organisations are working across the globe, could they highlight some incidents wherein any person were forced to convert to Hindu Dharma. These organisations are just following the principles of Hindutva and working there to promote good will, to bring harmony and to better physical, mental and social health of everyone on planet earth. Then why some people or few organisations want to dismantle Hindutva? India has never attacked any country to grab power, land and resources rather Pakistan and China captured Indias territories in past.

Many Indian spiritual and social organisations are working across the globe. These organisations are following the principles of HINDutva and working there to promote goodwill, to bring harmony and to better physical, mental and social health of everyone on planet earth. No person is forced to convert to Hindu Dharma. Then why some people or few organisations want to dismantle Hindutva?

The populous growth of other religions in India is increasing day by day; the simple fact is that Hinduism has accepted everyone so this freedom is helping other religions to grow without any fear however what is happening in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan, what happened to the minority population (Hindu, Christian, Parasi, Buddh, Sikh and Jain) in those countries, why there population declined in last 75 years? Can any university in America put effort to study and make the report public?

The New York Herald written after Swamijis speech: Vivekananda is undoubtedly the greatest figure in the Parliament of Religions. After hearing him we feel how foolish it is to send missionaries to this learned nation. I would request universities to come forward and study what exactly many missionaries are doing in India? Are they respecting other religious practices and what teachings they are giving to poor people in India?

Swami Vivekananda further says, If the Parliament of Religions has shown anything to the world, it is this: It has proved to the world that holiness, purity and charity are not the exclusive possessions of any church in the world, and that every system has produced men and women of the most exalted character. In the face of this evidence, if anybody dreams of the exclusive survival of his own religion and the destruction of the others, I pity him from the bottom of my heart, and point out to him that upon the banner of every religion will soon be written in spite of resistance: Help and not fight, Assimilation and not Destruction, Harmony and Peace and not Dissension.

Indias rich heritage never disowned anyone even if someone had bad intentions towards it. India has faced many adversities owing to its goodwill and harmonious gesture, more than 200 invasions, no country has faced such adversities, still this great heritage of Hinduism is preserved and working for the good of every living being on the planet earth. Hindutva not only believes in goodwill of human beings but also works for nurturing environment. Therefore, neither the Hindutva will be rooted out nor it will allow anything good to be destroyed on planet earth.

Regarding Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), they never worked or believed in destroying other religions rather it wants every citizen of this nation to work in unison for the upliftment and make our country great again, socially, economically and spiritually. If someone is thinking that RSS is against any religion then why RSS is working for Akhand Bharat (United India) which includes Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan as well.They wholeheartedly served everyone without seeing their religion during any natural calamity or Corona phase 1 and 2. Is it wrong to speak and work for own religion that too for enhancing the living of everyone and uniting society and bring back glory to the nation? So the fake theory created around RSS by propagandaorganisations needs to be studied and analysed, universities in America and rest of the world should visit India, spend time with the volunteers of RSS, see the activities rather than believing blindly against RSS or Hindutva.

It is the time for experts from the different universities to come forward and study Vedas and Bhagavad Gita to know Hindutva and how can we all make this world better and respect every religion.

I would like to suggest aconference on Connecting and Uniting the World using Philosophy of Hindutva rather than Dismantling the Hindutva.
The events in the last few weeks after the Taliban took over Afghanistan are an absolute validation that those of Indic origin, inclusive of Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Christians and even Indian Muslims, are not safe under any Islamic dispensation

Afghanistan is in the proverbial eye of the storm. Much before the imminent drawback of the United States and allied forces from the country, the Taliban moved in to take over. It met with no resistance from the Ashraf Ghani-led Government of Afghanistan and the Afghan Nation Army. As a result, by mid-August, the Taliban was in complete control of Afghanistan, as heralded by the takeover of Kabul around August 17.

As a result, all foreign nationals in Afghanistan, including the Embassies staff and those involved in the business over there, had to be evacuated; also, such Afghan nationals who had helped the US and allied forces over the years were under threat had to be taken out.

A small but significant segment in this lot that had to be evacuated was the remnants of the once vibrant Hindu and Sikh community that had inhabited Afghanistan for centuries and added significantly to its social, cultural and economic milieu.

The devastating image of Afghan Sikhs leaving their country for India with three Saroops (holy copies) of Sri Guru Granth Sahib and the same being carried from the Delhi airport on the head (as is the tradition) by Hardip Puri, a Union Minister with the Government of India, and two other prominent Sikhs is going to stay embedded in the minds of the Sikhs across the world for all times to come.

It is so because the Sikhs have maintained a spiritual connection with Afghanistan ever since the birth of the religion, and witnessing an end to the connection is very painful indeed.

The first Sikh master, Guru Nanak Dev, visited Afghanistan on his way back from the holy cities of Mecca and Medina during his fourth Udasi (Spiritual journey). Afghanistan naturally elicited the interest of all subsequent Sikh Gurus due to the connection with Guru Nanak. Since migration was not such a big issue in those days the Sikhs started building a presence in the area.

The famous Sikh historian Bhai Gurdas, who assisted Guru Arjan Dev in the Sri Guru Granth Sahib compilation, was sent as a preacher of Sikhi to Afghanistan. Another devout Sikh, Bhai Ghonda, was sent by Guru Har Rai (1630-1661) to Kabul to spread the word. Bhai Ghonda cheerfully accepted the responsibility and even established a few Gurdwaras there.

Sikh presence in Afghanistan further increased during Maharaja Ranjit Singh since Afghanistan literally came under Sikh suzerainty in that period. During partition, some Sikhs from the North-West Frontier Provinces fled from Pakistan towards Afghanistan and were welcomed by the Afghan rulers there.

In the 1970s, Sikh and the Hindu population in Afghanistan stood at 7,00,000 of which the Sikh population was between 2,00,000 and 5,00,000 (1.8 per cent - 4.6 per cent of the national population). Sikhs were living in Jalalabad, Ghazni, Kabul, and Kandahar.

The trouble began from the time of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and escalated sharply during the civil war period of 1992 and the ultimate takeover of power by Taliban 1.0. As with the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddha statues, the Taliban also targeted Sikh and Hindu places of worship. Seven out of eight Gurdwaras in Kabul itself were destroyed; only the historic Gurdwara Karte Parwan was left standing. More difficulty was faced in conducting last rites since cremation with fire was against Islamic edicts and not acceptable to the Taliban.

It was during this time that the Sikh population in Afghanistan started declining rapidly. Sikhs migrated across the world, and many came to India. By 2013, only about 8000 Sikhs remained in Afghanistan, and this figure further fell to about 1000 in 2019. By 2020, only 70-80 families with a total population of about 700 remained in Afghanistan.

There were 13 Saroops of the Guru Granth Sahib in Afghanistan, of which seven were already shifted to India earlier. Three have been shifted now and just three more remain in Afghanistan. Those too will be shifted soon, revealed Chhabol Singh, member of Karte Parwan Gurdwara Committee, on his return to India.

As with the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddha statues, the Taliban also targeted Sikh and Hindu places of worship. Seven out of eight Gurdwaras in Kabul itself were destroyed; only the historic Gurdwara Karte Parwan was left standing

The seven Saroops were shifted post the terrorist attack on Gurdwara Karte Parwan, Kabul, on March 25, 2020, which left 27 Sikhs, including women and children, dead and many wounded. The responsibility for the attack was taken by Islamic State-Khorasan (IS-K). However, reports and statements by the Government of Afghanistan suggested the hand of the Pakistan based Haqqani Network and also Pakistan based terrorist organisation, Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT). A huge exodus towards India took place after the attack.

Now there is hardly a Sikh to be seen in Afghanistan. Narendra Singh Khalsa, an Afghan Sikh politician and Member of Parliament from Afghanistan, was seen weeping at the Hindon Air Force Base after the Indian Air Force (IAF) plane evacuating him and others landed there. He profusely thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for having evacuated the distraught members of his community for the conflict-torn region. India is our second home. We are extremely thankful to the Indian government and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Narendra Singh Khalsa to the media after arriving in Delhi from Kabul. The Sikhs and Hindus from Afghanistan and Pakistan seeking refuge in India for the last two decades were identified as the biggest beneficiaries of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 (CAA). It needs to be reiterated that the Government of Punjab actively joined the self-serving protest against the CAA ignited by a few with a vested interest in destabilising the nation. It passed a resolution against CAA in its state assembly. The resolution went through due to the majority enjoyed by the Congress party in the state assembly. It did not keep in mind the problems of the Punjabi Sikhs and Hindus who were being persecuted in Pakistan and Afghanistan. It was both illegal and unconstitutional since the state governments are, by law, bound to apply the provisions of the CAA.

The Sikhs and Hindus from Afghanistan and Pakistan seeking refuge in India for the last two decades were identified as the biggest beneficiaries of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019. It needs to be reiterated that the Government of Punjab actively joined the self-serving protest against the CAA ignited by a few with a vested interest in destabilising the nation. It passed a resolution against CAA in its state assembly. The resolution went through due to the majority enjoyed by the Congress party in the state assembly

Under the circumstances, it is clear that the huge campaign against CAA by the Government of Punjab and others highlights the lack of sensitivity for those of the Sikh and Punjabi community who are being persecuted in the most dastardly manner in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The fallacy of the negative predictions is now very much apparent. It is a boon that refugees who have come to India before 2014 are receiving citizenship under provisions of CAA will be able to lead a life of honour. The provisions will also assist an early sanction of citizenship to those, including ethnic Afghan nationals, who have now been airlifted to India now on an electronic visa. It is hoped that those who agitated against the CAA will now understand the bill's humanitarian potential and the folly of their misconceived opposition to the same.

Sikhs lived in Afghanistan with honour till recent times when their persecution in the hands of the fundamentalist Taliban began. The Sikhs have now been forced to leave the country in what can be termed as the final exodus. It is heartbreaking to see the trauma of dislocation and complete destruction of their lives. The silver lining is the hope that they see in India.

The events in the last few weeks are an absolute validation of the fact that those of Indic origin, inclusive of Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Christians and even Indian Muslims, are not safe under any Islamic dispensation. The atrocities being committed on minorities in Pakistan are yet another sobering indication of this fact. Here, the danger of separatist agendas like the inimical foreign powers sponsored Khalistani agenda becomes more pronounced. n
The legacy of 9/11 is twin-fold! The recent one represented by the US and Islamic terror is one of violence and clash of civilisation, while the older 9/11 consolidates the message of universal brotherhood and harmony

September 11, 2001, is a tragic date for the history of the world, particularly for the United States. It indicates the brutal terrorist attack on New York City that killed thousands of innocent people. It began the War on Terrorism that today in 2018 continues unabated.

The threat of Islamist terrorist attacks has continued from the Taliban, Al-Qaida and ISIS to numerous smaller groups. Terrorist strikes have occurred on every continent. India has not escaped these either having endured several terrorist assaults like 26/11, 2008.

The 9/11 attack resulted in wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Yemen and Syria. In these and related civil conflicts hundreds of thousands have been killed. One could call the War on Terrorism the world war of the twenty-first century. Associated violence and instability in various Islamic countries have brought waves of immigrants and refugees into Europe, which may permanently change the demography and identity of Europe itself.

The overall war on terrorism has made some gains, particularly the recent defeat of ISIS in Syria, but has not come to an end. It threatens to cause greater conflicts with the US and its allies against Russia, Iran and perhaps other countries.

Osama Bin Laden, the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, was eventually captured and killed by the Americans at a military base in Pakistan in 2011. Though the majority of 9/11 terrorists came from Saudi Arabia and had connections with Pakistan, little has been done to penalise either country for their involvement.

Different 9/11

The September 11, 1893 speech of Swami Vivekananda in Chicago was a different event, transformative in the opposite direction. Hindus announced their presence in the modern world through Swami Vivekananda, not with a war cry or a terrorist attack but with a call for world peace, respect between religions and an honouring of Yoga and Vedanta along with all the spiritual paths of humanity. Whereas the 9/11 terrorist attack was a call to violence and hatred, Swami Vivekanandas call was to end intolerance and exploitation, such as India was suffering from under British colonial rule.

Swami Vivekananda with fellow saints and people who visited him at Vivekanandar Ilam at Triplicane, Chennai, on the shore of the Marina

Yoga has since become a worldwide movement offering wellbeing to millions of people. Along with Yoga came the profound teachings of Vedanta, new views of cosmology, higher states of consciousness and new healing methods for body and mind, with non-violence as the best approach for addressing our social conflicts.

Bharat became independent in 1947 after a long freedom movement, and today is the worlds largest democracy and fastest growing economy. Hindu Gurus travel all over the world teaching numerous groups from all backgrounds. A new Hindu diaspora has spread to North America, UK, Australia, New Zealand and elsewhere, building magnificent temples, and becoming among the most affluent and best-educated minorities in their countries of immigration.

Hindus have not created any terrorist movements or attacks, nor do they constitute any law and order problem in their newly adopted countries. And we must remember that India suffered more under colonial rule than the Middle East did. Hindus did not seek revenge but rather sought to create a deeper understanding and broader acceptance between people and cultures.

From Terrorism to Yogic Spirituality

How does the world move forward today in this era of division and violence? The deeper spiritual legacy of the planet as expressed through Swami Vivekananda and Hindu Dharma is one of integration with the whole of life. The current political and military legacy of the planet is one of a complicated war on terrorism mixed with the strife born of human greed and competing beliefs.

While everyone in the West knows of 9/11 for its terrorist attack, few know 9/11 as the date of Swami Vivekanandas profound message of human unity and universal consciousness.

Such terrorist attacks are rooted in a religious exclusivism and intolerance in the minds of those who perpetrate them. If we introduce pluralism into spirituality, such as is the Hindu view, recognising that there are many paths to the Divine or higher Self, and the freedom to pursue whatever path we prefer, we can cut off the roots of this terrible violence.

For this to succeed humanity must give up both its materialistic fixations and its religious aggression, once more honouring all life as sacred, not to be interfered with, exploited or harmed.

Will a new sense of human unity arise? It is crucial if we are to survive as a species. Swami Vivekananda led the way on this higher path that we need to follow with conviction.

Osama Bin Laden had his different path ending in the destruction that must be completely rejected. The causes behind these conflicts must also be addressed. It requires that all the countries of the world follow the way of dharma, understanding the unity and interdependence of all humanity and all of nature. It is a daunting challenge but certainly much more preferable than the alternative.


Joan Ruth (Geurts) Thompson, passed away at the Wesley Acres Health Center in Des Moines Iowa on September 8, 2021, at the age of 86 years. Joan was born on January 14, 1935, to Floris W.A. and Sophia (Vos) Geurts. Joan graduated from Pella High School with the class of 1953 and resided in D
Mississippi Republican Gov. Tate Reeves says President Joe Bidens new federal vaccine requirements are clearly unconstitutional and that he believes Biden issued the mandate to distract Americans from the fallout over his decision to withdraw American troops from Afghanistan
President Joe Biden walks along the Colonnade towards the Oval Office as he returns to the White House after visiting Brookland Middle School in northeast Washington, Friday, Sept. 10, 2021. Biden has encouraged every school district to promote vaccines, including with on-site clinics, to protect students as they return to school amid a resurgence of the coronavirus.
FILE - In this Nov. 2, 2016, file photo, dozens of protestors demonstrating against the expansion of the Dakota Access Pipeline wade in cold creek waters confronting local police, near Cannon Ball, N.D. Federal and state lawyers will meet in North Dakota next week to negotiate a settlement for money that the state claims it spent on policing protests against the Dakota Access oil pipeline. North Dakota filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 2019, seeking to recover more than $38 million in damages from the monthslong pipeline protests almost five years ago.
Were under attack, buddy.

These words, from my father on the morning of what we know refer to as 9/11, are forever etched in my memory.

On Sept. 11, 2001, I was a college student. That morning, like so many of my fellow college students, I was awakened in my dorm room by a phone call from a concerned parent about not one, but two, planes crashing into the World Trade Centers.

I remember my dad telling me the planes hit the towers, and a blurry-eyed sleepy 18-year-old me (I took mostly night classes that semester), replied something like How could those pilots be so stupid that they hit two towers?

Thats when my exasperated dad said, Were under attack, buddy.

Like the rest of America, my world changed that day. A naive me realized what I charmed life I had led up to that point, that I would first think of pilot error rather than acts of terrorism.

For days, all but one of my fellow dorm complex residents huddled around the TV in the socializing areas that existed in my tiny dorm building at Madonna University in Livonia. The one missing was a student from New York. I still remember the fear and devastation we all felt for her.

She never came back, though I think of her to this day as I count myself so very lucky to have not lost any loved ones on that horrible day in American history.

Thinking back to that day, I also remember my dormmate, a young woman from Dearborn, home to the largest concentration of Muslims in America. While so many of my friends and family remember how America came together in the aftermath of Sept. 11, united by grief, I remember being appalled by stories of anger directed toward Michigan residents of Middle Eastern descent. I later went to college with a young woman whose father got in trouble for accosting a Middle Eastern driver on the Ambassador Bridge. Islamophobia was, and still is, very real.

I remember media companies circulating lists of songs not to play on the radio, so as to not upset a traumatized nation. Not a fan of censorship, I distinctly remember scratching my head about why American radio stations wouldnt play harmless songs like Elton Johns Rocket Man and Simon and Garfunkels Bridge Over Troubled Water.

And then there was the rush to the gas pumps. I think everyone has the same recollection across the country: Fears soared over gas price hikes and Americans rushed to gas stations.

All this is not to say I dont remember the incredible stories of resilience, patriotism and love following 9/11. They were aplenty. In fact, I cant tell you how many friends in recent years have commented on social media that they wished America could be as united as we were following Sept. 11, 2001.

Personally, I would never wish for our nation to have to collectively grieve like we did after the World Trade Center attacks. Id rather be united through love, not loss. But thats just not realistic in our post-9/11 world. Thats what wed see through the rose-colored glasses of a naive college student whose first thought was pilot error.

Kate Hessling is the editor of the Midland Daily News. She can be reached at khessling@hearstnp.com
The experience of air travel took a drastic turn after the events of Sept. 11, 2001 as terrorists hijacked and crashed planes in New York City, Washington D.C. and near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Passengers were soon introduced to new procedures and restrictions while airports modified their approach to security.

MBS Airport Manager James Canders happened to be working at Albany International Airport on the day of the attacks. Shortly after the first plane crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center, Canders was kept busy shuttling planes around the tarmac, helping make room as more and more flights were rerouted and grounded. The rest of the day was spent working for airport management, making calls and checking the fences. Canders recalls how at one point, airport staff huddled around a TV watching the events unfold in New York City and Washington D.C.

We were in amazement. We were all dumfounded by what was going on, Canders said.

Air traffic slowed to a halt and tensions remained high for the next few days, which was the worst situation Canders could think of. It wasnt until several months later airports saw an increase in passenger confidence.

The traveling public was still afraid. We were looking through our security measures and shifting through the mayhem, Canders said.

In response to the terrorist attacks, President George W. Bush signed the Aviation and Transportation Security Act into law in November 2001, thus creating the Transportation Security Administration.

Prior to the creation of the TSA, airlines were responsible for their own screening operations, which was typically contracted out, said Canders. He went onto explain that passengers would have their baggage screened while security personnel would wave a security wand around them; pat downs were not common. Restrictions about liquids were nonexistent, pocketknives were given the OK to be taken aboard, though no firearms were allowed. If security officers discovered a firearm in a travelers carry-on bag, they would allow the person to return to the front desk and put it into their checked bag.

Meanwhile, flight crews would undergo minimal screening apart from having their credentials checked and were led through backdoor areas to their planes.

All of that was clamped down, Canders stated. Its been interesting to see over the course of my career how the TSA has evolved.

The TSAs new security regulations were more scrutinous and stressful for passengers. In addition to X-raying carry-on luggage, passengers must remove their shoes, belt, liquids and personal items from their pockets. Personal electronic devices including laptop computers and cell phones must be placed in a separate bin. Even after they get through security, travelers are asked to report suspicious activity as advertised in the Department of Homeland Securitys If You See Something, Say Something initiative.

You got to be more consciously aware of whats going on around the airport, Canders said.

If a low-risk passenger is approved for TSA Pre-Check, they are allowed to go through an expedited security screening process, thus shortening their wait time and eliminating most security procedures. According to a recent article by the Associated Press, more than 10 million people have enrolled in PreCheck. TSA wants to raise that to 25 million.

In addition to box cutters and firearms, the TSA prohibits aerosols, fuels or flammable liquids, lighter fluid, Magic 8 Balls, pepper spray, pocket and Swiss Army knives, screwdrivers longer than seven inches, strike-anywhere matches and more than 3.4 of liquid or gel among many other items in carry-on luggage. Even foam toy swords are off-limits in carry-ons. If a banned item is found, forms need to be filled, fines may be issued, and investigatory action can be taken.

They really cracked down on cutting implements because the (9/11) flights were taken down with boxcutters, Canders said.

Security measures have changed significantly at MBS International Airport. In 2001, operations were conducted from its old terminal, where only an accordion-style gate was placed in front of the security checkpoint. At the new airport terminal, which was completed in 2012, the security checkpoint is guarded with a sturdier roll-down gate and the equipment undergoes continuous reviews. The airport layout is also designed to separate the access point for incoming passengers from the exiting travelers.

Theyre really trying to keep that area segregated and prevent access, Canders said.

Prior to 9/11, a law enforcement liaison was posted nearby in case a situation arose. Canders explained that now the airport is not allowed to screen people without one present at the checkpoint. The airport is also required to immediately report any suspicious incident to a TSA representative or face fines and sanctions. All the while, airport management must handle constantly evolving TSA regulations, attend recurring meetings with local TSA representatives and conduct constant security inspections and testing in conjunction with TSA to find potential weak points.

The microscope got a little bigger after 9/11, Canders said.
Twenty years ago, Midland native Drew Samocki woke up on a beautiful autumn morning in New York City. Little did he know that the day would quickly unravel and his life would be forever changed as the World Trade Center was attacked before his eyes.

Samocki, then in his mid-20s, came to New York for his second job after graduating from Yale University in 1997. He worked as an account executive for advertising agency Saatchi & Sattchi from 1999 until 2002. While his apartment was in the neighborhood of Chelsea  home of Madison Square Garden  his commute would take him further south. The office was about 20 blocks from the bottom of the island of Manhattan.

Samocki woke up late on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. He recalls turning on the news and seeing the north tower of the World Trade Center smoking. At the time, he believed it was little more than a horrific plane crash, certainly not a terrorist attack.

It didnt seem like a big deal at the time. It seemed like an accident, Samocki said.

While he sometimes would walk to work, Samocki decided to save time that day and take the subway. Once he emerged from the tunnel, he realized that the atmosphere had changed, and something was seriously wrong.

The streets were crowded with people looking up. You never see people standing in the street looking up dumfounded, Samocki stated.

At the office, TVs in the hallways were tuned into the news channels covering the attacks. Samocki explained the office had a couple of telescopes on its roof for sightseeing. On a regular day, people would go up and view the Statue of Liberty or boats in the harbor. This time, his co-workers trained the lenses on the Twin Towers.

Soon after Samocki arrived, his boss pulled him into his office and said he had the choice to stay or leave for the day, hinting at rumors that there were gunshots on the street and that they werent sure if there were coordinated attacks on the ground.

Its really bizarre in retrospect. Who knows how those rumors start? Samocki said.

Samocki decided to take his chances on the streets and left with a co-worker. It was around that same time that the second plane hit the south tower.

The phone lines went down temporarily, but Samocki was able to get in touch with his dad for a brief chat before he left the office, to assure him that he was OK. It wasnt until later that day when he was able to connect with other family members and friends to check in.

Samocki and his co-worker headed north to a friends house on the west side of Manhattan, walking with a huge group of other New Yorkers along the highway, looking over their shoulders periodically. The surreal feeling continued, as cars were at a standstill and people moved along. At one point, one person alerted the others to the collapse of the second tower, causing Samocki to turn around for a moment.

It wasnt loud. I dont even remember a noise. It suddenly just wasnt there, replaced by smoke.

The mood in the city was significantly changed in the following weeks, said Samocki. What once was a vibrant place became much more subdued. Samocki was thankful that no one he knew had died in the World Trade Center, but he had friends who knew victims.

In my life, its by far the most energetic city Ive experienced. Cut that down by two thirds and thats what it was like. It all changed, Samocki said.

In the aftermath of Sept. 11, Samocki felt a sense of New York coming together in the next few days and weeks. He heard touching stories of people volunteering to help where they could; one friend of his who was a medical student offered his services.

Youd hear all kinds of stories like that, Samocki said.

When Samocki recalls the events of Sept. 11, 2001, he is filled with a deep sadness with a slight glimmer of hope. He is amazed by how the days events continue to have a grip on the country, 20 years later.

The days tragedy also made Samocki question his own trajectory and reevaluate where he was in his career and where he wanted to be. Although he never planned to remain permanently in New York, Samocki explained that his experience on Sept. 11 subtly ramped up his plans to move by a couple years. Eventually, he decided to return to the Midwest, attended the University of Toledo College of Law, and practiced as an attorney for a few years. Today, he is the senior trust officer and vice president of Fifth Third Private Bank in Traverse City.

Looking back at that day in Manhattan, more than lives was lost.

A lot of the country too ... lost that sense of invincibility, Samocki said.
LaPLACE, La. (AP)  Hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses in Louisiana, most of them outside New Orleans, still didnt have power Tuesday and more than half the gas stations in two major cities were without fuel nine days after Hurricane Ida slammed into the state, splintering homes and toppling electric lines.

There were also continuing signs of recovery, however, as the total number of people without electricity has fallen from more than a million at its peak, while hundreds of thousands of people have had their water restored.

State health officials, meanwhile, announced that they are revoking the licenses of seven nursing homes that evacuated to a warehouse where seven residents died amid deteriorating conditions after the hurricane.

The disparity in power restoration between New Orleans, where nearly 3/4 of the city had electricity again, and other communities where almost all residents were still in the dark prompted frustration and finger-pointing.

State Rep. Tanner Magee, the Houses second-ranking Republican who lives in the devastated city of Houma in Terrebonne Parish, said he's convinced his region is being shortchanged in favor of New Orleans.

Its very infuriating to me, Magee said.

Though water was running again in his area, most hospitals in the region remained shuttered and the parish was in desperate need of temporary shelter for first responders and others vital to the rebuilding effort, he said.

Warner Thomas, president and CEO of the state's largest hospital system Ochsner Health warned that it would be some time before two Ochsner hospitals  one in Terrebonne Parish and the other in Lafourche Parish  fully reopen. Emergency rooms at the two hospitals, however, were operating.

Carnival Cruise Line announced Tuesday that it will keep one of its ships, Carnival Glory, docked in New Orleans through Sept. 18 to serve as housing for first responders.

Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards said while there had been much progress in restoring water and power, "theres an awful lot of work to be done.

Without power, the Louisiana heat is the hardest thing to cope with, said Kim Bass, who lives in St. John the Baptist Parish. She and her husband are using a generator to keep food refrigerated but have no air conditioning. Water service is intermittent.

So you may have water one minute, then you may not have water for the next two days, Bass said.

In many neighborhoods, homes were uninhabitable. State and federal officials said about 3,200 people are in mass shelters around Louisiana while another 25,000 people whose houses have been damaged are staying in hotel rooms through the Federal Emergency Management Agencys transitional sheltering program. FEMA already has approved more than 159,000 household applications for disaster assistance, according to Louisianas emergency preparedness office.

Shontrece and Michael Lathers looked on despondently as workers wrestled a billowing blue tarp into place over what was left of the roof of their home in the St. John the Baptist Parish town of LaPlace. Idas floodwaters had risen to about 3 feet (1 meter) inside their home and rain that had poured in through the wind-damaged roof obliterated most of the drywall ceilings.

The house will have to be gutted floor to ceiling, Michael Lathers said, adding that he had no idea how much the repairs will cost.

Fuel shortages also persisted across hard-hit areas of the state. More than 50% of gas stations in New Orleans and Baton Rouge remained without gasoline Tuesday afternoon, according to GasBuddy.com.

The power situation has improved greatly since Ida first hit. In the first hours after the storm, nearly 1.1 million customers were in the dark, but that number was down to about 430,000 on Tuesday. With the help of tens of thousands of workers from power companies in numerous states, the states biggest energy provider, Entergy, has been able to slowly bring electricity back, leaving only 19% of its customers in the region without power as of Tuesday.

For residents in the states five hardest-hit parishes in southeastern Louisiana, however, that number is little comfort. Fully 98% of those residents are still without power more than a week after Ida slammed onshore with 150 mph winds (240 kph) on Aug. 29.

Power probably wont be widely restored to St. John the Baptist and St. James parishes until Sept. 17 and until Sept. 29 to Lafourche, St. Charles and Terrebonne parishes, Entergy said Tuesday. The parishes are home to about 325,000 people.

In contrast, nearly all power has been restored in the capital of Baton Rouge, and only 25% of homes and businesses are still suffering outages in New Orleans. Entergy said it expected to have the vast majority of New Orleans brought online by Wednesday. Once areas such as New Orleans have their power restored, Entergy is moving its crews into communities south and west of the city that saw more widespread damage, said Entergy Louisiana President and CEO Phillip May.

As Entergy worked to get the lights turned on everywhere, the Louisiana Department of Health reported that the number of people without water had fallen from a peak of 850,000 to 62,000, though about 580,000 people were being advised to boil their water for safety. And grocery stores reopened in some places.

Ida's death toll in Louisiana rose to 15 people Tuesday after the state Department of Health reported two additional storm-related fatalities: a 68-year-old man who fell off of a roof while making repairs to damage caused by Hurricane Ida and a 71-year-old man who died of a lack of oxygen during an extended power outage. The storm's remnants also brought historic flooding, record rains and tornados from Virginia to Massachusetts, killing at least 50 more people.

___

Deslatte reported from Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Associated Press writers Rebecca Santana in New Orleans; Jeff Martin in Marietta, Georgia; Sudhin Thanawala in Atlanta; and Lisa J. Adams Wagner in Evans, Georgia, contributed to this report.
On Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001, Roselle, a Labrador retriever, was sleeping under the desk of her owner, Michael Hingson, in the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Seven floors below them, a labrador retriever named Salty was sleeping under the desk of his owner, Omar Rivera. It seemed to be an ordinary day with the promise of lunch and a short walk outside to look forward to.

Everything pointed to a good day. The sort of September day that made you forget that winter was coming. Sunshine flooded the streets of New York City. And people across the country were getting up. Going to work. Ready for school. Preparing to have lunch with someone. Going shopping. Already that morning, 17,400 workers and visitors were in the North and South Towers of the World Trade Center.

None of us knew that four commercial airliners had been hijacked by 19 men who planned to destroy the Twin Towers in New York City, and the Pentagon and the White House in Washington, D.C. Those 19 men were going to change our country forever.

At 7:59 a.m., American Airlines Flight 11 took off from Boston's Logan International Airport, bound for Los Angeles. Fifteen minutes later, Flight 11 was hijacked. Mohamed Atta was the pilot. Four young men from Saudi Arabia with Atta made up the five hijackers who took over the flight. At 8:46 a.m., Flight 11, loaded with jet fuel, crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center between the 93rd and 99th floors.

Gary Lutnick, an employee of Cantor Fitzgerald in the North Tower, made his last call to his sister. He said, Im stuck on the 103rd floor. I am trapped and there is no way out.

Howard Lutnick, CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald and Garys brother, had decided to take his son, Kyle, to his first day in kindergarten. He was kneeling by his son to have their picture taken when his driver told him that a plane had crashed into the North Tower. Later, Howard said, I thought, maybe a Piper Cub?

Out of the 1,000 employees at Cantor Fitzgerald, 658 employees died that day as well as Lutnicks brother, Gary, and two of his best friends from college who worked for Cantor Fitzgerald. To date, Cantor Fitzgerald has given millions to the families of those who lost their lives in the North Tower.

The jetliner crashing into the North Tower instantly awakened Roselle. Michael Hingson, her owner, took hold of her leash and they walked to stairwell B.

Smoke, confusion and noise surrounded Michael and Roselle. But the lab led her owner and 30 other people down 1,463 steps out of the tower. The descent took over an hour and they had barely reached the safety of a subway station, when the South Tower collapsed at 9:59 a.m.

Likewise, Salty led his owner, Omar Rivera, safely from the 71st floor to the street, refusing to leave Riveras side in spite of people trying to take hold of his leash. The North Tower collapsed at 10:28 a.m.

Using crew telephones, flight attendants Betty Ong and Amy Sweeney on Flight 11 calmly relayed information to their colleagues on what was happening, My name is Betty Ong. I'm No. 3 on Flight 11. And the cockpit is not answering their phone, and there's somebody stabbed in business class.

Sweeney did the same, giving seat numbers, explaining that the hijackers were of Middle Eastern descent and one spoke English. It gave the FBI a jumpstart on its investigation.

Bob and Connie Dullock: Their world would never be the same again

Bob Dullock of Midland was attending a public health class at Oakland University when 9/11 happened. When he heard the news, a sense of fear came over him. He couldnt believe it. Class was immediately dismissed. As he left Oakland County, he noticed the roads were filled with traffic and police officers were everywhere. People feared that Detroit might be the next target.

Later, Bob and friends visited the site of 9/11 in New York City. He said the view was overwhelming and unbelievable. Everything was still covered with soot and ashes. All local businesses were still closed. And he could feel a sense of death everywhere. A deep sorrow filled his heart for our country and for our future as a nation.

Constance Dullock had just walked into the computer classroom with her fourth-graders at Bullock Creek Elementary when she heard the news. Kathy Harrand, the computer technician, told her what had happened. Two planes had destroyed the World Trade Center, a third had hit the Pentagon, and a fourth was prevented from hitting the Capitol or the White House by the courageous passengers on Flight 93. Constance realized that her world would never be the same again, and it hasnt.

Heroes sprang into action

At 8:14 a.m., United Airlines Flight 175 took off from Logan Airport bound for Los Angeles. At 8:42 a.m., Flight 175 was hijacked and at 9:03 a.m. crashed into the South Tower of the World Trade Center between the 77th and the 85th floors. Marwan al Shehhi was the pilot.

A young man named Welles Crowther worked on the 104th floor of the South Tower. Moments after the plane crashed into the South Tower, he called his mother and said, Mom, this is Welles. I want you to know that Im OK. And then he went down to the 78th floor sky lobby. In the midst of the chaos, he helped injured and disoriented office workers to safety.

Through the smoke, no one could really see Crowther, but they remembered the young man who was using a red bandanna to shield his lungs and mouth. He directed the survivors to the stairway. At one point, he carried a woman on his back down 15 flights of stairs to safety. Survivor Ling Young told CNN, Without him, we would be sitting there, waiting until the building came down.

The body of Welles Crowther was found later in a stairwell with firefighters who had died in the South Tower.

Another hero of the South Tower attack was Rick Rescorla, who was responsible for saving more than 2,700 lives. Rescorla was head of corporate security for Morgan Stanley.

When American Flight 11 hit the tower next to him, Port Authority ordered Rescorla to keep his employees at their desks. Rescorla gave a quick call to his friend, Daniel Hill, and said, "Everything above where that plane hit is going to collapse, and it's going to take the whole building with it. I'm getting my people out of here."

Rescorla, who had frequently warned the Port Authority and his company about the World Trade Center's security weaknesses, had already issued the order to evacuate. He had made Morgan Stanley employees practice emergency drills for years, and it paid off that day: Just 16 minutes after the first plane hit the opposite tower, more than 2,700 employees and visitors were out when the second plane hit their building. During the evacuation, Rescorla calmly reassured people, singing "God Bless America" and "Men of Harlech" over a bullhorn as they walked down the stairs.

During the evacuation, Rescorla called his wife and said, "I have to get these people out safely. If something should happen to me, I want you to know I've never been happier. You made my life."

Rescorla was last seen on the 10th floor of the South Tower, heading upward to look for stragglers. His body was never found.

American Airlines Flight 77 left Washington Dulles International Airport bound for Los Angeles at 8:20 a.m. Hijacked at 8:50 a.m., Flight 77 at 9:38 a.m. crashed into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C.. The pilot was Hani Hanjour.

Army Specialist Beau Doboszenski was working as a tour guide on the opposite side of the Pentagon when the building was struck by Flight 77 and didn't even hear the crash. But Doboszenski, a former volunteer firefighter and trained EMT, responded after a Navy captain asked for anyone with medical training.

Doboszenski ended up running around the building to try to get to the crash but was stopped by police. Eventually, he went around the barricades to reach a medical triage station, and helped give first aid to numerous victims. For hours, he dashed between treating his co-workers and dashing into the inferno with a team of six men.

'The courage and bravery ... was beyond belief'

The first thought that Midlander Janet Snyder had when she heard about the planes crashing into the Twin Towers in New York City was of her daughter, Julie, who lived and worked in Manhattan. Janet said, I could not reach her. Prayer came easy for her safety and for the safety of the people who lived in New York City. And I was thankful for a new President Bush who would know how to handle this evil act.

Janet's husband Irv Snyders first thought was, how could this happen? Maybe this isnt real? As the day progressed and more news poured out over the airways, he heard the story of Flight 93 and the heroic actions of the passengers, led by Todd Beamer who yelled out, Lets roll! Irv said, The courage and bravery of the police and firefighters was beyond belief.

Janet Snyder added, That day in our history will always bring tears when we sing the National Anthem and see our flag flying. God bless America and God bless those who write about it to remind us of what 9/11 meant.

Passengers prevented Flight 93 from hitting target

United Airlines Flight 93 left Newark International Airport for San Francisco at 8:42 a.m. At approximately 9:28 a.m., the terrorists stabbed the pilot and a flight attendant, then told the passengers that a bomb was on the plane. At 10:03 a.m., Flight 93 crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Ziad Jarrah was the pilot.

Tom Burnett called his wife at 9:45 a.m. and said, "We have to do something." Mark Bingham, Jeremy Glick, and Todd Beamer were also making phone calls as Flight 93 was barreling towards Washington, D.C..

Beamer was on his way to a business meeting in San Francisco, having just returned from five days of vacation in Rome, Italy. He managed to contact a woman named Lisa Jefferson, a GTE airphone supervisor. He told her the passengers were going to take the plane over from the hijackers. He asked Lisa to say the Lords Prayer and the 23rd Psalm with him. Then he said to Lisa, If I dont make it, please call my family and let them know how much I love them.

The passengers voted to fight back against the hijackers, led by the four-man group consisting of Beamer, Bingham, Burnett and Glick. Beamer led the passengers, yelling, You ready? Okay! Lets roll! They managed to thwart the hijackers and the plane crashed before reaching Washington, D.C and the hijackers' target, either the Capitol or the White House. The plane plunged into the ground, upside down, in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

'I love New Yorkers'

Nancy Barker was at work in her Northwood University office when her husband, Bill, called. Turn on the TV. As she watched, a plane disappeared into the side of the North Tower of the World Trade Center.

"We know now that we were in the first moments of when all our lives changed," Nancy says.

Bill spoke again through the phone. The building is going to fall.

"Bill and I had spent so much time in New York," Nancy recalls. "At the World Trade Center. Dinner on the top floor in the fabled 'Window on the World.' Liberty Weekend in 1976. The tall ships from around the world sailing into New York harbor. Now I watched as people began pouring, then leaping from the stricken Trade Center and the streets enveloped in the blinding blackness.

"What is New York like today? I may never know because Im not going to go there again. I love New Yorkers. Indomitable, spirited survivors. I love the city! And I love that theyve rebuilt. But I need no more reminders of what we saw. What we witnessed. And most especially what we lost."

Bill Barker was working in his home office when his son, Jim, called from Maryland. Bill said, I turned the TV on and there was the North Tower but with a large smoky hole in the middle of it. It immediately reminded me of seeing a picture of the Empire State Building when a B-25 bomber, lost in the clouds, had hit the building. I thought I was watching another terrible accident. Then I saw a second plane hit the other tower. I was baffled. Then I heard that the Pentagon had been hit and another plane had crashed near rural Shanksville, Pennsylvania. It was clear that our country was under attack. Those beautiful buildings had been part of my life for almost 30 years.

"The day of 9/11 changed the world forever, reaching into our daily lives personally and directly, testing our once comfortable feelings of security. And the gap in the skyline is still there.

To read more about the Barkers' thoughts on 9/11, click here.

Witnesses to a tragedy

Jason Thomas, a former Marine sergeant, had just dropped his little girl off at his mothers place in Long Island when he heard that the Twin Towers had been hit. He changed into his Marine Corps uniform that he always carried in the trunk of his car and drove to Manhattan at top speed.

Later, in an interview, Thomas said, Someone needed help. It didnt matter who. I didnt even have a plan. But I have all this training as a Marine and all I could think was My city is in need.

In Wilton, Connecticut, Dave Karnes was at work, watching the attack on television. A former Marine staff sergeant, Karnes told his boss he would be gone for awhile. He got his hair cut. Put on his Marine uniform and drove to New York City at 120 miles per hour.

Miraculously, the two Marines found each other and began searching for survivors in the toppled debris of the twin towers. All they had were flashlights and a military entrenching tool. They joined with other first responders and climbed over the metal, concrete and dust, yelling, United States Marines! If you can hear us, yell or tap!

They got a reply from the rubble. Two New York Port Authority police officers, William Jimeno and John McLoughlin, had been on the main concourse between the towers when the South Tower began to fall. They made it to a freight elevator before the collapse but were now buried 20 feet below the surface. Both had serious injuries.

It took three hours to dig Jimeno out and another eight hours to reach McLoughlin, who was buried further down. But without those two Marines, Karnes and Thomas, walking through unstable rubble, Jimeno and McLoughlin would never have been found in time.

Thomas returned to Ground Zero and worked there for the next two and a half weeks. Karnes helped for another nine days, then returned to Connecticut and reenlisted, serving two tours of duty in Iraq.

A total of 2,977 people (not counting the 19 hijackers) lost their lives.

 All 246 passengers and crew aboard the four hijacked planes were killed.

 At the Twin Towers, 2,606 people died, then or later of injuries.

 At the Pentagon, 125 people were killed.

The youngest victim was 2-year-old Christine Lee Hanson, who died on one of the planes with her parents, Peter and Sue. The oldest was 82-year-old Robert Norton, who was on another plane with his wife, Jacqueline, en route to a wedding.

In the North Tower, no one survived above the impact zone. Miraculously, 18 people managed to escape the flames above the impact zone in the South Tower.

Others survived by not being in the Towers on this day that they normally would have been at work. One man wasnt in the Twin Towers on Sept. 11 because it was his turn to buy doughnuts, and he was in a bakery when the first plane hit the World Trade Center.

Another man had bought a new pair of shoes the day before and was walking in them for the first time. He hadnt gone far when he realized that the new shoes were causing a blister on his heel, so he stopped at the drug store to buy a box of Band aids. That made him late for work and therefore he escaped the inferno that the Twin Towers turned into.

Howard Lutnick, CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, took his 5-year old son to his first day of kindergarten that day.

One person was in the lobby clearing a visitor through security. Some were on vacation on Sept. 11, and a few lucky ones were simply late getting to work that autumn morning and thereby are alive today.

So there we have the diametric moments of who is gone today and who is here today. We were witnesses to a tragedy we never expected to see in our country. Suddenly, we realized how fragile life is. And how fragile our country was on September 11, 2001.
(Katy Kildee/kkildee@mdn.net)

Northwood University of Midland issued the following statement to the Daily News regarding the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

"Northwood University is dedicated to advancing freedom, an especially poignant calling as the world observes the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks.

Nearly 3,000 people lost their lives on that tragic day in 2001 when terrorists hijacked jetliners and crashed them into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and a field in Pennsylvania. We look back on that day with sorrow and reverence. At the same time, we honor the many people who responded to the events by stepping forward to defend the way of life we hold so dear.

Freedom, it has often been pointed out, is not free. Nor is it easy. It requires great sacrifice on the part of many people. And there may be no more important sacrifice than that made by the men and women who choose to serve in the armed forces, agreeing to give up many of their liberties so the rest of us can fully exercise ours. On this historic occasion, let us remember those individuals and the sacrifices they have made. In particular, please recognize the many Northwood students, alumni, employees, and friends who have chosen to serve. Northwood has repeatedly earned Gold Star Status as a Military Friendly School, and we are honored to have many heroes among us.

Its impossible to comprehend why the September 11 attacks occurred, but one thing is certain: many worldwide view the American free-enterprise system with disdain. Yet Northwood University is unwavering in our mission to develop transformative leaders of a global free-enterprise society - a system in which visionaries with passion, commitment, and perseverance can be successful, regardless of gender, race, creed, or caste.

It is important, therefore, as we observe the somber anniversary of the September 11 attacks, to remember those who were lost, as well as the enduring freedoms that prevail."
BELGRADE, Serbia (AP)  Several thousand people protested in Serbia on Saturday demanding a ban on planned lithium mining in the Balkan country as well as a resolution to scores of other environmental issues that made the region one of the most polluted in Europe.

The rally in downtown Belgrade was organized by about 30 ecological groups who recently gained popularity in Serbia amid widespread disillusionment with mainstream politicians and amid major pollution problems facing the region.

The protesters held banners demanding protection of Serbias rivers, nature and air which they say have been endangered by profit-seeking government policies and decades of neglect.

The protesters later blocked one of the main bridges in the capital for a while as they announced several other blockades in the rest of the country in the coming months.

More than 100,000 people have signed a petition against international Rio Tinto mining company, which has sought to construct a lithium mine in the western parts of the country that is rich in the mineral used in the production of electric car batteries.

Our demand is that the government of Serbia annul all obligations to Rio Tinto, said Aleksandar Jovanovic, one of the organizers. We have gathered to say no to those who offer concentrated sulphuric acid instead of raspberries and honey.

A number of experts have warned that nature in western Serbia would suffer in the case of exploitation of lithium in the area that is rich in fertile land and agriculture. Serbia has also faced huge pollution problems caused by coal-powered plants run by Chinese companies.

In addition to mining, Serbia has faced mounting problems that include poor garbage management and high air pollution caused by the use of poor-quality coal and other pollutants. Rivers have been polluted by toxic industrial waste and many cities, including Belgrade, lack good sewage and waste water systems.

We were thirsty this summer, we breathe toxic air and land is being sold out, organizers of the protest said in a statement. Forests are being cut and mines are expanding.

The Balkan nations must substantially improve their environmental protection policies if they want to move forward in their bids to join the 27-nation EU. Impoverished and marred by corruption after years of wars in the 1990s, many Balkan countries have pushed environmental issues to the sidelines.

Rio Tinto has committed $2.4 billion to the project in Serbia which would make it one of the worlds largest producers of lithium amid increasing demand for electric cars.
While Umbareen Jamil was helping her 3-year-old son get out of her car onto a Midland Walmart parking lot, a man approached her. He said: You really do not have to dress like this. This is America, you can dress like that back home.

Jamil, a Midland resident of Pakistani descent, was wearing a hijab when he said this. As someone who was born and raised in Akron, Ohio, America was always her home country. She told the man that she knows this is the U.S. and she had the freedom to dress the way she was.

Her friends, who also wear Muslim garb, have had similar experiences. One walked out of an eye doctor and was told by a random woman to go back to her country, something that has been said several times to Jamil.

Sept. 11, 2021, marks the twentieth anniversary of the attacks. While many are still grieving and emotional about the attacks that day, animosity loomed over another group of U.S. citizens. Muslim Americans have been targets of racism and Islamophobia in ways not seen before the attacks, and forcing many to apologize for actions they did not make and beliefs they did not hold.

You have a whole group of people that are paying the price for what some-20 people did that did not represent the faith, Jamil said. They hijacked our faith. Islam is our religion, the religion of peace. They took it upon themselves to hijack it and we continue to pay the price for it.

Muslim residents in Midland and attendees of the Islamic Center of Midland have faced discrimination in and out of the city in the past 20 years. With many misconceptions and hatred directed at them, these community members have fought back by working to improve their faiths perception in the Midland area.

Before 9/11 and immediately after

While 9/11 certainly exacerbated Islamophobia, it did not create it. Midland resident of Pakistani decent Naveed Khan said it was there, but more suppressed.

When (9/11) happened, it opened up sentiments and then people started expressing (them) and then everybody started to develop the idea, or perception, about a certain group, Khan said.

He recalled the media played a big role in creating the perception of Muslims. Jamil said movies and textbooks displayed misleading and shallow views of what the Muslim faith was about.

Jamil moved to Midland in October of 2000 with her husband, and had their second child in July of 2001. When the attacks struck New York, she remembered her parents telling her not to go out of the house and lay low after the attacks. She said she was scared of being in a new community with little diversity.

Julie Christensen, a Shepherd resident who attends the Islamic Center, did not grow up as a Muslim, but as a Christian. She grew up with parents and relatives that believed in various denominations of Christianity, which gave her a strong belief in God but questioning the denominations.

Christensen converted to Islam in 2002, but heard hate speech before spouted directly as events unfolded on the day of the attacks in mid-Michigan. While working as teacher in Lake City, she recalled a fellow teacher telling the kids that, What they really should do with the Middle East is blow the whole thing up and call it like Afghanistan.

After she came out as Muslim her parents, her dad said they now get to have a Jihadist in the family. Christensen and her dad had a falling out for a while over this, though he eventually apologized.

The attacks basically gave free reign to let people spout hate speech and politicians used the attacks for their political gains, Khan said.

They kept on using (the Islamophobia) card whenever they needed to move people towards their opinion, and are wanting to get something out of the of their followers, Khan said.

Islamophobia in mid-Michigan and the age of Trump

Khan was not living in Midland when the Sept. 11 attacks occurred. Instead, he was living in the college town of Madison, Wisconsin, where he said he did not experience much Islamophobia or racism.

But he said smaller and more rural communities, like Midland and Mount Pleasant, are where he experienced many of his hate incidents. Khan works as a physician in Mount Pleasant, where his patients have told him that Muslims are bad people, but your are a good person.

When the Islamic Center of Midland opened in 2011 in Lincoln Township, Jamil said it gave the Midland Muslim community a central location to meet. But getting the center there did not come without an uphill battle. During the Lincoln Township meetings that had discussions over this, many residents had concerns over misconceptions about the center.

For instance, one resident said they did not want the center there because they did not think it was a good spot for the center, or they did not want to hear a call to prayer from the center. Jamil said this was never going to happen, since the center is in a rural area and the call to prayer would not be heard by its attendees.

The center was not approved by the board the first time, so it took another meeting where Muslims and non-Muslims came to rally support for the center. The center passed through the township board that time.

She said living in Midland after 9/11 was mostly free of Islamophobic instances, but the hardest years came more recently when former president Donald Trump became a prominent politician.

The whole rhetoric and hate that (Trump) spewed and brought to the surface made it almost politically OK correct to express your racist, bigoted thoughts, Jamil said.

Khan agreed, and said that Trump used the same Islamophobia card, making many people, even in Midland, to start saying Islamophobic things they were not saying before.

With his kids, Khan fears for their safety, and tries to not let them go out alone in Midland at night. When attending a public space, like a park, he looks out for any possible hostility and moves his family away if he feels like there is any nearby. Recently in Midland Public Schools, Khan said his third daughter was told by a Trump supporter that Muslims are bad and that they should get rid of Muslims.

About three years ago, Christensens kids, who are mixed race, went to play on some play sets at the Midland Mall. But other kids there said, Only white faces could play.

Jamil had a similar experience when her son was called a terrorist when he attended a Midland middle school. She only found out about it after another classmate told her, and she went to the principal, who she said was helpful in the situation. Her daughters experienced microaggressions, with substitute teachers asking one of her daughters if she got her hijab back home. She got her hijab in Midland.

Muslim kids, minority kids or kids that are not white in Midland sometimes carry these burdens, but they are unspoken, Jamil said. "They do not always share everything that they are going through because they feel like it is part of who they are. It is part of the baggage of being Muslim in Midland."

Jamil said it makes her angry, and exhausted, when she hears people displaying misconceptions about Muslims and cannot look beyond their biases and prejudices. She gets fatigue sometimes after telling people the same point over and over again, like that a small handful of radical terrorists do not define Islam. She asks non-Muslims to share these points as well.

Sometimes, I feel that I'm not getting treated equally, Khan said.

Fighting stereotypes and changing perspectives

Despite them representing an extremely slim number of the faith, Jamil said many Muslims feel they have to apologize for the actions of a few.

I can't tell you how many times Muslims, individually and collectively, have had to just apologize for individuals out there that claim to be Muslims that do something inappropriate, Jamil said. I do not want to apologize for every crazy lunatic out there that takes it upon him or herself to do this or that. They are acting of their own volition.

When someone has a misconception about Islam or Muslims, Khan said if a person seems reasonable, he can talk to them and hopefully make them see different sides of Muslims.

Community outreach is important to Jamil to help educate people on their faith and to shed negative perceptions. She said people are more likely to be Islamophobic if they never had met a Muslim before, so even just going out and talking to people helps.

One way to address racism and Islamophobia is to teach against it to children. When her kids were in Midland schools, Jamil asked if she could teach about Ramadan to all the other kids and help her kids feel empowered.

Not only has Jamil given presentations in MPS, she also helped donated books that related to Islam, such as a book about an Olympic, Muslim-American fencer. She also helped fundraise multicultural crayons for Midland, Meridian, and Bullock Creek public schools.

Another recent way the Islamic Center has done community outreach was its response to the 2020 Edenville Dam failure flood that hit the village of Sanford particularly hard. Jamil, the outreach coordinator for the Islamic Center, said she and her colleague, Haley Lodhi, wanted to help in the immediate aftermath of the flood. Christensen and Khan both said they also helped.

They started by delivering bagged lunches and adopting five families. They would deliver items, such as towels and bedsheets, that the families said they needed. The center also assisted with rebuilding efforts, helped by massive amounts of financial donations coming from people in Sanford and Midland.

The center helped raised over $175,000 for flood victims in Sanford.

Jamil said it is fair to say that most people in the rural village had never met a Muslim before. She said while the center wanted to help for humanitarian purposes first and foremost, a side-benefit was that it gave them an positive image of Muslims.

She said while the Midland community may have a side of intolerance, it also has an equal and perhaps louder side. Many in the community have also been open to reaching out, ask questions and be friends with members of the Muslim community.

While Islamophobia and racism will never die off completely, Khan said he is optimistic that things will get better. However, he said when incidents involving Muslims happen, such as terror attacks, he feels like whatever progress the Muslim community has gained, they take a few steps back.

I wish I had a crystal ball that we could see 20 years from now how things have panned out, Jamil said. I would say that there is a greater awareness and a lot more people are vocal against Islamophobia than maybe used to be.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP)  The U.S. has removed its most advanced missile defense system and Patriot batteries from Saudi Arabia in recent weeks, even as the kingdom faced continued air attacks from Yemen's Houthi rebels, satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press show.

The redeployment of the defenses from Prince Sultan Air Base outside of Riyadh came as America's Gulf Arab allies nervously watched the chaotic withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, including their last-minute evacuations from Kabul's besieged international airport.

While tens of thousands of American forces remain across the Arabian Peninsula as a counterweight to Iran, Gulf Arab nations worry about the U.S.'s future plans as its military perceives a growing threat in Asia that requires those missile defenses. Tensions remain high as negotiations appear stalled in Vienna over Iran's collapsed nuclear deal with world powers, raising the danger of future confrontations in the region.

Perceptions matter whether or not theyre rooted in a cold, cold reality. And the perception is very clear that the U.S. is not as committed to the Gulf as it used to be in the views of many people in decision-making authority in the region, said Kristian Ulrichsen, a research fellow at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University.

From the Saudi point of view, they now see Obama, Trump and Biden  three successive presidents  taking decisions that signify to some extent an abandonment.

Prince Sultan Air Base, some 115 kilometers (70 miles) southeast of Riyadh, has hosted several thousand U.S. troops since a 2019 missile-and-drone attack on the heart of the kingdom's oil production. That attack, though claimed by Yemen's Houthi rebels, appears instead to have been carried out by Iran, according to experts and physical debris left behind. Tehran has denied launching the attack, though a drill in January saw Iranian paramilitary forces use similar drones.

Just southwest of the air base's runway, a 1-square-kilometer (third-of-a-square-mile) area set off by an earthen berm saw American forces station Patriot missile batteries, as well as one advanced Terminal High Altitude Area Defense unit, according to satellite images from Planet Labs Inc. A THAAD can destroy ballistic missiles at a higher altitude than Patriots.

A satellite image seen by the AP in late August showed some of the batteries removed from the area, though activity and vehicles still could be seen there. A high-resolution Planet Lab satellite picture taken Friday showed the batteries' pads at the site empty, with no visible activity.

A redeployment of the missiles had been rumored for months, in part due to a desire to face what American officials see as the looming great powers conflict" with China and Russia. However, the withdrawal came just as a Houthi drone attack on Saudi Arabia wounded eight people and damaged a commercial jetliner at the kingdom's airport in Abha. The kingdom has been locked in a stalemate war with the Houthis since March 2015.

Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby acknowledged the redeployment of certain air defense assets after receiving questions from the AP. He said the U.S. maintained a broad and deep commitment to its Mideast allies.

"The Defense Department continues to maintain tens of thousands of forces and a robust force posture in the Middle East representing some of our most advanced air power and maritime capabilities, in support of U.S. national interests and our regional partnerships, Kirby said.

In a statement to the AP, the Saudi Defense Ministry described the kingdom's relationship with the U.S. as strong, longstanding and historic even while acknowledging the withdrawal of the American missile defense systems. It said the Saudi military is capable of defending its lands, seas and airspace, and protecting its people.

The redeployment of some defense capabilities of the friendly United States of America from the region is carried out through common understanding and realignment of defense strategies as an attribute of operational deployment and disposition, the statement said.

Despite those assurances, Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal, the kingdom's former intelligence chief whose public remarks often track with the thoughts of its Al Saud ruling family, has linked the Patriot missile deployments directly to America's relationship to Riyadh.

I think we need to be reassured about American commitment, the prince told CNBC in an interview aired this week. "That looks like, for example, not withdrawing Patriot missiles from Saudi Arabia at a time when Saudi Arabia is the victim of missile attacks and drone attacks  not just from Yemen, but from Iran.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, on a tour of the Mideast in recent days, had been slated to go to Saudi Arabia but the trip was canceled due to what American officials referred to as scheduling problems. Saudi Arabia declined to discuss why Austin's trip didn't happen after the withdrawal of the missile defenses.

Saudi Arabia maintains its own Patriot missile batteries and typically fires two missiles at an incoming target. That's become an expensive proposition amid the Houthi campaign, as each Patriot missile costs more than $3 million. The kingdom also claims to intercept nearly every missile and drone launched at the kingdom, an incredibly high success rate previously questioned by experts.

While Greece agreed in April to lend a Patriot missile battery to Saudi Arabia, the timing of the U.S. withdrawals comes amid wider uncertainty over the American posture in the region. Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab countries have renewed diplomacy with Iran as a hedge.

I think we saw in Bidens statements on Afghanistan, the way he said things that hes clearly going to put U.S. interests first and obviously that came as quite a disappointment to partners and allies around the world who maybe hoped for something different after Trump, said Ulrichsen, the research fellow. "He sounds quite similar to an America First approach, just sort of a different tone.

___

Associated Press writers Lolita C. Baldor in Washington and Aya Batrawy contributed to this report.

___

Follow Jon Gambrell on Twitter at www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP.
The following list includes recent reports from the Midland County Sheriffs Office and the Midland Police Department. Compiled by reporter Andrew Mullin.

Sunday, Sept. 5

11:29 p.m.  Deputies responded to a Lincoln Township location regarding a vehicle driving the wrong way. Deputies checked the area and were unable to locate the vehicle.

11:23 p.m.  Deputies were dispatched to speak with a 42-year-old Lee township male regarding questions about his 38-year-old Geneva Township ex-girlfriend. The male wanted deputies to contact his ex-girlfriend and tell her to leave him alone.

9:57 p.m.  Deputies were dispatched to a Greendale Township residence for a suspicious situation. The caller, a 62-year-old Greendale Township male, advised he could hear what sounded like someone knocking on his door and trying to get in. Deputies checked the male's property and did not notice any damage to his doors or windows. Deputies did not locate any suspicious subjects in the area and they checked with neighbors who did not notice any suspicious activity.

8:56 p.m.  Deputies were dispatched to a Lincoln Township residence for a verbal argument between a 47-year-old Lincoln Township male and a 25-year-old Lincoln Township male. Both parties were interviewed, it was determined no assault occurred. Both parties agreed to remain separated for the remainder of the night.

8:42 p.m.  Deputies were dispatched to a Lee Township residence to speak with a 67-year-old Lee Township male reference an unknown husky dog that attacked about six of his chickens. The value of the damaged property was about $120. Deputies checked around the area in attempt to locate the dog owner without success. The dog was transported to the Midland County Human Society for lodging.

7:03 p.m.  Officers responded disorderly conduct on Cinema Boulevard.

4:03 p.m.  Officers responded to a domestic assault on Dublin Avenue.

3:15 p.m.  An 80-year-old Lincoln Township female called 911 and reported that someone turned her yard light from the on position to motion light. The female wanted the incident documented in case suspicious activity continues to happen.

1:08 p.m.  Officers responded to a malicious destruction of property on West Carpenter Street.

12:51 p.m.  Officers responded to a case of larceny on Wheeler Street.

11:27 a.m.  Deputies responded to a Lincoln Township residence reference a dog bite complaint. Deputies contacted the complainant, a 41-year-old Lincoln Township female, who advised her boyfriend was attacked by the neighbors dog. Deputies learned the male was not bit, but the dog came after him and tried biting at his boot. Deputies contacted the dog owner, and subsequently secured the dog. This complaint will be forwarded to Midland County Animal Control for review.

11:11 a.m.  Officers responded to a verbal domestic situation on Eastman Avenue.

5:49 a.m.  Officers responded to a vehicle crash in the area of West Main and Ashman streets.

5:09 a.m.  Officers responded to a verbal domestic situation in the area of Eastlawn Drive.

2:59 a.m.  A deputy was dispatched to a Jerome Township residence reference a wellbeing check on a 46-year-old female. The complainant advised that she had not heard from her mother in a day and was worried. No one was home.

2:25 a.m.  Officers responded to a malicious destruction of property on Helen Street.
Since our founding in 1776, the United States or her territories have been attacked 16 times before Sept. 11, 2001. Unlike military attacks by foreign powers in 1812 (Great Britain) and 1941 (Japan), September 11, 2001 was an attack on the United States by terrorists; not a foreign country but a group of 19 radical individuals from four countries that took exception with America's free, open and inclusive society.

Why they attacked us

America stood for the promise of inalienable rights for allfor life, liberty, private property and the pursuit of happiness. 9/11 was an attack on the very reason we exist  our love of freedom, our belief in a constitution and rule of law, our belief in individual rights, rights that are owned by both genders, all walks of life, regardless of race, color, religion, or sexual preference.

They also attacked us because we believe in a free American economy, driven by entrepreneurship, invention and innovation. An economy like no other, where young and old, rich and poor, born in America or immigrant can dream of starting a business and bring it successfully to fruition as long as they satisfy their customers and shareholders. Today those businesses are run and/or owned by less than 4.2 percent of the worlds population yet they produce more than 24.3 percent of the worlds GDP. American companies produce a disproportionately large number of the worlds goods and services from companies like Amazon, Apple, Coca-Cola, Disney, Dow, General Motors, Google, and McDonalds largely due to the free enterprise system in which they function. The U.S. economy and her people were in 2001  and are today  an enduring monument to what human beings from around the world can accomplish within the borders of an exceptional and free country.

Our heroes

The attacks of 9/11 resulted in 2,996 deaths; 19 hijackers committed murder/suicide, killed 2,977 loved ones and left more than 6,000 injured. 265 died on the four planes that attacked the Twin Towers in New York City, the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and in Pennsylvania farmland. 2,606 were killed in the World Trade Center and surrounding areas, and 125 died at the Pentagon. One can only imagine the death toll had it not been for the brave passengers who thwarted the terrorist attack on the White House with United flight 93 by bringing it to an end in the fields of Shanksville, Pennsylvania. In all, the 2,977 victims were free human beings performing the daily tasks they loved that made America great. For this, they were loathed by the hijackers who killed thempeople from many countries, men and women, people of numerous faiths and ages, simply because they believed in freedom and the power of ideas. Instead of convincing others of the merits of their arguments, they chose to use force and terror in an attempt to impose their warped values.

Today we must never forget the 2,977 victims of 9/11, the more than 6,000 people injured and all family and friends. We must continue to support organizations like the World Trade Center Health Program (WTCHP) that serves over 100,000 enrolled survivors suffering from physical, psychological, and emotional stressors from 9/11. And charities for victims families like Tunnels to Towers, which supports families of deceased and injured 9/11 first responders and families of fallen and injured soldiers who after 9/11 defended American freedoms and brought Osama bin Laden to justice.

Why we must be concerned

We must also not forget the negative impact the terrorist attack had on our economy; an economy that lost roughly $32.4 billion due to factors from business interruption to property loss, saw GDP growth reduced by roughly .05% or $50 billion and realized just under 600,000 American jobs lost to 9/11 in 2001.

Today, America is measurably different than it was when 9/11 took place and in some ways, less capable of defending itself and our allies around the world. The U.S. national debt is more than $28 trillion and almost 126% of U.S. GDP; compare that with our national debt of only 56% of U.S. GDP in 2000, with many of our allies debt ridden in 2021 as well. Today many more countries have or are working to acquire nuclear weapons. China and Russia have more powerful militaries today and have made expansionary moves on Hong Kong and the Ukraine with China speaking openly of taking control over Taiwan.

Since 9/11, the federal government has taken over even greater control of the medical side of the U.S. economy, with current calls by many in Washington for greater government control of community college education, the automobile industry and the energy sector, to name a few. We strongly believe a U.S. economy that is less free, less competitive, less diverse, and less market-driven, will produce higher taxes, fewer jobs, less GDP, reduced tax revenue, and a weaker country less capable of defending itself from threats foreign and domestic, along with a reduced role in championing and protecting the freedoms of many around the world.

Peace through strength

Most recently, the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan has weakened the morale of our troops, veterans, and longtime allies. Their confidence in, and admiration for our foreign policy, and our resolve to be the worlds voice of liberty and the hammer of justice is now in question.

Let's celebrate our heroes of 9/11 and the American can-do spirit that allowed us to rebound from one of this countrys great tragedies. However, we must also be concerned for our future and ensure we have a strong American economy, one that is capable of defending itself and our allies against evil.

Dr. Timothy G. Nash is director of the McNair Center at Northwood University. Allen West is a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel and a candidate for governor of Texas. Jimmy Greene is president of the Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) of Michigan.
Leon Jones passed away at his home in Dallas, Texas. He is preceded in death by his twin brother Louis Jones, a son Timothy Jones and his father Elmer Jones. He is survived by his sister, Katie Jones Hodges of Dallas, Texas, a brother Calvin Jones of Dallas and locally by his sister Lois Jon
New York, US (PANA) - With just over 100 days until landmark elections in Libya, political leaders must join forces to ensure the vote is free, fair and inclusive, the UN envoy for the country told the Security Council on Friday
Photo: (Photo : Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

According to doctors, parents should not bring children exposed to COVID-19 in schools to the emergency room if they do not have any symptoms.

Fox News reported that parents and their kids have been crowding the ER in the past weeks at the SSM Health Cardinal Glennon Children's Hospital in Missouri. This has resulted in the delay of service for other non-COVID cases because of the long line of patients.

Although the doctors won't turn away people who come to the ER, Dr. Rachel Charney said that parents should bring their children to actual COVID-19 testing sites instead, especially if they need to meet the COVID-19 testing requirements of the school. Charney also advised parents to check with their doctors or the public health department for possible COVID-19 testing sites.

Read Also: Mu Variant: How Does This New COVID Compare to Delta?

Dr. Brent Kaziny of the Emergency Management at Texas Children's Hospital also advised parents not to bring their children to the ER for COVID-19 testing as emergency rooms cannot attend to all patients. She told Houston Chronicle that their pediatric ER has been busier this fall season because of increased respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) cases.

When to Bring Children to the ER

According to Dr. Cory Showalter of the Riley Children's Health in Illinois, parents should watch out for symptoms like difficulty in breathing and dehydration. If the children exhibit these worrying signs, then they can go to the emergency room to receive COVID-19 medical care as soon as possible.

Children with medical conditions, coupled with upper respiratory issues and fever higher than 100.4 degrees, may also go to the ER. Parents may bring their kids to urgent care facilities for non-threatening symptoms like allergies, stuffy noses, vomiting, or body aches.

Know before you go.

Please help us spread the word to help keep our facilities operating efficiently. pic.twitter.com/wG9JVcsMFc  Riley Children's (@RileyChildrens) August 24, 2021

The Riley Children's Health sees about 20 to 40 pediatric COVID-19 cases every day when school started in Texas. Since the pandemic's start in 2020, the state has had over 100,000 children under 17 years old who tested positive for the virus, which is about 12.5 percent of the total cases.

Ideally, the doctors said that people, whether adults or children, should go for a test at least three to five days after their exposure to reduce the chances of a false negative result. Most schools in the U.S. require children who have tested positive for COVID-19 to notify the school, the families of their classmates and school staff, and the local public health department.

Children's Immune System Still Better than Adults

Meanwhile, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) from March 2021 to August suggested that only two percent of children under 18 years old in the U.S. have been hospitalized for COVID-19. While there have been deaths among minors, these cases involved children with weaker immunities, underlying or chronic conditions.

The experts said that kids are "relatively spared" from the worst of COVID-19 because they have stronger immunities than adults. According to Dr. Betsy Herold of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, children's immunity response seems to have been "revved up and ready to go" when the pandemic threats started.

The experts also noted no clear evidence that children are vulnerable to the Delta COVID-19 variant. However, cases among kids are rising because most adults have been vaccinated against the virus.

Related Article: Ivermectin Poisoning: Families Infected With COVID-19 Getting More Sick From Misusing Anti-Parasite Medication
Photo: (Photo : Alex Wong/Getty Images)

The Justice Department under President Joe Biden is challenging the newly established Texas abortion law in court for its "unconstitutional" conditions. Senate Bill 8 (SB8), which took effect on Sept. 1, 2021, prohibits abortions in pregnancies as early as six weeks.

Attorney General Merrick Garland filed the lawsuit in a federal court Thursday, seeking to invalidate the abortion law. In a statement, Garland said that no state should "deprive individuals of their constitutional rights" by enforcing legislation "designed to prevent the vindication of those rights." The complaint also cited that the Texas abortion law is an "open defiance of the Constitution" as it bans nearly all abortion procedures.

SB8 has a unique provision that allows private individuals, instead of state officers, to sue abortion providers. Garland said in the 30-page complaint that this rule empowers the people to become "bounty hunters" who go after women and the people assisting them in the abortion. Garland said that if the Texas abortion law prevails, other states could follow and disregard the constitutional rights of more women.

Read Also: Paid Leave For Miscarriage: Lawmakers Introduce New Legislation for Workers

No Exception for Rape or Incest Pregnancies

The Texas abortion law doesn't make any exceptions apart from medical emergencies. This means that women who get pregnant because of rape or incest may also be sued if they abort the baby at six weeks.

Gov. Greg Abbott defended leaving out exceptions for rape or incest cases during a press conference. He said that the law doesn't require women who become abuse victims to carry on with the pregnancy term since his government will "eliminate rape."

"Texas will work tirelessly to make sure that we eliminate all rapists," the governor said. "So goal No. 1 in the State of Texas is to eliminate rape so that no woman - no person - will be a victim of rape."

But Brett Ligon, a Republican district attorney in Montgomery County, said that eliminating rapists in Texas cannot realistically happen. Most victims will also refuse to come forward because of the stigma attached to their situation.

More often than not, women, regardless of how they got pregnant, find out that they're with a child past the sixth week of pregnancy; thus, they won't be able to get an abortion in Texas. Abortion providers said that this would constitute 85 percent of the procedures.

An Audacious Step

Meanwhile, the Texas abortion law supporters called the lawsuit an "audacious overstep from the Biden administration." John Seago of the Texas Right to Life anti-abortion group said that the complaint violates Texas's ability to act on the issues faced by its constituents.

Renae Eze, the state's press secretary, said that the Biden administration is more interested in saving face for the Afghanistan evacuation and the reopening of borders, but it won't uphold the policies that protect the innocent.

Abortion providers hailed the Department of Justice's move as many patients are denied access to receive this specific essential medical care in Texas. Planned Parenthood Federation of America thanked the Biden administration for its action, especially after the Supreme Court denied the organization's bid to stop the enforcement of the Texas abortion law.

Related Article: Texas Abortion Law: Supreme Court Won't Block Six-Week Abortion Ban
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***

A new article, by Jeff Lindsay, went up earlier today in Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship:

Book of Abraham Polemics: Dan Vogels Broad Critique of the Defense of the Book of Abraham

Review of Dan Vogel, Book of Abraham Apologetics: A Review and Critique (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2021). 250 pp. $18.95 (softback).

Abstract: Dan Vogels latest book claims to offer clear-cut evidence showing what, when, and how Joseph Smith fraudulently translated the Book of Abraham. While he claims to use an objective approach, he instead weaves a polemical agenda that ignores some of the most important scholarship in favor of the Book of Abraham. He ignores crucial evidence and relies on assumptions and hypotheses as if they were established facts. The arguments of apologists, which he claims to be reviewing and critiquing, are often overlooked or, when treated, attacked without letting readers know the substance of the apologetic argument. He neglects key arguments, and important documents that dont fit his theory. The work is a valuable tool to explore Book of Abraham polemics, but it is not even-handed scholarship by any means. Vogels latest contribution does not overturn the evidence against his paradigm nor overthrow the growing body of insights into the antiquity of the Book of Abraham.

And this article, which was written by Garrett R. Maxwell, was also published today in Interpreter:

The Good God Hermeneutic: A Reconsideration of Religious Vocabulary

Review of Fiona Givens and Terryl Givens, All Things New: Rethinking Sin, Salvation, and Everything In Between (Faith Matters Press, 2020). 188 pages. $12.95 (paperback).

Abstract: Fiona and Terryl Givens once again deliver a book worthy of the comparatively wide readership they have gained within Latter- day Saint circles. Their orderly treatment of individual gospel concepts in this book can rightly be seen as a distillation and unification of their previous work, boldly attempting to awaken us from our ignorance of the sheer novelty and vitality contained in the Restoration vision of God and humanity. They convincingly argue that the historically wrought semantic baggage that comes with the most basic religious vocabulary we use must be consciously jettisoned to fully appreciate and articulate the meaning of the Restoration.

***

Well, I think we managed, in our drive up the coast today, to cover pretty much all of the important surfing hot spots in New Hampshire. We also discovered a remarkable and very good restaurant, and I want to share its name with you in case you ever find yourself in or driving through Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Please, you get the chance, check out Green Elephant. Dont be put off by the fact that its a vegetarian establishment. The food was really, really delicious.

En route from Boston to Portsmouth, we spent a little bit of time in Salem, Massachusetts, including a brief drive over by the famous House of the Seven Gables of which Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote. We encountered no witches in Salem, which was a considerable disappointment.

But there is a connection to Latter-day Saint history in Salem, and to Joseph Smith himself:

On 6 August 1836, he received the revelation known to us now as Section 111 of the Doctrine and Covenants at . . . Salem, Massachusetts. Here is a brief quotation from the official section heading:

At this time the leaders of the Church were heavily in debt due to their labors in the ministry. Hearing that a large amount of money would be available to them in Salem, the Prophet, Sidney Rigdon, Hyrum Smith, and Oliver Cowdery traveled there from Kirtland, Ohio, to investigate this claim, along with preaching the gospel. The brethren transacted several items of Church business and did some preaching. When it became apparent that no money was to be forthcoming, they returned to Kirtland.

Before arriving at Salem, we passed through Topsfield, Massachusetts, a place with a relationship to the history of the Joseph Smith family. We didnt stop; we had been there before.

***

This is a touching story:

Rival Orem soccer teams come together mid-game to pray for player

***

Its late notice, I realize, for the first session of streaming on Saturday morning, but not for the second (which will occur on Sunday):

The Tabernacle Choir to Stream 9/11 Special: 20th anniversary broadcast features award-winning journalist Jane Clayson Johnson

How to Watch/Listen to Choirs 9/11 | Coming Together

The streaming and the telecast will both be accessible, of course, at no charge.

Of course, if that way of remembering the September 11th terrorist attacks and honoring their victims is not to your taste or liking, a very distinct alternative will also be available:

Donald Trump Signs Up to Call Boxing Match on 20th Anniversary of 9/11: I LOVE GREAT FIGHTERS!

Donald Trump, son to provide commentary on Evander Holyfield-Vitor Belfort alternate telecast

You can tune in for just $49.99.

***

In the end  and in the beginning  its all about love: 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. (John 3:16)

In this context, I cite yet again one of my favorite sayings from the Prophet Joseph Smith:

Love is one of the chief characteristics of Deity, and ought to be manifested by those who aspire to be the sons of God. A man filled with the love of God, is not content with blessing his family alone, but ranges through the whole world, anxious to bless the whole human race. (History of the Church, 4:227; from a letter from Joseph Smith to the Twelve, 15 December 1840, Nauvoo, Illinois, published in Times and Seasons, 1 January 1841, p. 258; this letter is incorrectly dated 19 October 1840 in History of the Church.)

And heres another:

[A member of the Church] is to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to provide for the widow, to dry up the tear of the orphan, to comfort the afflicted, whether in this church, or in any other, or in no church at all, wherever he finds them. (Editors reply to a letter from Richard Savary, Times and Seasons, 15 March 1842, p. 732; Joseph Smith was the editor of the periodical.)

Posted from Portsmouth, New Hampshire
The Minister for Communications and Digitalisation Mrs. Ursula Owusu Ekuful has urged the Ghana Post to maximize the use of existing infrastructure to position the company as the front runner in the industry.



The legislature made this call on her visit to some rehabilitated post offices in the Central Region.



The E-transform project under the MoCD financed by the World Bank is rehabilitating 25 selected Post offices to provide e-Services.



Under the project, 50 Post Offices will be equipped with IT and office equipment for an efficient and effective discharge of duties.



Mrs. Ekuful interacting with Managers and staff of the Ghana Post at the Adisadel Branch tasked them to brainstorm in-house and leverage their brand as the unique selling proposition and capture the evolving market.



The Minister visited the Senya, Swedru, UCC, and the Adisadel offices of the Ghana Post



E-Service



e-services is the new strategic direction of Ghana Post aimed at turning the post office into a one-stop shop for government services at the community level.



Some of the e-services products include the sale of forms, results checkers, online applications, requests for transcripts and business services.

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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Mr Kwasi Amoako-Atta, Minister for Roads and Highways has called on stakeholders in the construction industry to position themselves strategically to take advantage of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).



According to him the AfCFTA provides numerous opportunities and thus implored the contractors to create a united front and compete fairly with foreign companies.



Mr Amoako-Atta made the call at the National Infrastructure Summit (NFS) 2021 in Accra.



The summit which was attended by professionals from the Built Industry was on the theme: The AfCFTA project financing and the construction industry in Ghana Myths or Reality.



The National Infrastructure Summit 2021 among other things sought to identify the opportunities under the AfCFTA for players in the construction industry to take full advantage of.



Mr Amoako-Atta also charged the construction industry to take the lead in terms of forming a strong consortium to be able to bid for big contracts for other sectors to follow.



He assured that the government would continue to partner and assist the Ghana Chamber of Construction Industry (GhCCI) with the things they required.



Mr Kwabena Agyapong, Executive Director, West African Federation of Engineering Organisation in his comment stated that the National Infrastructure Summit was intended to expose to the construction sector benefits that can accrue to them under the AfCFTA.



He said the conference seeks to create awareness for people to position themselves to take advantage of the AfCFTA since the market under the Free Trade Area is going to be big.



The market is going to be big, over a billion people on the African continentGhana is only 30 million people. If you are an entrepreneur providing service or a product you have access to a wider market.



Mr Agyapong also called Ghana contractors to form joint ventures to broaden their skillsets to be able to participate or bid for big projects.



He said it was about time Ghanaians got interested and showed more concern about what is in AfCFTA for the Ghanaian people.



Mr Cherry Emmanuel, Chief Executive Officer of GhCCI indicated that the meeting was to enable industry players to brainstorm and to assess the advantages that can accrue to their members under the AfCFTA.



He expressed concern about the rising cost of building materials in the country which he said was affecting the construction industry to be competitive.

Source: GNA









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A total of 51 female beneficiaries of the Youth Employment programme have received training in driving heavy-duty trucks under its Zoom Captains programme of Zoomlion Ghana Limited. They undertook a 15-week training which was crowned in a closing ceremony on Friday, September 10, 2021, at the Armed Forces Supplies and Transport Training School (FATS), Burma Camp in Accra.



The Zoom Captains Concept was launched on July 16, 2008,when25 Female Youth Employment beneficiaries were trained in the operation of various categories of Heavy-duty/ Earth Moving Equipment. ( Excavators, graders, vibratory rollers, payloaders and thrash compactors) Today these operators have been absorbed into our mainstream operations and can be seen exhibiting their skills on the various landfill sites and sites where we need to construct roads to aid our operations.

It is the objective of the company to also build a work environment that encourages and promotes affirmative action in less popular feminine job roles that the Zoom Captains program was extended to mainstream commercial driving.

Closing the ceremony, the Commanding Officer of the FATS, Lieutenant Colonel Franklin Gyamerah Amoako, charged the participants to put into practice the knowledge and skill they have acquired as well as the discipline they experienced. He expressed the schools appreciation to the Jospong Group of Companies for making them a part of their training programme.



And it is also my hope that when you get out there, you will be given the opportunity to handle and operate these vehicles because you have all the competencies to do so, he said.



However, he recommended that the new female heavy-duty truck drivers should be attached to the companys male heavy duty trucks drivers to further build their confidence and sharpen their competencies and enable the new drivers to be conversant with the operations of the heavy-duty vehicles.



According to Lt. Col. Franklyn Gyamerah Amoako, the ladies have acquired competencies in driving various tonnage capacities of trucks, I must say these were ladies who had no knowledge at all in driving, and within the time frame, were able to be transformed from ground zero to heavy-duty drivers, he disclosed.



With the help of instructors, he said, the trainees were taught from scratch how to move a vehicle from rest, changing of gears, steering control, road signs, road manners and ethics among several topics and skills. He explained that this was because apart from the weight of the vehicle, participants had to be introduced to the hydraulics systems, which are a major feature of heavy-duty trucks.



I am also happy to note that in collaboration with the DVLA, the school has managed to acquire for all the 51 participants license B upon which they will systematically be migrated to the license C, D in due course.







Mrs Florence Larbi, Chief Operating Officer (COO) of Environment and Sanitation Cluster of the Jospong Group of Companies (JGC), congratulated the female heavy-duty truck drivers for going through a successful 15-weeks training.



She said these were street sweepers who had no idea in driving, saying today they have been trained to drive heavy-duty trucks of the company.



She maintained that it has always been the vision of the Executive Chairman of JGC, Dr Joseph Siaw Agyepong, to empower women to take up such challenging opportunities to make them confident and compete with their male counterparts.



Zoomlion Ghana Limited and the entire Jospong Group has a culture of empowering our staff with the necessary learning interventions. For example, this year alone, our organization has invested about one million cedis in the developmental needs of our staff with the Ghana Armed Forces training School, she noted.



Adding that the company maintains its focus on enhancing diversity and inclusiveness programmes, and this is another reason why all these ladies here were selected to undertake this Development programme.



Earlier this year, one hundred Drivers and two hundred Janitors were trained and passed out successfully in this same school. These included ladies. Additionally, our management team participated in the Senior Executive Leadership training courses as well. This is to enable us to build a formidable, resilient and disciplined team of employees who deliver efficient services with Military precision.

Source: Peacefmonline.com/ghana









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President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo will host and deliver the Keynote Address at this year's Presidential Business Summit at the Kempinski Hotel Gold Coast City, Accra, slated for September 14-15.



It is an annual calendar event being organized by the Ministry of Trade and Industry, in collaboration with the Office of the President and selected Ministries, Departments and Agencies.



A statement from the Ministry of Trade and Industry, copied to the Ghana News Agency, said the Summit was to provide a platform for structured dialogue between government and the private sector on critical areas of interest to the private sector.



The theme is: Public-Private Dialogue on the Role of the Private Sector in Ghanas Post-COVID Economic Recovery.



The deliberations in the Plenary Sessions will focus on five cross-cutting thematic areas: Fiscal and Non-Fiscal Incentives to Support Production and Private Sector Development; Foreign Exchange Regulation and Currency Stability; Access to Finance and Cost of Capital; Energy Pricing, Availability, Access and Reliability; and Supporting Local Industries through Government Procurement and Local Content Regulation.



This will be followed by Breakout Sessions for a deep dive into seven economic sectors: Agriculture and Agribusiness; Manufacturing; Construction and Mining; Financial Services; Information and Communication Technology; Tourism and Hospitality; and Transport and Logistics.



Deliberations at the Summit will feed into governments Policy Framework for Private Sector Development, including the Budget Statement and the Economic Policy for the Year 2022.



The outcome will be a Ghana Business Compact, which will detail out specific priority areas of government policy interventions in support of private sector development.



Speakers include Mr Pierre Frank Laporte, the Country Director for World Bank Group; Mr Yaw Osafo-Maafo, Senior Presidential Advisor; Mr Alan Kyerematen, Minister of Trade and Industry; Mr Ken Ofori Atta, Finance Minister; Dr Matthew Opoku Prempeh, Energy Minister; Mr Charles Adu-Boahen, Minister of State at the Ministry of Finance, and Dr Ernest Addison, Governor of the Bank of Ghana.

Source: GNA









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Charles Owusu has condemned the 'do or die' affair comment by Ex-President John Dramani Mahama on Akina Radio in the Bono-East Region during his 'Thank You' tour.



Speaking to an obviously shocked Presenter, the former President said; ''We learn from the past so we [NDC] have learned our lessons from the 2020 election. The next elections will be won or lost at the polling station.



If otherwise, it will be a do or die affair at the polling station. The right thing must be done. We will win our election at the polling station.



We will do everything to make sure the election is transparent and fair. We dont want to cheat them, so they shouldnt. We wont wait for any Supreme Court, no!



Responding to John Mahama's comments during a panel discussion on Peace FM's 'Kokrokoo' programme, the former Head of Monitoring Unit at the Forestry Commission, Charles Owusu asked him to desist from making utterances that could potentially foment mayhem.



"I don't think anybody should entertain these statements and come to explain to us what he (Mahama) said. It's plain language. Nobody will go into the 2024 elections to die for any person to become President in this country," he cautioned.



He further schooled Mr. Mahama on the importance of life over death saying, "what we can't use money to buy, we can't use power or money to protect it. That's life; nothing on earth is important than it. Your legacy in the world is your life. Power doesn't guarantee your life".



"With all due respect, Mr. President, what you said was inappropriate," he stressed.





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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Leslie John McCulloch, shown here in a 2019 police photo, has been granted day parole after serving just over two years of an eight-year sentence imposed for drug trafficking.
Mourners stand at the rim of the north pool with the white World Trade Center Oculus in the background after the conclusion of ceremonies to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, at the National September 11 Memorial and Museum in New York, Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP-John Minchillo
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With COVID-19 cases on the rise in South Carolina, residents are being encouraged to learn more about monoclonal antibodies.

The South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control and S.C. Gov. Henry McMaster are prompting residents to look at the use and availability of these antibodies, a treatment proven to be effective in staving off serious illness from COVID-19, according to a Friday release.

Beyond a shadow of a doubt, the most effective way to protect ourselves and our loved ones from COVID-19 is to make the decision to get vaccinated, stated McMaster. Weve also seen that the use of these antibody treatments can greatly reduce the risk of hospitalization and severe illness in those who test positive. These treatments are now available at over 50 healthcare providers across the state, and were working to expand access to them every day. We continue to strongly encourage South Carolinians to get educate themselves about all of their options and talk to their doctor about whats best for them.

DHEC recommendations on COVID-19 vaccinations and masking have not changed: we still urge the usage of both and believe they are the best ways to get us out this pandemic, stated Dr. Edward Simmer, DHEC director. That said, it is important that South Carolinians know about all available resources to keep them safe. Monoclonal antibodies are safe and effective, and our state has several locations where residents can receive them.

Monoclonal antibodies are a type of treatment doctors have been using for COVID-19 patients since November 2020, when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued Emergency Use Authorizations for treatments.

One antibody, bamlanivimab, cannot be used by itself but can be used when combined with estesevimab to achieve the desired level of effectiveness. The other currently authorized monoclonal antibody treatments are casirivimab plus imdevimab (REGEN-COV) and sotrovimab.

These antibodies work by directly blocking the effect of the COVID-19 virus in patients that are already infected.

Treatment using these antibodies must be authorized and ordered by a doctor or medical provider. Those eligible to receive the treatment are at-risk individuals aged 12 and older who test positive for COVID-19 and exhibit mild to moderate symptoms that began within the last 10 days.

In addition, individuals with COVID-19 are not eligible for the treatment if they have been or are currently hospitalized or have received oxygen to assist with normal breathing.

DHEC is working with providers to expand treatment locations, including to areas where there currently are no providers. As of Sept. 1, more than 16,000 COVID-19 patients in South Carolina have been treated with monoclonal antibodies. It is estimated that this treatment has prevented nearly 2,000 hospitalizations and 200 deaths.

DHECs webpage on monoclonal antibodies includes facts on the treatment and a map of treatment locations across the state.
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Editor's note: This article was updated Sept. 13 to more accurately describe the pit production projects currently underway.

An exchange between three congressmen earlier this month provided a distilled look at the ongoing plutonium pit production debate, as the Department of Energy presses forward with its plans to craft the nuclear weapon cores in South Carolina and New Mexico.

Questions of price, timing and usefulness have for years dominated the plutonium-core discourse in Washington, D.C., and beyond. Lawmakers representing states with seemingly the most to gain  federal investment, jobs and, arguably, cachet  have coalesced and presented a bipartisan front. Others have pushed back, a skeptical cohort warning of government excess, incompetence and saber-rattling.

Such a clash played out in miniature Sept. 1, as the House Armed Services Committee worked through its version of the fiscal year 2022 National Defense Authorization Act, a bundle of defense spending and policy. Suggestions made by Rep. John Garamendi, a California Democrat, sparked a back and forth with Rep. Joe Wilson, a South Carolina Republican, and Rep. Adam Smith, the Washington Democrat at the helm of the committee.

Garamendi questioned the need for a second plutonium pit factory  namely the Savannah River Plutonium Processing Facility at the Savannah River Site  when another, earlier option is already in the works at Los Alamos National Laboratory, near Santa Fe, New Mexico.

If you work the math out, we do not need to spend somewhere between $11 billion and $15 billion on an additional pit production facility in Savannah, and we would have sufficient pits, should we ever decide to build the 87-1, which is questionable at the moment, he said, referencing the W87-1 warhead, which is slated for use on the contested Ground Based Strategic Deterrent.

The National Nuclear Security Administration has estimated the Savannah River Plutonium Processing Facility could cost some $11 billion, a price tag that has ruffled congressional feathers, and could come online years after its actually due. In contrast, the pit project in New Mexico could cost $3.9 billion, according to a preliminary NNSA estimate published in April.

So, Garamendi asked, why are we spending this money to build pits that we dont need in a pit facility that we dont need?

Wilson, whose district includes the Savannah River Site and all of Aiken County, responded: Having two sites eliminates a single-point failure. Los Alamos and the Savannah River Site work together to create a resilient production of our nuclear weapon cores, he said. Both sites are crucial, and critical, for deterrence for peace.

Its a rebuttal leaning on the greatest hits; if one facility goes down, officials have said time and again, another can pick up the slack. But exactly how much slack can be picked up, and when, is unclear.

Pit manufacturing risks for warheads are mitigated with both Los Alamos and the Savannah River Site, especially with the capacity constraints at Los Alamos, Wilson continued. This was verified by the NNSA in a PowerPoint three weeks ago.

As federal law currently stands, 80 plutonium pits  triggers  are required by 2030 and beyond. Gen. John Hyten, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has said his greatest infrastructure-related concern is any delay that would hobble pit fabrication. The leader of U.S. Strategic Command, Adm. Charles Richard, has expressed similar worries.

But nobody, Smith said this month, thinks that were going to produce 80 pits a year by 2030. It is, currently, a complete impossibility. While production benchmarks in 2024, 2025 and 2026 are achievable in New Mexico, the National Nuclear Security Administrations Michael Thompson explained in August, current planning shows the production deadline in South Carolina will be missed. And Los Alamos cant handle all 80 on its own, complicating the calculus.

The estimate is that at the earliest, Savannah River would be able to be online and begin producing pits by 2034, said Smith, who distrusts the South Carolina complex after the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility fiasco. So thats four years after our 2030 requirement.

Biden administration officials support the tandem approach, which was launched and massaged under President Donald Trump. Both Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm and National Nuclear Security Administration boss Jill Hruby have endorsed the Savannah River Site-Los Alamos split, despite lingering questions and uncertainties.

There is bipartisan support for the two-site solution, Wilson said during the NDAA markup. I am really grateful that I actually represent the Savannah River Site along with my colleague, Congressman Jim Clyburn, who is a strong supporter of plutonium pit production at the Savannah River Site.

Clyburn is the House majority whip  a formidable force. His district, the states 6th, includes a portion of the Savannah River Site. Some in Aiken County have described Clyburn as instrumental to the sites health as a behind-the-scenes powerbroker.

He has always been strong with finding funding for us, Aiken Chamber of Commerce President and CEO J. David Jameson said in a November 2020 interview. So its the same deal. His knowledge of the site. His ability to produce. And his staffs knowledge.

Once the full House approves its fiscal year 2022 National Defense Authorization Act, differences will need to be hashed out with the Senate. In the coming months, Smith suggested, lawmakers should take a serious look at what our pit production needs are and how we are going to achieve them. As he put it, There's a lot in play here.
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114-unit Kiawah senior living facility to break ground Sept. 15

With a limited number of guests because of the rise in COVID-19 cases, a new $180 million senior living facility on Kiawah Island will break ground Sept. 15 in an invitation-only event near Freshfields Village Shopping Center at the end of Betsy Kerrison Parkway.

Seafields at Kiawah is the first 62-plus luxury living community on the island. Scheduled for completion in late 2023, the development includes 98 one-, two- and three-bedroom residences as well as 16 assisted-living and continuing care units.

Kiawah Life Plan Village Inc. paid $8.4 million for a 9-acre parcel in the town of Kiawah Island off Seabrook Island Road on Aug. 11, according to Charleston County land records.

Along with high-end amenities and services, the facility will include an in-house medical clinic operated by the Medical University of South Carolina.

In attendance will be Richard Ackerman, managing partner of Big Rock Partners, a nationally known developer of luxury senior living and developer of Seafields, and Chris Randolph, partner at Kiawah Partners, owner of Kiawah Island Club and Kiawah Island Real Estate.

Presales for all units are now available through Kiawah Island Real Estate.

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With the first phase of 18 townhomes built as workforce housing sold out, a second phase of an equal number of units is now being offered to help police officers, teachers, firefighters and other service-industry workers afford residences in a town where median home prices are more than $500,000.

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By the numbers

240: Number of units in a new apartment development coming to Pringletown on S.C. Highway 27 near the Volvo Cars manufacturing campus and the Walmart distribution facility under construction near Ridgeville.

3: Number of new shops coming to King Street in downtown Charleston.

18: Number of months 2nd Sunday on King has been absent from downtown Charleston because of COVID-19 before its return Sept. 12.

This week in real estate

+ No. 1, again: Travel + Leisure readers selected Charleston as the No. 1 tourist destination in the U.S. for the 9th year in a row.

+ Flipping in Carnes: Three months after purchasing nearly 1,500 undeveloped acres in the Carnes Crossroads community of Goose Creek for $41 million, homebuilder Lennar sold more than 900 acres to a Dallas-based company for $29 million.

+ On an island: Two islands in South Carolina are ranked as the top two seaside getaways in the continental U.S.

+ An institution returns: Big John's Tavern, a longtime dive bar popular with Citadel cadets and late-night barflies, has been revamped and is back in business on East Bay Street after being absent the past few years.

S. Florida restaurant pays $6M for King St. building

The owners of Miami-based Le Chick restaurant plan to open a new venue in downtown Charleston in 2022 after paying nearly $6 million for the three-story building at 438 King St. Charleston Commercial/Provided

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Just a few months into a new power deal to add production at Century Aluminum's Mount Holly smelter, the company is already setting its sights on getting the plant back to full capacity.

A deal inked in March with Moncks Corner-based electric utility Santee Cooper lowered Century Aluminum's power costs enough to add workers and equipment that will bring the smelter to 75 percent capacity. Dennis Harbath, the plant's manager, said the goal is to hit 100 percent capacity in the future.

"We'd like to engage in negotiations with Santee Cooper for a long-term plan," Harbath told members of the Berkeley County Chamber of Commerce at a recent business event. "We're really interested in figuring out how to get the other 25 percent of the plant up and going."

Santee Cooper spokeswoman Mollie Gore said the two sides are already "talking about next steps."

These days, more than 100 contractors are working around the clock to fix the "pots"  large electrolytic cells  where molten aluminum is made. There are 270 such pots that have been idled or are in need of repair since Century cut production to 50 percent in 2015.

"Since 2015, we haven't rebuilt any pots whatsoever," Harbath said. "We just kind of made do with what we have."

The plan is to have a third of those pots back in action by the end of this year, with the rest completed by 2023. All told, the three-year expansion, which also includes infrastructure work such as roof repairs, will cost about $93 million and add 100 jobs. Bringing the plant to full capacity would add another $33 million investment and another 100 jobs with wages and benefits averaging $95,000 a year. The smelter once employed about 600 people before its workforce was cut in half at the end of 2015.

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A study by the University of South Carolina shows the Mount Holly site generates $250 million in economic impact for each 25 percent of capacity, with full production a $1 billion boost to the local economy.

"I'm hoping somehow we can cross that bridge" to full production, Harbath said.

A little more than $5 million of the current expansion is going toward an automated sow caster  a machine that takes molten aluminum from pots and pours it into molds. The aluminum is then sold to customers to be remelted and formed into a finished product. Harbath said the machine will "enhance a lot of work-life balance" because one person can do what it used to take six workers to accomplish.

"It will allow flexibility in scheduling and metal consumption," Harbath said, adding Mount Holly will be producing 165,000 tons of aluminum per year once it hits 75 percent capacity.

The Mount Holly expansion is taking place at an opportune time, with aluminum prices and demand on the rise. A Bloomberg report shows aluminum hit a 10-year high on Aug. 31 on the London Metal Exchange and is within striking distance of an all-time high. Prices are up because of a power crunch in China, which supplies most of the world's aluminum, and a crackdown on pollution at that country's smelters. At the same time, consumer demand remains strong for products that use aluminum, from car parts to appliances.

A global shift to electric vehicles also gives Century Aluminum hope for the future. Century is a major supplier of aluminum to vehicle parts makers, which are switching to the metal for vehicle bodies, brakes and other components because it is lighter than steel and adds range to battery-powered cars.

Jesse Gary, Century's new president and CEO, told investors during an earnings call that "we currently find ourselves in a robust market for aluminum, driven by high consumer spending ... a strong industrial expansion and GDP growth in most of the world's leading economies."

He added the long-term outlook will be "driven by energy transition into renewable generation, distribution and electrical vehicles."
NORTH CHARLESTON  One person was killed and a second injured in a shooting the afternoon of Sept. 11 at a motel in a busy commercial area in the southern section of the city.

Officers were dispatched at 2 p.m. for reports of a shooting at Charleston Heights Motel, 4241 Rivers Ave., according to North Charleston police spokesman Harve Jacobs.

One male victim was found dead at the scene, and a female victim was transported to a local hospital, Jacobs said. He did not provide their ages.

Jacobs said police and the Charleston County Coroner's Office were investigating. He said he could not provide information about any possible suspects.

The motel is less than a mile from the Deas Hill neighborhood, where 14-year-old Ronjanae Smith was fatally shot and 14 other people injured in gang crossfire during a neighborhood concert in May.

Gun violence has steadily risen in North Charleston in recent years, from 145 shootings reported in 2018 to 177 in 2020. It is part of a rising tide of violence reported by policy agencies in South Carolina and across the United States.

State Law Enforcement Division Chief Mark Keel announced in June that 2020 was one of the most violent years on record in South Carolina, with murders increasing statewide from 457 in 2019 to 571 in 2020.

"As I said last year, I am extremely concerned by the increasing amount of violence in our state, including the number of murders and assaults," Keel said. "I am particularly troubled at the steady increase in the number of murders taking place."
The silver lining in tragedies is often how the horrific events bring together people of different backgrounds.

Though the occurrences have the potential to divide communities, they frequently cause people to unite despite social, cultural and political differences.

Unity may have been on display throughout the nation following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, but Charleston's faith leaders said the collaboration wasn't as immediate and viable among the city's faith community in the initial aftermath.

The Rev. Joseph Darby had been pastoring at downtown Charleston's Morris Brown AME for about three years when the tragedy occurred.

As the September events unfolded in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, Darby contacted Charleston-area faith leaders to see where a vigil might be held.

He heard of none.

It wasn't until a week later that a memorial service would be organized by local Episcopal churches and the city of Charleston to include faith leaders from various denominations, Darby said.

The wake of the 9/11 attacks was somewhat of a missed opportunity for collaboration among the city's faith traditions to unite in providing hope, comfort and connection to the divine in the midst of national devastation, he said.

"Nobody was talking to each other," Darby said. "Every line of division you could find, you could find that in Charleston."

Local congregations made individual efforts to bring solace to the grieving community.

In the following weeks at Morris Brown, Darby preached about God's will, being faithful in spite of fear and the need to support one another.

Some days after 9/11, St. Andrew's Presbyterian in West Ashley opened its doors to the community for prayer.

During the day, people came for silent prayer. At night, a service featured Scripture readings, hymns and public reflections.

The Rev. Spike Coleman remembers particularly how two military veterans prayed the country wouldn't delve into war.

Former St. Andrew's member Bob Kay had lost an arm during the World War II Normandy invasion. At the church, Kay spoke about the need for peace. Retired Navy serviceman Allan Oliver offered similar words.

The sanctuary felt like a sacred space in a way it hadnt before," Coleman said. "It was a powerful sense of people there. And that God was in our midst. That we needed to be there.

Charleston's faith community isn't as divided as it was before 9/11, Darby said.

One example is the Charleston Area Justice Ministry, an organization Darby helped establish a decade later, in 2011, that now features dozens of faith traditions that work on problems in housing, health care and transportation.

As faith leaders increased efforts to work together, a foundation was laid that helped prepare for future tragedies.

When nine parishioners were slain at Emanuel AME Church in 2015, congregations united in effort to denounce racism and promote love and unity.

Morris Brown AME hosted a daytime prayer vigil the day after the Emanuel shooting that welcome political dignitaries, faith leaders across denominations and community members. Community leaders organized marches. Black and White churches joined together for multicultural worship experiences.

Numerous other efforts aimed to build on that collaboration, including the formation of Mayor John Tecklenburg's Clergy Advisory Council that features more than 100 faith leaders who have focused on helping Charleston take steps toward racial reconciliation and addressing issues like homelessness and affordable housing.

"I think (Sept. 11) opened the door for collaboration," Darby said.

The Rev. Adam Shoemaker, pastor of St. Stephen's Episcopal in downtown Charleston, spoke to the need for more collaboration within the religious community. For him, the desire is sparked by his own spiritual journey.

Shoemaker, who's of Middle Eastern descent, was in Boston during the 9/11 attacks. He recalls the Islamophobia that followed. He feels he wasn't targeted because of his lighter skin complexion.

Up until that time, Shoemaker had been ashamed of his Muslim heritage. But the 2001 events started him on a quest to learn more about his roots, a trek that led him to Egypt to meet his Islamic relatives.

Shoemaker, who arrived in Charleston about three years ago, has worked to live out his theological perspective of tolerance by developing a relationship with one of the mosques downtown, and participating in events hosted by the Charleston Interreligious Council.

I think any effort here in Charleston that is trying to raise awareness is good," he said. "Theres a long way to go and a lot more work for all of us to do in that.
WESTMINSTER  Sightings of Bigfoot are guaranteed this fall when this tiny Upstate town hosts its second festival celebrating the legendary elusive creature.

Beyond the food, craft vendors and live music that are common to festivals, events setting this one apart include contests to see who can look, sound and be judged most like Bigfoot.

There's also a non-subjective, literal big foot competition: Men and women are invited to step on stage, take off their shoes and get measured.

Organizers of the Oct. 23 South Carolina Bigfoot Festival in Westminster say the purpose is to showcase the town of 2,500 and surrounding Oconee County in a way that offers something different than the hundreds of other festivals statewide.

There are festivals that celebrate jumping frogs (Springfield), racing turtles (Allendale), and albino skunks (Greenville). Other festivals exalt South Carolina food staples, including okra (Irmo), collards (Gaston), watermelon (Hampton) and pulled pork barbecue (Kingstree), to name a few. For the more adventurous stomach, there's Salley's Chitlin Strut. (To the uninitiated, chitlins are pork intestines.)

The Pee Dee town of Bishopville celebrates another fabled creature: Lizard Man, a 7-foot-tall reptile indigenous to rural Lee County, first reported in 1988. Due to COVID-19, the Lizard Man Stomp, like many festivities, has been postponed until next year.

"We want to preserve the legend. Let's not let him die," said Margaret Copeland, one of the organizers. "I love the Lizard Man. People ask, 'Can you prove he's real?' I say, 'Can you prove he's not?' That's not the point.

"We just need to get people together and have fun," she said. "People have forgotten how to have fun."

Two hundred miles away, residents in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains have decided to hitch their town to the hairy, human-like beast that folklore says has roamed forests across North America for centuries, including throughout the Appalachians.

"This festival fits," said Dale Glymph, who came up with the idea in a brainstorming session in 2018 on how to bring people downtown. What started as a joke morphed into serious planning after the group learned that an inaugural Bigfoot festival in western North Carolina was a big hit.

"The more we put it together, the more people got excited. It gives us the opportunity to bring in this kind of weird, fun atmosphere," Glymph said. "Some people believe. Some don't. Even those who don't have fun with it. They love the story  the ifs, ands and buts. Maybe there is something in the woods wandering around."

An estimated 20,000 people attended Westminster's first festival in 2019. Despite the drizzle, Bigfoot enthusiasts came from as far away as Idaho and Colorado. Local businesses reported doing quadruple their normal Saturday sales, Glymph said.

After taking a year off due to COVID, organizers hope for a bigger turnout, and better weather, this fall and in years to come. COVID precautions include handwashing stations and a tongue-in-cheek request to "be like Bigfoot and avoid people," or, rather, social distance "when at all possible."

Robert Seiter, who moved to Oconee County in 2010, readily admits he's been infatuated with the creature for three decades, ever since a harrowing late-night bass fishing trip in the Catskills of Upstate New York. By himself at midnight, he said he heard something coming toward him with "very heavy thumping" on the ground.

"The thump, thump started getting closer and closer, real slow," he said. "I was so terrified, I couldn't even turn my flashlight on. I saw a shadow of something huge. It started growling. I ran all the way back to my car. I've never been so terrified."

Days later, he figured it had to have been Bigfoot.

"I think I took it's fishing spot and he wanted it back  and he got it back," Seiter said, noting he told no one, not even his wife, for years.

Now he runs the 44,400-member private Facebook group titled Bigfoot the Real Truth, a forum free from the "goofy stuff," he said, where people are invited to share their stories without fear of getting ridiculed.

And he becomes a quasi-celebrity himself when he and Glymph put on Bigfoot costumes to promote the festival.

"Everybody wants a picture of Bigfoot," he said.

As for Glymph, he's been a Bigfoot fan since seeing the 1972 documentary-style film "The Legend of Boggy Creek" at a Greenville drive-in theater.

"I can't say I do believe in him, but I can't say that I don't," he said. "I lean more toward there is something out there, now than I did before. Even if there's not, it's a great story."
Nearly 18 months after first proposing the Charleston peninsula be encircled by an 8-mile seawall, the Army Corps of Engineers released a major update to its plan, predicting it will cost $1.1 billion, or several hundred million less than originally thought.

The updated plan, released Sept. 10, kicks off a 45-day period for the public to send in comments on the proposal.

It addresses one question that has lingered since the idea was first floated: whether a wall would deflect waves and push more flooding onto surrounding areas like West Ashley or Mount Pleasant. The Corps said having a wall would push water levels a maximum of just 1 or 2 inches higher on these neighboring landmasses, according to simulations it has completed.

The biggest change may be the lower price, and the improved ratio of benefit to cost, which could make the project far more competitive for federal approval and funding. Of the cost, Charleston has to pay 35 percent, now down to about $384.5 million.

The proposal is the most ambitious on the table to protect the city's historic core from sea-level rise and tidal flooding  effects that are already eating away at Charleston's edges and expected to worsen as the planet warms.

Public comment The public can comment on the Army Corps' plan through Oct. 25 by:

Emailing chs-peninsula-study@usace.army.mil

Sending a letter to Charleston District, Planning and Environmental Branch, 69A Hagood Ave., Charleston SC, 29403.

Leaving a message at (843) 329-8017.

Mayor John Tecklenburg said in a Sept. 10 press conference the plan enables "the outright ability for the city of Charleston to remain here, to be here. It answers that existential threat of what happens to the city in light of storm surge, sea level rise, climate change."

The updated Charleston plan also comes at an interesting moment for the Corps. While a $14.5 billion levee project recently protected the city of New Orleans from Hurricane Ida's surge waves, other places are eschewing the engineering group's plans. Miami-Dade County in Florida recently said it would not pursue the Corps' design for a seawall along the back edges of Biscayne Bay, including through several waterfront neighborhoods.

At the same time, Charleston regularly experiences flooding now from intense rainstorms that swamp slow-draining streets, a problem the wall would not improve alone. A day before the Corps' new report was released, the same scenario played out as the remnants of tropical system Mindy traipsed over the Lowcountry, putting several roads in downtown Charleston under water.

The city is working on several drainage projects but some worry the long-term focus on the seawall proposal is distracting money and attention from those efforts. It's also a project that needs to go through several rounds of approval by the city and the Corps and Congress before detailed design could even begin, let alone construction.

"(Rainfall events) are the most common types of flooding were experiencing," said Jason Crowley of the Coastal Conservation League. "We still have all of these other things we need to be prioritizing and this continues to suck the oxygen out of the room."

Some watchers of the plan are also frustrated, arguing that the Corps has been too inflexible with its original idea of a large, engineered barrier, and has given only cursory attention to two minority neighborhoods that would stay outside the wall's perimeter.

Cost changes

The proposal is in many respects similar to the first version, released in April 2020. The wall would encircle most of the downtown peninsula; it would be 3 feet higher than Charleston's highest sea wall, The Battery; it would include pumps, five being permanent and five mobile, to drain rainfall that falls inside the perimeter of the wall.

One change was announced earlier this year and shaved off some $300 million in price: the Corps will no longer try to construct a 4,000-foot-long rock pile, or breakwater, offshore of the wall to slow down incoming waves.

The changes that have been made since, however, have gone a long way to reduce the total cost, said Project Manager Wes Wilson. Moving the alignment of the wall onto high ground, instead of through marsh in some places, reduced construction and wetland mitigation costs by $250 million.

The Corps also reduced the power of the drainage pumps it will use, equating to $75 million in savings. Wilson said the original plan assumed the pumps needed to be the same size as in New Orleans, a "conservative" assumption that wasn't borne out when further analysis was done on how much water the walls would trap.

The city has the option to make those pumps larger again, if it wants, but would have to pay by itself for the additional cost, Wilson said.

The Corps also revised its math on the properties the wall would protect and found that property values rose since it last collected them in 2019. All those factors, in addition to updated economic modeling, mean the Corps now reports the ratio of benefit to cost for the work is 10.2, or almost five times higher than the number it originally reported.

The ratio is in part what determines if Congress will agree to fund the work down the road, and the new benefit-cost number is highly competitive, said Dale Morris, the city's incoming chief resiliency officer.

A score of 10.2 is "perhaps one of the highest, if not the highest, in the nation for this kind of project," Morris added.

Missed alternatives

While the plan is refined, some are frustrated that the Corps is sticking to the concept of a wall at all, instead of relying on lighter touches such as living shorelines, or specially-placed oyster reefs that slow down waves.

Susan Lyons is a founder of the flooding advocacy group Groundswell and a member of a city committee that is assessing the Corps' plan. She said the city needed to make a comprehensive water-management plan first and then decide how the Corps' plan fits into it. A consultant for Charleston has said the same in the past.

Another frustration, she said, is that important details like the appearance of the wall won't be determined until after the city says it wants to move forward, and the Corps starts a more detailed engineering and design effort after.

"I think that the Army Corps and the city are trying to sell this project in a big way," she said, adding, "Youre buying a car sight unseen, and thats a problem."

Crowley, of the Conservation League, added that the plan still gives little attention to Rosemont and Bridgeview Village, two minority communities at the north end of the Charleston peninsula. The Corps has said it would be too costly to extend the wall that far, and that the buildings there can be protected with elevation or floodproofing measures.

The updated plan "continues strong emphasis on primarily benefiting the wealthy neighborhoods, because of this cost-benefit focus," Crowley said.

If the city formally decides to move forward, Charleston will have to send the Corps a letter in November or December agreeing to pursue the plan and signal it can pay for its part, said Mark Wilbert, the city's retiring chief resiliency officer.

When the Corps' leadership also agrees and Congress budgets money, that would begin the detailed design phase.

The city will face another challenge then, though, which has hung over the entire affair from the beginning and remains unanswered: how to pay the hundreds of millions it would owe toward design and construction.
Construction works Marcus McWhorter and Keith Hartwell cut flooring for the McCormick school building at John De La Howe school for agriculture on Wednesday, April 14, 2021 in McCormick. Andrew J. Whitaker/Staff
NORTH CHARLESTON  A new pedestrian bridge aimed at getting walkers and bikers safely across the Ashley River is making progress.

Charleston County's proposed 14-foot-wide pedestrian bridge, which would run adjacent to the North Bridge on S.C. Highway 7, is gaining traction as nearby roadways are targeted for safety improvements.

Local municipalities and the nonprofit Charleston Moves say the safety improvements being considered in North Charleston and West Ashley will help better connect walkers and bikers to the pedestrian bridge once its built.

"Youre addressing that question of, 'Where are people to go once they're off the bridge?'" said Katie Zimmerman of Charleston Moves.

Formally called the World War II Memorial Bridge, the span runs from Cosgrove Avenue in North Charleston to Sam Rittenberg Boulevard in West Ashley. The bridge has seen several fatalities over the years, igniting calls for improved access for walkers and cyclists.

The cities of Charleston and North Charleston, S.C. Department of Transportation, Berkeley-Charleston-Dorchester Council of Governments and Charleston Moves are involved in the efforts to improve safety at the bridge.

The new pedestrian structure is still in the early design stages. Neither the funding nor the exact landing points have been decided yet, though Charleston County has said it would run adjacent to the North Bridge.

As work on designing the structure continues, its important to build up better connectivity around the bridge so that people traveling the new pedestrian pathway have a safe place to commute once they exit the structure, Zimmerman said.

In that regard, Charleston County's Azalea Drive traffic analysis calls for restriping the four-lane street in North Charleston to two lanes, and adding a center turn lane, and bike lanes on both sides of the roadway.

That doesn't mean the project is a go. Whether Azalea Drive will see safety enhancements depends largely on public feedback for the project, which is focused on the section of the street that runs between Leeds and Cosgrove Avenues.

Charleston County invites residents to learn about the potential safety improvements from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sept. 11 at Grove Corner Grocery at 2301 Cosgrove Ave., Suite A, in North Charleston.

Residents also can submit comments and ask questions via the website betternorthbridge.com or by calling the Public Works Department at 843-202-6137. People can also write to Project Manager Sheila Sororian, 4045 Bridge View Drive, Suite B309, North Charleston, SC 29405.

"If those comments are favorable, thatll help move (the project) forward," Sororian said.

The Azalea project won't just benefit walkers and bikers, Zimmerman said.

Numerous studies point to how larger roadways entice people to speed, she said. Slimmer lanes should help ensure drivers are less distracted, she said.

"The added bonus of this is it will improve safety for motorists, as well," Zimmerman said.

If the Azalea Drive effort comes to fruition, it'll be constructed by DOT.

DOT would include the restriping in an upcoming resurfacing project focused on Azalea Drive from the King Street Extension to Leeds Avenue. DOT confirmed the Azalea bike project is moving forward and the county's public outreach component is being done before the final determination is made.

Additionally, Charleston County has plans to install a new sidewalk along Azalea Drive between Cosgrove Avenue and the Lowcountry Food Bank, located just east of Elegans Drive.

On the West Ashley side, new green space, sidewalks and crosswalks are proposed for Sam Rittenberg Boulevard and other surrounding roadways.
Firefighters, police officers, Scouts and everyday Americans silently crossed the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge on Sept. 11 to honor the 2,997 lives lost 20 years ago in the 9/11 terror attacks.

A ceremony afterward on the deck of the aircraft carrier Yorktown featured speeches from local police officials and firefighters, as well as two former members of the New York City Fire Department.

We remember those that were lost in a different way  in a very profound way  through our silence, as we reflect and remember, and also through our action, as we climb that bridge, North Charleston Fire Chief Gregory Bulanow said.

The 9/11 Silent Walk was started eight years ago by a group of Charleston-area firefighters. It has since grown to attract thousands of participants from across the state. The morning march was one of several events and tributes held in the area, including the 9/11 Heroes Run on Daniels Island and a moment of silence at the Charleston International Airport.

Twelve Scouts from Troop 420G took a 3-hour bus ride from Simpsonville to help honor the fallen in the bridge walk and ceremony.

They were not yet born when militant Islamic terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing them into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and, because of resistance by the passengers on United Airlines Flight 93, a barren field in Pennsylvania.

Scoutmaster Heidi Dannelly was working near the twin towers on the day of the attack. She wants to ensure the history of the tragedy is passed down.

"As the leaders, we remember 9/11, and we want to make sure the children do, too," she said.

Jeffrey Cleckley, 38, and Cheryl Livernois, 33, both radiology students from Trident Technical College, volunteered at the event. Livernois, whose husband is a battalion chief for the James Island Fire Department, said firefighters shared a close bond.

"When one brother hurts, they all hurt," she said.

The ceremony featured a presentation of colors by the North Charleston Fire Department Honor Guard and the raising of the New York City fire and police department's flags. Aisha Kenyetta performed "Amazing Grace" before keynote speeches from former New York City Fire Department Battalion Chief Kevin McNamara and Lt. Kevin Cunnane.

McNamara said what he remembers as vividly as the horrors of Sept. 11, 2001, was the unity of the country on Sept. 12. American flags flew off store shelves, makeshift memorials were erected at New York City's fire stations, and people stopped arguing over petty things.

"We were united as a nation to recover and rebuild," he said.

Cunnane said the best way to remember the tragedy was to ensure local police and firefighters had the funding they needed to do their jobs.

"What we need is concrete action," Cunnane said. "Not just saying, 'Never Forget.' Let's figure out how we can do things to actually never forget."
Syndicated and guest columns represent the personal views of the writers, not necessarily those of the editorial staff. The editorial department operates entirely independently of the news department and is not involved in newsroom operations.
Editorials represent the institutional view of the newspaper. They are written and edited by the editorial staff, which operates separately from the news department. Editorial writers are not involved in newsroom operations.
When a deep recession a decade ago forced three consecutive years of state budget cuts, the S.C. Legislature spread the pain around to nearly every agency, refusing to eliminate a single one of them, or even a single program.

The result of legislators inability to agree on what our priorities were was that programs we could live without continued to operate at reduced spending levels while our schools had to pack more kids into each classroom and social workers had to keep an eye on many more vulnerable children and seniors, and prison guards and the people who inspect dams, and restaurants, and nursing homes  among other critical professionals  saw their workloads increased to dangerously high levels.

Although dams dont collapse, children dont die of abuse and we dont end up with rat entrails in our dinner when lawmakers have a windfall of cash to spend, the same type of problem of prioritization occurs, especially when its found money. Which South Carolina, like other states, has in abundance since the Congress decided to print a bunch of it.

The great temptation is to treat all the extra billions like pork and spread them around in dribs and drabs so everybodys favorite program gets a little more money  just enough to make everybody feel like a winner, but nowhere close to enough to make a lasting difference. Nothing to produce what Gov. Henry McMaster calls a transformative effect on our state. To do that, you have to pick a few truly important initiatives and provide enough money, direction and oversight so theyre done really well.

Mr. McMasters proposal to spend federal COVID relief funds to widen Interstate 26 to six lanes all the way from Charleston to Columbia is a case in point. If were going to spend COVID relief funds on highways, we pick our top road priority and plow enough money into it to make a real difference, rather than spreading the money around to dozens of little projects most people have never heard of, without providing enough even to complete them. With $360 million  80% of the estimated $450 million that our state can legally spend on roads  we can complete the widening project at least six years ahead of schedule, and as a result 20% under budget.

Of course, its fairly easy for one person to focus on a handful of transformative projects. Get a bunch of elected officials in a room, all of them answering to different constituencies, and you can expect the list to mushroom.

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Yes, each lawmaker will say, it might be better to concentrate the money, but theres so much of it, we could give just a little bit to this. And this. And this. And pretty soon, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make lasting change is frittered away.

The challenge in spending the Legislatures $2.5 billion in American Rescue Plan Act funding well is compounded by the fact that most of it needs to be spent buying or building things rather than hiring people, who would have to be fired once the one-time money is used up. And by the fact that theres no obvious best way to spend it.

Yes, our economy could benefit from better roads. And broadband capacity, and flood-resilience projects, and water and sewer projects, particularly in rural areas. But nothing rises clearly above everything else.

The challenge  and the importance of meeting that challenge  is every bit as important for our cities, counties and school districts as their elected officials look for the best ways to spend their share of the approximately $9 billion in American Rescue Plan Act dollars arriving in our state in the next few years.

Regardless of what each entitys priorities are, the overarching theme should be the same: Pick a few extraordinarily important projects  projects that can make a difference not just this year but next year and the next decade  and allocate enough money to do them well.
U.S. soldiers at Forward Operating Base Bostick in Afghanistan sit beneath an American flag raised on Sept. 11, 2011, to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. A decade later, they're gone, and Afghanistan  and the world  face an uncertain future. File/AP Photo/David Goldman
I keep hearing the phrase I didnt think it would be this bad when it comes to either COVIDs delta variant or the war in Afghanistan.

On the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, we remember the nearly 3,000 deaths caused by blind religious dogma, yet we have learned nothing.

Unvaccinated and unmasked people are filling up our hospitals because of this type of dogma.

This kind of thinking is what has led to 653,000 COVID deaths, which is far more than the number of deaths on Sept. 11, 2001.

GERARD WATERS

Dogwood Ridge Road

Summerville

Foundational truths

I recently had occasion to retrieve my birth certificate from New Jersey.

It is an ornate, formal, one-page document with a picture of a mother and baby etched in the center.

The mother is focused on her child, while the baby is caressing her cheek and gazing out toward the viewer. Under the image are the words The foundation of our nation.

I was struck by the simple, profound truth depicted. In the heat of todays discourse, one might be misled to believe that shouting matches, the exercise of unrestrained personnel freedoms and guns are foundational, but they cannot be.

The image and words represent more than the birth of a child, but also caring, peace and love.

These most be the drivers of the American Dream and are the fruits of lives shared with mutual respect, empathy, compassion, service and unity.

Otherwise our Great Experiment is doomed to fail.

JOHN MARTIN

Rose Lane

Summerville

Retreat impact unknown

The withdrawal from Afghanistan has spurred many writers to use examples of past historical events.

Many comparisons seem to use the British experience of Dunkirk as an example of success.

In 1940, most British citizens didnt consider the evacuation a great outcome. Instead, they braced for a Nazi Germany amphibious invasion.

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Many felt it was time to negotiate with German dictator Adolf Hitler. Some even believed Hitler would be a benevolent conqueror, even when it was apparent that he was not.

A desperate British Prime Minister Winston Churchill did everything he could to get the United States involved and come to Britains aid.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt was constrained by an American public seemingly happy to pursue an isolationist policy.

History shows that Britain was saved by the tenacity of its people and its leaders, who refused to capitulate even when the end appeared certain. The many mistakes and bad decisions that Hitler made also were helpful to the British.

Using Dunkirk as an example is like comparing Afghanistan to Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lees highly successful Southern retreat after the debacle at Gettysburg.

Its not the same; historical eras and circumstances are different.

The miracle of Dunkirk has only been revisited through generations removed. Dunkirk in 1940 was viewed as an unmitigated disaster that left the British Empire uncertain of its future existence.

ANTHONY JANUSZKIEWICZ

Bears Bluff Road

Wadmalaw Island

Dont limit medicines

I have long suffered from incredibly debilitating migraines.

Like many people who suffer from chronic migraines, without my medication, I find myself bedridden and incapacitated by my symptoms.

As someone who lives on a fixed income, I pay extra attention to my expenses, including prescription costs.

While U.S. leaders need to address the price of medicine, I am staunchly opposed to Congress current attempt to set the prices of prescription drugs.

Under the guise of Medicare negotiation, the number of medications available to patients could be severely limited because of a potential lack of access to treatments.

I had to try several different prescriptions until I found one that helped alleviate my pain, and I cant risk losing access to the treatments that I know work best for me.

I am keenly aware of the importance of lowering prescription drug prices, but there has to be a better way to lower the costs without taking away Medicare patient protections.

Instead of stripping patients of access to the medications that work best for them, I encourage our congressional leaders to consider other options such as capping annual out-of-pocket costs for consumers.

Our elected officials should be working to expand access to medicine, not limiting patient and family choice.

DEBBI LILIENTHAL

Waterstone Lane

Charleston
The 9/11 Memorial was commissioned by Montgomery County in 2003 and was designed and built by artist Sassona Norton to honor area victims and first responders. It was first installed in 2005, on the fourth anniversary of 9/11 at the Courthouse plaza in Norristown. Due to construction of the Montgomery County Justice Center, the 9/11 Memorial is being permanently relocated to the Emergency Operations Center.
The New York Times has just posted this intensely interesting investigative scoop by Matthieu Aikins based on reporting by him as well as Christoph Koettl, Evan Hill, and Eric Schmitt:  In U.S. Drone Strike, Evidence Suggests No ISIS Bomb. Subhead: U.S. officials said a Reaper drone followed a car for hours and then fired based on evidence it was carrying explosives. But in-depth video analysis and interviews at the site cast doubt on that account.

Datelined Kabul, the story opens as follows:

It was the last known missile fired by the United States in its 20-year war in Afghanistan, and the military called it a righteous strike  a drone attack after hours of surveillance on Aug. 29 against a vehicle that American officials thought contained an ISIS bomb and posed an imminent threat to troops at Kabuls airport. But a New York Times investigation of video evidence, along with interviews with more than a dozen of the drivers co-workers and family members in Kabul, raises doubts about the U.S. version of events, including whether explosives were present in the vehicle, whether the driver had a connection to ISIS, and whether there was a second explosion after the missile struck the car. Military officials said they did not know the identity of the cars driver when the drone fired, but deemed him suspicious because of how they interpreted his activities that day, saying that he possibly visited an ISIS safe house and, at one point, loaded what they thought could be explosives into the car. Times reporting has identified the driver as Zemari Ahmadi, a longtime worker for a U.S. aid group. The evidence, including extensive interviews with family members, co-workers and witnesses, suggests that his travels that day actually involved transporting colleagues to and from work. And an analysis of video feeds showed that what the military may have seen was Mr. Ahmadi and a colleague loading canisters of water into his trunk to bring home to his family. While the U.S. military said the drone strike might have killed three civilians, Times reporting shows that it killed 10, including seven children, in a dense residential block.

Here is the storys conclusion:

Since the strike, U.S. military officials justified their actions by citing an even larger blast that took place afterward. Because there were secondary explosions, there is a reasonable conclusion to be made that there is explosives in that vehicle, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Mark A. Milley, said last week. But an examination of the scene of the strike, conducted by the Times visual investigations team and a Times reporter the morning afterward, and followed up with a second visit four days later, found no evidence of a second, more powerful explosion. Experts who examined photos and videos pointed out that, although there was clear evidence of a missile strike and subsequent vehicle fire, there were no collapsed or blown-out walls, no destroyed vegetation, and only one dent in the entrance gate, indicating a single shock wave. It seriously questions the credibility of the intelligence or technology utilized to determine this was a legitimate target, said Chris Cobb-Smith, a British Army veteran and security consultant. While the U.S. military has so far acknowledged only three civilian casualties, Mr. Ahmadis relatives said that 10 members of their family, including seven children, were killed in the strike: Mr. Ahmadi and three of his children, Zamir, 20, Faisal, 16, and Farzad, 10; Mr. Ahmadis cousin Naser, 30; three of Romals children, Arwin, 7, Benyamin, 6, and Hayat, 2; and two 3-year-old girls, Malika and Somaya. Neighbors and an Afghan health official confirmed that bodies of children were removed from the site. They said the blast had shredded most of the victims; fragments of human remains were seen inside and around the compound the next day by a reporter, including blood and flesh splattered on interior walls and ceilings. Mr. Ahmadis relatives provided photographs of several badly burned bodies belonging to children. Family members questioned why Mr. Ahmadi would have a motivation to attack Americans when he had already applied for refugee resettlement in the United States. His adult cousin Naser, a former U.S. military contractor, had also applied for resettlement. He had planned to marry his fiancee, Samia, last Friday so that she could be included in his immigration case. All of them were innocent, said Emal, Mr. Ahmadis brother. You say he was ISIS, but he worked for the Americans.

The Times story is accompanied by the video below. The video poses the question: Imminent Threat or Aid Worker: Did a U.S. Drone Strike in Afghanistan Kill the Wrong Person? The video caption explains: The New York Times obtained exclusive security camera footage and witness accounts to show how the military launched a drone strike that killed 10 people in Kabul on Aug. 29 without knowing whom it was hitting.

I will only add that it has become way too easy to believe the worst.
The left (i.e., the Biden Administration and the media) like to say that the greatest threat to America today is internal. They may ironically be correct about this. Ive been wondering or expecting that wed hear from Ward Churchill in the New York Review of Books or somewhere today, but it seems weve found a worthy successor for the fake indian:

Will it surprise anyone to learn that Jackson is a professor of political science at Syracuse University? She has locked down her twitter account today, but her personal website does a lot of the heavy lifting for us:

Jenn M. Jackson (they/them) is a queer genderflux androgynous Black woman, an abolitionist, a lover of all Black people, and an Assistant Professor at Syracuse University in the Department of Political Science.
Around the world, green energy is failing with consequences that soon will be catastrophic. From the U.K.: Ireland freezes power exports to UK as energy costs rocket tenfold.

Shockingly, if you depend on wind energy you are in trouble when the wind stops blowing.

Ireland has been forced to freeze power exports to the UK to prevent a shortage which could have sparked blackouts as surging energy prices continue to cause chaos across Europe. A toxic combination of low wind speeds and a severe squeeze on the supply of natural gas sent power costs jumping tenfold on the British mainland on Thursday to as much as 2,300 per megawatt-hour, a new record high.

If my arithmetic is correct, that is around 21 times the average cost of electricity in the U.S. at current exchange rates. The U.S. has the resources to offset a squeeze on natural gas supplies, but the Biden administration is opposed to domestic gas production.

Irelands Single Electricity Market Operator had issued an amber warning on Thursday morning, alerting the public to a general shortfall of electricity which could result in power cuts. The cost of energy has been spiralling across Europe, due in part to calm weather which has drastically reduced the availability of renewable power.

***

The spiralling prices will prompt further concern among officials who were earlier this week forced to fire up coal-based plants in an effort to cope with tight supplies. In Spain, day-ahead electricity prices hit a record 152.32 a megawatt-hour according to Bloomberg. In France, the benchmark power price for delivery next year was at a record 99.50.

This is not some kind of green growing pains. This is the inevitable and permanent consequence of depending on inherently unreliable, and intrinsically expensive, energy sources. Other than, perhaps, Critical Race Theory, renewable energy is the Wests worst self-inflicted wound. But many voters wont realize this until the lights start to go out.
Former Dartmouth College Professor Jonathan Mirsky died earlier this week. The fantastic Guardian obituary on Jonathan recalls that at Dartmouth he became co-director of the East Asia Language and Area Studies Center. However, he was refused tenure, in part because of his anti-Vietnam protest activity[.] My comments on Jonathan elicited the message below from one of his former students. With his permission I am publishing the message verbatim because it adds so much to the story and because of the way it illuminates the descent of higher education. Not a long time ago or in a galaxy far away, but it seems like it:

Like you, Im a Dartmouth gradclass of 1970, so I started the fall of 1966. During freshman year, I got the idea I wanted to study Chinese. As a junior midshipman in the Naval ROTC unit, I was well aware of Mirskys views and activities, so it was with some foreboding that I called on him in his office in little old Bartlett Hall. He could not have been more welcoming and we hit it off.

I began studying Chinese in the fall of sophomore year and toward the end of the year worked with Jonathan to develop a proposed major for me in Asian Studies. This was a full helping of Chinese language but also a collection of history and government courses that gave me a good grounding beyond language. I had lost a year of Chinese already, so Jonathan encouraged me to apply to a summer program at Stanford, which crammed second-year Chinese into ten grueling weeks. The Navy thought it was a fine idea, so released me from that summers duty at sea. By junior year, I had taken all the established courses in history and so on, so Jonathan taught me one-on-one in his office every term through graduation, an intensive directed personal seminar in Chinese and other Asian history and politics. Of course, we developed a close working relationship.

As my years at Dartmouth went on, I decided that I would try to get into Naval Intelligence upon graduation and commissioning. I shared this intention with Jonathan, and he encouraged me. More than once when he and I were in discussion with another prof or student, Jonathan would jocularly tell them that despite our profound political differences, he was training me for the CIA. He joked about it, but he seriously did dedicate himself unstintingly to my education and career preparation. (I did in fact spend my entire career in US Intelligence, including three stints at CIA, so he knew what he was talking about.) Not once was he ever snide or nasty to me as leftists are so commonly nowadays. He was a thoroughly honorable man, in my experience of him.

We corresponded in the years after Dartmouth, and I was treated to his personal account of the events at Tiananmen Square. I thanked him for all his help in the acknowledgments in my first book, China as a Maritime Power (Westview, 1983). Through the years, he always addressed me by the Chinese surname he assigned me the first week of my first Chinese class: Mu. I wondered if he was ill or failing in the past few years. The last two or three letters I wrote to him went unanswered. So the news of his death was not a shock.

Scott, allow me to use this opportunity to tell you how much I enjoy Power Line. I read it avidly every day, and have done for years. I often send links to especially good articles to my friends and colleagues across the US and overseas.

As for me, Im happily retired with two grown daughters (both adopted in China), living with my wife in Lexington, Virginia in the central Shenandoah Valley. Both Washington & Lee and VMI are in our small town, so I enjoy access to a good library. I publish occasionally in biblical studies, but also did a memoir of my intelligence career.

I wish you well, and please convey my best regards to the Power Line team.

Dave Muller

David G. Muller, Jr.

Dartmouth 70

Commander, US Navy (ret.)
When George Bush was president, parents of armed service members killed in Iraq received special attention from the media if they denounced the war and criticized Bush. Cindy Sheehan gained a huge profile for bitterly attacking Bush after her son was killed. Eventually, she became a fringe figure, to put it as politely as I can, but this was only after Barack Obama succeeded Bush.

Before then, the mantra on the left, first recited by Maureen Dowd, was that the moral authority of parents who bury children killed in Iraq is absolute. But this was nonsense.

Like all Americans, such parents have the right to speak out about Americas wars. And given the sacrifice of their sons or daughters, they should be listened to when they speak.

But absolute moral authority? No.

The idea of such authority falls of it own weight because parents who buried children killed in Iraq had differing views about that conflict. To give Cindy Sheehan absolute moral authority would negate the moral authority of parents who favored our militarys presence there.

Again, though, all Gold Star parents should be heard.

What do the parents and loved ones of the 13 Americans who died at Kabul airport think of Joe Biden and his Afghanistan policy? According to the Washington Post:

Family members of at least six of the 13 U.S. service members killed in the Aug. 26 attack in Kabul have been publicly critical of Biden. Some declined to meet with Biden when he attempted to console them as the bodies arrived at Dover Air Force Base. Some of those who did said they were put off by the amount of time Biden spent talking about his son Beau, who served in Iraq and later died of brain cancer.

Biden apparently has taken the criticism with his characteristic lack of class;

Shana Chappell, the mother of Lance Cpl. Kareem Nikoui, 20, who was killed in the attack. . .recounted meeting with Biden at Dover, with him attempting to console her and her telling him he had no idea how she felt. At one point, by her account, Biden grew visibly annoyed and began walking away.

Criticism of George Bush by family members of service members who died in Iraq was sporadic. In Bidens case, it approaches, if not exceeds, a majority of those killed at the Kabul airport.

And no wonder. Congress authorized the war in Iraq and that war overthrew an evil, terrorist-supporting regime.

Congress didnt authorize the withdrawal from Afghanistan and would never have authorized, nor would the American public have supported, a withdrawal carried out as Biden executed it. The 13 died after hurrying to Kabul to help evacuate Americans and their allies. They had to hurry into Kabul for this purpose because Biden had foolishly pulled the military out before Americans had been evacuated.

Moreover, unlike American soldiers who died in the Iraq war, these American soldiers werent fighting against evil terrorists and their supporters. They were in Afghanistan to mop up the spillage from a decision to allow evil terrorist supporters to return to power.

Donald Trump has reached out to family members who shunned Biden or found his attempts to console them for their loss in Kabul unsatisfactory. His enemies will say that Trump has pounced, and in a sense I suppose he has.

But these family members deserve to be consoled by a leader they like, or at least respect. In many cases, that leader is Trump, not Biden.

Darin Hoover, father of a Marine killed in Kabul, said of his phone conversation with Trump:

It was just very cordial, very understanding. He was awesome. He was just talking about the finest of the finest. He said he heard and saw everything that we had said, and he offered his condolences several times, and how sorry he was.

Similarly, Mark Schmitz, whose son was also among the Marines killed, said he was grateful for Trumps call and got much more satisfaction or a sense of compassion speaking with Trump than he did with Biden.

To be fair, when Trump was president a small number of Gold Star parents criticized the way in which he tried to console them. These days, how a parent felt about a president before losing an offspring might well influence how the parent feels about the presidents attempt at consolation.

But the high percentage of negative reviews Biden received suggests that this wasnt the only dynamic at work. The shockingly botched nature of the Afghanistan pullout along, perhaps, with Bidens insistence on talking about himself and his son, must have been a factor.

The parents who criticized Biden dont have absolute moral authority, but they know what theyre talking about.
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Nigerias new Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Mohammad Abubakar, on Wednesday assumed duty officially at the ministry over a week after his predecessor Sabo Nanono was sacked by President Muhammadu Buhari.

At the ministry, where Mr Abubakar addressed officials, he assured that the provision of necessary policy direction to position agriculture as the mainstay of the nations economy will be prioritised.

We provide the necessary policy direction and drive that will truly position agriculture as the mainstay of our economy as captured in the medium term national development plan, and the presidents vision of lifting 100 million people out of poverty in 10 years, the new minister said.

President Buhari on September 1 had announced the sack of Mr Nanono and his counterpart in the power ministry, Saleh Mamman.

The presidency said the sack followed an independent and critical self-review, that helped to identify weak areas under this government.

Key Pledges

Mr Abubakar said the livestock transformation plan would be prioritised, not just for food security, but also to curb insecurity challenges in the country.

During the handover ceremony, the new minister stated that under his watch; research and extension services will be strengthened to ensure that best practices are translated into concrete deliverables in the agric and livestock value chain.

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We will strive to promote synergy within the agencies and departments of the ministry. Our agencies must collaborate and work with relevant stakeholders in achieving our mandate, he added.

While laying emphasis on the need to boost food availability in the country, Mr Abubakar advocated patronage of local agro products so as to encourage domestic farmers in the country.

The job of keeping our environment safe and sound is the job of everybody. This can be applicable to agriculture. We must support our farmers so they can continue to produce. During the closure of border we had sufficient rice and this shows the possibility of our food sufficiency, he said.

The minister said food security is everything and that we have everything it takes to make Nigeria the number one producer and exporter of food not just in Africa but beyond.

In his remarks, Sabo Nanono, the former minister, urged the new minister to focus on improving fertilizer, stop the importation of rice, fish, wheat and several other food crops across the country, and scale up employment in the sector.
The first two bid-winning companies of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC)s controversial slop oil sale have been found to be owned by the same directors.

The third-highest bidder was also initially thought to be unregistered. But facts have since emerged that that company is known as Korpu Energy Limited (which is registered) and not Kurpo Energy Limited (which is unregistered).

These are but some of the new revelations tumbling out of the closet at the NNPC weeks after the Group Executive Director (GED) Refinery, Mustapha Yakubu, supervised a controversial bid that saw scarce slop oil  traditionally reserved for local industries  being controversially offered to preferred bidders that are export companies. The slop oil consignment is domiciled at the Port Harcourt Refining Company (PHRC).

Figures from separate financial bids submitted by the three companies are a window to the behind-the-scenes manoeuvres that underpinned the entire bid exercise. Specifically, they show that the three preferred bidders, namely Sign Oil &Gas Ltd, Synthesis Integrated Pure Oil and Gas Limited and Kurpo Energy Ltd possibly took cues from NNPC insiders and decision-makers.

While Nigerias public procurement rules forbid any form of insider dealing, abuse of process and collaborative exploitation of nonpublic material information, the financial quotes submitted by the three export companies suggest everything but the contrary.

A six-naira difference is a common factor in their three separate financial bids. While the first preferred bidder, Sign Oil & Gas Ltd quoted N111.00K per litre, the second preferred bidder Synthesis Integrated Pure Oil quoted N6 less at N105.00K per litre while the third preferred bidder, Kurpo Energy Ltd bid N99.00K per litre  a further N6 lesser than the second.

Checks at the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) by PREMIUM TIMES confirmed the worst suspicion. The first and second preferred bidders are owned and promoted by connected individuals. While the first preferred bidder  Sign Oil & Gas Ltd  has Orereh Kingsley and Orereh Oghenetejiri as directors, the second preferred bidder  Synthesis Integrated Pure Oil and Gas Ltd  has Orereh Kingsley and Orereh Oghenerukevwe as directors.

Weeks back, PREMIUM TIMES reported how cash-hungry NNPC officials sold off to an export company 30 million litres of slop oil reserved in Port Harcourt Refinery as a national strategic stock.

The sale, carried out under a shady bid process, got industry stakeholders, particularly local manufacturers, reeling because slop oil has never been exported in the history of the NNPC. Whats more, the taboo transaction was capable of precipitating disastrous knock-on effects on local industries thereby sabotaging the Buhari administrations economic programmes.

For local manufacturers in Nigeria  particularly those in labour-intensive industries like textiles, cement, rubber processing, food and beverages  slop oil is the only alternative to Low Pour Fuel Oil (LPFO), a product of fractional distillation that keeps the boilers of manufacturing industries running. The LPFO is also used in power generating plants to get around the challenge of acute gas shortages.

However, 24 months ago when the Port Harcourt, Warri, and Kaduna refineries completely halted the refining of crude oil to give room for major rehabilitations slated to last 44 months, LPFO as a corollary has gone off the market. With this harsh reality, it is the slop oil that has come in as a stop-gap arrangement and indeed a last-ditch measure to keep the many beleaguered but still faithful local industrialists from moving their operations to neighbouring countries.

Industry watchers are baffled at the uncanny coincidences of each of the first three preferred companies bidding N6 differently from the next. To them, the bid appears very well-coordinated and lacking in character.

PREMIUM TIMES learned there have been a lot of behind-the-scene moves since the bid winners were announced. The first allocation issued to Sign Oil & Gas on June 22, 2021, expired with the company unable to meet a 10 working-day deadline for payment.

On July 8, 2021, the allocation was transferred to the second bid winner, Synthesis Integrated Pure Oil at N105.00k per litre instead of N111.00k per litre. It came with a 10-day deadline. Like Sign Oil before it, Synthesis was also not able to meet payment obligations.

True to the expectations of keen watchers wary that the entire bid exercise was a deception ab initio, the slop oil allocation fell on the lap of the third preferred winner, Korpu (not Kurpo) Energy Ltd at N99.00k per litre. This development has generated widespread belief in the oil industry that not only was the bid process tailored to sell the slop oil to handpicked bidders but also at the lowest quote possible.

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Some of the companies that participated in the slop oil bid included:

1) Oando Energy

2) Yunusawa Petroleum Resources Ltd

3) Northbridge Energy Ltd

4) Slk Oil & Gas Services Ltd

5) Gas Project Ltd

6) Sign Oil & Gas Ltd

7) Speedo Energy Resources Ltd

8) Korpu (not Kurpo) Energy Ltd

9) PT Intim Perkasa

10) AMG Musa Integrated

11) Synthesis Integrated Pure Oil

12) Silver Anchor Shipping

13) Vigor Ltd

14) Prachal Energy Ltd

15) B O Gas & Chemical Ltd

16) 24 Hour Light Nig Ltd

17) Imani Petroleum & Transport Co. Ltd

18) A.Y. Mai Kifi Oil & Gas Co. Ltd

Perhaps to achieve a predetermined goal, the NNPC made the bid exercise a mismatch between local companies and export companies. The two categories of companies were invited under two separate pre-qualification conditions that were based on technical competencies.

The three preferred bid winners  Sign Oil &Gas Ltd, Synthesis Integrated Pure Oil and Korpu Energy Ltd  participated in the bid under the export category.

The technical capacities required of export companies were understandably different from those for local companies. However, during the financial bid, the NNPC, without explanations, merged export and local companies together knowing full well that the latter cannot match the financial muscles of the former.

To add to the woes of participating local companies, the NNPC insisted the slop oil must be off-taken ex-coastal. While that was good for the export companies which would just pick up the slop oil and sail off overseas, it was bad news for local companies which, in addition to paying cost price for the oil and extra N60 million handling charges to NNPC, must also rent storage facilities for the consignment. Also, because slop oil is a heavy liquid, truck drivers charge far higher to transport slop oil than they would petrol, kerosene or diesel.

Furthermore, by pitting struggling local companies against export counterparts in the same bid, NNPC officials succeeded in selling the slop oil to the bid winners at a rock-bottom price. A source at the NNPC Towers, who would not want to be named for fear of retribution pointed out that the best price offered by the export companies is still too low and cheap considering they will be selling at the international market at a dollar rate.

The source further revealed that following PREMIUM TIMES earlier report which exposed the plot to export the nations slop oil, a national strategic asset, the NNPC mulled a U-turn. Top-ranking officials charged with damage control quickly went to work; a development that saw the slop oil allocation going to yet another different company, the fourth bid winner said to be a local company.

At the time, it could not be ascertained if the third bid winner, Korpu Energy Ltd, could also not meet the payment deadline or was forced to give up its hold by the NNPC.

While stakeholders were grimly watching to see if the slop oil allocation would be passed on to a fifth company or that the fourth bid winner will supply to local end-users, information came in that Korpu Energy Ltd has paid for the allocation.

The official telephone contact provided by Korpu Energy Ltd in its bid documents failed to connect even with several call attempts made by PREMIUM TIMES.

When contacted on Thursday afternoon, the NNPC asked for time to allow it to investigate the allegations against its officials concerning the controversial bid. Hours later, its spokesperson, Garbadeen Muhammed, called to say he should be given till Friday to complete his inquiry.

Twenty-four hours later, he again requested another 24 hours to enable him to provide a comment. On Saturday afternoon, Mr Muhammed was reminded via WhatsApp that the time he requested had lapsed. He did not reply to that message as of the time of publishing this report.

EDITORS NOTE: We have updated this post to reflect new information we received that the third preferred bidder is KORPU Energy Limited (not KURPO Energy Limited). KORPU is registered with the CAC. Even at that, the fact remains that it benefited from a flawed procurement process.
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The Nigerian Police, Ogun Command, says it has rescued three workers of the former President Olusegun Obasanjos Farm, from their kidnappers den, three days after they were abducted.

The Police Spokesperson, Abimbola Oyeyemi, made this known to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abeokuta, on Friday evening.

NAN reports that the Obasanjo Farms workers were kidnapped on Wednesday evening at Seseri Village, while returning from work.

The farm is located at Kobape area in Obafemi-Owode Local Government area of the state.

Mr Oyeyemi told NAN on Friday that the release followed a serious pressure mounted on the kidnappers.

He said that the anti-kidnapping operatives had been on the trail of the abductors.

According to him, the squad had continued combing bushes around the area since the incident happened.

Yes, we mounted a lot of pressures on the kidnappers.

READ ALSO: Gunmen abduct three workers at Obasanjo Farms

Since yesterday (Thursday) our anti-kidnapping operatives have been in the bush searching for them.

They were able to trace them to the bush behind the Day Waterman College, along the Kobape Road.

This evening, they released them (victims) unhurt without any ransom, he said.

On whether there was any arrest, Mr Oyeyemi said not yet, but we are very sure that we will make arrests soon.
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The Niger State Police Command says it has rescued the kidnapped traditional ruler of Wawa in Borgu Local Government of Niger.

Mahmud Aliyu, the victim, was kidnapped by heavily armed gunmen on Sunday at his palace at about 10 p.m.

The Police spokesperson in the state, DSP. Wassiu Abiodun, made this known to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Minna on Saturday.

Mr Abiodun said that the royal father was rescued on Friday at about 19:30 hours, after a sustained effort of the Police, military and vigilante.

Mr Aliyu is currently receiving medical attention at an undisclosed facility.

(NAN)
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The Police in Kano have rescued a day-old baby stolen at the Muhammad Abdullahi Wase Teaching Hospital in Nassarawa, Kano.

Abdullahi Kiyawa, the police spokesperson in the state, disclosed this in a statement he issued on Friday.

He named the suspected thieves as Abubakar Sadiq and his wife, Maryam Sadiq, of Rijiyar Zaki Quarters, Kano.

It was gathered that the couple had been desperate for a male child.

According to the police, on Wednesday, one Rabiu Muhammad of Gayawa quarters, Ungogo local government area reported that one of his newly-born male twins was found missing at the hospital.

Mr Muhammad said the baby was taken from his sister in-law at the corridor of the maternity ward while she was asleep.

Mr Kiyawa said upon receiving the report, the Commissioner of Police, Samaila Dikko, sent detectives to the hospital.

The team immediately stormed the scene and launched a search. The Hospital was sealed off and thoroughly combed, but the child could not be found immediately.

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Sustained efforts coupled with intelligence sharing led to the arrest of one Maryam Sadiq, f, 22 years old, and her husband, one Abubakar Sadiq, m, 50 years old, all of Rijiyar Zaki Quarters, Kano.

The Child was recovered from them in their home.

On preliminary investigation, Maryam confessed that the child was taken away from Muhammad Abdullahi Wase Teaching Hospital, Kano and that she carried out the act under the influence of her husband, who has been longing for a male child.

The police spokesperson said the newborn has been reunited with his parents, and the Commissioner of Police has ordered the transfer of the case to the Criminal Investigation Department for discreet investigation.

He said the suspects would be charged to court after the investigation.
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A Nigerian author, Dayo Lomuwagun, has unveiled 15 books written by him.

Launching the books on Saturday, which was held virtually via Zoom, Mr Lomuwagun said the books were his contributions towards societal reformation and moral regeneration.

He said he was moved to write the books significantly for helping to set Nigeria on the path of moral rectitude.

Specifically, the author said the books are mostly centred around children to set them on the right path in life early enough.

The author, a chartered accountant by profession and public affairs analyst, said the writings of notable writers like Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, and a host of others, have a significant influence on his creative writing and literary worldview.

Aside from Messrs Soyinka and Achebe, Mr Lomuwagun also derives inspiration from his immediate environment, church and everyday occurrence around him.

Speaking during the book launch, Dele Farotimi, a renowned human rights activist, commended the creativity, productivity and brilliance of the author.

Mr Farotimi said writing and publishing fifteen books in one fell swoop are no mean feat, considering how difficult writing and even the publishing climate in Nigeria could be.

He added that he was perturbed by the general apathy of Nigerians towards reading.

Mr Farotimi said he hoped Mr Lomuwaguns books would spur Nigerians to read more.

The titles of some of the books launched include: Murdered by Love, The Appointment, Duke and the Lions, The Oracles Error, The Community College, Wisdom for the street, The Conversations, Dads Diamond, among others.

When asked about the number of books he has in his kitty so far, the author said he has written and published 27 books altogether, some of which can be found in various bookstores in Lagos and the libraries of various secondary schools in the state.

Mr Lomuwagun said he hopes to circulate his books more across the length and breadth of the country for larger penetration.

Some dignitaries who attended the book launch include, Sunday Ogunduyile, Vice-Chancellor of the Olusegun Agagu University of Science and Technology, Okitipupa, Ondo State; Wunmi Oladele; Oluseyi Aba; Gboluga Ikengboju, member representing Okitipupa/Irele Federal Constituency represented by Ropo Daso, among others.
A U.S. court on Friday sentenced a Nigerian, Afeez Adebara, to four years imprisonment for managing a group of money launderers in an online Nigerian romance scam.

The group led by the 36-year-old Oklahoma resident was said to have defrauded multiple victims, including elderly individuals across the U.S., and caused losses of at least $2.5 million.

A statement by the U.S. Department of Justice disclosed on Friday that Mr Adebara was sentenced in Northern District of Oklahoma after he earlier pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering on November 3, 2020.

The Assistant Attorney General, Kenneth Polite Jr. of the Justice Departments Criminal Division, Acting U.S. Attorney Clinton Johnson for the Northern District of Oklahoma, and Special Agent in Charge Melissa Godbold of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Oklahoma City Field Office, made the announcement.

They said the case was a part of an ongoing national effort by the Department of Justice to address online fraud schemes, including those based out of Nigeria, that target U.S. citizens and residents.

Their statement, which cited court documents and testimony, said Mr Adebara and co-conspirators used multiple bank accounts opened under various aliases using fake passports and other fraudulent identification documents for their fraudulent scheme.

The perpetrators, between 2017 and November 2019, knowingly concealed the proceeds of a romance scam operation by moving money between and among the fraudulent bank accounts.

This was done to obscure the source of the funds and the identities of the co-conspirators, the statement added.

Mr Adebara was also said to have taken further steps to conceal the source of the funds.

He would take commission for himself, and direct the remainder of the funds back to the online romance scammers in Nigeria, the officials added.

Sometimes, the proceeds sent back to Nigeria could be in the form of vehicles and vehicle parts.

How fraud was perpetrated

Mr Adebara coordinated with overseas co-conspirators who had assumed false identities on online dating websites and social media platforms to defraud victims.

He provided his multiple fraudulent bank accounts and routing numbers to co-conspirators.

The co-conspirators told victims that they were U.S. residents working or travelling abroad.

As the online relationships continued, the overseas co-conspirators requested increasingly larger sums of money, with the claimed purpose that the funds were needed to complete business projects or for them to return to the United States.

The victims were directed by the co-conspirators to send funds to certain bank accounts, with assurance that the money would purportedly be allocated as needed.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)Is Oklahoma City Field Office was said to have conducted the investigation with the assistance from the FBIs San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York Field Offices.

The case was prosecuted by Attorneys Babasijibomi Moore of the Criminal Divisions Fraud Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Christopher Nassar of the Northern District of Oklahoma prosecuted the case.

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Other Nigerians jailed

The statement of the U.S. Department of Justice provided a list of other Nigerians lawfully residing in the U.S. who have been recently jailed.

It did not give the details of the offences the convicts were jailed for.

Previously, John Ogundele, 32, of New York, New York, was sentenced to 33 months imprisonment, the statement stated.

READ ALSO:

It added that Paul Usoro, 25, a Nigerian citizen and lawful permanent resident of the United States residing in Norman, was sentenced to 12 months imprisonment, six of which were to be served in home confinement.

Joshua Ditep, 26, a Nigerian citizen and lawful permanent resident of the United States residing in Norman, was sentenced to 10 months imprisonment.

Tobiloba Kehinde, 29, a Nigerian citizen residing in Norman, was sentenced to eight months imprisonment, four of which were to be served in home confinement.

Also, Chibuzo Obiefuna, 28, of Long Beach, California, and Jamiu Adedeji, 25, a Nigerian citizen residing in Norman, were each sentenced to time served.
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President Joe Biden has described national unity as the United States greatest strength in a video commemorating the 20th anniversary of the al-Qaeda attacks on September 11 which left nearly 3,000 people dead.

In the days that followed Sept. 11, 2001, we saw heroism everywhere, in places expected and unexpected.

We also saw something all too rare: a true sense of national unity, Biden said in a video message posted on Twitter on Friday evening.

In the battle for the soul of America, unity is our greatest strength. Unity doesnt mean we have to believe the same thing, but we must have a fundamental respect and faith in each other and in this nation, the president said.

The 9/11 generation is stepping up to serve and protect in the face of terror  to show everyone seeking to do harm to the America that we will hunt you down and we will make you pay.

That will never stop, Biden said.

The president said that the darker forces of human nature also emerged following the attacks, namely fear and anger.

Resentment and violence against Muslim Americans, true and faithful followers of a peaceful religion, he said.

But the country cannot allow itself to be divided. Unity is what makes us who we are  America at its best.

White House spokesperson Jen Psaki, said that on Saturday, the president and the first lady would honor and memorialise the lives lost with travel to all three sites of the 9/11 attacks, visiting New York City; Shanksville, Pennsylvania; and the Pentagon.

The president was set to visit ground zero in New York City, the Pentagon and the memorial outside Shanksville, where one of the four hijacked planes crashed after passengers attempted to regain control of the aircraft, the White House said.

The al-Qaeda plane hijackings were the single worst attack on U.S soil in the countrys history.

(dpa/NAN)
Over 1,000 students have been abducted from Nigerian schools this year, Save the Children International, a non-governmental organisation (NGO), has observed.

The group said increasing cases of attacks on schools between 2020 and 2021 have led to many schools being shut, thereby putting the education system of the country at extreme risk.

From January to August, 2021, over 1000 children were abducted in Nigeria, with so many of them still in the hands of their abductors.

PREMIUM TIMES reported many cases of attacks by gunmen on schools in Kaduna, Katsina, Kebbi, Zamfara and Niger states, during which hundreds of students were abducted for ransom.

Mercy Gichuhi, Country Director, Save the Children International Nigeria, said this in a statement issued on Friday to mark the world second International Day to Protect Education from Attacks.

When education is under attack, a generation is attacked, Ms Gichuhi said. Children, girls and women are more vulnerable at times of attack  putting them at a higher risk of trauma, fear, gender-based violence, physical and sexual abuse.

Many children in such times will have no choice but to discontinue their education and some will never return back to school  with their childhood dream fading away.

Ms Gichuhi said her NGO was concerned about the persistent attack on schools, students and teachers in Nigeria.

The Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack (GCPEA), says between 2015-2019, there were 100 reported attacks on schools in Nigeria. These attacks have been on the increase between 2020 and 2021, which led to the closedown of many schools by the government due to fear of being attacked, she said.

Education at extreme risk

She said a recently released report by Save the Children, titled: Build Forward Better, revealed that the DRC, Nigeria, Somalia, Afghanistan, South Sudan, Sudan, Mali, and Libya have education systems that are at extreme risk while Syria and Yemen follow closely behind.

The new data, which is the first of its kind, follows recent Save the Children research, which found that on average, children in low-income countries have lost 66 per cent more of their lifetime schooldays during the pandemic, compared with their peers in well-off countries.

Ms Gichuhi, said the International Day to Protect Education from Attack, marked across the world every September 9, is an important moment to raise awareness on the situation of education in conflict and some of our focus on the Safe Schools Declaration.

Out-of-school children on the increase

In Nigeria, the number of out-of-school children, according to UNICEF, was at 10.5million before the effects of the conflict, humanitarian crisis and COVID-19 pandemic were felt. With the total or partial closure of schools in Zamfara, Katsina, Adamawa, Kaduna, Niger and other States due to kidnapping and abduction of school children, the number of children that would be prevented from accessing education in Nigeria could be on the increase.

We know that education is in the grip of an unprecedented crisis across West and Central Africa (WCA). For the first time in human history, an entire generation has had their education disrupted. But, before COVID 19, the education system was already in crisis across WCA, with the lowest school enrolment rates in the world at the primary level.

In fact, in normal times, 1out of 5 of children aged 6-11 years are out of school in WCA. While the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on education continues, violence and attacks against schools also continue in the Sahel, Nigeria and the DRC with huge consequences for children.

That context exacerbates pre-existing structural problems within the education system, including the lack of qualified teachers, school facilities, overcrowded classrooms, lack of teaching materials and the inability to adapt teaching to meet the psychosocial needs of children, the organisation said.

Child testimony

The statement quoted a Save the Children Girl champion in Borno State, Madina Abdulkadir, as saying: Closure of schools does not only affect our present but it also endangers our future. It is not appropriate that the first thing done in crisis is the closure of schools.

We understand that the government wants to save our lives but shouldnt there be a better option like providing the necessary security arrangements to protect the learning environment?

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The statement further highlighted: Save the Children urges governments to put in place mechanisms that ensure the protection of schools and other learning environments, as Nigeria hosts the globe at the fourth International Conference on Safe Schools Declaration.

We look forward to seeing government and international partners coming up with concrete measures to build resilience at the community level, evolved security measures that will help curb the persistent attack on educational facilities including the children and their teachers.

Save the Children equally calls on international partners and the Government of Nigeria to increase investment in education to address the multi-faceted factors affecting education in Nigeria.
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The Katsina State Government has cut mobile telecommunication networks in 13 local government areas of the state as part of efforts to discourage bandits being chased from Zamfara and Kaduna states from relocating to the state.

The Security Adviser to Governor Aminu Masari, Ibrahim Katsina, confirmed this in an interview with PREMIUM TIMES.

Mr Katsina said fleeing bandit might be using network service in some parts of Katsina to communicate with their colleagues.

PREMIUM TIMES reports that some areas in Katsina have been disconnected from mobile telecommunications network.

READ ALSO:

The affected local government areas include: Sabuwa, Faskari, Dandume, Batsari, Danmusa, Kankara, Jibia, Safana, Dutsin-Ma and Kurfi. These local governments are on the fringes of the Ruggu forest, which is a hub of the murderous bandits.

Other local government areas affected are Funtua, Bakori and Malumfashi.

The reason for taking the decision is that it helps in curbing banditry. It stops informants from reaching bandits and vice versa. For now, these are the only areas we have shut down but we will include any area we think they (bandits) may use to communicate.

The 13 affected areas are the frontline local government areas and those closer to Zamfara and Kaduna states. We are doing that to complement security agencies efforts in all the affected states, Mr Katsina said.

Governor Masari had on Monday announced the ban of commercial mobile phone charging points in 19 of the 34 local government areas of the state.

We believe it is also an area that is helping the bandits to acquire means of communication, the governor had said.

This comes barely a week after the government banned weekly cattle markets, closed Jibia  Zurmi and Sheme  Yankara roads, and outlawed sale of fuel in jerry cans, among other security measures.
A forensic expert from Sentinel Forensics Ltd, Joseph Funsho-Ako, on Saturday told the Lagos Judicial Panel of Inquiry that the integrity of the scene of the Lekki tollgate shooting was compromised before they began a forensic analysis of the environment.

He told the panel investigating the Lekki tollgate shooting incident of October 20 that the crime scene should have been preserved.

Mr Funsho-Ako said this while responding to a question from Bernard Onigah, head of the National Bar Association (NBA), pro bono team for the #EndSARS protesters, why they couldnt determine whether the ammunition recovered from the scene of the shooting were live or blank.

The forensic company was engaged by the Lagos State government on December 29 to conduct a forensic review of the incident at the Lekki Toll Plaza and submit a detailed comprehensive report on the subject.

Mr Funsho-Ako had on Friday submitted a ballistic report of the forensic investigation conducted on the ammunition presented by the Nigerian Army at the panel.

He had explained that the samples of ammunition presented by the Nigerian Army matched bullet shells recovered at Lekki Tollgate.

In November last year, the Nigerian Army, represented by Ibrahim Taiwo, the Commander of 81 Division, had told the panel that soldiers fired only blank ammunition at Lekki tollgate to disperse protesters on the night of October 20.

At another appearance before the panel, the army said although they went to Lekki tollgate on October 20 with both blank and live ammunition, they only fired blank cartridges.

Cross-examination

Mr Funsho-Ako said his team went to the scene of the incident first on January 13 and later on 15, about three months after the shooting.

He said if they had gone into the area earlier, they would have been able to determine whether the Nigerian Army discharged live or blank ammunition.

During cross-examination by Mr Onigah, he said another analysis would be needed to find out the kind of ammunition used by the Nigerian Army.

When he was asked by the lawyer the nature of the analysis, he said, to carry it out, it will require the firearm from individuals you are suspecting.

Mr Funsho-Ako again insisted that when they visited the scene of the Lekki toll plaza, they discovered that the integrity of the scene had not been preserved.

Items of physical evidence were removed and lost between the timeline of the incident at the scene and examination, he said.

Mr Onigah asked the witness whether the 500-gigabyte hard drive containing the footage of the incident was the primary source.

Mr Funsho-Ako responded that they were made to understand that the hard drive was retrieved from the Lekki Concession Company (LCC), adding that whether it was the primary source, I do not know.

Earlier during the cross-examination, Adeshina Ogunlana, a lawyer representing some #EndSARS protesters, asked Mr Funsho-Ako if the camera recovered from Babatunde Fashola, minister of works and housing, was given to his team for forensic analysis. The witness said no.

Days after the Lekki incident, Mr Fashola, while visiting the scene of the shooting, said he found a hidden camera at the tollgate.

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Sadly, the whole idea of social responsibility that places an ethical obligation to try all in our power to minimise the possibility that our behaviour will expose others to risk is lost on so many. There is no doubt that our world is totally consumed in the messy divide of politics and cultural wars, but the bigger problem is that the we are facing an epistemic crisis at a time when access to knowledge is at an all time high.

In the early 1900s, Mary Mallon worked as a domestic cook for many of New Yorks uber elite families. She was later identified as an asymptomatic spreader of Salmonella typhi and known to have infected 53 persons with typhoid fever. It took a while before medical investigators were able to identify her as the source. Nicknamed Typhoid Mary, she refused to be tested and fled from health authorities, but was captured and quarantined. Mary sued the health department for what she believed was an infringement on her personal right, but lost. Upon release, she violated the terms of her acquitance and picked up a job in a maternity hospital, where more people were infected, some of who died. Miss Mallon, who died on November 11, 1938, spent a total of 30 years of her life in forced quarantine for willfully breaking the terms of her release each time and posing a grave danger to public health.

Since the first cases were reported in the United States in January 2020, hundreds of thousands of Americans have succumbed to the equal opportunity and universally lethal COVID-19 virus. The Trump administrations initial handling of the pandemic was a study in management disaster, exacerbated in part by Americans cultural war and a strangulating partisan divide. However, with the introduction of the COVID vaccine in December 2020, amongst other preventative measures put in place, things started to look up. COVID imposed restrictions were incrementally getting relaxed and badly hit businesses, such as the airline industry, came roaring back this summer. The nation witnessed a months-long downward trend in the rate of infection that began in mid-January this year, but the good news was over very quickly.

The death rate from COVID-19 in the U.S. is back up again and steadily rising. A seven-day average of new cases has increased by nearly 70 per cent to almost 30,000 per day and hospitalisations are up by 36 per cent, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The highly transmissible delta variant has fueled this latest surge in cases. The CDC tracking that focuses on the number of new cases per 100,000 people during the previous seven days, defines a high transmission rate as more than 100 cases per 100,000. As of July this year, more than 63 per cent of U.S. counties met that definition.

Whereas much of the scientific research about the virus is still evolving, the emerging trend, according to the nations top infectious disease experts led by Dr Anthony Fauci and supported by evidence on the ground, is that almost 99 per cent of COVID-19 deaths in the United States today are among the unvaccinated.

The current increased incidence nationwide is being driven mostly by outbreaks in places such as the Ozarks, Florida and parts of the Mountain West, areas with record low vaccination rates, which is why some people now call it a pandemic of the unvaccinated. This demographic is very susceptible to infection and are more likely to spread the disease. Yet, millions of Americans continue to shun vaccines that have proven highly efficacious, resist wearing masks, and oppose government restrictions fiercely. They assert their individual liberties over the common good.

It is true that Americas founding fathers, steeped in uncommon wisdom and weary of the dangers of a coercive government, introduced the Bill of Rights, comprising the first ten amendments to the Constitution. That way, they reckoned, personal liberties will be fully protected and government powers limited. What is also true is that contrary to the understanding of so many, those liberties are not limitless.

Anti-vaxxers, traditionally, had centered their opposition along the line of drug safety and conspiracy theories, both of which have increasingly become harder to sell. In the ensuing debate, however, they pivoted. The argument has now shifted and they frame their refusal to be vaccinated in terms of values that reflect the freedom of choice. In order words, its now a civil rights issue and millions have been recruited to join in the fight.

It is true that Americas founding fathers, steeped in uncommon wisdom and weary of the dangers of a coercive government, introduced the Bill of Rights, comprising the first ten amendments to the Constitution. That way, they reckoned, personal liberties will be fully protected and government powers limited. What is also true is that contrary to the understanding of so many, those liberties are not limitless.

As humans, when we ditched jungle life to embrace the sophistication of communal living in organised society, we signed up to accommodate some constraints on individual freedom and liberty. One mans right to throw a punch stops right at another mans nose. Your right to choose should not come at the expense of your neighbours, co-workers, friends or familys right to live

President Joe Biden, not too ago, issued a mandate to all federal employees and contractors, to either attest to getting vaccinated or undergo weekly testing. As frustrating as the issue of vaccine opposition is to an administration that is fighting hard to contain a devastating global pandemic, the president is hamstrung to a significant degree when it comes to implementing a federal action to force or incentivise getting the vaccine.

Should President Biden make any attempt to impose a federal vaccine mandate, governors, especially in the Red States, are more than likely to invoke the 10th Amendments prohibition on commandeering or forcing states to use their own resources to carry out federal policies. The state and local authorities, however, are better positioned to achieve this, since they are in possession of the statutory authority to mandate and enforce compliance. Two landmark Supreme Court decisions speak to their authority on this issue.

In 1905, a Cambridge resident by name, Henning Jacobson, refused a free smallpox vaccination that was mandated by the city. Jacobson argued that the vaccination law violated his 14th Amendment due process rights and then went ahead to sue the state of Massachusetts after he was fined five dollars. He lost the case. Delivering the judgment, the Supreme Court ruled that under a state law, local health authorities could compel adults to receive the smallpox vaccine.

This Delta strain is taking no prisoners and our Intensive Care Unit has become such an eerie beehive, where humans queue in line, just waiting for their turn to die. This public health crisis is causing panic and creating fear for patients and families. Healthcare workers are feeling overwhelmed, burnt out, and, yes, angry. My colleague is angry that not even a single soul among the very sick and dying in his unit was vaccinated.

In another related case, Rosalyn Zucht was among the excluded students from San Antonios public and private schools in 1922 for refusing the smallpox vaccine. Her lawyer also argued that the vaccine policy violated Zuchts 14th Amendment due process rights. The presiding judge, Louis Brandeis cited the Jacobson vs. Massachusetts case as a proof that it is within the police power of a state to provide for compulsory vaccination.

In both cases, the courts majority conclusion was that states invoking general police powers had the ability to enact vaccine laws to protect their citizens. Such powers enable a state to pass laws to protect the health, safety, and overall welfare of the public. With the deep polarisation in the United States today, even between conservative versus liberal leaning judges, and the nations suffocating partisan rancour, its doubtful that such commonsense judgment will be heard in any American court .

Its barely a week since getting back on the groove, but not even the reboot of a relaxing three weeks vacation could provide a respite from the current onslaught. This body is already demanding another time off and its impossible to ignore the quiet groan beneath the white coat superhero facade.

This Delta strain is taking no prisoners and our Intensive Care Unit has become such an eerie beehive, where humans queue in line, just waiting for their turn to die. This public health crisis is causing panic and creating fear for patients and families. Healthcare workers are feeling overwhelmed, burnt out, and, yes, angry. My colleague is angry that not even a single soul among the very sick and dying in his unit was vaccinated.

Sadly, the whole idea of social responsibility that places an ethical obligation to try all in our power to minimise the possibility that our behaviour will expose others to risk is lost on so many. There is no doubt that our world is totally consumed in the messy divide of politics and cultural wars, but the bigger problem is that the we are facing an epistemic crisis at a time when access to knowledge is at an all time high.

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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In Nigerias ongoing cow wars, the truth appears to be the main casualty. Unable to contain what it describes as farmer/herder clashes, between sedentary farming communities and nomadic pastoralists over land and water resources, the current administration of President Muhammadu Buhari has resorted to a disinformation campaign as a means of public misinformation, in the effort to obfuscate the identity and motive of killer herdsmen

Frustrated by the mass killings in his State, which has resulted in thousands of deaths and the displacement of millions of people, Samuel Ortom, a Tiv and the governor of Benue, a State plagued by farmer/herder clashes, had this to say of President Muhammadu Buhari, a Fulani: Mr President is pushing me to think that what they say about him, that he has a hidden agenda in this country, is true, because it is very clear that he wants to Fulanise but he is not the first Fulani president. Shagari was a Fulani president, Yar Adua was a Fulani president and they were the best in the history. But President Buhari is the worst president when it comes to issues of security and keeping his promises.

The reaction from the Presidency was fast and furious, as if they were waiting for Ortom to throw the first punch before dealing him a fatal blow. In a statement signed by presidential spokesman, Garba Shehu, Ortom was accused of ethnic and religious hatred for the Fulani, as well as crass political opportunism, amongst many other sins. According to Shehu, Every time he feels the wind may be blowing in a certain direction, he follows it. Unfortunately, for the good citizens of Benue State, the most dangerous direction he blows in today is that of sectarianism and ethnicity.

In an attempt to boost his sinking political fortunes, Ortom takes the cheapest and lowest route possible by playing on ethnic themes  and in doing so, knowingly causes deaths of innocent Nigerians by inciting farmers against herders, and Christians against Muslims. Specifically, Ortom stirs up hatred by targeting one single ethnic group in Nigeria  using language reminiscent of the Rwandan genocide. As was the case in Rwanda, where the then Hutu leaders of the country incited their countrymen against each other, claiming there was a secret Tutsi agenda over the Hutu, Ortom claims there is a secret Fulanisation agenda over other ethnic groups in his state and in Nigeria. This is a copy of the language of Hutu Power  which falsely, and intentionally, accused the Rwandan Tutsi of plans to dominate the country.

In Nigerias ongoing cow wars, the truth appears to be the main casualty. Unable to contain what it describes as farmer/herder clashes, between sedentary farming communities and nomadic pastoralists over land and water resources, the current administration of President Muhammadu Buhari has resorted to a disinformation campaign as a means of public misinformation, in the effort to obfuscate the identity and motive of killer herdsmen. In the past six years, there has been a consistently deliberate effort, on the part of official information managers of the Buhari administration, to turn land owners into encroachers, aggressors into the aggressed, and killers into victims, also in ways that conversely portray terrorists as freedom fighters in Nigerias raging cow wars.

Much like the Hutus dominated power in 1994 Rwanda from the beginning to the end of the genocide against Tutsis, the Fulani are in power in Buharis Nigeria, as the genocide against sedentary communities are raging. If the Hutu government of Rwanda actively backed the Interahamwe in their mass killings of Tutsis in Rwanda, it appears that the Fulani dominated government of Nigeria is unwilling to contain the murderous excesses of their herdsmen kinsmen.

Whilst it is acceptable for the Buhari presidency to draw parallels between what happened in Rwanda in 1994 and the current happenings in Nigeria, it is unacceptable to deliberately switch the roles of various dramatis persona in what seems to be an unfolding re-enactment of the Rwandan tragedy in Buharis Nigeria, in order suit the official narrative. Whereas the Hutu are a predominantly farming group of people, the Tutsi are pastoralists; and there is a tendency in Buharis Nigeria to liken Fulani herdsmen to the Tutsis of Rwanda, while the Tiv, as well as other farming communities, are considered likewise as the Hutus of that East African country.

However, the hood does not make a monk and contrary to the narrative of the Buhari presidency, the Rwandan-style genocide is already happening in Nigeria. And in the on-going pogrom, the killer Fulani carrying out mass killings, the destruction of farm lands, rustling of cattle, and kidnapping for ransom across the country, are the aggressors, whose murderous activities approximate those of Rwandas Interahamwe  the Hutu militia group that was responsible for the massacre of nearly one million Tutsis in 100 days. The Tutsis of Nigeria are the unarmed and defenceless citizens who are daily hacked down in Benue, Plateau, Taraba and other farming communities across Nigeria.

Another striking similarity between the Hutu Interahamwe and their killer Fulani herdsmen counterpart in Nigeria, is that both groups kill moderate members of their own ethnic group, who do not subscribe to their murderous agenda. Just as the Interahamwe killed fellow Hutus who were not part of their anti-Tutsi agenda, so also are killer Fulani herdsmen killing, en masse, their own Fulani kinsmen, who are not members of their murderous gang of marauders in Zamfara, Sokoto, Niger, Katsina, Kebbi, Kaduna and other parts of Nigerias Fulani homeland, after rustling their cattle.

Much like the Hutus dominated power in 1994 Rwanda from the beginning to the end of the genocide against Tutsis, the Fulani are in power in Buharis Nigeria, as the genocide against sedentary communities are raging. If the Hutu government of Rwanda actively backed the Interahamwe in their mass killings of Tutsis in Rwanda, it appears that the Fulani dominated government of Nigeria is unwilling to contain the murderous excesses of their herdsmen kinsmen. In place of the grouse against the Tutsi by the Hutu, of a ploy to dominate power in Rwanda and the propagation of the bitter and oppressive rule of the Mwami, the Tutsi king of Rwanda during the colonial era, the grouse of Nigerias killer Fulani herdsmen is that pre-colonial grazing routes and reserves have been encroached upon by sedentary farming communities across Nigeria, hence the justification for their killing expedition as a mission to recover what rightly belongs to them. Unfortunately, the chief propagator of this incendiary fallacy is not the media but the Buhari administration, through official government communication. Times without number, President Buhari has made the claim that gazetted grazing routes and reserves have been encroached upon by farming communities and that the only panacea for peace and security in Nigeria is the recovery of these routes and reserves for the nomadic Fulani herdsmen.

What Governor Ortom and others like him whose people are victims of mass killings by killer herdsmen are doing, is simply reporting the violence in their States and not promoting violence against Fulani people in general, as claimed by the Presidency. This has been in the same way that the Tutsis of Rwanda cried out to the world over the Hutu-powered genocide of their people.

Unfortunately, in Nigerias ongoing cow wars, the Buhari administration seems to be more concerned about the wordings of the lamentations of victims of killer herdsmen, who are identifying their attackers by their Fulani ethnicity, than their bereavement over the loss of thousands of human lives. Save for intellectual dishonesty, the information managers of the Buhari administration are experienced enough to know that there is a clear difference between promoting violence and reporting violence. Similarly, there is a world of difference between criminal profiling of an ethnic group and the ethnic profile of an individual or group of criminals. In conflict zones all over the world, the media reportage of wars and other forms of violence are patterned to reflect the racial, ethnic, religious and political persuasion of the warring groups in order to highlight the socio-cultural, historic and environmental factors responsible for the crisis.

In Hitlers World War II Germany, the world was informed that six million Jews were exterminated in gas chambers by Nazi Germans of mostly the Aryan race, in racially motivated mass killings. The Middle East crisis is reported as an age-long conflict between Jews and Arabs of Palestine. Apartheid South Africa was rightly described as a white minority-dominating-a-black-majority country, where racial inequality, social and economic injustice reigned. The ousted leader of Sudan is wanted by the International Criminal Court in The Hague for backing Arab Janjaweed militia men to carry out genocide against the non-Arab communities of the Western Darfur region. The Muslim community in Nigeria often stand in solidarity with the Rohingya Muslims of Myanmar, who have come under violent attacks by radical Buddhists, while blaming the Buddhists dominated government in Yangon of aiding and abetting the killing of Muslims. Recently, President Buhari was said to have lost his appetite following what his government described as a pre-arranged killing of 25 Muslim travellers along the Jos-Bauchi road, and his police force described the perpetrators as ethnic Irigwe youths.

What Governor Ortom and others like him whose people are victims of mass killings by killer herdsmen are doing, is simply reporting the violence in their States and not promoting violence against Fulani people in general, as claimed by the Presidency. This has been in the same way that the Tutsis of Rwanda cried out to the world over the Hutu-powered genocide of their people. Otherwise, how did Garba Shehu come about the information that the crisis in Rwanda was genocide by Hutu against their fellow Tutsi country men and not just some farmer/herder clashes between Hutu farmers and Tutsi pastoralists?

More than Ortom and anyone else, the Buhari administration is most guilty of the charge of the ethnicisation of criminality in Nigeria, as it stubbornly categorises the raging violence in Nigeria as farmer/herder clashes. And it was in Ortoms Benue that the tone was set for this unfortunate ethnicisation of herdsmen terrorism. In its reaction to the killing of over 70 people in Benue by killer herdsmen in 2017, the Buhari administration, speaking through former Minister of Defence, Mansur Dan Alli, declared the mass killings as farmer/herder clashes and blamed the signing into effect of the anti-open grazing law by Governor Ortom for bringing about that situation. Minister Dan Alli also blamed the blocking of grazing routes and encroachment on reserves across the country as remotely responsible for the carnage. In his own belated reaction, President Buhari admonished the people of Benue State to learn to accommodate fellow Nigerians and live in peace. And not a single individual was brought to justice for the killings. Therefore, who are the farmers and who are the herders? You can beat a child but you cant ask the child not to cry.

Majeed Dahiru, a public affairs analyst, writes from Abuja and can be reached through dahirumajeed@gmail.com.

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The recent visit by Governor Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya of Gombe State to President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa, Abuja has been viewed by public commentators and political analysts as one of the most dynamic and result-oriented engagements ever undertaken by the Governor since assumption into office two years ago.

The issues discussed at the meeting made it even more unique and reassuring, considering their irrefutable importance to national security, economic development, social cohesion and wellbeing of the people. As a matter of fact, the visit can be viewed from the prisms of patriotism and responsiveness embedded in rare leadership qualities exhibited by Governor Inuwa Yahaya.

So what were the issues discussed? And to what extent would the eventual outcomes of the engagement rob off on Gombe State and the nation in general? At this point, it is important to clarify that the meeting was an initiative of the effervescent Governor Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya to push for some germaine matters of benefit to Gombe State and its people. And so, when it was that time to meet with the President, the Governor wasted no time in presenting and intimating the Commander-in-Chief on items in his order paper.

Firstly, the Gombe State Governor presented to President Muhammadu Buhari the master plan of the Gombe Industrial Park, a monumental project conceived by the Governor and which is named after the Nigerian leader. The Muhammadu Buhari Industrial Park is designed to sit on 1000 hectares of land and is expected to utilize the Dadinkowa Hydro power plant for its energy needs. Already, the Gombe State Government has approved over 16.4 billion naira contract for the construction of phase 1 of the Industrial Park, an ambitious contract sum and project never undertaken in Gombe state since the creation of the State in 1996.

According to Governor Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya during a parley with State House Correspondents, We discussed the issue of Gombe Industrial Park which we awarded the contract to start in record time and it has been named after Mr. President. So, I informed him and sought his support to see that we deliver on that. You know our people are naturally peasant farmers and herders and if were able to put up the industrial park, well have a big place that can provide opportunities for our youths in the industries within agricultural production, processing, marketing and distribution so that they will have very good means of livelihood and the economy will also improve.

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Governor Inuwa Yahaya equally engaged the President on security matters vis- a- vis the comforting role Gombe State has been playing in hosting Internally Displaced Persons, IDPs from Boko Haram afflicted states of Borno, Yobe and Adamawa thereby putting a strain on the States social infrastructure. During the heights of the Boko Haram insurgency, Gombe State became home to many fleeing IDPs, considering its proximity to the epicentre states of the uprising and above all the relative peace Gombe enjoys at that time and even now.

This sense of hospitality displayed by the Gombe State Government did infact come with a price as managing security in the State is gradually becoming a challenge. For us we dont put them in IDP camps; we allow them settle within our people and they have already acclimatised and are staying with our people but that puts a lot of strain on our resources. Schools, hospitals and other social facilities and amenities and equally security management is becoming an issue, the Gombe State Governor said.

Governor Inuwa Yahaya also intimated the President on Gombes permanent NYSC Orientation Camp which now serves as a rehabilitation center for surrendering and repentant insurgents.

He told the President that the facility has not been formally taken over by the federal government. This development, the Governor maintained, has led to a steady decline in the number of Youth Corps members being deployed to the State thereby affecting the human resource that the State need in our schools and other Government establishments.

To this end, the Governor appealed to the Federal Government to reimburse the state with equivalent amount to set up another NYSC orientation camp in view of the fact that Gombe State Government has come to realise that the de-radicalization center is no longer going to be temporary especially now that the insurgents are surrendering in their numbers.

The Governor also tabled before the President, the issue of Wawa-Zange grazing reserve and the need to fast track work on the largest gazetted reserve in Nigeria. With over 144, 000 hectares, the reserve was slated to be used as a pilot project for the National Livestock Transformation Programme of the Federal Government. I believe that Mr. President earlier in 2020 precisely in his 2020 January speech acknowledged and approved that the National Livestock Transformation Plan which is expected to take off with a model from Gombe, the Wawa-Zange reserve, but so far, nothing serious has been done on that, and with the recent outburst, and position taken by governors of southern parts of this country, there is the need for us to fast-track the process of building that place so that in the event our people move in multitudes to come back to resettle, we will have a space for them.

We did request for funds. I believe that every other state will do so because you need the resources in order to implement and there is scarcity of financial resources in the state, so, weve requested and submitted a proposal that is fully backed by a feasibility report that indicates what we require.

Equally discussed,was the issue of oil and gas discovered in the Benue Trough, specifically in Kolmani area which is situated in Bauchi and Gombe States. It is noteworthy that since the discovery of the black gold not much was achieved in terms of exploitation for the benefit of the people. Even though the Gombe State Governor acknowledges the political will and passion shown by the President since his days as the Federal Commissioner of Petroleum in the 80s and later when he became President, he however did not hesitate in appealing to President Muhammadu Buhari to utilize his good office in pressurising the NNPC to commence full exploitation of the oil and gas in the Benue Trough.

With the deposits discovered and the interest shown by investors who want to put in money and develop the gas and oil deposits available in that place, there is need for us to fast track the process of the take-off so that people will benefit from Gods resources that Nigeria is blessed with.

To say the least, the meeting between the Gombe State Governor Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya and Nigerias President, Muhammadu Buhari is one strategic engagement that will go a long way in addressing the social, economic, political, security, cultural and even religious challenges confronting the Nigerian State and its people if properly implemented.

A closer look at the issues discussed at the meeting, points in clear terms, the audacity, tenacity and never say die spirit of Governor Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya to go to any length in advocating, canvassing and lobbying pivotal issues that can be beneficial not only to Gombe State and North East sub-region but indeed the entire entity called Nigeria.

Misilli is the Director-General ( Press Affairs) Government House Gombe
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The Governor of Jigawa State, Muhammad Badaru, has warned Fulani people in the state against harbouring bandits fleeing from the military offensive against them in Zamfara State.

According to a statement by his spokesperson, Habibu Kila, the governor gave the warning on Friday when he met the leadership of Miyatti Allah, a Fulani socio-cultural group, over rising cases of kidnapping in the state.

Mr Badaru warned the officials over allegations that some members of their community were harbouring criminals, saying the state would not allow the repeat of happenings in Zamfara State.

Armed bandits are reportedly fleeing Zamfara to escape from the military onslaughts. This has coincided with an uptick in reported cases of violent crimes in Jigawa, a relatively peaceful state in the troubled North-west region of Nigeria.

You, as leaders, you have to engage your subordinates in discussion to warn them against harbouring of criminals, the governor admonished the Miyatti Allah officials.

They know those committing crimes but they shield them. If people are kidnapped, they are kept in Fulani settlements.

We dont want to use force on Fulani settlements. You have to report suspicious strange persons. All the people that are being kidnapped are kept in Fulani settlements. If we allow the insecurity to deteriorate, everyone will bear the consequences, Mr Badaru said.

Happenings in Zamfara are disgusting, people have been killed. We will not allow the situation here to reach the level of Zamfara, the governor added.

Efforts in progress to contain the crisis  Governor

Mr Badaru said the state would continue to provide and expand qualitative nomadic education to cattle herders in all parts of the state.

He said the government was committed to providing education to all, including the herders, for the development of the state.

In addition to about 400 nomadic schools across state, the government will establish 200 more new nomadic schools and employ 10 herders from each of the 27 local government areas of the state, Mr Kila said.

He said following the governors recent working tour to The Netherlands, plans are underway to expand cattle routes and grazing reserves to provide all-year grass for the nomadic.

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He called on Miyatti Allah to support the government in the fight against vices among the Fulani, especially their youth, who are engaged in criminal activities.

The chairman of the association commended the efforts of the government in maintaining peace in the state.

He said they would do everything possible to ensure that the peace between farmers and herders in the state is maintained.

He also said with the support of the government, the Fulani community will fish out any criminal among them.
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The police in Rivers State said they have rescued eight passengers abducted recently by pirates in the state.

The police spokesperson in the State, Nnamdi Omoni, confirmed the rescue and arrest of one suspected pirate in a statement in Port Harcourt on Friday.

He said the victims were taken forcefully from their passenger boat in two separate attacks along Bodo/Bonny waterways in the state.

The eight victims, comprising five male and three female were abducted on September 7 and September 8 by pirates and kept in captivity.

Their rescue was made possible by the intense pressure mounted on the kidnappers by operatives of the Anti-Cultism Unit, said Mr Omoni, a superintendent of police.

Mr Omoni said the anti-cultism unit of the police arrested the suspect, Baridula Gboro, 35, from Bodo area in Gokana Local Government Area of the state.

The suspect provided useful information to the police, including the identities of other gang members and the location the victims were kept, he said.

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Mr Omoni said detectives were, thereafter, deployed to rescue the victims.

The abductors on sighting a team of police detectives abandoned their victims and fled, he said.

The victims have been released by the police so they could get medical attention, the spokesperson said.

Efforts have been intensified to ensure the arrest of the remnants of the pirate gang as well as recover their weapons.

The Commissioner of Police, Eboka Friday, has directed an increased police presence on the Bodo/Bonny waterways with (a) focus to stemming further attacks and ensuring safety of passengers, Mr Omoni stated.

The police spokesperson advised passengers to avoid late-night journeys that could expose them to danger.

He called on marine transport operators to profile their members, alleging that some boat operators connive with pirates to aid the abduction of passengers.

(NAN)
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A former director-general of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency, Dakuku Peterside, has described the governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike as a wicked and irresponsible, following the peaceful protest by pensioners in the state.

Mr Peterside, a member of the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers, was the partys governorship candidate in the state in 2015. He lost the election to Mr Wike.

Pensioners in Rivers came out on Wednesday to protest the non-payment of their gratuities and pension arrears for over six years.

Mr Peterside, in a statement on Thursday, advised the governor to hearken to the voices of the retired senior citizens and pay them their outstanding entitlements without further delay.

He said the governor cannot complain of lack of funds, because the state had received huge allocations in the last six years, in addition to Paris Club refund, credits from banks, and N75 billion refund from the federal government.

The former governorship candidate said senior citizens have never been so ill-treated in Rivers.

I was moved to tears when I saw the pictures of old men and women protesting at their age. This is embarrassing and shameful to a state that has enormous resources to pay them all their entitlements and allowances.

Governor Wike still has an opportunity to redeem his battered image by immediately commencing the processes to pay them. On no account should they come out protesting again, enough is enough of their unmerited sufferings every year, he said.

Mr Peterside said what has befallen the pensioners typifies the attributes of a wicked and irresponsible emperor, who derives pleasure in seeing people cry and sometimes die in the course of demanding for their rights.

Meanwhile, in reaction, the Commissioner for Information in Rivers State, Paulinus Nsirim refused to say if the state government was owing the pensioners or not; he merely said a thorough investigation should be done before Mr Petersides remark is addressed.

When you see allegations like these, investigate them. Be sure that what the person is alleging is correct and then confront the person that is being accused. Not just someone throwing something there and then you begin to give the person cheap publicity.

Im sure if you have been following the development in the state over these few months, you will know the character of the person who is talking. Thats for me, he said.

The Nigeria Union of Pensioners, Rivers State Council, in 2018, said the Rivers State Government was owing pensioners in the state N60 billion since 1999.
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President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday praised the Igbos enterprising spirit, saying that it is evidenced they are in charge of Nigerias economy.

Mr Buhari stated this in a thank you message to the people and government of Imo State which he posted on his Facebook page after his Thursdays visit to the South-east state.

Imo State is considered to be the hub of the pro-Biafra group, IPOBs operations in the region.

Mr Buhari was in the state for a one-day working visit to inaugurate projects executed by Governor Hope Uzodinmas administration.

The president, while in Imo, had preached the importance of peace for the state, the South-east region, and Nigeria.

In the Facebook message afterwards, the president said the Igbos were truly the most enterprising.

There is no town you will visit in Nigeria without seeing the Igbos being in-charge of economic activities. The evidence is there for everyone to see, that Igbos are in charge of Nigerias economy.

It is, therefore, unthinkable for me that any Igbo man would consider himself not to be a part of Nigeria, said President Buhari.

The president said he was pleased with the development projects in Imo, promised to support the state and the region, and thanked the government and people of Imo State for the warm reception.

The Federal Government will complete all ongoing key projects in the South-east, including the 2nd Niger Bridge, and other major highways, as well as the railway lines and routes linking the region with other parts of the country, he added.

Troubled region

The agitation for an independent republic of Biafra, led mainly by IPOB which has been proscribed by the Nigerian government, has led to killings and destruction in the South-east for some years now.

The IPOB leader, Nnamdi Kanu, is currently detained in Abuja where he is on trial for treason.

President Buharis message here, quite reconciliatory in tone, is a complete departure from his tough-talking remarks in the past.

However, it is unclear, for now, what impact this may have on the Biafra agitation
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The Commissioner of Police in Enugu State, Lawal Abubakar, has ordered an immediate investigation and possible disciplinary action against a police officer seen engaging a woman in an altercation and physically assaulting her.

The incident, captured in a viral video on social media, is said to have occurred while some police operatives were on duty at a checkpoint in Obeagu-Awkunanaw near Enugu, along Agbani Road, on September 8.

The commissioners order is contained in a statement issued by the police spokesperson in the state, ASP Daniel Ndukwe, and made available to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Saturday.

The commissioner, Mr Abubakar, condemned the conduct of the police officer in the clip. He warned officers against unprofessional conduct or disrespecting the fundamental human rights of citizens in the performance of their duties.

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Anyone found wanting, in this kind of shameful incident, will be made to face maximum disciplinary sanctions.

I also appeal to the assaulted lady and eyewitnesses to the incident to visit the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (State CIID), Enugu, to volunteer their statements, in order to facilitate meticulous and swift conclusion of investigation, he added.

Mr Abubakar called on residents to promptly report to the nearest police station, police officers found conducting themselves in an unprofessional manner.

The statement published telephone hotlines and an email address which residents could reach the police with their complaint.

(NAN)
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Operatives of Ondo State Security Network Agency, code-named Amotekun, have rescued the remaining three people who were kidnapped last Wednesday in the state.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the victims were travelling to Lagos from Ifira-Akoko in Akoko South-East Local Government Area of the state when they were kidnapped by gunmen.

The incident occurred at the bad portion of Idoani-Ifira road in Akoko South-East council area.

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NAN also reports that the Amotekun corps had gone after the kidnappers and rescued nine victims on Thursday.

The State Commander of Amotekun, Adetunji Adeleye, on Saturday in Akure told journalists that the remaining three victims have now been freed.

Mr Adeleye said that the victims would be reunited with their family members later today (Saturday).

He said that his men responded to a distress call from concerned citizens.

I can confirm to you that we have rescued the three remaining victims and they will be reunited with their families today, he said.

(NAN)
ELIZABETHTOWN [mdash] Kenneth M. Eddy, 68, of Elizabethtown passed away Saturday, Sept. 4, 2021, at his home. He was a kind soul that always saw the good around him. He loved transforming the earth into lovely gardens and his work can be seen at the Colonial Gardens and many other locations 
AP FILE PHOTOA U.S. flag flies over the rubble of the collapsed World Trade Center buildings in New York on Sept. 13, 2001. City of Plattsburgh Fire Chief Scott Lawliss was among the first responders from Clinton County who traveled to New York City in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. I dont know, unless you saw the pile or the area, (that you could) get the magnitude of the work that needed to be done to recover people, he said.
P-R FILE PHOTOIn response to questions from locals used to a more laissez faire approach to the border, Clinton County Legislature Chair Mark Henry said, "We live in a different world than we did before. We need to be cognizant of that and it is our responsibility to ensure the safety of the people of the United States against, at that time, against terrorists, weapons of mass destruction. Thats our duty, thats our mission and thats what we need to do to accomplish that.
FILE - In this May 18, 2020, file photo, Transportation Security Administration officers wear protective masks at a security screening area at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport in SeaTac, Wash. The Biden administration says it is moving to increase the pay and union rights for security screeners at the nations airports. The Department of Homeland Security directed the acting head of the TSA to come up with a plan within 90 days to raise the pay of the screeners and expand their rights to collective bargaining. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson, File)
Southbury, CT (06488)

Today

Sun and clouds mixed. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High around 85F. Winds SSW at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. Low 66F. Winds NW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%.
Judging took place in 34 sessions over 17 days with strict health and safety measures in place. A total of 170 judges evaluated 9,680 entries from 2,192 breweries from all 50 states plus Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. The awards ceremony was held at the Bellco Theatre in Denver on Friday evening during the Craft Brewers Conference and was livestreamed on The Brewing Network.

To allow for the fall hop harvest and beer production, and to include Fresh Hop beers in this prestigious competition, 78 Fresh Hop Beer category entries will compete in early October, with winners announced Friday, October 15.

"Despite being forced to cancel the festival portion of GABF, our brewing community rallied together to make this year's GABF competition one for the booksour largest competition judged to date," said Chris Swersey, competition director, Great American Beer Festival. "Judges continue to be impressed with the quality and innovation of all entries they evaluated. The Brewers Association is proud to honor this year's deserving winners. We look forward to celebrating in person together next year."

As previously announced, the Great American Beer Festival will celebrate its 40th anniversary October 6-8, 2022, at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver.

View the 2021 winners or download a PDF list of the winners.

GABF Competition Statistics

35th edition of the GABF competition

9,680 beers judged

2,192 breweries in the competition from all 50 states plus Washington, D.C. , and Puerto Rico

, and 170 judges

Average number of competition beers entered in each category: 99.6

Category with the highest number of entries: Juicy or Hazy India Pale Ale (427)

290 total medals awarded

265 medal-winning breweries

425 first-time GABF entrants

30 first-time entrant GABF medal winners

MOST-ENTERED STYLE CATEGORIES

The winners of the top five most-entered categories were:

Category 64: JUICY OR HAZY INDIA PALE ALE (427 entries)  Sponsored by Antigo Zeon

GOLD: DeadHead IPA Series: TourBus - DESTIHL Brewery, Normal, IL

SILVER: Art is Hard - North Park Beer Co., San Diego, CA

BRONZE: Blissed - Attitude Brewing Co., San Diego, CA

Category 63: AMERICAN-STYLE INDIA PALE ALE (404 entries)  Sponsored by Micro Matic

GOLD: Volatile Substance - Von Ebert Brewing  Pearl, Portland, OR

SILVER: JAF IPA - JAFB Wooster Brewery, Wooster, OH

BRONZE: Bullitt - All Season Brewing Co., Los Angeles, CA

Category 25: FRUITED AMERICAN SOUR ALE (249 entries)  Sponsored by Amoretti

GOLD: Sherbet Drip - Fall River Brewing Co., Redding, CA

SILVER: Tropical Hurt Locker - Short Fuse Brewing Co., Schiller Park, IL

BRONZE: Rasmine - Lynnwood Brewing Concern, Raleigh, NC

Category 80: GERMAN-STYLE WHEAT ALE (226 entries)

GOLD: Hefeweizen - JAFB Wooster Brewery, Wooster, OH

SILVER: Kusterer Original Weissbier - Cedar Springs Brewing Co., Cedar Springs, MI

BRONZE: Hazy Skies Hefeweizen - Pilot Brewing Co., Charlotte, NC

Category 43: GERMAN-STYLE PILSENER (210 entries)  Sponsored by John I Haas, Inc.

GOLD: Meanwhile Pilsner - Meanwhile Brewing Co., Austin, TX

SILVER: Rail Pass - Bingo Beer Co., Richmond, VA

BRONZE: Golem Czech Pils - Gemut Biergarten, Columbus, OH

MOST MEDALED BREWERIES

The most medals won by an individual brewery:

Moontown Brewing Co. - Whitestown, IN  3 Medals

SILVER: Moonlite  40: American Cream Ale

BRONZE: 40th Parallel  44: Bohemian-Style Pilsener

BRONZE: Skool House Bock  51: Bock

Additionally, 15 breweries won two medals.

Brewery OF THE YEAR Awards

(See criteria here)

0  250 Barrels

Radiant Beer Co., Anaheim, CA; Andrew Bell & Radiant Beer Co. Team

251  500 Barrels  Sponsored by Brewers Supply Group

Main & Six Brewing Co., Jacksonville, FL; Dennis Espinosa & Alex Leuthold

501  1,000 Barrels  Sponsored by Fermentis

Moontown Brewing Co., Whitestown, IN; Cody Peczkowski

1,001  2,000 Barrels  Sponsored by ABS Commercial

Cloudburst Brewing, Seattle, WA; Steve Luke & Zach Kornfeld

2,001  5,000 Barrels  Sponsored by Brewers Supply Group

Short Fuse Brewing Co., Schiller Park, IL; Brian Lagro & Craig Kofod

5,001  15,000 Barrels  Sponsored by MicroStar Logistics

Sudwerk Brewing Co., Davis, CA; Team Sudwerk

15,001  100,000 Barrels  Sponsored by Sponsored by Briess Malt & Ingredients Co.

Allagash Brewing Co., Portland, ME; Team Allagash

Brewery Group  Sponsored by Live Oak Bank

Over 100,000 barrels produced in 2020 or multi-location breweries wishing to compete as a group

Metazoa Brewing Co., Indianapolis, IN; Metazoa Brewing Team

Editor's note: Photos for media use are available on the GABF website.

*Out of a possible 291 medals in 97 beer style categories, 290 were awarded. The gold medal was not awarded in category 96: Scotch Ale. The winners of the Fresh Hop Beer category will be awarded in mid-October.

The 2021 Great American Beer Festival competition was made possible in part by the generous support of its sponsors.

About the Brewers Association

The Brewers Association (BA) is the not-for-profit trade association dedicated to small and independent American brewers, their beers and the community of brewing enthusiasts. The BA represents 5,400-plus U.S. breweries. The BA's independent craft brewer seal is a widely adopted symbol that differentiates beers by small and independent craft brewers. The BA organizes events including the World Beer Cup, Great American Beer Festival, Craft Brewers Conference & BrewExpo America, SAVOR: An American Craft Beer & Food Experience, Homebrew ConTM, National Homebrew Competition and American Craft Beer Week. The BA publishes The New Brewer magazine, and Brewers Publications is the leading publisher of brewing literature in the U.S. Beer lovers are invited to learn more about the dynamic world of craft beer at CraftBeer.com and about homebrewing via the BA's American Homebrewers Association and the free Brew Guru mobile app. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

The Brewers Association is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, gender, religion, age, disability, political beliefs, sexual orientation, or marital/familial status. The BA complies with provisions of Executive Order 13672 and the rules, regulations, and relevant orders of the Secretary of Labor.

SOURCE Brewers Association
BENSALEM, Pa., Sept. 10, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Law Offices of Howard G. Smith reminds investors of the upcoming September 14, 2021 deadline to file a lead plaintiff motion in the case filed on behalf of investors who purchased RenovaCare, Inc. ("RenovaCare" or the "Company") (OTC: RCAR) securities between August 14, 2017 and May 28, 2021, inclusive (the "Class Period").

Investors suffering losses on their RenovaCare 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 [email protected].

On May 28, 2021, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") issued a litigation release stating that RenovaCare was being charged with alleged securities fraud. According to the SEC's complaint, between July 2017 and January 2018, the Company's controlling shareholder and Chairman, Harmel Rayat ("Rayat"), "arranged, and caused RenovaCare to pay for, a promotional campaign designed to increase the company's stock price." Specifically, "Rayat was closely involved in directing the promotion and editing promotional materials, and arranged to funnel payments to the publisher through consultants to conceal RenovaCare's involvement in the campaign." When OTC Markets Group, Inc. requested that RenovaCare explain its relationship to the promotion, the complaint alleges that "Rayat and RenovaCare then drafted and issued a press release and a Form 8-K that contained material misrepresentations and omissions denying Rayat's and the company's involvement in the promotion."

On this news, the Company's stock price fell $0.66, or 24.8%, over three consecutive trading sessions to close at $2.00 per share on June 2, 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) that, at the direction of Rayat, RenovaCare engaged in a promotional campaign to issue misleading statements to artificially inflate the Company's stock price; (2) that, when the OTC Markets inquired, RenovaCare and Rayat issued a materially false and misleading press release claiming that no director, officer, or controlling shareholder had any involvement in the purported third party's promotional materials; (3) that, as a result of the foregoing, the Company's disclosure controls and procedures were defective; and (4) as a result, Defendants' statements about its business, operations, and prospects were materially false and misleading and/or lacked reasonable basis at all relevant times.

If you purchased or otherwise acquired RenovaCare securities during the Class Period, you may move the Court no later than September 14, 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 [email protected], 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.

Contacts

Law Offices of Howard G. Smith

Howard G. Smith, Esquire

215-638-4847

888-638-4847

[email protected]

www.howardsmithlaw.com

SOURCE Law Offices of Howard G. Smith

Related Links

http://www.howardsmithlaw.com/


Innovation, Organic growth, and Acquisition driving substantial top-line growth

TORONTO, Sept. 9, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - Kontrol Technologies Corp. (NEO: KNR) (OTCQB: KNRLF) (FSE: 1K8) ("Kontrol" or the "Company"), a leader in smart building technology, today announced a record $6.5 million in revenue (unaudited) for the one month of August 2021.

"We delivered our highest revenue month in Kontrol's operating history based on strong organic growth and the consolidation of our recent acquisition," said Paul Ghezzi, CEO of Kontrol. "We remain focused on scaling the business across our operating portfolio and growing market share in the global smart buildings industry. Innovation is at the core of our business and the driving force behind the ongoing commercial building modernization cycle which we are uniquely positioned to capitalize on as we seek to create long term value for our shareholders."

Strategic Plan

The Company is executing on its strategic plan to innovate internally, accelerate organic growth through cross-sales opportunities, and make strategic value acquisitions on an opportunistic basis. Of particular emphasis is the continued growth of recurring revenues.

BioCloud continues to be accretive to year-to-date revenues and the Company has recently entered into a partnership with Steelcase (see press release dated August 16, 2021) which is set to launch this month. As a leader in office technology, Steelcase provides an established dealer network that is approximately 40 times the size of Kontrol's current independent distributor network.

New Innovation: Carbon Credit Platform

The Company is accelerating its carbon credit platform innovation in preparation for a launch in the Fall of 2021. Currently, organizations which seek out energy efficiency retrofit rebates from local utility companies will exchange ownership to carbon credits generated for those various rebates. Kontrol is establishing a new platform whereby those carbon credits associated with verifiable and measurable energy efficiency solutions and the associated greenhouse gas emission reduction can be monetized without the requirement for local utility incentives. Customers will be able to participate with Kontrol in the monetization of those carbon credits.



"The majority of large organizations have recognized the importance of improving their corporate sustainability initiatives and the need for reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in the building sector," continues Paul Ghezzi. "We look forward to adding value and incentivizing sustainable practices by offering a unique enhancement to monetize energy efficiency retrofits into carbon credits. We plan to deliver this through our existing energy retrofit technology solutions and the addition of a unique carbon credit monetization platform."

Quarterly Financials

The Company will report its financial statements for the third quarter ended September 30th, 2021 on November 15th, 2021, and will provide conference call dial-in details in the coming weeks.

About Kontrol BioCloudTM

Kontrol BioCloud is an operating subsidiary of Canadian public company Kontrol Technologies. The BioCloud technology is a real-time analyzer designed to detect airborne viruses and pathogens. BioCloud is an air quality technology and not a medical device. BioCloud has been designed to operate as a safe space technology by sampling the air quality continuously. With a proprietary detection chamber that can be replaced as needed, viruses are detected, and a silent notification system is created. BioCloud can be applied to any space where individuals gather. Additional information about Kontrol BioCloud can be found on its website at www.kontrolbiocloud.com.

Kontrol Technologies Corp.

Kontrol Technologies Corp., a Canadian public company, is a leader in smart buildings and cities through IoT, Cloud and SaaS technology. Kontrol provides a combination of software, hardware, and service solutions to its customers to improve energy management, air quality and continuous emission monitoring.

Additional information about Kontrol Technologies Corp. can be found on its website at www.kontrolcorp.com and by reviewing its profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com.

Neither IIROC nor any stock exchange or other securities regulatory authority accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

Forward-Looking Statements

This news release contains "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable securities laws. All statements contained herein that are not clearly historical in nature may constitute forward-looking information. In some cases, forward-looking information can be identified by words or phrases such as "may", "will", "expect", "likely", "should", "would", "plan", "anticipate", "intend", "potential", "proposed", "estimate", "believe" or the negative of these terms, or other similar words, expressions, and grammatical variations thereof, or statements that certain events or conditions "may" or "will" happen, or by discussions of strategy.

Where Kontrol expresses or implies an expectation or belief as to future events or results, such expectation or belief is based on assumptions made in good faith and believed to have a reasonable basis. Such assumptions include, without limitation, that sufficient capital will be available to the Company and that technology will be as effective as anticipated.

However, forward-looking statements are subject to risks, uncertainties, and other factors, which could cause actual results to differ materially from future results expressed, projected, or implied by such forward-looking statements. Such risks include, but are not limited to, that sufficient capital and financing cannot be obtained on reasonable terms, or at all; that those technologies will not prove as effective as expected; those customers and potential customers will not be as accepting of the Company's product and service offering as expected; and government and regulatory factors impacting the energy conservation industry. Kontrol BioCloud is an air quality technology and not a medical device. The Company is not making any express or implied claims that its product has the ability to eliminate, cure or contain the COVID-19 (or SARS-2 Coronavirus).

Accordingly, undue reliance should not be placed on forward-looking statements and the forward-looking statements contained in this press release are expressly qualified in their entirety by this cautionary statement. The forward-looking statements contained herein are made as at the date hereof and are based on the beliefs, estimates, expectations, and opinions of management on such date. Kontrol does not undertake any obligation to update publicly or revise any such forward-looking statements or any forward-looking statements contained in any other documents whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise or to explain any material difference between subsequent actual events and such forward-looking information, except as required under applicable securities law. Readers are cautioned to consider these and other factors, uncertainties, and potential events carefully and not to put undue reliance on forward-looking information.

SOURCE Kontrol Technologies Corp.

Related Links

https://kontrolcorp.com/


The remembrance dinner was attended by leaders in the military, intelligence, law enforcement, veteran service organization and first responder communities. PenFed honored today's heroes by presenting $50,000 in donations, $10,000 each, to National Military Family Association, Our Military Kids, Military Women's Memorial, FBI Agents Association and Firefighters Fund of Fairfax County.

James Schenck, President/CEO of PenFed Credit Union and CEO of PenFed Foundation, was working at a PenFed facility in Alexandria when he saw the news of the attacks on 9/11/2001. Schenck and several volunteers walked six miles to the PenFed financial center at the Pentagon to see how they could help the team and others who were immediately impacted.

"As we ran toward the Pentagon, I'll never forget what we saw: In the aftermath of the attacks, we saw the best of America  the selflessness and courage of the American people, moving toward the burning Pentagon building to help others survive," said Schenck during his remarks. "These brave Americans were not only first responders and military personnel; they were everyday civilians who were in the area, coming out of the Pentagon City Mall, stopping their cars on South Hayes Street and heading toward the burning Pentagon to assist in any way they could."

All PenFed financial center employees at the Pentagon on 9/11 were able to evacuate safely, and the credit union reopened for business the next day to provide continuous service and support to the Pentagon community.

"That morning we were on a one-way mission and if successful, we wouldn't be coming back. We were mission failure. The passengers on Flight 93 are the true heroes," said keynote speaker, Heather "Lucky" Penney, an American hero and renowned speaker most widely recognized for her service as an F-16 fighter pilot on 9/11. "I've come to learn that heroism isn't something unique or possessed only by a chosen few. The passengers on Flight 93 proved that and so did the people that helped each other moments before the towers fell."

Retired Army General John W. Nicholson Jr., President of the PenFed Foundation, was moving into a new house that day. His desk in the Pentagon was 100 feet from where the nose of the plane hit the building. "Everyone between my desk and the plane perished. You don't forget something like this. It stays with you forever. What I do every day, I do now in honor of those people we lost," he said during his remarks.

This year in honor of the 20th anniversary, PenFed is partnering with the Military Women's Memorial to support the 9/11 Remembrance Relay. This week the 9/11 Remembrance Relay is paying tribute to the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the 177 servicewomen who died in combat zones since, with a 177-mile walk from the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, to the Military Women's Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery.

Founded in 1935 as the War Department Credit Union, PenFed's core membership is comprised of members of the national defense communities and all who support them. Following the attacks of 2001, PenFed launched the PenFed Foundation to support service members, veterans and their families. The PenFed Foundation has delivered over $40 million in support to over 150,000 members of the military community through programs providing financial education, credit-building, homeownership, short-term assistance and veteran entrepreneurial support services. To learn more about PenFed's history, visit penfed.org/about-penfed. To learn more about the work of the PenFed Foundation, visit penfedfoundation.org.

About PenFed Credit Union

Established in 1935, Pentagon Federal Credit Union (PenFed) is America's second-largest federal credit union, serving 2.4 million members worldwide with over $28 billion in assets as of July 31, 2021. PenFed Credit Union offers market-leading certificates, checking, credit cards, personal loans, mortgages, auto loans, student loans, and a wide range of other financial services. Our mission is to empower members of our community to achieve their financial well-being. PenFed Credit Union is federally insured by the NCUA and is an Equal Housing Lender. To learn more about PenFed Credit Union, visit PenFed.org , like us on Facebook and follow us @PenFed on Twitter . Interested in working for PenFed? Check us out on LinkedIn . We are proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer.

SOURCE PenFed Credit Union

Related Links

http://www.PenFed.org


WASHINGTON, Sept. 10, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- On Thursday, September 9, 2021, After at least four years of investigations and trials, Dr. Hu Anming, a nanotechnology expert who was a professor at the University of Tennessee (UT), was acquitted by a federal judge, following a mistrial this year. Dr. Hu is the first to go to trial from the China Initiative, a program started by the Trump Administration in 2018 to maintain U.S. economic advantages over China.

"We want to thank United States District Judge Thomas A. Varlan for upholding equal justice," said United Chinese Americans (UCA) Board Chairman Jinliang Cai. "Thank you to the many Chinese American community groups and individuals for the strong support of Dr. Hu, and we send condolences to Dr. Hu and his family for this whole ordeal."

For two years, the federal government dragged Dr. Hu through investigations for espionage, which caused him to lose his job as professor at UT. Last year, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) did not have enough to file charges of espionage and instead filed charges of wire fraud and false statements against the Chinese Canadian.

Judge Varlan wrote that no reasonable jury could have inferred that holding a professorship at Beijing University of Technology disqualified him from working on NASA-funded research and that the federal government's latter charges failed the test of common sense.

The National Security Division of the Department of Justice has detailed components of the China Initiative program, stating that some of the purposes of the China Initiative is to counter espionage of the Chinese government and protect American "national assets." But as many critics have pointed out, with overzealous prosecutors and insufficient oversight, the China Initiative program has turned into a witch hunt of racial profiling for theater and show, ruining careers and turning peoples' lives upside down. It causes fear and anxiety for many Chinese Americans, as well as academics and scientists working in the U.S. who are of Asian descent, who have been incorrectly scapegoated for COVID-19 and who are continuing to make important contributions to U.S. science, technology and innovation.

"We demand that the Department of Justice investigate misconduct by the involved government agencies, enact a moratorium on all pending cases of the China Initiative, and for the White House to terminate the China Initiative," said UCA President Haipei Shue.

Media Contact:

Lucca Wang

202-642-5060

[email protected]

SOURCE United Chinese Americans (UCA)

Related Links

https://ucausa.org


In his visits to schools and universities in recent years, Xi greeted many educators and acknowledged their contribution to Chinese social development.



In 2016, he visited Beijing Bayi School where he spent his own elementary and junior high school years and extended his appreciation to the country's educators for their diligence and commitment.



"I would like to take this opportunity] to extend utmost festival greetings to all the teachers and educational workers across the country," Xi said years ago while visiting Beijing Bayi School where he spent his own elementary and junior high school years.

Xi held talks with many retired teachers of the school who witnessed Xi's development during his time as a student.



Xi visited Peking University in May 2018 and called for more efforts in building the country's universities into world-class institutions with Chinese characteristics.



When presiding over a symposium in Beijing for teachers of ideological and political theory back in March 2019, Xi stressed efforts to implement the Party's education policy and foster virtue through education with the thought on socialism with Chinese characteristics for a new era.



In his inspection of Tsinghua University this April, Xi talked to students of the university and encouraged Chinese youth to shoulder their historic responsibilities and strive for national rejuvenation.



He also thanked researchers and teachers for their academic contributions and encouraged young faculty members to continue making breakthroughs in their fields of study.

Link: https://youtu.be/bjrsjGt0Cb0

SOURCE CCTV+
The White House's sweeping new vaccine rules and mandates have fundamentally changed the way employers with 100+ employees  and two-thirds of the American workforce  respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, leaving many employers wondering: What now?

The stakes are high. Large employers, schools or healthcare facilities who can't comply  who can't prove hundreds of their employees are vaccinated, have a legally permissible waiver, or are submitting to weekly diagnostic tests  face thousands of dollars in penalties and fines for violations, fees that could cripple organizations already struggling with the economic ramifications of a global pandemic.

"These are waters most employers have never entered before, and it gets incredibly complex incredibly fast," said Brett Martin, CEO of infectious disease screening company CastleBranch. "Mandates mean continuously collecting sensitive medical documents from employees, verifying the document's veracity, having a process to accommodate legally permissible medical, religious and philosophical waivers, tracking weekly diagnostic test results, and creating a documented audit trail while protecting the individual's private information from unlawful exposure. For the inexperienced, it's an unmitigated nightmare."

To help large employers, colleges and universities, Martin's company created an essential tool kit: RealVaccinationID.com and CB COVID-19 Compliance. RealVaccinationID.com provides digital and physical proof of COVID-19 vaccination or waiver status while helping companies to create a secure audit trail; CB COVID-19 Compliance offers diagnostic test tracking, as well as temperature and symptom monitoring, isolation and quarantine processes, and contact tracing solutions. First launched in April of 2020, and then again in January 2021 ahead of the first COVID-19 vaccine  the tool kit is inspired by some of the world's leading epidemiologists and pandemic disease policy experts. It's also been endorsed by both the Organization for Associate Degree Nursing (OADN) and the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN), the nation's two largest nursing healthcare associations, representing over 80 percent of nursing education in the country.

RealVaccinationID.com cards are the first step to help employers comply with the new mandate, and to help protect themselves from legal liability by creating a secure, documented audit trail. The driver's licensed-sized cards can be obtained after an individual submits proof of his or her vaccination, booster shot, or waiver status, along with name, date of birth, address, photo ID and other personal identifiers. A team of trained experts reviews and verifies the medical information under CastleBranch's "nothing about me without me" policy, which protects the individual's private data from unwanted exposure. The cards also incorporate sophisticated forgery-prevention technology, including holographic film similar to those found on state-issued IDs, to help individuals prove they've received the COVID-19 vaccine or qualify for vaccine exemption, while making counterfeiting or forgery next to impossible.

The card can be paired with the company's Diagnostic Test Tracking, part of its overall CB COVID-19 Compliance toolset. The solution helps organizations track the results of any diagnostic COVID-19 test accessible via a secure, password-protected platform, and can be used to help comply with the White House's weekly test requirement.

"COVID-19 represents one of the greatest existential threats to our health, safety and wellbeing any of us have seen in our lifetime. It's important that we stop the virus, which means reaching herd immunity through vaccinations, but getting there requires process and experience," said Martin. "CastleBranch has the tools and experience to safely navigate the government's directive, and to help organizations and individuals manage the regulatory risks that come with handling protected health records."

CastleBranch is one of the leading providers of vaccination and immunization tracking in the United States. With 25 years' experience, the company has collected, reviewed, and/or stored over 35 million medical documents for a majority of healthcare education programs across the nation. Their applications are designed to maintain strict compliance with state and federal privacy regulations; create a detailed audit trail along every step of the process; and to help organization handle the logistics of implementing a complex vaccine mandate at scale.

For more information, visit RealVaccinationID.com.

###

About CastleBranch:

Located in Wilmington, N.C., CastleBranch is an infectious disease screening and compliance management company serving over 17,700 healthcare programs, tens of millions of individuals, and tens of thousands of employers, schools and healthcare facilities nationwide by verifying identity, tracking over 35 million medical documents, and helping individuals transition to and through professional life. CastleBranch has 25 years of experience, employs over 500 team members and has a long track record of providing innovative solutions for complex problems.

SOURCE CastleBranch

Related Links

https://www.castlebranch.com/


CORONA, Calif., Sept. 10, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - Ikanik Farms, Inc. (CSE: IKNK.U) (FSE: DFMA) (the "Company" or "Ikanik Farms") is pleased to announce that it has extended the expiry date of an aggregate of 2,236,985 previously issued subordinate voting share purchase warrants (the "SVS Warrants") and 4,183 previously issued series A multiple voting share purchase warrants (the "MVS Warrants" and, together with the SVS Warrants, the "Warrants") exercisable at a price of CDN$0.30 per SVS Warrant and CDN$30.00 per MVS Warrant, to March 28, 2022. The extension was effected in accordance with the terms of the certificates evidencing the Warrants and the policies of the Canadian Securities Exchange. The extension is effective September 13, 2021 and the Warrants had previous expiry dates ranging from September 28, 2021 to October 15, 2021.

About Ikanik Farms

Ikanik Farms is a California based, Multi-National Operator (MNO) who is building a dynamic portfolio of brands, inspired by its passion for health and wellness, action sports, and supported by its vertically integrated retail, distribution and cultivation in CA and its medical grade cultivation and laboratory in Colombia. The Company's leadership brings decades of expertise in R&D, cultivation, retail, branding, and corporate finance. Ikanik Farms' operation in Colombia, through its pharma division Pideka, holds GMP-PHARMA, (GACP) Good Agricultural and Collection Practice, (GPTCP) Good Production Transformation & Commercialization Practices Cannabis Pharma and ISO-9001:2015 certifications for its Casa Flores operating facility.

On behalf of the Board of Directors of Ikanik Farms Inc.

SOURCE Ikanik Farms Inc.

Related Links

https://ikanikfarms.com/


BALTIMORE, Sept. 11, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The American Urological Association (AUA) is a leading advocate in urology. Their work impacts both the federal and state levels to support the practice of urology, their members, as well as their patients. A new study presented during the 2021 AUA Annual Meeting aims to showcase the impact of telemedicine on urologic oncology patient outcomes. This study also supports one of the AUA's telehealth legislative priorities. A virtual press session highlighting this study was moderated by AUA Spokesperson, Dr. Charles Welliver and is now available for viewing.

New study highlighting the impact of telemedicine on patient reported outcomes in urologic oncology was recently presented during the 2021 American Urological Association Annual Meeting.

Watch Briefing

Publication # PD25-11

The Impact of Telemedicine on Patient-Reported Outcomes in Urologic Oncology

Nearly 20 percent of Americans live in rural communities and face barriers to access cancer care, including poverty and substantial travel burden to seeing cancer providers. The authors of this study aimed to assess the impact of a rurally focused telemedicine program on patient outcomes in a urologic oncology outpatient clinic.

Key Findings:

Telemedicine provides a medium for cancer care delivery that eliminates the significant travel burden associated with in-person clinic appointments.

Patients traveling from out-of-state and rural areas incur significant travel time, costs and time away from work costing around $1,000 .

. No differences were noted in patient satisfaction between in-person and telemedicine visits.

"Barriers to care can have a huge negative impact on patient outcomes," Dr. Welliver said. "The AUA continues to work at the federal level to address workforce shortages; healthcare equality; and to advocate for the continued use of telehealth services as an alternative health care delivery model in order to strengthen and expand a patient's ability to seek and receive care."

The full abstract can also be viewed online:

https://www.auajournals.org/doi/10.1097/JU.0000000000002018.11

About the American Urological Association: Founded in 1902 and headquartered near Baltimore, Maryland, the American Urological Association is a leading advocate for the specialty of urology, and has more than 22,000 members throughout the world. The AUA is a premier urologic association, providing invaluable support to the urologic community as it pursues its mission of fostering the highest standards of urologic care through education, research and the formulation of health policy.

Contact: Christine Frey, AUA

443-909-0839, [email protected]

SOURCE American Urological Association

Related Links

www.auanet.org


"We're excited to bring this new partnership to customers," says James Avery Director of Customer Service and Marketing Communications Lindsey Avery Tognietti. "As we expand, our goal is to bring the James Avery customer experience close to home for our new and loyal customers."

To celebrate the opening, September 15 through September 25, visitors may enter a drawing for a chance to win one of 60 James Avery gift cards valued at $50, $100 or $500.

Putting customer and associate safety first, the League City store is following recommended COVID-19 health protocols and guidelines implemented in all James Avery stores. Operating hours are Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Sunday, 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Store Manager Paula Jenkins-Miller and her team are ready to welcome customers to shop in the new store or use Buy Online, Pickup in Store options at JamesAvery.com.

In addition to the League City location, the company will open the next store on September 29 in Portland, outside Corpus Christi and on October 13 in San Antonio, at the 211 and Potranco location.

About James Avery Artisan Jewelry James Avery is a vertically integrated, family-owned company located in the heart of the Texas Hill Country. We offer finely crafted jewelry designs for men and women in sterling silver, 14K and 18K gold  designed by our own skilled artisans in Kerrville, Texas. We are a multi-channel retailer over 100 James Avery stores in five states. Our jewelry is also available in more than 220 Dillard's stores in Texas and 28 additional states, airport stores in Austin and Houston and nationwide through JamesAvery.com. James Avery crafts jewelry in Texas workshops in Comfort, Hondo and Kerrville. For more information, visit JamesAvery.com or facebook.com/JamesAvery.

About the Drawings  Odds of winning depend on total number of entries received. Forty-eight $50 gift cards, six $100 gift cards and six $500 gift cards. Entries accepted September 15 through September 25. Hourly drawings on September 18 and September 25 between 11:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. during the Grand Opening Celebrations at the League City James Avery Artisan Jewelry store. Thirty James Avery gift cards will be awarded on each drawing day: twenty-four $50 gift cards, three $100 gift cards, and three $500 gift cards. No purchase necessary. Must be at least 13 years old to enter. Only one entry per person per day. Winners not eligible to win a subsequent gift card in the same promotion. Winners need not be present to win. Associates and immediate family members not eligible for this gift card promotion.

SOURCE James Avery Artisan Jewelry

Related Links

http://www.jamesavery.com


Coral Genomics will receive the $25,000 monetary award to further develop its mission of bringing precision medicine to IBD and increasing its applicability in a diverse population. Additionally, Asaf Kraus of Dieta Health was given an honorable mention for pioneering its objective measurement of previously subjective measures of IBD health in its companion app.

"The level of innovation presented by each finalist was impressive and inspiring, and we look forward to seeing their ventures grow and make an impact on the inflammatory bowel disease community," said Karin Hehenberger, MD, PhD, Founder and CEO of Lyfebulb. "There is a significant unmet need within this community for solutions that improve the experience of receiving an accurate diagnosis, effective individualized care, and adequate patient education, and we applaud this group of entrepreneurs for their efforts to ease the burden of living with chronic disease."

The 2021 Innovation Challenge took place virtually over the past two days and was open to entrepreneurs motivated by a personal connection to inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) developing new products and solutions that help patients, care partners, and all those affected by IBD to better manage their health, navigate everyday challenges, and improve overall quality of life.

Ten finalists were selected to compete at the Challenge and pitch their companies' solutions to a panel of independent judges from a range of industries, including experts in the fields of business, healthcare, and patient advocacy. Finalists' solutions ranged from biotechnology platforms and diagnostics to virtual clinics, wearables, and other products for consumers and healthcare professionals, and were chosen based on their potential to address the unmet needs of the IBD community and how their relationship to IBD inspired the launch of their ventures.

"Arena is proud to participate in the Challenge and support these entrepreneurs who understand the needs of the IBD community," said Paul Streck, MD, Senior Vice President, Clinical Development, and Chief Medical Officer for Arena Pharmaceuticals. "The finalists showed the bold and innovative thinking needed to create impactful solutions for the millions of patients living with IBD."

To continue their commitment to patient entrepreneurship and raising awareness about inflammatory bowel disease, Lyfebulb and Arena Pharmaceuticals will be hosting a Fireside Chat with Atray and two members of the jury on Tuesday, September 14 at 4:00pm EDT. This virtual discussion is open to all members of the community, and more information may be found on Lyfebulb.com.

About the Lyfebulb and Arena Partnership

Rooted in the collaborative spirit of the Lyfebulb and Arena partnership and a shared commitment to continuous innovation in patient care, the 2021 Innovation Challenge endeavours to strengthen and engage the IBD community, support the sharing of experiences and insights, identify promising and impactful solutions, and ultimately change lives. The Innovation Challenge is one component of a larger sponsorship between Lyfebulb and Arena to partner directly with IBD patients, support partners and community leaders to accomplish these goals.

About Lyfebulb

Lyfebulb is an innovation accelerator that bridges the gap between patient communities and the healthcare industry by working directly with patients and care partners to generate insights and build new solutions to reduce the burden of living with chronic disease. Lyfebulb operates across 11 disease states and counting. For more information, see Lyfebulb.com, TransplantLyfe.com, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and Karin Hehenberger LinkedIn.

About Arena Pharmaceuticals

ARENA Pharmaceuticals is a team with a singular purpose  deliver important medicines to patients. In a rapidly changing treatment landscape, we work with a sense of urgency every day to identify the needs of the GI community and identify bold, sometimes disruptive, ideas to get medicines to patients. It's our determination to help improve the lives of millions of people suffering from GI disorders that inspires us all to relentlessly execute, until it's done. ARENA  Care More. Act Differently.

For more information:

Lyfebulb Contact:

Karin Hehenberger, MD, PhD

CEO & Founder, Lyfebulb

Phone: + 1 917-575-0210

Email: [email protected]

Arena Contact:

Patrick Malloy

Vice President, Investor Relations & Corporate Communications

Phone: +1 847-987-4878

Email: [email protected]

SOURCE Lyfebulb

Related Links

https://lyfebulb.com


PASADENA, Calif., Sept. 10, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Promis Diagnostics, Inc., a molecular diagnostics company focused on early cancer diagnosis, recently presented clinical validation data for CystoChek, its proprietary urine-based DNA methylation test of PENK for bladder cancer (BCa) detection in hematuria, at the 2021 American Urological Association (AUA) Annual Meeting.

Researchers from Genomictree Inc, Chungnam National University Hospital (Daejeon, South Korea), and Promis previously discovered that aberrant methylation of PENK, a potential biomarker, frequently occurs in bladder cancer. To further demonstrate the validity of their discovery, and to evaluate the performance of CystoChek, two separate clinical studies were conducted. First, in a retrospective study, the data showed a sensitivity of 91.0% with a specificity of 93.5% in detecting Ta high-grade and greater stages of BCa in 567 hematuria patients. Second, in a prospective study, the data demonstrated a sensitivity of 93.2% with a specificity of 90.4% in detecting all of Ta high-grade and greater stages of BCa in 183 hematuria patients who then received cystoscopy procedures.

"CystoChek is an accurate and cost-effective bladder cancer detection tool that we hope to present to the community with no delay. The sensitivity of the urine DNA test for early detection of bladder cancer will provide significant benefits not only to the patients but also to healthcare stakeholders'', said Sungwhan An, CEO of Promis.

A copy of the presentation was posted on the meeting's website. Also, the poster will be available at Promis' website at www.promisdx.com after the AUA Annual Meeting.

About Promis Diagnostics

Promis Diagnostics, Inc. is a molecular diagnostics company aiming to perform clinical trials and commercialize various biomarker-based IVD tests for early detection of cancers. It is a CLIA-certified and CAP-accredited laboratory in Pasadena, California, funded by Genomictree (a Korean public company) and a third-party venture capital. For more information, visit www.promisdx.com and follow us on social media at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/promisdx and facebook.com/promisdx.

SOURCE Promis Dx

Related Links

www.promisdx.com


CHARLOTTE, N.C., Sept. 11, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The Save Our Allies (SOA) coalition, founded by Chad Robichaux of Mighty Oaks Foundation and Sarah Verardo of The Independence Fund announced the completion of Phase 1 in its evacuation efforts in Afghanistan, where they successfully evacuated over 12,000 individuals, including Afghans, interpreters, widows, orphans, Christians, and Americans. Save Our Allies saved 8,911 from Afghanistan directly into the United Arab Emirates. Additionally, SOA assisted in manifesting and acquiring targets for the U.S. State Department that they evacuated to other countries of over 3,000 personnel, for a total of 12,000 evacuees. One evacuated family included an interpreter who served alongside Mighty Oaks Foundation Founder Chad Robichaux during his time as a Force Recon Marine. Chad had worked six years to help Aziz and his family using the SIV (Special Immigrant Visa) program.

The Afghan Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) program was created to protect Afghan allies who risked their lives helping U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Despite its promise, the program has been plagued by backlogs since it launched in 2009, leaving tens of thousands of Afghans in dire need of support.

The Save our Allies Coalition members know that the more than 800,000 brave men and women who served in Afghanistan can attribute a great deal of their success to the valuable addition the Afghan allies took to help protect and defend their country. Because of this critical assistance that was shown to our service members when they were deployed, we owe it to them to assist in their time of need.

"Our work and mission continue to honor our Allies as we move into Phase 2 of our operation," said Sarah Verardo, CEO of The Independence Fund. "It is our job to honor our fallen service members, continue to serve our nation's heroes, and complete the Save Our Allies mission to resettle the Allies we were able to evacuate with the respect and warm welcome they deserve. For so many of us, Afghanistan will be on our hearts and minds for all of our days."

"Now the real work begins as we see the mission through," said Chad Robichaux, Founder of Mighty Oaks Foundation. "These people lost everything, and our team at Save Our Allies feel a moral obligation to ensure each and every one we evacuated finds a new home, a new hope, and a new beginning through a process that treats them with dignity, love, and respect."

"We have a moral obligation as Americans and as people of character to help those in need," said Nick Palmisciano, CEO of Diesel Jack Media. "These people risked everything for the ideals we hold dear, and often take for granted here. Many of them saved the lives of our brothers and sisters in arms. They deserve a chance at the American Dream."

"I've never seen the desperation that I witnessed in that last week of Afghanistan in my entire life," said Tim Kennedy, President of Sheepdog Response. "I've been around the world many times in many combat situations and I've seen a lot of bad things, but never anything like that. I cannot undo what has happened in Afghanistan, or what these people have endured, but I can help them realize the wonder and opportunity that is the United States of America. Getting these people out of Afghanistan was just the first step. Now it's time to set them up for success."

Phase 1 efforts safely recovered 12,000 human lives and consisted of a team in the Middle East. In a matter of days, SOA was able to build a coalition of two non-profits (Mighty Oaks Foundation and the Independence Fund), partnering with other Non-Government Organizations and Chad Robichaux's network of elite veterans to form Task Force 6:8, named from the Isaiah 6:8 scripture "Here am I, send me". The men of Task Force 6:8 included Chad Robichaux, Dan Stinson, Hunter Robichaux, Joe Robert, Nick Palmisciano, Tim Kennedy and a host of others. The boots-on-the-ground effort used both charter and UAE military aircraft as Phase One of the operation that was named Operation Chivalrous Nightafter the building their UAE partners housed them in. Simultaneously, Sarah Verardo, CEO of The Independence Fund, helped set up a JOC (Joint Operations Center) in the U.S. and recruited team members to meet in UAE/Abu Dhabi military base and place an on the ground coordinator and personal recovery team at HKIA (Hamid Karzai International Airport) to move off-site to recover and extract target packages.

Save Our Allies is now transitioning to Phase 2, Operation New Hope, the coalition's effort to see it through, remaining committed to working with U.S. and foreign governments to ensure that each of our evacuees are treated humanely, with dignity and all the proper care to ensure a smooth transition to their now home, so that they might find a new hope and a new beginning.

The Phase 2 plan includes:

Resettlement efforts. The Save Our Allies Coalition is helping the 12,000 evacuees find a new place to settle.

We're also helping families who have arrived stateside with resettlement, including getting them supplies through our Amazon Wish List and working with other organizations to assist with their transition to America. To date, Save Our Allies has received over 1,000 packages.

The Save Our Allies Coalition joined the Interpreting Freedom Foundation to host an event in Charlotte to distribute supplies to Afghan families on Saturday, September 4 .

Save Our Allies will continue to help our nation's Veterans with mental health assistance and resources, casework, and other programs to improve their quality of life.

To learn more about the work of the Save Our Allies coalition, click here . To read the letter SOA sent to President Biden and members of Congress, click here .

Save Our Allies Coalition Background:

The Save Our Allies Coalition is dedicated to saving our Afghan Allies who served side-by-side with U.S. Armed Forces and working to ensure our Veterans are getting the care needed after bravely serving our nation.

Follow Save Our Allies: Facebook | Twitter | Instagram

Mighty Oaks Foundation:

Mighty Oaks provides peer-to-peer resiliency and recovery programs that serve as the catalyst to assist our Nation's Warriors dealing with challenges related to the struggles of daily military life, combat deployments and the symptoms of post-traumatic stress (PTS) offered at no cost to our Nation's Warriors, including travel at beautiful ranches across the US.

Follow Mighty Oaks Foundation: Facebook | Twitter | Instagram

The Independence Fund:

Founded in 2007, The Independence Fund is committed to empowering our nation's catastrophically wounded, injured, or ill Veterans to overcome physical, mental, and emotional wounds incurred in the line of duty. We are dedicated to improving the lives of both our Veterans and their families. Through our Mobility, Caregiver, Advocacy, Casework, Operation RESILIENCY, [email protected] and Family programs, The Independence Fund strives to bridge the gap of unmet needs for Veterans and their Caregivers.

Follow The Independence Fund: Facebook | Twitter | Instagram

Leadership:

Chad Robichaux is a former Force Recon Marine and DoD Contractor with eight deployments to Afghanistan as part of a Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) Task Force. After overcoming his personal battles with PTSD and nearly becoming a veteran suicide statistic, Chad founded the Mighty Oaks Foundation, a leading non-profit, serving the active duty and military veteran communities with highly successful faith-based combat trauma and resiliency programs. Having spoken to over 250,000 active-duty troops and led life-saving programs for over 4,000 active military and veterans at four Mighty Oaks Ranches around the Nation, Chad has become a go-to resource and is considered a subject matter expert on faith-based solutions to PTSD, having advised the former Presidential Administration, Congress, the VA the DoD and was appointed to serve as the Chairman of a White House Veterans Coalition.In addition to Chad's military service, he has served our nation as a Special Agent with the US Federal Air Marshal Service and the US State Department as a Surveillance Detection Senior Program Manager. Chad is a Medal of Valor recipient for his bravery beyond the call of duty in law enforcement.

Sarah Verardo is a national advocate for wounded Veterans and their Caregivers. Her husband Michael was catastrophically wounded in Afghanistan in 2010 in two separate IED attacks that took his left leg, much of his left arm, and left him with polytraumatic conditions that have required more than one hundred surgeries and years of speech, visual, physical, and occupational therapies. Verardo advises Administration officials and members of Congress on the experiences of the families of severely wounded Veterans and has been instrumental in shaping national policy for our warfighters and their families. Regularly appearing on cable news to commentate on the sacrifice of Veterans and Military families, Verardo is a respected subject matter expert in the field. Verardo is also the author of "Hero at Home" a children's book that celebrates the heroism of combat troops and educates young audiences on caring for the wounded heroes in their community. Sarah was selected as The Independence Fund's first Chief Executive Officer and created the organization's advocacy, adaptive sports, caregiver, suicide prevention, family, and SIV programs based upon her work with Active Duty troops and Veterans.

Nick Palmisciano is the CEO of Diesel Jack Media, a full-service marketing agency that specializes in helping brands to not suck at marketing. He is best known for his first company - military apparel brand Ranger Up, and his Hollywood films Range 15 and Not a War Story. He spent the best and hardest six years of his life as an infantry officer in the United States Army. After the Army he worked in various leadership roles in a multinational Fortune 100 company, before diving full force into entrepreneurship. Nick holds an MBA from the Duke University Fuqua School of Business and a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the United States Military Academy at West Point. He was awarded the Entrepreneurial Organization's Veteran Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2015, as well as the Bobcat, Wolf, Bear, and Webelo Badge in Cub Scouts.

The Wolf Badge was his favorite.

Tim Kennedy is a President of Sheepdog Response, with combat deployments throughout the middle east as part of the most elite counter terrorism and hostage rescue unit within the U.S. Army Green Berets. He is a former professional mixed martial arts fighter and two time title challenger. He has fought for the largest organizations in the world, which include the UFC, Strikeforce, and the WEC.

Contact: Sarah Verardo, [email protected]

SOURCE Save Our Allies

Related Links

https://saveourallies.org/


NEW YORK, Sept. 10, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Juan Monteverde, founder and managing partner at Monteverde & Associates PC, a national securities firm rated Top 50 in the 2018-2020 ISS Securities Class Action Services Report and headquartered at the Empire State Building in New York City, is investigating ADTRAN, Inc. ("ADTN" or the "Company") (ADTN) relating to its proposed merger with ADVA. Under the terms of the agreement, ADTN shareholders are expected to own approximately 54% of the combined company.

The investigation focuses on whether ADTRAN, Inc. and its Board of Directors violated securities laws and/or breached their fiduciary duties to the Company by 1) failing to conduct a fair process, and 2) whether the transaction is properly valued.

Click here for more information: http://monteverdelaw.com/case/adtran-inc. It is free and there is no cost or obligation to you.

About Monteverde & Associates PC

We are a national class action securities litigation law firm that has recovered millions of dollars and is committed to protecting shareholders from corporate wrongdoing. We were listed in the Top 50 in the 2018-2020 ISS Securities Class Action Services Report. Our lawyers have significant experience litigating Mergers & Acquisitions and Securities Class Actions. Mr. Monteverde is recognized by Super Lawyers as a Rising Star in Securities Litigation in 2013, 2017-2019, an award given to less than 2.5% of attorneys in a particular field. He has also been selected by Martindale-Hubbell as a 2017-2020 Top Rated Lawyer. Our firm's recent successes include changing the law in a significant victory that lowered the standard of liability under Section 14(e) of the Exchange Act in the Ninth Circuit. Thereafter, our firm successfully preserved this victory by obtaining dismissal of a writ of certiorari as improvidently granted at the United States Supreme Court. Emulex Corp. v. Varjabedian, 139 S. Ct. 1407 (2019). Also, over the years the firm has recovered or secured over a dozen cash common funds for shareholders in mergers & acquisitions class action cases.

If you owned common stock in the Company and wish to obtain additional information and protect your investments free of charge, please visit our website or contact Juan E. Monteverde, Esq. either via e-mail at [email protected] or by telephone at (212) 971-1341.

Contact:

Juan E. Monteverde, Esq.

MONTEVERDE & ASSOCIATES PC

The Empire State Building

350 Fifth Ave. Suite 4405

New York, NY 10118

United States of America

[email protected]

Tel: (212) 971-1341

Attorney Advertising. (C) 2021 Monteverde & Associates PC. The law firm responsible for this advertisement is Monteverde & Associates PC (www.monteverdelaw.com). Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome with respect to any future matter.

SOURCE Monteverde & Associates PC

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BALTIMORE, Sept. 11, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- It is estimated one in 10 people will have a kidney stone at some point in their life. Three new studies being presented this year during the 2021 American Urological Association (AUA) Annual Meeting demonstrate new trends in kidney stone patient care, including over-the-counter products and a new technique utilizing ultrasound. These studies were presented during a virtual press session, which was moderated by AUA Spokesperson, Dr. James Borin. The recording of this session is now available for viewing.

Watch Briefing

Three new studies being presented this year during the 2021 American Urological Association Annual Meeting demonstrate new trends in kidney stone patient care, including over-the-counter products and a new technique utilizing ultrasound.

Publication # MP18-07

Ultrasound to Reposition and Accelerate Passage of Distal Ureteral Stones

Patients presenting with a distal ureteral stone underwent ultrasonic propulsion alone or ultrasonic propulsion and intermittent burst wave lithrotripsy (BWL) to facilitate stone passage and relieve pain. During this treatment all participants were awake without anesthesia and underwent a screening ultrasound, pre  and post  procedure pain assessment, 3 week follow up to report any adverse events and follow up imaging within 12 weeks.

Key Findings:

93% of acute stones passed in an average of 3.6 days post-procedure.

Adverse events were limited to slight reddening of the skin, hematuria on only the initial urination post-procedure and a mild sensation, similar to a pinprick, on fewer than 10 of 620 propulsion bursts among 3 of 20 subjects.

There is potential for facilitating stone page of distal ureteral stones and relieving pain with ultrasonic propulsion and BWL.

Publication # PD21-12

Clinical Comparison of Non-Prescription Over-the-Counter Urinary Alkalinizing Agents: Effects on Urinary Citrate Excretion and Urine pH

Prescriptive urinary alkalinizing agents are expensive and many patients request alternatives to help with low urine citrate and pH levels to prevent kidney stones. The authors of this study compared two over-the-counter products, baking soda and LitholyteO on patients with low urine citrate, pH or both. Patients completed a 24-hour urine collection, side-effects survey and Wisconsin Stone Quality of Life questionnaire during the last weeks of the 90-day treatment.

Key Findings:

Baking soda and LitholyteO products increased urine citrate and pH without increasing calcium. All changes were clinically relevant.

Follow-up prevelance of low urine citrate, pH or both was slightly lower on patients who used baking soda than those who use LitholyteO.

Stone-related quality of life improved by 10 percent in both groups and the largest improvement was in disease symptoms.

Publication # PD21-07

Effect of a High Citrate Beverage on Urine Chemistry in Kidney Stone Formers

Moonstone is a high citrate, over-the-counter beverage designed to prevent recurrent kidney stones. Popular lore has promoted citrus juice for stone prevention, but the amount required to have meaningful benefits (increased urine citrate and pH) is not well-established. Thus, there are no evidence-based beverages that serve as an alternative to water, designed to increase urine volume and alter urine chemistry, in order to achieve stone prevention. We sought to demonstrate the effects of Moonstone on urine chemistry in a group of stone formers of various compositions.

Key Findings:

Compared to water, Moonstone caused an increase in 24h urine citrate from 469.1 + 231.9 mg/d to 635.4 + 349.1 mg/day. 24h urine pH went up from 6.21 + 0. 78 to 6.61 + 0.69.

Patients preferred Moonstone as a stone prevention regimen compared to water alone or Urocit-K.

Two packets of Moonstone caused increases urine citrate and urine pH. The effect on pH would also be expected to benefit patients with uric acid and cystine stones.

"More than one million Americans are diagnosed with a kidney stone each year," Dr. Borin said. "It is important to stay abreast of the latest developments in kidney stone prevention and treatment in order to help our patients avoid the morbidity of a kidney stone event."

Full abstracts are available for view:

https://www.auajournals.org/doi/10.1097/JU.0000000000002003.07

https://www.auajournals.org/doi/10.1097/JU.0000000000002010.12

https://www.auajournals.org/doi/10.1097/JU.0000000000002010.07

About the American Urological Association: Founded in 1902 and headquartered near Baltimore, Maryland, the American Urological Association is a leading advocate for the specialty of urology, and has more than 22,000 members throughout the world. The AUA is a premier urologic association, providing invaluable support to the urologic community as it pursues its mission of fostering the highest standards of urologic care through education, research and the formulation of health policy.

Contact:

Christine Frey, AUA

443-909-0839, [email protected]

SOURCE American Urological Association

Related Links

www.auanet.org


New Delhi, Sep 11 : Soon after former IPS officer Iqbal Singh Lalpura took over the charge of National Commission for Minorities as the Chairman, he started hearing the grievances of the people.

Lalpura believes that solving the pending cases quickly will be a challenge for him.

In an exclusive conversation with IANS on Friday, he said, "We will work for the victims belonging to the minority community and will try to ensure that no wrong narrative is being set." "Many old cases are lying pending and they will be disposed of soon," he added.

"Since the Chairman's has been lying vacant for a long time, steps will be taken to provide speedy justice to the victims at the district and state level," Lalpura asserted.

As per the information, over 500 cases are pending before the Commission.

"We have a total of 524 complaints pending cases. Delhi has the highest number of pending cases -- 187, while the incident from states like Maharashtra, Punjab, Haryana, Bihar and others are also pending, on which we will start working soon," he noted.

On the other hand, the several research studies in the Minorities Commission are also yet to be completed.

Lalpura is also considering to meet as many people as possible, know their problems and try to ensure justice, so that a trust can be established among the people.

"I will personally meet people or will contact them so that minorities can have faith that they will get justice," he elaborated.

Lalpura, who was previously associated with the Bharatiya Janata Party as a spokesperson, said: "I am sitting on this post after resigning, before that I have also paid many responsibilities. It's not necessary to be in the BJP only, my aim is to deliver justice to the people. However, the law of the country is above all the things for me.

"I want to appeal to the people that if they witness any injustice then I am with them," he said, adding that whether it is an earlier incident -- Delhi, Kanpur, Haryana etc. --, we are with riots victims irrespective to their religion. We will look everybody from same angle.

Earlier, Gairul Hasan Rizvi was the Chairman of the Commission whose term ended in May 2020.

The Commission comprises seven members including the Chairman, out of which presently five posts are lying vacant. Atif Rashid is the Vice-Chairman of the Commission.

(Mohammad Suaib Khan can be contacted at mohammad.k@ians.in)
Sanaa, Sep 11 : The Yemeni Houthi militia pulled 25 of their fighters from a frontline in Marib province and moved them to mortuaries in the capital Sanaa on Friday, medics at two public hospitals said.

"They were killed on Thursday in fighting with the government troops in the frontline of Rahabah district," one of the medics said.

The Houthis on Tuesday pulled other 33 bodies from the same frontline, according to other medics.

Last week, the Houthis advanced into al-Kulah, the center town of Rahabah district, after deadly fighting with the government troops, the Xinhua news agency reported.

Fighting in Yemeni western part of Marib is still ongoing, according to military sources.

The Iran-backed Houthi militia launched in February a major offensive on Marib in an attempt to seize control of the oil-rich province, the last northern stronghold of the Saudi-backed Yemeni government.
Rabat, Sep 11 : Morocco's King Mohammed VI on Friday has appointed Aziz Akhannouch, President of the National Rally of Independents (RNI), as the new Prime Minister with the task to form a new government, a statement by the Royal Cabinet announced.

This appointment takes place in accordance with the constitutional provisions, and on the basis of the results of the legislative elections on September 8, 2021, the statement added.

Aziz Akhannouch, 61 years old, served as Minister of Agriculture from 2007 to 2017. His party the RNI dominated the legislative, municipal and regional elections on September 8, the Xinhua news agency reported.

Wednesday's elections put an end to the rule of the Justice and Development Party, which has run a coalition government since 2011.
Chandigarh, Sep 11 : In a significant decision, the Punjab government has decided to operationalize a special helpline for the inmates to lodge complaints against any wrongdoings inside the jail premises.

ADGP (Jails) P.K. Sinha said the helpline is aimed to keep tabs on bribery, drugs and other illegal activities. The inmates and prisoners can register their complaints by making a call free of cost from the public call office installed in the jails.

He said the complaints received would be thoroughly investigated in the state headquarters and if found correct, the erring staff would be proceeded against.

The ADGP on Friday visited barracks in the Ropar jail, especially where women inmates are lodged and appreciated the embroidery, wall paintings as well as kitchen work done by them.

Afterwards, he addressed inmates in Gurdwara Sahib inside the jail and said the government is going to implement a master plan to stop the incidents of suicides by the inmates in the jails.

Institute of Correctional Administration Deputy Director Upneet Laali said there are lots of reasons behind suicides by inmates. She emphasized on deputing psychologists in the jails.
New York, Sep 11 : Alexander Zverev may have spoiled world No. 1 Novak Djokovic's dream of a Golden Slam at the Tokyo Olympic Games, but the Serbian did not let the German halt his pursuit of the Grand Slam at the US Open as the winner of 20 majors won 4-6, 6-2, 6-4, 4-6, 6-2 on Saturday (IST) to set up a title clash with Russia's Daniil Medvedev.

Djokovic battled past the fourth-seeded Zverev at Flushing Meadows and moved within one win of becoming the first man since Rod Laver in 1969 to complete a Grand Slam by claiming all four major trophies in a single season.

"I would like to say thank you, because the atmosphere was amazing, the best atmosphere of the tournament so far," Djokovic told the Arthur Ashe Stadium crowd.

"These are the moments we live for. These are the kind of unique opportunities that we dream of every day when we wake up and are trying to find motivation to go out there and do the same things over and over again," Djokovic told atptour.com.

"It pays off when you are playing in this incredible stadium with this atmosphere. Thank you so much for making it special." For most of the clash, Djokovic was patient. But after securing a double-break lead in the decider, the world No. 1, who is currently tied with Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal on 20 Slam titles apiece, stepped on the gas to triumph after three hours and 33 minutes.

Djokovic, who will play second seed Daniil Medvedev for history on Sunday, has already won the Australian Open, French Open and Wimbledon this year. A victory against the Russian would give him 21 major crowns.

"I'm going to treat the next match like it's the last match of my career," Djokovic said.

Zverev was by far Djokovic's toughest test yet. For the 10th time this year at a major, the Serbian lost the opening set. But this occasion felt more dangerous, as the German had not only beaten him six weeks ago, but he entered the match on a career-best 16-match winning streak.

"Alexander is a big champion. He's someone that I admire on and off the court. We get along very well, he's definitely one of my best friends. We train a lot, we see each other a lot in Monaco, [which] he uses as a base," Djokovic said. "He's a great guy and an even better player. I knew coming onto the court today that it was going to be a great battle." Neither player was at his absolute best. But in an intense match, Djokovic maintained his cool in key moments and served impressively under pressure to emerge victorious.

Djokovic is now 36-10 in five-setters and Zverev is 16-10. This year, the world No. 1 is 4-0 and the recent Cincinnati champion is 1-3. Djokovic leads the pair's ATP head-to-head series 7-3.

Zverev's big serves gave Djokovic trouble early on, allowing the German to sprint to the lead. But after taking the first set, the German got off to a slow start in the second.
Moscow, Sep 11 : Dmitry Rogozin, head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, has invited SpaceX CEO Elon Musk to his home to discuss efforts to explore the universe and whether there's life on other planets.

In his first interview with CNN, Rogozin appreciated the efforts by Musk in the field of space.

"Mr. Elon Musk realises many of the ideas and thoughts that we wanted to realise but did not get to because, after the breakup of the Soviet Union, our space program halted for some time," Rogozin said.

"We respect him as an organizer of the space industry and as an inventor, who is not afraid to take risk." Responding to Rogozin's offer on Twitter, Musk said "thanks" and asked, "what is your favourite tea?", to which the Russian space chief replied that they could "start with my grandmother's favourite" blend, posting a picture of a box of 'Three Friendly Elephants' loose-leaf tea.

Rogozin took office as Roscosmos' Director General in May 2018, succeeding Igor Komarov.

Meanwhile, SpaceX is all set to launch to orbit its first all-civilian mission 'Inspiration4' on September 15.

"#Inspiration4 and @SpaceX have completed our flight readiness review and remain on track for launch!" the Inspiration4 mission team said in a tweet recently.

Early this year in February, SpaceX announced the charity-driven mission named Inspiration4, which will be commanded by tech entrepreneur Jared Isaacman and will have three others.

They will orbit the planet aboard SpaceX's Crew Dragon capsule every 90 minutes along a customised flight path.

Upon conclusion of the three-day journey, Dragon will re-enter Earth's atmosphere for a soft water landing off the coast of Florida.

-- Except for the title, this story has not been edited by Prokerala team and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed
Mumbai, Sep 11 : A 30-year-old woman, who was brutally raped and brutalized with rods, remain unconscious and critical in a civic hospital as the incident sparked outrage all over the state, here on Saturday.

According to police, the woman was raped and then beaten with a rod, the rapist allegedly shoved a rod in her private parts, dumped her body on the desolate road before decamping from there.

The incident took place on the intervening night of Thursday-Friday on Khairani Road of the Sakinaka area of north-west Mumbai, and police recovered her in a pool of blood around 3 a.m. on Friday.

Sakinaka Police Station Senior Police Inspector Balwant Deshmukh said that the accused, identified as a local, Mohan Chavan, 45, was arrested hours after the dastardly crime and is being interrogated.

The police immediately rushed the victim in a critical condition to the BMC's Rajawadi Hospital in Ghatkopar, and Deshmukh said "she remains under treatment".

Police teams are awaiting the woman to regain her consciousness to record her statement which could throw light on the entire episode, even as scouring of the CCTV footage of the vicinity and questioning potential witnesses in the area continues.

The incident was strongly condemned by Deputy Chairperson of Maharashtra Legislative Council Neelam Gorhe, Shiv Sena spokesperson Manisha Kayande, many women activists and commoners, with many demanding the immediate passing of the Shakti Act which proposes death penalty for rape.

Top police officials are supervising the investigations and the possible involvement of others into the crime that shook the people on the eve of the state's biggest festival Ganeshotsav which started on Friday.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : Drawing a parallel with how the global footprint of Hollywood had impacted the French, German and Italian film industries, Bollywood actress Kangana Ranaut said at a recent media conference here that it must not be allowed to grow in India at the expense of regional cinema.

Kangana was in the national capital to promote the movie 'Thalaivii', which was released this Friday in Hindi, Tamil and Telugu. The movie is about the life of the late J. Jayalalithaa, who served as the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister for more than 14 years.

Kangana urged film exhibitors not to be impacted by Hollywood to such an extent that they start moving away from regional cinema. She said: "Like Hollywood has destroyed other industries, it is trying to overtake us. We must encourage regional cinema and promote dubbed versions of films in Malayalam or Tamil or Punjabi or other languages, than just showing the dubbed versions of 'Jungle Book' or 'Lion King'. This will be our contribution to the making of 'Atmanirbhar Bharat'." When asked about that one quality of the late leader she would like to imbibe, Kangana said: "Her foremost trait was her strong determination, which enabled her to accept challenges and became the chief minister of Tamil Nadu."

-- Except for the title, this story has not been edited by Prokerala team and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed
London, Sep 11 : Support for the UK's ruling Conservative Party has fallen to its lowest level since the 2019 general elections, after the government decided to raise taxes for the National Health Service (NHS) and social care reform, a new poll has revealed.

The poll, conducted by YouGov for the Times newspaper and released on Friday, said that support for the Conservatives is down five points to 33 per cent after the government announced plans earlier this week to increase national insurance, reports Xinhua news agency.

The poll put the opposition Labour Party in the lead at 35 per cent, for the first time since January at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic.

It showed only 1 per cent of voters believe that the new levy and social care reforms will leave them better off.

Six in 10 voters did not think Prime Minister Boris Johnson or his party cared about keeping taxes low, while about two in 10 voters said he did care.

The YouGov poll suggested the policy has undermined the Conservatives' reputation as a party of low taxation without giving them the credit for increased investment in the NHS and social care.

"We should be cautious of leaping to too many conclusions from a single poll but it looks as if the government may have sacrificed their reputation for low taxes amongst Tory voters without actually getting much credit for helping the NHS," said Anthony Wells, political research director at YouGov.

The Conservative Party has enjoyed the backing of over 40 percent of the electorate since the start of the mass Covid-19 vaccine rollout, leading over Labour of 18 points as recently as May.

Even last week, the Conservatives were leading over Labour was four points on 38 perc ent, according to the Times newspaper.

The newspaper said the new poll results would alarm Conservative lawmakers before the party conference next month and increase anger among those on the Conservative right who spoke out against the plan.

The findings will also be met with concerns in Downing Street, which carried out extensive polling in the run-up to the decision.

On Tuesday, Johnson announced a 1.25 percentage point increase in national insurance, which is the biggest personal tax rise in two decades, to pay for a 12 billion pound ($16 billion) annual package for the NHS and social care reform.

The need to treat Covid patients has contributed to worsening wait times for non-Covid care in Britain.

Official statistics showed that the number of NHS patients waiting for tests, surgery and routine treatment in England is at a record high of 5.5 million and could potentially reach 13 million over the next few years.
New York, Sep 11 : US President Joe Biden's Special Envoy for Climate, John Kerry is slated to visit India next week to launch an initiative for mobilising funds for battling climate change ahead of the UN climate change conference in October, according to the State Department.

This will be his second visit to India as Biden's point-person on climate change, a priority area for the President.

Announcing the visit on Friday, the State Department said: "The Special Envoy's travel will bolster the US' bilateral and multilateral climate efforts ahead of the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which will be held October 31 to November 12 in Glasgow." The Climate Action and Finance Mobilisation Dialogue (CAFMD), that will be inaugurated during the trip, is one of the two main tracks of the US-India Agenda 2030 Partnership that Biden and Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced at the Leaders Summit on Climate in April, the Department said.

Kerry is coming to India after failing to get any deals on climate change from China.

He met China's climate envoy Xie Zhenhua in Tianjin, away from the capital Beijing, but Foreign Minister Wang Yi spoke to him only by a video link.

Wang told him that cooperation on climate change cannot happen unless bilateral relations improved overall, according to China's Foreign Ministry.

The US should "cease containing and suppressing China all over the world", Wang reportedly told him as a pre-condition to cooperation on climate change.

While in Delhi, Kerry will meet Indian government officials and private sector leaders "to discuss efforts to raise global climate ambition and speed India's clean energy transition", according to the State Department.

Last month, India's Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav spoke to Kerry on the phone and tweeted afterwards that they "discussed at length how the largest and oldest democracies can set examples for other countries on Climate Action. India stands committed to working with the US on Clean Energy".

On another front of the war on climate change, India's Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Hardeep Singh Puri worked with US Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm on developing clean energy, the other track of the India-US partnership.

On Thursday, Puri and Granholm co-chaired the first ministerial meeting of revamped India-US Strategic Clean Energy Partnership (SCEP) "to advance the climate and clean energy goals of both countries".

India's Petroleum and Natural Gas Ministry said: "The two sides announced addition of a fifth Pillar on Emerging Fuels, which signals joint resolve to promote cleaner energy fuels. A new India-US Task Force on Biofuels was also announced to build on the scope of work on cooperation in biofuels sector.

"The meeting also reviewed the progress on the India-US civil nuclear energy cooperation." Ahead of the meeting, Puri spoke to her on Wednesday and tweeted: "We agreed to work closely through the revamped India-US SCEP, as part of the India-US Climate & Clean Energy Agenda 2030 Partnership, scheduled for tomorrow." Kerry visited India in April before the Climate Leaders Summit that Biden convened virtually to increase commitments to cutting greenhouse gas emissions and enhancing the use of clean energy.

The US pressuring India to set a net-zero emissions target that would require it to bring down its greenhouse gas emissions and to neutralise them with carbon and greenhouse gases being absorbed through more forests that absorb them or use new technologies to capture them.

The US paints India as the world's third-biggest emitter of carbon dioxide, accounting for 7.17 per cent of the world output.

It ranks below the US, which puts out 27.92 per cent of the global emissions, and China, which emits 14.5 per cent.

But this hides the fact that an Indian's greenhouse gas emission is only 1.91 tonnes per year, compared to 15.52 by an Americaneven as Biden and Kerry press other countries to cut their emission.

(Arul Louis can be reached at arul.l@ians.in and followed @arulouis)
Belfast, Sep 11 : European Commission Vice-President Maros Sefcovic has called for compromise from the UK and the European Union (EU) in the implementation of the Northern Ireland Protocol.

Sefcovic made the comment on Friday when speaking at Queen's University in Belfast during his two-day visit to Northern Ireland, reports Xinhua news agency.

He said the overarching priority has always been the people of Northern Ireland and the protection of the peace process.

"As you know, the UK published their command paper on July 21. And we have been engaging constructively with our UK partners on what can be done to limit the impact of the protocol on everyday life in Northern Ireland, while maintaining its access to the EU's single market.

"The EU and the UK must continue these discussions in order to reach an understanding," Sefcovic added.

Northern Ireland is at the centre of the post-Brexit trade dispute between the UK and the EU.

As part of the Brexit deal, the Northern Ireland Protocol stipulates that Northern Ireland remains in the EU single market and customs union to avoid a hard border between the region and the Republic of Ireland.

However, this leads to a new "regulatory" border between Britain and Northern Ireland.

Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party leader Jeffrey Donaldson said on Thursday that the full impact of the protocol has not yet been felt partly because of the grace period, and warned against any future additional checks at the ports in region that arise from the protocol.
New Delhi, Sep 11 (IANS : Indian Minister of State for External Affairs Meenakshi Lekhi is scheduled to visit Portugal and Spain next week in an effort to enhance bilateral ties with the two countries.

The visit will begin on Sunday and will conclude on September 17.

During her trip to Portugal from Sunday to September 14, the Minister will hold bilateral talks with her counterpart Secretary of State for International Affairs and Cooperation Francisco Andre.

She will also meet Foreign Minister Augusto Santos Silva and the Secretary of State for Internationalisation Eurico Brilhante Dias in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

A bilateral agreement on the recruitment of Indian citizens to work in Portugal will be signed.

Lekhi will also meet the Minister of Culture of Portugal, Graca Maria da Fonseca and the Executive Secretary of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries Zacarias da Costa.

India was admitted as an Associate Observer of Community of Portuguese Language Countries in July 2021 and is committed to deepen its historic relations with the Lusophone countries.

She will also meet members of the Indian community and attend an event marking the rich cultural heritage of India as part of the 'Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav' celebrations.

During her visit to Spain from September 15 to 17, Lekhi will hold discussions with her counterpart, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Angeles Moreno Bau and meet other senior dignitaries in the Spanish government.

Lekhi will also inaugurate 'The Beatles and India' exhibition at Casa de la India, Valladolid and deliver a talk on India's Development Cooperation at the Spain India Council Foundation.

She will also interact with Indologists and Indophiles, including ICCR Alumni, and the Indian Community in Spain.

"The visit of the Minister, which is the first in-person official engagement with both countries since the Covid-19 pandemic, is expected to provide fresh momentum to bilateral ties," the Ministry of External Affairs said.
Ramallah, Sep 11 : Palestine has slammed Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett for saying that he supports the expansion of Jewish settlements in the Palestinian territories.

In an official statement sent to Xinhua news agency on Friday, the Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it condemns Bennett's remarks he made in a meeting held on Thursday in the West Bank.

During the meeting, Bennett promised "not to freeze the advancement and approval of building plans for new Jewish homes in the West Bank's settlements", the Israeli media reported.

The Palestinian statement condemned Bennett's meeting and his remarks "provocative and never show any credibility toward a mutual trust-building and restoring calm, security and stability".

"Telling the settlers that he supports developing and building settlements and, at the same time, saying that the settlements won't be annexed is a policy of playing with words and expressions," the statement said.

Israel occupied the West Bank and East Jerusalem, which are claimed by the Palestinians, in the 1967 Middle East war and has controlled them ever since.

The Jewish settlements are considered a violation of international law by most of the international community.

Direct peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians stopped in 2014 after the US sponsored it for nine months without making any progress due to deep differences on issues of Israeli settlement and recognising a Palestinian state.
San Francisco, Sep 11 : Amazon is rolling out a software update for its Kindle, Paperwhite and Oasis devices that could make them easier to use.

The company announced the changes will be arriving in the coming weeks for Kindles 8th-generation and later, Paperwhites 7th-generation and newer as well as the Oasis line, reports Engadget.

First, the update would allow users to swipe down from the screen to adjust display brightness, toggle Airplane, Bluetooth and Sync modes and go to All Settings.

A new bottom navigation bar will let users switch between Home, Library and the book they are currently reading.

The company mentioned that soon "an improved Home and Library experience" is also coming that will offer a revamped Library with "new filter and sort menus, a new collections view and an interactive scroll bar".

The updated Home portal will feature a Recently Read section that stores up to 20 items, which can be accessed by swiping left.

Earlier this year, Amazon also added the ability to set a book cover as Kindle's screensaver and enabled faster downloads.

Kindles are the most popular e-readers around and have typically run a fairly basic operating system that can sometimes be hard to navigate, the report said.

These coming updates might not be a significant overhaul, but they do make common tools easier to find, it added.
Karnal, Sep 11 : Bharatiya Kisan Union President Gurnam Singh Chaduni and Haryana Additional Chief Secretary (ACS) Devender Singh on Saturday announced to conclude the week-long agitation in Karnal.

The decision was announced at a joint press conference after the first round of talks between farmers union leaders and the Haryana government representative.

ACS Singh said that "after several round of talks with farmers leaders we have reached up to an agreement considering farmers demands".

He said that state government will set up an inquiry committee of retired High Court judges to probe against SDM Ayush Sinha.

Meanwhile, during the probe, which will be completed within a month, he will be sent on leave.

Talking about other demands, the ACS said that two members of a farmer family who died in the unfortunate incident will be given jobs of the sanction posts on DC rate.

He said that chances are high to turn these posts permanent.

Meanwhile, Chaduni said in the press conference that the talks ended on a positive note and they were happy that the government has considered their demands.

He added that jobs will be provided to the two family members of the family within a week.

However, being asked about one of the other major demands of registering an FIR against Sinha, he said filing a complaint after the probe by the retired judges will give more strength to the case.

On ending the agitation, Chaduni said that "we are satisfied with the outcomes and this is our victory", adding that the protest against the new farm laws will continue as usual on the Delhi border and across the nation.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Mumbai, Sep 11 : Richa Chadha is doing her bit to create awareness about Covid-19 through her initiative on social media. She says social media campaigns are a great way to reach many people at one go.

Richa has started a social media initiative 'The KINDry', which is a space to discuss happenings around. This time around, she has used her page to spread awareness about the pandemic and help people in maintaining Covid appropriate behaviour.

Richa said: "Social media campaigns are a great way to reach many people at one go and through The KINDry, my ultimate purpose is to educate people on covid appropriate behavior and encourage them to get vaccinated at the earliest." Through her page, Richa urges people to get themselves vaccinated at the earliest and be prepared to face the worst possible situation mentally and physically.

She added: "The threat of the third wave of infections still persists and it is very important for people to maintain social distancing and stay at home. The second wave was devastating and a change in our behaviour is much needed."

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Geneva, Sep 11 : Food and job insecurity are now the primary causes of concern for families in Afghanistan, Anthea Webb, deputy regional director for the World Food Program (WFP), told a UN press briefing.

With winter setting in and the economy on the verge of collapsing, their worries are also growing, she said via a conference call on Friday.

Quoting from the latest survey of the WFP, she said that 93 per cent of households in Afghanistan have no sufficient access to food now, reports xinhua news agency.

The randomised phone survey, carried out from August 21 to September 5 in all provinces in the country, revealed that three in four Afghan families have been reducing portions or borrowing food.

"They are buying cheaper food, foregoing more nutritious options such as meat, dairy products and vegetables. Parents are skipping meals entirely to allow their children to eat," Webb said.

She added that food insecurity in Afghanistan had already been widespread before August 15, with 81 per cent of households reporting insufficient food consumption, with one in three Afghans signalling acute food insecurity.

"It is now a race against time to deliver lifesaving assistance to the Afghan people before roads are cut off by snow," the UN official said.

She told reporters that the main reason the situation had gotten so much worse over the past month was that many Afghans did not have access to the money they needed to buy enough food.

Afghanistan has also witnessed drought this year, which led to a 40 per cent decline in domestic food production.

It has caused food prices to skyrocket.

Wheat prices have gone up by 25 per cent while many essential ration items have to be imported and purchased at higher rates.

Presently in Afghanistan, half of the population, 18 million people, need humanitarian assistance to survive.

A third do not know where their next meal is coming from. More than half of all children under 5 are at risk of acute malnutrition.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has announced that he will travel to Geneva on September 13 to convene a high-level humanitarian meeting to address the growing needs in Afghanistan.
San Francisco, Sep 11 : Google is adding an official dark mode to search on desktops, letting those who prefer to avoid bright webpages complete their searches while bathed in inky gray.

Users can open settings and they will see "Appearance" at the end of the menu. That will take users to Search Settings > Appearance with the ability to select -- Device default, Dark theme and Light theme.

This dark gray background will appear wherever a user is signed in with their Google Account on desktop, reports 9To5Google.

Search pages include the Google homepage, search results page, and Search settings, among others.

As per the report, users might also get a banner in Search results, while some have spotted a sun icon in the top-right corner to quickly enable/disable.

In announcing, Google acknowledged user requests for this feature and said the Search dark theme would be fully available in the coming weeks.

"I am thrilled to announce that starting today and fully rolling out over the next few weeks, Dark theme is now available for Google Search pages on desktop," the company said.

This feature is also reportedly being tested for mobile.
Film: Kate (Streaming on Netflix); Duration: 106 minutes; Director: Cedric Nicolas-Troyan; Cast: Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Michael Huisman, Woody Harrelson, Tadanobu Asano, Miyavi, Jun Kunimura and Miku Martineau; IANS Rating: ***1/2Despite being a generic, assassin-on-the-prowl thriller, 'Kate' is engaging. The second of this week's female assassin films, 'Gunpowder Milkshake' being the other, 'Kate' is an exciting action-packed ride where the troubled, titular character is forced to fight her way out of various situations while experiencing a complete physical breakdown.

Set in Japan, 'Kate' is the story of the swift and agile assassin who was raised to kill, by the mercenary Varrick (Woody Harrelson). With all training and no childhood, Kate is the best of her lot and is thus given the most prestigious of assignments. She had never slipped up in the past twelve years.

But, this time for an assignment in Osaka, she flinches, when she realises that she has to shoot her target - a yakuza boss who is in close proximity of his daughter Ani (Miku Martineau). With this incident, Kate relives her past and wants to get out of the system.

Soon while preparing for an assignment in Tokyo, she meets Stephen (Michael Huisman), a handsome stranger in a bar and lands up sleeping with him. It is when she passes out before her mission and lands up in the hospital, she realises that there are others out there who also want her eliminated. She realises this after discovering that she has been injected with a lethal poison.

Escaping from the hospital, she uses her last day to frantically find out who wants her dead and why? During the process as a redemptive act, she befriends Ani.

Elizabeth Winstead displays Kate's physical prowess with authority, which screenwriter Umair Aleem and director Cedric Nicolas-Troyan have designed. She delivers fabulous, smash out moments including an early brawl inside a yakuza hotspot where she interrupts a dinner, showing little patience for those who refuse to answer her questions. That's not all, despite Kate's fragile state, Winstead continues displaying her agility against an army of goons, in the seamlessly choreographed action-sequences, with aplomb.

Miku Martineau is shrill and over dramatic as Ani the seeming, tagalong character. Jun Kunimura as Kikjima the Yakuza leader and Taadanobu Asano as Renji his second-in-command appear like stock characters.

Director of Photography Lyle Vincent's cinematography occasionally gets across the visual richness of urban Japan, but at least there are those occasions.

Overall, with Kate being a generic tale, one wonders why is it set in Japan?

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Thiruvananthapuram, Sep 11 : Even as Covid continues to rage in Kerala, the raging topic of discussion cutting across political spectrum on Saturday was the new syllabus for study at a MA course in Kannur University and the statement by a Catholic bishop with regard to 'narcotic jihad' and on Saturday even the Kerala Governor expressed his view.

It was two days back Syro Malabar Church Pala diocese bishop Mar Joseph Kallarangatt said that Catholic girls in Kerala were now becoming the victims of 'Love and narcotic Jihad' and the traditional rival political parties came out criticising the bishop and at Kannur, lot of heat was generated after Kannur University Vice Chancellor Gopinath Ravindran on Friday broke his silence and echoed the line of the CPI-M backed Students Federation of India (SFI) Union's view that there is no need to withdraw books of prominent RSS ideologues in the curriculum of the newly started Master's course in Public Administration at Kannur University.

Later a two member committee was appointed to submit its report on the syllabus issue.

On Saturday the much learned and Sanskrit expert Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan, often known for his views, without touching on the ongoing syllabus debate told the media that, he returned to the state only yesterday and he does not know what was discussed on the syllabus issue.

"I am not aware of the ongoing discussions, but I will say diversity is the law of nature. As a student one should be exposed to everything, then only one can come up with innovative ideas," said Khan.

Then came the turn of Union Minister of State for External Affairs V. Muraleedharan, batting for the Pala bishop, attacked both the traditional political rivals in Kerala.

"It's only natural for people who tell the plain truth to be attacked. Both the Chief Minister and Leader of Opposition are speaking like the spokesperson of Jihadis. Just look into the large-scale gold smuggling that's taking place in Kerala and that in itself is proof that narcotic jihad is taking place here," said Muraleedharan.

Leader of opposition V.D. Satheesan expressed concern that a section is out in the social media to fan trouble between the Christians and Muslims based on the statement of the bishop.

"And now it has come to be known that many who comment on this in the social media is done by those who are Sangh Parivar activists with fake Ids. People should not fall into this trap set by vested interests, who are out to create trouble. Then there is another section who are getting ready to march to the house of that bishop, that's also not needed and should be opposed. It's the responsibility of responsible political parties and politicians to see that these things are not taken to dangerous levels. The state government should look into if there is any merit in what the bishop said and do the needful and it should be seen that things are kept under control," said Satheesan.

Meanwhile the assistant bishop at Pala - Jacob Muriken said that the present controversy is needless and all should see that it is brought to an end.
Moscow, Sep 11 : The Russian Foreign Ministry said that it summoned John Sullivan, the US Ambassador to Moscow, over Washington's meddling in the upcoming State Duma or parliamentary elections.

According to the statement published by the Ministry on Friday, Sullivan was summoned for a meeting with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, reports Xinhua news agency.

During the meeting, the Russian side said it has irrefutable proof that US "digital giants" violated Russian legislation with regard to the preparation for elections.

The Ministry further said it is inadmissible to interfere in Russia's internal affairs.

The US State Department admitted that Sullivan discussed matters of bilateral relations with Ryabkov at the Foreign Ministry but did not mention about the envoy being summoned, TASS News Agency reported.

"On Friday, September 10, Ambassador Sullivan did meet with Deputy Foreign Minister Ryabkov to discuss a range of bilateral matters in support of (US President Joe) Biden's desire for a stable and predictable relationship with Russia," she said.
London/New Delhi, Sep 11 : Two events seem to be playing an instrumental role in the inner fighting among senior generals of the Pakistan army. One is the meddling by the ISI chief Lt general Faiz Hameed in the affairs of Kabul in bringing the Taliban into power and the other being the issue regarding the selection of the next Chief of Army Staff (COAS) due in November 2022.

Dr Amjad Ayub Mirza London/New Delhi, Sep 11 (IANS) Two events seem to be playing an instrumental role in the inner fighting among senior generals of the Pakistan army. One is the meddling by the ISI chief Lt general Faiz Hameed in the affairs of Kabul in bringing the Taliban into power and the other being the issue regarding the selection of the next Chief of Army Staff (COAS) due in November 2022.

Let's begin with the tussle between the COAS General Qamar Javed Bajwa and the chief of Pakistan's spy agency the Inter-Services-Intelligence (ISI) Lt General Faiz Hameed. On September 4 the DG ISI flew to Kabul allegedly without following the proper disciplinary protocol of informing his COAS. He has now returned to Pakistan after facilitating the installation of a Taliban (read Haqqani group) government in Kabul.

The Adjutant General (AG), Lt General Muhammed Amer, had issued a letter to the DG ISI and asked him to appear before the AG to explain his violation of military disciple. When Lt General Faiz Hameed arrived to attend the hearing at the GHQ (Sep 10) he was thoroughly humiliated. He was marched into the AG office which means he was cautioned at the door and the ISI flag was stripped of his motor vehicle before it was allowed to enter the GHQ premises.

Faiz Hameed has reportedly accepted the charges and asked for pardon which the COAS has now granted. Hence, the incident is now being hushed away. However, that does not mean that everything is back to normal.

On September 7, the Taliban announced a list of new cabinet members most of whom, by the way, have been on the UN designated terrorist list with millions of dollars of bounty for any information that would lead to their arrests. Most of them are wanted by the USA for drug trafficking, rape, murder, extortion and kidnapping for ransom.

This has angered the Doha office which had been in charge of negotiations between Taliban and the Americans. The Doha office is run by Sher Muhammed Abbas Stanikzai who said to be genuinely upset by the inclusion of (Pro-Pakistan/ISI) Haqqani group who now hold nearly half the government ministerial positions. This could very easily lead to a bloody conflict among the Taliban themselves.

On Tuesday the ISPR announced a big and very significant reshuffle in the top brass of the Pakistan army. Lt General Sahir Shamshad Mirza is to become the Commander of 10 corps in Rawalpindi, Lt General Muhammed Chiragh Haider is to become the Commander of Multan Corps and Lt General Muhammed Waseem Ashraf is named the next DG Joint Staff Headquarters.

Seventeen out of a 33-member cabinet comprises of those who belong to Haqqani group.

But the most significant appointment is that of Lt General Azhar Abbas, a Shia officer, to the post of Chief of General Staff (CGS). This is significant because COAS general Bajwa is considering to have the next COAS to be a Shia so that it can guarantee an uncompromising fight against the Tehreek e Taliban Pakistan.

The appointment of Lt General Azhar Abbas as the CGS has raised alarm among other high ranking generals precipitating into a power struggle that could further widen the fissures in the military hierarchy.

DG ISI Lt general Faiz Hameed and Rawalpindi Corps commander Lt General Sahir Shamshad themselves happen to be eyeing the post of COAS. This could lead to factional intrigues among the generals that could weaken the unity of purpose at the GHQ. However, in order to qualify for the post of COAS, Lt General has to become a Corps commander first. That is the criteria. So far it is most unlikely that Lt Gen Hameed will be given a corps to command, but you never know.

In the coming days and weeks as the Taliban fight the Punjshir forces in Afghanistan and the struggle to outmaneuver General Bajwa's attempt to install Lt Gen Azhar Abbas as the next COAS could prove to be fatal for the fighting moral of the lower ranking officers.

Pakistan army has got its fingers in too many pies. Fighting the Punjshir forces in Afghanistan, infiltration attempts in Kashmir, crushing the insurgency in Baluchistan, tackling the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement in KPK and confronting a rebellious mood in Sindh and subsequent insurgency launched by the Sindhudesh Revolutionary Army (SRA) in Sindh are all cause for grave concern for Pakistani military establishment.

As the power struggle among senior generals aggravates and fissures among the rank and file of the Pakistan army could widen and transform into an existential crisis that might be too big a challenge for it to overcome.

( is an author and a human rights activist from Mirpur in PoJK. He currently lives in exile in the UK.)
Tel Aviv, Sep 11 : Israeli police on Saturday announced that security forces captured two of the six Palestinian prisoners who escaped from a prison on September 6.

A police spokesperson said in a statement that the two were caught on Friday night by a team of the Shin Bet internal security forces near the Mount Precipice near the city of Nazareth, reports Xinhua news agency.

Video footage issued by the security forces showed that they have been arrested without resistance.

The police said the two men, identified as Yaqub Kadri and Muhammad Arda affiliated with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad militant group, have been taken for interrogation.

Israel's Channel 12 TV news reported that information from members of an Israeli-Arab family in Nazareth helped the police locate the suspects.

The two approached the family asking for food and the family immediately called the police.

Six Palestinian prisoners escaped the Gilboa Prison in northern Israel on Monday in a rare jailbreak that prompted a massive manhunt in Israel and the occupied West Bank.

The police believe the other four escapees have managed to reach "Area A", areas in the West Bank that are under full civil and security control by the Palestinian Authority.
Chennai, Sep 11 : Tamil Nadu Health Secretary J. Radhakrishnan has asked all the District Collectors (DCs) to stay alert following a marginal increase in Covid-19 cases in the state. The directive was issued on Friday.

While the rise is marginal the test positivity rate (TPR) that stood at 0.97 per cent on September 4 touched 1 per cent on September 10. Even though the increase is negligible the state government is not taking any chances.

The Health Secretary in the circular to the DCs said the increase in TPR is not due to the increase in testing but actual increase in Covid positive cases which cannot be taken lightly. He impressed upon the DCs to increase vaccinations and enforce Covid-19 appropriate behaviour among the people.

Areas such as Chennai, Chengalpattu, Coimbatore, Tiruvallur, Tirupur, Erode, Nagapattinam and Madurai had fluctuating TPR results for the past few days.

Radhakrishnan told the DCs that the emergence of new clusters of Covid-19 in workplaces and communities is a worrying trend. A family in Chennai, according to health department officials, reported five Covid positive cases on Friday.

While the admission of new Covid-19 patients in government hospitals in Chennai remained the same in the past one month, doctors, according to the public health department officials, opined that there was a marginal increase in admission of Covid-19 patients in private hospitals.

Suchithra V. Menon, Public Health Expert at Chennai, told IANS, "There is a slight or rather marginal increase in the admission of patients with Covid positive results in private hospitals. It is negligible but considering the history of the pandemic, the state government is not taking any chances and hence the Health Secretary's directive to all District Collectors."

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Mumbai, Sep 11 : The 30-year-old woman, who was raped and brutalized with rod, succumbed to her injuries following excessive bleeding at a civic hospital, triggering a furore among political parties.

"It's a tragic end. She had suffered very severe internal injuries and has passed away," Shiv Sena MLC Dr Manisha Kayande told IANS.

She said the victim has two minor daughters and appealed to Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray to consider compensation for them under the government schemes for women.

The incident, which took place early on Friday morning, sparked outrage all over the state with the National Commission for Women taking note on Saturday.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (Zone X) Dr Maheshwar Reddy said that early Friday, the police got a call from a citizen informing of a brawl between a man and a woman.

"The caller said that the man was thrashing the woman and requested to send help urgently. A police team rushed there in about 10 minutes and found the woman lying on a tempo with severe injuries and bleeding profusely," Dr Reddy said.

The police rushed her to Rajawadi Hospital, and in a crack operation, managed to nab the accused Mohan Chavan within hours of the incident.

A police official said the attempt to murder charges slapped on the sole accused shall now be enhanced to murder and further investigations are on.

The incident provoked all-round condemnation from the Maha Vikas Aghadi allies Shiv Sena, Nationalist Congress Party, Congress and the Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party.

Home Minister Dilip Walse-Patil assured that the accused would be meted out the most stringent punishment while BJP leader Chitra Wagh demanded to know the current status of the Shakti Act framed by the state government.
Jerusalem, Sep 11 : The Israeli military said on Saturday that militants in the Gaza Strip fired a rocket into the country's territory but was intercepted.

The rocket triggered sirens in the Eshkol Regional Council near the coastal Palestinian enclave but caused no injuries or damage, reports Xinhua news agency.

"The rocket was intercepted by the Iron Dome Air Defense System," an Israeli military spokesperson said in a statement.

The rocket attack came about an hour after Israeli security forces captured two Palestinian prisoners who escaped on Monday from a prison.

The two are affiliated with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a militant group.

Six Palestinian prisoners escaped the Gilboa Prison in northern Israel on Monday in a rare jailbreak that prompted a massive manhunt in Israel and the occupied West Bank.

The other four are still on the run.
Bengaluru, Sep 11 : With the decline in the number of Covid-19 cases in the state and successful functioning of higher secondary schools and colleges after reopening, the Karnataka government is mulling to start primary schools for classes 1 to 5.

Karnataka Education Minister B.C. Nagesh on Saturday said the state government will take a decision on the opening of schools for classes 1 to 5 after consultations with the technical experts committee formed on Covid-19.

"We are holding a meeting with experts committee soon. The matter will be deliberated upon and a decision will be taken after their consent," he added.

The Karnataka government reopened schools and colleges on August 23 for classes 9 to 12. After successfully conducting classes across the state, a decision has been taken to reopen schools for students of classes 6 to 9.

The Recognised Unaided Private Schools Association (RUPSA) in Karnataka has been demanding the reopening of primary schools for a long time. RUPSA President Halanuru S Lepaksha had warned the Karnataka government that they will stage protests if primary schools are not opened now. However, the state government has decided to tread a cautious path with respect to opening primary schools.

All districts in Karnataka have recorded less than 2 per cent Covid positivity rate. The weekend curfews have been lifted from this week in the districts bordering Kerala and Maharashtra after taking stringent measures to prevent Covid-19 infections. The state government has restricted the movement of students, employees, among others, coming from Kerala to the state till October 31.

Experts say that the threat of spreading Covid-19 infections looms large as the BJP government in the state has lowered its guard by allowing Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations. The experts' committee could ask the state government to take a decision after observing the situation after the Ganeshotsav celebrations.

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Mumbai, Sep 11 : Veteran actor Jatin Sial, who is playing a pivotal role in the latest released web series 'Potluck', says that in a patriarchal society, especially when a man has to be the bread-earner of the family, at the beginning of their lives, they cannot afford to have quality time with family.

In the show, Jatin plays the character of Govind Shastri who is the man of the house in the Shastri family. The story revolves around how Govind, post his retirement realised that even though he has all the time to spend with his family, children and wife, a distance has been created in all these years when Govind was oddly occupied in earning money and fulfilling all the needs of his family. Through the narrative, it shows how he and his children come together to bridge the gap.

Jatin told IANS in an exclusive conversation: "I think in a patriarchal society wherein every household, men are the main bread-earner, they really do not get or rather cannot afford to have quality time with their family in their prime. There is no work and personal life balance in most situations. Then the generation gap also happens between parents and children. Of course, society is changing, so is the man-woman, parents-children relationship. But an emotional gap between people and generation has also existed because everyone is trying to create their own world, with their ambitions, involvement on social media, friends...etc. At times, just keeping everything aside, sitting with parents, having a meal and having a quality conversation could sound like a rare occasion! Our show is an attempt to bring back those conversations, family values but with a touch of modern-day lifestyle." As there are many sequences in the show where Govind Shashtri is trying to fit in, with the new generation and trying to rediscover who he is, Jatin said, "I think a generation gap and difference in mindset can only happen when the conversation is not rigid. As parent, you cannot tell your children 'tu meri baat nehi sunta hai, main teri baat kyun sunu?' On the other hand, even children should understand that what one can earn through the experience of life, can never be earned through other's story! Also, our value of togetherness has been reestablished I feel, during the pandemic when everyone was stuck in lockdown, in a confined space. I think, the story of our show 'Potluck' therefore couldn't have been more relevant than now!" 'Potluck' is directed by Rajshree Ojha, it also features - Cyrus Sahukar, Harman Singha, Sikha Talsania, Kitu Gidwani, Ira Dubey among others.

The show streams on Sony Liv.

(Arundhuti Banerjee can be contacted at arundhuti.b@ians.in)
Puducherry, Sep 11 : Vice-President M. Venkaiah Naidu will reach Puducherry on Sunday for a three-day visit to the Union Territory. He will inaugurate a solar power plant at the Jawaharlal Institute of Post Graduate Medical Education and Research (JIPMER) on Sunday morning.

Puducherry Lieutenant Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan and Chief Minister N. Rangasamy will participate in the event.

JIPMER in a press statement on Saturday morning said Venkaiah Naidu would inaugurate a solar power plant. The total installed capacity of the plant is 1482 KWP and it was set up at a cost of Rs 7.67 crore, the statement added.

The plant will take care of 15 per cent of the electricity demand of JIPMER and save Rs 1.7 crore in electricity bills every year as per the present power tariff rates, the statement said.

The Vice-President will leave for Aurobindo Ashram and stay at the Raj Nivas till Monday night. He will dedicate the Pondicherry Technical University at the Pondicherry Engineering College campus on Monday. He will inaugurate a solar power unit at the Pondicherry Central University the same day.

Venkaiah Naidu will leave for Chennai on Tuesday morning.
Ramallah, Sep 11 : At least 174 Palestinians were injured during clashes with Israeli soldiers in the West Bank as protesters were showing their support for the Palestinians incarcerated in Israeli prisons, authorities said on Saturday.

In a statement, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society said that among the injured, 25 were wounded by rubber bullets, adding that an ambulance driver and a photojournalist were also hurt during the clashes on Friday, reports Xinhua news agency.

The rest of the injured suffered from pains after inhaling tear gas fired by the Israeli soldiers to disperse the demonstrators in the villages of Beita, Huwara and Beit Dajan near the northern West Bank city of Nablus.

Thousands of Palestinians participated in a demonstration called "a day of rage" to show solidarity with six Palestinian prisoners who broke out of an Israeli prison earlier this week.

The protesters went to the Israeli army checkpoints and roadblocks, confronting the Israeli soldiers.

Witnesses said the protesters threw stones at Israeli soldiers who fired teargas and rubber bullets to disperse them.

The tension between Israel and the Palestinians has been mounting since the escape of the Palestinian prisoners on Monday from the Gilboa Prison in northern Israel through a tunnel they dug.

Israel's security forces said on Friday night they captured two of the prisoners near the city of Nazareth in northern Israel.

The Israeli police believe the other four escapees have managed to reach "Area A", areas in the West Bank that are under full civil and security control by the Palestinian Authority.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : Rohullah Azizi, brother of Afghanistan's former Vice President Amrullah Saleh and one of the leaders of the resistance front in Panjshir, was killed by the Taliban in Karukh district of the province.

His relatives have confirmed the news and added that Azizi's body was not given to them, Khaama News reported.

Taliban has denied the news and has said that Azizi was killed during a conflict with them.

This is the second family member of the resistance front's leaders who lost their lives in Panjshir province.

Earlier, Commander Abdul Wodood, the nephew of slain guerrilla leader Ahmad Shah Massoud, was killed along with the spokesperson of the front Fahim Dashti.

Taliban has denied killing both and had added that they died in the intra-resistance front fight.

Panjshir province in the northeast of Kabul was the last holdout which was captured by the Taliban last week but fighting is still going on in some parts.

Officials in the resistance front claim to have taken some areas back from the Taliban but the latter has not commented on the issue yet.
Chennai, Sep 11 : The officials of food safety department in Tamil Nadu conducted raids across the state on eateries specifically non-vegetarian restaurants and hotels and wayside eateries on Friday and Saturday. Sources in the department told IANS that the raids were conducted after a ten-year-old girl in Arni, Tiruvannamalai district died of food poisoning after consuming stale biryani on Thursday night.

Situation is tense at Arni after the ten-year-old girl, Lokshana died consuming biryani at Seven Star Biryani centre. At least 21 people were admitted at various hospitals following vomiting and nausea. Doctors said that stale food has led to complications.

Food safety officials inspected the premises of the hotel and found after testing that 15 kg of stale chicken meat was stored in the hotel. Police and food safety officials sealed the eatery and a criminal case was registered against the owner, Kadar Basha, who has been taken in police custody along with his cook.

Following the death of the ten-year-old girl and the hospitalization of 21 people at Arni, the food safety department conducted a series of raids at restaurants, hotels and wayside eateries across the state and recovered huge quantities of stale and contaminated food.

This was on the directive of the state food minister R. Sakkarapani who immediately on receiving information convened a meeting of senior officials of the food safety department and ordered raids on the eateries.

The minister for food and civil supplies, R. Sakkarapani while speaking to IANS said, "The state government is committed to take action against those who serve stale food to consumers and the action is following the death of a ten-year-old girl at Arni, Tiruvannamalai on consuming stale biryani at an eatery. Stale and contaminated chicken meat was recovered from this eatery and we have sealed it down." The minister also said that searches and raids are being carried out across the state and those who were found guilty of serving stale food would be taken to task.
New Delhi, Sep 11: Even as China reached out to the hardline Taliban as they formed an interim government in Afghanistan, concerns remain over other terror outfits that may well use the region for carrying out dastardly acts.

Beijing's main worry is the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM)-- a Uyghur militant group - that has been expanding its network in and around Afghanistan. Until the withdrawal of the US troops from Afghanistan, there was little curiosity over the ETIM. But since the Taliban gained control, this not so known terror outfit has come to the fore.

"The United States is a strong country, it has its own strategy, and we see the withdrawal of the American government today from this war in Afghanistan, which is incurring huge economic losses, as a means of confronting China, who are the enemy of all humanity and religions on earth," Newsweek quoted a spokesperson of the ETIM as saying.

"We believe that the opposition of the United States to China will not only benefit the Turkestan Islamic Party and the people of Turkestan," the spokesperson said, "but also all mankind." The warning comes from ETIM despite the Taliban's assurance to China that terror outfits will not be allowed to use Afghanistan for their activities.

Several foreign policy watchers are of the opinion that the Taliban would have little control over the multiple terror outfits that have made Afghanistan their base and ETIM could become a major cause for concern.

Why is ETIM China's main worry? According to Al Jazeera, Beijing has been accusing the ETIM for undertaking violent terrorism "causing numerous deaths in the 1990s but there was little evidence to support these claims." The ETIM in turn has started to showcase the Chinese atrocities against the Uyghurs.

The ETIM has a transnational agenda to target Xinjiang, China, and the China - Pakistan Economic Corridor, as well as Chitral, Pakistan, which poses a threat to China, Pakistan and other regional States, a UN report noted.

The ETIM, according to the report, currently consists of several hundred members, located primarily in Badakhshan and neighbouring Afghan provinces.

What is ETIM? The militant ETIM, which has ties with other terror outfits such as Al Qaeda, was placed on the UN terror list in 2002. However, in November 2020, the US administration under former President Donald Trump delisted the outfit from the US terrorism designation list, "a move hailed by Uyghur organisations," as the Observer Research Foundation noted. "China has identified its fight against the Uyghurs as its main terrorism challenge, and it has deployed instruments and state capacity to deal with the same beyond its geography as well," the ORF study said, adding that more recently, in 2017, ETIM fighters were seen aligning themselves with the so-called Islamic State (ISIS or Daesh in Arabic). The ETIM has been undertaking terror attacks on the Chinese from time to time.

Existing terror outfits in Afghanistan The UN report has also revealed that about 8,000 to 10,000 foreign terror fighters have made Afghanistan their base. These fighters have come from Central Asia, the north Caucasus region of the Russian Federation, Pakistan and the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region of China, among others.

Not just that. Taliban too do not present a homogenous face. "There are several factions within the Taliban and now with the formation of the government, one could expect infighting among these factions to intensify," an analyst told India Narrative. The Taliban interim government will be headed under UN blacklisted Mullah Mohammad Hassan Akhund with the backing of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). Cracks within the Taliban are visible-initially Taliban co-founder Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar was slated to head the government.

However, Baradar has been 'demoted' and has now been made the deputy leader. Analysts opine that the situation in Afghanistan is likely to worsen in the immediate future.

(The 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, Sep 11: Chinese officials have highlighted Americas diminished standing on the world stage over Washingtons embarrassing public exit from Afghanistan. But CNN reports that celebrations in Beijing may be premature. In fact, China now faces the threat of extremism from Talibans return to power with the USA no longer in Afghanistan to protect it from the new geopolitical dangers and security risks.

Also, Chinese power across Asia can now be countered by the United States by redirecting its material heft toward the Southeast Asian region, now that the American military withdrawal is complete. Andrew Small of the German Marshall Fund in Washington has stated in CNN's report that China's entire mind-set around Afghanistan is about limiting and containing threats and not an opportunity to expand their influence or reap economic rewards.

He also said that China has always been uncomfortable with the Taliban's ideological agenda and fears Taliban's success in Afghanistan will have an inspirational effect for militancy across the region, including the Pakistani Taliban. Hence, China views Taliban-controlled Afghanistan as a trap and will be wary about taking on too prominent a role there.

Even as the Taliban looks towards China for investment, officials in Beijing worry that extremists could use Afghanistan to sow violence around the region, according to a report by NPR.

Although the Taliban has promised that Afghan territory will not be used as a staging ground for attacks inside China, their relations with terrorist groups like ISIS-K and ETIM is widely known. The author of The War on the Uyghurs, Sean Roberts states in NPR's report that the bigger threat to China is outside jihadist groups who may have begun to sympathise with the Uyghurs and their plight and perceive China as an enemy of Islam.

The major cause for concern is the resurgence of ETIM, which China claims is encouraging Uyghurs inside China to engage in terrorist acts and establish an insurgency. From the far north-eastern Afghan province of Badakhshan to China's mainly Muslim region of Xinjiang, Afghanistan and China share a 74km (46 mile) border along the remote Wakhan Corridor that is a barely accessible, inhospitable and narrow strip of land.

China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi has requested Taliban to make a "clean break" with the ETIM, which has around 500 fighters around the Wakhan region, according to a report by South China Morning Post.

China and Taliban may also sign a deportation treaty which has happened before in Taliban ruled Afghanistan. 13 Uyghurs were handed over to China following a meeting between Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan Lu Shulin and Taliban leader Mullah Omar in Kandahar in 2000. Historically, Afghanistan was viewed as safer for Uyghurs than neighbouring Central Asian countries because it lacked a formal extradition treaty with China.

While Taliban has promised it will never allow any force to use the Afghan territory to engage in acts detrimental to China, the spate of recent attacks on Chinese personnel and projects in Pakistan is a flashing warning sign about the impact a Taliban regime in Afghanistan. The security threat was underlined when a suicide bombing in Pakistan killed nine Chinese workers which was carried out by "the Pakistani Taliban out of Afghanistan" according to Islamabad in July 2021. A report by Reuters states that this is one of the deadliest attacks on overseas Chinese nationals in recent years.

Under its wider Belt and Road initiative, Beijing is investing over $65 billion in infrastructure projects through China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that became the target of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which is linked to al-Qaeda and Islamic State.

At ground level, China - along with Russia - appears to be staying put while USA and its allies scramble to evacuate embassies from Afghanistan, reflecting Beijing's confidence in dealing with the Taliban.

But Afghanistan's instability has jeopardised China's aspirations to expand the massive infrastructure project, the Belt and Road Initiative since Afghanistan provides China with a potential path to Turkey and Iran which circumvents the Pacific Ocean, where the U.S. and its allies wield power.

While Officials in China deny any intention of sending troops into Afghanistan, China is also reported to have built military outposts in Tajikistan near its border, according to The Diplomat.

Attempting to pressure Taliban to make good on their promises is China's best bet, and only applies to preserve Beijing's interests. Its repeated emphasis on non-interference highlights that the rights of the Afghan people, including women, under Taliban rule are ultimately of no concern.

So far, the irony of their partnership has not been acknowledged by either side: an extremist Islamist group next door embracing a powerful country using repressive tactics to fight extremism at home.

(The 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
Gandhinagar, Sep 11 : In a major political development, Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani on Saturday tendered his resignation to Gujarat Governor Acharya Devvrat at his residence, Raj Bhavan in Gandhinagar. The BJP leader confirmed that he has resigned from the top post.

"I am resigning from the post of the Chief Minister. I thank PM Modi and the party for giving me an opportunity to work for five years," Vijay Rupani told the reporters at Raj Bhavan.

"I am just a worker of the organisation and will continue to be so. For the upcoming state Assembly elections, definitely our PM Modi will be the face," Rupani said, when asked who will be the face for the elections, as he and the party earlier had declared that the 2022 elections will be led by him.

"I will accept whatever responsibility the party gives me," said Rupani.

Vijay Rupani took the state's Chief Ministerial position on August 7, 2016, and is representing Rajkot West in the Gujarat Legislative Assembly. It is learnt from sources that the party will declare Rupani's replacement by Sunday. Most likely his replacement could be deputy chief minister Nitin Patel.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
New Delhi, Sep 11: Protesters in Tajikistan, furious at Pakistani interference in Afghanistan, are seeking Imran Khan's boycott during the upcoming summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in the Tajik capital Dushanbe.

The Pakistani Prime Minister is one of the invitees to the SCO summit, which is likely to be overshadowed by the chaos in Afghanistan following the Taliban's takeover of Kabul on August 15. The Tajik have been incensed after Pakistani ISI chief, Faiz Hameed landed in Kabul to steer the aerial assault against ethnic Tajiks who had mounted an anti-Taliban resolve in the famed Panjshir valley.

Unsurprisingly, as the Tajik capital gets ready to host the all-important SCO Council of Heads of State meeting starting September 16, the country's civil society groups have urged the Emomali Rahmon-led government to stop Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan from attending it.

On Friday, the Tajik civil society urged the country's authorities to postpone Khan's visit to Dushanbe "until Pakistan refuses to interfere in Afghanistan's internal affairs" and an inclusive government is not created in Kabul.

The anti-Pakistan sentiment has only grown stronger since the Taliban unleashed a Pakistan-backed military operation to decimate the resistance mounted by Ahmad Masood, former Afghanistan Vice President Amrullah Saleh and their Tajik fighters in northern Afghanistan's Panjshir valley.

In a statement posted on Facebook, the civil society group said that the Taliban has proven to be a puppet of Pakistan and needs Islamabad to destroy its opponents.

"We categorically condemn Pakistan's intervention in Afghanistan's internal affairs, especially Pakistan's military aircraft involvement in the bombing of Panjshir residents," Dushanbe's Avesta News Agency quoted from the social media post.

"We believe that these days and nights, when the hearts of millions of Tajikistanis are bleeding because of the killing of people in Kabul and Panjshir, the upcoming visit of Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan to Dushanbe, his meeting in Tajikistan is unwanted," the statement added.

The appeal has been signed by the country's leading human rights activists, lawyers, journalists, philosophers, historians and public activists.

It includes names like Oynihol Bobonazarova - one of Tajikistan's most well-known human rights activists who has also fought the country's presidential election - and noted filmmaker Anisa Sabiri.

In its open address, the Tajik civil society urged the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Tajikistan to postpone the visit of Pakistani PM to Dushanbe until Pakistan rejects political and military support of the Taliban government in Afghanistan, the issue is discussed at the UN and an inclusive government is formed in the neighbouring country.

"In our opinion, Tajikistan and other countries of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization are obliged to establish a special commission and send it to Panjshir and other regions of Afghanistan to investigate the facts about Pakistan intervention and ethnic cleansing of the local population," the appeal mentions.

The group said that the collected evidence of the crimes committed by the Taliban and the Pakistani Army, especially in Panjshir, should then be sent to relevant international organisations, in particular the UN.

"Unfortunately, the launch of a large-scale operation of the Pakistani army against the Afghan People's Resistance Front in Panjshir, the genocide of Tajiks, the suppression of the women's uprising in Kabul and Herat, and the creation of a Nazi Taliban government in Kabul, although considered temporary, indicates the existence of the earlier developed Taliban scenario. It has now become the subject of extreme concern for the world community and neighbouring countries of Afghanistan," the activists noted.

Civil society groups, which have played an important role in Tajikistan's growth and development over the last couple of decades, now fear that the current situation in Afghanistan could lead to a protracted Afghan civil war and instability in Central Asia.

As reported by the India Narrative earlier, Tajikistan President Emomali Rahmon had last month conveyed to the visiting Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi, Dushanbe's extreme displeasure over Pakistan-backed Taliban backstabbing other ethnic groups of Afghanistan.

Rahmon had told Qureshi that the Tajiks have "a worthy place" in the future government of Afghanistan and Dushanbe will not recognize any other regime that will be formed "through oppression", without taking into account the position of the entire Afghan people, especially all its national minorities.

This was, of course, much before the bloody Sunday (September 5) when Pakistani drones, helicopters and special forces allegedly launched a joint operation with the Taliban fighters to crush Tajiks in Panjshir.

With not just Tajikistan but even Russia and Iran fuming with anger after the Panjshir bloodbath, it is Imran Khan's turn to run for cover now.

(The content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com) --indianarrative
Mysuru : , Sep 11 (IANS) Members of Karnataka Farmer Organizations Federation and State Sugarcane Growers Association have extended their support to the nationwide bandh call given by Samyukta Kisan Morcha on September 27 protesting against the Union government's controversial farms laws.

Kurubur Shanthakumar, the President of the association on Saturday said, members of his federation have also extended support for the bandh call. He urged the pro-farmer political parties who are against these laws to openly express support to farm organizations, and to take part during this protest. Farmers in all taluks, district level, and prominent hobli towns will hit the streets on the day supporting the Samyukta Kisan Morcha.

He condemned the stubborn attitude of Prime Minister Narendra Modi for not withdrawing anti-farmer laws despite the members of Samyukta Kisan Morcha comprising 500 farmer organizations had been staging a nine month long protest at Delhi- Haryana -Ghazipur borders.

As RSS supported Bharatiya Kisan Morcha activists too held nationwide protests against these farm laws, the union government must withdraw these laws. Shanthakumar also lashed out at Union minister of state for agriculture Shobha Karandlaje for not responding to the woes of farmers.

He also demanded the government to direct all lead banks to stop harassment meted out to farmers during the loan recovery process despite the fact that the RBI has not made mandatory to collect no objection certificate and not pledging properties to borrow the loan up to Rs 2 lakh, as several banks have demanded the loan borrowing farmers to pledge their properties besides harassing them.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : Heavy rain since Saturday morning led to water-logging in various areas of the national capital with a bus carrying passengers from the Indira Gandhi International Airport getting stuck due to water-logging at South Delhi's Palam flyover. However, all the bus passengers were rescued with the help of fire brigade personnel.

On Saturday morning, the bus coming from the airport was moving towards its destination through the Palam flyover but while passing through the underpass, the bus suddenly stalled due to a technical fault.

With the passengers being trapped in the middle of the water, fire brigade personnel immediately rushed to their help.

As many as 40 passengers inside the bus were evacuated safely.

A video of this incident has gone viral on the social media in which firefighters are seen evacuating the passengers from the bus in south Delhi and the passengers are seen leaving the underpass along with their luggage.

According to the fire department, they received a call at 11.31 a.m., following which two fire tenders reached the spot and all the passengers in the bus were safely taken out.

A police official said, "Nearly 30 to 40 people were sitting in the bus while it was coming out from the IGI airport, and suddenly stopped beneath the Palam flyover underpass. However, all passengers have been rescued safely now."
New Delhi, Sep 11 : HP has emerged as the top personal computer (PC) vendor in India in the second quarter of 2021 calendar year with a 26 per cent market share, after its PC shipments jumped 54 per cent year-on-year to 1.06 million units.

According to market researcher Canalys, Lenovo Group was the runner-up with a 20.5 per cent market share followed by Dell Technologies (12.8 per cent).

Samsung Electronics was the fourth largest PC vendor in India in the second quarter of the year, a report showed Friday, thanks to its strong tablet sales.

"The market has finally returned to pre-Covid shipment levels," Ashweej Aithal, Canalys Research Analyst, said in a statement.

"While desktops and notebooks haven't really seen a major bump in shipments, tablets are in much higher demand than before, resurrecting what was a dying category in India. Due credit for that should be given to remote learning, as well as the accelerated digital transformation of multiple industries and processes," Aithal added.

The South Korean tech giant accounted for 9.8 per cent market share in India after shipping 403,000 units of PCs, including desktops, notebooks and tablets, in the April-June period.

Samsung's second-quarter PC shipments soared 134 per cent from 172,000 units a year earlier when it had logged a 6 per cent market share in India.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : Vijay Rupani became the fourth BJP's chief minister to be replaced in the last six months. In a surprise move, Rupani on Saturday resigned as Chief Minister of Gujarat almost 15 months before state polls, becoming fourth chief minister to be changed in six months in three states - Uttarakhand, Karnataka and Gujarat.

In March, the saffron party replaced Uttarkhand then chief minister Trivendra Singh Rawat with Lok Sabha member Tirath Singh Rawat. In July, four months after being made chief minister, Tirath Singh Rawat was replaced by two time MLA Pushkar Singh Dhami. After Uttarakhand, BJP replaced B.S. Yediyurappa with B.S. Bommai.

A party leader claimed that chief ministers in Gujarat and Karnataka were replaced to bring in new leadership in the state. "In Karnataka, there was strong resentment against the chief minister and his son. Similarly there was demand in Gujarat unit for removal of Rupani by a section of the party saying it will be difficult to win next year's state polls under his leadership," he said.

While in Uttarakhand chief minister Trivendra Singh Rawat was replaced to bring in a new face but Tirath Singh Rawat removed due his failure to get elected to state assembly within six months of being sworn in as chief minister of state.

Among all the replacement of BJP chief ministers, the current change of guard in Gujarat took place without any buzz. "There was a discussion and demand from a section in the party to change the chief minister but no one expected that news would come this way. We have no idea that it will be announced after submitting resignation," a party leader from Gujarat said.

In March, before replacing Trivendra Singh Rawat, the BJP had sent two members to the state, which included former Chhattisgarh chief minister Raman Singh, to collect feedback. Similarly before replacing Tirath Singh Rawat, the BJP central leadership had called him to the national capital and explained to him about the constitutional and legal crisis. Amid months of speculation about a change of guard in Karnataka, Yediyurappa had met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and top BJP leadership. Yediyurappa took his time and resigned after completion of two years of his government in July.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Allahabad, Sep 11 : Chief Justice of India N.V. Ramana on Saturday described Kiren Rijiju as a 'dynamic' Law Minister who he thought had studied either from Oxford or Stanford, but got surprised to learn that he came from a rural background.

Ramana said that he appreciates Rijiju's outlook towards strengthening judicial infrastructure to increase access to justice and thought he was from an elite background.

Speaking at a function where President Ram Nath Kovind laid the foundation stone for the UP National Law University and a new building complex of the Allahabad High Court here, the CJI, who initially started his speech in Hindi before switching to English, said, "Unfortunately, my learning of Hindi is confined to just a year in school. Please forgive me for my inability to communicate with you in your language." Referring to Rijiju, the CJI said: "Many of us came from rural backgrounds... While travelling, he (Rijiju) mentioned about his background. I had thought that he studied from Oxford or Stanford university." He added that in the morning "I got to know from him (Rijiju) that he also comes from a rural background. He understands the difficulties of common people".

Terming the Law Minister as encouraging, Ramana said. "He is supportive to us. I thank him on this occasion." The function was also attended by Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, Governor Anandiben Patel, several judges of the top court and other dignitaries.

Rijiju, who gave his speech in Hindi, said the government believes in the independence of the judiciary, and wants to strengthen the judicial system besides taking steps to make it stronger.

He added that the Central government under the guidance of Prime Minister Narendra Modi wishes to develop a strong relationship with all the judges of the high courts and the Supreme Court.

Rijiju said: "In the upcoming Winter Session of the Parliament, we will table a Bill on mediation... We want to make India a hub of international arbitration." "Timely delivery of justice must be made a priority," Rijiju said, adding that the Centre would work with the judiciary in order to facilitate the delivery of justice to the common man.

The CJI also said that courts in India still operate from dilapidated structures, without proper facilities and such a situation is severely detrimental to the experience of the litigants and the lawyers.

"We neglected and failed to focus on providing good infrastructure to the courts in India after the British left," he said.

Ramana added that he is working on the National Judicial Infrastructure Corporation (NJIC), which will develop concepts for the national court development project and its implementation.

"The NJIC shall be along the lines of different infrastructure development statutory bodies that work towards creating national assets across the country. One of the design principles that the NJIC will follow is socially responsible and inclusive architecture," he said.
Kolkata, Sep 11 : The Enforcement Directorate has again served notice to Abhishek Banerjee asking him to appear before the ED officials in Delhi on September 21. This is the third notice served to Banerjee in this month in the alleged coal smuggling case.

Earlier on September 6, Banerjee appeared before the ED officials and he was interrogated for nine hours. The next day again he was asked to come to the office but Banerjee replied that it was impossible for him to appear because of his pre-scheduled political programs. The central agency again served a notice asking him to appear on September 21.

The interrogation of Banerjee has sparked debate across political circles with chief minister Mamata Banerjee attacking the BJP government on the issues alleging that the Modi-Shah duo were indulging in vindictive politics. "They don't have any proof. They are only harassing him (Abhishek Banerjee). When they can't fight us politically, they are using the central agencies to scare us," Mamata Banerjee said on the interrogation of Abhishek Banerjee who also happens to be her nephew.

The case, filed under criminal sections of the (PMLA), was filed by the ED after studying a November, 2020 FIR of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) that alleged a multi-crore coal pilferage scam related to the Eastern Coalfields Ltd mines in the state's Kunustoria and Kajora areas in and around Asansol. Local state operative Anup Majhi alias Lala is alleged to be the prime suspect in the case.

The ED had earlier claimed that Abhishek Banerjee was a beneficiary of funds obtained from this illegal trade. He has been denying all charges.

On September 6, after being interrogated by ED for nine hours Abhishek Banerjee had said, "It is difficult to cow us down by these agencies. We are not Congress that we will sit back and watch. We will go to all the places where democracy is being killed and butchered by the BJP".

Apart from Abhishek Banerjee, the ED summoned his wife Rujira Banerjee, his lawyer Sanjay Basu and two IPS officers - Shyam Singh and Gyanwant Singh for interrogation. Rujira Banerjee, however, told the central agency that in this pandemic situation, it would not be possible for her to go to Delhi for interrogation and asked the probe agency to come to her home to question her.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : Pakistan and China have named Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) and Uighur militant outfit, ETIM among terrorist groups which should not be allowed to gain a foothold in Afghanistan.

This is part of a joint statement issued by six neighbouring countries of Afghanistan including Pakistan and China.

The TTP has carried out several attacks in Pakistan while BLA has recently claimed responsibility for suicide attacks in the Balochistan province.

At the initiative of the Government of Pakistan, the Foreign Ministers of Pakistan, China, Iran, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan held the Foreign Ministers' Meeting on the Afghan issue among the neighbouring countries of Afghanistan via video link on September 8.

While TTP and BLA are banned in Pakistan as terrorist outfits, ETIM is a threat to China.

Apart from these militant outfits, Jondollah, which is a militant outfit carrying out threats in Iran has also been proscribed in the statement.

The other outfits mentioned are ISIS and Al Qaeda which are perceived as global threats.

"Reiterated that terrorist organizations, such as ISIS, Al-Qaeda, ETIM, TTP, BLA, Jondollah and others should not be allowed to maintain a foothold on Afghanistan's territory", the joint statement said.

China hopes the Afghan Taliban will fulfill its promises, break off from terrorist organizations, including the East Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM) and take effective actions to firmly crack down on it, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said at a press conference on Friday in response to the Taliban spokesperson's comments that ETIM has no place in Afghanistan in an exclusive interview with the Global Times.

"We have noticed the exclusive interview of the Global Times and the Afghan Taliban's further commitment on topics of the ETIM," Zhao said, noting that the ETIM has been listed by the UN Security Council as an international terrorist organization and poses direct threats to China's national security and territorial integrity. It is one of the scourges that harm regional stability and a malignant tumor that is parasitic to Afghanistan.

Zhao said at the Friday conference that it is the Afghanistan and the international community's shared responsibility to firmly oppose, curb, crack down and eradicate the ETIM. China reiterated its concerns to the Afghan Taliban, which it paid attention to and made promises related to it, Global Times reported.

Pakistan Interior Minister Sheikh Rasheed earlier said that Pakistan has taken the Afghan Taliban on board over the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) issue, hoping that Afghanistan's soil will not be used against Pakistan, Geo News reported.

The interior minister was responding on Geo Pakistan to reports of the release of key TTP commanders from jails in Afghanistan, as the Taliban took over the country.

Maulana Faqir Mohammad, the former deputy chief of the TTP, was also released as the Taliban took hold of the capital on Sunday.

"The outlawed TTP and Daesh militants are present in the mountainous ranges of Nooristan and Nighar," he said. "We have taken the Taliban on-board over the TTP issue and told them that Pakistan will not allow its soil to be used against Afghanistan and it hopes Afghanistan won't allow its soil to be used against Pakistan." (Sanjeev Sharma can be reached at sanjeev.s@ians.in)
Islamabad, Sep 11 : In view of the developing situation in Afghanistan with the interim Taliban government being questioned broadly by the western countries, including the US, CIA Director Willian Burns flew to Pakistan and India recently to have important meetings and consultations on the way forward for the war-torn nation.

During his stay in Pakistan, Burns met the head of the army, General Qamar Javed Bajwa, and the Intelligence chief, Lieutenant General Faiz Hameed.

"It was reiterated that Pakistan remains committed to cooperate with its international partners for peace in the region, ensuring a stable and prosperous future for the Afghan people," read a press release issued by the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) in Pakistan.

However, the situation is not as bright as it is reported. It is said that the main purpose of the CIA chief's visit to Pakistan and India was because Islamabad remained an ally to the US in the war on terror, and the US proposed increased influence and presence of India in Afghanistan, when it announced its South Asia policy under the Donald Trump administration.

Pakistan is playing an important role in the evacuation of foreign nationals from Afghanistan and became a vital destination when the US and other NATO troops were evacuated from Kabul during the troop withdrawal process.

Since the withdrawal of the US and NATO forces from Afghanistan, countries like Turkey, Qatar, Iran, Russia, China and Pakistan are converging in Afghanistan with constant consultations and active contacts with the Taliban regime, an alliance-based convergence that is raising serious concerns in Washington.

The Joe Biden administration has stated that it would keep a close eye on the developing situation in Afghanistan, insisting that if would take out terror hideouts through drone strikes at the time of its choosing and whenever needed.

It should be noted that US drone strike claimed the lives of at least 10 members of a family, including children, as it targeted a vehicle carrying an alleged Islamic State (IS) member. The drone strike was carried out after the deadly blast at the Kabul airport that claimed the lives of hundreds of Afghans and dozens of US troops. The attack was claimed by ISIS-K (Islamic State of Iraq and Levant - Khorasan).

Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid slammed the US for carrying out the drone strike, which he said claimed the lives of innocent civilians, adding that the US has no right to carry out attacks in Afghanistan anymore.

"If there was any potential threat in Afghanistan, it should have been reported to us, not an arbitrary attack that has resulted in civilian casualties," he said.

The CIA chief's agenda seems to be on the same lines, as he met with the top military brass of Pakistan and India and discussed security concerns linked to the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan.

However, it is believed that the US is trying to keep its influence in Afghanistan alive through intelligence sharing through Pakistan and eyes on ground through India as it sees Afghanistan being wrapped with its important opponents from the region.
Chennai, Sep 11 : Customs officials seized 3.125 kg of gold at Chennai international airport from two male passengers aged 34 and 35 years who arrived in an Emirates flight from Dubai on Friday, said officials on Saturday.

A statement from the Customs office in Chennai on Saturday said that the arrest and seizure of gold was due to clear inputs from the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI).

Customs on examination of the checked-in baggage of the two passengers found that 11 gold wires of 24 K purity and weighing 3,125 grams or 3.125 kg were seized. The cost of the gold smuggled in is valued at Rs 1.33 crore.

The statement said that these gold wires were concealed within the bag and silver quoted to prevent detection. The recovered gold was seized under the provisions of the Customs Act 1962.

The statement added that further probe is on regarding the sourcing of gold and whether these two are regular carriers and etc.
New Delhi: Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh, address to media after meeting with Congress president Sonia Gandhi in New Delhi, on Tuesday, July 06, 2021. (Photo: Qamar Sibtain/ IANS) Image Source: IANS News

Chandigarh, Sep 11 : As the Punjab Police department geared up for the next stage of its mega recruitment drive, Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Saturday directed the DGP to intensify the crackdown on leak of exam papers after six people were reportedly arrested for their suspected involvement in cheating during the written test on August 22.

The directives come ahead of the commencement of written exams for head constables (investigation cadre), to be conducted from September 12 to 19 for 75,544 applicants for 787 vacancies, followed by exams for constables (district and armed cadres), slated for September 25-26 with a whopping 470,775 candidates having applied for 4,358 vacancies.

Following this, in a first-of-its-kind move by any state police in the country, another recruitment drive will take place in October for appointing 2,600 uniformed specialists in the Punjab Police Department.

The Chief Minister asked DGP Dinkar Gupta to further intensify the security measures at the examination centres in view of reported attempts by recruitment fraudsters and scamsters to sabotage and subvert the examination process.

Jammers and other electronic gadgets were being installed in all examination centres to prevent internet or bluetooth connectivity, said Dinkar Gupta, in the wake of the arrest of six persons by Khanna Police in connection with cheating through bluetooth connectivity during the written test for sub-inspectors held in Chandigarh and across Punjab from August 17 to 24.

More arrests are likely in the case, he said, adding that any person, whether candidate of a tout or a professional scamster found involved in any examination related malpractices will be immediately booked and arrested.

Gurpreet Kaur Deo, Chairperson of the Central Recruitment Board for Constables, said strict protocols have been laid down for securing the areas outside the test centres as well as within the venues, and multiple rounds of physical frisking will be carried out, apart from use of various types of electronic and digital gadgets.

The Punjab Police mega recruitment drive is being conducted through six recruitment boards, each constituted under an ADGP-rank officer.
Gurugram, Sep 11 : Harassed by wife and in-laws, a doctor of a private hospital in Gurugram committed suicide by consuming a poisonous substance, police said here on Saturday.

The reason for committing suicide was revealed two weeks later after a suicide note was recovered from the house. The family members of the deceased reported the matter to the police against their wife and in-laws.

The complainant Om Singh, a resident of village Jhanjharola, told the police that his son Ravinder was a doctor in a private hospital in Gurugram.

"My son was married to Manisha, a resident of Alwar, in January 2015. On August 26, Ravinder had swallowed a poisonous substance due to mental stress. He died during treatment at a hospital. The police took the body in possession and handed it over to the family members after postmortem. I didn't file any complaint at that time," Singh told the police.

Singh said in his complaint that 14 days after Ravinder's death when he was cleaning the house after separating his belongings, a diary was found in Ravinder's suitcase which contained the suicide note.

"In the suicide note, Ravinder had written that his in-laws are harassing him due to which he is committing suicide. He also blamed his wife Manisha, mother-in-law Kamlesh, Manisha's aunts Suman and Surat, for his death," Singh asserted in his police complaint.

Following this, Singh filed a complaint and handed over the suicide note to the police, which have started the investigation on the basis of the complaint.
Belagavi, Sep 11 : Shrimant Patil, a former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) cabinet Minister in Karnataka and the party's Kagwad MLA, on Saturday said he was offered money at the time of quitting Congress by the BJP government.

"But I declined the offer of money and demanded that I should be given a good position in the BJP-led government so that I can do social service," he added.

"It was true that I was given an offer of money. I did not take the money and asked for a good portfolio. Accordingly, I was given a cabinet berth. Now, they (BJP) have dropped me from the new cabinet. However, I have the confidence of getting a cabinet berth in the coming days," he said.

"I have discussed with senior leaders regarding the cabinet portfolio and Maratha community is also pitching in for me, demanding inclusion in the new cabinet. The senior BJP leaders have assured me that I will be accommodated in the cabinet," Patil added.

Opposition parties in Karnataka have been targeting the BJP government alleging horse-trading of 16 MLAs belonging to the Congress and the Janata Dal (Secular) which ended the coalition government of the JD(S) and the Congress.

Later, The BJP formed the government in the state under the leadership of former Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa. When Yediyurappa was asked to step down, Shrimant Patil, who was then a cabinet minister was not included in the cabinet of the new Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : The Taliban beheaded an Afghan soldier, then chanted praise to their leader Hibatullah Akhundzada while holding the severed head of their victim by his hair in a video posted in a private Taliban chat room, Washington Examiner reported.

The 36-second video, which was obtained by the Washington Examiner, was posted a week ago. It's unclear when it was made, but on August 17, Taliban leaders promised amnesty for government workers and protection for women.

In the video, six Taliban fighters surround the soldier, lying on his back in the desert with his head atop his chest. Five of the men are carrying rifles, and a sixth is holding two bloody knives in one hand. A seventh person is filming the event, the report said.

The soldier is wearing a dark green uniform of the type assigned to the national army by US forces.

The knife-wielding assailant, apparently the group's leader, is seen raising his weapons in the air. In a translation from Pashto provided to the Washington Examiner by a USmilitary source, the men are heard chanting, "Mujaheddin!" Then they shout: "God is great and long life to Ameer ul momeneen Mullah Haybat Uallah Akhunzada!"

Mujaheddin is an Arabic term for guerilla fighters, and Ameer ul momeneen is a phrase of endearment. Mullah Haybat Uallah Akhunzada is the supreme leader of the Taliban.

At the end of the video, the group leader shouts, "Shoot him! He has to look shot!" as the fighters line up to shoot, the report added.

"This is barbaric, and I will never trust the Taliban," said Afghan security consultant Nasser Von Waziri, who worked with government agencies across the country while Americans were stationed there. "A terrorist is always a terrorist." Brig Gen Don Bolduc, who oversaw the police and army training as Special Ops commander, said he was saddened and sickened by the video, the report said.

(Sanjeev Sharma can be reached at Sanjeev.s@ians.in)
Seoul, Sep 11 : Samsung is planning to launch its next premium flagship Galaxy S22 as well as S22+, and now a new report has claimed that the S22 Ultra will come with two zoom lenses with a variable focal length -- the first starting at 3x, the second at 10x.

There will be a small upgrade to the sensors in the two telephoto cameras. The new model will use two 12 MP sensors with 1.22 um pixels and both cameras will feature Optical Image Stabilization (OIS), reports GSMArena.

The main camera will be the same, it will feature a 108 MP sensor with 0.8 um pixels. The upcoming series will enter mass production in November this year.

The smartphones in the lineup will be available for purchase from January 2022 and all the models in the series are expected to come powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 898 chipset.

Previous rumours suggested that the Galaxy S22 Ultra is expected to continue the dual 10MP telephoto camera setup on the Galaxy S21 Ultra. One of the lenses will be a periscope lens that will offer 10x optical zoom.

Galaxy S22+ is expected to be equipped with a 4500 mAh battery. In terms of software, Galaxy S22 will be pre-installed with OneUI 4.x based on Android 12.
Beijing, Sep 11 : With an aim to boost its audio segment, global smartphone brand OnePlus is likely to launch new earbuds -- Buds Z2 -- next month.

The company launched its predecessor -- OnePlus Buds Z TWS -- last year in October.

According to GSMArena, the Buds Z2 look similar to their predecessor, but the ear tips are slightly angled this time.

"We also see some sensors on the buds, which could be used for wear detection -- a feature that wasn't present on the original Buds Z," the report said citing a source.

In January, the company launched a limited edition of its Buds Z in collaboration with Los Angeles-based artist and designer Steven Harrington, for Rs 3,699 in India.

According to the company, the new OnePlus Buds Z Steven Harrington Edition features the artist's signature stylized graffiti along with artistic caricatures and designs.

The limited-edition earphones have a two-tone purple and mint colour combo with a matching charging case.

On a full charge, these limited-edition earphones provide an impressive 20 hours of playback time, while a quick 10-minute top-up provides three hours of vibrant audio.
Kabul, Sep 11 : On Friday, Hundreds of Hazaras worshippers gathered in mosques to offer Friday prayers om the outskirts of Kabul, a first after the Taliban took over the country.

The Hazara community, belonging to the Shiite sect, had previously been persecuted, executed and ethnically cleansed by the Taliban and Daesh militant groups for being Shia Muslim.

However, with the current and a little 'moderate' new Taliban government in place, they feel a little secure. But this feeling of security also comes with traumatic fears of the past, making them uncertain about their present and the future.

The Hazara community had been a target for not only the Taliban, but also the Islamic State (IS) factions in the past. And with the newly-formed interim government of the Taliban, the Hazaras fear of being shut out and cleansed again as the Taliban leadership comprises hardline militants, the old guards from Pushtun ethnicity.

"It is largely made of a single ethnicity. Pushtuns dominate the Taliban government. We do not see any participation of the Hazaras, which is a huge concern," said Hassanzadah, a local from the Hazara community.

The Hazara community comprises the country's Shia minority, while the Taliban leadership consists of hardline Sunni sect of Islam, who in the past were savage towards the Shiites during their last regime in the 1990s.

The Hazaras have not forgotten one of the country's most violent attacks on their community, when rallies were bombed, hospitals were targeted and ambushed attacks on the community were carried out.

The most recent attack on the Hazara community was during June this year, when a Daesh-linked suicide bomber targeted a school and claimed the lives of hundreds.

Today, the Hazaras feel scared to see the Taliban-led security forces, who are now a normal sight on the streets of Afghanistan.

"There is no doubt that the people of Afghanistan want an inclusive government in which all ethnicities, followers of all faiths and different segments of society are represented," said Abdul Qadir Alemi, the Imam (prayer leader) of a mosque.

Another major concern for the Hazara community is the exclusion from government offices as many of them have gone jobless since the Taliban takeover and have no hopes of inclusion in the current Taliban-led government.

"There are many people who used to work for the government. They have all become unemployed now. There is a lot of anxiety and worry. It's not like the Taliban are killing us, but it is better to die than to live suffocated like this," said Suleiman, a Shiite worshipper at the mosque.

Maintaining livelihoods has become another major challenge for the Shiite community under the Taliban rule. They say that while they have not yet seen anything bad being done to their community by the Taliban for the moment, soaring prices of basic food items, coupled with unemployment of many community members, are pushing them into starvation.

"We have not seen anything bad from the Taliban, but there is no work for the people. What are we supposed to do about our hunger," asked Suleiman.
Hyderabad, Sep 11 : A French national, who was missing for two days, was found murdered near Himayat Sagar on the outskirts of Hyderabad on Saturday.

The body of Marie Christene De Rochemonteix (68) was recovered from the bushes near the reservoir, a police officer said.

The body has been shifted to the government-run Osmania Hospital for autopsy. Police suspect that she was strangled to death and the body was later dumped near the Himayat Sagar.

A resident of Sun City, Christene was missing since Thursday. The police have reportedly arrested a couple in connection with the murder. Financial reason is believed to be the motive behind the killing.

The Cyberabad police are likely to announce the details of the case later on Saturday.

Christene was living in Hyderabad for more than two decades. She was the founder and chairman of Marica Group of Schools, which has branches at Toli Chowki and Kismatpur.
Mumbai, Sep 11 : It is quite interesting to see how over the past one year, most of the Bollywood superstars, from Amitabh Bachchan to Akshay Kumar, Salman Khan and Ajay Devgn, and even Varun Dhawan, Siddharth Malhotra and Abhishek Bachchan, have had films released directly on OTT platforms. The notable person missing from this list has been Shah Rukh Khan.

According to filmmaker and 'Bigg Boss OTT' host Karan Johar, whose proximity to SRK is well-known, the superstar is actually in a state of FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) for not being there on OTT.

In a video he shared on social media, SRK is shown on the balcony of his Mumbai villa, surveying his fans gathered outside in their thousands. The actor takes pride in the fact that he has so many fans, unlike others, but his secretary pipes up to say that it may be true but "you never know about the future because all the actors now have their films released on OTT". What the secretary meant was that the stars on OTT are meeting their fans in their homes. That changes SRK's expression because, according to KJo, he's struck by an attack of FOMO.

Taking the fun to the next level, KJo tweeted: "Never thought I'd see the day when even the Baadshah of Bollywood feels FOMO. Now I've seen everything!!" Ranveer Singh responded by tweeting: "INKA SANS OF HUMOR TOH ALAG HAI BHAISAHAB!!! SRK ko bhi FOMO ho sakta hai?? ?????? #SiwaySRK

Noticing the fun everyone was having at his expense, SRK replied to Karan's tweet with the cryptic comment: "Hmmmm .... Picture toh abhi baaki hai .... mere doston ... ." The superstar was hinting at an impending release on Disney+ Hotstar. So, was it another publicity buildup for a forthcoming SRK venture, or just weekend fun? As they say, that only time will tell.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : Strong resentment among BJP cadre at ground level against him is one of the main reasons for removal of Vijay Rupani from the post of Gujarat chief minister, sources told IANS.

Rupani on Saturday resigned from the office. A section in the party believes that the decision to replace the chief minister might help the party beat anti-incumbency against the government among its own cadre.

While there is no clarity at what exactly led to Rupani's resignation, saffron party sources said that there are many reasons for removal of Rupani and there was strong resentment against him among party cadre.

"There was a strong resentment among cadre against Rupani. His popularity is low among BJP workers. The removal of Rupani will help the party control the dissent at ground well in advance ahead of next year's assembly polls. In other words we can say that the move might help the party beat anti-incumbency against the government and the chief minister among its own cadre," a BJP leader said.

It is learnt that while discussing the reasons for Rupani's removal, the party leadership decided keeping workers unhappy will adversely affect the party's electoral performance in the state polls, which is all set to become triangular with the entry of Arvind Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).

Another leader pointed out that it is a political course correction ahead of assembly polls. "By bringing a new face, BJP will try to address the issue of social engineering in the state, which played a crucial role in state politics," he said.

A party insider claimed that Rupani lacks the quality of fire brand leader and may not be able to take on Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) which is all set to contest state polls scheduled in November - December next year. "He (Rupani) was good in executing the given works or assignments, but lacked the quality we needed in our chief ministerial candidate to take on Congress and AAP in assembly polls. Workers are demanding a leader who can lead the party from the front under guidance of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and union home minister Amit Shah," he said.

Rupani took the state's Chief Ministerial position on August 7, 2016, and is representing Rajkot West in the Gujarat Legislative Assembly. It is learnt from sources that the party will declare Rupani's replacement by Sunday.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : As Delhi is waterlogged due to incessant, record-breaking rain since Saturday morning, BJP spokesperson Tajinder Bagga and farmer union leader Rakesh Tikait were seen mocking Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on his inability to do anything about this basic rainy season problem.

Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM) national secretary Tajinder Pal Singh Bagga took to Twitter and posted a video of himself sitting in rafting boat tied to a vehicle while he was rowing it continuously. Taking a dig at Kejriwal, he said, "I couldn't go to Rishikesh due to pandemic but I am glad that Arvind Kejriwal fulfilled this dream of mine. I want the Delhi Chief Minister to put up hoardings and advertise this facility he has arranged for all Delhiites so that they too can enjoy." "Kejriwal mauj kar di! (You made my day!)", he exclaimed as a DTC bus drove alongside him, swaying his orange coloured boat.

On the other hand, Bharatiya Kisan Union leader Rakesh Tikait, who is leading a protest against 3 farm laws for over nine months now, was seen posing for the camera by lying on an inundated road. He was taking directions from cameraperson as to which pose should he go for next.

In another shot he was captured sitting along with his supporters on a waterlogged street with police barricades behind him. Donning a saffron 'safa' (headgear) and dressed casually, he also posed for a single picture of himself.

Tikait has been protesting on the outskirts of the national capital against three farm laws passed by the Parliament in September 2020.

Some areas in the national capital were so waterlogged that children were seen swimming and playing in the seemingly deep water.

Delhi and its adjoining areas received heavy rainfall on Saturday morning which led to major traffic disruption due to water-logging. Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) issued an orange alert for the day as it recorded heaviest rainfall in a day since 2010. According to MeT officials, with the rain forecast for the weekend, Delhi could beat the record in September itself.

Pictures and videos surfacing from areas like Madhu Vihar, Jorbagh, Motibagh, RK Puram, Sadar Bazar area and ITO showed vehicles stuck in middle of roads partially inundated, slowing down the traffic to a snail's pace. Zakira Underpass near Inderlok was closed.

The Indira Gandhi Airport (Terminal-3) was also waterlogged, affecting several flights.
Patna, Sep 11 : Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has decided not to participate in the Jind rally called by INLD chief Om Prakash Chautala on September 25.

The rally will be organized by veteran leader and Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) president Om Prakash Chautala to celebrate the birth anniversary of former deputy prime minister Chaudhary Devi Lal.

All non-BJP and non-Congress leaders have been invited to the rally to explore possibilities of formation of a third front ahead of the 2024 general elections.

Chautala had extended invitations to NCP president Sharad Pawar, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, former prime minister H.D. Deve Gowda, former Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar in a bid to organize a third front to take on the BJP and the Congress.

Sources have said that if Nitish Kumar were to participate in the Jind rally, it would antagonise the alliance partner BJP and would create fissures between the two which would be difficult to bridge.

Nitish Kumar cannot afford to take risks keeping in mind that his government is running on the support of the BJP in Bihar, sources said.

Nitish Kumar has been taking a stand against the BJP on the population control law, caste based census, phone tapping issue etc, -- all this can be tolerated but going to the Jind rally may be too much, sources said.

Rajiv Ranjan Singh alias Lalan Singh, the national president of the Janata Dal United (JDU) said: "Bihar is having various challenges including the coronavirus possible third wave, flood, current viral fever etc. Hence, it is not possible for Nitish Kumar to leave Bihar. If it would be very urgent, he may go to Delhi for a short period." Lalan Singh however said that the party will send national general secretary K.C. Tyagi to the rally.

Nitish Kumar, during a recent Delhi visit, met former Haryana chief minister Om Prakash Chautala. The latter had invited him for the rally which was accepted by Nitish Kumar.

Nitish Kumar has had a long relationship with Chautala in the past. He even went to participate in an election rally in favour of the INLD in Haryana but the political equation this time is slightly different. He is chief minister of Bihar only with the help of the BJP.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : India and Australia on Saturday jointly junked China's claims that the QUAD is akin to Asian NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organisation).

The QUAD, officially the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, came up as an informal group of three countries: The US, Australia and Japan. Later India joined the group.

Formed in 1949, NATO is a military alliance of 28 European countries and two North American nations to promote democratic values and commitment to peaceful resolution of disputes.

With growing QUAD influence in the Indo-Pacific region promoting free, open and inclusive region-based international law, China has been calling it as the Asian NATO.

After the India-Australia 2+2 ministerial dialogue here on Saturday, Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar said: "QUAD is a platform where four countries have come to cooperate for their benefit and world's benefit." Junking China's reference to QUAD as Asian NATO, Jaishankar said: "Looking back, I think a term like NATO is a Cold War term. QUAD looks at the future. It reflects globalisation and compulsion of countries to work together.

"If you look at the issues QUAD has focused on today like vaccines, supply chains etc., I can't see any relation with NATO or any other organisation. I think it's important not to misrepresent what is the reality out there." Jaishankar's Australian counterpart Marise Payne also expressed similar views on China's claims.

The Australian Foreign Minister said: "As Australia and India have re-energised relations, there is also the opportunity to work through smaller groups like the QUAD or other pieces of regional architecture like ASEAN. QUAD members are champions of ASEAN's centrality." The QUAD Leadership Summit is likely to take place on September 24 and it is expected to be attended by the heads of the QUAD member states, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Kabul, Sep 11 : After the Taliban deployed security in Kabul opted to aerial gunfire, lashes and manhandling of female protesters, who were marching in an anti-Taliban rally in Kabul; veiled women have taken to the streets and staged a rally in support of the Taliban regime.

Around 300 women, wearing black veils marched on the streets of Kabul and later sat at the Kabul university lecture theatre, asserting their support to the Taliban leadership, especially on gender segregation.

The women were carrying with them Taliban flags while the speakers criticized the west for what they called, an illegal invasion of Afghanistan.

In comparison to a women-led anti-Taliban protest rally, where participants and even journalists were blocked, stopped and assaulted by the Taliban security personal; the Taliban heavily guarded this particular pro-Taliban rally.

Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid, responding to a question about the anti-Taliban protest rally, said that there is no permission for any rally unless it is permitted by the Taliban regime.

This interpreted in one way means that anyone wanting to raise their voice against the Taliban, will not be allowed to voice their concern, while on the other hand, it means that a pro-Taliban event or rally, will be allowed by the Taliban regime, primarily because it would act at a counter-narrative to anti-Taliban sentiments, especially with reference to women's rights in the country.

The speakers at the Shaheed Rabbani Education University, where the pro-Taliban women gathered, said they were against those women, who are protesting against the Taliban on the streets, insisting that those women are not representatives of women.

"Is it freedom to like the last government? No, it is not freedom. The last government was misusing women. They were recruiting women just by their beauty", said one of the speakers at the gathering.

"Those not wearing the Hijab are harming all of us", said Shabana Omari, a student of the university, who criticized women who are not wearing headscarves.

"We are supporting our government with all our strength", said another speaker Somaiya.

Women's rights in Afghanistan have become a global debate, especially after the Taliban announced their interim government with zero representation of women and later banned women from playing any sport, as it would reveal their faces and bodies.

The new Taliban government maintains that it would be providing all rights to the women, which are legitimate under the Islamic Shariah law, which includes Hijab or Burka as the dresscode.
Patna, Sep 11 : Female students belonging to a minority community and residing in a girls hostel in Bhagalpur went on the rampage on Saturday afternoon after the hostel superintendent directed them to wear a burqa inside the campus.

The students pelted stones on the gate of the hostel. They alleged that the superintendent is trying to implement Taliban Sharia law in the hostel.

"Every time we wear trousers, the superintendent abuses students. She also gives wrong information to our parents saying that we talk to boys," said Daraksha Anwar, a student.

"It is not easy to wear a burqa in hot and humid conditions during summer season in Bihar, hence, we sometimes wear trousers and T-shirts inside the campus. Whenever she saw any student in trousers or talking to female students who are having scooty, she went berserk," said Neda Fatima, a research scholar.

The circle officer of Nath Nagar, Smita Jha along with a police team reached the girls hostel after the incident was reported and sorted out the matter.

The hostel superintendent denied the charges levelled against her by the students. The matter has also reached the district education officer.

"We have taken the statements of the students and the superintendent. The investigation is currently underway. We will submit the probe report to the district education officer soon," Jha said.
Mumbai, Sep 11 : The Mumbai Police on Saturday slapped murder charges on a man from Uttar Pradesh for heinous rape and brutalization of a 34-year-old woman leading to her death and triggering a massive political uproar.

The 'Nirbhaya' type of incident came on the eve of the state's biggest public festival Ganeshotsav and occurred in a desolate locality of Sakinaka early morning of Friday, stunning people as details of the horror surfaced.

Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray termed it as "a serious incident and disgrace to humanity" after it emerged that the accused had shoved iron rods into the victim's private part, culminating in her death due to excessive bleeding and damage to her vitals.

Leader of Opposition Devendra Fadnavis said the incident was both sad and shocking even as the Bharatiya Janata Party targeted the Maha Vikas Aghadi government for increase in serious crimes against women and children in the state.

Mumbai Police Commissioner Hemant Nagrale said a Special Investigation Team (SIT) headed by Assistance Commissioner of Police (Miss) Jyotsna Rasam has been formed to probe the matter within 30 days and the trial would be conducted before a fast-track special court.

The accused, identified as Mohan Chauhan, 45, a driver who hails from Jaunpur town in UP, but currently jobless, addicted to alcohol, and living on the streets doing odd jobs like rag-picking.

A Mumbai Court remanded him to police custody till September 21 with additional charges of murder invoked after the victim's death this afternoon, and the police are interrogating Chauhan's cousin brother and sister living nearby.

Recounting the sequence of events, Nagrale said the incident happened in an open tempo parked near the Rashid Compound off the Chandivali Studios in the early hours of Friday.

A local security guard called up the Mumbai Police Main Control Room about a man thrashing a woman and a team from Sakinaka Police Station rushed there 10 minutes later to find the battered and brutalised woman in a pool of blood.

"The police did not waste a moment and drove the same tempo to the Rajawadi Hospital (Ghatkopar). Her statement could not be recorded as she remained unconscious throughout, underwent a surgery, but succumbed this morning," said Nagrale.

Ruling out 'gang-rape', he said that the CCTV footage scanned by the police shows the presence of only the accused (Chauhan).

"The blood-stained clothes of the accused have been seized and sent for analysis. As far as the cause or the motive behind the crime is concerned, it will be known only after the detailed investigation," Nagrale added.

"It's a tragic end. She had suffered very severe internal injuries and has passed away," Shiv Sena MLC Dr Manisha Kayande told IANS shortly after the victim succumbed.

She said the victim has two minor daughters and appealed to Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray to consider compensation for them under the government schemes for women.

The incident, which took place early on Friday morning, sparked outrage all over the state with the National Commission for Women taking note on Saturday.

Sena leader Kishore Tiwari, accorded a MoS status, said that while the CM has already ordered the case to a fast-track court, lauded the police for its crack operation which helped nab the accused within hours as he was attempting to flee from the state.

The incident provoked all-round condemnation from the Maha Vikas Aghadi allies Shiv Sena, Nationalist Congress Party, Congress, the Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, and Aam Aadmi Party.

Deputy Chairperson of Maharashtra Legislative Council Dr Neelam Gorhe, activists like Bhumata Ranragini Brigade President Trupti Desai, Chitra Wagh, Preeti Sharma-Menon, and other women political leaders condemned the incident and demanded to know the status of the Shakti Act that is due to be implemented in the state.

The National Commission for Women Chairperson Rekha Sharma took strong cognizance and has written to the state government on the incident, even as Home Minister Dilip Walse-Patil assured that the accused would be given the most stringent punishment.

(Quaid Najmi can be contacted at: q.najmi@ians.in)
New Delhi, Sep 11 : Union Minister for Ayush, Sarbananda Sonowal, said on Saturday that the Centre has increased the financial support from Rs 9 crore to Rs 70 crore to establish Ayush colleges across the nation.

Addressing a conference on 'Diverse and Fulfilling Career Paths in Ayush Systems: Education, Entrepreneurship & Employment Focus on North eastern States' in Guwahati, Sonowal said that there are only a few Ayush colleges in the Northeast and the Indian traditional medicine systems can only be popularised by making available more qualified practitioners.

"For this purpose, more Ayush teaching colleges may be required to come up in the northeastern states. Earlier, the Centrally sponsored scheme of National Ayush Mission (NAM) provided financial support of Rs 9 crore to the state governments to open new Ayush colleges. Now, the government has enhanced this amount to Rs 70 crore. States may identify the land and manpower for this purpose and avail this opportunity as per the guidelines of NAM," Sonowal said.

The minister added that the Ministry of Ayush has also accorded in-principle approval to upgrade the Government Ayurvedic College in Jalukbari, Assam, as a Centre of Excellence with the support of up to Rs 10 crore.

Sonowal said that his ministry provides Rs 5 crore to upgrade the under-graduate teaching colleges and Rs 6 crore to improve the infrastructure of post-graduate institutions.

The minister also announced to begin a 'Panchkarma' technician course affiliated to the Health Sector Skill Council-National Skill Development Corporation at the Central Ayurveda Research Institute (CARI), Guwahati, with 10 seats for 10+2 students to produce skilled manpower for 'Panchkarma' therapy in the northeastern region and enhance employment opportunities in that part of the country.

"Career opportunities in the Ayush sector for professionals of all disciplines have increased dramatically during the recent years," Sonowal said.

He added that Ayush has great potential to cater to a large number of healthcare needs of people, besides contributing to the growth and development of the country.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : The civil services curriculum at Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration must suit India's changing scenario, said Union Minister Jitendra Singh on Saturday stressing upon the need for constant modification from time to time.

The minister said that the curriculum for IAS or Civil Services at Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration (LBSNAA) must suit India's changing scenario and therefore, needs to be accordingly modified constantly and from time to time.

"This is also important to re-orient present and future administrators for the visionary roadmap that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has laid down before us for the next 25 years till independent India turns 100," he said while addressing the valedictory session of Joint Civil-Military Program (JCM) at the Academy.

Singh called for joint programmes by institutes which are devoted to capacity building for good governance like, for example, LBSNAA, National Centre for Good Governance (NCGG), Indian Institute of Public Administration (IIPA), Institute of Secretarial Training and Management (ISTM) and others so that instead of working in silos, there could be synergistic programmes which would supplement the individual efforts made by these institutes.

He also suggested widening the range of the visiting faculty at the Mussoorie Academy and making Guest faculty more inclusive of scientific experts, industrial entrepreneurs, successful Start-ups and women achievers.

One major step taken by the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) in the direction of major reforms, the Minister said, was instituting "Mission Karmayogi", which when defined would be the emphasis on shift of functioning from 'Rule to Role'.

Congratulating the Course Coordinator and the staff of the Academy for successfully conducting the one-week Joint Civil-Military Programme, Singh also complemented the officers who attended the programme, which is intended to provide structural interface between Civil Service officers and Armed Forces officers for a better and shared understanding, coordination and collaboration during joint duties and for the purpose of serving the national security of the country.

The Minister said, this programme was initiated in 2001 in the aftermath of Kargil War and has gone a long way in familiarizing the participants with the challenges of external and internal security and plays a wider role in exposing the participating officers to the imperative Civil-Military synergy.

As India enters 75 years of its independence, said Singh, and plans for the next 25 years, such programmes enable us to prepare the Civil and the Military authorities to jointly work in different conflict situations internally as well externally.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : Soon after Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani resigned from his post on Saturday, the Congress said that there is an internal rift in all the BJP-ruled states, which exposes the failure of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah.

Taking to Twitter, the chief spokesperson of the Congress, Randeep Singh Surjewala, said, "Two things stand out today - 1) Deep-seated infighting in all BJP ruled states, be it Gujarat, Rajasthan, UP, MP, Assam or Haryana. 2) 'Bhakt' media remains oblivious to fratricidal wars in the BJP, for their only mandate is to focus on opposition ruled states." He added, "This show failure of PM's & HM's leadership. If their anointed CM, Sh Vijay Rupani has failed #Gujarat & its people after 5 years, onus must lie at the doorsteps of Modiji. Time to rid Gandhi-Patel's 'Karambhoomi' of the machiavellian BJP & its leadership." In a surprise move, Rupani on Saturday resigned as the Chief Minister of Gujarat, ahead of next year's Assembly elections in the state.

Rupani became the fourth BJP CM to be changed in the last six months in three states -- Uttarakhand, Karnataka and Gujarat.

"I am resigning from the post of the Chief Minister. I thank PM Modi and the party for giving me an opportunity to work for five years," Rupani told reporters.

In March, the saffron party had replaced then Uttarkhand Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat with Lok Sabha member Tirath Singh Rawat. In July, four months after being made the CM, Tirath Singh Rawat was replaced by two-time MLA Pushkar Singh Dhami.

After Uttarakhand, BJP replaced B.S. Yediyurappa with B.S. Bommai in Karnataka.

Sources said that the saffron party may declare Rupani's replacement by Sunday. Most likely, his replacement could be Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel.
Chennai, Sep 11 : The US Consul General in Chennai, Judith Ravin, has called for setting up new standards in Indo-Pacific cooperation in disaster management.

Ravin was speaking at a two-day seminar organised by the US Consulate General in association with the National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR) on the theme "Nontraditional Security Challenges in South Asia: Improving Disaster Management Cooperation".

Several experts in the fields of policy making, public health, energy, technology and disaster management from the US, India and several other countries within the Indo-Pacific region attended the virtual conference.

The US Consulate General office said in a statement that a white paper will be prepared and shared with government agencies, think-tanks, academia, community-based organisations and other key stakeholders across Indo-Pacific nations on the matter.

Ravin in her opening remarks said, "The United States like India provides relief and recovery to disasters, not just within its borders but beyond to nations around the world. I am optimistic that the learnings from this conference will set new standards on Indo-Pacific cooperation in the area of disaster preparedness and response." Gagan Singh Bedi, Principal Secretary and Commissioner of Greater Chennai Corporation, who has successfully led rescue and relief operations during major natural and man-made disasters in Tamil Nadu, said in his keynote address, "The cities always have to be prepared for disaster management as disasters are occurring very frequently across the globe. The managerial capabilities and strengths of an organisation are tested during the disasters. Each and every city, local body, state and central government should be prepared to handle disasters." Speaking on the occasion, Ashley Johnson, Director of Energy and Environmental Affairs at the National Bureau of Asian Research, said, "Fora like this can help identify the gaps in our understanding and improve coordination across disciplines to strengthen our approach to disaster resilience."
Jaipur, Sep 11 : A Jaipur court on Saturday sent an espionage accused, the MTS Railway Post Office worker, a resident of Jodhpur, on a two-day remand to the state intelligence team of Rajasthan.

He was arrested on Friday for allegedly supplying secret documents of the Indian Army to a Pakistani woman agent. Now he has been sent to the remand till September 13 for questioning.

According to Director General of Police Intelligence Umesh Mishra, the accused had made his Facebook ID in the name of Bharat Godara. About 6 months ago, a message from a female Pakistani intelligence agent came on his Facebook messenger, after which the accused started talking to the said female agent through a voice call and video call on WhatsApp. Information was shared about the documents of strategic importance coming to the Railway Post Office related to the Army.

Two mobile phones have been recovered from the possession of the accused. The accused used to delete entire information before leaving the office, however the intelligence team has been successful in recovering a lot of deleted data and chats by conducting technical tests of mobile phones.

Information about the arrest of the accused was sent to the superintendent of his department, Jaipur Division. Intensive interrogation is being done in collaboration with the CID Intelligence and Military Intelligence and his bank account details will be checked on Monday to know if any money was paid in lieu of information.

After checking all suspicious mobile numbers, efforts are being made to find out if this Pakistani female agent was in touch with any other person and what kind of information was shared with them. Information will be sought to find out as to how much information sent affects the national security system, said the officials.
Jaipur, Sep 11 : In an attempt to help underprivileged people, the Narayan Seva Sansthan (NSS) on Saturday organised the 36th mass wedding ceremony in Udaipur, where 21 differently-abled couples tied the knot, pledging against dowry while simultaneously urging people to get vaccinated.

The mass wedding ceremony promoted by NSS was organised following all the Covid-19 guidelines. The differently-abled couples got married with wedding gifts pouring in from family members and donors.

Those who tied knot included 26-year-old Roshan Lal from Udaipur, who is preparing for the Rajasthan Eligibility Examination for Teachers (REET). Lal, who is preparing for REET under the guidance of NSS, tied the knot with Kamala Kumari (32) at the ceremony.

"The Narayan Seva Sansthan has been a pillar of strength for me, as it helped me find a direction in life. I am sure I will be able to be a good teacher someday," Lal said.

Prashant Agarwal, President, NSS, said, "The 36th Divyang mass marriage ceremony is an event which is very close to our hearts. As we are entering the 19th year of our flagship campaign 'Say no to Dowry', we are glad that our efforts have paid off and the organisation has so far helped 2109 couples in leading a happy and prosperous married life.

"Over the years, we have been conducting free corrective surgeries, distribution of ration kits, operating limbs for the differently-abled, conducting skill development classes and holding mass marriage ceremonies as well as talent development activities to empower the differently-abled people." Manoj Kumar, a resident of Surat working with Tata Motors, tied the knot with Sant Kumari at the ceremony.

"I am extremely happy to find my life partner through the Sansthan," said Kumar, who leg operation was facilitated by the NSS.

After the marriage, Sant Kumari now wants to start her own startup using her stitching skills to become financially independent.

"The differently-abled individuals want to be treated equally in the society," she said.

Couples from several states approach the NSS for assistance in getting married. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the NSS this year shortlisted couples from five states.
Gandhinagar, Sep 11 : The Gujarat BJP legislature party is likely to meet on Sunday to choose the new chief minister following Vijay Rupani's resignation, a party spokesperson said on Saturday. Union Minister Amit Shah is most likely to join the legislature party meeting along with central observers. The meeting is to be held at state BJP HQ at Kamalam.

Putting an end to all speculations about a change of guard over his government's handling of the Covid-19 crisis, Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani on Saturday tendered his resignation to Gujarat Governor Acharya Devvrat at his residence, Raj Bhavan in Gandhinagar. This development comes even as the state assembly elections are more than a year away.

"I am a loyal soldier of the BJP and have resigned of my own accord. Nobody has asked me to do so. I will work to strengthen the organisation or whatever role the party leadership assigns me," Rupani told the reporters at the governor's residence after tendering the resignation.

"I am just a worker of the organisation and will continue to be so. For the upcoming state Assembly elections, definitely our PM Modi will be the face," Rupani said, when asked who will be the face of the elections, as he and the party earlier had declared that the 2022 elections will be led by him.

According to national general secretary in charge of Gujarat Bhupender Yadav, the BJP has convened a meeting of its legislature party on Sunday to elect a new leader. Union Home Minister Amit Shah is reaching here on Sunday.

"The BJP legislature party is likely to meet on Sunday, but we will be able to confirm this once the central parliamentary board conveys the exact time of the meeting to us. All BJP MLAs will attend the meeting along with central observers," said Yamal Vyas, the BJP spokesperson at Kamalam.

"The name of the new CM will be decided in the meeting. Being the Parliament constituency legislator, Amit Shah is also likely to be at the meeting," Vyas added.

The saffron party is yet to announce Rupani's replacement. But, political pundits are speculating a number of faces looking at the current scenario.

Praful Patel, the administrator of Union Territories of Lakshadweep and Daman and Diu is one such face that is likely to replace Rupani. He is believed to be close to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah.

Speculations are also rife that one of the state general secretaries Gordhan Zadaphia, a Patidar, may be given the mantle, though there is no official indication. Zadaphia was the home minister in the Modi government in Gujarat in 2002, during the infamous Godhra riots and believed to be a hardliner right wing face of the saffron party.

This is besides Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya, who is also a Patidar and his name has been cropping up for the post during the last one year.

The new political developments began on Saturday morning after BJP national general secretary (organisation) B.L. Santhosh landed at the Ahmedabad airport, driving straight to the party headquarters Shri Kamalam in Gandhinagar.

Soon after a closed door meeting started in which Santhosh, Gujarat BJP President C.R. Paatil and newly-appointed state general secretary (Organisation) Ratnakar, Chief Minister Vijay Rupani and Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel participated. Thereafter both Rupani and Patel drove down to the Raj Bhavan to tender the resignation.

Rupani and Patel were accompanied by all the cabinet ministers. They were joined by union ministers Mansukh Mandaviya and Parshottam Rupala, both Patidars, at the governor's residence.

Vijay Rupani took the state's Chief Ministerial position on August 7, 2016, and is representing Rajkot (West) in the Gujarat Legislative Assembly. The saffron party held a nine day statewide event in Gujarat, just last month celebrating the five years of Rupani in office.

It should be noted that, Gujarat Pradesh Congress Committee (GPCC) president, Amit Chavda at that time had said that it was an indication of Rupani's exit as the BJP had miserably failed on all fronts in fighting the second surge of Covid-19 in Gujarat. Rupani, however had rubbished the claim.

It is learnt from sources that most probably the party will declare Rupani's replacement by Monday, after the legislature party meet on Sunday.
Aizawl, Sep 11 : With the fresh influx of refugees from Myanmar, the number of people taking shelter in Mizoram after the military coup hit the neighbouring country has gone up to around 11,000, officials said on Saturday.

District administrations and police officials said that around 150 to 160 people, including women and children, took shelter in Mizoram's Champhai, Lawngtlai and Hnahthial districts bordering Myanmar during the past few days.

Mizoram Home Minister Lalchamliana told the media here that if the attacks and counter-attacks by the Myanmar military and the opposition forces continue, more people are likely come into Mizoram for shelter.

Most of the refugees from Myanmar have been provided makeshift shelters by various local NGOs, including the Young Mizo Association which also provided them food, medicines and other basic necessities on humanitarian ground, while several others are living with their relatives.

The officials said that the district administrations are unable to help the immigrants formally as they are yet to be granted refugee status by the government or international agencies.

According to the media and intelligence reports, the fresh refugee influx occurred in Mizoram as the Burmese government-in-exile, the National Unity Government (NUG), called for a countrywide uprising earlier this week and clashed with the military soldiers who undertook massive operations against the resistance forces.

Sounds of fierce gunfights and bursting shells and other firearms between the cadres of anti-coup NUG and the Myanmar army could be heard from the villages bordering Myanmar.

According to the officials of the Crime Investigation Department (CID), which maintains the data of Myanmarese refugees, around 11,000 refugees, including about 20 legislators, have taken shelter in Mizoram's 11 districts since March this year.

The Champhai district along the India-Myanmar border is currently sheltering 4,550 refugees, the highest, followed by Aizawl district where 1,700 refugees have taken shelter.

A majority of those who have taken shelter in the bordering state belong to the Chin community, also known as the Zo community, who share the same ancestry, ethnicity and culture as the Mizos of Mizoram.

Six Mizoram districts - Champhai, Siaha, Lawngtlai, Serchhip, Hnahthial and Saitual - share 510 km unfenced borders with Myanmar.

Mizoram Chief Minister Zoramthanga had earlier urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to provide asylum, food and shelter to the refugees who arrived in the state since the military coup in Myanmar on February 1.

Referring to the Union Home Ministry's advisory to the four northeastern states bordering Myanmar and also to the Assam Rifles and the BSF for taking action to prevent illegal influx from Myanmar into India, Zoramthanga had said, "This is not acceptable to Mizoram." A Mizoram government delegation had already met the Vice President, Union Minister of State for Home and Home Secretary in Delhi to persuade them to impress upon the Centre not to forcefully push back the Myanmar nationals sheltered in Mizoram.

As per the MHA advisory, the state governments and UT administrations have no power to grant "refugee" status to any foreigner, and India is not a signatory to the UN Refugee Convention of 1951 and its 1967 Protocol.

A one-year state of emergency has been declared in Myanmar, where power has been transferred to Senior General Min Aung Hlaing after President U Win Myint and State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi were detained by the military on February 1.

Meanwhile, the Mizoram government has decided to enrol children of Myanmarese refugees into the state government schools.

Last week, Mizoram's School Education Director James Lalrinchhana, referring to the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 (RTE Act-2009), had asked all the district and sub-divisional education officials that children aged between 6 and 14 years belonging to disadvantaged communities have the right to be admitted to schools in a class appropriate to his or her age for completing elementary education.
New Delhi, Sep 11 : After a hiatus in 2020 due to the pandemic, fashions greatest night, the Met Gala is set to return this September. At this year's event, also known as the Costume Institute Benefit, there be Indian representation once again.

Joining the megawatt celebrities who will take to the steps of the Metropolitan Museum in their finest attire, will be philanthropist and business tycoon, Sudha Reddy. Wife of billionaire Megha Krishna Reddy, this will be Sudha's maiden outing at the glamorous soirAe. As a supporter of the fine arts and widely known for her charitable disposition, her presence at the 2021 Met Gala comes as no surprise.

An avid connoisseur of art and fashion, Sudha Reddy is considered amongst the well-heeled jetsetters of South India and will be making her city proud as she will be the first Hyderabad based non-film luminary to attend the hotly-anticipated global affair. In the past Indian celebrities like Priyanka Chopra, Deepika Padukone, Isha Ambani and Natasha Poonawala have graced the event.

Sudha Reddy has moved from 'cheque philanthropy' to 'hands-on philanthropy', as the Sudha Reddy Foundation has socially and economically empowered lakhs of people in Telangana. When she's not spearheading Megha Group Of Industries and TruJet Airlines, she's working towards affordable healthcare and accessible education. Widely celebrated for her charitable disposition, she was the only Indian to be invited to the Global Gift Gala and nominated for The Global Gift Empowerment Of Women Award. With a commitment and vision to continually pledge out of her personal wealth, she handed over grants to two charities viz. 'Action Against Hunger and Fight Hunger Foundation' and 'Breast Cancer Research Foundation' in Paris with Elizabeth Hurley in attendance.

The exclusive invitation-only guest list is rumoured to include names such as Camila Cabello, Lewis Hamilton, Jennifer Lopez, BeyoncA, Kim Kardashian, Harry Styles, Lady Gaga Donatella Versace, Naomi Campbell amongst the 400 names this year.

Dubbed as the "Party Of The Year," the "Super Bowl Of Fashion," and the "Oscars Of The East Coast", at this year's scaled-down event the celebrity co-chairs include Naomi Osaka, Billie Eilish, Timothee Chalamet and Amanda Gorman, while honorary chairs are Tom Ford, Adam Mosseri, and Anna Wintour. Normally held on the first Monday in May, for the first time since its inception, the Met Gala will include two exhibitions. The first exhibition will be held on 13th September 2021 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art -timed to coincide with the close of New York Fashion Week. Held annually to support the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute in New York City, the second half of the event will fall in May 2022.

Each year, the Met Gala has a specific dress code that ties into the museum's latest fashion exhibition theme. "In America: A Lexicon of Fashion," will be the first exhibit's theme and will open in the Anna Wintour Costume Center on 18th September 2021. The second exhibit, "In America: An Anthology of Fashion," in May 2022 will illustrate through style 300 years of historic narratives, both personal and political.

Keeping up with the year's theme, South India's doyenne will don haute couture look by Indian designer duo Falguni Shane Peacock, who have dressed the likes of Beyonce, Madonna, Katy Perry, Rihanna, Nikki Minaj, Kim Kardashian, and Lady Gaga. Inspired by the American Revolution, the metallic gold body-hugging gown with its' au courant cuts will entail a shimmering 4-meter flared trail which will imbibe a medley of hues borrowed from the American flag and varnished with refined 3D adornments of Swarovski crystals, sequins and bugle beads.

Falguni Shane Peacock who has dressed Sudha Reddy on multiple milestone celebrations in the past state, "It took us numerous sessions and more than 250 hours of labour to put together this spectacular statement work of art for our dear friend Sudha. We have focused on a lot of detailing and we employed the services of our skilled atelier artisans in order to ensure the outfit does full justice to Sudha's eclectic persona. We have created a novel edgy military-inspired look that blends well with the overall theme of the Met Gala." Jewellery designer and gem maestro Farah Khan has designed a custom-designed statement ear piece called 'Dreamy Decadence' to complete Reddy's red-carpet look.

Elaborating further about her eclectic creation, Farah Ali Khan adds, "Drawing inspiration from the stars in the American flags that symbolise the 50 glorious independent states of America, I designed a sensual ear cuff with diamond-encrusted stars. I wanted to highlight Sudha's expressive eyes and the contours of her face so I created this bejewelled piece that starts from her cheek and extends to her hair culminating as a string of scintillating bezel set diamonds. It is crafted in 18kt gold with 35 carats of VVS diamonds." The 2021 Met Gala Livestream will begin at 5:30 p.m. EST on the night of the event and will be hosted by two special guests: actor and recording artist Keke Palmer, and actor, writer, and director Ilana Glazer. Together, they will provide unprecedented access to the Met Gala's famous red carpet, interviewing high-profile guests as they arrive in grand style.
Hyderabad, Sep 11 : A 68-year-old French national living in Hyderabad was murdered by her adopted daughter and the latter's live-in partner, the police said on Saturday.

Marie Christine, who went missing two days ago, was found murdered near Himayat Sagar on the outskirts of Hyderabad.

The body was recovered on Saturday morning and by the evening, the Cyberabad police announced that they have cracked the case with the arrest of three accused persons.

Roma, 24, the adopted daughter of the deceased, her live-in partner Vikram Sriramula, 25, and his friend Rahul Gowtham, 24, have been arrested in connection with the case.

N. Prakash Reddy, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Shamshabad Zone, Cyberabad, told reporters that the accused murdered Christine for her property.

The Rajendranagar police station on the night of September 9 received a complaint from Christine's son-in-law Prashanth that she was missing since the morning. The police registered a case and took up the investigation.

Since the family members suspected Roma, the police interrogated her following which she confessed to the crime.

The investigation revealed that Vikram and Rahul strangulated Christine to death with a rope at her residence in Dargah Khalij Khan in Gandipet mandal on September 8. They later shifted the body in a car and dumped it in the bushes near the Himayat Sagar reservoir.

Christine, who had migrated to India about 30 years ago and settled here, had established the Marica high schools at Toli Chowki and at Dargha Khalij Khan village to serve the poor and orphans.

She had two biological daughters -- Marie Solange who is married to Prashanth and stays at Sun City in Hyderabad, and Rebecca who is residing in Puduchery.

The deceased had also adopted Roma soon after her birth, and another girl by the name of Priyanka. All three were staying at Dargah Khalij Khan.

To perform the marriage of Roma, she had created a profile in a Christian matrimony website. Roma, however, developed acquaintance with Vikram, a native of Anantapur district in Andhra Pradesh through a matrimony website in May this year and since then they have been residing in a rented house at Laxmi Nivas Apartment in Kondapur.

Christine didn't approve the relationship and had refused to perform their marriage.

Roma and Vikram conspired with the latter's friend Rahul, a native of Nellore district in Andhra Pradesh, to eliminate Christine and extract her property.

On the evening of September 8, Roma came to the deceased's house and after some discussions, Christine dropped her in her car at the Marica High School in Toli Chowki and returned home.

When Christine came back, Vikram and Rahul were waiting near the bathroom. When the deceased came out to go to the bathroom, they strangulated her to death with a rope.

After dumping the body near Himayat Sagar, the two accused came to the deceased's residence, parked the car and took away her car keys, laptop and iphone. The next day, they transferred Rs 2 lakh to the account of Roma while she tried to mislead her sisters that she did not know about deceased's whereabouts.
Dhaka, Sep 12 : Bangladesh on Saturday received a new batch of China's Sinopharm vaccines against Covid-19 as the country continued to fight the pandemic.

A plane of Biman Bangladesh Airlines carrying the Chinese vaccine doses arrived at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport at around noon Saturday, Md. Shamsul Haque, a senior health ministry official, told journalists.

Bangladesh's vaccination drive is now running smoothly in the capital Dhaka and elsewhere in the country thanks largely to China's continued support for vaccines, the Xinhua news agency reported.

To fight against the alarming spike in Covid-19 cases, Bangladesh has signed an agreement on the co-production of the Chinese Covid-19 vaccines locally.

The Memorandum of Understanding was signed between China's Sinopharm Group, Bangladesh's Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and Incepta Vaccine Ltd., a local vaccine manufacturing company last month.

Bangladesh began the Covid-19 vaccination drive in January to contain the pandemic that has spread across the country.

Amid uncertainty over the timely arrival of vaccine shipment from India, the Bangladeshi government later halted administering the first doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine in the country.

In June, the vaccination drive resumed in parts of the country with the China-donated Sinopharm vaccines.
"In my duties as the president of Fork Union Military Academy, I often say, 'There are no easy days at Fork Union.' September 11th will never be an easy day for our FUMA family."

Col. David L. Coggins, USMC (Ret.), the President of Fork Union Military Academy, has released an open letter recalling the events of September 11th in 2001, and how those events have directly affected the alumni, students, and staff of the boys military-styled boarding school over the past twenty years. Fork Union Military School is located in central Virginia and serves boys in grades 7 through 12. The school head's letter was posted to the academy's website late Friday afternoon.

A Letter of Address: "No Easy Day"

On the morning of September 11, 2001, President George W. Bush was visiting a second-grade classroom in Sarasota, Florida, to promote education. His Chief of Staff, Andy Card, in a later interview with Neil Cavuto recalled, "That day, the president thought he was going into a classroom to talk about his favorite topic...education and reforming our education system. We thought it was going to be an easy day."

In my duties as the president of Fork Union Military Academy, I often say, "There are no easy days at Fork Union." This is true for our cadets, who are challenged each day to be better than they were the day before. It is true for our staff and faculty, who meet and exceed high standards for professionalism and excellence every day in the classroom and on our campus. There are no easy days at Fork Union.

September 11th will never be an easy day for our FUMA family.

As the President of the United States was listening to eight-year-old children read "The Pet Goat," it was Andrew Card, the past parent of a FUMA cadet, who was called on to be the one to quietly whisper in the president's ear the world-changing news that America was at war, telling the president, "A second plane hit the second tower. America is under attack."

Houston Eldridge, a longtime member of our staff and faculty, was among the first Green Berets to set foot in Afghanistan. Houston was just the first of many of us in the FUMA family called on to fight this war directly in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Jonathan Grundy, a graduate of FUMA's Class of 1994, was wounded in action in 2007 while leading a combat patrol in the Diyala River valley of Iraq, shot in the face during his third tour of duty in Iraq. Jonathan was just one of our FUMA family who came home bearing the wounds of this war.

Jonathan Dozier joined our Corps of Cadets twenty-seven years ago making straight A grades in all of his classes as a sophomore. Jonathan was killed in combat in central Iraq in January 2008 while serving in the US Army's 1st Armored Division. Eric Terhune, another of our past cadets, was killed in combat in June 2008 while serving in the 1st Marine Division of the US Marine Corps as a Forward Air Controller on the ground in Afghanistan. Their names are forever carved into the stone wall of our Veterans Memorial, and forever seared into our memories. We honor their sacrifice in this war that began on September 11th.

September 11th will never be an easy day for our FUMA family.

Their names joined the names of fifty-three other FUMA alumni honored on Fork Union Military Academy's Veterans Memorial wall for having made the ultimate sacrifice in conflicts from World War I through Vietnam and beyond.

You see, there comes a time when every generation will face a call to action, a call to defend freedom and liberty against the evil that opposes it. It is the responsibility of each generation to be prepared and ready to answer when that call comes. That call to action may need to be answered by force of arms in military action, or it may need to be answered by the force of our leadership, our service to our communities, our civic responsibilities, by our words, our prayers, our votes, our force of will, and our resilience. Each generation must be prepared to defend by all means our freedom and liberty against the evil that opposes it.

That is why there are no easy days at Fork Union Military Academy.

We met as a school this week in Wicker Chapelour Corps of Cadets and our staffto tell the story of September 11th, to remember, and to honor all of those who lost their lives on that day and in the war that began that day. Our school chaplain, Chaplain Ben Jamison, closed that session with a prayer, and I want, in closing, to share with you those words from Chaplain Jamison.

"Lord God,

We gather today to remember. Twenty years ago, we saw the power of evil. A power so profound that two decades later it still feels raw to see these images again. Many of us experienced the power of evil to kill and destroy. To tear down buildings and strip away from us the feelings of safety and security that we had come to take for granted. We watched it live or on our television screens amidst that backdrop of many in the world cheering at our pain.

We saw evil but we do not gather to remember such things.

No, in the darkness of that day, we saw something else emerge. Thousands of first responders woke up on a perfectly ordinary fall day. Unprepared for the unspeakable horror they would face. Yet we saw them run towards danger time and time again. Firefighters and Police Officers ran into burning and shaking buildings over and over. Many surely knew that this was the last act they would commit on this earth and chose to enter again to save one more life.

Men and women aboard United Airlines Flight 93, upon realizing the magnitude of what was happening around them had every opportunity to passively accept their fate. Instead, they chose to fight. Men and women who had not enlisted or commissioned, had not volunteered for dangerous jobs nonetheless chose to give their last full measure of devotion so that others may live.

We gather to remember these things. In the midst of the darkness these shined as a light the darkness could not overcome. Evil expected us to collapse but instead saw a nation emboldened by such heroism unite together. We fell to our knees in prayer and discovered a resilience that many mistakenly thought our country had lost.

We remember these things. We bear testimony to these things and as long as we have breath within our lungs, we must not, we will not stop telling this story.

I pray a blessing over the young man in this space today. As their character is formed within the crucible of Fork Union Military Academy and as they stand in the shadows of the heroes who have come before, we ask that you bless them. Help them to learn the lessons of that day. Create within them faith, courage and integrity so that if they find themselves facing the power of evil in the future, they too will be the light shining in the darkness.

In honor of all of those who lost their lives on 9/11 we enter into a moment of silence.

In Christs most holy name we pray, Amen."

I pray that God may bless all those whose lives are still touched by the events of September 11th.

And may God continue to bless Fork Union Military Academy as we prepare young men to be a light shining in the darkness.

God loves you and so do I.

Colonel David L. Coggins, USMC (Ret.)

President

Fork Union Military Academy
Leva Living. Houston, Texas. The Leva Living build-to-rent single-family housing development will be led by President Jennifer Orr, CEO Bobby C. Orr Jr. of Orr Commercial in Houston, and Executive VP of Finance Jeff Williams.

An extraordinary team of Houston-area real estate professionals representing five decades of construction and real estate development expertise is entering the build-to-rent single-family housing sector, with an initial offering planned for Atascocita, a northeastern suburb of Houston.

The new Leva Living build-to-rent single-family housing development will be led by President Jennifer Orr, CEO Bobby C. Orr Jr. of Orr Commercial in Houston, and Executive VP of Finance Jeff Williams. This team brings more than 50 years of commercial real estate development, brokerage assessment, and property management experience to the table. Jennifer Orr is spearheading product development, market positioning, site selection, and property management and will run day-to-day operations. Jennifer has deep expertise in real estate brokerage and retail and office leasing and has most recently served as Hospitality Team Lead for Sonder, a global tech-enabled hospitality firm.

Current real estate market analysis shows the need for single-family rental housing is on the rise as millennials are seeking more space and an affordable place to raise their families without sacrificing quality of life, said Jeff Williams, Executive VP of Finance at Leva Living. Although the single-family housing lifestyle appeals to those in their twenties and thirties, ownership attainability at this stage in their life is at a low point in comparison to those of previous generations, as theyve often saved less for a down payment due to economic circumstances and are often saddled with student loans and other debt. At Leva Living, were responding to this demand by moving into the horizontal housing rental space with the development of the Atascocita project, our first entry into the growing build-for-rent market.

With the housing market experiencing rapid transition, Leva Living has identified a growing need for innovative approaches to meet consumer demands. The Atascocita community will be a low-density housing development featuring 175-200 units of one-, two-, and three-bedroom single-family homes alongside high-end amenities including gated back yards, scheduled lawn maintenance, 24/7 onsite property management, a clubhouse with a fully equipped fitness center, a swimming pool and spa, a dog park, and ample green space for residents to enjoy outdoor activities. As a build-for-rent (BFR) development, Leva Livings Atascocita project will be a purpose-built community of contiguous homes that are rented as single properties but managed as a community, much as a Class A apartment building might be.

With the housing market tight, many millennials are opting to rent, with newer single-family rentals competing with apartments that often boast impressive amenities but may also feel crowded and anonymous, said Leva Living President Jennifer Orr. Tenants desire the benefits of home ownership, such as no shared walls and private yards, while also enjoying the amenities expected in luxury apartments. Leva allows our renters to live in the best of both worlds, creating new opportunities for residents, communities, and developers, while maintaining a low turnover rate and the highest standard in long-term maintenance.

Looking forward, the Leva Living team is focused on leveraging existing relationships to refine their offerings and present the best options available in a rapidly growing homes market. Once the Atascocita project is established, team members hope to continue to expand their program regionally to better serve this growing share of the housing market.

About Leva Living

Leva Living is a Houston, Texas-based build-for-rent developer that provides an alternative to traditional multi-family projects. The company is developing a new class of single-family living that focuses on a carefree, comfortable, and convenient experience. For residents, Levas developments feature all the benefits and amenities of single-family living in a master-planned community without the typical challenges associated with home ownership.

More Information

Additional information about the Leva Living experience and the company's leadership team can be found by visiting the Leva Living website or through the listed media contact.
Extreme Cold 4:1 Resin The extreme cold 4:1 resin is just one of many ways we are providing trenchless solutions for our customers and helping them to grow their business," Chris Duda, vice president of sales and marketing for Waterline Renewal Technologies.

Waterline Renewal Technologies, a portfolio company of Behrman Capital, announces Perma-Liner Industries now offers an extreme cold 4:1 resin that provides its customers with a lower viscosity product when used in colder temperatures and more stability during transportation. The new 4:1 mixture is a styrene-free epoxy resin used for mainlines, laterals, and verticals in extremely cold conditions.

The Perma-Liner Industries Clearwater headquarters and all distribution centers will stock and supply the new extreme cold 4:1 resin to its customers in North America. The resin will come in 40-pound buckets consisting of A resin and B hardener sold separately. Additional product features include 15-minute pot life, 30-minute work time in 50 degrees to below 30 degrees, cure times ranging from 1.5 to 4 hours, and meets and exceeds ASTM F1216 standards.

The addition of the 4:1 extreme cold resin now rounds out our resin portfolio, providing our customers one-stop for all their trenchless needs, states Chris Duda, vice president of sales and marketing for Waterline Renewal Technologies. The extreme cold 4:1 resin is just one of many ways we are providing trenchless solutions for our customers and helping them to grow their business.

Perma-Liner Industries offers 12 different resins for all types of rehabilitation projects that are eco-friendly, compatible with its products and provides minimal shrinkage for maximum adherence to the host pipe. The resin portfolio consists of 100% solids epoxy resins that are used for standard lateral lining in ambient and heat-assist options, CIPP industry-standard resins, and specialty resins for specialized projects in industrial and environmentally sensitive regions.

Waterline Renewal Technologies and its portfolio of brands is a leading provider of engineered products used in trenchless repair and rehabilitation of wastewater/stormwater infrastructure for municipal, commercial/industrial and residential applications, and provides a diverse range of products and services through its brands APM, LMK Technologies, Perma-Liner Industries, and LightRay. For more information, please visit waterlinerenewal.com.

About APM:

Since 1975, APM has produced high-quality products for sewer line repair and seamless manhole concrete pipe restoration. It is the foremost provider of spray-on coatings, manhole and larger diameter pipe rehabilitation solutions and anti-bacterial agents for corrosion prevention. The Permaform system and resourceful solutions make it easy to replace manhole concrete pipes without excavating and negatively affecting the area's structural integrity.

About LMK Technologies:

LMK Technologies is the leading provider for the municipal market that manufactures CIPP technologies compliant with applicable ASTM standards, industry-leading products and proprietary fabricated equipment. Since 1993 LMK Technologies has provided all the training and equipment necessary for the successful installation of its products.

About Perma-Liner Industries:

Perma-Liner Industries (PLI) is the leading manufacturer and supplier of trenchless pipeline rehabilitation equipment and materials in North America, focused on the residential market. Since 1999, PLI has developed systems to rehabilitate existing sewer systems without excavation. PLI offers customizable Pull-In-Place and Inversion Lateral packages from basic to turn-key and ambient cures to heat assist cure.

About LightRay:

LightRay manufactures state-of-the-art UV technology for the CIPP industry. This cutting-edge solution offers new opportunities for plumbers and contractors by significantly reducing the time and resources needed on the job site. Lowering both risk and cost with fast and high-quality results, LightRay ushers the trenchless industry into the 21st century.
The Residences at Reuten Park, a senior housing development in Closter, N.J., is necessary to help meet demand for independent, assisted living and memory care housing. (Courtesy of Reuten Associates) With The Residences at Reuten Park, Closters senior population wont have to seek housing and vital services outside of the community. It will enable them to remain close to their families and friends and continue to enjoy the many benefits of living in his town, said Mike Reuten.

Market research presented to the Closter Zoning Board of Adjustments last night confirmed that The Residences at Reuten Park  a proposed 195-unit luxury senior housing development  is necessary to help meet growing demand for independent, assisted living and memory care housing.

During testimony on the projects application, Bryon Cohron, vice president of market analysis and business development of ProMatura, an Oxford, Miss.-based market research firm, told board members that The Residences at Reuten Park will fulfill an unmet need for senior housing in Closter and surrounding Bergen County communities.

Property owner Reuten Associates and developer Metropolis Property Group are planning to build The Residences at Reuten Park on an approximately six-acre tract at Reuten Corporate Park, located at 231 and 239 Herbert Avenue in downtown Closter. The development will transform post-WW II-era industrial buildings into a modern, state-of-the-art housing community for senior residents.

The Residences at Reuten Park project will offer all-inclusive rental units with studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments on beautifully landscaped grounds along with private outdoor social spaces, outdoor and indoor dining areas, a cafe, an outdoor swimming pool and a host of other upscale amenities. The project is expected to be completed in approximately 14 to 16 months, pending the boards approval.

ProMaturas analysis is partly based on its evaluation of existing senior housing communities, and those under construction, within a seven-mile region that includes Closter. This area currently has a total of 11 comparable senior living communities. However, the need for senior housing is projected to grow by 878 households, or nine percent, in the next five years. Closter currently doesnt have a senior housing community that includes independent living, assisted living, and memory care.

The study also reviewed data including the number of seniors living in the area, income levels, home prices, and other demographic data of seniors and their adult children who could offer financial support.

Our report concluded that the current level of senior living housing stock doesnt adequately accommodate the existing senior population, nor will there be enough senior living housing to support the future needs of this growing market over the next several years, Cohron said. The strong demographic trends in this market fully support a development like The Residences at Reuten Park.

Mike Reuten, owner and managing partner of Reuten Associates, said: With The Residences at Reuten Park, Closters senior population wont have to seek housing and vital services outside of the community. It will enable them to remain close to their families and friends and continue to enjoy the many benefits of living in his town.

Additional Project Benefits

In addition to meeting demand for a local senior living community, here are the projects supplemental benefits:



Weekday rush-hour traffic on Herbert Avenue would be considerably less with the proposed development than other permitted uses, according to a traffic study conducted by New York-based engineering consulting firm Stonefield Design and Engineering, which is planned to testify before the zoning board on the application. In fact, according to the study, traffic entering and leaving Reuten Corporate Park is more than twice the amount that the senior living community will generate. The development will produce less car and truck traffic on Herbert Avenue, which will create a safer and quieter neighborhood, less air pollution and noise in the area.

Create hundreds of jobs during the projects construction and 90 full-time positions at the senior living facility.

Promote pedestrian foot traffic in the downtown, which would bring more business for local retailers, restaurants and other small businesses.

Increase the boroughs tax base by an estimated $1 million each year, which includes $700,000 for the Closter Public Schools, nearly 10 times the amount the school district currently receives in tax revenues from the property.

The community will be age restricted with no school-aged children. This requirement means that the housing community will not add any students to the boroughs school district.

Rezoning the site for residential development will beautify the Herbert Avenue neighborhood.

Background on Reuten Associates

For nearly 80 years, the Reuten family has been closely tied to the Closter community. In 1945, Michael Fred Reuten purchased the property for his gutter manufacturing business and grew the company into a national manufacturer of doors and windows. His son Fred Reuten later turned the site into Reuten Corporate Park, leasing buildings to several manufacturing companies. His spouse Pat Reuten and his children Michael Reuten and Laura Reuten Kessler, who now own and manage the property, envision the proposed Residences at Reuten Park to fulfill an unmet need for senior housing in Closter.

About Metropolis Property Group (MPG)

Metropolis Property Group is a privately owned full-service real estate investment, development, and management company that also provides consulting and brokerage services. It has offices in Rhode Island and New Jersey. In 2012 the company began to provide consulting and brokerage services to real estate development and investment companies working in the NYC Metro area. MPG focuses on the acquisition and development of senior housing communities as well as multifamily, industrial, and hospitality. To learn more about MPG, visit: https://www.metropolispropertygroup.com/
All my life, weve been talking about World War III, Ken Follett says. Hes Zooming from his cosy study in Hertfordshire, England. That a third global war would be the subject of his forthcoming novel, Never (Viking, Nov.), seemed almost inevitable to the bestselling author.

I was born in 1949, around the time the Soviets exploded their first nuclear device, Follett says. So the danger of a war that could destroy human civilization has really been with us since I was born. Never must have come from a deep-seated anxiety that seeped into me from a very young age.

Never is a departure and a return for the megaselling author (Viking says Folletts books have sold more than 178 million copies worldwide), marking a return to his roots in espionage thrillers. Though he became a household name for his 1989 doorstopper The Pillars of the Earth, about the building of a cathedral in 12th-century England, and further burnished his reputation as a master of historical fiction with the sweeping Century trilogy, which follows five families from WWI into the 1980s, Folletts tales of spycraft first put him on the literary map.

In the early 1970s, Follett launched his writing career as a reporter, first at his local newspaper, the South Wales Echo, later at Londons Evening News. Then he moved into book publishing, taking a job at Everest Books, a small press in London. He began writing fiction in his free time and published five spy thrillers in the mid 1970s before finding success with 1978s The Eye of the Needle. The novel sold more than 10 million copies, according to Viking.

By then, Follett says, hed figured out the secret sauce. It was an early decision of mine to look for real-life situations where the work of a spy could change the course of history, he recalls. Id ask, What if there had been a spy who had better intelligence on the other side of this conflict? What if we knew there was that spy and we were trying to catch him?  He says its a winning formula that, like the 12-bar blues, no matter how many times you do it, it always works.

Follett says that while doing research for his thrillers, he hit upon the idea for The Pillars of the Earth. I began to find compelling stories that existed on a broader canvas. That was something I had to learn how to pull off, because a tightly focused thriller is a heck of a lot easier to write than a historical novel with five POV characters and a wide geographical acreage. The Pillars of the Earth was a very difficult novelit was like learning to be a writer again.

The work paid off. Pillars has sold some 26 million copies worldwide, per Viking, and been adapted into both a TV miniseries and a computer game.

Never is an 800-page epic thriller spanning multiple continents with multiple story lines. Its interconnected plots follow characters who include a CIA operative facing the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara in Chad; a young widow escaping human trafficking in Libya; a senior Chinese government official butting horns with the old Communist guard in Beijing; and the president of the United States, a moderate conservative who is embroiled in a heated primary with a Trump-ish challenger. It maps current geopolitical conflictssuch as territorial disputes in the South China Seaand the way such situations can force the hands of global superpowers. Its also a cautionary tale that leads to nuclear war.

How these conflicts play out in embassies and governments around the world feels deeply authentic, largely thanks to Folletts own peripheral experiences in politics. He notes that his wife was a member of Parliament for 13 years, so for 13 years, half of our friends were running the country. Every now and then, wed be sitting in a restaurant and one of them would say, What are you going to do about so-and-so? The next day theyd go into Whitehall, talk to civil servants, and ratify the decision that had been made in that quick interchange at dinner. The way that kind of thing plays is very familiar to me.

Never gives the sense that its author might be a little less than hopeful about the future of humanity. Is he?

By nature, I am an optimist, Follett says. If Im ever playing a game of chance, I always think Im going to roll high dice, and no amount of experience to the contrary will change that. Most of my life I have felt that I knew the answers to political problems, but I have never felt as bewildered as I do today. So, yes, I think the world is in a dangerous place, and no, I dont know what we can do about it.

Throughout the novel, Follett weaves in threads of intergenerational angst between President Pauline Green and her idealistic teenage daughter, as they butt heads over political issues. It comes from my own experience as a grandparent whose grandkids treat him with a kindly tolerance, as somebody whos well-meaning but clearly out of date, he says. Its all part of making Paulines story dramatic in a very human way. When you write a very powerful person, youve also got to make them vulnerable. A story that was just about the global crisis would have been a lot less satisfying.

One of the North African story lines follows Kiah, a young widow who will do anything to escape poverty and build a better life in France for her two-year-old son. Again, Follett mined his own experiences of parenthood to offer a moving portrayal of a vulnerable young family. Our feelings as parents toward our children are universal, he says. When Im writing a story that takes place a thousand years ago, most of the tangible things about life are different, but the fundamental emotions are the same. People are still worrying about love and sex and family and money and work and violence and war. So, while I couldnt possibly imagine what its like to be an illegal migrant traveling across the Sahara on a bus with hostile jihadis, I can imagine what its like to be a parent worried about their child. I can imagine what its like to be somebody whos broke and desperate and has to take a risk.

Follett himself has gone from being a young journalist writing novels in his free time to being an author with millions of readers. So how does he feel when he looks back on his own career?

The thing Im most proud of is being able to do it for so long, he says. It takes a lot of determination to say: No, Im not going to publish a second-rate book, even though the publishers would take it and sell it and wed make money. It cant just be good. If I want my book to be read by 10 million peoplewhich is about the norm for me nowits got to be terrific.

Laura Steven is a journalist and author from Northern England. Her journalism has been featured in Buzzfeed, the Guardian, and The I.
DEAL OF THE WEEK

Armstrongs Nightbirds Fly to Paulsen For a rumored six-figure sum, Stacey Barney at Penguin Random Houses Nancy Paulsen Books preempted North American rights to the YA fantasy debut Nightbirds. Author Kate J. Armstrong was represented by Josh Adams at Adams Literary in the agreement, which also covers the sequel, Fyrebirds. Adams said Nightbirds was pitched as Carnival Row meets The Great Gatsby and is set in a 1920s-inspired world where magic is illegal. The book follows a secretive crew of girls who can impart magical gifts with a kiss. Publication is set for summer 2023. Armstrong is a former high school English teacher and book editor from Washington, D.C., who now lives in Melbourne, Australia; she is the creator of the podcast The Exploress, about women in history.

Grand Central Explores Ozas History

In a U.S. rights deal at auction, Grand Central Publishings Seema Mahanian won A History of Burning, the debut novel by Janika Oza. Grand Central said the book, set for May 2023, is a sweeping tale about how one act can reverberate through four generations of a family and their search for home and belonging, and compared it to work by authors like Min Jin Lee and Yaa Gyasi. A History of Burning unfolds in Canada, India, and Uganda and asks what it takes to belong to a nation, a land, and a family, the publisher added. Sarah Bowlin at Aevitas Creative Management represented Oza, whose short fiction and essays have won her a number of awards and plaudits, including the 2020 Kenyon Review Short Fiction Award.

Atria Burnishes Vaughans Reputation

In a two-book agreement, Emily Bestler acquired U.S., Canadian, and open market rights to Sarah Vaughans new novel, Reputation. The political thriller, to be released by Bestlers eponymous imprint at Atria, is about an MP embroiled in the death of a tabloid journalist, according to the publisher. Fighting to protect her reputation, and determined to protect her family at all costs, Emma is pushed to the limits as the worst happens and her life is torn apart in a very public way, Atria added. Lizzy Kremer at David Higham in the U.K. represented Vaughan (Anatomy of a Scandal), and she has also closed a number of deals with publishers around the world. The novel is set for a March 2022 release in the U.K. and a July 2022 release in the U.S.

Hampton Gets Unsettled at St. Martins

Kevin Reilly at St. Martins Press acquired world rights to Ryan Hamptons Unsettled: How the Purdue Pharma Bankruptcy Failed the Victims of the American Overdose Crisis. The book, slated for October, is the inside account of Purdues excruciating Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings, the companys eventual restructuring, and the Sackler familys evasion of any true accountability, the publisher said. It also tells the story of how a group of determined ordinary people tried to see justice done against the oddsand in the face of brutal opposition from powerful institutions and even government representatives. Hampton worked in the Clinton administration and is a specialist in addiction recovery. He was unagented in the deal.

Hogarth Buys Jenningss Island

Jillian Buckley at Hogarth took North American rights to Karen Jenningss An Island at auction. The novel, the publisher said, is about a lighthouse keeper and a stranger who find themselves together on a mysterious island. The characters circle one anothereach trapped on the island for different reasons as the book examines the extraordinary stakes of companionship and what it means to lose a home. Jennings is South African and was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2021; An Island marks her U.S. debut. Cecile Barendsma at Cecile B Literary Agency handled the sale on behalf of Agence Deborah Druba and Holland House Books UK.
At least one tradition is coming back intact to this years New York Comic Con: NYCC Professional Day will be held on Thursday, October 7. John Shableski, president of Reading with Pictures, a nonprofit devoted to educational efforts supported by comics, has been put together 18 hours of programming for professional development, including a full slate of sessions for K12 language, visual arts, and STEAM educators, school and public librarians, and academics. The N.Y.C. Department of Education, New York Public library, the American Library Associations Graphic Novel and Comics Round Table committee, and the N.Y.C. School Librarians Association are collaborating on programming with RWP.

Fewer people are traveling to this years show, so Shableski has focused on finding local educators, librarians, and academics. It really is wonderful now that these people who were the local experts can talk about this, he says. We see this as a great opportunity to bring all these disciplines together in a way that allows them to see how what they do in their environment can inform development across the disciplines.

All of the professional day programming will be held at Javits, and the tracks will cover many topics. We have a great slate of programming that covers visual arts, language arts, learning to cosplay, and even how to submit panels to comic cons, Shableski says. Theres also a session specifically for the publishers and authors called How to Sell Your Books into Schools and Libraries. He adds, The panelists represent over a billion dollars in book budgets.

RWP will also have a booth on the show floor that will function as a meeting spot for all these groups. This is going to be like the kitchen at moms house, Shableski says. Hopefully, everybodys going to stop by to check in and say hi.

Shableski is also working to make sure the panel track will count as professional development for those who attend. Thats part of making sure we have academics, librarians, and school teachers all talking together, he says. Because now cons have become the place for professional development that they cant get at their national shows.

Over the years, RWP has evolved from an organization focused on using comics in classrooms to become what Shableski calls a global network of comics-minded people. And its efforts are ongoinghes been approached by other convention organizers to put together similar tracks. We now have professional con producers who know the educational space, he says, and its evolving into a much better experience across the board.

Return to New York Comic Con 2021 main feature.
In the eight years since Orbit, Hachettes science fiction and fantasy publishing division, launched Redhook, a lot has changed for the imprint, but one thing remains a constant: Redhooks mission to publish books with bestseller potential. We were looking for an opportunity to build on the already-present success of the Orbit division, said Tim Holman, senior v-p and publisher of Orbit, about Redhooks origin. The idea in starting Redhook, he continued, was to broadens Orbit reach by expanding into more general commercial fiction.

The switch to Redhooks current focus on speculative fiction was a gradual one, though its seeds were planted in some of its earliest titles, including its first book, Robert Lyndons Hawk Quest, a 672-page epic historical novel set in Norman England, released in 2013. It was the 2014 publication of The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August, about a man reborn repeatedly across time, by Claire North, a pseudonym of British author Catherine Webb, that acted as an initial pivot point in Redhooks strategy.

It had speculative elements that connected with a general audience, Holman said in explaining the titles success. The novel, which has sold more than 200,000 copies across all formats, won the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel and was nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Best Science Fiction Novel. The book helped Redhook evolve into an imprint focused on publishing speculative fiction, Holman added.

But it wasnt an overnight shift. Like with anything new, Redhook needed to establish trust with both authors and agents. Even though the imprint found itself at the forefront of speculative fictions popularity, Holman acknowledged that it was helpful but not something we planned.

Redhook also met marketing and publicity challenges with its general fiction approach. We would often have a situation where every new book was a different book in a widely different genre every month, said Alex Lencicki, v-p and associate publisher of Orbit. One month it might be a science fiction thriller, and the next month it would be a romantically tinged thriller. This meant we were always trying to find new ways to market every book.

When it settled on a more speculative fiction focus, Redhook was better able to use Orbits marketing and publicity infrastructure to reach genre readersparticularly those in science fiction and fantasy. It frees us up to focus on promoting the uniqueness of each book, without having to always reinvent the wheel, Lencicki said.

Speculative fiction wasnt a term used widely in the 2013/2014 publishing landscape to describe books existing between genres. Anybody publishing speculative fiction would have been publishing them under the umbrella of science fiction or fantasy, with publishers like Tor or Orbit or Del Ray, Holman said. In just under a decade, much of that has changed. Today, the term speculative fiction is used to cover anything that is slightly out of the ordinary.

Redhook has followed a similar path, Holman said. We now publish into a world where SF, fantasy, or genre fiction are much more appealing to a wider range of readers.

Another title that moved Redhook down the speculative fiction path was Alix E. Harrows The Ten Thousand Doors of January, a fantastical mystery about a sprawling mansion and a book that carries secrets of other worlds. Harrow created this whole ecosystem of books that demonstrates how speculative fiction can combine magic and feminism and witchcraft and still work with a general audience and it helped expand our speculative area of the market, said Nivia Evans, senior editor at Redhook.

If Norths time-jetting novel helped steer the imprints mission into the world of speculative fiction, and Harrows fantastical world of mysterious books doubled down on that path, it was Louisa Morgans A Secret History of Witches that cemented and redefined Redhooks strategy. Morgan had already published numerous fantasy novels, and Redhook saw a book with crossover potential. We thought this book could reach an audience outside of fantasy, Holman said. The choice to promote the book as a work of speculative fiction showed us that Redhook could be a place where books spanning multiple categories can thrive, he added.

Having positioned Redhook at the center of an emerging category, Holman believes the future has never looked better. Were emerging into a world where there is a much broader and more exciting engagement with speculative fiction.

The imprints current strategy is to maintain its speculative focus while also increasing the number of books published per month. As part of its initial model, Redhook published no more than one to two titles per month, giving it an active backlist of about 60 titles. However, with the increase in popularity in speculative fiction, Redhooks editors have received more and more submissions. Were confident that we can publish more, Holman said.

The upcoming slate of titles is an example of Redhooks wide range. In September, it will publish Andy Marinos debut, The Seven Visitations of Sydney Burgess, about a woman suffering through trauma following a home invasion. Lucy Hollands Sistersong, a reimagining of an old British folklore ballad, will follow in October. The breadth of what Redhook can do is just, well, fun, Evans said.

In early 2022, Redhook plans on publishing Francesca Mays Wild and Wicked Things, a post-WWI adventure about a woman swept into an underworld of witchcraft, and Alex Jenningss The Ballad of Perilous Graves, a debut novel set in the dark underbelly of New Orleans. Both titles were acquired by Evans (who was named Superstar in PWs 2020 Star Watch program).

Redhook is committed to finding books that are out of the ordinary. But with its new approach, the imprint can publish books in science fiction, fantasy, or horror without having to exclude a promising title just because it doesnt fit a preexisting category. There are going to be more opportunities in the future for speculative fiction to be published in new and interesting ways, Holman said.
By any measure, the first half of 2021 was a good period for trade book publishing. Revenue at the companies that report trade sales to the Association of American Publishers StatShot program rose 17.6% over the first six months of 2020; NPD BookScan reported that unit sales increased 18.5% in the period; and bookstore sales jumped 30% over what was a miserable first six months of 2020. So it comes as no surprise that the four publicly traded major publishers also posted strong increases in the period.

Of particular note is the fact that while sales were strong, profits were even better, with operating margins showing healthy gains. In general, the publishers cited higher sales of both backlist books and digital content, especially digital audiobooks, for the improved margins. Though supply chain issues and the uncertainty over the delta variant are causing some concerns about how the rest of the year will unfold, publishers are hoping that the increased interest in reading will carry over through the 2021 holiday season and beyond.

Also of note is the fact that, for the first time, HarperCollinss results include Houghton Mifflin Harcourt trade groups sales, after HC completed its acquisition of the business in early May. The HMH group contributed $23 million in revenue to HC in the first half of the year. June 30 also marks the end of HCs fiscal year, which was a great one for the publisher, with total sales approaching $2 billion. Sales in first half of calendar 2021 were up 20% over the same period in 2020, a slightly faster growth rate than the 19% increase the company posted for the fiscal year.

HC CEO Brian Murray attributed the healthy gains in fiscal 2021 to higher consumer spending on books worldwide, saying that he has never seen such sustained increase in book buying in his more than 25 years in publishing. The Covid tailwinds are real, he added. Sales were up across all formats, and Murray was particularly heartened by strong growth in print sales in the U.S., which he believes is another sign book reading in general is on the upswing.

At Penguin Random House, profits soared 55.1% in the first half of 2021 over the first half of 2020, reported parent company Bertelsmann, while sales increased 10.9%. Total revenue for the period was 1.80 billion, or about $2.1 billion, up from 1.63 billion, while operating EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) jumped to 324 million, from 209 million a year ago. Sales in the U.S. increased 8.7%, to 1.08 billion.

Bertelsmann attributed the overall increases to solid sales of both frontlist and backlist books, as well as to a continuing audio boom in nearly all territories. In addition to the jump in audiobook sales, PRH continued to benefit from the accelerated shift to online retail channels, Bertelsmann noted.

While the regulatory review of PRHs pending acquisition of Simon & Schuster continues in the U.S., growth in the first half of the year was aided by acquisitions made by the companys Spanish-language subsidiary, Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial. Sales in PRHs services operationlargely in its distribution businessrose 18.2%, to 52 million.

In a letter to employees, PRH worldwide CEO Markus Dohle pointed to a strong book market in some of our large territories and the recovery from last years revenue losses due to the COVID-19 crisis in other regions as contributors to the good performance in the first half of the year. He thanked PRH employees for working together during the pandemic, writing, The remaining months of 2021 bring new areas to navigate: the development of hybrid work models and the opportunity to meet voracious customers demand for books.

Acknowledging that last years second quarter was weak, Lagardere said that sales in its publishing group increased 16.4% in the first half of 2021 over the same period in 2020, to 1.13 billion, and EBIT soared to 110 million, from 27 million. Revenue at Hachette Book Group rose 14.8%. CEO Michael Pietsch said that hardcover sales were strong in the period and noted an overall good performance in childrens books and in the companys Christian books business. HBGs distribution business was solidly ahead of 2020, he added.

HBG was only one part of what was an overall good performance for Lagardere Publishing. Sales rose 26.9% in France and 17.3% in the U.K., while sales in Spain/Latin America fell 4.5% due to a decline in Mexican sales that offset good momentum in Spain, the publisher said.

Digital sales share of total revenue at Lagardere fell in the period, which the publisher attributed to tough comparisons with the first half of last year, when consumers turned to digital formats due to the pandemic. E-book sales fell from roughly 97 million in the first six months of 2020 to 90 million in the first six months of 2021, but digital audio sales rose to about 52 million, from 48 million.

Sales at S&S rose 9.2% in the first six months of the year compared to the first half of 2020, helped by a strong performance from its international group. CEO Jonathan Karp said the overseas units have ramped up production after curtailing output last year because of the pandemic.

In the U.S., sales were led by the adult group and audio. Karp noted that backlist sales were strong and that sales through physical stores, including Barnes & Noble, bounced back.
Nothing says you are renouncing al Qaeda quite like appointing a member of al Qaeda to a top cabinet position in your new government, writes Peter Bergen. As the Taliban begins to constitute its new government in Afghanistan, it's becoming clear just how hard-line it's going to be. American leaders' wishful thing about a kinder, gentler Taliban 2.0 is a bipartisan failure.
VISTA, Calif.  Its a bright, cloudless morning in this heavily Latino, working-class exurb of San Diego. A Were Hiring sign hangs in the window of a run-down McDonalds on the corner of a major thoroughfare, Civic Center Drive. One side of the restaurant exterior serves as a homeless encampment, strewn with debris, while just down the street, construction has ramped up again in a trendy revitalized area with new storefronts and restaurants mixed in with the old.

Conservative talk show host Larry Elder, who shot to the top of the GOP pack of candidates vying to replace California Gov. Gavin Newsom since entering the recall race in July, is furiously trying to make his closing arguments to voters at the first of three stops Friday in Southern California.

Polls over the last week show Newsom opening up a comfortable lead in the final stretch, and media reports are already declaring him the victor. Elders unabashedly conservative views are out of step with voters in this solidly blue state and thus he became the perfect Newsom foil, the early obituaries contend.

But Elder, the quick-witted and often combative black Republican, is still out there throwing punches. Hes well aware that some of the same polls giving Newsom a 13- to 21-point lead also show weakness  that voter turnout is lagging among Latinos, who make up a nearly a third of Californias voters and have helped propel Democratic victories across the state for decades.

The COVID pandemic and Newsoms strict lockdown policies hit Latinos and their small businesses especially hard. An Emerson College survey in mid-July showed these voters as the only racial group favoring the recall  doing so by a whopping 13 percentage points  with more recent surveys indicating they are evenly split and failing to turn in their ballots in large numbers.

While sitting at a table outside Marisco del Pacifico, a popular local eatery, owner Esteban Sanchez told Elder hes struggling to find enough waiters and other employees to keep the restaurant afloat even after surviving the worst of the pandemic closures.

Its one of the busiest restaurants in this town, but he cant find workers, chimed in Frank Lopez, a former Vista City Council member.

Elder quickly offered sympathy from his own familys experience. His father was a janitor and a cook who eventually opened a cafe in the Pico-Union area of Los Angeles. A lot of restaurants have told me they have to cut hours, cut days because theyre short of staff  and if you serve somebody a bad meal it will hurt your business, so rather than do that, theyre cutting down [on their hours], he said in his usually blunt, rapid-fire clip. Of course, the profits go down when hours go down.  Its outrageous.

Newsom shut down the state to the point that a third of all small businesses are now gone forever, and many of them were owned by Latinos and blacks and Asian Americans, he said. He should not have done that, and he left his own winery open.

Its the polar opposite message Newsom has been driving home in the final weeks of the recall as the sitting governor has leaned into the strict pandemic policies that helped fueled the drive to oust him. As Elder and other Republicans have promised to overturn Newsoms restrictions, the first-term governor is casting the recall decision as a matter of life and death  literally. Last week in Oakland, Newsom warned that California would turn into Florida or Texas without his leadership, two states whose unemployment numbers have fared much better during the pandemic but where new COVID cases are now far higher.

On Monday, President Biden, fresh from implementing new vaccine requirements for federal workers and private businesses with more than 100 employees, will campaign with Newsom in Long Beach. The Biden appearance follows Vice President Kamala Harris time stumping with Newsom in San Leandro on Wednesday.

Republicans have questioned why Newsom would want Harris and Biden, with their plummeting poll numbers nationally, out with him on the campaign trail. But both remain popular in California. A Public Policy Institute of California poll, conducted in late August, during the administrations chaotic Afghanistan withdrawal, showed that 58% of Californians approve of the way Biden is handling his job, compared to 53% who feel the same way about Newsom.

Perhaps the most effective Democratic endorsement of all  an ad featuring former President Obama  warns that the recall vote could be the difference between protecting our kids or putting them at risk; helping Californians recover or taking us backwards.

The efforts to nationalize the election seem to be paying off. Democratic voters have already cast nearly twice as many votes as Republicans, and pro-recall organizers are sounding the alarm for supporters to return their ballots.

Proponents are urging Republicans not to let their distrust in the all-mail voting system cause them to wait until the last minute to turn in their ballots, as they did in the 2020 presidential contest. Many Democratic-controlled counties have offered fewer in-person polling places than in previous elections, so long lines are expected on the last day of voting, Sept. 14.

Yet, over the last week, there has been a tangible GOP air of defeat, and the Republican blame game has already begun. Centrist GOP strategists point the finger at the party for failing to rally behind San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, a pro-choice moderate, and allowing Elder to run away with the vast majority of their voters support.

Faulconers spokesman, John Burke, publicly lashed out at Elder on Friday. What changed between July and now? he tweeted, referring to a new poll showing the no on recall side leading by 21 points. One thing: @LarryElder. Hes been a gift to @GavinNewsom. California Republicans can do better.

In July, after Elder entered the race and started surging, the California GOP backed away from delivering an endorsement for one Republican candidate, which was widely expected to favor Faulconer. But others maintained that the party had no choice but avoid an endorsement because Faulconer would have suffered an embarrassing and debilitating loss.

These consultants think that if they can get the party insiders behind him, that will mean a path to victory, Carl DeMaio, a popular San Diego radio host and recall organizer, stated back in July. Having a bunch of insiders from the Sacramento swamp try to force-feed this grassroots movement a bad candidate is the path to destroying the recall.

DeMaio, who frequently refers to Faulconer as Mr. Vanilla on his radio show, argues that Elder breathed new life into the pro-recall movement when he threw his hat in the ring in early July.

Faulconer never caught fire and is now hovering in the single-digits, along with 36-year-old Assemblyman Kevin Kiley and businessman and perennial candidate John Cox. In fact, the second-highest vote-getter in most polls is not Faulconer but the lone Democratic candidate in the race, political novice Kevin Paffrath, a 29-year-old real estate broker who hosts a YouTube channel about personal finance.

Democratic strategists dismiss the idea that any Republican had a serious chance of replacing Newsom, although they believe that Elder has made a bigger win easier for the governor to achieve.

In a state where registered Democratic voters outnumber Republicans nearly 2-to-1, veteran Democratic consultants claim the math was never going to add up to a Republican win without a larger-than-life figure like Arnold Schwarzenegger in the race. Schwarzenegger, a Republican, won the last California recall in 2003, ousting then Democratic Gov. Gray Davis.

Its an argument Garry South, a longtime Democratic strategist who ran Davis political campaigns, has been making for months. Now that Democrats are paying attention, he predicts a crushing, double-digit recall defeat. This is not about enthusiasm, its about numbers  and math doesnt give a sh-- about enthusiasm, he told RCP Thursday. This thing is over.

The reason the Faulconer team is so upset, South said, is that their candidate has come out of the recall as damaged goods with even worse long-shot odds in the 2022 gubernatorial contest. If youre Kevin Faulconer, and you end up with 5% of the vote, how do you reboot and tell people that youre the best candidate for the Republicans to run against Newsom in 2022? he asked.

Recall organizers are far from capitulating, and argue Newsoms reputation has suffered most of all. Anne Dunsmore, the campaign manager and finance director of Rescue California, one of the main recall organizers, is working to keep the focus on Newsom in the final days. Dunsmore rattles off a litany of leadership failures during Newsoms two-year tenure, including one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation, spiking crime, massive unemployment fraud, lying about the states fire prevention efforts, disruptive school closures, failing to dramatically reduce homelessness and his infamous flouting of his own COVID lockdown rules during the French Laundry dinner last November.

No matter how much Newsom wins or loses by, Dunsmore said, she considers the recall an overwhelming success.

If you would have told me a year ago that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris would be out here campaigning for this guy, and recall opponents would end up spending $80 million to defeat our effort, I would have laughed, she said. Democrats, no matter, how you look at it, have to say [Newsom] is damaged goods.
Athens, GA (30605)

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Donna Davis works for Pitt County government, supporting technology. She has called eastern North Carolina home nearly all her life. She enjoys jamming with local musicians, running and writing. Contact her at donnadavisdavis@gmail.com.
D.G. Martin is a retired lawyer, politician and university administrator and is host of UNC-TVs North Carolina Bookwatch at 3 p.m. on Sundays and 5 p.m. on Tuesdays.
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Greenville, NC (27833)

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Brattleboro, VT (05301)

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Brattleboro, VT (05301)

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Thunderstorms, accompanied by locally heavy rainfall at times. A few storms may be severe. High 83F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%..

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Showers and thundershowers this evening giving way to periods of light rain late. A few storms may be severe. Low 61F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 80%.
Brattleboro, VT (05301)

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Scattered thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. High 82F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

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Thunderstorms early, overcast overnight with occasional rain. A few storms may be severe. Low 61F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 80%.
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP)  The Taliban raised their flag over the Afghan presidential palace Saturday, a spokesman said, as the U.S. and the world marked the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

The white banner, emblazoned with a Quranic verse, was hoisted by Mullah Mohammad Hassan Akhund, the prime minister of the Taliban interim government, in a low-key ceremony, said Ahmadullah Muttaqi, multimedia branch chief of the Talibans cultural commission.

The flag-raising marked the official start of the work of the new government, he said. The composition of the all-male, all-Taliban government was announced earlier this week and was met with disappointment by the international community which had hoped the Taliban would make good on an earlier promise of an inclusive lineup.

In a tweet, Afghanistan's first president to follow the 2001 collapse of the Taliban, Hamid Karzai, called for peace and stability and expressed the hope that the new caretaker Cabinet that included no women and no non-Taliban would become an inclusive government that can be the real face of the whole Afghanistan.

He marked the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on America with a meeting of tribal elders on his high-walled compound in the Afghan capital where he has remained with his family since the August return of the Taliban to Kabul.

Two decades ago, the Taliban ruled Afghanistan with a heavy hand. Television was banned, and on Sept. 11, 2001, the day of the horrific attacks on America, the news spread from crackling radios across the darkened streets of the Afghan capital of Kabul.

The city rarely had electricity and barely a million people lived in Kabul at the time. It took the U.S.-led coalition just two months to drive the Taliban from the capital and by Dec. 7, 2001, they were defeated, driven from their last holdout in southern Kandahar, their spiritual heartland.

Twenty years later, the Taliban are back in Kabul. America has departed, ending its forever war two weeks before the 20th anniversary of 9/11 and two weeks after the Taliban returned to the Afghan capital on Aug. 15.

Some things have changed since the first period of Taliban rule in the 1990s.

This time, the gun-toting fighters dont race through the city streets in their pickups. Instead, they inch through chaotic, clogged traffic in the city of more than 5 million. In Taliban-controlled Kabul in the 1990s, barber shops were banned. Now Taliban fighters get the latest haircuts, even if their beards remain untouched in line with their religious beliefs.

But the Taliban have begun issuing harsh edits that have hit women hardest, such as banning women's sports. They have also used violence to stop women demanding equal rights from protesting.

Inside a high-end women's store in the city's Karte Se neighborhood Saturday, Marzia Hamidi, a Taekwondo competitor with ambitions of being a national champion, said the return of the Taliban has crushed her dreams.

She was among the women attacked by the Taliban and called agents of the West during one of the recent protests. She said she's not surprised about America's withdrawal.

This year or next year, they had to leave eventually, she said. They came for their own interest and they left for their interest.

Hamidi is hoping the Taliban will relent and ease their restrictions, but with a glance toward the store owner, Faisal Naziri, she said most men in Afghanistan agree with what the Taliban say about women and their rules against them.

Naziri nodded, saying preserving the rights of women is not a cause that will bring Afghan men on the streets.

On Saturday, the Taliban even orchestrated a women's march of their own. This one involved dozens of women obscured from head to toe, hidden behind layers of black veils. They filled an auditorium at Kabul Universitys education center in a well-choreographed snub to the past 20 years of Western efforts to empower women.

Speakers read from scripted speeches celebrating the Taliban victory over a West they charged was anti-Islam. The women marched briefly outside the center grounds, waving placards saying the women who left dont represent us, referring to the many thousands who fled in fear of a Taliban crackdown on women's rights. We dont want co-education, read another banner.

Outside the hall, the Taliban director of higher education, Maulvi Mohammad Daoud Haqqani, said 9/11 was the day the world started their propaganda against us calling us terrorists and blaming us for the attacks in the United States.

At a dusty book store in Kabul's Karte Sangi neighborhood, Atta Zakiri, a self-declared civil society activist said America was wrong to attack Afghanistan after 9/11.

He blamed the invasion that followed the 9/11 attacks for creating another generation of hardline Taliban fighters.

The Taliban should have been allowed to stay. Why didn't we work with them? Instead they went to fight, he said." And now we are back to where we were 20 years ago.
TORRINGTON  Democrat Jeremy Kincaid, who is running in a primary Sept. 14 to earn a spot on the ballot Nov. 2 for the Board of Education, was hoping to have a candidates debate this week, but its not going to happen.

Kincaid chose to run as a petitioning candidate after he wasnt endorsed by the Democratic Town Committee at its caucus in July. He said hed secured City Council chambers in City Hall for a debate.

I reached out to (committee-endorsed) school board candidates Travis Tunais and Ellen Hoenhe, Kincaid said. I had wanted to have a informative and constructive conversation on Torringtons educational system, but I cant debate myself or have a conversation with myself.

Democrat Ed Corey also is running for the school board.

Democratic Town Committee Chairman Paul Summer said the school board candidates would participate in fairly organized and well-moderated debates and forums to discuss the issues facing our city.

Unfortunately, Mr. Kincaid did not reach out to all of our candidates, did not offer to work with us to find a suitable and unbiased moderator, and appears to be pulling a desperate political stunt, Summer said. Our candidates are focused on engaging directly with the voters of Torrington, not on last minute political games.

Summer said the endorsed candidates represent a diverse, forward-thinking slate with new ideas and we look forward to moving Torrington in a positive direction in November.

Ed Corey and Ellen Hoehnes experience, combined with the new ideas from educator Travis Tanuis, is just what our board of education needs, he said.

Kincaid, who has been critical of the Board of Education, said his fellow party members dont want to talk about the schools.

The town committee doesnt want to highlight problems they see with the Torrington School System, and the Board of Education doesnt want to open up meetings to the public, he said. I think it shows they are trying to avoid the public.

I say, have an open Board of Education and let all the parents vent their frustrations about everything and anything, Kincaid said.

Do what Joe Biden does  be the politician that answers every parents questions and be the last person answering questions in the room by the end of the meeting. That is what the public, voters, students and parents are due, he said.

Kincaid also has raised concerns with the school building project, which is under the purview of the districts School Building Committee for a new combined middle-high school building. Im in support of (the new school), but I want voters to get what they voted for, he said previously.

Kincaid is attending Central Connecticut State University for a masters degree in teaching secondary-level history. He holds a masters degree in international studies/affairs, bachelors degrees in political science with a history minor, and associate degrees in liberal arts and general studies. He is a substitute teacher for Torrington Public Schools, as well as in Thomaston and Terryville. He worked as a mental health assistant with young adults with disabilities for the state Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services, Young Adult Services, and the Department of Developmental Services.
KILLINGWORTH  Deer Lake Camp, a popular 35-year-old childrens summer camp and Boy Scout wilderness reservation, is up for sale in connection with the Boy Scouts of Americas $850 million sex abuse settlement.

Deer Lake, an unspoiled 255-acre wilderness site, is an attraction for hikers  its part of a trail system linking Chatfield Hollow and Cockaponset State Forest  as well as former campers and neighbors.

The camp boasts a mile-long spring-fed lake, a swimming area in a kettle (a lake or pond created by retreating flood waters or glaciers) called the lagoon, as well as manicured trails in pristine forest.

And, nearly everyone mentions the unique glacier rock formation called Fat Mans Squeeze that children love to explore.

The private Save Deer Lake Facebook group was created just two days after an announcement was made informally last week that Connecticut Yankee Council Boy Scouts of America wanted to sell the camp, according to Ted Langevin, a scout leader, chairman of Pack 491 in Madison and member of the Quinnipiac district committee.

Many on Facebook posted comments that they were surprised about the potential sale of the property and closing of the camp. Former campers, lifeguards, parents and volunteers were brainstorming online how to prevent its loss.

Theyre really going to miss it if we cant pull this off, Langevin said.

Many of the people that have joined the group  weve gotten close to 200 people  theyve reacted because they were childhood campers or their kids went. Theyre up in arms, Langevin said.

The summer camp rebounded after the pandemic and has remained popular for all of its years, he said. We usually have a waiting list  this year was no exception, Langevin said.

According to Langevin, group members hope to raise enough money or get grants to buy the camp, ensure the land remains preserved or attract a large donor or buyer.

$850 million settlement

The parcel was appraised between $3.7 million to $4.2 million. Some $2.6 million will go to the Boy Scouts of America, Langevin said, to help pay the local councils assessed share of the $850 million sex abuse settlement signed off on by a judge in August to pay the tens of thousands of abuse victims, according to claimsjournal.com.

The $850 million agreement is between the Boy Scouts national organization and about 250 local councils along with law firms representing about 70,000 former scouts who allege they were molested, the website states. A fund for survivors would receive about $250 million from the national Boy Scouts and $600 million from local councils, along with insurance rights.

The Save Deer Lake Facebook pages mission is to raise enough money to either buy the camp outright or to make sure that the land is protected as an educational and recreational camp or as a conservation area.

Other Boy Scout facilities in the state also up for sale as part of the settlement are the Connecticut Yankee Council headquarters in Milford and Camp Pomperaug in Union, according to Langevin.

At Save Deer Lake, members discuss the possibility of garnering a state grant, approaching the town of Killingworth for funds, as well as setting up a GoFundMe page and talking to potential donors.

Group members also suggest splitting the parcel into two pieces: an unimproved section to sell to the state or other entity to preserve the forest and trails, and the camp portion separately to an organization or owner wanting to continue its operation.

That way, Langevin said, It would be less expensive and attractive to somebody looking to run a camp.

For Langevin, the beauty of Deer Lake unique: Its a very peaceful place  you kind of get this feeling of all the world is outside, and youre just watching the sunset on the lake. What it does on the lake is amazing.

Camp Ranger Mark Clifton and his wife Patty have worked and lived at the camp for some 35 years. Theyve been a big part of the facility during their time there.

Mark and Patty  they were a young couple  the camp was in a shambles. Essentially, they built it back up with their bare hands, Langevin said. The house was uninhabitable.

Theyve been there ever since. Scouting is a nonprofit organization  they have never seemed to have enough to do what was needed to do, Langevin said.

The couple, he said, seemed to be sticking it together with bailing wire and chewing gum.

A perfect site

Patty Clifton worked alongside her husband, putting together the childrens camp since the mid 1980s. I really hope that it will remain a wooded and green space. Im very proud of what weve done  the summer camp program that has been my focus for the last 35 years.

I was really hoping to someday passing it on, she said. I just hate the thought of it all ending. It would be a shame if turned into a housing development.

The clock is ticking for fundraising and supporters are scrambling to come up with a solution, Langevin said, as the sellers will put it on the market soon.

And for the time being, the Cliftons have permission to stay at the camp until December.

Clifton said she takes pride in a well-developed program, and the parcel is a perfect site for summer camp activities. Were not into huge  were into more good, quality programs enriching kids lives, and teaching them to be good citizens and good humans, she said.

Clifton, a camp accreditation visitor, sees many other camps in the region and said she is always pleased to see how Deer Lake stacks up. I can tell you that this is, by far, the nicest piece of property Ive been to, and I visit camps every summer  and Im being objective. Ive never seen anything like this.

Its just beautiful  a nice balance of lakes and fields, ledge and cliffs and wetlands. Perfect for any kind of nature study and exploration out into the woods. It would just be a shame if it could not continue, she said.

Weve really maintained the forest, she added, noting that her husband Ranger Mark Clifton, with a degree in geology and earth science, has worked with forestry professionals. Everything is so perfectly groomed.

They have also taken part in a program to reintroduce chestnut trees  once native to the state, but now extinct. Chestnut seedlings have been planted under the guidance of the American Chestnut Foundation.

Fond memories

One member of Save Deer Lake, Christine Forristall, a lifelong Killingworth resident who worked as a lifeguard while in high school and later promoted to waterfront director as a young adult, said the camp would be sorely missed. Her daughters, in fifth and seventh grades, are campers now, and her family hikes the trails year round.

It was an amazing experience working with the kids  you were impacting the kids, too, Forristall said. In that time, she estimates she worked with 150 kids a week for over 10 summers.

She grew up across the street from the park. Part of the fun was getting to her job, I used to cross the waterfall every day to work.

From her experience at the camp, Forristall now teaches the lifeguards for the Madison Beach and Recreation Department as well as set up their waterfront management plan.

While at Deer Lake, she said, The whole program taught us to have an appreciation of not only nature, but getting outside of our comfort zone  knowing theres a whole world out there thats right in front of our face.

Its more than just a camp to me and many others  its a great to not be in front of a screen, she said, to go out and explore the outdoors.
It was theatrical in its design and a Shakespearean tragedy in its unfolding.

As the 20th anniversary of 9/11 approached, President Joe Biden desperately desired a historical and symbolic end to the nations longest war.

Bidens vision turned out to be nothing short of a 1970s-era U.S. military and intelligence debacle taken to an unprecedented scale paid for in American blood, fortitude and treasure.

Where are the resignations of all the generals and admirals who argued against capitulation?

Robert Gates, the respected former secretary of defense under both George W. Bush and Barack Obama, wrote in his memoir that Biden had been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades.

Some things never change.

Bidens foreign policy rewards our enemies and punishes our allies.

It was in June as the Taliban began its march to Kabul that all U.S. embassies throughout the world celebrated Gay Pride Month, as part of the Bidens Administrations foreign policy.

American exceptionalism was replaced with American perversion.

As Great Britains Neville Chamberlain is remembered for appeasement in the Nazi takeover of Sudetenland, Biden will be remembered for leaving Afghanistan to the Taliban, while abandoning thousands of Americas allies and rebooting Islamist fundamentalists the world over.

Allowing the Taliban to dictate the terms of withdrawal was reprehensible and irresponsible. As such, it raised the threat of terrorism to levels it had not witnessed in years.

Biden is a shoo-in for the Nobel Appeasement Prize for his military retreat  Dumbkirk.

Biden bequeathed the Taliban a reported $85 billion in military hardware that will allow them to wage war and terror for years. Moreover, Bagram Air Base is now Chinas de facto world class central Asian integrated air headquarters courtesy of the American taxpayer. Likewise, Afghanistan is rich in rare earth minerals that China will certainly exploit and profit from.

Bidens surrender plays daily throughout our fruited plain. Portland, Oregon is lawless, permitting Antifa and the Proud Boys to wage battle without consequences. In Los Angeles, Seattle and San Francisco, homeless bivouacs and unbridled crime have turned these cities into dystopian, democrat nightmares. In Chicago, gang warfare runs rampant with shootings far worse than what our military experienced in Afghanistan, especially over the last 18 months going without casualties.

What Biden has succeeded in doing is uniting nearly two-thirds of Americans  all of whom believe his flight from Afghanistan was a colossal disaster. It is the one-third who believe Biden is actually doing a good job that is most concerning.

In a successful military and intelligence campaign in Afghanistan, we had 2,500 troops with a strategic presence in central Asias foremost terrorist breeding grounds. Continued funding certainly could have been found in the series of COVID relief packages passed by Congress, of which less than half went to anything remotely COVID.

For more than 70 years, we have maintained thousands of troops in South Korea, and since the end of World War II we have had troops in Japan and Germany. Maintaining a contingent of troops in Afghanistan that have been successful in deterring terrorism at home you think would be a given.

The Russians, Chinese, Iranians and the North Koreans will certainly test our defenses, especially in cyberspace.

On 9/11, our enemies will be dancing in the streets as our southern border is wide open and we are lectured about how vaccinations, global warming and systemic racism are the most pressing problems facing the nation.

Perhaps Biden should send an army of social workers and psychologists into Afghanistan who could reason with the Taliban and show them the errors of their ways. Instructing them how they were wrongfully utilizing microaggression, ignorant of Facebooks 58 genders, and the wonders and marvels of applied critical race theory.

Such a pathetic ending in Afghanistan was most unworthy of this 20-year epic struggle.

It was not a departure but an abandonment.

Could there have been any less planning and foresight?

Whatever possessed Biden to believe that the 20th anniversary of 9/11 was the right time for such a pullout?

The ensuing chaos at Kabuls airport with people falling to their deaths from American Air Force planes is seared into the Biden legacy.

(Maresca writes from

Northumberland County)
The Ig Nobel Prizes hands over awards for funny science experiments resulting in rewarding researches. The latest series of the Ig Nobel Awards is as absurd as usual, with honours given out for studies into cat meows, bacteria on pavement gum, and the origins of human beards.

The aim behind the award is to both mock and celebrate the odd aspects of science. The Ig Nobel Prizes for 2021 were given out Friday, and like the previous year, the ceremony had to be performed online due to COVID pandemic. The 31st year of the contest was sponsored by the Annals of Improbable Research journal.

Orgasm during sex can help you decongest your nose

A team led by Olcay Cem Bulut from University Hospital Heidelberg in Germany is one of the ten winners. What they discovered can be termed unimaginable. Their findings revealed that nasal respiration improved dramatically after sexual intercourse with a climax, similar to taking decongestant medicines. Their discovery also revealed that the sinus-clearing effect lasted for more than an hour. It seems like a worthwhile study - clogged nasal passages are a total hassle.

Moving on to the next award, a team from the Max Planck Institute won an Ig Nobel for chemistry for testing the air inside movie theatres to see if odours produced by the audience can reliably indicate the levels of violence, sex, antisocial behaviour, drug use, and bad language in the movie that the audience was watching.

Corruption in the country is linked to citizens' obesity

In another interesting study, Pavlo Blavatskyy of the University of Montpellier in France found that obesity among post-Soviet politicians is related to rampant corruption in their nations. This won him the Ig Nobel Prize in Economics.

Airlifting the rhinos in an inverted position is the best solution

Another award on the list was for Cornell University's Robin Radcliffe and his colleagues. They were awarded the Ig Nobel Prize for Transportation, for analysing multiple techniques for relocating endangered black rhinos. Poachers have been harming these rhinos, and they must be transferred to avoid unnecessary interbreeding.

The use of a helicopter to lift sedated rhinos upside down by their feet is an ideal technique to transfer them. Radcliffe and his colleagues were concerned that inverting rhinos would cause breathing and cardiovascular issues. As a result of this, they tested 12 rhinos, both upright and upside down, to see if this was true. It turns out that it didn't make a difference and that it's perfectly acceptable to do so.

Did you know that the human beard can serve purposes other than good looks?

According to a report co-authored by Ethan Beseris of the University of Utah, human males evolved beards to defend themselves from punches to the face. The team was given the Ig Nobel Peace Prize for its brilliant hypothesis. This study did not include punching individuals. Instead, weights were dropped into a bone-like fibre epoxy composite wrapped in sheepskin (beard like material).

The findings of this study showed that hair is capable of lowering the force of contact from a blunt strike and absorbing energy, resulting in a lower failure rate. If the same is true for human facial hair, a long beard may assist in protecting weak areas of the facial bone, such as the jaw. Full beards are also thought to minimise facial skin and muscle damage.

Image: Pixabay
India and Australia on Saturday asserted that Afghanistan must not allow its soil to be used in any manner for terrorism and it should never again become a safe haven for "breeding and training" of terrorists, as the two countries held a detailed discussion on the situation in the war-torn country after its takeover by the Taliban.

At the inaugural India-Australia two-plus-two dialogue, the foreign and defence ministers of the two countries also vowed to work towards a free, open and inclusive Indo-Pacific, a region that has been witnessing increasing Chinese assertiveness.

With the dialogue coinciding with the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks that led to the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, both sides strongly called for combating terrorism without any compromise.

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and Defence Minister Rajath Singh held extensive in-person talks with their Australian counterparts Marise Payne and Peter Dutton.

Noting that Afghanistan was a "major subject of discussion", Jaishankar said,"we had a very detailed exchange of views and our approach is very similar in a way it is summed up by the UN Security Council Resolution 2593 which emphasises most of all that Afghanistan must not allow its soil to be used in any manner by anybody for terrorism."

Addressing a joint media briefing along with other ministers, the external affairs minister said there were also concerns relating to the composition of the interim Taliban cabinet as well as about the treatment of women and minorities.

"But apart from that (terrorism), there were issues of concerns about the inclusiveness of the dispensation, concerns about the treatment of women and minorities, matters related to travel of Afghans, issues relating to humanitarian assistance. It is an evolving situation and it was a good exchange of notes," he said.

Jaishankar said both sides agreed that the international community must be united in its approach, guided by UNSC Resolution 2593.

The UNSC resolution, adopted on August 30 under India's presidency of the global body, demanded that Afghan territory should not be used to threaten or attack any country or to shelter and train terrorists and plan or finance terrorist attacks.

"Today is the 20th anniversary of 9/11. It is a reminder- if one is still needed- of the importance of combating terrorism without compromise," he said.

"Close as we are to its epicentre, let us appreciate the value of international cooperation," he said, apparently referring to Pakistan with India often describing it as the "epicentre" of terrorism. However, he did not mention any country by name.

On her part, Payne said Australia shares a very strong interest in ensuring that Afghanistan never again becomes a "safe haven for breeding or training of terrorists", noting that it is an abiding concern of the international community.

"Along with the ongoing fight of terrorism, the future of Afghanistan remains a central concern to both of us," she said.

"Both of our countries have been victims of appaling terrorist attacks and this day, the 11th of September will be forever remembered for those terrible events 20 years ago when terrorism struck at the heart of our friend the United States, and by extension also a modern pluralist and democratic world," Payne said.

"It is fitting that minister Dutton and I should be here on this anniversary with such an important democratic partner," she added.

About the situation in Afghanistan, Payne said Australia is very much focused on seeking safe passage for Afghan citizens, foreign nationals and visa holders of other nations who want to leave that country.

"We have urged that they be allowed to leave safely. We are very conscious about the impact of violence and breaches of human rights of the Afghan community and would call for fundamental human rights to be observed," she said.

During the talks, the two sides also deliberated on the situation in the Indo-Pacific, South China Sea, ways to further deepen bilateral defence and trade cooperation and to effectively deal with the challenges of coronavirus pandemic.

Jaishankar said the 'two-plus-two' dialogue reflected the comfort that India and Australia have attained in the bilateral relationship, especially in strategic and security spheres, based on the growing convergence based on a shared commitment for a free, open, prosperous and rules-based Indo-Pacific region.

"The peaceful development of the Indo-Pacific region has been a focus of our relationship. Our two countries believe that it should be shaped in a participative and collaborative manner," he said.

Jaishankar said both sides reiterated their commitment to continue to work together for peace, stability and prosperity of all countries in the region.

"This would include a rules-based international order, freedom of navigation in international waters, promoting connectivity as well as respecting territorial integrity and sovereignty of all states," he said.

Jaishankar said the importance of ongoing cooperation in the multilateral arena for preserving the rules-based international order was also emphasised.

In his comments, Singh said both sides discussed various institutional frameworks for wide-ranging collaboration including defence cooperation and the fight against the global pandemic.

"During the discussions, both sides emphasised the need to ensure free flow of trade, adherence to international rules and norms and sustainable economic growth in the entire region," he said.

"On the bilateral defence cooperation we decided to expand military engagements across services, facilitate greater defence information sharing and to work closely for mutual logistic support," he said.

(With Inputs from PTI)
India and Australia held a '2+2' Ministerial Dialogue on Saturday in a bid to consolidate ties and strengthen the defence and security systems in the Indo-pacific region. The dialogue was attended by Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, External Affairs Minister Dr S Jaishankar, Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne and Defence Minister Peter Dutton in New Delhi.

Commencing the discussions, Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne said that the '2+2' Ministerial Dialogue have allowed the countries to elevate ties amid the uncertainty in the Indo-pacific region. "Today's inaugural 2+2 meeting is important and timely. It gives us the opportunity to build on the comprehensive partnership build by our Prime Ministers last year. The world has experienced considerable change since I was last in New Delhi for the Raisina Dialogue," she stated.

"Despite the economic and health crisis, we have elevated our ties to historic heights for an open and resilient Indo-pacific. It is safe to say that Australia and India have never been closer friends," she added.

The Foreign Minister also remarked that the leadership between India and Australia would provide the two countries with 'positive and practical growth' as they head into the 75th anniversary of their ties in 2022.

Addressing the meeting, Australia Defence Minister Peter Dutton stated that strengthening the defence relationship between the two countries was crucial amid the uncertainties in the Indo-pacific region. "This opportunity will help us take our defence and security partnership to the next level," he said.

Delhi: A '2+2' ministerial dialogue between India & Australia underway.



Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, EAM Dr S Jaishankar, Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne and Australia Defence Minister Peter Dutton were present pic.twitter.com/c2ROiltCRu  ANI (@ANI) September 11, 2021

India-Australia 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue

India is hosting the 2+2 dialogue with Australia in New Delhi between September 10-12 to boost the strategic cooperation between the two countries in the Indo-Pacific region. The ministers are looking forward to expanding the military cooperation in areas of maritime security, as well. Additionally, amid the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, sources have revealed that the 2+2 ministerial dialogue will see some major discussions on the war-torn nation and the security concerns.

"EAM Dr S Jaishankar & Defence Minister Rajnath Singh welcomed their Australian counterparts FM Marise Payne & Australia Defence Minister Peter Dutton for the India-Australia 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue. Bilateral, regional and global issues on the agenda," tweets MEA Spokesperson pic.twitter.com/XU83VCotxm  ANI (@ANI) September 11, 2021

The two countries' leaders had last interacted with each other after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison met during an online summit. In June 2020, India and Australia signed a landmark deal providing reciprocal access to military bases for logistic support.

Image: MEAIndia/Twitter
National Institute of Virology (NIV), Pune has sent a team of health officials to Kerala on Saturday to collect samples from fruit-eating bats. The purpose of the visit is to find the source of the Nipah Virus in Kozhikode, said the Public relation department of the state government. The team of health officials from NIV arrived on Friday, September 10 and visited the Nipah epicenter.

Due to the sudden surge in the number of cases of the Nipah virus, the officials of Kerala went into a state of panic. Back on September 8, Kerala Health Minister Veena George had announced that 68 people have been asked to isolate themselves after being tested positive for the Nipah Virus in Government Medical College in Kozhikode district of Kerala. Although the Nipah virus is a zoonotic virus, it has transferability from person to person and can also spread through contaminated food. Earlier last week, a medical team representing the Central government reached the district of Kozhikode after the state reported the first death due to the Nipah virus.

Kerala is trying to stop a potential outbreak of the Nipah virus as it continues its fight to curb the huge number of daily COVID-19 cases. The state has the highest number of COVID-19 cases in the country and has reported more than 50% of the total cases in the past two months. The state was shocked with the revisit of the Nipah virus as this would be the fourth time that the deadly virus has spread across the state. Last week, a 12-year-old boy succumbed to the virus which prompted the health officials to begin contact-tracing and isolating everyone who came into contact with the boy. It was later reported that the sample of eight primary contacts have been tested negative.

What is the Nipah virus?

Nipah virus was first identified in the late 1990s after an unknown virus spread in Malaysia. It was later discovered that it can by fruit bats, pigs and through human-to-human contact. As of now, there is no vaccine for the virus and the symptoms include raging fevers, convulsions and vomiting. The virus has a fatality rate of 40% to 75%, therefore is an extremely dangerous virus. The Kerala Health Minister said that more samples will be tested in the next week and other contacts of the boy are being monitored at a hospital.

(With ANI inputs)
To discuss the further diplomatic strategy on Afghanistan, India and Australia held the first round of talks on Saturday in a high-level meeting. Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, along with External affairs minister S Jaishankar met their Australian Counterparts, Peter Dutton & Marise Payne, in the 2+2 ministerial meet.

In the meeting, the ministers from both nations discussed the geopolitics surrounding Afghanistan and their upcoming diplomatic strategy, along with maritime security in Indo-Pacific, and other issues concerning multilateral cooperation.

On the same, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar tweeted, A productive 2+2 meeting today with Australia.

A productive 2+2 meeting today with Australia. pic.twitter.com/wVorRj4rks  Dr. S. Jaishankar (@DrSJaishankar) September 11, 2021



Defence Minister discusses Defence & multilateral Cooperation

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, while issuing a joint statement after the 2+2 ministerial meet said, "Today we held comprehensive discussions with Minister Payne and Minister Dutton over bilateral and regional issues. We also discussed different institutional frameworks for defence cooperation and cooperation in the fight against the pandemic. "We also exchanged views on Afghanistan, maritime security in Indo-Pacific, multilateral cooperation, and other matters," he added.

India shares an important strategic relationship with Australia and the meeting was another effort by both nations to bolster the ties. Asserting the same, Defence Minister said that India and Australia share an important partnership. As two democracies, our common interest lies in the peace and prosperity of the entire region," Singh added.

Agenda to strengthen Indo-Pacific region

He also asserted that the meeting also emphasised the shared vision of a free, open, inclusive and prosperous Indo-Pacific region. The discussions came as the Quad member countries reaffirmed their measures to enhance interaction in the Indo-Pacific region. The Quad also includes the United States and Japan, in addition to India and Australia.

In recent years, India and Australia have increased their defence and military cooperation. During an online summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Australian counterpart Scott Morrison in June last year, India and Australia elevated their ties to a comprehensive strategic partnership and signed a landmark arrangement for reciprocal access to military sites for logistics support.

The Talibans takeover in Afghanistan has brought about a significant change in global politics, as the world now fears the consequences of the terrorist groups rise to power. The situation in Afghanistan has dominated the international agenda, with international parties attempting to find measures to maintain regional stability.

(Image: Ministry of External Affairs/Instagram)
Assam Congress leader Gaurav Gogoi on Wednesday, September 8 wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging him to withdraw the Centre's scheme on palm oil plantations in Northeast India. In the letter, the Congress MP urged PM Modi to 'implement sustainable alternatives'. Gaurav Gogoi also tweeted describing the initiative as 'an alien species that will threaten the regions biodiversity and forces the people on an alternative economic model which is unsustainable must be revisited.'

Gaurav Gogoi's letter to PM Modi

The proposal to flood Northeast India with an alien species that threatens the regions biodiversity and forces the people on an alternative economic model which is unsustainable must be revisited. My letter to @PMOIndia on palm oil plantations in Northeast India. pic.twitter.com/BgK5wS3KsE  Gaurav Gogoi (@GauravGogoiAsm) September 11, 2021

Palm oil plantations - Congress MP fears diseases

In a one-page letter, Gaurav Gogoi wrote that Ebola disease in South Africa had spread 'by the oil palm plantation by bringing fruit bats in contact with people'.

"The History of oil palm cultivation points to serious ecological and social devastation that can result from its monoculture. South East Asian countries like Malaysia and Indonesia have borne its ill effects. The outbreak of Ebola in West Africa too was felicitated by the Oil Palm Plantations by bringing fruit bats in contact with people," read the letter.

The Congress MP has also cited negative effects on the environment and mentioned that the plantation can decertify the land of North East for being water-intensive. 'Human-wildlife conflicts are likely to increase and the economic vulnerability of forest-fringe communities will be worsened,' wrote Congress' Gaurav Gogoi.

Effect on income of farmers

The Congress MP has further claimed that the oil palm plantation can have 'adverse effects on the income of the farmers of the region'.

"80% are marginal farmers and it takes 5 to 7 years for maturation and will incur losses of Rs 7 lakh during this period. Once matured, oil palms can generate only Rs 1 lakh per ha. It will also push the region to the issues of food security," said Gaurav Gogoi.

Cabinet nod for oil palm boost

After PM Modi's August 15 speech on new Central scheme stating India can cultivate around 2,800,000 hectares of land for palm oil trees, especially in the northeast region, where over 900,000 hectares is feasible for such cultivation, the cabinet had approved Rs 11,040 crore for the plan. The move was to encourage palm oil production in India and decrease its import. Meanwhile, Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma said his government will ensure environmental safeguards before going ahead with Centres plans to promote palm oil cultivation in the Northeast region.
Thousands of people including former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah on Saturday attended the last rites of prominent National Conference leader T S Wazir here as various organisations demanded a CBI probe into his murder in Delhi.

Wazir, 67, a former member of the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Council, was found dead in a flat in West Delhi's Moti Nagar Thursday morning. Police are looking for two suspected persons who are believed to be behind his assassination.

A case of murder was registered in the matter and the investigation was transferred to Delhi Police's Crime Branch with the force's Special Cell to assist it.

As the body of the deceased reached his Gandhi Nagar residence here from Delhi, thousands of mourners turned up to pay their last respects to the deceased.

Wazir was a leading transporter who was also the chairman of All J-K Transport Welfare Association and Jammu District Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (DGPC).

Senior National Conference leaders including vice president Omar Abdullah and provincial president Devender Singh Rana also took part in the funeral which was also among others attended by senior BJP leader and former deputy chief minister Kavinder Gupta and senior vice president of J-K Congress and former minister Raman Bhalla.

Abdullah was seen consoling the bereaved family of the deceased including his wife and son who were in Canada and returned after the news of Wazir's death.

Wazir was a leader with qualities of heart and mind, who served the people in his different capacities. With his death, the National Conference has lost a public spirited leader and the vacuum created will be difficult to fill, Rana said, expressing solidarity with the bereaved family.

Wazir reached Delhi on September 2 and was scheduled to leave for Canada to visit his son. However, his highly decomposed body with his head wrapped in a plastic bag was found in the washroom of the flat after his family approached police to know his whereabouts.

The body was taken to Shashtri Nagar cremation ground in a procession and was consigned to flames.

Transporters and several Sikh organisations including Jammu DGPC have demanded a CBI probe into the killing of Wazir.

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
The leaking of crude oil in the waters causes massive loss of resources and has various debilitating effects on marine life. Highlighting the same, researchers now have found that the Deepwater Horizon rig that caused a massive oil spill incident, in April 2010, is still impacting the marine life around the mishap area. Reportedly, the incident saw leakage of over four million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico.

Deepwater Horizon oil spill

This oil spill incident is believed to be the biggest marine oil spill in history, caused by an explosion, on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig located in the Gulf of Mexico. A report by Britannica informed that the explosion occurred after a surge of natural gas blasted through a newly installed concrete lid. Reportedly, the weak lid couldn't contain the pressure created by the gas, making it travel upwards and ignite. As a result, over four million barrels of oil got mixed into the ocean following a massive explosion. The incident, which is blamed on British oil company BP, recorded 28 casualties including 11 deaths of the workers.

The aftermath continues

As per a Daily Mail report, the research conducted by scientists from the California Academy of Sciences has discovered significantly higher rates of metaplasia in Eastern oysters. Metaplasia is a condition that causes tissue abnormalities in the marine life of the former affected zone than that outside of it. The scientists reportedly analysed a total of 38 oyster specimens collected from the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, 2011 and 2013.

Surprisingly, scientists found 60 per cent of animals with digestive tract metaplasia, while the subjects caught from outside of the mishap zone were free from any abnormality. Nova Southeastern University's (NSU) Professor Deanne Roopnarine was reported saying that there were devastating differences between the oysters, which posed serious questions over the animal's survival.

However, the scientists lack tissue samples of oysters from before the spilling incident which is insufficient to reach a conclusion. Still, the researchers believe that the aforementioned findings inspire an even vast and longer-term monitoring efforts for Eastern oysters and other important marine species.

(Image Credits: AP)
Ousted Guinean President Alpha Conde is in good health, envoys from West Africas regional bloc ECOWAS said. According to the BBC, the delegation of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) visited Conde on 10 September. The visit came as diplomatic pressure mounted on Guineas ruling military following the detention of Conde last week. The envoys also met the leaders of the coup, including its figurehead Lieutenant Colonel Mamady Doumbouya.

After meeting the overthrown president in the coup leaders headquarters, ECOWAS President Jean-Claude Kassi Brou said, President Alpha Conde is well. It is to mention that ECOWAS and the African Union (AU) have suspended Guineas membership. The two groups have called for a return to constitutional order and for Condes immediate and unconditional release. The ECOWAS envoys have also demanded that the security forces maintain a constitutional posture.

The new military leaders, on the other hand, have pledged to install a transitional government. Guineas coup leaders have formed what they call the National Rally and Development Committee (CNRD), which dissolved the government and the constitution. The military even appointed army officers to head regional administrations, and ordered the central bank and other banks to freeze all government accounts, in a bid to secure state assets.

Aftermath of military coup

Mamady Doumbouya has accused Condes government of endemic corruption and trampling on citizens rights. The ousted president, who has been ruling the country since 2010, has faced criticism since he assumed the third term in office, saying that the two-term limit did not apply to him because of a referendum he had put forth. Conde was re-elected; however, the decision prompted protests across the nation.

Meanwhile, an alliance of 18 opposition parties in Guinea - Coalition for the Restoration of Democracy (CORED) - said that the military takeover of the nation is not a coup as Conde had previously changed the basic law in an unconstitutional manner. CORED said, The corrections that were made on September 5 should not be considered a coup d'etat in the classical sense. The opposition alliance went on to say that the rebels were bringing new prospects to Guinea. However, they also urged the Special Forces Group to respect the detained presidents physical and moral integrity.

(Image: AP)
Colonel Mamady Doumboya, the head of the junta that removed president Alpha Conde from power in Guinea, attended a meeting with members of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) in a hotel in Conakry on Friday.

Doumboya arrived in an armoured vehicle and escorted by militaries.

The mediators from Ghana, Nigeria, Togo and Burkina Faso along with ECOWAS commission president Jean-Claude Kassi Brou are expected to press the junta to immediately return Guinea to constitutional rule.

The 15-nation regional bloc suspended Guinea following Sunday's coup led by Doumbouya.

The group has urged the coup leaders to assure the safety of the deposed president and others who have been arrested.

Conde remains in the custody of the junta, who have only said that he is in a secure location with access to medical care.

Doumbouya and the special forces that put the West African nation under military rule for the first time in over a decade have criticized Conde's government for corruption and the poverty of Guinea's people.

They have created what they called the National Committee for Rally and Development (CNRD), lead by Doumbouya, that is ruling the country.

The junta leader portrayed himself as a patriot of Guinea, taking power for the people who remained poor.

However, experts say the coup happened after tensions increased between the army colonel and the president because of a recent proposal to cut some military salaries.

IMAGE: AP

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Moroccos King Mohammed VI on Friday appointed Aziz Akhannouch, the President of the National Rally of Independents (RNI), as the new Prime Minister in accordance with the constitutional provisions after the legislative election results were declared. The latter was immediately given the task to form a new government after the National Rally of Independents won a statement by the Royal Cabinet on Saturday, Sept.11 read. 61 years old Aziz Akhannouch from the RNI party served as Minister of Agriculture from 2007 to 2017. His party dominated the legislative, municipal, and regional elections on September 8, according to multiple agency reports.

RNI grabbed victory in the polls securing 102 of parliament's total 395 seats defeating Moroccos Islamist Justice and Development Party (PJD), which managed to secure just 13 seats. PJDs Saad Dine El Otmani had remained Moroccos Prime Minister since 2017. He condemned the results calling the victory of opposition RNI as driven by vote-buying. The Interior Ministry of Morocco released the results after all the ballots were counted earlier yesterday. Election turnout despite the pandemic was more than what it was in 2016 at over 50 per cent, reports suggest.

Akhannouch part of RNI in 2016

The billionaire businessman Akhannouch, who became a member of the party in 2016, was appointed as the countrys leader. Morocco King has appointed Akhannouch as head of the government and tasked him with forming a new government the palaces official statement read on Saturday. Akhannouchs RNI party that won a sweeping victory has been a part of coalition governments for the last 23 years. It won 9,995 of the total 31,503 seats in local polls, and 196 of the 678 in the regional polls. The next majority seat winner was Liberal Authenticity and Modernity Party (PAM), which clutched 86 seats.

The newly appointed Moroccan Prime Minister called the poll results a victory for democracy, its spirit and its rules while he addressed the state press. He lamented the devastation caused by the COVID pandemic in the country, saying that he will create a million jobs to boost the economy and eradicate unemployment. He also promised health insurance for all Moroccans and pensions for the retired elderly. The former agriculture minister is one of the richest men in Morocco with an estimated wealth of about $2 billion. He primarily runs fuel and gas distribution businesses.

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South Africa started vaccinating children and adolescents on Friday as part of the global Phase 3 clinical trials of China's Sinovac Biotech COVID-19 vaccine for children aged between 6 months and 17 years.

The global study will enroll 2,000 participants in South Africa and 12,000 others will be taking part in Kenya, the Philippines, Chile and Malaysia.

The first children in South Africa were inoculated at the Sefako Makgatho Health Sciences University in the capital Pretoria to kick off the trials, and others will get shots at 6 different sites across the country, the Sinovac company said in a statement Friday.

South Africa, which accounts for more than 35% of COVID-19 infections in Africa with 2.8 million confirmed cases including 84,327 deaths, has recently battled a resurgence driven by the delta variant.

South Africa has recorded 6,270 new infections and 175 deaths in the last 24 hours.

More than 7 million people have been fully vaccinated with either the single-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine or the two-dose Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.

The country is currently offering vaccines to all adults over 18 as it seeks to vaccinate at least 40 million of its 60 million population by the end of the year.

But health authorities are struggling to reach its target of vaccinating at least 300,000 people daily.

Health minister Joe Phaahla announced on Friday that the country would be issuing digital vaccination certificates to enable South Africans to produce these wherever they are needed.

While the government has said it will not force people to get vaccinated, some companies have already indicated that they will make vaccinations compulsory for their employees.

Various establishments like restaurants and bars would have to make their own decision on whether or not they serve unvaccinated patrons.

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Amid tensions between Beijing and Canberra, Australias Foreign Minister Marise Payne has said that in recent times China has presented challenges in the relationship. Speaking at the Third Indo-Pacific Oration organised by Observer Research Foundation (ORF) on Thursday, 9 September, Payne said that some of Chinas actions have threatened Australias national interest. She said that there are a number of actions that were enumerated publically by diplomats in Canberra, that were provided to the media by the Chinese embassy in Canberra.

Countries which respect open media would not agree to restrict that. Countries that respect the independence of institutions like think tanks and universities would not agree to restrict those. Countries that protect their own security in cyberspace and other areas would not agree to do that. And when we say our national interests were not advanced by those actions we will always say so, Payne added.

When asked about the Quad partnership, Payne went on to say that the group - comprising of US, Japan, Australia and India - present four great democracies that have shared interest in the region. Payne said that Quad is particularly present in the region that is open, independent, secure and stable. She went on to say that the group comes together with shared support for those global rules and norms that have given the exact prosperity and the capacity to be the nation we are today.

China-Australia relations

It is worth mentioning that Paynes remarks come amid rising tensions between the two nations. The relations between China and Australia have been in a downward spiral since April last year when Canberra infuriated Beijing by proposing an independent international inquiry into the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic. Australia has also been locked in an ongoing trade war with China for several months, which has seen China slap sanctions on various Australian products. In recent developments, China even decided to suspend all its activities under the Strategic Economic Dialogue with Australia.

During Thursdays meeting, while talking about Australia's bilateral relations with China, Payne termed its relation to being long-standing and of great importance. However, she also stated, We have seen the rise of China. It has lifted millions of people out of poverty but with that growth comes responsibility. She added, What we've seen in recent times is that this has presented challenges in the relationship.

(With inputs from ANI)




Albania's 140 new lawmakers were sworn in on Friday and elected a new speaker at the first session of parliament since elections almost five months ago.

Lindita Nikolla of the Socialist Party was elected parliamentary speaker, with 79 votes in favour and four against.

The main opposition center-right Democratic Party boycotted the vote after tearing up their ballot papers.

The elections were won, for the third time running, by the left-wing Socialist Party led by Prime Minister Edi Rama.

His party has 74 seats while the Democratic Party holds 59.

Rama has already named a 17-member Cabinet, 12 of whose members are women. Parliament is expected to approve it next week.

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The vice-president of the European Commission on Friday said that a compromise with the UK on the Northern Ireland Protocol could still be found.

Speaking after meeting local political leaders in Belfast, Maros Sefcovic said he told them that he wanted a "win-win" solution that benefited all parties.

The leader of the largest unionist party on Thursday warned that the power-sharing government could collapse if the protocol is not changed within weeks.

The protocol lays out rules for Northern Ireland trade and was agreed by the UK and the EU last year as part of the Brexit agreement.

Northern Ireland is the only part of the UK that has a land border with the 27-nation trade bloc.

The deal the two sides struck before Brexit means customs and border checks must be conducted on some goods moving between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK.

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Pope Francis is set to visit one of Europe's most marginalised communities next week when he travels to Slovakia and meets members of the Roma population. The encounter, in the Lunik IX quarter of Slovakia's second largest city of Kosice, will be one of the highlights of his trip.

Lunik IX has a reputation that could hardly be worse: a neighbourhood most Slovaks wouldn't dare to enter. But local resident Anna Turtakova says that's unfair. "Everybody's afraid of being eaten by wolves at Lunik IX but there are no wolves here, just people," she quips.

The neighbourhood is a fitting destination for Francis, the so-called Pope of the Peripheries. It's the largest of some 600 shabby segragated settlements where some of Slovakia's poorest Roma members live. Many of the Roma settlements lack even basic utilities such as running water or sewage systems, gas or electricity.

Local officials are preparing a warm welcome for the Pope. "It's a huge honor for us," Lunik IX mayor Marcel Sana says. For local priest Peter Zatkulak, the visit is a chance to reset the often-strained relartionship between the Roma and the rest of Slovakia's population.

"Through prayer, we'd like to seek reconciliation between the Slovaks and the Roma, and also the Church, because we have harmed each other and that has to end," he says. "It's time to say sorry and start all over again."

Roma have long suffered racism and discrimination in Slovakia and elsewhere in Central and Eastern Europe, and continue to face huge hurdles in employment and education. Residents of Lunik IX are hoping the Pope's visit will lead to a change for the better. "I've heard about him that he tends to visit the poorest, which might be the reason why he decided to come because this is the poorest neighborhood in Slovakia," said Monika Gulasova, 19, who's in a choir that will sing for Francis during a church service. Francis will arrive in Slovakia on Sunday after a brief stop in Hungary.

In addition to visiting the Roma in Kosice, he'll visit the Slovakian capital Bratislava and the city of Presov. The Pope will also meet with Slovakia's Jewish community and hear the testimony of a Holocaust survivor before wrapping up his trip with a Mass on Wednesday in Sastin, the site of an annual pilgrimage to venerate the patron saint of Slovakia, Our Lady of Sorrows. The last Pope to visit Slovakia was John Paul II in 2003.

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Police in Madrid on Thursday arrested a former Venezuelan spymaster wanted on U.S. narcoterrorism charges, capturing him in a hideout apartment nearly two years after he defied a Spanish extradition order and disappeared.

Gen. Hugo Carvajal, who for over a decade was late Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavezs eyes and ears in the Venezuelan military, was arrested in the small apartment in which he had been holed up.

He lived totally enclosed, never going outside or getting close to the window, always protected by people he trusted, Spain's police said in a statement on social media in which they posted a short video the moment heavily-armed officers put handcuffs on Carvajal.

Spain's leftist government last year approved Carvajals extradition to the U.S., where he faces federal charges for allegedly working with guerrillas from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia to flood the U.S. with cocaine.

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The US has removed its most advanced missile defense system and Patriot batteries from Saudi Arabia in recent weeks, even as the kingdom faced continued air attacks from Yemen's Houthi rebels, satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press show.

The redeployment of the defenses from Prince Sultan Air Base outside of Riyadh came as America's Gulf Arab allies nervously watched the chaotic withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, including their last-minute evacuations from Kabul's besieged international airport.

While tens of thousands of American forces remain across the Arabian Peninsula as a counterweight to Iran, Gulf Arab nations worry about the United States' future plans as its military perceives a growing threat in Asia. Tensions remain high as negotiations appear stalled in Vienna over Iran's collapsed nuclear deal with world powers, raising the danger of future confrontations in the region.

"Perceptions matter, whether or not they're rooted in cold, cold reality. And the perception is very clear that the U.S. is not as committed to the Gulf as it used to be in the views of many people in decision-making authority in the region," said Kristian Ulrichsen, a research fellow at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University.

From the Saudi point of view, they now see Obama, Trump and Biden as three successive presidents taking decisions that signify, to some extent, an abandonment. Prince Sultan Air Base, some 115 kilometres (70 miles) southeast of Riyadh, has hosted several thousand U.S. troops since a 2019 missile-and-drone attack on the heart of the kingdom's oil production.

That attack, though claimed by Yemen's Houthi rebels, appears instead to have been carried out by Iran, according to experts and physical debris left behind. Tehran has denied launching the attack, although a drill in January saw Iranian paramilitary forces use similar drones.

On the southwest of the air base's runway, a 1-square-kilometre (third-of-a-square-mile) area set off by an earthen berm saw American forces station Patriot missile batteries, as well as one advanced Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) unit, according to satellite images from Planet Labs Inc. A 'THAAD' can destroy ballistic missiles at a higher altitude than the Patriot missiles.

A satellite image seen by the AP in late August showed some of the batteries removed from the area, although activity and vehicles could still be seen there. A high-resolution Planet Lab satellite picture taken on Friday showed the batteries' pads at the site empty, with no visible activity.

Redeployment of the missiles had been rumoured for months, in part due to a desire to face what American officials see as the looming 'great powers conflict' with China and Russia. However, the withdrawal came just as a Houthi drone attack on Saudi Arabia wounded eight people and damaged a commercial jetliner at the kingdom's airport in Abha. The kingdom has been locked in a stalemate war with the Houthis since March 2015.

Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby acknowledged the redeployment of certain air defense assets after receiving questions from the AP. He said the U.S. maintained a broad and deep commitment to its Mideast allies.

"The Defense Department continues to maintain tens of thousands of forces and a robust force posture in the Middle East representing some of our most advanced air power and maritime capabilities, in support of U.S. national interests and our regional partnerships," Kirby said.

In a statement to the AP, the Saudi Defense Ministry described the kingdom's relationship with the U.S. as strong, longstanding and historic even while acknowledging the withdrawal of the American missile defense systems. It said the Saudi military is capable of defending its lands, seas and airspace, and protecting its people.

The redeployment of some defense capabilities of the friendly United States of America from the region is carried out through common understanding and realignment of defense strategies as an attribute of operational deployment and disposition, the statement said.

Despite those assurances, Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal, the kingdom's former intelligence chief whose public remarks often track with the thoughts of the ruling Al Saud family, has linked the Patriot missile deployments directly to America's relationship with Riyadh.

"I think we need to be reassured about American commitment," the prince told CNBC in an interview aired this week.

"That looks like, for example, not withdrawing Patriot missiles from Saudi Arabia at a time when Saudi Arabia is the victim of missile attacks and drone attacks not just from Yemen, but from Iran," he added.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, on a tour of the Mideast in recent days, had been slated to go to Saudi Arabia but the trip was cancelled due to what American officials referred to as scheduling problems. Saudi Arabia declined to discuss why Austin's trip didn't happen after the withdrawal of the missile defenses.

Saudi Arabia maintains its own Patriot missile batteries and typically fires two missiles at an incoming target. That's become an expensive proposition given the Houthi campaign, as each Patriot missile costs more than $3 million.

The kingdom also claims to intercept nearly every missile and drone launched at the kingdom, an incredibly high success rate previously questioned by experts.

While Greece agreed in April to lend a Patriot missile battery to Saudi Arabia, the timing of the U.S. withdrawals comes amidst wider uncertainty over the American posture in the region. Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab countries have renewed diplomacy with Iran as a hedge.

"I think we saw in Biden's statements on Afghanistan, the way he said things that he's clearly going to put U.S. interests first and obviously, that came as quite a disappointment to partners and allies around the world who may be hoped for something different after Trump. He sounds quite similar to an 'America First' approach, just sort of a different tone," said Ulrichsen.
Israeli police said an officer was lightly injured by a firearm in an attempt to thwart a suspected stabbing attack in Jerusalem's Old City on Friday.

Police did not immediately give any details as to how the officer was injured.

Police said in a statement that a Palestinian who tried to stab police officers was arrested.

The police officer was seen taken away in an ambulance.

Tensions have been high in Jerusalem as Palestinians have taken to protesting in support of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel.

On Wednesday, fires broke out at several prison facilities in Israel as the government searched for six Palestinian escapees who have been on the run since they tunnelled out earlier in the week.

The fires broke out amid efforts to try to move inmates as a precautionary measure by prison authorities.

An umbrella group representing prisoners from all Palestinian factions called on inmates to resist being relocated and to start fires in their cells if guards try to move them by force.

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The new U.N. special envoy for Yemen said Friday that the Arab worlds poorest nation is stuck in an indefinite state of war, and resuming negotiations to end the conflict wont be easy. Hans Grundberg, a Swedish diplomat who took up the post four days ago after serving as the European Unions ambassador to Yemen, told the U.N. Security Council that international mediation was "long overdue".

The Security Council welcomed Grundberg's appointment and said in a brief statement that it expects the parties to meet with him and with each other under U,N. auspices, in good faith and without preconditions. Yemen has been convulsed by civil war since 2014 when Iran-backed Houthi rebels took control of the capital of Sanaa and much of the northern part of the country, forcing the government of President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi to flee to the south, then to Saudi Arabia.

Yemen's U.N. representative Abdullah al-Saadi on Friday urged the international community to give "generous support" to his government to ensure economic stability and provide development as well as humanitarian assistance.

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The US has removed its most advanced missile defense system and Patriot batteries from Saudi Arabia in recent weeks, even as the kingdom faced continued air attacks from Yemen's Houthi rebels, satellite photos analysed by The Associated Press show.

The redeployment of the defenses from Prince Sultan Air Base outside of Riyadh came as America's Gulf Arab allies nervously watched the chaotic withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan, including their last-minute evacuations from Kabul's besieged international airport.

While tens of thousands of American forces remain across the Arabian Peninsula as a counterweight to Iran, Gulf Arab nations worry about the US's future plans as its military perceives a growing threat in Asia that requires those missile defenses.

Tensions remain high as negotiations appear stalled in Vienna over Iran's collapsed nuclear deal with world powers, raising the danger of future confrontations in the region.

Prince Sultan Air Base, some 115 kilometers (70 miles) southeast of Riyadh, has hosted several thousand US troops since a 2019 missile-and-drone attack on the heart of the kingdom's oil production.

That attack, though claimed by Yemen's Houthi rebels, appears instead to have been carried out by Iran, according to experts and physical debris left behind.

Tehran has denied launching the attack, though a drill in January saw Iranian paramilitary forces use similar drones.

Just southwest of the air base's runway, a 1-square-kilometer (third-of-a-square-mile) area set off by an earthen berm saw American forces station Patriot missile batteries, as well as one advanced Terminal High Altitude Air Defense (THAAD) unit, according to satellite images from Planet Labs Inc.

A THAAD can destroy ballistic missiles at a higher altitude than Patriots.

A satellite image seen by the AP in late August showed some of the batteries removed from the area, though activity and vehicles still could be seen there.

A high-resolution Planet Lab satellite picture taken Friday showed the batteries' pads at the site empty, with no visible activity.

A redeployment of the missiles had been rumoured for months, in part due to a desire to face what American officials see as the looming "great powers conflict" with China and Russia.

However, the withdrawal came just as a Houthi drone attack on Saudi Arabia wounded eight people and damaged a commercial jetliner at the kingdom's airport in Abha.

The kingdom has been locked in a stalemate war with the Houthis since March 2015.

In a statement to the AP, the Saudi Defense Ministry described the kingdom's relationship with the US as "strong, longstanding and historic" even while acknowledging the withdrawal of the American missile defense systems.

It said the Saudi military "is capable of defending its lands, seas and airspace, and protecting its people."

Saudi Arabia maintains its own Patriot missile batteries and typically fires two missiles at an incoming target.

That's become an expensive proposition amid the Houthi campaign, as each Patriot missile costs more than $3 million.

The kingdom also claims to intercept nearly every missile and drone launched at the kingdom, an incredibly high success rate previously questioned by experts.

While Greece agreed in April to lend a Patriot missile battery to Saudi Arabia, the timing of the US withdrawals comes amid wider uncertainty over the American posture in the region.

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Two Pakistani soldiers were killed and another was seriously hurt when unidentified gunmen opened fire on their convoy in the country's restive Balochistan province.

The Frontier Corps South soldiers were attacked in the mountainous Buleda area of Kech district on Friday.

The soldiers returned fire but the attackers managed to escape, officials said.

The martyred soldiers were a Lance Naik and a Sepoy. The injured soldier was taken to a nearby health centre.

Balochistan has been facing low-level violence by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) rebels and Baloch nationalists in recent months.

In the last three weeks, two major attacks have been reported.

On September 5, a suicide bomber of the outlawed TTP blew himself up in the province killing at least four security personnel and injuring 20 people.

The attack had targeted a Frontier Corps check post on the Mastung road in Quetta, the provincial capital.

The TTP had claimed responsibility for the attack.

The suicide attack took place less than two weeks after three Levies police personnel were killed and as many injured when their vehicle hit a landmine in the province's Ziarat district.

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As the US marks the 20th year of the 9/11 attacks, the international community came together to outpour solidarity in remembrance of one of the deadliest terror attacks in modern history. Pursuant to the date, Afghanistan's Embassy in Colombo extended its unison on a gloomy day. Taking to the official website, the Afghan envoy in Sri Lanka, M Ashraf Haidari, expressed his solidarity via a message.

"In memorial to the victims, we pay tribute to each innocent life lost on that tragic day, as well as condoling with the families and loved ones of the victims," message from Ambassador Haidari read.

The Embassy of Afghanistan in Colombo joins the Government of Sri Lanka and nations around the world in expressing our solidarity with the people and government of the United States on the tragic terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, that took 2,977 innocent lives, including 372 nationals from 90 countries, he added.

'September 11 is a sad but timeless reminder'

Haidari, who served as the Director-General of Policy and Strategy of the Ministry of the Foreign Affairs of Afghanistan from 2015-2018, stated that the day is a reminder of terrorist attacks on Americans and how the terrorists have been victimizing the people of Afghanistan.

"...having turned our beautiful country into a no man's land where poverty had become endemic; basic human rights had been daily violated; women had been reduced to sub-humans and confined to their homes, and global organized crime and terrorism had found a base of operations in isolated Afghanistan with worldwide targets," his message read.

The Afghanistan ambassador extended his gratitude to the international intervention pursuant to the 9/11 attacks. He claimed that Afghanistan was 'liberated from the dark forces of extremism, terrorism, criminality and the regional state-actors'.

"To preserve these hard-earned gains against escalated terrorist attacks in recent years, the Government and people of Afghanistan engaged in sincere peace efforts and made an unprecedented concession for peace by releasing over 5,000 Taliban prisoners," he stated.

A remorseful Afghan envoy, who on September 10 took part in 'The Debate' show on Republic TV, cited the fold of events since the Afghan peace process started aligning with the Doha Agreement between the Taliban and the US, which excluded the government and people of Afghanistan.

"Taliban reneged on all their commitments under the Agreement. Instead, they interpreted the Agreement as one of capitulation by NATO, emboldening and encouraging them to escalate violence across Afghanistan. Consequently, the past three months have seen the complete destruction of local state institutions, demolishing of infrastructure, displacement of over 500,000 suffering Afghans, as well as the killing and wounding of 1,000s of others," Haidari stated.

Furthermore, he urged the international community to enable Afghanistan to stand on its own as a sovereign, independent, and progressive country at peace within itself and with the rest of the world.
The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on 10 September informed that Germany has handed the instrument of accession to the International Solar Alliance (ISA) after signing the alliance agreement. MEA spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said that the ISA was handed over during a meeting of German Parliamentary Secretaries, German Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development with Secretary (ER) Dammu Ravi and Joint Secretary (Enforcement Directorate) Noor Rahman Sheikh. .

Germany Ratifies ISA Agreement!

 handed Instrument of Accession to @isolaralliance during meeting of Dr Maria Flachsbarth & Mr Norbert Barthle, Parliamentary State Secretaries, Ministry of Economic Cooperation & Development, with Sec(ER) Dammu Ravi & JS(ED) Noor Rahman Sheikh pic.twitter.com/z78spAhXfI  Arindam Bagchi (@MEAIndia) September 10, 2021

According to ANI, membership in ISA was limited to 11 sun-belt countries lying between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn. However, now the alliance is starting to look beyond the tropics. It is worth noting that there are currently 124 member nations and ISAs main objective is to work for the efficient consumption of solar energy in a bid to reduce dependence on fossil fuels.

International Solar Alliance Framework agreement

Earlier, major solar energy economies such as Germany werent allowed to join the alliance as it was increasingly seen as a foreign policy tool. But now, Germanys membership in the ISA is expected to help with Indias cross-border power grid plan - One Sun, One World, One Grid. The plan seeks to transfer solar power generated in one region to feed the electricity demands of others.

The ISA Framework initiative was launched by PM Narendra Modi at the India Africa Summit and a meeting of member countries ahead of the 2015 UN Climate Change Conference in Paris in November 2015. The framework agreement of the ISA opened for signatures in Marrakech, Morocco in 2016. Sputnik reported that around 84 countries have signed the ISA agreement framework, and about 67 have ratified it. Germany is aiming at generating two-thirds of its electricity needs from solar and wind by 2030.

(With inputs from ANI)




Amid increasing reports of the Taliban's brutality in Panjshir, Iran once again condemned the 'unjustifiable' attack on the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan. During the United Nations Security Council meeting to discuss the situation in Afghanistan, Iran's permanent representative at the UN Majid Takht-Ravanchi stated that the offensive in the aforesaid province went against the global consensus that a government that comes to power by force will not be recognized. Batting for intra-Afghan negotiations, he called for the formation of an inclusive government through free and fair elections.

Most importantly, Takht-Ravanchi stressed that women must be allowed to not only vote but also participate in the polls. As per reports, he also hinted that his country might recognize the new regime in Afghanistan if the Taliban fulfills all its commitments. Earlier, Iran's foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh had condemned "foreign interference" in the affairs of the war-torn country alluding to Pakistan's nefarious role.

The recent unjustifiable attack and condemnable fratricide in #Panjshir is in contradiction with the united position of the international community: @TakhtRavanchi at #UNSC#Afghanistan pic.twitter.com/rUKE1NQUWg  Permanent Mission of I.R.Iran to UN, NY (@Iran_UN) September 10, 2021

Situation in Panjshir

While Afghanistan president Ashraf Ghani resigned and fled the country with his associates after the Taliban stormed into Kabul on August 15, the NRF under the leadership of Afghanistan's 'caretaker' president Amrullah Saleh and Ahmad Massoud tried their best to prevent the terror group from capturing Panjshir. On September 5, the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan suffered a big setback after its spokesperson Fahim Dashty and General Sahib Abdul Wadood Zhor were killed during the fighting with the terrorist outfit. Even though the Taliban claimed that it had taken over the province on September 6, the NRF called upon people to continue their resistance.

According to reports, the Taliban is yet to control the entire province with the NRF leadership still holed up in strategic positions. Afghanistan's ambassador to Tajikistan Zahir Aghbar has insisted that Saleh and Massoud have not left the war-torn country. Speaking about the situation in Panjshir at the UNSC a day earlier, Afghanistan's envoy to UN Ghulam Isaczai said, "We have eyewitness accounts of Taliban's widespread atrocities which are perpetrated with support of foreign terrorist fighters and foreign intel and military assets". The terrorist group also mercilessly killed the Afghanistan 'caretaker' president's brother Rohullah Saleh when he was on his way to Kabul from Panjshir.
Just two days before the final US military plane C-17 departed the Hamid Karzai International Airport carrying the last US troops, a hellfire missile was launched off a reaper drone on August 29, that targeted a parked white sedan in a Kabul neighbourhood. US officials said that the drone strike blew up the vehicle carrying several suicide bombers from Afghanistans Islamic State affiliate [ISIS-K] who were planning another explosion during the final phase of the Kabul drawdown.

US President Joe Biden had directed the US Armed Forces to conduct the drone attack in retaliation for the deadly suicide bombing that killed 13 US military personnel, and nearly 170 Afghans.

Pentagon announced that the strike neutralized high-profile facilitator and a planner" for the ISIS-K. Pentagon also revealed that there were just two men on the scene at the time when the strike was authorized by President Biden - the driver and one other man that Pentagon was confident had links with IS. The drone strike, according to a US officials statements, on condition of anonymity, was ordered by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.

US military had first announced that at least one person was killed, later rectifying, We were able to recognize that another was killed as well and one wounded. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said at a Defense Department briefing, I wont speak to the details of these individuals and what their specific roles might be, they were ISIS-K planners and facilitators and thats enough reason.

Kirby had also declined to identify the terrorists at the presser, though in a statement shortly made public, US Central Command said that it believed its strike killed no civilians. USCENTCOM described the target as having ties with Islamic State-Khorasan and that the vehicle would have produced significant secondary explosions as it indicated a substantial amount of explosive material.

The missile took about half a minute to reach the white sedan, a report carried by US newspaper New York Times claimed, adding that three children approached the car just seconds before the car was blown off.

[Afghan people are seen inside a house after U.S. drone strike in Kabul, Afghanistan. Credit: AP]

The paper attributed the claims to a senior US military official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, giving details from the ongoing military investigation. All the children were killed and another seven people had also died. Ahead of the drone attack, the US President addressed the reporters at the White House, promising revenge.

US President said: We will hunt you down and make you pay.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said that Bidens national security team had advised the president and vice president about another lethal attack in the closing days of a frantic US-led airlift. The State Department had advised the US citizens to stay away from Kabul airport, especially from the New Ministry of Interior gate. In the aftermath of the strike, US Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, confirmed to the media that an Islamic State facilitator was killed.

I'm not going to talk about specific capabilities ISIS may have lost in this strike," Kirby had told reporters at the White House briefing on US-commanded drone strike. "They lost a planner, and they lost a facilitator, and they've got one wounded. And the fact that two of these individuals are no longer well longer walking on the face of the earth  that's a good thing.

In shocking details revealed on Friday, Sept. 10, imagery of the damage on the site of the US drone strike provided by Washington Post, and dozens of US military assessments of the operation by weapons experts, analysis by physicists, former bomb technicians, non-profits that employed the driver that drone targeted found that there was no evidence that the car contained explosives.

At least two experts, whose names were not disclosed due to security concerns, said that all evidence gathered from the scene point to the ignition of fuel tank vapours after the US strike on vehicles. And this, perhaps, was the potential cause of the second blast, indicating that the car in fact had no ISIS bombs as such.

Separately, the victimised drivers employer shot down suspicions on the driver and said, US military may have misinterpreted what he was doing as he moved from place to place and loaded packages into the vehicle, they said, according to a report carried by Washington Post.

[Credit: AP]

[Emal Ahmadi shows a photo of his family member who was killed during a U.S. drone strike. Credit: AP]

[Afghans inspect damage of Ahmadi family house after U.S. drone strike in Kabul. Credit: AP]

A relative of the other civilian casualties had earlier told CNN reporters on ground that the US drone strike killed ten members of one Ahmadi family, including seven children. The youngest victims of the imminent airstrike, as Pentagon officials described, were two 2-year-old girls. This was confirmed by family members and neighbours. One of the children named Malikas remains were found in the rubble, although it remains unclear if she was inside the car or playing around when the compound was hit by a drone strike.

We are not ISIS or Daesh and this was a family home -- where my brothers lived with their families. This, was an ordinary family," statement of a relative of the victim family read as recorded by CNN. When funeral was held and 10 family members with 2-year-old girls, Malika and Sumaya were laid in coffins, their Afghan relative yelled, Death to America.

Army Maj. Gen. William Taylor of the Joint Staff later that day on Aug. 30 told a press briefing: "We are aware of reports of civilians casualties. We take these reports extremely seriously.

Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, meanwhile defended the drone operation, as he called it a righteous strike that not only foiled the terror attack plans of Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan but saved lives of American troops.

"We're investigating this. I'm not going to get ahead of it. But if we have significant -- verifiable information that we did take innocent life here, then we will be transparent about that, too. Nobody wants to see that happen, "Pentagon spokesman John F. Kirby told a media briefing in a change of initially made statement. Were there others killed? Yes, there are others killed, Milley said a few days later in the press conference, adding Who they are, we dont know. US Central Command, meanwhile, had refrained from a response to the agencies in the US, but as per NYTimes, they launched an official investigation.

Site struck out of 'reasonable certainty'

In a statement separately, US Military officials said that the Army had credible intelligence about another bomb threat at Hamid Karzai airport and that the white sedan was going be used for the same. Out of reasonable certainty, the vehicle was surveilled and followed by military forces for over eight hours, a US Army official told NY Times on condition of anonymity.

The operation kicked off on the morning of August 29 and the military then zeroed in on a building that they suspected was a safe harbor for ISIS-K linked to a bomb blast near Abbey Gate. Intercepted communications found that the car was supposed to meet a motorcycle and then leave the location with 10 on board. As the white sedan pulled into the courtyard in the northwestern Kabul neighborhood of Khaje Bughra, it was struck, the official said.

Officers had obtained 450-square-foot yard satellite imagery where the drone strike was conducted days ahead. US Defense Department declined to publicly release video of the attack, citing the ongoing probe. However, it is being reported that the courtyard may not have been a highly sensitive area, but had a tree surrounded by four walls where a red Toyota SUV was parked to the west and the white sedan that was struck in the back.

White Sedan belonged to 'charity business', says California based firm

California-based Nutrition and Education International (NEI), the US company that operated the white sedan, said that the car belonged to a charity business. Steven Kwon, the president of NEI claimed that the driver was Zamarai Ahmadi, a technical engineer for the Non-Profit and the other casualty was an emergency food aid program worker who had arrived that morning to discuss aid for displaced Afghan people. Both had left to run errands with the car, Kwon told the paper.

While Pentagon argued that there was significant secondary explosions observed on drone footages, Ferenc Dalnoki-Veress, an explosives expert with the Middlebury Institute of International Studies that prepared a 19-page blast analysis, argued that there was no substantial amount of explosives in the car and blast occurred due to fuel vapors. It further stressed that the walls in the courtyard would have sustained catastrophic damage had the explosives gone off.

My theory is: The [Hellfire] explosives themselves ruptured the gas tank, released the vapor, and because of the fire that happened a short time afterward, it detonated and caused something that may have been explosion-like, he reportedy said in a statement.

A former Air Force bomb technician, Brian Castner, reviewed the analysis data and the site, and concluded that the gas tank was ruptured by the fire and that the other signs of a big explosion were missing.
Indias Permanent Representative to the United Nations TS Tirumurti on Friday, 10 September chaired the United Nations Security Council's (UNSC) meeting on Libya Sanctions Committee. During the session, Tirumurti reported on activities of SCR 1970 Committee in relation to Panel of Experts deliberations, asset freeze, an arms embargo, travel ban exemptions, etc. Tirumurti stated that the Committee is committed to peace and stability in Libya.

Briefed UN #SecurityCouncil on Libya as Chair of Libya Sanctions Committee



I reported on activities of SCR 1970 Committee relating to Panel of Experts deliberations, assets freeze, arms embargo, travel ban exemptions etc



Committee committed to peace & stability in #Libya pic.twitter.com/RQaNeP1oW4  PR/Amb T S Tirumurti (@ambtstirumurti) September 11, 2021

India began its eighth term as a non-permanent member of the UNSC chaired on Libya Sanctions Committee, also called the 1970 Sanctions Committee. Previously, Tirumurti had said that the Committee is a very important subsidiary body of the council, which implements the sanctions regime, including a two-war arms embargo on Libya, a travel ban, etc. He had added that India will be assuming the Chair of this Committee at a critical juncture when there is an international focus on Libya and on their peace process.

It is to mention that the North African country has had little peace since the 2011 NATO-backed uprising that overthrew Gaddafi. In 2014, the nation also saw the division between the warring eastern and western sanctions. However, last year, they agreed to a ceasefire, and the unity government backed by both sides was installed in March to prepare for national elections in December.

Work and mandate of Committee

Meanwhile, it is worth mentioning that the Committee comprises all 15 members of the Security Council and makes its decision by consensus. Tirumurti will be the Chair of the Committee for the period ending 31 December 31, 2021. Ireland is currently the Vice-Chair of the Committee. According to the official UN's website, the Libya Sanctions Committee prepares annual reports of the nations activities.

The committee is mandated to monitor the implementation of the sanctions measures, designate those individuals subject to the travel ban and asset freeze measures, report within thirty days to the Security Council on its work for the first report and thereafter to report as deemed necessary by the Committee, encourage dialogue between Committee and the Member States, examine and take appropriate action on information regarding alleged violations or non-compliance with the measures, and seek from all States whatever information it may consider useful regarding the actions taken by them to implement effectively the sanctions measures.

(With inputs from ANI)




The new U.N. special envoy for Yemen said Friday that the Arab worlds poorest nation is stuck in an indefinite state of war and resuming negotiations to end the more than six-year conflict wont be easy.

Hans Grundberg, a Swedish diplomat who took up the post four days ago after serving as the European Unions ambassador to Yemen since 2019, told the U.N. Security Council that there are no quick wins in Yemen's civil war.

To chart the best way forward, he said, he plans to review what has worked and what hasnt, and "listen to as many Yemeni men and women as possible.

The conflict parties have not discussed a comprehensive settlement since 2016, Grundberg said. It is therefore long overdue for the conflict parties to engage in peaceful dialogue with one another under U.N. facilitation on the terms of an overarching settlement, in good faith and without preconditions.

Yemen has been convulsed by civil war since 2014 when Iran-backed Houthi rebels took control of the capital of Sanaa and much of the northern part of the country, forcing the government of President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi to flee to the south, then to Saudi Arabia.

A Saudi-led coalition entered the war in March 2015, backed by the United States, to try restore Hadi to power, and threw its support behind his internationally backed government. Despite a relentless air campaign and ground fighting, the war has deteriorated largely into a stalemate and spawned the worlds worst humanitarian crisis. The U.S. has since suspended its direct involvement in the conflict.

The U.N.s approach to ending the conflict must include "meaningful participation of women, Grundberg said.

Surveying the complex situation in Yemen, he said that since early 2020 the focus has been on the Houthi offensive in the government-held city of Marib which has cost the lives of thousands of young people and left thousands of displaced civilians living in constant fear of violence and having to move again. In the key port city of Hodeida, there has been a noticeable decline in cease-fire violations, but hostilities in southern districts are of particular concern, he said.

In southern Yemen, Grundberg said, there have been regular flare-ups of violence and basic services and the economy have deteriorated. He stressed that southern grievances and demands must play a partin determining the path forward.

Ghada Eltahir Mudawi, a deputy director in the U.N. humanitarian office, told the council that the threat of famine is not over in Yemen but there has been a surge in donor funding over the past few months with the U.N. receiving more than $1.9 billion -- 50% of its total requirement.

As a result, she said, the U.N. has scaled up assistance, reaching 12.8 million people in June -- 3.3 million more than in May -- and famine has been prevented in the first eight months of the year.

Mudawi said a high-level side event on Yemen will take place on Sept. 22 at the U.N. General Assemblys annual gathering of world leaders co-hosted by the European Union, Sweden and Switzerland.

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Russia on Friday summoned the US Ambassador John Sullivan to the foreign office to discuss Americas alleged meddling in the upcoming parliamentary elections. The election interference, of which not many specific details were disclosed, were allegedly conducted by US tech giants. US envoy Sullivan arrived at the Moscow foreign affairs buildings and left 20 minutes after the talks. The latter did not answer reporters about what the dialogue entailed. In a press release issued on Friday, Russias Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov met with the US Ambassador to Russia, George Sullivan, about interference in the internal affairs of Moscow.

Russian side possesses irrefutable evidence of the violation of Russian legislation by the American 'digital giants' in the context of the preparation and conduct of elections to the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation, the statement from Russian Foreign Ministry on Sept. 10 read. Some other issues of a bilateral nature were also considered, it added.

Calling the US alleged meddling in Russias democracy as interference that was unacceptable, the Russian foreign ministry stated that Sullivan was informed that Moscow has proof of violations of Russian law by US tech firms ahead of elections of State Duma by the end of September. Courts in Russia have earlier penalised the US giants like Google, Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp with millions of rubles over security breaches. Russian President Vladimir Putin has also consistently accused American companies of failing to adhere to the Russian state laws and keeping secure the citizens' personal data.

Russia penalises US-based companies for 'breach of state laws'

Facebook and Russia have also locked horns in the past over the removal of government-linked accounts without consent. Russia had also accused the US-based social platforms of failing to take down the illegal content from the websites. Moscow reportedly fined Facebook with 15 million rubles, 17 million rubles against Twitter, and WhatsApp was fined four million rubles in a first-time law breach of law case, according to Russia's Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media (Roskomnadzor). As per legislation passed by Russia in 2014, the personal data of Russian users must be stored on local servers. Despite the law, the microblogging platform and Facebook were penalised earlier for not complying with country media law, whereas Google was fined last month.

Image: AP
Singapore, Sep 11 (PTI) Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong warned on Saturday that the fight against terrorism is "far from over" two decades after the 9/11 attack in the United States, and that terrorist groups in faraway places were serious threats to Singapore.

"Terrorist groups in these faraway places were serious threats to Singapore," he said in a commentary published on the 20th anniversary of the Al-Qaeda attacks in the United States.

"Extremist terrorism has metastasized. Digital media has amplified the poison," said Lee.

"Al-Qaeda was succeeded by ISIS, which has lost physical territory but continues to operate, including online. Lone-wolf attackers have self-radicalised on the internet." Lee highlighted how this year in Singapore, the authorities arrested two self-radicalised Singaporean youths who were preparing lone-wolf attacks -- one on a synagogue and the other on a mosque.

"And now that the US has left Afghanistan, we will have to watch closely how the situation there develops, whether groups based in Afghanistan will again threaten our security, and where else new fronts of terrorism may emerge," he said.

At the same time, Singapore's racial harmony is still a work in progress, said Lee of the city state's multi-racial society.

"9/11 showed how powerful are the forces that can pull us apart, and how careful we must be when making any changes to the formula that has delivered racial and religious harmony for Singapore," wrote the prime minister in the commentary.

"Never assume we have overcome for good the tendency of people to identify with their own racial and religious groups. We have to keep on bringing all the communities closer together, and from time to time adjust the delicate balance that the different communities have reached," the Channel News Asia quoted Lee from the commentary.

Internationally, Singapore cooperated with other countries to share intelligence and to "fight a common scourge". The Singapore Armed Forces participated in the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan, and contributed to the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS in Iraq, he said.

But terrorism was a greater threat to the country's mutual trust and social cohesion, said Lee.

In the face of such extremism, and especially after several Singaporean members of the JI were detained, non-Muslims in Singapore could easily have become fearful and suspicious of their Muslim neighbours, colleagues and friends, Lee said.

Muslims, in turn feeling distrusted and threatened, could have closed in on themselves.

"We would have been divided by race and religion. And if an attack had actually taken place here, our society could have been torn apart." Instead, Singaporeans "instinctively pulled together", and responded strongly and cohesively to keep themselves safe, said Lee.

Community and religious leaders from all groups and faiths came out to condemn the terrorist attacks, and stood in solidarity with one another.

"In particular, Muslim leaders were forthright in repudiating the terrorists, and they guided the community on the true teachings of Islam. Non-Muslim leaders too spoke up in support of religious tolerance and to express confidence in their fellow Singaporeans," he said.

The government held open discussions with leaders of all groups and closed door briefings to the key leaders, to share with them sensitive intelligence and threat assessments.

At the grassroots level, inter-racial and religious confidence circles were organised all over Singapore. These local networks of leaders were meant to manage any racial and religious tensions after a terrorist attack.

Singapore also sought to rehabilitate those led astray by the violent extremist ideology, said Lee.

"Because we did all this, our racial and religious harmony held, and indeed strengthened. This was vital, as the threat was real and continuing, said Lee, as he listed attacks and threats in the years since, including the Bali bombings, attacks in Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur and Bangkok, and the siege of Marawi in Southern Philippines.

Singapore, too, remains a prime target, he said. More than once, terrorists planned attacks on Singapore, including one to hijack and crash an airliner into the Changi Airport control tower, and another to launch rockets at Marina Bay Sands from Batam, an Indonesia island about an hour boat ride from the city state.

"The price of security is eternal vigilance. The price of harmony is an unflagging effort to uphold and realise ever more fully our nation's founding ideal to become one people, regardless of race, language, or religion," said Lee.

"Singaporeans shared experience of 9/11 and its aftermath is another formative chapter in our nation building journey. On its 20th anniversary, let us resolve to fortify ourselves so that should we ever face another such test one day, we will come through again, stronger, as one united people," he added. PTI GS SMN SMN

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On September 11, 2001, exactly 20 years ago, America witnessed one of the most heinous events carried by the terrorist group Al-Qaeda. Nearly 3000 people lost their lives and countless were injured at New York's World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and a field in Pennsylvania. The 9/11 attacks is considered one of the darkest events in American history that transformed the United States forever. Today on September 11, 2021, after 20 years, the United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres issued a statement recalling the most heinous event that took place in America.

The UN chief issued an official statement that read, "Today we mark a sombre day, seared in the minds of millions of people around the world. A day when nearly 3,000 lives from over 90 countries were taken by terrorists in cowardly and heinous attacks in the United States of America. Thousands more were injured. On this day, my thoughts are with the victims and their families. We pay tribute to the survivors, who have had to overcome physical and emotional scars to get on with their lives. We honor the first responders who put themselves in harms way, with many making the ultimate sacrifice, exemplifying the very humanity and compassion that terrorism seeks to erase".

The statement further read, "And we remember the solidarity, unity and resolve expressed 20 years ago by the international community, aiming for a future without terrorism. Today, we stand in solidarity with the people of New York City, the United States of America, as well as all victims of terrorism everywhere around the world. We recommit ourselves to working together to uphold their rights and needs."

US President Joe Bidden also remembered the 9/11 attack and paid tribute to people who lost their lives 20 years ago. To commemorate the day, Biden released a video message and urged Americans to show unity. He said, "We learned that unity is the one thing that must never break." Meanwhile, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson also remembered 9/11, and said the attacks had failed "to shake our belief in freedom and democracy."

20 years after September 11, 2001, we commemorate the 2,977 lives we lost and honor those who risked and gave their lives. As we saw in the days that followed, unity is our greatest strength. Its what makes us who we are  and we cant forget that. pic.twitter.com/WysK8m3LAb  President Biden (@POTUS) September 10, 2021

The 9/11 attacks

On the morning of September 11, 2001, hardline Islamist group, Al-Qaeda's supreme leader Osama bin Laden plotted the 9/11 attacks from within Afghanistan. The terrorist group had launched four US passenger jets into three different locations. Two jets were flown right into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York, while the third aircraft crashed into the Pentagon, outside Washington DC, and the fourth hit a field in Pennsylvania. The most brutal attack in American history claimed the lives of 2977 people belonging from 90 countries, while 19 suicide attackers also died. Laden had plotted the attack because he believed the US and its allies were triggering conflicts in the Muslim world. In response to the attack, the US-led an invasion into Afghanistan to eradicate al-Qaeda and hunt down Al Qaeda chief. However, the US was successful in assassinating Bin Laden after 10 years. In 2011, US troops finally located Osama and killed him in Pakistan's Abbottabad.

IMAGE: AP
UN Envoy for Afghanistan, on Thursday, 9 September 2021, called for a modus vivendi for money to flow in the Taliban controlled state and tackle the dire humanitarian crisis that has ensued. Addressing a virtual UN Security Council meeting, Deborah Lyons said that while frozen funds and assets were necessary to deprive the Taliban of resources, it could trigger an economic slowdown and throw millions of Afghans in poverty and hunger while setting the country back for generations. Notably, international organisations and western powers including the US have frozen billions of funds including donor aids.

To tackle the problem, she called for a Modus Vivendi or a way of life' to be created so that Afghanistans economy could breathe for a few more months. Highlighting that the central Asian country was already in a humanitarian crisis before the Taliban takeover, the UN official said that the crisis must not wait for political decisions, adding that the aid could help desperate Afghans struggling to make ends meet. Additionally, a release of funds could also give the Taliban a chance to depict a genuine willingness to do things differently this time.

"A modus vivendi must be found -- and quickly -- that allows money to flow to Afghanistan to prevent a total breakdown of the economy and social order," she was quoted as saying by Xinhua News.

'Aid should be distributed by NGOs'

Lyons proposed that while it was pivotal to release funds and supplies to Afghanistan, it was equally essential to ensure that the money is spent where it is needed and not misused by the Talibs. For that, she said, the aid needed to be disseminated through the UN and other Non-Governmental organisations.

"In the current environment, the UN role must be clear and build on our humanitarian imperative. There is an immediate and pressing need to deliver, on a huge scale, essential humanitarian aid in areas such as health, food security, non-food items, and sanitation," said Lyons.

SGs Special Representative for #Afghanistan @DeborahLyonsUN warns that #Afghanistan could face a far deeper crisis ahead. Full transcript of her remarks today to the Security Council session on Afghanistan available here: https://t.co/vqeM68XKLi pic.twitter.com/gdhvAmSqWJ  UNAMA News (@UNAMAnews) September 9, 2021

Earlier in August, the Taliban ordered banks to reopen but residents said that most of the banks remained closed. Meanwhile, a discreet report revealed the skyrocketing price of food and water at Kabuls international airport. An added problem is that many of the storekeepers are now demanding US dollars instead of Afghan currency, further escalating the turmoil.

Image: AP


Twenty years later, the mastermind of one of the deadliest terror attacks that had killed over 3,000 people, still awaits trial. As Saturday marks the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Twin Towers at World Trade Center, the mind behind the attack, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed along with four other convicts detained in Guantanamo Bay, faces trials.

Who is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed?

An Engineering student from one of the esteemed American universities unleashed the most horrifying terror attack in the history of the United States. Sixty years after 1944s Pearl Harbor attack, on September 11, 2011, the US had fallen in shambles again, as terrorists wreaked havoc in Manhattan.

The plot of the terror attack was all planned by the English speaking Mohammed, who was born in Kuwait. As per the investigation by the 9/11 commission, he was the one who had devised the plan and then proposed it to terror outfit Al-Qaeda.

Khalid was born to Pakistani parents in Kuwait in 1964/65 and was brought up in the Gulf country. He later moved to the US and graduated with a degree in mechanical engineering from North Carolina A&T State University in 1986. Khalid travelled to Peshawar, Pakistan, in 1987, where he met Mujahid Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, the head of Hizbulittihad El-Islam, who became his mentor and gave him military training.

During this time, Khalid also had his first encounter with Osama bin Laden. Between 1988 to 1992, Khalid worked for a Sayyaf-funded organisation that aided Mujahideen and later in 1998, he joined Al-Qaeda.

He was also engaged in the World Trade Center bombing in 1993, as he had transferred money to one of the suspects. This is when he initially drew the attention of US security officials. Khalid was abducted from Pakistan by the CIA in 2003 and was detained secretly for three years.

Recently, he along with four other alleged 9/11 plotters, appeared in a military court for a pre-trial hearing in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, on September 7. All five - Mohammed, Walid Muhammad Salih Mubarak Bin 'Attash, Ramzi Bin al-Shibh, Ali Abdul Aziz Ali, and Mustafa Ahmed Adam al Hawsawi - are accused of being involved in planning and executing the 2001 attacks. If convicted, all five detainees could receive the death penalty.

9/11 attacks

The 9/11 terrorist attacks were one of the deadliest attacks faced by the US in its history. Over 3,000 people were killed. The terrorist group had crashed three commercial jet planes into the twin towers of New Yorks World Trade Center and the Pentagon outside Washington DC.

A fourth hijacked plane believed to be targetting the US Capitol building, however, had crashed in a Pennsylvania field. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is believed to be one of the key terrorists who were behind the attack. After 9/11, the US had sent its troops to Afghanistan to kill Osama Bin Laden, who was the mastermind behind the deadly attacks on the US.

Image: AP
Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon dropped for the second consecutive month in August compared to the same period in 2020, according to preliminary data released Friday by the Brazilian National Institute for Space Research.

Forest destruction in August reached 918 square kilometers (354 square miles), the lowest indicator for the month since 2018 and 32% less than in 2020, according to daily alerts compiled by the the institute's Deter monitoring system.

That data is considered a leading indicator for complete calculations released near yearend from the more accurate system, Prodes. Following four earlier months of increase, the accumulated deforestation in 2021 has now declined slightly by 1.2% compared to last year, according to the preliminary data.

Marcio Astrini, executive secretary of the Climate Observatory, a network of environmental nonprofit groups, told The Associated Press that it's premature to know if there's a clear trend of decreased deforestation.

Before President Jair Bolsonaros took office in 2019, the Brazilian Amazon hadnt recorded a single year with more than 10,000 square kilometers of deforestation in over a decade. Between 2009 and 2018, the average per year was 6,500 square kilometers compared to the average of 10,500 square kilometers during Bolsonaro's term.

Bolsonaro has encouraged development within the Amazon region and dismissed global complaints about its destruction as a plot to hold back the nations agribusiness. His administration also has defanged environmental authorities and backed legislative measures to loosen land protections, emboldening land grabbers.

The government recently has tried to improve its environmental credibility. On Thursday, Bolsonaro told leaders of the BRICS group  which also includes Russia, India, China and South Africa  that he is committed to protecting the environment and complying with the Paris climate agreement.

But Astrini of the Climate Observatory said he saw no change in government attitudes that might favor reduced deforestation.

Environmental fines remain uncollected in Brazil and there are just few enforcement operations," he said, seeing no clear policy explanation for the improved numbers. The government ignores the environmental issue. The deforestation numbers just depend on the will of the criminals."

Burning to clear land in the Amazon region has become a growing problem. According to the space agency, in August more than 28,000 fires were registered in the region, the third highest indicator for the month since 2010.

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The Chilean Foreign Affairs on Friday granted refugee to the first Afghan citizen in the country who has fled since the Taliban took over Kabul in August.

University professor Zainab Momeny, 33, arrived on Friday to capital Santiago, with the help of Chilean authorities, which granted her a transit pass from Pakistan to France and then to Chile.

Momeny said that while she had not planned to go to Chile, she was happy to be finally safe. "I feel that I can finally sleep peacefully without worry," said Momeny.

Her sister, Zahra Habib, studying Medicine in Chile, requested authorities for their help after Momeny fled to Pakistan.

"It was not easy to rescue my sister. She entered illegally to Pakistan and taking her out from there was a tough job."

Chile plans to grant refugee status to more Afghans, but most will receive a temporary resident permit.

Foreign Affairs said more than a dozen Afghans in Pakistan and Iran had been granted a transit pass to reach Chile.

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Peru's National Police on Thursday escorted a group of detainees accused of human trafficking into a police base in Lima

They are suspected of trafficking Haitians across the border to Chile.

Police discovered the operation after a transit accident in a remote border region with Chile involving the group earlier this week; 2 Haitians were killed and 12 others injured.

Peruvian Interior Minister Juan Carrasco said 16 people were detained, including police and migration officers.

Police also informed 130 Haitians were detained.

Migrants were charged up to 200 (US) dollars to help them transit between the border of Chile and Peru using forged documents.

A large Haitian community settled in Chile after a devastating earthquake that hit Port au Prince in 2010, but the crisis of the COVID-19 pandemic forced them to look for other opportunities outside their host country.

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Peru's Ministry of Interior on Friday incinerated more than 18 tons of drugs, mainly cocaine and its derivate, which the National Police seized in different operations.

Juan Carrasco, Minister of Interior, said it was the first destruction of drugs made during the administration of recently sworn President Pedro Castillo.

A statement by the ministry said Peru's National Police through its narcotic division, worked in collaboration with the US Drug Enforcement Agency.

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The attacks of September 11, 2001, were an American national tragedy triggered by the terror outfit al-Qaeda, which resulted in the loss of lives of thousands of people and changed the American culture forever.

Interestingly, at the time when the 9/11 attack took place, NASA had a crew in outer space, which began to monitor the event as soon as they were informed about the incident. Expedition 3 Commander Frank Culbertson was stationed at the International Space Station and was the only American on the crew.

The story of Astronaut Frank Culbertson

As Commander Frank Culbertson was at the International Space Station when he was informed about the attacks, he began to closely observe the terror attack by capturing photographs. Luckily, the station was hovering over the Manhattan area, thus it made the process a bit easier. He captured many images during the attack and saw the world change within minutes in front of him.

Astronaut Frank Culbertson (in the middle) and his crew

NASA released a video on their YouTube channel back in 2013 where they first revealed that the International Space Station had documented the terror attack. The video is also an emotional tribute to the lives lost during the 9/11 attacks and talks about how NASA collaborated with the American Government and military for other high-profile missions like infiltrating Afghanistan. Station Astronaut Frank Culbertson again talks about his observations and the breath-taking images he clicked from the ISS of the 9/11 attacks.

Later, he talked regarding the images he clicked, "The smoke seemed to have an odd bloom to it at the base of the column that was streaming south of the city. After reading one of the news articles we just received, I believe we were looking at NY around the time of, or shortly after, the collapse of the second tower. How horrible!

He further said that before he was informed about the attack, he looked at the debris and saw a big cloud of dust and smoke across the Manhattan Area. He said that after seeing the aftermath of the attack, it was too painful for him because it was like a wound in the side of your country, of your family or of your friends.'

The 9/11 attacks as seen from the space

NASA wanted to pay a proper tribute to the victims of the 9/11 attack and did exactly on the tenth anniversary of the attack by taking an American flag on metal recovered from the site of the World Trade Centre towers and placing it on the surface of the planet Mars. The flag was recovered shortly after the destruction of the towers on Sept. 11, 2001, and it was taken to Mars on Sept. 11, 2011.

NASA later said, NASA wanted to come up with an appropriate tribute to the people who lost their lives in the tragic events of September 11. America's space program has a long history of carrying items into space to commemorate historic events, acts of courage and dramatic achievements.
America has evacuated a total of 21 US citizens plus 11 Lawful Permanent Residents (LPRSs) from the violence-torn country on Friday, September 10. While addressing a press conference, US secretary of state Antony Blinken confirmed the news and said, "As part of our ongoing commitment, today we facilitated the departure from Afghanistan of 21 US citizens and 11 Lawful Permanent Residents (LPRs).

This came after the new regime of Afghanistan allowed a flight carrying about 200 Americans and other foreign nationals to leave Afghanistan, said the US and Qatar in a joint statement on Thursday, reported news agency ANI. The Department also assisted 11 LPRS and two US citizens to depart Afghanistan via an overland route. "We provided guidance to them, worked to facilitate their safe passage, and Embassy officials greeted them once they had crossed the border," read the statement.

Afghanistan: 21 additional US citizens were evacuated from Kabul airport on Sept 10

After 21 US citizens were evacuated from Afghanistan, an additional Qatar airplane departed Kabul carrying 19 US citizens. The department offered 44 seats to US citizens, but everyone did not choose to travel.

Ever since the Taliban took control of Kabul, people in large numbers have been leaving their homeland, including civilians belonging to other countries. Blinken announced, "We are deeply grateful to the continued efforts of Qatar in facilitating limited operations at Kabul International Airport and helping to ensure the safety of these flights".

He also highlighted that the US will fulfill its commitment towards US citizens, LPRSs and Afghans. "We will be relentless in helping them depart Afghanistan if they choose to do so," he added.

Meanwhile, the US is also gearing up to inoculate all the people arriving in the country. It is pertinent to mention is that the US, under Operation Allies Mission, is going to evacuate the allies, permanent residents of the US residing in Afghanistan along with Afghan nationals, including women and children. Earlier, US Air Force officials said that as many as 6,000 American nationals have been evacuated from the country, while more than 1,24,000 civilians from Afghanistan have been airlifted.

An additional two U.S. citizens and 11 Lawful Permanent Residents departed Afghanistan today overland, while another 19 U.S. citizens traveled out on Qatar Airways. We continue to work to uphold our commitment to assist departures for those to whom we have a special commitment.  Secretary Antony Blinken (@SecBlinken) September 11, 2021

Afghanistan's current situation

The hardline Islamist group has announced the head of their country along with other members who will handle other important portfolios. The names of the new members inducted into the government were announced by the chief spokesperson of the Taliban, Zabihullah Mujahid. Meanwhile, several women were found protesting against the new government of the Taliban, as Afghan women are demanding a ministerial position in the new cabinet. Taliban has appointed Mullah Muhammad Hassan Akhund as the acting Prime Minister, while Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar and Molavi Abdul Salam Hanafi are appointed as the deputies.

With Inputs from ANI

IMAGE: AP
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin welcomed his Filipino counterpart Delfin Lorenzana to the Pentagon Friday for a meetiing centred on bilateral issues, and the importance of their mutual defense cooperation.

The Philippines recently announced it will keep having large-scale combat exercises with the United States after President Rodrigo Duterte retracted his decision to terminate a key defense pact in a move that may antagonize an increasingly belligerent China.

Duterte's decision was announced in July by Lorenzana during Austin's visit to Manila.

It was a step back from the Philippine leader's stunning vow early in his term to distance himself from Washington as he tried to rebuild frayed ties with China over years of territorial rifts in the South China Sea.

Secretary Austin thanked his Philippines counterpart saying, "Your visit is especially significant, since we've just celebrated the 70th anniversary of our Mutual Defense Treaty, which remains the bedrock of our alliance," and thanked Duterte for the decision.

Adding, "President Duterte's decision to restore the U.S.-Philippines Visiting Force Agreement puts our alliance on an especially strong footing."

Lorenzana said that the Philippines recognizes the significance of the Mutual Defense Treaty for the region.

"This significant milestone amidst current regional development offers a unique opportunity to reaffirm enduring ties that bind our countries, he said.

Terminating the pact would have been a major blow to America's oldest alliance in Asia, as Washington squares with Beijing on a range of issues, including trade, human rights and China's behavior in the South China Sea, which Beijing claims virtually in its entirety.

IMAGE: AP

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A federal judge on Thursday threw out all charges against a University of Tennessee professor accused of hiding his relationship with a Chinese university while receiving research grants from NASA.

Anming Hu was arrested in February 2020 and charged with three counts of wire fraud and three counts of making false statements. The arrest was part of a broader Justice Department crackdown under then-President Donald Trump's administration against university researchers who conceal their ties to Chinese institutions.

A jury in June deadlocked after three days of deliberation and U.S. District Judge Thomas Varlan declared a mistrial . Last month, prosecutors filed a notice that they intended to retry the case. Varlan ruled to acquit on all charges on Thursday, responding to a motion Hu's attorney made at trial that Varlan had declined to immediately rule on.

Asked on Friday whether prosecutors would appeal the acquittal, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Tennessee, Rachelle Barnes, said they had no comment.

Hu began working for UT Knoxville in 2013 and later was invited by another professor to help apply for a research grant from NASA. That grant application was not successful, but two later applications were. A 2012 law forbids NASA from collaborating with China or Chinese companies. The government has interpreted that prohibition to include Chinese universities, and Hu was a faculty member at the Beijing University of Technology in addition to his position at UT.

Prosecutors tried to show that Hu deliberately hid his position at the Chinese university when applying for the NASA-funded research grants. Defense lawyer Philip Lomonaco argued at trial that Hu didnt think he needed to list his part-time summer job on a disclosure form and said no one at UT ever told him otherwise.

On Thursday, Varlan ruled that, even assuming Hu intended to deceive about his affiliation with that second university, there is no evidence that Hu intended to harm NASA.

Without intent to harm, there is no scheme to defraud, Varlan wrote, quoting a necessary element of the wire fraud charges. Varlan added that NASA got the research from Hu that it paid for, and there was no evidence that Hu took any money from China or had anyone in China work on the projects.

Varlan also cited evidence that NASA's funding restrictions were unclear. For instance, the University of Tennessee's China Assurance letter sent in conjunction with the grant applications stated that the funding restriction did not apply to UTK faculty like Hu, Varlan wrote.

Lomonaco argued at trial that the Department of Justice had ignored the law and destroyed the career of a professor with three Ph.D.s in nanotechnology because the agency wanted a feather in its cap with an economic espionage case.

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A Florida businessman who made headlines for helping Rudy Giuliani seek damaging information on Joe Biden in Ukraine pleaded guilty Friday to a charge alleging he helped facilitate illegal foreign campaign contributions in an effort to build a marijuana business in the U.S.

Igor Fruman, 56, entered the plea at a federal court in Manhattan after reaching a deal reached with prosecutors. Fruman's plea agreement does not require him to cooperate in other cases, U.S. District Judge J. Paul Oetken said.

Initially charged in a wide-ranging indictment, Fruman pleaded guilty to a single count of solicitation of a contribution by a foreign national, who was not identified by prosecutors.

Federal sentencing guidelines call for a punishment of 37 to 46 months in prison, though Fruman could get up to five years, the judge said. Sentencing is scheduled for Jan. 21.

The plea leaves two men  including Lev Parnas, another Soviet-born Florida businessman and Giuliani associate  to face trial next month.

Mr. Fruman is not cooperating with the government and has determined that this is the fairest and best way to put the past two years of his life behind him, Frumans lawyer, Todd Blanche, said in a written statement after the plea hearing. He intends to continue to work hard, as he has his entire life, and raise his family in this country that he loves. We will not have any further public communications."

Fruman was also charged with, but did not plead guilty to, arranging hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal donations to Republicans and political action committees while trying to get Americans interested in investigating Bidens son in Ukraine during the Democrat's successful run for president.

Fruman apologized in court. He said he was not aware of laws prohibiting foreign campaign contributions at the time he engaged in the donation scheme.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Nicolas Roos said in court Friday that Fruman sent text messages to the foreign national and that persons agent seeking $1 million in political contributions and that the foreign national wired two $500,000 installments for that purpose.

In court Friday, Fruman said the donation scheme was part of an effort to encourage support for a fledgling marijuana distribution business that he and others were starting in states where the drug was being legalized.

Giuliani, 77, has said he had no knowledge of illegal campaign contributions, but has acknowledged working extensively with Fruman and Parnas as he sought communications with Ukrainian figures.

The Republican and former New York CitIMAGE: APy mayor who once gained worldwide respect and admiration as America's Mayor after the Sept. 11 attacks was not charged in this case. But Giuliani has been under criminal investigation for his dealings with Ukraine while serving as a personal lawyer to then-President Donald Trump.

In April, federal agents raided his Manhattan home and office and seized computers and cellphones, signaling a major escalation of the investigation. Authorities are deciding whether Giuliani's activities required him to register as a foreign agent.

Giuliani has insisted his Ukrainian activities were conducted on behalf of Trump, not a foreign entity or person.

Trumps efforts to press Ukraine for an investigation of the Bidens led the House to impeach the then-president, though he was acquitted by the Senate.

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The US State Department on September 10 informed that special envoy for North Korea, Sung Kim will be visiting Tokyo, Japan on September 13-15. According to a press release, during his visit, Kim is expected to discuss the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula. He will join a trilateral meeting with the Japanese Director-General for Asian and Oceanian Affairs Funakoshi Takehiro and Republic of Korea (ROK) Special Representative for Korean Peninsula Peace and Security Affairs Noh Kyu-duk.

Special Representative Kim will also meet with other senior Japanese officials to discuss cooperation on a broad range of issues, including the U.S. commitment to the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and the immediate resolution of the abductions issue, the press release read.

Special Representative Kims travel to Tokyo for trilateral and bilateral meetings underscores ongoing U.S. coordination with and commitment to our allies on DPRK issues, it added.

According to ANI, back in August, Kim had visited South Korea to meet with Security Affairs Representative Noh Kyu-duk. Back then, he discussed humanitarian aid to North Korea and military exercises by the allies. It is worth noting that the Biden administration and South Korea remain committed to ongoing close collaboration on North Korea issues as they seek complete denuclearisation and permanent peace on the Korean peninsula.

US- North Korea relations

Meanwhile, Kim's travel to Japan comes amid dwindling hopes for a rapid resumption of talks and rising tensions over continuing military drills between the US and South Korea. North Korea has labelled the drills as a drill for an invasion and has warned unspecified responses that will put the US and South Korea in a "security crisis. It is worth noting that since the collapse of a summit between former President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in 2019, when the Americans rejected the North's demand for a major easing of economic sanctions in exchange for a partial reduction of its nuclear capabilities, talks between the two countries have stalled.

Kim Jong Un has since pledged to bolster his country's nuclear deterrent while urging his people to stay resilient in a struggle for economic self-dependence in the face of US pressure. His government has so far rejected the Biden administration's overtures for talks, demanding that Washington abandon its hostile policies first.

(Image: Twitter)
The United States welcomes the formation of a new Lebanese government and urges the nation's parliament to adopt it quickly so that they can begin working to alleviate the economic problems of Lebanon, Ned Price, spokesman of the State Department, declared in a statement on Friday. As per ANI, Price said, The United States welcomes the announcement that Lebanon's leaders have agreed to form a new government under the leadership of Prime Minister-designate Najib Mikati.

He even added that the establishment of a new administration would provide optimism that immediate action will be taken to meet the severe needs and genuine expectations of the Lebanese citizen. We urge quick approval by the parliament so that this new government can get to work on concrete reforms to address Lebanon's deteriorating economic situation," Price added.

As per the US Department of the State press release, the United States has provided almost $372 million as humanitarian aid to the Lebanese people this year. It also states that the US is ready to assist the incoming government in the difficult job ahead.

Lebanon has experienced challenges varying from the COVID-19 outbreak to the financial downturn and the fall of the country's currency value since when the previous administration was dissolved in August of last year. On May 8, 2022, Lebanon will have parliamentary elections. The British government and European politicians have voiced support for the new administration, with UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab stating that changes in Lebanon must be implemented fast.

Establishment of new Lebanese administration

Najib Mikati, the new Prime Minister of Lebanon, promised on Friday to do all possible initiatives during his power to avert the nation's severe financial crash, encouraging divided parties to cooperate after the nation's first new administration in over a year was formed. President's administration released a new Cabinet of 24 ministers, led by Mikati.

There is a huge deal of work in front of the New Lebanese government. The new administration has confronted a big challenge which includes implementing crucial changes. The new government will also manage public outrage and unrest in the nation due to the withdrawal of gasoline subsidies, which is scheduled for this month. The government will also conduct a financial audit of the Central Bank, and begin discussions with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for a bailout package. The new Cabinet is also likely to manage next year's national polls.

Since the tragic explosion at Beirut port which occurred on August 4, 2020, caused the dismissal of then-Prime Minister Hassan Diab's administration. After that period, Lebanon was without a fully sovereign administration. During that time, competing political entities have been at odds over the composition of a new administration.

Image: AP
All nine of RFAs language services  Burmese, Cambodian, Cantonese, Korean, Lao, Mandarin, Tibetan, Uyghur and Vietnamese  participated in 9/11 coverage.

The twin towers of the World Trade Center billow smoke after hijacked airliners crashed into them.

The 20th anniversary of the attacks on the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City causes me to recall with considerable respect the journalists sent to New York to cover the attacks impact.

As the executive editor of Radio Free Asia, I had to approve who would go from Washington, D.C. up to New York to cover the events immediate aftermath.

Given the dangers that journalists might encounter in and around the still-smoking towers, I decided to send only those reporters who volunteered to go.

Those who went were instructed to get as close to the World Trade Center as they could.

But under our guidelines, if at any point they encountered obvious dangers they would pull back. They were also advised to consult with the police and firefighters whom they met along the way.

At one point, I got a call from a reporter who had taken a taxi part of the way up to New York City. But the taxi had been stopped at a police roadblock on its way into the city.

I told the reporter to tell the police that he was a journalist and to show them his credentials.

Then I told him to tell them that it was his job to get as close to the scene as he could, even if he had to walk several miles to get there.

As I recall, all nine of RFAs language services  Burmese, Cambodian, Cantonese, Korean, Lao, Mandarin, Tibetan, Uyghur and Vietnamese  participated in the coverage of an issue of interest to audiences in those countries and regions without free and independent media.

A total of 2,977 people were killed in the deadliest terrorist attack in American history when the two planes piloted by Islamic jihadists struck the World Trade Center.

Terrorists then flew a third plane into the Pentagon outside Washington D.C., killing all on board the plane, as well as 125 military and civilian employees at the Department of Defense.

A fourth hijacked plane, United Airlines Flight 93, was flying to California but was diverted by four Al Queda hijackers to head toward Washington, D.C. It crashed into a field in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, following valorous attempts by the crew and passengers to regain control of the plane.

All 44 people on board were killed, including the four hijackers.

The death toll included 28 South Koreans, and 21 Korean-Americans were reported to have died in the attacks, and RFAs Korean Language Service has sent reporters to New York over the years since to prepare reports marking anniversary dates.

One Korean reporter, Si Chun, was assigned to cover Ground Zero about a week after the attacks on the twin towers.

I remember people showing me photos of missing loved ones as well as the names and occupations of the people they were looking for, Si Chun said.

One of the heroes involved in the attacks was a cleaning woman working in one of the towers who left the tower following the attack but then went back to rescue others trapped inside.

Dan Southerland is RFA's founding Executive Editor.
The groups want to cut off revenue they say is used to purchase weapons to kill civilians.

Myanmars anti-junta Peoples Defense Force (PDF) militia has destroyed nearly four dozen towers operated by a military-run telecom since last week in a bid to decrease company revenue they say the regime will use to buy weapons to wield against the population.

At least 42 towers used by Mytel Telecommunications Co. to send and receive wireless signals have been damaged since Sept. 4 in Myanmars Mandalay, Magway, and Sagaing regions, as well as in southern Shan states Phekon township, according to residents and data compiled by RFAs Myanmar Service.

Of the 42 towers, 35 are solely operated by Mytel, two are jointly operated by Mytel and other operators, and five are owned by Qatars Ooredoo and Norways Telenor, but used by Mytel. At least 31 towers were destroyed by PDF units in Sagaing region alone, residents said.

Boh Nagar of the Pale Township PDF in Sagaings Yinmabin district told RFA Friday that the towers were targeted to halt the flow of cash from Mytel to the junta, which he said could be used to purchase weapons for killing civilians.

They were blown up mainly because they were businesses run by [junta leader] Min Aung Hlaings family. They are earning revenue from phone bills, he said.

Their family business is one that waters the poisonous and thorny plants that only hurt the people. We destroyed them because we dont want income from these businesses used to buy bullets.

Mytel is 49 percent owned by Viettel, a company under the control of Vietnams military, while 28 percent of the remaining shares are held by the Myanmar militarys Myanmar Economic Corporation and 23 percent by Myanmar National Telecoms Holdings Public Company Ltd.

PDF sources told RFA that several Mytel towers had been destroyed since Sept. 7, when Myanmars shadow National Unity Government (NUG) declared a nationwide state of emergency and called for open rebellion against junta rule, prompting an escalation of attacks on military targets by various allied pro-democracy militias and ethnic armed groups.

As many as 11 towers were destroyed on Sept. 7 alone in Sagaings Butalin township, they said.

A resident of Butalin said military units arrived at the scene shortly after a tower bombing on Thursday and opened fire blindly near a major road junction.

Several soldiers came to the scene of the destroyed tower at the Phone Gyi Road junction and opened fire seven or eight times to scare people nearby, the resident said.

Around 11 towers, including the one near Okpo village, were destroyed in a single day.

Locals said that Mytel phone lines were disrupted after the towers were felled, but internet connections were unaffected.

A resident of Sagaing who works for a private telecommunications company told RFA on condition of anonymity that while it is Mytel towers that are being targeted at present, the loss of other communication infrastructure could hurt the region.

Power generators used at some of these towers were shared by other operators, the resident said.

When such towers are blown up, not only Mytel connections, but all connections can be disrupted. Some towers control more than a dozen smaller towers nearby.

The resident noted that Mytel often establishes towers in monastery compounds and garrisons to provide an extra layer of safety for its infrastructure.

Nobody, not even engineers or company employees, would want to go near the destroyed towers and there would be delays for repairs, he said.

The military-run Myawaddy newspaper reported on Sept. 5 that security forces were working to investigate and take legal action against those who had disrupted communications networks that are helping to improve the lives of civilians.

Myanmars newest mobile operator established in 2018, Mytel provides the military with vast off-budget revenue and a means to access international communications technology, the group Justice for Myanmar said in a report released in December 2020.

Mytel has more than 10 million subscribers in the country of 54 million people and quarterly profits reported to be U.S. $25 million, the report says.

Khin Thiri Thet Mon, the daughter of junta leader Min Aung Hlaing, was a shareholder in Pinnacle Asia, a company that built towers for Mytel, when her father led a coup and seized power from Myanmars democratically elected government on Feb. 1, according to Justice for Myanmar.

She resigned from the company on March 17, days after the U.S. government imposed sanctions against her over the militarys attacks on unarmed civilians.

Attempts by RFA to contact representatives of Mytel at the companys headquarters in Yangon went unanswered Friday.

Anti-junta protesters in Yangon, Sept. 10, 2021. Citizen journalist The focus is to eliminate

In the seven months since the coup, security forces have killed 1,062 civilians and arrested at least 6,364, according to the Bangkok-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP)mostly during crackdowns on anti-junta protests.

The junta says it unseated Aung San Suu Kyis National League for Democracy (NLD) government because the party engineered a landslide victory in Myanmars November 2020 election through widespread voter fraud. It has yet to present evidence of its claims and public unrest is at an all-time high.

Amid nationwide turmoil, the military has stepped up offensives in remote parts of the country, triggering fierce battles with local PDF militias and some of the dozens of ethnic armies that control large swathes of territory along Myanmars periphery.

At least 443 armed clashes broke out between the military and ethnic armies or PDF militias in August alone, the NUGs Ministry of Defense said in a statement earlier this week. Sagaing region had the highest number of clashes last month with 106, it said.

Dr. Naing Swe Oo, a former military officer and executive director of the Yangon-based Thayninga Institute of Strategic Studies, a pro-military think tank, told RFA on Friday that the numbers listed in the NUG statement are unreliable and likely overstated, but warned of more bloodshed following the shadow governments Sept. 7 declaration of war.

Speaking to RFA, political analyst Maung Maung Soe noted that the international community is pushing for a dialogue between the two sides.

They say they dont want to see an escalation of the armed conflict in Myanmar, but the situation at home is very tense, he said.

The focus on both sides is to eliminate the other and there can be no negotiations now.

Reported by RFAs Myanmar Service. Translated by Khin Maung Nyane. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.
China brands Uyghur activists East Turkestan Islamic Movement terrorists, but the US says the group hasnt existed in a long time.

Suhail Shaheen (R), spokesman for the Taliban in Qatar, speaks to attendees at the Intra-Afghan Dialogue talks in Qatar's capital Doha, July 8, 2019.

UPDATED at 11:25 A.M. ET on 2021-09-13

A shadowy Uyghur Islamic group that China has used as justification for increasingly harsh rule over the Muslim ethnic minority in its far-western Xinjiang region is not present in Afghanistan and wont be allowed to return, a Taliban spokesman told Chinese state media.

China often brands Uyghur activists in exile as members of the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) and cites the threat of terrorism to discredit the minority groups campaign to raise awareness of widespread rights abuses in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR).

The fall of the Afghan government last month to the Taliban militants following the pullout of U.S. forces has raised both concerns in Beijing about instability and fears among Uyghurs that China will add to harsh measures in the XUAR, where authorities are believed to have held up to 1.8 million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in a vast network of internment camps since early 2017.

Suhail Shaheen, the Taliban'a spokesman in Qatar, said that ETIM members are no longer in Afghanistan because the Taliban has categorically told them that there is no place for anyone to use Afghanistan against other counties, including its neighboring countries, Chinas state-run Global Times newspaper said in an account of an interview published Thursday.

The warning to the ETIM meant that those who are intending to carry out sabotage activities in other countries or have their foreign agenda would not be able to remain in the country, Shaheen was quoted as saying.

At a regular press conference in Beijing on Friday, China's Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said that the ETIM is an international terrorist organization designated by the U.N. Security Council and a direct threat to China's national security and territorial integrity.

Afghanistan and the rest of the international community share the responsibility to firmly reject, curb, crack down on and eradicate the ETIM, he said.

Wang went on to say that China has expressed serious concerns about the ETIM to the Afghan Taliban on several occasions.

The Afghan Taliban attaches importance to this and has made solemn pledges, he said. We hope they will honor their words, make a clean break with the ETIM and other terrorist groups, and take effective measures to resolutely crack down on these terrorist organizations within its territory.

The Talibans statement on the ETIM follows the late 2020 reversal of a U.S. decision to place ETIM on the Treasury Departments list of terrorist organizations. The listing on Sept. 3, 2002, about a year after the Sept. 11 attacks, was seen as a U.S. gesture to enlist Beijing in the Global War on Terror.

Early last November, then U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that the ETIM had been removed from Terrorist Exclusion List, ending a policy that has been criticized for providing cover for repressive Chinese policies in the XUAR and leading to the capture of innocent Uyghurs in Afghanistan. Washington now says theres no evidence the ETIM exists.

Geoffrey Nice (L), chairman of the Uyghur Tribunal, gives the opening address on the first day of hearings investigating alleged abuses against Uyghurs in China, in London, June 4, 2021. Credit: AFP

Uyghur Tribunal



The Chinese reaction to the Taliban spokesmans comments came as lawyers, academics, and rights experts began a second round of hearings at the Uyghur Tribunal in London. The four-day session is weighing the proposition that Chinas repressive policies in the XUAR constitute crimes against humanity or genocide.

While the Uyghur Tribunal has no state backing and no power to enforce its determinations, it aims to compel international action to hold China accountable for alleged maltreatment of Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and other Turkic Muslim populations in the XUAR.

Eight people, including two Uyghurs, provided testimony on the first day of the second session.

Mehray Mezensof, 27, told the panel how authorities detained her husband, now 30 years old, two days before the couple was due to move to Australia in April 2017.

During a police interrogation about his previous travel to Turkey, Mirzat Taher was confined at times to a tiger chair  steel chairs with handcuffs and leg irons  to restrict his movement. He also was subjected to psychological torture, his wife said.

During these three days he was forced to sit in a tiger chair throughout the interrogation and he was deprived of sleep, Mehray said. He said the questioning took place at night and the police officers took turns interrogating him and they repeatedly asked the same questions over and over again.

Mirzat was taken to a detention facility and later transferred to a re-education camp, she said. He eventually was released, but police continued to harass him and rearrested him two more times, she said.

Mehray lost contact with her husband on September 2020, she told the panel.

Khalmat Rozakhon, a Uyghur who lives and works in Japan, told the tribunal how authorities intimidated and threatened his relatives in Xinjiang because he decided to remain abroad when the situation at home deteriorated.

During a video call with his brother in May 2020, Khalmat said his sibling appeared physically diminished.

When he lifted his face mask, I noticed his neck was swollen, then I desperately intended to have that conversation recorded from a close angle, he said.

The brother told Khalmat not to protest against China and said that Chinese President Xi Jinping and Chinas policies were good.

During the call, Khalmat saw security agents surrounding his brother. They later showed themselves and tried to intimidate Khalmat.

They uttered my name in Chinese, Halimaite, and it was a feeling of fear, and to be frank, I could have killed them if I had been able to, he said. But as my brother was in their hands, I tried calm myself and kept recording the conversation.

The last 30 minutes of that call made me feel like being burned in hell fire, Khalmat said. They held my brother and demanded that I follow their instructions.

Why governments must act

The Communist Party sees the Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples as a threat to China's political stability, so they use the excuse of fighting terrorism, extremism, and separatism as justification for the crackdown, said Teng Biao, a Chinese human right lawyer in the U.S. who appeared as an expert witness.

They use collective punishment, and the government can silence their family members and use them as hostages, he said.

Omer Kanat, executive director of the Uyghur Human Rights Project, said that the experts testimony at the hearing was compelling, while the Uyghur survivors eyewitness testimony was devastating.

Anyone who hears it understands why governments must act, he said in a statement issued Friday.

On Thursday, Chinas Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian dismissed the panel as a kangaroo court that has nothing to do with law, justice or truth, and is just another farce staged to smear and attack Xinjiang.

During the first round of the Uyghur Tribunal on June 4-7, witnesses gave grim accounts of torture, sexual assault, coercive birth control, forced labor, and the destruction of Uyghur cultural heritage.

The tribunal is expected to issue a final verdict on whether China is committing genocide or crimes against humanity in December.
An improvised barricade installed in late August restricts residents' movement in Hanoi as part of the authorities' plan to stop the spread of the COVID-19.

Ngoc Ha is very angry. Someone has added another layer of barricades outside her house in central Hanoi, on top of the one that was put up by the local authorities a couple days ago. The double barrier blocks the main entrance to her residential ward with a dozen households.

No-one dares to pass it as everyone knows just a couple hundred meters away theres a checkpoint where young volunteers zealously stop passers-by and demand to see their travel permits. Those who dont have it face a hefty fine of two million dong ($90).

And so the self-made barricade of cardboard, old wooden planks and sheets of corrugated plastic lies undisturbed under the pouring September rain, an ugly reminder of Hanois ongoing COVID-19 crisis.

Ha is lucky to be able to work from home. Hundreds of others in her area who have to go out to work have to obtain the hard-to-get passes and then, every morning trickle through the checkpoint, clustering before the barrier and risking cross-infection.

Hanoi is being divided to zones of different colors. In green zones where theres no known COVID cases, people can still move around freely but in red zones with COVID cases like the one where Ha lives, everything is restricted. She can only go out for food shopping three times a week and her block has now become some kind of a prison camp.

The normally mild-mannered 50-year-old mother of two is almost shouting at the leader of the ward: What happens if there is a fire? Or an emergency? Do you expect people to get off a stretcher and jump themselves over the barricade?

Fresh COVID outbreak

She is not the only one who is angry and frustrated over how the government is handling the pandemic.

Hanoi is suffering from a fresh outbreak of coronavirus, with dozens of new cases each day. Since the end of April, 3,700 people in Vietnams capital have tested positive for SARS-CoV-2. The number for the whole country has now exceeded half a million, with the largest hub, Ho Chi Minh City, accounting for half. The death toll tops 13,000 compared to zero deaths a year ago.

Vaccination is going at a very slow rate, mainly because of the lack of vaccines. As of Sept. 9, only 3.9 percent of the population have been fully vaccinated.

This new, fourth wave of COVID is especially worrying because of the presence of the highly contagious Delta variant. It has also exposed the unpreparedness of the whole system in dealing with one of the gravest public health disasters in modern times.

We became too complacent after the initial outbreaks [last year], said a veteran doctor in Ho Chi Minh City, who wished to stay anonymous to avoid getting into trouble with authorities. The government thought it was easy to contain the virus this time, too. We have had a whole year, but did not make any preparation in terms of medical resources and procurement of vaccines.

It really shows the government doesnt have any appropriate understanding of the virus nor the pandemic, he added.

The result is late, inadequate and often confusing policies issued by government at all levels. It is not unheard of that a directive is given late in the afternoon, only to be withdrawn that night. Or half-baked orders that leave people baffled.

Explaining some of the recent policy mistakes, Hanois Chairman Chu Ngoc Anh said the situation is new and unprecedented but we listen to criticism and adjust.

On Aug. 30, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh seemed to have signaled that Vietnam is ready to change course from the Zero COVID strategy which has become outdated to a new, more suitable approach. He told a high-level government meeting: We should be aware that this battle against COVID is going to be a long one and we will have to co-exist with the pandemic as total containment is impossible.

Ten days on, theres still nothing to back up Chinhs living with COVID policy.

Zero COVID?

Authorities across the country are still tracking and tracing positive cases and mass testing is being done in hotspots in order to extract F0s from the society, which is official language for confirmed COVID cases.

Contact tracing and isolation  the measures that contributed to Vietnams success in keeping the virus at bay last year  are still very much alive and kicking. Now though, they have led to widespread public grievances.

A video clip sent to the RFA Vietnamese Service shows a man in Ca Mau city being restrained by uniformed police and forced into a car to be taken away because he refused to take a COVID test. The man is writhing violently and screaming: You are breaking my arm! Have I done a robbery or a murder to be treated like this?

In another clip, people in an area in Binh Tan district in Ho Chi Minh City, are seen protesting against an effort to blockade the entire residential ward because there were allegedly around one hundred F0 cases inside. A man is heard saying: Do you want to kill all of us here?

In a more extreme case, the local government in Hoang Hoa district in Thanh Hoa province, decided to lock up a whole village with 400 people for 14 days just because some of them had had contact with those who had been in contact with suspected positive cases.

Strict containment measures that show no respect to citizens are still being imposed, according to the veteran doctor in Ho Chi Minh City.

A member of Vietnamese parliament, Luu Binh Nhuong, was quoted in the domestic media as warning that the authorities should not take COVID prevention as the pretext for going against laws and the constitution. The public dont approve of this.

Nhuong urged authorities to direct resources to improve peoples welfare and assist those who are in need because of COVID. With lockdowns being imposed in many locations, residents have been complaining about lack of food and essential services. But the distribution of supplies has been problematic, to say the least, even in government-run quarantine and treatment facilities.

Shocking images coming from a makeshift hospital in Binh Duong province near Ho Chi Minh City show hundreds of COVID patients fighting for food. The hospital, one of the largest of its kind in Vietnam, created after mainstream hospitals became overloaded, has also been suffering from electricity and water shortages.

Army deployment

Two weeks ago, for the first time since the end of the Vietnam war, the military was brought in to Ho Chi Minh City to support the citys quarantined residents. Soldiers and the police have been helping with delivery of supplies, but also with enforcing stay-at-home rules. Troop deployment was a smart move, analysts say, as the army enjoys a high level of credibility and trust in a country that has experienced numerous wars. But the presence of army uniforms and guns on the streets may also indicate that the authorities are aware of the growing public discontent.

Unrest is extremely rare in Vietnam and the government takes great pride in maintaining political and social stability. But as the number of Covid cases has shown signs of dropping, albeit slowly, the need to look after the people whose livelihoods have been shattered by the pandemic increases.

At night, in empty street corners, under the bridges or outside hospital gates, homeless people have reappeared who look many times worse than before. At dusk and at dawn, we can find guerrilla squatting markets where both sellers and buyers move quietly and swiftly, writes a well-known columnist, Pham Gia Hien, in the popular VnExpress news portal about what he sees these days in Hanoi.

These are the first drops that spill out of the glass [of the populations patience].
Le Thi Kim Phi used the social media platform to connect with other members of the Provisional Government of Vietnam, authorities say.

Vietnamese authorities on Friday arrested and charged a woman with carrying out activities to overthrow the government, making her the third person this year apprehended for joining a U.S.-based exile Vietnamese organization branded by Hanoi as an overseas terrorist force, state media reported.

Le Thi Kim Phi, 62, used a Facebook profile under the name Phi Kim to connect with members of the Provisional Government of Vietnam, a U.S.-based opposition group, said the investigation division of the An Giang Police.

Based in Orange County, California, the Provisional Government of Vietnam was founded in 1991 by former soldiers and refugees loyal to the U.S.-backed government of South Vietnam that was overthrown and absorbed by North Vietnam in 1975.

The Vietnamese government designated the group a terrorist organization in January 2018 after group members were charged with a plot to attack Ho Chi Minh Citys Tan Son Nhat International Airport with petrol bombs ahead of a major holiday the year before.

The group had earlier attempted to explode a bomb in a parking lot for impounded vehicles at the Bien Hoa police station in Dong Nai province, according to state media reports published at the time of the 2017 trial.

Le Thi Kim Phi of Long Xuyen city in An Giang province applied to join the Provisional Government of Vietnam on Jan. 1, investigators said.

As a member, her job was to propagandize, promote the organizations profile, and engage others to join the organization, they said.

Authorities also said they seized six videos and 440 pages of materials against the Socialist Republic of Vietnam on the womans Facebook account.

Tran Huu Duc, 57, of Nghe An province and Ngo Cong Tru, 33, of Phu Yen province were also arrested this year for using Facebook to connect with other members of the Provisional Government of Vietnam.

On Aug. 16, Nghe An Peoples Court sentenced Tran Huu Duc to three years in prison for activities aimed at overthrowing the countrys one-party communist government, according to state media reports. Five days later, Phu Yen Peoples Court handed Ngo Cong Tru a 10-year jail term on the same charge.

Over the past years, Vietnam has continuously arrested and imprisoned many people for their involvement in the Provisional Government of Vietnam.

RFA has contacted the organization many times for comment, but never has received a response.

In 2017, Lisa Pham, who was accused by Vietnams communist government of being involved in the organization and the plot to blow up Tan Son Nhat International Airport, told RFA that she had nothing to do with the detainees or the accusations of inciting terrorism in the country.

The groups leader, Dang Hoang Thien, was sentenced in December 2017 to 16 years in prison and five years of house arrest, while 14 other members of the group were sentenced to terms ranging from five to 14 years.

RFA has reported about two-dozen cases in which Vietnamese citizens have been convicted and jailed for political offenses over social media posts since the beginning of this year. Among those serving sentences for Facebook posts are journalists, bloggers, and an ordinary citizen who posted complaints about coronavirus policies.

Reported by RFAs Vietnamese Service. Translated by Anna Vu. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.
The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency will travel to Iran on September 12 in an attempt to salvage stalled talks between Tehran and the West over the Islamic republic's nuclear program.



In a September 11 statement, the IAEA said Director-General Rafael Grossi plans to meet in Tehran with Iranian Vice President Eshaq Jahangiri and the head of the country's atomic energy agency, Mohammad Eslami.



The visit comes after the IAEA issued a critical report saying Tehran had seriously hampered its efforts since February to inspect Iran's nuclear program, according to AFP, which reviewed the document.

President Ebrahim Raisi insisted that Iran was being "transparent".



However, the United States and Europe are losing patience with Tehran as they seek to resurrect the 2015 international agreement that lifted sanctions on Iran in exchange for greater monitoring of its nuclear program.

The Trump administration unilaterally withdrew from the agreement three years ago over concerns the agreement would open the door for Iran to eventually produce weapon's grade uranium.

The Biden administration said it would seek to have the United States rejoin the agreement if some of those concerns were addressed.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned on September 8 that the Biden administration was close to abandoning those efforts amid Iran's stonewalling.

Based on reporting by AFP and Reuters
Dozens joined a rally held in North Macedonia's city of Tetovo on September 11 following a deadly fire at a makeshift COVID-19 unit of a local hospital. Participants planted 14 trees, matching the number of victims. The Balkan country's health minister and Tetovo's hospital managers resigned in wake of the September 8 incident that shook the predominantly ethnic Albanian population of the city.
A court in the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don has ordered the arrest of a journalist after he made a post on social media about the voting strategy of jailed Kremlin critic Aleksei Navalny -- the latest move against the opposition ahead of parliamentary elections.

Igor Khoroshilov, who is also a member of the local election committee, was detained on September 10 while on his way to work and charged with public dissemination of the symbols of an extremist organization following his Facebook post about Navalny's Smart Voting strategy.

His detention is to last 10 days, which his lawyer says will sideline him until after the elections. Khoroshilov was to monitor the vote for irregularities.

Russia earlier this year declared Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation an "extremist" organization in what critics say is an attempt to quash opposition to the Kremlin.

Navalny, who is serving a jail term on charges he says are bogus, has called on his supporters to vote against candidates from the ruling, pro-Kremlin United Russia party in this month's parliamentary elections.

The Kremlin has carried out a sweeping crackdown on the opposition heading into the September 17-19 vote amid concerns United Russia could fail to win the two-thirds majority needed to rubber-stamp legislation.

Some opposition politicians have been barred from running for parliament for spurious reasons, while others have left the country amid fear of detention. Journalists and bloggers have also been harassed.

Feliks Berkovich, Khoroshilov's lawyer, said he was illegally denied access to his client at the police station in Rostov-on-Don.

The lawyer also said his client has the right to immunity during the election season as a member of the election committee.

He said the arrest of his client was "ordered" by the authorities.
In the run-up to the September 17-19 national legislative elections, Russia has purged the field of almost all genuine opposition politicians and implemented multiple legal amendments that critics say could facilitate fraud.

And the battle against dissent has also been raging online.

In recent months, Russia has ratcheted up its campaign to rein in Western tech giants, stopping short of blocking the platforms outright but issuing hefty fines against Google, Facebook, and Twitter and demanding that they remove content the government has deemed offensive, dangerous, or lewd.

On September 9, the state-run news agency RAPSI reported that the Moscow prosecutor's office had sent a letter to the chief operating officers of Apple and Google, Tim Cook and Sundar Pichai, with demands that their companies block a smartphone app run by the team of jailed opposition leader Aleksei Navalny.

According to RAPSI, the state views the app as technology funded from abroad and not by Russian taxpayers, and in turn as a violation of Russian electoral law.

"This testifies to Apple's violation of Russian electoral law and illegal foreign meddling in the internal affairs of the country and its influence on the exercise of free will by Russian citizens," a source close to the prosecutor's office was quoted by RAPSI as saying.

The app in question, which is simply called Navalny, is a key element in an electoral strategy that the Kremlin critic's aides call Smart Voting.

Before voters begin casting ballots on September 17, the app is designed to alert registered users to local candidates who have the best chance of defeating rivals from the ruling United Russia party, which Navalny describes as a deeply corrupt "party of crooks and thieves."

But Navalny's team has steadily lost ground in its monthslong standoff with the Kremlin since Navalny's near-fatal poisoning in August 2020 by what he says were agents of the Federal Security Service (FSB).

The prominent critic of President Vladimir Putin was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison on a disputed parole violation on February 2, and his nationwide political network has since been declared "extremist" and banned by the state.

The latest effort to block access to his app is part of a broader push -- which has continued unabated over the past year -- to sideline his beleaguered movement.

It's also part of an effort by Russia to enforce complete compliance with restrictive Russian laws by major tech companies, including Western tech giants and Russian ones like Yandex, which reportedly also received the letter from the prosecutor.

In a parallel development on September 9, Interfax reported that Russia's communications watchdog, Roskomnadzor, demanded that Apple, Google, and U.S. telecommunications and software companies Cloudflare and Cisco work to enforce Russia's blockage of the Smart Voting website -- and limit users' ability to circumvent the tools the state uses to prevent access.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said Ukraine must remain a transit country for Russian natural-gas exports during her final tour of European capitals before leaving office.

"I have made clear that it is our concern that Ukraine remains a transit country for Russian gas," Merkel told reporters at a news conference with Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki on September 11 in Warsaw.

Merkel is stepping down as German chancellor after federal elections on September 26 after 16 years in office.

In the weeks leading up to her departure, Merkel struck an agreement with the Biden administration that will allow Russia to complete a controversial gas pipeline to Germany.

The pipeline, known as Nord Stream 2, will reroute Russian gas exports under the Baltic Sea, circumventing Ukraine and depriving Kyiv of nearly $2 billion a year in transit revenue.

The project has divided Europe.

Ukraine and Poland vehemently oppose the project on the grounds that it is a national security threat, while Merkel has steadfastly supported it.

The U.S. Congress has sided with Kyiv and Warsaw, imposing two rounds of mandatory sanctions to stop its completion.

However, the Biden administration in May agreed to waive some of those sanctions in an attempt to improve frayed ties with Germany, a key NATO ally.

In exchange for the waiver, Berlin promised to invest in Ukraine's alternative energy sector and push the Kremlin to continue to export some gas through the country.

Experts have expressed strong doubts that Russia would agree to continue to ship gas export through Ukraine once the pipeline is launched.

Russia currently occupies Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula and is backing separatist fighters in two regions in eastern Ukraine.

Russia on September 10 announced that it had completed construction of Nord Stream 2.

The project now awaits certification -- which could take several months -- before it can begin pumping gas to Germany.

Polish President Andrzej Duda cancelled his meeting with Merkel shortly after Russia's announcement.

The presidential office in Warsaw said that Duda would instead be in Katowice on September 11 for celebrations marking the anniversary of the Solidarity labor union.

Relations between Germany and Poland have been cool since the nationalist Law and Justice party took power in 2015, although top German officials had tried to thaw relations during repeated visits in recent years.

During her visit to Warsaw, Merkel is also expected to discuss migration from Europe's eastern borders -- and particularly, the situation on Poland's eastern border with Belarus.

The issue is of increasing concern in the European Union.

The governments of Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia have accused Belarusian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka of pushing large numbers of refugees from the Middle East across the Polish border in retaliation for EU sanctions against Minsk.

Officials said Morawiecki and Merkel also want to discuss developments in the coronavirus pandemic and the future of the EU.

Merkel's talks with the Polish prime minister also will cover the Polish COVID-19 National Recovery Plan, which has not been approved by Brussels because of concerns over Warsaw's commitment to the rule of law.

Poland, along with Hungary, is embroiled in a long-running dispute with the EU over a number of issues, including judicial independence, press freedoms, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights.

The conflict recently intensified when Brussels took legal action against Warsaw and Budapest. Both have lashed out at the holdup of the stimulus plans as ideologically motivated and unconstitutional.

Merkel's farewell visit to Warsaw comes two weeks ahead of Germany's federal elections, which will draw the curtain on her 16 years in power.

Merkel's one-day visit to Poland began with a wreath-laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Warsaw -- an act of remembrance and remorse for Nazi Germany's 1939 invasion of Poland that started World War II.

Her tour will continue next week when she travels to Serbia, Albania, and France.

She is to meet Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic in Belgrade on September 13 before meeting representatives of civil society from a range of Balkan states in the Serbian capital, her spokesman announced on September 10.

Merkel is scheduled to travel to Tirana on September 14 for talks with Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama. She will also have discussions in Tirana on regional cooperation with the heads of government of six countries in the region.

With reporting by AFP, dpa, and Deutsche Welle
A plane flying from the Turkish resort of Antalya to Vladivostok in Russia's Far East made a emergency landing in the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk.

An Azur Air Boeing 767 requested an emergency landing while over Krasnoyarsk after experiencing problems with the hydraulics, Russia's Interfax news agency reported.

There were no reports of anybody being hurt.

The number of passengers and crew abroad the plane was not yet available. Boeing 767s can seat more than 200 passengers.

Azur Air is a former regional Russian airline that now operates charter flights.

An Azur Air flight leaving Antalya on September 10 on its journey to the Russian city of Belgorod, about 580 kilometers south of Moscow, initiated an emergency descent after a cabin-pressure alert, air-safety publication Aviation Herald reported.

That plane, a Boeing 757, returned safely to Antalya and a replacement Boeing 767 flew to Belgorod after a delay, according to the report and flight-tracking website Flightradar24.

Azur Air did not immediately respond to Russian media requests for comment.

Antalya on Turkey's Mediterranean is one of the most popular resort destinations for Russians.

Based on reporting by Interfax and Reuters
Thousands of Serbs have taken to the streets in Belgrade to protest against the planned development of a large lithium mine in the Balkan country and to call for tougher environmental controls.

Demonstrators gathered in front of the parliament building on September 11 to demand an end to the development of the lithium project as some waived signs saying that Serbia's nature is "not for sale."

Nenad Kostic, a chemistry professor, told the crowd there was no such thing as "green" mining, a reference to lithium's classification as a green energy source because of its use to power electric cars.

The protesters then proceeded to block Branko's Bridge -- one of the city's main thoroughfares -- for an hour.

The rally was organized by about 30 environmental groups, whose influence has grown amid widespread concerns that pollution is worsening.

It was the largest environmental protest in Belgrade since April. Organizers threatened to hold more should the authorities not heed their message.

London-based Rio Tinto, the world's second-largest metals and mining company, is studying possible development of Serbia's lithium mine, believed to be one of the largest in Europe.

The mine has the potential to generate significant export revenue and jobs for Serbia, especially if the country pursues plans to refine it locally and develop battery plants.

Demand for electric cars is expected to surge in the coming years as the United States, Europe, and China seek to cut carbon emissions.

Rio Tinto has said it would invest as much as $2.4 billion to develop the project.

However, protesters say Serbia's rivers, natural surroundings, and air quality have already been endangered enough by profit-seeking government policies and fear fertile agricultural lands in the western regions will be harmed by the project.

"Our demand is that the government of Serbia annul all obligations to Rio Tinto," said Aleksandar Jovanovic, one of the organizers. "We have gathered to say no to those who offer concentrated sulphuric acid instead of raspberries and honey."

Organizers warned more protests lay ahead if the government doesn't heed their demands.

More than 100,000 people have already signed a petition against the development of the lithium mine.

In a statement following the protests, Rio Tinto said it understands citizens' concerns about the environmental impact of the project and would adhere to the nations ecology laws.

Serbian Minister of Mining and Energy Zorana Mihajlovic accused some organizers of the protest of using the lithium project as an opportunity to build their political careers.

However, she said the government would hold a referendum on the construction of mines and factories.

Serbia's environmental movement has been spurred in part by what citizens say is worsening air pollution and a growing waste-management problem.

Much ire for the air pollution has been directed at coal-fired power plants run by Chinese companies.

With reporting by AP
Today (Saturday) marks the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.

On Sept. 11, 2001, four coordinated terrorist attacks were executed by members of al-Qaeda, who were allegedly acting in retaliation for Americas support of Israel, its involvement in the Persian Gulf War and its military presence in the Middle East.

Four commercial airliners were hijacked mid-flight, with the goal of crashing each plane into a prominent American building to cause mass casualties.

Two planes hit the World Trade Center, causing both of its two, 110-story towers to collapse. A third flight crashed into the west side of the Pentagon, and a fourth flight was flown into the direction of Washington, D.C. The fourth plane did not hit its intended target as passengers diverted it from hitting either the White House or the U.S. Capitol.

In total, 2,996 people from 78 countries died, including 343 firefighters and paramedics, 23 New York City police officers, 189 people at the Pentagon, as well as 19 terrorist hijackers.

To remember the loss of life, the sacrifice of first responders and the Ripon community's efforts to unify, the Commonwealth is sharing its coverage of 9/11 from 2001 and the years following.
The scene just outside City Hall on Friday morning was of remembrance a day in advance of the 20th anniversary of 9/11.
Twenty years ago today, Inez Ribustello should have been at work on her job as beverage director for Windows on the World, the restaurant loca
Rocky Mount, NC (27804)

Today

Partly cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 88F. Winds S at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 69F. Winds light and variable.
Rutland, VT (05701)

Today

Thunderstorms, accompanied by locally heavy rainfall at times. A few storms may be severe. High 71F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Rain early...then remaining cloudy with showers overnight. Low 56F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 80%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch.
Danvers, MA (01923)

Today

Considerable cloudiness. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High around 85F. Winds SSW at 10 to 20 mph..

Tonight

Scattered thunderstorms early, then variable clouds overnight with more showers at times. A few storms may be severe. Low 66F. Winds WNW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 60%.
Ipswich - Joseph David Short, 77, a long-time resident of Ipswich, entered into eternal life on Tuesday, September 7, 2021, following a battle with cancer. Joseph was born in Memphis, Tennessee on May 9, 1944, the son of the late Sammons Short and Gladys (Watkins) Short. He was the husband o
Hottest Degree  Supply Chain Management

Looking for a major where 76 percent of students are placed in a job at or before graduation? Thats the employment rate for Supply Chain Management (SCM) majors and MBAs, according to research firm Gartner. That figure rises to 93 percent within three months of graduation.

Colleges and universities mirrored businesses for decades in giving CSM short shrift. However, that is rapidly changing.

For years, we had sort of taken logistics for granted, Skrikant Datar, the dean of Harvard Business School told Bloomberg. The pandemic caused us to rethink it.

Reality-Based Curriculum

Other schools are adding or expanding supply chain management programs. In addition, much of that coursework will deal with real-world supply issues.

Penn State is adding a reality-based course in supply chain risk management to its Masters program. As a result, it will borrow heavily from the pandemic experiences of Hershey and Dell Technologies.

Programs at other schools often feature faculty with experience handling supply chain issues at major corporations.

In addition, those major corporations are on the hunt for graduates.

Take this quote from Global Trade Daily on the University of Tennessees two annual job fairs for supply chain students.

Roughly 1,000 students arrive to these fairs to be ultimately placed in touch with between 160 and 180 Fortune 500 companies for internships, full-time jobs as well as co-op programs.

SALARIES

A degree in supply chain management could land graduates a job in logistics, purchasing, or management. The U. S. Labor Departments Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) expects logistics jobs to increase 8,200 or four percent over the next eight years. Meanwhile, Management analyst jobs are expected to jump 11 percent, according to the BLS.

The average annual base salary for an MBA in supply chain management is over $86,000 according to Payscale. A Bachelors or advanced degree in supply chain management can qualify for a range of jobs and salaries. At the low end, buyers average $58,889. Directors of supply chain management average $139,865.

TINA Buffers Economic Concerns

Economists have begun lowering expectations for economic growth. As a result, many investors are seeking comfort with their old friend TINA.

But wait. Its not what you think. TINA is an acronym. It stands for There is no alternative. The reference is to investors loading up on stocks because other investments offer worse returns.

Looking Ahead

Goldman Sachs lowered its growth projections for the year from 6.4 percent to 6 percent.

At the same time, Goldman continues to project an increase in stocks.

Goldman is not alone. Bank of Americas July Global Fund Managers Survey showed 47 percent think the economy will improve. That is down from a high of 91 percent in March.

Delta and TINA

Fund managers and investment banks are walking back earlier forecasts due to continued concerns about the Delta variant and supply chain disruptions.

The coronavirus situation has deteriorated over the last couple months, according to Goldmans Sept. 6 investor note. Daily new cases increased from 20k to 163k (based on a seven-day moving average), daily fatalities have increased six-fold, and hospitalizations now exceed the winter peak in the South.

TINA Effect

Investors usually look for conservative investments in times of economic uncertainty. However, with bond yields low, many see stocks as the only option. Thus, you have the TINA effect.

Many forecasters, such as Goldman, have lowered growth projections. However, most remain bullish about stocks.

Bank of America is one exception. Its head of U.S. Equity & Quantitative Strategy, Savita Subramanian, sees little growth in stocks through 2022.

Regardless of forecasts, many investors are still in love with TINA.

What Could Go Wrong

The TINA effect is based in part on group participation. It becomes a self-fulfilling reality as more people join in. As a result, stock prices can exceed value. That creates a bubble. When the economic winds change, that bubble can burst.

Misinformation Has Consequences

The spread of misinformation by foreign sources is well documented. However, misinformation is also being spread by domestic sources that are impacting our health decisions and our pocketbooks.

How Misinformation Impacts Your Finances

A 2019 report from the University of Baltimores Roberto Cavazos and cybersecurity firm CHEQ shows that misinformation costs the stock market $39 billion annually. However, the global impact is almost twice as high.

This first-ever in-depth economic analysis of the economic impact of the problem says the price tag to the global economy is $78 billion each year, according to the University of Baltimore, with economic damage being inflicted on major sectors including politics, finance, advertising, online retail, and media.

The report determined that misinformation is affecting everything from stock markets to media, reputation management, election campaigns, financial information, and healthcare.

What a Tangled Web

Misinformation spreads rapidly across the internet.

A report from Science found that false information spreads 70 percent faster than factual information.

The top one percent of false news posts were distributed to between 1,000 and 100,000 people, according to the report. Whereas verified factual reports rarely reached more than 1,000 people.

Public Health Hazzard

Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy recently declared misinformation a public health hazard.

Dr. Murthy specifically cited misinformation about COVID and vaccines. However, his warning extended to all false information online.

From the tech and social media companies who must do more to address the spread on their platforms, to all of us identifying and avoiding sharing misinformation, said Dr.Murthy, tackling this challenge will require an all-of-society approach, but it is critical for the long-term health of our nation.

How to Combat Misinformation

Do not be a spreader.

Before hitting the share button, ask yourself:

Does the article cite credible references and provide links to original sources? If not, it may not be reliable.

Is there transparency about the author and website? For example, District Media is SAs parent and you can find tabs for About Us, Our Team and Contact on our home page.

Is the article published by an individual or on a credible website? Anybody can write anything on social media. However, if the information is published on an established site, it has probably had to pass some form of editorial review.

Read More:

If you enjoy reading our blog posts and would like to try your hand at blogging, we have good news for you; you can do exactly that on Saving Advice. Just click here to get started.

Check out these helpful tools to help you save more. For investing advice, visit The Motley Fool.
LATEST Sept. 15, 9:00 a.m. Honolulu Mayor Rick Blangiardi has agreed with the City Council and approved the removal of the Haiku Stairs.

"We have listened to the varying compelling arguments and appreciate all the feedback and information received from all sides of the Haiku Stairs issue," he said in a statement, KHON2 reported.

"We recognize the interest the stairs have to certain community groups, however issues such as trespassing, personal injuries, invasive species and overall safety of the public cannot be ignored," the statement continued. "Fundamentally, it is inappropriate to have a high-use tourist attraction entering through this residential neighborhood, which lacks in the capacity to provide appropriate facilities or parking. In addition, there is no unrestricted access to the stairs and the primary landowner at the base made it clear it is not interested in providing access. Consequently, my administration is aligned with the City Councils resolution to remove the stairs and we intend to move forward with the necessary plans.

There is no timeline available yet as to when the Haiku Stairs will be removed.

Sept. 10, 12:14 a.m. One of the most popular hikes in Hawaii, the Haiku Stairs, is now one step closer to removal.

The Honolulu City Council voted unanimously Wednesday to remove the Stairway to Heaven in a nonbinding resolution urging the City Administration to remove the Haiku Stairs and its accessory structures to stop trespassing, reduce disturbances to local neighborhoods, increase public safety, remove potential liability to the City, and protect the environment, according to the City Councils agenda.

Honolulu has allocated $1 million for the removal. Mayor Rick Blangiardi will be the ultimate decision-maker on the stairs if he approves the budget.

With its spectacular views and the sensation of walking into the clouds, the stairs are regularly featured in Instagram and social media posts from visitors and residents alike.

But the hike itself is also illegal, complete with a $1,000 fine if youre caught.

The steps also have a storied history: leading to a top-secret Navy radio station atop the Haiku Valley that was used to communicate with ships in the Pacific theater during World War II. In the decades after, ownership of the steps shifted hands multiple times, from the Navy to the Coast Guard to Honolulus Board of Water Supply. The city of Honolulu has owned the site since 2020.

Many neighbors in the area are supportive of the removal. They have long complained about trespassing and litter. One Haiku resident told Hawaii News Now that during a community stakeout, 191 trespassers were counted between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m.

However, others have called for a managed plan of the site instead of a full removal, including offering ticketed access.

To lose the stairs would be a catastrophe," Vernon Ansdell of the Friends of Haiku Stairs, a group that advocates for the site, told KITV. The group recently rallied in Honolulu to save the stairs. "This is a priceless Windward treasure. And they must not be destroyed."
Mary Schwalm/AP

BOSTON (AP)  A retired flight attendant who has been pushing an airline beverage cart from Boston to New York City for days in honor of the flight crews who died on 9/11 arrived at Ground Zero on Saturday to mark the 20th anniversary of the terror attacks.

Paul Veneto announced his arrival by posting a picture of himself at the World Trade Center memorial with the phrase Journey's End" on his Facebook page.
TEHRAN, Iran (AP)  Iran says that the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency is arriving in the country for talks with Iranian officials.

Kazem Gharibabadi, Irans envoy to the IAEA, said in a tweet that Rafael Grossi is arriving Saturday, and will travel to Tehran this afternoon. He's scheduled to meet Iran's vice-president and head of the countrys atomic organization, Mohammad Eslami, on Sunday.

It will be Grossis first visit to the country since new president Ebrahim Raisi took office. Gharibabadi said the two sides will issue a joint statement after the meeting.

Talks between Iran and world powers over limiting Iran's nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief have been idle since June, and Raisi took office in August.

Earlier this month, the IAEA in a report said that Iran has continued to increase its stockpile of highly enriched uranium. It also said that verification and monitoring activities have been seriously undermined since February, after Iran refused to let inspectors access IAEA monitoring equipment.

In response, Iran said its nuclear activities had been carried out in the framework of Irans nuclear rights and under nonproliferation treaty.

The two major issues being negotiated are the rollback of American sanctions imposed by former President Donald Trumps administration after it withdrew from the deal, and the return of Iran to compliance with restrictions imposed on its nuclear program.

___

This story has been updated to corrects the name of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
UNITED NATIONS (AP)  The U.N. special envoy for Libya warned Friday that failure to hold presidential and parliamentary elections on Dec. 24 could renew division and conflict and thwart efforts to unite the oil-rich North African nation after a decade of turmoil.

Jan Kubis told the U.N. Security Council that aborting the drive for elections will be for many be a signal that violence is the only path to power in the country.

U.N.-sponsored peace talks brought about a cease-fire last October between rival governments in Libyas east and west and installed an interim government that is expected to lead the country into December elections, but the Libyan parliament has failed to finalize a legal framework for voting to take place.

Kubis said the House of Representatives adopted the presidential electoral law, and he was told it is in the process of finalizing the electoral law for parliamentary elections. He said the High Council of State, an executive institution that among other duties proposes electoral laws, complained that the presidential electoral law was adopted without consulting its members.

The country and its people need a full clarity that the elections are going to happen on Dec. 24, Kubis said in a video briefing. The existing uncertainty creates a fertile ground for spoilers and skeptics to manipulate the situation against the political transition, feeding in the existing tensions in relations between diverse Libyan institutions and authorities.

He stressed that holding elections, even in less than ideal situation, and with all imperfections, challenges and risks is much more desirable than no elections that could only foster division, instability and conflict.

Many Security Council members also called for elections to take place on Dec. 24, the date decided by the Libyan Political Dialogue Forum, a 75-member body from all walks of life, and endorsed by the Security Council.

Frances U.N. Ambassador Nicolas De Riviere called on all Libyan leaders to assume their responsibilities to complete this process on time and to rise to the challenge. He said: France will support any Libyan decision supported by the United Nations to clarify the legal basis for holding the elections.

U.S. deputy ambassador Jeffrey DeLaurentis said The parties need to agree on a constitutional and legal framework for elections  urgently. While its fortunate that work is progressing, he said, we urge maximum efforts to consult and secure broad consensus.

Libya has been wracked by chaos since a NATO-backed uprising toppled longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi in 2011 and split the country between a U.N.-supported government in the capital, Tripoli, and rival authorities loyal to commander Khalifa Hifter in the east. Each have been backed by different armed groups and foreign governments.

Hifter launched a military offensive in 2019 to capture the capital, a campaign backed by Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Russia and France. But his march on Tripoli ultimately failed in June 2020 after Turkey sent troops to support the government, which also had the backing of Qatar and Italy. This paved the way for the October cease-fire agreement.

Kubis urged Libyas rivals to join forces and ensure inclusive, free, fair parliamentary and presidential elections, which are to be seen as the essential step in further stabilizing and uniting Libya.

He said more than 500,000 new voters have recently registered, bringing the total to over 2.8 million -- 40% of them women. Most of the new voters are under 30 years old, he said, a clear testament to the young generations eagerness to take part in determining the fate of their country through a democratic process.

Kubis said Libya needs to move beyond the state of paralyzing perpetual crisis and conflict and perennial transition to build a united, stable and secure country that can focus on development. He stressed that elections are a political and security necessity ensuring that the positive developments achieved in Libya since October 2020 continue.

The October cease-fire continues to hold, Kubis said, but the continued presence of mercenaries, foreign fighters and foreign forces who were supposed to leave under its provisions remains a cause of grave concern for Libya and the international community.

To support implementation of the cease-fire, Kubis said the U.N. is continuing preparations to deploy the first group of 10 U.N. cease-fire monitors and support staff in the coming days.

With just over 100 days until Dec. 24, the U.N. envoy urged all countries and regional organizations to send election observers in order to help ensure integrity and credibility of the electoral process and acceptability of the results.
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP)  The United Nations on Friday sounded the alarm over Taliban crackdowns on peaceful protests, many of them by women demanding equal rights, and journalists covering such events.

In one case, two Afghan video journalists were beaten with iron rods.

Tagi Daryabi said he and a colleague were covering a protest earlier this week by women demanding their rights from Afghanistans new Taliban rulers. Taliban fighters stopped the two journalists, bound their hands and dragged them away to a police station in Kabuls District Three.

The 22-year-old photographer told The Associated Press that the first thing he heard in the station were screams from a nearby room. Several fighters then began beating him and his colleague, 28-year-old Neamatullah Naqdi.

At one point, Daryabi said he was beaten non-stop for 10 minutes. I couldnt think. I didnt know if I would be killed or if I would live, he said, his face and body still bearing the scars.

We call on the Taliban to immediately cease the use of force toward, and the arbitrary detention of, those exercising their right to peaceful assembly and the journalists covering the protests, the office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights said in a statement Friday.

It said reports point to an increasing use of force by the Taliban against those involved in or reporting on the demonstrations.

Uncowed, Daryabi said he would return to the street to cover another protest.

Its very dangerous for me to stand up to them. The Taliban say the media is free, but how can they say that when they are beating me and my colleagues? he said. We cannot just stop our work.

Daryabi and Naqdi work for the small, privately owned Etilaat Roz newspaper, which also broadcasts video news on a YouTube channel.

In the chaotic days following the Talibans takeover of Kabul on Aug. 15, thousands of people, including women and young journalists, rushed to the Kabul airport desperate to escape the militants rule.

In the weeks since, women have held multiple protests for their rights, almost all of them broken up violently by Taliban fighters. Two men were killed last week when Taliban opened fire on a womens rights protest in the western city of Herat. Journalists have been harassed at the rallies, including another cameramen who was beaten.

Despite the abuse at the hands of the Taliban, Duryabi said he wasnt ready to give up on his homeland.

I will see if the Taliban continues like this, but if they change and bring a face that protects the media, I will live here. My life is in Afghanistan. But I dont know, because today I cant guarantee anything, he said.

Daryabis newspaper and other media houses say its not clear whether the heavy handedness of some local police commanders is sanctioned by the Talibans media wing. That office has shown a more engaging side, welcoming foreign journalists, and allowing some women presenters to remain on the air at the countrys most popular TV station, TOLO TV.

My own feeling is that there seems to be a disconnect between the leadership and...the rank-and-file type commanders, who are doing this on the ground, said Saad Mohsini, executive director of Moby Media Group, which owns TOLO TV. The way they behave reflects perhaps, not the official Taliban media policy, but more the attitude of that particular commander.

Etilaat Roz chief editor Khaadim Karimi, who went to the police station to rescue his reporters, said one Taliban fighter tried to stop the beating of the two journalists by his comrades.

I saw his humanness. He tried to help, Karimi said. Daryabi and Naaqdi were freed after about four hours.

Mohsini said the media needs guarantees and protection. He called for a commission including both the Taliban information ministry officials and representatives of the media to hear complaints from both sides.

Mohsini, whose TOLO TV employs hundreds, says he has stayed engaged with the Taliban leadership as it navigates its way forward.

Governments around the world are deeply skeptical. In their eyes, the new interim all-Taliban Cabinet defied the movements promises to be inclusive. Instead, the militants appear to have embraced the leadership of the 1990s, when their harsh interpretation of Islam denied women rights and severely restricted the media.

One difference now is that those leaders have a global exposure they didnt have during their earlier time in power.

Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, for example, rarely left the movements former heartland, Kandahar in the south, when they last ruled. In recent years, he was the Taliban chief negotiator, stood on the same stage as world leaders, worked out a deal with the U.S. heavily weighted in the Talibans favor and now is the deputy premier.

It was Baradar who helped ensure the departure from Kabul on Thursday and Friday of American citizens and Afghan green card holders on the first commercial flights.

Still, hundreds of Afghans in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif are waiting to leave the country. But the Taliban have refused to allow their aircraft to depart, demanding their documents. The Taliban say only Afghans with proper travel documents will be allowed to leave.

The Afghans stranded in Mazar-e-Sharif, many of whom have worked for the U.S. and German military, fear they will be forgotten.
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What you might call the chalk squat  when a person checks the tires of a parked car for the white stripe of chalk that could result in a fresh ticket landing on the windshield  is on its way out in the Bay Area.

But perhaps not without a final, multimillion-dollar legal battle.

Even as cities across the region switch from chalking tires to digital enforcement of time-zone limits, gaining efficiency and reducing carpal tunnel injuries among parking officers, a pair of federal lawsuits says the old-fashioned way is a violation of drivers Fourth Amendment right to be free of unreasonable searches and seizures.

In one of the cases, filed Sept. 4, plaintiff Maria Infante seeks $50 million and class-action status after a San Francisco parking enforcement officer wielding chalk on a residential street gave her a $95 ticket. Unlike some in her predicament, Infante had apparently not spotted the stripe in time to rub it away.

The city, the suit alleges, systematically places chalk or a similar substance on vehicle tires without the owners consent, surreptitiously to obtain information used as the basis for parking citation.

The second case, filed the same day against San Leandro, demands $5 million for class members whose tires were chalked to financially benefit the city. Plaintiff Akeel Nasser invokes four tickets he received from the city in March for allegedly exceeding a two-hour parking limit. The violations cost him $180.

The San Francisco attorney who filed both suits, Eduardo Roy, hinted in an interview that he may bring more. But if the legal challenges sound like sour grapes, they also stand a chance of succeeding.

Thats because both extend from recent decisions by the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, which twice ruled in favor of a Michigan woman whod racked up 14 parking tickets.

In the most recent opinion, published Aug. 25, Judge Richard Griffin wrote that chalking may constitute an unreasonable search under the Fourth Amendment. He and the other two judges rejected the citys argument for an exemption in a lawsuit that is still pending.

The Sixth Circuit ruling, which applies to Michigan, Ohio, Tennessee and Kentucky, has mushroomed into lawsuits in other communities that may hasten the demise of an ancient, low-tech practice.

Paul Chinn/The Chronicle 2012

Some cities have gotten rid of chalk in response. Others found workarounds. In Chillicothe, Ohio, officials put up new signs specifically warning people who parked in time-restricted areas that they were consenting to be chalked.

A trial court in San Diego, meanwhile, ruled that chalking tires is not a Fourth Amendment violation, a decision now headed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.

It seems the question now is not whether tire chalking will go away, but how  and how soon. The form of enforcement emerged in the 1920s, deployed by a first generation of parking officials, according to UCLA Professor Donald Shoup, who has extensively studied urban parking policies.

Back then, the concept was the same: chalk was a substance that would rub right off a car that moved; a person who overstayed would bear the mark. Shoup said he welcomes new technology  and the death of a century-old system.

In the 1920s, they got used to chalking, because its easy to do, Shoup said, noting that the practice was already ingrained by the time the first parking meter arrived, in 1935. Its just surprised me that its lasted so long. Municipal parking enforcement has been the most stagnant industry in the U.S. What other practices havent changed in a hundred years?

Shoup blames chalk for lax and selective enforcement. Of all the people who flout parking restrictions each day, few get cited, he said. Those who do face high fines that can be unbearable.

Many cities now equip parking officers with GPS-enabled license plate scanners and data analytics tools that can flag a parked car that hasnt moved in one or two hours and even confirm whether a tire has rotated at all. Oakland has moved past chalk, as has Berkeley, according to spokespeople for those cities. San Francisco and San Jose are nearly chalk-free.

Sophisticated new systems can enable motorists to pay parking fees remotely, negate the need for individual meters, and alert police to vehicles that have been reported stolen. They can even pinpoint serial offenders who routinely occupy curb space for too long, Shoup said.

Asked about this months lawsuits, officials at the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency referred questions to the City Attorneys Office. There, spokesperson John Cote said parking control officers have a tough job, and they do it lawfully and thoughtfully to help keep the City moving so people can get where they need to go.

Cote said the city still uses chalk in some parking enforcement, though its not the main tool anymore.

Parking officials in San Leandro did not return phone calls, and the city attorney declined to comment. Neither Infante nor Nasser wanted to talk, and Roy suggested he was upset that their suits were deemed newsworthy.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

One person who finds the whole saga worth following is UC Berkeley Law Professor Orin Kerr, a Fourth Amendment expert. He said he found himself captivated after the Sixth Circuit court first sided with the Michigan plaintiff, in 2019.

Courts are still trying to figure this out, Kerr said of the conflicting opinions. It ends up being a surprisingly interesting Fourth Amendment question that nobody expected, with a quirky and totally pedestrian fact pattern.

To weigh whether the chalking of tires is unconstitutional, he said, the courts need to decide whether its a search, and on top of that, whether the search is unreasonable. To date, nobody has answered both questions definitively.

Another legal scholar, Gregory Shill, cringed at the Fourth Amendment argument.

Realistically, the privacy invasion that is involved when police chalk your tires is the very definition of trivial, said Shill, an associate professor of law at the University of Iowa. He contrasted the minor inconvenience of a chalked tire with the more severe monitoring of transit riders, noting that after 9/11, New York police searched the bags of subway riders.

He sees this disparity through the prism of social equity: People driving into a city skew white and wealthy, he said, while transit users tend to be more racially diverse, with lower average incomes.

Shill pointed out that modern alternatives to chalk, such as license plate scanners that store data for months or years, are more expensive for cities and more invasive for drivers. If you park on a street in an American city where a crime happens, its possible that a police detective will serve a warrant on the parking department to find you and others who were nearby  and then knock on your door.

Whether in court, or in the court of public opinion, Shill said of the Bay Area plaintiffs, theyre going to have to show that, say, security cameras are somehow more protective of privacy than chalking your tires.

Rachel Swan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: rswan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @rachelswan
ERproductions Ltd/Getty Image

A Mountain View police officer helped to save the life of a baby boy this week, rushing to action and applying his training on infant CPR, police officials said.

At about 7:45 p.m. Monday, dispatch received a call about a choking baby outside an In-N-Out fast food restaurant on the 1100 block of Rengstorff Avenue, according to police.
Two weeks ago, a 68-year-old man came into a Fairfield emergency room complaining of body aches thatd been bothering him for four days.

Hospital staff swabbed his nose and processed the sample immediately on-site, using a machine that confirmed within the hour that the man was positive for the coronavirus. The fast results let doctors know that the patient  who also had diabetes and heart disease  was a good candidate for monoclonal antibodies, an intravenous treatment for high-risk COVID patients that works best when given within the first week of symptoms.

Knowing the patient had symptoms for four days meant that if we got an answer earlier, we could immediately start monoclonal antibody therapy, said Dr. Caesar Djavaherian, the emergency physician who treated the man. If wed sent the (sample) to the lab, and it typically takes two or three days to get results back, they probably wouldve been outside the window of therapy.

Polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, tests  the type that Djavaherian used  are considered the highest quality coronavirus test. These molecular tests amplify genetic material many times over in order to detect the viruss presence. This is more accurate than the rapid antigen tests like BinaxNow or Ellume that can be done at home, like a pregnancy test, and detect viral proteins. But normally, as Djavaherian noted, PCR lab tests take at least a day to return results  a critical window in which an infected person may not take sufficient precautions to protect others, or a COVID-negative person may lose in unnecessary quarantine.

And so, some hospitals are using machines that produce accurate results within 45 minutes, like the test used for the Fairfield patient, made by the diagnostics company Cepheid. Rather than being sent out to labs, the samples are processed on-site by a piece of equipment that can be as small as a desktop printer. Another commonly used rapid molecular test, Abbott ID Now, generates results in about 20 minutes. The ID Now is similar to PCR in that both amplify viral genetic material, but with different technology. An Abbott spokeswoman said the company is selling the machines for no more than $4,500 apiece.

It seems like the best-case scenario: a highly accurate test that returns results quickly. In the case of the Fairfield hospital, it allowed a patient to get time-critical monoclonal antibodies the same day  and he responded well, Djavaherian said.

Peter DaSilva / Peter DaSilva

So why arent these fast, accurate tests more common in settings like schools, clinics and workplaces, many of which require people to confirm their COVID status using lab tests?

There are several reasons, Bay Area experts say  including supply constraints, cost, staffing demands, and because rapid molecular tests are hard to scale up efficiently.

The best test, experts say, depends entirely on your goal: Is it to diagnose a sick patient quickly to start treatment? To screen hundreds of asymptomatic people so they can go to work? To get cleared to fly, go to camp or a concert?

As hospital leaders, school officials, office human resources managers and consumers attempt to incorporate testing into their routines for months if not years to come, theyre learning there is no one perfect test for all occasions. A test that works well in a hospital for a few patients at a time doesnt always translate to mass testing operations.

Its a challenge inherent to building an unprecedented testing infrastructure that touches virtually every part of peoples lives  and affects settings that usually are not intensely involved in health care, such as schools, workplaces, airports and homes.

Its been fascinating to see all the differences, the scaling up of what is one of the largest health care delivery programs happening outside of health care right now, said Caroline Savello, chief commercial officer at Burlingame company Color, which is providing testing for thousands of schools and businesses in California and elsewhere, including San Francisco Unified School District.

Some providers say the rapid molecular testing machines arent in short supply, but the test cartridges are getting harder to obtain as demand soars for all types of testing.

The San Francisco-based urgent and primary care network Carbon Health uses the Abbott ID Now test in its dozens of clinics, and for schools and business with whom they contract to provide frequent testing.

In the summer we had ample supply of the Abbott ID Now point-of-care test, said Djavaherian, the emergency physician who also co-founded Carbon Health. Starting six weeks ago we started to see a lot of strain on the supply of the test.

Carbon plans to add the Cepheid test in the next month to accommodate the high demand in rapid tests, and to prepare for flu season. The Cepheid system can test for COVID, respiratory syncytial virus and the flu at the same time.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

That was the initial reason we started to explore it, Djavaherian said. And as (COVID) cases spiked over the past two months we realized we also need to have a diversified supply chain.

The Abbott ID Now machine, which some hospitals use in their emergency department, is the size of a toaster oven. Because the machine must be supervised by an entity affiliated with a federally certified lab, schools or businesses cannot use it unless they partner with such an entity, said Dr. Jeanne Noble, director of COVID response at UCSFs Parnassus emergency department, which has four Abbott ID Now machines.

And each test must be done one at a time by a staffer who handles the sample manually. That works if a few or even a few dozen sick patients get tested in the emergency room throughout the day. So UCSFs four Abbott machines, for example, allow it to run four tests every half-hour. Most PCR lab tests, by contrast, get sent to labs and are processed by automated systems that run hundreds of samples at a time.

If youre doing 3,000 tests a day, its hard to imagine 3,000 cartridges, you have to pipette into each cartridge, said Dr. James Zehnder, director of clinical pathology at Stanford Medicine, which runs 100 to 200 Cepheid rapid tests a day, mostly in the emergency room and for patients right before urgent operations. That kind of supply chain doesnt exist and its a very inefficient and expensive way of doing testing. We reserve it for situations where we truly need rapid turnaround time for clinical decision-making. Otherwise, 12 to 24 hours, or even two days, is fast enough turnaround time for most outpatient screening.

Even though lab tests take longer to report results, theyre more efficient when testing lots of people frequently. SFUSD, for example, tests staff using a LAMP test, which is similar to a PCR test. Teachers and staff self-swab, and drop the samples in a bin. Those samples are sent to Colors lab in Burlingame, and results come back within 24 hours, said Savello of Color, which is providing testing for the school district. The self-swab eliminates the need for a health care professional to be there to do it.

Were reducing costs and overhead of testing programs when doing it this way, Savello said.

Catherine Ho is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: cho@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @Cat_Ho
Inside reopened classrooms in California, most students are back in seats, once again studying the life cycles of frogs, the sonnets of Shakespeare or what x equals in an algebraic equation.

Behind the scenes, adults are still debating how to keep schools safe amid a pandemic. Each district has adopted its own policy on masking, vaccination, testing, ventilation or more, making for a dizzying array of rules  many of which have led to community outcry.

Los Angeles, the second-largest district in the country, has become something of a standout, requiring weekly testing as well as vaccinations for all students and staff  a policy that exceeds health requirements and pressures other districts to follow suit.

There is no one way to navigate this pandemic in the states public schools. Its a juggling act, officials say, a no-win scenario.

It is uncharted territory, said Alameda County Superintendent L.K. Monroe.

Each district is grappling with this, she said. Every superintendent is feeling the pressure from the community. People want different things.

In San Ramon, parents loudly protested masks in early August, shouting down elected officials, calling them cowards and lunatics.

In San Francisco, a few weeks later, parents and teachers rallied at City Hall, demanding free and better masks, regular testing for students and staff, and air filtration systems in every classroom to address the combination of COVID-19 and wildfire smoke.

And in Manteca (San Joaquin County), at raucous public meetings, the demands from parents and teachers fall on both sides  some want more protections, some say the protections are unnecessary.

Each county health department provides guidelines for in-person instruction and the state requires indoor masking in all schools, but some districts choose to exceed the guidelines or rules.

Jessica Christian / The Chronicle

In Oakland, for example, the district opted to require masking outdoors. San Francisco, in turn, requires students who come into close contact with an infected person to isolate at home  rather than to come to school and get tested twice a week during the quarantine period, which was what the county recommended.

In general, however, regional school districts have hewed closely to county guidelines, relying on health experts to dictate what needs to be done to make schools safe.

As a branch of government, we have an obligation to do that, said Clark Burke, Manteca Unified superintendent. We are referring to the experts in the field who are providing health mandates and structure for what were doing.

Our directive is to educate kids in a safe environment.

That said, Manteca was ahead of the curve swapping drinking fountains for water refill stations and putting air purifiers in classrooms last school year.

But what Los Angeles is doing isnt an issue for Manteca, he said.

I would wonder what the decision-making process that got them to that point is, he said. Is it political in nature? Is it rooted in science?

Los Angeles will require all students 12 and older to get vaccinated by January, a decision announced last week. It is the first district in the country to do so. Students turning 12 have eight weeks to get vaccinated after their birthday.

The decision follows the districts decision to baseline-test all staff and students before the start of the school year this month and once a week thereafter.

Los Angeles Unified is testing 95,000 people per day, at a cost of $31 each  or a total of $2.9 million, according to district officials. For a 180-day school year, thats more than $530 million. The state is expected to cover at least part of the cost.

The decision last week to require eligible students to be vaccinated by January, despite a lack of full federal authorization of the vaccine for those younger than 16, could result in lawsuits against the district and the withdrawal of students from the districts schools.

This decision was not made lightly, said Interim Superintendent Megan Reilly. Every single person in our Los Angeles Unified community has been impacted by COVID-19 in some way, and we feel a strong commitment to do our part to ensure that the worst of the pandemic remains behind us.

In San Francisco, some parents and teachers have pointed to Los Angeles as an example, arguing that San Francisco schools should also conduct weekly testing and other mitigation efforts to keep students and staff safe.

We should be protecting our under-12-year-olds, said parent Marjorie Sturm, who has children ages 13 and 17 in district schools. We should be doing everything we can to protect them the way we protected ourselves.

Sturm would like to see frequent testing of at least once a month, upgraded air filtration and more full-time nurses in schools.

It would reassure people, she said. I really do think, ethically, as a culture we need to protect kids who are not vaccinated.

Yet with limited resources, districts have to choose what to spend time, staff and money on, Monroe said. During the pandemic, its no different.

Testing all students and staff once a week doesnt just require the tests, but also a huge logistical operation to administer the tests and distribute the results. It also requires giving up instructional time to get hundreds or thousands of students at each school through the testing line.

Currently, most districts require tests for employees and students who are symptomatic, with many teachers, employees and families self-reporting test results from their health providers.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

In addition, the state will require unvaccinated adults in schools to submit to weekly testing starting in October.

County health guidelines in San Francisco and many other areas so far do not require additional testing.

The question is whether weekly testing like whats required in Los Angeles would make a difference in a city where more than 80% of eligible residents are fully vaccinated and the school district has reported no confirmed cases of in-school transmission since classrooms reopened nearly a month ago.

By comparison, 66% of Los Angeles is fully vaccinated, with much lower rates for communities of color, with 51% of Black residents, for example, having at least one dose.

In the Southern California city, as of Friday, the district had a positive case rate of 0.9%, with 1,301 active coronavirus cases, including one case of in-school transmission.

In San Francisco, the most recent weekly case rate available was about 0.1% and even lower in recent days.

Would it make more sense, asked San Francisco school board member Jenny Lam, to target resources where they are needed most.

Its about identifying where the district can make the greatest impact with the resources it has. That could be increased surveillance testing, which would test a large number or all students to identify asymptomatic cases.

What are the challenges, where are the gaps, and where are the resources to fulfill testing? she said. You need to be able to understand what resources its going to take.

Adding to the complicated logistics is the unpredictability of the pandemic, Lam said.

There is new information on a weekly, daily basis, she said. That requires public institutions to adapt quickly.

Thats not always easy, Monroe said. Los Angeles has economies of scale, which make it hard for a lot of other districts to always follow their lead, even if they want to do so.

With different populations, varying resources, and politics all in play, its a lot to fall on districts, Monroe added.

And its hard, she said. Its difficult and challenging each and every day. Its not anything any of us could have fathomed.

Jill Tucker is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jtucker@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @jilltucker
GRIZZLY FLATS, El Dorado County  Residents of a small Gold Country town ravaged during the first days of the Caldor Fire will be temporarily allowed back in to inspect the damage starting Sunday.

El Dorado County Sheriffs Office officials were preparing to allow some of the 1,200 evacuated residents of Grizzly Flats to return in waves beginning Sunday and probably into Monday.

Most of the rural towns roughly 650 homes were destroyed in the fire, as was the school, post office, church and fire station.

Meanwhile, fire crews continued to push their hard-won advantage against the blaze that ignited Aug. 14 a few miles south of Grizzly Flats and barreled more than 30 miles to the edge of South Lake Tahoe.

As of Saturday evening, firefighters kept Caldor stalled at 218,764 acres while increasing containment to 65%. The fire, which ranks as Californias 15th largest on record, has destroyed 782 homes and injured 15 people. Nearly 3,990 firefighters are assigned to it.

The drought-driven mega-fire forced tens of thousands to evacuate while threatening to reach Lake Tahoe, one of Californias most cherished jewels.

Nearly a month into battling the blaze, fire officials said Saturday they saw an end in sight, although they warned winds and warm weather forecast through the weekend into the week could grow the fire.

In a Saturday morning update, Brian Mackwood, a Cal Fire operations section chief, said crews would seek and destroy flareups south of Highway 50 near Kyburz and anything left in a rocky terrain on the fires eastern front.

Our crews have been working extremely hard, Mackwood said.

Mackwood also suggested that fire crews got lucky with the weather, despite responding to 12 new lightning-sparked fires Friday.

More than 3,000 lightning strikes were recorded in Northern and Central California in a 24-hour period ending Friday evening as thunderstorms swept across the state. The lightning ignited some new fires, but none was out of control.

Thunderstorms also delivered enough rain to slightly dampen parched vegetation  but only temporarily.

Officials said Saturday they were focused on the cleanup effort from the Caldor Fire. They were clearing dangerous trees and other debris around Grizzly Flats, the nearby town of Pollock Pines and along the Mormon Emigrant Trail.

Beale Monday, Cal Fire operations section chief, said Saturday evening that cleanup was the big problem faced along Highway 50. Access to Kirkwood along Highway 80 was still cut off, but the goal was to hopefully finish clearing the road by the middle of next week, although he made no assurances.

Mark Matthews, chief of the Pioneer Fire Protection District, which covers 296 square miles in southern El Dorado County, said crews had worked every day to clear Grizzly Flats roads once littered with fallen power poles, wires and other debris.

He cautioned residents to be mindful of weakened trees, underground fire smoldering through root systems, and hazardous materials in the burn sites.

Allowing people to return will be an important yet painful step in the towns recovery, Matthews said. Two of his districts 20 career and 20 volunteer firefighters were among the hundreds who lost homes.

Fire Tracker Follow wildfires across the state Latest updates on wildfires burning across Northern and Southern California

Gwen Sanchez, a supervisor with the U.S. Forest Service, praised the perseverance of firefighters who for weeks have endured record-breaking fuel conditions, heat waves and thunderstorms while wrestling with extreme fire. And on the 20th anniversary of 9/11, she pointed out that many also responded to the crises on the East Coast, conducting search and rescue missions and backfilling fire stations.

As residents return to the area, dozens have gathered every morning and evening in South Lake Tahoe to celebrate first responders with signs, smiles and hugs.

This community loves their firefighters, Sanchez said.

Meanwhile, the Dixie Fire, in Butte, Tehama, Plumas, Shasta and Lassen counties, stood at 960,213 acres and 65% containment Saturday evening.

Humidity overnight moderated fire behavior, but Cal Fire officials said in a Saturday morning report that theres potential for spots to become established well outside of the control lines.

Fire officials said among their priorities are to prevent spread into Highway 395 and into nearby communities.

The blaze has been burning for 58 days.

Julie Johnson, Lauren Hernandez and Raheem Hosseini are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: julie.johnson@sfchronicle.com, raheem.hosseini@sfchronicle.com
NEW YORK (AP)  From an urban memorial to a remote field to the heart of of the nation's military might, President Joe Biden on Saturday paid tribute at three hallowed places of grief and remembrance to honor the lives lost two decades ago in the 9/11 terror attacks.

The solemn day of commemoration offered frequent reminders for Americans of a time when they united in the face of unimaginable tragedy. That fading spirit of 9/11 was invoked most forcefully by the president at the time of the attacks, George W. Bush, who said, That is the America I know, in stark contrast to the bitterly divided nation Biden now leads.

Biden left the speech-making to others, paying his respects at the trio of sites in New York, Pennsylvania and outside Washington where four hijacked planes crashed on Sept. 11, 2001, killing nearly 3,000 people, shattering the nations sense of security and launching the country into two decades of warfare.

Biden wiped away a tear as he stood in silence at the site where the World Trade Center towers fell, and looked up at the haunting sound of a jet plane under clear blue skies reminiscent of that fateful day.

Now Playing: President Joe Biden delivered an impassioned appeal for the nation to set aside its differences and reclaim the spirit of cooperation that sprung up in the days following the 9/11 terror attacks. (Sept. 10) Video: Associated Press

In a grassy field in Pennsylvania, Biden comforted family members gathered at a stone boulder near Shanksville that marked where passengers brought down a hijacked plane that had been headed for the nation's capital. At the Pentagon, Biden and his wife, Jill, took a moment of silence before a wreath studded with white, purple and red flowers on display in front of the memorial benches that mark the victims of the attack at the military headquarters.

Delivering Bud Light and appreciation to the Shanksville Volunteer Fire Department, which responded to the crash of United Flight 93, Biden praised Bush's comments in his only public remarks of the day, saying the Republican made a really good speech today  genuinely," and wondered aloud what those who died that day would think of today's rancor.

Gesturing to a cross-shaped memorial made of steel from the twin towers adjacent to the firehouse, Biden reflected: Im thinking what, what what would the people who died, what would they be thinking. Would they think this makes sense for us to be doing this kind of thing where you ride down the street and someone has a sign saying f- so-and-so?

It was a reference to an explicit sign attacking Biden last week in New Jersey as he toured storm damage that was displayed by supporters of former President Donald Trump. Biden expressed incredulity at recent comments by Trump, whom he accused of abandoning the nation's ideals during his time in office.

Everyone says, Biden, why do you keep insisting on trying to bring the country together? the president told reporters. Thats the thing thats going to affect our well-being more than anything else.

Now Playing: President Joe Biden stood somberly side by side with his wife on Saturday at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania sharing a moment of silence to mark the anniversary of the nation's worst terror attack. (Sept. 11) Video: Associated Press

In a frequent refrain of his presidency warning of the rise of autocracies, he added, Are we going to, in the next four, five, six, ten years, demonstrate that democracies can work, or not?"

At ground zero in New York City, Biden stood side by side with former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton at the National September 11 Memorial as the names of the dead were read aloud by their loved ones. Each man wore a blue ribbon and held his hand over his heart as a procession marched a flag through the memorial before hundreds of people, some carrying photos of loved ones lost in the attacks.

Bush, delivering the keynote address in Shanksville, lamented that so much of our politics have become a naked appeal to anger, fear and resentment.

On Americas day of trial and grief, I saw millions of people instinctively grab for a neighbors hand, and rally for the cause of one another, Bush said. That is the America I know.

Alluding to domestic turmoil, including the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol, Bush said that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders but from violence that gathers within. He added that while they have little cultural similarity to the 9/11 attackers, they are children of the same foul spirit, and it is our continuing duty to confront them.

Vice President Kamala Harris also spoke at the Flight 93 National Memorial, echoing the theme of unity as she praised the courage of those passengers and the resilience of Americans who came together in the days after the attacks.

In a time of outright terror, we turned toward each other, Harris said. If we do the hard work of working together as Americans, if we remain united in purpose, we will be prepared for whatever comes next.

Biden was a U.S. senator when hijackers commandeered four planes and carried out the attacks. He was Obamas vice president in 2011 when the country observed the 10th anniversary of the strikes. Saturdays commemoration was his first as commander in chief.

It is now Biden who shoulders the responsibility borne by his predecessors to prevent another strike. He must do that against fears of a rise in terrorism after the hasty U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, where those who planned the Sept. 11 attacks were sheltered.

In remarks at the firehouse Biden defended the withdrawal, which culminated with a massive airlift to evacuate more than 110,000 Americans and allies  but still resulted in many being left behind for an uncertain future under Taliban rule.

Could al-Qaida come back? Yeah. But guess what, its already back other places," Biden said. "Whats the strategy? Every place where al-Qaida is, were going to invade and have troops stay in? Cmon.

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Rather than deliver formal remarks, Biden released a taped address late Friday about the anniversary in which he spoke about the true sense of national unity that emerged after the attacks, seen in heroism everywhere  in places expected and unexpected.

To me thats the central lesson of Sept. 11, he said. Unity is our greatest strength.

Biden became the fourth president to console the nation on the anniversary of that dark day, one that has shaped many of the most consequential domestic and foreign policy decisions made by the chief executives over the past two decades.

Trump skipped the official 9/11 memorial ceremonies and instead visited a fire station and police precinct in New York, where he laced into Biden over his withdrawal from Afghanistan and repeated lies about the 2020 election as he paid tribute to New Yorks first responders.

Bush was reading a book to Florida schoolchildren when the planes slammed into the World Trade Center. He spent that day being kept out of Washington for security reasons  a decision then-Sen. Biden urged him to reconsider, the current president has written  and then delivered a brief, halting speech that night from the White House to a terrified nation.

The terrorist attack would define Bush's presidency. The following year, he chose Ellis Island as the location to deliver his first anniversary address, the Statue of Liberty over his shoulder as he pledged, What our enemies have begun, we will finish.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were still deadly when Obama visited the Pentagon to mark his first Sept. 11 in office in 2009.

By the time Obama spoke at the 10th anniversary, attack mastermind Osama bin Laden was dead, killed in a May 2011 Navy SEAL raid. Though the nation remained entangled overseas, and vigilant against threats, the anniversary became more about healing.

Trump pledged to get the U.S. out of Afghanistan, but his words during his first Sept. 11 anniversary ceremony in 2017 were a vivid warning to terrorists, telling these savage killers that there is no dark corner beyond our reach, no sanctuary beyond our grasp, and nowhere to hide anywhere on this very large earth.

___

Jaffe reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Jill Colvin in New York and Aamer Madhani in Wilmington, Delaware, contributed to this report.
The crumbling chaos of the falling twin towers is burned into the American consciousness much like the John F. Kennedy assassination was 38 years prior. I wasnt even born, but I remember the open convertible, the waving and smiling to the adoring Dallas crowd. I still see Jackies powder pink suit and matching pillbox hat. Then the shots! Shock and complete devastation at the same time.

But that was nothing compared to 8:46 a.m. on Sept. 11, 2001.

It was a Tuesday, as cloudless and clear a morning as New York has to offer. I lived 3,000 miles away in Oregon, so I was still fast asleep when the first plane struck. My mother, however, who was a punctual economics teacher, had already been awake for 45 minutes, listening to a local shock jock as she sipped green tea and applied the first touches of her makeup routine.

I heard her yell for my father. Then she came for me. The three of us gathered in the kitchen, my dad and I in our boxer shorts and T-shirts, my mom clutching her robe like it was a life jacket. We huddled around the TV, mouths open, eyes fixed. I was scared when I saw the look on my mothers face, one Id never seen before.

Fear.

Whats happening? my mother asked.

Its an attack. Terrorists, my father said slowly, emphasizing each syllable.

Then the second plane hit and whatever doubt or wonder had existed vanished. The whole country knew the world would never be the same.

Do you think its worse to kill people at a wedding or at a funeral? In Afghanistan we did both.

I spent most of 2003 on top of the world, 23,000 feet above sea level, treading the Hindu Kush Mountains of Afghanistan. There is no other place where the peaks are so high for so many miles, not even the Himalayas. There exists a beauty that high up that makes one feel close to the heavens, even if whats happening on the ground looks more like hell.

I was an Army infantry private assigned to the 82nd Airborne Division and I was 18 years old. I was the only one from my high school to enlist in the direct aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks. I left for basic training two days after graduation. Six months later I was manning an M249B automatic rifle with 80 pounds of ammunition and gear on my back.

There was nowhere else in the world Id have rather been.

I wasnt what I would describe as a patriotic teenager  there wasnt really such a thing if you grew up in the 90s. But there did exist an unbridled machismo boiling under the surface of nearly every boys skin. We were a generation raised for war.

Some time after Vietnam, the U.S. military learned how to supply its ranks with an all-volunteer force to avoid pissing off the public with draft cards to wars nobody but a few politicians wanted to fight. The military learned that if you just feed the combined arrogance and self-consciousness of young American males, youll have plenty of volunteers ready to fill the ranks and prove themselves the tough guy that Lee Marvin or John Wayne (a draft dodger) convinced them they needed to be.

Too many Americans reduce our war in Afghanistan to the Sept. 11 attacks. But to truly understand our war in Afghanistan, you need to examine the Russian occupation we reductively call the Soviet Unions Vietnam. We call it that because, like our war with the North Vietnamese, a comparatively microscopic military sustained and ultimately won a war against a major superpower.

After over nine years of fighting, the Soviets returned home with their tails between their legs. They were defeated by the CIA-backed mujahedeen, a guerrilla warfare unit that was the first military posting for a man named Osama bin Laden, the son of a Saudi Arabian millionaire and construction magnate.

We built the soldiers who would attack us in 2001.

Some statistics tell only part of the story. Thats especially true regarding loss of human life.

Americans often hear of the nearly 3,000 civilians who died on Sept. 11, the deadliest attack on American soil. As an infantry vet who enlisted directly following the attacks, I am the last person to take those deaths lightly. But when weighed against even the most modest estimates of Afghan civilian deaths  47,000  I dont feel like America delivered justice for our dead. We delivered vengeance.

Another 52,000 Taliban and al Qaeda forces, mostly farmers recruited through bribery or threats, were killed in combat.

Not nearly as important as the human losses on both sides, but nothing to ignore, is the $2.3 trillion in U.S. defense spending. Thats enough money to write every man, woman and child in the country a check for $7,000. Thats enough money to pay off every student loan almost two times over. The $2.3 trillion we spent in Afghanistan could have changed the world forever  and not the way we changed it through 20 years of continuous war.

Its been 19 years since I was in Afghanistan. I practically have to write that sentence twice to fully comprehend its significance. When we were in country, my friend from another squad and I used to fantasize about coming back to visit in 20 years. Maybe wed do a backpacking expedition with some of our Army friends, just like the Nam vets who vacationed on Vietnams sandy gold beaches 20 years after the war ended.

A decade ago, he and I had a laugh on the phone about our naivety. But its no joke.

The ruling Taliban would take one look at our documents, drive us out to the desert, put a camera on us and saw our heads off one by one.

This is the world weve helped create. Thats the Afghanistan weve left behind.

Whatever attempts at preserving any moral context behind my involvement in the war dissolved when we left our allies on the ground to be slaughtered by the regime we were once so determined to protect the people from.

I hope history will absolve us.

In the 20 years since Sept. 11, 2001, gas prices have skyrocketed. The Red Sox lifted the curse of the Bambino. We elected our first Black president. Then we watched the nation react to that Black president with the election of Donald Trump. Climate change went from theory to daily reality. Ive written three books and had two wives leave me.

Suffice it to say, a lot has changed.

But it often doesnt feel that way for those of us who fought in Afghanistan. I dont think the war will be over for us until the last veteran draws their final breath.

Operation Enduring Freedom vets call it the suck.

Theres a few meanings behind this. The obvious one refers to being in harsh conditions  the incessant heat, or cold depending when you were there, the lack of adequate food and ammunition, and the constant threat of death knowing that the 60 American troops at your little fire base are surrounded by hundreds of Taliban.

That sucks.

But then theres that other aspect of the suck, what it takes from you. The kind of cancerous suck that never leaves the deepest recesses of your mind and body.

America had no idea what we were getting ourselves into in Afghanistan. We saw 3,000 innocent civilians murdered by an enemy we created but didnt understand. I worry that lessons have not been learned, that we will one day try to assert our will over the people of Afghanistan once more  a people who will never submit to the whims of Western power.

America has been living in the suck for two decades since 9/11. And we have no one to blame but ourselves.

Joseph Andrew Holsworth is a veteran of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. He is the author of two novels and holds a masters in writing from the California College of the Arts.
SACRAMENTO  California would streamline its assisted death process, making it easier for terminally ill patients to obtain a lethal prescription and end their lives on their own terms, under a bill sent to Gov. Gavin Newsom.

If signed by Newsom, SB380 would shorten a mandatory 15 days that patients must wait between making two separate requests for the life-ending drugs to just 48 hours. Advocates estimate that thousands of Californians who sought to use assisted death have died before they were able to complete the process because they became too sick to continue.

The bill, by state Sen. Susan Talamantes Eggman, D-Stockton, would also extend the law, which is set to expire in 2026, for five years.

It is time to remove unnecessary barriers, Sen. Connie Leyva, D-Chino (San Bernardino County), said on the Senate floor Friday, and ensure that all eligible, terminally ill individuals will have the right to remain autonomous and die with dignity in the manner that they desire.

The Legislature originally approved assisted death in 2015, after acrimonious and emotional debates over the morality of the proposal. But the follow-up measure generated relatively little controversy as it worked its way through the Capitol this session, a reflection of how it has since established itself as a widely accepted option at the end of life.

No members spoke against the bill Friday as it passed 47-14 in the Assembly and 26-8 in the state Senate. A spokesperson for Newsom said he does not comment on pending legislation.

Currently, California adults seeking the lethal medication must confirm with two doctors that they have less than six months to live and are mentally capable of making their own medical decisions. They must also make two spoken requests, a minimum of 15 days apart, and submit a written request, signed and dated by two witnesses, to the physician who will write them a prescription. Then they must fill out a final attestation, 48 hours before ingesting the drug, that they are doing so voluntarily.

The stringent rules were put in place to assuage concerns  raised by Catholic groups and other religiously-affiliated organizations, as well as advocates for disabled people and some lawmakers  that vulnerable patients might be coerced into ending their lives prematurely or change their minds after initially seeking a lethal prescription.

But advocates for assisted death say there have been no documented cases of abuse with the law.

Meanwhile, one hospital study found that a third of patients who inquired about assisted death died before completing the process or became too ill to continue. Fewer than a quarter of the patients ultimately received the lethal prescription.

Only 2,858 state residents obtained a prescription and 1,816 died by ingesting the medication between June 2016 and the end of last year, according to state data. That means there could be thousands more who have unsuccessfully pursued assisted death.

Other provisions of Eggmans measure would eliminate the final attestation for patients before they take the lethal medication and require doctors who refuse to participate in the assisted death law, which is optional, to document a patients request and transfer their medical record.

Disability rights and Catholic groups continue to oppose the measure, citing concerns that the high cost of medical care could pressure some patients into choosing death instead.

Alexei Koseff is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: alexei.koseff@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @akoseff
About a dozen smiling people in matching yellow T-shirts wheeled 45 heavy boxes through the City Hall basement to the Department of Elections the other morning.

Inside those boxes sat six months of effort and nearly a quarter million signatures of San Francisco voters that are almost certain to qualify school board members Gabriela Lopez, Alison Collins and Faauuga Moliga for a recall.

Get ready for a special election, probably in January or February, that would be the first local recall to qualify for a San Francisco ballot since 1983. Already, supporters of the internationally ridiculed school board have bashed the recall for supposedly being fueled by Republicans, conservatives and dark money, but is it?

Unlike with Tuesdays recall election of Gov. Gavin Newsom, the answer is no. Everyday San Franciscans with real concerns about the school board  and who believe the citys kids deserve better  launched the effort and worked tirelessly to gather signatures. And their beefs are far more significant than Newsoms unwise, unmasked dinner at the French Laundry.

Carlos Avila Gonzalez/The Chronicle

Do I look like a Republican? Hello! said one of the men in a yellow T-shirt  plus a rainbow beard, top hat, silver pants and platform boots. Im Gaybraham Lincoln. Queens for the recall!

Honest (and Fabulous) Abe was David Thompson, who pulled his 10-year-old son out of the district after months of the boys outbursts and despondency over Zoom school  while the school board mostly ignored families concerns and instead focused on distractions like renaming 44 closed schools, including Lincoln High.

A good board catches the mistakes of the administrators it oversees and corrects them. This one ignores the districts errors, blasts critics and creates unnecessary messes.

What should it be focusing on? The districts enrollment drop to 49,774, a 5% dip from June, 2020. And the projected budget deficit of at least $114 million next year. And the fact its teachers are still underpaid in one of the most expensive cities in the world while not a single unit of teacher housing, talked about for at least 17 years, has opened.

Theres also the districts last-minute change in school schedules, made without parent or teacher input, which the district said saved $3 million in transportation costs, but which budget documents show cost it $2.1 million this year in before and aftercare costs, seeming to negate the point.

Then theres the new resolution from Collins and Lopez directing Superintendent Vince Matthews to craft a plan to ensure 3 feet of social distancing at schools, weekly testing of students and staff and air filtration in all used spaces including hallways  despite it probably making the budget picture even worse and new data showing there hasnt been a single case of COVID-19 transmission in the citys public schools.

Carlos Avila Gonzalez/The Chronicle

Matthews, who agreed to stay on an extra year after his planned retirement when the board promised to not micromanage him, resisted the resolution, saying it would distract his already stretched team.

Backers of the school board say the fact a recall election will cost the district several million dollars means voters should wait until November 2022 when the same three commissioners are up for re-election. But recall supporters point out the group will need to choose a new superintendent and close a huge budget gap well before then, and this crew doesnt seem up to the job.

Besides, Collins wasnt concerned about the districts gaping budget hole when she sued it and her colleagues for $87 million after losing her vice president title because of her anti-Asian tweets. She finally withdrew the lawsuit Tuesday after a federal judge dismissed the case, but she hasnt offered to repay the district more than $110,000 in legal fees, and theres no sign her colleagues will force the issue like they should.

The three school board members could prevent the district spending money on an election by resigning, but that seems improbable.

At a recent meeting of the Harvey Milk LGBTQ Democractic Club, Collins said of the recall, When I see certain people getting upset, I know Im doing the right thing, according to news coverage of the event. Lopez blamed the recall on sexism, racism and discrimination against young people and said, They recognize this is an opportunity to bring down someone who is me.

It seems unlikely that a city that elected a Black woman as mayor is secretly out to get women of color on the school board. Neither Collins nor Lopez returned requests for interviews.

Moliga, who to his credit engages with journalists, texted that the Pacific Islander community strongly supports him and added, We have seen a tremendous outpouring of support in San Francisco and throughout California from people who are standing with us to oppose my recall.

The Rev. Amos Brown, president of the San Francisco NAACP and an opponent of the recall, said he hasnt agreed with the group on everything  including its insistence on covering murals at Washington High  but said recalls are foolishness that will destroy this republic.

Gabrielle Lurie/The Chronicle

Supervisor Hillary Ronen, though, said she and her colleagues are getting a tremendous amount of email from district parents asking the supervisors to solve problems that the school board and central office wont address.

I want a school board thats going to be laser-focused on the impending budget deficit and on the day-to-day needs of educators and students to make school safer and more successful, Ronen said. That hasnt happened for quite a long time.

The recall was initiated by Siva Raj and Autumn Looijen, partners who between them have five kids and were furious by the unending Zoom school for Rajs kids in San Francisco versus an earlier, smooth return for Looijens kids on the Peninsula.

Raj, who moved from India in 2010 to run his tech startup, is not a citizen and cannot vote except in local school board races under a proposition passed by city voters in 2016. Looijen is a registered independent who voted for Joe Biden for president.

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Neither of us have any association with the Republican Party, Raj said. We are fiercely nonpartisan.

Campaign disclosures filed with the citys Ethics Commission show the recall effort has raised $569,000. A lot of that money has come from the tech industry  including $49,500 apiece from venture capitalists David Sacks and Arthur Rock and $10,099 from venture capitalist Garry Tan.

Most of the donations, though, came from 1,400 people giving much smaller amounts including about 50 people who listed their occupations as educators.

Those who signed the petition are all over the map too  literally. Data from Raj and Looijen show people living in the Sunset, Richmond and west of Twin Peaks neighborhoods had the highest percentage of signers. Visitacion Valley and the Bayview were close behind  and had higher percentages of signers than the Marina and Pacific Heights.

Gabrielle Lurie/The Chronicle

One of the recall campaigns most avid backers is Monty Worth, a history teacher at Lowell High whos gathered signatures since the spring. He said he was stunned and embarrassed by the school boards refusal to involve historians in its effort to rename 44 schools.

He said hes a registered Democrat who disagrees with the recall effort against Newsom and District Attorney Chesa Boudin, but believes the school board has been so uniquely destructive and intolerant of others views that the recall is imperative.

Its damaging to progressivism to have this kind of radicalism, he said. We need practical people, and frankly, much more boring meetings.

Perhaps the happiest person Tuesday as the group turned in its petitions was Kit Lam, the dad whose petitions were stolen at a farmers market but went on to collect more than 4,300 signatures on his own.

My wife wants her husband back, Lam said with a laugh. Now well let the voters decide.

San Francisco Chronicle columnist Heather Knight appears Sundays and Wednesdays. Email: hknight@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @hknightsf
BEIJING (AP)  An avalanche of changes launched by Chinas ruling Communist Party has jolted everyone from tech billionaires to school kids. Behind them: President Xi Jinpings vision of making a more powerful, prosperous country by reviving revolutionary ideals, with more economic equality and tighter party control over society and entrepreneurs.

Since taking power in 2012, Xi has called for the party to return to its original mission as Chinas economic, social and cultural leader and carry out the  rejuvenation of the great Chinese nation.

The party has spent the decade since then silencing dissent and tightening political control. Now, after 40 years of growth that transformed China into the world's factory but left a gulf between a wealthy elite and the poor majority, the party is promising to spread prosperity more evenly and is pressing private companies to pay for social welfare and back Beijings ambition to become a global technology competitor.

To support its plans, Xi's government is trying to create what it deems a more wholesome society by reducing childrens access to online games and banning sissy men who are deemed insufficiently masculine from TV.

Chinese leaders want to direct the constructive energies of all people in one laser-focused direction selected by the party, Andrew Nathan, a Chinese politics specialist at Columbia University, said in an email.

Beijing has launched anti-monopoly and data security crackdowns to tighten its control over internet giants, including e-commerce platform Alibaba Group and games and social media operator Tencent Holdings Ltd., that looked too big and potentially independent.

In response, their billionaire founders have scrambled to show loyalty by promising to share their wealth under Xis vaguely defined common prosperity initiative to narrow the income gap in a country with more billionaires than the United States.

Xi has yet to give details, but in a society where every political term is scrutinized for significance, the name revives a 1950s propaganda slogan under Mao Zedong, the founder of the communist government.

Xi is reviving the utopian ideal of early communist leaders, said Willy Lam of the Chinese University of Hong Kong. But of course, huge question marks have arisen, because this will hurt the most creative and lucrative parts of the economy.

Alibaba, Tencent and others have pledged tens of billions of dollars for job creation and social welfare initiatives. They say they will invest in developing processor chips and other technologies cited by Beijing as priorities.

The party's anti-monopoly enforcement and crackdown on how companies handle information about customers are similar to Western regulation. But the abrupt, heavy-handed way changes have been imposed is prompting warnings that Beijing is threatening innovation and economic growth, which already is declining. Jittery foreign investors have knocked more than $300 billion off Tencent's stock market value and billions more off other companies.

I expect that over the next year or two we are likely to see a very rocky relationship develop between the political elite and the business elite, Michael Pettis, a finance professor at Peking University's Guanghua School of Business, said in a report.

Chinese officials say the public, consumers and entrepreneurs will benefit from higher incomes and more regulatory oversight of corporate giants. Parents welcome curbs announced last month that limit children under 18 to three hours of online games a week and only on weekends and Friday night.

I feel this is a good rule, said Li Zhanguo, the father of an 8-year-old boy and a 4-year-old girl in the central city of Zhengzhou. Games still have some addictive mechanisms. We cant count on childrens self-control.

The crackdowns reflect party efforts to control a rapidly evolving society of 1.4 billion people.

Some 1 million members of mostly Muslim ethnic groups have been forced into detention camps in the northwest. Officials deny accusations of abuses including forced abortions and say the camps are for job training and to combat extremism.

A surveillance initiative dubbed Social Credit aims to track every person and company in China and punish violations ranging from dealing with business partners that violate environmental rules to littering.

Our responsibility is to unite and lead the entire party and people of all ethnic groups, take the baton of history and to work hard to achieve the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, Xi said when he and the six other members of the new party Standing Committee appeared in public for the first time in November 2012.

The party Central Committee shifted its economic emphasis from efficiency to fairness in late 2020, a researcher at a Beijing think tank wrote in August in Caixin, China's most prominent business magazine.

The party moved from early prosperity for some to common prosperity and from capital to labor, wrote Luo Zhiheng of Yuekai Securities Research Institute. He said leaders are emphasizing science, technology and manufacturing over finance and real estate.

Prominent economists have tried to reassure entrepreneurs.

It is impossible to achieve common prosperity through robbing the rich and helping the poor, the dean of the school of economics at Shanghais Fudan University, Zhang Jun, told the news outlet The Paper on Aug. 4.

The 1979 launch of market-style economic reform under then-leader Deng Xiaoping prompted predictions abroad that China would evolve into a more open, possibly even democratic society.

The Communist Party allowed freer movement and encourages internet use for business and education. But leaders reject changes to a one-party dictatorship that copied its political structure from the Soviet Union and watch entrepreneurs closely. Beijing controls all media and tries to limit what Chinas public sees online.

As the previous decade's economic boom fades, Xi sees himself as the only person capable of recreating the momentum, said June Teufel Dreyer, a Chinese politics specialist at the University of Miami.

Party members who worry reforms might weaken political control appear to have decided Chinas rise is permanent and liberalization is no longer needed, said Edward Friedman, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin.

That means anti-totalitarian elements of the reform agenda could be rolled back, Friedman said in an email. That is what Xi is doing, as manifest in his attack on purportedly gay and girlie culture as a supposed threat to a so-called virile militarism."

An Aug. 29 commentary by an obscure writer, Li Guangman, described common prosperity as a profound revolution. Writing on the WeChat message service, Li said financial markets would no longer be a paradise for capitalists to get rich overnight and said the party's next targets might include high housing and health care costs.

The commentary was reposted on prominent state media websites including the ruling party newspaper Peoples Daily. That prompted questions about whether Beijing might veer into an ideological campaign with echoes of the violent 1966-76 Cultural Revolution, when some 5 million people were killed.

Hu Xijin, the editor of the Global Times, a newspaper published by Peoples Daily that is known for its nationalist tone, responded by criticizing Lis commentary. Hu warned in a blog post against a return to radicalism.

The Cultural Revolution was a period of chaos, purposely unleashed by Mao because he felt comfortable in chaos, Nathan said.

This is almost the exact opposite, he said. It is an effort to create tightly structured orderliness.

___

AP researcher Chen Si in Shanghai contributed to this report.
LONDON (AP)  A U.S. court will hold a pretrial conference Monday in the civil suit filed by a woman who claims Prince Andrew sexually assaulted her as the two sides argue over whether the prince was properly served with documents in the case.

Attorneys for the woman, Virginia Giuffre, say the documents were handed over to a Metropolitan Police officer on duty at the main gates of Andrews home in Windsor Great Park on Aug. 27.

But Blackfords, a law firm that said they represent Andrew in certain U.K. matters, have questioned whether the papers were properly served and raised the possibility of challenging the court's jurisdiction in the case, according to a Sept. 6 letter referenced in court documents filed by Giuffres attorneys.

We reiterate that our client reserves all his rights, including to contest the jurisdiction of the US courts (including on the basis of potentially defective service), they wrote.

A U.S. judge will ultimately determine whether the papers were properly delivered. Judge Lewis Kaplan of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York will hold the first pretrial conference in the case via teleconference on Monday.

The prince has repeatedly denied the allegations in the lawsuit brought by Giuffre, a longtime accuser of the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

When the suit was filed last month, legal experts suggested it left Andrew with no good options as the second son of Queen Elizabeth II seeks to repair his image and return to public life.

If the prince tries to ignore the lawsuit, he runs the risk that the court could find him in default and order him to pay damages. And if he decides to fight, Andrew faces years of sordid headlines as the case winds its way through court.

Guiffres attorney, David Boies, said in court documents that it was implausible that Andrew is unaware of the suit.

Attorneys at Blackfords, who he has apparently instructed to evade and contest service, have confirmed that Prince Andrew himself already has notice of this lawsuit and is evaluating his chances of success, Boies wrote. And even if Blackfords had not confirmed as much, any other conclusion would be implausible  reputable media outlets around the world reported on the filing of plaintiffs complaint, and hundreds, if not thousands, of articles about this lawsuit have been published.

The lawsuit is another unwanted story for the royals, reminding the public of Andrews links to Epstein two years after his death. Britains royal family is also still recovering from allegations of racism and insensitivity leveled at them by Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan, earlier this year.
JOHANNES EISELE, Contributor / AFP via Getty Images

MAPLE VALLEY, Wash. (AP)  A 15-year-old girl wanted in connection with a July fatal hit-and-run near Maple Valley turned herself in to King County Sheriffs detectives Thursday and remains in detention at the Children and Family Justice Center in Seattle, according to a sheriffs spokesman.

The Sheriffs Office announced earlier this week that they were looking for the teen and had located the car she was believed to be driving when she allegedly struck 53-year-old Greg Moore on July 18 as Moore was on an early morning run, The Seattle Times reported.
RACINE, Wis. (AP)  Elizabeth DeKraay Dunlap never wants to see an energy drink or energy bar again.

Theyre just disgusting, she said.

Elizabeth, along with her two sisters, Carolyn DeKraay Dickens and Sarah DeKraay, had to drink an electrolyte powder drink and eat energy bars as a part of their big hike: climbing Mount Kilimanjaro, the dormant volcano in Tanzania. Its the highest mountain in Africa, and the highest single free-standing mountain in the world at an elevation of about 19,340 feet above sea level.

The electrolyte mix was to make sure the three sisters and the rest of their group were full of nutrients and well-hydrated with 3-4 liters of water a day. We threw them away when we got down the mountain, Elizabeth said.

Additionally? I think Im done with hiking mountains for a while. I need something tropical.

The three sisters, who lived in Racine, agreed last year hiking Mount Kilimanjaro would be a fabulous bucket list trip in conjunction with celebrating Elizabeth and Carolyns milestone 60th and 50th birthdays, respectively. They started coordinating schedules.

Everything was going fine until the delta variant. We couldnt put it off another year. If we didnt do it now, it was now or never, Elizabeth said.

Their fourth sister, Christina Zikeli, stayed in Racine with their parents, Nancy and Warren DeKraay. The three started hiking Aug. 13 and finished Aug. 20, the Racine Journal Times reported.

Carolyn DeKraay Dickens, a 1988 Case High School graduate, is now 51 and lives in downtown Chicago.

Sarah DeKraay, a 1983 Case High School graduate, is now 56 and lives in Madison.

Elizabeth DeKraay Dunlap, who graduated high school in Iowa before her family moved to Racine, now lives in Cary, Illinois. She celebrated her 61st birthday Aug. 12 while on the trip.

The DeKraay sisters were the oldest hikers on the trip.

I was worried about being the weak link, Elizabeth said. I was a little nervous when I realized I was the oldest one there. The first day we saw it (the top of the mountain), I was like, Oh my gosh. It was so far away.

Despite her initial worries, Elizabeth said she didnt have any trouble.

When climbing Mount Kilimanjaro, there are seven main routes to choose from. The sisters used the Machame route, the most popular path. Its a seven-day hike: about six days to the top and about one day back to the bottom.

The guides made sure the hikers were acclimated to the change in altitude so they took the hikes slowly and had scheduled stops along the way at campgrounds. Thats also when meals and bathroom breaks at standard outhouses took place.

Those hiking Mount Kilimanjaro are required to go with a guide; no one can go up by themselves.

As a tour group of seven Americans, the number was a lot smaller than normal because of the pandemic. But 34 porters carrying food and supplies accompanied them; Carolyn said that was to keep people employed.

Elizabeth called herself not a huge athlete, but has always stayed in shape. Sarah and Carolyn said theyve always been fit.

Sarah has golfed the majority of her life and was inducted into the Racine County Sports Hall of Fame for that sport in 2016, but she said hiking was never on her list.

Elizabeth and Sarah signed up with separate personal trainers in March and focused on cardio and strength training. The three sisters additionally hiked a 14,000 foot mountain together in Colorado in preparation.

Despite the three sisters living in different cities, they visit Racine a lot, Carolyn said. The three completed 85% of their training for the hike in the Racine/Kenosha area  specifically at Petrifying Springs Park in Kenosha, around the University of Wisconsin-Parkside in Somers and along the lakefront in Racine.

While training, they hiked distances of 7 or 8 miles on cross-country paths at UW Parkside, which they said paid off during the hikes.

One of the groups biggest challenges was dealing with the altitude and resulting altitude sickness, which was a surprise, Elizabeth said.

The average physically fit person can do the hiking part, Elizabeth said. Its the nausea and headaches and just in general not feeling good that makes it hard. You dont have an appetite.

Another of the major challenges was the Barranco Wall, elevation 843 feet. Its located on the side of Mount Kilimanjaro and what climbers would refer to as a scramble, meaning it does not require experienced mountain climbing skills.

However, the wall is steep and climbers have to use handholds and footholds to maneuver the vertical wall.

It was a little more technical than we had planned, Sarah said.

During the hike, Sarahs skin on her fingers cracked due to the dryness of the air. Elizabeth said she had sunburned hands that blistered. Carolyn said she also had impressive blisters. Other than that, they didnt incur any other injuries.

What helped them persevere and carry them through the rough patches was having good work ethic they learned in the Midwest, Carolyn said.

The altitude and cold were overwhelming at times, but the cold didnt faze them too much thanks to being from Wisconsin, Elizabeth said: It was about 0 degrees at the summit. We were ready for it.

Another thing that helped was their guides and the stories they told  such as the story of when helicopters took a group of hikers back. But after a while, things got really quiet among the group. Nobody was talking.

The last 18 hours was really tough. I wanted to quit, Elizabeth said. It just wasnt an option, so we just kept going.

They ate very well  besides the energy bars and electrolyte drink mix. They were served oatmeal, bacon, eggs, pasta and stir fry, just to name a few, from the groups official cook.

We were really burning through the calories so we got a lot of food, Elizabeth said.

And, of course, the sisters loved the sights. Sarah described the views as absolutely spectacular once they were through the clouds.

Carolyn said the sky full of stars was the best part. Theres no pollution. You look up at night and it was like glittering diamonds.

The sisters visited other areas of Tanzania before and after their big hike; Carolyn said the country is incredible.

They stayed at a hotel that had monkeys, saw some tribes and other outdoor landscapes, stating they were beautiful, exactly what you would expect from Africa.

Tanzania was fantastic, just one of the bucket list things you can do, Elizabeth said, noting traveling with her sisters was also really special.

We have never traveled this long and this close with this type of situation before, she said. I thought Carolyn might snore. I could just picture us fighting. I didnt know what would happen. But we had a great time; we made some really special memories together.

Elizabeth said it was an amazing trip and she felt fortunate to be able to do it during these particular times. The three faced a lot of additional hurdles in regards to COVID-19, such as taking frequent COVID tests and filling out extra paperwork.

And as far as the difficulty level for the hike?

This is doable, Elizabeth said. Its something challenging. It sounds very intimidating, but its doable. You can do this.
HARTINGTON, Neb. (AP)  A 6-year-old rural northeast Nebraska boy has died after an all-terrain vehicle accident.

The accident occurred just before 11 a.m. Saturday on a farm northwest of Hartington in Cedar County, the Sioux City, Iowa, Journal reported. The boy was operating the ATV when it went over an embankment and flipped on top of him, authorities said.

Authorities did not release the boy's name. They said he was taken to a hospital in Yankton, South Dakota, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) to the northwest of Hartington. He was pronounced dead there.

The accident remains under investigation. Hartington has about 1,500 residents and is 60 miles (97 kilometers) northwest of Sioux City, Iowa.
PRESQUE ISLE, Maine (AP)  The attorney general's office is investigating as a possible hate crime an incident in which a white motorist allegedly aimed her vehicle at a Black man and his two nephews.

Michael Stiggle, 50, said he had to jump to get out of the way of the vehicle in a Walmart parking lot.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP)  A California death row inmate who was convicted of a 1986 killing by a jury with only one Black member can challenge his conviction and sentence, a federal appeals court ruled Friday.

Curtis Lee Ervin, who is Black, was tried by a mostly white panel after the prosecutor used peremptory challenges to dismiss nine of 11 Black prospective jurors, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals noted in reviving Ervin's discrimination challenge, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

Ervin, 68, of Richmond, was convicted of kidnapping and fatally stabbing Carlene McDonald of El Sobrante after accepting $2,500 from her ex-husband, Robert McDonald of Pinole, to kill her.

Ervin and and McDonald were sentenced to death and another man, Orestes Robinson, was given a life sentence.

McDonald and Robinson both died in prison.

The California Supreme Court upheld Ervin's death sentence in 2000 and he appealed in federal court, where a judge in 2018 found there hadn't been any discrimination in jury selection.

However, the appeals court panel ruled 3-0 that the federal judge must reconsider the case using stricter standards for racial bias in jury selection that the U.S. Supreme Court declared in a 2019 ruling, the Chronicle reported.

The retired prosecutor in the case, James Anderson, told the Chronicle on Friday that race didn't play a role in his questioning of prospective jurors.

I dont care if they were Black, or white, or whatever ... if they werent able to give me a definite answer about how strongly they felt on the death penalty, they were gone, he said.

Defense lawyers Pamala Sayasane and Robert Bryan said Ervin is innocent.

A black man is in prison because of the misconduct and racial bias of the prosecutor, Sayasane said.
BOISE, Idaho. (AP)  An arrest warrant has been issued for a former Idaho lawmaker who resigned in disgrace after a 19-year-old intern reported that he brought her to his apartment on false pretenses and raped her.

The Ada County arrest warrant on charges of rape and sexual penetration with a foreign object comes nearly five months after Aaron von Ehlinger, a Republican from Lewiston, resigned from the Idaho House of Representatives after an ethics committee found he should be formally censured for his behavior.
CHICAGO (AP)  Dozens of employees of the Art Institute of Chicago rallied this week in support of a move to start a union at one of the country's largest art museums.

Organizers hope the museum will voluntarily recognize the union if enough employees sign signature cards in support, avoiding a formal vote. They declined to say this week how many employees have signed so far.

The Chicago Tribune reports that about 200 employees of the museum and the associated School of the Art Institute marched down Michigan Avenue on Thursday evening before holding a rally outside the museum.

The union would be part of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. Employees of other prominent art museums have successfully formed unions with AFSCME in recent years, including the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles.

A spokesman for AFSCME Anders Lindall said the Art Institute union would represent about 340 non-management employees including curators, custodians, librarians and retail workers.

There are about 600 employees at the museum.

Sheila Majumdar, a member of the union organizing committee, said staff need more input in the museum's operations.

Majumdar, who is an editor in the museum's publication department, said they will push for higher wages and better working conditions after more than 200 layoffs and furloughs during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The disconnect between what is reality in our day-to-day work and what leadership thinks is going on is just baffling, Majumdar said.
SOFIA, Bulgaria (AP)  Bulgaria is to hold its third parliamentary election of the year in November after the largest three parties in parliament failed to find common ground for a coalition government.

Bulgarian President Roumen Radev said Saturday that the vote will be held on Nov. 14, the date already set by lawmakers for the scheduled presidential election.

He said holding the two votes together will save public money and voters time.

Radev, who will be seeking a second term in office in the presidential vote, said that he will dissolve parliament next week and appoint a caretaker government.

It is obvious that the two campaigns will be taking place at the same time and will merge. I will count on the support of all respectable Bulgarians on the big issues  the fight against poverty and injustice, he told reporters.

General elections in April and July both produced a hung parliament. There was a widespread desire for change after months of protests against three-time Prime Minister Boyko Borissov and his center-right GERB party. The political groups that emerged from the protests, however, failed to cobble together a working majority.

Political analysts expect that a new vote could have a similar outcome and deepen the political impasse that has gripped the European Unions poorest member for months.

They also expect political instability to hinder Bulgarias ability to effectively fight a new surge in the COVID-19 pandemic or tap the EUs coronavirus economic recovery fund, and disrupt its path toward adopting the euro currency in 2024.
courtesy of the Montgomery County Police Reporter

YACHATS, Ore. (AP)  A California man who attempted to jump across a wide cove of frothing water at Cape Perpetua Scenic Area is presumed deceased, according to state police.

Steve Allen, 67, of Walnut Creek, California, apparently tried to hurdle Devils Churn, a narrow boiling inlet just off Highway 101 south of Yachats on the central Oregon coast, the Statesman Journal reported.
YUCAIPA, Calif. (AP)  The husband of a Southern California nurse who died of complications from COVID-19 more than two weeks ago has died after battling the disease himself, leaving behind five young children including a newborn girl.

Daniel Macias of Yucaipa died on Thursday, a family member told KTLA-TV.

I dont know anyone who loved their kids as much as they did, and they made sure they told them every day, Terri Serey, Daniels sister-in-law, told the station. I want them to be aware of how much theyre loved. And I want them to know how much their parents loved them.

Daniel and his wife, Davy, were admitted to a hospital intensive care unit days apart last month after being diagnosed with COVID-19. A doctor delivered the couple's daughter eight days before Davy Macias died.

The parents never got the chance to meet or name their daughter, according to family members.

Its absolutely heartbreaking. We were really pulling for Daniel after Davy died. We wanted him to wake up and name his baby girl, Terri Serey told KTLA.

The couple developed symptoms after going on a family trip to the beach and an indoor water park at the end of July, family members said.

Macias brother, Vong Serey, told the San Bernardino Sun last month that his sister was not vaccinated against COVID-19, and was hesitant to get the shot because she was pregnant. She was a nurse in the labor and delivery ward at Kaiser Fontana Medical Center and had worked throughout the pandemic, he said.

Serey did not know whether his brother-in-law had been vaccinated.

Daniel Macias was a middle school math teacher in the Rialto Unified School District, district spokeswoman Syeda Jafri said.

He is remembered as a compassionate, kind-hearted, fun-loving and generous teacher at Jehue Middle School but he was also a devoted family man, the district said in a statement.

The couple's children, who are 7 and under, are under the care of their grandparents, according to family members.
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP)  The Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission will ask state lawmakers to revise the state's medical marijuana law in order to get plants in the ground next year and make the products available to patients sooner, Al.com reported.

The commission also voted to offer State Treasurer John McMillan the job of executive director of the new agency that will run the medical cannabis program. McMillan served two terms as state agriculture commissioner and is a former commissioner of the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. McMillan told the news outlet he expects to accept the job, which would require him to resign as state treasurer. Ivey would appoint a replacement.
BOSTON (AP)  A Catholic priest that led parishes in Massachusetts has been found guilty of sexually abusing a child in the 1960s by a church panel and barred from public ministry, the Archdiocese of Boston said Friday.

Paul J. McLaughlin, a former pastor of St. Peter Parish in Lowell and Immaculate Conception Parish in Marlboro, will not be allowed to function in any manner as a priest, meaning he can no longer celebrate public Mass, provide spiritual direction or wear clerical attire.
Chi Han Lin/Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2021

A frightened fish. A dancing bear. A pigeon with a leaf on its head. Nature, too, can be silly and sometimes downright funny when captured in the right light.

The annual Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards honor the most hilarious photos captured of animals in the past year. This year's finalists include a dancing kangaroo, a flying prairie dog and even a grinning camel.
ATLANTA (AP)  Atlanta's zoo says at least 13 western lowland gorillas have tested positive for COVID-19, including 60-year-old Ozzie, the oldest male gorilla in captivity.

Zoo Atlanta said Friday that employees noticed the gorillas had been coughing, had runny noses and showed changes in appetite. A veterinary lab at the University of Georgia returned positive tests for the respiratory illness. Zoo Atlanta says its waiting on confirmation from the National Veterinary Services Lab in Ames, Iowa.

The zoo says it is treating the gorillas at risk of developing complications from SARS-CoV-2 with monoclonal antibodies. The zoo is also testing all 20 of its gorillas, who live in four troops.

Zoo officials say they believe an asymptomatic employee who cares for the gorillas passed on the virus. The employee had been fully vaccinated and was wearing protective equipment such as a mask and gloves.

The zoo says theres no evidence that the gorillas can pass the virus back to humans and says visitors are too far away to be infected by gorillas.

We are very concerned that these infections occurred, especially given that our safety protocols when working with great apes and other susceptible animal species are, and throughout the pandemic have been, extremely rigorous, said Dr. Sam Rivera, the zoos senior director of animal health, said in a statement.

Rivera tells The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that Atlanta's gorillas appear to be the second group of great apes infected by COVID-19, after eight gorillas at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park were treated for the virus in January. One San Diego silverback received an experimental antibody regimen, and all recovered.

Because the gorillas live close together, Rivera said it's impossible to keep infected animals isolated. He said the Atlanta zoo will vaccinate the gorillas with a veterinary vaccine. Zoo Atlanta is vaccinating its Bornean and Sumatran orangutans, its Sumatran tigers, its African lions and its clouded leopard.

Rivera said Ozzie is showing mild symptoms. We dont feel that were out of the woods, he added. Were taking it on a day by day basis.

The zoo says it has stepped up anti-infection efforts including more protective masks, suits, more intensive cleaning and increased ventilation.
BAGHDAD (AP)  Explosives-laden drones targeted Irbil international airport in northern Iraq late Saturday where U.S.-led coalition troops are stationed with no reports of casualties, according to security forces and officials in Kurdish-run region.

Kurdistan's Counter-Terrorism Service said at least two drones carrying explosives targeted the airport in a statement. It said the attack did not lead to any casualties.
TUCSON, Ariz. (AP)  The uncertainty of the COVID-19 pandemic has caused a national dip in college enrollment.

Pima Community College, for instance, has seen a near 20% drop in enrollment since fall 2019.

But drive across Tucson, and thats not whats happening at the University of Arizona. At least, not on the surface.

Preliminary figures show that overall enrollment at Arizonas flagship university has not stopped climbing since fall 2019  it topped 48,000 students this fall  despite 1 years of mostly remote course offerings and limited on-campus activity, the Arizona Daily Star reports.

And although the final numbers will not be available until later this month, the UA is on track to record the largest incoming class in its history after welcoming roughly 8,700 first-year students during the first week of in-person classes this school year.

Nathan Grawe, a professor of economics at Carleton College and author of Demographics and the Demand for Higher Education, said the uptick in enrollment is not unique to the UA.

Last spring we saw a shift in applications  and now matriculations  toward both larger institutions and more selective institutions. So, (the UA) might be riding that wave, he said. Arizona State University, the University of Missouri and the University of Tennessee are also among the many big-name public universities that have recorded enrollment growth during the pandemic because the institutions with a name for themselves in this last year seem to have done better.

But at the UA at least, theres another trend at play within those rising enrollment numbers: an influx of out-of-state students and a contraction of in-state students.

In fall 2019, nearly 62% of undergraduate students enrolled at the UA were Arizona residents and 32% were not. In-state enrollment dropped to about 61% in fall 2020, and the unofficial data from this semester shows it has now dropped to 57%. Meanwhile, out-of-state enrollment jumped 2% last fall and another 4%  to 38.4%  this fall.

Its also happening at ASU, whose preliminary numbers show out-of-state undergraduate enrollment has increased by about 4% since fall 2019, while in-state enrollment has decreased by a similar percentage. Northern Arizona University did not provide its preliminary in-state and out-of-state enrollment breakdown.

Grawe said the rise in out-of-state students bucks the initial hypothesis that the pandemic would keep more prospective college students closer to home. Instead, the shutdown of campus tours and test-optional policies many universities, including the UA, have temporarily adopted likely encouraged more applications to more selective schools.

If youre a student and youre not able to visit the campus, you might be drawn more to the school with the name, Grawe said. On the testing front, you might get some students who say, I would normally be concerned about not having the test scores to get into the University of Arizona, but if I dont have to take the test, maybe this year is the opportunity for me to catch the eye of the admissions office and show them other parts of my portfolio.

To some degree, that analysis appears to have borne out at the UA, where in-person campus tours and recruitment events were on pause until March 2021  after many would-be students had already submitted their applications for this school year.

One of the silver linings of the pandemic and us having to close down our on-campus offerings is that we created so many virtual options for student to really be able to imagine themselves here at the U of A, said Kasey Urquidez, vice president of enrollment management, who helped lead the universitys virtual recruitment campaign last year.

Families that maybe couldnt afford to travel all the way here could do everything from their home while they were home during the pandemic and really explore us in different ways. The access we were able to open up  not just with phone calls and on-demand stuff, but with interactive ways that helped families see themselves here  made a huge difference to students.

The sticker price for one year of out-of-state tuition and fees at the UA was more than $36,000 during the 2020-21 school year. But most students dont actually pay that much. According to U.S. News and World Report, which ranked the UA as one of the top 100 universities in the country, the university met 61% of its students financial needs. Further, roughly one-third of first-year students this year qualified for a federal Pell Grant, which is a common metric used to quantify low-income student enrollment.

Diane Campbell is a college counselor in Fort Collins, Colorado, who also serves on the UAs counseling advisory board. The virtual recruitment experiences last year exposed more of her students to the idea that going out-of-state  to the UA or one of the numerous other competitive public universities offering increasingly generous financial aid packages  could be affordable.

Because students were locked down and at home doing virtual school, the excitement of going away to college was exacerbated a bit. Pre-Covid, students leaned toward being local, she said. That sentiment, combined with widespread test-optional policies and virtual outreach, drove up the average number of schools she saw students applying to in general. A lot of families who ended up applying to the UA, specifically, were surprised by how much aid they received, and that they could afford it.

The other side to the out-of-state enrollment boom at the UA, however, is the 5% decline in in-state enrollment since 2019.

Precise, localized reasons for that shift is not yet clear, especially because the UA wont be releasing demographic data broken down by in-state and out-of-state students until the final census numbers are in.

The consequences of this general trend, however, were examined in a 2016 study in the Journal of Higher Education, which concluded that increases in nonresident enrollment squeeze out in-state students from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds, especially at prestigious universities as well as those in states with high minority populations.

ASU, which is experiencing an enrollment trend similar to the UA, did share some unofficial numbers with the Arizona Daily Star for this article, and at first blush, they support that relationship. The number of Pell-eligible first-year in-state students dropped from 45% in 2019 to 38% this fall, while 21% of out-of-state first-year students this year are Pell-eligible (the same as 2019).

In the years to come, scholars will no doubt examine the social and economic implications of numbers like those within the context of COVID-19. But for those on the ground of pandemic-era college recruitment in Arizona, which has the worst counselor-to-student ratio in the nation, there are already some plausible explanations.

There were some students who were reluctant to go because they felt like they needed to go to work right away because their parents had lost jobs during COVID, Bryan Pisetsky, a college counselor at Marana High School, said. On top of that, the message of college affordability didnt always make it through the added social and emotional barriers of remote learning to the students who needed to hear it the most.

And if the almost-5% annual drop in American high school seniors who completed the Free Application for Federal Student Aid last school year is any bellwether, that wasnt just happening in Arizona.

Its one reason why Pisetsky is already planning in-person recruitment events this year.

Without that in-person support and guidance on how to fill out a FAFSA or pursue other aid and scholarships, Pisetsky said, Students who are first-generation or low-income will look at the ($12,691 for in-state tuition) sticker price for a place like the University of Arizona and immediately decide they cant afford it.
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP)  The estate of a man fatally shot in downtown Portland after a pro-Trump car rally last year is suing the city, the mayor and the county district attorney, saying their negligence contributed to his violent death.

The suit, filed Friday in federal court in Portland, contends a hands-off approach to political demonstrations and counter-protests in the city fostered a culture of vigilante policing between opposing factions that filled the void and led to the killing of Aaron Jay Danielson on Aug. 29, 2020.

It seeks $13 million in damages -- $1.5 million in economic damages, $1.5 million in non-economic damages and up to $10 million in punitive damages, the Oregonian/OregonLive reported.

We are seeking justice for the preventable death of a young man, gunned down in a city with a dangerous and deadly hands-off approach to public safety," Christopher Cauble, the estates attorney, said in a statement. Time and time again, City leadership and law enforcement have failed to find an effective response to clashing groups of protesters.

City Attorney Robert Taylor declined comment on the suit.

The Danielson estate also accused Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt of playing a role by broadcasting last summer that he had adopted a new policy and generally wouldnt pursue what he considered public order crimes such as criminal mischief, interfering with an officer or a stand-alone riot charge, and instead would focus on deliberate property damage and threats of force or actual force against others.

Schmidts office didnt immediately return a message seeking comment.

Residents protested police violence against people of color in cities around the country after the 2020 death of George Floyd, a Black man killed by a white officer in Minneapolis. In Portland, demonstrations were nearly nightly and led to complaints that authorities were heavy-handed in their use of force to control crowds.

Michael Reinoehl, a self-described anti-fascist who said he provided security for racial justice protests in Portland, appeared to have targeted Danielson, according to surveillance camera video of the shooting released by police. Reinoehl, 48, emerged from an alcove of a downtown parking garage before firing two gunshots as Danielson was walking in downtown after the rally, according to a police affidavit.

The suit says Danielson deployed bear spray at Reinoehl in response to the gunshots.

Danielson, 39, died from a single bullet to the upper right chest, an autopsy found.

Danielson had been with his friend Chandler Pappas and both were wearing Patriot Prayer hats, signifying their support of the right-wing group based in Vancouver.

Reinoehl was shot and killed days later outside a Washington apartment complex when officers from a multi-agency federal task force moved in to try to arrest him on a Multnomah County warrant charging him with second-degree murder and unlawful use of a firearm in Danielsons fatal shooting.

The suit said that officers from the Rapid Response Team, the Police Bureaus specialized crowd control unit, were less than a two-block radius from the shooting but were following orders not to get involved that day between dueling demonstrators.

Given the enormity of the press coverage over the past several years regarding clashes between left- and right-leaning protest groups in the downtown core of Portland, Defendants knew or should have known that violent clashes would occur, Cauble wrote in the suit.
ORLANDO, Fla. (AP)  A 1-year-old baby was found dead possibly from heat exposure in a car where her mother was shot dead, and both of them were found days later at a parking lot.

Orange County Sheriff John Mina says detectives are searching for Doujon Duwayne Griffiths, 21, who is considered a person of interest in the deaths of the mother and the baby. Police secured an arrest warrant for Griffiths in the shooting of the babys father in the same car earlier this week in Orlando, Florida.
WASHINGTON (AP)  Twenty years after 9/11, Sekou Siby still feels the pangs of survivor's guilt. A cook and dishwasher at the World Trade Center's Windows on the World restaurant, Siby had swapped shifts that day with a co-worker who ended up dying in the terrorist attacks.

The tragedy sent Siby on a path he had never imagined he would take when he emigrated from the Ivory Coast in 1996: He made it his mission to advocate for higher pay and better working conditions for restaurant workers  a role that has gained importance as the restaurant industry has struggled more than most in the grip of the viral pandemic.

Siby, 56, is now the president of Restaurant Opportunities Center United, a nationwide advocacy group that emerged from the attacks.

The pandemic's calamitous impact on restaurant workers has raised the group's profile since last year's widespread shutdowns initially cost 6 million restaurant workers  nearly half the industrys total  their jobs. ROC United, using donated funds from foundations, responded by distributing $1.5 million in cash payments to about 5,000 laid-off workers.

The money was a financial life-saver for people like Jazz Salm, 37, who lost her server job at a Sunrise, Florida, Chilis that closed in March 2020 when the pandemic erupted. The $225 she received from ROC United enabled her to pay her mobile phone bill  her only connection to the internet, which she needed to file for unemployment aid.

Compounding her difficulties, Florida's unemployment aid system, like other states', was overwhelmed at the time.

They were actually the first people to help me out, Salm said. It was a month before I saw unemployment. They really saved my rear end.

ROC United helped keep its members informed during last year's debates over stimulus checks, supplemental unemployment aid, and other financial support. Salm, along with about 11,000 others, participated in a Facebook Live event with Sen. Elizabeth Warren in May 2020 discussing the Massachusetts Democrat's Essential Workers Bill of Rights that called for hazard pay, protective gear, and paid leave for essential workers, which includes food service workers.

The group has also been active in seeking changes in social policies, having marched on behalf of a higher minimum wage and for the elimination of the federal tipped minimum wage for restaurant waiters, which has remained $2.13 for 30 years.

All the while, Siby has been driven by the memories of his 73 Windows on the World co-workers, many of them fellow immigrants, who died in the 9/11 attacks.

Without 9/11, there wouldn't have been a ROC United," he said. The fact that I was able to turn whatever anger I had to support other people who were more desperate than me, is what allowed me to turn the corner.

Windows on the World was a unionized workplace, and after the 9/11 attacks, its union donated money to an informal group that helped former employees who were out of work. In April 2002, that organization became ROC United, with Siby as its first member. He later worked as a community organizer for the organization, using his fluency in French and Spanish to connect with immigrants in New York City, before becoming executive director in 2017, and CEO last year.

Siby still keeps photos of co-workers he lost that day. One of them shows Abdoul Karim Troare, a fellow immigrant from Ivory Coast who had been Siby's roommate when he arrived in the United States in 1996.

Traore helped Siby find his job as a cook and dishwasher at Windows on the World. And it was Troare's wife, Hadidjatou Karamoko, who first alerted Siby to the Sept. 11 attacks. She called to say that Traore wasn't answering his phone.

Traore had left that morning at 4 a.m. for his other job, delivering newspapers, before heading to the Twin Towers at 7:30 that morning.

I did not know that it was the last time I was going to see him and hear his voice, she said Wednesday in a virtual call organized by ROC, her first public comments about her husband.

Another photo captures Siby and Isidro Ottenwalder, who had just obtained his citizenship six months before the attacks, allowing him to travel to his native Dominican Republic to marry before returning to New York City.

And then there was Moises Rivas, who had asked Siby take his Sunday shift at Windows on the World. Rivas, 29, who was performing with his band that Saturday night, didn't want to work an early morning shift, which often began at 5 am. In return, he offered to work Siby's shift that Tuesday, Sept. 11. An immigrant from Ecuador, he left behind a wife and two children.

In the years that followed 9/11, ROC United began engaging with victims of other tragedies. After Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in 2005, the group established its first chapter outside New York City. It now has 59 employees in 11 cities, including Los Angeles, Chicago and Minneapolis.

Just last month, Minnesota's attorney general, Keith Ellison, announced a $230,000 settlement with a restaurant chain, the Bartmann Group, that hadn't paid final paychecks owed to workers who had been laid off, as well as overtime. ROC United had helped the workers bring the complaint and demonstrated outside the one of the chain's restaurants.

Still, the coronavirus pandemic represents a threat of an altogether different magnitude for U.S. restaurant workers. The industry still employs roughly 1 million fewer people than before the virus hammered the U.S. economy in the spring of 2020.

Some restaurant owners are experimenting with software and automation that can replace waiters and cashiers. Ghost kitchens, which cook food in central locations for restaurants that deliver food but don't have actual storefronts, function with far fewer employees than traditional restaurants. They began before the pandemic but have spread more widely since.

Siby, though, retains an optimistic outlook for the industry. Automation may reshuffle some jobs, he says, but will never fully replace the ability of humans to provide top-notch restaurant service. And ghost kitchens can provide new opportunities for entrepreneurs as well as chefs and delivery workers.

Siby didn't want to work in restaurants after 9/11. The sights and smells of a commercial kitchen brought back too many painful memories. But now his oldest daughter, Fanta, born three weeks after the attacks, is in her third year of nursing school, and works at Starbucks after a previous job at Chipotle.

Asked what he would say to those struggling with the pandemic, Siby said: At the time when you think youve reached a rock bottom in your life, there is always a light to look forward to. This is where I am, compared to 20 years ago. The light is out there, you just need to seek it.

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This story has been corrected to show that Restaurant Opportunities Center United distributed $1.5 million to laid-off workers, not $10 million.
PORT WENTWORTH, Ga. (AP)  A Georgia man says he plans to fight a city officials decision to disqualify him from running for mayor because of a past felony conviction.

Julius Hall filed paperwork last month to run for mayor of Port Wentworth, a city of 11,000 just west of Savannah. But the city clerk who oversees local elections, Shanta Scarboro, disqualified Hall on Thursday because of a 1991 felony conviction.
MACON, Ga. (AP)  The grandmother of a 4-year-old boy who was shot and killed in her home has been arrested in connection with the case.

Kawana Liggins, 50, of Macon, faces a charge of tampering with evidence, WMAZ-TV reported. It was unknown whether Liggins has an attorney who could speak on her behalf.
INDIANAPOLIS (AP)  Gov. Eric Holcomb is directing flags statewide to be flown at half-staff Saturday in honor of Sept. 11.

Flags should be flown at half-staff from sunrise until sunset, his office said Friday.
INDIANAPOLIS (AP)  State health officials are asking Indiana residents to protect themselves from mosquito bites after the first West Nile virus case of 2021 was identified in a Lake County resident, and in mosquitoes in multiple other counties.

As of Friday, 83 mosquito pools positive for West Nile virus were detected in Allen, Clark, Daviess, Elkhart, Floyd, Gibson, Hamilton, Jennings, Lake, Marion, Martin, Pike, Scott, Steuben, St. Joseph, Vanderburgh and Vigo counties.
TOKYO (AP)  Japan can now give defense equipment and technology to Vietnam under an agreement signed Saturday, as the two countries step up their military cooperation amid worries about China's growing military influence.

Japan's Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi said the deal elevates their defense partnership to a new level and that Japan and Vietnam plan to deepen defense ties through multinational joint exercises and other means. Details about the transfer of specific equipment, including naval vessels, will be worked out in subsequent talks, the ministry said.

Kishis meeting with his Vietnamese counterpart, Phan Van Giang, in Hanoi coincided with a two-day visit to the Vietnamese capital by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi. He wrapped up his visit by saying China plans to donate 3 million doses of its coronavirus vaccine to Vietnam.

The agreement comes two weeks after the U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris travelled to Vietnam to strengthen ties with the Southeast Asian nation. During the tour, Harris urged countries to stand up against bullying by China in the South China Sea.

Japans Defense Ministry said in a statement that Kishi and Giang agreed on the importance of maintaining freedom of navigation and overflight in the Indo-Pacific region, as well as cooperation in various defense areas including cybersecurity.

Tokyo regularly protests the Chinese coast guard's presence near the Japanese-controlled Senkaku islands, which China also claims and calls Diaoyu. Japanese officials say Chinese vessels routinely violate Japanese territorial waters around the islands, sometimes threatening fishing boats.

During the talks, Kishi expressed Japan's strong opposition to "any unilateral attempts to change the status quo by coercion or any activities that escalate tensions, referring to Chinas increasingly assertive activity in the East and South China Sea, but without identifying any country by name.

Vietnam is the 11th nation with which Japan has signed a defense equipment and technology transfer deal. Tokyo is looking to expand military cooperation beyond its longtime ally the United States, and has signed similar agreements with Britain, Australia, the Philippines and Indonesia.

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Follow Mari Yamaguchi on Twitter at https://www.twitter.com/mariyamaguchi
VIDALIA, La. (AP)  The first legal distillery in Concordia Parish in over 100 years is open for business.

Business partners Finley Hootsell, Chuck Bearden, Kyle Greer and Wendall Gibson recently opened 1827 Spirits as a bar, taste room and distillery. They produce a selection of silver rum, spiced rum, flavored rum and moonshine on Carter Street in a space that once stored junk, from Hootsells Concordia Pawn and Gun Shop in Vidalia.

I was ready to do something different after running a pawn shop for 30 years, Hootsell said. I have been interested in American history since I was a kid. My mom brought home the first foxfire books. It was written about Appalachia, and included pioneer skills in it. When I read about moonshining in the book, I was intrigued and have thought about it ever since.

Bearden, a Natchez, Mississippi, native, has a chemical engineering background in distilling oils and oil refineries. Thirty years ago, he discovered the lure of distilled spirits.

Now, hes brought the recipes and techniques developed over three decades to the new bar, taste room and distillery. Chemical engineering helps when producing moonshine or rum, he said.

I have a good understanding of the reactions that occur when you are using various yeasts, filter media and distilling equipment, Bearden said. It helps to have a background in math and science.

Jim Bowies legendary sandbar fight, which occurred near Vidalia in 1827, inspired the companys branding. Rum worth fighting for is printed on t-shirts beneath a painting of Jim Bowie in the fight. Bearden and Hootsell said they love the history of the fight.

A member of the Bowie family is buried next to Beardens mom at the Natchez City Cemetery, he said, adding that the owners plan to display more Bowie memorabilia in the distillery room.

Producing a batch of rum takes four days from fermentation to bottle, although spiced rum is aged longer. Moonshine takes a little longer, Bearden said, adding that he is constantly looking for new flavors to develop.

Apple pie is quite popular in flavored moonshine, Bearden said. To be different, we are doing an apple pie flavored rum. There is a blend of apple juice, cider, cinnamon and spice to replicate the flavor of apple pie. It is best served over ice and chilled. It could be used in other cocktails.

Bearden uses blackstrap molasses and sugar cane from mills in New Roads to make the rum. These ferment in large plastic containers for three days. After three days, the mash has an alcohol content by volume of about five to 10 percent, he said.

Next, the mash is put in a still where he heats it to 136 degrees Fahrenheit. As the alcohol evaporates, a column captures the impurities. Then it condenses into a five-gallon carboy to repeat the cycle.

The product is distilled twice with an initial proof of 160 to 180 proof. After distillation, the alcohol passes through a charcoal filter system. Filtration removes any undesirable tastes. Most of the final product is anywhere around 30 to 90 proof, he said.

Currently, Bearden is developing a peach-flavored rum to go with the fall-flavored Apple Pie Rum.

The leftover material is polished and has no bite, Bearden said. From that, you can make any kind of rum. Moonshine is made in the same process, just without any molasses.

The distillery is open from noon to 6 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday for tastings and sales of the products.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP)  Resettlement agencies in the Kansas City area have told the federal government that they have the capacity to welcome 625 refugees from Afghanistan.

Three organizations designated by the U.S. State Department as resettlement agencies submitted the figure in a proposal to the agency in late August, The Kansas City Star reports. The agencies are Della Lamb Community Center, Jewish Vocational Services and Catholic Charities of Northeast Kansas.
CUMBERLAND, Md. (AP)  A man remained jailed Saturday for the death of a woman found lying on the floor of her Maryland apartment, cut on her head and neck, authorities said.

Travis Allen Duckworth, 44, was charged with first-degree murder in the death of Krystal Rose Gallen, 34, of Cumberland, according to a Cumberland Police Department news release.
COLUMBUS, Ind. (AP)  A southern Indiana man was jailed in connection with the death of his 37-year-old girlfriend whose remains were found in a shallow grave.

Heather Ann Steuvers remains were found buried Thursday near Columbus, according to the Bartholomew County sheriff's office.
MASON CITY, Iowa (AP)  At the time that the Colby Motor Co. shut down its plant in 1914, about four years after cars first rolled off an assembly line in Mason City, the business had purportedly managed to sell about a thousand automobiles for anywhere from $1,400 to $1,800.

For years now, the Kinney Pioneer Museum, located near the Mason City Municipal Airport, has had what it touts as the only-remaining Colby car, a 1911 Roadster, that wouldve been made near 19th Street Southwest.

This summer, museum treasurer John Barron said that he got a call from someone who wanted to know if the Kinney Pioneer Museum would be interested in bolstering the four-wheel piece of Mason City history with a complete Colby engine and transmission.

Theyve got the Colby car out there so I thought they ought to have a spare engine so they can get a good look at it, said Lloyd Van Horn who operated the Van Horn Truck Museum in the Mason City area for 18 years.

The Mason City Globe Gazette reports that over time, Van Horns collection has included the only known 1912 American-made Saurer (a Swiss brand), a 1923 Model T Ford factory conversion snowmobile with skis and, eventually, a Colby engine with the transmission. Some he came by through auctions and others through informal negotiations over a three-year timespan. The latter method is how Van Horn acquired the Colby.

According to Van Horn, a gentleman wanted to sell him a Colby truck which included the engine and transmission. However, Van Horn insisted that the brainchild of William Colby never actually produced trucks and that what the gentleman had was a homemade rig of sorts. Eventually, Van Horn said the gentleman conceded.

He said, I wont sell you just the engine, Van Horn relayed.

Once he got it, Van Horn refurbished the engine himself and Barron said that it looks like it wouldve the day it went into a Colby car.

When Barron got the call, he said Van Horn asked him plainly: Ive got the engine, would you like to have it?

The local historian said yes and now the museum has a new piece on display that Barron said can serve as a tie-in with the Colby car.

People can see things up close and personal. As it sits on a frame. They can see how it started. Its kind of a tie-in for people to see an industry in Mason City and that particular engine in its entirety, Barron said.

Along with the engine and the transmission, Barron said that Van Horn provided a framed photo of some industrious men working. Men who may well have had a hand in crafting a Colby or one of its engines.

Per a 2002 article in the Globe Gazette by Kristin Buehner, the Colby plant was shut down in 1914 and went into receivership in 1915.

An auction was held May 26, 1915, to raise money to pay off the estimated 100 to 200 creditors, many of which were banks.

A sale bill for that auction listed, among other things: radiators, auto frames, 25 auto bodies, springs, 9 partially completed automobiles, 10 mohair touring car tops, gasoline tanks, mufflers, windshields, numerous other auto parts, office furniture and one sewing machine.
MADISON, Wis. (AP)  Sitting in his North Side Milwaukee rental house, Nazir Al-Mujaahid discussed his son Shuaibs challenges while the quiet 9-year-old lingered in another room. Shuaib excels at sports, Al-Mujaahid said, but his speaking skills developed late, and he lags behind his 6-year-old brother in reading.

Al-Mujaahid, 45, believes that lead poisoning is hindering Shuaibs development. Confirming where the lead came from is impossible, but Al-Mujaahid suspects the lead pipelines that carried water into his home.

The city for years failed to warn the family of lead hazards in their home  or that Shuaib registered elevated lead levels as a toddler in 2014, Al-Mujaahid said.

My awareness of it hasnt been an issue taken seriously at all. Al-Mujaahid said. I found out about it because my son wasnt developing normally.

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The nonprofit news outlet Wisconsin Watch provided this article to The Associated Press through a collaboration with Institute for Nonprofit News.

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Shuaib is among 9,600 Wisconsin children younger than 16 found to be poisoned by lead between 2018 and 2020, according to Wisconsin Department of Health Services data. The neurotoxin damages the brain and nervous system, particularly in young children.

Nearly two-thirds of Wisconsins lead-poisoned kids live in Milwaukee County, where 5.6% of children tested in 2020 had blood lead levels above 5 micrograms per deciliter, which the state defines as poisoning. Thats compared to 3.4% of children statewide.

Gov. Tony Evers and Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett have called for aggressive lead pipeline replacements, but their health departments primarily focus on lead paint and dust, calling that the predominant hazard, as do many experts.

Since 2016, when the Flint, Michigan water crisis was declared a disaster, Wisconsin has replaced about 20% of known service lines made of lead and galvanized steel that may contain lead flaking  or other materials that might contain lead, a Wisconsin Watch analysis of state Public Service Commission data shows.

Despite that, Wisconsin does not require local governments to test drinking water during lead investigations, even though it can make up 20% of a persons total exposure to lead, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency  or up to 60% for infants consuming mostly mixed formula.

Childhood lead poisoning rates in Milwaukee and statewide have steadily decreased in recent decades since lead was phased out in paint and gasoline. Yet Milwaukee in 2020 still had a higher percentage of lead-poisoned children than Flint did in 2015.

Al-Mujaahid is among residents urging Milwaukee to bolster lead poisoning prevention efforts  including by accelerating pipeline replacements.

Wisconsin communities have replaced more than 115,000 utility-owned and privately-owned service line portions since 2016, a Wisconsin Watch analysis shows. An estimated 465,000 pipeline portions made of lead or other potentially hazardous materials remained in 2020.

Madison and Green Bay are among cities that have replaced all of their lead pipelines. But Milwaukee is much larger and installed exponentially more than others, even mandating their installation until 1948.

Milwaukee has replaced less than 1,000 of its full lead service lines annually since launching its effort in 2017. Replacing the remaining 70,000 lead pipes at that pace would take more than 70 years, and the full price tag would cost hundreds of millions of dollars that city officials say they lack.

Federal funding may provide the most hope, including President Joe Bidens infrastructure bill, a version of which the U.S. Senate approved this month.

But some residents are tired of waiting.

Its a public health crisis, said Derek Beyer, a steering committee member of Get The Lead Out, a Milwaukee coalition fighting for speedier replacements. Its not an option to wait 30 more years or whatever, to beg for some money that might not ever come.

The Al-Mujaahid family has rented their home since 2014. The home has lead service lines, city records show. In 2017, a fingerstick test detected 11.4 micrograms per deciliter in Shuaibs blood, which prompted the Milwaukee Health Department to warn the family in a letter that Shuaib was lead poisoned.

It wasnt the first time that Shuaib tested positive for lead poisoning. A 2014 test had flagged 6.4 micrograms per deciliter in Shuaibs blood. No immediate follow up tests were scheduled, and Al-Mujaahid said he wasnt notified. The health department could not confirm whether its current notification policy for test results of at least 5 micrograms per deciliter was in place at the time, said spokesperson Emily Tau.

Milwaukee Water Works tested the familys drinking water after Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service profiled their lead saga in 2018, finding lead levels ranging from 0.35 to 2.5 parts per billion (ppb). Thats below the EPAs 15 ppb action level  the trigger for actions such as pipeline replacement and education.

But many experts call that threshold too high, since no level of lead exposure is safe.

The Al-Mujaahids have turned away from tap water. For drinking and cooking, they use 5-gallon jugs of store-bought water. The family wonders whether lead-tainted water flowed through their previous Milwaukee rental home, where they lived when Shuaib was first tested. It also has lead service lines.

Their experience wasnt unique. In January 2018, Barrett announced that the Milwaukee Health Department lost track of whether it had followed up with 8,000 families whose children registered elevated lead blood levels.

A 2020 Public Health Foundation audit found the department made progress in fixing lead poisoning prevention problems, but it flagged lingering issues related to surveillance systems for blood testing, risk assessments of lead exposure, waits for safe housing for lead-poisoned children and budgeting accountability.

Overcoming these challenges and rectifying any mishandlings of cases is a tremendous task that will take time, Tyler Weber, Milwaukee deputy commissioner of environmental health, told Wisconsin Watch in a statement, adding that his team is dedicated to urgently achieving that goal.

Even amid calls to replace pipelines quicker, health officials continue to prioritize paint over drinking water when investigating home lead hazards.

The Milwaukee Health Departments focus is on lead abatement in paint and soil, as lead-based paint hazards are the primary source of lead exposure in the Milwaukee community, Weber said. However, we know lead poisoning can also occur from contaminated drinking water, so the Milwaukee Health Department distributes free water filters to anyone in the city of Milwaukee who needs them to eradicate the danger until Milwaukee Water Works is able to replace the service line.

Elizabeth Goodsitt, a Wisconsin Department of Health Services spokesperson, told Wisconsin Watch in an email: Water is not an issue in Wisconsin the way paint is when it comes to lead poisoning.

Wisconsin local health departments in 2019 identified lead-based paint as a hazard in 97% of investigations of elevated blood levels, Goodsitt noted, and they flagged other primary hazards just 3% of the time. In 2020, 99% of investigations implicated paint.

But Wisconsin health departments investigate only a fraction of lead poisoning cases.

The state mandates investigations and case management services for children only when one venous blood test detects at least 20 micrograms per deciliter of lead  or if two tests conducted at least 90 days apart find lead at 15 micrograms per deciliter. Thats far above the 5-microgram threshold that the state defines as poisoning.

In an email from spokesperson Jennifer Miller, DHS called it uncommon to have water samples collected during an investigation.

Milwaukee offers drinking water testing for families during lead investigations, but doing so requires consent from all building tenants, Tau said. Water must stay stagnant in service lines for at least eight hours, and some tenants opt out.

Henry Anderson, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor and expert on environmental and occupational diseases, said prioritizing paint hazards made sense.

Theres so much more lead in a paint chip than there is in a glass of water, Anderson said. When theres an old house, it has paint chipping off the walls, they (children) are crawling around, putting their hands in their mouth.

But Virginia Tech University engineering professor Marc Edwards, who helped expose Flints water blunder, contends that governments downplay drinking waters role in lead poisoning. Edwards said governments face a massive government conflict of interest in parsing dangers from paint from those in drinking water, because governments often own the pipes.

If its true lead paint is a danger, then lead in water is a danger, too, Edwards said.

Who pays for replacements? Wisconsin homeowners typically own the service line portion from the curb stop to the home, while utilities own the stretch between the curb stop and water main. State law bars municipal workers from performing private construction projects, and partial service line replacements can worsen lead exposure.

Milwaukee in recent years mandated replacements for lead pipes found to be disrupted or leaking  and those that serve private schools and child care providers. For mandated replacements, a city cost-sharing program limits the tab for property owners to $1,843. Properties with more than four units are not eligible for cost sharing. Also ineligible for the subsidy: Milwaukeee property owners who choose to replace service lines when not required.

Al-Mujaahid said his landlord has no interest in paying for a replacement, and Al-Mujaahid doesnt want to pay for work on a property that he doesnt own. The city should bear responsibility for lead pipelines it once mandated, he said.

Said Robert Miranda, a spokesperson for the Milwaukee-based Freshwater for Life Action Coalition: Theres no excuse at this point for the situation we find ourselves in today. Its criminal.

But Karen Dettmer, Milwaukee Water Works superintendent, sees good progress in replacements, and she cited the utilitys compliance with EPAs embattled Lead and Copper Rule since the 1990s, when it began running corrosion control chemicals through its pipes. Still, Dettmer said she understands calls to pick up the pace on replacements.

Barrett has suggested earmarking pandemic stimulus funds for fixing lead paint hazards, and hes waiting to see whether Bidens infrastructure bill will deliver additional funding for pipeline replacements, which the city estimates would cost $800 million to fully complete.

But Al-Mujaahid has lost faith that his homes lead pipeline will be removed. Hes contemplating moving.

My thing is to just get up out of here, he said. Minimally somewhere without these lead lines. Ideally out of this country.
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP)  A Sioux Falls man faces burglary charges after police found him afterhours at a bar drinking a beer.

Police say the 53-year-old man was arrested at about 5:30 a.m. Friday. The man was charged with first degree burglary and booked into the Minnehaha County Jail.

The Argus Leader reports An alarm notified police of a possible occupant at the bar. Police say they found the man walking around the establishment drinking a beer.

Police were unsure how the man got into the bar, but they said forced entry was not a factor.
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP)  Haitis chief public prosecutor invited Prime Minister Ariel Henry on Friday to meet with him next week as part of an ongoing investigation into the slaying of President Jovenel Moise, noting that Henry spoke with one of the main suspects in the case just hours after the killing.

The carefully worded invitation noted that Henry had multiple phone calls with fugitive Joseph Felix Badio, who once worked for Haitis Ministry of Justice and authorities say had a key role leading up to the July 7 killing of the president at his private home.

Bedford Claude, Port-au-Princes chief prosecutor, said two of the calls occurred at 4:03 a.m. and 4:20 a.m. on July 7 just hours after the killing. He said evidence shows that Badio was in the vicinity of the president's home when the calls were made.

Claude told the prime minister that he was requesting a meeting with him to verify the content of those conversations, although he implied it wasnt mandatory.

The head of the criminal prosecution would be grateful if you so wish, taking into account the restrictions given your status as a senior state official, Claude wrote.

He added that the invitation issued to Henry was justified given what he called a case of extreme gravity for the nation and a power vacuum that prevented authorities from obtaining prior authorization from a president to request that Henry appear at the public prosecutors office.

Claude ended the letter by writing, Receive, Mister Prime Minister, my highly patriotic greetings.

Chenal Augustin, who works in the prime ministers communications office, told The Associated Press that the office would not issue comment on the matter.

Henry previously told a local radio station that he knew Badio and defended him, adding that he didnt believe Badio was involved because he didnt have the means.

Maarten Boute, CEO and chairman of Digicel Haiti, told the AP that the company turned over information as requested by judicial authorities but declined further comment, noting that it is confidential.

The invitation sent to Henry comes as authorities seek to arrest additional suspects in the slaying, including Badio. He once worked for Haitis Ministry of Justice and joined the governments anti-corruption unit in 2013. The agency had issued a statement saying Badio was fired in May following serious breaches of unspecified ethical rules, adding that it filed a complaint against him.

More than 40 suspects have been arrested in the case, including 18 former Colombian soldiers who recently accused Haitian police of torture. A police spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment.

Last month, a Haitian judge appointed to oversee the investigation stepped down, citing personal reasons. The move came after one of his assistants died under unclear circumstances. A new judge has been appointed.

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Coto reported from San Juan, Puerto Rico.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP)  A retired Navy officer from Rhode Island has been sentenced to serve life in prison for sexually abusing a child for years.

U.S. District Judge John McConnell ordered retired Lt. Cdr. Ronald Zenga to serve the rest of his natural life in federal prison on Friday in Providence federal court, WPRI-TV reports.

Zenga tearfully apologized to the victim and others he'd hurt in court. His lawyer argued for leniency, saying he suffered from mental illness and was capable of rehabilitation.

But the victim's mother described Zenga as manipulative and incapable of remorse.

Zenga, who had been stationed at the Naval War College in Newport, pleaded guilty to coercion and distributing and possessing child pornography last November. He'd previously pleaded not guilty to eight charges.

Authorities say Zenga used a Russian website to communicate with a law enforcement agent in England, where the case started, to graphically describe an ongoing sexual encounter with a child.

The federal indictment against him showed he had transported the underage victim across state lines and another country for sex over the course of nearly a decade.

Prosecutors say the abuse happened while he was actively serving and continued into his retirement from the Navy in 2017.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP)  Just because a house under construction isnt finished and lacks key features doesnt mean its not a dwelling under the New Mexico law that makes burglary of a residence a crime, an appellate court ruled for the first time.

The New Mexico Court of Appeals ruled Thursday in case from San Juan County, upholding Albert Dell Shelby's conviction for residential burglary of a home that was enclosed and had a complete exterior but had an incomplete interior and lacked utility services.
CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP)  The house of worship is stained with the sin of slavery, not unlike many other buildings constructed in Charleston before the Civil War.

Dedicated in 1841, Kahal Kadosh Beth Elohims synagogue was built by enslaved Blacks.

Were being honest and transparent about what has enabled us to come together and has enabled us to come to this space, said Rabbi Stephanie Alexander.

The congregation is making an effort to formally acknowledge this painful past with a plaque recently installed outside the house of worship. The inscription on the new monument also speaks to KKBEs commitment to equality for all people.

Upon the renovation and rededication of the building in 2020, Kahal Kadosh Beth Elohim rededicates itself to recognizing the errors of the past and reconciling the beliefs of our faith with our actions as we commit to spiritual growth and social justice for all, it reads.

The recognition came as the Reformed Judaism congregation began renovating its historic building in 2019, the year after the city of Charleston issued a formal apology for its role in the slave trade.

KKBEs $1 million effort was completed in 2020, an effort to preserve the historic structure while also modernizing it for future use.

The new brick monument sits about knee-high outside the sanctuary. The bricks themselves have significance, as they were taken from the synagogues historic Coming Street cemetery and were likely also formed by enslaved Blacks, Alexander said.

Other religious groups have made similar steps. KKBE took inspiration from the Unitarian Church in Charlestons brick monument that honors the African Americans who built that religious building. First Baptist Church in Charleston has a plaque at the sanctuarys stairwell, a path once used by enslaved African Americans who sat upstairs in a segregated church.

KKBEs fight for equality for all people continues in several ways. The synagogue is actively involved in the Charleston Area Justice Ministry, a coalition of dozens of faith groups that tackle issues of housing, transportation and health care. The Jewish group has also been helping form the faith advisory council for Charlestons International African American Museum.

KKBEs congregation is not only reminded of its own commitment towards racial justice but also hopes to inspire others. The synagogue, which hails as the first Reformed Jewish congregation and also has the oldest Jewish sanctuary in continuous use in the nation, welcomes thousands of visitors each year.

The hope is that guests will be inspired to also think about how many of the nations institutions are built upon the legacy of slavery, Alexander said.

Hopefully, theyll be inspired to do some of that soul searching, she said.

Prominent Charleston area Jew and slave owner David Lopez Jr. led the construction of the KKBE structure, using skilled and enslaved African American workers to build the site. The place was built after the original sanctuary burned in a fire.

The names of two slaves are known  Kit and George, as detailed in College of Charleston professor Barry Stiefels journal David Lopez Jr.: Builder, Industrialist, and Defender of the Confederacy.

Whats also known is Lopez paid at least one other slave owner to use the owners enslaved African Americans to help construct the house of worship.

Additionally, researchers believe it was an enslaved worker who repaired one of the silver casings that once held the Torah scrolls inside the synagogue. That device is no longer at KKBE because it was sent to Columbia in anticipation of Gen. William Tecumseh Shermans March during the Civil War, only to have the holy texts burned there in the march.

Its important for synagogue members to study the past so as to not repeat the same wrongdoings, said KKBE member Harlan Greene.

Its a heavy burden, he said. We have to acknowledge it.
ST. LOUIS (AP)  A downtown St. Louis nightspot accused of flouting local COVID-19 mask and social distancing rules has had its liquor license suspended after one official concluded that shootings outside made it a health and safety threat.

The suspension of Reign Restaurant's license will last at least until hearings before city Lquor Control Chief Myles McDonnell resume Sept. 27, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports. McDonnell suspended its liquor license after opening hearings Friday.
OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP)  The state of Washington has agreed to settle a lawsuit brought by 10 people who said they were sexually abused at a juvenile rehabilitation facility when they were teenagers.

One of the plaintiffs lives in Pierce County, which is where the lawsuit was filed in Superior Court in 2018, The Olympian reported.

Some plaintiffs were at Green Hill School in the 70s while some were there as recently as the early 2000s. The state on Sept. 1 agreed to settle their lawsuit for more than $2.1 million.

The facility in Chehalis houses teenagers from across the state who are sentenced to juvenile rehabilitation treatment.

Through numerous sources, the State knew or should have known that a culture of sexually inappropriate behavior pervaded the Green Hill School, the lawsuit said. The knowledge of this culture of abuse went all the way to the highest levels of management of Green Hill School and, upon information and belief, the highest levels of those State agencies charged with protecting the children sent there.

Darrell Cochran, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said this week the settlement is a fresh start that gives his clients resources to support things such as education, stable housing and sobriety.

The Department of Social and Health Services previously ran Green Hill and other juvenile facilities. The recently created Department of Children, Youth and Families started administering juvenile rehabilitation programs in 2019.

These claims all stem from events that occurred between 1976 and 2008  15-40 years ago, and do not reflect DCYFs current practices, policies, or procedures, department spokesperson Jason Wettstein said in a statement. DCYF hopes these settlements are a start to the healing process for these 10 individuals.

The oldest plaintiff was 18 and the youngest was 14 when they went to Green Hill.

Cochran said law enforcement approached three of his clients about ongoing criminal investigations.
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP)  The Louisiana Department of Revenue is granting filing extensions to taxpayers in 25 parishes whose homes and businesses were affected by the impacts of Hurricane Ida.

The automatic extension due date is Jan. 3, 2022, for excise, franchise, income, severance and withholding taxes with original or extended due dates on or after Aug. 26 and before Jan. 3 are eligible.
TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP)  Airline flights, ferries and train service were canceled as Typhoon Chanthu roared toward Taiwan on Saturday and authorities warned of high wind and heavy rain along the island's south and east coast.

Chanthu's center was forecast to pass Taiwan's east coast on Sunday, but its edge should dump rain on land, the Central Wealth Bureau announced.
TUSKEGEE, Ala. (AP)  A lawsuit has been filed that could decide the fate of a Confederate monument that has stood in a square at the center of nearly all-Black Tuskegee for 115 years.

WSFA-TV reported that the Macon County Commission has filed suit against both the local and state chapters of the United Daughters of the Confederacy arguing that the county owns the property where the statue is located and wants title to the plot.

While records show the county gave the land to the Confederate heritage group for use as a park for white people in 1906, the suit contends the property belongs to the county because the county's action was illegal.

The county, which was joined in the suit by three Black residents, said it is willing to negotiate with the Daughters of the Confederacy. If someone comes forward, they could settle and give the statue to the group.

The statue has been the subject of periodic demonstrations for decades in Tuskegee, which is almost all Black and the home of Tuskegee University. The nation's first Black military pilots trained in the city during World War II.

Protesters tried and failed to pull down the monument in the 1960s, and it has been the target of vandals and community opposition for years. In July, City Council member Johnny Ford and another man used an electric saw to cut into the statue, but the damage was later repaired by a crew hired by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.

The group hasn't commented publicly on the lawsuit, filed Sept. 1, and court records do not show an attorney representing either the local or the state chapter of the heritage group.

Fred Gray, a longtime civil rights lawyer who filed the complaint, said officials have been trying to find members of the Tuskegee chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. Only one member, who resides in the Alabama town of Elba, has been located, he said.
KABUL, Afghanistan -- A Taliban official said that the group raised their flag over the Afghan presidential palace in a brief ceremony on Saturday  the same day the U.S. and the world marked the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

The milestone anniversary takes place just weeks after the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the return to power of the Taliban, the faction that sheltered the al-Qaida terror network founded by Osama bin Laden that carried out the attacks.

The Taliban's new Prime Minister Mohammad Hasan Akhund raised the flag in a ceremony at 11 a.m. local time to mark the official start of work by the Talibans 33-member caretaker government, said Ahmadullahh Muttaqi, multimedia chief of the group's cultural commission.

Earlier, another Taliban official said the religious militia's black and white flag was first raised at the palace on Friday. The militant group has also painted their banner on the entry gate to the U.S. Embassy building.

The U.S. is marking the 9/11 anniversary with commemorations at New Yorks World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

___

KABUL, Afghanistan  The Taliban shot dead the brother of Amrullah Saleh, the former vice president of Afghanistan, and his driver in northern Panjshir province, Salehs nephew said Saturday.

Shuresh Saleh said his uncle Rohullah Azizi was going somewhere in a car Thursday when Taliban fighters stopped him at a checkpoint. As we hear at the moment Taliban shot him and his driver at the checkpoint. he said.

A message left with a Taliban spokesman Saturday was not immediately returned.

Shuresh Saleh said it was unclear where his uncle, an anti-Taliban fighter, was headed when the Taliban caught him. He said phones were not working in the area.

Amrullah Saleh led forces resisting the Taliban in Panjshir, which was the last holdout province to be overrun by Afghanistan's new rulers.

Videos circulating on social media purportedly show Taliban opening fire on anti-Taliban fighters in Panjshir whom they have arrested.

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MORE ON AFGHANISTAN:

 US gives 1st public look inside base housing Afghans

 UN raises alarm on Taliban crackdown on dissent, journalists

 Pentagon chief: al-Qaida may seek comeback in Afghanistan

 Analysis: Taliban hard-line path worsens Afghanistan dilemma

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 Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/afghanistan

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KABUL, Afghanistan  More than 250 foreign nationals have left Afghanistan in the past three days, says Zalmay Khalilzad, Washingtons special envoy and the architect of an often criticized deal with the Taliban.

The deal signed last year provided for the safe withdrawal of U.S and NATO troops but say his critics was heavily weighted in favor of the hardline-Islamic movement.

In a series of tweets Khalilzad praised both the Middle Eastern State of Qatar, whose national airline carried out the flights and the Talibans cooperation in this important effort, for the recent departure of foreign nationals from Afghanistan.

We will continue to engage the government of Qatar, the Taliban, and others to ensure the safe passage of our citizens, other foreign nationals, and Afghans that want to leave, Khalilzad tweeted.

However, hundreds of Afghans, including U.S. citizens and green card holders, remain stranded in northern Afghanistans Mazar-e-Sharif waiting to be evacuated but stopped by Taliban rulers demanding travel documents.
TORRINGTON  In response to the states bill allowing recreational marijuana in Connecticut, the Planning & Zoning Commission is enacting a one-year moratorium on new cannabis businesses, starting Sept. 25.

Gov. Ned Lamont in June signed into law Senate Bill 1201, which legalizes and regulates the adult use of cannabis in Connecticut. The legislation contains comprehensive reforms that address many areas, including equity, criminal justice, public health and public safety, according to the state website, ct.gov.

Commissioners held a public hearing Sept. 8 on the moratorium.

This moratorium is temporary and limited to cannabis establishments, to provide the commission with the time necessary to consider adoption and potential changes to our own ordinance and regulations, said City Planner Martin Connor. The Connecticut General Assembly has passed a bill allowing cannabis establishments, and existing dispensaries are exempted.

The moratorium goes into effect Sept. 25 and will be in place until the same date in 2022. But it could be a shorter period of time if the commission is able to draft, present and approve its own regulations over the next year.

The statute has already been adopted, but the state isnt likely to put it in place until next year, so it gives the commission time to work on it, Connor said.

Some who attended the public hearing said the moratorium would prevent them from applying to the state for the proper permits to run a cannabis sales business. But Connor said that wasnt the case.

Under the legislation, cannabis business licenses will be granted based on a towns population  one store per 25,000 people, according to Connor, and the state is using a lottery system to provide those licenses. He said Torrington is likely to be able to have two of them, since its population is about 40,000.

But people can still apply for those permits, Connor said.

Thomas Macre, a co-owner and manager of Still River Wellness, a medical marijuana distributor on Winsted Road in Torrington, said the moratorium wasnt a big concern.

Still River Wellness celebrated its second year in business in June. The dispensary serves about 2,000 patients, many of whom live in Torrington, and has 11 full-time employees, Macre said. We operate quietly, responsibly and with no infringement on other businesses, he said. Were here, were local, and we want to have a partnership with the city.

I think (the moratorium) is a good idea, he said. It buys the commission time to draft their own regulations. My only concern was the one-year time frame, because it seems like the state is moving pretty quickly and if applications for new businesses are available, I want to do that; and I want to be able to stay in Torrington. Were planning our next step. It was nice of them to say they werent saying no, that they were just buying time.

Still River Wellness clients wont be affected by the moratorium, Macre said.

Medical marijuana patients will definitely need to be prioritized, he said. So wed separate the business, to keep our patients in their comfort zone, doing things the way theyve been doing them, by appointment.

Patients are allowed to use a certain amount per month and they dont pay taxes, and they get a higher concentration (of cannabis), he said. For other users, theyll be taxed at a higher rate, and theyll get lower levels. So our patients wont want to change. .... Its a benefit to stay where they are, with us.

Commission Chairman Greg Perosino said the board could make its new regulations a priority. Moratoriums dont have to last a whole year, he said. We can make it a priority, so that were dealing with it in an ongoing basis. If it takes us five months, six months to get it done, and its the way we like it and the way we want it, then thats what well do. Were not going to put off drafting new regulations until the twelfth month of the moratorium. This is just giving us as much room as we can afford to take.

Connor said Mayor Elinor Carbone was working with Police Chief Bill Baldwin on an ordinance. Theyre working on that, regarding the use of marijuana in public, and that could work in concert with our development of a regulation for facilities and retail sales, he said. Were just trying to create the best opportunity to regulate (marijuana) on a retail level.

Commission member Tom Telford said the states new bill still was a work in progress. There are a lot of variables that have been mentioned, like tax abatements. But at this point, we dont even know who will get what, he said. So theres a lot of questions that arent answered yet.

If were approving retail sales, I want us to be the shining star on how were going to do it, Perosino said.
UNITED NATIONS (AP)  U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres issued a dire warning that the world is moving in the wrong direction and faces a pivotal moment where continuing business as usual could lead to a breakdown of global order and a future of perpetual crisis. Changing course could signal a breakthrough to a greener and safer future, he said.

The U.N. chief said the worlds nations and people must reverse todays dangerous trends and choose the breakthrough scenario.

The world is under enormous stress on almost every front, he said, and the COVID-19 pandemic was a wake-up call demonstrating the failure of nations to come together and take joint decisions to help all people in the face of a global life-threatening emergency.

Guterres said this paralysis extends far beyond COVID-19 to the failures to tackle the climate crisis and our suicidal war on nature and the collapse of biodiversity, the unchecked inequality undermining the cohesion of societies, and technologys advances without guard rails to protect us from its unforeseen consequences.

In other signs of a more chaotic and insecure world, he pointed to rising poverty, hunger and gender inequality after decades of decline, the extreme risk to human life and the planet from nuclear war and a climate breakdown, and the inequality, discrimination and injustice bringing people into the streets to protest while conspiracy theories and lies fuel deep divisions within societies.

In a horizon-scanning report presented to the General Assembly and at a press conference Friday, Guterres said his vision for the breakthrough scenario to a greener and safer world is driven by the principle of working together, recognizing that we are bound to each other and that no community or country, however powerful, can solve its challenges alone.

The report -- Our Common Agenda -- is a response to last years declaration by world leaders on the 75th anniversary of the United Nations and the request from the assemblys 193 member nations for the U.N. chief to make recommendations to address the challenges for global governance.

In todays world, Guterres said, Global decision-making is fixed on immediate gain, ignoring the long-term consequences of decisions -- or indecision.

He said multilateral institutions have proven to be too weak and fragmented for todays global challenges and risks.

Whats needed, Guterres said, is not new multilateral bureaucracies but more effective multilateral institutions including a United Nations 2.0" more relevant to the 21st century.

And we need multilateralism with teeth, he said.

In the report outlining his vision to fix the world, Guterres said immediate action is needed to protect the planets most precious assets from oceans to outer space, to ensure it is livable, and to deliver on the aspirations of people everywhere for peace and good health.

He called for an immediate global vaccination plan implemented by an emergency task force, saying investing $50 billion in vaccinations now could add an estimated $9 trillion to the global economy in the next four years.

The report proposes that a global Summit of the Future take place in 2023 that would not only look at all these issues but go beyond traditional security threats to strengthen global governance of digital technology and outer space, and to manage future risks and crises, he said.

It would also consider a New Agenda for Peace including measures to reduce strategic risks from nuclear weapons, cyber warfare and lethal autonomous weapons, which Guterres called one of humanitys most destabilizing inventions.

The secretary-general said a new United Nations Futures Lab will publish regular reports on megatrends and risks.

He said the COVID-19 pandemic also exposed deficiencies in the global financial system.

To tackle these weaknesses and integrate the global financial system with other global priorities, Guterres proposed holding summits every two years of the 20 leading economies in the G20, the U.N.s Economic and Social Council, the heads of international financial institutions including the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, and the U.N. secretary-general.

He also called for the correction of a major blind spot in how we measure progress and prosperity, saying Gross Domestic Product or GDP fails to account for the incalculable social and environmental damage that may be caused by the pursuit of profit.

My report calls for new metrics that value the life and well-being of the many over short-term profit for the few, Guterres said.

It also calls for a new Emergency Platform that would be triggered automatically in large-scale crises comprising governments, the U.N. system, international financial institutions, civil society, the private sector and others, he said.

Guterres also proposed repurposing the U.N. Trusteeship Council, whose work is largely completed, to create an intergovernmental body for intergenerational issues that would be a platform to consider the interests of the entire human family, present and future.

As part of a new focus on the worlds young people and future generations, Guterres said he intends to appoint a special envoy for future generations to ensure the interests of those born in the 21st century and establish a new United Nations Youth Office.

Saying much of the world's unease is rooted in poverty and growing inequality, Guterres noted that the 10 richest men saw their combined wealth increase by half a trillion dollars since the COVID-19 pandemic began while 55% of the worlds population, or 4 billion people, are one step away from destitution, with no social protection whatsoever.

To address the threats to social stability, the U.N. chief recommended a series of measures to provide universal health coverage, education, housing, decent work and income protection for everyone, everywhere.

Guterres proposed holding a World Social Summit in 2025 on global efforts to address these issues and repair the social fabric.

The secretary-general also proposed global action to tackle disinformation and conspiracy theories and promote facts, science and integrity in public discourse.

We must make lying wrong again, Guterres said.
SEATTLE (AP)  Members of Washington states largest labor union have approved a tentative agreement with the state over Gov. Jay Inslees COVID-19 vaccine mandate.

The Washington Federation of State Employees approved the agreement Thursday night, with more than 80% of ballots cast in favor of ratifying the agreement, KING-TV reported.

Our union was able to achieve what we set out fora victory for public health and due process, WFSE President Mike Yestramski said.

The agreement defines the exceptions and religious and medical exemptions process for employees who cant or wont get their shots.

Anyone who is eligible to retire by the end of the year can forgo the vaccine if they use accrued or unpaid leave until they reach their retirement date.

Those who miss the October deadline will be allowed to take leave for up to 30 days in order to get vaccinated.

Workers wont lose their jobs while they wait for a determination on their exemption request and those denied will have 45 days on leave to get fully vaccinated.

Employees can also get the vaccine while on the clock and they will get a vaccine incentive in the form of an additional personal leave day in 2022.

The union, which represents 47,000 state employees, previously filed a lawsuit asking a judge to stop the mandate from going into effect after the union and the state failed to reach a bargaining agreement over the exemption process.

Inslee, a Democrat, issued the order in August, citing the highly contagious delta variant.

The WFSE said it's withdrawing the lawsuit.
BETHLEHEM, Pa. (AP)  Sick with COVID-19 in a hospital bed, pregnant with her third child and anticipating the worst, Jackie Gonzalez penned a letter to her oldest son.

My dearest Jacob, it began. I thought we would have forever together. But forever isnt as long as I hoped ... 

It was early December. Gonzalez, 36, was diabetic, so she had long taken every precaution against COVID. Indeed, she seldom left the house. But she caught it anyway and was admitted to a hospital in her hometown of Jersey City, New Jersey, on the weekend after Thanksgiving. Jacob, 4, and his brother J.T., who was 10 months old at the time, stayed with family.

Gonzalez declined quickly. Not long after writing the letter, she was placed on a ventilator to help her breathe. On Dec. 3, doctors performed an emergency Caesarean section to deliver the baby, Justin. He was two months premature.

The next day, Gonzalez died.

She never got to meet him, said Gonzalezs older sister, Zeneida Torres of Bethlehem, whose grief over the loss remains raw nine months later, even as she moves deeper into a new and unexpected role: adoptive mother to her sisters children.

Its an extraordinary change and challenge for a 44-year-old woman who already raised three sons and a daughter, two of whom still live with her. But her nephews father is out of their lives, Torres said, and her brother couldnt take them because of his job demands.

It was either I take them or the system takes them and separates them and I never see them again, Torres said. And I promised my sister  I said If you have to let go, let go. Ill look after the boys. And I cant break a promise I made her.

What makes things immensely harder is that Jacob, J.T. and Justin all have serious developmental disabilities. Jacob is autistic, nonverbal and at times hard to control. J.T. is showing signs that he falls on the autism spectrum. And Justin, who suffered brain hemorrhaging at birth, is partially paralyzed on his left side.

Hes not rolling or turning, said Torres husband, Jose Serrano, though he noted one important thing as the bright-eyed babys lips curled in a smile: Hes the happiest baby ever.

The demands of caring for the boys means Zeneida cant work. Nor can Serrano, who just came off the last of three surgeries for a work-related injury. Even with help from Torres and Serranos older children, all of whom have their own jobs and responsibilities, there are simply too many tasks.

Their weeks are spent taking the boys to therapy appointments and, in Justins case, to periodic appointments at Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia. Their car is a small, old Toyota, so unreliable that they wont take it as far as Philadelphia. They often have to use Uber instead, a serious drain on what little money they have.

The situation likely would be untenable were it not for the assistance of Youth Advocate Programs, a national nonprofit agency that helps families connect with community resources and develop skills to manage households. Torres was referred to the agency by Northampton County Children and Youth.

Basically we meet with families and determine what they need, said Cheryl Hopkins, a family support specialist with YAP in Northampton and Lehigh counties. We were able to help with things like diapers and detergent. The big need the family had was to get a vehicle so they can transport the children together. What we came up with was the (GoFundMe online fundraiser), but the vehicle hasnt come through yet.

It may, in time. The GoFundMe effort has raised just over $1,800 of its $5,000 goal. But other good things have happened, thanks to the generosity of friends and strangers who have learned of the situation through social media or word of mouth  clothes, shoes, baby wipes, toys, a stroller.

Its a lot of people coming together to help the best they can, said Torres, recalling how a woman showed up at the front door recently with boxes of wipes and a big tray of stuffed shells.

Someone I never met in my life, she marveled. The shells were delicious.

When Torres talks about the boys, and how her family life has changed so abruptly, she moves quickly from tears to smiles to tears again. She and Serrano moved to Bethlehem in November, not long before Gonzalez got sick, because friends had recommended the area as a pleasant, quiet and cheaper alternative to Jersey City. There, Torres said, you didnt know if the noise was fireworks or a gunshot.

Both were working at the time, Serrano in maintenance and Torres at a payroll company. They planned to have what Torres called a real wedding and perhaps travel.

This was our second-to-last stop, Serrano said, meaning they intended to buy a house and settle permanently.

God had other plans, Torres said, balancing J.T. and Justin on her lap as Jacob roamed the living room.

Gonzalez knew the children would be in good hands with her sister. She told Jacob so in her letter.

I could make sure youd be safe with Aunt Zeny, she wrote. She will protect you. Youll find the answer to a long and happy life.

___

Online:

https://bit.ly/2YzhRWC
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. (AP)  Marie Scheff could do it, but she didnt like it.

The 95-year-old woman was among thousands of women who took jobs in factories during World War II, replacing the men who went to war and oftentimes working on planes or equipment for the war effort. These women are now referred to as Rosies, for Rosie the Riveter  the star of a workforce recruitment campaign who said We Can Do It.

Scheff worked in a plant in Chicago that made earphones for pilots. The work was soul-destroying, Scheff said Sept. 3 during an event honoring Rosies at Woodlands Retirement Community in Huntington.

It was mind-boggling, to do the same chore day after day, month after month, Scheff said. Its not to be romanticized. We had to do it.

Keynote speaker for the event, Trevellya Tee Ford-Ahmed, said the Rosie legacy is more than stepping up to do mans work or being caregivers or keeping things in order; its about putting all those skills together to be something greater.

Ford-Ahmed and 13 brothers and sisters grew up in London, West Virginia. All her brothers joined the armed forces, and two of her sisters joined the Womens Army Corps.

Rosies are frequently associated with working in factories, but thousands also worked for the military  checking the science, writing the correspondences (as women had the typewriting and shorthand skills) and making sure the bills got paid, Ford-Ahmed said.

One of Ford-Ahmeds sisters went to West Virginia State University for one semester before joining the Womens Army Corps. It was her dream to go to college, but their father could only save enough money working in the coal mines for one semester.

The only job she could get in West Virginia as a Black woman was cleaning houses, so she went into the Army, she said.

Her other sister also joined, but to this day, at more than 90 years of age, refuses to say what kind of work she did, as she swore an oath to never reveal it when she got the job.

Scheff said Rosies are romanticized these days, just like John Wayne movies romanticized active war, but thats OK. It helps the people who lived through those harrowing times rearrange their memories.

She herself likes to believe her brother, a Navy pilot, was wearing one of the earphones she worked on as he destroyed an enemy ship in the South Pacific, for which he received the Navy Cross.

Ford-Ahmed said there are still Rosies today, actively using their unique skills as women to make the world better.

The group joined others around the world in ringing a bell at 1 p.m. on Sept. 3 to honor the work of the original Rosies.
SANAA, Yemen (AP)  Yemeni officials said the country's Houthi rebels fired a ballistic missile and explosive-laden drones at a Red Sea port on Saturday, destroying humanitarian aid warehouses.

The attack on the port city of Mocha on Yemens western coast was the latest blamed on the Iranian-backed Houthis, who have in recent weeks accelerated their offensives on government areas, as well cross-border attacks on neighboring Saudi Arabia.

The rebels did not claim responsibility for the attack, which bore the hallmarks of the Houthis. A Houthi spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Yemen has been convulsed by civil war since 2014 when Iran-backed Houthi rebels took control of the capital of Sanaa and much of the northern part of the country, forcing the government of President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi to flee to the south, then to Saudi Arabia.

A Saudi-led coalition entered the war in March 2015, backed by the United States, to try restore Hadi to power, and threw its support behind his internationally backed government. Despite a relentless air campaign and ground fighting, the war has deteriorated largely into a stalemate and spawned the worlds worst humanitarian crisis.

The Foreign Ministry of the internationally recognized government said in a statement that the Houthis had fired a ballistic missile and five explosives-laden drones at the port.

No human causalities were reported, but the ministrys statement said the attack caused huge destruction to the ports infrastructure and burned the storehouses of some aid agencies. It didnt name which agencies have cargo stored at the port.

Saturdays attack on Mocha port came after the new U.N. special envoy for Yemen, Hans Grundberg, said Friday that the Arab worlds poorest nation is stuck in an indefinite state of war." He warned that resuming peace negotiations wont be easy.

Earlier this year, the Houthis renewed their offensive on the central city of Marib, but they have failed to achieve substantial progress and suffered heavy casualties. They also launched numerous cross-border attacks on Saudi Arabia.

Last month, a bomb-laden drone crashed into an airport in southwestern Saudi Arabia, wounding eight people and damaging a civilian plane, an attack the Kingdom blamed on the Houthis.

The attack on Saudi Arabia came just days after days after missiles and drones slammed into a key military base in Yemens south, killing at least 30 Saudi-backed Yemeni troops.
ATLANTA (AP)  Several members of a troop of western lowland gorillas at Zoo Atlanta have tested positive for the coronavirus after handlers noticed many of the great apes were showing signs of mild coughing, runny noses and a small loss of appetite, the zoo said Friday.

Zoo Atlanta's animal handlers collected fecal samples and nasal and oral swabs from the gorillas and sent the samples to a diagnostic lab at the University of Georgia, which returned presumptive positive results for the virus that causes COVID-19, a Zoo Atlanta statement said.
PB57photos/Getty Images/iStockphoto

September traditionally marks the start of Hawaiis shoulder season, when the number of visitors dips as mainland and local families send their children back to school.

But with coronavirus cases and hospitalizations surging to record levels across the state, many in the islands are questioning the ethics of traveling there now.
You are now listening to the sounds of the New Generation. A podcast created for those who desire a new way of gaining information rather than reading a traditional newspaper. In our show we will discuss everything from sports, pop culture, politics, and local news. To stay up to date on our latest episodes every week be sure to follow us on your favorite podcast service. And dont worry, we keep it short.
Sharon, PA (16146)

Today

Thunderstorms likely. High 71F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 54F. Winds light and variable.
The U.S. Supreme Court recently declined to hear a case challenging a Texas state law banning nearly all abortions and offering $10,000 to any resident who sues clinics that violate the law.

The decision has some expecting other states to follow in restricting abortion rights. But in Connecticut, an effort to support and affirm reproductive rights did the opposite decades ago when the state passed a law that guarantees a womans right to an abortion.

The purpose of that law, passed in 1990, was to protect the rights granted by the U.S. Supreme Courts decision in Roe v. Wade, which made abortion legal in all 50 states. Connecticut was one of the first few states to pass a law affirming the decision in Roe.

Its not like we had this great vision, former Connecticut Lt. Gov. Nancy Wyman said. Its that we had this great fear that it could be withdrawn from women.

Wyman was a member of the state House of Representatives when that law was passed. She said she feels the same fear now that Texas and other states are moving to criminalize abortion.

Now all of a sudden this is coming on, she said. I have three granddaughters. I want them to have the choice about their bodies. Not anybody else. Not even their grandmother.

Connecticut's state law reads: The decision to terminate a pregnancy prior to the viability of the fetus shall be solely that of the pregnant woman in consultation with her physician.

That language, according to state Senate President Pro Tempore Martin Looney, D-New Haven, was intentional. Looney was also in the state House in 1990.

We at the time thought that it would be prudent to place the language of Roe v. Wade in Connecticut statute so it would not be dependent on a court ruling, he said. We thought that at some point, something might happen to destabilize Roe v. Wade.

But Connecticut wasnt always so progressive. Abortion was illegal in the state until months before Roe was decided, and Connecticut was the first U.S. state to pass an anti-abortion law in 1821.

Between 1821 and 1973  first making abortion illegal and then a panel of federal judges overturning that law  Connecticut played an important role in the movement toward abortion rights.

Griswold and Planned Parenthood

Catherine Roraback is central to the history of abortion law in Connecticut.

She was in the trenches from the very beginning, said Superior Court Judge Andrew Roraback, her cousin and a former state senator.

Both Catherine, who died in 2007, and Andrew came from a well-known legal family.

Theres been 11 members of the Roraback family practicing law in Connecticut since Catherines grandfather was admitted to the bar in 1872, Andrew Roraback said.

Catherine made a name for herself as a civil rights lawyer, known as much for her defense of communists during the McCarthy era as she was for her defense of womens rights.

There was always a great deal of pride in the family for her bravery, Andrew Roraback said of his cousin, calling her indefatigable in terms of her work ethic.

Nowadays, youd call her a disruptor, he said.

Almost a decade before Roe, the case Griswold v. Connecticut set the stage for a discussion of reproductive rights. The use of contraceptives was illegal in Connecticut in 1965, until attorney Tom Emerson successfully argued before the U.S. Supreme Court that a couple had the right to use contraception, if they so chose.

And Catherine Roraback was sitting in the chair next to him.

I would think that if you asked her what her signature achievement was in the realm of civil rights, it would be Griswold and its progeny, Andrew Roraback said.

In 1961, then-Planned Parenthood Executive Director Estelle Griswold opened a birth control clinic in New Haven, with the intention of challenging the states ban on contraception.

According to reports from the time, the clinic had 10 patients on opening day, along with requests for contraception. Griswold was arrested and fined $100, and the conviction was upheld by the state Supreme Court.

In 1965, that case reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of Griswold, striking down Connecticuts ban on contraception and setting the stage for Roe nearly a decade later.

It really did establish the right to privacy for married couples to use contraception without government interference, said Gretchen Raffa, senior director of public policy, advocacy and organizing for Planned Parenthood of Southern New England. And that was radical in 1965. That was a radical thought. And, you know, that really paved the way to get to the other landmark decisions around the right to privacy, including Roe v. Wade.

Abele and Roe

Abortion remained illegal in Connecticut until 1972, just before Roe v. Wade was decided. Fifty years ago in Connecticut, a doctor performing an abortion could be fined $1,000 and imprisoned for up to five years.

The woman who had the abortion can be fined $500 and imprisoned up to two years, according to a 1970 organizing pamphlet intended to find women interested in participating in a class action suit challenging the law. Anyone who helped her arrange the abortion can be fined $500 and imprisoned for up to one year.

There had been previous challenges to laws restricting reproductive freedoms, Griswold among them, but the group known as Women vs. Connecticut represented something of a paradigm shift, according to Reva Siegel, a professor at the Yale Law School and an expert in the history of abortion law.

As the 1970s began, there are beginning to be, for the very first time, women who have the degrees and the skills to fashion law on their own behalf rather than rely on men to defend them, she said.

Women vs. Connecticut began bringing test cases to the courts, in the hopes of overturning the states anti-abortion statute.

In 1971, the group filed a lawsuit, with 858 women signed on as plaintiffs. The legal team was all women, led by attorney Catherine Roraback.

Its pretty widely recognized that Catherine Roraback was at the head of this evolution, Andrew Roraback said. If she wasn't in the drivers seat, she was certainly in the front of the bus.

The case, which became known as Abele v. Markle, became the basis for the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Roe two years later.

Its not reasoned the way Roes reasoned. You can see the feminist energy, Siegel said. This case has this whole class of plaintiffs, and its raising all types of claims.

A panel of federal judges ruled the states anti-abortion statute was, in fact, unconstitutional, so then-Gov. Thomas Meskill encouraged the state legislature to rewrite the law to get around the courts decision.

That rewritten law was again ruled unconstitutional and Connecticuts anti-abortion statute was repealed, a few months before the U.S. Supreme Court decided on Roe v. Wade, making abortion legal in all 50 states.

It actually does shape the decision in Roe, Siegel said.

The future

When Connecticut passed its law in 1990, affirming a womans right to an abortion, Wyman said it was a bipartisan group of legislators, male and female, who thought it was necessary.

We were all scared that something would happen in the federal government that would change this in a different way, and I guess we were right, she said. There were so many of us in the legislature that said we also have to do this on the local level.

Connecticut was one of the first four states to pass a law, affirming the U.S. Supreme Courts decision in Roe, though there are now 13 such state laws on the books. Looney said he believes other states will follow suit, either affirming or challenging abortion rights.

You may see more efforts in blue states to do what we did, he said.

Raffa said conservative states are beginning to follow Texas model, including Florida and Arkansas. She said, we'll see copycat bills around the country.

Connecticut Attorney General William Tong filed a brief along with 20 other states last week in support of a challenge against South Carolinas Fetal Heartbeat and Protection from Abortion Act, which bans abortions after the detection of a fetal heartbeat.

We are witnessing a cruel and relentless attack on a womans right to choose, Tong said in a release. This South Carolina law is just the latest unlawful and draconian legislation aimed at making it more difficult for women to access health care.

Raffa said laws like those in Texas and South Carolina have been decades in the making.

It's part of a national agenda to end abortion access in this country, she said. The Texas law does set a dangerous legal precedent and could clear the path for the states to override people's constitutional rights.

That is a possibility, Siegel said. The country could be divided, as it was just before Roe, or the U.S. Supreme Court might try to impose a uniform fetal protective law on the whole country and there is a counter-mobilization against the court.

Raffa said regardless of what happens to abortion rights at the federal level, access to health care, including abortions, remains a problem in Connecticut.

Connecticut has done what we can to protect the legal right to abortion, but abortion is not accessible to all people that need abortion, she said. Even in a state like Connecticut, we know that not everyone has equitable access to health care.
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"They are supporting us so those in need will receive the aid," TOLO News quoted Yousuf Ahmadi, a spokesman for the Taliban, as saying on Friday shortly after the flight arrived in the Afghan capital.

Kabul, Sep 11 (IANS) A third plane from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) carrying humanitarian aid landed at the Kabul airport, following which the cargo was delivered to the Taliban leadership, the media reported.

The humanitarian aid, consisting of food and medicine, will continue coming to Kabul until the end of September, according to Haji Obaidullah, head of the Association of Afghan Businessmen in the UAE.

Earlier this week Bahrain sent 30 tons of food and medicine to Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, Abdul Hadi Hamdan, who is in charge of Kabul airport, said that food, clothing and medicine provided by various countries had arrived at the airport, and he said the airport will soon become operational for civilian flights as well.

"So far, those flights that carry humanitarian aid have landed at the airport," Hamdan said.

Meanwhile, officials of the Pakistan Consulate in Kandahar say that 12 tonnes of food and medicine provided by Islamabad arrived in the city on Friday.

"More of such support will arrive. And we hope trade between the two countries also should increase," said Naeem Khan, Pakistan General Consul in Kandahar.

Following the collapse of Kabul and the disruption of aid to Afghanistan, a few countries, including the UAE, Bahrain and Pakistan, have started sending humanitarian aid.

--IANS

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Sefcovic made the comment on Friday when speaking at Queen's University in Belfast during his two-day visit to Northern Ireland, reports Xinhua news agency.

Belfast, Sep 11 (IANS) European Commission Vice-President Maros Sefcovic has called for compromise from the UK and the European Union (EU) in the implementation of the Northern Ireland Protocol.

He said the overarching priority has always been the people of Northern Ireland and the protection of the peace process.

"As you know, the UK published their command paper on July 21. And we have been engaging constructively with our UK partners on what can be done to limit the impact of the protocol on everyday life in Northern Ireland, while maintaining its access to the EU's single market.

"The EU and the UK must continue these discussions in order to reach an understanding," Sefcovic added.

Northern Ireland is at the centre of the post-Brexit trade dispute between the UK and the EU.

As part of the Brexit deal, the Northern Ireland Protocol stipulates that Northern Ireland remains in the EU single market and customs union to avoid a hard border between the region and the Republic of Ireland.

However, this leads to a new "regulatory" border between Britain and Northern Ireland.

Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party leader Jeffrey Donaldson said on Thursday that the full impact of the protocol has not yet been felt partly because of the grace period, and warned against any future additional checks at the ports in region that arise from the protocol.

--IANS

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Manila, Sep 11 (IANS) Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has extended the state of calamity for another year until September 2022 to allow the government to draw emergency funds faster as the Southeast Asian country grapples with a Covid-19 resurgence.

"All law enforcement agencies, with the support from the Armed Forces of the Philippines, are hereby directed to continue undertaking all necessary measures to ensure peace and order in affected areas, as may be necessary," said a proclamation signed by Duterte on Friday.
C Christine Fair, Professor at Georgetown University's security studies program within the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service writing in Foreign Policy, says that Washington has an endless appetite for Islamabad's con games.

New Delhi, Sep 11 (IANS) Pakistan has spent decades setting fires in South Asia and then expected praise and remuneration for offering to put them out.

"It's astonishing that US officials continue to peddle Pakistan's own fictions-alongside such media outlets as the BBC, as I discovered recently when I was cut off in the middle of an interview for speaking about it," Fair wrote.

She said even though Pakistan's involvement in Afghanistan goes back some seven decades, the Washington elite continues to fall for Pakistan's efforts to sell itself as the solution to the very problems it created.

"With the US Embassy in Kabul shuttered, the US is very likely to do what it usually does: go back to the arsonist and sustain the pretense that it is in fact the fire brigade. The US will likely find itself more dependent on Pakistan as it seeks a foothold to retain intelligence cooperation and likely drone basing for targeting the terrorist refuges in Pakistan, even while Pakistan continues to cultivate the same refuges," Fair says.

Pakistan will continue to provide the minimal results to justify the expenditures to a US Congress that is always wary of Pakistan but not enough to do anything meaningful to curtail its myriad outrages.

"In the meantime, Pakistan's militant assets cultivated for action in India will benefit enormously from the terrorist safe havens protected by the Taliban led house of horrors that is the Afghan government," she adds.

After Mohammed Daoud Khan came to power in Afghanistan in 1973 and established a one-party republic that embarked on an aggressive top-down social reform program and purged Islamists and communists alike, Pakistan saw an opportunity.

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto took the helm of a vivisected Pakistan, which lost half of its population when Bangladesh gained independence in a 1971 war.

Bhutto resolved to lose nothing else, as per the article.

In August 1973, Bhutto set up the Afghan working group within Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) directorate. Despite a brief interregnum, Gen. Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq continued with this policy after he ousted Bhutto in a July 1977 coup, it said.

Fair added that Pakistan opines that it is the real victim of terrorism, that it is being unjustly maligned, and that if the West wants to fight terrorism, it needs to give Pakistan more money-and ignore its wrongdoings, which include sponsoring numerous Islamist terrorist groups as well as vertical and horizontal nuclear proliferation.

Islamabad understands the value of congressional delegations in shaping policymakers' opinions. Unlike protocol-bound India, Pakistan dispenses with all diplomatic protocol on these occasions.

Delegates meet the army chief, the ISI chief, and the prime minister, and they are often treated to military tourism opportunities, Fair said.

In addition to having lavish budgets for legal lobbyists, Pakistan also has a history of cultivating shadowy figures who launder Islamabad's dirty laundry and promote its pet projects to American policymakers and opinion-makers.

--IANS

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Save Log in , register or subscribe to save articles for later. Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size Like many Australians, it wasnt until she reached her 30s that Angela Hibbert started thinking about starting a family. After several years of trying for a baby, a shock endometriosis diagnosis, and a break-up, Hibbert decided to freeze her eggs at age 35 seeking a small layer of security. Her only wish, she says, is that she had done it sooner. Her disease had furtively affected her egg reserve, so the $12,000 procedure only resulted in three eggs. The 37-year-old vet nurse, from Sydneys western suburbs, says that if she had known earlier that her fertility might be compromised, she would have taken steps to preserve her chances to someday have a child. In my 20s, it wasnt something that even entered my mind, I wanted to travel, she says. Ive had painful periods my whole life, but no doctor ever mentioned [endometriosis]. It makes me a bit angry ... There was no discussion about what that could potentially mean in the future.

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Hibberts experience is shared by many Australians, with infertility affecting one in six couples. Cara Steggles, founder of Fertility Support Australia, says she frequently hears people question what they could have done, if only they had known sooner. We definitely see a lot of people reflecting on their past and on what they could have changed, Steggles says. While nothing can remove the heartbreak, and sometimes inevitability, of infertility, leading expert Dr Karin Hammarberg, the senior research officer for the Victorian Assisted Reproductive Treatment Authority, says some of the pain could be diminished with a shift in the way we understand and discuss fertility in our earlier years. A large gap in education Hammarberg says its normal for most Australians to not put much thought into their fertility until they are ready to have a child, which for many is in their 30s, with the average age of first-time mothers rising to 29.4 in 2019. And even if they do bring it up sooner, its often waved off with you have plenty of time. Early on, from sex education at school, theres the notion that the most important thing is to protect against pregnancy  and theres a very big piece missing there. Dr Karin Hammarberg But the COVID-19 pandemic has forced many to contemplate their family plans. Some fertility clinics have reported the number of women seeking to freeze their eggs has more than doubled. Meanwhile, July research by the Australian Institute of Family Studies showed that one in five Australian women aged under 40 changed their plans of having children because of COVID-19, with the vast majority choosing to delay. Of those surveyed who were currently pregnant, one-fifth said the pandemic influenced the timing. Hammarberg welcomes the idea of increased reflection, but wants this to go further. She says there is a profound gap in Australians understanding of fertilitys limitations, which stems back to what we learn in school and then informs our 20s.

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Early on, from sex education at school, theres the notion that the most important thing is to protect against pregnancy  and theres a very big piece missing there, Hammarberg says. People think they can turn off fertility with contraception and you can turn it back on when youre ready. But its not that simple. Theres a need for more awareness of the limitations of fertility and what we can do to improve it ... and the most important thing is to not leave it too late. And thats not easy to say. Hammarbergs research shows that Australia has low levels of fertility awareness. A survey of almost 500 people found that the majority overestimated, by about 10 years, the age at which fertility declines, which is about age 35 for women and 45 for men. Of course, it doesnt help that celebrities continue to make baby announcements well past their 30s, from musician Alanis Morissette at 45, to actor Diane Kruger at 42. Hammarberg says IVF is also incorrectly seen as a sure thing. The reality, she says, is a 35-year-old woman has a 42 per cent chance of a baby after one IVF cycle, while a 40-year-old woman has a 12 per cent chance. Its why she believes education about fertility should be integrated into school, as an option at university, and throughout peoples 20s when they go to the GP by opening up discussion about whether they might want to have kids someday and what lifestyle factors  such as not smoking, exercising, eating well  can improve future chances.

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Hammarberg says younger people are often dismissed with retorts such as you dont need to worry about it now, which she feels is completely wrong  particularly if theyd like to have a large family. At least if you know what the limitations are you can make decisions that are informed. A major issue, Hammarberg says, is that government and workplace policies dont make it easy for Australians to have children at a younger age even if they want to; from lack of superannuation for women on maternity leave, to unequal parental leave, insecure employment, inflexible work arrangements and poor housing affordability. Julijana Todorovic was forced to think about her fertility in her early 20s. Credit:Luis Enrique Ascui Julijana Todorovic was one of few 22-year-olds to have thought about her fertility, though through no choice of her own. Todorovic underwent urgent fertility preservation treatment after she was diagnosed with an aggressive form of bone cancer, ewings sarcoma. Before starting chemotherapy, her ovaries were removed, with the tissue now stored to later be re-transplanted to produce and fertilise eggs via IVF. Todorovic says while the decision was a no-brainer, it was very confronting. No one else her age was talking about babies  even today, at age 27, they dont, she says. Youre trying to work out who you are and youre making a decision you didnt expect to, she says. The graduate lawyer, from Melbournes north, believes its important to have earlier conversations about age-related fertility decline, and GP clinics are a valuable place for it, but she adds its delicate. Its a really careful line we need to tread but discussion is important, Todorovic says. The problem is fertility is so inextricably linked with womanhood ... so the risk with talking about fertility more in our 20s is we reinforce that.

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Is egg freezing the answer? Egg freezing is sharply on the rise, and Dr Molly Johnston, a bioethics researcher at Monash University, says while the procedure does not guarantee future children  its estimated that a woman under 35 needs 14 eggs frozen for an 80 per cent chance of having a baby  it can be valuable for some women, depending on when they do it. Too early, and theyre likely to never need the eggs. Too late, and the quality and quantity of eggs may be poor. If youre someone in your early 30s and you want to have children but personal circumstances are incompatible with that right now, then it might be worthwhile having a conversation with a specialist, Johnston says. Egg freezing can cost about $10,000 per retrieval cycle, and women often require more than one round to get a sufficient number of eggs. Johnston believes Medicare subsidies should be available for people at heightened risk of age-related infertility, before egg quality has significantly degraded. Its not unusual for global tech giants  think the likes of Apple and Facebook, but also companies such as Spotify and Salesforce  to offer employer-sponsored egg freezing. Johnston published a study in July that showed almost half of Victorian women surveyed supported the concept. Respondents viewed it as a way to access an unaffordable treatment and more reproductive options, as long as it didnt come with pressure to delay having children or at the expense of other family support benefits. Johnston stresses that improving public knowledge of fertility from our teenage and early adult years is not about reintroducing archaic ideas about valuing women solely as child-bearers, nor is it about encouraging people to have babies or get their eggs frozen in their 20s.

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If dating in Sydney wasnt difficult enough, the citys long lockdown has made finding love, lust or a casual dalliance a lot more challenging.

Next week will mark twelve weeks of stay-at-home orders in Sydney - but physical restrictions havent stopped romance-starved singles from pursuing romance.

Justine Daden, 46, has dabbled with dating apps during lockdown. Credit:Anne Kucera

For hairdresser Justine Daden, 46, who lives in Pagewood, dating during the second lockdown has had its highs and its lows.

I had a virtual Christmas in July date with a guy I met on an app, along with his friends, she says. Someone prepared the food and had it delivered to everyone homes and we enjoyed it together over Zoom.
Record numbers of young people have become investors for the first time in the past 18 months, with many making their debuts via platforms that appeal to novice investors.

However, many of those investing in shares, exchange traded funds (ETFs) and cryptocurrencies, either directly or through micro-investment platforms, have not given much thought to declaring income or capital gains from their investments in their annual tax returns.

And the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) has signalled it is on the lookout for any errors regarding investments in 2020-21 returns.

ATO assistant commissioner Tim Loh says first-time investors often misunderstand their tax obligations in relation to reporting capital gains and income from their investments Credit:

For those doing their own returns, the deadline to file them with the ATO is October 31. Those using tax agents have longer to file them.
A contracted service provider at Villawood Immigration Detention Centre has tested positive to COVID-19.

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The Australian Border Force has confirmed reports a staff member tested positive to the virus, and standard departmental protocols are being followed including contact tracing, quarantining, testing and cleaning, in conjunction with the NSW public health unit.

The priority for the Australian Border Force is the health and safety of detainees and staff in immigration detention facilities, a spokesperson from Australian Border Force said.

To date, no detainee has tested positive to COVID-19.

A spokesperson for the Refugee Action Coalition told the SMH about seven detainees were believed to be in isolation following exposure to a guard working at the facility.

We are very concernedDetention centres are high-risk environments with many people vulnerable because of underlying medical conditions, the Refugee Action Coalition spokesperson said.

The Australian Border Force did not confirm how many staff or detainees were in isolation.

All detainees continue to have ongoing access to the medical professionals located within facilities, the ABF spokesperson said.

The health care and range of services provided to detainees in immigration detention is broadly commensurate with health care available to the Australian community through the public health system.

The roll-out of the COVID-19 vaccination program to immigration centre detainees commenced in early August and has taken place at all immigration detention facilities across the network.

All detainees continue to have ongoing access to the medical professionals located within facilities. The health care and range of services provided to detainees in immigration detention is broadly commensurate with health care available to the Australian community through the public health system.
The NSW governments road map to reopening the state is welcome after almost three months of lockdown but its ambiguity on many points breeds uncertainty and its conservative timeline does little to reward those who are already fully vaccinated.

The Premier has made it clear the state needs to live with COVID-19 but her road map does not fully explain how we are going to do this.

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian at Fridays COVID-19 update. Credit:James Brickwood

It is silent on when adults might return to work and its caveat, which allows the government to reimpose restrictions if there is a surge in cases, diminishes a key incentive for getting vaccinated in the first place.

Any road map for getting through this pandemic must involve an element of flexibility to ensure authorities can respond appropriately to an outbreak that would otherwise overwhelm our health services, but the government should clearly define the circumstances that would trigger this surge response.
Health Minister Brad Hazzard is standing firm behind plans to require churchgoers to show proof of vaccination when NSW reopens, despite religious leaders pushing for an exemption on the grounds no one should be turned away from church.

Catholic Archbishop of Sydney Anthony Fisher, Anglican Archbishop of Sydney Kanishka Raffel and other faith leaders are lobbying Mr Hazzard directly on the issue, and some ministers have publicly contemplated civil disobedience if the government keeps the requirement.

Churches have a responsibility to minister to all, regardless of immunisation status, so we will be discussing with government how we can fulfil that ministry commitment in future stages of the recovery, Archbishop Raffel told The Sun-Herald. We want everybody to be safe at church, but we also want to make sure we minister to everybody.

Sydney archbishops have challenged Health Minister Brad Hazzard over the governments plans to make vaccination a requirement to go to church. Credit:Composite

The Catholic Archbishop of Sydney Anthony Fisher said he and other religious leaders had told the government worship was an essential service, not mere recreation for many people.
Plibersek: It has its problems. And factions are not what politics are about. But at least we have had three fantastic women competing for two positions, which makes us a real contrast to the Libs, whose leaders always say they cant find enough quality women to fill their positions. At the ALP we can, and its why we have nearly 48 per cent female parliamentary representation. Fitz: If Albo got hit by a bus and Kristina Keneally was in the lower house, who would be best equipped to take his place, Keneally or you? Plibersek: Anthony Albanese has already been hit by a Range Rover. He came back stronger. Im sure the same would not happen again! When Ray met Neddy One person more interested than most in the death of Sydneys most famous criminal, Neddy Smith  the notorious murderer, rapist and standover man who passed at Long Bay Prison on Wednesday aged 76  is Ray Martin. Thirty years ago, the iconic TV journalist was filling in for a week for the suddenly crook Mike Willesee on his eponymous show on Channel Nine, to find that Willesee had booked interviews with the corrupt detective Roger Rogerson and Smith.

It was a warm summers day, Martin tells me, and Neddy turned up in a T-shirt. My vivid memory is of him shaking almost uncontrollably. I asked if the air conditioning was too high? He laughed and said No, its my f--king Parkinsons. Its a killer. Exact words, interesting phrasing. And what impression did you have of the man? Loading Physically he was intimidating, given his height and how ripped he was  even at that age. If you didnt know what an evil psychopath he was, he seemed affable with a knockabout sense of humour. I had interviewed Rogerson the day before and as Neddy shook hands, he smiled and said Roger said you was fair with him, so I decided to give ya a go!!! At the end he shook hands and said Anyway, thanks! Rogerson, of course, is where he belongs, in prison, serving time for murder.

The decades pass, the gangsters die. Am I alone in thinking that Sydney has less of a problem now with vicious thugs like Neddy Smith and crooked cops like Rogerson, and more with corruption at a higher level? Joke of the week A philosopher and a theologian, both blind, are challenged to go into a pitch-black room and find a black cat that isnt there. The theologian finds him. Tweet of the Week You might be having a bad day at work, but at least you didnt ignore two months worth of Pfizer meeting requests, and in doing so plunge half your country into a completely avoidable second wave of lockdowns. - @shauncrowe

Quotes of the Week Its not a sad day, its a great day for NSW. He came out [of prison] horizontally. - Former NSW Assistant Police Commissioner John Laycock on the death on Wednesday of infamous Sydney criminal Neddy Smith at Long Bay Correctional Centre. The No Texts Party. Cos how long till Craig Kelly starts sending nudes? - Satirist Mark Humphreys on ABC 7.30 launching his new party. I was too different I think and didnt fit NIDAs mould. Four times I auditioned for NIDA and got rejected. I remember each time I went to Pizza Hut all-you-can-eat buffet afterwards to console myself. They said I didnt have the voice for Shakespeare. - Rebel Wilson, who has donated $1 million to the Australian Theatre For Young People which nurtured and taught her, after her rejection from NIDA. We stand before a harsh justice: biodiversity loss, environmental degradation and climate change are the inevitable consequences of our actions, since we have greedily consumed more of the earths resources than the planet can endure. - From A Joint Message for the Protection of Creation issued by Pope Francis, Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby and Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew. They ask Christians to pray that world leaders at the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow in November make courageous choices.

I want all women, every girl, in this nation to live without fear. Thats liberty. I want their humanity, their dignity, their innate worth as a human being and the freedoms to which theyre entitled, to be respected. - Scott Morrison at this weeks summit on womens safety. I think Mr Morrisons exercised poor judgement in this case. I was a bit surprised when I read he had done this, to be honest. Its not that he doesnt deserve to see his kids but so does every other Australian. And I think that when your people are doing it tough, youve got to do it tough, too. I know for a lot of MPs when we leave Canberra weve got to spend two weeks locked down away from our families. So I just dont know how he was able to get a permit when most people cant. - Labor disability insurance scheme spokesman Bill Shorten after Scott Morrison got permission to fly from Canberra and Sydney and back again, on an RAAF jet no less, to spend the Fathers Day weekend with his family, and didnt have to quarantine in either direction. Hes got some nappy rash. Hes been bitten, by ants. Hes fallen over - but hes alive. - A greatly relieved Anthony Elfalak, father of 3-year-old AJ, who was missing for three nights from their home near Putty. To come to Venice, you are going to have to make a booking. We cannot continue to have such huge numbers of tourists. Venice is a small and very delicate city. The number of visitors must be compatible with Venices size. If there is no room, you wont be able to come in. - The mayor of Venice, Luigi Brugnaro, explaining what the authorities are calling a contribution to access but is in effect a tourist tax of between $4 and $16. If the city is assaulted by too many day trippers, then no more access passes will be sold and the turnstiles will be closed. Nobody listens to us. They talk over the top of us, they tell us what we are going to have in our communities, and no one listens to the women in the communities, the women in the towns, the women in the suburbs who have to deal with all those young women and older women and children fleeing from violence. Lives are being lost because people who think they know better than us will not listen to us and will not act on our advice. - Professor Marcia Langton, Foundation Chair of Australian Indigenous Studies at the University of Melbourne, at the womens safety summit, saying that the national plan to reduce domestic violence that had existed for 12 years does not work for us and Indigenous representatives must be involved in designing local initiatives.
Two Melbourne attractions came to grief this week. One of them had structural flaws, never lived up to its potential and tried to survive by promising what could never be delivered. The other was the Melbourne Star observation wheel.

Michael OBrien was unflappable and thoroughly decent for three years as leader of the Liberal Party, which in politics is disastrous and code for ineffectual. There was none of the essential mongrel.

Michael OBrien last Tuesday after the leadership changed hands. Credit:Justin McManus

Tellingly in his exit speech, he declared that The way I saw it either give up your job, or you give up your integrity. What was he being pushed to do that meant losing his integrity? Did new leader Matthew Guy promise to do what OBrien refused to?

Guys return is as much an exercise in save the furniture as a genuine pitch to form government in November 2022.
In a modest clinic on the outskirts of Melbournes western suburbs, Dr Lester Mascarenhas is patiently explaining to asylum seeker Plehmeh the benefits of being inoculated with the Pfizer vaccine at the Utopia medical clinic.

Its a small miracle she is sitting here at all. Plehmeh and her family spent more than a decade in a cramped refugee camp in northern Thailand after fleeing Myanmar Army soldiers who ransacked their home, killed members of their family and ran them off their land. She arrived in Australia last March, just as the pandemic started.

Juliette Moe vaccinating Plehmeh on Saturday at Utopia Refugee and Asylum Seeker Health. Credit:Jason South.

Dr Mascarenhas health advice is frank and compassionate but must be relayed through nurse and interpreter Juliette Moe. Plehmeh and her family are Karenni people, from eastern Myanmar, and dont speak English.

A team of young Karenni interpreters bustled through the small health centre on Saturday, ushering families in and out of Utopias back room at the Hoppers Crossing clinic.
Unless you get that absolute buy-in [with compliance], luck on your side and a small-enough, tight-enough spread of community transmission that you can contain, then its all about vaccine because vaccine works everywhere, Professor Bennett said. However, Professor Adrian Esterman, an epidemiologist from the University of South Australia, points out South Australia and Northern Territory have both managed to quash Delta outbreaks. He says NSW was far too late with its lockdown. As of Saturday, the effective reproductive (R) rate of Delta in Victoria is 1.7, compared with 1.2 in NSW. This means the virus is spreading 1.4 times faster in Victoria. A week ago, Victorias R rate was tracking above 2, meaning daily cases double every four days. Victorias outbreak started a month later than NSW, but NSW has not had an R rate above 2 for two months.

The R rate refers to the number of other people an infected person will go on to infect - for example, an R rate of 2 means every person who is infected with COVID-19 will infect two other people. This was calculated using three-day averages of daily cases to smooth out the choppiness of daily testing rates, and a four-day interval for incubation. Sydney and Melbourne are not identical cities, but they are a similar size and have similar demographics. Sydney has more dense population centres outside the CBD, which is a disadvantage in fighting the virus. Professor Robert Booy, an infectious diseases paediatrician at the University of Sydney, says the comparison between the two cities is fair. Its instructive to compare two cities of similar population having a similar kind of outbreak at the same time and compare the R values in the light of whether one city went through a hard and fast lockdown compared to another, a commensurate or proportionate lockdown, Professor Booy said. Theres always the possibility of an unmeasured confounder, but it appears as if the hard and fast lockdown was not nearly as effective as it was suggested to be.

Melbourne has spent more than 200 days in lockdown during this pandemic. Credit:Getty Images Both cities have had outbreaks in lower socio-economic suburbs where a higher percentage of the population are young (meaning they are more mobile and less likely to have been vaccinated at the start of the outbreak), working in face-to-face roles in essential industries, and living in big multi-generational households. The main difference was that the NSW government initially tried to squash Delta with localised restrictions and contact tracing and did not send Greater Sydney into full lockdown until 11 days after the first case. Restrictions such as curfews in certain areas, a statewide outdoor mask mandate and further retail closures have been progressively added amid complaints Sydney was in a lockdown lite or mockdown. In the early days of Delta in the Victorian community, the virus was spreading more slowly. Early on it appeared to come down to zero daily cases  Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews marked the occasion with a one-word Facebook post: zero - though Professor Bennett said it was likely there were undetected chains of transmission in the community. Since then, the Victorian outbreak has accelerated - a phenomenon that becomes clearer after the so-called doughnut day of zero cases on August 4, as shown in the charts.

In the 39 days since August 4, Victorian infections have grown from a rolling three-day average of three daily cases to 369. In the 39 days since June 16, the NSW three-day average for daily cases grew from zero to 144.3. NSW reached a rolling three-day average of 20.3 daily cases on June 26 and 31 days later reached 153.3. After doughnut day Victoria reached 21 on August 12 and 31 days later is at 369. Data scientist Luke Metcalfe has published on social media similar graphs showing the trajectory of the pandemic in both cities since they reached a seven-day rolling average of six daily cases. As health experts keep telling us, Delta is a game-changer. It is much more infectious and will rip through entire households in a way that previous variants havent. What is not clear is why the virus is now spreading more rapidly in Victoria than it did in NSW.

Health experts say the outbreaks in both cities have been driven by spread within households and workplaces, not rule-breaking, but compliance does play a role. After six lockdowns adding up to more than 200 days, Professor Bennett says many of her fellow Victorians are over it. Every time my partner comes back from his hour of exercise or a bike ride, he tells me hes seen 40 people with no mask and 20 with a mask, so theres this sense that even early in this lockdown it quickly looked a bit like the end of the last big lockdown, she said. One expert says the Sydney v Melbourne lockdown debate proved to be a distraction. Credit:Kate Geraghty University of Melbourne scientific modeller Jason Thompson, who helped Victoria get to COVID-zero last year, has been tracking mobility and movement in Victoria throughout every lockdown. He estimates movement is higher by between 10 and 15 per cent in Victoria, when you compare the data to the lockdown in August last year.

People just dont have the energy left in the tank to do the lockdowns like they used to, he said. So when you look back at movement it is lower than it is now. Professor Peter Collignon, a microbiologist at the Australian National University, said there was a strong element of chance in how the virus moved around a city. For example, Sydney had the sheer bad luck of the outbreak at a seafood wholesaler where the cold-storage environment made it the perfect conditions for the virus to spread. The NSW outbreak started with a single case on June 16 with a limousine driver transporting passengers from the airport. As The Sunday Age reported, the Victorian outbreak has had at least two incursions  Sydney removalists travelling on July 8 and a Hume family that visited Coles on July 10  and most likely a third. Dr Norelle Sherry, a genomics expert with the Doherty Institute, said analysis of samples indicated there was likely another introduction of the virus, separate to the older outbreak.

Another theory is that it is not a new source of infection, but a subtle change in genomics that has occurred locally as the virus moved from one person to the next. Obviously, the third potential incursion mattered especially as it was undetected and overlapping with the other outbreaks. However, both Professor Bennett and Professor Booy say it doesnt explain the higher R rate months later, especially since there is now just one outbreak. What about vaccination? NSW has now accelerated its vaccination rollout and there is controversy over the extra doses of Pfizer allocated to NSW to fight the outbreak in south-western and western Sydney. Professor Esterman said: The reason were seeing this slowdown in the NSW case numbers and reproduction number is because the vaccination is slowly kicking in, whereas in Victoria, I dont think vaccinations are coming into play yet.

Loading Professor Bennett says vaccination initially played in Victorias favour. The fact Victorias outbreak started a month later than NSWs meant a higher percentage of the population was vaccinated on day one of the outbreak. Victoria lost its vaccination advantage as the NSW outbreak accelerated. NSW now has 78 per cent of the population with one or more doses, while Victoria is at 65.5 per cent. Coverage is also lower in Melbournes hotspot areas compared with Sydney. But Victoria has come surging back in recent weeks and, as of Saturday, was administering first doses at the fastest rate in the nation. Experts also say the vaccination advantage NSW obtained was not as simple as nabbing extra Pfizer supplies. Im not pretending that means weve got enough supply [in Victoria] because I think if we had more supply and it was easy to make a booking then more people would, Professor Bennett said.

But at the moment, were not actually using all the bookings we have. Theres an argument we need more supply to stop the escalation, but it gets harder to make that argument if youre not using all the appointments you have. Loading Professor Bennett says cases in NSW are starting to plateau and the vaccination rates should be starting to lower the R rate. Once it drops below one, it means the number of daily cases will fall. NSW is expected to surpass 70 per cent of the eligible population with double vaccination in mid-October and restrictions will ease partially the Monday after the state crosses that threshold. Professor Bennett says the next month is a crucial time for NSW to stay the course with lockdown and even pedal harder because it was important to keep the R rate steady or falling while vaccination rates rose.
Although the perception was the summit was part of dealing with the governments women problem, its genesis was last December, when a womens safety taskforce was formed with the ministers from every state, territory and the Commonwealth. Part of its remit was organising a summit to inform development of the next national plan to reduce violence against women and children. Similar events had been held in 2016 and 2018. The first was essentially a COAG meeting, with the associated public posturing by leaders. The 2018 summit in Adelaide was enthusiastic but low-key; Morrison spent those two days in Perth. Watt, who was involved in the previous two summits, says this years national conversation about the treatment of women meant there was a much bigger group of people who wanted to engage. There are also now a core group of outspoken victim-survivors  like Higgins and Tame, the Australian of the Year  drawing attention to the issues. Anti-child abuse campaigner Grace Tame will push for nationally consistent definitions of consent and sexual abuse. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen This wider interest and the COVID-induced lockdowns that sent the summit online led to disappointment from some about a lack of inclusiveness. Higgins said she only became a delegate after a last-minute invitation from the ACT. Tame was on a panel, but tweeted that shed had to remind the government it had invited her.

Domestic Violence NSW chief executive Delia Donovan agrees summit discussions werent as robust or interactive as at an in-person event, although its no ones fault, it was COVID. But she believes the sector did the necessary heavy lifting of consultation in the lead-up. This included two days of roundtable discussions held last week, closed to the public, that allowed deeper examination of issues. Despite the trials of a virtual summit, Hayley Foster, the head of counselling and advocacy organisation Rape and Domestic Violence Services Australia, is hopeful. She was encouraged by the sentiments from ministers at the summits end. She also has hope after Morrison and Minister for Women Marise Payne described the $1.1 billion womens safety package in the last federal budget as a down payment. Were all holding our breath, Foster says. There are words and sentiment, and then there are actions. Theres been a fair amount of inaction over the last 11 to 12 years.

The first national plan ran from 2010 to 2022, with the overarching goals delivered through a series of three-year action plans. The most recent evaluation  based on 2016 data  shows progress was made on three of its four headline measures. But on the fourth, reduced prevalence of domestic violence and sexual assault, things got worse. Advocates say the dial hasnt shifted on actual reduction of violence, although they agree the first plan has led to important infrastructure being put in place. A draft version of the next 12-year plan should be ready before the end of the year. It will formally start in July 2022. But advocates want action before then.

Loading Dr Michael Salter, an expert on gendered violence with the University of NSW, says the looming federal election could pose challenges to policymaking, but there must be change as soon as possible. We cannot wait according to the whims of the electoral cycle before we see implementation because women are dying now. Theyre dying every single week, he said. The public is really sick of talk. The public wants to see real action and real results. Victorias Minister for Women Gabrielle Williams used her closing remarks to the summit to take aim at what she saw as sluggishness from the Commonwealth. This prompted a warning from Payne to maintain the nonpartisan, collaborative approach. Later, Williams said her government would work collaboratively but pointed out the evidence was there for the Commonwealth to act on a range of areas including housing affordability and boosting funding for legal services.

Were almost a year away from when this [new plan] would come into effect and thats too long to wait when we know there are areas in need of urgent attention now, she said. Federal Womens Safety Minister Anne Ruston acknowledges the urgency. We cannot look back and say the summit was just a talkfest and the next national plan cannot be a document that just sits on a shelf, she said. It must translate into real and practical outcomes and actions because we have to change the dial and we have to make a difference  lives depend on it. One suggestion repeatedly raised for governments to act on immediately is legislating nationally consistent definitions of terms such as consent and coercive control. There isnt even a consistent definition of domestic violence, a decade after concerted action began to tackle it.

Loading Tame announced during the summit she was starting a campaign to get the nations attorneys-general to fix this. We have nine jurisdictions with nine very different definitions of consent. We have nine definitions of grooming and in some jurisdictions grooming isnt even defined at all... Nine different definitions of the age of consent to sex and nine different definitions of sexual intercourse itself, she said. We wonder why we dont have a consistent understanding of each of these concepts. The lack of consistency also translates to difficulty in assessing whether programs are working.

How do you make sense of the data or join up the data when you dont even have consistent definitions? Because youre not collecting the same things, says Padma Raman, head of Australias National Research Organisation for Womens Safety. It does feel like there are pockets of activity over the place, and its just not coordinated. Donovan said the sector was constantly talking about transparency, accountability, and good governance for both governments and services, and that should be embedded in the new plan. Until weve got a national definition, and national minimum standards, we really cant measure ourselves very well, she said. Another frequent theme is the need for different services to suit different communities. The one size fits all approach set programs up to fail, Queensland Indigenous Family Violence Legal Service principal solicitor Thelma Schwartz said.

Watt points out using a tailored approach comes back to consistent data and evaluation to make sure governments properly understand what is happening on the ground. If we need more police, we need more police. But if we need more social workers [that needs to be known], she says. By the time police get [involved], its probably happened five or six times before. It would be better if you could get there before the police get called. The call for tailored approaches came loudly from Indigenous leaders, who said women in their communities were ignored when they suggested solutions. The delegates statement asked for a specific action plan for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women and children, to sit under the national plan. Ruston said she had heard this message loud and clear.

It makes absolute sense to establish a standalone action plan, she said. Its not good enough for Indigenous women to feel like they have just been tagged on or added on as an afterthought. Loading Then theres the question of money to back up the intentions of the plan. Services are already stretched thin, with most on short-term funding arrangements that make it difficult to plan. Year after year we are begging for money, begging for funding to support over 60 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, Schwartz said. How is that acceptable ... [to] go cap in hand begging to provide essential services?

Donovan says funding for frontline services should at least double, while Foster says there needs to be a billion dollars a year  compared with the $1.1 billion over four years in the federal budget. Yet Payne said at the end of the two days that if anyone walked away thinking the only answer was more funding, they would have taken the wrong outcome from this summit. Melbourne University law professor Heather Douglas was shocked when she heard that. We do know about a lot of programs that are working well. But unfortunately, a lot of them get stuck in this sort of pilot project status, she said. Its not long term. Its not sustained  and thats really problematic. Foster says this permanent short-term funding is incredibly wasteful, means people started from scratch when they could be setting up a program that was already working, and often leaves services with little time or resources to do the primary prevention work governments agreed was so vital.

Theyve still got families in crisis coming to them, and they drop everything and do the crisis work, she said. Loading Theyre never going to be able to get that early intervention and prevention work done at the local level unless [governments] make that brave expenditure. Salter said there was no doubt calls for more money were always challenging to governments, especially for long-term investments. But I dont think theres any two ways about it. If we want to reduce violence against women and children, then we are going to have to see significant financial commitments from the public purse.

Ruston said the way the current plan was carved up into the three-year action plans created a stop-start approach to funding. That created uncertainty for the sector as well as not allowing enough time for delivery and evaluation. This has created duplication as well as gaps which is why the next national plan must set out clearly the responsibilities of each level of government as well as the business sector and community more broadly, so we can ensure there is accountability, she said. Ultimately, women dealing with domestic violence or sexual assault dont care who the money comes from, Watt says. They just want the services to be similar and accessible no matter where they are. Unless we drop the politics and get really ambitious, were not going to get there. Support is available from the National Sexual Assault, Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732).
The countrys airports have warned the federal government that foreign airlines are at risk of pulling out of Australia even as the country reopens its international border, leading to fewer seats and higher prices, unless clearer plans are locked in immediately.

Meanwhile, Trade and Tourism Minister Dan Tehan has flagged high demand is likely to lead to long wait times for Australians needing to renew their passports before they can get on a plane.

Tourism Minister Dan Tehan said there was likely to be a longer wait for people to renew their passports. Credit:Sarah Baker

The department is doing everything it can to prepare but longer than usual processing times cant be ruled out ... once youre fully vaccinated, its time to dust off your passport and make sure it is still valid, Mr Tehan said.

Submissions to former health department secretary Jane Haltons second review of the quarantine system, obtained by The Sun-Herald and The Sunday Age, reveal the airport sector is alarmed about a lack of preparation for the resumption of overseas travel once 80 per cent of Australians are vaccinated.
Labor senator Kristina Keneally has hit back at suggestions her move into the safe Labor seat of Fowler is a blow to diversity and vowed she will fight for the local community.

Senator Keneally on Friday confirmed she would switch from the Senate to the culturally diverse lower house seat, after months of internal tensions over whether she or fellow senator Deb ONeill would take the top spot on Labors Senate ticket, rather than in the difficult-to-win third spot.

Labor senator Kristina Keneally speaks about her decision to contest the lower house seat of Fowler at the next federal election. Credit:Rhett Wyman

There has been disquiet within Labor about Senator Keneallys move, with retiring MP Chris Hayes known to favour lawyer Tu Le, a daughter of Vietnamese refugees, to replace him.

On Saturday Labor MP Anne Aly, the first Muslim woman elected to the Federal Parliament, told the ABC: Labor needs to do better on diversity ... this is a huge failure for Labor when it comes to diversity and inclusion.
NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard says he would support easing more restrictions in outdoor settings before the state reaches the 70 per cent full vaccination target.

As NSW posted a daily record of 1599 new cases of COVID-19 and eight deaths on Saturday, Mr Hazzard indicated the government could soon consider easing restrictions in some settings over the coming weeks as vaccination rates climbed.

People flock to Sydney beaches as the temperature hits 28 degrees. Credit:Rhett Wyman

I think we need to be looking at, as the [vaccine] numbers go up, what are the freedoms, what other normality we can bring back into our lives, Mr Hazzard said when asked whether he would be open to increasing the number of fully vaccinated people attending a picnic from five to 10.

So Im totally supportive of that, if I could just get some time to work with the team I would be doing it.
Under Operation Stay at Home, the value of the on-the-spot penalties increased from a maximum of $1000 to a maximum of $5000. Health Minister Brad Hazzard said the police were essential to defeating COVID-19 as part of a whole-of-government approach and also played a role as community helpers looking after the welfare of individuals who are isolating at home, even delivering food packages in some parts of the state. At other times, when there is deliberate and persistent non-compliance the police have a job to do, which is to enforce the health orders, Mr Hazzard said. My assessment is that the police have been absolutely invaluable and any criticism directed to them in the broadest sense is most likely to have come from those who have not seen the on-the-ground work done by them.

Loading Four days after the launch of Operation Stay at Home, the government introduced additional policing measures, including a curfew in the local government areas of concern, an outdoor mask mandate, further restrictions on retail including making Bunnings click n collect only, exercise limits in the LGAs of concern, and the ability for police to lock down apartment buildings without waiting for NSW Health. Deputy Premier John Barilaro said last week the curfew in south-west Sydney did not work and was only done because of media pressure. The extra measures came after days of persistent questions at the daily press conferences about why NSW did not adopt stricter measures in place in Victoria, and social media derision calling it a lockdown lite or mockdown. Premier Gladys Berejiklian declined to comment on the effectiveness of the police action but a NSW government spokesperson said the additional compliance measures were a request from NSW Police and the curfew was a request from NSW Health and Police. A police road block on Enmore Road checking road users identification and address. Credit:Brook Mitchell

Professor Catherine Bennett at Deakin University said it was impossible to gauge the effect of the police effort on the pandemic because the bigger factor was the increasing pace of the vaccination program. NSW Health data shows total vaccination doses increased from 5.1 million on August 16 to 7.9 million on Friday. However, Professor Bennett said the pandemic in NSW was definitely nearing a plateau. The effective reproductive (R) rate was 1.2 on August 16, meaning each person who became infected with COVID-19 went on to infect 1.2 other people. The R rate was calculated based on a rolling three-day average of new cases and a four-day incubation period. On Saturday the R rate was still 1.2, though it fell to 1 or 0.9 several times in the past week. Cases start to decline when the R rate drops below 1. NSW Police patrol Bondi Beach keeping the COVID-19 restrictions in place. Credit:Steven Siewert Professor Bennett said lockdown restrictions rely heavily on voluntary compliance and that could be undermined by rules on top of rules, such as a curfew that made it illegal to leave the house to attend an already-illegal nocturnal gathering.

Some people are going to get the message and some people arent, some people are living in fear already and it just stops them going out at all and thats unhealthy and unnecessary to be that fearful, particularly between outbreaks, she said. For other people  it makes them feel oppressed and less likely to comply with any part of lockdown. Professor Peter Collignon at Australian National University said restrictions and the policing of them ought to be proportionate to their public health risks from different activities. When asked whether the fines had public health value, he said: If the fines were for sitting on a park bench, then I would think no, but if the fines were because you were with 10 other people inside having a party, then yes. NSW Police declined to provide a breakdown of what the fines were for, directing The Sun-Herald to file a freedom of information request. Millions owed in pandemic fines From the beginning of the pandemic to June 24, there were 3,132 penalty notices issued with a face value of $4.3 million. Of that, $1.9 million has been paid, $42,800 is not yet due, and $2.1 million is overdue.

From June 25 to September 6, there were 28,726 penalty notices issued with a face value of $24.3 million. Of that, $1.6 million has been paid, $21.3 million is not yet due, and $1.3 million is overdue.

Source: Revenue NSW

Redfern Legal Centre, which runs a free COVID-19 fines advice centre, said police were fining people who were clearly not breaking the law. Loading The public health order allows people outside the 12 areas of concern to undertake recreation alone or with one other person or with members of the same household. Samantha Lee, police accountability solicitor Redfern Legal Centre, said she knew of several cases where the police were fining people for sitting in a park, away from others, and not in an area of concern. We are calling on the NSW Government to revoke all COVID-19 fines that have been issued incorrectly by NSW Police to those undertaking lawful recreation, Ms Lee said.

A Revenue NSW spokesperson said the recovery rate for an overdue COVID-19 fine was 31 per cent for the 2019-2020 financial year, compared with 46 per cent for other debt. For the 2020-2021 financial year, it was 28 per cent compared with 30 per cent. As debt is recovered over time these rates will increase, the spokesperson said. Given that fines for breaching public health orders are a high-value fine, this is seen as a relatively good result that will improve over time. NSW Minister for Finance and Small Business Damien Tudehope said: If youve received a fine because youve broken the law and breached the public health order, we expect you to pay that fine. And if you dont, we will be contacting you.

Mr Tudehope said there were options to have a fine reviewed when people believe they have been incorrectly issued. A Revenue NSW spokesperson said when a penalty notice is issued, the customer has 28 days to pay the full amount or take another form of action, including setting up a payment plan. A Revenue NSW spokesperson said overdue fines are issued when a customer has not paid after a reminder notice and recovery actions have included suspension of driver licences, cancellations of vehicle registration and deducting money from wages or bank accounts. As of August 23, there have been 117 people who challenged their fines in court but Revenue NSW does not track the outcome. Figures from the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research predating Operation Stay at Home show in March 2021 the courts had upheld 45 out of 56 COVID-19 fines challenged in court.
The Queensland government must provide an additional $247 million for palliative care as an amendment to its proposed assisted dying bill to go to Parliament next week, a crowd of anti-euthanasia protesters demanded on Saturday afternoon.

About 400 to 500 people  a mix of Christians, academics, doctors, nurses and general families  protested outside Queenslands Parliament House before marching down George and Elizabeth streets chanting, Kill the bill, not the patient.

Protesters against the Queensland Government Voluntary Assisted Dying Bill march quietly through the streets calling out Kill the Bill, not the patient. Credit:Tony Moore

The Palaszczuk government plans to debate its assisted dying bill into Queensland Parliament next week  pending a COVID-19 lockdown.

It is a major policy initiative of the Labor government and a key election promise of Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk at the 2020 election campaign.
New York: World No.1 Novak Djokovic kept his bid for a grand slam alive on Friday, overcoming German Alexander Zverev 4-6, 6-2, 6-4, 4-6, 6-2 in the US Open semi-finals.

Djokovic moved within one win of reaching a mens record 21 grand slam titles and avenged his loss to Zverev at the Tokyo Olympics in front of a roaring crowd inside Arthur Ashe Stadium, with Rod Laver, the last person to complete a calendar slam 52 years ago, looking on.

The Serbian will face Russian Daniil Medvedev in Sundays final, after the world No.2 sent off 21-year-old Canadian Felix Auger-Aliassime in his semi-final.

Novak Djokovic. Credit:AP

Djokovic handed the German his first break of the night with a double fault in the first set but otherwise showed no mercy, firing off 41 winners and a dozen aces across the entire match.
Chenna Teklehaymanot, Ethiopia: The smell of death lingered for days after the killings. The bodies, more than a dozen in the uniforms of fighters, others in civilian clothing, were still scattered on the muddy ground.

In a nearby churchyard, many more were already buried  at least 59 people killed by forces from Ethiopias northern Tigray region, residents alleged. Six bodies of priests were laid to rest inside the church itself. In their rush to flee to safer areas of the Amhara region, residents said at times they placed several bodies in single graves.

Senait Ambaw, left, who says her home was destroyed in the fighting, carries her belongings out of the town as she looks for a safe place to stay. Credit:AP

At the scene of one of the deadliest battles of Ethiopias 10-month Tigray conflict, witness accounts reflected the increasingly blurred line between combatant and civilian after the federal government weeks ago urged all capable citizens to stop the Tigray forces once and for all.

When the Tigray fighters captured the village of Chenna Teklehaymanot in the Amhara region on August 31, shortly after a military division defending the area left for unknown reasons, our (local) defence forces confronted them. Ordinary people here also joined with whatever they could, said 66-year-old Dagnew Hune. He told The Associated Press he witnessed the ensuing killings and helped to bury the dead.
The United States has halted flights of Afghan evacuees, pulling some off planes, after discovering a few cases of measles among new arrivals in the US.

A US government document warned the development would have a severe impact on an evacuation that since August 15 has moved many thousands of people out of Taliban-held Afghanistan, but also been grindingly drawn out for Afghan evacuees and Americans alike, and was plagued by attacks and other deadly violence.

The decision was made by Customs and Border Protection on the recommendation of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the halt stemmed from discovery of measles among four Afghans who had arrived in the United States. It was not immediately clear from Psakis remarks whether the stop applied to flights from all transit sites overseas, or only two of the biggest ones, in Qatar and in Germany.

Passengers waiting to board a flight from Kabuls reopened international airport. Credit:Victor J Blue

Customs and Border Protection spokespeople did not immediately respond to questions, including how long the halt would last.
London: Flashbulbs fill the air, frenzy fills the night, a lonely girl aswirl, lost in blinding light.

Those are the opening lyrics from the newly released trailer for Netflixs Diana: The Musical, a production based on the life and legacy of the princess. And while the film of the Broadway production is not set to be released on the platform until next month, the musical is already causing quite a stir.

The controversial clip, which was shared by the streaming giant on Friday AEST, portrays numerous key events in the life of the princess - including her wedding to Prince Charles and the birth of Prince William - and explores her complex relationship with Britains royal family and the worlds media.

The musical was being previewed in the United States last year but performances were stopped when the coronavirus pandemic forced theatres to close. Netflix is now set to stream a film of the production, which will return to Broadway in December.
Washington: President Joe Bidens sweeping new vaccine requirements have Republican governors threatening lawsuits. His unapologetic response: Have at it.

The administration is gearing up for another major clash between federal and state rule. But while many details about the rules remain unknown, Biden appears to be on firm legal ground to issue the directive in the name of protecting employee safety, according to experts interviewed by The Associated Press.

My bet is that with respect to that statutory authority, theyre on pretty strong footing given the evidence strongly suggesting  the degree of risk that (unvaccinated individuals) pose, not only to themselves but also onto others, said University of Connecticut law professor Sachin Pandya.

South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster vowed to fight the new vaccine mandates to the gates of hell. Credit:AP

Republicans swiftly denounced the mandate that could impact 100 million Americans as government overreach and vowed to sue. Texas Governor Greg Abbott called it an assault on private businesses while Governor Henry McMaster promised to fight them to the gates of hell to protect the liberty and livelihood of every South Carolinian. The Republican National Committee has also said it will sue the administration to protect Americans and their liberties.
~ Company collaborates with the Ministry of Health to encourage vaccination~

PHILIPSBURG, St. Maarten:---Flow & the Ministry of Public Health, Social Development, and Labor have partnered to encourage vaccinations on St. Maarten in the drive to reach the 85% vaccination goal. The Telecoms operator will participate in the CPS Vineyard Office Park Vaccination Pop-up Fair this Saturday and has committed to providing any persons vaccinated on the day with a free Chippie top-up.

The effort is part of the companys pledge to support the local communities it serves and assists in the return to a stable economy. Our team is part of our island community, and we want to do our part in increasing our vaccination rate to keep our customers, our friends, and our loved ones safe, says Flow Country Manager Eastern Caribbean, Charlesworth Sydney.

With a higher vaccination rate, we can also look forward to more visitors returning to our island because they feel safer deciding to do so. This will of course benefit us all because our islands economy and livelihoods depend on our guests.

With the vaccination Pop-Up Fair, the Vaccination Management Team (VMT) is also taking steps to make sure the public gets accurate information on vaccination and debunk any false rumors and incorrect information. Medical professionals and other health experts will be on-hand Saturday to answer questions on vaccines and advise on other matters, such as boosting your immune system and overall health.

With the new approach the VMT wants to make sure that truthful, factual information is available so that the public can make informed decisions on their health and wellbeing. To date the (VMT) has vaccinated 25.495 persons with the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine.



We applaud the Ministry, the CPS team and our overburdened healthcare workers for their steadfast commitment to keeping our community safe. In talks with the Minister, we saw an opportunity to support and didnt hesitate to do so. We believe in the benefits of corporate citizens supporting local leadership and will offer our support when called upon. As citizens we all want what is best for our island, our families and our livelihoods and the best way for us to remain the top tourist destination in the Caribbean is by making sure that our visitors know that they will be safe when coming to our shores. Sydney commented.

Minister Ottley commented: As Minister of VSA, I encourage everyone to come out and get vaccinated. I am extremely happy that FLOW and other stakeholders came on board and offered their services. We hope that Saturday will be a success and we can continue working towards herd immunity, let us drive to 85.

The vaccination fair at the CPS facility in the Vineyard Office Park in Philipsburg will run from 9 am to 3 pm. Aside from the free credit offered by Flow, the visiting public can also look forward to free pizza from Dominos Pizza and information from various health experts. We are proud to support the Health Ministry in the good work that they are doing and encourage anyone who is hesitant, to come out and get the right information to make an informed decision. Sydney stated.
Susie Rogers, 77, of Somerset, passed away on Monday, September 13, 2021 at her residence. Arrangements are pending and will be announced later by Morris & Hislope Funeral Home. Condolences may be expressed to the family at: www.morrisandhislope.com.
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Roosevelt's early childhood addition on track for February 2022 completion

Construction of the new Roosevelt Elementary early childhood addition has taken place over the last several months. Barring any setbacks, the addition is anticipated to be completed in February 2022, with early childhood programming set to begin at Roosevelt in that fall. (Michelle Vlasak/southernminn.com) Sage

Smith

A lot of progress has been made since the Faribault School Board approved construction of an early childhood addition to Roosevelt Elementary a year ago next week.

The building, now rising from the soil below, is on track for a February 2022 completion. Classes are expected to begin next fall.

Construction began this spring, and overall the project has been moving along smoothly, with only minor bumps in the road, said district Buildings and Grounds Director Kain Smith.

Though the interior renovation was ahead of schedule, Smith says the actual addition part is a bit behind. After learning its steel manufacturer unexpectedly went out of business, Smith says the problem worked itself out, and Met-Con was able to take over.

The delay was very minimal (pushing it just one month back), compared to what it could have been. Outside of the steel issue, Smith feels fortunate that things have gone well so far and theyve not come across any shortages in materials other projects have run into because of COVID.

An easier transition

The project will allow for the transition of McKinley Early Childhood into the new classrooms in 2022 and support the Early Childhood Departments need for more space, expanded programming and a cohesive building to improved students transition to elementary school.

Prior to the boards approval, Early Childhood Executive Director Olivia Sage shared ways the project would support the vision and mission of McKinley Early Childhood Center by providing high-quality early childhood education to all families in collaboration with the communitys early childhood partners. The addition would also allow McKinley to better fulfill its mission to provide support, encouragement and education to families.

It will represent an increase in square footage for the program, though not an increase in the number of classrooms. A fenced playground will be installed around the expansion, along with other landscaping. It will not include additional parking, as existing on-site parking is already sufficient to meet the requirements laid out in the city ordinances.

Sage explained how moving early childhood education to Roosevelt correlates with the McKinley strategic plan pillars of family and community engagement, student-centered learning, equity, mental health and safety, and school climate. Having one, cohesive building supporting early childhood through fifth-grade students will support the work of building upon relationships within home schools, she said. The multi-grade structure will allow for more partnerships with older students and provide continuity in the effort to have students well-read by third grade.

The additional space that comes with the project will increase opportunities for programming designed to help students socially and emotionally. Roosevelt will continue to share resources with the other elementary schools, Jefferson and Lincoln. Sage said one benefit being considered is access to a social worker.

The early childhood projects can be funded through a lease levy authority, and the school district can authorize a certificate of participation, which allows investors to be a part of the project. The district would then own the ground it was built on and pay off the lease with annual payments of $250,000 for 20 years. As a result, the tax impact would be $250,000 a year  an additional $12 per year to the average Faribault homeowner.

Last November, the board approved the issuance of $3.8 million Certificates of Participation, essentially is a 20-year lease agreement. The estimate of the true interest cost was 2.62%, so the district will spend about $182,000 less, $9,000 annually.

Early this January, the 6,500 square-foot expansion was brought to the Faribault Planning Commission since the area is zoned residential. A similar conditional use permit, issued in 1995, allowed for the construction of the school itself. In the end, the Planning Commission endorsed the $3.8 million projects design with little concern, or discussion.
News

spotlight

Owatonna teachers remember learning along with students on 9/11

Jeff Williams distinctly remembers the genetics lesson he was giving his students. Kristen Andrix vividly recalls the look her husband gave her through the door of her math classroom.

Both remember how it felt to be in the same Owatonna High School rooms they still teach in today when historic attacks on America left them  and their students  in quiet shock that Tuesday morning.

aharman / By ANNIE GRANLUND annie.granlund@apgsomn.com Owatonna teacher Jeff Williams teaches in the same high school science room he was in 20 years ago during the infamous 9/11 terrorist attacks. Williams said on that day, he was learning right alongside his students. (Annie Granlund/southernminn.com)

I had 30 kids in my class, and we just kind of  watched, said Williams, as he recalls seeing smoke come out of one of the World Trade Centers in New York on Sept. 11, 2001. There was just so much uncertainty, and as a teacher, youre left trying to talk to the kids about this unknown, but then the second strike happened. The second tower was hit by a second plane. And it all became very clear  America was under assault.

Williams said he has thought a lot about that day as the 20 anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks creeped closer. Over the last couple months, one of the students that sat in Williams science class that morning corresponded with him via email, as they recalled what that day was like. Williams said it felt like being in a paradigm, as a teacher, to be in charge of a classroom without having any answers.

Were kind of used to, as teachers, having some sort of answer, but as were watching this all unfold, there are no answers, Williams said. So we just were watching and learning together with our students  that was really humbling.

Andrix echoed her coworker, stating she also was left speechless during the first hours of that day. Still a young teacher at the time, she said it had never been harder to find that balance of being the adult in a room with teenagers who werent, in reality, that much younger than her.

I remember having to question, as the adult, How much of this should I let them continue seeing? Andrix said. I remember trying to balance my reaction to make sure the kids felt safe, but at only 26, I was still trying to figure things out myself. But in these moments, you have to turn off your own emotions and take the mindset of being a role model and a caretaker  you have to be the adult.

Processing the day

Andrix and Williams admit that the day of the terrorist attacks felt cold, somber and extremely long. When Andrix returned home, she said she and her husband, social studies teacher Todd Andrix, continued to sit in silence and process the never-ending news cycle.

Williams went home and held his 5-month-old son.

We had a job to do during the day, and we werent the ones under attack, Williams said about waiting until the school day was over to process his own feelings. America was honestly under attack, and for a day, we had no idea how big it was going to get. That was difficult, but we had to talk the kids through it, make sure they knew that, not only were we going to figure this out, but that we were going to stand strong against the people who did this.

Though there are many parts of that day that still bring pain to both teachers  watching people jump from the World Trade Center buildings before they collapsed, seeing buildings that Williams said seemed to go up forever fall straight down  Andrix fondly recalls one specific thing from that day.

I had never felt such a strong, unified sense of patriotism, she said. It is the most impactful part of that day for me  our country hasnt felt that patriotic since, but it was truly a come together moment that I felt on the big, grand scale. We were just kids  me and my students  but that day we were a part of the bigger picture.

A new world

aharman / By ANNIE GRANLUND annie.granlund@apgsomn.com Kristen Andrix, a math teacher at Owatonna High School, was only 26 years old when she found herself in front of a room full of teenagers grasping for answers during the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001. Andrix still teaches today in that same classroom. (Annie Granlund/southernminn.com)

For days, weeks, months and even years following the terrorist attacks, Williams and Andrix said the world changed as a direct result of that one day. The attacks led to massive changes in security procedures and protocols around the nation, from security checkpoints in airports to the immigration and deportation process.

Less than a month after 9/11, U.S. troops invaded Afghanistan in an attempt to dismantle al-Qaeda  the terrorist group that claimed responsibility for the attacks that day. The invasion became a key part of Americas War on Terror, under the leaders of President George. W. Bush.

Americas military involvement in Afghanistan  which just ended in August and was immediately proceeded with the Taliban reclaiming control of the country  was the longest war in American history.

Now, when the two longtime, beloved Owatonna teachers walk into those same rooms they stood in 20 years ago, they are met with faces of children who were seemingly untouched by the events of that day.

They may not have been alive when the attacks happened, but they are living in a world that is a direct result of that day, said Andrix.

Though the world has been forever changed and todays high school students may not be completely aware of just how much, Williams said that change was the only thing that was perfectly clear about 9/11.

I think we all understood there was going to be a different world than the one we grew up in, Williams said. The students that day knew they were in a historic moment, a moment that would change the way we look at the world from this point moving forward  we could all really feel it at that time.

Pull Quote "We were just kids  me and my students  but that day we were a part of the bigger picture. Kristen Andrix, Owatonna High School Math Teacher
Could be theres more than a few dogs in Greenwich that dig lullabies, but you can consider Miles Davis at the head of the pack.

And the dogs owner Derrick Garnett promises a lot more will follow, as he rolls out his Zoundz Music for Pets app as a streaming service with calming tunes to help people and pets  and their vets  better connect.

The idea for Zoundz Music for Pets came to Garrett two years ago when a Greenwich neighbor, who is a veterinarian, described the difficulties in calming edgy dogs and cats while at the clinic.

A music industry veteran, Garrett mused on the possibilities of creating soothing musical scores for vet clinics to play, as well as pet grooming services and animal shelters. He discovered a body of research on what combinations might work best and reached out to some of those experts.

With the concept in hand, it was an easy leap to realize the service could extend to the home, helping people connect better with their pets. Garrett is leasing space at the Serendipity Labs office in Stamford as he develops Zoundz.

Pets dont know if theyre listening to rock or reggae, but there are parameters within music that they respond to such as frequencies, tempo or the key that a song is written in, Garrett said. Theres a big misconception for a lot of people who even recognize that music can calm your dog or cat: they immediately think classical. ... Theres certain classical pieces of music that will fall in the parameters of the right key, the right tempo, the right frequency  but its hit or miss.

He has built a catalog of music using freelance musicians that Zoundz streams to an app on a subscription basis, at a cost of a few dollars a month. Music is differentiated for cats and dogs, and categorized across channels designed to encourage specific responses in pets.

Garrett became attuned to the animal kingdom in his youth, first in Hamden where he spent his earliest years, then in Virginia after his father moved the family to establish a working farm. He had a tandem interest in music, playing drums in a rock band with high school friends before gravitating quickly to running the sound board during performances.

He went on to study audio engineering at Full Sail University in Florida, eventually landing a job with the renowned Clinton Recording Studios in New York City. Garrett took an offer to become head engineer for a smaller studio in Mamaroneck, N.Y., then started his own production company called Roundhouse Media that began producing music for major ad campaigns.

His career took a turn while on vacation in Mexico. As Garrett tells it, the resort restaurant was playing a song he deemed pretty lousy, but when he went poolside the ambiance music was far better. The play list was repetitive there and in other parts of the resort. The possibility dawned on him for producing extended musical scores for hotels and resorts to play, with differentiated music for separate areas and vastly expanded play lists. He would eventually adopt the term music architecture to describe the service.

This is way beyond muzak  its strategically putting together music based on the audience that the resort is trying to target, Garrett said. The different areas, the time of day, even the restaurant looking at the menu  we really took a deep dive. ... Thats when Roundhouse really shifted and we started focusing on resorts.

Roundhouse continues today, but Garrett is now spending much of his time getting Zoundz off the ground. He is aiming to launch the first full version of Zoundz Music for Pets by November on the App Store and Google Play, with a 15-day free trial. Those who do not subscribe to the full service at that point can still access a single pet music channel for free.

At the end of the day, its our goal to affect cats and dogs in a positive way, Garrett said. Music is such a powerful tool. ... Our hope is that Zoundz becomes the genre  that when people think of music to calm pets, that they think of Zoundz.

Alex.Soule@scni.com; 203-842-2545; @casoulman
BOISE, Idaho (AP)  President Joe Biden will be in Boise, Idaho on Monday to visit the National Interagency Fire Center.

Biden's trip to the western U.S. will also include a stop in Sacramento, California to survey wildfire damage.
STAMFORD  With Strawberry Hill School only two years away from full K-8 enrollment, work is ramping up on and around the site to accommodate the greater numbers.

A traffic project at the intersection of Strawberry Hill Avenue and 5th Street is designed to increase safety for pedestrians and create better-defined travel lanes for vehicles, while the renovation of a 1860s-era barn on the property is nearly complete.

The C.J. Starr Barn, which was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979, is a large wood-frame structure with an Italianate woodwork exterior that was once part of a larger country estate belonging to Starr.

The barn renovation is part of the original construction plan for the school, which opened in 2016 with only kindergarten and first-grade classes. At first, students attended class out of the old 1925 Sacred Heart Academy building, which the city bought from the Sisters of St. Joseph in 2014.

In 2019, a new building was completed on the site, adjacent to the 1925 structure. The new building has more than 30 classrooms in addition to a media center, cafeteria and gymnasium.

A grade level has been added every year, and the school currently caters to students in grades K-6. By 2023, it will be a full K-8 school.

The plan for the barn is to create an additional space for students to use for a variety of reasons.

At a Board of Education meeting in May, Superintendent Tamu Lucero said she envisioned the school using the space for student performances, and as a meeting place for the community to use.

For community, the skies are the limit, Lucero said.

Funding is split 80-20, with the state picking up the bulk of the cost through a grant. City Engineer Lou Casolo previously said the contract for the work was $2.6 million. On Friday, he said that figure is likely to go up, as additional rot demolition work added cost to the project and has also delayed it past its expected completion date of June 2021.

Casolo said the new estimated completion date is the end of October.

The project is being led by contractor Kronenberger and Sons, a historic building restoration company based out of Middletown.

Part of the renovation included installing a new roof, a new HVAC system, electrical installations and flooring upgrades.

Some of the old timber framing was left exposed, something Casolo said could be used teach students and visitors about the construction of the building.

Its a pretty significant building for Stamford as far as historic buildings, Casolo said at a March meeting of the board.

This week, a trio of trees was cut down at the intersection of Strawberry Hill Avenue and 5th Street in anticipation of traffic work. The corner, which is at the northeast end of the school property, will have pedestrian safety equipment added and better delineated vehicle traffic lanes.

Dave Avery, the president of the Strawberry Hill Neighborhood Association, said he was supportive of the changes.

It should be making the intersection safer, he said.

The ongoing challenges brought on by COVID-19 have resulted in more parents driving children to the school, as opposed to allowing them to ride the bus, which is also increasing traffic in the area, he said.

Casolo said the traffic project involves widening the streets to better align them and allow for better movement of vehicles.

As the population grows at Strawberry Hill, so will the demand for the use of the infrastructure around it, Casolo said.

Frank Petise, the acting director of transportation for the city, said new turn lanes would be installed and there would be a new traffic signal  a rectangular rapid flashing beacon  installed at the intersection. The units are intended to provide greater visibility for pedestrians crossing streets.

With the school adding a grade every year, theres more and more pedestrian and vehicle traffic, Petise said.

A contractor will soon be selected for the intersection work, with a completion target of 2022.

Avery said he has long advocated for safer streets in the neighborhood. In 2016, an 18-year-old was killed when she was struck by a van in front of Stamford High School a few blocks south of Strawberry Hill School.

Our important issue throughout any of this is to keep the traffic speed under the control and to protect people, protect walkers, Avery said. There are a lot of pedestrians out there.

ignacio.laguarda@stamfordadvocate.com
Milton, PA (17847)

Today

Thunderstorms, accompanied by locally heavy rainfall at times. A few storms may be severe. High around 85F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. A few storms may be severe. Low 63F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%.
Earl Berger was eating breakfast before an auto dealers convention when he saw a plane crash into the World Trade Center on television.

He telephoned his wife, Jacqueline, at their familys dealership in Hazle Twp., to say, At least Im in Washington, not New York.

Later that morning, a plane hit the Pentagon, and federal agents interrupted the convention and whisked away members of Congress.

Agents, understating the real story, said a helicopter crashed into the Pentagon.

Lets go, Berger, who was chairman of the board of Pennsylvania Automotive Association, said to Paul McMillan, the associations president. Lets go home. Im not staying here.

That quick decision gave them a head start on others trying to flee the Capitol Hilton hotel as another hijacked plane headed toward Washington, D.C.

Some people who waited at the convention didnt make it out of the city until the next day. Auto dealers from the West Coast ended up driving home, when they could rent cars, after the attacks halted air travel.

The most memorable thing, McMillan recalled on Friday, was people running up 16th Street away from the White House in abject fear ... I can see it today.

Helicopters circled low over the White House.

Television crews set up outdoors.

Cell phones werent working so Berger found a phone and told his wife, Jacqueline, that they were leaving the city.

I dont know how, but were going to make it, he said.

Berger and McMillan waited to get their car out of the parking garage. Berger tipped an attendant more than once to move their car up in the queue.

Then they drove at the pace of people on foot who clogged streets after the metro and buses stopped running.

We were going like a parade with the people in front of us, Berger said.

McMillan, who knew the streets from working in Washington, D.C. for five years, steered through crowds and away from the worst traffic jams.

By the time Flight 93 plummeted into a field in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, McMillan and Berger were motoring well north of Washington, D.C., on Interstate 270.

The first report that McMillan heard said the plane had been shot down. Instead the plane crashed as passengers struggled to wrest control from hijackers.

The sense of things being out of your control was with us, McMillan said. My god, what is going to happen next?

Flight 93 was nearing Washington, D.C., when it went down. Analysts arent positive if terrorists planned to ram the plane into the White House, two blocks from the Capitol Hilton, or into the Capitol, where Berger, McMillan and others from the convention planned to go after their morning briefing.

Instead, McMillan reached his home in Camp Hill, Cumberland County, and said goodbye to Berger.

As Berger drove the rest of the way home, signs posted along Interstate 81 said bridges and tunnels leading to New York City had been closed.

I got back to Hazleton. It was a blessing in disguise. I didnt think I was going to make it, he said. It was a harrowing experience. It still is just thinking about it. Awful what happened. You never forget it.

For the past 20 years near the anniversary, Berger and McMillan have telephoned each other to remember.
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Dailey: So we have two groups of individuals, none of which were patrons of Reign on this particular night, who got into a conflict in the street in front of Reign, and Reign security were de-escalating that situation. Was that an accurate view of what you saw before this footage?

Krull: "Yes."

Dailey countered Strohmeyers suggestion that Reign attracted an abnormal amount of violence by having the detective read from a list of police calls that tallied shootings, holdups and fights at other Washington Avenue addresses.

And when Dailey got to liquor control officer Donna Wisdom, who testified about the after-hours incident in late May, he queried her on how she knew the people coming out of the rear entrance had alcoholic drinks: Did she confiscate any of the drinks? Did she test them? Could she smell anything on peoples breaths?

Wisdom said no each time. She also conceded she didn't know if people exiting were patrons or employees.

None of the shootings happened inside Reign, Dailey said. The nightspot, he added, could not be held responsible under liquor code for what happened outside its premises.

McDonnell, the liquor control chief, made his ruling late Friday afternoon.
Gyllenhaal said her film is Italian in its bones even though it was shot in Greece and in the English language.

In a way as women we have been born into an agreement to be silent and Ferrante broke that agreement, Gyllenhaal said. I had the same feeling seeing The Piano when I was in high school.

John Arcilla was awarded the Volpi Cup for best actor for On The Job: The Missing 8.

The festival has in the past decade reestablished itself as the preeminent launch pad for awards hopefuls. Zhaos Nomadland won the prize last year and went on to win best picture, best director and best actor at the Oscars. In addition to Zhao and Bong, who served as president, the jury also included actors Sarah Gadon and Cynthia Erivo and directors Saverio Costanzo (My Brilliant Friend) and Alexander Nanau (Collective).

Zhaos trajectory was the second time in four years that the Golden Lion winner has won best picture. Guillermo del Toros The Shape of Water shared a similar path. Venices 2019 winner, Joker, simply went on to get 10 Oscar nods, including one for best picture.
The three have been charged by the St. Clair County state's attorney's office with one count of felon in possession of a weapon and seven counts of aggravated battery/discharge of a firearm, the state police said, adding that bail has been set at $950,000 each.

Witnesses reported seeing three men leaving the scene of the shooting with weapons. The shooting sparked a 10-hour manhunt involving multiple local police agencies. At 2:30 a.m. Friday, officers about a block from the crime scene arrested three people in the 600 block of St. Louis Avenue.

The incident came on the heels of two other fatal shootings this week. On Sunday, a 3-year-old girl was hit by a stray bullet while she slept in her home, and later was declared brain-dead. On Tuesday, a 16-year-old was killed in a shooting.

Eastern said additional measures also would be taken, including the hiring of more officers and improved safety measures, most prominently the curfew.

He acknowledged that not all will be happy about the curfew, but said it was necessary under the circumstances.

"It's better to be sure we have safe businesses so they can sell the goods and services they do, and the citizens of East St. Louis are safe," he added.
Months later, the Trump administration reinstated the herbicide just days before the presidential election in the swing state of Georgia. That decision, which the Biden administration has defended, has been challenged by conservationists and farmers.

Despite that decision, which also incorporated new measures designed to mitigate the harm, there were many news reports of widespread harm, the EPA said. The EPA said it recently held listening sessions with groups such as the Weed Science Society of America, the American Association of Pesticide Control Officials, academics and state extension agents. These groups raised concerns about damage to non-target plants.

In the letters, the agency also asked the companies for any information prepared for lawsuits about adverse effects caused by dicamba.

The Investigate Midwest investigation found Monsanto and BASF expected thousands of complaints from farmers about dicamba, designed investigations into damage to limit their liability and limited testing on dicamba that had the potential to delay or deny regulatory approval.
The Reuters report documented several election officials in her district who received death threats and went into hiding. Scanlon said she plans to have discussions with DOJ officials to ensure they have the tools to effectively prosecute the threats of violence.

In response to the Reuters report, the Justice Department said in a statement on Wednesday that it was committed to aggressively addressing threats of violence directed toward state and local election workers and will work tirelessly with our federal, state, and local partners to strengthen our collective efforts to combat this recent and entirely unacceptable phenomenon.

Attorney General Merrick Garland promised more than 1,400 election officials in an Aug. 26 call that the Justice Department takes their safety seriously.

Threats to election officials, he said, are "the subject of intense focus by the highest levels of the Department of Justice, according to a transcript of his remarks.

Pete Aguilar, a Democrat from California, said the ongoing threats underscored the need to better protect the personal information of election workers. Reuters found that many officials received threats on their personal cell phones or faced personal attacks from people who knew their home addresses.
Both Biden and Sisolak have recently adopted more aggressive postures on vaccines and the segments of the population that remain unvaccinated.

We can make institutional settings safer for all by requiring vaccination for employees and contractors, the governor said on Twitter after the vote.

Correctional officers have for months warned that they would quit if forced to be vaccinated. In July, prison officials said 41.9% of staff had received vaccines. Correctional officers on Friday warned board members the requirement would cause mass resignations, exacerbate staff shortages and make it impossible to operate prisons.

If they say, OK, you dont have a job anymore,' then 75% of your workforce is gone. Then that means the National Guard is going to have to come in and run the prison. Thats going to be a mess itself, High Desert State Prison correctional officer Michael Dante said of the requirement.

The measure comes as Nevada reaches another coronavirus milestone this week, topping 400,000 known cases of COVID-19 since the pandemic began.

Health officials on Thursday reported 1,115 new cases and 44 deaths from the day before, bringing the Department of Health and Human Services tally to 400,349 cases and 6,681 deaths since March 2020.
Ethics are not an issue with Mark McCloskey. He instinctively does the wrong thing. It does not require any soul-searching. Protesters might walk in front of your house? Lock and load, Baby. In an age when everything is videotaped, McCloskey didnt have the decency to tell his wife to dress stylishly  no stripes, please!  for what should have been their 15 minutes of fame

Those 15 minutes were elongated by St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner, who chose to criminally charge the McCloskeys for waving their guns at the protesters. Suddenly, Trump himself was a McCloskey fan, promising to pardon the couple if a city jury dared convict them.

From obscurity to senatorial candidate. Thank you, Ms. Gardner.

Speaking of Gardner, she is a strong presence in this Republican primary. Greitens was in the end stages of being ousted by a Republican coup when Gardner intervened and charged him with a crime. Her handling on that matter was so inept that charges were dropped against Greitens and issued against her investigator. Meanwhile, Greitens has been allowed to claim that he was ousted not by his fellow Republicans, but by a George Soros-funded prosecutor.

After Gardner catapulted McCloskey to fame, the Trumpian press lionized him and the liberal press scrutinized him.
Its a new country. It is a country in the making," says Raghida Dergham, founder of the Beirut Institute think tank and a longtime columnist in Saudi papers. What has happened over the past 20 years in Saudi Arabia, Dergham says, has amounted to a major cleanup of extremism ... and it has not been easy."

The crown prince doubled down in April of this year in remarks to Saudi TV. He said Saudi identity is built on its Islamic and Arab heritage. His words appeared to equate the two, and pointed to the broader effort the state has embarked on to affirm a national Saudi identity that is no longer tied to pan-Islamic causes nor the religious ideologies of Sheikh Mohammed Ibn Abdul-Wahhab, whose ultraconservative teachings of Islam in the 18th century are widely referred to by his name.

If Sheikh Mohammed Abdel-Wahhab came out of his grave and found us adhering to his text and closing our eyes to independent reasoning (ijtihad) or deifying him, he would be the first to oppose such a thing, Prince Mohammed said.

Ali Shihabi, who has ties to the royal court, says the kingdom's new tone signals to any fence-sitting clerics" that moderation is the only path to take going forward.
Every time I mention Donald Trump in a column, a certain segment of readers demands to know why were still talking about a president who is no longer in office. They tend to be conservatives who may have supported him but now, clearly, are tired of defending him.

Under normal circumstances, they would have a point: How often do we talk about former presidents once they leave office? But as with everything Trump, these circumstances arent normal.

Since descending his golden escalator into the presidency, Trump has become the embodiment of a level of socio-political dysfunction today unseen in our lifetimes. Embodiment is the right word. Trump didnt single-handedly create this moment in which wide swaths of the nation reject medical science and an entire political party rejects democracy. The anti-vax movement had been quietly simmering like a latent virus for generations, waiting for the opportunity to go mainstream. The GOPs transformation from the party of patriotism to the party that tries to overturn valid elections began more than a decade ago, when Barack Obamas rise foretold a demographic future that would be unkind to a party made up mostly of white people.
It was Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. I saw the first signs of something amiss when the Goldman Sachs trading floor came to a standstill. People left their desks and gathered beneath two mounted televisions.

I made my way over to the TVs and saw footage of the World Trade Center on fire. The news anchors didnt know whether it had been a bomb or an airplane, but it had happened about 10 minutes earlier. Outside our lower Manhattan window, debris was falling.

One second later, we felt a rumble and heard a loud roar. Almost instantaneously, an anchor announced, Another plane has just flown into the World Trade Center. Debris was flying like crazy outside our window, and then a man with a blue jacket and two-way radio appeared on the trading floor and yelled at us to evacuate immediately.

We filed down 29 flights of stairs, silently, with grave faces and no clue what to say. In the lobby, I found my closest friend Carla, and we talked about who we knew in the Twin Towers. Suddenly, a loud noise from outside caught my attention. I whipped around and saw a sight that made my stomach drop, a spectacle that trapped my breath in the back of my lungs. Outside, just feet in front of us, hundreds of people were running for their lives.
It was only a few months after the fall of the Taliban, in 2002, when I started working for international newspapers as an interpreter. It was also the only time when I really felt that I had a country and that there was hope for its future. After six years of working with the international media in Afghanistan, I had saved enough money to start my own company, carrying out contracts with coalition forces in Afghanistan and international organizations.

I was also one of the leading members of a social and business network, persuading and motivating Afghan youth to have a vision of their own and become the countrys future business and social entrepreneurs. However, the rise of religious extremism, the inability of Afghan government forces to protect me and my family, and the direct threats to my life, left me with no choice. I applied for asylum in Denmark, where I started from scratch and built a career in academia.
An American firm (True Velocity) put its new plastic (composite) case ammo on sale for the first time. The initial offering was the popular, with hunters and snipers, .308 Winchester round. The composite case ammo is 30 percent lighter than metal case ammo, transfers less heat to the rifle and puts less stress to the barrel when fired. The initial price of the composite case .308 Winchester rounds is $3.50 each. Metal case equivalents cost from a dollar to $2.40 per round. This caliber of ammo is the most popular type used by big-game hunters who need long-range accuracy and hitting power to take down elk, black bear and other large mammals. The .308 Winchester is a higher performance version of the NATO standard 7.62 rifle round that was largely replaced by 5.56mm assault guns in the 1960s. The .308 Winchester and 7.62mm rounds are interchangeable, but the .308 must be used with caution in 7.62 weapons because it generates higher pressure and is meant for rifles built to handle it. Soldiers and marines found that their semi-automatic M14 7.62 rifles were excellent sniper rifles when equipped with a scope and using .308 Winchester ammo. For this reason, the troops in an infantry squad who are designated as sharpshooters are equipped with refurbished (to hunting standards) M14s that get the most out of the .308 cartridge. The sharpshooters proved so useful that they became standard. The sharpshooters did not require the extensive training of dedicated snipers, who operated on their own in teams of two using longer range rifles and more powerful rifle rounds that were accurate beyond a thousand meters. Sharpshooters used M14s and .308 ammo that proved equally accurate out to 900 meters, which was sufficient for infantry squads.

Sharpshooters and other infantry would appreciate the composite case .308 ammo because it is 30 percent lighter while the weight of weapons and equipment carried by modern infantry is a growing problem. The military will pay premium prices for lighter versions of current items carried by the troops. Hunters and recreational target shooters are less concerned with the weight of their ammo but for the military it is something worth paying a premium for. The True Velocity composite case ammo prices are expected to come down if these rounds are solid in large quantities to military as well as civilian customers.

To gain access to the military market, True Velocity teamed up with a major defense firm (General Dynamics), to provide a more acceptable ammo for the U.S. Army than what was developed during the recently (2017) cancelled LSAT (Lightweight Small Arms Technology) 5.56mm machine-gun program. At one point the army planned to replace all existing assault rifles, pistols and machine-guns with models using smaller caseless or telescoped ammo. The True Velocity composite case ammo was very tempting to the army and marines, which could have the benefits of lightweight ammo without having to replace all existing rifles and machine-guns with new designs that can use existing caseless/CTA (Cased Telescoped ammunition) ammo designs that are also 30 percent lighter than existing ammo but are shorter and could not be used with existing weapons. Before True Velocity came along the military planned to choose caseless or CTA for new infantry weapons designs. Even with that it would mean supply problems because it would mean another ammo type would have to be supplied to troops. Because the first new infantry weapon under development is the LSAT, a replacement for the current light-machine gun that uses the same 5.56mm ammo as the rifle troops carry.

The basic design of LSAT was available since 2012 but acceptance for production was delayed by efforts to see if it should be built to use either conventional (brass) or caseless/CTA ammo. Initially LSAT prototypes were built to test two types of lightweight ammo and it wasnt until now that one of those lightweight ammo designs reached the point where it was ready for combat testing. That was when the True Velocity polymer case design finally arrived. Commercial ammo using the True Velocity polymer rounds were ready for sale in 2020, aimed at hunters and target shooters. One market that was not pleased was reloaders, who reload their own ammo, often with custom propellant loads, using the reusable brass casings. The reloaders would need new equipment to handle composite cases and even then, the reloadable composite cases would be different than the current ones. For the military that was not a problem and the fact that the polymer case, unlike the brass case, insulates the rifle from the heat of the propellant is a bonus. For machine-guns that is a major advantage and military ammo is rarely reloaded. Civilian target shooters will find the heat handling aspects of the polymer case useful if they fire a lot of rounds on the range and need to be careful about overheating of the receiver portion of the rifle, where the ammo is ignited and the empty case ejected while another is loaded. Overheated receivers are sometimes a problem with military weapons, where the heat can rise to levels where rounds fire spontaneously when loaded and before the trigger is pulled. The composite rounds also put less wear on the rifle barrel, another feature more valuable to military users.

The LSAT weapons program was cancelled in 2017 as the army decided to replace the 5.56mm round with something larger. Within a year the army had settled on a new, and very popular, 6.8mm design and called on weapons developers to create a NGSW (Next Generation Squad Weapon) that would replace the 5.56mm M4 assault and M249 5.56mm machine gun with a single weapon using the new 6.8mm round. Lightweight ammo was no longer a priority. Initially the army wanted NGWS prototypes using the shorter and lighter ammo designs. Shortly thereafter cost became an issue as procurement budgets were being cut and the troops were enthusiastic about converting to the new caseless round.

Caseless ammo is not a new concept but you need the right materials and right design to make it work. Its all a matter of getting the right tech and the right design and then getting the new ammo some convincing battlefield success. Back in the 1980s German firm Dynamit Nobel developed a 4.73mm round that weighed much less than the existing 5.56mm rounds but was similar in effectiveness. The new (at the time) G11 assault rifle was designed to fire the caseless 4.73mm round. A G11, along with 510 rounds, weighed the same (7.36 kg/16.2 pounds) as an M-16 with 240 rounds (eight, 30 round magazines.) The West German army tested the G11 extensively in the late 1980s and was considering adopting it and its caseless ammo to replace its 7.62mm assault rifles. Then the Cold War ended, Germany was united, and the decision was made to go with the cheaper G36 5.56mm weapon firing conventional brass cased ammo. Caseless ammo was also more expensive than the conventional 5.56mm stuff, and there were still concerns about reliability, even after years of testing. Not much work was done on this caseless ammo in the 1990s but after 2001 American firms began working on upgrading and improving the Dynamit Nobel tech. While field testing has shown that the new polymer case design is safe and reliable, the new caseless design must survive combat testing and the military has yet to decide on when and where to carry that out. Germany later had problems with their new 5.56mm assault rifles when they finally got some combat use in Afghanistan and several serious flaws in the rifle were discovered. In the Internet age details of this failure quickly spread to troops worldwide who used the Internet, often for this kind of information.

The LSAT weapon prototypes came in two versions. One used ammo with a CTA telescoped case, and the other was caseless. The CTA ammo was ready for use first while the caseless stuff was still in development. Both LSAT weapons feature a revolutionary ammo feed that employs a pivot, rather than a bolt, to load the ammo into the chamber. This design propels the case out the front of the weapon. Naturally the caseless ammo has no case to eject. The use of the pivot reduced overheating problems, which are more of a hassle with the polymer case of the CTA cartridge prototype. The CTA case is a straight case, like a pistol round, not a bottleneck case more common with high powered rifles. A caseless round was seen as the ideal solution but this design was more difficult to manufacture. Caseless rounds have been developed before but were found to be more expensive and more vulnerable to rough handling.

The original LSAT expectation was that if the caseless round were used, the LSAT and 600 rounds would be 9 kg (19.9 pounds) lighter than the current M249 and its ammo. The new plastic case ammo and the LSAT is 6.8 kg (15 pounds) less than the M249. In early 2012 eight LSAT machine-guns and 100,000 rounds of the CTA ammo were delivered for army troop use and passed field tests. At this point it became possible to use the same technology for a new assault rifle. While LSAT passed muster with the troops and the realities of use in a combat zone, by 2012 most of the fighting was over. The new machine-gun would be much appreciated by infantry operating in Afghanistan, where the machine-gunner is often lugging his weapon and all that ammo up steep hills.

Back home there was less enthusiasm, and money, for a new generation of assault rifles and light machine-guns using radically different ammo. The True Velocity polymer case conventional ammo was now available and easier to implement, especially since hunters and sport shooters reported success with the distinctive white and lighter polymer case rifle ammo. News like that always spreads quickly on the Internet and infantry worldwide pay attention. That composite case ammo costs twice as much as brass case ammo but the manufacturer points out that the price will come down as larger quantities are sold and military contracts get the largest discounts of all. Hunters dont have a problem with ammo weight but the infantry does. The U.S. military has already been paying more for lighter versions of weapons and equipment troops must carry into combat. The 6.8mm round with a composite case weighs the same as a 5.56mm round with a brass case.
FILE PHOTO: Vials with Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccine labels are seen in this illustration picture taken March 19, 2021. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration

By Julie Steenhuysen

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Three U.S. studies suggest COVID-19 vaccines offer strong protection against hospitalization and death, even in the face of the highly transmissible Delta variant, but vaccine protection appears to be waning among older populations, especially among those 75 and older.

U.S. data on hospitalization from nine states during the period when the Delta variant was dominant also suggests that the Moderna Inc vaccine was more effective at preventing hospitalizations among individuals of all ages than vaccines from BioNTech/Pfizer Inc or Johnson & Johnson.

In that study of more than 32,000 visits to urgent care centers, emergency rooms and hospitals, Moderna's vaccine was 95% effective at preventing hospitalization compared with 80% for Pfizer and 60% for J&J.

Overall, the findings, released on Friday in the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's weekly report on death and disease show that vaccines continue to offer strong protection from COVID-19.

(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen; Editing by Aurora Ellis)
Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - September 10, 2021) - LaSalle Exploration Corp.(TSXV: LSX)("LaSalle" or the "Company") announces that a total of 800,000 incentive stock options ("Options") have been granted to directors and officers of the Company of which 400,000 are subject to a vesting schedule over three years. Each Option entitles the holder to acquire one common share at $0.15 per share for a period of five years.

About LaSalle Exploration Corp

LaSalle is a Canadian exploration company focused on less explored districts of the Abitibi in Ontario and Quebec, recognized for mining investment based on mineral potential, policy and success., LaSalle is actively exploring Radisson in the developing Eeyou Itschee-James Bay region in Qubec as well as the Egan and Blakelock high-grade gold properties located in northeastern Ontario. LaSalle trades on the TSX Venture Exchange ("TSX-V") under the symbol "LSX". Additional information about LaSalle can be found on SEDAR at www.sedar.com and on the Company's website at www.lasallecorp.com.

On behalf of the Board of Directors

LASALLE EXPLORATION CORP.

"Ian Campbell"

President and Chief Executive Officer

Telephone: (604) 647-3966

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements and Information

The information in this news release includes certain information and statements about management's view of future events, expectations, plans and prospects that constitute forward-looking statements. These statements are based upon assumptions that are subject to significant risks and uncertainties. Because of these risks and uncertainties and as a result of a variety of factors, the actual results, expectations, achievements or performance may differ materially from those anticipated and indicated by these forward-looking statements. Any number of factors could cause actual results to differ materially from these forward-looking statements as well as future results. Although the Company believes that the expectations reflected in forward looking statements are reasonable, it can give no assurances that the expectations of any forward-looking statements will prove to be correct. Except as required by law, the Company disclaims any intention and assumes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements to reflect actual results, whether as a result of new information, future events, changes in assumptions, changes in factors affecting such forward-looking statements or otherwise.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/96209
TYSONS, Va., September 10, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Tonight, in honor of those who were impacted by and responded to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, PenFed Credit Union hosted an evening of remembrance and saluted today's heroes serving in defense of our nation and communities at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Washington D.C.

The remembrance dinner was attended by leaders in the military, intelligence, law enforcement, veteran service organization and first responder communities. PenFed honored today's heroes by presenting $50,000 in donations, $10,000 each, to National Military Family Association, Our Military Kids, Military Women's Memorial, FBI Agents Association and Firefighters Fund of Fairfax County.

James Schenck, President/CEO of PenFed Credit Union and CEO of PenFed Foundation, was working at a PenFed facility in Alexandria when he saw the news of the attacks on 9/11/2001. Schenck and several volunteers walked six miles to the PenFed financial center at the Pentagon to see how they could help the team and others who were immediately impacted.

"As we ran toward the Pentagon, I'll never forget what we saw: In the aftermath of the attacks, we saw the best of America  the selflessness and courage of the American people, moving toward the burning Pentagon building to help others survive," said Schenck during his remarks. "These brave Americans were not only first responders and military personnel; they were everyday civilians who were in the area, coming out of the Pentagon City Mall, stopping their cars on South Hayes Street and heading toward the burning Pentagon to assist in any way they could."

All PenFed financial center employees at the Pentagon on 9/11 were able to evacuate safely, and the credit union reopened for business the next day to provide continuous service and support to the Pentagon community.

"That morning we were on a one-way mission and if successful, we wouldn't be coming back. We were mission failure. The passengers on Flight 93 are the true heroes," said keynote speaker, Heather "Lucky" Penney, an American hero and renowned speaker most widely recognized for her service as an F-16 fighter pilot on 9/11. "I've come to learn that heroism isn't something unique or possessed only by a chosen few. The passengers on Flight 93 proved that and so did the people that helped each other moments before the towers fell."

Retired Army General John W. Nicholson Jr., President of the PenFed Foundation, was moving into a new house that day. His desk in the Pentagon was 100 feet from where the nose of the plane hit the building. "Everyone between my desk and the plane perished. You don't forget something like this. It stays with you forever. What I do every day, I do now in honor of those people we lost," he said during his remarks.

This year in honor of the 20th anniversary, PenFed is partnering with the Military Women's Memorial to support the 9/11 Remembrance Relay. This week the 9/11 Remembrance Relay is paying tribute to the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the 177 servicewomen who died in combat zones since, with a 177-mile walk from the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, to the Military Women's Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery.

Founded in 1935 as the War Department Credit Union, PenFed's core membership is comprised of members of the national defense communities and all who support them. Following the attacks of 2001, PenFed launched the PenFed Foundation to support service members, veterans and their families. The PenFed Foundation has delivered over $40 million in support to over 150,000 members of the military community through programs providing financial education, credit-building, homeownership, short-term assistance and veteran entrepreneurial support services. To learn more about PenFed's history, visit penfed.org/about-penfed. To learn more about the work of the PenFed Foundation, visit penfedfoundation.org.

About PenFed Credit Union Established in 1935, Pentagon Federal Credit Union (PenFed) is America's second-largest federal credit union, serving 2.4 million members worldwide with over $28 billion in assets as of July 31, 2021. PenFed Credit Union offers market-leading certificates, checking, credit cards, personal loans, mortgages, auto loans, student loans, and a wide range of other financial services. Our mission is to empower members of our community to achieve their financial well-being. PenFed Credit Union is federally insured by the NCUA and is an Equal Housing Lender. To learn more about PenFed Credit Union, visit PenFed.org, like us on Facebook and follow us @PenFed on Twitter. Interested in working for PenFed? Check us out on LinkedIn. We are proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer.

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SOURCE PenFed Credit Union
DUBLIN, Calif., Sept. 11, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- TriNet, a leading provider of comprehensive human resources for small and medium-size businesses (SMBs), today announced the addition of Ralph Clark, President and CEO of TriNet customer Shotspotter, Inc., and Maria Contreras-Sweet, managing director of investment firm Rockway Equity Partners and management consulting firm Contreras Sweet Companiesboth TriNet board members to its roster of well-known business leaders, thought leaders and influencers at the 2nd annual, award-winning, TriNet PeopleForce 2021.

The four-day conference will be held in-person from The Times Center in New York City (built by renowned architect Renzo Piano) and virtually from anywhere. It kicks off on September 13 with an impressive roster of distinguished speakers sharing timely and insightful content vital to business success and the future of work.

Clark has nearly 30 years of executive experience in the small to medium-size business space and has led ShotSpottera leader in precision policing solutions that enable law enforcement to more effectively respond to, investigate and deter crimefor over a decade. He took Shotspotter public in 2017.

His experience also includes leading and founding several startups, VC firms and financial services companies. Clark received the 2019 EY Entrepreneur of The Year Award for Northern California and was recognized as a 2019 Most Admired CEO by the San Francisco Business Times. Additionally, he holds a Master of Business Administration from Harvard Business School.

Prior to founding her current business, Contreras-Sweet served as the 24th administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration. She also founded ProAmerica Bank, the first Latino-owned commercial bank in California in over 35 years, which focused on serving small to mid-size firms, especially those that are women and minority-owned. Her advocacy roots as a public servant include her role as Secretary of California's Business, Transportation, and Housing Agency, with 42,000 employeesmaking her the first Latina to hold a state cabinet post in Californiaas well as working for both the California State Legislature and the U.S. Department of Commerce. She also held several leadership roles for the 7-Up RC Bottling Company.

Contreras-Sweet's current and previous board experience includes Sempra Energy, Regional Management Corporation, ProAmerica Bank and Blue Cross of California. Her volunteer nonprofit boards include the Bipartisan Policy Center, Inc. and the World Affairs Council.

Through their individual fireside discussions with TriNet President and CEO Burton M. Goldfield, both Clark and Contreras-Sweet will share their inspiring stories and deep knowledge of entrepreneurship and resilience with business leaders attending TriNet PeopleForce.

On September 14 at 2 p.m. EST, Clark and Goldfield will examine the resiliency of SMBs, especially in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Clark will discuss facing adversity, overcoming challenges, taking calculated risks, and leading through crisis.

Contreras-Sweet will sit down with Goldfield on September 15 at 3:45 p.m. EST to provide insight into the entrepreneurial cycle, from turning one's passion into purpose, ebbing and flowing through the ups and downs, and guiding one's employees through it all.

"Ralph and Maria are both well-respected leaders whose interpersonal and professional experiences are reflective of both the audience of entrepreneurs and business leaders at TriNet PeopleForce, and the business-forward, inspirational spirit we are conveying with this conference," said Goldfield. "They have a wealth of expertise around building a successful business, surviving turbulent times, and thriving through even the most seemingly devastating of business challenges. I am very much looking forward to an insightful, engaging and motivating conversation with each of these incredibly talented, innovative and compassionate individuals."

Occurring September 13-16, TriNet PeopleForce is a one-of-a-kind event taking place both virtually and in-person from New York City. The conference brings together business, culture and the arts with a roster of high-profile leaders to help SMBs reimagine, rebuild and move forward as they come out of the COVID-19 pandemic. Attendees will hear from renowned speakers and experts on topics such as SMB agility, calculated risk-taking, the future of work, business resiliency, DEI, healthcare, the state of the economy for SMBs and much more. TriNet PeopleForce also fosters networking opportunities for its participants with business leaders from across the country.To register for the virtual conference, click here.

Those wishing to attend the live SMB event in New York City can request a ticket by emailing PeopleForce@TriNet.com.

About TriNetTriNet (NYSE: TNET) provides small and medium-size businesses (SMBs) with full-service HR solutions tailored by industry. To free SMBs from HR complexities, TriNet offers access to human capital expertise, benefits, risk mitigation and compliance, payroll and real-time technology. From Main Street to Wall Street, TriNet empowers SMBs to focus on what matters most-growing their business. TriNet, incredible starts here. For more information, visit TriNet.com or follow us on Twitter.

Investors: Media: Alex Bauer Renee Brotherton TriNet TriNet Investorrelations@TriNet.com PR@TriNet.com (510) 875-7201 (925) 965-8441

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SOURCE TriNet Group, Inc.
Family members of U.S. Marine Sgt. Johanny Rosario Pichardo are emotional as the casket with Pichardo arrives at Logan Airport on Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. (Jonathan Wiggs, The Boston Globe/AP)

LAWRENCE, Mass.  The body of a U.S. Marine killed in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan returned home Saturday in a solemn procession through Massachusetts on the 20th anniversary of the attacks that led to America's longest war.

Sgt. Johanny Rosario Pichardo died in the Aug. 26 bombing near the Kabul airport where people were being evacuated amid the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. A dozen other U.S. service members and 169 Afghans were killed as people struggled to get into the airport and on flights out of the country.

Dignitaries including Gov. Charlie Baker, Boston Mayor Kim Janey and U.S. Sen. Edward Markey paid their respects to her family as the body arrived at Boston's Logan International Airport.

In Rosario Pichardo's hometown of Lawrence, people lined highway overpasses and streets waving American flags as the vehicle procession made its way through the city near the New Hampshire state line.

A Marine honor guard carried the flag-draped draped casket into the Farrah Funeral Home as police, firefighters and others stood and saluted.

Military personnel and others salute as the body of Marine Sgt. Johanny Rosario Pichardo returns to Logan Airport in Boston on Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. (Jonathan Wiggs, The Boston Globe/AP) The hearse carrying the remains of U.S. Marine Sgt. Johanny Rosario Pichardo passes a line of bikers as it travels through her hometown of Lawrence, Mass. Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. (Winslow Townson/AP) Residents watch the funeral procession for Sgt. Johanny Rosario Pichardo, a U.S. Marine who was among 13 service members killed in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan, in Lawrence, Mass, Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. (Robert F. Bukaty/AP) Massachusetts political representatives are present as the body of U.S. Marine Sgt. Johanny Rosario Pichardo arrives at Logan Airport on Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021 in Boston. (Jonathan Wiggs, The Boston Globe/AP) The casket of Sgt. Johanny Rosario Pichardo, a U.S. Marine who was among 13 service members killed in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan, is carried into the Farrah Funeral Home in her hometown of Lawrence, Mass, Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. (Robert F. Bukaty/AP)

"We will never forget her name," Lawrence Mayor Kendrys Vasquez said afterward. "We are proud to have her home."

Francisco Urena, a former state veterans affairs commissioner who has been assisting Rosario's family, said the significance of the fallen soldier coming home on the anniversary of the attack that prompted the war that ultimately cost her life isn't lost on her family.

"You have to understand that Johanny was five, a kindergartner 20 years ago. She has lived in a country at war," he said. "She volunteered to serve our country and volunteered to be in that mission."

Saturday represents the true beginning of the the family's grieving, as many recently arrived from Rosario Pichardo's native Dominican Republic and elsewhere, Urena said.

"This has been a long time coming for this family. This has been very difficult days, sleepless nights," he said. "But the city of Lawrence came together to ensure that this young Marine sergeant and her family are not alone during this time."

The 25-year-old served with the Naval Amphibious Force, Task Force 51/5th Marine Expeditionary Brigade. She and other Marines were killed as they were helping to screen Afghans and others at the gate of the Kabul airport. They were all awarded the Purple Heart last week.

A funeral Mass will be held Monday morning at St. Mary's of the Assumption Church for Rosario Pichardo's family and other invited guests.

On Tuesday, there will be a public wake at Veterans Memorial Stadium next to Lawrence High School, where Rosario Pichardo graduated. She'll be laid to rest at Bellevue Cemetery in a section reserved for military veterans.
Joe Biden, then the Democratic presidential nominee, with wife Jill Biden, lays a wreath at the wall of names at the Flight 93 National Memorial on Sept. 11, 2020, in Shanksville, Pa. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post )

WASHINGTON  Joe Biden was sitting on a park bench outside the U.S. Capitol, as helpless in the moment as the rest of the nation. He had just arrived on an Amtrak train, the twin towers smoldering and a violent fire raging at the Pentagon  and his demands to enter the Capitol denied by security guards fearing a fourth plane was heading toward the building.

Outside, the veteran senator sat and fielded calls on his cellphone, eager to showcase that the foundations of American democracy would not be shaken. "I refuse to be part of letting these bastards win," Biden said that day. At 2:12 p.m., records show, he connected with President George W. Bush for a two-minute call, urging him to return to Washington to display some sense of normalcy.

"This in a sense is the most godawful wake-up call we've ever had," he said that afternoon.

That wake-up call would reshape the world in multiple ways, and few politicians would play a more central role - or for as long - as Biden, who has been inextricably bound to every stage of the wars over the past two decades: He began as a member of the ensemble in the Senate, became a supporting actor as vice president and finally became the leading man as president.

Biden's arc on the global war on terrorism largely traces that of the nation - from enthusiastic supporter after 9/11 to strident critic in recent years - as he has adopted a far more cautious view of advice coming from the Pentagon.

In the immediate aftermath of the 2001 attacks, as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he was among those advocating for war. A decade later, as vice president, he was engaging in increasingly heated debates inside the Situation Room when he argued for a more narrowly defined mission and fewer troops than the military wanted, as well as his controversial skepticism about the mission that killed Osama bin Laden. And now, on the 20th anniversary of the attacks, he is the president who just brought the final U.S. troops home from Afghanistan, where the terrorist attacks had been planned.

But Biden is finding that closing the book on the 9/11 era after two decades, as he promised during the 2020 campaign, is fraught with new perils and political uncertainty. The chaotic exit from Afghanistan last month showcased the challenges in the country in a way that Biden argued was the very reason for leaving. But his decision also has triggered warnings - in some cases from the same national security advisers Biden has rebuffed through multiple administrations - that his decisions have erased much of the work done over 20 years and effectively returned Afghanistan to the same place it was before any American involvement.

Biden entered his presidency with an unwavering conviction that he was right to end the "forever wars," and was unlikely to be swayed by any military pitch or nuance.

"I think he brought with him the experiences that he had on the inside, and maybe some would say to a fault," said David Axelrod, a former adviser to President Barack Obama who sat in many meetings with Biden. "But I think he was not going to be receptive to arguments about why we should stay just a little longer, because he had heard these arguments for decades, and was deeply skeptical of them."

Just as the attacks 20 years ago caused him, and the country, to adopt significant foreign policy changes, Biden appears determined as president to mark another shift. He is attempting to oversee an emerging Biden doctrine that deploys fewer troops and relies instead on precision counterterrorism operations, one that presses diplomatic solutions and depends on the patience of sanctions rather than shock and awe of the military.

Some - particularly former military officials who disagree with Biden's decision, and the execution of it - have warned that Afghanistan could again become a safe haven for terrorism. They view the Sept. 11 anniversary as not so much as a bookend but the end of a chapter in a story that is not yet complete.

"Obviously you're going to remember all of those who got killed on 9/11 and their families and all of those who fought and sacrificed over these last 20 years to make sure 9/11 wouldn't happen again and Afghanistan would not become a safe haven for terrorists," said Leon Panetta, who served as CIA director and defense secretary under Obama. "But you have on the 20th anniversary a bitter reality that once again the Taliban control Afghanistan."

"I think it is in many ways a wake-up call that the war on terrorism is far from over," he said.

Like most Americans, Biden began the post-9/11 era determined to avenge the attacks and convinced, albeit with some reservations, that the country would be safer for the deployment of American military power in Afghanistan, as well as Iraq.

But as the war in Afghanistan lingered, Biden's skepticism increased. Although he had supported the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, Biden later came to see both conflicts as damaging to American credibility.

"Clearly he felt like we had to go into Afghanistan and for all the reasons everyone said," said Ted Kaufman, a longtime aide and confidant who also was appointed to serve the remainder of Biden's term in the Senate. "But as soon as we moved from the original objective, which was go in there and make sure they never committed a 9/11 - as soon as that turned into nation-building, that's when they lost him."

While Biden did not join the antiwar protest movement in his youth, his formative experience growing up was the Vietnam War. Increasingly, Kaufman said, Biden began to worry about Afghanistan becoming another Vietnam, with protracted battles and costing more American lives.

His son Beau would also soon join the Delaware National Guard, deployed to Iraq in 2008.

"Does it deepen it when your son is in the military? I can't believe it doesn't," Kaufman said. "But he had already made his commitment coming out of Vietnam to the troops, and the importance not to put them in harm's way without it being vital to our national security."

By 2008, after several visits to Afghanistan, Biden began seeing the war as faltering, but still winnable.

But he also would begin to doubt the viability of the Afghan government. During one visit just before being sworn in as vice president, Biden and Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., had a heated dinner with Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

Biden ticked through a list of Obama administration complaints, including corruption within Karzai's government and alleged criminal ties in his own family, but Karzai countered with his own complaints. When he accused Americans of indifference to civilian deaths, Biden abruptly ended their meal.

"He came back with a pretty clear assessment, and essentially the assessment was highly critical of the governance situation in Afghanistan at that time," said Tom Donilon, who served as national security adviser under Obama and is the brother of one of Biden's closest advisers, Mike Donilon. "And that assessment I think informed his view as we went into the discussions in 2009 about the right way forward."

Within the Obama administration debates, Biden was constantly questioning and frequently irritating officials at the Pentagon. Then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates said that Biden was subjecting Obama to "Chinese water torture."

"Joe kind of played the role of challenging the kind of status quo," Panetta said. "He always accepted the president's decision and was willing to back it up when the president made the decision. It wasn't an issue that cast him in any way disloyal. He really viewed that the best expression of his loyalty was to raise questions that nobody else wanted to raise."

Biden was also skeptical about the raid that killed bin Laden, one of the primary reasons U.S. troops got involved in the region in the first place. At the time, Biden believed more needed to be done to confirm bin Laden was in the compound in Pakistan and he vocalized some of his dissent. He later claimed that he told Obama privately, "Follow your instincts." Obama authorized the successful raid.

Biden's view that the war in Afghanistan was unwinnable crystallized during the run-up to the troop surge under Obama, and he has held to that conviction ever since. Announcing in April that he would withdraw American troops within months, Biden did not try to paint the war as a victory. Instead, he suggested the war had become irrelevant - a relic of the post-9/11 hunt for terrorists that no longer fit the threats of 2021.

"We went to Afghanistan because of a horrific attack that happened 20 years ago," Biden said then. "That cannot explain why we should remain there in 2021."

Biden shared Obama's commitment to closing Guantanamo, which remains open as a prison for suspected al-Qaida terrorists 12 years after Obama and Biden took office.

"He sees all that and he probably comes out of the Obama administration frustrated that instead of pulling us out, in some ways we went deeper in," said University of Pennsylvania law professor Claire Finkelstein.

Biden has recommitted to closing the prison, but there is no set plan.

Biden followed up with an announcement in July that the American combat mission in Iraq would also end, although some noncombat forces will remain. The withdrawals punctuate Biden's effort to pull the United States out of the long shadow of the Sept. 11 attacks, and the foreign policy era defined by the hunt for terrorists around the world.

"By the way, in a lot of what he talked about 10-plus years ago has turned out to be accurate, about whether or not the conditions were there for a successful counterinsurgency campaign, and they were not there," Donilon said. "It's been consistent, it's rooted in analysis and firsthand observation. It was taken through a rigorous analytical process."

In a video released Friday, Biden focused remarks on those who died on Sept. 11, 2001 - and the heroism displayed by average Americans on that day - only briefly alluding to fighting terrorism and not mentioning the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

"Unity is what makes us who we are," Biden said. "To me, that's the central lesson of Sept. 11. It's that, at our most vulnerable, in the push and pull of all that makes us human, in the battle for the soul of America, unity is our greatest strength."

After visits to 9/11 sites on Saturday, Biden is planning, as he did 20 years ago, to go home to Wilmington, Del. That time, he had to catch a ride with then-Rep. Robert Brady, D-Pa., who was heading to Philadelphia. This time, he'll fly on Marine One.
The dead bodies of unidentified people wearing military uniforms lie on the ground near the village of Chenna Teklehaymanot, in the Amhara region of northern Ethiopia on Thursday, Sept. 9, 2021. (AP)

CHENNA TEKLEHAYMANOT, Ethiopia  The smell of death lingered for days after the killings. The bodies, more than a dozen in the uniforms of fighters, others in civilian clothing, were still scattered on the muddy ground.

In a nearby churchyard, many more were already buried  at least 59 people killed by forces from Ethiopia's northern Tigray region, residents alleged. Six bodies of priests were laid to rest inside the church itself. In their rush to flee to safer areas of the Amhara region, residents said at times they placed multiple bodies in single graves.

At the scene of one of the deadliest battles of Ethiopia's 10-month Tigray conflict, witness accounts reflected the increasingly blurred line between combatant and civilian after the federal government weeks ago urged all capable citizens to stop the Tigray forces "once and for all."

When the Tigray fighters captured the village of Chenna Teklehaymanot in the Amhara region on Aug. 31, shortly after a military division defending the area left for unknown reasons, "our (local) defense forces confronted them. Ordinary people here also joined with whatever they could," said 66-year-old Dagnew Hune. He told The Associated Press he witnessed the ensuing killings and helped to bury the dead.

About 100 people are still missing, Dagnew said on Thursday, walking past what he said were fresh graves in the churchyard covered with tree branches and stones.

Local officials have said as many as 200 people in all may have been killed over several days of fighting, with the worst of it on Sept. 4 in Chenna Teklehaymanot after Ethiopian forces reportedly blocked an attempt by Tigray fighters to seize the city of Gondar.

Priest Yared Adamu holds an Ethiopian Orthodox cross in the churchyard where residents say more than 50 civilians have been laid to rest in makeshift graves, in the village of Chenna Teklehaymanot in the Amhara region of northern Ethiopia Thursday, Sept. 9, 2021. (AP) Men gather to speak to a militia fighter Kibret Bidere, with an injured arm, center, near the village of Chenna Teklehaymanot, in the Amhara region of northern Ethiopia Thursday, Sept. 9, 2021. (AP) Spent bullet casings lie scattered on the ground in a hut near the village of Chenna Teklehaymanot, in the Amhara region of northern Ethiopia Thursday, Sept. 9, 2021. (AP)

The Tigray forces have since retreated north, residents said, leaving survivors to check the pockets of dead fighters for clues to their identities. And some questioned why the division of Ethiopian soldiers had left them alone, with only local militia and residents to defend them.

Since retaking much of their embattled home region from Ethiopian forces in June, the Tigray fighters have brought the war into the country's neighboring regions of Afar and Amhara, where Chenna Teklehaymanot is located. The Tigray forces say they are pressuring Ethiopia's government to lift a blockade on Tigray that has left millions of people without telecommunications, electricity, banking services and almost all humanitarian aid.

Now a massive humanitarian crisis that already affects millions inside Tigray is spreading as hundreds of thousands of people flee the Tigray fighters, fearing their retaliatory attacks. The Tigray forces have said they are not attacking civilians.

But grieving witnesses and survivors in Chenna Teklehaymanot said the Tigray forces arrived demanding food, then killed people who tried to resist when the fighters killed their animals or looted their properties.

"Many of the innocent civilians here have lost their lives," said local priest Yared Adamu. Holding a cross, he walked inside the damaged church, where bullet casings were scattered on the ground.

Spokesman for the Tigray forces Getachew Reda, speaking with the AP on Friday, called allegations that Tigray fighters had targeted civilians in the village "absolutely, absolutely false." He accused Amhara regional special forces of forcing civilians to fight, and "of course they will be caught in the crossfire."

Told that residents had not reported being forced to fight, Getachew replied, "Whatever they told you was staged drama." He also denied allegations that the Tigray forces were retreating.

Ethiopia's widening war, with atrocities reported on all sides, has led to urgent calls by the United Nations, United States and others for an immediate cease-fire and a path to dialogue. But there is little peace in sight.

Villagers carry wood on a path near the village of Chenna Teklehaymanot, in the Amhara region of northern Ethiopia Thursday, Sept. 9, 2021. (AP) An unidentified armed militia fighter walks down a path as villagers flee with their belongings in the other direction, near the village of Chenna Teklehaymanot, in the Amhara region of northern Ethiopia Thursday, Sept. 9, 2021. (AP) The dead body of an unidentified man lies on the ground near the village of Chenna Teklehaymanot, in the Amhara region of northern Ethiopia Thursday, Sept. 9, 2021. ()

Ethiopia's government this year declared the Tigray People's Liberation Front, which long dominated the national government before Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed took office, a terrorist group. That designation can't be lifted until a new federal government is formed, likely in early October, his spokeswoman told reporters on Thursday.

What began as a political dispute has killed thousands since November. Now in the Amhara region, as in Tigray, some outraged civilians have joined the fight.

Resident Kibret Bidere described himself as a member of the Amhara militia called the Fano. He told the AP his sister and her 1-year-old son had been killed, and his father was missing.

"Even today we are looking for the lost ones from morning to evening, but we haven't found any," he said, nursing an injured arm from previous fighting.

The village's traditional homes of grass and mud were emptying as residents departed through the mist, searching for safety elsewhere. Many had bundles on their backs. One, a gun propped on his shoulder.

"Our home was attacked by heavy artillery," said Senait Ambaw, who was leaving with her husband, clutching a chicken. "All the people of Chenna have no home now. It's over."

In the nearby town of Dabat, Amhara militia riding by on a truck fired their guns skyward in victory. Children ran after them, collecting the bullet casings from the ground.

___

Cara Anna in Nairobi, Kenya contributed.
Guinea's Junta President Col. Mamady Doumbouya, center, is heavily guarded by soldiers after a meeting with ECOWAS delegation in Conakry, Guinea Friday, Sept. 10, 2021. (Sunday Alamba/AP)

CONAKRY, Guinea  International pressure mounted Friday on the junta that seized power in Guinea after the African Union suspended the country and as a delegation of West African officials came to urge a return to democratic rule.

The African Union has suspended Guinea "from all AU activities and decision-making bodies," the organization announced. The suspension comes after military officers in Guinea overthrew President Alpha Conde on Sunday.

The 15-nation West African regional economic bloc, known as ECOWAS, had already suspended Guinea following the coup led by Col. Mamady Doumbouya.

Mediators including foreign ministers from Ghana, Nigeria, Togo and Burkina Faso along with ECOWAS commission president Jean-Claude Kassi Brou met with Doumbouya on Friday at a hotel in Conakry, the capital. Doumbouya and the ECOWAS mediation team left the hotel without speaking to the media, but talks likely focused on the timing of a return to constitutional rule.

Burkina Faso's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alpha Barry, said that the leaders will now report back to their respective presidents.

The delegation was able to meet with deposed president Conde, who was at the headquarters of the Special Forces, according to Barry.

"We saw President Alpha Conde. He's fine," Barry said. "The rest of the report will be made to the presidents."

The delegation is now heading back to Accra, Ghana, he said.

Guinean soldiers patrol outside the Presidential palace in Conakry, Guinea Friday, Sept. 10, 2021. (Sunday Alamba/AP)

The group has urged the coup leaders to assure the safety of the deposed president and others who have been arrested. Conde remains in the custody of the junta, who have only said that he is in a secure location with access to medical care.

Members of the delegation are believed to have met with Conde Friday, according to local media reports.

Doumbouya and the special forces that put the West African nation under military rule for the first time in over a decade have criticized Conde's government for corruption and the poverty of Guinea's people. The junta leader portrayed himself as a patriot of Guinea, taking power for the people who remained poor. However, experts say the coup happened after tensions increased between the army colonel and the president because of a recent proposal to cut some military salaries.

The junta has ordered the central bank to freeze all government accounts in an effort to secure state assets and "preserve the country's interest."

The junta announced the temporary freezing of withdrawals on bank accounts related to public administrative and commercial establishments in all ministry departments and the presidency. The freeze also applies to "the programs and projects of presidential initiatives," and "outgoing members of the government as well as senior civil servants, administrators and financial authorities of the state."

Conde's removal by force came after he sought and won a controversial third term in office last year, saying the term limits did not apply to him. Conde was elected in 2010 in the country's first democratic vote, with hopes that Guinea would see a fresh start after decades of corrupt, authoritarian rule and political turmoil. But in the years since, opponents say Conde failed to improve the lives of Guineans, most of whom live in poverty despite the country's vast mineral deposits of bauxite and gold.

Violent street demonstrations broke out last year after Conde organized a referendum to modify the constitution. The unrest intensified after he won the October election, and the opposition said dozens were killed during the crisis.

___

Petesch reported from Dakar, Senegal.
U.S. Army Col. Timothy MacDonald, operations director, Combined Joint Task Force  Horn of Africa, re-administers the Oath of Enlistment to Sgt. 1st Class Nathan Phelps, from Locke, N.Y., while aboard a KC-130J over East Africa, Sept. 11, 2021. (Michael Cossaboom/U.S. Air Force)

Two soldiers from upstate New York participated in a reenlistment ceremony aboard a KC-130J Super Hercules flying over a ground ceremony commemorating the 20th anniversary of 9/11 attacks Saturday at Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti.

Col. Timothy MacDonald, operations director of Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa, administered the enlistment oath to Sgt. 1st Class Nathan Phelps, a military police officer on his third deployment supporting the Global War on Terrorism.

Flanked by two French Dassault Mirage 2000s, the KC-130J flew over a joint services formation where the colors were presented and taps was played. Camp Lemonnier is the only permanent U.S. military installation in Africa and was established in 2002 to support U.S. operations against extremist groups in the Middle East and Africa.

Phelps, from Locke, N.Y., was in high school Spanish class when the World Trade Center was hit on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001.

Our entire school stopped that day and watched as the towers fell, he said in an emailed statement.

A U.S. KC-130J Super Hercules, with Combined Joint Task Force  Horn of Africa, and two French Dassault Mirage 2000s perform a combined flyover with during a Patriots Day ceremony at Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti, Sept. 11, 2021, commemorating the 20th anniversary of 9/11. (Dereck White/U.S. Army) U.S. Marine Staff Sgt. Roberto Bravo, with Marine Air Refuel Transport Squadron 234, holds an American flag during a Patriots Day ceremony at Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti, Sept. 11, 2021, commemorating the 20th anniversary of 9/11. (Dwane Young/U.S. Army) Sgt. 1st Class Nathan Phelps, military police officer, CJTF-HOA, from Locke, N.Y., takes the Oath of Enlistment while aboard a KC-130J over East Africa, Sept. 11, 2021. (Michael Cossaboom/U.S. Air Force)

He "felt a calling" to join the Army in 2008, and deployed to Iraq the following year and Afghanistan in 2013. He renewed his enlistment indefinitely Saturday because he still felt that calling, he said.

My thoughts of 9/11 are remembering the lives lost that day because of to the actions of terrorists, Phelps said. I will never forget the sacrifices made that day or those made since by my fellow Americans who have paid the ultimate cost. I remember my brothers and sisters who have come home injured or forever changed.

MacDonald, of Sydney, N.Y., joined the Army in 1994 and deployed twice to Iraq and once to Afghanistan.

I am humbled to have been part of his continued dedication to our country, MacDonald said of Phelps reenlistment. I personally have felt the impacts of September 11th, and I admire every soldier who chooses to serve and defend our great nation.
Abimael Guzman, founder and leader of the Shining Path guerrilla movement, center, enters a courtroom at the Naval Base in Callao, Peru, on Feb. 28, 2017. (Martin Mejia/AP)

LIMA, Peru  Abimael Guzman, the leader of the brutal Shining Path insurgency in Peru who was captured in 1992, died on Saturday in a military hospital after an illness, the Peruvian government said.

Guzman, 86, died at 6:40 a.m. after suffering from an infection, Justice Minister Anibal Torres said.

Guzman, a former philosophy professor, launched an insurgency against the state in 1980 and presided over numerous car bombings and assassinations in the years that followed. Tens of thousands died. Guzman was captured in 1992 and sentenced in life in prison for terrorism and other crimes.

Guzman preached a messianic vision of a classless Maoist utopia based on pure communism, considering himself the "Fourth Sword of Marxism" after Karl Marx, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and Mao Zedong.

He advocated a peasant revolution in which rebels would first gain control of the countryside and then advance to the cities.

Guzman's movement declared armed struggle on the eve of Peru's presidential elections in May 1980, the first democratic vote after 12 years of military rule.

Throughout the 1980s, the man known to his followers as Presidente Gonzalo built up an organization that grew to 10,000 armed fighters before his capture inside a Lima safehouse in September 1992.

By the time Guzman called for peace talks a year after his arrest, guerrilla violence had claimed tens of thousands of lives in Peru, displaced at least 600,000 people and caused an estimated $22 billion in damage.

A truth commission in 2003 blamed the Shining Path for more than half of nearly 70,000 estimated deaths and disappearances caused by various rebel groups and brutal government counterinsurgency efforts between 1980 and 2000.

Yet it lived on in a political movement formed by Guzman's followers that sought amnesty for all "political prisoners," including the Shining Path founder. The Movement for Amnesty and Fundamental Right failed, however, to register as a political party in 2012 in the face of fierce opposition from Peruvians with bitter memories of the destruction brought by the Shining Path.

In its songs and slogans, the Shining Path celebrated bloodletting, describing death as necessary to "irrigate" the revolution.

Its militants bombed electrical towers, bridges and factories in the countryside, assassinated mayors and massacred villagers. In the insurgency's later years, they targeted civilians in Lima with indiscriminate bombings.

For 12 years, Peruvian authorities could not crack the Shining Path's ranks, organized in a near-impenetrable vertical cell structure. Guzman was nearly captured at a safehouse in Lima in June 1990, but slipped away.

A January 1991 police raid in Lima found a videotape showing Guzman and other rebel leaders mourning at the funeral of his wife, Augusta La Torre, known as "Comrade Norah." About 15 years Guzman's junior, La Torre was No. 2 in the Shining Path's command structure before dying under mysterious circumstances in 1988.

Analysts believe she may have been murdered or forced to commit suicide over an internal political dispute.

The video showed a portly Guzman, wearing thick glasses and snapping his fingers as he drunkenly danced to music from the 1960s movie "Zorba the Greek." It was the first image Peruvians had seen of him since a mug shot taken during a 1978 arrest.

After La Torre died, she was replaced as No. 2 by Elena Iparraguirre, alias "Comrade Miriam," who later also became Guzman's wife.

Guzman married Iparraguirre in 2010 at the maximum-security prison inside the naval base in Lima where he was serving a life term. Iparraguirre, also captured in 1992, was brought from the women's prison for the ceremony.

Guzman was initially sentenced to life imprisonment by a secret military tribunal, but Peru's top court ruled in 2003 that the original sentencing was unconstitutional and ordered a new trial. He also received a life sentence at the 2006 retrial.

The Shining Path was severely weakened after Guzman's capture and his later calls for peace talks. Small bands of rebels have nevertheless remained active in remote valleys, producing cocaine and protecting drug runners.

Guzman was born the illegitimate son of a prosperous trader in Tambo, Arequipa, in Peru's southern Andes on Dec. 3, 1934.

He studied law and philosophy at the University of San Agustin in Arequipa, where he wrote two graduate theses: "The Theory of Space in Kant" and another on law titled "The Democratic-Bourgeois State."

"Mr. Guzman was an extraordinarily brilliant man, very studious, very disciplined," recalled Miguel Rodriguez Rivas, one of his professors.

Guzman took a teaching job in 1963 at the state University of San Cristobal de Huamanga in Ayacucho, an impoverished central Andean capital neglected for centuries by Peru's traditional power elite in coastal Lima.

In Ayacucho, he joined the pro-Chinese Bandera Roja political party, or "Red Flag," becoming head of its "military commission" and visiting China in 1965.

Later returning to Ayacucho, Guzman discovered that political rivals had expelled him from the party and he formed his own splinter group.

A descendant of the white elite that had governed Peru since the Spanish destroyed the Inca empire nearly 500 years earlier, Guzman recruited the sons and daughters of Quechua-speaking indigenous peasants as he gradually took control of the university.

During the 1970s, his student followers spanned out into the countryside to conduct detailed studies of communities that would be used years later to consolidate guerrilla control in the zone.

Over 10 years, Guzman patiently planned before launching his war on what he characterized as Peru's "rotten and antiquated" state, taking the government by surprise.
Polish security forces surround migrants stuck along with border with Belarus in Usnarz Gorny, Poland, on Sept. 1, 2021. (Czarek Sokolowski/AP)

WARSAW, Poland  German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Saturday that she found it unacceptable that refugees were being used to apply pressure to Poland and other European Union members on the border with Belarus.

Speaking at a news conference during what she said she expected to be her last official visit to Poland as chancellor, Merkel appealed to Belarus, but also to Poland, to help people in difficult humanitarian conditions caught between the border of Poland and Belarus.

She stressed that she found it "completely unacceptable that such hybrid attacks" were being carried out with the use of people seeking to reach the EU, recalling that it was also a message she delivered to Russian President Vladimir Putin during a recent meeting.

Poland, Lithuania and Latvia have seen a rise in crossings by Iraqis, Afghans, Syrians and Africans from Belarus in recent months. The three EU countries accuse Belarus of pushing the migrants across their borders and say they view that as an element of "hybrid warfare" against the EU.

Merkel spoke at a news conference with Polish President Mateusz Morawiecki in front of a palace in Warsaw's Royal Baths park.

The two said they discussed the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, security issues in light of recent developments in Afghanistan, as well as new threats coming from cyber attacks.

European issues also came up, including climate policy and an ongoing dispute between Warsaw and Brussels over changes to the judicial system in Poland which the EU considers to violate the rule of law.

Merkel said she hoped the issue can be solved through dialogue. Merkel, who has been chancellor since 2005, plans to step down after an election later this month.

A meeting between Merkel and President Andrzej Duda, which was originally announced by the German government, isn't taking place after all, and political observers in Warsaw interpreted that as a snub.

Duda's office said Duda would instead be in the southern Polish city of Katowice for celebrations marking the anniversary of Solidarity, the anti-communist trade union.

Relations have sometimes been strained under Poland's government because it has often said it plans to demand reparations from World War II, an issue that resonates with older Poles. Germany often voices remorse for its wartime occupation of Poland, but says the issue of reparations has already been dealt with.

Morawiecki said that despite some disagreements, the Polish-German relationship has developed well during Merkel's time at the helm, and thanked her for her cooperation.

"We have very often discussed difficult topics, but our solid political coordination has also led to the fact that our economic relations are very good," he said.

He said that "despite various differences, we are able, above all, to emphasize what unites us."

Merkel also commemorated the victims of World War II in Warsaw by laying a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The war began with Germany's invasion of Poland. Tens of millions of people were killed in the war, with some 6 million killed in Poland.
Evacuees wait to board a Boeing C-17 Globemaster III during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport, Kabul, Afghanistan, Aug. 30, 2021. (Victor Mancilla/U.S. Marine Corps)

In the days before the Taliban took full control of Afghanistan, an elite group of Afghan special forces trained by the CIA helped evacuate more than 2,000 American citizens and permanent residents, in what would be among the Afghans' last missions with their American partners before leaving the country, according to current and former U.S. officials familiar with the operations.

The Afghan forces had been trained for counterterrorism missions and had worked for years with U.S. intelligence agencies and the military hunting militants and fighting Taliban insurgents. When the general Afghan military collapsed in the face of a Taliban onslaught, the special forces moved into Kabul, helping to defend the Hamid Karzai International Airport and fanning out across the capital to rescue stranded evacuees.

"They were extraordinarily well trained, and when, frankly, the regular army was dropping their weapons and running away, they were running into the breach," said a senior administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to candidly describe the Afghan forces' operations in recent weeks.

Like other Afghans who had assisted U.S. forces during their two-decade presence in the country, the Afghan soldiers - as well as linguists, intelligence collectors and support staff - were at particular risk of Taliban reprisal, current and former officials said. The senior official noted that the Taliban had identified some members of the elite group and sent them text messages, threatening to kill them and their families.

Without the highly trained fighters, multiple current and former officials familiar with the operations said, the eventual evacuation of Americans would have been even more difficult than it was amid the collapse of the Afghan government and a hasty retreat by U.S. forces and personnel.

In addition to the approximately 2,000 American citizens and permanent residents, the Afghan units also assisted in evacuating around 5,550 local embassy staff, third-country nationals and Afghans who were at risk of Taliban reprisal, the senior official said.

The Afghan units were trained for raids and other combat operations, not necessarily to provide physical security. But in mid-August, as chaos engulfed the airport and scores of desperate Afghans flooded the tarmac, the Afghan units helped bring order back to the airfield so that flights could continue, the senior official said.

Most of the forces had been deployed in about five locations around southern Afghanistan and in some cases had to "fight their way" to the capital to assist in the evacuations, the official added.

The Afghans also helped their fellow citizens escape.

On Aug. 26, a convoy of Afghan evacuees that hadn't been able to get through Taliban checkpoints at the airport were routed through a gate on the north end that is normally sealed and had previously been used by the CIA, according to current and former officials.

The CIA-trained Afghan forces cleared crowds at the gate by firing in the air over people's heads, the current and former officials said. Upon hearing the heavy volume of fire, the Afghan evacuees tucked as low as they could in the buses. The Afghan bus drivers sent panicked reports of a firefight to the Americans guiding them.

A U.S. military officer informed the convoy that the forces were friendly, describing them as "the most Taliban hating group of badass friends we have," according to text messages shared with The Washington Post and descriptions of phone conversations.

The units worked with military and State Department personnel, but their primary point of contact was with the CIA, which had trained them, the senior administration official said.

The special operators also deployed into Kabul, where U.S. military personnel were unable to move on foot, and met evacuees at their apartments or on street corners and shuttled them to the airport or the CIA's Eagle Base, a compound a few miles away, the official said.

Biden administration officials have faced stiff criticism from the left and right over their efforts to get Afghan allies and their families safely out of the country.

Former military personnel who served in Afghanistan and maintained friendships with their former linguists and support staff have said the resettlement process is inordinately bureaucratic and slow.

Current and former intelligence officers have been particularly worried about the Afghan special forces, who would be prime targets if they remained.

"Over the years, CIA personnel served alongside these units as brothers, just small groups of Americans with hundreds of Indigenous soldiers," said Marc Polymeropoulos, a former CIA base chief in Afghanistan. "Their contribution to the counterterrorism fight against al-Qaida and the Taliban was extraordinary."

The resettlement issue has also divided the GOP, with a number of Republican lawmakers and political operatives arguing that Afghan immigrants could be a drain on the states and cities where they eventually make their home.

The Afghan special forces and CIA-backed paramilitaries have previously been accused of human rights abuses, which could further stoke anxiety and opposition about bringing them to the United States.

Over the years, news reporting, including by The Washington Post, and investigations by human rights advocates have implicated Afghan counterterrorism forces in alleged killings and other acts of violence against Afghan civilians.

A 2019 investigation by Human Rights Watch alleged that Afghan paramilitary units "have been responsible for extrajudicial executions and enforced disappearances, indiscriminate airstrikes, attacks on medical facilities, and other violations of international humanitarian law, or the laws of war."

The CIA has denied those and other claims of abuses. In response to the Human Rights Watch report, the agency said in a written statement that the allegations were "likely false or exaggerated" and part of a "propaganda campaign" by the Taliban to distort counterterrorism operations and undermine the Afghan government.

The senior administration official said that all members of the Afghan special forces were vetted before they joined and "continuously" while they served. Their family members who fled with them also were vetted, as are all Afghans who may be resettled in the United States, the official said.

- - -

The Washington Post's Greg Jaffe contributed to this report.
A U.S. soldier crouches at the back of a CH-47 Chinook during a flight over Kabul, Afghanistan on March 3, 2020. For years, there have been bounties on members of the Haqqani network, which the United States has branded as terrorists. Now they're in power in Kabul, after the Taliban took over in August 2021. (Jeffery Harris/U.S. Army )

DOHA, Qatar  Twenty years after al-Qaida attacked the United States  a plot hatched in Afghanistan  its loyalists hold senior positions in the Taliban's new transitional government. There is one name that stands out: Haqqani.

A U.N. report in June described the Haqqani network as the "primary liaison between the Taliban and Al-Qaida." Its leader, Sirajuddin Haqqani  a brutal insurgent commander known for dispatching suicide bombers who've killed or maimed hundreds of civilians  was "assessed to be a member of the wider Al-Qaida leadership, but not of the Al-Qaida core leadership."

Today, he is Afghanistan's acting interior minister, overseeing the nation's police, intelligence services and other security forces.

He is also in charge of combating terrorism.

"It's a major concern," said Colin P. Clarke, director of policy and research at The Soufan Group, an intelligence and security consulting firm. "You are one step removed from having the group that attacked us on 9/11 running the country."

The appointment of Haqqani, as well as relatives and members of his network, underscores his immense influence inside the Taliban. It also raises concerns that the new government will pursue a hard line agenda, even as Taliban leaders publicly claim to be gentler and more moderate than their brutal image in an effort to curry favor with donors and foreign governments.

Haqqani's political rise puts the Biden administration and other Western governments in a precarious position, particularly in countering terrorist threats. They are forced to have relationships with people they have sanctioned, many with bounties on their heads, for committing or sponsoring terrorism  or targeting Americans. In the interim government, at least 14 of the 33 cabinet members are on U.N. sanctions lists.

A Taliban spokesman did not immediately respond to questions about the Haqqani's alleged al-Qaida ties and concerns it could complicate much-needed relationships with foreign governments, the United Nations and international donors.

Sirajuddin Haqqani is on the FBI's most wanted list with a $5 million reward for information leading to his arrest. The State Department, through its Rewards For Justice Program, is offering $10 million, describing him as "a specially designated global terrorist."

He is wanted for "questioning in connection with" a January 2008 attack on a Kabul hotel that killed six people, including a U.S. citizen. He is also believed to have orchestrated attacks against U.S. and coalition forces and in planning an assassination attempt of former Afghan president Hamid Karzai, the State Department says.

Khalil Haqqani, the uncle of Sirajuddin, is the acting Taliban minister for refugees. The State Department is offering up to $5 million for his capture, in part because he "acted on behalf of al-Qaida and has been linked to al-Qaida terrorist operations."

In 2012, the United States designated the Haqqani network as a foreign terrorist organization.

Secretary of State of Antony Blinken told reporters at Ramstein Airbase in Germany on Wednesday that the Taliban interim government "does not meet the test of inclusivity and it includes people who have very challenging track records."

"Our engagement with the Taliban and with the government  interim or longer  will be for purposes of advancing the national interest, our national interest and that of our partners," said Blinken. "We have and we will find ways to engage the Taliban, the interim government, a future government, to do just that and to do it in ways that are fully consistent with our laws."

On Thursday, the Taliban demanded that the United States and the United Nations remove the Haqqanis and other cabinet members from their "blacklists," declaring that they violated the agreements of a peace deal signed in Doha. The movement also criticized Pentagon officials for noting that the Haqqanis were still targets.

"That America and other countries are making such provocative statements and trying to meddle the internal affairs of Afghanistan, the Islamic Emirate condemns it in the strongest terms," the Taliban said in a statement. "Such remarks by U.S. officials are a repetition of past failed experiments and such positions are detrimental for America."

"It's a pretty difficult spot for the Biden administration," Clarke said. "If you deal with the Taliban in these confines, you are essentially dealing with a terrorist group or members of a terrorist organization. And if you don't, you have no leverage and no influence to control events in Afghanistan."

The Haqqanis trace their roots to the Soviet Cold War occupation of the 1980s and the Afghan mujahideen struggle to liberate their nation. Sirajuddin's father, Jalaluddin, was a famed commander and CIA asset who forged a close alliance with Osama bin Laden and other foreign Islamist militants who arrived to push the Soviet troops out of Afghanistan.

In 1996, the elder Haqqani aligned with the Taliban, helping the movement seize the country for the first time. He served as a cabinet minister and a provincial governor. When the Taliban was toppled in 2001 following the September 11th attacks, the Haqqanis became an integral part of the insurgency against U.S.-led NATO forces.

In 2018, the Taliban announced the death of Jalaluddin due to an undisclosed illness. By then, Sirajuddin was already in charge of the Haqqani network, which was based in eastern Afghanistan as well as in bases inside Pakistan's Northwest Territories; three years earlier the Taliban had appointed him as a deputy leader.

The Haqqanis became known as "the most lethal and sophisticated insurgent group targeting US, Coalition and Afghans forces," often attacking with small-arms, rocket, suicide bombers and bomb-laden vehicles, according to the National Counterterrorism Center.

The network orchestrated some of the highest-profile attacks in the past two decades of war. This included a June 2011 assault on Kabul's Intercontinental hotel, two suicide bombings against the Indian embassy and a day-long assault on the U.S. Embassy and other high profile targets in Kabul a decade ago.

"People must be both reassured and terrified by the fact that an entity seen as responsible for some of the worst crimes of the war is now in charge of securing the population," said Ashley Jackson, an expert on the Taliban at the Overseas Development Institute. "But there is a certain logic from inside the Taliban . . . if anyone can bring security, one assumes it's the Haqqani network."

But that could also pose a threat to Sirajuddin Haqqani's influence inside the movement, where he has several rivals, including Mohammad Yaqoob, the acting defense minister and son of the Taliban's late founder Mohammad Omar.

One of Haqqani's primary challenges will be to prevent large-scale bombings by the Islamic State and other militant groups that are against the Taliban - like the attack on Kabul's airport last month that killed 13 U.S. service members and more than 170 Afghans.

"Since he's number one now, it's his responsibility to prevent these urban attacks," said Vanda Felbab-Brown, director of the Initiative on Nonstate Armed Actors at the Brookings Institution. "If he doesn't, there's going to be people unhappy, including within the Taliban. They will say 'you have this important portfolio, what the hell are you doing?'"

Haqqani has also shown he can think strategically off the battlefield. Last year, he shared his visions in an op-ed in the New York Times with the headline: "What We, the Taliban, Want." Many analysts viewed it as a shrewd tactical move to soothe the concerns of the United States and the international community following the withdrawal of U.S. troops.

"Everyone is tired of war," the op-ed from the brutal warlord read. "I am convinced that the killing and the maiming must stop."

"We are committed to working with other parties in a consultative manner of genuine respect to agree on a new, inclusive political system in which the voice of every Afghan is reflected and where no Afghan feels excluded," the op-ed continued.

Today, the acting Taliban government is anything but inclusive. And there are already signs that Haqqani's interior ministry will not tolerate dissent. Protests by women seeking basic rights have been broken up by Taliban fighters firing weapons and assaulting local journalists. An interior ministry statement this week decreed that all protests must be approved by the government at the risk of arrests.

"The Haqqani network is the kind of hammer that comes back down and doesn't allow the Taliban to be perceived as moderate," Clarke said. "That's part of the reason why the Haqqanis are stacked in the government. It's to make sure there is no deviation from what they have been working on for the past two decades."

A key concern for the United States is whether Haqqani's rising profile will open the gateway for al-Qaida to resurrect itself in Afghanistan. In the U.N. report, investigators found that the Taliban and al-Qaida "remain closely aligned and show no signs of breaking ties." Al-Qaida members live in at least 15 provinces.

At the moment, said both Jackson and Clarke, the Haqqanis appear more interested in growing their influence in the country, the region and within the Taliban movement rather than waging global jihad.

"They waited 20 years to get back into power," Clarke said. "Now, they are, and they want to hold on to that power."

The Washington Post's Karen DeYoung in Washington contributed to this report.
TEHRAN, Iran  Iran says that the head of the International Atomic Energy Organization is arriving in the country for talks with Iranian officials.

Kazem Gharibabadi, Iran's envoy to the IAEA, said in a tweet that Rafael Grossi is arriving Saturday, and will travel to Tehran this afternoon. He's scheduled to meet Iran's vice-president and head of the country's atomic organization, Mohammad Eslami, on Sunday.

Gharibabadi also said the two sides will issue a joint statement.

It will be Grossi's first visit to the country's since new president Ebrahim Raisi took office.

Talks between Iran and world powers over limiting Iran's nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief have been idle since June, and Raisi took office in August.

The two major issues being negotiated are the rollback of American sanctions imposed by former President Donald Trump's administration after it withdrew from the deal, and the return of Iran to compliance with restrictions imposed on its nuclear program.
Palestinian fugitive Zakaria Zubeidi is arrested by Israeli police officers, in Umm al Ghanam, northern Israel, Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. (Israeli Police/AP)

JERUSALEM  Israeli police on Saturday said they have arrested four of the six Palestinians who broke out of a maximum-security prison this week  including a famed militant leader whose exploits over the years have made him a well-known figure in Israel.

The arrests moved Israel closer to closing an embarrassing episode that exposed deep flaws in its prison system and turned the fugitive prisoners into Palestinian heroes. Late on Friday, Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip fired a rocket into Israel in an apparent sign of solidarity, drawing Israeli airstrikes in reprisal.

The four wanted men were caught in a pair of arrests in northern Israel.

Early on Saturday, police said they had caught two men, including Zakaria Zubeidi, hiding in a truck parking lot in the Arab town of Umm al-Ghanam.

The Israeli Haaretz news site, quoting an unidentified defense official, said Zubeidi and fellow fugitive Mohammed Aradeh had been hiding outdoors for some time. The source said the two escapees appeared to have received no help following their escape and had no planned route on where to go.

Zubeidi was a militant leader during the second Palestinian uprising in the early 2000s.

While he has been linked to attacks on Israelis, he also was well known for giving frequent media interviews and for a friendship he once had with an Israeli woman. Zubeidi over the years had received amnesty and taken college courses and was active in a West Bank theater movement before he was re-arrested in 2019 on suspicions of involvement in attacks.

Photos released by police showed Zubeidi, handcuffed and wearing a white head band, being led away by two police officers.

In a statement, police said that Israeli security forces, including the military, have been working "around the clock" to catch the fugitives.

"All of the forces were deployed at full strength, searched in open areas, collected every piece of information until they succeeded in solving the puzzle to locate these two fugitives," including Zubeidi, police said. The search for the final two prisoners was continuing.

Earlier, two other prisoners were arrested in Nazareth, an Arab city in northern Israel just west of Umm al-Ghanam.

A video circulating on social media showed Israeli police shackling one of the prisoners, Yakub Kadari, into the backseat of a police vehicle and asking him for his name. The man, wearing jeans and a green T-shirt, calmly identifies himself as Kadari and answers "yes" when asked whether he is one of the escapees. Kadari was serving two life sentences for attempted murder and bomb planting.

According to Israeli media reports, local residents in both towns had turned in the prisoners.

In a statement issued late Saturday, Israel's Prime Minister, Naftali Bennett, praised the Israeli security forces for the arrest of the four fugitives, describing the search operation as "determined and persistent."

"We have to maintain heightened readiness and continue until the mission is complete," Bennett said.

The six Palestinians tunneled out of the Gilboa prison on Monday, setting off a furious manhunt across Israel and in the West Bank.

For the Palestinians, the fugitives won praise for succeeding in freeing themselves from multiple life sentences. Fighting against Israel and taking part in attacks against the Israeli military or even civilians is a source of pride for many, and Palestinians consider prisoners held by Israel to be heroes of their national cause.

In the Gaza Strip as well as in the West Bank, Palestinians had organized sit-ins and joyful gatherings to celebrate the prison break.

While Zubeidi was a member of the secular Fatah group, the others belonged to the Islamic Jihad militant group, including four serving life sentences. All of the prisoners are from the nearby city of Jenin in the Israel-occupied West Bank.

As soon as the news about the capture of the two fugitives was confirmed Friday, a flurry of bitter posts expressing disappointment and shock filled Palestinian social media.

Israel said late Saturday that Palestinian militants in Gaza fired a rocket toward Israel that was intercepted by Israeli air defenses. The Israeli military said it responded with airstrikes on a series of Hamas targets in Gaza. Israel says it holds Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, responsible for all rocket fire emanating from the territory.

There was no immediate reaction from the Palestinian Authority, but Abdeltaif al-Qanou, a spokesman for the Gaza-ruling Hamas movement, said despite the re-arrest, the prisoners have "scored a victory and harmed the prestige of the Israeli security system."

The escape has exposed major flaws in Israel's prison service and set off days of angry criticism and finger-pointing. The men escaped through a hole in the floor of their shared cell, tunneled through a hole outside the prison and according to media reports, escaped past a sleeping prison guard.

It has also increased tension between Israel and the Palestinians.

Earlier on Friday, Hamas had called for "a day of rage" to protest Israeli crackdown against imprisoned Palestinians, but the day passed without major confrontation. In Jerusalem, a Palestinian suspected attacker died shortly after being shot by Israeli police in the volatile Old City, where he had reportedly tried to stab officers. Police said one officer was lightly wounded in the leg.

previous coverage Israel searches for 6 Palestinians after rare prison break
Evacuees walk to be processed during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 25, 2021. According to reports on Friday, Sept. 10, Taliban fighters are carrying out extrajudicial executions of civilians in Panjshir province. (Isaiah Campbell/U.S. Marine Corps )

Taliban fighters have imposed a withering siege in Afghanistan's rebellious Panjshir province, denying food to residents and carrying out some extrajudicial executions of civilians, a tribal elder who recently fled the province said Friday, adding to a growing list of alleged abuses carried out by the militant group.

A Taliban spokesman denied that the movement's fighters had killed any civilians in Panjshir, a northern region that has been a last redoubt for anti-Taliban fighters. The latest accusations came as U.N. officials decried other alleged Taliban abuses, including reprisal killings and beatings and fatal shootings of protesters across the country.

Taken together, the accusations have painted a bleak picture of Taliban rule in the weeks since the Islamist militants took power and pledged to govern inclusively, respect women's rights and press freedoms, and avoid retaliatory actions against former adversaries.

An interim government named by the Taliban this week consists entirely of Taliban members, excludes women and eliminates the ministry in charge of ensuring opportunity and rights for women and girls. A Taliban spokesman, defending the appointments, said they were the result of discussions held "all over the country."

Last week, the militants seized control of Panjshir. As sporadic clashes have continued, civilians have seized chances to flee the province amid reports that at least eight residents, including children, had been killed by the Taliban, said the elder, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he feared for his safety.

He said he fled with his clothes, leaving behind his cows, goats and chickens. "My people pressed me to leave the area," he said, adding that his family warned him Taliban fighters would kill him. The eight civilians killed in Panjshir three days earlier were "neither supporters of the resistance or the Taliban," he said, without providing more detail about the deaths.

In a Skype interview from London, Ahmad Wali Masoud, the uncle of Ahmad Massoud, the leader of anti-Taliban resistance fighters in Panjshir, echoed the accusations that the Taliban were imposing clampdowns in the province and had killed civilians, though he was not able to say how many or under what circumstances they were killed. The uncle, a former Afghan ambassador, said that resistance fighters still controlled "major" areas in Panjshir and were engaged in intermittent clashes with Taliban fighters.

"Everyone is weighing their next move," the elder Masoud said, adding that there was little prospect that negotiations would end the standoff in Panjshir.

"The Taliban is the Taliban," he said. "They are worse and more violent than ever before."

Bilal Karimi, a Taliban spokesman, denied that the group's fighters were harming civilians in Panjshir, calling reports to the contrary "baseless and unfounded."

The Taliban's harsh handling of protests was on full display earlier this week in Kabul, the capital, where activists and journalists said they faced lashings by Taliban fighters. Among those beaten were two journalists who work for Etilaatroz, an Afghan newspaper, the outlet said on Twitter. Photos shared on social media showed their backs covered with red-and-purple bruises.

A United Nations human rights official warned the Taliban on Friday to "immediately cease" using force against peaceful protesters. Demonstrators "across various provinces in Afghanistan over the past four weeks have faced an increasingly violent response by the Taliban, including the use of live ammunition, batons and whips," the official, Ravina Shamdasani, a spokeswoman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, said in a media briefing in Geneva, according to a transcript of her remarks.

Her comments came a day after Deborah Lyons, the U.N. secretary general's envoy to Afghanistan, said in a briefing to the Security Council that there were "credible allegations" that reprisal killings have been carried out against members of the former government's security forces, despite Taliban pledges of amnesty for soldiers and government officials. "We have received reports of members of the Taliban carrying out house-to-house searches and seizing property, particularly in Kabul," she said.

Lyons added that she was "increasingly worried" by a growing number of incidents of "harassment and intimidation" targeting Afghan members of the U.N. staff. "The U.N. cannot conduct its work - work that is so essential to the Afghan people - if its personnel are subjected to intimidation, fear for their lives, and cannot move freely," she said.

Thousands of people, including some U.S. citizens, have attempted to leave Afghanistan since the end of the U.S. military airlift on Aug. 31, but the flow has been limited, in part by the slow recovery of operations at Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport following the withdrawal of foreign military forces from the country.

A second civilian airliner left Kabul late Friday bound for Qatar and carrying American and other foreign passport holders, according to Emily Horne, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, and a Qatari official briefed on the details. The first civilian flight, on Thursday, carried 10 U.S. citizens and 11 green-card holders, according to the State Department.

Nineteen U.S. citizens were among the 158 passengers on Friday's Qatar Airways flight bound for Doha, along with French, Dutch, British, Belgian and Mauritanian nationals, the officials said. Horne, in a statement, said that an additional group of two U.S. citizens and 11 lawful permanent residents left Afghanistan on Friday "via overland passage to a neighboring country."

Also on Friday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said that flights of refugees from Afghanistan to the United States had been "temporarily paused" because four Afghans who had recently arrived in the United States had been diagnosed with measles. The suspension of flights was made at the request of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention "out of an abundance of caution," she said.

- - -

Khan reported from Peshawar, Pakistan, and Fahim from Istanbul. The Washington Post's John Hudson in Washington contributed to this report.
A member of the U.S. Air Force stands near a Patriot missile battery at Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia on Feb. 20, 2020. The U.S. has removed its most advanced missile defense system and Patriot batteries from Saudi Arabia's Prince Sultan Air Base in recent weeks, satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press show. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AP)

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates  The U.S. has removed its most advanced missile defense system and Patriot batteries from Saudi Arabia in recent weeks, even as the kingdom faced continued air attacks from Yemen's Houthi rebels, satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press show.

The redeployment of the defenses from Prince Sultan Air Base outside of Riyadh came as America's Gulf Arab allies nervously watched the chaotic withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, including their last-minute evacuations from Kabul's besieged international airport.

While tens of thousands of American forces remain across the Arabian Peninsula as a counterweight to Iran, Gulf Arab nations worry about the U.S.'s future plans as its military perceives a growing threat in Asia that requires those missile defenses. Tensions remain high as negotiations appear stalled in Vienna over Iran's collapsed nuclear deal with world powers, raising the danger of future confrontations in the region.

"Perceptions matter whether or not they're rooted in a cold, cold reality. And the perception is very clear that the U.S. is not as committed to the Gulf as it used to be in the views of many people in decision-making authority in the region," said Kristian Ulrichsen, a research fellow at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University.

"From the Saudi point of view, they now see Obama, Trump and Biden  three successive presidents  taking decisions that signify to some extent an abandonment."

Prince Sultan Air Base, some 70 miles southeast of Riyadh, has hosted several thousand U.S. troops since a 2019 missile-and-drone attack on the heart of the kingdom's oil production. That attack, though claimed by Yemen's Houthi rebels, appears instead to have been carried out by Iran, according to experts and physical debris left behind. Tehran has denied launching the attack, though a drill in January saw Iranian paramilitary forces use similar drones.

Just southwest of the air base's runway, a 1-square-kilometer (third-of-a-square-mile) area set off by an earthen berm saw American forces station Patriot missile batteries, as well as one advanced Terminal High Altitude Area Defense unit, according to satellite images from Planet Labs Inc. A THAAD can destroy ballistic missiles at a higher altitude than Patriots.

In this satellite photo, an area of Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia sees Patriot missile batteries stationed with one advanced Terminal High Altitude Air Defense unit on Aug. 9, 2021. (Planet Labs Inc. via AP) In this satellite photo, an area of Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia that once saw Patriot missile batteries stationed with one advanced Terminal High Altitude Air Defense unit stands empty Friday, Sept. 10, 2021. (Planet Labs Inc. via AP)

A satellite image seen by the AP in late August showed some of the batteries removed from the area, though activity and vehicles still could be seen there. A high-resolution Planet Lab satellite picture taken Friday showed the batteries' pads at the site empty, with no visible activity.

A redeployment of the missiles had been rumored for months, in part due to a desire to face what American officials see as the looming "great powers conflict" with China and Russia. However, the withdrawal came just as a Houthi drone attack on Saudi Arabia wounded eight people and damaged a commercial jetliner at the kingdom's airport in Abha. The kingdom has been locked in a stalemate war with the Houthis since March 2015.

Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby acknowledged "the redeployment of certain air defense assets" after receiving questions from the AP. He said the U.S. maintained a "broad and deep" commitment to its Mideast allies.

"The Defense Department continues to maintain tens of thousands of forces and a robust force posture in the Middle East representing some of our most advanced air power and maritime capabilities, in support of U.S. national interests and our regional partnerships," Kirby said.

In a statement to the AP, the Saudi Defense Ministry described the kingdom's relationship with the U.S. as "strong, longstanding and historic" even while acknowledging the withdrawal of the American missile defense systems. It said the Saudi military "is capable of defending its lands, seas and airspace, and protecting its people."

"The redeployment of some defense capabilities of the friendly United States of America from the region is carried out through common understanding and realignment of defense strategies as an attribute of operational deployment and disposition," the statement said.

Despite those assurances, Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal, the kingdom's former intelligence chief whose public remarks often track with the thoughts of its Al Saud ruling family, has linked the Patriot missile deployments directly to America's relationship to Riyadh.

"I think we need to be reassured about American commitment," the prince told CNBC in an interview aired this week. "That looks like, for example, not withdrawing Patriot missiles from Saudi Arabia at a time when Saudi Arabia is the victim of missile attacks and drone attacks  not just from Yemen, but from Iran."

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, on a tour of the Mideast in recent days, had been slated to go to Saudi Arabia but the trip was canceled due to what American officials referred to as scheduling problems. Saudi Arabia declined to discuss why Austin's trip didn't happen after the withdrawal of the missile defenses.

Saudi Arabia maintains its own Patriot missile batteries and typically fires two missiles at an incoming target. That's become an expensive proposition amid the Houthi campaign, as each Patriot missile costs more than $3 million. The kingdom also claims to intercept nearly every missile and drone launched at the kingdom, an incredibly high success rate previously questioned by experts.

While Greece agreed in April to lend a Patriot missile battery to Saudi Arabia, the timing of the U.S. withdrawals comes amid wider uncertainty over the American posture in the region. Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab countries have renewed diplomacy with Iran as a hedge.

"I think we saw in Biden's statements on Afghanistan, the way he said things that he's clearly going to put U.S. interests first and obviously that came as quite a disappointment to partners and allies around the world who maybe hoped for something different after Trump," said Ulrichsen, the research fellow. "He sounds quite similar to an 'America First' approach, just sort of a different tone."

Associated Press writers Lolita C. Baldor in Washington and Aya Batrawy contributed to this report.
An unidentified detainee is seen in late 2003 standing on a box with a bag on his head and wires attached to him in the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad, Iraq. (AP)

ALEXANDRIA, Va.  A military contractor being sued for alleged complicity in the torture of inmates at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison argued Friday that recent Supreme Court cases make clear it can't be held liable for misconduct that occurred overseas, but a judge was skeptical.

CACI, a Virginia-based contractor that supplied interrogators at the infamous prison, is seeking to have the 13-year-old lawsuit dismissed. The most recent legal debate centers on the extent to which U.S. companies can be sued for international conduct.

In recent years, the Supreme Court has restricted corporations' potential liability. Most recently, the high court tossed out a civil suit against a subsidiary of chocolate maker Nestle after it was accused of complicity in child slavery on cocoa farms in Ivory Coast.

John O'Connor, a lawyer for CACI, said at a hearing Friday in U.S. District Court in Alexandria that the high court's ruling in the Nestle case earlier this year compels the CACI lawsuit to be thrown out on similar grounds.

But U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema seemed unpersuaded from the outset.

"I think you overread Nestle," Brinkema said at Friday's hearing.

She did not immediately reject CACI's motion, and took it under advisement after Friday's hearing. But she said she sees major differences in the allegations against Nestle and the allegations regarding CACI's conduct at Abu Ghraib.

In the CACI case, for example, company personnel were assigned directly to Abu Ghraib under a government contract, an element that was not present in the Nestle case.

In fact, Iraq's status at the time as an invaded nation governed by the Coalition Provisional Authority, a multinational entity dominated by the U.S., calls into question whether Iraq and Abu Ghraib were truly foreign territory, lawyers for the Abu Ghraib victims argued.

Brinkema also mentioned an email from a CACI employee assigned to Abu Ghraib that she described as a potential "smoking gun." The email was uncovered in the discovery process of the lawsuit, but it is filed under seal.

But as described in generic terms in court papers and by Brinkema, it was sent by a CACI employee to his boss outlining abuses he had personally witnessed. The employee apparently resigned in protest, Brinkema said.

Brinkema said she was "amazed" that no one at CACI seemed to follow up on the employee's concerns.

O'Connor disputed that the email was incriminating. He said the email took note of improper interrogations conducted by inexperienced Army soldiers, not by CACI interrogators or supervisors.

CACI has strongly denied that any of its employees engaged in or sanctioned torture. And the three inmates who filed the suit, with the assistance of the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights, acknowledge that they were never directly assaulted or tortured by any CACI employees.

But the lawsuit alleges that CACI was complicit and aided and abetted the torture by setting up the conditions under which soldiers conducted the brutal treatment that shocked the world when photographs of the abuse were made public in 2004.

CACI's legal arguments are just the most recent in a string of challenges to the lawsuit. On two prior occasions a judge did in fact toss out the lawsuit, only to see it reinstated on appeal.

Most recently, CACI argued it had immunity from a lawsuit in the same way that the U.S. government would enjoy immunity, because it was working as a contractor at the behest of the government. But Brinkema ruled that when it comes to fundamental violations of international norms like those depicted at Abu Ghraib, the government enjoys no immunity, and neither does a government contractor.

In June, the Supreme Court let Brinkema's ruling on that issue stand.

The plaintiffs are suing under a law called the Alien Tort Statute that is among the first laws passed by Congress after the Constitution took effect in 1789. Its scope has been narrowed in recent years by a series of Supreme Court decisions.
WASHINGTON  A Pentagon program that delegated management of a huge swath of the internet to a Florida company in January  just minutes before President Donald Trump left office  has ended as mysteriously as it began, with the Defense Department this week retaking control of 175 million IP addresses.

The program had drawn scrutiny because of its unusual timing, starting amid a politically charged changeover of federal power, and because of its enormous scale. At its peak, the company, Global Resource Systems, controlled almost 6% of a section of the internet called IPv4. The IP addresses had been under Pentagon control for decades but left unused, despite being potentially worth billions of dollars on the open market.

Adding to the mystery, company registration records showed Global Resource Systems at the time was only a few months old, having been established in September 2020, and had no publicly reported federal contracts, no obvious public-facing website and no sign on the shared office space it listed as its physical address in Plantation, Fla. The company also did not respond to requests for comment, and the Pentagon did not announce the program or publicly acknowledge its existence until The Washington Post reported on it in April.

And now its done. Kind of.

On Tuesday, the Pentagon made a technical announcement  visible mainly to network administrators around the world  saying it was resuming control of the 175 million IP addresses and directing the traffic to its own servers.

On Friday the Pentagon told The Post that the pilot program, which it previously had characterized as a cybersecurity measure designed to detect unspecified vulnerabilities and prevent unauthorized use of DoD IP address space, was over. Parts of the internet once managed by Global Resource Systems, the Pentagon said, now were being overseen by the Department of Defense Information Network, known by the acronym DODIN and part of U.S. Cyber Command, based at Fort Meade.

The IP addresses had never been sold or leased to the company, merely put under its control for the pilot program, created by an elite Pentagon unit known as the Defense Digital Service, which reports directly to the secretary of defense and bills itself as a SWAT team of nerds that solves emergency problems and conducts experimental work for the military.

The Defense Digital Service established a plan to launch the cybersecurity pilot and then transition control of the initiative to DoD partners, Russell Goemaere, a spokesman for the Defense Department, said in a statement to The Post. Following the DDS pilot, shifting DoD Internet Protocol (IP) advertisement to DoDs traditional operations and mature network security processes, maintains consistency across the DODIN. This allows for active management of the IP space and ensure the Department has the operational maneuver space necessary to maintain and improve DODIN resiliency.

But the Pentagon statement shed little new light on exactly what the pilot program was doing or why it now has ended. Its clear, though, that its mission has been extended even as it comes more formally under Pentagon control.

On the unusual timing of the start of the pilot program  which began the transfer of control of IP addresses at 11:57 a.m. on Inauguration Day, three minutes before President Joe Biden took office  Goemaere added, The decision to launch and the scheduling of the DDS pilot effort was agnostic of administration change. The effort was planned and initiated in the Fall of 2020. It was launched in mid-January 2021 when the required infrastructure was in place.

Global Resource Systems did not return a request for comment Friday.

The unusual nature of the program has been tracked by several people in the networking world, including Doug Madory, director of internet analysis for Kentik, a network monitoring company.

In April, Madory, a former Air Force officer, had come to believe the program was intended to collect intelligence. By announcing control of such a large section of the internet  especially one the Pentagon had left mothballed for years  it likely was possible to reroute information flowing across the internet to military networks for examination and analysis.

Madory said Friday that routine networking errors can make such operations fruitful.

There are a lot of networks that inadvertently leak out vulnerabilities, he said. Im sure theyve been scooping that noise up for the past few months.

Such tactics, he added, can allow cyberspies to discover weaknesses in the networks of adversaries or potentially detect evidence of how adversaries are surveilling your own networks, to help inform the creation of better defenses.

Madory shared one more tantalizing fact: His analysis of traffic flowing through the internet addresses once controlled by Global Resource Systems are still leading to the same place as they have for most of the year  a computer router in Ashburn, Va., a major hub of internet connections for government agencies and private companies  despite the official resumption of Pentagon control.

The Washington Posts Alice Crites and Paul Sonne contributed to this report.
Larry Elder is escorted by a security guard on Wednesday, Sept. 8, 2021, in Venice, Calif., after a woman in a gorilla mask, at right, threw an egg at him. (Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times/TNS)

LOS ANGELES (Tribune News Service)  As the Los Angeles police investigators try to identify a woman wearing a gorilla mask who threw an egg at Republican gubernatorial candidate Larry Elder in Venice, some of the talk show hosts supporters are complaining that the Wednesday incident that forced Elder to cut his campaigning short is not generating more outrage.

The gorilla mask prompted conservative commentators to suggest that the incident was racially motivated, given the history of dehumanizing Black people with ape imagery.

Two law enforcement sources told the Los Angeles Times on Friday that the department was working the case as a misdemeanor battery because the woman gave no indication she was moved by hate in a video taken at the scene. But they stressed that no decision will be made until shes identified and police get more details about what happened.

The altercation occurred when Elder, as part of his Recall Express campaign bus tour, was visiting homeless encampments Wednesday morning when he was angrily surrounded by a group of homeless people and advocates.

When a male aide confronted the woman who threw the egg and missed, she slapped him in the face.

According to a police statement: As the aide and Mr. Elder continue walking to their vehicle, the aide was approached by a male, white, bald, wearing a grey T-shirt yelling profanities at him, who struck him in the back of the head. During that altercation, an unknown individual approached the aide from the side and struck him in the face.

Detectives are seeking both assailants as part of the investigation.

Elder and his team hastily parted in an SUV, 12 minutes after arriving.

Police say a more dangerous incident occurred earlier that day outside a senior center in Hollywood when someone fired a pellet gun at Elders entourage and struck a staffer in the buttocks.

Detectives from the Robbery Homicide Division are investigating that attack and have no strong leads. This is the more serious incident involving the candidate, Robbery Homicide Capt. Jonathan Tippet said.

After the attacks on Wednesday, Elder tweeted: Today I kicked off the Recall Express bus tour. Before we even left Los Angeles, my security detail was physically assaulted, shot with a pellet gun, and hit with projectiles. The intolerant left will not stop us.

The next day he blamed the hostility in Venice on Gov. Gavin Newsoms failure to curb the homelessness crisis in California. The reason that happened is because I was at the intersection of rising crime and homelessness here in California, Elder said at a campaign event Thursday afternoon in Glendale.

Elder told Fox News later that day that racial epithets were yelled during the fracas, elaborating only that one person said, Larry Elder doesnt give a blank about Black people; Larry Elder only cares about white people.

He said he did not know if the egg-thrower was acting out of racism, but he complained that Democrats and the media would have hyped up the story if he were liberal.

Im not somebody who pulls out the race card the way Barack Obama does, the way Al Sharpton does, the way CNN does, the way Black Lives Matter does, he said. Maybe it was just an idiot. Maybe it was just a fool. Maybe it was just someone who doesnt like Larry Elder.

All I know is: If I were a liberal, and somebody wearing a gorilla mask who was a white woman threw an egg at me, the left would be screaming about systemic racism, he continued.

Other conservatives have jumped in with similar accusations of a double standard.

If Elder were a Democrat, the attack would have been instantly and with good reason dubbed racist, wrote Kyle Smith in the National Review. It would not only be front-page news, it would be just about the only news you were hearing about today on CNN and MSNBC. ... We would be treated to multiple news analyses about the history of the usage of gorilla tropes against blacks.

Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva tweeted: QUESTION: How is this not a hate crime?

ANSWER: Because woke privilege means a white woman can wear a gorilla mask and attack a black man without fear of being called a racist.

Where is the outrage from our politicians?

___

2021 Los Angeles Times.

Visit at latimes.com.

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
Air Force veteran Richard Pitera, left, and Al Lester look over some photos that Pitera had taken while serving in the Vietnam War. Lester hosted a luncheon recently to return the photos to Pitera, who is retired and living in Murphy, N.C. (Wayne Ford/Athens Banner-Herald)

ATHENS, Ga.  In 1968, a young U.S. Air Force captain assigned as a photographer was trekking through the cities and countryside of South Vietnam focusing his lens on city scenes, infantrymen and the casualties of war.

Fifty-three years later, Richard Pitera sat at a table in an Athens restaurant across from two other Vietnam War veterans, Jerry Crawley and Stan Sheram. On this day, he was reunited with at least a thousand of those photos he took during those dangerous days.

Did you ever wonder what happened to them, Crawley asked about the boxes of photo slides lost after Piteras military career was over.

No, Pitera quickly responded. I was not one to resurrect Vietnam.

The boxes of slides were left in the attic of a Duluth home where Pitera once lived. Somehow, the slides ended up at a thrift store in Athens, where they were purchased about 20 years ago. About six months ago, the slides ended up in the hands of retired University of Georgia employee Al Lester, who was inspired to seek out the unknown photographer.

Lester engaged the help of two friends, Crawley, a retired state probation officer, and Sheram. The two men are photo hobbyists, as is Lester.

They couldnt find a thing, Lester said as he recalled their efforts to identify the photographer during a luncheon he hosted recently as a way of returning the photos to Pitera. The only viable clue the men had was the last name of Pitera visible in a photo showing the airmans name tag.

An Aug. 23 news story about the mystery photos on the Athens Banner-Herald website sparked the interest of Sandy Baumwald, a seasoned Athens genealogist who within hours found Pitera and his wife, Joanne, living in retirement in the mountain town of Murphy, North Carolina.

One of the Vietnam War-era photos that Athens, Ga., man Al Lester is attempting to return to the family of the photographer. Most of the photos in a collection that Lester now owns were taken during the Vietnam War. Although he examined the photos closely, he has been unable to put a full name on this mysterious airman who was an adept photographer. (Facebook)

Lester arranged to have the slides returned to Pitera, but he also had them digitized to be viewable on a computer. That eliminated having to find a vintage slide viewer.

The gathering occurred at the Hilltop Grille in Athens, where Lester also hosted Baumwald, Crawley, Sheram and a news crew from WSB-TV in Atlanta.

What intrigued Lester about the photos is that instead of scenes of war, these particular photos captured by the airman showed everyday life in Southeast Asia. There were also some taken in Japan and Hawaii, which Pitera described as my R&R.

Pitera was grateful to have the photos returned, but the retired chemist said his two sons and daughter were even more enthused.

The Pitera family plans to gather during the Thanksgiving holiday for a showing of the photos.

That will be the highlight of the day, he said. I cant believe how excited the kids are.

Lester and Pitera also shared their thoughts with the Atlanta news media.

The two men were interviewed by WSB reporter Berndt Petersen about their story of how boxes of old photos had resurrected memories of days long ago in a faraway country.
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Changes to the SunCommercial's back end processing means the e-edition is getting a facelift. The biggest change is the e-edition, by default, is now presented in Text view.
Critical borders workers who must be vaccinated against Covid-19 by the end of the month are able to apply for an exemption, but no one has yet done so.

The news comes as a small number of port workers in Tauranga resist getting vaccinated, citing their rights under the Human Rights Act.

Maritime Union figures suggest that at least 83 per cent of critical maritime workers have received the vaccine.

And Ministry of Heath figures show that 98 per cent of government-employed border workers required to do so are fully vaccinated, with a further 17 recorded as having had one dose.

Another 50 workers who were originally shown as unvaccinated were found on follow-up to have received at least one vaccination.

However, in the Bay of Plenty, only 70 per cent of Taurangas active port workers had received at least one dose of the vaccine.

Compulsory vaccination rules were extended in July for ports and airports, as well as for those coming into contact with quarantining air crews.

The Maritime Border Order required all affected government employees to have their first dose by August 26, and privately employed border workers by the end of September.

After then, unvaccinated workers will not be able to do frontline work and they will need to discuss options with their employer.

For workers who can't take the vaccination for medical or personal reasons, there is an supply chain exemption to the Vaccination Order, but the Ministry of Health has confirmed no one has applied for it yet.

Craig Harrison, chief executive of the Maritime Workers Union, thought it was unlikely many people will do so.

They would have to have a role that no one else can do.

The exemption criteria sets a high bar. It can only be sought by an employer, on behalf of a named worker, and requires ministerial approval.

Applications would be reviewed by a cross agency panel within the Ministry of Transport, with the minister making the final decision, a ministry website says.

Criteria includes the importance of the workers' job to the supply chain, the amount of contact with other critical border workers, the worker's reasons for rejecting vaccination and the information they had received.

The exemption is expected to help deal with the issue of critical workers who have health issues if they take the vaccine.

But it doesnt address the debate over whether other employers can compel their workers to take the vaccine.

Air New Zealand has announced it wants 4000 staff to be vaccinated and Auckland Airport has recently announced compulsory vaccinations for frontline and new staff.

Trucking unions support the vaccination programme, but say they will represent members who refuse to take it.

People have the right to refuse medical treatment and it would require a legislation change to make that happen, says First Union national secretary Jared Abbot.

While the issue has yet to be fully tested by the courts, a decision by the Employment Relations Authority last week upheld the dismissal of a border worker for the Customs Service.

The worker was dismissed along with eight other frontline border staff who refused to be vaccinated in May.

One man claiming to be a truck driver that regularly went to and from the Ports of Auckland told Stuff his employer had required him to be vaccinated, even though he did not think he came into contact with anyone working directly with the ships.

The man, who asked not to be identified, says his company had told him he needed to undergo regular testing every 14 days under the Maritime Border Order and had to wear masks.

It seemed so unfair when there were port workers that did not seem to need to do the same, he says.

Harrison says he could not see why a truck driver at the port would need the jab.

And not everyone who worked on the port was compelled to get one, either.

The easy way to look at it is if your work involves going up the gangway or being on a ship, you must have your first vaccination by September 30.

Ports of Auckland spokesman Matt Ball says the vaccination order is being well observed by port staff and that in the higher risk roles, all its marine pilots and 95 per cent of stevedores had had one dose.

There are 310 staff on the Border Worker Testing Register at the port and at least 83 per cent are vaccinated.

All visitors to the port are being asked to wear a mask, he says.

Ball also confirmed that a crew member on a ship which berthed at the port recently tested positive for Covid in MIQ.

The crew member went straight into MIQ before the current lockdown.

Only a small number of our staff worked on the ship, they were all notified and received appropriate follow-up, he says.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Health is turning its attention to vaccinations in the businesses sector, saying district health boards will be contacting large firms to advise workers on how to book vaccines set aside for essential workers.

Smaller businesses would also be able to tap into this facility and the ministry is also working with Whakarongorau (a telehealth service) to set up a process for small and sole operator businesses.

-Stuff/Catherine Harris.
The possibility of another liquor store in Brookfield has spurred the community into action, with a local school filing a petition to oppose it.

An application has been made to Tauranga City Councils environmental health and licensing team for a Super Liquor store in Ridge Plaza, at 2 Jude Place.

There are already three shops that sell alcohol within 300 metres of Brookfield School, and Principal Ngaere Durie says another one is unnecessary.

She is worried about the impact it will have on students and the community - especially with high numbers of elderly people living in the area.

Were concerned around the social problems that come with it, says Ngaere.

Whether its from alcohol-related harm, alcohol consumption, violence or other crime, driving and any motor vehicle accidents and especially binge drinking.

There are also three early childhood centres in close proximity to the proposed shop.

The proposed store hours are from 9am to 10pm, seven days a week.

The store will be open for the entire school day, and Ngaere is worried about children walking home when theyve finished after-school care.

We could be exposed to some highly intoxicated people during the school day, she says. I'm not keen on that at all, because it becomes a security issue.

There are further concerns around students seeing advertising for alcohol and vaping, as well as the risk of them encountering intoxicated people.

Children are naturally inquisitive, and I would rather they ask questions about positive things rather than alcohol ads or people that they might see drinking, says Ngaere.

The proposed store is just across the road from the new site for Brookfield School, around 500m from the current school on Millers Road.

In 2019 the Ministry of Education announced a new school would be built because of the burgeoning roll, and plans have recently been finalised. A start date for the build is yet to be confirmed.

Ngaere says the community has backed the schools stance, with lots of people coming to sign the petition and making their own submissions.

We have a very tight community, she says. We support each other.

As part of the process, applications are publically notified and people have 15 days to object in writing. The notification period ended on August 4.

Tauranga City Council team leader of environmental health and licensing, Sam Kemp, says a significant number of public objections to the application have been received.

The liquor licensing team is awaiting reports from the medical officer of health, the police and the alcohol licensing inspector, he says.

Once completed, the application will go to the independent District Licensing Committee who will decide if there is a need for a public hearing and determine the outcome of the application.

With the current number of objections received, it is likely that a public hearing will be held, says Sam.

Ngaere says she will attend the hearing if there is one.
Contact tracers are urgently investigating four mystery Covid-19 cases where officials don't know how or when the person caught the virus.

Experts say the unsolved cases could keep Auckland locked down.

Genomic testing suggests two cases in one household may have got the virus from someone unknown, while two people who tested positive for Covid at Middlemore Hospital have not been linked to other cases. Cabinet is due to consider the Auckland restrictions on Monday.

On Friday, the Ministry of Health reported 11 new community cases, all in Auckland. The total number of cases in the current outbreak rose to 879, of whom 288 have recovered. There are 27 people with Covid in Auckland hospitals, four in intensive care and on ventilators.

The ministry has started reporting on the number of epidemiologically unlinked sub-clusters in the outbreak. These are groups of people who have tested positive for Covid-19 but haven't been linked to the wider outbreak. The ministry said the unlinked sub-clusters were genomically linked to the outbreak, but had yet to be linked to a known exposure event.

Seven police officers are in isolation after coming into contact with a woman who was tested for Covid at Middlemore Hospital on Thursday and returned a positive result. Thirty-six patients at the hospital were also potentially exposed to the virus after coming into contact with the woman. Staff at the hospital were wearing appropriate PPE and none had to be stood down.

Police from around the country arrived in Hamilton on Friday to help at the ten road checkpoints on the Auckland-Waikato boundary. Of the 45 reinforcements, 32 flew in on an air force C-130 Hercules.

The Government is downplaying any chance the trans-Tasman bubble could reopen soon. A Melbourne epidemiologist said the return of a full bubble would only be possible if both countries were vaccinated and accepted Covid in the community.

Vaccinated seasonal workers from Samoa, Tonga and Vanuatu will be able to travel to New Zealand without going through managed isolation and quarantine in time for the upcoming picking season, the Government says.

New Zealand's summer festival season is in doubt amid uncertainty over Covid restrictions. Tens of thousands of people are due to pack into party hot spots, but event organisers are concerned predicted tougher alert level 1 restrictions could see unworkable caps on crowd sizes.

Cafes, restaurants and bar owners around the country are anxious about the new level 2 rules, with some refusing to take on what they say is a policing role. University of Canterbury law professor John Hopkins says while businesses were required to encourage mask wearing, individuals were the ones facing prosecution if they refused to wear one without an exemption.

A Levin cafe owner says she has been the target of threats and online backlash after encouraging customers to question mandatory vaccinations and refusing to display QR codes.

A dozen Defence Force personnel are taking court action in a bid to keep their jobs despite declining to have Covid-19 vaccinations. Their lawyer, Christopher Griggs, said none of the group could be labelled anti vaccine, because theyd generally had every other injection required of them.

The applicants are standing up for their fundamental freedom to decline medical treatment without then being treated prejudicially," says Christopher.

Global toll

On Saturday morning Johns Hopkins University was showing nearly 223.6 million confirmed Covid cases worldwide, with more than 4.6 million deaths attributed to the disease, while about 5.62 billion vaccine doses have been administered.

The US has more than 40.7 million cases and 656,139 deaths, India has nearly 33.2 million cases and 442,009 deaths, and Brazil has nearly 21 million cases and 585,174 deaths.

What should I do?

Anyone who wants to get tested can find their local testing centres by visiting the Ministry of Health website.

Quarantine-free travel from Australia has been suspended.

The country outside of Auckland is at alert level 2, with masks mandatory for people over the age of 12 in more public places, such as libraries and malls.

People should use the Covid-19 tracer app.

If you are sick, call your GP before you visit, or Healthline on 0800 358 5453.

To avoid contracting and spreading the virus, wash your hands properly, cough and sneeze into the crook of your elbow and throw tissues away immediately.

To find support from people who care, connect with your community or help a neighbour in need.
One lucky Lotto player will be having a weekend to remember after winning $1 million with Lotto First Division in Saturday nights Lotto draw.

The winning ticket was sold on MyLotto to a player from Hawkes Bay.

Powerball was not struck on Saturday night and has rolled over to Wednesday night, where the jackpot will be $10 million.

Strike Four was not struck on Saturday night and will be $300,000 on Wednesday.

Eight lucky Lotto players will be celebrating after each winning $30,074 with Lotto Second Division in last nights Lotto draw.

Two lucky players also won Powerball Second Division, taking their total winnings to $ 37,815. The winning Powerball Second Division tickets were sold on MyLotto to players from Auckland and Whanganui.

The winning Second Division tickets were sold at the following stores:

Store Location MyLotto (x2) (+PBx 1) Auckland MyLotto Hamilton Countdown Paeroa Paeroa MyLotto Tauranga MyLotto New Plymouth MyLotto (+PB) Whanganui MyLotto Wellington

All Lotto counters within the Auckland region continue to remain closed while in Alert Level 4 lockdown. During this time, customers in Auckland will only be able to buy tickets online at MyLotto.

Our live draws are unable to continue while Auckland remains in Level 4 lockdown, so during this time computer generated draws will be held for Lotto, Powerball and Strike under Audit New Zealand scrutiny.

The rest of the country is currently at Alert Level 2. Lotto NZ counters outside the Auckland region are open and will continue to follow the Governments health and safety guidelines.

To find out about the draws, claiming prizes and Lotto NZs response to COVID-19, visit mylotto.co.nz/covid-19

Anyone who bought their ticket from any of the above stores should check their ticket online at mylotto.co.nz or through the Lotto NZ App.
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Former Councilor Joe Byrd cuts the ribbon for the opening of Bliss Ave. on Sept. 3. From left are: Cherokee Nation Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Executive Director Michael Lynn, Secretary of State Tina Glory Jordan, Deputy Chief Bryan Warner, Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr., Special Envoy for International Affairs and Language Preservation and former District 2 Tribal Councilor Joe Byrd, current District 2 Tribal Councilor Candessa Tehee, Tahlequah City Administrator Alan Chapman, Cherokee Nation Transportation Director Andy Quetone, Tahlequah Mayor Sue Catron, Cherokee Nation Chief of Staff Todd Enlow.
For the second week in a row, Florida Department of Health reported fewer new COVID-19 cases; however, the opposite is true for deaths with an increase of nearly 2,500 for the week of Sept. 3-9.
som9729 BHPian

Join Date: Jun 2021 Location: VKR Posts: 27 Thanked: 40 Times

Re: Need advice on a car that's been unused for 6 years Quote: lifeinpune Originally Posted by



Posting this on behalf of a friend who has a Chevy Spark that has been lying unused for 6+ years. From what I have been told it has not even been started once in this time. All the tyres are flat and unfortunately car has been still the entire period. Location is Bangalore, car is parked in the basement and hasn't seen rain or sun during this entire time.



I looked up a couple of threads on this topic



- https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/suvs-...lked-away.html (Toyota Innova, unused for 4 years - Worth considering? EDIT: Walked away!)

- https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/techn...an-1-year.html (What things can go wrong if a car is kept idle for more than 1 year?)



The friend wants to know whether this car can be revived at all and if so what all things will need to be inspected / changed and what would be the likely cost. Given that this is a Chevy Spark, I am very skeptical. Will try to upload some pictures of the car exteriors and interiors. Dear BHPians,Posting this on behalf of a friend who has a Chevy Spark that has been lying unused for 6+ years. From what I have been told it has not even been started once in this time. All the tyres are flat and unfortunately car has been still the entire period. Location is Bangalore, car is parked in the basement and hasn't seen rain or sun during this entire time.I looked up a couple of threads on this topicThe friend wants to know whether this car can be revived at all and if so what all things will need to be inspected / changed and what would be the likely cost. Given that this is a Chevy Spark, I am very skeptical. Will try to upload some pictures of the car exteriors and interiors.

But bear in mind, that if the condition of the car is too bad, then your expense might be too much.



So have a meaningful budget limit, like 25k-30k, and if that limit is breached by a large %, at that point consider scrapping the car.



Point being that if the car can be genuinely repaired within the 25-30k, its worth doing.

Else its not.



Also factor in expenses for a interior 3M wash with AC vent deep cleaning.

Costs around 3k

Exterior wash - 800rs



Do consult a pro mechanic to actually evaluate the car before hand, and come up with actual estimates (incl his labor charges) Follow steps in above posts regarding getting the car repaired.But bear in mind, that if the condition of the car is too bad, then your expense might be too much.So have a meaningful budget limit, like 25k-30k, and if that limit is breached by a large %, at that point consider scrapping the car.Point being that if the car can be genuinely repaired within the 25-30k, its worth doing.Else its not.Also factor in expenses for a interior 3M wash with AC vent deep cleaning.Costs around 3kExterior wash - 800rsDo consult a pro mechanic to actually evaluate the car before hand, and come up with actual estimates (incl his labor charges)
LONG_TOURER BHPian



Join Date: Feb 2021 Location: CCU/GAU Posts: 57 Thanked: 452 Times

View My Garage





Assam To Ladakh in a Hyundai Tucson



Well, i feel the most easiest part of a road trip is to select the destination, the other difficult factors like execution of the trip follows later. When i say a road trip to Ladakh from Assam, it means covering atleast 2300kms through the plains all the way from Guwahati to foothills of Himalayas crossing chandigarh. Hence a thorough waypoints and stopovers needed to be decided before actually taking the trip and the most difficult part would be to get the leaves on the desired dates. Leave was not an issue for Wife as she is working from home at the moment, however i had to do some nice buttering with my boss to get those two long weeks off.



When i told about my road trip plan to my boss, he got as excited as my friends did, such is the hype the ladakh trip has amongst us Indians. He immediately approved the leaves. The dates of the trip had been decided from 17th August to 31st August 2021.



We decided to take the Manali-Leh-Manali circuit as taking Srinagar route is a bit risky affair due to rigorous road construction and lot of reported traffic jam in jammu-srinagar highway. I have even heard people getting stucked for 5-6 hours in Jammu-Srinagar route after chenani tunnel. I would be happy to drive extra miles of 5-6 hours than getting stucked for 5-6 hours at the same spot. Now, we knew that taking Manali-leh route would make us more prone to Acute Mountain Sickness or AMS as they call it. Also the road condition between Manali to Leh is not in great shape with lot of water stream crossings and high altitude passes. But we were prepared for the same. Ofcourse the obvious choice of vehicle would be our humble Tucson and not the elantra if we want to come back in one piece from the mighty Himalayas.







Before actually taking trip, i went through various travelogues and vlogs regarding various precautions to be taken in the trip. Accordingly an essential shopping list was created and the items were brought. The list includes



1) Fuel jerry can 20L - 1nos

2) Portable oxygen cylinder - 3 nos

3) Tyre inflator ( i already had this)

4) Medicines - Diamox, loose motion medicines, Sentizin (for cold), Saridon, Avomin.

5) Rope and M-seals

6) Portable powerbank to charge our devices

7) multiport 12V DC charger to keep our devices charged while in move.



After everything were packed into our car, we were all set to go.



Day 1) Guwahati to Durgapur ( 970kms)(Messy Kishangunj & Dalkhola)

As my current work station is located at Durgapur, we decided to take a night hault there. Durgapur is a city in the state of west bengal and is famous for Durgapur steel plant. We started off at around 4.30 am in the morning and took Guwahati-Nalbari-Siliguri-Dalkhola-Bhagalpur-Dumka-Asansol-Durgapur route. Now, this route may sound very easy on paper but it isn't. The road from Guwahati to Siliguri is in great shape as you drive through Toll roads (NH27, NH317 and NH17) all the way. The route is very scenic before approaching Siliguri with beautiful Dooars welcoming you the moment you hit West Bengal. Dooars is the alluvial plain in the northeastern part of India in the foot of Himalayas.



The real thrill however starts when you cross Siliguri. I agree that roads have improved over the years but are far from good. There are flyover construction happening at kishangunj junction and also at the Dalkhola junction. You need to be careful with the time at which you cross these junctions. We crossed these junctions in afternoon leading to relatively low traffic jams. Please note that if you wish to cross these junctions at night, you can expect long queue of trucks along the road which would delay your trip by atleast 3 hours (based on my previous experience). We reached bhagalpur by pass by 4 pm same day and took the SH19 of Bihar side and continued till Bounsi, the same road changes to SH17 once you step into Jharkhand. The road as usual has moderate traffic with few jams on small towns. These two SHs are 2- Lane undivided road, so you better be crossing this stretch before the dark set in. Else be prepared to get attacked by highbeamers. We could not cross this in daylight though. After Dumka, the traffic becomes very sparse and you would love driving in this stretch. We encountered few moon sized potholes as we reached West Bengal-Jharkhand border but our car took it in its stride without any underbelly hits. The roads become great again with 6 Lanes all the way till durgapur after asansol which is a part of NH19. We reached home by 11.30pm at night.



Trip : Guwahati,AS to Durgapur,WB

Distance : 970kms

Time : 19 hours ( with 2 hours meal and powernap break)





Somewhere on NH27 Between Guwahati To Siliguri





Enroute Dumka





A River coming out of the Lower Himalayas at Dooars





Lovely Dooars Somewhere on NH27 Between Guwahati To SiliguriEnroute DumkaA River coming out of the Lower Himalayas at DooarsLovely Dooars











Day 2 & Day 3

Durgapur, WB to Agra, UP (1140kms)

(Stock Nexen tyres gave up on us)



After doing Guwahati to Durgapur route, we thought we had covered the hardest route in the plains and rest of the trip should be smooth with NHs and Expressways till we reach chandigarh. But God had some other plans for us.



At the time of our travel it was mandatory to have covid negative RTPCR report before entering ladakh within 96hours. Hence we decided to give our samples at Sanaka hospitals, durgapur. Also as my Tucson covered around 19xxx kms, i sent the car for usual 20k service at Rudra, Hyundai Durgapur. Rest of the essential shopping we did at Durgapur. Car was topped up with DEF (adblu) by myself once i got it back from service.



It was by 5 pm in the evening we started off for our journey to Agra. We took Durgapur-Dhanbad-Varanasi-Prayagraj-raebareilyy-Lucknow-Agra route. From Durgapur to Prayagraj we kept driving on NH19. The road from Durgapur to Dhanbad is good with 6 lanes with few diversions here and there but a good pace can be maintained. Dhanbad to Barhi junction most of the construction activites have been completed, hence no jams and very less diversions. However after barhi we were stuck in traffic jam for 1 hour due to head on collision involving two lorrys in one of the road diversions. Thanks to NHAI patrolling team, the accident vehicles were moved out of the road and we were good to go again. RIP to the drivers of the lorrys, It was a major accident. Apart from this incident, the road was mostly clear but quality of the roads deteriorated when we stepped into Bihar. One should be really careful in the culvert areas/bridges in this stretch of NH19 in Bihar as the broken roads may damage your suspension. I am glad to inform you that the bottleneck of Chandauli, Dehri on Sone, Sasaram toll plaza are no longer bottlenecks. We passed through these like a breeze. There was minor traffic jam in the Varanasi toll plaza but it was not that serious one. We crossed Varanasi toll plaza at around 1.30 am.



The Rain Gods were not very pleased with us making the progress of our trip smoothly and they decided to shower us with their blessings once we crossed Varanasi. It rained cats and dogs all the way to Prayagraj and we could bare go beyond 40kmph due to very low visibilty. At around 4.30 am we moved to the side of the road and took a nap of 1.5 hour since the rain didnt stopped at all and we didnt wanted to drive with such low Visibilty. One thing i like to add here is the presence of Halogen fog lamps in the Tucson. Ofcourse they may look very ugly with the LED headlamps but they serve the purpose very well in heavy rains and fogs. I wonder why manufacturers now a days do not add halogen fog lamps to their new offering. No doubt the LEDs lit the road better under normal conditions, but are completely useless in rain, no wonder why we see baleno, creta, seltos being driven with high beam on monsoons because they can barely see anything in rain.



We again started our journey at around 6am but what came in due course was not at all expected.



We continued driving till prayagraj, the patch of road between varanasi to prayagraj is mostly 4 lane concrete road and we gained speed once the rain intensity decreased. Being concrete road, i kept on monitoring the tyre pressure at every 30 mins. The tyre pressure was fine at 35PSI all around. However, just after driving the car for 30 mins, we heard a loud burst from the rear left wheel. I knew it was a tyre burst. Tucson TPMS suddenly showed TPMS malfunction within 10seconds of the burst and we moved to the side of the road again. Upon examining, i found that the rear left tyre was completely flat. Took the tyre inflator and tried to inflate the tyre, but in vain.



I had to move the car for another 1km with the flat tyre as the place where the tyre had burst was totally deserted and i did not wanted to take risk with a female companion. With no other option, i had to take out all our languages and equipments from the boot to take out the space saver, changed the tyre with space saver in heavy rain. It was a challenging task. Let me remind you, you cant find a tyre shop at around 6.30 am. The burst tyre was completely useless as the whole rubber was sheared off from the contact portion. I was shocked to find the quality of these nexen tyres so bad which are offered in a car costing 25L. I would advice all the tucson owners to get the stock nexen tyres changed before embarking on a long road trip.



Now the space saver the tucson comes with has a size of 135/70/17 which has a restricted speed limit of 80kmph. So Good luck taking your car to Ladakh with that space saver. Another problem is size of main tyres, they are 225/55/R18. I know i wouldn't find the replacement of these tyre in small cities like Prayagraj and Rae bareli. Hence decided to continue with the space saver all the way to lucknow with maximum speed at 60kmph. Do note that the road from Prayagraj to Rae Bareli is around 110 kms (NH30) which is completely 2 Lane undivided highway. With heavy rain and thin tyre, we couldnt move beyond 40kmph in this whole stretch which added to further delay.



By 11 am we reached Lucknow and i enquired about the tyre availability of 225/55/R18 size. I knew bridgestone makes this size of tyre, called up few bridgestone dealer but they didnt had stock of this size. Totally frustrated with the tyre scene, I was almost cancelling the trip untill a bridgestone dealer called me back stating that he have stock of 235/55/R18 Pirelli scorpion tyres. This new size means i cannot change only one tyre but all four tyres but i said i would change all four tyres as i was pretty much unsatisfied with the stock nexens. Went to the dealer and checked the manufacturing dates of the tyre which were december 2020 make and nodded yes to them ( as if i had any other choice).



After all the tyre episode ended, we set off for Agra once again at around 1.30 pm and it was going to be my first time experiencing India's longest expressway of 340kms, the Agra-Luckmow Expressway. With a speed limit of 100 kmph, driving at ALE feels just like playing a video game. All vehicles be it a Hyundai Eon or Range rover would ply at 100kmph and honestly its quite boring once the initial excitement fades. ALE have two petrol pumps along with food joint in between separated by a distance of 100kms. We had our lunch at one of the food joints and continued till agra.



We reached agra by 5.30 in the evening and straight away drove to Tajmahal to keep up our confidance high which was badly thrashed due to whole tyre episode. We crashed into hotel at around 7 and called it a day.





Car being serviced at Rudra Hyundai, Durgapur (3rd Free service at 20k kms)







Clean car after the service





Roads from Durgapur to Dhanbad now almost complete. Less traffic and 6 lane roads Clean car after the serviceRoads from Durgapur to Dhanbad now almost complete. Less traffic and 6 lane roads



Roads in Bihar before Sasaram





Stretch of NH30 between Prayagraj and Raebarelli





The Ugly space saver with 135mm section with a speed restriction of 80kmph





This how it looks from the rear.





Lucknow welcomed us with a overcast weather





Replaced the stock Nexen 225/55/R18 with Pirelli scorpions 235/55/R18. Everything has improved ever since. The ride quality, road noise, handling





Greenery across the streets of Lucknow





Approaching ALE for the first time. The excitement was at its peak







Tucson Enjoying the tarmac of Agra Lucknow expressway





Some more pictures of ALE





Stop over at Agra Lucknow expressway where you could find good food, washrooms and fuel. You could also avail a night stay accommodation here Car being serviced at Rudra Hyundai, Durgapur (3rd Free service at 20k kms)Roads in Bihar before SasaramStretch of NH30 between Prayagraj and RaebarelliThe Ugly space saver with 135mm section with a speed restriction of 80kmphThis how it looks from the rear.Lucknow welcomed us with a overcast weatherReplaced the stock Nexen 225/55/R18 with Pirelli scorpions 235/55/R18. Everything has improved ever since. The ride quality, road noise, handlingGreenery across the streets of LucknowApproaching ALE for the first time. The excitement was at its peakTucson Enjoying the tarmac of Agra Lucknow expresswaySome more pictures of ALEStop over at Agra Lucknow expressway where you could find good food, washrooms and fuel. You could also avail a night stay accommodation here



Heavy rain during our approach to ALE





Beautiful roads and the smiling sun





The Symbol of Love, The Taj Mahal





No wonder it is a wonder of the world Heavy rain during our approach to ALEBeautiful roads and the smiling sunThe Symbol of Love, The Taj MahalNo wonder it is a wonder of the world





Trip : Durgapur, WB to Agra, UP

Distance : 1180 kms ( drove in Lucknow)

Time : 24.5 hours ( Bio breaks, powernap, food stop, fuel stop included)

Stay : ITC Mughal, Agra It was during the end of 2020 when COVID seemed to diminishing in Inda, My wife (then girlfriend) and I had decided that we would go on a long road trip across New Zealand after our marriage. But all plannings came to a hault when the COVID again hit us with its 2nd wave in a more deadly manner. Our wedding actually happened amidst the peak of 2nd wave and all the plans for road trip went for a toss due to covid as well as financial constraints. Slowly as time passed by, COVID cases reduced, urge to go on a road trip increased exponentially. It was then when we both decided to keep the road trip plan on, albeit within India. After thorough discussion and enough persuasion with parents of both sides, the trip was decided. Yes, you guessed it right. A road trip to Ladakh !Well, i feel the most easiest part of a road trip is to select the destination, the other difficult factors like execution of the trip follows later. When i say a road trip to Ladakh from Assam, it means covering atleast 2300kms through the plains all the way from Guwahati to foothills of Himalayas crossing chandigarh. Hence a thorough waypoints and stopovers needed to be decided before actually taking the trip and the most difficult part would be to get the leaves on the desired dates. Leave was not an issue for Wife as she is working from home at the moment, however i had to do some nice buttering with my boss to get those two long weeks off.When i told about my road trip plan to my boss, he got as excited as my friends did, such is the hype the ladakh trip has amongst us Indians. He immediately approved the leaves. The dates of the trip had been decided from 17th August to 31st August 2021.We decided to take the Manali-Leh-Manali circuit as taking Srinagar route is a bit risky affair due to rigorous road construction and lot of reported traffic jam in jammu-srinagar highway. I have even heard people getting stucked for 5-6 hours in Jammu-Srinagar route after chenani tunnel. I would be happy to drive extra miles of 5-6 hours than getting stucked for 5-6 hours at the same spot. Now, we knew that taking Manali-leh route would make us more prone to Acute Mountain Sickness or AMS as they call it. Also the road condition between Manali to Leh is not in great shape with lot of water stream crossings and high altitude passes. But we were prepared for the same. Ofcourse the obvious choice of vehicle would be our humble Tucson and not the elantra if we want to come back in one piece from the mighty Himalayas.Before actually taking trip, i went through various travelogues and vlogs regarding various precautions to be taken in the trip. Accordingly an essential shopping list was created and the items were brought. The list includes1) Fuel jerry can 20L - 1nos2) Portable oxygen cylinder - 3 nos3) Tyre inflator ( i already had this)4) Medicines - Diamox, loose motion medicines, Sentizin (for cold), Saridon, Avomin.5) Rope and M-seals6) Portable powerbank to charge our devices7) multiport 12V DC charger to keep our devices charged while in move.After everything were packed into our car, we were all set to go.As my current work station is located at Durgapur, we decided to take a night hault there. Durgapur is a city in the state of west bengal and is famous for Durgapur steel plant. We started off at around 4.30 am in the morning and took Guwahati-Nalbari-Siliguri-Dalkhola-Bhagalpur-Dumka-Asansol-Durgapur route. Now, this route may sound very easy on paper but it isn't. The road from Guwahati to Siliguri is in great shape as you drive through Toll roads (NH27, NH317 and NH17) all the way. The route is very scenic before approaching Siliguri with beautiful Dooars welcoming you the moment you hit West Bengal. Dooars is the alluvial plain in the northeastern part of India in the foot of Himalayas.The real thrill however starts when you cross Siliguri. I agree that roads have improved over the years but are far from good. There are flyover construction happening at kishangunj junction and also at the Dalkhola junction. You need to be careful with the time at which you cross these junctions. We crossed these junctions in afternoon leading to relatively low traffic jams. Please note that if you wish to cross these junctions at night, you can expect long queue of trucks along the road which would delay your trip by atleast 3 hours (based on my previous experience). We reached bhagalpur by pass by 4 pm same day and took the SH19 of Bihar side and continued till Bounsi, the same road changes to SH17 once you step into Jharkhand. The road as usual has moderate traffic with few jams on small towns. These two SHs are 2- Lane undivided road, so you better be crossing this stretch before the dark set in. Else be prepared to get attacked by highbeamers. We could not cross this in daylight though. After Dumka, the traffic becomes very sparse and you would love driving in this stretch. We encountered few moon sized potholes as we reached West Bengal-Jharkhand border but our car took it in its stride without any underbelly hits. The roads become great again with 6 Lanes all the way till durgapur after asansol which is a part of NH19. We reached home by 11.30pm at night.Trip : Guwahati,AS to Durgapur,WBDistance : 970kmsTime : 19 hours ( with 2 hours meal and powernap break)After doing Guwahati to Durgapur route, we thought we had covered the hardest route in the plains and rest of the trip should be smooth with NHs and Expressways till we reach chandigarh. But God had some other plans for us.At the time of our travel it was mandatory to have covid negative RTPCR report before entering ladakh within 96hours. Hence we decided to give our samples at Sanaka hospitals, durgapur. Also as my Tucson covered around 19xxx kms, i sent the car for usual 20k service at Rudra, Hyundai Durgapur. Rest of the essential shopping we did at Durgapur. Car was topped up with DEF (adblu) by myself once i got it back from service.It was by 5 pm in the evening we started off for our journey to Agra. We took Durgapur-Dhanbad-Varanasi-Prayagraj-raebareilyy-Lucknow-Agra route. From Durgapur to Prayagraj we kept driving on NH19. The road from Durgapur to Dhanbad is good with 6 lanes with few diversions here and there but a good pace can be maintained. Dhanbad to Barhi junction most of the construction activites have been completed, hence no jams and very less diversions. However after barhi we were stuck in traffic jam for 1 hour due to head on collision involving two lorrys in one of the road diversions. Thanks to NHAI patrolling team, the accident vehicles were moved out of the road and we were good to go again. RIP to the drivers of the lorrys, It was a major accident. Apart from this incident, the road was mostly clear but quality of the roads deteriorated when we stepped into Bihar. One should be really careful in the culvert areas/bridges in this stretch of NH19 in Bihar as the broken roads may damage your suspension. I am glad to inform you that the bottleneck of Chandauli, Dehri on Sone, Sasaram toll plaza are no longer bottlenecks. We passed through these like a breeze. There was minor traffic jam in the Varanasi toll plaza but it was not that serious one. We crossed Varanasi toll plaza at around 1.30 am.The Rain Gods were not very pleased with us making the progress of our trip smoothly and they decided to shower us with their blessings once we crossed Varanasi. It rained cats and dogs all the way to Prayagraj and we could bare go beyond 40kmph due to very low visibilty. At around 4.30 am we moved to the side of the road and took a nap of 1.5 hour since the rain didnt stopped at all and we didnt wanted to drive with such low Visibilty. One thing i like to add here is the presence of Halogen fog lamps in the Tucson. Ofcourse they may look very ugly with the LED headlamps but they serve the purpose very well in heavy rains and fogs. I wonder why manufacturers now a days do not add halogen fog lamps to their new offering. No doubt the LEDs lit the road better under normal conditions, but are completely useless in rain, no wonder why we see baleno, creta, seltos being driven with high beam on monsoons because they can barely see anything in rain.We again started our journey at around 6am but what came in due course was not at all expected.We continued driving till prayagraj, the patch of road between varanasi to prayagraj is mostly 4 lane concrete road and we gained speed once the rain intensity decreased. Being concrete road, i kept on monitoring the tyre pressure at every 30 mins. The tyre pressure was fine at 35PSI all around. However, just after driving the car for 30 mins, we heard a loud burst from the rear left wheel. I knew it was a tyre burst. Tucson TPMS suddenly showed TPMS malfunction within 10seconds of the burst and we moved to the side of the road again. Upon examining, i found that the rear left tyre was completely flat. Took the tyre inflator and tried to inflate the tyre, but in vain.I had to move the car for another 1km with the flat tyre as the place where the tyre had burst was totally deserted and i did not wanted to take risk with a female companion. With no other option, i had to take out all our languages and equipments from the boot to take out the space saver, changed the tyre with space saver in heavy rain. It was a challenging task. Let me remind you, you cant find a tyre shop at around 6.30 am. The burst tyre was completely useless as the whole rubber was sheared off from the contact portion. I was shocked to find the quality of these nexen tyres so bad which are offered in a car costing 25L. I would advice all the tucson owners to get the stock nexen tyres changed before embarking on a long road trip.Now the space saver the tucson comes with has a size of 135/70/17 which has a restricted speed limit of 80kmph. So Good luck taking your car to Ladakh with that space saver. Another problem is size of main tyres, they are 225/55/R18. I know i wouldn't find the replacement of these tyre in small cities like Prayagraj and Rae bareli. Hence decided to continue with the space saver all the way to lucknow with maximum speed at 60kmph. Do note that the road from Prayagraj to Rae Bareli is around 110 kms (NH30) which is completely 2 Lane undivided highway. With heavy rain and thin tyre, we couldnt move beyond 40kmph in this whole stretch which added to further delay.By 11 am we reached Lucknow and i enquired about the tyre availability of 225/55/R18 size. I knew bridgestone makes this size of tyre, called up few bridgestone dealer but they didnt had stock of this size. Totally frustrated with the tyre scene, I was almost cancelling the trip untill a bridgestone dealer called me back stating that he have stock of 235/55/R18 Pirelli scorpion tyres. This new size means i cannot change only one tyre but all four tyres but i said i would change all four tyres as i was pretty much unsatisfied with the stock nexens. Went to the dealer and checked the manufacturing dates of the tyre which were december 2020 make and nodded yes to them ( as if i had any other choice).After all the tyre episode ended, we set off for Agra once again at around 1.30 pm and it was going to be my first time experiencing India's longest expressway of 340kms, the Agra-Luckmow Expressway. With a speed limit of 100 kmph, driving at ALE feels just like playing a video game. All vehicles be it a Hyundai Eon or Range rover would ply at 100kmph and honestly its quite boring once the initial excitement fades. ALE have two petrol pumps along with food joint in between separated by a distance of 100kms. We had our lunch at one of the food joints and continued till agra.We reached agra by 5.30 in the evening and straight away drove to Tajmahal to keep up our confidance high which was badly thrashed due to whole tyre episode. We crashed into hotel at around 7 and called it a day.Trip : Durgapur, WB to Agra, UPDistance : 1180 kms ( drove in Lucknow)Time : 24.5 hours ( Bio breaks, powernap, food stop, fuel stop included)Stay : ITC Mughal, Agra Last edited by LONG_TOURER : 7th September 2021 at 18:51 .
In brief: TCL was hoping to bring a foldable phone to market that would go against the likes of the Motorola Razr and Samsung's Galaxy Flip3. That would have meant a foldable flip phone with a starting price of $799, but apparently that won't be possible for at least another year.

Foldable phones have been available for a few years at this point. However, people who actually wanted one have been discouraged by the relatively high price and questionable reliability. It was only when Samsung released the Galaxy Z Fold3 and Galaxy Z Flip3 that consumers finally felt the urge to upgrade to one.

There are, of course, alternatives like the Motorola Razr 5G, Royole's FlexPai 2, and even Huawei's Mate Xs. The problem is that the first two are decidedly underpowered while the latter option doesn't have access to Google Play services. Samsung's Galaxy Z lineup isn't perfect either, but the $999 starting price of the Galaxy Z Flip3 and the refined recipe of the Galaxy Z Fold3 helped the two phones outsell the Galaxy S21 and the Galaxy Note 20.

For the past few years, TCL has also been working on foldable phones of its own. This includes a competitor for the Galaxy Z Flip3 dubbed Project Chicago -- an ambitious effort that has unfortunately been put on hold for another 12 to 18 months. The decision was made right before Samsung revealed the Galaxy Z Flip3.

Stefan Streit, TCL's chief marketing officer, explained the company will go back to the drawing board because of several reasons. One is that TCL had hoped to build a foldable device at a more affordable price point, something that's not possible with the current shortage of chips and other essential components. Then there's the lack of carrier support for the 5G modem that was inside the canceled phone.

Another reason has to do with the weakness of the TCL brand on the smartphone market. That's because the company only began selling phones under its brand in 2020, after years of selling affordable phones under the Alcatel brand, and until recently under the BlackBerry and Palm brands. One of the current offerings is the TCL 20 Pro 5G -- a capable phone that can hold its own against the Samsung Galaxy A52 and the Google Pixel 4a.

The good news is that TCL isn't giving up on this and has promised to eventually bring its foldables to market. However, the market as it is today is still in its infancy. Samsung may be the first mover, but many speculate that foldables won't take off in a big way until Apple joins the fray. The Cupertino giant reportedly plans to release one in 2023 at the earliest, but that could change if the device doesn't meet the company's high standards.
What just happened? Tinder CEO Jim Lanzone has been named as the next head of Yahoo. Apollo Global Management made the announcement on Friday, just one week after completing its acquisition of the Internet pioneer. With new management and new leadership, will Yahoo be able to return to its former glory?

Verizon back in May, if you recall, decided to offload AOL and Yahoo to Apollo Global Management as part of a deal valued at $5 billion. It was a significant loss for Verizon, considering the company had paid $4.4 billion for AOL in 2015 and $4.48 billion for Yahoo the following year.

Lanzone is described as a seasoned executive with more than two decades of technology and media experience under his belt. He was appointed by Match Group as Tinders CEO on July 27, 2020, but before that, he led CBS Corporations digital operations, overseeing more than 30 digital media brands.

Lanzone, who also serves as a member of the board of directors of GoPro, will succeed current Yahoo CEO Guru Gowrappan, who has been named senior advisor to Apollos private equity business. Yahoo Chairman and Apollo Partner Reed Rayman said they are confident that with his experience and proven management skills, Lanzone is the right person to lead Yahoo through a transformational phase.

Lanzone will become Yahoos CEO on September 27, 2021.

Tinder, meanwhile, said Renate Nyborg will fill its vacancy. Nyborg joined the company as general manager of Europe, Middle East and Africa last year. Her first day as CEO will also be September 27.

Image credit David Paul Morris, Bloomberg
FDA (Food and Drug Administration) says that it has rejected almost one million flavored e-cigarettes in the tobacco market. However, the government agency still retains Juul and other top brands. On the other hand, the department also announced that its review for Juul would be delayed.

"On this day last year, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration faced the unprecedented task of reviewing applications for over 6.5 million 'deemed' new tobacco products," said FDA via its official press release.

Specifically, the Food and Drug Administration rejected a total of 946,000 e-cigar products. This means that the banned brands would no longer be able to sell their traditional tobacco alternative products in the market.

Aside from this, the FDA also announced that it could review 93% of the applications it received from various manufacturers, which contain around 6.5 million e-cigarette models.

The government department added that it would continue reviewing the remaining 7%, including Juul and other high-end e-cigarettes.

FDA Rejects Almost 1 Million E-Cigars

According to The Verge's latest report, the announcement marks the end of the market period where various e-cigar companies were allowed to sell and market their products while their applications were being reviewed.

Also Read: E-Cigarette, Vape Quitting: Withdrawal Symptoms Like Drugs and Regular Cigarette Addiction

This is also a sign that the e-cigarette market, which has been operating without the provision of the FDA, would soon be under the rules and regulations of the Food and Drug Administration.

And now, FDA warned manufacturers that vaping devices marketed without its authorization would be considered illegal. Some e-cigar experts claimed that the decision of the FDA would force many consumers to go back to their traditional tobaccos.

However, vaping also has negative effects, including possible lung damages. Aside from this medical complication, e-cigarette flavorings were found capable of increasing the rate of cardiovascular attacks.

FDA Postpones Juul Review

Recently, FDA confirmed that it would release its final review for Juul, which would decide whether the top vaping brand could continue in the market.

However, CNBC reported that the Food and Drug Administration decided to delay its final decision for the manufacturer. The recent schedule was supposed to be last Sept. 9. However, Juul and other high-end brands are still operating right now.

For more news updates about e-cigarettes and other related topics, always keep your tabs open here at TechTimes.

Related Article: FDA's E-Cigarette Judgement | Would the Agency Allow or Reject Vaping Industry's Continuation in US?

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Written by: Griffin Davis

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
(Photo : GettlyImages/ SOPA Images ) Fujitsu logo

Fujitsu released an official statement regarding the data being marketed by cyber criminals online. The company said that it is not related to a cyberattack on its systems.

Fujitsu Says Data Online is Not Theirs

Marketo, a known criminal marketplace, claimed that it has 4GB worth of data from Fujitsu that was posted in August. The platform began marketing the data widely, according to TechRadar.

At the time, the company said that it was investigating a potential breach. Fujitsu said that the source of the breach, including whether it comes from their systems or environment, is not known.

Marketo stated that it has customer information in-store. It also has its budget data, company data, reports, and company documents, including project information.

Also Read: Bangkok Airways Data Breach: 'Partial Credit Card Information' May be Among Data Stolen

However, on Sept. 10, both the company and the marketplace confirmed that the data stolen is not connected to Fujitsu and is instead linked to one of its affiliates.

Andrew Kane, a spokesperson for Fujitsu, confirmed that an investigation revealed the stolen data was not from their system. He noted that even Marketo has changed how they are marketing the data, ZDNet reported.

Kane stated that while the company is aware that Marketo claims that it has uploaded data linked to the relationship between Fujitsu and a customer in Japan, they have conducted a review of the incident. To date, there is no evidence that the data is from the company's systems.

Regarding the authenticity of the data, Fujitsu is not in a position to speculate where it came from, and they will no longer comment about it.

Marketo has changed its statement. The marketplace wrote that the stolen data was from a Japanese manufacturing company named Toray Industries, according to ZDNet.

A cyber threat intelligence analyst, Ivan Righi, said that the 24.5M evidence package in August that was provided on Marketo had screenshots of data relating to Toray Industries. However, the public thought that the data came from Fujitsu.

Despite changing its initial statement, the marketplace is still using Fujitsu's logo to sell the data on the platform. However, it did change the description under the picture to focus on Toray Industries.

Security experts have stated that the data on Marketo is accurate, and the changes and revelations are some of the examples of how unreliable criminal marketplaces can be.

Japanese Government Agencies Suffers Data Breaches

In May, multiple agencies in Japan were breached due to Fujitsu's ProjectWEB information sharing tool. The company said that the hackers got unauthorized access to government projects that used ProjectWEB.

It was not revealed whether the breach happened because of a vulnerability or if it was a targeted attack, according to Bleeping Computer.

The National Cyber Security Center in Japan announced that the hackers were able to get information through Fujitsu's sharing tool.

Fujitsu also stated that the hackers got access to all of its projects that used the ProjectWEB tool. They were also able to steal proprietary data.

By gaining unauthorized access to government systems, the hackers were able to steal more than 76,000 email addresses. They were also able to steal proprietary information.

Several data breaches were recorded earlier this year. In February, Wordpress suffered a data breach that affected 100,000 websites.

In May, Verizon also suffered a data breach that prompted the company to reveal how cybercriminals market the stolen data online.

Related Article: Guess, an American Clothing Brand Reveals About Data Breach; DarkSide Ransomware Most Likely the Culprit

This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by Sophie Webster

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
A tiny homes startup based in Seattle has expressed their desire to address the homelessness in the city.

The tiny homes startup called City Pods is hoping to build small dwellings for homeless people that not only provides adequate shelter, but also access to telehealth resources, reports NewsWeek.

Company founder Keenan O'Leary originally planned his venture to offer people a low-cost alternative to staying in hostels, but the pandemic has been hard on the business itself.

Coupled with the risk of a business failure and seeing the effects that the pandemic has had on Seattle's population, O'Leary realized that his tiny homes startup could be put to better use.

All of City Pods' tiny homes are designed for easy setup in any unused space that has access to plumbing, heating, and cooling.

However, O'Leary partnered with designer James Lee reworked the tiny homes to better serve the homeless.

Their redesign involved using aluminum frames for strength, as well as PVC plastic panels which are easy enough to clean. The panels are also bacteria-resistant, which is extremely useful given the world's current situation, and is protected from graffiti.

Furthermore, the tiny homes can be easily repaired if one panel is damaged.

But aside from everything else, the one thing that sets apart these tiny homes from City Pods is their focus on tech-ifying the dwellings.

According to a report by GeekWire, each pod will be equipped with Amazon Fire tablets, which people can use to access healthcare services within the privacy of their homes.

These services could be anything from mental health experts or support for treating substance abuse, which O'Leary says are some of the biggest root causes of homelessness.

City Pods is offering their tiny homes to government agencies, elected officials, and organizations that aid the homeless.

The target price for a 64-square foot pod is $12,000.

Read also: This Tiny Cosmos-Inspired Pod By Ex-IBM Manager is Available For Pre-Order For Only $99 {Photos Inside]

Tiny Homes With Tech: The Answer to Homelessness?

In the United States, where home prices and even rent have been skyrocketing for the past several years, homelessness is one of the most obvious end-results.

According to data from EndHomelessness.org, over 580,000 people reported they were homeless as of January 2020. A good chunk of this number, or 70% were individuals, with the rest being families with children.

There are far more reasons for homelessness, though, aside from sky-high home prices and rent.

According to LifeBridgeNorthshore.org, unemployment and mental illness make up two of the top three causes of homelessness in America.

It's easy to see how those two can be directly linked: people who struggle to find jobs can find it tougher to maintain their mental health, which could lead to substance abuse and other things.

Tiny homes for the homeless, especially with built-in tech-based access to healthcare, is not the magic pill to solve this problem. But it could usher in an era of startups who care for those who couldn't get themselves a good place to live.

Related: Tesla's Elon Musk Lives in a Small $50K Prefabricated House in Boca Chica, Texas

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Written by RJ Pierce

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
ADA [ndash] Graveside Services for Delbert Gene Wallis, 96, of Byng, was 10 a.m. Monday, Sep. 13, 2021, at Rosedale Cemetery, David Gray officiated. Mr. Wallis passed away Friday, Sep. 10, 2021, at his home. He was born March 13, 1925. He retired from Ideal Cement. Survivors are his three so
When protests erupted following the 2016 fatal police shooting of Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge, Louisiana State Police Trooper Carl Cavalier felt pulled in two directions, struggling to balance his commitment to law enforcement with a growing affinity for racial justice activism.

Years later, after details started trickling out about how the Black motorist Ronald Greene died following a brutal 2019 encounter with troopers in the Monroe area, Cavalier published a fictional book under a pseudonym, based on his real-life experiences as a Black man and law enforcement officer in Louisiana.

He also leaked internal State Police records about the Greene case and publicly criticized the agency in recent media interviews, all extraordinary steps that landed him in serious hot water.

Cavalier was recently notified he faces a five-week unpaid suspension for violating State Police policies by publishing his book  a punishment more severe than the agency has meted out to almost any of the troopers involved in the violent arrest that left Greene dead and the apparent coverup that followed.

'Awful but lawful': In Ronald Greene case, State Police leaders rejected early arrest of trooper Months after Ronald Greene died following a violent struggle with Louisiana state troopers who brutally beat and repeatedly tased the unarmed 

The discrepancy in discipline has raised eyebrows as State Police leaders scramble to restore public trust in the agency by demonstrating their commitment to rooting out racist behavior and holding troopers accountable for misconduct.

"I am compelled to express my extreme and profound dismay over the recent disciplinary action taken against a trooper for his honest comments relative to the death of a suspect," state Sen. Cleo Fields wrote in a letter to State Police Superintendent Col. Lamar Davis this week, noting the apparent lack of accountability for some troopers with direct involvement in the Greene case.

"This is not the kind of impression that fosters public confidence," Fields wrote.

In an interview Friday, Fields said law enforcement officers have a duty to intervene when they see their colleagues committing misconduct, but "they can't do that when they're getting sanctioned for speaking out."

Penalizing the leakers

A federal civil rights probe is ongoing, focused on several instances of excessive force involving the Monroe-based Troop F. Advocates, attorneys and lawmakers are ramping up demands for a more comprehensive "pattern or practice" investigation, which would likely result in a consent decree forcing reforms at State Police. But the Department of Justice has not confirmed the existence of such a probe.

In the case that first landed State Police under scrutiny, Greene took his last breaths on a dark Union Parish roadway, where troopers brutally beat and repeatedly tased the unarmed man following a lengthy high-speed chase and crash. The details of his death became public thanks to leaked body camera footage.

Fields penned his letter after recent reports that the ranking trooper on scene that night, Lt. John Clary, was cleared following an internal investigation into whether he kept his body camera video secret from investigators.

Clary received no discipline for his actions, even though the footage was missing from the original file sent to state prosecutors. The videos were finally turned over earlier this year  only after a State Police investigator learned of them during an unrelated conversation with a training instructor.

During a press conference Friday, Davis sought to explain why Clary received no discipline, saying investigators were unable to determine whether Clary concealed the videos on purpose. He said the investigation could be reopened in the future.

After watching the press conference, state Rep. Ted James tweeted a list of criticisms, including an inadequate explanation from Davis about why Cavalier received more discipline "than the troopers he exposed."

"It seems like they have been more focused on trying to penalize the folks that are leaking the information, and not the people identified in the videos for violating the law," he said in an interview.

Davis also said during the press conference he was unable to comment on the apparent discrepancies in discipline because Cavalier planned to appeal his suspension, meaning the case was still technically ongoing. But Davis promised to be "fair and equitable" in all discipline matters.

Another trooper involved in the Greene case, Kory York, was suspended for 50 hours  about a month less than Cavalier  as punishment for dragging the handcuffed man by his leg shackles. York also forced Greene to remain prone, laying facedown for several minutes, until troopers finally realized he was struggling to breathe.

His suspension came months after Chris Hollingsworth, who said on camera that he "beat the ever-living f--k" out of Greene, died in a single-vehicle crash on the same day he learned that he faced termination for his role in the incident.

Cavalier, meanwhile, received a 200-hour suspension for violating two agency policies: a ban on secondary employment and conduct unbecoming an officer.

That suspension refers to the book investigation, which began before its publication date, but Cavalier faces more potential discipline as well. He received a letter last month saying he was under investigation for three recent media interviews in which he "discussed past, current and ongoing investigations, including but not limited to the Ronald Greene case." The letter also noted Cavalier had been ordered not to comment publicly on such matters.

U.S. Rep. Troy Carter pushes for federal 'pattern-or-practice' probe into Louisiana State Police Freshman Congressman Troy Carter is now among those calling for a top-down federal civil rights probe into the embattled Louisiana State Polic

He had received a warning letter after appearing on WBRZ-TV in June, with supervisors reminding him of a policy against commenting publicly in the media.

Then in July came more media appearances and the book release. Last month, Cavalier spoke to WWL-TV in New Orleans, once again pressuring agency leaders to hold more troopers accountable in the Greene case.

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"I considered it a murder," he said during the interview. "Because why else would we hesitate to be transparent about it? Why else would we not do our jobs and hold these guys accountable? Why else? What other reason?"

'Oftentimes conflicted'

His book  whose title is an acronym for "N---er with a Badge"  was written under the pseudonym Elijah Steele, the protagonist whose fictional experiences mirror those of Cavalier, with some embellishments.

"Out of nowhere, a law enforcement career found me, and there I was joining forces with the exact people I had always been taught to run from," Steele says. "Most importantly, I learned why someone like me was necessary to law enforcement, and furthermore why law enforcement was necessary to the world."

Steele grew up on the west bank of New Orleans, then attended Jackson State University, a historically Black college in Mississippi. His career started in corrections and local law enforcement.

"Being a Black officer comes with a lot of baggage, man, and I am oftentimes conflicted," Steele tells his cousin, explaining how he feels tugged in opposite directions  wanting to participate in racial justice protests without losing his law enforcement career.

The book avoids naming Louisiana State Police but includes hints about the agency, noting the prestigious uniform "with a fancy hat to match" and sought-after reputation.

The agency helped keep the peace at police protests in Baton Rouge following the police shooting of Alton Sterling in 2016, Steele says, calling the heated demonstrations "completely necessary." He says Black communities across the country were tired of hearing excuses whenever "a White officer unapologetically and unjustly took the life of a Black American."

The Baton Rouge police officer who killed Sterling, Blane Salamoni, was ultimately fired from the department but faced no criminal charges. His termination came after State Police veteran Murphy Paul was appointed Baton Rouge police chief.

Violent, buried videos from Louisiana State Police show pattern of beatings targeting Black people LSP says 67% of its uses of force in recent years have targeted Black people  double the percentage of the state's Black population.

But just days after the shooting, when protests had started winding down, a lone gunman traveled to Baton Rouge and opened fire on law enforcement officers behind an Airline Highway convenience store, killing three and wounding three more.

One of the Baton Rouge police officers killed that day, Montrell Jackson, had posted on Facebook the week before about the protests roiling his city: "These are trying times. Please don't let hate infect your heart."

"I felt his message in my heart and soul," Steele says of Jackson in the book. "He and I were fighting similar battles as Black officers stuck in the middle  between black and blue."

Steele ends up helping some protesters organize a demonstration, giving them tips about how to cause problems for law enforcement. He then worries about losing his job when some supervisors learn of his involvement.

During one scene, he shows up to a demonstration in uniform and leads an "army" of protesters to peacefully confront other law enforcement officers on the scene.

"Never again will I stand behind one of our own just because they're our own," he tells his lieutenant. "I no longer stand behind your f--ked-up definition of protecting and serving. As a matter of fact, you need to reevaluate that s--t."

More investigations pending

During another scene, Steele addresses the congregation of a large Catholic church in Baton Rouge, asking the majority-White crowd to place themselves in the shoes of African Americans who descended from slavery and consider the impacts of police brutality against Black people.

"What would you do? Protest until your arms are tired of holding signs?" he asks the crowd. "March until your feet are blistered and scream for justice until your lungs are sore? If you and your people did all of those peaceful things for hundreds of years in an attempt to achieve equality only to be ignored, what would you do?"

In the end, Steele advocates for more Black law enforcement officers patrolling their own communities. He also expresses support for continued racial justice protests, saying "there can be no peace in the absence of justice."

While the book investigation has concluded, internal investigators are still looking into the second discipline case against Cavalier, focusing on his media appearances. The exact timeline for that case is unclear, but records show it involves a series of potential policy violations, including loyalty to the department, public statements, lawful orders, and interference and release of information.

Cavalier could appeal his discipline in either or both cases.

If he emerges from the disciplinary matters without getting fired, he will return to work at State Police. Before being placed on leave, he worked for the narcotics division based in Baton Rouge. He has since been transferred to gaming enforcement.

Advocate staff writer John Simerman contributed to this report.
Ever since Michael Scott Scotty Lamana was killed on Sept. 11, 2001, in the Pentagon, his family has kept his memory alive.

They talk about him. They tell his story. They say his name, and then say it again.

That forces you to humanize them, that that was a person who died for your freedom  not for anything else, not for the glory  but for your freedom, his sister Dani Lamana said.

Its something that military families do to remember loved ones who are gone.

It reminds you that you are not the only one grieving and in pain, she explained.

As the nation gathers Saturday to remember that tragic day 20 years ago, and the attacks that killed almost 3,000 people, families like the Lamanas, of Baton Rouge, labor to keep alive memories of each and every one of them.

Although the pain is ever present, Dani tries to set that aside.

I tend to force myself to think of the good rather than how he died, which is that he spent his life in service, she said.

Lost Louisianians U.S. Navy Lt. Michael Scott Lamana was not supposed to be at the Pentagon on Sept 11, 2001.

The 31-year-old Lamana, a briefer for the chief of Naval operations, had already spent nine years in the U.S. Navy when terrorists crashed a plane into the Pentagon. While he was a student at Catholic High and LSU, he also worked as a reserve deputy with the East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriffs Office and a volunteer with the St. George Fire Department.

Firefighters were also on the front lines on Sept. 11. A total of 343 died that day.

The Baton Rouge Fire Department for the past 10 years has preserved their memory every Sept. 11 by observing a moment of silence at 7:46 a.m., the moment the first plane struck the World Trade Center. It will do so again Saturday.

Curt Monte, BRFDs public information officer, remembers that day, watching the TV with his fellow firefighters, watching with growing horror.

When we saw that scene, we knew then before anybody else knew that firefighters were going to lose their lives, Monte said. We knew those firefighters knew when they were going up (into those towers), they probably werent coming out. We could feel what they were feeling.

He said that 20 years later the feelings from that stay with him.

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It never goes away, Monte said. I just hold our brothers and sisters who went in, in a special place in my heart.

In all, six natives of Louisiana died on Sept. 11.

Besides Lamana, they include Elizabeth Ann "Betty" Farmer, who was 62, of New Orleans; Robert Joseph Hymel, who was 55, of New Orleans; Leo Russell Keene, III, who was 33, of Sulphur; Louis Calvin Williams, III, who was 53, of Mandeville; and Kevin Wayne Yokum, who was 27, of Lake Charles.

Fewer and fewer Americans remember Sept. 11, 2001. Todays schoolchildren werent even alive.

But many do still remember.

We still have consistent support every year, Dani Lamana said. Weve already received phone calls and text messages. Family members and friends have reached out to us and let us know that they are here for us.

On Friday, St. Aloysius Catholic School, where he spent his elementary years, raised and flew a U.S. flag donated by Scotty Lamanas parents. Catholic High School also remembered him during morning prayers. Both schools have long had permanent memorials to him on their campuses.

Despite what happened 20 years ago, Dani Lamana, who works as an occupational therapist, maintains a positive view of humanity, that people are far more likely to pursue good than evil. She said she applies that to her own life as a way of continuing what Scotty no longer can.

Id give anything to get my brother back, but thats not going to happen, so you choose to make peoples lives better every day because he cant, she explained.

When asked what she thinks of what has happened in the 20 years since 9/11, including the recently chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, Lamana is not sure what to say.

Im not going to claim to be any type of political expert. I think we need to just get back to being normal people, she said. I definitely dont have the answer. The last 20 years  I dont necessarily have a good answer.

Lamana, however, said that Americans should not send soldiers into new conflicts without learning from prior ones, or their lives are lost in vain. She said Americans should work to protect the lives of those who serve on their behalf.

Every day there are military, there are police, there are firemen who serve, who put on a uniform who know that when they step out of their house or their car, they may not get a second chance, she said. And its our responsibility as Americans to make sure that they safely go home to their families.

Elyse Carmosino contributed to this story.
Louisiana businesses are processing the sweeping new COVID-19 vaccine mandates issued by President Joe Biden, which order employers with more than 100 workers to require immunizations or weekly testing.

"At this time, there is more we dont know, than what we do know," said Erin Kilgore, an attorney who specializes in labor law for the Baton Rouge-based firm Kean Miller. "Although legal challenges to the rule seem certain, the devil will be in the details."

The president's order didn't come as a surprise, said Connie Fabre, president of the Greater Baton Rouge Industry Alliance, a trade organization made up of petrochemical plants.

Prior to this coming down, everyone was asking when it was going to happen, she said.

Louisiana COVID cases peak in fourth surge, remain exorbitantly high': state health officer While COVID-19 cases in Louisiana remain "exorbitantly high," the state appears to have peaked in its fourth surge of the deadly disease, stat

Fabre said while none of the plants in Baton Rouge have mandated COVID vaccinations, companies were eyeing each other to see who would make the first move. Once one does it, everybody will be doing it, she said.

Some of the states largest employers already have vaccine mandates. Ochsner Health, which employs about 32,000 people across Louisiana, requires all doctors, providers and employees get the COVID vaccine by Oct. 29.

Letters to Ochsner, Lourdes threaten legal action if COVID vaccine mandates not pulled A Louisiana law firm sent letters to two Lafayette hospital systems Wednesday threatening legal action on behalf of a group of employees if th

Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady health system, which includes employees at Our Lady of the Lake in Baton Rouge and Our Lady of Lourdes in Lafayette is requiring all managers, doctors, residents and advanced practice providers get vaccinated by Halloween or face unpaid suspension. The rest of the FMOL employees have to get vaccinated by Nov. 30 or face suspension without pay.

Walmart is requiring all headquarters employees and managers who travel to get the vaccine by Oct. 4. Chevron and Valero require some employees to get vaccinations, such as those working offshore or in refineries.

The Louisiana Association of Business and Industry, the states largest business organization, said while improving vaccination rates is critical to the economy and community health, Bidens measure goes too far.

This policy has the potential to offshore American companies who fear losing their employees, subjecting themselves to predatory litigation and are at risk of paying exorbitant OSHA fines enforced from unnamed federal agencies in a challenging, pandemic-influenced economy, LABI President Stephen Waguespack said.

Bidens vaccination mandate will affect about a quarter of LABIs 2,000 members, he added.

Workers at health facilities that receive Medicare or Medicaid funds will have to be fully vaccinated, which will have wide-ranging effects on hospitals and nursing homes. Mark Berger, executive director of the Louisiana Nursing Home Association said the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services will issue interim rules in October.

"Louisianas nursing facilities will adjust accordingly when new guidance is issued," he said in a statement.

At CGI, which employs 600 at its U.S. Delivery Center in Lafayette and hopes to open its downtown location later this year, officials are also waiting to see the specific guidelines that come out next month before moving forward, Vice President Will LaBar said.

He could not estimate how many employees  many of whom are working remotely due both to the pandemic and the transition to the new building  are vaccinated. The company did not offer an incentive to get vaccinated.

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MacLaff, which runs 45 McDonalds locations from Acadiana to the River Parishes, held three vaccinations drives at its offices in Baton Rouge and Lafayette to encourage employees to get the shot, CEO E.J. Krampe said.

A significant amount of the companys 1,900 employees is vaccinated, he said, but noted its not even close to all workers being vaccinated.

We certainly encourage it, Krampe said. But Im not one to tell everyone what they need to do  not regarding their health at least.

For Excel USA, a construction business in Baton Rouge, the goal is to comply without compromising the relationship with its workforce.

"We have not make a final decision but our goal is to comply while at the same time providing as much personal freedom providing for testing options as well," chief legal officer Cherie Pinac said. "It's a personal decision for our employees and their medical provider, we're going to accommodate our employees."

Likewise, for construction and petrochemical giant Turner Industries, the company is still gathering information before making a decision.

"This is something that the whole business world will deal with and we will too. But it wont be in a vacuum," Turner Industries President Stephen Toups said.

At Community Coffee, the company aims to comply with the federal requirement.

"We are following mandates from public health officials to maintain safe and healthy work environments during this pandemic," company spokesman Tyler Gamble said.

For some businesses, a vaccine mandate is more practical than consistent testing to ensure there are enough workers to meet customer demand. Employment in Louisiana, like most states, is at-will. That means employers can fire workers for any reason that's not protected such as having a disability or because of a person's race, nationality, religion, gender identity or sexual orientation.

"I think one thing employers need to consider is that you might have a higher incidence of COVID and sickness which means more expense for the business," New Orleans-based attorney Casey Denson said.

Beyond that, workers who are not interested in getting the vaccine can't just opt out by citing a sincere religious belief or documented disability. In theory, once the rule is implemented through the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, employers could be investigated for failing to comply.

"You don't just get to say I can't get the vaccine," Denson explained. "You have to work with a medical provider and then your employer can use that medical documentation."
Along with tossing out spoiled food and mucking out saturated Sheetrock, another hallmark of a major Louisiana storm is postponing elections.

Gov. John Bel Edwards approved Thursday Secretary of State Kyle Ardoins request to push back for a month the Oct. 9 primary until Nov. 13 and the Nov. 13 runoff to Dec. 11.

Ardoin said that with much of the state without power, damage to some voting locations and widespread displacement of voters and elections commissioners  the storm affected 42% of the states 3 million registered voters  his office needed additional time to put on a proper election.

It makes a huge task much more doable, said Slidell Republican state Sen. Sharon Hewitt, who as chair of the Senate & Governmental Affairs Committee oversees election-related issues.

Louisiana fall elections postponed because of Hurricane Ida damage; see adjusted dates Gov. John Bel Edwards ordered the delay of upcoming elections that featured important Constitutional questions statewide and municipal electi

This isnt Louisianas first foray into rearranging storm-addled elections.

Gov. Bobby Jindal postponed for a month the 2008 primaries and runoffs after Hurricane Gustav cast 1.5 million residents into the dark and caused 2 million to evacuate.

Many then, and now, worry about the impact of December balloting on election outcomes.

And with some reason.

Only 20% of electorate voted in the December 2008 general elections, giving the edge to candidates who could mobilize their minority of supporters.

In the 2012, 2018 and 2020 elections, anemic turnouts of 15.7%, 17.7% and 16% decided congressional races as well as municipal contests and statewide constitutional questions. The anomaly was on Dec. 6, 2014, when 43% turnout helped Republican Bill Cassidy defeat Democratic incumbent Mary Landrieu.

This years December general election likely will include some runoffs to decide who will be mayor, sheriff, and assessor in New Orleans  21 candidates are challenging incumbents  plus all seven seats on the New Orleans City Council are contested by multiple candidates.

At the same time, it gives candidates in New Orleans and elsewhere another month to campaign. Thats not lost on the promoters of a 10-year property tax renewal at a 10.6 millage rate to fund Baton Rouges bus system, which is wildly unpopular for some but very necessary for others in the spread-out city-parish of about 437,000 people. We will make the necessary adjustments and continue educating the public on how CATS connects this community, spokeswoman Amie McNaylor wrote in a text.

The blueprint for how to handle these kinds of elections was written in 2006 in federal courtrooms, the State Capitol, the Governors Mansion and the Secretary of States office long before Ardoin and Hewitt were office. Republican Jay Dardenne, now commissioner of administration, became secretary of state in September 2006 when he and two minor GOP candidates polled 54% of the vote in the Democratic stronghold of New Orleans after an estimated 250,000 people were displaced by hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005.

Gov. Kathleen Blanco rescheduled the Feb. 4, 2006, primaries and March 4 runoffs for New Orleans municipal elections until April 22 and May 20, 2006.

Our Views: An election delay good for voters, hard-pressed by Ida If the Election Day scheduled for Oct. 9 was not the biggest one that Louisiana has ever seen, it still was an important one  with municipal 

With about $750,000 spent on advertising in cities outside Louisiana to reach potential voters, the state expanded absentee balloting and early voting, allowed voting at 10 satellite locations outside the city, and accepted the ballots of those who drove in on election day.

About 108,000 voters participated in the 2006 mayoral primary, or a 36% turnout, which was down 10% from the 2002 municipal elections. In the runoff that year, about 114,000 ballots were cast, with a 37% turnout, 25,000 of those absentee or at satellite polling places before the election. Ray Nagin beat Mitch Landrieu by about 5,000 votes.

Ironically, many of the storm-related features are the very same that Republican legislators tried to circumscribe in the Louisiana Legislature earlier this year, only to be vetoed by Democratic Gov. Edwards. Many similar ideas were banned in the voting procedures bill signed into law by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, on Tuesday.

Sen. Hewitt has a lot of respect for the new law in Texas, which supporters say protects against fraud and opponents say limits the participation of minority voters who are less likely to back GOP causes and candidates.

Theres not anything Im aware of in the Texas legislation that I dont think would be good policy in Louisiana, Hewitt said, raising the possibility that Louisiana legislators will revisit voting laws in next years session.
In this Sept. 9, 2018 photo, people attending the dedication stand around the 93-foot tall Tower of Voices at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pa. The tower contains 40 wind chimes representing the 40 people that perished in the crash of Flight 93 in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Newstead House became Brisbanes original society party house when the Harris family owned it, when extravagant society parties dominating the early colonys social life were a weekly event 50 years before F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote his Roaring 20s novel The Great Gatsby. Newstead House has for years been run by a Board of Trustees. It now has a new chair, former senator Claire Moore who has pushed for the first significant investment of funds from the Queensland government. Jen Garcia is Newstead Houses long-serving program manager. She is asking the questions Newstead Houses Board of Trustees are asking as the chipped paintwork, water damage and timber rots begin to emerge in Brisbanes old lady of the river. Heritage is not necessarily front and centre for people, Ms Garcia said.

I think the refurbishment of this place sends a message to Brisbane and Queensland people that heritage is of value. Because, as you know, there have been lots of stories out there and I think this project will have a big impact. We have to make heritage relevant in a modern world. Inside Brisbanes Newstead House before the renovation program where 5000 pieces are now being carefully stored away began last month. Credit:Newstead House. Ms Garcia said the new approach  in addition to the in-house theatre and jazz shows  which link school children and casually interested visitors to Newstead House should show Newstead Houses sense of place in Brisbane.

We have to engage with new audiences, Ms Garcia said. We have to act more as a stewardship; we must ask: How do we make heritage relevant for young people? She gives the analogy of enjoying heritage as similar to enjoying traditional jazz. It is considered something that is enjoyed by people of a certain vintage, she suggests. The big issue is making more young people aware of Brisbanes heritage and how to make it relevant to them?

When we bring young people here they really love it, they really do. Heritage is not everybodys cup of tea, she admits. But more people should be encouraged to walk up from the river and the gardens to look through the house when Newstead House reopens in her revitalised splendour in about 18 months time. They dont necessarily really need to take in the dates, Ms Garcia says. They just need to be here and to see, and to feel.

Brisbanes heritage protection has been questioned harshly in the past five years with fires at Woolloongabbas Broadway Hotel, the struggle to save Kangaroo Points Lamb House and the embarrassment of the demolition of Linden Lea at Toowong merely the tip of the iceberg. Environment Minister Meaghan Scanlon has subsequently announced a review of Queenslands heritage protection laws and will report on changes before Christmas. Heritage Minister Meaghan Scanlan (right) with local MP and Education Minister Grace Grace on the veranda of Newstead House as it begins a $5 million restoration. Newstead House has its own Facebook page with 2900 followers and, despite COVID-19, the management is trying to lure people back to the gardens and then back to the tours when the home reopens. There were recent Fathers Day events and jazz days, all echoing the original glory days when Newstead House was the jewel in the centre of Brisbane.

Those glory days included a time when one previous owner had three Galapagos tortoises, Tom Dick and Harry (later renamed Harriet when her correct gender was realised), gifted to him in England by biologist Charles Darwin. Originally, the three tortoises  part of Darwins research into his theories of evolution  were bought to Brisbane by Wickham. Harriet lived for 175 years and died at Australia Zoo at Beerwah in 2006. Harriet the tortoise lived in Brisbanes Botanical Gardens until she spent her final years at Australia Zoo, where she is pictured with a young Bindi Irwin in 2006. Credit:Facebook Australia Zoo The glory days continued when the Harris family owned Newstead House.

The Harris family had an entertainment budget of over 20,000 pounds, Ms Garcia said. That equates to around $1.3 million each year. They were known for their extravagant parties. There was champagne flowing. People wanted to be seen here. There was music, there was entertainment. There were letters written back to England where they described the carry-on in the parks. The Harris used to set up tents on their land for their guests who travelled here. That is why we are so excited with the $5 million for the restoration.

Its a really significant building on so many different levels; the social history, the built environment and what it shows of Brisbanes evolution as a town, and then a city. Brisbanes heritage-listed Newstead House which is undergoing a $5.5 million renovation has hosted millionaires, celebrities and even rare Galapagos Island turtles. Perhaps as COVID-19 sees more and more films being written, produced and created in Queensland, there could a film of extravagant parties, Newstead Houses Galapagos tortoises, spies and submarines. Its all part of Newstead Houses heritage. It depends on how it is told. Timber, paint and plaster works will be restored and Newstead Houses original Welsh slate roof will be replaced during the 18-month restoration.
Premier Annastacia Palasczczuk has warned parts of south-east Queensland may have to go into lockdown within days after five new local cases were reported on Saturday, but for now the region will remain open.

But some restrictions, including in aged care homes, have been reinstated, with facilities south of the Brisbane River to the northern edge of Logan City closed to visitors.

Ms Palaszczuk said the really good news was that all five new cases were from the same family.

I know theres a lot of concern amongst the community about is there a lockdown today, she said.
Credit where its due: the Commonwealth has stepped up to the plate in recent months, doing the leg work to secure additional vaccine doses at any cost, as it should have all along. Millions of additional doses from Poland, Singapore and Britain have given the rollout the shot in the arm it needs  so much so that soon supply will outstrip demand.

But the risk now is that the government rolls out the mission accomplished banner, passing the buck to Australians to turn up for a jab. In fact, the governments role is far from over, and what it does next is every bit as critical as anything that came before.

People queuing at Sydney Olympic Park vaccination hub. Credit:Dean Sewell

Not helping matters is our current national obsession with specific vaccine targets which seems to have created a false impression of a finish line at 80 per cent vaccinated (either of the population or those over 16, depending whom you ask), beyond which we can all take a seat, relax and enjoy the summer. Indeed, worryingly, the Prime Minister himself this week described 40 per cent of those eligible (around a third of the population) as the halfway mark.

In fact, theres no such finish line. The only thing we know for sure is more is better  the higher the vaccination rate, the less likely an outbreak will occur and the less severe it will be if it does occur. When Australia gets to 80 per cent of those eligible (around two-thirds of the population), we wont have won the race, well have qualified for the final. Winning the race requires doing all we reasonably can short of physically pinning people down.
In an ideal world, Nikki would have inspected her dream home before purchasing it.

But with a ban on private inspections during lockdown, the 27-year-old knew shed miss out on the four-bedroom Fitzroy North house if she didnt buy it sight unseen.

If you had asked me three years ago, theres no way I wouldve bought a property without seeing it, said Nikki, who does not want to disclose her surname or the price she paid for her new home.

Nikki recently purchased a four bedroom house in Fitzroy North but was unable to inspect it in person due to Melbournes lockdown restrictions. Credit:Wayne Taylor

Many buyers are in a similar situation, with real estate agents reporting an increasing number of sight unseen property sales during Melbournes sixth lockdown.
A three-week vaccine blitz targeting Melbournes northern and western suburbs will start on Monday, with the Commonwealth to send several hundred thousand extra Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 jabs to GPs, pharmacies and state-run hubs.

State hubs and GPs will receive the Pfizer vaccine and pharmacists will receive the Moderna vaccine, which is finally due to arrive in Australia this week.

Victoria has started opening drive-through clinics in areas with lower vaccination rates, such as Melton in Melbournes west. Credit:Paul Jeffers

Cases have surged in Local Government Areas in Melbournes north and west such as Hume (652 active cases) and Wyndham (209 active cases) in the past week, but according to Commonwealth data reported to the Victorian Department of Health these areas are receiving fewer Pfizer doses for GP clinics than Melbournes more affluent eastern and southern suburbs.

A total of 2370 Pfizer doses were sent to GP clinics in Hume and 2400 doses were sent to Wyndham in the last week. The nearby LGA of Moonee Valley (45 active cases) received 2400 doses too. These three LGAs are primarily within federal Labor-held electorates.
Towanda, PA (18848)

Today

Thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. High 74F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 80%..

Tonight

Showers likely along with a possible rumble of thunder early, then cloudy skies after midnight. Low around 60F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 80%.
Oneonta, NY (13820)

Today

Variable clouds with strong thunderstorms. High around 75F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. 2 to 3 inches of rain expected..

Tonight

Rain early...then remaining cloudy with showers overnight. Low 58F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%. Rainfall around a quarter of an inch.
Oneonta, NY (13820)

Today

Thunderstorms likely. A few storms may be severe. High 72F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

A steady rain this evening. Showers continuing overnight. Low 58F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 90%. Rainfall around a quarter of an inch.
Terry Kovel and Kim Kovel answer readers questions sent to the column. Send a letter with one question describing the size, material (glass, pottery) and what you know about the item. Include only two pictures, the object and a closeup of any marks or damage. Be sure your name and return address are included. By sending a question, you give full permission for use in any Kovel product. Names, addresses or email addresses will not be published. We do not guarantee the return of photographs, but if a stamped envelope is included, we will try. Questions that are answered will appear in Kovels Publications. Write to Kovels, The Associated Press, King Features Syndicate, 628 Virginia Dr., Orlando, FL 32803 or email us at collectorsgallery@kovels.com.
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Asst News Editor

Sadaf Nikzad is a junior at WVU. She is from Morgantown, WV and this is her second year on staff. She is majoring in journalism and has two minors in English and Professional Writing and Editing.
HARRISBURG  Gov. Tom Wolf today announced state employees in state health care facilities and high-risk congregate care facilities will be required to be either fully vaccinated against COVID-19 by Sept. 7 or undergo weekly COVID-19 testing, according to a news release from Wolf's office. A
The Tribute in Light art installation is seen from Empire State Building, commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, in New York City on Sept. 11, 2021. (Go Nakamura/Reuters)

20 Years After 9/11: Did War on Terror Achieve Its Objective?

Twenty years after the Sept. 11 attack, the question remains as to whether the mission in Afghanistan achieved its objective of eradicating terrorism.

Allen Weiner, international legal scholar and senior lecturer at Stanford University, said that the initial goal to destroy al-Qaedas base in Afghanistan was largely achieved.

Al-Qaedas training camps in Afghanistan were destroyed, many of its leaders were killed and captured (although some, including Osama bin Laden, managed to escape at least initially), and its ability to plan, finance, and execute major global terrorist operations was severely diminished, Weiner said in an interview published on the universitys website.

However, the initial success didnt last, Weiner said, although al-Qaeda never resumed significant operations in Afghanistan, the organization metastasized, and lethal variants of the organization arose in other countries in the Middle East and elsewhere. Also, other terrorist groups such as ISIS emerged, he said.

Al-Qaeda, designated as a terrorist organization by the Department of State in 1999, was behind the terrorist attack of Sept. 11, 2001, which killed almost 3,000 Americans and international citizens.

After the Sept. 11 attack, the United States invoked the NATO treatys clause of collective defense, which stipulates that an attack against one member is considered an attack on all members of the alliance.

As a result, the NATO forces led by the United States invaded Afghanistan in response, with a goal to ensure that the country does not again become a safe haven for international terrorists, according to a NATO statement.

Al-Qaeda had at the time of the attack a symbiotic relationship with the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, which effectively controlled most of the country, Weiner said.

President Bush and others quickly began to emphasize an additional objective for overthrowing the Talibanto liberate the Afghan people from the regimes repressive practices. We sought to promote basic human rights and to end the Talibans oppression of women, he said.

Afghanistan did make significant progress in terms of economic development and the realization of at least some civil and political rights, the scholar said. However, the Taliban wasnt eradicated and the civil war against the Afghan government continued with varying degrees of intensity until early August, he noted.

Who Are the Taliban?

The Taliban comprises diverse groups, according to Ahmad Farid Danesh Akrami, currently a political analyst based in Poland, who was a journalist in Afghanistan until 2014.

Some of those groups are closer to ISIS, while others are locals who want some peace and stability, Akrami said in a conversation at Warsaw Institute, a Poland-based think tank.

In the past, the Taliban allowed bin Laden to operate in Afghanistan, and the group has a very deep ideological connection with Islamist and radical groups around the globe, Akrami said. In his opinion, countries shouldnt recognize the Taliban or maintain any political relationship with it because its very dangerous for the future of the world.

Akrami believes that other countries such as China, Russia, Iran, or Pakistan cannot exert much influence on the Taliban. Thats not because of the Talibans politics, but because of their ideology, he said.

The Taliban are an ideological group, and their ideology is based on Sharia law, and they wont accept any other ideology, Akrami said.

The Taliban structure is a bit different than what the other governments are. So we cannot expect that the Chinese influence can change the behavior of Taliban.

The political leadership of the Taliban most of the time needs to ensure support from local Taliban forces and will be unwilling to take any action without their support, Akrami said.

ISIS in Afghanistan is different from ISIS groups in Syria and Iraq, according to Akrami. Its a more intelligent group, in his opinion, acting as intelligent proxy fighters in the region and heavily influenced by Pakistan.

If the Taliban doesnt want to accept responsibility for an attack, they would say ISIS did it, and ISIS would claim responsibility, Akrami said.

ISIS in Afghanistan is called ISIS of Khorasan Province (ISIS-K); it emerged in 2015. It was joined by some other radical groups in the region, some of which are inside the Taliban, Akrami said.

Afghanistan has historically never had a strong nationalist state, the analyst said. Moreover, a quarter of the countrys territory is covered by high rocky mountains with big caves that create favorable conditions for guerrilla wars, he said.

The analyst believes Afghanistan wasnt defeated militarily, but politically.

Afghanistan military was able to fight for long term. We had around 370,000 police and army. So we had around 45,000 commando forces.  And in most parts of Afghanistan, the army didnt fight with the Taliban. They just give the areas to the Taliban and left.

Akrami thinks Afghanistans collapse began with the negotiations between the United States and the Taliban in Qatar. He considered these negotiations a strategic mistake by NATO and America because it helped the Taliban, a terrorist organization, to boost its image as a strong force respecting peoples rights, Akrami said.

There could be other important reasons for Afghanistans collapse, but theres not much information about it, Akrami said, hoping that eventually, more will become known.
The International Association of Firefighters conducts a wreath laying ceremony for the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks at the World Trade Center memorial site in Manhattan, New York, on Sep. 10, 2021. (Enrico Trigoso/The Epoch Times)

9/11 First Responders and Victims Families Recall the Tragedy 20 Years Later During Wreath Laying Ceremony

NEW YORKThe International Association of Firefighters conducted a wreath-laying ceremony for the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks at the World Trade Center memorial site.

Pipers played a melody neither joyous nor sad over the underlying drone sound. They marched before the main body of representatives and waited for the priest to throw his blessing upon the garlands.

The Epoch Times approached some of the people who were directly affected by the attacks.

Fireman Dave Lohl was present the day of the catastrophe. Ten years later, it was his second time down here.

Its tough, he said, as his throat knotted and eyes started watering.

He wasnt able to withhold his emotions, Excuse me, he said, looking blankly at the distance, as if remembering the events.

Ill always remember what happened. Its a beautiful monument, and Im very sad.

He was visiting with his wife and children.

I lost a lot of co-workers, he added. a lot of them.

I just come down to see them, he said.

First responder during 9/11 Dave Lohl with his wife at the World Trade Center memorial site in Manhattan, New York, on Sep. 10, 2021 (Enrico Trigoso/The Epoch Times)

Lohl thinks that, for younger people who do not necessarily feel the impact of the event, they should read about it and inform themselves.

Eddie Bracken came to the memorial site to remember his sister, who wanted to stay home on Sept. 11 since it was her sons first day of school, but was denied the day off by her boss.

So, Mary Dwyer went to work on the second tower at AON insurance, doing her job like an American citizenthe people that the terrorists turned on, and they took upon themselves, on planes, like bombs, put them into the buildings, into the Twin Towers, and killed our families. Thats why I guess we went to war in the Middle East, Bracken said.

Bracken hopes that President Joe Biden declassifies the papers of the 9/11 terror attacks, but thinks that how the United States cut and ran from Afghanistan was a bad move.

We didnt need to be there but we were, he said. We just had a timetable, and everything, we left there. We should never leave all the weapons there. Its only going to arm them again, and were going to have to go back in again.

Thats defeating its whole purpose, he added.

Bracken was working in the Javits Center on the morning of Sept. 11 when he saw a plane hit the second tower, and he immediately went to look for his sister. He stayed for a couple of days looking for his sister through the rubble.

It was surreal. People became silent when somebody said that they found something. Everything stopped.

He eventually realized there was nothing, and left after two days.

Dwyers children have grown up a lot now after 20 years, and her daughter had a baby. They hold a memorial every year in Sheepshead Bay.

Eddie Bracken, leaving a letter and flowers for his sister at World Trade Center memorial site, in Manhattan, New York, on Sep. 10, 2021 (Enrico Trigoso/The Epoch Times)

Some people werent even born and often dont understand that this should never happen again. We[ve got to] learn from the mistakes, Bracken said.

Twenty years later, we reflect and see all the things that we try to do for our families because our family members werent here, and try to make their lives better. And I hope we did it. I hope we made their lives better as much as we can, he further said, as my sister would  if I were in her position.

Miles Warren and David Goldberg were first responders during the terror attacks, and remember it like it was yesterday.

I think people take safety for granted. Goldberg told The Epoch Times, They dont fear things when they think nothing is going to happen, [but] I think this could happen at any time, and become a tragedy.

He said that the memories of the things that happened during that time will be with him for the rest of his lifethat is, the people whom he worked with and the people who didnt come out of it.

I think what people need to take away from this is dont take things for granted. Dont take your safety or your loved ones for granted, Goldberg added.

First responders during 9/11 David Goldberg (L) and Miles Warren (R) at World Trade Center memorial site in Manhattan, New York, on Sep. 10, 2021 (Enrico Trigoso/The Epoch Times)

Miles Warren asserted that people under the age of 30 do not know what happened, other than what they saw on television.

Unfortunately some people have forgotten what happened. And this should never, ever be forgotten. And it should never, ever happen again, Warren said.

The Epoch Times asked them about their memories of the catastrophe.

I looked around, smoke everywhere, Warren recalled. I have no idea where I am, he told his co-worker. And then I started crying.

I remember everything that day, said Goldberg. That day was nothing but dust, fire apparatus everywhere, firefighters, law enforcement officers, it was like a state of shock, but for the first responders over here, we knew what we had to do. No questions whatsoever, while we were here, we knew we had to go to work, and thats exactly what we did.

World Trade Center memorial site in Manhattan, New York, on Sep. 10, 2021 (Enrico Trigoso/The Epoch Times)

The fire lasted for weeks, weeks  weeks, Goldberg said, the smell didnt go away.

His most shocking memory is when he drove by the highway and the towers were not there anymore.

There were thousands of police officers, firefighters, volunteers. Whenever we thought we heard noise, everything went silent, Warren said.

Anytime we thought we found somebody, everyone would stop everything they were doing, and you were able to hear a pin drop. Otherwise, it was just noise and commotion the whole entire time, around the clock. 

They were here for two weeks and then came back for three more shifts, each lasting a couple of weeks.

A year later, they finally left when everything was cleaned up.

NYPD Counterterrorism unit at the World Trade Center memorial site in Manhattan, New York, on Sep. 10, 2021 (Enrico Trigoso/The Epoch Times)

NYPD officers inspect suspicious boxes at the World Trade Center memorial site in Manhattan, New York, on Sep. 10, 2021 (Enrico Trigoso/The Epoch Times)
Pedestrians make their way through the dust of lower Manhattan in New York on Sept. 11, 2001, after two hijacked planes were flown into the World Trade Center. (Doug Kanter/AFP via Getty Images)

9/11 Smell of Death Continues to Claim Lives

Toxins from the rubble of the former World Trade Center continue their poisonous streak even 20 years on, leading to serious ailments and death. Its not just the first responders who took part in rescue efforts after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001; also affected were the tens of thousands of civilians who volunteered to help with the cleanup or returned to work in the downtown area shortly after.

Everyone from security guards to office workers returned to do their jobs following an assurance from the government that the clouded air was safe to breathe. People questioned the assurance, as the air quality was palpably bad. How bad it truly was, though, they realized only after people started getting sick. The government came to recognize dozens of ailments linked to the toxic exposure, including respiratory issues and more than 60 types of cancer.

In 2010, Congress passed a law providing health care coverage and financial compensation to anybody diagnosed with one of the recognized ailments who can prove presence in the lower Manhattan affected area on 9/11 or sometime in the following months. The bill was expanded and reauthorized several times, most recently in 2019.

Chris Sorrentino is one of those covered by the bill. He worked as a specialist on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange several blocks from Ground Zero.

On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, he was on a bus from Brooklyn, stuck in an exit from the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel due to a traffic jam. Unbeknownst to him, the gridlock was caused by the first plane hitting the World Trade Center. Eventually, the driver let the passengers off the bus, and Sorrentino started walking toward Wall Street.

I heard a plane just screaming. I looked up and I saw a huge jetliner, a passenger jetliner, he told The Epoch Times.

It was way too low, he thought.

This isnt going to be good.

As the plane disappeared from view, he heard an explosion and saw a massive cloud of smoke and flame engulfing all the buildings in the area. The second tower had been struck.

He started to walk toward the area, still unsure what was going on. He met a few colleagues who also worked on the floor. They told him this was the second plane to hit.

This is like a war, one of them said.

They decided to still go to the exchange, but received a call on the way to head uptown instead.

They headed for FDR Drive, which was open for people to walk north. On the way, he saw a person, possibly a government worker, with a satellite phone. Cell reception was down at this point, so he asked if he could call his wife.

Make it quick, the man said.

His wife was watching what was happening on the news. He told her to get his boat, parked south of the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge in Brooklyn, and come to the South Street Seaport on the west side of lower Manhattan.

She had never taken the boat out by herself before, but she agreed to do it.

As Sorrentino and his colleagues walked toward the seaport, the towers collapsed.

All you saw was a dust cloud just rummaging through every street and alleyway, he said.

Although they were already close to the western edge of Manhattan, across the width of the island from the towers, they were still covered head-to-toe with soot.

You couldnt see 50 feet in front of you, Sorrentino said. Thats how thick it was.

People immediately wrapped clothing around their faces, as the cloud was choking to breathe in, he said.

About two hours after the phone call, his wife arrived. There was already a crowd of people on the pier trying to jump on any boat that pulled up.

Just make a quick sweep, dont even stop, he yelled at his wife.

He jumped on the boat and made another pass, picking up about 10 people.

We left the island, he said.

On their way to Brooklyn, they were stopped by the Coast Guard inquiring about who they were, since the entire area was supposed to be sealed off.

My wife, I guess, snuck in under the radar before they shut it down, he said.

Back to Work

Sorrentino and thousands of his colleagues returned to work the following Tuesday. There was pressure at the time to reopen the stock exchange to restart trading, but also to show defiance in face of the attacks.

Christine Todd Whitman, then-head of the Environmental Protection Agency and a former governor of New Jersey, announced that the air quality was acceptable for people to return to the area.

Governor Whitman assured everybody that the air quality was fine and there was nothing wrong, Sorrentino said. Which was a 100 percent lie.

It was no mystery to anybody who came downtown that the air quality was not acceptable, he said.

The dust was ever-present, impossible to completely clean out. Sanitation workers were hosing down the streets every day, but it wasnt enough.

It looked almost like snow every morning, he said.

In addition, the fire underneath Ground Zero kept burning for about three months.

There were still plumes of smoke coming out every day, Sorrentino said. It was the most rancid smell you would ever want to smell in your life.

Many of those who experienced it, including Sorrentino, described it as the smell of death.

It reeked like asbestos and rotten flesh and filled lower Manhattan for a good three weeks to a month, he said.

Building workers had to constantly replace air filters in their ventilations systems as they were quickly getting clogged, he heard from other workers.

The smell was so irritating it made some peoples eyes water, he said.

Yet many, it appears, didnt grasp the full weight of the consequences of breathing it in.

I definitely didnt think long-term on it, Sorrentino said.

Looking back, he wasnt even sure if regular workers there knew what an N95 mask was. Many were wearing simple cloth masks, such as those handed out by the National Guard, he said.

I would say I know well over a hundred people that passed away or got cancer from 9/11, he said.

Through the years, anytime he heard about somebody getting sick, he said, We must be the lucky ones.

Then, in 2018, he started to feel pain in his abdomen. He went to doctor after doctor, but nobody could figure out what was wrong. It got to the point where the doctors considered sending him to a psychiatrist, thinking the pain was psychological.

He finally had an upward cystoscopy done in 2019, which revealed an aggressive bladder cancer. He agreed to undergo a biopsy on the spot with no anesthesia, the most painful thing in his life, he said. He went on to undergo advanced bladder surgery and began a grueling recovery.

He was told that if he was diagnosed a few months later, there would have been nothing doctors could have done for him.

Sorrentino was able to register for the 9/11 compensation fund, as his type of cancer is one of the ailments presumed to be linked to the toxins.

Involved Lawyer

While its not necessary, many people file claims with the compensation fund through a law firmin Sorrentinos case, Barasch and McGarry.

The firm, which represents more than 25,000 clients with claims against the fund, used to be a small practice handling work injury claims, mostly by firefighters. However, with offices less than three blocks from Ground Zero, the firm was fundamentally changed by the attacks, according to Michael Barasch, managing partner at the firm.

On the day of the attacks, Barasch was at a gym on Vesey Street, about a block from the towers, when he heard an enormous explosion, he told The Epoch Times.

Somebody said a plane hit the World Trade Center.

We went out to the corner of Broadway and Vesey Street and were just watching in horror as people were leaping out of the building, he said.

As the fire ate its way through the tower, the second plane hit.

Holy cow! Were under attack, Barasch realized.

He ran back to his office.

Get out of here. Were at war, he told everyone.

He stayed behind with a partner whose wife worked at one of the towers. The man wasnt sure if his wife had made it to work that morning and was trying to get in touch with her.

Finally, the doorbell rang and it was his wife, Barasch said.

They all stood there in astonishment watching the grisly scene when the first tower started to collapse.

We better get out of here, they realized.

They ran down 18 flights of stairs.

By the time we got to our lobby, it was already filling up with dust from the first implosion, he said.

They ran north.

Coming Back

Barasch and his coworkers returned to their offices a month later, after power was restored.

The outage saved them from exposure to the worst of the contamination, but the place still absolutely reeked when they got back, Barasch said.

Even if the windows were shut, it would come through the air conditioning system, he said.

The smell was so irritating it would prompt nosebleeds in some people, he said.

About half his office ended up with health problems, from respiratory issues to various forms of cancer. Some died. Barasch himself went through prostate cancer.

His firm got involved in the first wave of victim compensation, representing about 1,000 clients. The initial program was designed to shield airlines from liability for the attacks. Claims against the fund were conditioned on waiving ones right to sue the airlines.

The first wave ended in 2004 after paying out $7 billion.

But people didnt stop getting sick, Barasch said.

After a protracted back-and-forth over the scope and funding, Congress reopened the compensation fund and health program through the 2010 James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act. It was named after one of Baraschs clients, NYPD detective James Zadroga, who participated in the 9/11 rescue and recovery efforts and died of pulmonary fibrosis in 2006.

The 2019 reauthorization extended the program to 2090. At the time, the Victim Compensation Fund had already paid out some $5 billion under the Zadroga Act and was projected to spend another $10 billion by 2029 (pdf). The health program paid out about $1.5 billion by 2019, based on an earlier estimate by the Congressional Budget Office (pdf).

The law limits lawyer fees to 10 percent of the compensation award.

The government did the wrong thing when it told us the air was safe, but  the government did the right thing by creating the victim fund, the health program, and then permanently extending both programs, Barasch said.
A floral tribute laid on behalf of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson at the 9/11 Memorial Garden at Grosvenor Square in London, on Sept. 11, 2021. (Hollie Adams/Getty Images)

9/11 Terrorists Failed to Undermine Freedom and Democracy: UKs Johnson

The perpetrators of the 9/11 terrorist attacks failed to undermine freedom and democracy and failed to make the world live in fear, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in a message marking the 20th anniversary of the attack.

He said the terrorists tried to destroy the faith of free peoples everywhere in the open societies which terrorists despise and which we cherish.

Today we remember the 2,977 people taken from us on September 11th 2001. But while the terrorists imposed their burden of grief and suffering, we can now say with the perspective of 20 years that they failed to shake our belief in freedom and democracy. pic.twitter.com/BBuz9i08WZ  Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) September 11, 2021

But Johnson said the terrorists failed to shake our belief in freedom and democracy; they failed to drive our nations apart, or cause us to abandon our values, or to live in permanent fear.

The fact that we are coming together todayin sorrow but also in faith and resolvedemonstrates the failure of terrorism and the strength of the bonds between us.

Johnson said the recent events in Afghanistan only strengthen the Wests determination to hold fast to our belief in liberty and democracy, which will always prevail over every foe.

Among the 2,977 victims of the terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, 67 were British citizens.

Johnson said each of these British victims was a symbol of the eternal friendship between the United Kingdom and the United States.

Labour leader Keir Starmer said, as he marks the anniversary, he is convinced our resolve has never been stronger, we will continue to fight terror and violence, by promoting our values of justice and peace.

Tony Blair, the prime minister at the time of the attacks, told the BBC on Friday that the international community must be prepared to take action against the Taliban if they again allow Afghanistan to become a base of terrorism.

Blair, who has been highly critical of the decision to withdraw international forces, said the Taliban needed to know they would be held to account if they allowed terrorists to regain a foothold now that they are back in control again.

Also talking to the BBC, Ken McCallum, director-general of the MI5 intelligence agency, said the UK is vigilant to the increased terror threats as the Taliban takeover has heartened and emboldened Islamic extremists.

General Lord Richards, the former head of the UK armed forces, told LBC radio the return of the Taliban in Afghanistan raised the prospect of another 9/11 as ungoverned spaces opened up which the terrorists were able to exploit.

PA contributed to this report.
A Chinese Policeman on the Run After Standing Up for Justice for His Father

A Chinese police constable had to resign because his father was being harassed for reporting the illegal operations and breaches of regulations of a local business. Police officers from the public security office went to his home on the evening of Sept. 5 to bring him in for questioning. Luckily he was not there at the time.

Wang Ke, born in 1990, was a second-class police constable of the Huangyan Police Station, Taizhou City, Zhejiang Province, before he resigned in August. The city is about 300 km south of Shanghai.

Wang Youyi, Wang Kes father, reported online in 2018 that Yuanqiao Supply and Marketing Cooperative illegally leased the business licenses of its gas stations to individuals with no business qualifications and that there were safety hazards in the gas stations. The safety issues included a dangling power wire above a gas pump and trees close to fuel nozzles.

Wang Youyi is a shareholder of the cooperative that he was reporting on.

One of his online posts stated that the ground construction of one of the gas stations didnt comply with the land certificate, meaning that placement of the gas station was probably not approved by the local land management administration.

In his posts, Wang Youyi reported the alleged breaches to the local market regulation administration, the fire brigade, work safety administration, and the local Chinese Communist Partys (CCP) disciplinary organ. He went to the local disciplinary committee on March 22, 2021, to inquire about the results of the investigations. The staff told him: What you reported is a legal dispute; we cant reach an investigative conclusion. No conclusion is our conclusion.

According to Wang Youyis online posts, Deputy District Director of Huangyan District Jiang Dehua held a coordination conference on May 21, 2019, about the alleged breaches of regulations and business license issues of the gas stations. Almost two months later, on July 18, the market regulation administration replied to Wang Youyi that it cannot cancel the business licenses of the two gas stations based on relevant laws.

Wang Ke helped his father post the materials on Chinese social platforms. He did not expect that he would be put under pressure by his own police station for assisting his fathers reporting.

Pressure on Wang Ke

Wang Ke has a Bachelor of Laws degree, majoring in criminal investigation. He also holds a Chinese lawyers license.

Wang Ke told the Chinese edition of The Epoch Times on Sept. 2 that the Huangyan Police Station, where he worked, tried to silence his father by exerting a lot of pressure on him.

Police officers of various levels have summoned him at least 100 times in the past three years, asking him to persuade his father to stop reporting, but Wang Ke refused to do so. They also investigated him in various ways and threatened to fire him. The police station once held him in solitary confinement. He was rated as incompetent in his 2019 and 2020 annual assessments, which is a reason for a Chinese workplace to fire an employee. Wang could not accept what he was experiencing because he had done nothing wrong.

Through his and his fathers experiences, Wang realized that Chinese society under CCP rule functions in an abnormal way. I havent seen [the dark side of the society] before and I could not see clearly [the reason], Wang said. He came to understand that his father has been upholding justice, and he later helped his father to post details of his allegations on Chinas social platforms.

I feel the local political environment is really murky. Officials collude with and protect each other. I couldnt bear this atmosphere and didnt want to tolerate such treatment, so I resigned, Wang said.

The past few years were like a nightmare to Wang. He wrote in his resignation letter: What I have experienced in the past years caused a lot of mental pain. I often have insomnia, cold sweats, and nightmares. I feel very upset and anxious in my heart.

Wang noted that the basic reason for the deteriorating society is corruption in the system. Unless you do not want any promotion or benefits, you have to sell your soul to them to a different extent in the current system, Wang said.

Wang happened to not be at home on Sept. 5 when agents of the local public security came to get him. They left a message with his family, asking him to remove the online posts. He ran away but was caught the next day.

Friends Seek Help for Wang

The Chinese language Epoch Times reached out to the interviewee before the publication of the article but did not succeed. An anonymous source told The Epoch Times that Wang Ke was taken away by the local police on Sept. 6.

To date, The Epoch Times has not been able to verify the details after contacting the local police departments and individuals who have refused to comment. The Epoch Times will continue to follow up.

One of Wangs friends (unnamed for safety) told The Epoch Times that he admires the young mans courage to stand up for justice. He said there are other young and brave police officers in China who also stand up for justice.

Wangs former colleague Chi Wen has been arrested twice under criminal charges after he reported that Zhou Xianghui, the deputy chief of the police station, committed adultery.

Wangs friend hopes the international society will support Wang and others like him.
Retired Paramedic Chief Charlie Wells kisses the name of a relative killed in the attack on the World Trade Center at the National 9/11 Memorial & Museum during a ceremony commemorating the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in New York on Sept. 11, 2021. (David Handschuh/AFP/Getty Images)

America Commemorates 20th Anniversary of 9/11 Terror Attacks

Americans across the country came together on Sept. 11 to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks, which killed nearly 3,000 people, wounded thousands more, and left an indelible scar on the nations psyche.

Observances were planned across the countryfrom a wreath-laying in Portland, Maine, to flags flying at half-staff at the Washington Monumentmarked by a sea of statues, 9/11 plaques, and sorrowful Americans vowing never to forget the deadliest act of terrorism on U.S. soil.

A ceremony at ground zero in New York got underway with a first responder striking a silver bell at 8:46 a.m., the exact time that the first of two hijacked planes crashed into one of the World Trade Centers twin towers.

It felt like an evil specter had descended on our world, but it was also a time when many people acted above and beyond the ordinary, said Mike Low, whose daughter, Sara Low, was a flight attendant on that plane.

As we carry these 20 years forward, I find sustenance in a continuing appreciation for all of those who rose to be more than ordinary people.

In attendance at the ceremony were President Joe Biden and former presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton.

A memorial flag is brought onto the stage during ceremonies to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in New York on Sept. 11, 2021. (John Minchillo/AP Photo)

Relatives then read aloud the names of the 2,977 victims who died in the World Trade Center attack, and later Bruce Springsteen gave a heart-wrenching performance of Ill See You in My Dreams.

In line with tradition, no politicians spoke at the ground zero ceremony in Manhattan, where buildings will be illuminated in blue and, at sunset, twin beams will project four miles into the sky to mirror the fallen towers.

During this 20th anniversary year, we will share the history and lessons learned with a new generation, teach them about the ongoing repercussions of the 9/11 attacks, and inspire the world with memories of our fortitude, strength, and resilience, the 9/11 Memorial & Museum wrote in a special section on its website dedicated to the 20th-anniversary commemorations.

A family member at the reflecting pool places a flag during a ceremony at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, in New York on Sept. 11, 2021. (David Handschuh-Pool/Getty Images)

While many of the large events were happening in and around New York, people across the country planned events to remember those who died and to educate the public.

In Shanksville, Pennsylvania, family and guests gathered at the National Memorial there to honor the 40 people killed when United Airlines Flight 93 crashed into a field. According to the 9/11 Commission Report (pdf), the actions of the passengers who confronted the planes hijackers ultimately led to the aircraft plummeting into an empty field in rural Pennsylvania instead of hitting its intended target, likely the White House or the U.S. Capitol. Their courage and sacrifice almost certainly saved the lives of others.

Former President George W. Bush, who took office eight months before the attacks, was among those to speak at the ceremony.

In these memories, the passengers and crew of Flight 93 must always have an honored place. Here the intended targets became the instruments of rescue. And many who are now alive owe a vast, unconscious debt to the defiance displayed in the skies above this field, Bush said.

A ring of bells takes place during a 9/11 commemoration at the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pa., on Sept. 11, 2021. (Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images)

In those fateful hours, we learned other lessons as well. We saw that Americans were vulnerable, but not fragilethat they possess a core of strength that survives the worst that life can bring. We learned that bravery is more common than we imagined, emerging with sudden splendor in the face of death.

Calvin Wilson, whose brother-in-law LeRoy Homer died aboard Flight 93, spoke ahead of the ceremony.

We dont focus on the damage. We dont focus on the hate. We dont focus on retaliation. We dont focus on revenge. We focus on the good that all of our loved ones have done, Wilson said.

A commemorative ceremony was also held in Arlington, Virginia, where another hijacked planeAmerican Airlines Flight 77slammed into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, killing 125 people in the building and 59 passengers and crew aboard the plane.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley honored the victims at the ceremony.

All of the values and principles embedded in our Constitution and made real in our daily lives were paid for with the blood of the fallen on this place at 9:37 on Sept. 11, 2001, Milley said at the ceremony, according to the New York Post. Those ideals were and still are hated by our enemies: the fascists, the Nazis, the communists, al-Qaeda, ISIS, the Taliban, authoritarians, dictators, and tyrants of all kinds. They hate those ideals. They hate those values.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin also spoke at the ceremony outside the Pentagon.

It is our responsibility to remember. And it is our duty to defend our democracy, Austin said, according to The Associated Press. We still work here. We still remember here. We still uphold our values here. With clear heads and fearless hearts.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin speaks during a remembrance ceremony to mark the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, at the Pentagon in Arlington, Va., on Sept. 11, 2021. (Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images)

Many other commemorative ceremonies were held across the country, with Fox News citing the 9/11 Memorial & Museums registry as counting at least 1,190 ceremonies taking place in the United States.

Other events included a 9/11 Memorial 5K Run and fundraiser jointly organized by Arlingtons police and fire departments, the Sheriffs Office, and the Emergency Communications Center; a Missouri Fire Marshal 9/11 Memorial Stair Climb, which was underway at the time of reporting; and a 9/11 Flags of Honor Across America Memorial ceremony in Arizona.

While 9/11 remembrances have become an annual tradition, this Sept. 11 had special significance, coming 20 years after the morning that many view as a turning point in U.S. history.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Flags on display at the 2020 Orange Field of Valor, in Handy Park in Orange, Calif., on Nov. 9, 2020. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

American Flags Honoring 13 Service Members Killed in Terrorist Attack Stolen in Riverside

A number of flags placed above a freeway overpass in Riverside honoring the 13 U.S. Marines killed in the recent Afghanistan attack were damaged and stolen for unknown reasons.

It began with a set of 13 American flags and one Marine Corps flag that was set up during Labor Day weekend over the Ivy overpass on the 91 Freeway.

Shortly after they were installed, all of the flags were completely shredded, Riverside Police Department spokesperson Ryan Railsback told The Epoch Times.

On Sept. 7, a family went to the Ivy overpass to replace the damaged flags with a fresh set of 13 American flags and one marine flag when another family showed up at the same time with another 13 American flags, which were installed on the other side of the overpass, Railsback said.

Unfortunately within 24 hours, all 27 flags were stolen.

At the same time that the 27 flags were being put up, the Riverside Chamber of Commerce put up 13 American flags and one Marine flag on the 14th street overpass, and the Marine flag was stolen the following day.

The police department is following up on slim leads as to who might committing the vandalism, but there are currently no suspects, given that the area around the Ivy overpass is between residential neighborhoods with few security cameras.

Its also unclear whether there was one person or multiple people destroying the memorials.

Railsback speculated that whoever damaged the first flags could have had a mental illness; but whoever purposely stole all 27 flags likely was intentional in their actions.

We do have homeless people in these areas, but the one who cut the first flags, it could have been some kids, some angry person, some mentally ill homeless person walking by and decided to cut them and rip them. Whoever did that maybe wasnt in their right mind, Railsback said.

But when you steal 27 flags the next day, you know what youre doing. Thats not someone coming by deranged, thats behavior of someone whos more intentional and probably in their right mind to some extent. But we wont know for sure [unless we catch them].

Railsback said that if the person was looking to divide the community, the opposite effect actually happened, with people buying up flags to unify over both the 13 soldiers killed in the Kabul attack as well as the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

Right after 9/11, it was this sense of everybody coming together and talking about what they have in common more than what they dont, and just a sense of unity and support for many different things, but back then it was the military and the people who were lost that day. So, you kind of get a little sense of that [here], with part of it relating to the 13 [service members] who were killed, but also having the 20th anniversary of 9/11 tomorrow. Its kind of a combination of both that were starting to see people come up.

Residents in Riverside are starting to place 13 flags around their houses in support of the soldiers, and due to the ones on the overpass being ruined, another group has put 13 more flags on the Adams Street overpass. Two of the 13 soldiers killed were from Riverside, something that Railsback said really hit close to home for the community.
An exam room is seen at the Planned Parenthood South Austin Health Center in Austin, Texas, on June 27, 2016. (Ilana Panich-Linsman/Reuters)

Appeals Court Panel Leaves Texas Abortion Law in Place

An appeals court panel opted on Sept. 10 to leave the new Texas law banning most abortions in place for the time being, marking the latest decision of its kind.

Abortion providers filed suit against the state of Texas in July over the law, arguing that Texas Senate Bill 8, which went into effect Sept. 1, is unconstitutional and should be blocked from enforcement. The measure bans the performance of abortions without an attempt to detect a fetal heartbeat and bars abortions outside of medical emergencies if such a heartbeat is detected.

But state officials arent allowed to enforce the measure. Instead, the unusual law allows private citizens to bring lawsuits against doctors who allegedly perform illegal abortions or others who allegedly aid or abet them.

In the lawsuit, the abortion providers named Texas judges as defendants, asking the court to not allow them to participate in the enforcement of the new law in any way. They also sued Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and several other state officials.

Earlier attempts at stopping the law from taking effect were shot down by several courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court.

In the new ruling, three judges on the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals said the plaintiffs employed a novel strategy in trying to prevent Texas judges from entertaining any lawsuits brought under Senate Bill 8. They found the claims against the judges as specious because existing Supreme Court precedent excludes judges from the scope of the relief the plaintiffs are seeking.

Moreover, it is well established that judges acting in their adjudicatory capacity are not proper Section 1983 defendants in a challenge to the constitutionality of state law, the ruling reads.

When acting in their adjudicatory capacity, judges are disinterested neutrals who lack a personal interest in the outcome of the controversy. It is absurd to contend, as Plaintiffs do, that the way to challenge an unfavorable state law is to sue state court judges, who are bound to follow not only state law but the U.S. Constitution and federal law.

They also said none of the state defendants, such as Paxton, has an enforcement connection with the new law, since it expressly forbids them from enforcing it.

The sole private defendant, Mark Dickson, described by plaintiffs as being deputized to bring S.B. 8 enforcement actions under color of state law, was also granted his motion to stay a lower court order, as the judges found his appeal was linked to the other defendants regarding jurisdictional issues.

The panel concluded that there are serious questions regarding the constitutionality of the Texas law at issue. However, citing the Supreme Courts recent ruling against a preliminary injunction in the case, the panel stated that a federal court shouldnt proceed yet without the jurisdiction matters being decided, as doing so would threaten to grant unelected judges a general authority to conduct oversight of decisions of the elected branches of Government.

In light of that nonnegotiable principle, we cannot allow proceedings to go forward while our court considers whether the federal judiciary has any power to entertain this novel lawsuit to begin with, they wrote.

The panel consisted of two Donald Trump appointeesU.S. Circuit Judges Kyle Duncan and Kurt Damian Engelhardtand Ronald Reagan-installed U.S. Circuit Judge Edith Hollan Jones of the conservative 5th Circuit joined the per curiam order.

The ruling, which expedited the case to the full appeals court, leaves the law in place until the court considers the arguments from both sides.

Whole Womans Health, an abortion clinic and the lead plaintiff, didnt immediately respond to a request for comment, nor did the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, which filed the suit, or a lawyer for Dickson.
Arizona School Buildings Manager Demoted to Substitute Teaching for Declining Vaccine, as Mandate Resistance Grows

An Arizona public school district faces a lawsuit following its decision to demote buildings manager William Bishop to substitute teacher for his refusal to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.

Cartwright School District in Phoenix is being sued for its refusal to grantin fact, its refusal to even respond toMr. Bishops request for an accommodation that would allow him to honor his religious convictions that prevent him from receiving the COVID-19 vaccine, Bishops attorney, Rebecca Dummermuth, told Superintendent Dr. LeeAnn Aguilar-Lawlor in a Sept. 9 letter made available to The Epoch Times.

The CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, which causes COVID-19, has reportedly killed more than 660,000 Americans since the first death occurred in January 2020 in California.

Dummermuth is an attorney with the First Liberty Institute, a Plano, Texas-based public interest law firm that specializes in First Amendment and religious freedom issues.

Dummermuth said in the letter that the school districts refusal came despite the fact that 95 percent [of] district staff were carved out of its vaccine mandate. The districts refusal to accommodate Mr. Bishops sincerely held religious beliefs, and its adverse employment action of transferring and demoting him to a position as substitute teacher, violate of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the Arizona Free Exercise of Religion Act, and executive orders by [Arizona] Governor [Doug] Ducey.

A spokesman for the school district told The Epoch Times that Aguilar-Lawlor was unavailable to comment on the First Liberty letter due to a bereavement. The superintendent will return to the office next week.

Bishops demotion comes as President Joe Biden warned the estimated 80 million Americans who havent yet been vaccinated that we have been patient, but our patience is wearing thin. And your refusal has cost all of us.

Bidens warning came in a speech in which he announced his signing of an executive order directing the Department of Labor to issue regulations mandating all private companies with 100 or more employees to require vaccination as a condition of employment.

But Bidens announcement almost immediately sparked new protests from an already surging public resistance, with at least 19 governors and two attorneys general issuing statements disagreeing with Bidens decision and vowing to defy it.

The defiant governors, all Republicans, include Arizonas Gov. Doug Ducey, as well as those of Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, and Wyoming.

Two state attorneys general, Sean D. Reyes of Utah and Todd Rokita of Indiana, also spoke out against the policy. Rokita is a former U.S. congressman. The Republican National Committee (RNC) said its suing in federal court in opposition to Bidens forthcoming directive as well.

Many of those declining to be vaccinated cite religious grounds for doing so, including Bishop, according to Dummermuth.

As a Christian, he believes that his body is a temple of God (I Corinthians 3:16-17, 6:19), and therefore he has a God-given responsibility to protect the physical integrity of his body and not to defile it (I Corinthians 8:7; II Corinthians 7:1), she said in her letter to Aguilar-Lawlor.

Additionally, he believes that human life begins at conception, and he staunchly opposes abortion. Therefore, receiving a vaccine that has been developed using aborted fetal cell lines would violate his conscience.

The health care industry appears to be especially hard-hit by the growing resistance to vaccine mandates, with severe staffing shortages in multiple states, according to Liberty Counsel (LC).

The Florida-based LC, like First Liberty, is a public interest law firm that specializes in civil liberties issues, especially those involving religious freedom.

There are thousands of nurses all over the United States that are refusing the injection because they dont believe its been thoroughly tested or vetted, that its being forced, and/or they have a deeply held religious belief against it. Many of these nurses have either been put on unpaid leave or have been fired due to refusing the injection, LC said in a Sept. 8 statement.

In Texas, weeks after 150 hospital workers were fired by Houston Methodist, one of several hospitals struggling has reached a breaking point amid the COVID-19 outbreak.

The statement quoted a California physician, Dr. Tom Sugarman, who said, Oftentimes at hospitals, there are long waits and long delays. Theres not enough staff to keep beds open, and patients can languish waiting.

Sugarman is an emergency physician and senior director of government affairs at Vituity, a physicians and medical services group.

In addition to clients in the health care industry, LC is representing hundreds of Department of Veterans Affairs employees who are seeking exemptions from Bidens vaccine mandate for government workers, issued in August.
The logo of the Therapeutic Goods Administration is seen at a COVID-19 vaccines press conference in Canberra, Australia, on May 6, 2021. (AAP Image/Lukas Coch)

Australia Imposes New Restrictions on Prescribing Ivermectin for COVID-19

Australias medicine and therapeutics regulator, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA), has introduced new restrictions on the prescribing of ivermectin for COVID-19 and other off-label use.

The TGA, an agency under Australias Department of Health, announced that the changes were introduced because of concerns with the prescribing of oral ivermectin for the claimed prevention or treatment of COVID-19.

The new restrictions mean that general practitioners may only prescribe the drug for TGA-approved conditions and not for other non-approved purposesalso referred to as off-label use. No penalties were specified in the TGA announcement in the event of a GP skirting the rules.

The Epoch Times has reached out to the TGA for further information.

Only certain specialists can continue to prescribe oral ivermectin for off-label use. They include infectious disease physicians, dermatologists, gastroenterologists, and hepatologists, the TGA announced.

Stromectol ivermectin 3mg is the only oral ivermectin product that is TGA-approved. The indications approved are river blindness, threadworm of the intestines, and scabies.

Ivermectin is not TGA-approved for use to treat COVID-19 in Australia. The TGA said that its use for COVID-19 in the general public is currently strongly discouraged by three entitiesthe National COVID Clinical Evidence Taskforce (pdf), the World Health Organization, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

TGA Lays Out Concerns

The TGA in its announcement asserted that there are a number of significant public health risks associated with taking ivermectin in an attempt to prevent COVID-19 infection rather than getting vaccinated.

The agency added that people who think they are protected from COVID-19 by taking ivermectin may choose not to get tested or to seek medical care if they experience symptoms, and claimed that doing so has the potential to spread the risk of COVID-19 infection throughout the community.

The TGA said that a second concern involves unreliable social media posts and other sources that have reportedly advocated for the use of ivermectin in significantly higher doses compared to what is approved and found safe for the treatment of scabies or parasites.

These higher doses can be associated with serious adverse effects, including severe nausea, vomiting, dizziness, neurological effects such as dizziness, seizures, and coma.

The regulator also said that there has been a three- to four-fold increase in the dispensing of ivermectin prescriptions in recent months, which has resulted in national and local shortages for those who need the medicine for scabies and parasite infections.

It is believed that this is due to recent prescribing and dispensing for unapproved uses, such as COVID-19, its statement reads. Such shortages can disproportionately impact vulnerable people, including those in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.

Immediate Backlash by MPs

Two Australian politicians immediately issued announcements late Sept. 10 criticizing the TGA restrictions.

Federal MP George Christensen, a Liberal Party member from the state of Queensland, posted on Telegram a photo of his medications, writing, My ivermectin treatment pack. Prescribed by a GP. Now the TGA has banned GPs from prescribing the drug off-label. Its a decision they will regret.

Christensen also shared a lengthy list of studies, writing, heres some REAL INFO on IVERMECTIN.

Photo captioned My ivermectin treatment pack. Prescribed by a GP, shared on Telegram by Australian federal politician George Christensen on Sept. 10, 2021. (Courtesy of George Christensen MP)

Federal MP Craig Kelly, a former Liberal Party member and now leader of the United Australia Party, in a statement posted on Telegram called the TGA move OUTRAGEOUS and accused the agency of having interfered with the sanctity of the Doctor patient relationship in Australia, by ignoring the evidence of over 50 published studies and also ignoring expert medical advice from doctors that have treated thousands of patients successfully with Ivermectinby prohibiting doctors from prescribing this medicine to sick Australians.

The UNITED AUSTRALIA PARTY tonight calls for [an] urgent Royal Commission in this TGA over this decision, he wrote, saying that the decision could be investigated for possible corruption.

Its a sad day for the nation, as the expert medical evidence from overseas indicates that this outrageous decision by the TGA will result in the death of Australians, Kelly added.

A health worker shows a box containing a bottle of Ivermectin in Cali, Colombia, on July 21, 2020. (Luis Robayo/AFP via Getty Images)

On Ivermectin

Ivermectin is a generic medicine that can be produced cheaply in many places around the world and has been widely used in humans against some parasitic worms, and to combat scabies, lice, as well as rosacea. It is also used as an anti-parisite drug in livestock, including horses and cows.

William Campbell and Satoshi Omura in 2015 won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery and applications of ivermectin. The World Health Organization features ivermectin on its List of Essential Medicines. It is also an FDA-approved antiparasitic agent.

Doctors and health care professionals have considered ivermectin as a repurposed medicine in tackling COVID-19, especially when used in early treatment. Many have praised ivermectin for having successfully helped thousands of their patients survive the initial waves of COVID-19.

As of Sept. 9, there are at least 63 studies, of which 45 are peer-reviewed, on the treatment of COVID-19 with ivermectin.

Two groups, the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance and the British Ivermectin Recommendation Development Group, have been campaigning for the off-label use of the drug to combat the disease amid the pandemic.

Monash University, based in the Australian state of Victoria, announced in April 2020 that a study it led showed that a single dose of the drug, Ivermectin, could stop the SARS-CoV-2 virus growing in cell culture.

But it cautioned that ivermectin cannot be used in humans for COVID-19 until further testing and clinical trials have been completed to confirm the effectiveness of the drug at levels safe for human dosing.

The potential use of Ivermectin to combat COVID-19 remains unproven, and depends on funding to progress the work into the next stages, the university said at the time.
Biden Admin Launches Probe Into Legality of Floridas Restriction on School Mask Mandates

The U.S. Department of Education informed Floridas education secretary on Friday of an investigation into the Sunshine States restriction against school mask mandates.

In a Sept. 10 letter (pdf) to Florida Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran, Suzanne Goldberg, the acting assistant secretary for civil rights at the U.S. Department of Education, wrote that Floridas requirement for school districts to allow parents to opt their children out of mask mandates may violate the civil rights of students with disabilities, who are purportedly at a higher risk to adverse outcomes from COVID-19.

The departments Office of Civil Rights (OCR) in Atlanta will conduct the directed investigation, according to the letter.

OCRs investigation will focus on whether, in light of this policy, students with disabilities who are at heightened risk for severe illness from COVID-19 are prevented from safely returning to in-person education, in violation of federal law, Goldberg wrote.

The Epoch Times contacted the office of Gov. Ron DeSantis for comment.

School districts in Florida were briefly free to impose mask mandates after a state court struck down Floridas restriction on the measures. A higher court sided with DeSantis on Sept. 10 and reinstated the mask mandate restriction. A number of school districts are in open defiance to DeSantis; at least two are bleeding funds as punishment for doing so.

DeSantis issued an executive order on July 30 directing Floridas departments of health and education to issue emergency rules related to stemming the spread of COVID-19 in schools. The order included a provision requiring school districts that impose mask mandates to allow parents to choose whether their children should wear masks in school.

The U.S. Department of Education inquiry will also look into whether the states restriction on mask mandates is preventing Florida from providing an equal educational opportunity to students with disabilities, Goldberg wrote.

The question of whether to mandate masks in schools is split neatly among political lines, with most Republicans opposing mandates and most Democrats supporting them. All six of the states with statewide bans on school mask mandates are led by Republican governors. Meanwhile, Democrat governors preside over every one of the more than a dozen states which mandate masks in schools.

The Biden administration has repeatedly stepped into the mask debate, including by promising to repay the Florida schools, which lose state funding as a result of defying the governor and imposing mask mandates.

The U.S. Department of Education on Thursday announced a program that would grant funding to schools that defy their states restrictions on mask mandates.

We should be thanking districts for using proven strategies that will keep schools open and safe, not punishing them, Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said in a press release.

GQ Pan contributed to this report.
President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden arrive at LaGuardia International Airport, in New York, on Sept. 10, 2021. (Evan Vucci/AP Photo)

Biden to Visit 3 Attack Sites on 9/11, Calls for Unity

President Joe Biden is set to visit three sites that were attacked on Sept. 11, 2001, on the 20th anniversary of the tragic day that took at least 2,977 lives and injured thousands more.

According to a release from the White House, Biden and First Lady Jill Biden will start the day in New York in a commemoration ceremony at the National September 11th Memorial, the site where the World Trade Centers twin towers once stood before attacks that caused them to collapse.

Smoke billows from one of the towers of the World Trade Center as flames and debris explode from the second tower, in New York City, on Sept. 11, 2001. (Chao Soi Cheong/AP Photo)

From there, the Bidens will travel to Shanksville, Pennsylvania, to attend a wreath-laying ceremony at the Flight 93 National Memorial, the site where United Flight 93 crashed into a field after passengers thwarted hijackers plans to hit another target.

Finally, the president and the first lady will join Vice President Kamala Harris and the Second Gentleman Douglas Emhoff for a wreath-laying ceremony at the Pentagon, the symbol of the U.S. military, the western facade of which was attacked on Sept. 11, 2001.

Biden is not scheduled to deliver a live address at any of the three sites. The president released a video late Friday, expressing hope for national unity and honoring the memories of the victims.

20 years after September 11, 2001, we commemorate the 2,977 lives we lost and honor those who risked and gave their lives. As we saw in the days that followed, unity is our greatest strength. Its what makes us who we are  and we cant forget that. pic.twitter.com/WysK8m3LAb  President Biden (@POTUS) September 10, 2021

In the days that followed September 11th, 2001, we saw heroism everywhere, in places expected and unexpected. We also saw something all too rarea true sense of national unity, Biden said in his recorded address.

Unity is what makes us who we are. America at its best. To me, thats the central lesson of September 11  unity is our greatest strength, he said later, adding, Unity doesnt mean we have to believe the same thing. But we must have a fundamental respect and faith in each other and in this nation.

May God bless you all. May God bless the lives lost on September 11th, 2001, and their loved ones who were left behind.
Passengers board a Qatar Airways aircraft at the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Sept. 9, 2021. (Wakil Kohsar/AFP via Getty Images)

Canada Helped 145 Afghan Refugees Flee Overland to Pakistan

OTTAWACanada has helped 145 Canadianbound refugees flee Afghanistan overland to Pakistan.

A spokesman for Immigration Minister Marco Mendicino says all 145 have Canadian visas and are now being processed in Pakistan and will be on their way to Canada within days or weeks.

Alexander Cohen says most of the refugees are Afghans who helped Canada during its military mission to Afghanistan from 2001 to 2014 and who fear retribution now that the Taliban have regained control of the country.

He says their number includes individuals associated with the Malala Foundation, students at the Marefat Girls School and fixers who helped Canadian journalists covering the mission.

The overland evacuees are in addition to the 3,700 Canadians, Afghan refugees and other countrys nationals who were airlifted by Canada out of Afghanistan before American troops completed a frenzied withdrawal from the country at the end of August.

On Thursday, 43 Canadians were evacuated on a flight organized by the government of Qatar, the first passenger flight to leave Afghanistan since last month. Ten more were evacuated Friday on another flight bound for Qatar.

Cohen said the government began working with allies and neighbouring countries even before evacuation flights were shut down last month to find new routes for Afghan refugees to flee to safety.

Thus far, the overland journey to Pakistan has been the most effective way to get people out of Afghanistan, he said.

Cohen said officials are working with individuals to ensure they have the necessary documents and with allies, including humanitarian groups, that have been helping organize overland convoys of refugees.

Staff at the Canadian High Commission in Islamabad have been beefed up to help process the refugees and are working with the Pakistani government to ensure border officials are ready for their arrival, he said.

Were working with refugees to support them while in Pakistan and facilitate onward travel to Canada, and well add resources where necessary, Cohen said.

We expect more refugees to leave Afghanistan and come to Canada via Pakistan in the coming days and weeks.

Cohen said 2,200 Afghan refugees have resettled in Canada so far, with another 400 in transit.

The federal government has promised to continue doing whatever it can to get people out of Afghanistan. It has also pledged to accept at least 20,000 refugees who make it to neighbouring countries.
A health worker shows a dose of the Chinese Sinopharm vaccine for COVID-19 disease, at a vaccination centre in the Jordanian capital Amman, on January 13, 2021. (KHALIL MAZRAAWI/AFP via Getty Images)

China Initiates Development of mRNA Vaccines

Sinopharm and Sinovac COVID-19 inactive vaccines are being called into question

While the efficacy of Chinese inactivated vaccines is in doubt, the Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA vaccine is still blocked on the Chinese Communist Partys (CCP) approval process, and not allowed in mainland China. Meanwhile, state-owned Sinopharm announced it will develop an mRNA vaccine.

On Sept. 6, state-owned First Financial said that the National Pharmaceutical Group Co., Ltd. (Sinopharm) has begun developing an mRNA variant vaccine and expects to launch it next year. Sinopharm is the only central enterprise directly under the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission that focuses on life and health.

Chinese authorities had been resisting mRNA technology in the research for a CCP virus (also called the novel coronavirus) vaccine. China has chosen a safe and mature inactivated vaccine route, while the mRNA vaccine route is immature and may pose a safety risk, said mouthpiece Xinhua media on Dec. 29, 2020.

However, based on its actual efficacy, Chinas domestically produced vaccine has had little effect, an anonymous Chinese lawyer told The Epoch Times, citing that the latest outbreak was triggered at Nanjing airport, where 37 people were infected, and 36 had received two doses of Chinese vaccines.

Two vaccine makers in China, both state-owned Sinopharm and private firm Sinovac, rely on inactivated vaccine technology.

Current domestic vaccines offer low protection against the COVID-19, admitted Gao Fu, director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, saying Its now under consideration whether we should use different vaccines from different technical lines for the immunization process. Gao gave the speech at a conference in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, on April 10.

Gao also praised the benefits of mRNA vaccines. The technology behind the vaccines Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna is seen as the most effective, reported The Associated Press.

Inactive Vaccine and mRNA Vaccine

According to data from Healthcareitnews, Sinovac and Sinopharm are whole virus vaccines that uses a weakened or deactivated form of the pathogen that causes COVID-19 to trigger protective immunity, also named inactive vaccine.

Modena and Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines are RNA or mRNA vaccines that, instructs the cells to produce antigens and then detected by immune cells, triggering a response by the bodys lymphocytes, and thus allow immune efficacy to be more easily amplified.

On Dec. 31, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) approved the Comirnaty COVID-19 mRNA vaccine for emergency use, jointly developed by Pfizer and BioNTech, therefore also called the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.

Clinical trials proved that the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine has an overall vaccine efficacy of 95 percent, according to a Feb. 19 assessment report issued by European Medicines Agency.

While the Sinovac inactive vaccine has a different efficacy rate from each of the trials conducted in some countries, ranging from around 50 percent to over 83 percent, reported The Associated Press.

The Sinopharm official website said that its inactive vaccine has an efficacy rate of 79 percent.

On 23 Aug., 2021, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted full authorization to use the PfizerBioNTech vaccine to prevent COVID-19 disease in individuals 16 years of age and older.

Sinopharm and Fubitai

Following the United States policy closely, on Sept. 6, state-owned Sinopharm announced the development of an mRNA vaccine.

Early in May, Fosun Pharmaceutical established a partnership with Germany company BioNTech Biotech, the co-maker of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine with Pfizer. Both parties agreed to produce mRNA vaccines with an annual capacity of 1 billion doses in China. However, the mRNA vaccine also called the Fubitai vaccine in Chinese, has not received license approval in China.

Some investors were concerned that the Fubitai vaccine could not be listed in China. Fosuns chairman and general manager, Wu Yifang responded on Aug. 23 that he would communicate with Chinese regulators, according to First Financial.

The announcement of state-owned Sinopharm comes when the approval of Fubitai Vaccine is being blocked, which might indicate that the CCP is fostering domestic companies, said Li Yanming, a U.S.-based commentator on current affairs with a doctorate in Biology. [The] CCP [is] concerned that the launch of Fubitai vaccine will lead to a boycott of domestic vaccines.

In addition to Sinopharm, as early as June 2020, the CCPs Institute of Military Medicine, Abogenbio Biotechnology in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, and Walvax Biotechnology in Yunnan Province engaged in co-development of an mRNA vaccine. However, after approval by the State Drug Administration, the vaccine phase 1 clinical trials have been stalled and no data has been released.

The Epoch Times reporter contacted Sinopharm, Institute of Military Medicine, Abogenbio Biotechnology, and Walvax Biotechnology for comment, but has received no response as of publishing time.

China-Made COVID-19 Vaccines Called Into Question

To increase its international influence, the CCP has engaged in vaccine diplomacy. As of early August, it has donated vaccines to more than 100 countries and exported vaccines to more than 60 countries, with a total volume of more than 770 million doses, reports mouthpiece Chinanews.

Chinese vaccines are being approved and administered at an extraordinary rate; however, as the virus mutates and fails to form an immune barrier, each vaccination is equivalent to being poisoned, Guiyuan, with a doctorate in medicine, told The Epoch Times.

CCPs Great Leap Forward in vaccines is absurd and completely against the normality, said Guiyuan.

Seychelles, Chile, Bahrain, and Mongolia, the main countries using the Chinese vaccine, were listed among the top 10 most severe outbreaks globally, according to an article in the New York Times on June 22.

On Aug. 19 Johns Hopkins University announced it would accept only vaccines approved by the U.S. FDA, including Moderna, Pfizer, and Johnson & Johnson. Chinese vaccines Sinopharm and Sinovac are not endorsed, and students who received those vaccines in China will need to receive the approved vaccines before Oct. 8 when they return to school.

On Sept. 1, North Korea rejected 3 million doses of the Sinovac vaccine from China, saying China should send them to severely affected countries. The Institute for National Security Strategies (INSS), a South Korean think tank, said that North Korea was not keen on the Chinese vaccine because it worried that the Chinese vaccine would be less effective, reported Reuters.

Some countries that once received mainly Chinese vaccines are also beginning to change their vaccination policies. For example, health care workers in Indonesia will receive the Moderna vaccine after two doses of the Sinovac vaccine; Bahrain is urging people over 50 to receive a booster dose of Pfizer after two doses of the Sinopharm vaccine; Thailand has decided to give the AstraZeneca vaccine after a first dose of Sinovac vaccine.

Winnie Han Winnie Han is currently engaged in reporting Chinese news for The Epoch Times. She was a lecturer at the Nantong University of China and an editor for the New Zealand Epoch Times. She holds BA and MA in Educational and Developmental Psychology as well as a Masters in Philosophy and Ph.D. in Womens Studies.
A Jio mobile phone is on display inside a digital store of Reliance Industries Ltd. in Mumbai, India, on Oct. 7, 2020. (Niharika Kulkarni/Reuters)

Chip Shortage Pushes Reliance, Google to Delay India Smartphone Launch

BENGALURUIndian conglomerate Reliance Industries delayed the launch of a low-cost smartphone it is developing with Google to November, citing an industry-wide semiconductor shortage.

The ultra-affordable smartphone, developed jointly by Reliances telecom arm and Google, was set to be rolled out from Sept. 10.

Companies globally are tackling a massive semiconductor shortage as the COVID-19 pandemic-led shift to remote working drove demand for the critical component used in making laptops and phones. As a fallout, several automakers have also suspended production.

Both the companies have begun testing JioPhone Next with a limited set of users for further refinement and are actively working to make it available more widely in time for the Diwali festive season, Jio said in an exchange filing late on Thursday.

The annual festive season in India typically lasts for 30 days, beginning in October and ending with Diwaliset for Nov. 4 this year. Indians usually make big-ticket purchases from jewelry to gadgets and cars around this period.

The additional time will also help mitigate the current industry-wide global semiconductor shortages, Jio added.

In June, when the phone was announced, Reliance Chairman Mukesh Ambani did not specify its price but said it will be the most affordable smartphone not just in India, but globally.

Jio disrupted Indias telecom market in 2016 when it launched with cut-price data plans and free voice services, forcing several competitors out of the market. It is now Indias biggest mobile carrier with more than 425 million customers.

Ambani had also said in June that Jio, which counts Facebook, Qualcomm, and Intel among its backers, was confident of being the first to launch 5G services in India.
COVID-19 Vaccines Holding Up Well Against Delta Virus Variant, but Protection Waning in Elderly: Studies

The two main COVID-19 vaccines used in the United States are still protecting well against hospitalization and death, even with a new variant of the virus that causes COVID-19 circulating, a trio of new studies out Friday show.

At the same time, the effectiveness of the vaccines is down for the elderly, and the Johnson & Johnson jab showed much lower protection than the others, researchers found. And people who are not fully vaccinated have a much higher risk of needing hospital care or dying with COVID-19, the disease caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, the studies indicated.

One of them, in which researchers examined over 32,000 encounters at hospitals and urgent care centers across nine states between June and August, found vaccine effectiveness against hospitalization was 86 percent overall, though the difference was significant among adults under the age of 75 (89 percent) and those 75 or older (76 percent).

The same study found effectiveness was 95 percent among people who received a Moderna vaccine, compared to 80 percent among Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine recipients. Johnson & Johnsons afforded the least protection, with it pegged at being 60 percent effective.

The researchers utilized data from the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions (CDC) VISION Network to examine the medical encounters, which had to have involved a COVID-19 test within 14 days before or 72 hours after the admission or encounter, and a COVID-19-like illness discharge diagnosis.

All three studies were published by the CDC and separated those who are fully vaccinated from those who are not.

Fully vaccinated means a person received both Pfizer or Moderna doses or the single-shot Johnson & Johnson dose, and at least two weeks elapsed since the receipt of the final shot of their regimen. Unvaccinated people were counted with partially vaccinated people.

In a second study, researchers conducted a crude analysis of surveillance data across 13 U.S. jurisdictions, 11 of which submitted hospitalization data. They evaluated over 600,000 COVID-19 cases from April through mid-July and found fully vaccinated persons accounted for 5 percent of cases, 7 percent of hospitalizations, and 8 percent of deaths, with the share of fully vaccinated in all three categories increasing over time.

The percentage of fully vaccinated persons suffering so-called breakthrough infections, or infections despite being vaccinated, was higher than expected, the researchers said. But they also said the analysis showed that people who were not fully vaccinated had a five times higher chance of contracting the CCP virus, a 10 times higher risk of getting hospitalized with COVID-19, and a higher than 10 times risk of dying with COVID-19.

Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the CDCs director, highlighted the study in a virtual briefing Friday, saying the study showed that vaccination works.

The bottom line is this: We have the scientific tools we need to turn the corner on this pandemic. Vaccination works and will protect us from the severe complications of COVID-19. It will protect our children and allow them to stay in school for safe in-person learning, she said.

Walensky also acknowledged that officials are seeing more people in the hospital who have been vaccinated but maintained that its still well over 90 percent of people who are in the hospital are unvaccinated.

She was drawing from the second study, a spokesperson told The Epoch Times in an email.

Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo, director of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Medicine, called the study important and said it shows that even as vaccines fail to protect as well against contracting COVID-19, they remain strongly protective against hospitalization and death.

The third study published Friday looked at vaccine effectiveness between Feb. 1 and Aug. 6 among U.S. veterans receiving hospital care at five Veterans Affairs medical centers.

Researchers found that vaccine effectiveness against hospitalization was 95 percent among adults 64 or older, but 80 percent among elderly persons 65 and up. They found little difference in efficacy before and after the Delta variant became prominent and stronger protection from the Moderna jab versus the Pfizer shot. Both are built on messenger RNA, or mRNA, technology.

These findings support current evidence that COVID-19 mRNA vaccines are highly effective in preventing COVID-19associated hospitalization and reinforce the importance of vaccination, including among veterans, who are at high risk for COVID-19 hospitalization because they are older and have a higher prevalence of underlying medical conditions compared with persons in the general U.S. population, researchers wrote.
DeSantis Responds to Bidens Vaccine Mandate: In Florida, We Will Fight Back

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said his state will fight back against President Joe Bidens plan for the Labor Department to draft an emergency rule that would require all employers with 100 or more employees ensure their workforces are fully vaccinated or show a negative test at least once a week.

During remarks on Sept. 9, Biden said that the United States can and will turn the tide against COVID-19 by mass vaccinations, while casting blame at the 80 million people who havent been vaccinated. Were in a tough stretch, he said. This is not about freedom or personal choice, he said. Its about protecting yourself and those around you.

Governor DeSantis is focused on working for Floridians, Christina Pushaw, press secretary for DeSantis told The Epoch Times. Yesterdays White House spectacle was a desperate attempt to regain control of the narrative and distract from the Biden administrations abject failures: Afghanistan, the border crisis, and the COVID-19 response.

Vaccine mandates are unscientific, ineffective, and fundamentally wrong, she said. In Florida, we will fight back.

While speaking to the media the next day, DeSantis noted how Biden has been critical of Floridas Parents Bill of Rights (pdf), saying Biden believes that school boards should be able to force five-year-old kids to wear masks all day.

Thats what he thinks is appropriate government? he said. Yet, he institutes an unprecedented mandate, which even his own people have acknowledged in the past is not constitutional. Thats not leadership.

DeSantis said Biden promisedwhen campaigning in 2020that he would shut down the virus. Yet today the country has 300 percent more cases than there were a year ago when we had no vaccines at all.

Hes doubling down on things that are going to be very destructive for the livelihoods of many, many Americans, he said. Nobody should lose their job based on this decision.

On Sept. 10, the Biden administration suffered another setback when the First District Court of Appeal temporarily reinstated Gov. Ron DeSantiss ban on school mask requirements, saying they have serious doubts about standing, jurisdiction and other threshold matters.

Not only did Leon County Circuit Judge John Cooper rule the ban illegal he took the uncommon step of removing an automatic stay while DeSantis appealed his ruling.

Just like last year in the school re-opening litigation, the First District Court of Appeal has reinstated Floridas ability to protect the freedom for parents to make the best decisions for their children while they make their own ruling on the appeal, Taryn Fenske communications director for DeSantis told The Epoch Times. We look forward to winning the appeal and will continue to fight for parents rights.

Jack Phillips contributed to this report.
Drugmaker Endo Settles With New York State, Counties Over Opioids

NEW YORKThe state of New York and two large counties agreed Thursday to a $50 million deal to end their lawsuits with drugmaker Endo International, in the latest of a progression of settlements of government claims over the opioid addiction and overdose crisis.

Under the deal announced Thursday night, the Dublin-based drugmaker and its subsidiary Par are to pay $22.3 million to the state attorney generals office and $13.85 million to both Suffolk and Nassau counties.

Endo, which also settled claims recently with a group of local and county governments in Tennessee, admits no wrongdoing.

This agreement ensures funding will be made available for critical abatement programs in a more expedited fashion, Jayne Conroy, the lead lawyer for Suffolk County and co-lead counsel in a series of lawsuits across the country over opioids.

Conroy said a trial, which has been going on for about two months in New York, will continue against the remaining defendants, which include Teva Pharmaceuticals and Allergan Finance and their affiliates.

The plaintiffs say that companies improperly marketed opioids, downplaying the addiction risks, and that big shipments were not flagged as suspicious.

Johnson & Johnson settled just before the trial began, and the nations three largest drug distributions companiesAmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health, and McKessonhave all since settled.

Those four companies have since announced a tentative $26 billion nationwide settlement deal that would take months to finalize.

Last week, a federal bankruptcy judge gave conditional approval to a plan to allow OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma to settle some 3,000 claims it faces.

Opioids, including prescription painkillers and illicit drugs such as heroin and illegally produced fentanyl, have been linked to more than 500,000 deaths in the United States over the last two decades.

As settlements are reached, it means companies are starting to fund drug treatment and education programs.

Other trials are queued up across the United States, including a federal trial next month over claims against pharmacies.
Smartphone with Epic Games logo is seen in front of Apple logo in this illustration taken, on May 2, 2021. (Dado Ruvic/Illustration/Reuters)

Epic Ruling Invites Future Efforts to Paint Apple as Monopolist: Experts

WASHINGTONA U.S. judge stopped short of labeling Apple Inc. an illegal monopolist on Friday, but the closely-watched ruling provides a roadmap for similar claims against the iPhone maker in the future, legal experts said.

Ruling on an antitrust case brought by Epic Games, creator of the online game Fortnite, U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers said Epic did not present sufficient evidence of Apple having unlawful monopoly power in the relevant market, which she defined as digital mobile gaming transactions.

But the California judge made clear that the decision was limited to the facts before her.

While the Court finds that Apple enjoys considerable market share of over 55 percent and extraordinarily high profit margins, these factors alone do not show antitrust conduct, Gonzalez Rogers said. The Court does not find that it is impossible; only that Epic Games failed in its burden to demonstrate Apple is an illegal monopolist.

The judge did find that Apples rules on its lucrative App Store business violated California state competition laws.

The question of whether Apple abused monopoly power remains very much unsettled, said Joshua Paul Davis, a professor of antitrust law at the University of San Francisco School of Law.

Given how controversial these issues are right now, I would expect this not to be the final say, he said.

In her ruling, Gonzalez Rogers noted that Epic Games had overreached in a trial earlier this year by trying to define the relevant market as all app distribution and in-app payments on iPhones.

As a consequence, the trial record was not as fulsome with respect to antitrust conduct in the relevant market as it could have been, Gonzalez Rogers said.

The Apple Inc. logo is seen hanging at the entrance to the Apple store on 5th Avenue in Manhattan, New York, N.Y., on Oct. 16, 2019. (Mike Segar/Reuters)

Apples legal team said it was still reviewing whether to appeal the decision.

Were extremely pleased with this decision, Apples General Counsel Katherine L. Adams told reporters. It underscores the merit of our business, both as an economic and competitive engine.

Valarie Williams, a partner at law firm Alston & Bird, called Gonzalez Rogers decision a road map to future plaintiffs pursuing monopoly claims against Apple.

Future plaintiffs could bring a case that adopts Gonzalez Rogerss market definition and introduces additional evidence, Williams said.

Sam Weinstein, a professor of antitrust law at Cardozo School of Law, agreed the judges ruling could encourage other market participants to learn from Epics case and try to launch a stronger blow against Apple.

Language in the ruling could even signal that the judge thinks its only a matter of time before Apple becomes a monopoly, Weinstein said.

This is only one particular piece of litigation framed in one particular way, said Davis. The court was pretty explicit that different litigants could come forward with different evidenceand that could potentially change the result.

By Jan Wolfe and Mike Scarcella
Facts Matter (Sept. 8): 19 Governors and 2 Attorney Generals Resist Bidens Vaccine Mandates

On Thursday, President Joe Biden announced his new plan to get more Americans vaccinated, whether they want to or not.

Whats interesting is that after many months of government officials, including Joe Biden himself, saying that they will not issue a federal vaccine mandate, it seems like thats exactly what he did, though in a roundabout way. Thats because included in that plan is an order for the Department of Labor to mandate that all American businesses with over 100 employees must enforce vaccinations, conduct weekly COVID-19 testing, or face hefty fines.

However, within hours of him making this announcement, governors and attorneys general across 21 different states came out in direct opposition to these orders, with some of them saying that legal challenges are already being prepared.

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Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, is seen during a press conference at the White House in Washington on Jan. 21, 2021. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

Fauci: No Firm Answer on Why Americans Who Recovered From COVID-19 Should Get Vaccinated

Dr. Anthony Fauci, a top U.S. public health official, said that a new study regarding so-called natural immunity following COVID-19 infection is provoking discussion among government experts.

The real-world study, conducted by Israeli researchers, found that previous COVID-19 infection confers better protection against infection and hospitalization than COVID-19 vaccines.

COVID-19 is the disease caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus.

Fauci, the longtime director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, was asked Friday about the research in the context of convincing people who have natural immunity, or who have recovered from COVID-19, to get vaccinated.

I get calls all the time people say, Ive already had COVID, Im protected. And now the study says maybe even more protected than the vaccine alone. Should they also get the vaccine? How do you make the case to them? Dr. Sanjay Gupta asked Fauci during an appearance on CNN.

I dont have a really firm answer for you on that, Fauci responded.

Thats something that were going to have to discuss regarding the durability of the response. The one thing that paper from Israel didnt tell you is whether or notas high as the protection is with natural infectionwhats the durability compared to the durability of a vaccine? So it is conceivable that you got infected, youre protected, but you may not be protected for an indefinite period of time, he continued.

So I think that is something that we need to sit down and discuss seriously because you very appropriately pointed out, it is an issue, and there could be an argument for saying what you said.

Some experts who have studied the matter have expressed confusion as to why vaccination efforts are not focused on those who have not gotten a shot and have not recovered from COVID-19.

Were trying to update policy such that people who have recovered have the same privileges and access as people who are vaccinated, Dr. Jeffrey Klausner, clinical professor of preventive medicine and medicine at the University of Southern Californias Keck School of Medicine, told The Epoch Times previously.

The Israel findings, because theyre based on real-world data, even led Pfizer board member Scott Gottlieb, former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, to call for natural immunity to be part of policy discussions.

The balance of the evidence demonstrates that natural immunity confers a durable protection, Gottlieb said during a recent television appearance.

Official guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) acknowledges people have some level of immunity after COVID-19 recovery. But the agency still recommends the vast majority of Americans get a COVID-19 vaccine, asserting the protection is even better when combining natural immunity and a jab.

Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the CDCs director, last month pointed to a study conducted by CDC and Kentucky researchers that suggested vaccines actually provide better protection than previous infection.

These data further indicate that COVID-19 vaccines offer better protection than natural immunity alone and that vaccines, even after prior infection, help prevent reinfections, the agency said in a statement.

Correction: A previous version of this article inaccurately described Scott Gottliebs relationship with the FDA. He is its former commissioner. The Epoch Times regrets the error.
In an aerial view, cattle gather around a pond on a ranch in Snelling, Calif., on May 26, 2021. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Former Trump EPA Official Questions Court Order Striking Down Key Water Rule

A former Trump Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) official and Senate Republicans have criticized a ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Rosemary Marquez for the District of Arizona, who remanded and vacated the Trump administrations 2020 Navigable Waters Protection Rule (NWPR) last month.

The NWPR had replaced the Obama administrations 2015 Clean Water Rule for interpreting the waters of the United States (WOTUS) under the 1972 Clean Water Act.

The Trump rule has been opposed by environmental organizations such as the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), which has claimed that the rule misrepresents the science on streams and wetlands and poses substantial risk to our waters.

The rule has drawn support from farming and ranching organizations such as the American Farm Bureau Federation, which has claimed that it would simplify complex jurisdictional issues and clarify that usually dry areas should no longer be considered federally regulated water.

The district court decision was met with concern from Matthew Leopold, who assisted in creating the NWPR as EPA general counsel under Trump.

I think that its fairly unprecedented to vacate a duly promulgated federal regulation, like the Navigable Waters Protection Rule, without undertaking a review of the rule itself and how it relates to the authority under which it was promulgated, which is the Clean Water Act, Leopold told The Epoch Times. The judges order is very short.

Leopold thinks case law from the 9th Circuit Court, under which Arizonas district court falls, and other circuits around the country would suggest that Marquez, an Obama appointee, should have taken additional steps before granting the remand with vacatur.

The Arizona courts decision comes just months after the Biden administrations EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers signaled their intention to revise the Trump administrations WOTUS definition, which they claimed was causing destructive impacts to critical water bodies.

Notably, in an associated June filing with the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, the EPA sought to remand but didnt seek to vacate NWPR, in light of the Agencies stated intent to address their substantial concerns with the NWPR through a new rulemaking.

South Carolinas district court also remanded the NWPR without vacating it, in line with the EPA and Corps request.

By contrast, the environmentalist NRDC has sought to have the courts both remand and vacate the rule, arguing that a remand alone would [allow] an illegal rule to remain in place indefinitely.

After the Trump administration initially issued the NWPR, Colorados district court issued an administrative stay that was later lifted by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit.

The EPA and Corps have swiftly responded to the Arizona courts remandan EPA webpage now states the agencies are interpreting waters of the United States consistent with the pre-2015 regulatory regime until further notice.

Meanwhile, in a Sept. 3 letter to EPA and Army officials, Democrats on the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, led by Chairman Thomas Carper (D-Del.), stopped short of praising the decision, stating that theyve noted it. As plaintiffs in the Arizona case, the EPA and Army officials had argued that the rule should be remanded without vacatur.

In light of your administrations strong concerns about the adverse impacts of the Trump rule, we urge you, nonetheless, to proceed to remove the NWPR administratively through a formal notice and comment rulemaking on the basis of its fundamental policy failings, the senators wrote. We also urge the agencies to narrowly tailor their removal of the NWPR in order to restore safeguards for those waters that have been protected since the 1980s.

The ranking member of the EPW committee, Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), issued a statement on Aug. 31 criticizing the decision and the EPAs general approach to WOTUS.

This opinion highlights EPAs lack of transparency around repealing and replacing NWPR, Capito said. For months, I have asked EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to provide any specific examples of any actual environmental harms occurring under NWPR, yet none have been provided. While the ruling cites the possibility of serious environmental harm if NWPR remains in place, there hasnt been any evidence from either agency to support the claim.

Administrator Regan promised transparency regarding the repeal of NWPR. However, his failure to follow through on that promise with any scientific data or specific examples has led us to this courts decision based on the opinion of activists.

Leopold said that he believes that the decision could be overturned on appeal.

The EPA has been clear that they believe the [NWPR] rule is not as protective as they would like it to be, he said. Administrations can change policy, and thats well established in case law.

The question in Arizona, though, is about respecting that rule-making process, which is deliberate and well-considered and not having rash decisions that are not well supported vacating rules without going through the proper process.

I think there are legitimate arguments that this decision could be overturned on appeal. I think it would be appropriate for the litigants to file additional briefing requesting clarification of the judges order, and/or file appeals raising the standards that the 9th Circuit has articulated in order to grant remand with vacatur.
Four Santa Clarita Students Arrested, Firearm Confiscated

Four students were arrested at William Hart High School in Santa Clarita, Calif., on Sept. 8 after police allegedly located a firearm on one of the students, officials said.

After receiving an anonymous tip of a social media post depicting a Hart High School student allegedly in possession of a firearm, the school immediately began the investigation with the Santa Clarita Sheriffs department to ensure the safety of all students, principal Jason dAutremont told the Santa Clarita Signal.

Police quickly located the weapon and arrested four studentstwo males and two females.

Three of the four students have been sent to juvenile hall in Sylmar and one was cited and released.

The three that were taken to juvenile hall should see a judge today, and he will make a housing determination whether or not they are going to keep them longer, or whether they will release them on some kind of home monitoring program to their parents, a Santa Clarita Valley Sheriffs Department spokesperson told The Epoch Times.

The anonymous tip was received as a text through the Student Care Line provided by the William Hart Union High School District, which encourages the public to utilize the service if anyone sees or hears anything that may endanger the safety of others.

We are so grateful to the individual who saw something and used the Student Care Line to say something. It is proactive, pre-emptive and proof that early intervention works. We are stronger as a community when we work together, the school district told The Epoch Times via email.

We also are so thankful to the Hart High School administrators, campus supervisors and the school resource officer Deputy Javier Guzman for their quick, professional work. This situation was resolved shortly after getting the tip on the Student Care Line.

An unloaded black semi-automatic handgun and ammunition were found among the four arrested students, the department spokesperson said, adding that they passed the gun around throughout the day.

In addition to being in possession of a weapon, one student was also on suspicion of vandalism, the department spokesperson said.

On the same day, a Buena Park High School student was also arrested for allegedly carrying a firearm on campus after a school employee alerted the police.

A loaded handgun was located in the students pant pocket after a quick struggle, Buena Park police said in a statement.

The student has been taken to juvenile hall. Police are still investigating the students motive for bringing the gun to school.
Vials containing doses of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine are viewed at a clinic in Los Angeles on April 9, 2021. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)

House Democrats Oppose GOP Proposal for Schools to Require Parental Consent to Vaccinate Kids

Rep. John Yarmuth (D-Ky.) said during a recent budget reconciliation markup meeting that he opposes an amendment proposed by Rep. Mary Miller (R-Ill.) that would require parental consent for schools to administer vaccines to children, with the Democratic lawmaker challenging the idea that parents always know whats best for their kids health.

During the virtual meeting of the Select Committee on Education and Labor on Sept. 10, Miller argued in favor of her amendment, saying that parents need to have the power to make decisions on vaccines because they know whats best for the health of their families.

State laws establish vaccination requirements as a condition of admitting children to public day cares and schoolsand in some cases also to private oneswith all states providing medical exemptions and some providing exemptions on religious or philosophical grounds. Some states, however, allow minors to decide on their own about getting vaccines, even over parental objections.

When it comes to any medical treatment, making an informed decision is of the utmost importance. Parents know whats best for their children, not any government body. We must protect our future generations. Thats why my amendment would restrict local education agencies from administering vaccines to children on school grounds without the consent of a parent or guardian.

Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.), a member of the committee, came out in opposition to Millers amendment, saying that all states have laws that provide parents with a process to exempt children from getting vaccines, arguing further that theres currently no legal framework that would force a vaccination without parental consent.

This is a nonsense amendment that is in search of a problem that does not exist, and I would urge my colleagues to reject it based on  its intended to score political points; its not a sincere amendment, Takano said.

Takanos remarks appear to overlook the fact that some states give minors the power to consent to health care decisions on their own, even over the objection of parents. Stateline, a publication from The Pew Charitable Trusts, indicated that about 10 states have given teenagers some rights in this regard, including vaccines.

Following Takanos remarks, Yarmuth also urged his colleagues to oppose the amendment, making the argument that parents dont always know best.

I know Ill get in a lot of trouble for this, but I want to refer to the sponsors premise for the amendment, and the first words out of her mouth were, Parents know whats best for their children. I think the evidence is compelling and overwhelming and widespread that they dont, Yarmuth said.

Unfortunately, a lot of parents are misinformed and thats why we have, literally, tens of thousands of kids now in hospitals, and suffering from this virus, he said, referring to the CCP virus, which causes COVID-19.

According to a recent report by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), COVID-19 infections in children have increased exponentially after declining in early summer, with more than 750,000 cases added between Aug. 5 and Sept. 2. Still, the report found that severe illness among children infected with the CCP virus was uncommon.

Between 0.1 percent and 1.9 percent of all child COVID-19 cases in 24 reporting states resulted in hospitalization, according to the AAP report. At the same time, among 45 states reporting data on child mortality from COVID-19, children accounted for between 0.00 percent and 0.27 percent of all COVID-19 deaths, with 7 states reporting zero child deaths. Between 0.00 percent and 0.03 percent of all child COVID-19 cases resulted in death, the report said.

Yarmuth argued that Millers amendment and similar measures should be rejected.

We need to protect kids from their parents. That is the unfortunate state of the country right now.

Miller criticized Yarmuths remarks later on Twitter: Children across our nation are being administered the vaccine without parental consent.  Not surprisingly, Democrats are rejecting parental rights in favor of an all-powerful government.

Millers amendment ultimately failed to win committee approval.

It comes as the Biden administration has ramped up efforts to overcome vaccine hesitancy in the face of waning vaccination rates. The White House embarked on a summer campaign that included offers of cash, door-to-door outreach, and recruitment of social media influencers to help spread the word and persuade more Americans to get the shot.

But those efforts have had a limited impact, with President Joe Biden turning to more aggressive measuresrequiring federal employees and contractors, as well as health care workers at facilities that get federal funding, to show proof of vaccination, with no testing option.
Palestinian commander of the Israeli-designated terrorist group Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades Zakaria Zubeidi is carried on the shoulders of supporters in Jenin, in the West Bank, on Dec. 30, 2004. (Ammar Awad/Reuters)

Israel Catches Two More Escaped Palestinian Militants, Police Say

NAZARETHIsraeli forces on Saturday captured two more of the six Palestinian terrorists who made a dramatic escape from a maximum-security Israeli jail this week, a police spokesperson said.

The two men were found hiding in a truck parking lot in an Arab village in northern Israel, near the city of Nazareth, where two other escapees were captured hours earlier.

Their Hollywood-style prison break on Monday, through a hole in their prison cell floor, delighted Palestinians and embarrassed Israel.

In this photo provided by Israels Prisons Service, a hole in a floor is seen after six Palestinian prisoners escaped from the Gilboa prison in northern Israel on Sept. 6, 2021. (Israeli Prisons Service via AP)

Footage distributed by Israel Police showed officers leading the two men, blindfold and handcuffed, into a police vehicle as a manhunt for two more fugitives that are still at large continued.

The six men have either been convicted or are suspected of planning or carrying out deadly attacks against Israelis. Israeli officials have pledged a thorough investigation into apparent security lapses that allowed their escape.

One of the men captured on Saturday morning was Zakaria Zubeidi, a high-profile former commander of Fatahs Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades armed group in the West Bank city of Jenin.

A member of the Israeli forces clashes with a demonstrator during a protest in solidarity with prisoners following the escape of six Palestinian terrorists from an Israeli prison, in Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank on Sept. 9, 2021. (Mussa Qawasma/Reuters)

Zubeidi, who once received Israeli amnesty, was rearrested by Israel in 2019 after his alleged involvement in further shootings.

The other five prisoners are members of the Islamic Jihad terrorist group.

In the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, protests were held in support of the men, where some regard them as heroes in the Palestinian struggle for statehood in territory Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war.

Palestinian demonstrators clash with Israeli forces during a protest in solidarity with prisoners following the escape of six Palestinian terrorists from an Israeli prison, in Beita, in the West Bank, on Sept. 10, 2021. (Mohamad Torokman/Reuters)

Israel says Palestinians involved in violent activities are terrorists.

Palestinian factions said there would be repercussions for the mens capture. Gaza militants fired a rocket towards Israel on Friday following the first two rearrests, drawing Israeli air strikes in the enclave.

By Rami Ayyub
Los Angeles Resumes Homeless Encampment Cleanups

The city of Los Angeles has resumed its CARE Plus homeless encampment cleanups after the cleanups were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Earlier this year, the city council voted to resume the cleanups, which require the homeless to take down their tents so the Los Angeles Sanitation Department can sweep and wash the streets and remove trash and waste from the area, beginning on Sept. 1, with amendments for enhanced street engagement strategies proposed by Councilmembers Mike Bonin and Nithya Raman. Those strategies include EZ-up tent distribution and exchanges, along with water bottle and sanitary kit exchanges, and voluntary trash disposal options.

The CARE Plus cleanups are regularly scheduled by Mayor Eric Garcettis office in areas that need cleaning the most, Los Angeles Department of Public Works spokeswoman Elena Stern told The Epoch Times. The comprehensive cleanups remove tents and hazardous items and sanitize the streets.

The city typically does about 20 cleanups across the city per day. During the week of Sept. 6, cleanups took place in nine of the citys 15 districts.

(Courtesy of Rick Swinger)

Some Angelenos expressed concern for the unhoused people whose shelters and belongings were destroyed by the sanitation crew.

The [cleanup crew] put the police tape up, and they really just went at it and started destroying everything with very minimal going through belongings, Peggy Lee Kennedy of Venice Justice and Service Not Sweeps said. They had, I guess for these four blue tabs that they stored peoples belongings in, but [everyones belongings were mixed up]. And a front loader was pushing things and sort of crushing them, and then a crane picked everything up and threw it in the trash truckfull tents and everything.

Kennedy said that some of the people in the encampment who had mental health issues didnt respond well to their tents being destroyed. While some replacement tents were given to people who asked for them, the tents the sanitation crew gave out were a joke.

Nobody wants those cheesy tents. No full-grown man is going to take those little tents. Theyre like little child tents, she said.

Other residents welcomed the cleanups, citing health and safety concerns about the unhoused with drug addictions and mental health issues.

Venice Beach resident and community activist Rick Swinger took a picture of one of the buckets collected by the cleanup crew filled with needles, knives, and other sharp objects. Swinger told The Epoch Times that many of the homeless in the area were addicted to meth, which causes users to suffer many small strokes as well as short-term memory loss, affecting their ability to clean up after themselves.

Youve got many cases where there are people that are so strung out on meth that theyve had many strokes. Their short-term memory is gone, so they dont even remember when the last time they shot up [meth] was, and they get these needles, and when youre in that condition, you dump everything on the ground, he said.

Venice Family Clinic, a local medical clinic with an emphasis on harm reduction, offers people free needles in addition to other services. Swinger thinks this is a mistake, as its led to many discarded needles in the street that could potentially contaminate the citys water and oceans.

[Venice Family Clinic] does a lot of good work there, dont get me wrong, but they made a huge mistake with this one, he said. They should have a needle exchangeone for one, but instead theyre giving them away. And thats why we get all these needles in the streets.

(Courtesy of Rick Swinger)

Kennedy, however, said the cleanups are especially hard on those with major mental health issues, whose tents are often destroyed; she said they often end up displaced because shelters, such as the nearby A Bridge Home shelters, dont have solutions for them.

Shelters are not great for everybody; it could be a really traumatizing experience. We need permanent solutions  you cant just throw shelter at people, expect it to workits not working.  Instead, the city is warehousing mentally ill people in jail, and the ones on the street, were criminalizing. Its a thing you have to address. Its a major thing we have to address to do the right thing for people who have major mental health issues and our homeless, Kennedy said.

The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority was not immediately available for comment.
Robert ONeill, the former Navy SEAL who shot and killed Osama bin Laden, poses for a portrait in Washington, on Nov. 14, 2014. (Jacquelyn Martin/AP Photo)

Navy SEAL Who Shot Bin Laden Says Internal Division Now Biggest Threat to America

Robert ONeill, the former Navy SEAL credited with killing Osama bin Laden, the terrorist mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks, said that the biggest threat to America comes not from outside but from internal strife and division.

ONeill made the remarks in an interview with Fox News on the eve of Sept. 11, as the nation prepared to honor victims of the terror attack on the World Trade Center 20 years ago that killed at least 2,977 people and injured thousands more.

My biggest concern is the division in this country, ONeill told the outlet. Most people are good to each other. But the anger and the division gets the ratings, and thats what people hear. A lot of people know if they keep people divided they can stay in power and its wrong.

We can disagree with each other but were on the same team when it all comes down to it, ONeill added.

Smoke billows from one of the towers of the World Trade Center as flames and debris explode from the second tower, in New York City, on Sept. 11, 2001. (Chao Soi Cheong/AP Photo)

ONeill was part of the 2011 raid in Pakistan targeting the Al-Qaeda leader and says he was the one who fired the fatal shot.

In a separate interview with CBS News, ONeill recounted the daring mission that left bin Laden dead.

When I turned the corner, I saw Osama bin Laden standing there, he said, adding that he thought the Al-Qaeda leader may have been preparing to detonate an explosive.

Hes a threat, hes going to blow up, I need to treat him like a suicide bomber and thats why I had to shoot him in the face, ONeill said.

Copies of a newspaper are seen outside the World Trade Center site after the death of accused 9/11 mastermind Osama bin Laden was announced by U.S. President Barack Obama, in New York City, on May 2, 2011. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)

ONeill said the mission to get bin Laden was a testament to the ability of people holding different political views to join forces to counter threats against the homeland.

We proved that we can work together, he said, adding that he hopes events like the anniversary of 9/11 are seized as an opportunity by both the right and the left to bridge divisions in the pursuit of common objectives.

When all is said and done, were all Americans and we should be on the same team, he said.

ONeills remarks about the need for Americans to bridge political and ideological divides was echoed by President Joe Biden, who in a recorded video released on Sept. 10 recalled the heroics seen in the aftermath of the terror attacks and how America saw a true sense of national unity.

Biden, who on Saturday was set to visit three sites attacked on 9/11, added in the video that unity makes us who we are and called for people to have a fundamental respect and faith in each other and in this nation.

Former President Donald Trump, meanwhile, told Fox News that he planned to visit Ground Zero in New York City on Saturday to mark the 20th anniversary of the attacks.
New York City Teachers Union Wins Battle Over COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate

New York Citys largest teachers union has won a battle to keep teachers and other educators employed if they suffer from certain medical conditions and as a result dont want to comply with the Big Apples COVID-19 vaccine mandate.

An arbitrator ruled late on Sept. 10 that teachers with certain documented medical afflictions must be offered assignments outside of classrooms and be kept on the citys payroll.

Other educators who dont want to get a COVID-19 vaccine must be offered unpaid leave that keeps their health coverage in place or a severance package.

City officials announced in August that all 148,000 of the New York City Department of Educations employees would have to get a COVID-19 vaccine, with limited exemptions.

The city had planned to remove people who were granted an exemption from the payroll, infuriating the United Federation of Teachers (UFT), the citys largest teachers union.

That was it for us, Michael Mulgrew, the unions president, said recently on NY1.

That prompted pushback, which ultimately resulted in the arbitration decision, even after New York Mayor Bill de Blasio seemed to publicly reverse the stance during a Sept. 8 press conference.

De Blasio said that few cases of medical or religious exemptions being granted are expected, but they will be honored if approved.

Those folks will continue to work for us in some capacity, in some location. We got to work that through, he said, referring to the arbitration.

Mulgrew said it was the pushback from the union that led to the reversal.

After our demand for independent arbitration, the city backed off its initial position that all unvaccinated personnel be removed from payroll, and will offer out-of-classroom work for those with certified medical or other conditions, he said in a statement after the arbitrators decision was released.

Educators with a documented contraindication, as defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), for the vaccines are now able to refuse to comply with the mandate.

Temporary exemptions will also be granted if a person has received a monoclonal antibody treatment within the previous 90 days, is being treated for conditions as delineated by the CDC, or has suffered heart inflammation, a condition seen in some people after they receive a COVID-19 vaccine.

Religious exemptions must also be approved, but not if the leader of the religious group has spoken publicly in favor of the vaccine and not if the request is deemed personal, political, or philosophical in nature.

The vaccine mandate takes effect on Sept. 27.

More than 80 percent of the citys teachers have already been vaccinated, according to the UFT. Schools Chancellor Meisha Porter pegged the number as 72 percent on Sept. 8.

De Blasios office and the New York City Department of Education didnt respond to requests for comment by press time.

Our vaccine mandate was put into place for the health and safety of our children and the protection of our employees, Porter told NBC New York in a statement. Were pleased that the binding Arbitration was issued before the first day of school, and we will swiftly implement the terms.
OC Sheriff Personnel and Surviving Family Member Recount 9/11 Experiences 20 Years Later

To commemorate the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, personnel from the Orange County Sheriffs Department and a surviving family member who were all involved in the aftermath of the attack recently came together in Tustin, California, to discuss their surreal experiences and how their lives are still affected by them.

Tom Frost

Former Deputy Bob Wank, Tom Frost, Chaplain Kathleen Kooiman, and Deputy Jamie Canett share 9/11 memories in Tustin, Calif., on Sept. 7, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Tom Frost was at his job with Southern California Edison in the early morning of Sept. 11, 2001, when his daughter, Lisa Frost, called him from a payphone at Gate 19 at Logan International Airport. She was coming back to Rancho Santa Margarita after graduating from the Boston University School of Hospitality as valedictorian a few months prior.

Informing him that she had made it to the airport just in time for her flight, United Airlines 175, which would take off in a few minutes, the two confirmed that Tom would still be picking her up from the Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) in a few hours.

She said, Cant wait to see you, Tom said. And I said, Yeah, Im going to go home and catch a couple hours sleep, you dont get in till like 11, so Ill pick you up then.

Love you, Lisa said.

Love you, too, Tom said before they hung up.

That would be the last time the two ever spoke.

A few hours later, Tom got a call from one of his coworkers telling him to turn on the TV after American Airlines flight 11 had hit the north tower of the World Trade Center.

Seventeen minutes after the first plane hit, Tom saw the flight his daughter was on fly into the south tower on live television.

I watched the plane come out on the left side of the TV screen and crash into the building, he said. And my first impression was this cant be real, this has got to be Hollywood or something. And about that time, the announcement came out that it was a nonstop from Logan to LAX and my heart stopped.

Throughout the past 20 years, Tom has done everything he can to represent his daughter and continue her legacyeven referring to himself as Lisas dad when meeting people. To honor her, Tom frequently gives speeches around this time of year, has helped to develop two scholarships in her nameone at Trabuco Hills High School and the other at Boston Universityand has worked to have a student lounge at Boston University dedicated to her.

Tom said he would like people to remember Lisa as someone who got along with everyone she met, who would help anyone she could, and who was driven to be the best that she could be.

After the attack, Tom never expected searchers to find anything of hers in the rubble, but that changed one fateful morning.

Considering the orange ball that her plane turned into I saw on live TV, which is something Ill have to live with for the rest of my life, I thought they would never find anything of Lisa, he said. It was a week before the one-year anniversary that the Rancho Santa Margarita Sheriff showed up on my porch and told me that they had found three DNA matches for Lisa. At that time, I was amazed.

Since then, one more DNA match of Lisas has been found, along with her credit card.

Sgt. Bob Wank

Former Deputy K9 Handler and 9/11 first responder Bob Wank shares 9/11 memories in Tustin, Calif., on Sept. 7, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Also present to share his experience was Reserve Sgt. Bob Wank, who worked with the Orange County Sheriffs Department from 1986 to 2016. Wank, along with his K-9 partner Aris, was deployed as part of the Federal Emergency Management Agency to the area after the attacks to search the rubble for people who might still be alive.

When we landed at an airport in New Jersey, we were bused into Manhattan, and on the way in, I could seeIve never been to New York beforebut Ive seen pictures of the skyline and the twin towers are historical. Theyre in a lot of movies and everything, and not seeing them there and seeing smoke rising from that area, just really the reality started to set in for what I was about to see, Wank said.

As I walked on the pile that first night with my partner Aris, we noticed that there [was] still smoke rising from several areas in the pile, and it was still warm to the touch. And I just looked out over the immense devastation and just thought to myself, Wow, this one building was 110 stories of steel, office equipment, people, and all thats left is this concrete and steel that I was walking on. It was surreal.

Wank recalled Aris and two other dogs alerting to a live person, possibly in critical condition, in one area of the rubble, but due to nearby scaffolding that was estimated to have a high likelihood of falling down, searchers had to be called away from the area.

We later found out that there [were] some deceased people recovered from that area days later, Wank said. So we dont know if they were clinging to life in those last few days or what, but they were definitely indicating live human scent below the pile at that time.  It was frustrating, to say the least, that we werent able to actually search out that alert.

Wank said that 20 years later, hell never forget how incredible it was for all Americans to come together during a time of need.

The thing that I take away from it also 20 years later is how people came together, how everybody worked together. They put aside their opinions and thoughts, and there was one goal and that was to locate victims, he said.

The public greeted us literally with signs as we drove into the pile every day in our van, standing on the street saying, Youre heroes, and I didnt feel like a hero, thats for sure. But I was at least thankful to be able to provide some relief during my search in there.

Despite both being from Orange County, Frost and Wank never knew one another until September 2019. Wank, who had decided to become a flight attendant for JetBlue, was working out of Boston Logan Airport and was the number one, meaning he was the person at the front of the aircraft who greets everyone as they come on board.

Frost was one of the passengers aboard that flight, who had just come from a dinner banquet at Boston University. He complemented Wanks 9/11 pin, something given to all California first responders who helped with the 9/11 search. Wank noticed a pin that Frost was wearing on his hat of Lisa, which prompted the two to get to know each other throughout the flight.

We began talking and I mentioned the fact that the jet bridge that he just walked on, was the same one that his daughter walked on, on that fateful day, Wank said. They still fly an American flag over that jet bridge, even though it was taken over by JetBlue. It was the United Airlines gate of that time. So it just gives me chills every time I think about it on how we met, and we just hit it off from there.

Chaplain Kathleen Kooiman and Deputy Jamie Canett

Mother/Daughter Chaplain Kathleen Kooiman (L) and Deputy Jamie Canett (R) share 9/11 memories in Tustin, Calif., on Sept. 7, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Kathleen Kooiman, a senior chaplain for the Orange County Sheriffs Department (OCSD) who started her career by providing spiritual services for 9/11 members, and her daughter, OCSD Deputy Jamie Canett, also spoke about how much the events of 9/11 affected their lives.

[After arriving on scene,] we started talking to people down in the pit immediately from NYPD, NYFD, the Port Authority Police, ironworkers, and steelworkers, and we had just started being chaplains, Kooiman said. And the smell. Ill never forget, Ive never had that scent or smell since. But the massive devastation was very overwhelming.

But if we were going to be chaplains, and if we were going to be of any use at all, we had to just go moment by moment and trust that God would help us. You cant prepare for this. And I was a new chaplain for the department at the time, so I cut my teeth in this ministry at Ground Zero.

Kooiman also helped sort through the rubble at Fresh Kills Landfill, where it was transported from Ground Zero to find personal items or DNA matches and was the same area where Lisa Frosts DNA matches and credit card were found.

Kooiman is Canetts mother, and she brought Canett with her to Ground Zero when the latter was just 18 years old, which inspired her to eventually become a sheriffs deputy in Orange County.

Canett recalled being at the scene and serving food to workers when a bell went off, which meant that workers going through the rubble had found another body. A firefighter had been found, collapsed under the rubble with his flashlight still on, a moment that Canett said changed everything for her.

I was so affected by the evilness of that day, the unjust way that everybody died, Canett said. And my goal was I wanted to be a part of that relentless pursuit of the unjust. I wanted to bring people to justice, I wanted to go out there and find victims and find those that have committed crimes, and I wanted to bring them to justice.

That moment was where that fire ignited inside me. And I knew that being a deputy was what I wanted to do, that it was my calling. So that is why Im sitting here now. Im the deputy sheriff with the Sheriffs Department, and its my passion. And it all started from that moment.

That all Americans came together after the terrorist attack to help for the common good was something that gave all four of them hope going forwardand its something they thought the country could use more of in the current moment.

Maybe just this week, people put their differences aside, Tom said. And maybe  just this week, we act like it was 20 years ago and hopefully, itll continue on. Thats all we can do and pray that it does.
Orange County Equity Map Designed to Further Social Progress

Officials say that Orange Countys new online data platform, the OC Equity Map, has been a useful tool in highlighting social and health disparities amidst the COVID-19 pandemic in recent months, but it could soon be used for more.

In addition to utilizing the map for COVID-19-related planning and the implementation of strategies, officials will be able to continue to assess the long-term ramifications of the pandemic in communities across Orange County, and that the map will help them to assess other societal impacts.

Its continuing to be used for COVID planning and implementation strategies, Karin Kalk, director of Office Project Management and Quality Improvement at the Orange County Health Care Agency (HCA), told The Epoch Times. In terms of the impact of COVID in our community, thats going to be felt for years to come. So the utility of this map for COVID, and COVID-related impacts and disparities are going to continue.

The creators of the map are from Advance OC, a nonprofit established in 2019 with a mission to address inequities in Orange County communities through innovation, technology and strategic philanthropy. The group plans to soon add more data to the platform, such as transportation and childcare data.

Well also start incorporating things like pediatric population health data for children, and potentially offer information about transportation corridor access. We will map more resources in the community, Katie Kalvado, executive director of Advance OC told The Epoch Times.

As part of their contract with the county, Kalvado stated that Advance OC will incorporate 2020 census data to the map as soon as available, which she said is expected to be released by the end of the year.

However, the additional work on the mapping tool, she said, will be paid for by the private sector.

Social Progress

The OC Equity Map was also developed with data from the Social Progress Imperative (SPI), to create a map specific to Orange County.

The Social Progress Imperative is a nonprofit based in Washington, DC, aimed at providing decision-makers and everyday citizens with the very best data on the social and environmental health of their societies and helping them prioritize actions that accelerate social progress, according to the organization.

Orange County utilizes the map to guide its allocation of a $22.8 million grant it received from the CDC, meant to be used for COVID-19-associated inequalities.

On its website, the county touts the map as a data-driven approach to addressing inequity and resource disparities designed to monitor Orange Countys health and social gaps.

Although the map was officially launched in July 2021, the county says its used the map to look at a variety of data throughout the pandemic.

Especially in summer and fall of last year, in HCA, our public health team, we were looking to place access to testing and creating greater awareness about how and why to get tested, said Kalk. It was the equity map (that) enabled us to prioritize and be fairly focused in our targeting the vaccine efforts.

We used it to target communities with the testing strategies, especially in those in hard hit areas. We used the map to target communities by zip code, and then within the zip code by neighborhood, where we want to place a mobile clinic or support our partners who are also providing vaccines to serve those communities.

The Orange County Administration Building in Santa Ana, Calif., on Oct. 22, 2020. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Building the Map

To assist the HCA in identifying the root causes of emerging disparities in Orange County believed to have resulted from the pandemic, the Board of Supervisors approved an agreement with Advance OC on July 28, 2020.

The initial contract (pdf) from the county gave Advance OC $385,000 for their work in developing the data platform until December 30, 2020.

And we also supplemented that with private donations, and in-kind contributions, for example, some data research we got for the project was donated time and effort to help us, so it was not only 100 percent paid for by the county, there were private donations as well, Kalvado said.

Outlined in the contracts scope of work, Advance OC was tasked with creating a map that overlays Census and CDC data to provide information on community needs and disparities at county, city, neighborhood, and Census tract levels.

According to background in the contract, the SPI Equity Map allows inputs from various local, state, and national vetted sources to display a wide range of social indicators, including social determinants of health.

COVID-19 has exacerbated several health and social inequities, which many municipalities and local organizations were unprepared to meet at the height of the pandemic, explained Supervisor Andrew Do, Chairman of the Board of Supervisors in a statement. Our OC Equity Map tool will provide actionable benchmarks to allocate resources and reduce disparities in our communities.

In May of 2020, the Board of Supervisors directed the HCA to develop a Latino Health Equity Initiative (Initiative) to inform Orange County residents in Santa Ana and Anaheim about the increasing risk of COVID-19 and to encourage residents to take advantage of great accessibility to testing and support services now from the County, according to a July 2020 staff report (pdf).

The report stated that in order to target the initiatives efforts, HCA had identified hot spots of COVID-19 cases in zip codes they said were disproportionately Hispanic, low-income, and more likely to live in more dense housing.

The Data

The county tasked Advance OC to capture population outcome data in three broad dimensions, focusing on basic human needs, foundations of wellbeing, and opportunity.

The basic human needs aspect analyzed nutrition and basic medical care such as supermarket access, vaccination rates and preventative medical and dental access; water and sanitation by identifying food deserts, groundwater threats and impervious surfaces; housing and homelessness such as cost burdens, displacement risk and homelessness density; and personal safety including traffic deaths, and property and violent crime rates.

The foundation of wellbeing analysis included access to basic knowledge including high school graduation rates, preschool enrollment and adult literacy rates; information and communications access such as average broadband access, cellular usage, and access to technology; health and wellness issues including obesity rates, diabetes prevalence and access to mental health; and environmental qualities such as traffic volume, percentage of land with tree canopy and carbon footprints.

The opportunity analysis took a look at personal rights such as voter registration, percentage of homeownership, and voter turnout; personal freedom of choice including childcare deserts, walkability, and disconnected youth issues; inclusiveness such as residential isolation, vulnerable employment and gender pay gap; and access to advance education such as percentage of Bachelors degrees, access to tertiary- and globally-ranked schools.

There are proxies that measure economics in terms of poverty rate, median household income  there are proxies to measure the economic impact and influence on certain outcomes in a better part of the 50 indicators that were used for the Orange County Social Progress Index to create the map, Heiu Nguyen, Director for the Office of Population Health and Equity told The Epoch Times.

The other purpose that were trying to say is theres environmental and social conditions, theres income indicators that impact health disparities, COVID being one of them, Nguyen continued.

So, theres more utility to amass than just for COVID alone, its broader than just COVID-19. We have been able to use it to both identify vulnerable communities and communities with low vaccination rates.

Navigation Tool

To help users navigate the complexities of employing the OC Equity Map properly, an instructional manual is available on the website, and Advance OC conducts webinars, hosts online working sessions and in-person workshops in the community. The website also has a quick-fire Q&A that visitors to the site can utilize if they need guidance.

Different groups host us and we do hands-on workshops to teach them how to use the map, Kalvoda said.

Kalvoda acknowledged that using the map can at first be cumbersome.

As you can imagine, the data is very, very complex. I can see how it could be a little challenging which is why we have the instruction manual, webinars and workshops. But for people who are in the field, who do this kind of work, theyve commented to us many times how easy the map is to navigate, she said.
Conservative activist Scott Presler after a street cleanup event in Baltimore, Md., on Aug. 5, 2019. (Courtesy of Scott Presler)

Scott Presler: Stop Talking, Start Doing

Scott Presler aka #ThePersistence on Twitterhasnt stopped cleaning up trash.

We did a cleanup in New Orleans about two months ago, says Presler, a conservative activist from northern Virginia who also registers voters and teaches people how to run for office.

More recently, he led a cleanup at the South Beach Boardwalk on Staten Island in New York.

Preslers cleanups began a little more than two years ago following a fateful Tweet.

In July of 2019, after Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) said that children at the U.S.Mexico border were sitting in their own feces and unable to shower, Trump responded on Twitter by calling the border clean, efficient, & well-run, just very crowded, while calling Cummings home district in Maryland a disgusting, rat- and rodent-infested mess.

The resulting conflagration on social media caught Preslers eye. But something didnt sit right.

I was really disappointed, because I saw that everybody was quick to post on social media, Presler says. They wanted the likes, they wanted the retweets, they wanted the attention from posting about the problem of trash in Baltimore, but nobody was offering a solution.

So, Presler tweeted an announcement to his followers: he was going to Baltimore to pick up trash.

The message spread far and wide, thanks in part to Preslers existing reachhe estimates he had about 250,000 Twitter followers at the time.

A few days later, Presler and 200 volunteers arrived in Baltimore, ready to help.

We picked up 12 tons of trash in 12 hours on the most dangerous streets of America in West Baltimore, he says.

Local media sneered.

We assume it was pure motives that led a Trump supporter to launch a cleanup in Cummings district, right? The Baltimore Sun opined.

But Presler persisted.

I thought to myself, Okay, Im a private citizen. I dont have millions of government resources at my disposal. And yet, I was able to do a job that the government failed to do, despite having unlimited resources to get the job done.

I figured, why cant I just do this across the country? And so I did.

Preslers cleanups have taken him everywhere from Denver, where he removed graffiti from the Colorado State Capitol following the George Floyd riots and protests, to a homeless encampment in Van Nuys, California, where he says he cleaned up 50 tons of trash.

Where else?

Presler rattles off the names: Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Miami, Portland, Oregon, and Austin, Texasthe list goes on.

During last years violent summer, he cleaned cities hard-hit by mostly peaceful protests.

After the riots that burned down several businesses in Kenosha, Wisconsin, we went to Kenosha, and we did cleanups, said Presler. We spoke to several members of the community who saw their businesses burn to the groundwhich, by the way, were minority-owned businesses.

He conservatively estimates that he and his fellow volunteers have cleaned up hundreds of tons of trash.

Although Presler wears his heart on his sleeve, he says he didnt make his cleanups political.

When we went to Baltimore, it was just about Americans helping Americans, Presler says. I didnt go in there with any political shirt. I went in there just as an American citizen.

Presler says the Baltimore Suns negative coverage actually got him more attention. Of course, it wasnt the only time that bad publicity backfired in his favor.

I have been protested for picking up trash, says Presler.

In San Francisco, a group of picketers chanted at Presler, telling him he should go home.

Preslers take?

I love living in a country where we have the freedom to choosewhere Im choosing to spend my time as a private citizen volunteering my time to pick up trash and make America a cleaner and greener place. How wonderful is it that other people can choose to spend their time as private citizens protesting?

Even after cleaning up tons upon tons of American trash, Presler hasnt given in to cynicism about the American people.

My sense is the majority of people want to help, he says. And I think the majority of people also dont know how to help. Thats where I see my role.

What we really need is more leaders to step up in society, who are going to be able to delegate, and who are going to be able to teach people what actions they can take to actually make a difference, he adds.

You dont have to wait for governmentyou dont have to wait for anybody else.

Presler thinks his positive example has resonated.

I now get messages from people all across the country who say, Because of you, I went out with my son, or my daughter, and we went and picked up trash, he says.

The stories of those hes met along the way also stick with him.

Its the people like Miss Louisewho was an 80-year-old grandmother, who came out of her home to find out what we were doing in Baltimore and was so thankful that people were actually showing attention, showing that they care, whereas so many people had just overlooked their situation, he says.

Preslers motto is simple: Stop Talking, Start Doing.
Sir Richard Dearlove, former head of MI6, leaves the High Court after giving testimony in an inquest in London, UK, on Feb. 20, 2008. (Cate Gillon/Getty Images)

Security Services Work to Tackle Terrorism Should Be Remembered: Ex-MI6 Chief

The vital work of the security services to protect against terrorism should not be overlooked, a former MI6 chief has said, as the world marks the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks on the U.S.

Sir Richard Dearlove, who headed the secret intelligence service between 1999 and 2004, told a memorial event in London that we owe a debt to the diligence and skill of the women and men of our intelligence and security community.

He was speaking in front of a four-tonne twisted piece of steel from the ruins of New Yorks Twin Towers which has been forged into a memorial artwork at Londons Olympic Park.

Sir Richard told those gathered at the memorial: On the 20th anniversary of 9/11 I ask you to also remember the work of my former colleagues in helping to keep us safe in this day and in this world.

Events in Afghanistan remind us that their task is not finished. It is appropriate today to recognise their patriotism and selfless devotion to this task.

Sir Richard said the 9/11 attacks in the U.S. in 2001 in which Islamic terrorists hijacked aeroplanes and flew them into buildings had shocked and terrified in equal parts.

It was an assault of unprecedented ruthlessness and ferocity on our society and on our values, and it still shadows modern political and social life.

Sir Richard recalled what it was like to be in a position of responsibility at that time and the challenge of having to respond the attacks in which 2,977 people from more than 90 nations were murdered. There were 67 Britons among the dead.

Sir Richard was flying back to London from Sweden when the attacks happened.

He went straight to Downing Street and within 36 hours he was travelling to Washington with a small group of senior intelligence and security officials on the only flight across the Atlantic which was allowed as U.S. airspace was closed in the immediate aftermath.

The former MI6 chief said: We had reason to expect a major terrorist attack, but tragically intelligence did not indicate where or when precisely.

His role was to tell the U.S. that the UK would pledge its resources to the coming pursuit of al-Qaida and its affiliates, as it was already clear who was behind the bloodshed.

He recalled that as he flew over New York and Washington, the plane descended over the still-smoking ruins of the Twin Towers.

After touching down in the U.S., Sir Richard was launched into an intensive schedule of high-level meetings which were business-like but emotionally charged.

Sir Richard recalled that Washington was like a ghost townthe attack on the heartland of U.S. government and business had no 20th century precedent.

He added: We felt we were on the cusp of a global terrorist offensive against the Wests interests, wherever they might be located.

Some days later, Sir Richard was in Washington with the then UK prime minister Tony Blair who was personally working on joint security initiatives with U.S. President George W Bush.

Sir Richard said: We did not know where the fight against al-Qaida would lead us, but we did understand that to gain and hold the initiative would require skilful planning, courage, execution, and significant risk.

A response which became know as the War on Terror followed.

Sir Richard said: Though there were divergences of method between us, the strategic alignment of our intelligence and security resources yielded important results in countering the overall terrorist threat.

The work of the security services is still vital and is not recognised in public end-of-day applause, he said.

Sir Richard added: They quietly and discreetly get on with their jobs out of sight and often out of (peoples) minds, too.

Their successes largely go unacknowledged, but they are among the first to be blamed when things go badly, as they must do sometimes when the nature of the threat stretches from large-scale conspiracies to lone wolves, and their targets are infinite and random.

To be able to stop terrorist attacks you have to gain the courage to risk mistakes, even serious ones. The choice between intervention and gaining more intelligence is always a fine one.

By Helen William
Bob Roth, CEO of transformer manufacturer RoMan Manufacturing, poses for a photograph in his plant in Grand Rapids, Mich., on Dec. 12, 2018. (Rebecca Cook/Reuters)

Small Employers Frustrated by Bidens COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate

Small employers like Bob Roth on Friday voiced frustration with President Joe Bidens mandate that workers either get vaccinated or tested regularly to combat the spread of COVID-19.

The co-owner of RoMan Manufacturing, a producer of transformers and glass-molding equipment in Grand Rapids, Michigan, supports vaccination but worries about increased costs, such as for testing and administration, that small companies like his will be forced to bear. He called the new mandate encroaching.

Its easy when you sit in Washington, D.C., to say the employers will handle it, he said.

On Thursday, Biden took aim at vaccine resistance, announcing policies requiring most federal employees to get COVID-19 vaccines and large employers to ensure their workers are vaccinated or tested weekly. The new measures would apply to about two-thirds of all U.S. employees, who work for businesses with more than 100 workers.

Large employers like automakers General Motors Co. and Ford Motor Co. and rare earths producer MP Materials Corp. said they encourage employees to get the vaccine, but they were quiet about Bidens executive order.

If we are required to mandate vaccines or weekly testing, we will certainly comply, railroad operator Union Pacific Corp. said in a statement.

Executives said Bidens new mandate provides cover for companies that want to raise their vaccination rates. But RoMans Roth said it presents a challenge at a time when his 160-employee company is struggling to fill 18 open jobs.

Sub-assembly worker Joel Dykema works on the sub-assembly of a transformer in the RoMan Manufacturing plant in Grand Rapids, Michi., on Dec. 12, 2018. (Rebecca Cook/Reuters)

RoMans vaccination rate has been stuck at 54 percent, and Roth stopped paying employees $50 each to get vaccinated when it became clear no more were stepping forward.

Andreas Weller, chief executive of auto aluminum parts maker Aludyne, which employs about 3,000 people in the United States, said the mandate creates a substantial burden on companies. With several hundred job openings, Weller also fears the potential devastating impact on hiring and job retention the mandate could have.

Arnold Kamler, CEO of bike maker Kent International, was delighted with the mandate, however. His company operates an assembly plant in South Carolina, where only 80 of 140 workers have been vaccinated.

If they dont want to be tested on a weekly basis, Ill wave goodbye to them gladly because thats selfish and irresponsible, he said of his workers, whom he notified of the mandate on Friday morning.

Roth feels that the mandates effectiveness will be questionable given the religious and health exemptions allowed under Title VII and the Americans with Disabilities Act. On Wednesday, United Airlines said employees who receive religious exemptions for vaccinations will be placed on temporary, unpaid personal leave starting next month.

Even before the mandate, many companies resorted to incentives for their employees to get vaccinated, and some are turning to disincentives.

States also will play a critical role in enforcing the mandate and support there varies, company executives said. In historically more conservative Indiana, Governor Eric Holcomb on Friday said a vaccine mandate was not the answer.

The announcement from President Biden is a bridge too far, he said in a statement. Private businesses should be able to look at their own mission, their staff and their goals and make the decision best for them that will keep their doors open.

By Ben Klayman and Timothy Aeppel
Texas AG Sues 6 School Districts Over Mask Mandates

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced he is filing six lawsuits against six school districts that have defied Republican Gov. Greg Abbotts executive order on mask mandates.

Abbotts Executive Order GA-38 (pdf) issued in July served as a reiteration of an earlier order issued in May that prohibits local governments and schools from requiring masks indoors.

Richardson, Round Rock, Galveston, Elgin, Spring, and Sherman Independent School Districts are being targeted in the lawsuits, Paxtons office announced. The office said it anticipates the filing of additional lawsuits if school districts and other governmental entities continue to defy state law.

It is not immediately clear why Paxton chose the six school districts out of the 85 school districts and six counties in Texas that have defied the order.

His office has shared a list of school districts and local governments that have been non-compliant. The list also points out which districts have been issued a letter warning of legal action, and which districts are under active litigation.

Paxton said in a post on Twitter, Today, I filed suit against 6 Texas [Independent School Districts] and this is just the beginning. I will put an end to these unconstitutional mask mandates.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton at a press conference in Anzalduas Park near McAllen, Texas, on April 28, 2021. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

In a separate statement, Paxton said, Not only are superintendents across Texas openly violating state law, but they are using district resourcesthat ought to be used for teacher merit raises or other educational benefitsto defend their unlawful political maneuvering.

If districts choose to spend their money on legal fees, they must do so knowing that my office is ready and willing to litigate these cases. I have full confidence that the courts will side with the lawnot acts of political defiance, he added.

Round Rock Independent School District said in a statement via The Texas Tribune, We do work closely with both our local health authorities in Williamson and Travis counties who advise us that masks remain an essential tool in stemming the spread of COVID-19 in our classrooms.

Meanwhile, officials from Spring Independent School District told the outlet that they learned about the lawsuit from the release from Paxtons office, and havent seen the lawsuit. They told the outlet, Spring ISD will let the legal process unfold and allow the courts to decide the merits of the case.

The Texas Education Agency (TEA), which oversees pre-K through Grade 12 public education in the state, released new COVID-19 guidance (pdf) on Aug. 5 saying that school systems cannot require students or staff to wear a mask, citing Abbotts order on masks.

However, the agency also noted on its website that it does not have the general authority to close schools for matters related to health.

The Biden administration announced on Thursday that federal financial support can be made available for school districts that defy their state governments orders in implementing mask mandates. The financial support would come via a new grant program called Project SAFE (Supporting Americas Families and Educators).

In August, the Texas Supreme Court ruled in favor of Abbott and overrode lower court rulings that allowed Dallas and Bexar counties to implement local mask mandates. Later that month, the court temporarily blocked Bexar County from implementing mask mandates in schools.

Over in Florida, Gov. Ron Desantis, a Republican, had his ban on school mask mandates reinstated on Sept. 10 after the 1st District Court of Appeals, a state court, ruled in his favor.

On the same day, the Department of Education under the Biden administration informed Florida Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran in a letter that there will be a directed investigation into whether the mask mandate ban is preventing school districts in the state from considering or meeting the needs of students with disabilities.

The investigation will focus on whether, in light of this policy, students with disabilities who are at heightened risk for severe illness from COVID-19 are prevented from safely returning to in-person education, in violation of Federal law, according to the letter.
This Extra-Easy Spinach Lasagna Cant Be Beat

Say hello to the ultimate vegetarian lasagna. Three hearty layers of pasta, marinara, ricotta, mozzarella, and garlicky spinach ensure both vegetarians and omnivores will be satisfied. And were not talking about a wimpy handful of spinach: Nope, an entire pound of baby spinach is tucked among the layers, giving you a little something green in every cozy, decadent bite.

Here, Ill show you how easy it is to make.

The Smartest, Fastest Spinach Lasagna

Lasagna is often a labor of love, but thanks to a few lasagna-making tricks Ive picked up over the years, this one is simple and streamlined.

1. Soak your lasagna noodles. I picked up this smart tip from Ina Garten and have used it ever since. Instead of par-boiling your noodles or using no-boil noodles (which dont cook up to have the same al dente texture as regular noodles), soak them in hot tap water while you prepare the fillings. This softens them so they cook efficiently between the layers of sauce, cheese, and spinach. I like to soak the noodles in the lasagna pan. Just drain the water when youre ready to layer, and you have one fewer dish to clean.

2. Lean on store-bought sauce. Since I would like to have more lasagna in my life, Im all for taking shortcuts to streamline the often-lengthy process. One easy way to cut down on prep time is to reach for store-bought marinara. Just be sure its one you love! My favorite is Raos.

Cooking the Spinach

Do you need to cook spinach before adding it to lasagna? Yesbut dont overdo it! Fresh spinach releases a lot of water as it cooks, which can result in a soggy lasagna. Thats why youll want to saute the spinach until it just wilts, which prevents it from releasing too much liquid too quickly. It will continue to soften in the oven, and any additional water thats released will be absorbed by the lasagna noodles as they cook.

If you opt for frozen spinach, you need to make sure its as dry as possible. Start by thawing the spinach, then wrap it in a dishtowel and squeeze out as much liquid as possible before sauteing it with the aromatics.

Bechamel Versus Ricotta

Traditional Italian lasagnas use bechamel sauce to achieve creamy richness between each layer. The white, milk-based sauceenriched and thickened with butter and flouris luxe and indulgent, but isnt necessary for all lasagnas. Italian American lasagna recipes generally call for ricotta cheese, which is equally creamy but much easier.

I personally love both iterations, although here I reached for ricotta as another way to streamline the process so this lasagna can be on your table faster. For the best flavor and texture, choose whole-milk ricotta. My go-to store-bought brands are Galbani Double Cream and Calabro.

Serving Spinach Lasagna

This lasagna doesnt need much to turn it into a complete dinner. Even though its packed with greens, I like to add a few more on the side. A quick and easy green salad, like an arugula or a spring mix salad, adds a little freshness to the comforting meal.

Spinach Lasagna

Serves 8 to 10

15 dried lasagna noodles (not no-boil, about 2/3 of a 1-pound box)

1 medium yellow onion

3 cloves garlic

12 ounces low-moisture whole-milk or part-skim mozzarella cheese, shredded (about 3 cups)

2 ounces Parmesan cheese, finely grated (about 1 firmly packed cup grated on a microplane or 2/3 cup store-bought)

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 pound baby spinach, or 1 (16-ounce) package frozen spinach

3/4 teaspoon kosher salt, divided

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, divided

1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes (optional)

1 (15- to 16-ounce) container whole-milk ricotta cheese (about 2 cups)

1 (32-ounce) jar marinara sauce (about 3 1/2 cups), such as Raos

Prep: If using frozen spinach, thaw according to package directions. Transfer to a clean kitchen towel, roll it up in the towel, and squeeze out all the excess moisture.

Arrange a rack in the middle of the oven and heat the oven to 400 degrees F. Meanwhile, arrange the dry lasagna noodles in an even layer in a 9-by-13-inch baking dish. Cover the noodles with hot tap water and let soak while you prepare the spinach and cheeses, about 20 minutes.

Dice the yellow onion. Mince the garlic cloves. Grate the mozzarella cheese on the large holes of a box grater. Finely grate the Parmesan cheese.

Heat the olive oil in a large Dutch oven or pot over medium heat until shimmering. Add the onion and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened and translucent, 5 to 7 minutes. Add the garlic and saute until fragrant, about 1 minute. If using fresh baby spinach, add it a few handfuls at a time and stir until just wilted, about 5 minutes. If using frozen spinach, add to pot and cook, stirring occasionally, until the liquid has evaporated, about 2 minutes. Season with 1/2 teaspoon of the kosher salt, 1/4 teaspoon of the black pepper, and the red pepper flakes, if using. Remove from the heat and let cool for 5 minutes.

Meanwhile, place half of the Parmesan cheese, all of the ricotta cheese, the remaining 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt, and remaining 1/4 teaspoon black pepper in a medium bowl and stir to combine.

Drain the lasagna noodles and set aside. Spread a thin layer of marinara sauce from the jar into the baking dish.

Arrange 5 lasagna noodles in an even layer on top of the sauce, breaking them if needed to fit (its OK if the noodles overlap slightly). Dollop and spread half of the ricotta mixture over the noodles. Spoon half of the spinach over the ricotta, then sprinkle with 1 cup of the mozzarella. Dollop and spread about a third of the marinara sauce (about 1 heaping cup) over the mozzarella.

Arrange 5 more noodles over the mozzarella, followed by the remaining ricotta mixture, remaining spinach, 1 cup of the mozzarella, and 1 heaping cup of the marinara sauce. Top with the remaining 5 noodles and the remaining sauce, spreading the sauce thin so that it almost completely covers the noodles. Sprinkle with the remaining 1 cup mozzarella and Parmesan.

Bake uncovered until the cheeses are melted and lightly browned, and the sauce is bubbling, about 30 minutes. Let cool on a wire rack for at least 15 minutes before serving.

Recipe Notes

The lasagna can be assembled and refrigerated unbaked up to two days in advance, or frozen for up to one month. Thaw the frozen lasagna for two days in the refrigerator before baking.

Leftovers can be refrigerated, tightly wrapped, for up to three days.
Former President Donald Trump prepares to speak during the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) held at the Hilton Anatole in Dallas, Texas, on July 11, 2021. (Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

Trump Makes Surprise Visit to NYPD and FDNY on 9/11 Anniversary, Hints at 2024 Presidential Run

Former President Donald Trump made a surprise visit to the New York City Fire Department (FDNY) and New York City Police Department (NYPD) on the 20th anniversary of Sept. 11.

Its a sad day, its a very sad day for a lot of reasons, Trump told reporters.

He went on to criticize President Joe Bidens pullout from Afghanistan, saying that it hasnt been covered properly by the media and that he felt it was very disappointing.

President Biden and First Lady Jill Biden, along with former presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton were at ground zero the same day, commemorating the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

I grew up with you. You are New Yorks finest. Youre incredible people, Trump told police and firefighters.

He then said that he appreciated the New York city police having endorsed him.

First time they ever endorsed a candidate, they told me, Trump said, for president.

An NYPD officer then asked him if he planned to run for president in 2024.

Oh, thats a tough question, he answered, amid some laughter.

Actually for me its an easy question. I know what Im going to do, but were not supposed to be talking about it yet, from the standpoint of campaign finance laws, which frankly are ridiculous, Trump said.

But I think youre gonna be happy, let me put it that way, he added.

Trump left the NYPDs 17th Precinct early afternoon, amid cheers and applause, signing some autographs, and waving to the public.

We love the blue. Ill say it loud. Were not supposed to say it, we love the blue! Trump said, while several voices could be heard responding, We love you!
Special Representative of the U.N. Secretary-General for Afghanistan Deborah Lyons delivers a statement during the 2020 Afghanistan donor conference hosted by the U.N. in Geneva, Switzerland, on Nov. 24, 2020. (Fabrice Coffrini/AFP via Getty Images)

UN Employees Face Harassment, Fear for Their Lives in Afghanistan

United Nations employees in Afghanistan are being subjected to harassment and intimidation at the hands of the Taliban following the terrorist groups swift takeover of the war-torn nation in August, according to U.N. staff members.

We are, however, increasingly worried by the growing number of incidents of harassment and intimidation against our national staff, U.N. special envoy to Afghanistan Deborah Lyons said in a Sept. 9 statement.

We will continue to do everything possible to support our staff and keep them from harms way. The U.N. cannot conduct its workwork that is so essential to the Afghan peopleif its personnel are subjected to intimidation, fear for their lives, and cannot move freely.

An internal U.N. security document obtained by Reuters on Aug. 25 describes dozens of incidents, including veiled threats, the looting of U.N. offices, and the physical abuse of staff since Aug. 10, five days before the Taliban seized power.

Senior U.S. diplomat Jeffrey DeLaurentis told the U.N. Security Council that the United States was outraged at reports that members of the Taliban have engaged in reprisals against U.N. staff throughout the country, stating that such behavior is simply unacceptable.

Despite the Taliban recently providing assurance that theyll respect the rights of Afghan women and present themselves as more moderate, a brutal clampdown against protesters in opposition to the terrorist group recently erupted at locations across the country. There are also reports of the Taliban implementing prohibitions on womens rights.

We are receiving increasing reports where the Taliban have prohibited women from appearing in public places without male chaperones and prevented women from working, Lyons said.

They have limited girls access to education in some regions and dismantled the Departments of Womens Affairs across Afghanistan, as well as targeting womens NGOs [Non-Governmental Organizations].

When the Taliban was in power between 1996 and 2001, prior to a U.S.-led military operation two decades ago, the terrorist group banned women from the workplace and nearly all women were mostly confined to their homes. They also forbade women from leaving the home unaccompanied by a man and forced them to cover their entire bodies.

Taliban fighters try to stop the protesters, as they shout slogans during an anti-Pakistan protest, near the Pakistan Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Sept. 7, 2021. (Stringer/Reuters)

The U.N. also stressed that its extremely disturbed about reports of violence used against Afghan nationals protesting Shariaor Taliban extremist ruleas well as journalists covering the demonstrations. That violence included shootings and persistent beatings, among other repressive measures, according to the U.N.

We call on the Taliban to immediately cease the use of force towards, and the arbitrary detention of, those exercising their right to peaceful assembly and the journalists covering the protests, a spokeswoman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights said in a statement.

A newspaper editor said two of his journalists were beaten in police custody recently after covering the womens protest in Kabul, where they were detained by the Taliban.

Zaki Daryabi, founder and editor-in-chief of the Etilaat Roz newspaper, shared images on social media of two male reporters, one with large, red welts across his lower back and legs and the other with similar marks on his shoulder and arm.

Reuters contributed to this report.

From NTD News
Computer science professor Christa Lopes' Scion IQ electric car is plugged in in her garage in Irvine, Calif., on Jan. 26, 2015. (Lucy Nicholson/Reuters)

Democrats Propose Dramatic Expansion of EV Tax Credits That Favors Big Three

WASHINGTONDemocratic lawmakers on Friday proposed an expansion of tax credits for electric vehicles that includes significantly higher subsidies for union-made zero emission models assembled in the United States.

The proposal, a key part of President Joe Bidens goal to ensure EVs comprise at least 50 percent of U.S. vehicle sales by 2030 and boost U.S. union jobs, will give Detroits Big Three automakers a big competitive edge and has drawn criticism from foreign automakers like Honda Motor Co. and Toyota Motor Corp.

The tax credit for up to $12,500 per vehicle for U.S.-made union-made zero emission models compares with a $7,500 incentive for most other electric carsan amount that has not changed.

The bill, however, does away with phasing out automakers tax credits after they hit 200,000 electric vehicles sold, which would make General Motors Co. and Tesla Inc. eligible again. It would also create a new smaller credit for used EVs of up to $2,500.

A customer prepares to charge his Tesla electric vehicle (EV) after parking in a bay for electric vehicles at a supermarket in north London on Nov. 18, 2020. (Daniel Leal-Olivas /AFP via Getty Images)

House Democrats had not previously disclosed how much they might boost EV credits. The dramatic hike and other revisions could cut the price of some EVs like GMs Chevrolet Bolt by as much as a third and make battery-powered vehicles more competitive with or in some cases cheaper than similar gasoline models.

We want to incentivize this. It puts American manufacturers in the lead, which is where we want them, and it reduces emissions faster than any other policy that we could put in place, Rep. Dan Kildee (D-Mich.) told Reuters.

He said the new EV tax credit would cost an estimated $33 billion to $34 billion over a decade.

In a decade, we want to see American workers making good wages building American electric vehicles, he added.

Kildee said Biden, who has made the proposal a cornerstone of his climate policy, was very insistent he wanted a hefty EV tax credit. He wants us to lean in. Lets go big and lets get this done, Kildee said, recounting a recent conversation with Biden.

A visitor is reflected as he takes pictures of a new Ford Aspire car during its launch in New Delhi, India, on Oct. 4, 2018. (Anushree Fadnavis/Reuters)

Bill to Face Opposition

GM, Ford Motor Co., and Stellantis NV, the parent of Chrysler, assemble their U.S. made vehicles in plants represented by the United Auto Workers union.

In contrast, foreign automakers operating in the United States as well as Tesla do not have unions representing assembly workers and many of them have fought efforts by the UAW to organize U.S. plants.

As talk of the EV tax proposal gathered steam, Honda said in a statement last month that its workers deserve fair treatment from Congress and should not be penalized for their choice of a workplace.

The House Ways and Means Committee will vote on Tuesday on the proposal which is a part of a broad tax measure in a planned $3.5 trillion spending bill.

The bill will face opposition in the Senate, which is evenly divided 5050 between Republicans and Democrats. Republicans have harshly criticized much of the spending bill and Democrats must hold onto all 50 Democratic Senate votes to win approval.

But a Senate panel in May also approved legislation to boost EV credits to as much as $12,500 for U.S. vehicles made by union workersdespite all Republicans in opposition.

The proposed EV credits would last for 10 years and consumers would be allowed to deduct the value of the credit from the sales price at the time of purchase.

In 2027, the $7,500 credit would only apply to U.S.-made vehicles. There are also lower credits for EVs with smaller battery packs.

The bill says individual taxpayers must have an adjusted gross income of no more than $400,000 to get the new EV tax credit. It would limit the EV credit to cars priced at no more than $55,000, while trucks could be priced up to $74,000.

But those limits may face pushback.

Last month, the Senate in a non-binding amendment narrowly voted in favor of prohibiting taxpayers from claiming EV tax credits if they make more than $100,000 annually or if vehicles cost more than $40,000.

By David Shepardson
A mural celebrates the history of mining at City Hall in Superior, Ariz., on March 29, 2021. (Caitlin O'Hara/Reuters)

US House Committee Moves to Block Rio Tintos Resolution Mine

A U.S. House of Representatives committee has voted to include language in a wider budget reconciliation package that would block Rio Tinto Ltd from building its Resolution copper mine in Arizona.

The San Carlos Apache tribe and other Native Americans say the mine would destroy sacred land where they hold religious ceremonies. Elected officials in nearby Superior, Arizona, say the mine is crucial for the regions economy.

The House Natural Resources Committee late on Thursday folded the Save Oak Flat Act into the $3.5 trillion reconciliation spending measure. The full House could reverse the move and the legislation faces an uncertain fate in the U.S. Senate,

If approved, the bill would reverse a 2014 decision by former President Barack Obama and Congress that set in motion a complex process to give Rio federally-owned Arizona land that contains more than 40 billion pounds of copper in exchange for acreage that Rio owns nearby.

Former President Donald Trump gave the land swap final approval before leaving office in January, but successor Joe Biden reversed that decision, leaving the project in limbo.

A Resolution Copper facility in Superior, Ariz., on March 30, 2021. (Caitlin OHara/Reuters)

The final reconciliation budget is expected to include funding for solar, wind and other renewable energy projects that require immense volumes of copper. Electric vehicles use twice as much copper as those with internal combustion engines. The Resolution mine could fill about 25 percent of the demand for U.S. copper.

Superior Mayor Mila Besich, a Democrat, said the project seems increasingly stuck in bureaucratic purgatory.

This move seems contradictory to what the Biden administration is trying to do to address climate change, said Besich. I hope the full House does not allow that language to stay in the final bill.

Rio said it would continue consultation with local communities and tribes. Rio Chief Executive Jakob Stausholm plans to visit Arizona later this year.

Representatives for the San Carlos Apache and BHP Group Ltd, which is a minority investor in the project, could not immediately be reached for comment.

By Ernest Scheyder
A U.S. Navy SEAL special forces operator, front, and colleagues during a joint U.S.-Cyprus military drill at Limassol port on Sept. 10, 2021. (Philippos Christou/AP Photo)

US Navy SEALs, Cyprus Special Forces Hold Anti-Terror Drill

LIMASSOL, CyprusMembers of the U.S. navys elite special forces SEAL unit joined Cypriot underwater demolition soldiers on Friday in a joint drill to hone skills in countering terrorist hijackings at sea.

The exercise involved teams of U.S. and Cypriot special forces re-taking a ship controlled by terrorists.

Cypriot Defense Minister Charalambos Petrides said after the drill that Cyprus and the United States are on the same strategic path to ensure security and stability in a turbulent region.

He said close cooperation between the two countries special forces in the past two years aims to achieve peak preparedness in order to deal with asymmetrical threats and emerging crises.

U.S. Ambassador to Cyprus Judith Garber said more joint drills will follow in the near future.

The United States decided for the first time last year to provide military education and training funding to Cyprus following Congressional approval as part of Washingtons push to enhance ties with countries in the region in order to boost security.

The funding is part of the Eastern Mediterranean Energy and Security Partnership Act that U.S. legislators approved in 2019. The legislation underscores U.S. support for a partnership between Greece, Cyprus, and Israel founded on recently discovered offshore gas deposits in the region.

The Act also partially lifts a 1987 U.S. arms embargo on Cyprus that was imposed to prevent an arms race that could hamper efforts to reunify the ethnically divided island nation.
A burnt out vehicle is seen in the Nghar Village, near Jos on June 27, 2018. Fulani herdsmen attacked the village. STEFAN HEUNIS/AFP via Getty Images)

Victims of 9/11 Attack in Nigeria Also Mark 20-Year Anniversary

Dark memories of Sept. 11, 2001, strike a solemn chord with Nigerians who lost everything that same day in the idyllic hilltop town of Rankum, south of Jos.

Unnoticed by Nigerias press and overshadowed by the sensational attacks in the United States, the brutal murder of 200 Christian residents by Fulani militants remains a traumatic memory for survivors who remain uncompensated by the Nigerian government. Today, the former affluent farming town of Rankum has been renamed Mahanga and converted to an armed Muslim zone, according to human rights attorney Solomon Dalyop.

Mahanga came about as a result of an invasion of armed Fulani militias, Dalyop told The Epoch Times.

Solomon Dalyop, Rankum native and human rights lawyer. (Masara Kim/The Epoch Times)

Dalyop was a student living in the neighboring town of Jol and remembers seeing clouds of dark smoke rising from Rankum that day.

It was one of the richest sites in Plateau state. The inhabitants were millionaires by todays standards, due to revenue from fertile fields and abundant streams, which made both farming and cattle-rearing lucrative, he said.

Stephen Jugu, former mayor of Rankum village, Riyom County, Nigeria. (Masara Kim/The Epoch Times)

Hundreds of terrorists armed with AK-47 rifles attacked Rankum and its adjourning villages on the evening of Sept. 11, 2001, killing close to 200 people, according to Stephen Jugu, a former mayor of Rankum.

They came around 7:30 p.m., shooting and burning houses, and looting anything they could see, he told The Epoch Times. Some of them had guns and some had petrol, with which they were burning houses. They killed my nephew and uncle but we escaped to a neighboring village and to date, we have not been able to go back because they have settled there and have taken it over to be their own.

Shortly after the attack, Rankum was renamed to Mahanga, which means watchtower in the Fulani dialect of the terrorists, Jugu said.

The terrorist takeover of the town wasnt opposed by federal authorities and was never reversed by Plateau officials. On the contrary, the so-called land grab by militias was a harbinger of similar takeovers throughout the state and in the neighboring states of Kaduna, Benue, Nasarawa, Taraba, and Niger states, according to Christian Solidarity International.

More than 380 Christian communities have been annexed since 2001; many have been renamed by the militant conquerors.

Simon Mwadkon, Riyom Countys representative in the Nigerian House of Representatives. (Masara Kim/The Epoch Times)

The newly renamed Mahanga currently serves as a staging ground for massacres by Fulani militants in the Central and Northwestern regions, according to Simon Mwadkon, Riyom Countys representative in the Nigerian House of Representatives.

Every attack by the Fulani in Plateau state and beyond is usually coordinated from Mahanga, Mwadkon told The Epoch Times. That is where they camp and train most of their militias, and no attack in this region occurs without Mahanga playing a role, he said.

I have seen them myself and have personally been attacked by terrorists who came from the Mahanga area, and when they were repelled by [security forces], they ran toward the community; no one but they live there.

I have cried out against the emergence of terror elements in that community since I was local government [county] chairman in 2010, but no one heard me.

Timothy Dantong, Plateau state legislator from Riyom (Masara Kim/The Epoch Times)

The attacks are mainly to take land and displace people of a different ethnicity, said Timothy Dantong, a Plateau state legislator from Riyom.

They are using that community as their base to launch attacks on other communities so that [the land] can become theirs as well, Dantong told The Epoch Times. My people and constituents are under siege by the Fulani terrorists.

More than 10,000 people have been killed in Plateau state since the capture of Rankum according to Dalyop, who also serves as the chief executive officer of Emancipation Centre for Crisis Victims in Nigeria, a local non-governmental organization tracking Fulani terrorist attacks.

The Fulani have killed more than 60,000 people in Nigeria since 2001, according to the International Crisis Group.
Whatever the Result, Billionaire Clive Palmers Border Lawsuit Will Have a Formidable Effect

Commentary

Mining magnate Clive Palmer will take the Western Australian government to court over their plan to limit entry to their state to only those vaccinated against the CCP virus.

In addition, he has offered to fund a class action over vaccination passports.

It has been pointed out in the media that he, or the entity through which he operates, may well require an ASIC licence to undertake litigation funding. But that would hardly operate as a barrier to his plans, and there would be no difficulty with Palmers compliance under the law.

It would be unwise to dismiss his declarations as mere bravado, or to assume that he will not succeed in some or even all of his lawsuits.

Palmer remains one of the most interesting and powerful persons to have appeared on the Australian national scene in many years. In fact, most of us will only see one Clive Palmer in our lifetimes.

United Australia Party founder Clive Palmer addresses the media during a press conference in Townsville on April 18, 2019. (AAP Image/Michael Chambers)

Ridiculed by the elites and subject to their condescension, he remains a man not to be trifled with.

This threatened litigation should not be considered alone. It is part of a trifecta which can quite legitimately advance his political impact.

Like a good general, Palmer relies on all weapons to win victoryadvertising, politics, and his latest acquisition, Independent Federal MP Craig Kelly, to whom I return below.

As to Palmers threatened litigation, recall that his immediate objective is for the United Australia Party (UAP) to make significant inroads in the next federal election, which must be held before May 21 next year for the House of Representatives and half the Senate.

It is extremely unlikely that there will be final rulings on any of the cases by then.

The cases will ask the High Court of Australia to determine whether recent government actions to contain the CCP virus and protect residents, can be justified under the Australian Constitution.

It is likely the following provisions will be scrutinised including Section 51 (xxiiiA) against civil conscription in providing medical services; Section 117, which requires that residents of one state not be subject to any disability or discrimination in another state; and Section 92, which allows trade, commerce, and intercourse between states to be absolutely free.

A general view of the High Court of Australia in Canberra, Australia, on Nov. 5, 2020. (AAP Image/Lukas Coch)

Yet, as U.S. Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes famously once said, the Constitution is what the judges say it is 

The High Court hearing will no doubt feature arguments that Australias constitutional system protects fundamental rights as outlined by Justice Mary Gaudron in the 1992 High Court case, Australian Capital Television Ltd v Commonwealth, who said, The notion of a free society governed in accordance with the principles of representative parliamentary democracy may entail freedom of movement, freedom of association and  freedom of speech generally.

Two experts in constitutional law, Professors Augusto Zimmermann and Gabriel Moens, also recently argued that the Constitution must always be interpreted in a manner that promotes its purposes, values, and principles, which includes fundamental rights for citizens.

Accordingly, they argue that compulsory vaccination, either directly or indirectly, constitutes a form of civil conscription that is constitutionally invalid.

However, this only seems to relate to the exercise of power by the federal parliament, leaving the states free to act.

Zimmermann and Moens concede that they are not predicting what the High Court might do, but only arguing what they believe it should do.

Apart from the Constitution, I expect there will be a minefield of litigation to emerge against ministers of health across the country. A significant amount of their law-making could be found unlawful.

I expect we will see massive claims alleging the ministers committing the common law wrong of misfeasance (a transgression) in public office. If such claims were successful, as I am sure they will be, the damages to be paid by taxpayers will be large.

To return to Craig Kelly, like Palmer he is also subject to the condescension of the elites.

Craig Kelly announces his leadership of the United Australia Party and speaks against COVID-19 vaccination in a press conference at Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, on Aug. 23, 2021. (Rohan Thomson/Getty Images)

But the fact is that he is one of those rare politicians who has not deviated from his principlesand has followed them even to the extent of resigning from the Liberal Partywill be widely recognised among rank-and-file Australians I believe. Any major advertising campaign may enhance this message.

He is precisely the sort of representative 18th century Irish stateman Edmund Burke had in mind when he said representatives owe you their judgement.

If one bothers to read all of Burke, it will be seen that he condemned what now dominates the major political parties in Australiato a greater degree than in the United Kingdomwhich is that party members regularly receive instructions that they are bound blindly and implicitly to obey, to vote, and to argue for, though contrary to the clearest conviction of (their)  judgment and conscience.

In the 2019 election, while the UAP gained no seats, Palmer played a significant role through his advertising campaign in creating legitimate distrust among a significant number of traditional Australian Labor Party voters who would suffer from its policies.

I wrote in the Spectator Australia on why this was the case, and we saw the subsequent defeat for the Labor Party at the 2019 election.

Since the election, Australias two major parties, Labor and the Liberal-National coalition, have drawn together in policy and only differed at the margins.

With Kelly, Palmers UAP is led by a politician who carries weight among the rank-and-file and offers a notable point-of-difference from the major parties.

The result may be that the UAP plays a strong hand at the next federal election.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Large and midsize Connecticut companies are looking ahead with plenty of questions after President Joe Biden said all organizations employing 100 people or more must require vaccinations against COVID-19 or require weekly tests for the infection.

Bidens declaration on Thursday stunned the world at a time when the nation is divided over vaccine mandates, and left at least two huge questions: How will that happen? Can he do that?

Aside from those big questions, managers, lawyers and executives in Connecticut wondered on Friday about details. Would employers face fines? Or would companies be forced to terminate workers who do not comply? Would those workers qualify for unemployment compensation?

I did not see it coming, said David Lewis, CEO of the human resources advisory firm OperationsInc in Norwalk, who called Bidens move a well intentioned effort at driving more of those who are not vaccinated to get vaccinated.

But Lewis said the announcement was poor in execution and planning that left 100 questions, a fair amount of confusion and the likelihood that none of this will matter for some time until they work it out through whatever court challenges surface.

In addition to larger companies, any organization that sells goods or services to the federal government must adhere to the new rule.

Lets see how it works out  had the same thing with state employees, Gov. Ned Lamont said on Friday. Obviously if everybody is vaccinated thats the best. But if I lose a third of my corrections officers because they dont want to get vaccinated, that doesnt work, so thats the balance youve got to reach between mandates and just really giving people strong incentives to do the right thing.

As for the rules in Bidens declaration, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration is working up initial guidance for expected release next week on how employers should implement the order. Two of every three U.S. workers, or about 100 million people in all, would be affected by the requirements, if enacted as Biden articulated on Thursday.

Biden promoted the move as necessary to lower the infection rate for COVID. The White House suggested the federal government has already established a legal precedent by requiring nursing home workers to get vaccinated if they treat patients covered by Medicare or Medicaid.

Under the new rules, other medical workers will be required to get vaccinated or weekly testing including home health workers.

Connecticut has among the highest vaccination rates in the nation, with nearly 2.9 million residents having received at least one dose according to the latest update Thursday.

Its not clear yet  well have to wait for OSHA guidance  on whether the rules apply to all employees or just those in company facilities, said Gary Phelan, an employment law attorney with Mitchell & Sheahan, which has a Stratford office. There isnt necessarily any legal precedent, which often means this may be destined to go quickly to the Supreme Court.

A spokesperson for General Dynamics, whose Electric Boat subsidiary in Groton is one of the largest work sites in Connecticut, said the company is awaiting specifics and that it will comply with whatever new rules surface. Electric Boat offers vaccines through its own on-site pharmacies in Connecticut and Rhode Island.

Since vaccines first became broadly available, we have encouraged our employees to get vaccinated to help protect themselves, their families and their coworkers, said General Dynamics spokesperson Liz Power in an email response about Bidens order. We record any EB-administered vaccinations, and have asked our employees who get vaccinated outside of work to report their vaccination status to our medical team. We believe our vaccination rates are close to those in the communities surrounding our sites.

Nationally, some unions have said thee order must be bargained  as happened in Connecticut last month when Lamont ordered mandatory vaccines for all nursing home employees and contractors, and for all state employees. As an illustration of the difficulty of carrying out these mandates, Lamont agreed to delay the $20,000-a-day fines against nursing homes from Sept. 7 to Sept. 27.

Daniel Schwartz, a Shipman & Goodwin partner specializing in employment law, said some companies will welcome the development as providing a justification for a vaccination standard they may have been hesitant to implement on their own.

Some were on the fence, and there were some who didnt want to be the leaders in that  but they are more than happy to be the followers, Schwartz said. This type of rule will give cover to many employers to implement perhaps even stronger ... policies.

Biden pointed out that some companies have already moved ahead with their own vaccine and testing requirements, including Walt Disney, United Airlines and Tyson Foods.

My message to unvaccinated Americans is this: What more is there to wait for? What more do you need to see? Biden said Thursday in prepared remarks. The vaccine has FDA approval. Over 200 million Americans have gotten at least one shot. Weve been patient, but our patience is wearing thin. And your refusal has cost all of us.

But the precise cost for any companies or workers choosing not to comply has yet to be revealed by the Biden administration.

OperationIncs Lewis said companies subject to the new rules should consider alerting their workers by Monday that they are aware of the announcement and awaiting guidance for next steps. Employers will have to investigate options for tracking vaccination and testing status, he added. And with many mass vaccination and testing sites having been dismantled, the possibility exists those will return to handle any masses of employees choosing the testing option as opposed to getting the vaccine.

That could make for long lines in cities such as Bridgeport, Hartford, New Haven and Stamford, Lewis noted, even with Connecticuts relatively high vaccination rate compared with other states.

Now the tough part comes, Lewis said. How are we going to implement this? How are we going to get everybody behind this? Wheres the teeth in enforcement here? And what are we going to do when we take a closer look at where we have the populations of people who are not vaccinated, and what the attitudes are of the state governors in those areas?

Includes reporting by John Moritz.

Alex.Soule@scni.com; 203-842-2545; @casoulman
NORWALK  The state Department of Transportation presented the progress made on the Merritt 7 train station to Gov. Ned Lamont Friday, with the station set to be completed next fall.

The station, a stop on the Danbury Branch of Metro-North Railroad, will be equipped with a 500-foot-long platform, 105 parking spaces and heated platforms to prevent snow and ice accumulation, DOT Public Transportation Chief Rich Andreski said.

Merritt 7 will serve 28 trains daily, eight of which are direct to New Yorks Grand Central, Andreski said. Parking availability will increase from 88 to 105 spots, some of which will be in a newly constructed and paved lot across the street from the station.

Connecticut first authorized funding for the project in 2017, when $21 million was approved to borrow for the upgrades to the Merritt 7 stop and design work for a proposed station servicing Orange.

The Connecticut State Bond Commission funding put in motion the two projects that had been on the books for several years. Renovation on the Merritt 7 station began in September 2020.

Set for completion in fall 2022, the improved station will also include a walkway bridge over the tracks leading to the Merritt 7 offices, the largest corporate park in Fairfield County, according to the compounds website.

Merritt 7 is home to IBM, Xerox, MassMutual and Frontier Communications, among other companies. Hearst Connecticut Media Group, including the Norwalk Hour, has office space in the complex.

They want to give it a village effect and you can get everything you need, Mayor Harry Rilling said of the areas new condo and apartment complexes being developed in the area. There are all kinds of things that can be done here to get things running smoothly and traffic flowing.

The new footbridge and improved station will open at a time when Norwalk is rapidly growing. Norwalk had the seventh-largest population increase in the state during the last decade and third-largest growth among big cities, according to 2020 census data.

Norwalk is one of the fastest-growing cities in the state, if not the fastest, said U.S. Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn. Norwalk is an amazing demonstration in how to do it right.

With a $1 trillion infrastructure bill soon to be signed into law in the next two weeks, Connecticut is set to receive $1 billion the next five years, Lamont said.

Thatll mean a billion dollars a year for transportation for the state of Connecticut, Lamont said. We have to match with our 20 percent share so were not out of the woods yet, but it really allows us to get this state moving again.

The goal of the reconstructed Merritt 7 station, along with expediting travel to New York, is to create a more commuter-friendly environment, where residents can live, work and shop in the same area without the need for car travel, Lamont said. Additionally, the new Merritt 7 will be handicap accessible.

The new platforms aim to improve accessibility for customers and reduce boarding time by providing access to all the cars on the longest trains traveling up and down the line, according to DOT spokesperson Kevin Nursick. The existing platform only allows some doors to open for boarding.

Throughout the coronavirus pandemic, Connecticut did not halt its transportation and infrastructure development, DOT Commissioner Joe Giulietti said.

The government never stopped any construction all way through the pandemic, so all plans that were there we met the goals and kept it going, Giulietti said. Where some states chose to shut down, we kept it going. We kept construction going on the highway side and rail side.

The Merritt 7 is the final stop on the Danbury Branch before it connects with the New Haven Line in South Norwalk.

abigail.brone@hearstmediact.com
CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP)  When news came that a 20-year-old Wyoming soldier was one of the last casualties of the two-decade-long U.S. war in Afghanistan, it arrived as a tragic bookend: A 20-year-old soldier from Wyoming was among the first to die in the same war.

Army Ranger Spc. Jonn Edmunds, of Cheyenne, was one of the war's first two casualties when a Black Hawk helicopter on a search-and-rescue mission crashed in Pakistan on Oct. 19, 2001.

Last month, the family of Marine Lance Cpl. Rylee McCollum, of Bondurant just outside Jackson, got word he was among 13 U.S. soldiers killed in a suicide bombing Aug. 26 at the Kabul airport.

Edmunds and McCollum were both killed on their first deployments. In between, almost 2,500 U.S. troops died in the Afghanistan war, most with far less attention than the two Wyoming men got.

As with Edmunds death in the chaotic aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, McCollums strikes an especially sad chord as Americans struggle to process what good  if any  has come from their nations longest war.

That was a totally senseless death," Edmunds father, Donn Edmunds, said of McCollum. Seeing the other people losing their loved ones, all that does is bring back bad memories for my family."

A 25-year U.S. Army veteran who served in Vietnam, Edmunds remembers how two officers knocked on his door on the outskirts of Cheyenne before sunrise on Oct. 20, 2001, bringing word of his sons death.

I looked out the window, I saw them standing there and all I could think was Oh my God, I know what theyre here for. Ive done notifications so I knew, said Edmunds, who as a military police officer participated in telling relatives of loved ones' deaths. He got choked up and quiet while looking at a display of his sons medals and the folded American flag presented to him and other families of fallen soldiers.

They came in and gave us the Regret to inform you speech. My wife had been up by then, and I watched her melt into this carpet right here on the floor," Edmunds recalled. "And they asked, Is there anything we can do? and we said, No, just let us absorb this, and we have to be able to accept this.

Wyoming is the least populated state and one that values tradition: rodeo and county fairs in summer, elk hunting in fall, calving season in spring and military service.

Jonn Edmunds and his friends grew up playing with water guns, then laser tag in the familys big yard. Eventually the honors student moved up to paintball, Donn Edmunds recalled.

We used to have the guys from the Air Force come out here. And theyd knock on the door and say, Can Jonn come out and play paintball with us? he said.

On the opposite side of Cheyenne, F.E. Warren Air Force Base has overseen nuclear missiles in silos beneath the Wyoming, Colorado and Nebraska plains since the 1960s. Each July, the city hosts its massive Cheyenne Frontier Days rodeo festival but Cheyenne has always been a military town at heart.

Like Edmunds, McCollum seemed born with soldiering in his blood.

He grew up in the Jackson Hole area, a region of rugged, forested mountains and big-time outdoors culture on the other side of Wyoming from Cheyenne. Even as a toddler, McCollum played with toy rifles, pretending he was a soldier or hunter, relatives said.

As a high school wrestler, he distinguished himself by training intensely. At school, in 2017, he and his father spoke out publicly when a multiple-choice quiz for a reading assignment facetiously offered shooting at Trump as an answer.

On Friday, hundreds of people lined the streets of Jackson to honor McCollum as his remains returned home from Afghanistan. Many people drove from surrounding towns, some multiple hours away, to pay their respects, and law enforcement saluted as the hearse passed by.

I wrestled with him all my life. He was a senior when I was a freshman, said Colter Dawson of Jackson. He died for our country. Theres not that many people who get to make that kind of honorable sacrifice, and thats something this town and this country need to recognize more.

Jackson, where McCollum graduated from high school, is a wealthy ski and summer tourism enclave near Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks that many in Wyoming view as socioeconomically out of step and politically more moderate than the rest of the state.

Yet the town of 10,000 has shown no less respect for veterans and military service, especially over the past 20 years, said Joseph Burke, commander of the local American Legion post.

It was around 9/11 that people started to recognize veterans, the sacrifices they and their families really made, Burke said. We've got kids who go in the service from here all the time.

McCollums widow, Jiennah Crayton, is due to deliver a baby in a couple of weeks and the family plans a memorial service sometime after. Meanwhile, three online fundraising efforts have brought in over $900,000 for Crayton and the childs education.

After Jonn Edmunds death, television trucks lined up outside the family's home. Reporters gathered at their daughters school, Donn Edmunds recalled, and the family lived like hermits for a few weeks.

At a memorial service that filled a 4,500-seat gym, Jonn Edmunds commanding officer remembered him as a gritty soldier who still had that intense look on his face even after other soldiers looked tired.

Such crowds wouldnt always show up, however, at services for soldiers killed in Afghanistan and Iraq over the next two decades.

Yeah, people got numb. But the families that were affected never got numb, Edmunds said.

The Edmunds family received about $24,000 in donations which they gave away to causes including the Wounded Warrior Project, a charity for troops wounded since 2001, Edmunds said.

He has spent the years since his sons death riding his Harley-Davidson with the Patriot Guard Riders, a biker group that helps maintain decorum at military funerals, running unsuccessfully for the Wyoming Legislature and trying to raise interest in establishing a veterans memorial park. Now hes thinking about suing the U.S. government over its withdrawal from Afghanistan, which he criticized as poorly organized.

All of these peoples sons were great. Every one of them was a traumatic loss for their family. And the thing about it is, what for? Edmunds said. We have abandoned their mission.

The work of consoling and counseling grief-stricken relatives, however, was therapeutic both for him and for relatives, said Edmunds, 72, who runs a security business.

A woman once asked at an event held by the Armys Survivor Outreach Services family support group whether losing a loved one ever got easier, Edmunds recalled.

I said Maam, it will never get easier. The only thing that will happen to you is time will separate you from the event, Edmunds said.

____

AP journalist Amy Beth Hanson in Helena, Montana and photographer Amber Baesler in Jackson, Wyoming contributed to this report.

____

Follow Mead Gruver at https://twitter.com/meadgruver
NORWALK  Students walked out of school on March 13, 2020, thinking they would return to their classrooms in two weeks. Then it was four weeks. Eventually, they finished the 2019-20 school year completely remote, never seeing their teachers and classmates in-person again that spring.

Almost 18 months later, many students are returning to in-person learning for the first time since the pandemic took hold.

Jaxson McQuaid, 15, a sophomore at Norwalk High School, remembers talking about the coronavirus in the weeks preceding the shutdown. He spent most of the last year and half learning remotely, only going into school a couple of times last year to receive some extra help from teachers.

We were talking about the virus and how it would only be short term. Wed only be out of school for a week or two, McQuaid said.

Laszlo Balazs, 14, a freshman at Brien McMahon High School, described the week prior to schools closing as chaotic. He remembers everyone pulling up a map from the New York Times showing where confirmed cases had been reported, but the week of March 8, people knew we were going to be shut down.

He spent his last weekend before the shutdown seeing West Side Story in New York, eating dinner in a packed pub, and spending time with his family.

Balazs made the decision on his own, with the support of his parents, to learn remotely for the 2020-21 school year. McQuaid made the same decision, although he stopped into Norwalk High School a couple of times last year to meet with teachers for extra help and to see what was happening in the school building.

In December 2020, Norwalk Public Schools reported only 200 high school students were taking advantage of the hybrid option to learn in-person for two days and remote for two days. The district opened for full in-person learning in late spring 2021, but students could continue to learn remotely if they chose.

Both students have made the transition back to in-person learning almost seamlessly. McQuaid said the first day of school felt like all the others before the pandemic. Balazs was nervous about going back. He not only was returning to in-person instruction, but also starting at a new school.

The transition was better than I expected. Its second nature, he said. By the end of the first day, beside getting lost in the hallways a couple of times, Id gotten a handle on the new school year.

Some of the freedoms of remote learning are missing being back in school. Balazs has a little more homework after school than he had last year when he could complete an assignment for one class then immediately start work on another assignment. He also found less distractions at home.

I felt I learned just as well, possibly better, Balazs said of his remote experience, although he doesnt miss the seven hours alone in front of a computer screen. Waking up, making the bed, and going to the computer screen is not the brightest way to start a morning.

McQuaid misses getting a little extra sleep in the morning and the flexibility to get up and move around throughout the day. Hes happy to see people again as he figures out his schedule and class. Its also been easier to interact with his teachers instead of being stuck behind a screen all day.

Norwalk schools started this school year with everyone back in-person with the requirement that all students and staff wear masks while inside the buildings. The statewide mask mandate is in effect until at least the end of the month, but the state no longer requires schools to offer a voluntary remote option.

Balazs has been impressed by his peers compliance with the mask mandate. But he still hears teachers telling students cover the nostrils.

And as COVID cases pop up in Norwalk schools, students will be sent home again. After a case was reported late Tuesday night, all Norwalk High and P-Tech students learned remotely the next day so the school could conduct contact tracing.

As that happens, Balazs said he hopes students who are learning remotely will receive the same attention as those in the classroom.

One of the difficult things last year, by the end of the year, only three or four kids were fully remote and the rest were in person, Balazs said. You go from being in the majority to being the minority. Its hard for teachers. They focused on the in-person folks. There needs to be some sort of way that teachers can keep two stable bodies of students without ending with only one or two kids on computers.

Correction: This story has been updated to correct the pronouns for Laszlo Balazs.

emily.morgan@hearstmediact.com
Do you remember where you were the day the terrorists attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon?

I remember it so vividly like it was yesterday. I was teaching at Lewis & Clark Community College. What really shook me up was that exactly one year before on September 11, I was in New York and in the World Trade Center. Some 3,000 people lost their lives on 9/11 and in the aftermath.

What is your life worth? What is any life worth? How can you determine that?

Worth is based on the actual events that followed the losses of life at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on 9/11. Worth is based on actual events.

U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft, (Victor Slezak) appointed attorney Kenneth Feinberg (Academy Award nominee Michael Keaton) to lead the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund. Assigned with allocating financial resources to the victims of the tragedy, Feinberg and his firms head of operations, Camille Biros (Academy Award nominee Amy Ryan), face the impossible task of determining the worth of a life to fairly distribute to the families who had suffered losses. Feinberg runs into problems when he meets Charles Wolf (Academy Award nominee Stanley Tucci), a community organizer mourning the death of his wife in the Tower. Wolf gains the trust of the people where Feinberg cant.

The acting is excellent, as one might expect from the three actors who are Academy Award nominees. This is Michael Keatons film. He transitions from a man who is all facts and figures into a compassionate man concerned about individuals.

This is a very smart script that is reminiscent of Spotlight or The Post. The script, written by Max Borenstein, relates the problems that people who live through catastrophic events must go through to receive compensation.

Although it is rated PG-13, I dont think this is a film that people who werent older teens or adults when 9/11 occurred will appreciate.

This is a very interesting time see this film. We have just pulled out of Afghanistan after 20 years. The war started because we were seeking Osama Bin Laden who orchestrated the 9/11 terrorist attacks. This week the architect of 9/11 Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has been in the news because victims have not had justice after twenty years. He is still in Guantanamo Bay without ever going to trial. And the twentieth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks are upon us this week.

Sara Colangelo directed this interesting film now playing on Netflix.

I give it 5 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.
Edwardsville School District 7 will begin offering free Sheild Testing on a voluntary basis, according to Superintendent Patrick Shelton Tuesday.

Shield testing provides a comprehensive solution to curb and control the spread of COVID-19, according to the SheildT3 website. Using the technology developed by researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, the testing is a non-invasive and FDA authorized salvia-based test that can provide results in 24 hours.

The testing program will assist District 7 with its efforts to monitor and mitigate the spread of COVID-19 in its schools and community, which is in line with its goal to keep students in classrooms, Shelton stated in a letter distributed Tuesday.

Consent for testing is completely voluntary and will not be administered unless you indicate that you wish your child to participate by filling out and returning the authorization form to your school nurse, Shelton said.

Any District 7 students can get the testing beginning Monday, Sept. 27. There is no cost to you or to the school district. The diagnostic tests for COVID-19 will be conducted at each school building. Parents are able to opt in, or opt out, the program for their children at any time. However, those wishing to begin testing as early as Sept. 27 are encouraged to submit their consent form by Tuesday, Sept. 14 to avoid delays.

Visit the District 7 News section at ecusd7.org to view the consent form.

Students will be tested one time per week and results will be available to school nurses as well as to the students parents through a self-service online portal. In addition, the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) will also receive students test results.

Families should also remember that our testing plan is fluid and may change as we work closely with the local health department and as the data is evaluated, Shelton stated. School nurses will work with families on a case-by-case basis to determine the steps to ensure students are able to return to school as soon as possible.

If a students test results are positive, District 7 asks parents to contact the childs doctor immediately to review the test results and discuss the next steps. COVID-19 positive students may return to school until quarantine protocols have been completed.

Shelton said the Illinois Department of Public Health released new guidance specifically for schools. This includes close-contact parameters identification, which states three feet of social distancing should be maintained in a classroom-based setting where all occupants are wearing masks. The three feet change applies only to classrooms and not other common areas such as a school cafeteria.

Thats a little bit of a change from what we understood, so were navigating through that, Shelton said during District 7s Citizens Advisory Council (CAC) Committee meeting on Aug. 30. Its messy. Its messier every day we go, our nurses are drowning in data and communication.

According to IDPHs Covid-19 website, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention defines close contact as an individual not fully vaccinated against COVID-19 who was within six feet of an infected person for a cumulative total of 15 minutes or more over a 24-hour period.

For every close contact, Shelton said that is 20 to 30 more calls that have to be made. This comes as the district is operating with fewer staff members this year.

We are trying to get information out there that is accurate and correct, and working with the health department to make sure we are communicating what they want as well, Shelton said.

Shelton told the CAC committee he is not sure if the district will ever have an accurate number of individuals vaccinated. He said the district has not yet asked the staff about vaccinations so he cannot give an official number. However, he estimates approximately 70 to 80 percent of staff have been vaccinated and approximately 40 to 50 percent of eligible students seem to be vaccinated.

[Covid is] an ever-changing thing that we navigate and deal with, Shelton said. The district continues to provide updates through its online Covid Dashboard every Tuesday.

District 7 is also offering an antigen test called BinaxNOW from 3:30 to 8 p.m. Monday-Thursday for staff and students. Shelton hopes to be able to eventually open the testing services to the community, as well. However, at this time the testing service is overwhelmed, causing results to take longer than usual.
ST. JOHN'S, Newfoundland (AP)  People in the Canadian Atlantic coast province of Newfoundland woke up Saturday to streets littered with branches and debris, torn and tossed around by the ferocious winds of Hurricane Larry.

Larry made landfall as a Category 1 storm just after midnight Friday along the southern coast of the island, bringing sheets of rain and sustained winds of 130 km/h (80 miles) across the Avalon Peninsula, which includes the provincial capital of St. Johns.

The citys streets were linked with fallen branches Saturday morning, and trees were uprooted and overturned on many lawns. The City of St. Johns is asking residents to stay home do crews can clean up the torn branches, downed power lines and scattered debris.

Hurricane Larry caused a significant amount of tree and property damage throughout our city, said St. Johns Mayor Danny Breen said at a news conference Saturday.

Still, he said, it could have been a lot worse.

A small crowd gathered around Mary Queen of Peace elementary school Saturday, shaking their heads slowly as fragments of the schools shredded roof whipped around in the remaining winds. A large part of the roof was blown clear off the building and lay in a heap of siding and nail-riddled boards on the ground some distance away.

Nearly 10,000 people in St. John's were still without power on Saturday evening, Newfoundland Powers website said. Earlier in the day, more than 30,000 in the metro region were in the dark.

Lights and coffee makers were on at a Tim Hortons near the Rooms provincial art gallery, and the lineup to get a morning coffee snaked through the restaurant and out the door.

Brandon Snook was outside the coffee shop with his infant son, Myles, as his wife grabbed a few cups inside. They didnt have any power to make their own, he said.

Myles slept through the entire night, Snook said, clearly impressed. My sister, her little little one lost her play house, he said. It got smashed up against the house in about two million pieces.

His own house made it through OK, he said -- just a bit of siding peeled loose.

An empty building nearby in the Rawlins Cross intersection wasnt so lucky; several of its traffic-facing windows were shattered in their frames, leaving the inside of the building completely exposed.

Up the street, parts of the green iron fencing surrounding the Basilica Cathedral had fallen down and several of the massive structures windows were missing.

The Royal Newfoundland Constabulary urged pedestrians and drivers across the peninsula to stay home as officers swept the area to report fallen trees and power lines.

Newfoundland Power, meanwhile, assured those in the dark that crews had been out since daybreak to work on the power lines.
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SuperCheap ordered closed over COVID infections

PHUKET: The main SuperCheap shopping complex in Rassada, north of Phuket Town, has been ordered closed for seven days as a measure to prevent COVID-19 infections from spreading after at least 23 staff there were confirmed infected.

COVID-19Coronavirushealth

By Eakkapop Thongtub

Saturday 11 September 2021, 05:33PM

The main SuperCheap store and shopping complex north of Phuket Town has been ordered closed for seven days. Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub

Phuket Governor Narong Woonciew announced the closure today (Sept 11), which he pointed out was agreed by the Phuket Communicable Disease Control Committee.

The order is in effect from Sept 12-18.*

Governor Narong today explained that he dispatched a team of officers from the Phuket Provincial Public Health Office (PPHO) and from the Muang District Office to the main SuperCheap complex yesterday (Sept 10).

It was reported back to him that 111 staff were tested.

Among the staff, 20 staff working in the warehouse section and three sales staff tested positive, Governor Narong said.

Governor Narong gave no explanation as to why he dispatched officers to investigate the site for COVID-19, despite PPHO Chief Kusak Kukiattikoon explaining to Deputy Prime Minister Supattanapong Punmeechaow at a meeting held in the same conference chamber at Phuket Provincial Hall just yesterday that a cluster of infections had been identified at a large shopping mall.

Dr Kusak revealed no other details about the new cluster, just as Governor Narong today avoided confirming when officials learned about the new infections at the SuperCheap main store.

Of note, while reporting that 111 workers at the complex were reported as tested, it was not confirmed how many people actually work at the usually busy shopping complex, which also features many individual vendors operating small stores at the shopping complex.

Asked why the closure was for only seven days, Governor Narong replied, For people who may be concerned about why we ordered to close [the SuperCheap scomplex] for only seven days, we have learned from the Bansan market [Phuket Town Fresh Market 1] that we close it for seven days and then test people in the area. If the situation in the area meets our criteria, then they can reopen.

An officer at the meeting reminded us to think about effect of the closure on our people, we have thoroughly and carefully considered and agreed to close the store, he said.

Asked what about the small branches across the island, Governor Narong would only answer, We will discuss about that later.

UPDATE: The closure was originally announced by officials yesterday afternoon as from Sept 11-17, but by 8pm last night officials posted the actual order which confirmed it was from Sept 12-18.
Montgomery County officials opened a COVID-19 vaccination clinic at the Parkside Shopping Center, in the former Petco location, in Willow Grove.
EAST ALTON  On 9/11, St. Louis Regional Airports manager Dave Miller and its now-retired operations director Steve Bell, both of East Alton, both worked for the Montrose (Colorado) Regional Airport.

On that day, all forms of transportation halted, most significantly air travel. The Montrose airport was the first in Colorado to close.

All activity stopped, Miller said. It all stopped. It was eerie  no air traffic in the sky.

Miller said it remained that way for four days except for a few rogue pilots, including a rancher who landed a small prop plane at the airport a few days after 9/11. Miller said the ranchers plane was picked up on radar by F-16s and the man lost his pilot license for six months.

The no-fly order lasted for four days.

We were so busy over those days, said Bell, who retired in 2012. He and I make a living in the airplane business. For us, personally, it was unconscionable, unreal, that a loaded passenger jet flew into one of our buildings.

Things will never return to normal, said Miller. Air travel, as we knew it, will never be the same again.

Miller had authored a support protocol which included what he called Go to Hell Kits and a detailed list of security responsibilities of the FAAs precursor to the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) and the Department of Homeland Security. The kits became crucial to the Montrose airport.

Larger than St. Louis Regional, the Montrose airport is in a town of about 7,000 people and has a terminal serving three airlines, including United and Delta.

At the time, under the microcosm of the FAA, there was the Civil Aviation Security Office (CASO), Miller recalled. With having commercial service, we were under the auspice of CASO.

The two told how, om 9/11, a large flat-screen TV in the terminal broadcast the news of an airplane striking the World Trade Center.

I knew right then and there passenger flying would never be the same again, said Miller. We didnt know what it was  if it was a small aircraft that got off track, or what it was. As it unfolded, we realized a commercial aircraft ran into that building.

Like everybody else flocked around the snack bar watching a large screen TV, lo and behold, we saw the second airplane fly into the next tower, he said. Then the Pennsylvania attack happened. Then the Pentagon.

Bell said the Montrose fire chief called him with news about the first tower.

I drove to the fire station, watching TV there, and was, like, Oh my God. This is, really, something else, said Bell, a pilot himself who thought it was probably a small plane.

But it was crystal blue skies, he said, noting it would have been odd for a plane hitting one of those buildings.

Miller and Bell simultaneously saw the second plane fly into the South Tower. We both looked at each other and said, This is a terrorist attack, Bell said.

At the airport, the editor of the Montrose County newspaper was one of 20 people in a twin-engine turbo prop plane on the runway.

It didnt get off the ground; it taxied back, Bell recalled. Thats when it all started for us. We got everyone, all three airlines, from the terminal going through the kits checklist of things.

Thats when everything, kind of, went into automatic, he said. There was no time to be excited, or scared. We were too busy doing stuff.

Having the kit Dave made, we fortunately got everything done, he said. As I recall we were the first airport in Colorado that had everything accomplished before we were told what to do. Thats the kind of response we had to this.

The first tower still burned but had not yet collapsed when Bell called the towns towing company to remove 140 vehicles from the airports perimeter.

TSA was not even thought of at that time, he said. A wing of the FAA was attempting to do what TSA does now.
NEW YORK (AP)  Two decades after the collapse of the World Trade Center, people are still coming forward to report illnesses that might be related to dust that billowed over the city after the terror attack.

To date, the U.S. has spent $11.7 billion on care and compensation for those exposed to the toxic dust and fires that burned at ground zero for weeks after the attacks. More than 40,000 people have gotten payments from a government fund for people with illnesses potentially linked to the attacks.

More than 111,000 people have signed up for the World Trade Center Health Program, which gives free medical care to people with medical problems potentially linked to the dust.

Enrollees include people like Barbara Burnette, a retired police detective still suffering from severe respiratory problems two decades after she spat soot from her mouth for weeks as she worked on the burning rubble pile without a protective mask. She credits the intensive health monitoring she got through the health program with helping to spot lung cancer.

Had I not been in the program ... I dont know that they would have found it, Burnette says. Since then she has had two rounds of chemotherapy to keep the cancer at bay.

Scientists still cant say for certain how many people developed health problems as a result of exposure to the tons of pulverized concrete, glass, asbestos, gypsum released when the towers fell.

Many people enrolled in the health program have conditions common in the general public, like skin cancer, acid reflux or sleep apnea. In most situations, there is no test that can tell whether someones illness is related to the Trade Center dust, or a result of other factors, like smoking, genetics or obesity.

Over the years, that has led to some friction between patients who are absolutely sure they have an illness connected to 9/11, and doctors who have doubts.

Mariama James, who had to clean up copious amounts of the gray powder that billowed through the open windows of her Manhattan apartment, says she initially had a hard time persuading doctors that the chronic ear infections, sinus issues and asthma afflicting her children, or her own shortness of breath, had anything to do with 9/11.

Most people thought I was crazy back then, she says.

Years of research have produced partial answers about 9/11 health problems like hers. The largest number of people enrolled in the federal health program suffer from chronic inflammation of their sinus or nasal cavities or from reflux disease, a condition that can cause symptoms including heartburn, sore throat and a chronic cough.

Post-traumatic stress disorder has emerged as one of the most common, persistent health conditions. Nearly 19,000 enrollees have a mental health problem believed to be linked to the attacks, according to health program statistics. More than 4,000 patients have some type of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, a family of potentially debilitating breathing problems.

Many first responders who developed a chronic cough later had it fade, or disappear entirely, but others have shown little improvement.

About 9% of firefighters exposed to the dust still report a persistent cough, according to Fire Department research. About 22% report experiencing shortness of breath. About 40% still have chronic sinus problems or acid reflux.

On the encouraging side, doctors say their worst fears about a possible wave of deadly 9/11 cancers havent come true. Not yet, at least.

Nearly 24,000 people exposed to trade center dust have gotten cancer, but for the most part it has been at rates in line with the general public. Rates of a few specific types of cancer have been found to be modestly elevated, but researchers say that could be due to more cases being caught in medical monitoring programs.

We really dont have the tremendous elevations in cancer I was afraid of, says Dr. Michael Crane, director of the World Trade Center health clinic at Mount Sinai.

One study showed that cancer mortality rates have actually been lower among city firefighters and paramedics exposed to Trade Center dust than for most Americans, possibly because frequent medical screenings.

In the federal health program's early years, many people enrolling were police officers, firefighters and others who worked on the debris pile. More recently, though, a majority of applications have been from people who worked or lived in Lower Manhattan -- folks like Carl Sadler, who was enveloped by the dust cloud after escaping from his office at the World Trade Center.

Initially, Sadlers health seemed fine. But years later he started to get winded while exercising.

I just had breathing problems," he says, but I never knew what they were."

Now 80, he has been diagnosed over the years with acid reflux disease, asthma, and also thyroid cancer and skin melanoma, for which he was successfully treated.

Last year another 6,800 people joined the health program, which has grown so much it might run out of money. Members of Congress have introduced a bill that would provide an additional $2.6 billion over 10 years to cover an expected funding gap starting in 2025.

The average age of enrollees in the federal health program is now around 60, and Dr. Jacqueline Moline, director of the World Trade Center health clinic at the Northwell Health medical system, is concerned that people's health problems will worsen as they age. Cancer caused by asbestos, she noted, can take as long as 40 years to develop after exposure.

We are just getting to the point where we might start seeing stuff, Moline says.

Crane, who has been treating ground zero responders since the beginning, says one thing is clear based on the continuing stream of new patients: The issue isnt going away.

They keep on coming," he says. They keep on coming in the door.

___

David Caruso, New York City news editor for The Associated Press, has covered the aftermath of 9/11 for more than a decade. Follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/dcarusoAP.
EDWARDSVILLE  Bethalto Police Chief Mike Dixon remembers watching the destruction of the World Trade Center at breakfast with his wife on September 11, 2001.

Then a member of the Madison County Sheriffs Department, Dixon was assigned to the Metropolitan Enforcement Group of Southwestern Illinois.

I remember waking up and seeing the very first plane, he recalled. I looked at her and told her it was an attack.

I just remember being numb, he said. I was so sad for the people in our country at that moment.

Numb and nauseous were phrase used by several current and former police to describe their immediate reaction to 9/11.

Back then it was unusual, to be actually watching the first one. And then that second plane hits the tower live was just a nauseous feeling, said Chief Deputy Maj. Jeff Connor of the Madison County Sheriffs Department.

Like many other aspects of society, 9/11 prompted major changes in law enforcement.

Two of the biggest long-term changes have been an increase in information sharing and an emphasis on collecting intelligence data, as well as new equipment acquired with either federal funding or direct donations to local departments.

While it has left law enforcement better prepared to respond to terrorist threats, it has also created concerns about infringement on civil liberties in the gathering of intelligence, and whether some of that equipment  and how it is used  is appropriate for civilian law enforcement.

Limiting access

Dixon said one of the immediate responses was the hardening or fortifying of buildings, such as police stations and federal buildings. Today that can be seen in a number of ways: limited access, closed-off areas and crash barriers in front of everything from courthouses to retail stores.

East Alton Mayor Darren Carlton, who was police chief before being elected to the post in November, said there were some immediate changes in his department.

I was teaching DARE class at the time, he said of 9/11. A bunch of the kids were worried about it.

One of the departments more immediate responses was to increase patrols around the schools.

Not because we were worried, he said. But to make the citizens feel safer, he said. We were on guard, but we werent hyped. We were a little bit more (security-) conscious when our guys made traffic stops or encountered people.

Riverbend industries such as Winchester also tightened security, and the East Alton Police Department took a firmer stance against trespassers at industrial properties.

Connor, who was with the Granite City Police Department in 2001, said there was not a lot of difference in how officers were patrolling immediately after the incident.

We were still responding to whatever calls there may be, he said.

He agreed there were calls for increased security at some facilities.

I do recall that for a long time the Corps (of Engineers) and Illinois American Water paid to have officers on site 24/7, he said. For months after I remember those places were hiring our police to monitor them.

Lock and Dam 27 had long been feared to be a potential terrorism target because of its importance to commercial Mississippi River traffic. While the Corps never publicly confirmed those fears, tours of the facility were stopped and public access was greatly reduced.

At the state level the Illinois Law Enforcement Alarm System was developed in 2002 and a more coordinated emergency response was put in place. ILEAS includes regional tactical response teams and includes more than 900 local units of government statewide.

We developed local responses, Dixon said, including field forces and command centers and tactical teams.

Shared information

All three agree another post-9/11 response has been the sharing of information between local, state and federal agencies.

The big change in law enforcement nationwide  due to a spin-off of 9/11  was the intel, the intelligence information gathering that has taken place since then, Connor said.

Before 9/11 there had been a long-time impression that federal agencies did not like to share information with local law enforcement agencies. Instead, information would make its way to whatever federal agency, and stay there.

Now, Connor said, there is a give-and-take on both sides.

The Statewide Terrorism and Intelligence Center (STIC), Illinois designated fusion center, or information clearinghouse, opened in 2003. It is part of the Illinois State Polices Intelligence Command which also includes the Joint Terrorism Task Force, the Intelligence Support Unit and Digital Crimes Unit.

Tony Falconio, director of Madison County Emergency Management, said because of the countys proximity to St. Louis they also receive daily briefings from Missouris fusion center.

Since 9/11 there has been a push for better communication between federal, state and local, Connor said. That has to go both ways; you have to send it up and send it back down.

Prior to 9/11 you have someone who threatens to blow up a school, blow up a building, you would handle that locally, he said. Now, you give the information to STIC and they are able to determine if that person or persons have been on the radar for other issues.

Dixon agreed that sharing information was a major change after 9/11. But he also is concerned that may be changing.

I feel that is potentially going to go away again, he said. It seems like its becoming more of an us-versus-them. Thats always been an issue, big brother not talking to the guys below them.

Dixon said American society seems to have come full circle from the post-9/11 idea that the country and law enforcement need to rethink and prepare for terrorism.

At the time we were attacked, we werent all together, he said. Everybody realized we need to prepare. Now everybody seems to want to take it away.

He said much of that comes from social unrest over the past few years.

New tools

The creation of the Department of Homeland Security also led to major changes in local policing, primarily through grants.

Connor said the grants have paid for everything from improved communications gear and ATVs to ballistic vests and weapons.

It all boils down to more money is available to law enforcement to better equip themselves, Connor said.

Different departments had different needs, he said. Some have a need for helicopters. We dont, he said.

They do have several drones, he said, which have proven to be useful in situations ranging from intelligence gathering prior to a raid to searching for missing persons.

The militarization of police has become a controversial aspects of terrorism-related grant programs. Some allege civilian law enforcement is adopting equipment and tactics better suited to combat instead of police work.

War Comes Home: The excessive militarization of American policing, a 2014 report by the American Civil Liberties Union, raised numerous concerns.

The militarization of American policing has occurred as a direct result of federal programs that use equipment transfers and funding to encourage aggressive enforcement, it stated. Begun in during the 1990s War on Drugs, it accelerated after 9/11 and the War on Terror.

Since the early 2000s, the infusion of DHS money and assistance to state and local law enforcement anti-terrorism work has led to even more police militarization and even greater military-law enforcement contact, the report states. And DHS grants have allowed police departments to stockpile specialized equipment in the name of anti-terror readiness.

Dixon said militarization concerns, at least in the Metro East, are often exaggerated.

This region got two armored vehicles (Alton and Madison County) that are simply used to carry officers to risky situations, he said, adding the perception by some is that they now have tanks that can fire armor-piercing shells into buildings,.

Carlton said that, under a previous chief, his department got a Humvee.

They painted that up and use it for PR, he said.

Prior to 9/11, most law enforcement agencies had begun rethinking how officers were armed. As a result of the War on Drugs, semi-automatic handguns had replaced revolvers. While shotguns remain in use, they have largely been replaced by semi-automatic rifles, the AR-15 platform being the most popular.

Dixon said the big shift toward arming officers with rifles came after the 1997 Bank of America robbery in North Hollywood, California. Two men wearing body armor used automatic weapons to shoot 19 people before being killed. Police only had 9mm handguns and shotguns.

It showed that law enforcement they couldnt take two guys, Dixon said. They had to go borrow guns from a pawn shop to take these guys down.

The 1999 Columbine High School shooting in Colorado that left 13 dead also led to an almost immediate change in tactics for active shooter situations. Authorities now emphasize aggressively going after a shooter to limit casualties, rather than securing the perimeter to negotiate or bring in a tactical team.

Some also have been critical of using tactical teams to serve warrants.

Any time there is going to be a search warrant, there is an evaluation of that incident, Connor said. The experts can evaluate everything and make a determination of what level of response is necessary and would be the safest. All of that plays a part, and we let the experts who have been trained for that evaluation process to determine that.

Despite all the changes, the basics of the job  patrolling and responding to calls  remains the same, according to Connor.

It is necessary for the officer to be out there driving around, he said. They (people) feel safer when they see an officer, a squad car.
PHOENIX (AP)  Arizona has sold off $93 million in Unilever bonds and plans to sell the remaining $50 million it has invested in the global consumer products company over subsidiary Ben & Jerry's decision to stop selling its ice cream in Israeli-occupied territories, the latest in a series of actions by states with anti-Israel boycott laws.

The investment moves state Treasurer Kimberly Yee announced this week were mandated by a 2019 state law that bars Arizona government agencies from holding investments or doing more than $100,000 in business with any firm that boycotts Israel or its territories.

Arizona appears to be the first of 35 states with anti-boycott laws or regulation to have fully divested itself from Unilever following Ben & Jerry's actions. Illinois warned the company in July that it had 90 days after its investment board met to change course or it too would sell. Florida and other states have taken similar action, according to IAC For Action, the policy and legislative arm for the Israeli-American Council.

While Ben & Jerry's, which is based in Vermont, is owned by London-based Unilever, it maintains its own independent board, which Unilever said makes its own decision on its social mission. Ben & Jerry's announced on July 19 that maintaining its presence in the occupied territories was inconsistent with our values.

Ben & Jerry's decision brought a strong reaction from Israel, which vowed to act aggressively" in response to the move, including by urging U.S. governors to punish the company under anti-boycott laws. Arizona and 34 other states have laws against boycotts of Israel.

U.S. groups that support Israel are split on whether pushing back on Unilever for Ben & Jerry's decision is appropriate. The Israeli-American Council urged governors to act through IAC For Action.

IAC for Action Director Joseph Sabag called boycotts of Israel antisemitic and said it is important to fight them at the state level.

The Israeli American community is sensitive to it, because I would say more than other parts of the Jewish American community, we experienced the national origin aspect of antisemitism in a more pronounced way, Sabag said Friday. "Thats really why were very proactive. Its our children who are being affected by this in the classrooms and are being made fearful and intimidated and to feel harassed. ... Thats definitely what our communitys interest is in the matter.'

But the head of J Street, a Washington, D.C.-based pro-Israel organization that backs a two-state solution, supported Ben & Jerrys decision and said punishing the company is gravely dangerous.

Its not anti-semitic to criticize Israeli policy or to not sell ice cream in illegal settlements, President Jeremy Ben-Ami tweeted in July. Its actually a truly pro-Israel decision.

The anti-boycott laws face court challenges, as Arizona's did after it was first enacted in 2016. A Flagstaff lawyer who contracted to help defend jailed people sued on First Amendment grounds, arguing that the law violated his free speech rights.

A U.S. District judge in Arizona blocked enforcement while the case proceeded, but the Legislature changed the law so it only applied to contracts worth more than $100,000, effectively ending the case because it no longer applied to the Flagstaff man. The state was ordered to pay $115,000 for his attorney fees.

In Arkansas, the publisher of a weekly newspaper sued to block that state's law on similar grounds. A trial judge dismissed the case, ruling that a boycott of Israel is neither speech nor inherently expressive conduct protected by the First Amendment. But a split three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals revived the Arkansas Times' lawsuit in February, finding that supporting or promoting boycotts of Israel is constitutionally protected ... yet the Act requires government contractors to abstain from such constitutionally protected activity.

The ruling is not the last word: In June, 8th Circuit judges agreed to hear the case and vacated the three-judge panel's decision. They are set to hear arguments in the case later this month.

Both cases were brought by the American Civil Liberties Union.

Meanwhile in Arizona, Yee wrote to Unilever's investor relations department on Sept. 2 to tell the company that although Ben & Jerry's is run independently, Arizona law would require her to sell Unilever assets if the decision was not rescinded.

I gave Unilever PLC, the parent company of Ben & Jerrys, an ultimatum: reverse the action of Ben & Jerrys or divest itself of Ben & Jerrys to come into compliance with Arizona law or face the consequences," Yee, a Republican who is running for governor, said in a statement. "They chose the latter.

Unilever said in an Aug. 2 letter to Deputy Treasurer Mark Swenson that it has never supported boycotts of Israel, commonly called Boycott Divestment Sanctions, or BDS, but that Ben & Jerry's operates independently. The company had no additional comment.

The Arizona investments were in bonds and commercial paper held in the state's short-term fixed-income investment fund.

The Arizona law enacted in 201 6 and revised in 2019 had broad, bipartisan support and was signed by Republican Gov. Doug Ducey. He tweeted that the Ben & Jerry's decision is discrimination.

Arizona will not do business with a company that boycotts Israel  in 2016 and 2019, I signed bills to make sure of it, the tweet said. Arizona stands with Israel."
BUNKER HILL  The Bunker Hill school district has launched another career certified nursing assistant program for its high school students interested in pursuing a career in the medical field.

For several years, Bunker Hill High School students have listed healthcare as a top career choice. To ensure the school offers a pathway for every student, a viable partnership was sought.
EDWARDSVILLE  Madison County health officials want people to know there is a treatment for those who test positive for COVID-19, and it decreases hospitalization and death from the disease.

Chairman Kurt Prenzler on Tuesday said the Madison County Health Advisory Committee has discussed monoclonal antibody infusion following Missouris rollout of the treatment last week.

Its important that this treatment is offered to COVID-positive patients as soon as possible, Prenzler said.

Medical professionals say the treatment is a potent version of the natural defense that people build to fight a virus. Monoclonal antibodies are laboratory-made proteins that mimic the immune systems ability to fight off harmful viruses and bacteria, which can cause disease.

Committee members asked about the treatment and why it wasnt advertised. Committee member Laura DeLuca, a registered nurse, said a co-worker who tested positive was provided the treatment, because they knew about it.

I dont ever see anything about it, Deluca said. Its a shame its not advertised.

Madison County Health Department Director Toni Corona said medical providers in Madison County are aware of the treatment and it is available on a case-by-case basis. She said the trick is for the individual who tests positive for COVID to discuss the treatment with their health care provider.

Youre right; you dont hear a lot about it. Corona said.

Dr. Ray Weber, chair of the advisory committee, said in several states where it is advertised its made to sound like an alternative to the vaccine.

Its an alternative to life is what it is, Deluca responded. They were dying.

Weber said the reason its not advertised is there is confusion among the public. He said the antibodies are not lasting like you would get with your own immune system producing them.

Committee members agreed the public should know more about it.

Committee member Dr. Loren Hughes said when Missouri announced it would be opening up COVID antibody infusion clinics, people in Illinois asked if it would be available here.

Im all about the vaccine, but this is also a very effective treatment, Hughes said.

After the meeting Hughes found information about the treatment on the Illinois Department of Public Healths website and asked that it be shared on the county health department site.

Prenzler said the consensus of the health advisory committee is that it is a good idea to tell people the monoclonal antibody treatment is effective and available in Madison County.
STAUNTON  In the 5th year of operation, the Macoupin Art Collective staff has found an unusual solution to reach kids and adults who are not able to get transportation to its studio.

Director Brandace Cloud envisioned a mobile art studio as a means to take art opportunities to students in surrounding areas. A substantial anonymous donation was offered to make this dream a reality.

With the mission of art to all, the ArtReach Program will travel to 91 small communities within a 40-mile radius of Staunton.The MAC will work with local parks, libraries, retirement communities, village halls and community centers to arrange visits beginning early 2022. The Art Bus will offer free art instruction to the public of all ages.

In the future, The MAC hopes to generate revenue for the charitable operations through private event rentals such as birthday parties, family events, retirement parties, baby showers and much more.

In August, the organization worked with Midwest Bus Sales to find a 15-passenger minibus to turn into a studio on wheels. Local woodworker Micah Wall will be retrofitting the interior, removing the interior seats and replacing them with rolling shelves and storage for equipment and materials, such as tabletop pottery wheels, glass grinders, soldering irons, clay, paint and brushes. Joe Gugger of Edwardsville has provided partial support for a fused glass kiln to expand class offerings. Steve Hanson of Viking Electrical Services of Edwardsville will be engineering the vehicles electrical needs.

Funding also has been received from The Walmart Community Grant Team at Facility No. 334 in Carlinville and Bayer Rural Fund Community Arts Program through the St. Louis Arts and Education Council. Other grants are pending.

An important aspect of the ArtReach Program is community empowerment. The MAC will call on students to advocate for the art that they would like to see in their hometowns.

To learn more or to get involved visit macart.org/bus.
SPRINGFIELD  To combat the rise of online rental scams, state Rep. Katie Stuart, D-Edwardsville, has filed legislation that adds rental scams to crimes considered deceptive practices.

When bad actors try to take advantage of those looking for housing by creating false housing listings, there are currently, very limited options to take legal action to combat this issue, said Stuart. I filed the legislation after local reports on false housing lists to help keep residents safe from fraud.
Sarah Gray, age 80, of Beech Bluff, TN passed away Sunday, September 12, 2021 in Jackson, TN. She was preceded in death by her husband of 61 years, Oliver Gray, her parents, Charlie and Verna Hollin, and several brothers and sisters. Sarah is survived by her three children: Marsha (Karl) You
Westerly, RI (02891)

Today

Lots of sunshine. High near 80F. Winds SSW at 10 to 20 mph..

Tonight

Mostly cloudy with showers and a few thunderstorms. Low 66F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
Westerly, RI (02891)

Today

Sun and clouds mixed. High 78F. Winds SSW at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Chance of an isolated thunderstorm early, then variable clouds overnight with more showers at times. Low 66F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
Taxes are being raised to their highest level since the Second World War to grab an extra 12billion a year the Government claims it needs to help tackle the health and social care crisis.

We pick through the details to find where the money is actually going  and how it affects us.

Tax hikes: National Insurance contributions are rise by 1.25 percentage points

So how are our pockets going to be picked?

National Insurance is to rise by 1.25 percentage points. This extra 1.25 per cent tax will be paid by both workers and employers  so it will effectively add up to 2.5 per cent.

The self-employed will also have to pay the new tax, as will pensioners aged 66 or over and still working. The rate of dividend tax will also be raised by 1.25 percentage points  meaning income from investments may be hit.

Why does the Government want this extra cash?

The pandemic has proved costly, leaving a huge backlog of hospital treatments and operations that need to be paid for in the coming years. Already 5.5million people are on waiting lists, but that could hit 13million by the end of the year.

Initially, money raised in the first three years  an estimated 12billion a year  will almost all be spent on clearing up this backlog. Only about 5.4billion of this 36billion has been earmarked specifically for social care.

How will I notice the change?

Your pay packet will be lighter. For example, a basic-rate taxpayer on a salary of 24,100 will pay an extra 180 in tax a year, while a higher-rate taxpayer on 67,100 will pay an extra 715. Although the money will probably end up in an NHS black hole, the tax should appear on a separate line on pay slips  to be labelled as a health and social care levy.

The younger generations will bear the biggest burden because they are funding the elderly

When is the tax hike going to happen?

Next April. But the funding rules for social care will not kick in until October 2023. This means that before then, those facing care costs must keep paying just as before.

Are we all being treated the same?

No. The younger generations will bear the biggest burden because they are funding the elderly, who are more likely to need social care than them in the next few years. But 1.3million working pensioners will also pay the new National Insurance tax.

Previously, employees aged 66 or over never had to pay any National Insurance contributions. There will also be a higher tax on dividend income  hurting investors and the self-employed that take payments in dividends.

So will my investments end up being taxed?

Most private investors will largely be left unaffected if their money is kept inside a tax-efficient Individual Savings Account or within a pension plan, such as a self-invested personal pension. There is also a 2,000 annual tax-free allowance on dividend income for individuals on top of a 12,570 personal allowance.

Those receiving annual dividends in excess of 2,000 a year will pay tax on any surplus at 8.75 per cent, as opposed to 7.5 per cent now. For higher-rate payers, it goes up from 32.5 per cent to 33.75 per cent.

Will all parts of the UK pay these new taxes?

National Insurance contribution taxes are levied the same wherever you live. While those living in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland must also foot the bill, they will enjoy a combined additional 'union dividend' of 2.2billion a year. This equates to a 15 per cent hike in spending on care. Together, these nations will receive about 300million a year more than they pay into the new tax.

About 5.4billion of this 36billion has been earmarked specifically for social care

What exactly is social care?

It is care that is given to assist the elderly and disabled. This could be provided in their own home, a residential or nursing care home, a day centre or in supported housing. It is focused on personal care  for example, helping the elderly with washing, bathing and mobility issues.

How do we currently fund social care?

The majority of social care is funded directly from those who need support (typically, the elderly who need to go into a residential or nursing home). Some people on low incomes draw on assistance provided by local authorities, and funded through council tax.

In England, you might only get help with care costs if your personal savings and assets are worth less than 23,250  full help from your local council if your assets are under 14,250. Above 23,250, anyone requiring social care must pay the full cost. This has led to thousands of elderly people having to sell their home to fund care home fees.

Currently, the average cost of being in a care home is 36,000 a year  more if full-time nursing is required.

And what will happen under the new regime?

The State will now contribute to care costs if someone's assets are below 100,000  a massive hike on the current 23,250. If someone's assets are below 20,000, the State should pick up the social care tab.

In terms of care costs, a new cap will be introduced that means you will have to foot no more than 86,000 of social care bills. After this 'cap' has been reached, the State should step in with funding.

About one in seven people aged over 65 face care costs that could total more than 100,000 over a lifetime.

Those receiving dividends in excess of 2,000 a year will pay tax on any surplus at 8.75%

Are there any nasty catches?

Yes. There is a big one. Check the small print of the 86,000 'cap' and you discover it only relates to the 'personal' aspect of social care. It does not include the food, accommodation or cleaning costs related to residential or nursing home care.

Experts believe these 'hotel costs' account for about half of total care costs. So although there is an 86,000 cap, by the time you reach this limit you may well have spent double this amount  172,000.

Is 36billion enough to solve the problem?

Nothing is ever enough to fill the NHS black hole. There are fears this cash could simply get sucked up by public-sector bureaucrats. There is already talk of 42 new bosses to be employed on salaries of up to 270,000.

The NHS in England has already received 136billion this year, plus a further 18billion to tackle the Covid-19 crisis. It has more than 1.3million employees to pay. Unions are already calling for bumper pay rises (surprise, surprise).

Is there any way of avoiding the tax hike?

Employees who use salary sacrifice to contribute into a company pension can put more aside into a retirement pot because such contributions avoid having to pay National Insurance on them. Non-working pensioners and those earning less than 9,564 a year also do not pay National Insurance.
Chinese car maker Great Wall Motors confirmed at the Munich Motor Show that it is to sell perky, all-electric hatchback cars from its Ora brand in the UK.

First to arrive will be the cute Ora Cat, which seems to be a cheeky blend of styling cues that pay homage to everything from Porsches to Minis.

Powered by a 63kWh battery and a 169bhp electric motor, it accelerates from rest to 62mph in 8.5seconds with a claimed range of 250miles.

But expect prices of about 25,000 to 30,000 when order books open at the year's end for delivery in mid-2022.

Cream of the crop: Great Wall confirmed that it is to sell all-electric hatchback cars from its Ora brand in the UK - first to arrive will be the cute Ora Cat (pictured)

On display at a trendy minimalist gallery in central Munich that will be the model for new premium Korean car maker Genesis's UK boutique showrooms, I spied the Genesis X, the prototype for a new sleek and sporty coupe-like grand tourer.

Low CO2 city cars being killed off by red tape

Super fuel-efficient and low CO2 city cars are, perversely, being killed off by red tape, environmental rules, and emissions regulations that make them prohibitively expensive, says a top car boss.

Sounding the death knell for the small Citroen C1, the firm's executive Vincent Cobee said replacing it would be 'nearly impossible'.

Innovation: The C1 was developed alongside the Peugeot 108 (both part of the Stellantis conglomerate) and the Aygo from Toyota

He said: 'That segment is being erased by the environmental pressure.'

The C1 was developed alongside the Peugeot 108 (both part of the Stellantis conglomerate) and the Aygo from Toyota, which says it will continue with its city car for another generation.

End of the road: Sounding the death knell for the small Citroen C1, the firm's executive Vincent Cobee (pictured) said replacing it would be 'nearly impossible'

Last year, Citroen launched its 5,000 zero-emissions AMI electric quadricyle, pictured, driveable in some European countries at age 16 without a licence. A decision on whether it'll be sold in the UK is imminent.
Veteran City Commentator David Buik

David Buik, a veteran of the UK stock market and now a market commentator at Aquis Exchange was working for Cantor Fitzgerald when the September 11 attacks hit.

The firm had offices in the World Trade Center and lost many of its staff in the attacks here 20 years on from 9/11, David recalls how the terrible day unfolded and remembers those who died.

It was Tuesday 11th September 2001. London looked at a picture on a warm sunny day. I was lunching at the Connaught Hotel with Nick Cheyne, the Racing Director at Ascot, Mike Dillon, of Ladbrokes and my colleague and much-missed friend Graham Cowdrey.

We were discussing Cantor Indexs and Ladbrokes' joint sponsorship of the Ascot Christmas race meeting. Graham had left early for another meeting.

To my embarrassment, my mobile went off at the table at 1.55pm. It was Graham, telling me to return to America Square without delay. He relayed to me that an American Airlines Boeing had ploughed into the middle of the North Tower of the World Trade Center. This had happened at 8.46am EST, when New York was starting a new day.

My heart sank a thousand feet - Cantor Fitzgeralds offices were on floors 101 to 105. It took several minutes for the magnitude of this human tragedy to sink in.

Then a United Airlines crashed into the South Tower at 9.03am EST and then another into the Pentagon.

Who instigated these atrocities?

I left the Connaught with haste and headed back to 1, America Square! I was numb with apprehension and fear. The realms of the unknown seemed a terrifying prospect.

I thought of the desolation that my 300 colleagues must have been subjected to, knowing that many of them had personal relationships with their counterparts in New York. Money broking is a peoples business. Relationships are a prerequisite to deliver a successful operation.

Everyone was horrified at the magnitude of the attack, repeatedly watching on TV these jumbo jets ploughing into the World Trade Center, like a child knocking over his tower of toy bricks.

The feeling of deprivation from this brutality and inhumanity emanating from this act of war, will be with me for the rest of my natural days. This act of barbarism had huge political connotations, but for me, my friends, and colleagues at Cantor Fitzgerald, it was personal.

658 employees of Cantor Fitzgerald out of 2,977 total casualties, perished in the rubble of the North Tower. 63 members of staff were English and a memorial for them was erected in 2002 in Grosvenor Square. Eurobrokers, an associate company, lost 62 employees.

Cantors CEO Howard Lutnick, was taking his son to school for the first time, so avoided the tragedy. Howard and his sister, Edie set up trusts for the bereaved families and Cantor Fitzgerald donated 25 percent of their profits to the families of their employees who died on 9/11 for five years and paid for their healthcare for another ten. The families also benefitted from donations from the initial annual charity days through the generosity of the staff and its clients, the banking fraternity.

My arrival back at America Square coincided with everyone filing out of the office, for security reasons, many weeping in sorrow. Most knew at least ten people from the New York office. I must pay tribute to Howard Lutnick, Lee Amaitis, the CEO in London, Shaun Lynn and all the staff who rallied together so powerfully, driven by anger, stoicism, fortitude as well as fond memories, in putting the company back on its feet.

Cantors had the vision to duplicate all its accounts and systems in London. This was a vital call, especially as it provided protection to Cantors dominance in the Treasury market. It also bought breathing space to enable brokers to be hired.

Fortunately, Wall Street had lightened up many key traders and brokers, due to adverse trading conditions, which complimented Cantors requirements. Londons role during this time was pivotal for the resurgence of the global operations of both Cantor and BGC Partners.

It was understandable that Cantor Fitzgerald attracted huge media attention for several days. We were all shell-shocked and haunted. Focusing on work was tough, while constantly thinking how devastated the bereaved families must be.

The Prince of Wales visited us the following day. This act of commiseration was very much appreciated, as was the work put in by the much-missed Dame Tessa Jowell in dealing with crestfallen families in the UK.

Markets were not new to volatility, with the 1987 crash, the Russian credit crisis of 1993, and the Greenspan irrational exuberance sell-off still fresh in most mature market protagonists minds.

However, 9/11 was uncharted waters and in the realms of the unknown. Was the World Trade Center massacre just the catalyst for greater hostilities? Initially $1.4 billion was wiped off equity values. Markets were closed on Wednesday and by the end of the week the S&P 500 had shed 11.6% in value and the DOW 14%, with gold rallying 6% to $287 an ounce!

The FTSE 100 fell by 5.7 per cent. Within a month, markets had all but regained their poise. Stock markets losses were but a mere bagatelle in comparison to the cost to the US of running sustained campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan.

We will always remember you! - RIP
Emerging markets trust Mobius will celebrate its third anniversary at the start of next month. And while the newish fund has faced hurdles in the form of the pandemic and being a small investment fish in a big sea, it's done a pretty good job so far for investors.

Since launch, the trust's share price has risen from 1 to 1.49, a respectable return of 49 per cent for shareholders who invested from the start.

According to lead manager Carlos Hardenberg, the share price growth is vindication of the trust's focus on small to medium-sized companies.

Since launch, the trust's share price has risen from 1 to 1.49, a return of 49% to investors

'Our style is all about investing in companies that are not well researched by others,' he says. 'Their shares are not overbought, the businesses are often not well understood, and their share price usually does not reflect their true value or potential. We then invest with high conviction.'

The result is a 156million portfolio comprising just 28 stocks  and one that does not include the 'big' emerging market stocks typically held by most rival funds: the likes of Chinese tech giants Alibaba and Tencent.

Instead, the focus is on companies often operating in niche areas and leading the way in terms of technological advancement and product development.

Often, the trust's six-strong investment team draw upon external experts  for example, academics, doctors and those working in private equity  to identify emerging investment themes. 'It allows us to move up the learning curve,' says Hardenberg.

Top ten holdings Persistent Systems and eMemory Technology are typical of the companies Hardenberg and his investment team hunt down. Indian business Persistent Systems, one of the trust's first investments, provides information technology solutions for companies operating in the healthcare sector.

'It makes good profits,' says Hardenberg, 'and has a strong balance sheet which is a driver of growth.'

Taiwan-based eMemory Technology is a leader in making semi-conductor chips more secure from hackers.

The 156million portfolio comprises just 28 stocks and does not include the 'big' stocks typically held by most rival funds like Chinese tech giants Alibaba and Tencent

Taiwanese companies account for 17 per cent of the trust's assets  a bigger slice than Chinese businesses (14 per cent). Hardenberg's view is that Taiwanese-listed companies tend to benefit from better corporate governance.

'We're very careful where we invest in China,' he adds. 'We avoid big tech and sectors where there is a risk of regulatory or political interference. We also have concerns over the reliability of much corporate data.'

Its biggest Chinese holdings include fast food home delivery service Yum China and healthcare provider EC Healthcare. The shares of both companies are listed in Hong Kong, the preferred way for Hardenberg and his team to get exposure to Chinese companies.

Hardenberg believes the outlook for emerging markets is encouraging, provided the world economy continues to recover. A potential blip is political unrest in countries such as Brazil and Turkey.

Darius McDermott, managing director of investment scrutineer FundCalibre, says Mobius has been a 'success,' but prefers more established trust JP Morgan Emerging Markets.

Mobius takes its name from Mark Mobius who is often referred to as 'Mr Emerging Markets' as a result of being the investment force behind Templeton Emerging Markets.

When launched in 1987, this was the world's first fund to specialise in emerging markets. Together with Hardenberg, Mobius set up Mobius Capital Partners in 2018.

The trust's annual charges total 1.5 per cent (a little on the high side) and the stock market identification code is BFZ7R98.
Steel jobs could be at risk if the industry comes under pressure this winter from soaring energy bills, the sector's trade association warned.

Gas prices in the UK and Europe have hit a series of record highs in the last few weeks and experts have said a cold winter could push them up further.

UK Steel has warned this would be 'extremely damaging' to companies of all sizes in the beleaguered sector, which has faced a series of crises over the last few years.

Surge: Gas prices in the UK and Europe have hit a series of record highs in the last few weeks

Gas prices have surged because of lower supplies from Russia, which has affected the amount being stored in Europe, and tough competition for liquefied natural gas imports.

Gareth Stace, director general of UK Steel, said: 'Continued energy price spikes would be extremely damaging for the sector. Already we are facing electricity prices almost double those of our European competitors and these price increases only widen that chasm.'

Steel companies have for years asked the Government to cut energy bills for heavy industry, which they say is holding back investment.

UK producers pay 86 per cent more for power than their counterparts in Germany and 62 per cent more than France.

Matthew Watkins, principal steel analyst at advisors CRU, however, said any hits from higher energy prices this year should be temporary.
The owner of the Franco Manca pizzeria chain said business is picking up as customers flock to its restaurants following the end of lockdown.

Fulham Shore, which also owns The Real Greek brand of eateries, said revenues for the three weeks to September 5 were 27 per cent higher than the same period in 2019.

However, the firm added that 17 of its restaurants located in London's West End and around the capital's city centre offices were still down on pre-pandemic levels, although these branches were seeing 'week-by-week improvements in footfall' as tourists and workers began to return.

Hungry for more: Fulham Shore said revenues for the three weeks to September 5 were 27 per cent higher than the same period in 2019

'We are very encouraged by the accelerating revenue growth trends during recent weeks despite continued challenging trading conditions,' said Fulham Shore chairman David Page. 'This reflects the popularity and relevance of both Franco Manca and The Real Greek.'

Like other restaurant owners, Fulham Shore suffered heavily during the pandemic, with its revenues falling by over 40 per cent in the year to the end of March as lockdown measures forced it to close its doors for months at a time. But with the pandemic receding, the company is continuing its expansion plans, announcing that two Franco Mancas are being fitted out in London while its lawyers are negotiating over another 15 potential locations.

Page said the group is also on course to open another ten branches in the coming year, with 150 additional sites planned over the medium-term.

Fulham Shore shares climbed 3.3 per cent, or 0.6p, to 18.75p as investors cheered the update.

The FTSE100 barely moved during the session, ticking up 0.07 per cent, or 4.99 points, to 7029.2, while the FTSE 250 fell 0.28 per cent, or 66.38 points, to 23,733.56. The market seemed unnerved by the bleak GDP data, which showed the economic recovery in the UK sputtered in July as the 'pingdemic' forced many workers to self-isolate.

Commodities markets attracted attention after nickel prices hit record highs amid supply shortages and surging demand for the metal, which is used to make batteries for electric cars.

FTSE 100 miner Glencore, one of the world's largest nickel producers, climbed 1.2 per cent, or 3.85p, to 336p on the back of the news, while fellow digger BHP, which owns the Nickel West mine in Western Australia, rose 1.1 per cent, or 22p, to 2071.5p.

Yourgene Health surged 6.4 per cent, or 1p, to 16.75p after it signed a 34m contract with the Department of Health and Social Care to support the Government's Covid19 testing programme through its lab in Manchester.

Online estate agent Purplebricks received an upgrade from UBS, sending shares up 3.5 per cent, or 2.2p, to 65p, despite analysts also slashing their target price to 64p from 78p.

On the up: FTSE 100 miner Glencore, one of the world's largest nickel producers, climbed 1.2%, or 3.85p, to 336p

In the fallers, FTSE 250 storage unit provider Big Yellow dropped 2 per cent, or 29p, to 1457p after its chief executive James Gibson pocketed 5.2m from selling 350,000 shares in the group at 1487p a pop.

Gibson's sale follows similar moves from chairman Nicholas Vetch, who sold 1.7m worth of shares in late August and another 3.8m on September 2, when the shares hit a record intra-day high of 1579p.

Podcast network Audioboom sank 3.9 per cent, or 35p, to 860p following news that a possible takeover offer from private equity firm All Active Asset Capital, which was previously rejected by management, has been backed by just over 50 per cent of shareholders.

Cryptocurrency miner Argo Blockchain was flat at 19p after it took out an 18m loan secured against a portion of its bitcoin holdings.

The firm said the cash will be used to fund the expansion of its data centre in Texas.
Britain's financial watchdog is investigating three traders at an unnamed bank for engaging in market abuse around the 2016 Brexit vote.

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) accused the anonymous trio of 'spoofing' - a tactic where traders attempt to profit by placing orders on financial assets which they never intend to complete.

Probe: The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) accused the anonymous trio of 'spoofing'

In this case, the traders were placing orders on complex financial contracts called futures. They placed large orders which they did not intend to complete, moving the price of the futures, before placing smaller orders which profited from the price change.

The revelation came in a warning notice, which is usually published after an internal investigation but before a formal ruling by the FCA. It said the alleged misconduct took place in June and July 2016, in the weeks before and after the vote to leave the European Union on June 23.

The FCA said the three traders were acting both individually and together, but it declined to comment further.

On the night of the vote, sterling rose above $1.50 for the first time in six months after Nigel Farage conceded defeat and predicted that Remain had won.

But as the results started to come through, the pound dived to $1.32 in one of the largest crashes of any major currency since the birth of the modern global financial system.
Embattled aerospace giant Boeing has received a boost as the Government agrees to pour 400million into military aircraft, including planes used in the UK's evacuation from Afghanistan.

The Royal Air Force will receive 400million to upgrade its fleet of C-17 Globemaster planes and Chinook helicopters, both developed by the US aerospace and defence specialist.

The spending, part of a four-year 24billion defence spree by Boris Johnson, will see 324million invested in improving the C-17  eight vast planes capable of carrying two large helicopters.

Refurbish: The Royal Air Force will receive 400m to upgrade its fleet of C-17 Globemaster planes and Chinook helicopters, both developed by the US aerospace giant Boeing

Its systems will be enhanced to allow longer range communications, making flying information easier for pilots to read, and its parachute capabilities will be improved.

The planes have been used by the UK for 20 years and are available to nine nations, including the US, India and Qatar, under the five-and-a-half-year contract.

Last month, the C-17 completed the biggest capacity flight in RAF history carrying 439 people from Kabul.

Boeing will carry out the manufacturing work with fellow American aerospace manufacturer Pratt & Whitney and the US Air Force.

Separately, the UK's fleet of 22 Boeing CH-47 Chinook helicopters will be enhanced with high-end protective systems in a 64million deal.

The contract with Boeing's UK defence arm will see 'blanking plates'  which mask hot areas of the aircraft and redirect airflow to cool exhaust gases  fitted to defend them against heat seeking missiles.

The full Chinook support programme is worth about 750million, with Boeing working alongside contractors including Thales UK and Germany's Schenker.

The awards mark a bright spot for Boeing, which has spent the past three years handling the fallout from crashes of its 737 Max passenger jet and the effect of the pandemic on its civil aerospace arm.

Air Chief Marshal Sir Mike Wigston, head of the RAF, said the Chinook had proved its worth in the Falklands, Iraq, Afghanistan and even helping to stabilise the dam at Whaley Bridge in Derbyshire in 2019.

Asked why US contractors were awarded the work, he said: 'There are no UK equivalents on the market but we are determined to make clear to US contractors there has to be a dividend for highly skilled jobs in the UK.'

The contracts will support hundreds of jobs, including at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire.

Anna Keeling, head of Boeing Defence UK, said: 'The Chinook and C-17 have been central to our military transport and logistics for decades and we look forward to many more years of service for both.'
The average UK house price stands at a record high of 262,954, according to Halifax. Some of this rise is attributable to the stamp duty holiday.

But, as this concession ends, it seems as though what Stuart Law of the lender Assetz calls 'deep-rooted changes in consumer trends brought on by the pandemic' are becoming set in concrete.

Lockdown appears to have permanently raised the value that the British place on property.

The pace of growth may be slowing, as the latest survey from RICS, the surveyors' body underlines. But some expect a second wave of demand in 2022.

So, since mortgage rates are falling to record lows  and tipped to become even cheaper in 2022  are the Halifax figures, supported by data from Nationwide, a signal to buy shares in housebuilders?

The Government's controversial planning reforms, intended to produce thousands more new homes, may be watered down in response to ire in the shires.

However, the acute housing shortage must still be addressed.

Moreover, if Boris Johnson wants to attract young voters, he must deliver on his pledge to turn Generation Rent into Generation Buy  if only to compensate for the shock imposition of extra national insurance on this age group.

Since politicians can promise homes, but must rely on housebuilders to build them, the sector's giants will be crucial to the delivery of these policies.

They are: Barratt whose market capitalisation is 7billion, Bellway (4.2billion), Berkeley (5.2billion), Persimmon (8.7billion) Redrow (2.5billion), Taylor Wimpey (6.1billion) and Vistry (2.6billion).

But how do you choose, and what are the risks?

This week, Vistry complained of a scarcity of bricklayers and plasterers. But there are other shortages too. Barratt, Berkeley, Vistry and the rest may boast bulging order books. But they are being hit by increases of 4-5 per cent in material costs, and by logistical issues arising from Brexit.

They will also be liable for a tax to remove unsafe cladding. Help to Buy, the taxpayer-funded scheme that has been a boon to the whole sector supporting sales and enriching executives, ends in March 2023.

Will it happen? It is rumoured that Barratt, which sits on a 1.3bn pile of cash, may pay a special dividend next summer, although there is no confirmation of this

These concerns have weighed on housebuilder shares this year. But suddenly, thanks to the property market's unexpectedly bravura performance, there is more enthusiasm for the sector. Share prices of its members tend to move in tandem, either upwards or downwards, as they are subject to roughly the same macro-impacts.

Glynis Johnson of Jefferies, the brokers, contends that housebuilder stocks 'are still too cheap', and that there could be an upturn towards the end of the year when bosses provide updates.

Johnson also cites the sector's dividend yields of 4 per cent-plus.

It is rumoured that Barratt, which sits on a 1.3billion pile of cash, may pay a special dividend next summer, although there is no confirmation of this.

Supporters of the housebuilders contend that the obstacles in the way of progress are outnumbered by the opportunities.

Nobody is a superfan  and superfans always make me suspicious. I prefer a sober assessment of any investment.

Neil Hermon, portfolio manager of Henderson Smaller Companies Investment Trust, says: 'Construction costs may be going up, but that is being offset by increases in house prices. Margins are not being affected.'

He continues: 'We know that there will a cladding tax to raise 2billion. This may mean a 3 per cent tax on housebuilders' profits, although this has yet to be decided.

'But the market is already discounting this. Also there are structural pressures  thanks to planning constraints, Britain does not have enough houses.'

Bellway, whose shares have risen by 17 per cent so far this year, is one of the trust's largest holdings.

Hermon says the firm has 'a good national spread, a very good management team  and its balance sheet is incredibly strong. Because of our concern for ESG, we are engaging with Bellway on the renovation of blocks with cladding'.

The qualified optimism for housebuilders' prospects provides a strong argument to continue to hold their shares, or to add a mix to your portfolio.

You may already be an investor through such trusts as Aurora which has stakes in Barratt and Bellway; Fidelity Special Values and JP Morgan Mid-cap which own Vistry; Independent which has opted for Bellway and Redrow; and Mercantile whose selections are Bellway and Countryside.

You may deplore some of the housebuilders' practices or be dismayed by the quality of some of their output.

However, their central role in the fulfilment of government policies, their dividends and the nation's heightened ardour for property could be enough to assuage the doubts.
Ocado has seen demand for its services soar during the coronavirus pandemic.

The online supermarket, which releases its third-quarter trading update on Tuesday, saw its waiting list swell to more than 1million as families sought to get their shopping delivered during lockdown.

At the same time, the business successfully launched a partnership to deliver shopping for Marks & Spencer last year.

But it must now grapple with the reopening of most of the economy, which has seen demand for online shopping fall from the peaks reached at the height of the Covid-19 crisis.

And investors will also be looking for new guidance on how it plans to push ahead with selling its pioneering robot warehouse technology to other grocers.

This part of its business  known as Ocado Solutions  is seen as most promising and Ocado has already struck deals to supply the likes of Kroger in the United States, Casino in France and Aeon in Japan with its technology.

In July the firm also agreed to provide state-of-the-art warehouses for multinational giant Auchan Retail in Spain.

Analysts say the firm may have 'struck gold' with this deal in particular, as Auchan operates in another 12 countries that Ocado may be able to expand into as well.

Susannah Streeter, an analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: 'While the successful partnership with M&S still has potential to expand, it's the Ocado Solutions business which could turbo charge growth.'
Tifton, GA (31794)

Today

Cloudy with showers. High around 85F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%..

Tonight

Mostly cloudy with showers and a few thunderstorms. Low 71F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%. 1 to 2 inches of rain expected.
Tifton, GA (31794)

Today

Mixed clouds and sun with scattered thunderstorms. High 87F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%..

Tonight

Variable clouds with showers and scattered thunderstorms. Storms more numerous this evening. Low 71F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%. 2 to 3 inches of rain expected.
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The heroes of Flight 93 were remembered Saturday for their courage in the face of terror, at a memorial built in their honor.
Barre, VT (05641)

Today

Thunderstorms likely. A few storms may be severe. High 78F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%..

Tonight

Rain showers this evening with overcast skies overnight. Low 56F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
Diane C. Jones, age 59, of Thomasville passed away on September 12, 2021. She was born on July 3, 1962, daughter of the late Leon and Ruth Jones. Diane was a 1980 Thomas County Central graduate and went on to graduate from technical school for respiratory therapy. She was employed with Archb
Princeton, KY (42445)

Today

Scattered showers and thunderstorms. High around 80F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 50%..

Tonight

Partly cloudy skies. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low near 65F. Winds light and variable.
This column expresses the views of the author, separate from those of the Times Union.

ALBANY  The window opened by the Child Victims Act is closed. The lawsuits are filed, though the legal wrangling continues.

We will hear more about that wrangling in the months ahead, as numbers and settlements are discussed and debated. But this much, at least, is already clear: Claims filed under the legislation have been devastating for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany.

For one thing, the reputation of former Bishop Howard Hubbard is in tatters.

Once a celebrated and beloved figure for many area Catholics, Hubbard has been directly accused of sexual abuse in at least seven Child Victims Act lawsuits. Though he denies the allegations, the volume of claims may have dismayed many who believed so fervently in Hubbard's innocence and decency.

Hubbard is also named in dozens of lawsuits accusing him of covering up the abuse of children, and, as the Times Union recently reported, he has acknowledged that the diocese under his watch shielded priests facing abuse allegations from accountability.

Hubbard has his rationalizations and prevarications, but whatever. Who, at this point, wants to hear them?

The bottom line is that the diocese is continuing to experience a long, painful reckoning  with financial consequences still to come.

While Bishop Edward Scharfenberger recently told me the diocese is not planning to file for bankruptcy protection, as the Boy Scouts of America and four New York dioceses have done, he conceded it remains a possibility. The diocese has been named in more than 300 lawsuits, leaving it shell-shocked.

"A lot of our people are having a very hard time coming to terms with it," Scharfenberger said. "Any claim is both a scandal and a tragedy, and to know that people were so hurt by predatory individuals who wore a collar, it's a tough thing."

The Child Victims Act, debated for a decade before state lawmakers passed the measure in 2019, temporarily scuttled time limitations to allow lawsuits  and accusers filed nearly 10,000 statewide before the window closed in August.

It has been nearly two decades since pedophile priest revelations rocked Boston and cities around the world. By this point, the abuse scandal is familiar news.

Still, the scope and scale of allegations detailed in Child Victims Act litigation is shocking, and nauseating. Reading through the lawsuits is like getting punched in the stomach, again and again.

No, the church wasn't the only place where the vulnerable were victimized. Child Victims Act lawsuits make that clear, too. The sexual abuse of children was, and is, a widespread societal problem.

But consider the case of Br. Clement Murphy, who worked at Notre Dame-Bishop Gibbons and St. Paul the Apostle schools Schenectady starting in the 1960s. Murphy is accused in 17 separate lawsuits, suggesting he was responsible for a staggering amount of abuse and pain.

If so, how many may have known but looked away? How much did silence allow new horrors?

Colleen Garbarini, one of Murphy's accusers, told me she never planned to file a Child Victims Act claim. Then she learned that Murphy, who is on the diocese's list of credibly accused clergy, had been accused of abuse 10 years before her elementary school experience with him beginning in the late 1970s.

With that came the realization that her suffering could have been prevented, if only somebody had bothered to do something. Enraged, she decided she would, in fact, file a lawsuit.

Garbarini, who is 50 and lives in Schenectady, told me she remembers Murphy, now deceased, setting a chair on the playground. He was grooming children, she believes, for his predation. The diocese, she says, must have known he was a danger.

Seventeen lawsuits.

"It's almost like we could have our own little support group," Garbarini said.

When we spoke, Scharfenberger expressed hope that the church could be a place of healing for the abused. Love for the oppressed and victimized has long been at the heart of Jesus' message and church teaching, of course, and could perhaps be a path back to trust after this alienating scandal.

But Garbarini said the diocese's public support for victims is belied by the hardball tactics of its lawyers. She remains furious at the diocese. She is hardly alone.

A quick update: In a July column, I wrote about Child Victims Act allegations lodged against the Rev. John Varno, who, to the dismay of John McIntyre and other congregants at the Our Lady of Grace in Ballston Lake, continued to preside over Masses at three area churches.

That was because of a loophole. By diocese policy, you see, allegations made directly to the diocese or law enforcement triggered an investigation and the removal of the accused priest from service.

However, there was no immediate investigation or removal of the priest for allegations made only in civil lawsuits. Yet if the foremost objective is to protect children, I asked, why should it matter how the complaint is filed?

Scharfenberger has subsequently closed the loophole.

"I want to do everything I possibly can," he told me. "I don't want there to be any hidden corners. I don't want there to be any loopholes."

cchurchill@timesunion.com  518-454-5442  @chris_churchill
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP)  Several hundred people line up every morning, starting before dawn, on a grassy area outside Nairobis largest hospital hoping to get the COVID-19 vaccine. Sometimes the line moves smoothly, while on other days, the staff tells them theres nothing available, and they should come back tomorrow.

Halfway around the world, at a church in Atlanta, two workers with plenty of vaccine doses waited hours Wednesday for anyone to show up, whiling away the time by listening to music from a laptop. Over a six-hour period, only one person came through the door.

The dramatic contrast highlights the vast disparity around the world. In richer countries, people can often pick and choose from multiple available vaccines, walk into a site near their homes and get a shot in minutes. Pop-up clinics, such as the one in Atlanta, bring vaccines into rural areas and urban neighborhoods, but it is common for them to get very few takers.

In the developing world, supply is limited and uncertain. Just over 3% of people across Africa have been fully vaccinated, and health officials and citizens often have little idea what will be available from one day to the next. More vaccines have been flowing in recent weeks, but the World Health Organizations director in Africa said Thursday that the continent will get 25% fewer doses than anticipated by the end of the year, in part because of the rollout of booster shots in wealthier counties such as the United States.

Bidian Okoth recalled spending more than three hours in line at a Nairobi hospital, only to be told to go home because there weren't enough doses. But a friend who traveled to the U.S. got a shot almost immediately after his arrival there with a vaccine of his choice, like candy, he said.

Were struggling with what time in the morning we need to wake up to get the first shot. Then you hear people choosing their vaccines. Thats super, super excessive," he said.

Okoth said his uncle died from COVID-19 in June and had given up twice on getting vaccinated due to the length of the lines, even though he was eligible due to his age. The death jolted Okoth, a health advocate, into seeking a dose for himself.

He stopped at one hospital so often on his way to work that a doctor got tired of seeing me and told Okoth he would call him when doses were available. Late last month, after a new donation of vaccines arrived from Britain, he got his shot.

The disparity comes as the U.S. is moving closer to offering booster shots to large segments of the population even as it struggles to persuade Americans to get vaccinated in the first place. President Joe Biden on Thursday ordered sweeping new federal vaccine requirements for as many as 100 million Americans, including private-sector employees, as the country faces the surging COVID-19 delta variant.

About 53% of the U.S. population is vaccinated, and the country is averaging more than 150,000 new cases of COVID-19 a day, along with 1,500 deaths. Africa has had more than 7.9 million confirmed cases, including more than 200,000 deaths, and the highly infectious delta variant recently drove a surge in new cases as well.

The head of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, insisted Wednesday that rich countries with large supplies of coronavirus vaccines should hold off on offering booster shots through the end of the year and make the doses available to poorer countries.

John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told reporters Thursday that we have not seen enough science to drive decisions on when to administer booster shots.

Without that, we are gambling, he said, and urged countries to send doses to countries facing vaccine famine instead.

In the U.S., vaccines are easy to find, but many people are hesitant to get them.

At the church in northwest Atlanta, a nonprofit group offered the Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer vaccines for free without an appointment from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. But site manager Riley Erickson spent much of the day waiting in an air-conditioned room full of empty chairs, though the group had reached out to neighbors and the church had advertised the location to its large congregation.

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Erickson, with the disaster relief organization CORE, said the vaccination rate in the area was low, so he wasnt surprised by small turnout. The one person who showed up was a college student.

When you put the effort into going into areas where theres less interest, thats kind of the result, he said. His takeaway, however, was that CORE needed to spend more time in the community.

A second vaccination site run by county officials  this one in downtown Atlanta  had a little more foot traffic around lunchtime, but not enough to cause even the slightest delay.

Margaret Herro, COREs Georgia director, said the group has seen an uptick in vaccinations at its pop-up sites in recent weeks amid a COVID-19 surge fueled by the delta variant and the FDA's full approval of the Pfizer vaccine. It has administered more than 55,000 shots from late March through the end of August at hundreds of sites around the state, including schools and farmers markets. It also has gone to meatpacking plants and other work locations, where turnout is better, and it plans to focus more on those places, Herro said.

We definitely dont feel like its time to let up yet, she said.

In Nairobi, Okoth believes there should be a global commitment to equity in the administration of vaccines so everyone has a basic level of immunity as quickly as possible.

"If everyone at least gets a first shot, I dont think anyone will care if others get even six booster shots, he said.

___

Thanawala reported from Atlanta.
MONROE, La. (AP)  Kathy Spurlock, an award-winning journalist who served as editor of several newspapers in Louisiana and Mississippi, died Friday after a long illness.

She died at her home in Monroe, Louisiana, The News-Star reported. She was 67.

Spurlock served two stints at the newspaper, including 21 years as its top editor when she retired in 2016.

She was a mentor to Barbara Leader, who is now the top Louisiana editor for Gannett, the company that owns The News-Star.

Kathy hired me at The News-Star when I had little newspaper experience and her faith in me provided the confidence I needed to grow and succeed, Leader said. She not only supported and encouraged me in my career, but did the same for countless other journalists who are now working around Louisiana and in other states.

Long after she retired from The News-Star, she stayed involved in our work. Always a journalist, she sent us news tips through social media, texts and phone calls. She will be greatly missed.

Spurlock often said the best part of being a journalist was the ability to make a difference in peoples lives and their communities.

Spurlock graduated from Louisiana Tech University and started her career at The News-Star in 1975. She was promoted to various midlevel editor positions at The News-Star and the former Monroe Morning World. In 1982, she became editor of Louisiana Suburban Press in Baker, and moved in 1985 to the Baton Rouge Morning Advocate.

In 1989, she returned to Gannett as metro editor of The Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, Mississippi. She came back to Monroe in 1995 as executive editor, adding general manager to her title in 2014.

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During Spurlocks tenure, the news department was transformed from a once-daily print publication to a digital and print information center. The newspaper was recognized for its investigative reporting, commentary, innovation, economic development, public service and community service work under her leadership. She also was an award-winning writer for editorial commentary and columns.

Spurlock served as a past president of the Louisiana/Mississippi Associated Press Media Editors board of directors and chair of the Louisiana Press Associations Freedom of Information Committee and on the national board of the American Society of News Editors.

She is survived by her husband, Lindsey Wilkerson, a daughter, Anne Perrone, and two grandchildren.

Funeral arrangements were not immediately announced.
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ALBANY  City detectives said they took three people into custody Thursday night on South Pearl Street who were carrying two loaded handguns and narcotics.

At about 6:30 p.m., detectives in the departments Community Response Unit used a search warrant at 117 S. Pearl St., as part of an investigation arising from complaints from residents about drug sales and neighborhood quality-of-life concerns.
Capital Region school districts that unexpectedly got pre-K funding from the state for the first time this year scrambled to get free preschool programs off the ground by this fall  with varying levels of success.

The state budget enacted in April for the 2021-2022 school year included $105 million in pre-K funding to expand programs in low- and medium-wealth districts and for districts that currently do not have a program.

Local school board leaders did not anticipate the funding, which was approved just as they were finalizing school budgets for the current academic year.

With little time to find adequate space for a preschool, get certified and hire staff, many districts sought to partner with community organizations to operate the classrooms. Others are attempting to establish and staff their own prekindergarten classrooms, which can get expensive.

East Greenbush school officials plan to establish two 18-student classrooms at Red Mill Elementary School this fall using a combination of state funds and federal COVID-19 relief aid.

The district, which enrolls about 4,000 students across all grades, is working with Questar III BOCES to hire staff for its pre-K program.

The district looks forward to expanding instruction to 4-year-olds in our community, Superintendent Jeff Simons said in a statement. We will work collaboratively with Questar to ensure a high quality, age-appropriate program to address the social-emotional, cognitive and psychomotor development of young children, enhancing readiness for Kindergarten.

Next, district officials will seek certification from the state and create a registration and lottery system. Thirty-six 4-year-olds will be selected randomly through a lottery process, officials said.

The district has been fielding questions from interested parents and will have an update at a school board meeting next week, officials said.

A request for proposals (RFP) was initially issued to find existing child care organizations to operate the pre-K program, but only one community-based organization responded by the deadline of July 28. The district's pre-K committee ultimately decided to use American Rescue Plan funds to establish an in-house program.

There will be no impact on taxpayers, East Greenbush officials said. For the inaugural year, $5,400-per-student will be covered by the state grant and the balance of $4,437 per student will be covered by the onetime federal relief funds.

Simons noted that while the state funding for this program is only available for the next two years, lawmakers have been talking about an expansion of free high-quality preschool.

I think there is a direction both at the state level and the federal level to expand available funding for 3- and 4-year-olds, which hopefully will enable schools to sustain pre-K in future years, he said.

It's a risk not all districts can afford to take. Officials at Schuylerville Central School District, which enrolls about 1,500 K-12 students, said they had hoped to create an in-house preschool program of four classrooms with enough seats to meet parents' needs and avoid a lottery system.

But setting up the program by September 2022 would likely cost an additional $228,752 in salaries and benefits, Superintendent Ryan Sherman wrote in a memo to families.

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"This is the first time in 14 years that the district has received UPK funding in its state aid runs," he said. "The district would need a commitment from the state for continued funding in future school years before the implementation of a UPK program; this is necessary in order to avoid passing on the costs of the program to local taxpayers."

The district is currently focused on bringing K-12 students back to school and will form a committee to discuss the possibility of creating a pre-K in the future, according to Sherman.

To become approved UPK providers, private child care centers must complete the certification process and have a curriculum that complies with state early childhood education guidelines.

Bethlehem Central School District put out an RFP but was unable to find community partners that met the state's qualifications, according to spokeswoman Jo Ellen Gardner.

"The district notified the NYS Education Department that it was not intending to use the funds in 2021-22. It is the district's understanding that there will be another allocation in 2022-23," she said. "In anticipation of that, BCSD will reissue an RFP in early 2022 to try to locate a qualified community provider that can meet the early childhood education requirements for the pre-kindergarten program next school year."

Guilderland Central School District, which was allotted enough funds to cover the tuition and meals for 115 children, also sought community partners and on Friday announced it was accepting applications for open pre-K spots at Kidz Korner Childcare & Learning Center in Schenectady. Parents will be notified if more locations become available.

The average cost of child care for pre-school-aged children in the Capital Region is $210.60 per week or $842.40 monthly, according to Brightside Up, a child care referral agency.

The availability of high-quality, free preschool is linked to better cognitive outcomes in children of all backgrounds, but particularly those who are at risk.
VOORHEESVILLE  For the last four decades Will Aubrey has made the approximately 100-mile round trip from his home in the Adirondack community of Northville to Thacher Park, a well-known spot offering majestic views of Albany County.

He doesnt travel for the scenery, though. He comes to count broad-winged hawks and other raptors that come through the area each year on their way south.

And for 20 years, Aubrey has coordinated the annual Helderberg Escarpment Hawk Watch in which birders from the Capital Region and beyond count the hawks flying from their summer homes in northern New York and Canada to points as far south as the Gulf of Mexico.

This Saturday will mark Aubreys last Hawk Watch as its official leader. He's turning over the responsibility to the Audubon Societys Jon Loz, another avid birder.

For the last 20 years Ive had my head in a chart, said Aubrey, 75, explaining the work of documenting the numbers and species of birds that fly by. Twenty years is enough."

Thacher Park's overlook is an ideal spot to watch the migration. Its over 1,000 feet above the terrain below and faces north. On days when the sun warms the ground and when there is a good north or northeast breeze, the area turns into an airborne conveyor belt allowing migrating birds to ride the updraft up and over the park and glide for 20 or 30 miles on their way south.

Its like a tailwind for an airplane, Aubrey said.

While early birds may get the worms, they dont get the air currents, which tend to heat up later in the morning, he said. These guys dont get up early, he said of the birds that wait patiently for the updrafts to build.

Due to the enormous distance they travel the birds rely heavily on air currents to save energy.

Broad-winged hawks are the most prevalent birds sighted, making up about 80 percent, said Aubrey. They are diurnal birds of prey, meaning they fly during the day and feed on small mammals, amphibians and other smaller birds.

In addition to the hawks, the birders at Thacher Park also spot eagles, turkey vultures and ospreys.

In past years, birders have spotted up to 2,000 broad-winged hawks coming through the area at this time of year.

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The birds face threats as well, said Loz. He explained in an email that migrating raptors can fall prey to wind turbines, power lines and even tall windowed buildings that birds can smash into if they mistake the glass for open terrain.

The Hawk Migration Association of North America has more information on the birds journeys.

Loz hopes to build on the interest in counting hawks, eventually working with a number of local bird-watching groups to form a not-for-profit organization to count the birds in fall and run education programs during the rest of the year.

Aubrey said the event should be in good hands with Loz who has a lot of plans for enhancing the annual count. "He's going to just soar," he wisecracked of the new coordinator.

rkarlin@timesunion.com 518 454 5758 @RickKarlinTU
New York is joining the growing clean car movement. Gov. Kathy Hochul last week signed legislation that sets 2035 as the date by which all new passenger cars and light trucks sold in the state are zero emissions. That is expected to boost sales of electric vehicles, which have no tailpipe emissions and are viewed as helping to greatly reduce greenhouse gas pollution.

The law also directs the state Department of Environmental Conservation to develop regulations to cut pollution from trucks.



"We must reduce emissions from the transportation sector, currently the largest source of the state's climate pollution," Hochul said of the legislation. "The new law and regulation mark a critical milestone in our efforts and will further advance the transition to clean electric vehicles, while helping to reduce emissions in communities that have been overburdened by pollution from cars and trucks for decades."



The new law also calls for new off-road vehicles to be zero emission by 2035 and heavier vehicles like medium and heavy trucks or buses to be green by 2045 if feasible, according to the law.

The deadlines are goals, but they are in keeping with the states 2019 Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, which calls for a carbon-free economy by 2050.

Transportation, including cars, trucks and buses as well as trains and planes, is one of the economys largest producers of CO2, or greenhouses gases that scientists say are contributing to global warming. Other contributors include power generation, heavy industry and the heating and cooling of buildings.



The law was sponsored by Long Island Democratic Assemblyman Steve Englebright and Westchester Democratic Sen. Peter Harckham. It passed largely along party lines.

A wide range of environmental groups, including Environmental Advocates NY, the Nature Conservancy and the League of Conservation Voters hailed the laws signing.

While several Republicans in both chambers voted against it, the auto industry, at least outwardly, has remained quiet on the measure.

New York is among more than a dozen states to adopt such measures recently led by California, which is the nations largest vehicle market.

The truck standards are based on a similar rule in California, requiring truck manufacturers to transition to clean, electric zero-emission vehicles by meeting a certain annual sales percentage of zero-emission trucks, which will vary among vehicle weight classes, starting in 2025.

By 2035, at least 55 percent of new pickup trucks and vans, 75 percent of all new larger trucks, and 40 percent of all semi tractors sold are supposed to be zero-emission.

Trucks are of concern for several reasons. Pickup trucks are among the nations best-selling vehicles these days. And larger semi tractors, powered by diesels, also have particulates in their emissions.



Moreover, many disadvantaged communities, home to low-income Black or other minority New Yorkers are near industrial facilities and roads with heavy truck traffic.

Additionally, medium- and heavy-duty trucks (those weighing more than 8,500 pounds) are the second-largest source of nitrogen oxide emissions from mobile sources even though they make up only 5 percent of New York's 10.6 million registered vehicles. That has led to ozone pollution in heavily populated areas, especially downstate.



In April 2021, New York and 11 other states asked President Joseph Biden to set federal standards similar to what they are doing. Additionally, state officials hope the White House will advance new electric vehicle tax credits and funding for more electric chargers.

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New York state already offers inducements to build more charging stations where the operators of electric vehicles or EVs can charge their batteries when not at home.

In addition to the higher initial cost, consumers have said they worry about the possibility of running their batteries down on electric vehicles and being stranded if they are too far from a charging station. Many EV cars have a reliable range of about 200 miles before a recharge is needed. On the other hand, purely electric cars eliminate the need to buy gasoline, and with fewer moving parts, offer the prospect of trouble-free motoring. EVs also offer very rapid acceleration.

Pure electric or plug-in EVs are different from hybrids such as the Toyota Prius, which combine traditional gasoline motors with electric motors.

Despite the range anxiety, as worries about charging stations are called, pure EVs are selling well, with Tesla cars and Chevrolet Bolts gaining traction with buyers.

Tesla is also rolling out a futuristic EV pickup truck and Ford recently announced they had more than 130,000 reservations from buyers who wanted their all-electric version of the F150 pickup truck, dubbed the F150 Lightning.

Thats notable as the standard gas-powered F150 is the best-selling passenger vehicle currently on the market.

rkarlin@timesunion.com 518 454 5758 @RickKarlinTU
CONAKRY, Guinea (AP)  International pressure mounted Friday on the junta that seized power in Guinea after the African Union suspended the country and as a delegation of West African officials came to urge a return to democratic rule.

The African Union has suspended Guinea from all AU activities and decision-making bodies, the organization announced. The suspension comes after military officers in Guinea overthrew President Alpha Conde on Sunday.

The 15-nation West African regional economic bloc, known as ECOWAS, had already suspended Guinea following the coup led by Col. Mamady Doumbouya.

Mediators including foreign ministers from Ghana, Nigeria, Togo and Burkina Faso along with ECOWAS commission president Jean-Claude Kassi Brou met with Doumbouya on Friday at a hotel in Conakry, the capital. Doumbouya and the ECOWAS mediation team left the hotel without speaking to the media, but talks likely focused on the timing of a return to constitutional rule.

Burkina Faso's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alpha Barry, said that the leaders will now report back to their respective presidents.

The delegation was able to meet with deposed president Conde, who was at the headquarters of the Special Forces, according to Barry.

We saw President Alpha Conde. He's fine," Barry said. The rest of the report will be made to the presidents.

The delegation is now heading back to Accra, Ghana, he said.

The group has urged the coup leaders to assure the safety of the deposed president and others who have been arrested. Conde remains in the custody of the junta, who have only said that he is in a secure location with access to medical care.

Members of the delegation are believed to have met with Conde Friday, according to local media reports.

Doumbouya and the special forces that put the West African nation under military rule for the first time in over a decade have criticized Condes government for corruption and the poverty of Guineas people. The junta leader portrayed himself as a patriot of Guinea, taking power for the people who remained poor. However, experts say the coup happened after tensions increased between the army colonel and the president because of a recent proposal to cut some military salaries.

The junta has ordered the central bank to freeze all government accounts in an effort to secure state assets and preserve the countrys interest.

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The junta announced the temporary freezing of withdrawals on bank accounts related to public administrative and commercial establishments in all ministry departments and the presidency. The freeze also applies to the programs and projects of presidential initiatives, and outgoing members of the government as well as senior civil servants, administrators and financial authorities of the state.

Condes removal by force came after he sought and won a controversial third term in office last year, saying the term limits did not apply to him. Conde was elected in 2010 in the countrys first democratic vote, with hopes that Guinea would see a fresh start after decades of corrupt, authoritarian rule and political turmoil. But in the years since, opponents say Conde failed to improve the lives of Guineans, most of whom live in poverty despite the countrys vast mineral deposits of bauxite and gold.

Violent street demonstrations broke out last year after Conde organized a referendum to modify the constitution. The unrest intensified after he won the October election, and the opposition said dozens were killed during the crisis.

___

Petesch reported from Dakar, Senegal.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP)  Topeka police officials said a homicide suspect who was shot by police on Friday has died from his wounds.

Jesse B. Lees, 33, of Topeka died hours after multiple officers shot at him in a residential area. Police said he was armed but have provided few details about the confrontation.
AUBURN, Maine (AP)  An Auburn councilor apologized Friday after making racist remarks during a discussion of naming a footbridge for the late Mayor John Jenkins.

In a statement, Leroy Walker noted that Jenkins, who was Black, was a good friend of mine for 40 years and that he meant no disrespect to him or his family.

He said his comments during Tuesday's City Council meeting were insensitive and inappropriate, the Sun Journal reported.

Walker said he will use the days and weeks ahead to speak with and seek guidance from experts in diversity and communication in order to communicate for and to my constituents more effectively.

I will use this time to reflect and learn from this experience, Walker said.

Walker's apology came after a rant in which he said, among other things, that dark-colored people recently breaking laws in the South put a bad name on good people like Jenkins.

Jenkins, who died last year, was the first Black person to serve as a state senator in Maine. He also served as mayor of both Lewiston and Auburn.

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Both the Auburn and Lewiston city councils denounced his comments before the councilor offered his apology. An Auburn council member, Holly Lasagna, said Friday that Walker should resign despite his apology.

A spokesperson for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which called for Walker's resignation, said Friday that the organization welcomed the apology and would monitor the situation.
SCHENECTADY  City police are asking for help from the public to locate a vehicle that was seen in the vicinity of a Sept. 5 nightclub shooting that caused the death of one man and left two others injured.

The car is a black, four-door Mercedes-Benz C-240 with a temporary New Jersey registration plate of 332248T. Police describe it having a sunshade in the rear window and black-and-silver wheels. The announcement said only that information about the vehicle was being sought because it was "connected to the shooting homicide" in the parking lot of Tropics Bar and Restaurant at 201 S. Brandywine Ave.

Anyone with information related to the incident or the vehicle is asked to call the Schenectady Police Departments TIPS line at 518-788-6566 or the Detective Division, 518-382-5245.

E-Shawn Amir Berkley, 23, of Albany, was shot and killed around 12:45 a.m. Sept. 5; in the same incident, a 27-year-old woman suffered a gunshot wound to the leg, and a 22-year-old man was shot in the abdomen, police said. An update on their conditions was not immediately available.

Berkley made headlines last October when he was charged with two counts of attempted murder in connection to a double shooting on Mount Hope Drive in Albany's South End neighborhood, a incident that left two men wounded.

At the time he was fatally shot, Berkley was out on $25,000 bail and awaiting sentencing in connection with the Albany shooting, where an investigation revealed he was the driver, said Cecilia Walsh, spokeswoman for the Albany County District Attorneys Office.

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He pleaded guilty to hindering prosecution, a felony, before state Supreme Court Judge Richard McNally on Aug. 12 and was expected to receive a sentence of five years of felony probation on Sept. 16, Walsh said.

Berkley was also among nearly 50 people indicted earlier this summer in connection with a sweeping probe into drug sales and violence in Albany. He faced weapons charges as a result of a separate but related indictment containing 36 counts, all related to criminal possession of a weapon.

Walsh said Berkley was released on $75,000 bail as part of the state Attorney Generals Office case. The AG is handling that case separate and apart from our cases.

His was the first homicide in Schenectady this year. The Electric City totaled five homicides in 2020, a year that saw more gun violence across the U.S. Albany, in contrast, has 13 homicides so far this year, most recently a pair of fatal shootings that happened within hours of each other in mid-August.
The letter "Afghanistan debacle affirms futility of war," Sept. 3, from Lynda Ames, with Women Against War, must be read with James Rothenberg's commentary "What will it take to change U.S. opinions on foreign policy," July 8, regarding the lack of interest of most Americans in foreign policy as instilled and sustained by Washington's institutionally trained career professionals.

Afghanistan has been, and is, a "nation" composed of several dozen separate tribes with their own dialects, leaders, allegiances and conflicts with each other. After 9/11, the United States and its dependent nations invaded and cobbled together and installed a government that it called "the Afghanistan government." Trillions of unaccounted for U.S. taxpayers' and allies' dollars and more than 20 years were spent on promoting the concept that natives of a region that functioned for hundreds of years would give up their societal identities and associations and sacrifice themselves for their invaders' security and a governing system that allows self-serving officials like former President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney and former President Donald Trump and his personal lawyer, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, to dictate whether  during national crises  available best science practices or politically advantageous promotions are followed.
Richard L Bleigh, 77, of Rivesville, WV passed away on Monday, September 13, on a beautiful fall day. Richard was born September 08, 1944 in Fairmont, the son of Howard V Bleigh and Zelma N. Bleigh (both deceased). He married his high school sweetheart, Sandra Jean Hall, (deceased), daughter
A Colorado state trooper honored for shooting and killing an armed man outside the governors office over a decade ago has been charged with felony menacing
[September 10, 2021] DEADLINE ALERT: Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C. Reminds Investors that a Class Action Lawsuit Has Been Filed Against RenovaCare, Inc. and Encourages Investors to Contact the Firm

Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C., a nationally recognized stockholder rights law firm, reminds investors that a class action lawsuit has been filed against RenovaCare, Inc. ("RenovaCare" or the "Company") (Other OTC: RCAR) in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey on behalf of all persons and entities who purchased or otherwise acquired RenovaCare securities between August 14, 2017 and May 28, 2021, both dates inclusive (the "Class Period"). Investors have until September 14, 2021 to apply to the Court to be appointed as lead plaintiff in the lawsuit. Click here to participate in the action. RenovaCare is a development stage company that has not generated any revenue since its inception and has no commercialized products. On May 28, 2021, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (" SEC (News - Alert) ") issued a litigation release stating that RenovaCare was being charged with alleged securities fraud. According to the SEC's complaint, between July 2017 and January 2018, the Company's controlling shareholder and Chairman, Harmel Rayat ("Rayat"), "arranged, and caused RenovaCare to pay for, a promotional campaign designed to increase the company's stock price." Specifically, "Rayat was closely involved in directing the promotion and editing promotional materials, and arranged to funnel payments to the publisher through consultants to conceal RenovaCare's involvement in the campaign." When OTC Markets Group, Inc. requested that RenovaCare exlain its relationship to the promotion, the complaint alleges that "Rayat and RenovaCare then drafted and issued a press release and a Form 8-K that contained material misrepresentations and omissions denying Rayat's and the company's involvement in the promotion."



On this news, the Company's stock price fell $0.66, or 24.8%, over three consecutive trading sessions to close at $2.00 per share on June 2, 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) that, at the direction of Rayat, RenovaCare engaged in a promotional campaign to issue misleading statements to artificially inflate the Company's stock price; (2) that, when the OTC Markets inquired, RenovaCare and Rayat issued a materially false and misleading press release claiming that no director, officer, or controlling shareholder had any involvement in the purported third party's promotional materials; (3) that, as a result of the foregoing, the Company's disclosure controls and procedures were defective; and (4) as a result, Defendants' statements about its business, operations, and prospects were materially false and misleading and/or lacked reasonable basis at all relevant times.

If you purchased or otherwise acquired RenovaCare shares 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/20210910005582/en/

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[September 10, 2021] GUESS? INVESTIGATION CONTINUED by Former Louisiana Attorney General: Kahn Swick & Foti, LLC Continues to Investigate the Officers and Directors of Guess?, Inc. - GES

Former Attorney General of Louisiana, Charles C. Foti, Jr., Esq., a partner at the law firm of Kahn Swick & Foti, LLC ("KSF"), announces that KSF continues its investigation into Guess?, Inc. (NYSE: GES). In July 2021, media outlets reported that the Company had sent letters to an unknown number of individuals regarding its investigation into a "cybersecurity incident" that was discovered on February 19, 2021, involving "unauthorized access to certain Guess systems between February 2 and February 23, 2021." Further, the Company had determined on May 26, 2021, that "personal information related to certain individuals may have been accessed or acquired by an unauthorized actorthat Social Security numbers, driver's license numbers, passport numbers and/or financial account numbers may have been accessed or acquired." KSF's investigation is focusing on whether Guess?'s officers and/or directors breached their fiduciary duties to Guess?'s shareholders or otherwise violated state or federal laws. If you have infrmation that would assist KSF in its investigation, or have been a long-term holder of Guess? shares and would like to discuss your legal rights, you may, without obligation or cost to you, call toll-free at 1-877-515-1850 or email KSF Managing Partner Lewis Kahn (lewis.kahn@ksfcounsel.com), or visit https://www.ksfcounsel.com/cases/nyse-ges/ to learn more.



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, Louisiana and New Jersey.

To learn more about KSF, you may visit www.ksfcounsel.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210910005568/en/

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NASHVILLE  The Tennessee Department of Human Services (TDHS) is making additional assistance available to support the health and well-being of individuals impacted by the recent flooding disaster. Qualifying families located in Humphreys, Hickman, Dickson, and Houston counties that experienced loss as a result of the August 21, 2021 storm are now able to apply for Disaster Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (D-SNAP) benefits.

Our office in Humphreys County is among the many structures in Middle Tennessee that received damage in last months disaster and DHS stands ready to serve our neighbors in need, said TDHS Commissioner Clarence H. Carter. This one-time disbursement of food benefits will help those whove been affected by this disaster buy the food needed for their families while they work on recovering and rebuilding.

How D-SNAP Works:

D-SNAP benefits are provided through an electronic debit-like card and can be used to purchase food items at grocery stores and other authorized retailers who accept electronic benefit transfer (EBT). These cards will be mailed to qualifying families following approval.

Who Can Receive D-SNAP:

If you lived or worked in Humphreys, Hickman, Dickson, or Houston County on August 21, 2021, you may be eligible for D-SNAP benefits if you meet special disaster income limits and have experienced one of the following as a direct result of the severe weather event:

 Damage to or destruction of the home or self-employment business.

 Loss or inaccessibility of income including a reduction or termination of income or a significant delay in receiving income due to disaster related problems.

 Disaster-related expenses (home or business repairs, temporary shelter, evacuation, etc.) that are not expected to be reimbursed during the disaster benefit period.

Recipients of Tennessees regular SNAP benefits are not eligible to receive D-SNAP. However, affected residents in Humphreys, Hickman, Dickson, and Houston counties, who are receiving regular SNAP benefits may temporarily use their EBT cards to purchase hot foods through September 21. Recipients of D-SNAP also may temporarily purchase hot foods with their EBT cards through September 21.

How to Apply for D-SNAP:



Families who meet the qualifications for disaster assistance may apply on the D-SNAP application page. Applications from residents or workers in Humphreys County will be accepted beginning on Monday, September 13 at 8:00 A.M. CST through Friday, September 17 at 4:30 P.M. CST. Applications from residents or workers in Hickman, Dickson, and Houston counties will be accepted beginning on Monday, September 20 at 8:00 A.M. CST through Friday, September 24 at 4:30 PM CST.

Additional Information:

Customers in need of technical assistance can call the D-SNAP hotline number at 1-888-615-8180. Face-to-face assistance is available by appointment. To schedule an appointment contact your local TDHS office in Hickman, Dickson, or Houston counties. In-person appointments in Humphreys County are available on a limited basis and by appointment only. Scheduled appointments will be held in the Multi-Agency Resource Center in the Cumberland Presbyterian Church at 109 North Church Street in Waverly.

Disaster SNAP Assistance is provided under the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act and each eligible county is approved by the United States Department of Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Service.

The Tennessee Department of Human Services is dedicated to making our state a place where all Tennesseans can move beyond the barriers they may face, to self-sufficiency, and on to new heights.

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Never forget that TKC is an ALTERNATIVElocal news-ish outlet . . . A digital place where we fart in the general direction of all your silly politics and then threaten to taunt you a second time.

However . . .



We can't help but notice that MSM is rehashing all of their dusty 9/11 footage in between commercials for boner pills and heartburn medication.

So we also take a poke at this orgy of mutual masturbation with the caveat that very little of this recycled coverage is worthwhile and that vast majority is manipulative, saccharine garbage the revels in misery and misses an opportunity to apply any context to the legacy of the tragedy.

TKC can only find meaning in snark and the blessed fact that not everyone consents to the cavalcade of condescending corporate coverage.



Check-it . . .

Pieces of World Trade Center help Kansas City area remember 9/11 tragedy OVERLAND PARK, Kan. - The World Trade Center may have been more than 1,000 miles away from Kansas City when the towers collapsed after a terrorist attack on Sept. 11, 2001, but you can find pieces of the twin towers showing the strength of resilient America all across the Kansas City area.

Queen Elizabeth says prayers for victims and survivors of 9/11 LONDON, Sept 11 (Reuters) - Britain's Queen Elizabeth said on Saturday that her prayers remained with victims and survivors of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States and paid tribute to the communities that joined together to rebuild after the devastation.

Two Decades After 9/11, Are We Safer? As President George W. Bush flew back to Washington on Air Force One on Sept. 11, he was accompanied by Michael Morell, the CIA officer who briefed the president daily. Morell was in touch with CIA headquarters, which gave him heart-stopping intelligence that he had to urgently deliver to the president.

America's response to 9/11 was as damaging as the attack. It's not too late to change course On that ghastly day, September 11, 2001, I never saw what happened in real time. I was on assignment in West Africa, in the midst of Sierra Leone's civil war.

From TV News Tickers to Homeland: The Ways TV Was Affected By 9/11 There is a long list of ways America was transformed by the terrorist attacks that destroyed the Twin Towers on 9/11/2001. But the question of how TV itself was changed - particularly in ways still relevant today - is more complicated.

So much digital 9/11 coverage has disappeared. Here's why Journalism is often considered the first draft of history, but what happens when that draft is written on a software program that becomes obsolete?

9/11 anniversary: From United to Disunited States It's almost a cliche, hackneyed even. A big event happens, and people say they will never forget where they were when they heard about this or that. But I suspect nearly everyone around the world above the age of 30 really does remember where they were when they heard about, then watched in real time, the most audacious, most dreadful terrorist attack on the United States unfold.

Developing . . .
This week has been rough, we've blogged some good stories but video games other priorities have kept us a bit preoccupied.

Accordingly . . . Because we love our late night lurkers most of all, we share just a few news links from pop culture, community news and other interests as we prep for another attempt to focus on the cowtown discourse . . .

Kansas City Considers Work Vs. Vaxx

Kansas City employment attorney talks COVID-19 vaccine mandate executive orders KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Some of the Kansas City area's largest employers - including the Federal Reserve and the IRS - will be affected by President Joe Biden's announcement of COVID-19 vaccine mandates for federal employees and federal government contractors.

Rock Chalk Pro-Life?!?

Will Kansas pursue Texas-style abortion restrictions? Here's what stands in the way. While lawmakers in Missouri and other red states plan bills modeled after the nation's strictest abortion law that just took effect in Texas - barring all abortions after the sixth week of pregnancy - Kansas legislators are unlikely to follow. A major reason is the 2019 state Supreme Court ruling that the Kansas constitution guarantees the right to an abortion.

Show-ME Vaxx Tragically Unwanted

More than 330,000 people attended the Missouri State Fair. Only 53 got a COVID vaccine SEDALIA, Mo. ( KTVI) - In the push to get Missourians vaccinated against COVID-19, a surprising fact came out of the Missouri State Fair, which offered free vaccines to attendees this year. After being canceled last year because of the pandemic, the fair was back to normal in 2021 with concerts and a carnival.

Digital Smut Is A Snooze

Adult star recalls mortifying moment male co-star fell asleep during sex scene A porn star has recalled the hilarious time one of the male actors she was working with fell-asleep - midway through a sex scene. Speaking on Holly Randall's Unfiltered podcast, Bunny Colby described how the incident occurred while she was shooting a VR scene with male porn star Ryan Driller.

Republicans United Against Prez Trump Vaxx Orders

Biden 'disappointed' in GOP governors who plan to resist vaccine mandate: 'Have at it' President Biden said he's "disappointed" in the Republican governors who plan to resist his vaccine mandate and are threatening legal action. "I am so disappointed," Biden said Friday during a visit to the Brookland Middle School after he told a reporter to "have at it" regarding a question about Republicans who have pushed back on his six-point coronavirus plan.

Droning On . . .

Biden droned the wrong guy, innocent aid worker killed in Kabul strike: NYT A US airstrike in Kabul against a supposed Islamic State bomber actually killed an innocent man who worked for a US aid group and his family, according to newly published testimony and footage - raising the specter that the Pentagon lie to the public about the strike.

GOP Still Needs MAGA

Allies see rising prospect of Trump 2024 White House bid Republicans angling for potential 2024 presidential runs are at risk of colliding with former President Trump Donald Trump President Biden Joe Biden Kentucky state lawmakers vote to scrap school mask mandate Arkansas governor pushes back against Biden's vaccine mandate RNC vows to sue over Biden vaccine, testing mandate MORE .

Always Be Polite When Going Down

Coronavirus FAQs: A Vaccinated Person's Guide To COVID Exposure And Elevator Etiquette Each week, we answer frequently asked questions about life during the coronavirus crisis. If you have a question you'd like us to consider for a future post, email us at We've been answering coronavirus questions from our audience for over a year, but this past week, I had some questions of my own.

Kansas City Baller Still Benched By Plague Precaution

Chiefs' Mathieu remains in COVID-19 protocol ahead of opener KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) - Tyrann Mathieu remained in the COVID-19 protocol on Friday and the Kansas City Chiefs remain uncertain whether their All-Pro safety will be cleared in time for their season opener against the Cleveland Browns.

Good Deeds Feed Kansas City

'I really feel like we do something special': Harvesters volunteers keep nonprofit running OVERLAND PARK, Kan. - Harvesters, a community food network based in Kansas City, Missouri, keeps food pantries and banks across the region stocked and ready to serve those in need. And a network of volunteers keeps Harvesters running. "I like seeing the people and meeting the people, but I really feel like we do something special here," Richard Wood said.

Royals Stay Winning Tonight

Benny's huge night helps Royals top Twins in 6-4 extra inning win Andrew Benintendi had a huge four-hit, two-home run night capped off by a two-run blast in the eleventh to give the Royals a 6-4 win over the Twins on Friday night. The Royals jumped on Twins rookie right-hander Griffin Jax in the first.

Steamy Weekend Ahead

Your weekend will be sunny, hot Hide Transcript Show Transcript RIGHT NOW IN OTTAWA THE HOT SPOT EVENING FORECAST HAZY SUNSHINE TEMPERATURES GRADUALLY COOLING FROM THOSE MIDDLE 80S INTO THE LOW 80SY B 9 PM 78 DEGREES HEADING TOWARDS 10 O'CLOCK THIS EVENING LOWE'S BY TOMORROW MORNING WON'T BE VERY COOL AT ALL. T70YPICAL LOWS CLOSER TO 60 DEGREES.

And this is the OPEN THREAD for right now.
Right now hottie diva Lana Del Ray and her body of work inspires this peek at pop culture, community news and top headlines . . .



Check the www.TonysKasnasCity.com compilation . . .

Dude On Right Track

Meet the man engineering CP Rail's bid to snatch Kansas City Southern from Canadian National Sunday will be a crucial moment in the life of Keith Creel. Sept. 12 marks the deadline for Kansas City Southernto accept the US$27.2-billion takeover bid launched by Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd., where Mr. Creel is chief executive officer. His quest for the U.S.

Rail Deal

Man sentenced for smuggling eight pounds of meth and heroin aboard train in KC A Jonesboro, Mississippi, man was sentenced in federal court today for transporting more than five pounds of methamphetamine and nearly three pounds of heroin through Kansas City, Missouri. The illicit drugs final delivery location was St. Louis, Mo.Willie Lewis Braison, 48, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Brian C.

Rock Chalk Protest Rallies For Vaxx

Sunday protest at KU hopes to push for vaccine mandate on campus LAWRENCE, Kan. - Some University of Kansas students are protesting this weekend. They want to see stricter COVID-19 regulations and mandatory vaccination for students and faculty. The school did put a mask requirement in place last month, but some say it's not enough. Sophie Kunin is one of them.

Show-Me Exoneration Support

Former Missouri Supreme Court Chief Justice wants Kevin Strickland released from prison KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Former Missouri Supreme Court Chief Justice Edward Robertson Jr. will be on the legal team trying to get Kevin Strickland released from prison. Robertson, who is considered one of the nation's top attorneys, entered an appearance Thursday in Jackson County Court.

Diva Really Named Liz Grant Lives Her Best Life As Faux Latina

Lana Del Rey, 'Arcadia' Recently Lana Del Rey seems to perform best when she keeps it simple. She's distanced herself from the aesthetic-driven persona (a dirty word for Del Rey, but a true one) of 2012's with each passing record, and on her new single "Arcadia," she is not speaking of existential questions or relationship grandeur, but rather, holding the focus on herself.

Prez Offers Tribute

Biden commemorates 9/11 anniversary with stops at all three attack sites President Joe Biden will commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States on Saturday by visiting each of the sites where hijacked planes crashed in 2001, seeking to honor the victims of the devastating assault.

MAGA Makes Appearance

Trump says he will visit Ground Zero to mark 9/11 20th anniversary Former President Donald Trump said he will visit Ground Zero Saturday to mark the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The 45th president revealed that he would travel to Manhattan in an interview with Fox News Friday. Trump had been tight-lipped about whether he would commemorate the tragedy.

Danes Do COVID Vaxx Messaging Much Better



Entire police department resigns in Missouri An entire Missouri police department, including the police chief and his officers, resigned leaving the city of Kimberling without immediate authority. Citing problems like an inadequate pay rate and not having the right tools to do the job, the department has local leaders struggling to find replacements, especially when rhetoric against law enforcement is high amongst some, reported.

Latest American Vaxx Shaming

Not getting vaccinated against Covid-19 is like driving while intoxicated, one health expert says As the US averages more than 1,000 Covid-19 deaths daily, not getting vaccinated is akin to driving while intoxicated, one health expert said Friday.

Brit Frees Her Bottom

Britney Spears Posts Unfiltered Video of Her Butt: 'It's the Real Deal' Baring it all! Britney Spears took to social media to show off her body and she brought receipts to prove that it was all authentic! "Here's my ass ," Spears, 39, captioned a photo of her topless from behind via Instagram on Thursday, September 10.

Cowtown Cafe Morning Blend

Cafe Ollama brings traditional Mexican coffee preparations to Kansas City's Crossroads Arts District When you step foot into Cafe Ollama, a Mexican coffee shop that opened in Kansas City's Crossroads Arts District in March, you'll notice a drink menu that's striking in its simplicity relative to its surroundings. The walls of the cafe display vibrant prints from Hispanic artists, and bright colors - from the artwork to the house plants to the furniture - pop throughout the space.

Katie Shares Forecast

Sunny, smokey, hot and windy for Saturday Sunny, smokey, hot and windy for Saturday.A cool morning in the 60s with a layer of smoke to start the morning. Once the smoke clears temperatures will continue to rise. Temps will hit the low 90s by the afternoon on Saturday. Things look similarly hot and sunny for the Chiefs home opener on Sunday.

Lana Del Rey - Arcadia is the song of the day and this is the OPEN THREAD for right now.
Update on a story we talked about earlier this week . . .

"The Kansas Federation of College Republicans has called for her to be removed from office"

And . . .

Per ushe.

The outrage didn't really influence anyone.

Read more via www.TonysKansasCity.com news link . . .
Every hack in the world is obligated to pour their heart out on the 20th anniversary of 9/11 and express deep thoughts about a moment in history that's largely misunderstood.

However . . .

At this moment we consider the words of a world-renowned wiseacre who once said that "the less a man makes declarative statements, the less apt he is to look foolish in retrospect."



So all we've got today at TKC is questions that hopefully invite further contemplation or thoughtful answers from our irascible blog community.

Here goes . . .



We're we never supposed to forget the Taliban terrorists in Afghanistan who sparked an invasion and a 20 year war??? Nah. That couldn't have been it . . . Given that the Prez Biden White House is now cooperating with the very same group . . .



White House defends calling Taliban 'cooperative and businesslike' in negotiations on Americans leaving The White House said the Taliban have been "businesslike and professional" in their dealings on allowing Americans to leave Afghanistan, calling the dialogue "cooperative" and casting it as a "positive first step." The U.S. government said it facilitated the safe evacuation of American citizens and lawful permanent residents from Afghanistan on Thursday on a chartered Qatar Airways flight that safely landed in Qatar.

What about Prez Bush? I think we might have been advised never to forget that he started a war he didn't finish and has never faced any accountability for his horrific FAIL to devise even a hint of an exit strategy. But that couldn't be it either because the dude is actually somewhat beloved by many Americans . . . And his paintings are nice too.



Two wars, Trump and the miraculous rehabilitation of George Bush In early July, on the very same day the Pentagon announced it had completed 90 per cent of the planned withdrawal from Afghanistan, former president George W Bush sat for a rare, nationally televised interview. "Happy birthday, Dad!" shouted his daughter Jenna Bush Hager, a co-host of the Today show.

Or maybe we must never forget the importance of civil liberties protected by the Constitution even in the midst of crisis???



Poll: Americans say civil liberties increasingly at risk A decade after 9/11, Americans were optimistic about the government's protection of their civil liberties. In the 10 years since, however, public opinion has turned increasingly critical, with many more now saying that the government could do a better job.

Probably not . . . Given that our Democratic Party friends no longer seem concerned with freedom.



Biden declares sweeping new vaccine mandate: 'This is not about freedom' President Joe Biden formally announced his plan to force companies with more than 100 employees to vaccinate workers against the coronavirus or test them weekly and dismissed concerns about encroaching on personal freedoms. "This is not about freedom or personal choice," Biden said during a Thursday address to the nation.

Remember back in the early 2000s cynical souls said the hot mess that sparked 9/11 was related to a U.S. alliance with Saudi Arabia . . . But now the desert royal family is getting cozy with China and American missile defense is pulling out . . .



US pulls missile defenses in Saudi Arabia amid Yemen attacks DUBAI, United Arab Emirates -- The U.S. has removed its most advanced missile defense system and Patriot batteries from Saudi Arabia in recent weeks, even as the kingdom faced continued air attacks from Yemen's Houthi rebels, satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press show.

Or maybe we must "never forget" the importance of immigration rules and regs in order to defend the homeland . . . TKC remembers that Latinos took a rhetorical beating on this topic for more than a decade until it turned out that a growing number of Hispanics vote more reliably conservative than most middle-class whites. Even former Prez Trump eased up on the Mexicans during his failed reelection bid. Thankfully, progressives have always been consistent in their love of open borders for better and worse . . .



Biden doesn't require migrants at border to get vaccinated despite mandate on Americans The Biden administration is not planning to vaccinate the nearly 200,000 migrants who are showing up on the border each month, despite imposing mandates on federal workers and private businesses nationwide.

Nevertheless and despite it all . . .

Nobody is really clear about what we were supposed to "never forget" about 9/11 and the constant stream of disaster pr0n rebroadcast today is mostly self-indulgent garbage that summons disgustingly sentimental nostalgia without offering any substance, insight or historic lesson so that the U.S. doesn't repeat the same mistakes which preceded the horrific events of 9/11 - An iconic moment in time that's now mostly without any readily identifiable meaning.
I've learned in my journey, and especially as news coverage relates to the events of Sept. 11, 2001, that the biggest of stories roll on and on  winding, evolving, growing and enduring  and requiring a passionate relentlessness of the storytellers.
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Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb speaks during a bill signing ceremony at the Indiana Law Enforcement Academy in Plainfield, Ind., Monday, Aug. 16, 2021. Holcomb told reporters afterward that he supported the growing number of Indiana school districts issuing mask mandates for students and staff as they try to head off more COVID-19 outbreaks. (AP Photo/Tom Davies)
While two planes struck the World Trade Center, a third plane would strike the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001. It was an event experienced by a former mayor, former U.S. congressman and former Army colonel, all Terre Haute natives who were in the nation's capital at the time.
Ceremonies in metropolitan St. Louis on Friday, Sept. 10, 2021 recognized the 20th anniversary of those who died and survived the attacks on America on Sept. 11, 2001.

Photos by Robert Cohen, rcohen@post-dispatch.com

TownNews.com Content Exchange

Memories of 9/11 recalled 20 years later in O'Fallon Memories of 9/11 recalled 20 years later in O'Fallon Memories of 9/11 recalled 20 years later in O'Fallon Memories of 9/11 recalled 20 years later in O'Fallon Memories of 9/11 recalled 20 years later in O'Fallon Memories of 9/11 recalled 20 years later in O'Fallon Memories of 9/11 recalled 20 years later in O'Fallon Memories of 9/11 recalled 20 years later in O'Fallon Memories of 9/11 recalled 20 years later in O'Fallon Patriots Day Reveille Patriots Day Reveille Patriots Day Reveille Patriots Day Reveille
From Michigan here.....grew up in our snowbelt with INSANE amounts of snow (2 feet of snow overnight wouldn't guarantee that we got out of school) and I wouldn't do it.

1. It is going to be DARK then. The Ring Road is dark dark dark. You would have to slow down so much at night on the unfamiliar and curvy roads. It would be torture to drive. And you won't see anything!

2. The wind. Holy smokes, that wind is for real.

3. The drop-offs on the side of the road are pretty nuts. The "shoulder" is maybe 10-12" wide and is often a soft shoulder which wants to grab your tires and flip you. Then the roads (especially in the east, north, and west) have these crazy steep and high drop offs on each side. We actually commented several times that there is no way you could do a ring road trip in the winter and not end up upside down off the road at some point....likely in a desolate area. Between the narrow/soft shoulders and those drop-offs, there is not an inch of room for error.

4. I'm with you, I relish driving in snow and blizzards but can see that black ice and ice would be a very real problem in Iceland and the way the roads are engineered it is a recipe for disaster. You would have to drive so slowly and carefully it wouldn't be fun at all (and you would struggle to cover the large distances on the ring road!).
Sean, thank you for your recommendations. We plan to fly Emirates so we will look at the option of returning from Muscat, as long as it's nonstop to Miami, otherwise we will get a roundtrip back to Dubai. We have had this trip planned for a long time, but kept concentrating on Europe. We hope things will improve by next year.

Maybe we can stay in Dubai the 2 weeks and take a tour to AD to visit the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque, if there is nothing else to see there. We prefer to leave the R&R for when we get home. :)

Al Maha will be perfect since we can use Marriott points. Thank you for recommending this!!

We're planning on booking 2 Marriott properties in different locations in Dubai. One in the marina and one close to where Burj Khalifa is located or close to Dubai Mall would be best?

We need to do more research on Atlantis, but thought it would be interesting.
i am sorry for the very late reply but for the future there is a very good tour bus that a friend of mine owns called SK Tours

he is a friend of Stevens and most likely has access to some items. In any case i hear the tour is awesome and if i know Stu it is a first class operation.
We are a group of 3 friends from Mumbai, India, on a 2 week trip in early October and have 3 nights in the Engadin area (October 2-5). We are in our early 50s and are interested in easy hiking and generally enjoying the beauty of Switzerland. We will have a HFC.

Of the 3 Mountain top excursions listed on the Engadin website (Corvatsch, Piz Nair and Muottas Muragl) - how would you rate the scenic value given the early October visit? In terms of costs the Piz Nair is the most expensive at CHF69 return, while the other two are more affordable.

Is there a special area to visit to enjoy the autumn colours with easy hiking (2-3 hours)?

Can anyone point me in the direction to research the hike to Val Fex - I'm going in circles and not getting as to upto where we can take the bus and where the walking starts. (sorry if I've missed the obvious)

Thanks in advance for any help.
Ukraine military reported eight ceasefire violations by Russian-led armed groups in the Joint Forces Operation zone over the past 24 hours, September 10.

Thats according to the press center of the Joint Forces Operation HQ, Ukrinform reports.

"In the area of the settlement of Popasna, occupiers fired three times at our defenders positions, employing automatic easel-mounted grenade launchers and 120 mm mortars.

Russian mercenaries fired at our positions near Zolote-4 using large-caliber machine guns and small arms. Russian occupation forces used grenade launchers of various systems near Shyrokyne and Vodiane, the statement reads.

In addition, two Orlan-10 type enemy UAVs were spotted flying over the line of contact in Luhansk and Donetsk regions.

It is noted that Ukrainian forces returned fire to enemy shelling.

All violations by enemy troops were properly reported to the OSCE monitors.

As of 7:00 Kyiv time on September 11, Ukraine recorded two ceasefire violations by Russian occupation forces.

"In the area of Novohnativka, the enemy used 122 mm artillery systems proscribed by the Minsk agreements. Near Zolote-4, Russian occupation forces engaged the Ukrainian army positions with MANPADs, grenade launchers, and small arms," the statement said.

In one of the enemy attacks, a Ukrainian soldier sustained a gunshot wound non-compatible with life, while three other military suffered shrapnel wounds.

The three servicemen, who remain in moderate condition, are now undergoing treatment at a medical facility.

"Ukrainian military is monitoring the situation in the Joint Forces Operation zone to repel and deter armed aggression by the Russian Federation," the JFO HQ stated.

im
Ukraine can be economically attractive in various industries, including digital services.

This was stated by Deputy Minister of Economy, Trade Representative Taras Kachka who spoke at the YES Brainstorming Forum in Kyiv on Saturday, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

"In the future, well also offer digital services because they are in our portfolio and they are greater than energy resources. We profit twice as much off of digital services compared to gas transmission," Kachka said.

He also stressed Ukraine's role in ensuring food security.

In addition, Ukraine can be a partner of the United States and European countries in metallurgy, including in steel production through eco-friendly technology.

"In any sector of the economy, we have a lot to offer and discuss with the world at large. That is why Ukraine is becoming more economically attractive," Kachka said.

The trade envoy believes the application of European rules in Ukraine can help localize production of major corporations in the country.

As reported, the Ministry of Economy believes that involving the private sector in public-private partnership projects will in the coming years contribute to a significant increase in investment in various sectors of Ukraine's economy.

im
The scenarios that are being worked out at the Russian-Belarusian strategic exercises Zapad 2021 carry serious risks to Ukraine, so the government is monitoring them very closely.

Thats according to Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba who spoke at Savik Shuster's Freedom of Speech panel show on Friday, September 10, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

"As for the Zapad 2021 exercises, we must monitor them very closely. And this is exactly what our military and diplomats are doing because the scenarios that are being worked out there carry very serious risks, the minister said.

Read also: Zapad 2021 maneuvers and Anschluss 2023 without a chance to any maneuver

He stressed that in the event of the Russian takeover of Belarus, another thousand kilometers will emerge as a source of threat to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine.

The top diplomat also predicted that the implementation of all joint programs between Belarus and Russia will take more than a year.

"Even the agreements that have been reached so far, as weve calculated, I believe will take two years to harmonize legislation and five years to deploy the implementation of all these joint programs," Kuleba said.

As Ukrinform reported earlier, on September 10, Russian and Belarusian military launched a practical stage of the joint strategic exercise Zapad (West) 2021.

im
Presidents Office chief Andriy Yermak on Friday had a phone call with U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, Robin Dunnigan.

Thats according to the press service of the Presidents Office, Ukrinform reports.

Yermak greeted Dunnigan with the new appointment and wished success in her endeavor. The interlocutors exchanged views on the results of the visit of President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky to the United States and next steps to implement the agreements reached and further strengthen the strategic partnership between Ukraine and the United States. They also discussed preparations for the meeting of the renewed Strategic Partnership Commission, the report says.

The parties also discussed further cooperation in the energy sector, while Yermak stressed Russias use of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline as a weapon.

During the call, the parties touched upon the issues of corporate governance reform in Ukraine. Yermak briefed the U.S. official of the governments intention to announce in the coming days a competition for the posts of four independent members of the Supervisory Board at NJSC Naftogaz of Ukraine.

Also, Yermak shared Ukraine's views on the current state of negotiations toward a peaceful settlement in eastern Ukraine and discussed with Dunnigan the security situation along Ukraine's borders.

It is noted that Dunnigan thanked Ukraine for the effective cooperation on the evacuation from Afghanistan, including of at-risk individuals. Yermak assured the interlocutor of the countrys readiness to further coordinate efforts and cooperate on the Afghanistan issue.

As reported earlier, U.S. President Joe Biden's administration had tapped Robin Dunnigan, a career diplomat with a background in energy, to oversee policy for Central and Eastern Europe at the Department of State.

Dunnigan, who served as deputy assistant secretary for energy diplomacy in the State Department's Bureau of Energy Resources from 2014 to 2017, will help craft policy toward Ukraine, Belarus, and Moldova, as well as Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic.

She had been serving at the U.S. Embassy in Vienna for the past three years, first as deputy chief of mission and most recently as charge d'affaires to Austria.

Dunnigan was an early critic of Russian plans to lay the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline.

im
Shorok Alsulaiman, 19, loves the Estonian sea. Originally from Syria, she explains that her home town was far from the ocean.

Shorok arrived in Estonia three years ago through UNHCRs resettlement programme. At the time, Shorok and her family had stayed in Turkey for a period of three years after having been forced to flee Syria. They had never heard of Estonia.

When I first came to Estonia, everything was difficult for me, she explains. Shorok mentions the challenges of starting a new school, getting friends and starting over in a new country. Speaking in Estonian, Shorok shares that learning and speaking the language has been the key to becoming part of the community.

For World Refugee Day 2021, Shorok produced a video in which she guides the viewer through Tallinns Old Town, shows her school and shares her dream of one day studying to become a dentist.

To read more about Shoroks experiences in Estonia, see the article Refugees speak at the Opinion Festival: Estonians, lets be friends! from 2020.

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The Biden administration last month required that nursing-home workers get vaccinated but, despite pleas from advocates, has yet to extend that to people who provide home health care. (Dreamstime/TNS)
View of a dialysis machine. Delaying needed surgeries can can result in worse outcomes and higher mortality for patients across a spectrum of diseases, according to a study in the Annals of Surgery. (Andrei Malov/Dreamstime/TNS)
Dr. Stephanie Stuart, emergency room physician and chief of medical staff for Adventist Health Sonora hospital and outpatient clinics, is among the health care professionals who treat about 100 emergency patients a day. She estimates about one-third of daily emergency department patients are potential COVID-19 patients.
The death of Marjorie (Marge) Veal Smith occurred Tuesday, Sept. 14, 2021. Services will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday at the chapel of Moores Funeral Home with the Rev. Mac Enfinger officiating. Private burial will follow at Memory Hill Cemetery. Ms. Marge was a native of Washington County an
WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 10th September, 2021) The Syrian Kurds would be willing to cooperate with the American energy companies on their oil fields if the US Government granted a waiver, Syrian Democratic Council Representative in the United States and member of the Presidential Committee, Bassam Saker, told Sputnik.

When asked whether the Syrian Kurds would be interested in cooperation with US companies on oil iuf they receive a waiver from the US government, Saker said, "Of course, we will be because in our area there is pollution."

"We don't have refinery," he explained. "And because the oilfield is in bad situation."

Ex-US President Donald Trump signed the Caesar Act, which set out Washington's plan to impose sanctions on Syrian government officials as well as foreign companies that work with Damascus to help reconstruction efforts, back in December 2019.

In August of last year, former US President Donald Trump signed a deal for a US company, Delta Crescent Energy, to develop oil fields in Syrian territories in the country's northeast, which are under control of the Kurdish-led and US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces.

US Special Representative for Syria James Jeffrey then said that the United States was not involved in private oil deals made by Kurds in northeast Syria.

Damascus has said the United States is in Syria illegally and is engaged in theft of Syrian oil under the excuse of fighting the Islamic State terrorist group (banned in Russia).
Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Chaudhry Fawad Hussain has stressed that Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf government firmly believed in fundamental, democratic and constitutional rights of freedom of expression and wanted to take all stakeholders on board to create consensus on the draft of Pakistan Media Development Authority (PMDA)

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 11th Sep, 2021 ) :Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Chaudhry Fawad Hussain has stressed that Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf government firmly believed in fundamental, democratic and constitutional rights of freedom of expression and wanted to take all stakeholders on board to create consensus on the draft of Pakistan Media Development Authority (PMDA).

During a meeting with British High Commissioner to Pakistan Dr Christian Turner, the minister said that the PMDA aimed to ensure a cohesive approach to media development and efficient management besides providing one-window operation to media practitioners and the consumers.

He said that the government also wanted to streamline and ease the process for issuance of the NOC of the film in order to give boost to film industry. He clarified that no criminal section was being included in the media development authority law. He said that protection, perseverance and promotion of the democratic values of freedom of expression and right to criticism were vital for any democratic civilized society.

He told that presently seven regulatory bodies were regulating media organizations. These bodies, he said included PEMRA, Press Council of Pakistan, Pakistan Telecom Authority, Central Board of Films Censors, Press Registrar Office, Audit Bureau of Circulation and Implementation Tribunal for Newspapers Employees.

The minister said that presently media regulatory authorities were scattered and currently digital media platforms were not under any regulatory framework.

He said in the modern times television, radio and newspapers were part of the cellular mobile set and hence need a single regulatory authority. The convergence of media bodies under PDMA was essential to develop electronic, print, digital and emerging media platforms.

He said under the present mechanism of regulation over half a dozen outdated laws and set of rules were in place which did not meet the modern day requirements of converged media.

The minister said that under the existing regulatory system, redressing of public complaints takes a long time and applications for registration and grant of NOCs were not processed in time.

He said the proposed framework would address challenges and requirements for the convergent media environment as per global practices to make Pakistan a major global center for multimedia information and content services.

"We want to do away with outdated laws and bring a simple single law in line with requirements of modern age, focusing on facilitation for both the media platforms and citizens," Fawad added.

Unlike the present system which focused on policing and revenue collection, the new authority would focus on development, innovation, digital economy, training and research, information minister stressed.

He said that all present laws related to media regulation would be abolished and a new legislation finalized in consultation with stakeholders would be enacted.

He said that transparency in all processes would be ensured through the simplification of rules and procedures.

He highlighted that PMDA would have a Press Directorate, Digital Media and Film Directorate, Electronic Media Directorate, Media Complaints Council and Media Tribunal.

Fawad said that Pakistan being a democratic and pluralist society has one of the most vibrant media landscapes which has grown enormously in terms of scale and influence, disseminating news and views 24/7.

He said that there were 114 satellite television channels in Pakistan out of which 31 were news and current affairs channels. He said that there were a total of 258 FM channels in Pakistan out of which 196 were commercial and 62 non- commercial.

He told the ambassador that there were 4026 cable operators in Pakistan and 12 IPTV and 6 mobile tv channels whereas 1672 newspapers and 203 weeklies. However, over six hundred newspapers were proved to be dummies.

He said that a consultation process with the stakeholders had been started and the concept paper shared with public and private stakeholders. He said a committee headed by the Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting, Farrukh Habib had been constituted for consultation with private stakeholders. Chaudhary Fawad apprised that the committee had held meetings with APNS, CPNE, PBA and office bearers of PFUJ and Press clubs and largely there was consensus over the establishment of PMDA.

Fawad said that social media regulation was imperative as its advertising has swelled to Rs25 billion within a few years.

He said that advertising on social media was mounting and there was urgent need to regulate the money that was flowing out of Pakistan in Dollars. He underscored that PMDA was being established to bring all the rules and respective forums under one platform.

He added that Media Complaints Commission will be formed under the authority which will be an independent body. He said that a high court judge or a person eligible to become a high court judge would head the Media Tribunal.

The British High Commission suggested that all stakeholders should be taken on board before finalizing the draft of the PMDA. He said that the stakeholders should be assured that this authority was meant for facilitation and journalistic independence and the right to criticism would not be affected.

Chaudhary Fawad Hussain also hoped that British government would review its policy of retaining Pakistan on the red list as the government has removed several reservations of United Kingdom on Pakistan's Covid-19 data.
US President Joe Biden called on Americans to remember the importance of unity on the 20th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 11th September, 2021) US President Joe Biden called on Americans to remember the importance of unity on the 20th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

"20 years after September 11, 2001, we commemorate the 2,977 lives we lost and honor those who risked and gave their lives. As we saw in the days that followed, unity is our greatest strength. It's what makes us who we are  and we can't forget that," the US president tweeted.

On this day 20 years ago, 19 al-Qaeda (a terrorist organization banned in Russia) terrorists hijacked four commercial airplanes.

Two of the planes were flown into the World Trade Center towers in New York. Another plane struck the west side of the Pentagon, and yet another one crashed in Pennsylvania before reaching its presumed target.

Earlier this week, Biden designated September 11 as Patriot and National Day of Service and Remembrance and noted that on this day, all government entities should display the US flag at half-staff.
NEW DELHI (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 11th September, 2021) The foreign and defense minister of Australia and India have agreed to expand military engagement, as well as boost defense information sharing, during the 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue, Indian Minister of Defence Rajnath Singh said on Saturday.

New Delhi is hosting on Saturday the inaugural India-Australia summit between the nations' foreign and defense ministers. The agenda includes bilateral, regional and global issues of mutual interest.

"On the bilateral defence cooperation we decided to expand military engagements across services, facilitate greater defence information sharing and to work closely for mutual logistic support," the minister said in a statement.

The sides also thoroughly discussed various institutional frameworks for wide-ranging collaboration, including defense cooperation and the fight against the coronavirus pandemic, Singh said.

"We exchanged views on Afghanistan, Maritime Security in the Indo-Pacific, cooperation in multilateral formats and other related topics. During the discussions both sides emphasised the need to ensure free flow of trade, adherence to international rules and norms and sustainable economic growth in the entire region," he added.

Additionally, India invited Australian partners to engage in its growing defense industry and cooperate on co-production and co-development of defense equipment, the minister said.

The sides agreed to further maintain high-level engagements "to build a strong and robust partnership."
(@ChaudhryMAli88)

Russian President Vladimir Putin congratulated Tajik President Emomali Rahmon on the 30th anniversary of Tajikistan's independence on Thursday, noting that Moscow attaches great importance to the bilateral alliance and strategic partnership

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 09th September, 2021) Russian President Vladimir Putin congratulated Tajik President Emomali Rahmon on the 30th anniversary of Tajikistan's independence on Thursday, noting that Moscow attaches great importance to the bilateral alliance and strategic partnership.

"Your country is successfully advancing on the path of socioeconomic development, it plays a constructive role in addressing important issues on the regional and international agenda. We attach great importance to the relations of alliance and strategic partnership with Tajikistan," Putin's letter, released by the Kremlin, read.

Putin expressed confidence that Russia and Tajikistan would further boost their bilateral cooperation and interaction within international bodies such as the anniversary of Tajikistan's independence, the Collective Security Treaty Organization and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.
Three NATO soldiers have been injured as a result of an accident during the Namejs 2021 military exercises taking place at the Adazu training ground in Latvia, Kaspars Galkins, the spokesman for the Latvian Defense Ministry, said on Saturday

RIGA (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 11th September, 2021) Three NATO soldiers have been injured as a result of an accident during the Namejs 2021 military exercises taking place at the Adazu training ground in Latvia, Kaspars Galkins, the spokesman for the Latvian Defense Ministry, said on Saturday.

"Three soldiers of the allied armed forces got injuries as a result of an accident," Galkins said.

The injured were hospitalized, but one of them was released shortly after medical examination. The condition of the others is stable, the spokesman added.

Galkins did not specify the details of the incident, and did not say which country the soldiers were from.

The Namejs 2021 drills began in Latvia on August 30 and will last October 3, with 9,300 people from 17 countries.
(@ChaudhryMAli88)

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 11th September, 2021) US Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry will be visiting India on September 12-14 to bolster the country's green energy transition as well as international efforts to address the climate crisis, the State Department said in a release.

"Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry will travel to India from September 12-14, 2021 to engage with international counterparts on efforts to address the climate crisis," the release said on Friday. "Special Presidential Envoy Kerry will meet with Government of India counterparts and private sector leaders to discuss efforts to raise global climate ambition and speed India's clean energy transition.

"

The visit will become the starting point of the Climate Action and Finance Mobilization Dialogue that was announced by the US President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the climate summit in April, the release added.

Kerry's trip takes place ahead of the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) to the to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change which is slated for November in Glasgow, United Kingdom.
WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 11th September, 2021) The US drone strike against an alleged Islamic State-Khorasan (banned in Russia) target in Kabul last month killed an Afghan who worked for a US aid group, the New York Times reported citing video evidence and interviews it conducted with the individual's coworkers and relatives.

The report on Friday identified the target of the US drone strike as Zemari Ahmadi, an electrical engineer for the US non-governmental organization Nutrition and education International.

The US military may have mistakenly thought Ahmadi's vehicle contained a bomb that would be used against American troops at the Kabul international airport after he was scene loading water containers for his home. Although the US military claims only three civilians were killed in the attack, the investigation found that ten members of Ahmadi's family, including seven children, were killed in the strike.
(@ChaudhryMAli88)

US Special Envoy for the North Korea Sung Kim will be visiting Tokyo, Japan, on September 13-15 to discuss the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, the State Department said in a release on Friday

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 10th September, 2021) US Special Envoy for the North Korea Sung Kim will be visiting Tokyo, Japan, on September 13-15 to discuss the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, the State Department said in a release on Friday.

"US Special Representative for the DPRK Ambassador Sung Kim will travel to Tokyo, Japan from September 13-15, 2021," the release said. "Special Representative Kim will also meet with other senior Japanese officials to discuss cooperation on a broad range of issues, including the US commitment to the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and the immediate resolution of the abductions issue.
USM Transfer Student Overcomes Disabilities, Pursuing Dreams with Support from MS Hearing-Vision Project

Fri, 09/10/2021 - 16:58pm | By: David Tisdale

She believed she could, so she did.

Thats the motto of Wilicia Kelly McClendon, a transfer student who begins her first semester at The University of Southern Mississippi (USM) this fall, bringing with her to the Hattiesburg campus a determination that has served her well as she has overcome obstacles to pursue her dream of earning a college degree.

That goal might have been derailed if not for her own sheer will to succeed, the support of fiercely supportive parents, and the assistance of the federally supported Mississippi Hearing-Vision Project (MHVP), headquartered at USM. MHVP funding comes through the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

Wilicia parents learned that when she was a year old, she was profoundly deaf. Cochlear implants have brought some improvement to her hearing, and her ability to read lips is also an asset. Later, at age 10, it was discovered that she had vision challenges associated with night blindness and peripheral vision issues due to a condition known as RP or Retinitis pigmentosa.

The family moved to Laurel, Mississippi from New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, staying with a friend while trying to decide whether to stay in Mississippi or move back to start over in New Orleans after the storm destroyed their home. They chose to stay in Laurel, which turned out to be a blessing as Wilicia greatly benefited from services provided at USMs DuBard School for Children with Language Disorders. She went on to graduate from Laurel High School and then earned 2 degrees AAA and AAS at Jones College (Jones County Junior College). At USM, she plans to pursue a BS Degree in Early Childhood and after graduation, open her own daycare to work with deaf-blind children.

Before making it to USM, Wilicia encountered challenges throughout K-12 in the form of misunderstandings and even indifference and discrimination from some fellow students and educators who either werent aware of her disabilities and or were unwilling to accommodate her academically or in extracurricular activities. Despite these challenges, Wilicia forged ahead, with the unwavering advocacy of her mother and father.

Her parents, Wilbur and Alicia McClendon, believe that because of Wilicias unique ways, she didnt want others to know of her disabilities and be treated any different than her peers.

We feel at times she was denied opportunities due to her disabilities, Alicia McClendon said. Nonetheless, Wilicia never let that decide her fate in life.

I have been Wilicias primary advocate throughout her school years and knew what was best for her, Alicia McClendon continued. So, I tell parents that no one knows your kids better than you. Get to know their teachers, program directors and all the outside services who suggest and make decisions about your childs education, communicate with them often, get a team to stick with, emphasize solutions for your child, and focus on the importance of their future.

One of those outside services that the family engaged with during Wilicias senior year in high school were those offered through MHVP, after the Mississippi Department of Rehabilitation Services reached out to the family and introduced them to its director, Toni Hollingsworth. The project is supported through a federal grant, which has been renewed through 2023, that provides a variety of support mechanisms for educators and families of children and young adults who experience concurrent hearing and vision loss which may also include other disabilities.

MHVP support includes specialized training and technical assistance to families, administrators, educators, and service providers of children (birth to 21) who have both a hearing and visual impairment. Children and youth with varying degrees of hearing and vision losses are eligible for inclusion under this grant (very few children who qualify for services through the project are totally deaf and blind, even though the combination of both primary senses affected is referred to as deaf-blindness under IDEA). Qualified individuals may also have additional disabilities, such as cognitive, motor disabilities or/and medical conditions.

The end goal of MHVP is to strengthen each familys and educational teams efforts to ensure greater access to the educational curriculum for each individual learner, Hollingsworth said.

Services provided through MHVP include, but are not limited to, the following:

*Online deaf-blind learning modules

*Transition support and services

*Direct support for educational staff

*Team collaborations

*Professional and paraprofessional development opportunities

*Family workshops, support and networking

*Long-term support and expertise to participating families for navigating their childs educational journey

The McClendon family praised MHVP as a valuable resource that played a key part in Wilicias journey to where she is today. I believe having the Mississippi Hearing-Vision Project available in Wilicias senior year of high school was critical to her momentum in attaining not only her high school diploma, but graduating from Jones with two degrees and now making the transition to USM, Wilbur McClendon said.

USM has always been Wilicias dream college since she attended DuBard School for Language Disorders. Now Im living my dream as I start my first semester as a Golden Eagle, she said.

Hollingsworth believes Wilicias success story is still unfolding. Wilicia has already achieved great things, and now that she is at USM, I know she will continue to soar like an eagle, she said.
Pope Francis meets with the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, and discusses the plight of people who have fled Afghanistan.

By Vatican News staff reporter

The Holy See Press Office announced on Saturday that the Pope met with Mr. Charles Michel that same morning in the Apostolic Palace.

A press statement said the President of the European Council and Pope Francis engaged in cordial dialogue which touched on several regional and international items of interest.

The two men paid particular attention to the situation of Afghan refugees who have fled in the wake of the Taliban takeover of the country last month.

Pope Francis and Mr. Michel also spoke about the challenges facing Europe, in reference to the ongoing Conference on the Future of Europe.

Mr. Michel then met separately with Cardinal Secretary of State Pietro Parolin and Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher, Secretary for Relations with States.

According to its website, the European Council defines the European Unions overall political direction and priorities by identifying issues of concern and actions to take.

The Council is made up of the heads of state or government of the EUs 27 member states, as well as the President of the European Commission.
Astrologer NANCY BLACK continues her mother Linda Black's legacy horoscopes column. She welcomes comments and questions on Twitter, @LindaCBlack. For more astrological interpretations, visit Linda Black Astrology go to www.nancyblack.com.

(c)2016 bY NANCY BLACK. DISTRIBUTED BY TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
ELIZABETH URBAN is News Editor for The Vidette. Urban can be contacted at emurba1@ilstu.edu. Follow Urban on Twitter at @eliizabethurban.

IF YOU SUPPORT THE VIDETTE MISSION of providing a training laboratory for Illinois State University student journalists to learn and sharpen viable, valuable and marketable skills in all phases of digital media, please contribute to this most important cause. Thank you.
A recent poll by The Washington Post and ABC shows that a majority of unvaccinated Americans will resign from their jobs if employers make COVID-19 vaccines mandatory. Seventy percent of respondents who are not self-employed would quit work if they were not granted a religious or medical exemption. The poll was conducted on Aug. 29 with the participation of 1,006 adults.

Fifty-two percent supported businesses mandating vaccination for employees. Eight in 10 Democrats agreed to such a requirement, while six in 10 Republicans strongly opposed it. Independents were split almost equally on the issue. Only two in 10 Americans said that their employers want workers to get the jab.

Among workers whose employer lacks a mandate, about 3 in 10 are unvaccinated. Asked what they would likely do if their employer imposed a mandate, 16 percent of that group say they would get vaccinated while 35 percent would ask for a medical or religious exemption and 42 percent would quit. If no exemption was given, 72 percent of unvaccinated workers say they would quit their job rather than get vaccinated, states The Washington Post.

Vaccination mandates are likely to become a major flashpoint as businesses and governments seek to impose these measures on the public. Such mandates are largely fueled by the FDA granting full approval to Pfizers Comirnaty vaccine last month.

However, nonprofit Liberty Counsel points out that the existing Pfizer vaccines remain under Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) while there are no supplies for the approved Pfizer Comirnaty vaccine. This might cause confusion, forcing employees to inject themselves with a EUA vaccine thinking that it is an approved one. The group also points out that even if employers implement vaccine mandates of the approved Comirnaty vaccine, workers can still refuse it.

Despite whether these COVID shots are licensed or not, they cannot be mandatory under Title VII. In general, employee vaccine religious exemption requests must be accommodated, where a reasonable accommodation exists without undue hardship to the employer, pursuant to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, says Liberty Counsel. Title VII protections are also applicable to nonreligious beliefs related to ideas of life, purpose, death, and morality.

Vaccine mandates

Among companies that are mandating vaccines for employees is United Airlines that issued the requirement last month. The company insisted that its 67,000 person workforce should be vaccinated by this fall while stating that it would consider exemptions in some cases. United has warned that if an employees request for an exemption on the basis of religion is denied, they should be vaccinated within five weeks of receiving the denial notice. Failing that, they will be expelled.

Delta Airlines has slapped a $200 surcharge on the healthcare premiums of unvaccinated workers. Alaska Airlines, Delta Airlines, and American Airlines have announced that they will end pay protections for employees who contract COVID-19 in cases where they are not vaccinated.

The Henry Ford Health System (HFHS) in Detroit mandated healthcare workers to get vaccinated by Sept. 10. Those who do not comply will be suspended and given time until Oct. 1 to get inoculated.

Fifty-one employees have banded together and filed a lawsuit against HFHS. They argue that the mandate violated their right to bodily autonomy and their right to reject medical treatments as interpreted under the 14th Amendment. The lawsuit also cites data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) to say that 13,627 deaths have occurred in the U.S. as a result of COVID-19 vaccines.

In Oregon, a coalition of firefighters and police officers have sued Governor Kate Brown due to a COVID-19 vaccine mandate issued for state employees. In Arizona, Attorney General Mark Brnovich has warned the Tucson government that its vaccine mandate for city employees is unconstitutional.

The legislatures intent was clear when it passed S.B. 1824 earlier this year  government entities from the local to state level cannot mandate COVID-19 vaccines. This law was further supplemented by the Governors Executive Order 2021-18 (E.O. 2021-18) in August 2021. In the AGOs opinion, Tucson public employees could rely in good faith on E.O. 2021-18 and state law to refuse the citys COVID-19 vaccine mandate, a press release from Brnovich stated.

Jim Rickards is the author of The New Great Depression: Winners and Losers in a Post-Pandemic World. In an interview with The Epoch Times, he warned that vaccine mandates would create a two-tier system in the United States. He said that such mandates are a monomaniacal drive to force every American to get vaccinated.

If you want to participate in society, whether its going to school, dining out, social life, sports, whatever, you have to be vaccinated. If youre not vaccinated, youre going to be, in effect, in the basement. Youre going to be crammed down in the basement. Youll be treated like a leper, Rickards said.
Zimbabwean Den Moyo, who lives in Virginia, says the world was shocked by the terrorist attack in USA on September 11, 2001, which was done by Bin Laden's Al-Qaeda. Moyo says there are fears that some terrorist groups may attack America in the near future.
President Joe Biden is commemorating the 20th anniversary of September 11, 2001, on Saturday with three somber, silent events as he visits the three sites of the worst terrorist attack in modern history.



Biden, along with first lady Jill Biden, is attending ceremonies at the places where four planes and 19 hijackers started Americas 20-year involvement in Afghanistan. His first stop, in New York City, comes amid beefed-up security, city and state officials said, though Mayor Bill de Blasio stressed that there are no specific and credible threats against New York.



In prerecorded comments, Biden used the grave occasion to again call for unity in an increasingly divided America.



Unity is what makes us who we are, he said. America at its best  to me, that's the central lesson of September 11th  is that, at our most vulnerable, in the push and pull of all that makes us human, in the battle for the soul of America, unity is our greatest strength. Unity doesn't mean we have to believe the same thing. We must have a fundamental respect and faith in each other and in this nation.



He began his day in New York City, at the site of the World Trade Center, where two planes crashed into the north and south towers on that sunny September morning two decades ago.



He was joined Saturday morning by former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, former Secretary of State Hilary Clinton and former first lady Michelle Obama, along with senior officials.

Biden will then pay his respects at a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where passengers revolted against the planes hijackers as they attempted to divert the flight to its intended target, the U.S. Capitol.



Vice President Kamala Harris started her commemorations Saturday morning in Shanksville , alongside former President George W. Bush and former first lady Laura Bush.



In the afternoon, Biden will lay a wreath at the Pentagon, the other government target hit by hijackers.



In New York, where the greatest number of people were killed, Mayor de Blasio said this anniversary hits close for many New Yorkers.



We lost so many people, it's personal for us, he said Friday in an event with Governor Kathy Hochul. And 20 years later, we feel it just as sharply, which is why we are resolved, we say never again. We're resolved to ensure that terrorists never can perpetrate such an act in this city again, which is why in the months and years after 9/11, this city took it upon ourselves to protect ourselves and build up an extraordinary counterterrorism capacity.

People visit the 9/11 Memorial during ceremonies to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Sept. 11, 2021 in New York City.

Biden, known for his empathy, highlighted that resolve in his remarks Friday.



On this day, Jill and I hold you close in our hearts and send you our love, he said. For people around the world that you'll never know, who are suffering through their own losses, who see you, your courage  your courage gives them courage that they too can get up and keep going. We hope that 20 years later, the memory of your beloved brings a smile to your lips even while still bringing a tear to your eye.



But underlying Bidens messages of love and unity also was a somber reminder of his administrations uncompromising stance on those who seek to strike the United States. The unity that arose after the event, he said, also showed a steely resolve.



Unity and resilience, the capacity to recover and repair in the face of trauma, unity in service, the 9/11 generation stepping up to serve and protect in the face of terror to get those terrorists who are responsible, to show everyone seeking to do harm to America that we will hunt you down and we will make you pay, he said. That will never stop: today or tomorrow, ever from protecting America.



The president also drew a subtle numerical line, delivering his sympathies to the families of the 2,977 people from more than 90 nations killed on September 11th, 2001, in New York City, Arlington, Virginia, and Shanksville, Pennsylvania.



That was echoed in the New York event, which started at 8:46 a.m. local time with the ringing of a bell to mark the time the first plane hit the North Tower. Family members read names of the victims.



Of the 2,996 people who died on September 11, 2001, 19 were hijackers. By omitting any reference to the 19 hijackers in his comments, Biden communicated  silently  that these killers will have no memorial, no moment, and no forgiveness.
Malawi's high court has found a businessman guilty of attempting to bribe Constitutional Court judges who were ruling on the disputed 2019 presidential election.

Thomson Mpinganjira, who owns a commercial bank in Malawi, was arrested in January 2020 by the Anti-Corruption Bureau, or ACB, after the High Court's chief justice, Andrew Nyirenda, reported he had attempted to bribe the judges.

Mpinganjira was accused of offering judges an unspecified amount of money so that a court case over the disputed 2019 presidential election would end in favor of then-president Peter Mutharika.

Mpinganjira had pleaded not guilty to six bribery-related charges. But High Court Judge Dorothy DeGabriele, in her judgment Friday, said the court proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Mpinganjira wanted to bribe the five judges.

"The court found the accused person under count 1 and 2 for offering an advantage to Justice [Healey] Potani and Justice [Michael] Tembo who were public officers and for the benefit of that advantage to be shared amongst the judges, to induce the judges to make a decision in favor of the respondent. The accused person is hereby convicted accordingly," DeGabriele said.

Mpinganjira's lawyer, Tamando Chokotho, asked the court to consider giving his client noncustodial punishment, saying his client is a first offender and a responsible man.

Reyneck Matemba, Malawi's solicitor general, dismissed calls for the noncustodial sentence, saying the convict needs a maximum prison term to serve as a lesson to potential offenders.

"What the convict wanted to do, the offense which he has committed, is a very serious offense," Matemba said. "He wanted to defeat the course of justice in one of the most high-profile cases in this country, ever."

Following the conviction, DeGabriele revoked Mpinganjira's bail and remanded him to Chichiri Prison in Blantyre, where he will await his sentencing.


(The Center Square)  Theres at least one confirmed case of the measles and nearly two dozen confirmed cases of the coronavirus among Afghan refugees at Fort McCoy.

The forts spokeswoman, Cheryl Phillips, on Thursday told The Chippewa Herald they identified a case of the measles last Saturday.

"Since the identification of the case, no other guests have been diagnosed with measles," Phillips told the paper. "The rapid response at Fort McCoy reflects careful preparation and strong interagency collaboration aimed at meeting the needs of our guests, including the management of infectious disease."

The Wisconsin Department of Health Services referred The Center Squares questions about the measles case, as well as questions about coronavirus vaccinations to Gov. Tony Evers office.

DHS has said in the past, however, that it is providing the coronavirus vaccine as well as other critical immunizations'' to the refugees currently staying at Fort McCoy. At last count, Phillips said there were fewer than two dozen confirmed coronavirus cases.

Phillips said anyone who has tested positive for either the coronavirus or the measles is being isolated and quarantined.

But so too are the people who were exposed to both. Phillips did not have a count as to just how many of those people are in quarantine.

The confirmation of the measles case came the same day as word from the Wisconsin National Guard as to just how many refugees are coming to the state.

Commanders on Thursday said 90 planes full of refugees have arrived at Wisconsins Volk Field, and were then transferred to Fort McCoy. The National Guard says Fort McCoy is ready to handle as many as 13,000 refugees as part of what they are calling Operation Allies Welcome.
Taliban have pledged to ban from their country any group that uses its soil to carry out hostile actions against a third country, including the United States, China or Russia.

In an interview with the Global Times, Taliban spokesperson, Suhail Shaheen, confirmed that members of the Islamic Movement in East Turkestan have already been ordered to leave Afghanistan.

This movement, also known as the Turkestan Islamic Party, has claimed responsibility for several hundred terrorist attacks in China over the past 30 years. It intends to establish an Islamic Emirate in Xinjiang. The exact size of its membership is unknown, but it controls the enclave of al-Zanbaki in Syria, (Idlib governorate), which has become a Chinese city. This group is now protected by the CIA and armed by Turkey.

China provided $ 31 million in aid to Afghanistan on 8 September 2021.
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey said Friday she and her fellow Republican governors are united in fighting back against Covid-19 vaccination mandates from President Joe Biden.

Here in Alabama, we dont put up with that nonsense, Ivey said in a statement released after a call with her other governors.

Biden on Thursday announced sweeping new federal vaccine requirements that all employers with more than 100 workers require them to be vaccinated or test for the virus weekly. Biden has also signed an executive order requiring vaccination for all employees of the executive branch and contractors who do business with the federal government. No testing opt-out is expected to be included for the executive branch requirement. (Read more HERE and HERE)

On Thursday, Ivey referred to those plans as outrageous, overreaching mandates and continued her call for all Alabamians who are able to get a Covid-19 vaccine. (See that full statement HERE)

The Associated Press reported Friday that Biden called some Republican governors cavalier for resisting his new federal vaccine requirements.

Biden also pushed back against Republicans, and some union officials, who have charged that he is overreaching his authority. Asked about potential legal challenges to the new vaccine requirements, Biden responded, Have at it, according to the APs report.

Heres Iveys full statement from Friday:

A conference call with Republican governors just wrapped up. President Biden has overreached with these new mandates, and were united in fighting back. Im partnering alongside my conservative colleagues across the country in this fight. This is a fight for businesses, our hardworking men and women, and our American liberties.

I encourage Alabamians to take the vaccine  have been since the beginning, but were never going to mandate it. And we certainly arent going to allow Washington, D.C. and this president to tell Alabama what to do. Here in Alabama, we dont put up with that nonsense.
As the US averages more than 1,000 Covid-19 deaths daily, not getting vaccinated is akin to driving while intoxicated, one health expert said Friday.

"We need to start talking about the choice to remain unvaccinated as the choice to go out and drive intoxicated," CNN Medical Analyst Dr. Leana Wen told CNN's Wolf Blitzer.

Wen's remarks come after the Biden administration announced Thursday a Covid-19 vaccine mandate plan that directs the US Labor Department to require all businesses with 100 employees or more to ensure their workers are either vaccinated or tested once a week. President Joe Biden also signed an executive order requiring all government employees to get their Covid-19 vaccine shots, with no option for regular testing to opt out.

And while some Republican officials have criticized his move as overreaching, health experts say the President should have implemented stricter measures to curb the recent surge of Covid-19 cases.

"From a public health perspective, it is not overreach at all. And in fact, I wish that they came out earlier and went even further," Wen said. "We're in the middle of the biggest public health crisis of our lifetimes. We have more than a thousand Americans who are dying every single day. We, as a society, set laws that protect people's health and well-being all the time."

An average of 1,110 people died in the US from Covid-19 each day over the last week, data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed on Thursday. The rate of deaths since late August is the highest it has been since early March.

While 73.5% of those ages 12 and up have been vaccinated with at least one dose, tens of millions of eligible recipients remain unvaccinated as the highly contagious coronavirus Delta variant continues to grip pockets of the country. Around 62% of the same age group is fully vaccinated as of Friday.

"The vast minority of Americans are resistant to vaccination, but that's where the virus has been circulating," CNN Medical Analyst Jonathan Reiner told CNN's Don Lemon on Friday. "We live in a country that has rules. You can't smoke in most buildings in the United States, and you can't drive drunk. You can't smoke on planes. And you can't blow virus into my face.

"That's how it has to be in this country. And if you're going to be a persistent threat to the public health by refusing to get vaccinated, well your actions have consequences, and the consequences may be you can't work at your job."

An August poll from Gallup showed that 56% of Americans favor vaccine requirements at work while 53% support them for restaurant dining and 61% approve of them for air travel.

And as for those who have not yet gotten their shots, it's not too late to convince them, former US Surgeon General Dr. Jerome Adams said Friday.

"We need to remember that most of these people are not what I call 'vaccine-resistant' -- some people say 'anti-vax,' I find that term pejorative," Adams told CNN's John Berman. "Most of these people are in the movable middle. They're vaccine-hesitant.

"I found that when I talk to them with compassion and with empathy, I can convince a lot of them over time to get their vaccination."

Health care systems strained

Six US states saw at least a 10% increase in new Covid-19 cases in the past week compared to the week before, data from Johns Hopkins University showed Friday, while the other states didn't see a change or experienced a decline in cases altogether.

Alabama, one of the states that saw the recent drop in new cases, is now facing a shortage of 60 intensive care unit beds -- an uptick of 20 from last Friday, the state's Health Officer Dr. Scott Harris said.

That's 60 patients "who are receiving critical care because they're chronically ill, and yet they don't have an ICU bed," Harris said Friday.

"They're being cared for in an emergency department or a ward bed that's been converted to an ICU room or on a gurney in the hallway," Harris said.

Alabama on Thursday reported 2,667 Covid-19 hospitalizations and 53 deaths, he added.

In West Virginia, 252 Covid-19 patients are in ICUs and another 141 are on ventilators, marking the most people hospitalized with the disease since the pandemic began, Gov. Jim Justice said Friday.

"A high percentage of the folks in the hospitals are unvaccinated," Justice said. "We lost another 38 people since Wednesday. We're going to continue to lose people in this surge without any questions," he said.

Minnesota health officials linked at least 69 Covid-19 cases to the State Fair, according to a statement obtained from the state's health department by CNN affiliate WCCO. The Minnesota State Fair's website says the event ran from August 25 through September 5 in Falcon Heights.

Heated debate over mask mandates

Meanwhile, the debate over mask mandates remains heated in many states, especially when it comes to schools.

In Kentucky, schools will have the choice of whether they will mandate masks, after the General Assembly overrode the governor's partial veto on that portion of a bill pertaining to Covid-19 provisions in schools, officials say.

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear vetoed the part of the SB1 bill that would eliminate the mask mandate for K-12 schools and leave it up to school districts to decide if masking is necessary, he said at a media gaggle on Friday.

Beshear said that the Senate's recent rejection of a statewide school mask mandate is the wrong choice -- and one that will reap harmful results.

"Mask requirement for schools is not only the right thing to do for our young people, especially those who are too young to even get vaccinated," Beshear said. "It's our best way to keep our children learning in the classroom."

Meanwhile in Mississippi, Gov. Tate Reeves said Thursday that Biden's vaccine mandate plan is unconstitutional.

"A member of the executive branch of government does not have the authority to mandate something such as this," Reeves said.

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Salesforce announced that it will assist its employees and their families if they want to leave Texas after the state passed the nation's most restrictive abortion law.

In a Slack message obtained by CNBC, the cloud computing company told its 56,000 employees that they "stand with all of our women at Salesforce and everywhere."

"With that being said, if you have concerns about access to reproductive healthcare in your state, Salesforce will help relocate you and members of your immediate family," the Slack message said.

Salesforce took no position on Senate Bill 8 in the statement. The company has 16 locations in the US, including one in Dallas.

The Texas law, which prohibits abortion providers from conducting abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected, essentially bans the procedure as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. (Under current federal law, the procedure is legal but many states have restrictions such as waiting periods or a ban after a woman has been pregnant for 20 weeks.)

The law took effect on September 1 after the Supreme Court and federal appeals court declined to rule on attempts to block. It effectively outlaws at least 85% of abortions sought in the state, according to opponents. It also punishes anyone, not just medical providers, who "aids or abets" a restricted abortion. That would include healthcare providers, family and friends, or anyone who transports a person to or from an abortion clinic.

The Justice Department filed a lawsuit against Texas over the abortion law Thursday.

On Friday night, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff tweeted, "Ohana if you want to move we'll help you exit TX. Your choice."

Benioff and Salesforce have long championed social causes and corporate responsibility.

The company Salesforce acquired Slack in December for more than $27 billion. Shares have since risen more than 6%.

"Business is the best platform for change. My role is to help CEOs see they can change," Benioff said in an interview with CNN Business in December.

This is not the company's first time criticizing a controversial state law. Salesforce was an early corporate voice against sweeping election bills in Georgia, which critics said was clear voter suppression. Atlanta is home to Salesforce Towers, the company's regional headquarters, which has 1,300 employees.

"A person's right to cast their ballot is the foundation of our democracy," Salesforce tweeted in March after Georgia's House of Representatives passed a bill that called for voter ID, less time to request absentee ballots, sharply limited access to early voting and even clarified that no one can offer water to voters waiting in line.

"Georgia H.B. 531 would limit trustworthy, safe & equal access to voting by restricting early voting & eliminating provisional ballots. That's why Salesforce opposes H.B. 531 as it stands," the company said.

While corporate America has taken public stances on last summer's racial justice protests and the restrictive voting laws filed or enacted in different states, corporate America has largely stayed silent on the Texas abortion law.

Exceptions include privately held Bumble and the Match Group CEO which both announced last week they were creating relief funds for people affected by the Texas abortion law.

"Bumble is women-founded and women-led, and from day one we've stood up for the most vulnerable. We'll keep fighting against regressive laws like #SB8," the company said on Twitter.

And Lyft CEO Logan Green tweeted that his company created a legal defense fund to cover legal fees for any of its drivers who are sued under SB8. Uber then followed. The law's broad wording could make drivers liable for helping someone receive a restricted abortion by transporting them, even unknowingly.

No major company has announced it is leaving Texas. Big Texas-based corporations such as Hewlett Packard in Houston publicly came out against the state's restrictive new voting law, which went into September 7.

Other cities are capitalizing on the state's controversial new laws. The city of Chicago will run a full-page ad in Sunday's edition of The Dallas Morning News listing reasons why the Windy City is "a great place for business." That ad references voting, abortion and Covid-19, all major political issues in Texas.

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Two big updates on COVID-19 in Alabama.

One, Alabama continues to have more hospitalized patients than ICU beds available, and two, the state is getting some help with a treatment aimed at keeping people out of the hospital.

A nurse prepares a Covid vaccine shot A nurse prepares a Covid vaccine shot

The state's health officer, Dr. Scott Harris, on Friday said Alabama already has more than 200 providers who can give the monoclonal antibody infusion.

There has been talk that there may not be enough, but Alabama is getting a hefty supply.

Many hospitals are being inundated with patients sick with COVID who are not vaccinated.

Dr. Harris says he knows the monoclonal treatment will keep people out of the hospital, but wanted to shut down any rumors that Alabama will struggle when it comes to supply.

"There's no shortage of monoclonal antibody products. However, the states that are ordering a lot of them are going to see their orders reduced somewhat. It's effectively like a shortage, even though it's not a shortage. I think they're trying to make sure there's not products still on the shelves that hasn't been used," he said.

He said the state is getting 70 percent of what was requested.

He didn't specify an exact number but says it's enough until demand skyrockets.

Dr. Harris says the only way we'll end this pandemic is if we mask up and get the vaccine.

Doctors and state leaders are continuously begging people to come in crowds to get vaccinated.

Dr. Harris says Alabama is looking a little hopeful with the numbers trending upward in terms of people getting vaccinated, but we still need more.

He says many people are opting to just trust the human body to adapt and that will not happen with COVID.

He says the more people who refuse to get vaccinated, the more the virus will mutate.

Many facilities in the Huntsville Hospital network can't take any more patients and can't send them elsewhere because of how full everyone is.

Now, Dr. Harris has a stark message for those who think they'll naturally beat this COVID virus.

"Please don't go for natural immunity because overall, in terms of all of our overall numbers, about 2 percent of those people are going to die. So, the rate of re-infections of death is just under 1 percent, but that only applies to the people that didn't die the first time around," he said.

Vaccines are free and readily available and you can look on the state's website if you need help finding one.

Dr. Harris says if more people do not get vaccinated now, we're looking at a dangerous place in terms of the major holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas.
A Marshall County teenager was killed late Thursday in a single-vehicle crash.

The teen, from Horton, was fatally injured when the 2006 Chevy Cobalt he was driving ran off the roadway, struck a culvert, and overturned, according to the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency.

He was pronounced dead at the scene, troopers said. ALEA has not released his name or age.

The crash took place about 8:55 p.m. Thursday on Nixon Chapel Road near Bean Street, about 12 miles southwest of Albertville.

A passenger in the vehicle was injured and taken to a hospital for treatment.

Troopers said neither were wearing seat belts.
Project Say Something in the Shoals has filed an amicus brief stating why it believes the Confederate monument at the Lauderdale County Courthouse should be moved.

Three Lauderdale County residents filed an injunction against the city of Florence to stop the monument from being moved.

Florence and Lauderdale County Confederate monument Florence and Lauderdale County Confederate monument

Project Say Something is not named in that lawsuit, but since it's something they are fighting to have moved they wanted their voices to be heard by the courts.

Project Say Something Founder Camille Bennett said lawsuits like the one filed by the three citizens just hinder their efforts to have the monument relocated by tying everything up in red tape. She said they feel hopeful this is the first step of many to legally challenge Alabama's laws on monuments.

"We're hopeful that the injunction will be dismissed and that we can then get the city to move their monument like they promised they'd do but if not, we will take it as far as we need to take it and even go as far as challenging the memorial preservation act," said Bennett.

The lawsuit has been continued several times. So it's unclear when the monument issue would go before a judge.

Bennett said it does give them hope the monument can be removed after seeing several cities and counties, including Huntsville, remove a Confederate monument at the Madison County Courthouse.
President Biden's new COVID-19 vaccine order is causing tension between both the Democratic and Republican parties.

WAAY 31 spoke with state officials from both sides about this and learned their stance on the President's executive action.

State leaders react to new vaccine mandate State leaders react to new vaccine mandate

State Representatives Mike Ball (R) and Anthony Daniels (D) agree that President Biden's new vaccine requirement goes beyond the division between political parties. They said it's heading into an individual's rights. However, they view it on opposite sides of the spectrum.

President Biden's executive order will require all federal employees and their contractors to receive a COVID-19 vaccine. As well as requiring businesses with 100 or more workers to enforce their employees to get vaccinated or get a weekly COVID test.

Ball said he views this order as President Biden overstepping his executive powers by enforcing vaccinations.

The only way to have successful policies is to change hearts and minds first," Ball said. "Forcing somebody to do that doesnt change hearts and minds, it creates push back, it creates resistance, and it increases fear and anxiety.

Daniels said he views it as President Biden giving our country a way out of this pandemic.

What do we say to the thousands of, you know, all the children that are on ventilators, and the lives that have been lost in this, and its easy for us to really defeat this virus," Daniels said. "Just get vaccinated, for those that can. There are some who have health conditions where they are unable to get vaccinated, but at the end of the day, weve got to put this behind us.

Alabama Republican leaders are ready to fight the President's new executive order and take legal action.

Republican leaders, like Chairman of the Alabama GOP, John Wahl, have stated they believe people should choose to get vaccinated. Wahl said he believes it should be an individual's choice; Wahl believes the executive order is taking away a federal employee's choice.

Daniels and Wahl agree that the vaccine requirement shouldn't be viewed as one political party against another.

We made this thing too political, and it shouldnt be a political tool," Daniels said. "It should be something that we all stand up and say, Heres what we have to do, to move forward as a state, as a community, as a country, and hey, were going to make the sacrifices that its going to take for us to get to that point so that were able to defeat this common enemy of COVID-19.

I actually dont see this as a Republican or Democratic issue, I see this as a fundamental American issue, protecting the rights and the freedoms of American citizens, and their right to make their own health decisions," Wahl said. "I think this is not just Republicans. It is Republicans and Democrats who are concerned about this.

Federal employees will have about 75 days to get vaccinated.
As we commemorate the 20th anniversary of the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, ABC News compiled these reminders about what happened that day, as well as in the years since.

FAST FACTS

19 hijackers took over four planes.

Three sites hit: The South and North towers of the World Trade Center, The Pentagon, a field in Shanksville, PA

102 minutes: Total time of the major events at the World Trade Center-- the time from the first crash into The North Tower, to the second crash into the South Tower, to the collapse of the South Tower, to the collapse of the North Tower.

As of 2021, the remains of 1,106 individuals killed that day in New York City have still yet to be identified, according to the New York City Office of Chief Medical Examiner.

FLIGHT NUMBERS AND TARGETS

American Airlines Flight 11: Crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center

AA 11 was scheduled as a nonstop flight from Boston to Los Angeles before it was hijacked and crashed into the World Trade Center at 8:46am, according to the 9/11 Commission Report. The second plane hit shortly after.

United Airlines Flight 175: Crashed into the South Tower of the World Trade Center

UA 175 had been scheduled as a nonstop flight from Boston to Los Angeles before it was hijacked and crashed into the South Tower of the World Trade Center at 9:03am, according to the 9/11 Commision Report. The first plane had hit the towers just under 20 minutes earlier.

American Airlines Flight 77: Crashed into Pentagon

AA 77 had been scheduled as a nonstop flight from Washington D.C. to Los Angeles. AA77 was hijacked just before 9am, according to the 9/11 commission report, and crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37am.

United Airlines Flight 93: Crashed in field in Shanksville, PA

UA 93 had been scheduled as a nonstop flight from Newark to San Francisco. The plane was likely hijacked at 9:28am, according to the 9/11 Commission Report, and passengers began to revolt at 9:57 am before it ultimately crashed at 10:03am.

9/11 MEMORIAL OFFICIAL TIMELINE

5:45 a.m. - Hijackers pass through security in Portland, Maine, and board a flight to Boston, where they connect to American Airlines Flight 11.

6:00 a.m. - Polling stations open, as September 11 was a primary election day in New York City.

7:59 a.m. - Flight 11 takes off from Boston for Los Angeles. Eleven crew members, 76 passengers, and five hijackers are on board.

8:15 a.m. - Flight 175 takes off from Boston for Los Angeles. Nine crew members, 51 passengers, and five hijackers are on board.

8:19 a.m. - Flight 11 crew members alert ground personnel that a hijacking is underway. Shortly before, one hijacker stabbed a passenger, Daniel Lewin, who was seated in front of him. Officials speculate that Lewin may have tried to stop the hijackers and was likely the first victim of the attacks.

8:20 a.m. - American Airlines Flight 77, en route to Los Angeles, takes off from Washington, D.C. Six crew members, 53 passengers, and five hijackers are on board.

8:24 a.m. - Attempting to communicate with passengers, a hijacker contacts air traffic control, unwittingly alerting controllers to the attacks.

8:37 a.m. - Boston air traffic control alerts the military. Air National Guard jets in Massachusetts are mobilized to follow Flight 11.

8:42 a.m. San Francisco-bound United Airlines Flight 93 takes off at Newark following a delay. Seven crew members, 33 passengers, and four hijackers are on board.

8:46 a.m. - Flight 11 crashes into floors 93 through 99 of the North Tower.

8:50 a.m. - President George W. Bush is alerted. His advisors assume this is a tragic accident.

8:55 a.m. - The South Tower is declared secure.

8:59 a.m. - Port Authority police order the evacuation of both towers. A minute later, the order is expanded to the entire World Trade Center complex.

9:00 a.m. - A flight attendant aboard Flight 175 alerts air traffic control that a hijacking is underway.

9:03 a.m. - Flight 175 crashes into floors 77 through 85 of the South Tower.

9:05 a.m. - President Bush learns that a second plane has crashed into the World Trade Center. Twenty-five minutes later, he addresses Americans, saying that "terrorism against our nation will not stand."

9:05 a.m. - Flight 77 passenger Barbara Olson calls her husband, U.S. Solicitor General Theodore Olson, who alerts other federal officials of the hijacking.

9:36 a.m. - Secret Service agents evacuate Vice President Dick Cheney to the Presidential Emergency Operations Center beneath the White House.

9:37 a.m. - American Airlines Flight 77 crashes into the Pentagon. The crash and fire kill 59 on the plane and 125 on the ground.

9:42 a.m. - The FAA grounds all flights.

9:45 a.m. - The White House and U.S. Capitol are evacuated.

9:59 a.m. - The South Tower collapses in 10 seconds after burning for 56 minutes. More than 800 people in and around the building are killed.

10:03 a.m. - United Airlines Flight 93 crashes near Shanksville, Pennsylvania after passengers and crew storm the cockpit. Forty people on board, excluding the hijackers, perish.

10:15 a.m. - The Pentagon's outer ring collapses.

10:28 a.m. - The North Tower collapses after burning for 102 minutes. More than 1,600 in and around the building are killed.

11:02 a.m. - New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani orders the evacuation of Lower Manhattan.

12:16 p.m. - The last flight still in the air above the continental United States lands.

12:30 p.m. - A group of 14 survivors emerge from a North Tower stairwell.

3:00 p.m. - A survivor, Pasquale Buzzelli, is rescued from the rubble of the North Tower.

5:20 p.m. - After burning for hours, 7 World Trade Center collapses. There are no casualties.

8:30 p.m. - President Bush addresses the nation from the White House, assuring Americans that a search is underway for "those who are behind these evil acts."

10:30 p.m. - Rescuers locate and extract two PAPD officers injured but alive in debris of the World Trade Center.

DEATHS

THE DAY OF THE ATTACK: 2,977 total deaths occurred on the day of Sept. 11, 2001, according to the 9/11 Memorial and Museum. They occurred in three locations: New York City, Washington D.C., and Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Breakdown of each:

NEW YORK CITY:

2,753 KILLED AT THE SITE OF THE WORLD TRADE CENTER

According to the NYC Medical Examiner's office, 2,753 individuals were killed at the WTC on September 11th. As of 2021, the remains of 1,647 (60%) of those individuals have been identified, according to the office. The remains of 1,106 individuals (40%) remain unidentified.

Those killed at the WTC that day included, but are not limited to:

441 FIRST RESPONDERS.

Among the nearly 3,000 killed that day are 441 first responders who rushed to the site to save others, according to the 9/11 Memorial. They include, but are not limited to:

 23 New York Police Department Officers, according to the NYPD

 343 New York City Firefighters, according to the NYFD

 37 Police Officers from the Port Authority of New Jersey, according to PANJ

92 PASSENGERS AND CREW MEMBERS ON AMERICAN AIRLINES FLIGHT 11

All 11 crew members and 81 passengers, including 5 hijackers, on American Airlines Flight 11 were killed when it crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center.

65 PASSENGERS AND CREW MEMBERS ON UNITED AIRLINES FLIGHT 175

All 9 crew members and 56 passengers, including five hijackers, were killed on United Airlines Flight 175 when it crashed into the South Tower of the World Trade Center, according to the commission report.

WASHINGTON D.C.:

184 KILLED AT PENTAGON

184 individuals were killed at the Pentagon, according to the memorial, including the 64 individuals on the plane that crashed into the building.

PENNSYLVANIA:

40 KILLED IN SHANKSVILLE CRASH

All 40 passengers and crew members, as well as four hijackers, were killed when United Airlines Flight 93 crashed into the field in Shanksville, PA.

SINCE THE DAY OF THE ATTACKS, thousands of individuals-- including first responders and survivors- have died from illness contracted from the terror sites. They include, but are not limited to:

2,833 FIRST RESPONDERS AND SURVIVORS WHO HAVE DIED DUE TO CANCER OR AERODIGESTIVES, ACCORDING TO THE CDC

At least 2,833 first responders and survivors have passed from illnesses related to the site, according to the CDC's World Trade Center Health Program-- the majority of them first responders. According to the program, 1,167 first responders have died from Aerodigestives1 and 1,105 from cancer. An additional 302 survivors have died from aerodigestives, according to the program, and 305 from cancer.

241 NEW YORK POLICE DEPARTMENT OFFICERS KILLED FROM ILLNESSES AS OF 2019

ABC News has previously reported that, as of 2019, 241 members of the NYPD died of 9/11-related illnesses -- compared to the 23 killed in the attack on the World Trade Center. The most common killer has been cancer, but new research suggests that cardiovascular disease is markedly higher in responders who were first on the scene as well as those who spent protracted periods of time on the pile.

MORE THAN 250 NEW YORK CITY FIRE DEPARTMENT FIREMAN KILLED FROM ILLNESS AS OF 2021

More than 250 firefights have died since in the 20 years since 9/11, according to the latest snapshot of FDNY health released this week. Nearly 16,000 FDNY members were exposed to dust, particulates, noxious gases, chemicals and fibers while working for more than 10 months in the rescue and recovery effort, the report said.

IN THE WARS IN IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN

AT LEAST 6,783 U.S. MILITARY CASUALTIES HAVE OCCURRED IN IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN, ACCORDING TO THE DOD:

As of August 23rd, 4,431 U.S Military and Department of Defense personnel have been killed in Iraq since 2003, according to the Department of Defense. More than 30,000 have been injured.

As of August 23rd, 2,353 U.S. military service members have been killed in Afghanistan since October 2001, according to DOD. More than 20,000 were wounded.

More than 30,000 ACTIVE SERVICE MEMBERS AND U.S. VETERANS OF THE 9/11 WARS HAVE DIED BY SUICIDE

A study out of Brown University's Watson Institute found that 30,117 active-duty service members have died by suicide. These high suicide rates-- which outpace average Americans-- are caused by multiple factors, the study found, some inherent to fighting in a war and others unique to Americas war on terror framework.
Two dead and nine injured as tornado hits cars full force.

At least two people have been killed after a tornado hit the remote Italian island of Pantelleria on Friday evening.

There were also nine people injured, with four of them in a critical condition, as the tornado overturned at least 10 cars, ripping the roofs off the vehicles.

The 'tromba d'aria' whirlwind hit the Mediterranean island - located 100 km southwest of Sicily - along the Campobello coastline at around 19.00.

The tornado flipped cars upside down, causing at least two fatalities.

The dead include a 47-year-old offduty fireman and an 86-year-old pensioner, reports news agency ANSA, both of whom were driving when the tornado struck.

Italian media published photographs of cars flipped upside down, in scenes described as "apocalyptic" by one rescue worker.

The tornado left "apocalyptic" scenes in its wake.

A local resident told Sky TG24 that he heard a loud bang, accompanied by sudden, intense rain and "wind so strong we couldn't get out of the house."

Emergency services were waiting for the weather conditions to improve before flying the wounded to hospitals in Palermo by helicopter.

The island's mayor Vincenzo Campo has proclaimed a day of mourning on Saturday.

Cover photo: La Repubblica
AS: I think we have to. The British foreign minister said just the other day that we have to work with China and Russia to figure out how to moderate the Taliban. I think thats tragic: after weve spent $2 trillion in Afghanistan, we want to depend on the Chinese? And remember, one of the reasons we pulled out of Afghanistan, according to the Biden administration, is to focus on the great-power competition with China, and on security challenges posed by China and Russia. But now the West needs to work with the Chinese and with the Russians in order to figure out what to do in Afghanistan? This is a colossal failure.
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The Texas abortion law threatens to blow up this truce. In empowering anti-abortion activists to sue any party that aids and abets a woman seeking an abortion after six weeks, the law is an open invitation to upend the private lives of untold numbers of Texans. Its not just abortion providers that can be sued; so can friends or relatives who might accompany a pregnant woman, or even a driver hired for the journey. So much for reducing regulations on small businesses or the self-employed.
Four of the worlds leading museums last year postponed an exhibition about Philip Guston (1913-1980) that had been set to open at the National Gallery of Art. While we wait for (ironically) Philip Guston Now, Hauser and Wirth, the mega-dealer which manages Gustons estate, has organized a show focused on the decade of Gustons career, from 1969 on, that (with apologies to his earlier styles) really matters. This is when he switched from abstraction to a style of figurative art engaged both with brute politics and the existential comedy and influenced by underground comics. The show, at Hauser & Wirths West 22nd Street Gallery in New York, will feature 18 key works, some of them from private collections and never previously exhibited. Sept. 9-Oct. 30 at Hauser & Wirth, New York. hauserwirth.com.
How you get over your fear of a dog? Well, Ive gotta be around a dog, said Beidel, executive director of UCF Restores. You have to do it for a period of time. There are actually new neuronal connections that are being made in your brain, and what youre learning is that just because a dog bit you once doesnt mean every time you see a dog youre going to get bit. Those new memories become stronger.
Indeed, she found similar chemical processes at play in grapes themselves. Wildfires burn lignin in trees and produce volatile phenols that can be toxic to plants. To protect themselves, grapevines react by coupling these aromatic compounds to sugars. Once bound, these conjugated chemicals are soluble in water and can be metabolized or transported out of cells. The bound versions of smoke chemicals are no longer volatile, so they can be tough to detect via smell or taste  meaning a smoke-tainted grape may seem no different from one not exposed to smoke. But during fermentation, yeast enzymes can break these bonds, releasing the phenols once more and causing an ashy, smoky finish to wines.
Dear Heloise: Keep No. 4 plastic bags such as those for bagging fruits and vegetables at grocery stores and the plastic bag your newspaper is placed in for delivery (long and narrow). Stuff this bag with the other nonrecyclable thin plastic bags to create a neck rest or to block cold air from entering at doors and windows; use as packing filler; fill a drawer to keep items from slipping. This is no cost and is easily replaceable. Some stores will recycle these bags.
It never leaves you, wondering what they could have contributed if they were alive today, said Menchaca, who especially missed her sister when the coronavirus pandemic devastated her hometown of San Antonio. I know she would have told me to trust the science. I do that. But I have to believe that maybe she would have helped guide us if she were still here.
School systems expected some quarantines, but officials hoped that looser guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would make them less of a defining factor this school year. Over the summer, the CDC said that in school settings, if a student is properly masked and at least three feet from an infected classmate who was also masked, they are not considered a close contact and do not need to quarantine. Unmasked people, or those who are within three feet of someone with the virus, need to quarantine only if they were near that person for at least 15 minutes.
At first, Peruvian officials paid little attention to the movement, which began with the takeover of town halls in rural areas, bombings at polling stations and assassinations of local leaders. By 1981, Shining Path guerrillas had extended their reach to the capital of Lima, announcing their arrival in a particularly gruesome way: by hanging the carcasses of dozens of dead dogs from lampposts, as a warning to capitalist dogs and to anyone unwilling to follow Mr. Guzmans doctrinaire ideas.
Jonathan Gray Newell, 50, served as a circuit court judge in Caroline County on the states Eastern Shore. Criminal records unsealed this week revealed that when Newell was first questioned by investigators at his cabin in July, he was allowed to go to his bedroom to ostensibly charge his mobile phone but instead is alleged to have ingested an SD memory card he had furtively removed from the camera.
From a resource management perspective, we try to keep our parks in natural conditions, said Cuvelier. This is a reminder of the impact invasive plants can have, and the amount of labor and work required when they cause harm to a park. Its a good reminder to every one of us that what you plant in your yard may end up downstream. We want to encourage native plants at home and in the park.
The field office is not among the unmarked, undisclosed government buildings in the D.C. area. An FBI flag waves outside. So, on that day, there was reason to believe the building could also end up a target. As Lapp tells it, the staff was ordered to gather in the basement. They clustered there for about 20 minutes, waiting for the unknown, and then collectively decided to leave. There was work to be done.
Those issues intersect most dramatically in the case of the suspected 9/11 plotters. Administration officials have not said they will try, as Obama did, to move that or other trials to federal courts, which have convicted hundreds of terrorism suspects since the 2001 attacks. Neither have officials said where they would plan to detain the men after any convictions if the commissions can run their course and the prison is closed.
Like other Afghans who had assisted U.S. forces during their two-decade presence in the country, the Afghan soldiers  as well as linguists, intelligence collectors and support staffers  were at particular risk of Taliban reprisal, current and former officials said. The senior official noted that the Taliban had identified some members of the elite group and sent them text messages, threatening to kill them and their families.
The ceremonies commemorating 9/11 are wholly appropriate, designed as they are to mark the loss of innocent lives and the selfless heroism of firefighters and police and other first responders who threw themselves into efforts to rescue anyone who could be rescued and to recover the remains of those who could not, and the bravery of those on Flight 93 who gave their lives to save others. They remind all Americans of what is best about the country.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Thursday that federal employees will be given about 75 days to become fully vaccinated. The mandate will have limited exceptions for medical or religious reasons, she said. Employees who refuse to comply will face disciplinary action that is likely to vary among agencies, depending on what is laid out in their collective-bargaining agreements. Union officials said they hope any discipline to start with written warnings and progress to suspensions without pay  and possible dismissals.
Australias Foreign Minister Marise Payne said the future of Afghanistan was a central concern for both India and Pakistan. She said the gains of the past 20 years  such as womens empowerment and steps toward an inclusive society  should not be allowed to be reversed.
The Virginian, who won his first Senate race in 2012, has tilted at this windmill almost from his first day in the Capitol. And Young, who joined the Senate in 2017 after six years in the House, has taken up the mantle of several other Senate Republicans who previously worked with Kaine on this issue.
The firefighters and the police in New York City had been, traditionally, a very Irish-Catholic group. There were miniature, grim Catholic school reunions in the stairwells of the buildings: Irish-Catholic traders running down; Irish-Catholic first responders running up. Those first responders knew exactly what they were doing and where they were going. Their sacrifices were without measure. I lost a high school classmate that day, Brian Hickey, one of the brave firefighters.
Our engagement with the Taliban and with the government  interim or longer  will be for purposes of advancing the national interest, our national interest and that of our partners, Blinken said. We have and we will find ways to engage the Taliban, the interim government, a future government, to do just that and to do it in ways that are fully consistent with our laws.
In the letter, the ex-soldiers describe how police tortured and then executed one of their colleagues who was injured after being shot by Haitian officers while trying to turn himself over. He was one of three former Colombian soldiers killed. The letter also accuses police of kicking some ex-soldiers in the testicles and even burned one of them in their groin, allegedly while saying that human rights dont exist in Haiti and that they could do whatever they wanted.
But the message being sent is clear, and Francis even hammered home the point in a recent interview with the COPE broadcaster of the Spanish bishops conference. In the interview last week, Francis said he didnt even know if hed meet with Orban while in Budapest. Vatican officials have said he will, of course, meet with the prime minister along with the Hungarian president in a scheduled meeting.
I think we saw in Bidens statements on Afghanistan, the way he said things that hes clearly going to put U.S. interests first and obviously that came as quite a disappointment to partners and allies around the world who maybe hoped for something different after Trump, said Ulrichsen, the research fellow. He sounds quite similar to an America First approach, just sort of a different tone.
Charlene Thomas, 73, passed away while at the Daviess Community Hospital, Sept. 8, 2021. She was born April 23, 1948, in Washington, to Eugene Matteson and Eileen (Best) Matteson. Charlene was a homemaker who loved to play the piano, enjoyed genealogy, and liked to play cards and board games
No re-runs for ABBA movie As the wave of ABBA nostalgia sweeps the globe following the release of the bands first new music in 40 years, now seems as good a time as any to resurrect the film ABBA: The Movie, shot during their historic 1977 tour of Australia and co-produced by the late Reg Grundy. They way they really were ... ABBA at the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest. Their hit song, Waterloo, won. Credit:Olle Lindeborg In theory, its a great idea  the film remains an extraordinary time capsule of another time  except for one glaring problem: its lead actor, the jailed paedophile Robert Hughes. PS spoke with several television executives this week who have all ruled out giving the film an airing in 2021, agreeing that while it has had late-night screenings over years, at the moment it is untouchable because Hughes is in jail serving a 10-year sentence for historic child sex offences.

In 2014 the former Hey Dad! star and husband of one-time showbiz power agent Robyn Gardiner was sentenced to a maximum of 10 years and nine months in jail after a jury found him guilty of 10 charges relating to sexual and indecent acts perpetrated on four young girls in the 1980s and 1990s. Back in 1977 he was a budding actor who scored his first big break when he landed a role in the ABBA film, playing a hapless radio reporter who spends most of the film chasing the band across the country trying to score an interview. Convicted paedophile Robert Hughes. Credit:Janie Barrett In 1991 Hughes told former Herald journalist Cotton Ward: Getting the part in the ABBA movie was a knockout. When it turned out to be the lead role in an international film I was flabbergasted. Hughes was paid a modest weekly wage during the shoot, and complained bitterly that he saw no residuals in the years that followed, claiming his contract with Grundy had mysteriously vanished.

But missing contracts are the least of TV executives worries with the film today. Viewing the film in light of Hughes conviction makes scenes featuring Hughes, in particular those showing him interviewing children about their adoration of Abba, more than a little awkward. As one network programmer said: It just looks creepy. Hughes was cast in the role by Swedish director Lasse Hallstrom who had been making music clips for ABBA before signing up to do the movie. Co-producer Grundy used the film to create a vast range of merchandise around the band, and it was a money spinner. For the time, the film had a huge budget  reportedly more than $1 million  and was shot in an array of iconic venues, from the washed-out ABBA concert at the old Sydney Showground in Moore Park to the now demolished Sebel Town House.

Hallstrom went on to direct The Cider House Rules (1999), Whats Eating Gilbert Grape (1993) and Chocolat (2000). The quartets members Anni-Frid Lyngstad, now 75; Benny Andersson, 76; Bjorn Ulvaeus, 73; and Agnetha Faltskog, 71, scored their big breakthrough in 1974 when they won the Eurovision Song Contest, but it was Australia that was the first market to really embrace Abba in a fanatical way. Hallstrom later said the script was written during an eight-hour flight from Singapore to Sydney, though the end product was the result of plenty of improvisation, which the director later admitted was pretty silly. Teo flies out Weeks after the NSW Medical Council slapped conditions on Dr Charlie Teos registration following several complaints, the celebrity neurosurgeon has left Australia for a three-month sabbatical in Europe.

Dr Charlie Teo is off on a European sabbatical. Credit:Quentin Jones But dont expect Teo to take up basket-weaving or painting classes. Aside from catching up with friends PS is informed Teo will be embarking on an international road trip to promote his Omniscient brain scan machines, kicking off in Germany. However, girlfriend Traci Griffiths has not joined him on the trip, which had been planned for a year, well before the Health Care Complaints Commission investigation got under way. Last month Teo told the Murdoch press he would consider his future on his self-imposed sabbatical, describing the medical watchdogs move against him as soul-destroying. Costas Penthouse woes continue Just months after Sydney porn king and Penthouse Australia publisher Damien Costas creditors voted to annul his bankruptcy despite being owed millions of dollars, the trustee who endorsed the annulment, David Sampson of BPS Recovery, has been issued with an official caution by watchdog the Australian Financial Security Authority.

While the caution letter is not a finding that any rules were breached, it constitutes a light rapping on the knuckles. Sampson told PS: I take this matter very seriously and I do not consider it appropriate at this stage to publicly respond to any specific issues in relation to the matter. Damien Costas of Australian Penthouse. Credit:Nic Walker Investigators have also proposed AFSA Enforcement consider investigating the proof of debt form used by Costas creditor, PSHD Capital Pty Ltd. PS previously revealed PSHD requested a change in trustees, which resulted in Sampsons appointment. PSHD was formerly known as HMD Capital Pty Ltd. HMD, according to ASIC records, was owned by convicted drug smuggler Sean Dolman, who is currently in prison over Australias biggest-ever meth bust, in which 1.2 tonnes of the drug were found off Western Australias coast in 2017. Dolman is a former business partner of Costas. At the time of Dolmans arrest, Costas told PS he was shocked.

Medichs shiny new toy There has been a very loud and very noticeable addition to Sydney Harbour in recent days, with the arrival of Sydney property developer, art collector, and former pub owner Anthony Medichs new $25 million Mangusta super yacht, Royale X. Anthony Medich has taken delivery of a new Mangusta super yacht. It is understood Medich, who is the son of millionaire businessman Roy Medich and the nephew of convicted killer Ron Medich, has been waiting for the shiny new toy to arrive for some time. In 2015, Anthony Medich was reportedly cashed up with the sale of three pubs in two weeks, worth about $50 million. Meanwhile, his father shared in a $500 million windfall with his jailed brother in April that resulted from the sale of their substantial landholding adjacent to the proposed second airport at Badgerys Creek.
Jenni Rickards father is a Vietnam veteran, her grandfather was a soldier in World War II, and her great uncle Teddy Sheean was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross. She has never fought in a war, but she has witnessed the cost.

As the president of the Australian Parents Council, she wants children to understand those costs, and supports a plan to explore conflicting views in the national history curriculum. This is why she was worried when federal Education Minister Alan Tudge said this week that the Anzac legend was not going to be a contested idea on my watch.

Jenni Rickard, of the Australian Parents Council, with a photo of her soldier grandfather. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

For Ms Rickard, the danger lies not in teaching students about differing views of Anzac Day, but in denying them. She believes they should learn from the past. Educating our children, not indoctrinating our children, is at the core of a quality education, Ms Rickard said.

Like former Prime Minister John Howard, who famously rejected a black armband view of the nations past, Mr Tudge is critical of what he describes as an overly negative approach to history in a draft revision of the national curriculum. But Associate Professor Heather Sharp, an education academic who specialises in history, described Mr Tudges approach as Howard on steroids.
The headlines in the Murdoch papers were often brutal and sometimes brilliant. In February 2010, then climate change minister Penny Wong said Australias beaches could be eroded away over the coming century at a National Climate Change Forum. In response, the front page of The Australian read Wong wipeout doesnt wash with locals. It quoted Bondi local Lee Boman who said he hadnt noticed any sea level rise. It also featured Bondi regular Patrick Doab who said no one could predict how sea levels would change because it was like the stock market. In 2011, Cate Blanchett was dubbed Carbon Cate on the front page of The Sunday Telegraph after fronting a TV campaign urging Australians to promote the Gillard governments carbon tax. It positioned Blanchett as an out-of-touch millionaire and said then opposition leader Tony Abbott would save Australia from the tax. The tax was scrapped in July 2014.

In the lead-up to the 2019 federal election The Australian ran the headline Carbon cut apocalypse: cost of the ALP energy plan. The story quoted modelling by Brian Fisher that asserted Labors 45 per cent emissions reduction target would wipe $472 billion from the economy and drive electricity prices up by 50 per cent. According to the Australia Institute, the modelling was a complete outlier compared to analysis of more than 20 other modelling exercises and Treasury models that found the economic impacts of high ambition targets small or negligible. In December 2020, Wendy Bacon and Arunn Jegan analysed all news, features, opinion pieces, letters and editorials discussing climate change that appeared in The Daily Telegraph, Herald-Sun, Courier Mail and The Australian between April 2019 and March 2020. They found 45 per cent of all coverage either rejected or cast doubt on consensus scientific findings. Their research asserted that most News Corp reporters do not promote sceptical views, but of 55 per cent of stories that accepted climate science, misunderstandings about that science were almost always promoted rather than explained, and the reporting on the effects of climate change was negligible.

Half of the news and feature stories either had no source or one source. Nearly two thirds of published opinion pieces were sceptical of climate science. The top five climate sceptics were Sky News presenters Andrew Bolt, Tim Blair, Peta Credlin, Peter Gleeson and Chris Kenny. In a staff email obtained by The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, News Corp Australias executive chairman Michael Miller told local staff that the companys columnists and commentators would not be muzzled as part of their editorial campaign on climate change. One media adviser at a leading environmental group this week said she believed slanted news coverage in News Corp was more dangerous than the commentary. At least you know what you are getting in the opinion pages.

One of the hallmarks of the coverage was that it was as willing to discredit the scientists as it was the science itself. In one infamous instance the Daily Telegraph, the Herald-Sun and The Australian published stories attacking author and environmentalist Tim Flannery for buying a property near the waterfront north of Sydney. It did not matter that the house in question sat above the level of predicted sea-level rise, the coverage suggested that it proved climate change was a hoax and Flannery a hypocrite. After one of the mastheads ran a story showing the homes location Flannery was forced to take on extra security. He eventually won a retraction, an apology and legal costs.

Loading Its worth noting that the News Corp mastheads picked up the story from a segment on Ray Hadleys show on 2GB, now a stablemate of this masthead. According to Marian Wilkinson, whose recent book The Carbon Club is a forensic analysis of the interplay between the political, media and industry actors who have stalled action on climate in Australia for decades, News Corps coverage influenced other media in the country. She believes even the ABC pulled its punches on climate coverage for fear it would look soft when compared with the Murdoch presss hardline climate denialism. Wilkinson is one of many who believe that Australian climate and energy policy has been rudderless for decades, but she does not blame News alone.

Rather she says the Murdoch empire helped derail climate action along with well-connected fossil fuel industry lobbyists and complicit politicians from both parties. The result is the nation is now slowly engaging in the process of decarbonising its energy system, but years have been lost and billions of dollars of public money wasted, she says. So far News Corp has not commented on  or denied  the coverage and its silence is being met with speculation. They did not respond to a request for comment about this article. Wilkinson notes that if News Corp does shift its editorial stance it would be falling in line with the corporate and financial sectors and with major advertisers such as Woolworths and Coles. Mann is one of many who note that such a move would also help solve a problem for Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who wants to announce a net zero target before or at the COP26 climate talks in Glasgow but faces trenchant opposition from some Nationals MPs.

This may be more about giving Morrison cover going into an election year, by establishing the pathetically low bar of net zero carbon by 2050 as somehow constituting meaningful action, particularly given that he is being roundly criticised by the world community for his meager climate commitments going into COP26, Mann said on Friday. Inactivists  polluters and politicians and media outlets such as News Corp that have enabled them  are moving away from outright denial because its no longer tenable. This is particularly true in Australia after having lived through the climate change-fuelled devastation of the Black Summer of 2019-20. Instead, as I describe in the book, theyve turned to other tactics  delay, distraction, deflection, division, etc  in their effort to maintain the fossil fuel status quo. Focusing on a target of 2050, three decades away, kicks the can so far down the road that its largely meaningless. Though he welcomes the apparent shift in editorial direction, Flannery says the impact of its coverage extends beyond the politics of climate change.
It was not until 1992, with the publication of Andrew Mortons Diana: Her True Story, that their affair became public knowledge. This was followed by the Camillagate tape scandal in 1993, when the transcript of an intimate telephone conversation between Camilla and Charles was published in the tabloid newspapers. Loading While the Princes reputation was badly damaged, Camilla bore the brunt of the vilification. The animosity reached fever pitch after Diana died in a car crash in Paris in 1997. In an interview to mark her 70th birthday in 2017, Camilla admitted: It was horrid. It was a deeply unpleasant time and I wouldnt want to put my worst enemy through it. The Duchess could not have survived that time without the support of her son Tom, now 46, daughter Laura, 43, sister Annabel Elliot and brother Mark Shand, who died in 2014 after a fall in New York. Despite the scrutiny they have faced over the years, Camillas family have not put a foot wrong (bar Toms admission that he has taken cocaine), and have remained unwaveringly loyal and discreet. Those who know the Duchess best agree that while she was sometimes hurt by the negative press, she never really let it get to her. As one source puts it: She didnt really complain about how she was treated. She would get upset sometimes and wonder how long it would go on for, but she always adopted a very English, Home Counties sort of approach to life.

A former employee who first met Camilla in 2004 reveals: She wasnt fearful of the press, which was quite unanticipated. She understands the media well  she loves a gossip, she loves a good story. Everyone in her family has got opinions that they freely express and she loves that. She didnt really complain about how she was treated. She would get upset sometimes and wonder how long it would go on for, but she always adopted a very English, Home Counties sort of approach to life. Ive always thought if you want to chart the journey, how has she got to where she is now, it starts off with her personality and her character. Shes a brave, strong person. Her laid-back manner has sometimes been interpreted as laziness, although as one friend points out, She is working well beyond retirement age. And despite being six years shy of 80, she will play a central role at the helm of Charless slimmed-down monarchy. It is a daunting prospect. As the Duchess herself once admitted: Sometimes you get up in the morning and think you cant do it, and you just have to. The minute you stop its like

a balloon, you run out of puff  you sort of collapse in a heap.

Yet her life experience has proved an asset to the royal family and to a prince who has at times been accused of rather prissy and entitled behaviour. The Prince trusts her judgment, says a source. So while she may not be in the driving seat, she is very much the support act. Princess Diana and Camilla Parker Bowles in 1980. Credit:Getty Images Described as someone who would not shy away from expressing what she thinks about a situation and with very good instincts, the value of Camillas emotional backing should not be underestimated either. Friends say that throughout the fallout from Megxit, which has affected Charles very deeply, his wife has been his crutch. There is a clear sense  although Clarence House would not care to admit it  that they feel terribly let down by Harry and Meghans decision to unleash their interview with Oprah Winfrey on the royal family. One source goes so far as to suggest, I dont think the Duchess will ever forgive Meghan for what shes done to the Prince of Wales, although as per Buckingham Palaces various statements, the Sussexes remain much-loved members of the family. When he [Charles] becomes king, shell understand the need to be by his side  as the Duke of Edinburgh was for the Queen  and I dont think shes daunted by that, says a friend.

Brandreth agrees: Its clear, seeing them together, that its a perfect fit. Shes playful with him and ultimately she makes him happy. She has no desire to be in the limelight at all. Theres no competition. All she wants is for him to do well. The Prince trusts her judgment. So while she may not be in the driving seat, she is very much the support act. The Queen also likes Camilla and appreciates how supportive she has been of her son and heir. As Penny Junor wrote in her 2017 book, The Duchess: The Untold Story, Camilla felt accepted when the Queen gave a touching speech at their wedding, likening them to horses in the Grand National whod made it to the winners enclosure. Loading Yet will Camilla inherit her mother-in-laws title? Clarence House insisted on their wedding day she will be known as Princess Consort when the time comes, even though the title has no historical precedent  under English common law, the wives of kings automatically become queens.

Sixteen years on, there is growing evidence to suggest that she will take the title Queen Consort instead. In 2018, Clarence House removed all references to Princess Consort from its website. He will 100 per cent insist on her being queen, says a former courtier. The references to Princess Consort infuriated the Prince. But will the public accept it? Having supported charitable endeavours, including childrens literacy and women suffering from domestic abuse and sexual violence, she has arguably earned her public-service stripes. After initially being advised by public relations expert Mark Bolland in the lead-up to their marriage,

Camilla has slowly reconstructed her reputation with the help of a string of communications experts. Charles and Camilla with the Queen in 2018. Credit:Getty Images According to one former adviser, who remembers how nervous Camilla was when she made her first official appearance as Charless girlfriend, at her sisters birthday party at The Ritz in 1999, She was not only anxious about the whole coming-out process, but whether she would have the stamina to deal with it.

Over the past 20 years, shes adapted. Its extraordinary how confident she is, how popular shes become. Theres still some lingering negativity, but it was only ever a question of time. People have got to know her. Now people think we probably owe it to her for her to be queen consort. Another aide points out that a turning point came when Princes William and Harry happily appeared at the couples side on their wedding day. There was a sense that if Dianas sons had accepted her, so should we. Theres still some lingering negativity, but it was only ever a question of time. People have got to know her. Now people think we probably owe it to her for her to be queen consort. According to one source: Its been difficult, but I think they both now accept that Camilla makes Charles a better man. Shes very jolly and always makes an effort with them and their wives; [Camilla] would never have dreamed of trying to replace Diana, but she is naturally quite mumsy. Princess Anne is universally respected because she is who she is  and I think its the same with Camilla, says the aide. What you see is what you get. Shes unselfconscious, unpushy and on message and she gets on with the job. Shes respected and admired and liked a lot  some people may now even love her.
Defence Minister Peter Dutton believes Australia has been too complacent about the threat posed by China. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen OK, so whats the reality of Beijings plan for Australia? Whats Beijings objective? Chinas objective would clearly be to have us in a subservient position and to sign up to their objectives. They are seeking to disrupt the relationship we have with the five eyes [the intelligence sharing partnership between the US, Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand] and the US in particular. This is consistent with Kevin Rudds view that Chinas policy towards Australia since 2017 has been hostile, as he put it to me last year. Loading Dutton says theres a 24/7 effort under way by Beijing to achieve their objectives  in Taiwan, in the South China Sea, and dominance otherwise. If you doubt him, you might have missed President Xi Jinpings opening remarks on taking leadership of the Chinese Communist Party in 2012. He pledged we will win the initiative and have the dominant position. Xi is all about dominance, at home and abroad. On his frequent visits to Chinas military bases, he typically dresses in military camouflage and rallies the troops: Prepare to fight and win wars. Dutton says they have momentum, they have very clear direction and, in their mind, no one is going to get in their way. The Australian Defence Minister is working on getting in their way: We are standing up for our own sovereignty and for peace in our region. We want a prosperous China and a peaceful Indo-Pacific, but you have to fight for that peace and show that you are prepared to defend the order as it currently exists.

Hold on. Fighting for peace? Whos the warmonger? We are looking for continued peace through deterrence, he says. Theres no sense pretending that if we curl up in a ball that tensions will abate. I would love to say that we dont have to spend a dollar on defence again. Its best to be honest with the public and be frank about the role of the CCP in the Indo-Pacific. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, Australia has boosted its military spending by 34 per cent over the decade to 2020 while China has increased its by 76 per cent. Theres a desire to bring like-minded countries together, Dutton says. By calling out the behaviour of China in the region, we give ourselves the best chance to see behavioural change [from Beijing]. Loading Speaking from Jakarta, Dutton was on the first leg of a four-nation tour. He and Australias Foreign Affairs Minister, Marise Payne, had just held a long conference with their Indonesian counterparts. The two nations announced work towards a treaty and an upgrading of defence co-operation. Dutton and Payne next visit India, South Korea and the US.

We are having frank conversations with neighbours about preserving peace in the Indo-Pacific, says Dutton. Their trip is prelude to the forthcoming summit of the Quad group. Joe Biden has announced that he will host the leaders of the Quad  the US, Japan, India and Australia  for their first face-to-face meeting later this month. But is any of this slowing Chinas activities or ambitions in any way? The short answer, replies Dutton, is no. Frankly, it takes notice of the US and given that the French, the British, NATO, Germany, are all concerned about whats happening in the Indo-Pacific and have their attention firmly fixed on the region, I think it takes some strong and forceful conversations. Accepting that Australia has shed its complacency, Dutton still has to deal with the fact that when he took the defence portfolio six months ago he inherited the results of a long and languid complacency. The prime exhibit is the complete debacle of Australias effort to acquire new submarines. Labor and Liberal alike spent over a decade fumbling this critical capability. While China is capable of producing a new nuclear-powered submarine every year, Australia wont be receiving any subs for at least a decade. Dutton says hes working on it.

A nations defence capability is generated by all its other abilities. Its a product of a countrys economic size, its industrial base, its educational standards, its technological and scientific prowess, its organisational skill, its military competence, the effectiveness of its governance, the quality of its alliances. And its success in all of these realms is driven by a sense of purpose. Unfortunately, Australia is bedevilled by complacency across every one of these fields. For example, a century after federation the economy still depends on rocks. When China brings on stream the massive iron ore deposits of Guinea or Afghanistan, when appetites for coal cool or collapse, Australias economy faces a savage reckoning. Where is the sense of driving purpose in diversifying the economic base? Loading Australia enjoyed the highest educational standards in the world but seems content to let school performances slide inexorably down the global rankings year after year. Australia is a global weakling in science and innovation policy, which the Coalition treats as an unmentionable as it boldly clings to obscurantist ideas of the primacy of coal. Rock dependency reigns supreme in a country with rocks in it head.

The pandemics disruptions have combined with Chinas trade sanctions to expose the fragility of Australias sovereign industrial base. Where is Australias national resilience plan? As for organisational skill, I offer two words  vaccine rollout. As for the quality of governance, where is our national anti-corruption agency? And have you looked at Australias political donations laws lately? Loading And the quality of alliances? Australia is fortunate that it has a strong alliance with the US, a valuable national asset. Its just as well that the federal government is busy trying to improve relations with a range of regional powers, large and small. Because while the US may be indispensable, its also unreliable and prone to incompetence. Donald Trump personified unreliability; Joe Bidens withdrawal from Afghanistan demonstrates incompetence. Theyve had a setback in Afghanistan, Peter Dutton allows, but knowing the resilience of the Americans, I think they will dust themselves off quickly and be more determined to see peace and order prevail in the Indo-Pacific. We have to hope hes right, but hope is not a plan.
Can Australia prosper without Sydney? Its the diabolical question Gladys Berejiklian is asking of the national economy as she conducts one of the most challenging policy experiments in our history.

There is no margin for error in the NSW Premiers plan to begin easing health restrictions once the state has vaccinated 70 per cent of its adult population. If she reopens too soon, the remainder of the year will be a write-off. The double dip recession that began in July could easily spill over into 2022, returning us to where we were at the bottom of the lockdown cycle in 2020.

We would truly be in uncharted territory at this point because Melbourne, not Sydney, has traditionally been the epicentre of our biggest economic shocks, from the land bust and depression of the 1890s to the recession of the early 1990s. Sydney emerged from those episodes with its economic power enhanced at the expense of its southern rival. Now it confronts the real danger of a once-in-a-century setback, which reinforces the shift of population, and wealth, to the frontier states of Queensland and Western Australia.

Berejiklians fellow premiers and chief ministers do not begrudge her desire to live with COVID-19. Daniel Andrews has reluctantly accepted that he cant eliminate the virus in Victoria, and is sounding more like his NSW sparring partner as he charts a more cautious path to reopening once his state reaches the 70 per cent vaccination threshold.
The police arrived in Dubbo [to reinforce stay-at-home orders] so everyone buggered off to the outback. This was a friends succinct assessment of a largely Aboriginal communitys response to COVID enforcement, which sparked Wilcannias hotspot nightmare. Wilcannia is four hours back o Bourke. COVID should never have reached there. Wariness of officialdom among Australias First Nations peoples is entirely rational and wholly predictable. What COVID shows is that its not their problem. It belongs to all of us. Can architecture help fix it?

Kaunitz Yeung Architectures award-winning Pilbara Aboriginal Medical Service building at Newman in the Pilbara, Western Australia. Credit:Robert Frith

Is there an architecture of trust? If so, how would it look?

The idea that architecture conditions our behaviour is known as architectural determinism. Ive never been quite persuaded. Its not clear that, as Winston Churchill told the House of Lords on October 28, 1943, We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us. Influence, sure. Shape? Hmm, not so much.

But it is true that our built environment can feel either benign or hostile, friend or foe. Its also true that these qualities inhere partly in the building or place, and partly in how we perceive it. And that this interactive relationship with place, part objective, part subjective, can subtly influence how we feel and how we act.
Johannesburg: The proliferation of COVID-19 variants in Africa has alarmed a group of 137 international scientific organisations, which has published a study warning that the continents low vaccination rate could foster vaccine-evading mutations that complicate attempts to end the pandemic.

A study of genomes from 33 African nations and two overseas territories, published in the journal Science, tracks the evolution of the pandemic across the continent and the emergence of a number of so-called variants of concern and variants of interest. One of those, Beta, spread around the globe earlier this year and rendered some vaccines partially ineffective.

The slow rollout of vaccines in most African countries creates an environment in which the virus can replicate and evolve, the organisations said. This will almost certainly produce additional [variants of concern], any of which could derail the global fight against COVID-19.

A nurse checks a COVID patient in the intensive care unit in Machakos, Kenya. Credit:Bloomberg

While more than half of the population of the US and over 60 per cent of people living in the European Union are fully vaccinated, just 3.2 per cent of Africas 1.2 billion people have been fully dosed. Thats resulted in a severe third wave of infections in many countries and the emergence of a new variant in South Africa known as C.1.2.
Police say a woman crashed into a home on Regent Way, not far from GE Appliance Park, on Friday evening.
The Indiana State Department of Health says the Hoosier State has seen its first human case of West Nile virus for 2021.

According to ISDH, the first human West Nile virus case of 2021 in Indiana was identified in a resident of Lake County, which is in the northwest corner of the state.

Back in July, we reported the first mosquito case of West Nile virus in the state for the year after it was identified in Vigo County. As of Friday, ISDH said that 83 mosquito cases of West Nile virus had been identified throughout the state.

Local counties where mosquito cases of the West Nile virus have been identified include Vanderburgh County (2 mosquito cases), Gibson County (5 mosquito cases), Pike County (3 mosquito cases), and Daviess County (1 mosquito case).

The state health department is urging everyone to do what they can to prevent the spread of mosquito-borne diseases.

Mosquitoes are still active even in cooler fall weather, said State Health Commissioner Kristina Box, M.D., FACOG. Hoosiers in every county should take precautions against mosquito-borne diseases until the first hard freeze.

According to ISDH, symptoms of the West Nile virus can include fever, headache, body aches, swollen lymph glands, or a rash. Some people will develop a more severe form of the disease affecting the nervous system, including inflammation in the brain and spinal cord, muscle paralysis, or even death.

You can see mosquito bite prevention strategies from ISDH by clicking here.

To track the current West Nile virus cases around the state, you can click here.
Allentown, PA (18103)

Today

Still rather warm and humid with partial sunshine and a late-day shower or thunderstorm..

Tonight

Mostly cloudy. Few showers and thunderstorms possible.
Reading, PA (19601)

Today

Still rather warm and humid with partial sunshine and a late-day shower or thunderstorm..

Tonight

Mostly cloudy. Few showers and thunderstorms possible.
CROMWELL, CT (WFSB)  Friday, Channel 3 asked its viewers to help raise money to give Connecticut's first responders the tools they need to stay safe.

HeroFundUSA, a charity that's now expanded to Connecticut, is actively working to help two local fire departments purchase life-saving equipment they can't fund on their own. Channel 3 partnered with HeroFundUSA to help make that happen. Information about donating to a telethon on Friday can be found here.

One of those departments desperately needs radio communications equipment.

The other, Cromwell's fire department, needs new gas meters.

North Stonington receives new communication equipment NORTH STONINGTON, CT. (WFSB) - The North Stonington Volunteer Fire Department needs to replace their aging communications system, and Hero-Fun

When bad things happen, people count on their local fire and police departments to show up, as Cromwell firefighters did in July when a shed very close to a home caught on fire.

When they pull up to any scene, there may be dangers they can see. However, there are also those they can't.

Whenever we go into an atmosphere, we can't see anything, said Chief Jason Balletto, Cromwell Fire Department. There can be something in the atmosphere right now that is affecting us. We would never be able to tell."

Balletto said that's why fire departments carry gas meters.

"So, this is our typical MSA Altair 4 Gas Meter 4X, Balletto explained.

Gas meters produce readings on four specific things that, if too high or too low, can be dangerous and even life-threatening:

They measure oxygen and carbon monoxide levels.

Anything that gets greater than 35 percent, we automatically put on our [self-contained breathing apparatus] packs and we go on air and that protects us, Balletto said.

They also detect hydrogen sulfide levels and lower explosive levels, also known as LELs.

The meters draw the air in through pads and if the levels are out of range, an alarm goes off to warn firefighters.

Alan Dominy is a Cromwell firefighter. He and his fellow firefighters use the gas meters regularly, including at fire scenes and on calls where a resident might spell the odor of what could be natural gas.

We would go in with the meters on, Dominy explained. We turn them on outside, so we have our neutral atmosphere of the numbers we need to be at, and then once we enter, we would be continuously monitoring the numbers on our meter and making sure they're not dropping or rising above where it needs to be. And if this happens to go into an alarm, we're aware of what's happening and we can get the proper resources to, wherever we're at, to make sure that the environment is corrected and brought to a neutral state."

Cromwell fire is hoping to purchase three of the "four gas" meters. They need additional meters and some of the ones they have are being used beyond their lifespans. The chief would also like to buy one "five" gas meter, which detects everything previously mentioned, along with VOCs, or volatile organic compounds. With new businesses coming to town, the chief said he needs it.

We have a lot of things going up where there's a lot of chemicals within these areas that maybe our meters can't pick up if we have a 'four gas,' Balletto said. Now with the 'five gas', we could pick up something, God forbid [if] it is leaking within any business or outside, we can deal with it."

Cromwell's chief said the total cost of all four devices is around $5,000, but the protection they offer, one could easily argue, is priceless.

"This is not just going to protect my firefighters, but it's also going to protect my community, Balletto said.

More information about HeroFundUSA can be found on its website here.
President Joe Biden and his team are promoting an agreement reached with the U.S. airline industry to cut aircraft greenhouse-gas emissions 20% by decades end, but the deal might not fly
Public Engagement, Outreach, and Partnerships Lead, Abuja, Nigeria

Organization: UNDP - United Nations Development Programme

Country: Nigeria

City: Abuja

Office: UNDP Abuja

Grade: P-3

Closing date: Monday, 20 September 2021

Agency: UNDP

Title: Public Engagement, Outreach, and Partnerships Lead

Job ID: 39596

Practice Area - Job Family: Management - PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT AND PARTNERSHIPS

Vacancy End Date: (Midnight New York, USA) 20/09/2021

Duty Station: Abuja, Nigeria

Education & Work Experience: G-Bachelors Level Degree - 7 year(s) experience, I-Masters Level Degree - 5 year(s) experience

Languages: Required: Desired: English

Grade: P3

Vacancy Type: FTA International

Posting Type: Common System

Bureau: Africa

Contract Duration: 1 Year with possibility for extension

Background

UNDP is systemically changing how its institutional and programmatic activities are portrayed and financed. Country Offices are now compelled to unlock new innovative partnerships and business models that enable programmes, projects, and services that support countries to accelerate sustainable development. Adopting a new resource management paradigm, as the global funding landscape for development cooperation is transforming requires the enabling self-sustaining initiatives that are people centered, results oriented and impactful. As a result, dynamic positioning of UNDP for emerging opportunities that help communities to address the complex and evolving development challenges is core to country office programming and delivery.

UNDP has identified partnerships and communications as a core strategic area of growth in support of its work at global, regional and country level. Focus on this area is motivated by the new demands posed by the 2030 and 2063 Agendas, which require of concerted actions from all development actors, in order to achieve their ambitious goals for socioeconomic transformation and sustainable development. It is also driven by the growing number of development actors active in the development landscape and the demands that this places on UNDP as convener of national and regional policy dialogue and facilitator of development partnerships.

In Nigeria, UNDP works with its national counterparts to the government implement its development priorities towards achievement of sustainable development. The work is guided by global, regional and national development and normative frameworks to which Nigeria is signatory to, including the 2030 Agenda and Agenda 2063. Achieving these core strategic ambitions at country level requires UNDP to take action in a number of areas that support programmatic delivery in crisis and post-crisis settings, to national capacity development, the provision of innovative policy advice to national governments, or the convening of national dialogues around key development issues. To support this work successfully, the UNDP Nigeria intends to engage qualified professionals to support the reimagination of its development offer and support the acceleration the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) through integration of community voices, ideas and action as informed by context, leaving no one behind.

To support its work in this area, the UNDP Nigeria country office intends to engage a professional expert to support the reimagination of its outreach, partnerships and public engagement initiatives and function.

Under the direct supervision and guidance of the Resident Representative, the Public engagement, Outreach, and Partnerships Lead is expected to provide creative, innovative, visionary and strategic leadership to the country office, through distinct approaches and tangible actions that helps to position UNDP Nigeria in key development areas as a thought leader in ways that boost demand for various service lines and increase overall business opportunities.

The incumbent will invest time and experience in proactive public engagement and management for the benefit of the country office and its partners, with the aim of enhancing UNDPs programmatic profile and promote accountability and, public engagement. With the leadership of the Resident Representative and in consultation with the Deputy Resident Representatives (Programmes and Operations) the incumbent will ensure support for inter-agency/multi-sector partnerships and collaboration through critical actions geared towards the strategic positioning, partnership building and business development with a view to influence the development agenda and, mobilize political and financial support for UNDP.

Duties and Responsibilities

i Design and implementation of public engagement and outreach initiatives

i Strategic positioning and partnerships (corporate/private and public sector)

i Proactive Media engagement and management

i Knowledge Development and Management

i Effective team management

Ensures design and implementation of public engagement and outreach initiatives focusing on the following results:

Curates and oversees implementation of the country office public engagement and outreach strategies based on goals and priorities

Assesses the impact of the country office public engagement and outreach implementation and makes adjustments accordingly as informed by trends, media and audience analysis

Integrates issue-based and people-centered advocacy around key priority areas relevant to UNDPs work in Nigeria in support of accountability and transparency

Ensures communication on and around UNDP contribution and that of its partners to Nigerias development agenda is relatable, contextualised, locally understood and visible through evidence-based stories of impact and documentation of lessons learned

Fosters outreach partnerships with communication innovators, creatives and social influencers to achieve programmatic visibility and engagement

In collaboration with team leaders, and based on their insight, guides the production of results-based communications assets that enhance understanding of UNDP work, programmatic accountability and public appreciation of the UNDP offer

Leverages innovative communication approaches, tools and outlets including digital and social media campaigns to enhance understanding of UNDP work in Nigeria

Provides technical and oversight support to the packaging and promotion of work carried out under Regional Stabilization Programme, the Accelerator Lab and ECOWAS/EU Small Arms and Light Weapons Programme

Supports strategic positioning and innovative partnerships (corporate/private and public sector) focusing on the following:

Supports country office efforts to position UNDP as a trusted partner of choice and convener of policy dialogues on crucial development priorities

Identifies opportunities to convene development partners, think-tanks, academia, civil society, media, UN and others around development issues and priorities that can support Nigerias acceleration of the SDGs

Works with the Senior Management Team (SMT) and team leaders in positioning UNDP Nigeria as a thought leader and an integrator within the development domain, in a manner that promotes UNDPs offer and boosts demand for collaboration at programmatic and policy level

Liaises with UNDPs Bureau for External Relations and Advocacy to ensure full alignment of the country office partnerships and communications strategy with UNDP corporate partnerships, policies and procedures

Contextualises and integrates regional and global public campaigns that promote UNDP as a leading development partner and influences national development agendas based on current programmes and new initiatives

Strategically supports UNDP engagement with the Nigeria creative sector for development

Manages proactive media engagement and management focusing on the following:

Supports country office and programme inoculators public engagement and messaging to articulate UNDPs offer, programmatic priorities, key milestones, impact and results

Works with the Resident Representative, senior officials, team leaders and project focal persons to produce blogs, op-eds and speeches, talking points, organise interviews and support high-level programme visits and events that showcase UNDP work

Provides timely support on responses to reputational management inquiries raised by media and donors in close consultation with the Regional Service Centre in Addis Ababa, RBA regional and sub-regional teams and, BERA

Delivers substantive oversight and quality assurance of communication products, including external website and social media platforms by strengthening their utility for public engagement.

Ensures Effective team management focusing on the following:

Manages Partnerships and Communications unit and delivery of its work plan as aligned to the country office vision and priorities

Under the guidance of the Resident Representative, sets priorities of the Partnerships and Communications unit in support of programmatic delivery and resource mobilisation

Oversees the development and implementation of the Partnerships and Communications unit annual work plans

Encourages and fosters intra-team collaboration to ensure the provision of an integrated package of partnerships and public engagement support to the country office

Supports staff development and professional growth to achieve the desired results as outlined in UNDPs people management strategy

Represents the Partnerships and Communications unit at various internal and external engagements

Manages recruitment of consultants and delivery of their tasks

Ensures facilitation of knowledge building and management focusing on the following:

Shares an instrumental culture of knowledge management and sharing within the team and with partners

Actively engages in relevant UNDP communities of practice and other practice networks, within UNDP, in the broader UN landscape and externally

Leverages the use of blogs, social media, and communities of practice to ensure wide dissemination of positions, events, debates on programmatic work and related issues

Ensures the continuous analysis and collation of lessons learnt, best practices and impact in the area of communications for development

Provides advice and support to UNDP inputs to CCA, United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework (UNSDCF), Country Programme Document (CPD) and other documents

Organization and provision of training, consultancy and advice to UNDP staff on communications and advocacy.

Competencies

Core

Innovation

Ability to make new and useful ideas work.

Creates new and relevant ideas and leads others to implement them

Leadership

Ability to persuade others to follow.

Plans and acts transparently, actively works to remove barriers

People Management

Ability to improve performance and satisfaction.

Models high professional standards and motivates excellence in others

Communication

Ability to listen, adapt, persuade and transform.

Gains trust of peers, partners, clients by presenting complex concepts in practical terms to others

Delivery

Ability to get things done while exercising good judgement

Critically assesses value and relevance of existing policy / practice and contributes to enhanced delivery of products, services, and innovative solutions

Technical/Functional:

Brand & Quality Management

Ability to strengthen UNDPs identity and distinction through its brand and uphold it to a high level of quality.

Catalyzes new ideas, methods, and applications to pave a path for innovation and continuous improvement in professional area of expertise

Marketing

Ability to communicate the value and distinct characteristics of a product or service and to understand the market landscape.

Media Relations

Ability to form and maintain meaningful working relationships with various members of the media.

Multimedia writing/editing

Originating and/or editing written content for media and the general public to be disseminated through press or other online outlets

Public Relations

Ability to manage information sharing and partnership alliances between the UNDP and the public

Social Media

Ability to represent and promote the UNDP brand in virtual communities / networks and promote citizen engagement in UNDPs work

Building Strategic Partnerships

Ability to maintain and establish networks of contacts for general information sharing and to remain up to date on partnership related issues.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Masters Degree or equivalent in mass media, public relations, journalism, international relations or related studies

Experience:

Masters Degree with 5 years or Bachelors with 7 years of progressively responsible for teams with relevant professional work experience in communication, print, broadcast, and/or new media and or fundraising/corporate communication, advocacy, Public Relations, project management, brand management including

Work experience in conflict related contexts, ideally at national or regional level is an asset

Demonstrated experience in partnership development, collaboration and management is required

Demonstrated skills and experience in media and public engagement through dynamic platforms is required.

Experience in communications for development is not mandatory but an asset

Excellent written and verbal communication skills is required.

Experience in leading teams to create highly effective content targeting various audiences for use on digital platforms and mainstream media using innovative approaches and tools is required

Experience in the United Nations, a governmental, other multilateral or civil society organization is an asset.

Language Requirements:

English Proficiency.

Other official language of the UN will be desirable.

*QUALIFIED FEMALE CANDIDATES ARE STRONGLY ENCOURAGED TO APPLY

Disclaimer

Important information for US Permanent Residents (Green Card holders)

Under US immigration law, acceptance of a staff position with UNDP, an international organization, may have significant implications for US Permanent Residents. UNDP advises applicants for all professional level posts that they must relinquish their US Permanent Resident status and accept a G-4 visa, or have submitted a valid application for US citizenship prior to commencement of employment.

UNDP is not in a position to provide advice or assistance on applying for US citizenship and therefore applicants are advised to seek the advice of competent immigration lawyers regarding any applications.

Applicant information about UNDP rosters

Note: UNDP reserves the right to select one or more candidates from this vacancy announcement. We may also retain applications and consider candidates applying to this post for other similar positions with UNDP at the same grade level and with similar job description, experience and educational requirements.

Scam warning

The United Nations does not charge any application, processing, training, interviewing, testing or other fee in connection with the application or recruitment process. Should you receive a solicitation for the payment of a fee, please disregard it. Furthermore, please note that emblems, logos, names and addresses are easily copied and reproduced. Therefore, you are advised to apply particular care when submitting personal information on the web.

Link to the organizations job offer: https://unjobs.org/vacancies/1631131547977
Coronavirus

featured

Williams County doctor shares his perspective fighting for lives during the COVID-19 pandemic

Williston Herald file photo CHI St. Alexius Health in Williston. rjean / Provided Dr. Robert Kemp

Social distancing. Vaccination. Masks. Quarantine.

Theyre words were all tired of hearing. But theyre also words doctors are tired of saying.

An end doesnt appear to be in sight, however, in vaccine-hesitant North Dakota, where COVID-19 cases  and hospitalizations  are climbing once again as the more contagious, and potentially more dangerous, Delta variant spreads. Hospital beds are filling up. Fast.

You know, everybodys flooded up here, CHI St. Alexius Dr. Robert Kemp told the Williston Herald. Our staff is getting very worn out and tired and emotionally exhausted beyond belief. And its extremely hard. People dont understand it unless youre doing the job. If youre a nurse working with these patients, youre shot. Your respiratory therapist, or the hospital doctors, theyre just exhausted over this.

The reversal of the COVID-19 trend line in Williams County is hurting morale.

I think everybody, including myself, thought we got through the big phase last winter. And that this wasnt going to happen again, Kemp said. But nobody wrote this book before, so its being written.

Meanwhile, it doesnt help that morale to hear people continuing to claim there isnt a pandemic or suggesting that doctors are just inflating numbers.

Yeah, that destroys me, Kemp said. Im probably losing friends over this whole concept in discussion. And Im probably losing patients over this discussion, because Im extremely dissatisfied with people that wont listen to their doctor or nurse or pharmacist when they say you ought to get a good vaccine. These are great vaccines, theyre safe. Your tiny risk of problems versus the alternative of getting COVID and getting potential very, very serious complications and deaths. Why dont people listen to the doctor any more? Its extremely upsetting.

Hospitalizations are getting younger

Kemp is seeing more younger patients than last time, and theyre getting hit harder than expected.

Our brains are full of when we were dealing with the Alpha strain last winter when it was pretty rough, he said. It was fitting these categories real well. You know that all the young people seem to kind of not bat an eye at it. Now were seeing people that are younger getting hit pretty hard.

COVID-19 is different from other cold viruses.

How it starts isnt necessarily how it ends, he said. Most (of the time) with a normal human cold virus, the first few days are kind of rough and then its just better better better. In this situation, your immune reaction can, you know, just like go fight the virus in a pathological manner where you get seriously ill.

COVID cases tend to last longer than other hospitalizations, Kemp added. Its a week, sometimes two.

And sometimes, despite having a seemingly mild case in the beginning, people find they are still experiencing symptoms like brain fog, tiredness, memory issues, and shortness of breath weeks and even months later. Some athletes in the 20 to 29 age group have not regained the vitality they had pre-COVID weeks later, despite having a fairly mild case in the beginning.

The possibility for whats being called Long COVID is yet another way in which coronavirus appears to be different from the common cold.

Lack of hospital beds

COVID patients in Williston are transferred to other facilities when they need critical care like intubation or a ventilator. But they cant be transferred until a bed is found in a bigger center that has the dedicated pulmonology and the intensive care needed. With cases spiking in so many cities and states at once, those centers are rapidly filling up. Thats extending the search for beds, often to other states.

I mean you reach out as far as you can if you have a critically ill patient and hes got a chance of surviving, Kemp said.

Meanwhile, those larger hospitals have set up ethics committees, Kemp pointed out, to decide who will and who wont get a ventilator, because supply is limited.

People need to understand that if you have a heart attack right now and you show up in the ER, you might have a hard time getting shipped to get a stent put in your heart, Kemp said. You might have a hard time getting sent somewhere for a heart attack, or you have a surgery that cannot be done locally, you know thats emergent, you might not have the option of getting out to where you have to go.

Reversing the crisis

It is the strain on the health care system of all these COVID-19 cases at once that makes vaccination, or, failing that, COVID-19 protocols, more important than ever to avert a health care crisis in Williams County.

Everyone can play a role in ensuring there is hospital space for those who need it by simply following the oft-repeated protocols. Vaccinations. Or, failing that, social distance, masks, hand-washing. Stay home if you are sick. Isolate yourself from others if you suspect you have caught COVID-19.

The vast majority of what we see (in the hospital) are non-vaccinated people, Kemp said. I totally, you know, understand, because I understand the science of vaccines, and theres no perfect vaccine so people can and do still get COVID infections despite being vaccinated.

But the safety data so far shows that the vaccines are very safe and very effective when it comes to preventing hospitalizations and deaths, Kemp said. On the flip side, he has yet to see a single person hospitalized as a result of taking the vaccine.

The risk reduction (with the vaccine) is remarkably good, unbelievably good, Kemp said. And its thanks to the prior administration that we have this vaccine. Its just now the people who supported that administration tend to be the people that dont want to get the vaccine, and thats where I dont get it.

For his patients with underlying conditions who still refuse to be vaccinated, Kemp urges them to be tested early if they have cold symptoms.

Come in and get tested as soon as possible, and make sure you tell them youre diabetic (or whatever the underlying condition is) when you come get tested, Kemp said. Youll get a rapid test. And if youre positive, let me know as soon as possible, and Ill get you orders for monoclonal antibody very quickly.

Monoclonal antibodies have been shown to reduce hospitalizations 70 percent in a Mayo Clinic clinical trial. But they have to be administered very early to do any good, and that means the COVID test needs to be given at the first onset of cold symptoms.
Willmar, MN (56201)

Today

Sun and clouds mixed. High 76F. Winds S at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Partly cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 63F. Winds S at 10 to 20 mph.
SALT LAKE CITY (AP)  The unusual legal strategy used to ban most abortions in Texas is already increasingly being employed in Republican-led states to target pornography, LGBT rights and other hot-button cultural issues.

While private residents filing lawsuits is a fixture of some arenas like environmental law, some warn that expanding it and applying it to new areas could have a boomerang effect if Democrats were to use it on issues like gun control.

When Attorney General Merrick Garland announced the Department of Justice would sue over the Texas law, he said it could become a model for action in other areas, by other states, and with respect to other constitutional rights and protections. He worried about the damage that would be done to our society if states were allowed to implement laws and empower any private individual to infringe on anothers constitutional rights.

The concept has already popped up in other states, including on issues like abortion where courts have sided against laws backed by conservatives.

In Missouri, a new law lets people sue local police departments who enforce federal gun laws. In Kansas, residents can go to court to challenge mask mandates and limits on public gatherings, and in Ohio people can sue over any action taken in response to an emergency.

It's also an enforcement mechanism on laws restricting transgender students bathroom use in Tennessee and their sports team participation in Florida.

These laws are deliberately engineered to avoid challenge in federal court, Jessica Clarke, a Vanderbilt University law professor who specializes in anti-discrimination law, said about the Tennessee and Florida measures.

In Utah, an anti-porn bill passed last year requiring sites to post a warning about dangers to minors. It was called a free-speech violation by adult-entertainment sites, but the possible onslaught of lawsuits convinced major sites to comply before a single person sued.

Republican Utah Rep. Brady Brammer said he modeled his bill on Proposition 65, which allows people who might have been exposed to potentially carcinogenic materials to sue and collect a kind of bounty if they win. Civil enforcement has long been a fixture of environmental law, with private attorneys acting as a kind of extension of stretched regulators. Court settlements with businesses often bring funding to green nonprofits.

Republicans are weaponizing the tool that Democrats thought they owned, which was civil enforcement, Brammer said. Theyre following the tactics that Democrats have used for years, for decades, and theyre doing it for conservative causes.

The Texas abortion law, which lawmakers in several other states want to copy, has another unusual feature that vastly expanded the number of people who can sue. Unlike the vast majority of civil law, it doesn't require people to show they've been directly affected.

After the Supreme Court decided not to block the law, just the threat of being sued meant some abortion providers in Texas have stopped offering abortions altogether, even those before the six weeks specified.

But others point out the tactic could come back to haunt Republicans who have long sought to limit the size of court settlements in things like medical malpractice cases.

If a wide-ranging civil-enforcement tactic were applied to gun control, for example, it could allow people to sue gun sellers if the weapon was used to hurt someone, said Texas attorney Michelle Simpson Tuegel, who sued to block the abortion law.

This law in Texas is a double-edged sword for Republicans," she said. "It's potentially really dangerous for them to be pushing something like this forward with other issues that could be turned on them in a similar way.
Winchester, VA (22601)

Today

Partly cloudy with a slight chance of thunderstorms. High 89F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Variable clouds with showers and scattered thunderstorms. Storms more numerous this evening. Low 64F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
Winchester, VA (22601)

Today

Variable clouds with scattered thunderstorms. High 88F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

Variable clouds with showers and scattered thunderstorms. Storms more numerous this evening. Low 64F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
CHARLOTTETOWN - A 35-year-old man from Alberta has been charged with assault after a health worker at the Charlottetown Airport was pushed early Thursday morning.

CHARLOTTETOWN - A 35-year-old man from Alberta has been charged with assault after a health worker at the Charlottetown Airport was pushed early Thursday morning.

Jen Zoratti | Next A weekly look towards a post-pandemic future delivered to your inbox every Wednesday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement.

Charlottetown Police say a man and a woman who were passengers on an incoming flight refused to go through the Covid-19 screening center at the airport.

They say the man allegedly pushed a health worker aside, by-passed the screening area, and left the airport.

The couple was later located by police and arrested.

The man has been charged with assault, while he and the 41-year-old woman with him were each issued a $1,050 fine in violation of the Public Health Act.

The man was released with conditions and is to appear in Provincial Court at a later date.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2021.
DALLAS (AP)  President Joe Biden and his team are promoting an agreement reached with the U.S. airline industry to cut aircraft greenhouse-gas emissions 20% by decade's end, but the deal might not fly.

President Joe Biden, takes off his mask as he speaks to school staff during a visit at Brookland Middle School in northeast Washington, Friday, Sept. 10, 2021. Biden has encouraged every school district to promote vaccines, including with on-site clinics, to protect students as they return to school amid a resurgence of the coronavirus. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

DALLAS (AP)  President Joe Biden and his team are promoting an agreement reached with the U.S. airline industry to cut aircraft greenhouse-gas emissions 20% by decade's end, but the deal might not fly.

In an announcement Thursday, the White House unveiled an array of measures to reduce climate-changing emissions. The administration is also setting a goal of replacing all of today's kerosene-based jet fuel with cleaner or sustainable fuel by 2050.

Climate experts say that while the effort is laudable, the administration's approach is aspirational and unrealistic. The targets are voluntary, and robust government support will be needed to offset the higher cost of sustainable fuel  up to three times more than regular fuel.

Airlines in fact have talked up sustainable jet fuel for years and even made small investments in it, but it may prove to be a vision beyond Biden's promised reach. Airline executives have expressed concern in particular that flight shaming  famously advocated by Swedish activist Greta Thunberg  could catch on in the U.S. if the companies are seen as uncaring about the environment.

WHITE HOUSE, touting Biden's steps to involve the government, aircraft makers, airlines and fuel suppliers to boost the use of cleaner fuels: The measures will result in the production and use of billions of gallons of sustainable fuel that will enable aviation emissions to drop 20% by 2030 when compared to business as usual.

FILE - In this May 16, 2008 file photo, Southwest Airlines jets are seen parked at their gates at Baltimore Washington International Airport in Baltimore, Md. Southwest Airlines will reduce flights for the rest of the year as it tries to restore an operation that stumbled over the summer and now faces lower demand because of the rise in coronavirus cases. Southwest said Thursday, AUg. 26, 2021 it will cut its September schedule by 27 flights a day, or less than 1%, and chop 162 flights a day, or 4.5% of the schedule, from early October through Nov. 5. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak, file)

THE FACTS: That's a giant step that will be highly difficult, if not impossible, to achieve.

Only 2.4 million gallons of sustainable aviation fuel, or SAF, were produced in the United States in 2019, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. In contrast, airlines burned 21.5 billion gallons of regular fuel that year. That means just over 0.01% of the nations supply currently comes from sustainable fuel.

The airline industry says bridging the gap will require bold steps including grants and tax credits for producers, government support for research, and more. Biden is seeking a SAF tax credit as part of a $3.5 trillion spending bill being pushed in Congress by Democrats, but its outcome remains uncertain. Even with that money, it's not clear all those things would be enough to meet the administration's ambitious goals, according to aviation experts.

Aspirational goals like this dont move markets, says Dan Rutherford, who oversees aviation research at the International Council on Clean Transportation, an environmental group based in Washington.

Without a government mandate or very strong incentives, Rutherford says, I doubt that much SAF will be generated. He notes that the International Air Transport Association, a global trade group for airlines, had a voluntary goal of 10% sustainable fuel by 2017 and the federal government had a target of 1 billion gallons per year by 2018, and neither came anywhere close.

Liz Jones, a climate-law attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, says the administration plan largely relies on biofuels aspirations that simply arent based on reality.

FILE - United Airlines employees work at ticket counters in Terminal 1 at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago, on Oct. 14, 2020. United Airlines said Wednesday, Sept. 8, 2021, that more than half its employees who weren't vaccinated last month have gotten their shots since the company announced that vaccines would be required. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh, File)

Airlines have been announcing promises to become carbon neutral around the middle of the century, and some have invested in sustainable fuel as they defend against criticism over aviations role in climate change. Airplanes produce only around 3% of the worlds heat-trapping emissions, but their share is growing rapidly.

Jones says, however, that nothing in the administration's plan would force airlines to live up to their promises.

And even the best-case scenario doesnt cut climate pollution fast enough, she says. "The Biden EPA needs to set strong airplane emissions standards now, not get mired in the myth of sustainable airline fuels.

The White House and airline trade groups are counting on tax credits to produce three billion gallons a year by 2030. Airline trade groups are pushing Congress to enact a tax credit of $1.50 to $2 per gallon, depending on how much the fuel reduces greenhouse gas emissions when burned.

Airlines for America, a trade group for the biggest U.S. airlines, had previously set a goal of producing 2 billion gallons of sustainable fuel in 2030. This week, the group agreed to back the White House goals.

The airline group's president, Nicholas Calio, said the airlines are proud of our record on climate change, but we know the climate change challenge has only continued to intensify, and so it raised its goal for sustainable fuel.

Airlines are also placing orders and making investments in startups that are designing aircraft powered by electricity or hydrogen. Some of the manufacturers aim to have small electric planes of up to 19 seats in service by the end of the decade.

We want to operate aircraft that are very good for the environment in the long run," Andrew Nocella, the chief commercial officer of United Airlines, said this week. How they come to be and when they come to be is still a little bit TBD (to be determined)."

___

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Associated Press writer Hope Yen contributed to this report.

___

EDITOR'S NOTE  A look at the veracity of claims by political figures.

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THESSALONIKI, Greece (AP)  Greece's economy will grow 5.9% during 2021, far more than the original 3.6% estimate, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said Saturday.

Greece's Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, left, reacts as he looks at a computer monitor during a tour of Thessaloniki International Trade Fair, in the northern Greek city of Thessaloniki, Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. The keynote speech Mitsotakis is set to deliver later Saturday is still under wraps, but aides have let it be known that it will focus on youth and small business owners. (AP Photo/Giannis Papanikos)

THESSALONIKI, Greece (AP)  Greece's economy will grow 5.9% during 2021, far more than the original 3.6% estimate, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said Saturday.

Mitsotakis gave the keynote address at the Thessaloniki International Fair, where heads of government traditionally announce the coming year's economic policies.

Mitsotakis noted that despite there are about 70,000 more people employed than before despite the pandemic; 46,000 additional businesses, and bank savings increased by 35 billion euros ($41 billion), of which 20 billion ($23 billion) were from additional household savings.

Greek police use a water cannon to disperse anti-vaccine protesters during a rally, at the northern city of Thessaloniki, Greece, Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. While Greece's Prime Minister, Konstantinos Mitsotakis was touting the achievements of his government despite the pandemic emergency, some 3,500 vaccination deniers clashed with riot police near the venue. (AP/Photo Giannis Papanikos)

The faster growth gave the prime minister the fiscal space to announce a range of tax reductions and spending targeted at young people, small businesses and the middle class. Small businesses are encouraged to merge with tax breaks and new entrants in the job market will be subsidized. There was even something for 15- to 17-year-olds who will be vaccinated, in the form of 50 gigabytes of free data for their smartphones.

Our announcements have one main goal: to increase households' disposable income, Mitsotakis said.

The prime minister put special emphasis on climate change.

This tragedy of overheating will be avoided only if the planet reduces (carbon) emissions to zero by 2050, he said, adding that his government will effect a swift transition away from the heavily polluting lignite, or brown coal, into renewable energy.

To help with the transition and also to counteract rising electricity prices, the government will set aside a 150 million-euro ($177 million) fund to help consumers absorb the price rises. In addition, about 24 billion euros ($28 billion) will be invested in environmentally-friendly projects, with the help of EU funds.

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While Mitsotakis was touting the achievements of his government despite the pandemic emergency, around 3,500 people protested against vaccine mandates, especially for health workers, and other restrictions including the requirement for those who are not vaccinated to show coronavirus test results at certain places.

The protesters clashed with riot police near the venue, throwing firebombs, firecrackers and stones at police, who responded with tear gas and stun grenades and gave chase to the protesters. The clashes lasted about an hour, and there were nine arrests.

There were also protest marches by unionists and the extreme left. Participants in the latter burned a U.S. and a European Union flag, as well as electricity bills, but there was no confrontation with police.

Police put the total number of protesters at 21,000.



Demetris Nellas reported from Athens.
Two Winnipeg women are among the 24 finalists for the ninth instalment of The RevolutionHer Awards (formerly Mompreneur Awards) that recognize dedicated and impactful female and youth leaders who are making a difference in the world today.

Two Winnipeg women are among the 24 finalists for the ninth instalment of The RevolutionHer Awards (formerly Mompreneur Awards) that recognize dedicated and impactful female and youth leaders who are making a difference in the world today.

They are Nengi Offurum  the founder of Black Women Owned (BWO), an online community that brings visibility to Black Women Owned brands and Amanda Buhse, the founder and owner of Coal and Canary, the Winnipeg candle company that makes and sells hand-poured luxury wood wick candles

Maria Locker: not a popularity contest

Maria Locker, the founder and CEO of RevolutionHer, believes her awards program distinguishes itself from other womens business awards programs for its more holistic approach.

"We really strive to look at the success of the women as whole. This is not a popularity contest," she said.

Among the five categories, which includes a Community Vision Youth Award for the first time, the awards try to highlight women who affect change in the people and the community around them.

"We are looking for women who inspire others to pursue their passions and do what they love, through leadership, charitable work and entrepreneurship," she said. "We really try to look at the whole picture."

There were about 1,600 nominations and applications and this is the first year Locker has included participation from women in the U.S.

Supplied Nengi Offurum is the founder of Black Women Owned (BWO), an online community that brings visibility to Black Women Owned brands.

Even after decades of hard-fought equal rights in the society, Locker said women are still reticent about putting themselves out there.

"We want women to shout from the mountain tops that they are really amazing at what they do," she said. "Sometimes we need to encourage them to do it a bit more."

Nengi Offurum is a finalist in the Impact in Leadership Award category.

As a 24-year-old from Nigeria, Offurum is a self-styled go-getter. She founded Black Women Owned  an Instagram and Facebook platform to raise the profile of black women-owned brands after her own clothing company struggled to gain exposure.

"It was very shocking to hear I was a finalist," she said. "Im very happy."

The posts on her platforms are there free of charge the idea being to support the products and services owned by Black women featured on BWO giving these brands exposure, increasing their brand awareness and sales.

"I just felt like Black women business owners do not have that much exposure," she said. "I have been inspired by other ambitious women and I just felt there really wasnt a community for Black women business owners."

The idea for the network is that its not just for Black women, but for all people of all genders and race.

Offurum took time to talk to a reporter while she was busy on one of her side hustles  a hair-braiding service she does. She also runs a social media business called Spurt 365.

Oh. And she is also a student at Canadian Mennonite University where she studies media and communications.

Amanda Buhse, the founder and owner of Coal and Canary Candle Company is a finalist in the Trailblazer award that recognizes entrepreneurs who have shown dedication and commitment to having an impact on the community. Finalists have to have been operating their companies for at least five years, with a minimum of $1 million gross annual revenue.

Buhse, who bought out her partner at the beginning of 2020 adding to the rest of the craziness that has been going on for the last year and a half, said she was "over the moon" about her nomination.

"One of the reasons we applied for this award is that it is not just about business success," she said. "They are looking for women who are inspiring and are movers and shakers and disrupters. I am humbled to be part of this."

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The other element of this category is that it recognizes women who are committed to their business enough to keep it alive for more than a couple of years.

"Coal and Canary is my entire life," she said, only half-jokingly.

It is easy to tell that Buhses enthusiasm is not artificial.

She said one of the main principles of her being in business is to be able to give back to the community. A portion of the sales of some of the candles goes to charity and Buhse is always ready to put on workshops in schools  when that is possible again  and elsewhere.

"For me success is not measured by dollars and cents, but by the kind of impact we can have," she said.

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VATICAN CITY (AP)  Unchecked poverty and ignorance help fundamentalist violence to take hold easily, Pope Francis said as he urged fellow religious leaders and others to counter the phenomenon by promoting schooling.

Pope Francis walks past a Vatican Swiss Guard as he arrives for his weekly general audience in the Paul VI hall, at the Vatican, Wednesday, Sept. 8, 2021. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)

VATICAN CITY (AP)  Unchecked poverty and ignorance help fundamentalist violence to take hold easily, Pope Francis said as he urged fellow religious leaders and others to counter the phenomenon by promoting schooling.

Francis made the call in a message to a four-day meeting that began on Saturday evening in Bologna, Italy, with the gathering aiming to foster understanding among religions.

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We must help each other to free the horizon of the sacred from the dark clouds of violence and fundamentalism," Francis said in a message which the Vatican said the pope wrote on Sept. 7.

The pope decried that about 5,000 people have been killed in places of worship throughout the world in the last 40 years. Francis called that an outbreak of violence that exploits the sacred.

As religious leaders, I believe that first of all we must serve the truth and declare what is even when it is evil, without fear or pretense, even and especially when it is committed by those who profess to follow the same creed as us," Francis said.

The pontiff called for a joining of forces to combat the religious illiteracy which permeates all cultures: it is a widespread ignorance that reduces the experience of belief to slogans."

Francis said: "Above all we need to educate, promoting equitable, solidarity-based and integral development that increases opportunities for schooling and education, because where poverty and ignorance reign unchecked, fundamentalist violence takes hold more easily.

The Bologna forum drew participants from countries of the Group of 20, a grouping of nations that together account for about 80% of the global gross domestic product. Italy currently holds the rotating presidency of the G-20.
RED River College is expanding its offering of micro-credential training programs with three new information technology programs designed to fill the growing workforce gaps in the Manitoba digital economy.

RED River College is expanding its offering of micro-credential training programs with three new information technology programs designed to fill the growing workforce gaps in the Manitoba digital economy.

And for the first time the college has partnered with IBM to deliver courses. While RRCs continuing education program has delivered courses using third-party content in the past, for two of these courses the curriculum is produced 100 per cent by IBM and the accreditation will be from IBM, not from Red River College.

The new online courses  students can take them whenever they like so they can keep working at nine-to-five job if thats the case  cover Android mobile app development, security intelligence, and predictive analytics modelling (the latter two are the IBM courses).

"Red River Colleges strong ties with Manitobas fast-growing tech sector ensures we are creating more accessible, flexible learning options that channel homegrown talent into workforce gaps with speed and precision," says Dr. Christine Watson, vice-president academic and research at Red River College.

Steve Lawrence, the program manager for IT and professional studies at RRCs continuing education department, said the courses are designed for undergraduate senior students from IT-related academic programs

"Typically students in these programs are looking to up-skill or switch into a new field," he said.

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Steven Astorino, vice-president data and AI development and IBM Canada lab director, said, "These programs provide a skills-building pathway to in-demand IT career openings such as security intelligence and predictive analytics. Additionally, were giving faculty members a window into industry-relevant tools and skill sets to provide greater learning value to students."

Lawrence said that these IT-oriented micro-credential courses are needed for skills development in the ever more sophisticated IT world. In many cases, he said, employers are sponsoring or reimbursing students.

The security intelligence, and predictive analytics modelling courses cost $999 and the Android mobile app development is $509.

Lawrence is hoping for between 20 and 30 students for the courses which in some cases can be used as credit for other RRC certificates.

Watson said these kinds of offerings in support of the IT sector continue to position RRC as the go-to source for rapid, relevant programming that may take a little of the stress off the current tight labour market and the ever-growing needs for the right kind of skills in the IT industry.

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OTTAWA - The Liberal government has directed a state-owned Chinese telecommunications firm to divest its stake in a Canadian subsidiary over national security concerns, prompting a court challenge of the order.

Flags of Canada and China are shown prior to a meeting of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing on Dec. 5, 2017. The Liberal government has directed a state-owned Chinese telecommunications firm to divest its stake in a Canadian subsidiary over national security concerns, prompting a court challenge of the order. THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP, Fred Dufour, Pool Photo

OTTAWA - The Liberal government has directed a state-owned Chinese telecommunications firm to divest its stake in a Canadian subsidiary over national security concerns, prompting a court challenge of the order.

China Mobile International Canada is asking the Federal Court to set aside the recent decision, saying the government has no grounds to believe the company would compromise security or engage in espionage on behalf of Beijing.

CMI Canada says the Trudeau government was motivated, at least in part, by "the current political socioeconomic climate and the general biases against Chinese state-owned companies."

The case unfolds amid high tensions between Ottawa and Beijing over China's prolonged detention of Canadian citizens Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor for alleged spying.

China's actions against Spavor and Kovrig are widely seen in the West as retaliation for the late 2018 arrest by Canadian authorities of Meng Wanzhou, an executive with Chinese firm Huawei Technologies, so she can be extradited to the U.S. to face fraud charges.

CMI Canada's application filed this week in Federal Court reveals details of an investment screening case that has quietly unfolded outside the public eye over the last year.

The company, established in 2015, provides mobile communication services, including prepaid call plans, but does not itself own or operate any telecommunications network facilities. Instead, it has partnered with Telus Communications Inc. for provision of wireless services through the Telus network.

CMI Canada says it inadvertently neglected to inform the federal government of its presence as a new Canadian business until October of last year. A series of requests for information from federal officials soon followed.

The Investment Canada Act and the National Security Review of Investments Regulations allow the federal government to scrutinize an investment in Canada by a foreign enterprise.

In January, the government informed CMI Canada of a review on security grounds, saying the investment could result in the Canadian business being leveraged by the Chinese state "for non-commercial purposes, such as the compromise of critical infrastructure and foreign interference, to the detriment of Canadas national security."

Following additional information exchanges, the government issued an Aug. 9 order directing China Mobile to either divest itself entirely of or wind up the Canadian business within 90 days.

CMI Canada contends the conclusion was "tantamount to speculation about what the Canadian business may do," such as using its supposed access to sensitive information for "military applications or espionage."

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The company argues Ottawa could not reasonably have concluded, based on the information available, that the investment would be harmful to Canada's national security.

It says the company does not own nor operate any transmission facilities in Canada, lacks privileged or direct access to any critical infrastructure, and does not have access to any sensitive telecommunications data or personal information, other than basic contact details.

CMI Canada is asking the court to quash the federal decision or, in the alternative, to send the matter back to the government for reconsideration. It also wants the order put on hold pending outcome of the case and any appeals.

If the decision is not stayed, the company will be forced to leave "the Canadian landscape entirely. This would require the termination of its client base and operations," the application says.

The federal government has not yet filed a response and no date has been set for a hearing.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2021.
SQUAMISH, B.C. - From a suffocating heat dome to wildfire smoke that weighed down the skies, it's no surprise that several federal candidates in one British Columbia riding say they're hearing at the door that climate change is the top election issue.

Patrick Weiler, centre, Liberal candidate for West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country, campaigns at Bowfest on Bowen Island, B.C., on Saturday, August 28, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck

SQUAMISH, B.C. - From a suffocating heat dome to wildfire smoke that weighed down the skies, it's no surprise that several federal candidates in one British Columbia riding say they're hearing at the door that climate change is the top election issue.

West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country is as sprawling as its lengthy name might suggest, stretching north of Pemberton, down to the edge of Vancouver and west onto the B.C. coast.

Its local issues are just as diverse. Whistler's tourism economy has struggled under pandemic pressures and staffing shortages; Squamish is going through growing pains as one of the fastest-growing municipalities in the province; drought conditions have created water shortages on the Sunshine Coast; and parents in West Vancouver are worried their children won't be able to afford to live in the neighbourhoods they grew up in.

Yet several candidates in a crowded race said they're hearing a common concern from both rural and urban constituents.

"The go bags parked at the doors and the climate emergency caught in our throat under smoke-choked skies  this is an extraordinary historical moment where we need massive changes," said NDP candidate Avi Lewis, 54, who is hoping to wrest the seat from Liberal incumbent Patrick Weiler.

The New Democrats are hoping Lewis's profile as an environmental activist and filmmaker is the key to disrupting the tradition that has seen the riding typically trade hands between the Liberals and Conservatives. The Greens surged to third place in the last election, making it a packed race this year.

It would be new territory for the NDP, which has never won the seat.

"Im not naive. Im an underdog and Im trying to pull off what would be a gigantic upset," Lewis said.

Lewis, who is pitching a Green New Deal for Canada, is married to journalist Naomi Klein and is the son of former Ontario NDP leader Stephen Lewis and feminist journalist Michele Landsberg. He is also the grandson of former federal NDP leader David Lewis.

Also in the race are Conservative John Weston, Green Party candidate Mike Simpson and Doug Bebb of the People's Party of Canada.

Weiler, 35, who was first elected in 2019, says he believes he's proven to his constituents that he's a hard-working MP whose background in environmental and Aboriginal law makes him suited for local issues.

He says he's proud of the progress he has made having thousands of conversations with constituents and believes the Liberals have momentum toward an economic recovery from COVID-19 and other issues, warning a Conservative government would turn back the clock.

Weiler said he's keen to keep tackling local issues  like bringing $10-a-day child care to meet demand in Squamish  as well as the broader themes that unite the diverse riding.

"First and foremost, there's concern about climate change and ensuring we're going to have a bold plan to mitigate it," Weiler said, adding housing affordability and reconciliation after the discovery of unmarked graves on residential school grounds are not far behind.

Weston, 63, represented the region in the Commons for seven years until 2015. He's an international lawyer and government relations specialist who launched both the Canadian Constitution Foundation and the Canadian Health and Fitness Institute.

Weston believes constituents are ready for a return to a Conservative government, but one with a new leader and new ideas.

"We need a change of direction," Weston said, adding only a Conservative government can reduce unemployment, give businesses confidence and keep debt under control.

Protecting the economy should be accompanied by a viable environmental policy and he said he's satisfied the Conservative plan will meet the Paris Accord greenhouse gas emission reduction targets without harming the economy.

"I told Erin O'Toole I would only run if we had a robust, achievable environmental policy," he said.

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Meanwhile, Simpson, 56, is hoping to build on the Green momentum from the last election, as well as a surge in local support for the party at the provincial level. Jeremy Valeriote nearly won a seat in the area for the Greens in last year's B.C. election.

Simpson, a filmmaker who has also worked with environmental non-profits, bases his campaign on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

With climate change on track to create significant damage in his nine-year-old daughter's lifetime, he said he felt he had to change tack.

"There actually is no time left to do advocacy and education. And all the things I've been doing for 20 or 30 years have all become something we no longer have time for, because the actual decisions need to be made really quickly."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2021.

Note to readers: This is a corrected story. A previous version ran an accompanying photo that featured someone other than Avi Lewis, one of the story's subjects.
Twenty years ago on Sept. 11, Bruce and Kathryn Fleming were walking through Logan International Airport in Boston at the same time as 10 terrorists who were hell-bent on destruction and death.

Twenty years ago on Sept. 11, Bruce and Kathryn Fleming were walking through Logan International Airport in Boston at the same time as 10 terrorists who were hell-bent on destruction and death.

The couple had just visited his parents and were on their way home to West Vancouver via a direct Air Canada flight to Vancouver.

Instead, their pilot was forced to land in Winnipeg after two planes hit the twin towers of the World Trade Centre in New York City and North American airspace was shut down to non-military planes.

"Parts of that day could have been yesterday," said Fleming, who now lives in San Antonio. "I can still see the fall in Winnipeg, the leaves falling off the trees. I can picture walking down to the river and the collection of stores at The Forks.

"And especially how great everybody was to us."

San Antonio resident Bruce Fleming was a passenger mid-flight on an Air Canada airline when the attacks on Sept. 11. Enroute from Boston, MA. to Vancouver, B.C. his flight was grounded in the Winnipeg area where he stayed for four days when flights resumed. (Scott Stephen Ball / Winnipeg Free Press)

More than 1,500 passengers from 15 planes  the fifth-highest number of planes diverted to a Canadian airport  spent four days in the city as the continent grappled with fallout from the terror attacks. Four planes had been hijacked by terrorists; two were flown into the twin towers, one hit the Pentagon, and the fourth crashed into a field in Pennsylvania after passengers fought back against the hijackers.

The two planes, which crashed into the twin towers, took off from Boston around the same time as Flemings plane. The other two took off from Newark, N.J. and an airport near Washington, D.C.

"It is just so sobering," said Fleming. "I have thought about (how close I was to the terrorists) a lot. Speculative, of course, but the interviewers asked as many ways as they could whether we noticed anything unusual.

"Its just strange to think we all left at the same time, around 8 a.m., within a few minutes of each other."

"Its just strange to think we all left at the same time, around 8 a.m., within a few minutes of each other."  Bruce Fleming

Fleming is pictured standing at the top of a stairway to an Air Canada jet in a photo that appeared on the front of the local section of the Sept. 12 Winnipeg Free Press.

"Earlier, the pilot had suddenly pulled the throttles back, said "the company has asked us to land the airplane," and, from the right-hand window I looked down from 37,000 feet on the airport in Winnipeg," he said.

"Air Canada crew didnt tell the passengers what was going on, but the lead stewardess was standing in the aisle with tears pouring down her cheeks."

Remembering 9/11: 20 years later Fire and smoke billows from the north tower of New Yorks World Trade Center on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/David Karp) Smoke billows from one of the towers of the World Trade Center as flames and debris explode from the second tower, Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Chao Soi Cheong) - = A person falls from the north tower of New Yorks World Trade Center as another clings to the outside, left, while smoke and fire billow from the building, Tuesday Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Richard Drew) - Pedestrians in lower Manhattan watch smoke billow from New Yorks World Trade Center on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Amy Sancetta) - Two women hold each other as they watch the World Trade Center burn in New York Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Ernesto Mora) - People flee the falling South Tower of the World Trade Center on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Amy Sancetta) - Pedestrians flee the area of New Yorks World Trade Center in lower Manhattan on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Amy Sancetta) - People cover their faces as they escape the collapse of New Yorks World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Suzanne Plunkett) - Thick smoke billows into the sky from the area behind the Statue of Liberty, lower left, where the World Trade Center was, on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Daniel Hulshizer) - Flames and smoke pour from a building at the Pentagon in Washington on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Will Morris) - Smoke rises from the Pentagon in Arlington, Va. Tuesday Sept. 11, 2001 as members of the Fairfax Co. Search and Rescue team approach after a terrorist attack. (AP Photo/ The Daily Progress, Dan Lopez) - Deputy chief of the Army Reserve, Col. Malcolm Bruce Westcott, comforts Pentagon employee Racquel Kelley while giving her medical aid outside the Pentagon in Washington on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Will Morris) - FBI agents, fire fighters, rescue workers and engineers work at the Pentagon, where a high-jacked American Airlines flight slammed into the building on Sept. 11. The terrorist attack caused extensive damage to the west face of the building. (Tech. Sgt. Cedric H. Rudisill/Department of Defense/MCT) - An FBI aerial photograph, taken Wednesday, Sept. 12, 2001, shows the crash site of hijacked United Airlines Flight 93 in Shanksville, Pa. The Boeing 757 was headed from Newark, N.J., to San Francisco when it made an abrupt turn near Cleveland and veered back east across Pennsylvania before crashing in Shanksville, killing all 44 aboard. Flight 93 was the fourth plane to crash in a coordinated terrorist attack that included New Yorks World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and the only one that didnt take lives on the ground. (AP Photo/FBI/FILE) - Smoke billows through buildings in Manhattan as seen from Brooklyn after the collapse of New Yorks World Trade Center, Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens) - Harry Shasho sweeps up before being evacuated from his vitamin store after the collapse of New Yorks World Trade Center on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Suzanne Plunkett) - A fireman screams in pain as he is rescued shortly after both towers of New Yorks World Trade Center collapsed following a terrorist attack, Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (Robert Mecea/Newsday via AP) - People flee the scene near New Yorks World Trade Center Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Diane Bondareff) - People walk over New Yorks Brooklyn Bridge from Manhattan to Brooklyn following the collapse of both World Trade Center towers on Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan) - Pedestrians on Pierrepont Place in the Brooklyn borough of New York, watch as smoke billows from the remains of the World Trade Center in New York, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Lawrence Jackson) - A firefighter moves through piles of debris at the site of the World Trade Center in New York, Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Graham Morrison) - Firefighters work beneath the destroyed mullions, the vertical struts, of the World Trade Center in New York on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan) - The remains of the World Trade Center stands amid the debris in New York, Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Alexandre Fuchs) -

Fleming said once on the ground, passengers had to wait inside their planes  some for as long as 12 hours  while other passengers were questioned by RCMP and plainclothes federal agents.

"One (questioner) was in front of you and another, who didnt say anything, was at a 90-degree angle from you," he said. "They were interested in why we have U.S. passports and why my wife was in care because of a transplant."

Fleming said they were put on a bus with other passengers and taken to a hotel. He and his wife spent the next few days wandering throughout the city, visiting The Forks, the Assiniboine Park Zoo, the Via Rail train station, and many restaurants.

In between, Fleming said the provincial Emergency Measures organization somehow managed to get his wife the medication she was running out of because they hadnt arrived home as scheduled.

"The inter-agency co-ordination behind that was amazing in its speed and organization, given an event nobody could have planned for," he said.

Diverted Air Canada passenger planes sit among military aircraft on the tarmac at the 17 Wing airfield on Sept. 12, 2001. (17 Wing photo)

Norma Mitchell and her six-year-old daughter of California also spent four days in Winnipeg after their flight was grounded here.

"I was on the one and only United Airlines flight which landed in Winnipeg that day," said Mitchell, whose flight was from London, England, to Los Angeles.

"There were 170 of us on the flight and one of the captains came on and said President (George) Bush said we cant continue to the United States and we are landing in Winnipeg, Canada. Then the captain came on again and said the twin towers had been hit. I knew it wasnt good. Within the next half hour, we knew what was going on."

Mitchell said once on the ground they couldnt leave the plane.

"We had to stay on the plane for hours and hours. They even brought lunch in," she said.

"People were so kind. Ill never forget it." Norma Mitchell

Mitchell said she can only remember sitting in the hotel room watching TV, trying to explain what was happening to her young daughter, and walking around the city.

"I just told her she was safe. I dont think she really comprehended what happened," said Mitchell.

She said she doesnt know which hotel she stayed at because she never got a bill. "We didnt have to pay. Your government paid for it.

"People were so kind. Ill never forget it."

Four days later, her United Airlines flight was the first international flight to leave Winnipeg, she said.

"But it was six months before I wanted to go on a plane again. It was scary."

Travellers stranded by the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks crowd Winnipeg's airport. (Ken Gigliotti / Winnipeg Free Press files)

Two decades ago, Glen Murray was mayor of Winnipeg. He had just started his day when one of his office staff told him to turn on the television.

"I turned it on and within 15 to 20 minutes, they shut down the airports for outgoing flights," said Murray.

"We also knew planes would be coming here, but we didnt realize how many planes would arrive in an incredibly short time."

It was amazing how people just came together, says Glen Murray, mayor of Winnipeg in 2001. Theres something very much in the DNA of our community. We dont even have to ask people to pitch in. I hope we never lose that. (John Woods / Winnipeg Free Press files)

While Halifax and Gander, NL., hosted travellers flying across the Atlantic Ocean, federal aviation authorities assigned cities such as Winnipeg and Calgary to take in planes flying over the polar route.

Murray said Winnipeg Transit was just one agency that quickly responded to the task.

Business passengers stranded at Winnipeg's airport on Sept. 11, 2001 make do after all flights were cancelled. (Ken Gigliotti / Winnipeg Free Press files)

"Rick Borland and his transit people reorganized all the bus routes in an hour and had buses go to the airport with a complete service bay there for passengers," he said.

"It was amazing how people just came together," he said.

"Theres something very much in the DNA of our community. We dont even have to ask people to pitch in. I hope we never lose that."

Murray said one problem  which was resolved in the months after 9/11  popped up with the emergency centre in an underground area of the airport and the citys own emergency centre in the basement of city hall.

"The walls were so thick, it blocked cellular communications," he said. "It was built during the wired period, but now we had cellphones. They were almost useless. So afterwards, we reorganized and upgraded our system."

Murray remembers that one plane, which arrived from the Philippines, had sick children on board.

"The Health Sciences Centre mobilized to help them," he said.

"When I look back this was one of the few opportunities where, in the middle of a disturbing tragedy, what came out was a human response. We know that when people do something terrible, others within minutes and hours can engage a hopeful and loving response to it.

"There was goodness in a dark moment."

"We know that when people do something terrible, others within minutes and hours can engage a hopeful and loving response to it... There was goodness in a dark moment." Glen Murray

Twenty years ago, Shelley Napier was a regional manager with the Emergency Measures Organization. Today, she runs a consulting company that specializes in helping communities plan for emergencies.

It gladdens my heart to hear people contacted you to say how wonderful people in Winnipeg were for them," says Shelly Napier, seen here in 2001 when she was a regional manager with the Emergency Measures Organization.

"In emergency management, its all about care and control of people," said Napier.

"This was a day that we all remember. We all remember where we were. When you looked at the news that morning you didnt know how it would impact people here, but it did."

Napier said by the time she got to work that morning, EMO staff knew planes were headed to Winnipeg and would soon land.

"We quickly became mobilized. We knew the city would have to take care of the people. We didnt know how long theyll be here. It took a huge amount of co-ordination to look after that many people."

Napier said early on they made the decision to put up passengers in hotels instead of billeting them in homes.

"I know Gander gets all the publicity, they were smaller and had more planes  but it was Winnipeg which helped us." Bruce Fleming

"It was cost shared 50-50 between the province and the city," she said. "That was a very generous act.

"We took care of their basic needs. The city and the province and everyone just pulled together to take care of people. We are always proud of how we pitch in as Manitobans, but we really stepped in to make the passengers realize people cared.

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"It gladdens my heart to hear people contacted you to say how wonderful people in Winnipeg were for them."

Fleming and Mitchell, who have never met, decided separately that after 20 years, it was time to reach out to Winnipeggers to thank them for what they did for them during those stressful few days here.

"It has been on my mind to thank all of the people who helped," said Fleming. "I knew if I didnt do it now, I wouldnt. So, this is the time.

"I know Gander gets all the publicity, they were smaller and had more planes  but it was Winnipeg which helped us."

As Mitchell said, "I very generously was taken in by your country, so I really wanted to thank your country and I want to thank the people."

kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca
The greater incidence of protests, marches and public events, including anti-mask and anti-vaccine rallies, has taken a toll on Winnipeg police staffing.

The greater incidence of protests, marches and public events, including anti-mask and anti-vaccine rallies, has taken a toll on Winnipeg police staffing.

Supt. Dave Dalal, who oversees the police service's event command group, told the Winnipeg Police Board Friday some events have the potential to become volatile as people's emotions spill over on everything from pandemic rules to reconciliation issues.

So far this year, officers have been deployed to 110 events. Until 2017, the city averaged 12 to 15 events annually. Social media has made it much easier for rallies to be held, he said.

RUTH BONNEVILLE Winnipeg Police Chief, Danny Smyth, said the large number of demonstrations means the service will have to reassess its response. (Ruth Bonneville / Winnipeg Free Press files)

"Anybody with a social media account is capable of creating an event that then requires some level of police attention or response," Dalal told the board, noting he was referring to events that took place without a parade permit being filed beforehand.

"That police response can range from simply monitoring online to determine what risk, if any, it may present to public safety, to the full deployment of officers to the event."

Dalal said engaging with protest organizers to assess risk and offer safety advice, to eventually deploying officers, happens almost daily.

Generally, when police assess events as medium- to high-risk, the service will deploy officers who are trained to de-escalate tense situations and manage crowds, and have experience with crowd-control equipment and safety gear.

JESSE BOILY / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Protestors gathered for the second day of their seven days of no peace protest in June 2020.

"Using (the crowd management unit) for every event, though, is not necessary, reasonable or fiscally sound. These officers come from across all areas of the service and dedicating these members to each and every event would come at a high cost, and not just financially, but operationally, as well," Dalal told the board.

Community support officers are often reassigned to manage events, with general patrol cops called in as a last resort.

"It puts a strain on our ability to respond to calls for service in the community and takes officers away from their critical role doing that," Dalal said, though he repeatedly noted the goal of police is to ensure demonstrations are conducted safely, while respecting the right to protest.

"Using (the crowd management unit) for every event, though, is not necessary, reasonable or fiscally sound. These officers come from across all areas of the service and dedicating these members to each and every event would come at a high cost, and not just financially, but operationally, as well."  Supt. Dave Dalal, Winnipeg Police Service

Police Chief Danny Smyth said the large number of demonstrations means the service will have to reassess its response.

"Well have to take a pretty close look at how we do this and perhaps make some adjustments," Smyth told reporters after the meeting.

Police might train more officers in basic crowd control, Smyth said.

About 40 per cent of unpermitted demonstrations over the past two years have been pandemic-related, including anti-vaccine and anti-mask protests. An anti-vaccine mandate demonstration outside the Health Sciences Centre on Sept. 1 drew criticism after some patients said they had trouble entering the hospital.

JESSIE BOILY / FREE PRESS FILES Winnipeg Police officers have been deployed to 110 events so far this year. Prior to 2017, the city averaged 12 to 15 events annually.

"Im not a big fan of anyone protesting someone who might be going to a hospital for medical care. Ive always been supportive of people's right to protest places like city hall or the legislature might be more appropriate," Smyth said.

He said more demonstrators showed up than police had anticipated and officers had to call for backup.

"We learn how to plan based on our experiences I can assure you that well be taking different plans should (a hospital protest) go forward in the future... I think our general approach would be to steer them into a different location," the chief said.

"You can't be blocking emergency departments at hospitals."

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca

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AN uptick in demand for COVID-19 vaccines in some of the lowest-uptake areas of the province is being heralded as a good sign heading into the pandemics fourth wave.

AN uptick in demand for COVID-19 vaccines in some of the lowest-uptake areas of the province is being heralded as a good sign heading into the pandemics fourth wave.

Since Manitoba announced Aug. 24 proof of vaccination would be required to access restaurants and gyms and participate in many non-essential activities, Steinbachs vaccination rate has jumped by two per cent  a growth rate more than double the previous three weeks.

By Sept. 8, 62.5 per cent of Steinbachs eligible population had their first shot (and 57.6 per cent had a second), according to provincial data. It is well-below the provincial rate of 83 per cent, but its higher than several communities in the Southern Health region, such as the rural municipalities of Stanley and Hanover, and Winkler.

Starting Monday, Manitobas vaccine task force is keeping its Steinbach super site vaccine clinic open one extra day per week. For at least the rest of September, the clinic will be open Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays.

The additional appointment and walk-in times are being added "in direct response to positive uptake in the Steinbach area," a provincial spokesperson said Friday in a statement.

Kyle Penner, a pastor in Steinbach, has been keeping tabs on the southern Manitoba citys case counts for almost a year. He started a spreadsheet last fall, when Steinbachs test positivity rate spiked to 40 per cent, one of the highest in Canada at the time.

His first reaction to seeing the recent uptick in vaccinations, he says, was gratitude.

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"For people to get their first doses now means theyve obviously had some concerns or some wondering, some fears, and so for them to address that now and show up, Im just thankful. I would say Im not surprised," said Penner, who is a member of the provincial Protect MB advisory committee.

Penner said he thinks public health restrictions requiring widespread proof of vaccination, coupled with the provincial government and other employers beginning to require staff vaccinations or regular testing, has made the difference.

When eligibility was extended to all Manitobans over the age of 12 in late May, the province was still under strict public health restrictions.

"The common refrain was, well, why would I get vaccinated? My life wont change, were still under restrictions and I still cant do all these things," Penner said, adding thats changed.

katie.may@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @thatkatiemay
WINNIPEGS police chief is trying to quell concern over an anticipated budget shortfall related to the pension plan.

WINNIPEGS police chief is trying to quell concern over an anticipated budget shortfall related to the pension plan.

In its second-quarter update, the Winnipeg Police Service said it expects its tax-supported budget to fall short by $9.6 million this year. Thats partially due to an actuarys assessment that found the police pension fund requires a $5.7-million increase in employer contributions.

Police Chief Danny Smyth said he believes the fiscal situation will change before the end of the year.

The service has so far been unable to find the full $6.1 million of savings council directed it to achieve in the 2021 budget, $5.1 million of which is linked to a cancelled pension overhaul. Revenue from photo radar and traditional traffic enforcement is also down and may fall short of the projection in the 2021 budget.

"Ill work with the board, Ill work with the city to find a solution," Smyth said following the Winnipeg Police Board meeting Friday.

"Nobody has come to me and asked me about service cuts. Were all looking for a path forward that avoids service cuts, but still puts the city in the balance."

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In late 2019, city council unilaterally decided to overhaul the pension plan, with the goal of saving millions annually. Instead, the changes were axed after an arbitrator ruled they would breach collective agreements. The result was a shortfall.

"Cuts, I guess is one option, but its not the only option," Smyth of making up the shortfall.

"The city certainly has reserve funds as well. Most cities do. Thats another option. I dont know what the solution will be here."

Police board chairman Markus Chambers said the pension issue should have been addressed years ago.

"When the rates were good and the pension was doing really well (in the late 1990s and early 2000s), the City of Winnipeg decided to take a pension holiday," Chambers said, meaning the city stopped contributing to the fund at the time.

 Erik Pindera
At Thursdays federal leaders debate, in the segment entitled reconciliation, APTN host Melissa Ridgen asked Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau why Canadians should give his party a third term when his government has doubled the bureaucracy of Indigenous Affairs, failed to fix boil water advisories and Canadians and Indigenous peoples are losing patience with the lack of results from all of this spending.

At Thursdays federal leaders debate, in the segment entitled "reconciliation," APTN host Melissa Ridgen asked Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau why Canadians should give his party a third term when his government has doubled the bureaucracy of Indigenous Affairs, failed to fix boil water advisories and "Canadians and Indigenous peoples are losing patience with the lack of results from all of this spending."

APTN Melissa Ridgen

In a testy tone, Trudeau said: "One of the enemies of progressive politics, Melissa, is cynicism, discounting the hard work that millions of people have been involved in over the past years."

Trudeau added his government has fixed more boil water advisories, provided "new or refurbished schools," settled more land claims and created more partnerships with First Nations then any in history, but "progressives always know there is more to do."

"I dont think that anyone is questioning the money thats spent but questioning the results," Ridgen dryly replied.

It was a terrible look for Trudeau.

A man giving a lesson to an Indigenous woman on "progressivism" is bad enough; a prime minister chiding an Indigenous person for being "cynical" is another level of insulting.

FRED CHARTRAND / THE CANADIAN PRESS Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau

I dont know any Indigenous person not "cynical" about a century-and-a-half of federal governments and their violent policies that fail to treat Indigenous people as human beings.

A couple years of attention and dollars wont cure this, never mind some mansplaining on how "progressivism" works. Trudeau doesnt even know what it is.

Until Thursday night, no Indigenous reporter had participated in a federal leaders debate. Progressivism is how calm Ridgen was when asking about the life-and-death situations in Indigenous communities created by racist laws and a callous, uncaring and colonial Canada.

The country saw five federal leaders in a room debating whether boil water advisories should be dealt with at all, and witnessed Bloc Quebecois Leader Yves-Francois Blanchet complain how Quebecs reputation has taken hits because people are talking about racism in the province after the in-hospital, highly-publicized death of Indigenous woman Joyce Echaquan.

The fact everyone was so calm talking about an ongoing genocide is unsettling.

FRED CHARTRAND / THE CANADIAN PRESS Conservative Leader Erin O'Toole

Progressivism is Indigenous people participating in a Canadian election where barely 15 minutes is spent talking about Indigenous communities and much of it was full of inaccuracies and ignorance.

Conservative Leader Erin OToole once again spread falsehoods on the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Nothing in the declaration challenges "partnerships for Indigenous communities," no matter how many times OToole says it does.

Watching Thursday's debate gave Canadians a window into what former justice minister Jody Wilson-Raybould (whose name was evoked by Green Leader Annamie Paul many times) must have gone through in government; surrounded by privilege, ignorance, and a bunch of men who think mansplaining, making stuff up and acting less violently is progressive.

This isnt an attack on Trudeau, who was rattled throughout the night and (ironically) particularly during the segment on "reconciliation."

OToole may have been a victor of the debate according to critics, but this is because he said so little. If he had to answer for his atrocious platform that promises to criminalize Indigenous activists, ramp up resource extraction projects, and reduce Indigenous rights, his "Canadas Recovery Plan" would be renamed "Canadas More of the Same Plan."

FRED CHARTRAND / THE CANADIAN PRESS NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh

Jagmeet Singhs NDP platform is the most engaged and interesting for Indigenous peoples  particularly in the promise for a "new standard" on consultation  but provides few details (such as cost).

Paul and the Green party has been in the midst of a political civil war and, frankly, anything theyre offering is moot.

Anything I would write about the Bloc would be more than the 10 paragraphs in its platform it dedicates to talking about Indigenous peoples, which frame Indigenous communities into Quebecs "nation-to-nation" interests.

This leaves yet another depressing situation for Indigenous voters, left to choose from a set of bad choices Sept. 20.

One thing is for sure: the debate on who is most "progressive" was proven Thursday, and it wasnt who was being questioned. It was who was asking the questions.

niigaan.sinclair@freepress.mb.ca
In the spring, when hundreds of unmarked graves were discovered on former Indian Residential School sites, a national conversation about the terrible legacy  and ongoing trauma  of Canadas residential school system was ignited.

In the spring, when hundreds of unmarked graves were discovered on former Indian Residential School sites, a national conversation about the terrible legacy  and ongoing trauma  of Canadas residential school system was ignited.

In June, the House of Commons unanimously passed legislation making Sept. 30 the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, which is now an official federal statutory holiday. Its a long overdue response to call to action No. 80 in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canadas final report, which called for the federal government to establish a statutory holiday to honour residential school survivors, their families and communities.

TIM SMITH / BRANDON SUN The new statutory holiday will build on the grassroots momentum of Orange Shirt Day.

The provinces are not unified in how they are recognizing the federal holiday, however. Manitoba is marking it by closing schools on Sept. 30, as well as all non-essential provincial government services and offices. Flags on all provincial government buildings will be lowered to half-mast. Other provinces, such as Ontario, are not recognizing it provincially.

Previously, Sept. 30 had been unofficially observed across the country as Orange Shirt Day, so named for the orange shirt six-year-old Phyllis Webstad wore  and had taken away  on her first day at a residential school in Williams Lake, B.C., in 1976. The date is significant; late September is when government agents would remove Indigenous children from their families. People wear orange shirts to honour residential school survivors and the children who never came home.

According to a Government of Canada news release, the choice of Sept. 30 as the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation "builds on the grassroots momentum of Orange Shirt Day."

Or it slows it, depending on ones perspective. On its face, the fact schools and post-secondary institutions in Manitoba will be closed on Sept. 30 is a bit puzzling, considering education is such a powerful tool in reconciliation. Manitobas schools have embraced the concept of Orange Shirt Day as an entry point into difficult and absolutely necessary conversations with young people about residential schools.

The date is significant; late September is when government agents would remove Indigenous children from their families.

For too many decades, Canadians were taught a lopsided history that omitted residential schools as a tool of assimilation. Many Canadians had no idea the residential school system even existed. From that perspective, it makes sense that a National Day for Truth and Reconciliation ought to be spent learning. (As well, while orange shirts will indeed still be worn on Sept. 30, theres an added visibility when classrooms full of children create an orange wave together.)

Then again, a classroom is not the only place one can learn. A holiday creates space for people to attend and participate in events, memorials, marches and ceremonies, to engage, listen, learn, remember and mourn in a fulsome way  so long as everyone gets to participate, not just those employed by the federal government.

Those who dont have work or school on Sept. 30 should be encouraged to observe the day by learning, by attending events, by reading up on the TRCs 94 calls to action (and identifying how few of them Canada has accomplished), by supporting Indigenous artists and creators, by listening, honouring, remembering. This work cannot be limited to one day; it must be ongoing.

The National Day for Truth and Reconciliation must be a national day of sombre reflection, education and action.

What it should not become is just another day off.
The police officer who leans into the window after a vehicle has been pulled over. The firefighter who runs into a bus shack for a distress call. The paramedic who rushes into a home for a medical emergency. The bus driver who transports hundreds of people to work each day.

The police officer who leans into the window after a vehicle has been pulled over. The firefighter who runs into a bus shack for a distress call. The paramedic who rushes into a home for a medical emergency. The bus driver who transports hundreds of people to work each day.

The public has no way to know if they are vaccinated because the City of Winnipeg doesn't track vaccination data for civic employees, including those who routinely come into close contact with members of the public in uncontrolled environments.

In Winnipeg, it appears no one knows what percentage of police, paramedics and firefighters (all of whom were fast-tracked for access to vaccines), as well as bus drivers, have received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine.

"We do not currently require city employees to declare their vaccination status and do not track the requested statistics," said David Driedger, the citys manager of corporate communications, in a statement to the Free Press.

As a fourth wave of the pandemic looms, vulnerable and immunocompromised Winnipeggers remain in the dark as to what extent theyll be protected from the virus when they have to rely on emergency services or public transportation.

Meanwhile, the city continues to drag its feet on implementing a vaccine mandate for public-facing civic employees  a measure adopted by the Manitoba government for many front-line workers in late August. Other municipalities in Canada have done the same.

"We do not currently require city employees to declare their vaccination status and do not track the requested statistics." David Driedger

The city, the Winnipeg Police Service and the Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service all confirmed they did not know what percentage of their workforce has been vaccinated. The unions that represent those employees didn't know either.

While Manitobas vaccination rates are solid  with 83 per cent of the eligible population single-dosed and 78 per cent double-dosed  it remains unclear if first responders and bus drivers are getting vaccinated at the same rate as the public.

Arthur Schafer, founding director of the Centre for Professional and Applied Ethics at the University of Manitoba, said vulnerable members of the public have the right to access public services without undue threat of contracting the virus.

Police wear masks while investigating the scene of a shooting in central Winnipeg this summer. (Mikaela Mackenzie / Winnipeg Free Press files)

As such, it is imperative for vaccination rates for public-facing civic employees  who are paid by taxpayers  to be made public, so that citizens can make informed decisions about their level of risk when accessing services.

"The question for the city is not only why its not tracking the percentage of its (public)-facing employees who are vaccinated, but also why they dont require vaccination in order to protect the public from being infected?" Schafer said.

"Theres also the question of the rights of the patients who will be treated by paramedics and (firefighter-paramedics), and the rights of the people who will be dealing with the police when something has gone badly wrong in their lives."

"Theres... the question of the rights of the patients who will be treated by paramedics... and the rights of the people who will be dealing with the police when something has gone badly wrong in their lives." Arthur Schafer

Schafer said it is time for the civic government to follow other Canadian jurisdictions and mandate double vaccinations for police, paramedics, firefighters and transit drivers.

For example, on Aug. 24, the Toronto Police Service announced a mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policy for its members, both uniform and civilian. One day later, the Hamilton Police Service announced it would follow suit.

"I think (the city) must implement (a similar policy). I think its their obligation to protect their own employees and to protect the public  but they have to make reasonable accommodations for those who are medically exempt," Schafer said.

When contacted, the unions that represent civic employees were non-committal about a vaccine mandate for their members should one be implemented.

Manitoba Government and General Employees' Union president Michelle Gawronsky said her union supports the current recommendations on COVID-19 vaccines from public health officials in Manitoba.

"We encourage all eligible members to be vaccinated. When combined with appropriate PPE and workplace safety protocols, vaccines are known to be one of the most powerful tools we have to keep people safe," Gawronsky said.

Winnipeg Police Association president Maurice Sabourin said in a written statement his union would have "more to say" on the issue once the city makes an official declaration about the possibility of a vaccine mandate for his members.

We are definitely urging our members to get vaccinated, but we also recognize that there are members who are not getting vaccinated for a number of reasons, said a spokeperson for the Amalgamated Transit Union 1505. (Mikaela MacKenzie / Winnipeg Free Press files)

"Since the start of the pandemic, the WPA and its members have been firmly committed to following all public health orders and guidelines to ensure the safety and well-being of each other and the people we interact with every single day," Sabourin said.

The United Firefighters of Winnipeg did not respond to a request for comment.

In a written statement, the Amalgamated Transit Union 1505 said it was unaware of the percentage of its membership who have received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine.

"We are definitely urging our members to get vaccinated, but we also recognize that there are members who are not getting vaccinated for a number of reasons," the spokeswoman said.

"Recognizing the right of everyone to their own body and health, we have to respect each individuals right to choose to get vaccinated or tested."

"Recognizing the right of everyone to their own body and health, we have to respect each individuals right to choose to get vaccinated or tested." Amalgamted Transit Union 1505

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Schafer said the right of individuals to safely access public services, and the right of society to have a functioning health-care system, far outstrip the right of an employee who refuse to be vaccinated.

While the "restricting the liberty of individuals always requires justification," Schafer said, he believes the courts would back up the City of Winnipeg should it adopt a vaccine mandate and face a legal challenge.

"If the city were to require its paramedics and firefighters and police to be vaccinated, and if an employee were to challenge that requirement as an unreasonable violation of their rights, I think human rights legislation would protect the employer," Schafer said.

"I think the employee would lose that challenge if their job required them to be in close, intimate contact with vulnerable people in the context of a deadly pandemic where the delta variant is frighteningly infectious."

ryan.thorpe@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @rk_thorpe
Photo by Alexandra Retter

Cochrane-Fountain City Elementary School Teacher Mary Kay Looney goes over a lesson with her class. Looney recently won a $1,000 grant for classroom supplies from the Wisconsin Education Association and shared some of the funds with new teachers at her school.
We greatly appreciated that assistance, she said. The harsh part is that I just felt like the officers didnt know some key things that they should have possibly been able to pass on, even in just like a pamphlet.

Once, she said, an officer came to her door on a call about a mulatto boy, a term she associates with slavery.

That was probably my most, like, made me ball up in tears and, like, are we serious here? We dont know proper terms of how to address someone? Or why not just say child versus a mulatto boy? Crowder said.

As a Black woman living in the Baraboo area for more than two decades, Crowder said its frustrating when people  from police to grocery store clerks  assume shes from out of town.

Now shes caring for a child experiencing deep depression and suicidal tendencies, she said, adding that the most difficult things to deal with now are waitlists and a lack of communication between mental health providers, police and other institutions.

War on drugs

Jesse, the community health strategist, said on a national level all races and ethnic groups use illegal drugs at similar rates. However, people of color are caught with drugs at a higher rate than is proportional.

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Recognizing the connection, Slama said he felt proud to have a significant piece of equipment from that day at its fire station. Its a sense of pride he still feels today.

Sept. 11 (2001) was a very sad day, Slama said. The number 343 is the numbers of firefighters that lost their lives on Sept. 11, so its kind of a moving memorial to them.

The fire engine isnt only a somber reminder of the events that unfolded 20 years ago.

Fire departments they say we are all brothers and its just like helping somebody in your family, he said.

Slama said he was talking to his brother and dispatching trucks on Sept. 11, 2001, when his brother told him to turn on the television to witness what was happening. Slama said he recalled the disbelief of watching the events unfold that day. He also felt dismay and wanted to spring into action and help.

On one hand you wanted to be there and help but just the logistics of the situation made it impossible, Slama said.
Florida's 1st District Court on Friday reinstated a stay on mask mandates in schools, blocking local school requirements for now, court documents show.

Lawyers for Gov. Ron DeSantis filed the emergency appeal after a judge ruled on Wednesday that the state must stop its enforcement of a mask ban.

The latest court ruling comes amid a showdown between the state and some local school districts that have insisted on requiring students to wear masks as Covid-19 infections surge.

The civil rights enforcement arm of the US Department of Education added to the issue Friday, saying it is opening an investigation into whether the Florida education department "may be preventing school districts in the state from considering or meeting the needs of students with disabilities" with the mask mandate ban.

The Department's Office for Civil Rights (OCR) sent a letter to Florida Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran Friday, detailing how "OCR is concerned that Florida's policy requiring public schools and school districts to allow parents to opt their children out of mask mandates may be preventing schools in Florida from meeting their legal obligations not to discriminate based on disability and from providing an equal educational opportunity to students with disabilities who are at heightened risk of severe illness from COVID-19."

The federal department last month said it had sent letters to state school officials in five states -- Iowa, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and Utah -- notifying them of investigations into whether their state mask restrictions prevented students with disabilities from "safely returning to in-person education, in violation of Federal law."

At the time, OCR said it had not opened investigations in Florida and other states "because those states' bans on universal indoor masking are not currently being enforced as a result of court orders or other state actions."

On August 27, Second Circuit Judge John Cooper ruled against DeSantis, allowing Florida schools to institute mask mandates while the case was appealed at a higher level.

Cooper ruled DeSantis had overreached when he issued an executive order in late July directing the Florida Department of Education and the Florida Department of Health to issue emergency rules giving parents a choice on whether their children should wear masks in class.

The state threatened to withhold funding from districts that violated the order and required masks, but 13 Florida school districts have implemented mask mandates without a parental opt-out, in defiance of the governor.

DeSantis tweeted he was not surprised by Friday's ruling.

"The 1st DCA has restored the right of parents to make the best decisions for their children. I will continue to fight for parents' rights," he added.

School districts react

Some school districts with mask mandates, though, said Friday that the appeals court decision wouldn't immediately change their policies.

Miami-Dade County Public Schools, Florida's largest school district, will continue to enforce a mask mandate as the appeals process runs its course, Superintendent Alberto Carvalho told CNN's Erin Burnett Friday, "for one simple reason -- it works," he said.

Broward County Public Schools, the second-largest district, will continue to implement its current policy, Interim Superintendent Dr. Vickie Cartwright said in a press conference Friday. The district has lost four staff members -- two teachers and two paraprofessionals -- to Covid-19.

"We're in the middle of a pandemic and we've got to respond accordingly to what's in the best interest of our students related to the pandemic," Cartwright said. "We look forward to the future ruling from the District Court of Appeals."

Orange County Public Schools, which includes Orlando, will "continue to monitor the court proceedings," spokesperson Michael Ollendorff said.

"Our current policy remains in place through October 30," Ollendorff said.

Leon County Public Schools, which includes Tallahassee, won't comment on the ruling and "will continue to mandate masks" through eighth grade, according to spokesperson Chris Petley.

There will also be no changes in the mask policy at Lee County Public Schools, according to spokesperson Rob Spicker, who said "the mask requirement remains in place." Lee County includes Fort Myers.

Brevard Public School System spokesperson Katherine Allen said the system had "not been notified of any changes to our current policy at this time."

"The decision is disappointing, but we understood from the beginning that the legal battle over masks in schools would take time and not every decision would be favorable," said Alachua County Public Schools spokesperson Jackie Johnson.

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UTICA, N.Y.  Excellus BlueCross BlueShield Regional President Eve Van de Wal was honored Friday as a 2021 New York State Woman of Distinction.

Each state senator gets to select a woman to honor each year, and Sen. Joseph Griffo, R-47, chose Van de Wal.

It is an honor to recognize Eve as a New York State Woman of Distinction, Sen. Griffo said. From her time as a nurse in the Critical Care Unit of Faxton Hospital to her current role as regional president of the Utica/North Country region for Excellus BlueCrossBlueShield, Eve has made it a priority to give back and help others. She is a positive force in the community and region and is committed to improving the lives of residents and families throughout Upstate New York."

Van de Wal is also a registered nurse and has spent 35 years working in health care and related services. She has been with BCBS since 1998.

Along with her professional work, Van de Wal is was also honored for her contributions to various community organizations, including: Community Foundation of Herkimer and Oneida Counties, Mohawk Valley EDGE, the United Way of the Mohawk Valley, The American Heart Association, YWCA of the Mohawk Valley, Healthcare Workforce New York and the Rotary Club of Utica.

As a lifelong resident of the Mohawk Valley, I take great pride in working to improve the health and well-being of our members and our community, said Van de Wal. It is my privilege to be able to support and contribute to the efforts of the many wonderful community-based organizations we have throughout our area focused on creating positive changes that improve the quality of life for the people of our region.

Van de Wal lives in New Hartford with her husband, Dale, and has two children.
The Biden Justice Department sued the state of Texas on Thursday over its new six-week abortion ban, saying the state law is unconstitutional.

Announcing the lawsuit at a news conference in Washington, Attorney General Merrick Garland said the Texas law's "unprecedented" design seeks "to prevent women from exercising their constitutional rights by thwarting judicial review for as long as possible."

"The act is clearly unconstitutional under longstanding Supreme Court precedent" Garland said.

The Texas law was designed specifically with the goal of making it more difficult for clinics to obtain federal court orders blocking enforcement of the law. Instead of creating criminal penalties for abortions conducted after a fetal heartbeat is detected, the Texas Legislature has tasked private citizens with enforcing the law by bringing private litigation against clinics -- and anyone else who assists a woman in obtaining an abortion after six weeks.

Since the law went into effect, clinics across Texas have stopped offering abortions after six weeks, or have shuttered altogether.

"This kind of scheme to nullify the Constitution of the United States is one that all Americans -- whatever their politics or party -- should fear," Garland said, warning that Texas' approach could become a model for other states as well as other kinds of attack on other constitutional rights.

The lawsuit, filed in a federal court in Austin, alleged that the Texas law is unconstitutional because it conflicts with "the statutory and constitutional responsibilities of the federal government."

"The United States has the authority and responsibility to ensure that Texas cannot evade its obligations under the Constitution and deprive individuals of their constitutional rights by adopting a statutory scheme designed specifically to evade traditional mechanisms of federal judicial review," the lawsuit states.

The Justice Department is seeking a declaratory judgment declaring the Texas abortion ban invalid, as well as a "preliminary and permanent injunction against the State of Texas -- including all of its officers, employees, and agents, including private parties" who would enforce the abortion ban.

DOJ was surprised by Supreme Court's actions

The US Supreme Court last week declined a request by clinics to block the law from going into effect.

In an unsigned order, the court's majority wrote that while the clinics had raised "serious questions regarding the constitutionality of the Texas law," they had not met a burden that would allow the court to block it at this time due to "complex" and "novel" procedural questions.

The Supreme Court's refusal to stop the law from going into effect caught Justice Department officials by surprise, according to a DOJ official, since every other similar restrictive law had been blocked.

Dozens of lawyers spent the past week working on the best way to try to challenge the law directly. They determined using the federal programs that would be disrupted by the ban presented the best way to establish standing and to try to preempt the law.

Thursday, Garland said the Texas law infringed upon the activities of Labor Department, Defense Department and other federal agencies. Specifically, DOJ said in the lawsuit, the Texas law "exposes federal personnel and grantees to liability for carrying out their federal obligations to provide access to abortion-related services to persons" in the federal government's care.

The DOJ also argued in the filing that the government has the right to bring the suit against the state because the the US may "vindicate its interest" when a state law "flagrantly infringes the constitutional rights of the public at large."

The "United States therefore may sue a State to vindicate the rights of individuals when a state infringes on rights protected by the Constitution." It also cited the so-called "Take Care" Clause of the Constitution, which says that the President has the duty to "take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed."

Reproductive rights group that have already brought their own federal court challenge to the Texas law, only to see that lawsuit stalled by the procedural difficulties the ban presents, cheered the Biden administration's actions. Brigitte Amiri, deputy director of the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project, called the new lawsuit, "welcome news," and Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, deemed the DOJ's involvement a "gamechanger."

Earlier, Texas Right to Life, the anti-abortion group that led the charge in getting the Texas law passed, scoffed at the news that the Department was taking action. Its Vice President Elizabeth Graham said Biden was a "puppet of the radical abortion agenda, and his DOJ will quickly find that they do not have jurisdiction to stop the Texas Heartbeat Act."

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott's office pledged to defend the law and called the DOJ lawsuit a distraction for the White House.

"The most precious freedom is life itself. Texas passed a law that ensures that the life of every child with a heartbeat will be spared from the ravages of abortion," Abbott press secretary Renae Eze said in a statement. "Unfortunately, President Biden and his administration are more interested in changing the national narrative from their disastrous Afghanistan evacuation and reckless open border policies instead of protecting the innocent unborn."

Garland on Monday had also pledged to protect abortion clinics in Texas by enforcing a federal law that prohibits making threats against patients seeking reproductive health services and obstructing clinic entrances.
Hurricane Ida's landfall in Louisiana August 29 left at least 62 dead, more than one million without power, and hundreds needing rescue  horrifying measures of devastation, to be sure, as they played across our screens  yet it's easy for onlookers across the country to forget this is a too-common sight.

Louisiana and its neighbors have been hammered by storm after storm, with a total of five storms just last year, including one as powerful as Hurricane Ida, all while dealing with a devastating Covid-19 outbreak. And with many seeking public shelter, there is danger the Covid-19 pandemic will only intensify in Ida's aftermath. Communities in the region can't catch their breath.

"Building back better"  and faster  would help mitigate the effects of this cycle of disaster. President Joe Biden's campaign adopted the phrase as a slogan, but building back better has a 20+ year history that predates the current presidency. As described in the 2015 United Nations Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, building back better means focusing on recovery that not only restores damage from a disaster but also reduces future risk. To meet that goal today, we need to look at the ways our disaster preparedness and response systems actually create risk themselves, by reinforcing things like wealth inequality, systemic discrimination or access to crucial services. The practice of building back better not only avoids these paths, it addresses them head on.

The incomplete recovery from events like the pandemic and the five named storms that hit the state in 2020 has blended into the Hurricane Ida fallout. Covid-19 complicated evacuation efforts this time and left hospitals filled with pandemic patients struggling to handle the storm's effects. Hurricane Laura hit the state a year ago, followed shortly after by Hurricane Delta, and residents of places like Lake Charles are still struggling through the long waiting periods and byzantine bureaucratic hurdles to access the federal aid they need to rebuild.

Last month, Lake Charles' mayor pointed out $900 million worth of housing needs and $400 million of local school needs were still unmet following other recent weather disasters. Moreover, Lake Charles and other nearby communities saw three more weather disasters hit while they waited for aid to come through after Hurricane Laura. Disaster response and recovery happens on scales far exceeding a single community's resources, with both official aid, and unofficial aid and assistance from neighbors. Had the recovery progressed further before Ida's landfall, cities like New Orleans might have more help in the form of mutual aid at their disposal today.

With the state now shifting focus toward immediate need following Ida, and agencies like the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) overworked and stuck with systems and rules that perpetuate, for example, racial inequities in recovery efforts and funding, who knows how much longer the people already suffering from inequalities in wealth, housing, and more might wait for the funds they need to rebuild homes and livelihoods? Health systems across the state have been overtaxed since the first wave of the pandemic. How much longer will they struggle with unsustainable surges of patients now that the picture has been complicated by evacuations of multiple hospitals and the prospect of new patients arriving and no room left in neighboring areas' hospitals?

Decades of research on building back from disaster point to several considerations as affected areas rebuild after Ida. First, state and federal programs need to provide sufficient resources to rebuild. Billions of dollars of upgrades to levee systems in much of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, seem to have shown their worth during Ida, holding back floodwater in the city; a success, but an incomplete one.

Other infrastructure remains in disrepair or in a delicate state, as widespread power outages and incomplete repairs from the 2020 hurricane season show. Investment in the grid, with options like the incorporation of microgrid strategies and technologies where the grid can decentralize and function autonomously; building "fatter," more duplicative grids; and addressing supply chain and staffing resilience can all help keep the lights on longer and make repairs quicker. Federal disaster mitigation grants are starting to address this, but more funding and attention at all levels is needed.

Also crucial is where and how resources are directed. Instead of recovery that recreates the conditions that were vulnerable to disaster in the first place, rebuilding systems in ways that reduce future vulnerability for communities and the people in them  and doing it fast enough to show change on the ground before the next storm hits  should be a priority.

Some of this is about physical infrastructure, but that can't be the only focus. The environment needs to be part of the equation. For example, bayous in the South provide critical protection from hurricane flooding by standing as a natural storm barrier. They should be protected from development, dredging and invasive species, and expanded through natural rehabilitation efforts where possible.

Building stronger communities means investing in making them more equitable. Hurricane Katrina showed the significance of communities supporting each other in mitigation, response and recovery; similarly, this recent disaster saw towns like Lake Charles, still recovering from past storms, serving as hosts to Ida evacuees. Investing in communities could support the crucial role of "everyday resilience" in disaster and these communities' preparedness for large and small events alike. How can a system rely on a 72-hour emergency kit or reimbursable repairs to homes and long the focus of many preparedness and recovery plans, in a state with an economic prosperity marker that has been consistently ranked near the bottom nationwide even before the pandemic?

Finally, it may also be crucial to ask who benefits from building back better? Equity could take the lead in conversations about what recovery looks like, to ensure those most vulnerable and most impacted are provided the support they need to recover.

While the principles behind these ideas are relatively simple, implementing them is not easy. Finding the money to do it in a way that will stand the test of time is a significant challenge, as the slow recoveries from last year's hurricanes and the ongoing pandemic show. A congressional infrastructure bill might provide some of it, but more might be needed to support the environment and communities. Also required might be a rearticulation of existing policies and processes. Federal law permits FEMA to participate in building back better initiatives, which were carried out partially after Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico in 2017, though not to the extent needed to build true resilience. Still, FEMA policies may not sufficiently incorporate ideals of building back better into post disaster recovery and can struggle to deliver resources quickly.

It may be wise to recognize the capacity and knowledge of community members and partners and to figure out creative solutions for working with them. At the same time, community approaches are also no silver bullet: efforts could also be made to prevent disaster risk creation outside of the community, including addressing continued climate change, the factors that exacerbate vulnerability, and systems of external support.

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WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. (WLFI) -- Purdue University is sticking to its COVID-19 policy, but it could mean trouble for those not following it.

"It is a little bit frustrating to see people just not show up," said vaccinated Purdue sophomore Brett Heckman.

Purdue University reported 84 students and 214 employees failed to show up for required COVID testing.

The policy requires proof of vaccination or surveillance testing.

"They're not making it as hard as possible, but I think they're just making it hard for students so eventually they just get vaccinated," said unvaccinated Purdue freshman Kennidy Vermillion.

Vermillion chose to not get the vaccine.

She's complying with the testing policy, but doesn't think it's necessary.

"I don't think it's making us safer," she said. "I mean, if the masks work then why do we have to get tested every week."

Unvaccinated freshman Gabriella Blankenship agreed with Vermillion, but that hasn't stopped them from following the rules.

"I will do whatever it takes to, like, to be able to be a student at Purdue," Blankenship said. "I'm not going to take any risks by getting suspended or anything like that."

"I think that they should just come to get tested, but at the same time, it's an inconvenience," Vermillion added.

What Vermillion called an "inconvenience" is keeping unvaccinated students and employees from facing disciplinary action.

"That was the agreement," Heckman said. "If you don't get vaccinated, you have to get tested."

Students and employees have three chances to comply.

Students could eventually be suspended, and the final action for staff is termination.

Faculty will be on unpaid leave until they get a negative test result.

"Just go to testing," Heckman said. "It's usually just 15 minutes of your time. It's not that big of a deal."

News 18 reached out to Purdue for comment about the policy Friday, but no one was available for an interview.
When Lt. Col. Green returned to his post at Camp Grant following his expedition into the White Mountain area he filed a report to his superiors in California on Aug. 20, 1869. In that report he included his recommendation that a reservation be created for the Apache Bands living in the area 
A beautiful boat brings a festive atmosphere to Guangyuan City, Southwest China's Sichuan Province. [For China Daily]

Sichuan's Guangyuan City  hometown of Empress Wu Zetian of the Tang Dynasty (618-907)  welcomes the celebration of the Girls' Festival (better known as nyuerjie) that fell on Sept 1.

During the opening ceremony, brightly decorated boats slowly approached the riverside.

Visitors are able to watch the performances from the side of the river. [For China Daily]

The stages aboard the boats buzzed with performances of short play, songs and dances that displayed the city's historical and cultural deposits, as well as exhibiting the charms of the local women in the new era.

In addition, eight teams competed fiercely in the final of the 800-meter Phoenix Boat Race. Athletes tried their best to embody the spirit of self-improvement, and the contest roared with the sound of oars hitting water and the booming of the drums.

Racers strive to be first during the rowing competition. [For China Daily]

The President of the Sichuan Women's Federation, Yang Juan, expressed her congratulations. According to her, the festival has evolved from just a piece of folklore to commemorate Empress Wu. In 1988, the local government renewed the time-honored tradition and it is now a shining "brand name" of Guangyuan.

Zou Zijing, Party Secretary of the CPC municipal committee, extended a warm welcome to guests who appeared at the event, with extra emphasis on greeting the women in attendance.

He noted that hardworking Guangyuan women have displayed their talents across various fields, and have made outstanding contributions to the city's economic and social development.

The recently-concluded Party congress of the city, which is held once every five years, just laid out its vision for the city's modernization. Zou expressed his sincere hope to continue focussing on and welcoming people from all walks of life to invest in and further develop the city.

(Source: chinadaily.com.cn)
Children create a carousel-like installation, called Blooming Time, in Puge County, Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province, as part of a program helping cultivate youngsters' creativity in rural areas. [For China Daily]

Under the cloudy night sky lit by fireworks, a group of schoolchildren takes a "carousel ride "to celebrate a traditional torch festival in Puge County, Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province.

This "carousel" is a new toy they make themselves  with 12 bicycles joining each other to form a circle. The inside space is dotted with colorful solar lamps.

As the 12 children ride the bicycles, the bright yellow installation turns round and round  just like a carousel in theme parks.

The torch festival, which fell on Aug 2 this year, is for the Yi people to pray for a good harvest. Although the COVID-19 pandemic has prevented large-scale celebrations, the children did get a new fantasy instead.

Nan Xueqian is one of the initiators of Program Spark which helps nurture the creativity of children. The bicycle installation, Blooming Time, is inspired by the strong emotional connection among children.

It was the fourth time Beijing-based One Take Architects, together with Wuhan-based social enterprise group, Sunners, launched the weeklong program. It aims to motivate "left-behind" children  8 to 12 years old  to use easily available material to create large playthings for themselves under the guidance of architects and volunteers.

They dismantle bicycles to make the major structure of the installation. [For China Daily]

"When I was at this age, I was no longer satisfied with little handworks but always dreamed of something big enough to put myself in," Li Hao, founder of One Take Architects, says about his original intention of the program.

He grew an interest in the education of "left-behind" children when he worked with projects in the countryside in 2015.

He discovered that as living conditions improved, another problem became evident. Apart from their parents' work  the majority do blue-collar jobs in cities, the children barely knew what other choices, such as more creative job opportunities, could possibly lie in their future.

Li then wanted to give rural children an example: What an architect can be good at.

This year around 30 pupils from Te'erguo township's central primary school joined the making of the "carousel" and some of them learned to ride a bicycle for the first time.

Before the architects set off from their city base, they had prepared for a month.

They managed to get 12 bicycles out of use, designed the main structure of the "carousel" and completed the whole process for testing before tearing it down again and deciding what tools the children would use. They made a manual introducing the assembling steps one by one.

They use plants to decorate the canopies. [For China Daily]

Fun-Filled Activities

It was the children who took the lead in designing the canopies made from canvas and thermoplastic sheets.

They collected local plants, covered them on the sheets and sprayed pigments on them to form patterns. They also pasted white tape in the shape of Yi characters on the canopies.

The Yi characters are a set of single fonts, mainly symbolizing their meanings, with some also indicating the pronunciation. The earliest document with Yi characters dates to the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279).

Yi families usually speak the language in daily conversation, but not many children know how to write it these days.

Li says that during the program, the volunteers took the characters from books. They also learned how to pronounce the characters from the school cook.

It was not easy for the children to learn to ride, but the installation could move while being stable enough so they did not fall. Meanwhile, it could not turn around smoothly if any of the children slacked off in pedaling.

The architects and volunteers hoped the children could safely maintain their physical balance and coordination while learning to cooperate at the same time.

Not to waste other parts of the bicycles, they also painted the fenders showing what their hometown looked like.

Students enjoy a Quidditch game with plastic drain pipes as they participate in the creativity program in Dabie Mountain Area in Hubei Province. [For China Daily]

Sustainable Efforts

The program has been designed to engage as multiple senses as possible. One of the trials took place in the Dabie Mountain Area in Hubei Province in 2019, where musician Tie Yang joined other participants to build a multifunctional theater with white and blue plastic drain pipes.

One of the installations, Blue Daydream, was a percussion instrument itself similar to old Chinese chimes. The pitch was determined by the length and thickness of the pipes. Using disposable slippers as drumsticks and accompanied by a djembe (African drum), the children's band was able to work out the well-known tune of We Will Rock You.

Just some minor rearrangements turned the installation into an amphitheater where the children performed a mini play in English. They even managed to make a ukulele.

Children in Puge County, Sichuan Province, show part of their creation, featuring Yi characters and patterns made with plants. [For China Daily]

But children making magic and casting a spell to better their surroundings means that a certain person is not too far away. Enter Harry Potter. During the break, the children spontaneously turned a balloon into a Quidditch ball  Quaffle. They designed and assembled their own clubs, and started a little Quidditch game that primed the adults for a try.

Despite all that, Li and Nan have another ambition close to their heart  they want to explore a standard system to insert such lessons into more rural schools.

The system, hopefully, can operate without the architects actually on the scene. Volunteers, usually college students majoring or interested in architecture or art, can be trained online and independently guide the children to get going with the least intervention.

The children, meanwhile, forming teams or simply creating their own work, would design the appearance and functions of the installation or variants if any, give a presentation, discuss, vote and make the decision at last.

In fact, Li's team has already developed two such lessons: one to build conical shelters with thin, flexible tubes and painted plastic sheets, and the other a toy block course.

Li says they have uploaded program information online for reference without charge.

A boy attending a 2018 program in Hubei Province wrote in his diary: "I enjoyed concentrating on what I liked doing today, not to ask and not be bothered, but I'm more looking forward to tomorrow's workshop because we're going to use a drill. A real man must know how to use a drill!"

And the next day he continued: "The drill is powerful, efficient and soaked me with sweat, but then I've got a clue how hard my father works, in the heat and without complaints."

As son of a construction worker, the boy says he wants to thank all the fathers who fight for their families.

Program Spark has won the innovative design award for people under 40 at this year's China Eco Design Award held by Beijing Contemporary Art Foundation.

"With mature operation experience and the capability for relatively large-scale replication, the program can benefit more 'left-behind' children," says designer Zhang Na, from the award jury.

Zhang adds that from creating, experiencing, sharing to interacting, the program has helped build a complete solution to tackle creativity and boost morale among the participants.

Li says: "Rural revitalization is not just about upgrading infrastructure, but also about nurturing the younger generation. It's like sowing seeds and we have to wait for 10 years to see whether it brings positive economic, social and environmental linkages between urban, semi-urban and rural areas."

(Source: China Daily)
How to keep children safe as they return to school
Seven US Capitol riot defendants pleaded guilty on September 10 to charges related to the January 6 insurrection, including one man who threatened to shoot House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
North Wales Fire and Rescue Service set to launch recruitment drive for full-time firefighters

Local people are being encouraged to apply to become whole time firefighters, as North Wales Fire and Rescue Service opens its doors for recruitment.

Registration for on-line applications will open at noon on Monday 20 September and close at noon on Wednesday 22 September.

Senior Operations Manager Paul Jenkinson said: We already have an ongoing recruitment drive for on-call (or retained duty system) firefighter opportunities across our Service which is supported by a national website www.oncallfire.uk this encourages people interested in a part time role to get in touch with us throughout the year.

Now we are preparing to launch a recruitment drive for full-time firefighters  and this recruitment window will only be open for online registrations for a 48 hour period.

We want people to join our team. Remember that theres no such thing as a typical firefighter  applications will be welcomed from all sectors of the community.

We recruit on merit and ability, so whether youre male, female, short or tall, if you think you might have what it takes please keep an eye on our website and social media for further information about the recruitment process.

The fire service is promoting Positive Action Days on 12 and 17 September at Rhyl Fire Station.

Paul said: The role of a modern-day firefighter is challenging, rewarding and most of all varied  and for such a diverse role we need a diverse workforce which reflects the communities we serve.

So were particularly keen to encourage applications from under-represented groups  these currently include women and people from LGBTQ+, black and ethnic minority groups. 

Were also keen to recruit Welsh speakers as were committed to making sure we provide a first-class service to all communities  and as part of our commitment to the Welsh Language, all new members of staff are required to have the ability to show basic Welsh language courtesy skills before the end of their probation period.

To find out more and to book a place on a Positive Action Day keep an eye on our social media or email hrdesk@nwales-fireservice.org.uk

Our website also contains a wealth of information for all applicants about what it takes to become a full-time firefighter.
NASHVILLE, TN (WSMV)  Local legal experts answered the legalities regarding the president's new plan against the fight of COVID-19.

President Joe Biden's executive order requires vaccinations for all federal employees and those working at healthcare facilities that receive Medicare and Medicaid. Private companies, with more than one hundred employees, have the option to vaccinate or test weekly.

Gary Blackburn, a Nashville lawyer, said the federal government infringing upon the private sector when implementing new work rules could get risky.

"How do you impose a burden on a private employer who has a private contract relationship with an employee? How does the United States gets it foot into that, and I'm skeptical of that?" Blackburn said.

Biden announces new vaccine mandates that could cover 100 million Americans President Joe Biden on Thursday imposed stringent new vaccine rules on federal workers, large employers and health care staff in a sweeping attempt to contain the latest surge of COVID-19.

Blackburn also mentioned that if an employee claimed they got ill after the vaccine, it could be a worker's compensation claim. He said there are still questions regarding how the federal government will enforce this mandate. He says if congress passed a law, this type of mandate would hold up in the courts.

"If the Congress empowered the federal agencies to make these requirements to any entity that received federal funds, that would likely be enforceable," Blackburn said.

The Attorney General Office said they're working with other state officials to review the president's plan.

Pull Quote "It will take some time. The labor department's rule has not even been written; the executive orders are complex and frankly, I have my doubts that anyone knows the True ramifications of his actions at this point." Attorney General Herbert H. Slatery III.

In the meantime, there are still so many questions and factors in Biden's new plan that will need ironing out.

"What power is provided by law to a particular individual to do a particular act and make it stick. This is going to be challenged throughout the United States," Blackburn said.

The Governor's Office says the Biden Administration has yet to release details on their attempt to impose sweeping mandates and how they will work. However, they're planning to remain in close communication with the Attorney General.
Directed by James Newton,produced by Daisy Ayliffe at BBC Studios for Channel 4. The programme is availableto watch(for viewers in the UK)at Channel 4s websitehereuntil October 5, 2021.

On June 14, 2017, 72 people were killed in a fire at Grenfell Tower in London. It was an act of social murder, preventable and predicted.

The tower was refurbished with highly flammable cladding panels to cut costs. Residents complaints were ignored. Firefighters were not informed of the buildings cladding, so the existing fire policy was inappropriate.

The longer the official Inquiry into the fire drags on, the more it is revealed as an exercise in preventing those responsible from being held to account. This devastating new documentary, Grenfell: The Untold Story, shown as the Inquirys second phase opens, is a stark reminder of the injustices that remain unresolved.

The film incorporates previously unbroadcast footage of meetings between residents, the councils arms-length management companythe Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation (KCTMO)and then local Conservative MP, Victoria Borwick.

This footage, by artist Constantine Gras, constitutes vital evidence of KCTMOs contempt for residents, and of the residents fight, long before the fire, for justice and the social right to decent, safe housing.

Constantine Gras (Credit: Channel 4)

The footage shows that KCTMO initially considered demolishing Grenfell Tower, built in 1974, before releasing 10 million for a refurbishment, which began in 2014. KCTMO would oversee this, being responsible for health and safety, and commissioned contractor Rydonthe lowest bidderfor the work.

In 2015, as a PR exercise, KCTMO hired Gras as the refurbishments artist-in-residence. He was contracted to make a short promotional film and a large-scale artwork.

Residents were initially hostile, with Gras, looking back, saying that there was a sentiment that We dont need artists here! In part, they saw Grass fee as a drain on the refurbishment budget. Social and cultural life are not separable, and these are not either/or decisions.

The crisis Grenfell exposed touches on every aspect of social and cultural life. Artistic responses are a significant part of the attempt to address it.

Gras was conscious of the risk of artwashing, considering the possibility that KCTMO were using him to gloss over existing cracks. Instead, to his credit, he decided to deviate from my contract and make a documentary about local residents, The Forgotten Estate. An extract of the film is available here.

Grass actions earned him the trust of residents, who invited him to film their meetings with the council and TMO. The TMO were less enamoured, telling Gras he would not be paid for that filming. KCTMO also never hung his mural artwork in the tower, so it survived the fire.

Gras documented residents complaints about the refurbishment work from the outset. He handed this material to the police one month after the fire and made it available to survivors and the bereaved. The police have now cleared him to use it publicly, which again points to the limited nature of the inquiry, which has no powers of prosecution and, in an agreement with the Conservative government, will not investigate any causes of a social, economic and political nature.

The film shows that KCTMO pledged to consult residents during the refurbishment, but, recalls Grenfell tenant Marcio Gomes, the penny dropped when the work began. Residents frequently found themselves without water or functioning lifts in the 24-storey tower. KCTMO kept changing plans without consultation, and didnt respond well to their own complaints procedure.

Marcio Gomes (Credit: Channel 4)

This created a backlash. Ed Daffarn, already active in the Grenfell Action Group (formed in 2010 to oppose a gross overdevelopment of an inappropriate site adjacent to Grenfell Tower), called a meeting. This resulted in many residents putting up notices barring Rydon access to their flats. Says Daffarn, recalling events in the film: If you want to divide a community, you dont allow them to speak with a unified voice. The Residents Group was formed in 2015 to provide that voice.

Gras attended their first meeting with local Labour Party councillorswho controlled the local district where Grenfell is locatedand the KCTMO. Grenfell resident David Collins said they were not consulted on changes. KCTMO insisted they had been. Tenant Lorraine Beadle put up a no access sign on her door, but Rydon entered her flat anyway and fitted new windows.

What is clearly revealedin filmed evidenceis that two years before the fire the residents were complaining about the refurbishment works. Their complaints touched directly on safety.

Beadle is shown bitterly complaining about a gap around the new window frame big enough to put her arm through. In response, Rydon filled the gap with silicone. Later, in the harrowing testimonies of the night of the fire, we hear of such mastic surrounds melting and burning away.

Lorraine Beadle (Credit: Channel 4)

In July 2015, the Residents Group met Peter Maddison of KCTMO and Borwick, pointing out that 46 percent of residents were unhappy with the work already done.

Grass footage is damning. It captures how vulnerable the residents were, although they could not realise the enormity of the indifference and resentment they faced from the authorities. Says Collins, We were fighting for our lives.

Borwick declared that resolving these complaints was not her job, but local councillors. When Meron Mekonnen, a mother of two small children, complained about regularly having no water, Borwick advised her to go to a neighbours for a bath.

Borwick now claims she was on the residents side. Everything we were told was a lie, says Mekonnen.

As unhappiness spread, the Residents Group had another, more acrimonious meeting with KCTMO and Borwick in December 2015.

KCTMOs contempt is undisguised. Maddison will not respond to general points, saying they will investigate specific complaints. But you dont! explodes Daffarn. Maddison denies even receiving information about specific complaints. Their handling of such complaints can be seen in the response to Daffarns concerns about his neighbours flat doors. Nothing happened, and two of his neighbours died in the fire as a result.

Ed Daffarn (Credit: Channel 4)

The Residents Group called for an independent inquiry. There was none.

The refurbishment was completed in July 2016, but residents were unaware of the dangers of the cladding. They were shown photographs but not samples, so saw it as cosmetic rather than the life-threatening finish it really was.

A title screen in the documentary notes that original plans to use fire-resistant cladding were changed at the beginning of refurbishment to cut costs, saving 293,368.

Housing journalist Peter Apps discusses well the Aluminium Composite Material (ACM) cladding and insulation materials used. ACMs polyethylene bond burns and melts, spreading fire, while the burning/melting insulation material in some cases gave off cyanide.

It was a deadly combination, and the commercial suppliers knew the risks. Arconic were warned 10 years before the fire their product was flammable. Celotex rigged their fire-safety test. Kingspans fire-safety test concluded their product burned like a raging inferno. Their products covered Grenfell Tower from top to bottom.

Peter Apps (Credit: Channel 4)

This invalidated existing fire safety procedures. The London Fire Brigades (LFB) stay put policyrecommending residents not directly affected by the fire remain in their homes with doors and windows shutwas based on the expectation that fires would be contained within individual flats. But the refurbishment ensured any fire would spread further, making stay put untenable.

There were still further missed warnings. At nearby Shepherds Court, a flat fire on August 19, 2016just 10 months before Grenfellalso spread to external cladding.

In November 2016, the Grenfell Action Group posted a blog article reading: It is a truly terrifying thought but the Grenfell Action Group firmly believe that only a catastrophic event will expose the ineptitude and incompetence of our landlord, the KCTMO, and bring an end to the dangerous living conditions and neglect of health and safety legislation that they inflict upon their tenants and leaseholders.

The LFB, just months before the fire, were concerned enough to ask councils for information on the Grenfell Towers cladding. KCTMOs fire risk assessor responded that Grenfell Tower has cladding but it meets building regulations. Firefighters, expecting modern building containment, were stunned to see the rapidly igniting polyethylene spread fire up Grenfell Tower faster than one floor per minute.

The footage and testimony of the fire are all but unbearable. We hear Marcio Gomess desperate 999 call as he tried to get his wifeheavily pregnant and asthmaticand daughters down from the 21st floor. After eight minutes or so he realised that his daughter was no longer ahead of him, but still above him.

They were all eventually rescued, but his son, Logan, was stillborn while Marcios wife was in an induced coma after the fire. Eighteen children, one quarter of the children living in Grenfell Tower, died that night.

Survivor Willie Thompson saw cladding panels pop, and fire spreading around the building as if someone were pouring petrol cans down it. Gras talks of his own disbelief, shock. It is more than anyone should have to endure.

The documentary concludes with the official Inquiry. Its chair, Sir Martin Moore-Bick, is shown at the opening session in 2017 saying it was convened because we need to understand. But the main issue was that those responsible for heinous crimes had to be held accountable, which is what the inquiry is aimed at avoiding.

Apps, whose Inside Housing has been steadfast in exposing the criminality of the cladding, tries to be sanguine about the decades-long process that led to the fire, but the veneer is wearing thin. The survivors cannot grieve until they have justice, he says simply.

This will not come through the Inquiry, as closing slides show. KCTMO, Rydon, Peter Maddison, all offer contemptuous statements that it would be inappropriate to comment further in the light of the ongoing inquiry. KCTMO even dare to offer sympathies and condolences to the survivors and families of those killed.

Rather than being given immunity and protected, these people should be charged and on trial.

The film shows, however, that Grenfell marked a turning point in consciousness. The survivors have been through hell, and they are blunt. Theyre still not listening to us. We want change, insists Hanan Wahabi. Ed Daffarn says, Those people would still be here if wed been respected or listened to.

Hanan Wahabi (Credit: Channel 4)

Four years on, many high-rise towers are still covered in flammable cladding. Last week, Lorraine Beadle told press Nothing has changed, demanding to know why cladding had not been removed everywhere. She warned Prime Minister Boris Johnson that if he does not act he will have blood on his hands. He already does. As London Mayor (2008-2016) he slashed fire services in the capital and told firefighters who protested to get stuffed.

There are growing recognitions of what caused the Grenfell disaster, and what must be done for the future. Marcio Gomes states, Youve put profit ahead of peoples well-being. Willie Thompson says simply and powerfully of the broader issue of the right to safe housing: Let people sleep at night.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at SXSW in 2019 (Image Credit: Flickr/nrkbeta)

On Tuesday, New York congresswoman and Democratic Socialist of America (DSA) member Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez appeared on CNNs program AC360 with Anderson Cooper. One of the topics of discussion was the recent ban on abortions in Texas, which the Supreme Court allowed to go into effect September 1.

The new Texas state law imposes the so-called fetal heartbeat rule, which effectively prohibits abortion after about six weeks of pregnancybefore most women even know they have become pregnant. The law also authorizes any individual to file a lawsuit against anyone who aids or abets an abortion, with the promise of a $10,000 reward if the lawsuit is upheld.

The ban is a savage attack on democratic rights that openly defies the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision by the US Supreme Court that a womans choice to have an abortion was constitutionally protected.

During the CNN program on Tuesday, Cooper asked Ocasio-Cortez to respond to recent comments by Republican Governor Greg Abbott. In the clip played by Cooper, Abbott promised to eliminate all rapists from the state of Texas so that no woman would need to have an abortion due to a rape.

Asked about her reaction, Ocasio-Cortez said she found the governors remarks disgusting and that she was sorry she needed to break down biology 101 on national television. Ocasio-Cortez pointed out that six weeks pregnant  for any person with a menstrual cycle meant being two weeks late. So, she added, you dont have six weeks.

The congresswoman spent the remaining portion of the segment obscuring or burying the central political issue involved in the abortion ban and generally adapting herself to the needs of the Democratic Party establishment.

Ocasio-Cortez focused her remarks on painting the issue exclusively in gender terms, blaming cisgender men for the assault on abortion rights. The congresswoman made approving reference to the #MeToo movement and concentrated the discussion on rape culture and misogynistic culture.

What this is about she noted, is controlling womens bodies ... This is about making sure that someone like me as a woman or any menstruating person cannot make decisions over their own body.

The congresswoman argued that sexual assault is about the abuse of power and sexual assault is about asserting control over another person. And the ease with which these men seek to do that to other people is atrocious. It is morally reprehensible, and they cannot even begin to understand the agonizing decisions that people have to make including in cases of miscarriage, rape and incest.

A number of points should be made about Ocasio-Cortezs remarks.

First, the most significant aspect of Ocasio-Cortezs appearance is the series of political issues she managed to avoid. Nowhere in the segment did the congresswoman refer to Roe v. Wade. Nothing was said about the reactionary role of the Supreme Court in denying an injunction against the Texas ban and the political implications of this unprecedented attack on democratic rights. In fact, the phrase democratic rights never escaped the congresswomans mouth. No reference was made to the increasingly fascistic character of the Republican Party.

In keeping with the official Democratic Party line, Ocasio-Cortez did not call for Congress to pass a law to codify Roe v. Wade, which would require overriding a Senate filibuster. Too many Senate Democrats support the filibusteror oppose abortion rightsto make this possible. She made no criticism of the Democratic Partys inaction and, of course, no mention of the decades-long retreat by the Democrats on abortion and other elementary rights.

The considerable length of time Ocasio-Cortez spent discussing abortions in cases of rape is particularly notable considering that less than one percent of women get abortions because of sexual assault. This was by itself a political concession to the law-and-order frenzy of the extreme right, framing abortion entirely in the context of violent crime. She said nothing about the rights of the vast majority of women who choose to get abortions due to health concerns, economic problems or simply because they do not want or are not yet ready to have children.

It must be noted as well that the Texas law does not equally impact all women or all menstruating people as Ocasio-Cortez suggests. Any affluent woman who wants an abortion will be able to get one with relative ease for the right price or by traveling to a different state.

Ocasio-Cortezs focus on sexual assault and gender issues is a calculated political decision. The Democratic Party officialdom is aware that the right to abortion is an explosive issue that has support within wide layers of the population. The ultra-right Texas measure comes in the context of a sharp turn by sections of the Republican Party toward more direct authoritarian forms of rule, taking place only months after an attempted coup in Washington.

Ocasio-Cortez directed a number of harsh remarks toward Abbott, undoubtedly a repugnant figure, but said nothing about the fascistic political elements for whom he speaks. The last thing Democratic Party leaders want is for the real political and democratic content of the issue to come to the fore. To reveal the political forces involved in this campaign would expose the lie that the threats bound up with Trumps rise to powerthat is, of fascism and dictatorshipdisappeared when he left office. The Democrats, as part of the ruling elite, are much more frightened of the population being alerted to the dangers and mobilizing themselves than they are of Abbotts right-wing conspiracies.

All the conditions that gave rise to Trump and his January 6 coup attempt persist in American society. The campaign to destroy the right to abortion, with the complicity of the Supreme Court, should come as a serious warning: no democratic rights, no matter how elementary, are safe in capitalist America.

To provide a left cover for their cowardice and complicity, the Democrats rely on figures such as Ocasio-Cortez. The strategy is to keep the discussion narrowly contained to gender, create as much confusion as possible and obscure the burning class questions. This has been the essential content of the Democratic Partys campaign over womens issues for years.

The muted response to the Texas abortion ban by the most ardent promoters of the #MeToo campaign clearly brings this out.

At the height of the #MeToo movement, enormous resources were devoted to removing men from positions in government, the media and cultural life on the basis of unproven allegations. For months, leading newspapers and magazines recounted every allegation in graphic detail. At one point, the New York Times published a two-page spread exulting in the downfall of the various men targeted in the sexual misconduct witch-hunt.

Where are all these crusaders for womens rights now? Where is the saturation coverage in the Times identifying the major political figures spearheading the reactionary campaign against abortion rights and exposing its aims?

Only a small fraction of the time and money mobilized in the four-year #MeToo effort is being allocated to fighting the vicious Texas ban and upholding Roe v. Wade. In fact, the upper-middle-class womencorporate executives, media personalities, academics, Hollywood actorswho loudly and enthusiastically supported every smear against powerful men, i.e., their rivals for positions and income, have responded to Abbotts law with a conspicuous collective yawn. The conditions and suffering of working class and younger women do not arouse their interest at all.

As for the Democratic Party, the subservience of its left spokeswoman Ocasio-Cortez to the political establishment on this issue reveals, in a stark manner, that this corporate-controlled party is incapable of offering any serious resistance to the mounting attacks on the democratic rights of the working class. On the contrary, they are the accomplices of such assaults.

The fight to defend abortion rights, and all democratic rights, is an existential one for the working class. It requires an all-out and determined struggle. However, not a single step forward can be made without breaking with both capitalist parties. The working class must be organized independently, in a struggle against the Democratic Party and the two-party setup, on the basis of a revolutionary socialist perspective.
Epidemiologists, health staff and working people are strongly opposing a plan by the New South Wales (NSW) Liberal-National Coalition government to lift lockdowns next month, as COVID infections, hospitalisations and deaths continue to soar.

Long lines of cars at inner-west Sydney COVID-19 testing station [Photo: WSWS Media]

Unveiled on Thursday, the roadmap to freedom will be activated once 70 percent of the states adult population is doubly vaccinated, likely in mid-October. Mass outdoor gatherings such as sporting events will resume for people who have received two vaccine shots, along with all retail and hospitality. Groups of 20 will be permitted to congregate outdoors and five in homes, while large religious services, weddings and funerals will be allowed. Full face-to-face teaching in schools will begin on October 25, with all students returning to classes by November 7.

These measures are a practical application of the homicidal herd immunity program pursued by the ruling elites internationally. They are in line with a federal government roadmap to end lockdowns and safety restrictions, signed off by all the state and territory leaders, most of them Labor. The governments acknowledge that these policies will result in increased deaths and infections, but insist that the population must learn to live with the virusall in the interests of corporate profit.

Underscoring the bipartisan character of this program, NSW Labor leader Chris Minns welcomed the state government roadmap, as did federal Labor representatives.

The response on social media has been very different, with thousands of comments denouncing the plan for jeopardising the health and safety of ordinary people while boosting the fortunes of big business. Popular opposition has particularly focused on NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklians declaration on Friday that the government would end daily press briefings.

That announcement was made as daily infections reached a new record of 1,542 yesterday, followed by 1,599, an even higher tally, this morning. The press conferences, moreover, are being shut down before next week, which the government forecasts will witness the highest infection rates, and October, when its own cherry-picked modelling predicts that hospital intensive care units (ICUs) will be overwhelmed, just as the reopening begins.

The government is seeking to shield itself from any scrutiny, as medical experts speak out on the dangerous character of its reopening plan, and health workers expose its lies that the healthcare system will be able to withstand the pressure, while it may be stretched.

Professor Alexandra Martiniuk, a University of Sydney epidemiologist, told the Sydney Morning Herald she believed the measures were prioritising industry above public health. The reopening was inequitable and too early. Martiniuk expressed surprise at the resumption of large gatherings, noting the limited character of evidence about whether they could become super-spreader events, even if only attended by fully-vaccinated people.

Grattan Institute health economist Stephen Duckett told the same newspaper: This plan was developed by business for business. They said right up front the Deputy Premier has worked with industry to develop this road map. It is an extremely risky strategy which guarantees an increase in the number of cases and the number of hospitalisations.

Duckett added that increased case numbers will mean one persons freedom is another persons going to hospital.

For weeks, the governments assertions about the state of the hospital system have been exposed as falsehoods.

Publicly, the NSW government claims that the crisis in the hospitals will be limited to one month, October. This morning, the Saturday Paper revealed that the national cabinet of the state, territory and federal government leaders, received a briefing yesterday indicating that serious pressure on hospital networks would continue for a protracted period of time, likely to span at least half a year.

Given that the hospitals in NSW are already overwhelmed, this is a scenario that will spell mass death.

Other material in the Saturday Paper, based on leaks from NSW Health, exposed the fraudulent character of the state governments hospital modelling, released last Monday. That document predicted that the states hospitals would enter a code black in late October, signifying that demand for critical care services significantly exceeds organisation-wide capacity.

Even this dire forecast, however, deliberately understated the extent of the crisis. The figures in the publicly-released modelling, for infections and hospitalisations, were limited to 12 hotspot local government areas in Sydney, excluding most of the city and the state. The documents forecast was predicated on the existing restrictions remaining in place, not the lifting of the lockdown that Berejiklian later announced.

The Saturday Paper, moreover, noted that the modelling allowed for a maximum of 387 non-COVID ICU patients, for the system to avoid a complete collapse. But as of September 2, there were 519 such patients in NSW hospitals. The modelling also assumed that critically-ill patients could be rapidly transferred from one hospital to another, when ambulances are currently being forced to wait with patients for up to 11 hours before they are admitted to a hospital.

The paramedic service is in such a staffing crisis that students are being hired on 12-week contracts. Even with this, there are a limited number of ambulances and no plans announced to increase the fleet size.

The Saturday Paper included chilling new details about the triage system to be implemented once the code black is declared. In the second stage of a major surge, staff-to-patient ratios would effectively be scaled back, with trained ICU nurses overseeing other health staff from other areas, such as anaesthetics, emergency, operating theatres, recovery and coronary care units. Despite lacking experience or training in the field, these workers would be responsible for ICU patients. Their redeployment would mean a scaling back of other services.

During the third stage of the plan, an intensive care consultant would work with other medical specialists to support intensive care triage and decision-making on resuscitation and goals of care.

Effectively, some patients would be denied treatment, resulting in their death. The Saturday Paper reported: In NSW, doctors and nurses have been told by hospital managers that life-saving support may not be provided, or potentially even be withdrawn, for those with a median age of 72 during the overwhelming phase of the current Delta outbreakwhich is forecast for late October and early November.

An August study, led by Dr Jai Darvall from the Royal Melbourne Hospital, found that the activation of these ICU protocols would exclude patients with a close to 80 percent hospital survival [rate] and a more than 30 percent five-year survival. People with an eight in ten chance of livingif provided with adequate carewould be left to die.

This program is triggering mass opposition from healthcare workers, including nurses, doctors and paramedics.

By contrast, NSW Nurses and Midwives Association state secretary Brett Holmes responded to the shocking revelations by telling the Saturday Paper the union was still having discussions with the NSW Health Department. He insisted that the crucial issue was operationalising, i.e., implementing the plan.

The fight against the criminal reopening, and to protect life, requires a rebellion against the trade unions in health and every other sector, which function as the industrial and political police of the governments and big business. Workers rank-and-file committees are required to fight for a massive expansion of funding to public health, and for policies that prioritise safety and lives ahead of private profit.
If the opinion polls are correct, Justin Trudeau and his Liberals have bled support to both the Conservatives and Canadas social democrats, the NDP, in recent weeks, and will fall far short of winning a parliamentary majority in the Sept. 20 federal election. Indeed, it increasingly appears that the Conservatives will win a plurality of both votes and seats. They could well displace the Liberals, who are currently polling around 32 percent support compared to the Tories 34 percent, as Canadas government.

Erin OToole [Source: Wikimedia Commons]

The corporate media has played a major role in boosting Conservative fortunes. It has touted Conservative leader Erin OToole as a moderate, even Red Tory, and promoted his claim that he heads a different and open Conservative Party.

This is a sham and a fraud.

OToole served as a cabinet minister in Stephen Harpers hard-right Conservative government and staunchly defends its record of austerity, militarism and reaction. Like their US Republican and British Tory allies, Canadas Conservatives have for decades shifted ever further right, and have served as incubators for far-right forces like the Peoples Party of OTooles onetime cabinet colleague Maxime Bernier.

OToole became party leader by pillorying his chief opponent, Harpers Defence and Foreign Minister, Peter McKay, as a closet liberal, and by courting the partys substantial anti-abortion, anti-gay religious right faction. In the thirteen months since, he has made four major changes to Conservative messaging and policy. He has repeatedly affirmed his support for abortion and LGBTQ rights; defied the express wishes of last springs Conservative Party convention and elaborated a policy to fight manmade climate change; outlined a package of purported pro-worker policies; and, most recently, tempered the Conservatives demand for a quick, post-pandemic pivot to austerity.

At the same time, he has doubled down on key right-wing Conservative policy prescriptions. Chief among them are ever more strident calls for Ottawa to adopt a more aggressive stance against China and Russia and strengthen Canadas role in NATO and NORAD; gut environmental and other barriers to resource development projects; and formulate and implement a plan to eliminate the annual federal budget deficit.

OTooles media-hyped repositioning of the Conservatives is transparently aimed at making the party more electable by appealing to sections of the middle class hitherto alienated by their pandering to the religious right and hostility to any serious measure to combat climate change. It is also aimed at solidifying big business support. Big capital wants pandemic relief programs for working people rapidly phased out. But fearing the potential for a rapid economic downturn, it is pressing for continued stimulus measures in the form of tax cuts, subsidies, and infrastructure spending. The Conservatives new climate change policy is also meant to placate the powerful sections of big business who believe they have been too wedded to the interests of Big Oil and that Canadian capitalism must seek to become a global leader in the green industries of the future.

It is OTooles pro-worker agenda that above all demonstrates the true character of his repositioning of the Conservatives. Far from moving to the centre, OToole and his Conservatives are using demagogy, lies, smoke and mirror promises, and calibrated appeals to the far right to bamboozle their way into office so they can intensify the assault on the working class at home and pursue imperialist aggression, in close concert with Washington, around the world.

In the naming of defending Canadian workers, OToole is calling for protectionist, economic nationalist policies. He specifically ties this to Canadas further integration into Washingtons full-court diplomatic, economic, and military-strategic offensive against China.

When he first outlined this policy last September, OToole described it as a Canada First policy and readily admitted its affinity with the America First program of then US President Donald Trump. The Conservative leader subsequently stopped using the Canada First label just as he dropped the Trump-inspired Take back Canada slogan he used in winning the Conservative leadershipfor fear it would draw attention to the extent of the support that there was, and no doubt still is, for the fascist-minded, failed coup-plotter Trump within Conservative ranks.

OTooles advisors claim the Conservatives pro-worker policies are modelled after those of British Tory Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Long a close ally of Trump, Johnson has made it his political mission to complete the social counter-revolution initiated under Margaret Thatcher. In keeping with this policy of maximizing profit extraction from the working class, Johnson has systematically sabotaged anti-COVID-19 measures, infamously telling his advisors as the pandemic raged, No more f***ing lockdowns, let the bodies pile high in their thousands!

All sections of Canadas political establishment, beginning with the federal Liberal government and including the NDP, have prioritized profits over saving lives throughout the pandemic with catastrophic results. These include more than 27,000 official COVID-19 deaths and tens of thousands if not more stricken with Long COVID. Yet like Trump and Johnson, it is OToole and the federal Conservatives closest provincial allies, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney, Saskatchewans Scott Moe, Ontarios Doug Ford and Quebecs Francois Legault, who have been the most vociferous advocates of eliminating all social distancing measures and letting the virus rip.

Last October, as Canadas second COVID-19 wave was rapidly developing, OToole went to Alberta to specifically praise Kenneys opposition to lockdown measures. He favourably contrasted Kenneys actions with those of Ontario Premier Doug Ford, who was then being chastised by the Toronto Sun and National Post for not fully implementing the homicidal herd immunity policy advocated in the so-called Great Barrington Declaration.

OToole and his Conservatives have cynically appealed to popular anger over Trudeaus reckless decision to call a snap election amid the countrys Delta variant-driven fourth wave, while simultaneously appealing to far-right anti-vaxx sentiment. This has included opposing mandatory vaccination even for hospital and nursing home workers, and demonstratively refusing to order all Conservative candidates to get vaccinated or even revealing how many are refusing to do so. Grudgingly, OToole announced earlier this week that he would ensure the Health Minister in a Conservative government, that is the minister responsible for overseeing the procurement and rollout of vaccines, would be vaccinated!

In promoting the lie that the Conservatives have changed, the media was quick to point to their platform commitment to increase health care transfers to the provinces by an additional $60 billion over the next 10 years. They also praised OToole for making improved mental health care one of the five priorities of his Canada Recovery Plan, and for promising to introduce direct payments to parents via the tax system, in lieu of a Liberal commitment to develop a nationwide network of $10 per day early childcare facilities.

However, even before the election campaign is over these spending promises have proven to be largely smoke and mirrors. When the Conservatives released their costed platform on Wednesday, it emerged that over the next five years they plan to increase all federal health care spending, including transfers and funding for mental health care, by just $5.1 billion or $1 billion per annum. This under conditions where the pandemic has demonstrated that decades of cuts have ravaged Canadas health care system, and exacerbated the punishing work-loads and psychological stress endured by health care workers.

Similarly, in place of the Liberal plan, much lauded by sections of corporate Canada eager to see more women in the labour force, to spend upwards of $26 billion over the next five years on creating $10 a day child care, the Conservatives are proposing to spend just over $2 billion in tax credits.

The costed platform reveals that the Conservatives budget priorities are corporate tax cuts, including a three-year $13.8 billion capital investment tax cut, a rapid end to pandemic relief, which they have castigated as a disincentive to work, and the provision of targeted wage-subsidies for industries like tourism that were especially hard-hit by the pandemic.

The Conservatives have also pledged to double the Canada Workers Benefit (CWB), which provides a tax credit to the lowest-paid workers, to a maximum of $2,400 per year for an individual working full time and making less than $24,573 per year. While workers condemned to live in poverty no doubt would welcome any increase to their income, the CWB constitutes a subsidy for low-wage employers and is based on the invidious Victorian distinction between the so-call deserving and undeserving poor. Moreover, it is meant to legitimize the Conservatives tax-cutting agenda, which has and will continue to massively favour the most privileged sections of society and big business.

To the initial consternation of sections of his own party, OTooles phoney pro-worker agenda includes a series of pro-union commitments, such as requiring large federally regulated companies to have worker representation on their boards of directors and giving unions greater say in Canadian trade disputes. This reflects an understanding on the part of OToole and his backers within the ruling elite that the unions firmly uphold the interests of Canadian capitalism by suppressing the class struggle.

These policies are aimed at further integrating the corporatist trade unions with big business and the state, and enjoy in their essential orientation widespread support within the ruling class. While corporate Canada has become increasingly critical of the Trudeau government for its supposed, to quote the Globe and Mails Wednesday editorial, drunken spending, it has repeatedly praised the government for fostering tripartite collaboration with the unions. The unions have been pivotal in both enforcing the ruling class ruinous back-to-work/back-to-school policy and suppressing upsurges of militant working class struggles that have erupted across Canada over recent months.

To date, the major unions have eschewed OTooles overtures. However, this could easily change if the Conservatives form a government. The US unions, including major International unions with large Canadian memberships such as the United Steelworkers (USW) and United Ford and Commercial Workers (UFCW), collaborated closely with Trump and continue to echo his reactionary economic-nationalist America First rhetoric.

As part of their opposition to public and social services for working people across Canada, the Conservatives have long championed provincial autonomy and, although historically the party of Anglo-chauvinism, have often found common cause with the Quebec nationalists.

This continues under OToole. On Thursday, Quebecs CAQ Quebec First premier, Francois Legault, explicitly endorsed the election of a Conservative government. Among his stated reasons was that the Conservatives have guaranteed not to support a constitutional court challenge to Bill 21, a chauvinist Quebec law that discriminates against religious minorities, especially Muslim women.

The medias sympathetic coverage of the Conservative campaign underscores that powerful sections of the ruling class are considering a change of government to shift politics sharply further to the right. A major factor in this is their fear of growing social opposition in the working class and anger that Trudeau has not moved more aggressively against it, including by more forthrightly championing an end to all COVID-19 restrictions.

That the ruling class will prevail on the next government, whatever party leads it, to work to place the full burden of the pandemics economic fallout on the working class was illustrated by a recent article by senior Globe and Mail business columnist Andrew Willis. It reported that Canadas CEOs are angered by the supposed anti-business tenor of the election campaign and the failure of their political representatives to champion a growth agenda, i.e. a battery of measures to swell profits through intensified worker exploitation.
A child receives a COVID-19 test (Credit: Envato)

Daily confirmed pediatric COVID-19 hospitalizations in California reached an average of 102 for the week ending September 2. This is 770 percent above the level in early June 2021 before schools reopened and only 29 percent below their previous high of 144 in January 2021. This rapid increase in incidence of severe COVID-19 is a devastating indictment of the Democratic Party and its pandemic strategy of allowing the virus to circulate widely in reopened schools, businesses and sporting events with token mitigation measures in place.

As the September 14 deadline approaches for the gubernatorial recall election, the surge in child hospitalizations also exposes the central lie upon which Newsoms entire campaign is based: that his administrations policies have protected Californians, particularly children, from the pandemic.

The national Democratic Party is deeply concerned that Newsom may lose the election, with the party and wealthy Silicon Valley and Hollywood donors flooding over $60 million into his campaign, against roughly $8 million raised by the far-right backers of the recall.

No serious attempt is being made to present the recall as an endorsement of Newsoms record. Instead, they are relying on workers justifiable fear that a yes victory would usher in the ultra-right Republican talk show host Larry Elder, who, in addition to scrapping the minimum wage and attacking reproductive rights, explicitly aims to remove all remaining efforts to curb the spread of COVID-19 in favor of a homicidal herd immunity policy.

Former President Obama recently released an ad stating that the election is a choice between protecting our kids and putting them at risk. One of Newsoms major video ads begins with the claim that with Delta surging, Gavin Newsom is protecting California.

To justify this assessment, Democrats point to a full vaccination rate of 66 percent for those 12 and older, according to the New York Times. Daily new cases of COVID-19 in California, reported by Worldometers.info, for which the 7-day average was 10,176 on September 8, was a 77 percent reduction from the high of 45,021 in December 22 of last year. Texas, which has banned masks in schools and has a lower 12 and older vaccination rate of only 58 percent, has 18,532 daily average new cases, approaching the all-time high of 22,968 in January 2021.

However, these case numbers mask the reality of a poorly developed testing and reporting infrastructure. Californias reported 7-day average case rates were 37 percent higher the day before Labor Day weekend, with the New York Times noting a dip in reported numbers across the country over the long weekend. Hospitalizations provide a more accurate picture of the true state of the pandemic and the realities workers face under a Democratic-led mitigation policy.

Data from the COVID-19 Reported Patient Impact and Hospital Capacity by Facility dataset, compiled by the United States Department of Health and Human Services, illustrates trends in pediatric and adult COVID-19 hospitalizations. Data presented in this article demonstrates the choice workers face between the twin ruling class policies of herd immunity (promoted by Republicans in states such as Florida, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Texas) and mitigation (advanced by Democrats in states such as California and New York, as well as the Biden administration).

Pediatric COVID-19 hospitalizations in California remained below 35 per day from May 1 through mid-July of 2021, as schools were largely closed and the Alpha variant remained dominant in the state, as illustrated in Figure 1 below. Schools began to fully reopen in August at the orders of the Newsom administration, following the lead of the Biden administration, with the full support of American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten and the teachers unions.

Figure 1: Daily average pediatric hospitalizations in California, Florida, New York, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Texas. Total state pediatric populations (ages 17 and under) listed above each graph. Source: US Department of Health and Human Services

Students were herded into full classrooms, making physical distancing impossible. Remote learning options were offered only at the last minute, with many districts refusing to allow students to opt into remote learning or placing steep barriers to entry. Testing was left up to cash-strapped districts. The definition of exposure and requirements for quarantine were changed on an entirely unscientific basis to allow the continuation of in-person instruction amid widespread community transmission. Wildfire smoke forced educators in much of the state to choose whether to open doors and windows for ventilation while inhaling dangerously polluted air or keeping them closed and worsening the risk of transmission. Everyone was asked to wear masks indoors.

The result is illustrated in the rapid rise in pediatric COVID-19 hospitalizations beginning in August, which has strained pediatric emergency care capacity in parts of the state. In the week ending August 26, reported hospitalizations reached 112 children per day, falling slightly the next week. This is likely due in part to the increased effects of the Delta variant on children. However, it also suggests massive undercounting of pediatric cases of COVID-19.

The case of New York, which has not yet opened most schools for in-person learning, illustrates the obvious role of schools in transmitting the virus. Pediatric hospitalizations in that state are just above 31 per day, less than half the level in California on a per capita basis.

With the exception of mask mandates and other tepid mitigation measures, the same basic reopening policy was pursued in states such as Florida, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Texas. The results in Florida, South Carolina and Texas have been record-shattering levels of pediatric hospitalizations.

Levels in Texas are now at 227 per day, roughly double the per capita rate in California. Florida spiked at 104 per day in the week ending August 12, a per capita rate commensurate with the current levels in Texas, before changing its COVID-19 reporting protocols to reduce reported numbers.

South Carolina largely avoided a pediatric surge last winter but has now risen above 25 pediatric hospitalizations, a similar per capita level to Florida and Texas. Oklahoma has a population smaller than South Carolina but has reached 50 pediatric hospitalizations per day, making its per capita level twice that of Texas and roughly four times that of California.

Adult hospitalization levels in California, Oklahoma, Florida and New York mirror pediatric trends. South Carolina and Texas are seeing levels of adult hospitalizations similar to, but not exceeding, previous peaks.

Note that all numbers presented in this article report only confirmed and not suspected COVID-19 cases, meaning that these are conservative estimates.

Figure 2: Daily average adult hospitalizations in California, Florida, New York, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Texas. Total state adult populations (ages 18 and over) listed above each graph. Source: US Department of Health and Human Services

This presents the choice workers face between the Democrats and mitigation vs. the the Republicans and herd immunity.

The latest reported California pediatric hospitalization rate of 102 children per day equates to 3,060 children per month, or one in every 2,900 children, aged 17 and under in the state. If this level were to hold for a full nine-month school year, one in every 320 children would be hospitalized, meaning that most children in the state would likely know a child who was hospitalized this school year.

At 7,070 adult hospitalizations per day, this amounts to 2.3 adult hospitalizations per 100 children in the state every month. By the end of nine months of school, most children would likely see a family member or close adult friend hospitalized with COVID-19. This all assumes that hospitalization rates hold at present levels and do not continue on their current upward trajectory.

These numbers illustrate the devastating cost the Democrats are asking workers to bear as they learn to live with the virus. The fact that these numbers could double under a Republican-led herd immunity policy does not change the fact that the Newsom administration and the rest of the Democrats, not to mention the teachers unions, have utterly failed to keep workers, and especially children, safe from this deadly pandemic.

The choice between herd immunity and mitigation is just as false as the choice between the Republican and Democratic parties. Eradication of COVID-19 can be accomplished, but only with a socialist strategy. As illustrated by Dr. Malgorzata Gasperowicz of University of Calgary at a panel discussion hosted by the World Socialist Web Site, a scientifically guided lockdown of about two months could bring transmission down to levels that could be isolated and contained through mass testing, contact tracing, as well as masking and vaccination.

The Democrats and Republicans refuse to even acknowledge the possibility of eradication even though countries such as New Zealand, China and others have been generally successful in pursuing an elimination strategy, even with the Delta variant, a policy that could lead to eradication if adopted globally. The reason for this is simple: In their cost-benefit analysis, they value the profits of ultra-wealthy capitalists like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos far more than the lives of the highly exploited workers risking their lives under sweatshop conditions in their factories and warehouses.

There is only one candidate on the ballot in California fighting for the elimination of COVID-19, and it is not a coincidence that he is a socialist. We urge all California voters who agree with the arguments put forth here to vote for Socialist Equality Party candidate and educator David Moore and against the right-wing recall. More importantly, we encourage you to contact the Socialist Equality Party today and get involved in the fight for socialism.
Frame from D.C. police body-camera footage released in shooting death of 27-year-old Antwan Gilmore. (Source: Metropolitan Police Department)

Residents are outraged after a Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) shot and killed 27-year-old Antwan Gilmore in late August.

Officers claimed to have found Gilmore unresponsive inside a vehicle at Florida and New York avenues at 2:45 a.m. on August 25 with a gun tucked in his waistband. Police claim further that when they tried to wake him, Gilmore drove forward, prompting officers to fire ten rounds into the moving vehicle which rolled several blocks and struck a tree. Gilmore was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead.

The department released body camera footage, but a ballistic shield carried by the wearer obstructs much of the view. A video taken by a bystander shows at least eight officers surrounding the vehicle with guns drawn. The video shows the vehicle lurching forward and then accelerating; at which point the police open fire.

In a press conference, MPD Chief Robert J. Contee III conceded that firing into a moving vehicle was in direct violation of department policies and that the firearm was found still tucked into Gilmores waistband where it was originally seen. Contee then tried to deflect from the obvious responsibility of the police for Gilmores death and endangering the public, saying, Its unfortunate that we have to come face-to-face with armed gunmen in our community. It makes the communities unsafe; it makes officers unsafe.

While there was an outstanding arrest warrant for Gilmore, officers were completely unaware of this when approaching him, and nothing in Gilmores past nor immediate actions could justify his summary execution. By all accounts Gilmore was not threatening anyone, and was likely not even fully conscious when he was shot.

The killing comes just a month after Contee ranted against policies that coddle violent criminals and demanded greater funding for the police at the expense of social services. While circumstances have compelled him to be more restrained and announce an investigation, there can be little doubt how his officers interpreted his statements.

For her part, D.C.s Democratic Mayor Muriel Bowser offered her condolences to Gilmores family and likewise promised an investigation. Such perfunctory statements, done for public consumption, mask Bowsers unwaveringly pro-police record as mayor. Several weeks prior to Gilmores death, Bowser had requested the Democratic Party-controlled city council add an additional 170 officers to the MPD and funnel $10 million more into equipping them.

Gilmores death provoked a series of protests across the city. On September 4, a multiracial crowd shut down intersections, chanted his name and demanded an independent investigation into Gilmores death and the prosecution and jailing of the officer responsible. They recounted their friendship with Gilmore, describing him as friendly and generous. One of his friends told NPR that Gilmore inspired him to go back to school and finish high school.

The marchers also stopped outside of the home of George Watson, who was fatally shot by police after he was seen on his balcony with an air-soft rifle a week after Gilmore was killed. Watson, likely in the middle of a mental health crisis, pointed the gun at police officers when they arrived at his apartment; the police responded by shooting him multiple times. One officer was wounded non-fatally, and Contee could not say whether it was due to Watson firing his air rifle.

The Washington Post, speaking for sections of the Democratic Party close to the US state, released an editorial nervously demanding answers over the egregious shooting. The editorial board cited a Twitter comment by Democratic DC Council member Janeese Lewis George that contrasted the MPDs violent response to Gilmore, who was African American, with their de-escalation of a white domestic terrorist in a truck threatening to blow up the Capitol with a bomb in early August.

The Post is worried that the MPDs summary execution of Gilmore and others will undermine the Democratic Partys ability to posture as the more pro-police party in Congress. The Democrats have appealed to the military, intelligence agencies, and police forces as the supposed defenders of American democracy in the wake of the January 6 fascist-led coup on Capitol Hill, where insurrectionists in army gear swearing allegiance to Republican president Donald Trump attacked police security forces in their siege of Congress.

The Democrats main concern is that any precipitous action by either themselves or Trumps Republican Party could galvanize working class opposition which could break free of their political control as ever larger sections of the police are openly gravitating to the far right.

The criminal killing of Gilmore has also exposed the futility of attempts to reform the police, and the complicity of the Democratic Party in their continuing attacks on the working class. Only an independent movement of the working class toward socialism can bring about justice for Gilmore and end the epidemic of police murder.
After the devastating forest fires in July and August, Greece is now heading into the next wave of the pandemic with sharply rising COVID-19 infections and a low vaccination rate. On August 24, authorities registered a record 4,608 COVID cases. On September 2, 106 people died from the virusthe third highest figure since the pandemic began. In the small country of around 11 million inhabitants, more than 14,000 people have already died from COVID-19.

There is growing concern and anger in the population about the lack of resources in the health system and the dangerous herd immunity strategy of the government. The reopening of schools next week in particular will fuel the spread of the Delta variant and put thousands of children, young people and their families at risk. At the same time, only about 56 percent of the population is currently fully vaccinated.

The Greek government under the right-wing New Democracy (ND) party is reacting to the social tensions escalated by the pandemic with a further shift to the right and is bracing itself for a confrontation with the working class. Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis therefore reshuffled his cabinet last week and gave positions to radical right-wing forces.

Newly appointed ministers are sworn in at the Athens presidential palace after Greeces cabinet reshuffle, Aug. 31, 2021 (AP Photo/Yorgos Karahalis)

The new health minister is Athanasios (Thanos) Plevris, a lawyer and the son of Greeces most influential fascist and Nazi Konstantinos Plevris. Until his defection to ND in 2012, Thanos Plevris was an MP for the far-right party LAOS (Peoples Orthodox Alarm). This means that three ministries are now in the hands of former LAOS politicians: Health under Plevris, Interior under Makis Voridis and Development under Adonis Georgiadis. All three are notorious right-wing extremists known for their xenophobic rants.

LAOS founder Giorgos Karatzaferis, himself a racist and anti-Semite, commented on the cabinet reshuffle over the weekend on his own television station, Art TV, with evident satisfaction. Half of my faction is currently running the country, said Karatzaferis, who sees this as a concession to right-wing opponents of vaccination. Thanos Plevris was my protege, he stressed. When Plevriss fathers Nazi propaganda was too much in the public spotlight, the son was promoted instead and first entered parliament in 2007.

Although Thanos Plevris has been trying to distance himself from his father in words for a long time, a closer look at his political background proves what kind of politics he has.

The father, Konstantinos Plevris, is considered the ideological pioneer of the neo-Nazi party Chrysi Avgi (Golden Dawn). During the military dictatorship from 1967 to 1974, Plevris worked closely with the junta and is also said to have been on the payroll of several secret services, including the CIA. Already in 1965, he founded the Fourth of August Party, whose name goes back to the dictatorship of General Ioannis Metaxas (19361941) who bloodily suppressed the workers movement in the interwar period. Plevris senior is not the only one in this tradition. His son, too, has reportedly referred positively to Metaxas on several occasions, calling him a comrade and a leader.

Konstantinos Plevris in October 2020 as the lawyer of right-wing extremist and MEP Ioannis Lagos, who was convicted as ex-member of Chrysi Avgi (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)

In 2006, Plevris senior published the anti-Semitic book Jews, the Whole Truth, in which he promoted the Holocaust and bluntly declared that he despises the Jews and regards them as subhumans, as the German online magazine Telepolis reported . This book was promoted on television by the current Development Minister Georgiadis. When K. Plevris was sentenced to 14 months in prison on probation for incitement of the people and racial hatred in December 2007, he appealed and was defended in court by his son Thanos in the following trialand won. In 2009, the old Plevris was acquitted, which his son praised as proof of freedom of expression in Greece.

In a statement on September 1, the Central Board of Jewish Communities in Greece expressed concern about the appointment of Thanos Plevris, recalling how he explained to the court in 2009, as a defense lawyer, why it was perfectly legal for his father to want to exterminate other people. Commenting on K. Plevriss reference to Auschwitz, he said: I will examine the most extreme interpretation. That the defendant with this reference means: Keep the camp of Auschwitz in good conditions because I want, at some point, the national socialist regime to come back, Hitler to come back, take the Jews and put them in Auschwitz. What kind of instigation is this? What incitement is this? Is it that one is not allowed to believe and want to believe that I want to exterminate someone?

Plevris responded to the accusations of the Central Board by apologizing to the Jewish population and speaking out against any form of anti-Semitism. But such worthless phrases are only meant to cover up his extreme right-wing views.

As early as the 1990s, Plevris marched with the neo-Nazis. He is on friendly terms with the former spokesman of Chrysi Avgi, Ilias Kasidiaris, as this photo proves.

Thanos Plevris (left) with neo-Nazi Ilias Kasidiaris (Twitter / @AntilianKotzai)

In 2020, the trial began for the murder of an LGBT activist who was beaten to death in Athens two years ago. The defendants legal counsel is Thanos Plevris, according to a Deutsche Welle report.

In 2010, Plevris appeared with Georgiadis before the extreme right-wing Patriotic Association of Thermopylae, where they ranted about the purity of the Greek race and the importance of blood ties.

Moreover, the new health minister is a vaccine sceptic. When the H1N1 influenza pandemic spread in 200910, he encouraged right-wing opponents of vaccination and railed in parliament against doctors calling on citizens to get vaccinated, denouncing them for creating panic. This July, he spoke out against the government persuading people to get vaccinated against COVID-19.

Particularly shocking are his inhumane statements from 2011, when he called for the killing of refugees at an event hosted by the right-wing Patria magazine. There is no border protection without deaths, Thanos Plevris declared to the applause of his fascist followers.

He threatened immigrants, When youre here, there will be no social benefits, you wont get anything to eat or drink, you wont be able to go to the hospital, and youll be telling others in Pakistan, Were worse off here. Migration to Greece should be deterred, he stressed. Hell must look like heaven to what they will live here!

It is not just Plevriss ilk in Europe like Hungarian prime minister Orban or German politicians of the AfD who have made similar diatribes. In recent years the entire ruling class in Greece and the EU has followed precisely this path, terrorizing refugees with gunfire at the border, pushbacks in the Mediterranean and hellish living conditions in detention camps.

The strengthening of fascist elements in the Greek government must be understood as an open declaration of war on the working class. The new extreme right-wing health minister will relentlessly impose reopening policies and cuts in the health system under the conditions of the new Delta wave.

Mitsotakis has made other changes in his cabinet. Citizen Protection Minister Michalis Chrysochoidis, discredited for his fatal inaction during the recent wildfires, has been replaced by Panagiotis Theodorikakos, who is also in charge of the police and fire brigade.

Theodorikakos has had a long march to the rightfrom the youth organization of the Communist Party of Greece to the social democratic PASOK to the ND. His history means he is seen as a suitable man for suppressing social protests. A few days after taking office, he applied for the first time the new law restricting demonstrations that was passed last year. A demonstration of around 200 students in the centre of Athens was pushed to one side of the street by the police last Friday so that car traffic could continue as normal.

The government also set up a new ministry for the climate crisis and civil protection to deflect popular anger over the consequences of this years forest fires. Mitsotakis first appointed Evangelos Apostolakis, a former navy general and defence minister in the Syriza government, to the post, with the aim of integrating the opposition party. He declined, and the job was given to Cypriot right-wing conservative politician Christos Stylianidis, previously EU Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Protection from 2014 to 2019.

The current right-wing shift in Greece is part of an international process. Everywhere, the ruling class is turning to dictatorial forms of rule and relying on far-right forces to suppress the growing opposition among workers and youth.

The year began with the storming of the US Congress by a fascist mob instigated by former President Donald Trump. In Germany, the bourgeois parties candidates for the Bundestag are vying to see who can most aggressively push a militarist agenda and implement school openings most ruthlessly. In all EU countries, the public health system is in danger of collapsing due to the spread of the Delta variant as governments let the virus run rampant, removing all protective measures except vaccinations. A year and a half into the pandemic and after more than a million deaths in Europe, the ruling elites continue to pursue the same agenda: profits before lives.

That is why there was no outcry in the international media about the fact that a politician in the mould of German fascist Bjorn Hocke now heads the Greek Ministry of Health. Major newspapers like Spiegel Online, the New York Times and the Guardian have remained silent, as have most EU politicians and international pseudo-leftist parties.

The largest opposition party, Syriza (Coalition of the Radical Left), feigned verbal criticism of the cabinet reshuffle. Party leader Alexis Tsipras spoke of an extreme right-wing government of LAOS ministers and Syriza MP Euclid Tsakalotos quoted Plevriss anti-refugee rants in parliament. A man who made this statement and thinks like this cannot be a health minister in any European country, Tsakalotos said.

But he then immediately offered to accept Plevris if he distanced himself from the statements: In our view, there are only two options: either he retracts his statements now, before the inauguration, or Mr Mitsotakis revises his decision.

In fact, Syriza itself is part of the right-wing turn in Greek and international politics and directly responsible for the rise of far-right forces to the highest government offices. During its 20152019 term in government, it formed a coalition with the ultra-right Independent Greeks (Anel) to impose the austerity dictates of the Troika of the European Central Bank, International Monetary Fund, and European Commission in the face of enormous popular opposition. In the process it also armed the police state apparatus and the military, and pursued a brutal refugee policy in the spirit of Plevris.
An Amazon fulfillment center (Wikimedia Commons)

On Wednesday, September 1, Jeff Linnell, a 51-year-old employee at Amazons BFI4 warehouse in Kent, Washington, in the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue metropolitan region died of COVID-19. Linnell is remembered by his wife of 24 years, along with family and friends as a big jokester with bad jokes and a big heart.

According to a GoFundMe page set up to assist in funeral costs, Linnell was a soulmate to his wife. I met Jeff not long after him starting at the same company his wife and I worked at, says the introduction. He could always make you laugh with his bad jokes and big heart.  Jeff lost his battle after 3 weeks in the ICU trying to fight off this horrible virus.

Linnell was a safety ambassador at the BFI4 facility. The fulfillment center is referred to in the Seattle Times as the closest of its kind to Amazons Seattle headquarters and a proving ground for several new safety measures implemented by the commerce giant, including coronavirus testing.

Amazon also used BFI4 as a backdrop for several propaganda films that it distributed to local media stations last spring in order to bolster the companys public safety image. One of the pitches the company fed to local news anchors to repeat on-air was, The company [Amazon] is keeping its employees safe and healthy.

Early on in the pandemic, Amazon was compelled to introduce a number of protective measures and concessions to its workforce in order to keep operations going. A New York Times investigation last June described, Semi trucks [sitting] at warehouses around the country, without enough workers to unload them.  Warehouse laborers were not showing up as news of cases spread throughout the company.

Some of the limited measures started at BFI4 included temperature checks, social distancing rules, better cleaning, contact tracing, testing and mask mandates. In most cases, these precautions have all been eliminated within Amazon, following the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)s directives that allowed public health and safety measures, such as masking, to be discarded.

Amazon was again compelled to introduce masking requirements in its warehouses last month as infections increased in the United States due to the rapid spread of the Delta variant. According to the New York Times COVID Tracker, cases in Washington state have reached levels near the peak of the wave which hit the US last winter, when a majority of the population was unvaccinated.

Linnells deatha terrible loss to friends, family and co-workersis a further demonstration of Amazons callous attitude toward the safety and well-being of its employees. Despite the persistent danger posed by COVID-19, the company has dismantled other health and safety measures, such as its self-testing centers. Other measures, such as the anonymous COVID-19 text alert system which informs workers when a person at their facility tests positive, do not give workers details about cases in the facility and are largely useless for public safety purposes.

Workers reacted to Linnells death with expressions of sympathy to his family and co-workers, as well as anger directed against Amazon management. We send our most sincere condolences to the family, friends and coworkers of our fellow Amazonian, wrote Marc, a leading member of the Baltimore Amazon Workers Rank-and-File Committee that was formed last year among Amazon workers to oppose the exploitative policies of their employer amid the pandemic. Marc demanded Amazon create better measures to keep us all safe.

Last month, the committee issued a statement (Amazon rank and file respond to company decision to bring back masks as COVID-19 surges: Too little, too late), which asked: In the week between Amazons announcement that it was bringing back its mask requirement and the following Monday, the number of COVID-19 cases in the United States rose by about 360,000. How many of those 360,000 cases were Amazonians? We dont know because Amazon does not publicly report its daily case numbers at its locations. It is now clear that Linnell was one of those cases.

The Baltimore Amazon Worker Rank-and-File Committee has raised a series of safety demands, including:

 A genuine system of contact tracing within Amazons facilities.

 Paid time off with no threat of termination for workers unwilling to risk themselves during the pandemic. The rehiring at the same wage or higher for workers previously terminated for protesting and resisting Amazons abuses.

 Accessible, reliable and safe testing and vaccinations for all employees who desire them. These items should be overseen and administered by medical professionals with the required background training and experience in their fields.

 Closure of facilities for necessary cleaning. If an outbreak is detected at a fulfillment center, it must be closed for at least two days and deep-cleaned with no loss of pay to the workers affected.

 An end to abusive speedup. Extended break periods at the end of every hour to maintain health and safety. Time Off Task (TOT) tracking and other forms of harassment must be abolished.

 Immediate reinstatement of hazard pay with retroactive pay increases.

The committee has also demanded Amazon provide all information in its possession about the death of fellow Amazonian Poushawn Brown, as well as [f]ull financial and medical support for the Brown family, paid for by Amazon. Brown mysteriously passed away in her sleep after working a shift in Amazons COVID-19 testing department at the DDC3 facility in Northern Virginia.

Company executives have frequently stated that warehouses are safe from COVID-19. When asked by a reporter on CBSs 60 Minutes if Amazon was free of blame for any cases spreading  in your facilities, operations executive Dave Clark replied, Thats correct.

However, in the spring of this year, Amazon was ordered to close fulfillment centers in Ontario, Canada following a rise in COVID-19 cases inside the facility. Closer to BFI4, the Oregon Health Authority (OHA) reported 345 cases of COVID-19 at Amazons Troutdale facility since May, which made the Troutdale PDX9 fulfillment center the workplace with the highest number of cases in the state.
In lockstep with President Joe Bidens moves to fully reopen the economy amid soaring COVID-19 infections and deaths, all of New York Citys municipal workers have been ordered to report to their offices and work locations for in-person work on Monday morning.

This includes 75,000 public school teachers, who, along with 1,100,000 students, are being herded back Monday into unsafe, poorly ventilated school buildings where they will be crammed together, a situation that makes a mockery of Bidens claim that his new pandemic plan, announced Thursday, is motivated by a desire to save lives and protect children.

This takes place under conditions where COVID infections and hospitalizations of children are already soaring, and children are dying at the highest rate since the pandemic erupted at the beginning of 2020. School openings around the country have fueled a 500 percent rise in child infections over the past month, to the point where children account for nearly a quarter of all new infections nationwide. Already, scores of schools have been forced to close and temporarily shift back to remote learning due to eruptions of the pandemic among students, educators and staff. Teachers and staff are becoming infected and the death toll is rapidly rising.

The New York Times COVID tracker reported 170,460 new infections nationwide on Thursday, and a sharp increase in new deaths to 3,231far greater than the recent average of about 1,300. New York City has already officially reported 34,000 deaths due to COVID.

In announcing mandatory vaccinations for federal employees and mandates for workers at private companies, Biden said that the most important part of his plan was to keep schools open, which he falsely claimed could be done safely. This has been a central demand of the ruling class under both Trump and Biden, as it is considered critical to getting parents back into unsafe workplaces.

Bill de Blasio (Credit: Flickr.com/Gage Skidmore)

The massive back-to-work drive in the countrys largest city is being enforced by Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio. It shows that the real purpose of Bidens plan is to reverse the slowdown in the economy caused by the Delta variant-driven new wave of the pandemic. This is to be accomplished by forcing workers back into offices, schools and factories to fully resume the flow of corporate profits, despite the inevitable cost in human lives.

It goes hand in hand with the termination of pandemic relief measures that have served as a lifeline for millions, including federal unemployment benefits and a ban on evictions. A 15 percent increase in food stamp benefits is set to expire at the end of this month.

The trade unions are playing a critical role in enforcing this homicidal policy. The teachers unions are backing the school reopenings, with American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten carrying out a nationwide tour to impose full in-person instruction. The AFL-CIO as a whole is playing the same role. In New York, the city unions are doing nothing to oppose the back-to-work drive, despite mounting concern and opposition among city workers.

As the New York Times noted in a front-page article Friday promoting the return to work in New York, The move will be closely watched in cities around the nation. The Times acknowledged that the demand for in-person working is sparking significant unrest among workers in New York City. It reported that it interviewed a dozen city employees and all but one disapproved of de Blasios plan. It cited the local union chapter president for the Parks Department as saying he has been inundated with concerns from his members.

In a separate front-page article headlined Bidens New Vaccine Push Is a Fight for the US Economy, the Times acknowledged that the administration was driven to announce its new measures by the recent slowdown in economic growth due to the surge in the pandemic.

The ruling class was stunned by the dismal jobs report for August released September 3, which fell far below economists predictions, registering only 235,000 new jobs, barely a quarter of the new jobs created in each of the previous two months. Fears are mounting within the corporate-financial elite that the massively inflated stock market, pumped up by trillions of dollars from the Federal Reserve, will collapse unless workers are driven back onto assembly lines and into warehouses to back up the mountain of debt with real value extracted through sweat-shop exploitation.

Noting that Biden administration officials had made clear on Thursday the new vaccination mandate plan excluded any return to lockdowns or shutdowns, the Times wrote that the surge in deaths crippled consumer confidence in August and portends a possible chill in fall spending

It complained that there is little sign that would-be workers, even vaccinated ones, have become more accepting of the risks of returning to service jobs as the pandemic rages.

Since the majority of the New York City workforcefirefighters, EMS, police, sanitation, health care workershave continued to work in person throughout the pandemic, the back-to-work order primarily affects the 80,000 office employees who have worked remotely since the city was forced by the pandemic to shut down in March 2020.

In line with Bidens mandated vaccination of federal workers, and in order to spur the lagging rate of vaccination in the city, all 280,000 city workers must show proof of full vaccination or submit a negative COVID test weekly when they report to work starting September 13.

Inside offices, elevators and stairwells, mask-wearing will be required all day, but no social distancing will be enforced in open office spaces, where work stations are often less than three feet apart. No remote or hybrid work schedules will be permitted. Failure to comply, without a Reasonable Accommodation from the Equal Opportunity Office, will result in termination.

The unilateral terms and less than two-weeks notice have left many of those most affected angry and resistant, as they are forced to rearrange child care, living arrangements and other obligations to resume their pre-pandemic schedules at the drop of a hat.

At the beginning of August, it was announced that city workers, like public school children and teachers, would be expected to return fully in-person without any remote option come September.

Given only well see in answer to questions over the summer about what preparations were actually being made to implement a return to the office, workers were led to expect that some phased-in plan would be forthcoming. However, the back-to-work order issued on the day before the Labor Day weekend had nothing to do with a rational plan.

Wall Street and the real estate speculators are particularly concerned over low occupation rates in business districts across the city. Real estate interests that command astronomical rents in such high profile towers as the rebuilt One World Trade Center face a situation where more than 21 percent of office space in Lower Manhattan is vacant, double the vacancy rate before the pandemic and an all-time high. A similar situation exists in the other primary business districts like midtown Manhattan.

This is what is driving the unsafe reopening of a city, the home of Wall Street and the worlds largest concentration of billionaires, where massive poverty, inequality and decaying infrastructure were brutally exposed earlier this month when the remnants of Hurricane Ida caused massive flooding that left 48 dead and hundreds homeless.

The response of District Council 37 and the rest of the city unions to the unsafe back-to-work drive is to file lawsuits against the mayors office for failing to include them in negotiations.

Bidens new pandemic plan and de Blasios back-to-work drive are part of the same policy. It is the policy, either in the naked form of herd immunity or the more muted form of mitigation by means of vaccination and masking, that has been adopted by capitalist governments around the world. It is dictated not by science or concern for saving lives. Rather, it is dictated by the economic interests of the capitalist class, which rejects the only scientifically valid and effective strategy to fight the pandemica strategy to marshal vaccines and every other means to eliminate and eradicate the virus.

That requires the shutdown of all non-essential workplaces and schools, along with universal vaccination, universal testing, contact tracing and isolation of infected individuals, until the spread of the virus is halted. All the resources needed must be allocated to fully compensate workers impacted by shutdowns and provide high quality remote learning. The money must be requisitioned from the vast fortunes of the financial oligarchy, which has increased its wealth dramatically in the course of the pandemic, feasting off of mass death.

As the Socialist Equality Party explained in its statement of September 7, the only social force that can enforce the strategy of eradicating the virus is the working class. This requires the expansion of rank-and-file committees independent of the unions and both big business parties to fight for the immediate closure of schools and all non-essential workplaces in the US as part of an international movement.
Former Trump campaign official and executive director of Look Ahead America, Matt Braynard, is organizing a fascist rally in defense of the insurrectionists charged in the attack on the US Capitol on January 6.

In this Jan. 6, 2021, file photo rioters try to break through a police barrier at the Capitol in Washington. (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)

The Justice for J6 event was announced on July 31. While speakers have yet to be finalized, the event is expected to draw Republican Party officials and far-right supporters of Donald Trump, including fascist militia members who spearheaded the attack on the Capitol in an attempt to overturn the Electoral College victory of Joe Biden.

Referring to the event set for September 18, Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told the press on Wednesday, What happened on January 6 was such an assault on this beautiful Capitol. And now these people are coming back to praise the people who were out to kill members of Congress.

In response to a query about planned security measures, Pelosi said there are some briefings going on at the appropriating level involving the House Administration Committee. Multiple outlets have reported that Pelosi has invited Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy for a security briefing with recently installed US Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger on Monday.

The Hill reported Wednesday that security fencing, which was installed following Trumps attempted coup and remained standing for months, would be set up again ahead of the rally. An anonymous D.C. law enforcement source told CNN in August that the Metropolitan Police would be fully activated for the Saturday rally, including the deployment of additional Civil Disturbance Units on a stand-by basis.

The organizer of the rally, Braynard, is a long-time Republican operative. He joined the Republican National Committee in 1996 and has worked for hundreds of Republican campaigns, including arch-conservative Pat Buchanans failed 1996 presidential run.

Braynard, along with the majority of elected Republican officials, have characterized those charged and imprisoned in connection with the coup attempt as political prisoners targeted by the FBI and police for exercising their First Amendment rights on January 6.

In a July interview with former Trump White House adviser and Breitbart News editor Steve Bannon, Braynard said of the September rally: We are going back to the Capitol, right where it started, on September 18, and we are going to push back against the phony narrative that there was an insurrection.

Braynard has previously held rallies outside federal courthouses and the D.C. Correctional Center in support of militia members currently being detained. Republican lawmakers such as Marjorie Taylor Greene (Georgia), Matt Gaetz (Florida), Paul Gosar (Arizona) and Louie Gohmert (Texas) have spoken at such events. While it does not appear at this time that Greene and Gaetz will speak at Saturdays event, Gosar and Gohmert have yet to comment publicly.

Some 37 members of the Proud Boys have been indicted for their role on January 6, but the group is not expected to attend the September 18 event en masse. It was revealed earlier this year that the head of the Proud Boys, Henry Enrique Tarrio, was an FBI informant.

Tarrio will not be in attendance at the rally, having turned himself in this week to begin a five-month jail sentence. In July, Tarrio pled guilty to one count of destruction of property and one count of attempted possession of a large-capacity ammunition feeding device. As part of the plea deal, Tarrio admitted to burning a Black Lives Matter banner he had stolen from a D.C. church during a December 12, 2020, far-right rally backing Trumps claims of a stolen election.

Prior to turning himself, Tarrio claimed he was simply a free speech activist, who was unfairly punished for engaging in constitutionally protected free speech activities.

The D.C. Metropolitan Police, US Park Police and US Capitol Police have announced plans for stepped up security measures on the day of the event. An internal Capitol Police memo shared with CNN this week warned of an increase in online chatter in support of the rally after an interview with Capitol Police officer Lt. Michael Byrd aired in late August. Byrd was cleared of any wrongdoing early this year in the fatal shooting of Q-Anon adherent and Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt, who was trying to break into the House chamber on January 6.

In the interview with NBCs Lester Holt, Byrd defended his actions, telling Holt: I know that day I saved countless lives. Refuting Republican characterizations of the attempted coup as a normal tourist visit, Byrd said, I know members of Congress, as well as my fellow officers and staff, were in jeopardy and in serious danger. Byrd added that his decision to shoot Babbitt was a last resort.

I tried to wait as long as I could, he recalled. I hoped and prayed no one tried to enter through those doors. But their failure to comply required me to take the appropriate action to save the lives of members of Congress and myself and my fellow officers.

On Tuesday, a series of internal US Park Police emails were released revealing that Park Police had seized multiple weapons on January 6, including rifles and handguns. The emails revealed that at least 10 arrests were made for simple assault and weapons possession by 9:35 a.m. on the morning of the attack.

The emails were obtained by NBC4 Washington through a Freedom of Information Act request. They show that far from lacking intelligence, the police were actively monitoring the Proud Boys group that spearheaded the attack on the Capitol. NBC reported that one Park Police intelligence branch commander noted, We are monitoring the groups movement through the city.

Another email revealed that the FBI was also actively monitoring the attack, passing along a warning to a US Park Police detective that read: Per US Capitol Police, a congressional staffer was at the Hyatt Regency Hotel this morning and overheard an individual wearing fatigues state, We are going to storm the FBI at 2 p.m.

Prior to his interview, Byrds name had been circling on right-wing message boards for months. The confirmation that Byrd, an African-American, shot Babbitt has incited white supremacists and neo-Nazis, some of whom are expected to travel to D.C. on September 18.

Babbitt has been held up by fascistic Republicans as a martyr. Lead Stop the Steal organizer, Republican Representative Paul Gosar (Arizona), has claimed in congressional hearings that Babbitt was executed. Trump, channeling Hitlers promotion of Nazi martyr Horst Wessel, has described Babbitt as an innocent, wonderful, incredible woman.

The online chatter cited in the internal Capitol Police report includes calls to re-brand the September 18 event as the Justice for Ashli Babbitt rally. According to CNN, the report also warns that some right-wing elements are discussing violence against Jewish centers and liberal churches while law enforcement is distracted that day.
Children get a meal during a break at a school in Moscow, Russia, Monday, Jan. 18, 2021. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin)

About a week after the start of the school year on September 1, dozens of areas in Russia are reporting the closure of classrooms at all levels of the educational systemfrom daycare to collegesdue to outbreaks and exposures impacting thousands of children, young people, and educators. Russias families are now confronting a COVID-19 crisis, with a situation developing akin to that seen in the US over the last several weeks.

In Saratov, 21 schools, 20 kindergartens, three vocational high schools, and several institutes had to send hundreds of students and dozens of faculty into quarantine. In Vologodsky, 27 schools had to shutter 34 classes. In Volgograd, children in 28 classrooms moved to online learning this week. In Altai, where automatic closures are triggered when more than 20 percent of teachers are sick, 20 institutions shut 30 school rooms. Other regions forced to take similar measures include, but are not limited to, Adygea, Chelyabinsk, Kemerov, Yekaterinburg, Perm, Nizhegorodsky, Krasnodar, South Ossetia, Kuzbass, and the countrys second-largest metropolitan area, Saint Petersburg.

That city is also now recording 10-15 child hospitalizations a day, two to three times what was witnessed in January, as part of a rapid rise in severely ill patients over the last several days. This comes on top of an already worsening situation for the young. It took Saint Petersburg just three months this past summer to see the same number of hospitalizations in the under-18 population as it did from March to September of last year.

The federal government in Russia does not regularly publish official statistics on coronavirus infections among children, forcing analysts to turn to information released by local health agencies to get a portrait of the situation. The Russian national media barely reports on the unfolding catastrophe.

Just before schools reopened on September 1, the Russian Health Ministry revealed that half a million school childrenout of a total number of almost 7 million official caseshad already been infected with the virus in the previous year and a half. Infections among newly born children have climbed 26 times in comparison to the winter, according to Moscow-based pediatrician Evgeny Timakov. He added that, if adults fall ill in a family, in 80 to 90 percent of cases the children will fall ill too.

As of early to mid-Augustthat is, even before schools opened their doors the Sakha Republic reported seeing a 30 percent rise in cases among kids, the region of Saratov registered a 57 percent uptick in those under 6 with the virus, and local doctors in Altai, Kamchatka, and Bashkortostan said they were seeing more sick children.

Now, Russia is confronting a new surge bound up with the spread of the Delta variant and the reopening of schools.

In Kazan, in a single day this past week, the city reported 500 cases of children with respiratory infections. In Kuzbass, an increase in child coronavirus cases has tipped the region into the red zone and led to an extension of the hours of pediatric clinics and increase in emergency services. This comes on top of a population-wide surge in COVID-19 infections in Russia this summer, which, while declining somewhat, still remains well above previous lows with daily cases averaging around 18,000 over the last week.

While government officials seek to publicly downplay the danger of a fourth wave, it is clear that it has already begun, and they were well aware of what would happen as millions of school children streamed back into classrooms. The newspaper Nezavismaya Gazeta reported that the Ministries of Education and Science and Higher Education have been anticipating widespread transitions to online learning as COVID-19 makes its way through the schools.

Experts state that massive investments in air filtration systems are necessary to arrest the progress of the disease, but so far, all that schools have managed to introduce, if anything, are anti-germicidal UV systems, the purchase of which is financed out of local budgets and in some cases, parent committees. These efforts, along with other limited mitigation measures such as masking, social distancing, temperature checks, surface cleaning and, in some schools, vaccine mandates for staff, cannot transform Russias dilapidated schools into safe spaces.

As government officials and the media have done around the world, Russian leaders and major media outlets have long promoted the view that children tend to not get COVID-19 and, should they be infected, not become severely ill. This is untrue. Pediatricians in Tomsk recently reported that 40 percent of their COVID-19 patients have had to consult a cardiologist, 19 percent an allergy-immune specialist, and 10 percent a rheumatologist after infection. In Altai, the head physician at a childrens polyclinic, noted that doctors are having to treat infants who have recovered from COVID-19 for urinary tract complications that are long-term.

Child deaths from coronavirus, data about which the government does not release, will rise in the coming weeks and months, mirroring what is happening in countries like the United States and the UK.

There have been just two COVID-19-related deaths among the under-18 population reported recently in the country, including a two-month-old baby in Tula and a 12-year old in Novosibirsk, although in the latter case the local Ministry of Health insisted that the real cause was an underlying genetic disease.

Daily coronavirus deaths in Russia, which have between 750 and 800 since mid-July, show no signs of abating, despite a small drop in the number of cases. It is also widely known that these numbers are a gross underestimate, as officials routinely attribute COVID-19 deaths to other causes, should a patient have any other co-morbidity. Estimates indicate that the real death toll may be up to five times higher than the officially acknowledged 187,000 deaths. The mortality rate from COVID-19 has been climbing upward throughout this year, and July has been the deadliest month in the pandemic for Russia so far with over 50,000 deaths from the coronavirus.
The state of emergency proclaimed by Sri Lankan President Gotabhaya Rajapakse on August 30, is a grave threat to the democratic rights of the working class and oppressed masses.

Gotabaya Rajapaksa (AP Photo/Eranga Jayawardena)

The repressive law was rushed through the parliament on Monday, with the support of the majority of the ruling party and submissive criticism from the opposition parties.

The government claims the law is to ensure public security and well-being, and the maintenance of supplies and services essential to the life of the community. As a pretext, it has used food shortages during recent weeks that have caused the doubling of prices for rice and sugar.

President Rajapakse appointed a senior military official, as essential services commissioner, to coordinate essential food supplies. The government, backed by the media, has launched a populist campaign about the seizing of rice and sugar supplies and distributing them.

By declaring a state of emergency, the president has acquired far-reaching powers. He is able to make regulations as appear to him to be necessary or expedient in the interests of public security and the preservation of public order, and the suppression of mutiny, riot or civil commotion, or for the maintenance of supplies and services essential to the life of the community.

Rajapakse is yet to promulgate new regulations under these powers, but they are in the pipeline. He can also amend any law, suspend the operation of any law, and apply any law with or without modification. Through regulations, he can ban any form of struggle, proscribe any organisation, including political parties, arbitrarily arrest people and impose media censorship.

The Socialist Equality Party (SEP) warns the real target of the emergency laws is the working class and rural masses, who are confronting enormous hardships as the burden of the countrys economic crisis is imposed on them.

Rajapakse this week renewed the essential public services act, first declared on May 27, that covers key state institutions that employ nearly one million workers.

Under this law, strikes are banned. Violations are punishable with rigorous imprisonment and fines, following a summary trial before a magistrate. Those found guilty will be blacklisted from any future employment, and can have their movable and immovable property seized. Anyone inciting or inducing employees to violate the law faces similar punishment.

The global pandemic has exacerbated the economic and political crisis facing the government. According to official data, daily cases have surged in recent weeks to between 3,000 and 5,000. The current number of total infections now exceeds 475,000 and the death toll is nearing 11,000. All these figures grossly underestimate the actual situation.

Public anger is rising over the governments criminal mishandling of the pandemic. The Rajapakse regime has repeatedly ignored the advice of health experts to combat COVID-19 and has failed to overhaul the public health system to deal with the countrys worsening medical emergency.

Speaking to the parliament on Tuesday, Finance Minister Basil Rajapakse admitted that Sri Lanka was gripped by a profound domestic and external economic crisis. Internally, this years estimated state revenue has plunged by between 1,500 billion and 1,600 billion rupees ($US7.5 and $US8 billion).

With declining exports, tourism and remittances, the country confronts a massive foreign exchange crisis. Citing Central Bank data, Basil Rajapakse explained: The countrys net foreign exchange reserves are close to zero, which means almost all of its reserves are borrowed. The rupee has been sharply depreciated against the US dollar.

These figures have dire implications. The government is planning to force workers and the poor to bear the economic brunt of the crisis. The finance minister has directed all ministries to slash expenditure, including on salary incentives for employees, and even new projects. He has prohibited employing new recruits.

There is also an ongoing discussion about slashing the salaries and pensions of state employees, and rationing food distribution. Many imports have already been cut.

Working people were already facing a deep social crisis. According to the World Bank, half a million people fell into poverty last year. The limited data, it said, suggests that the poverty rate, based on earning less than $3.20 a day, had increased from 9.2 percent in 2019 to 11.7 percent in 2020. Other reports indicate more than a million workers have lost their jobs.

Previous governments have used emergency laws when facing social and political unrest that threatened bourgeois rule. In 1953, the government declared a state of emergency, in the midst of the general strike and mass protests of the Hartal. State forces killed nine workers.

Successive governments maintained emergency rule almost continuously between 1971 and 2011.

In 1971, the coalition government of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party, the Lanka Sama Samaja Party, and the Stalinist Communist Party exploited emergency powers to violently suppress an uprising of rural youth, massacring at least 15,000.

During the 19731974 global oil crisis, the coalition used the laws to impose severe food rationing and seize farmers produce, paving the way for widespread starvation. Working class struggles and rural unrest shattered the coalition regime.

The United National Party (UNP) government of J. R. Jayawardene, came to office in 1977, established an autocratic presidential constitution and unleashed emergency measures against rebelling workers and poor, amid a continuing social crisis.

The same emergency powers were used to prosecute the bloody anti-Tamil communal war against the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Tens of thousands of Tamils were killed and many disappeared. Thousands were arrested. During 19881990, amid widespread unrest, about 60,000 rural youth in the south were massacred by military-linked death squads, under the cover of emergency rule.

Emergency rule was only finally lifted two years after the military defeat of the LTTE in 2009, in which tens of thousands of Tamil civilians were slaughtered, hundreds of thousands rounded up and held in military-run detention camps, and many Tamil youth re-educated in secret centres.

The current government has turned to emergency rule as a wave of working-class struggles erupts. Nearly 250,000 teachers are continuing their two-month strike action, while protests and strikes have broken out among railway, postal, plantation and health workers in recent months. Rural unrest among farmers and youth is also developing.

Teachers demonstrate in Nuwara Eliya on July 30 [Credit: WSWS Media]

Significantly, despite the constant government and media promotion of anti-Tamil and anti-Muslim communal poison, workers of all ethnic backgrounds have participated.

In recent weeks, the Rajapakse government has systematically launched a police witch hunt against activists among teachers and studentsarresting some, gathering names and filing court casesin a warning of the further repression being prepared.

The governments shift to police state methods is part of an international phenomenon. Ruling classes around the world are turning to autocratic forms of rule, in response to rising social opposition.

Former US President Donald Trump mobilised fascistic layers early this year in an unprecedented coup attempt on January 6, and is continuing to plot his return. European regimes have passed more repressive laws and fascist elements are being actively promoted. In Brazil, President Jair Bolsonaro is backing fascist forces and preparing an authoritarian coup. In India, right-wing Prime Minister Narendra Modis regime is taking similar autocratic actions.

In Sri Lanka, the opposition partiesSamagi Jana Balavegaya (SJB) which is a UNP breakaway, Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) and the Tamil National Alliance (TNA)have made token criticisms of the emergency law.

The SJB demagogically called on the government to take steps to promulgate legislation to deal with the pandemic, instead of imposing emergency rule.

JVP leader Anura Dissanayake declared it to be a hysterical attempt by an inactive leader to seize more power. In reality, Rajapakse is acting not just as an individual, but with the support of broad sections of the ruling class.

UNP leader and sole MP, Ranil Wickremesinghe, even did not even bother to attend the parliamentary debate on the law, indicating the partys tacit backing for Rajapakses repressive measures.

TNA MP M.A. Sumanthiran, speaking in the parliament, ridiculously sought an assurance from the government that it would not extend the emergency law to other areas.

All these comments are completely hypocritical. In the past, the UNP and SJB leaders, as well as the JVP leaders, have participated in governments that have ruthlessly used emergency powers. All of them are seeking to confine and deflect mounting opposition to the Rajapakse government and its police-state measures into safe political waters.

The pseudo-left Frontline Socialist Party declares that it hopes to mobilise working people against these laws. However, in recent weeks, its chief activity has been to hold discussions with opposition parties to establish a broad front, whose only purpose is to paralyse the opposition of working people.

At the same time, the trade unions have maintained a criminal silence on the emergency laws, just as they failed to utter a word about the repressive Essential Public Services Act.

The working class must respond to Rajapakses class-war measures by preparing to politically mobilise its united industrial strength, independently of the opposition parties, fake-left groups and the trade unions.

Demand the immediate withdrawal of the state of emergency and Essential Public Services Act.

Build action committees in every workplace to defend democratic rights. These committees should oppose working in unsafe pandemic conditions and defend the social rights of the working class.

The action committees should rally support from the rural poor and young people.

Billions of rupees must be spent on overhauling the public health service and supporting workers who have lost jobs and income, due to lockdowns.

The Rajapakse governments actions are completely bound up with the global crisis of capitalism and can only be defeated by fighting for socialist policies to expropriate the capitalist class. The large estates, major companies and banks must be nationalised under the democratic control of the working class, and foreign loans repudiated. A workers and peasants government must be brought to power to implement these policies.

None of the major problems confronting working people, including the pandemic, can be resolved in one country. The struggle for socialism is an international task. To forge international unity, workers must oppose all forms of nationalism, communalism and chauvinism, whose purpose is to divide the working class.

We urge workers and youth to form action committees and join the international workers alliance of rank-and-file committees initiated by the International Committee of the Fourth International. The Socialist Equality Party in Sri Lanka is alone in fighting for this political perspective and we urge workers and youth to join and build our party, as the necessary leadership for the revolutionary struggles ahead.
The recent announcement that the UAW and USW are going to be reopening negotiationsat some unnamed date sometime in the futureis a trap aimed at deceiving the working class. Their goal is to force us to work up to 84 hours a week stockpiling parts for the company in case we strike. The union is effectively forcing us to scab on ourselves. This must stop.

September 10 statement of USW

On September 10, the USW posted a notice stating the following:

USW District Directors Daniel Flippo and Michael Millsap had calls with the UAW International Leadership and then together with the UAW, a call with Dana management on September 8th to discuss the process going forward. It is clear to the company, due to the failure of the tentative agreement to ratify, that we need to come back to the negotiating table. We are currently working on the dates and the logistics of where the talks will occur In the meantime, we are working on an extension agreement of the expired contract because without an extension the company is allowed to discontinue automatic dues collection.

Translation:

We know you workers just rejected by 90 percent the sweatshop conditions we imposed in the last contract. But the company is extremely vulnerable and wants you to keep stockpiling parts in case you strike. We want you to keep working too, so we can keep taking your dues money out of your paychecks. To this end we met with the corporation without telling you and we all agreed that you must keep working indefinitely. We also agreed to tell you that well negotiate at some vague point in the future to keep you working as long as possible. In reality, we never negotiate with the company, we simply accept their orders. But keep up those 84-hour-weeks, or else the company wont make profits and we wont get your dues money.

The Dana Workers Rank-and-File Committee (DWRFC) issues an urgent warning to our co-workers: Dana, the UAW and the USW arent planning to negotiate anything. The company gave the unions their marching orders months ago: in effect, Get us a contract with five more years of tiers, low wages, rising health care costs and limitless mandatory overtime. The only thing Dana and the unions are discussing is their strategy for forcing this contract through.

This is why the UAW and USW continue to keep us in the dark and berate our brothers and sisters for even asking questions about what theyre up to. If they told the truth, they know it would provoke a full-scale rebellion by workers.

We must respond to this ongoing conspiracy by organizing our rank-and-file committees and uniting all plants in preparation for a strike!

Our no vote showed we have tremendous potential power. The unions and corporations are going to such extremes to forestall a strike because the corporation is extremely vulnerable. Interconnected supply chains and just-in-time delivery schemes mean a strike would have a serious impact on the entire auto industry.

If rank-and-file workers are informed and united, it is absolutely possible to win our gains: the 8-hour day, 40-hour week, a 75 percent wage increase, COVID safety, air conditioning, no points system, and new clean machines with training and good air quality.

But we need a strategy for victory. On September 7, the DWRFC issued an Open Letter demanding the UAW and USW take the following immediate actions:

Refuse all company requests for mandated overtime and slow production to a safe and comfortable pace, controlled by the workers. Call strike votes at plants that have not done so by Friday, September 10. Set a strike deadline of Monday, September 13 to involve all plants together. Set strike pay at 100 percent of our present pay. Any future meetings between UAW, USW and company must be livestreamed and supervised by representatives of the rank-and-file workers.

The UAW and USW have responded by doing the exact opposite.

This shows workers must rely on one another. In our unity lies our strength. We must organize rank-and-file strike committees at each plant to prepare for strike action. These committees will share information, carry out democratic discussions, root out spies for the corporation and union, and ensure that every worker at the plant acts together as one voice. Each local committee will elect delegates to a national strike committee that will devise a strategy to ensure common action of all Dana plants together. Broad self-organization is our only protection against the USW-UAW-Dana conspiracy.

Finally, we must actively reach out to friends, family and acquaintances at Big Three production facilities, to teachers at our local schools, to Amazon workers, to Dana workers internationally, and to all sections of the working class.

Our situation is not unique. The entire international working class is fighting a two-front war against both the corporations and the trade unions. In Chile, the unions helped the companies fire miners who stood up against union-corporate collaboration. In Germany, the head of the national union federation is denouncing train drivers for going on strike for higher wages and COVID safety. At Volvo, Nabisco, Frito Lay, Warrior Met Coal and many other recent workers struggles, the unions have openly served as corporate strikebreakers, isolated workers, stringing them out on no strike pay, and working to defeat their struggles.

We say: not this time. We are standing up against decades of corporate exploitation that impacts every aspect of our lives. The strength of the working class comes from the unity of rank-and-file workers no matter our industry, race, gender or nationality. If you have not yet contacted us, we urge you to do so now. There is no time to lose. Join the Dana Workers Rank-and-File Committee by emailing us at danawrfc@gmail.com or texting us at (248) 6020936.
Patient in an Intensive Care Unit (ICU) [Source: Wikimedia Commons]

As the COVID-19 Delta variant continues to rage through Texas, the availability of staffed intensive care unit (ICU) beds has shrunk to alarmingand in some cases, nonexistentlevels. On September 9, Texas once again led the nation with 25,293 new cases and 398 new deaths, placing severe demands on health care facilities and personnel. On a weekly basis, upwards of 25,000 public school children are coming down with coronavirus.

The 11-county region of the state that includes the capital Austin ran out of staffed ICU beds on September 6, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) data. In this area of 2.3 million residents, 245 adult and 14 pediatric patients were being treated for COVID-19.

Health officials in Denton County, north of the Dallas-Fort Worth region, with a population of over 887,000, reported that there were no ICU beds available on September 8. The 14-day average of hospitalizations is 197, with the last four days showing 200 or more COVID admissions. Tarrant County, Texass third most populous, reported over 1,000 hospitalizations for the seventh straight day, averaging 1,130. Fully 25 percent of total hospital bed capacity is occupied by COVID-19 patients.

Similar statistics are reported throughout the state, with some regions reaching or surpassing hospitalization figures not seen since January. Last week, for example, Austin-Travis County suffered 36 deaths, the highest weekly death count in more than a year.

Austin-Travis County Medical Director Dr. Desmar Walkes told KVUE that, with ICU units filling up, there is nowhere else that patients can be sent because all the other hospitals are confronted with the same situation. Theyll be moved to nontraditional care areas like the recovery rooms for surgery areas and cath labs, where normally cardiac cuts occur, Dr. Walkes said.

He also noted the staff shortage that hospitals face as nurses and other health care workers face a plethora of stressful challenges: overwork, hostility of patients and their relatives, the risk of getting infected themselves, the constant sight of what should have been preventable sickness and death. As one Austin nurse, Selena Xie, told the station, Its just really emotionally, mentally and physically exhausting. Xie also mentioned compassion fatigue, especially when treating patients who chose not to get vaccinated.

Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott is simultaneously doubling down on his ban on mask mandates, with he and State Attorney General Ken Paxton vowing to retaliate against any school district that defies the ban. Abbott has based his battle against mandates on his supposed opposition to violating parental rights. Meanwhile, the parents whose rights Abbott claims to be protecting are growing angrier as they see teachers, bus drivers and their children falling victim to COVID infection.

A group of parents in the Allen Independent School District in the Dallas area filed a federal class action lawsuit on September 1 to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. The court complaint says: The School Board has a duty to assure the right to life of the DOESs and all students for that matter, is effectuated in School Board Policies, Procedures and Directives but currently it is not. In fact, it gives more import to the happiness of some students over the life, health and welfare of many others.

The Allen ISD, while avoiding specifics, stated its disagreement with the claim that students constitutional rights were being violated by making mask use optional. The statement further asserted,  Allen ISD continues to work proactively and professionally with parents who have questions or concerns about COVID-related issues. The vast majority of these concerns have been resolved without the need for litigation.

On the contrary, the parents complained that the Allen ISD has refused to take up the issue at school board meetings. One parent told NBC 5 Dallas-Ft. Worth, They shut us down when people try to talk in the board meetings. [Parents] are just getting messages back saying well we know you have other options. You can leave Allen ISD if you want. Thats what parents are getting, and these are our schools. She added, They arent doing tracing. They arent really distancing.

Another parent, a vaccinated nurse and mother of two who, along with her kids, caught COVID-19 three weeks into the school year, put it succinctly: Honestly, I feel like when Im sending them [to school] were playing Russian roulette with their lives and other kids lives.

The parents demands for vaccination and mask mandates are justified. But these measures are not enough to put an end to the scourge of COVID-19 or to protect the lives of children. They are palliative efforts and part of the Democrats and trade unions mitigation strategy, the aim of which is to slow down the spread of Delta variant but not halt it or the suffering and death it causes. The Democrats, with the support of the trade unions, advocate for mitigation because they see it as the most effective means to keep workers in the workplace so that profits can continue to be produced. Children have to be forced into schools in order to make this happen.

The argument is made that a full shutdown of schools and nonessential businesses is impossible because there is, in essence, no money to finance such an action. This is false. There is plenty of wealth to fund the closure of schools, full wages for parents to look after homebound children, high-quality online education, and social services necessary to help families cope with the psychological strains of shuttered schools. The problem is that all of this wealth is in the hands of the super-rich. Houston, Texas alone is the home to 17 billionaires.

Families and educators cannot accept just the mitigation of COVID-19. They must demand its eradication. This requires measures that go beyond vaccination, distancing and masks to lockdowns, contact tracing, shutting of nonessential businesses, full support for laid-off workers, massive investments in education and child welfare and international coordination. This will not be implemented by appeals to any section of the ruling class but through massive, unified action by the working class. Join the Texas Educators Rank-and-File Safety Committee to be a part of this struggle.
The September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, which killed more than 2,900 people, were the deadliest terror attacks in the history of the United States. Nineteen supporters of Al Qaeda, 15 from Saudi Arabia, crashed two passenger planes into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York; a third plane into the Pentagon building outside Washington; and a fourth into the ground.

The horrific massacre of civilians was immediately exploited by the imperialist powers, led by the United States government itself, to justify far-reaching attacks on the democratic rights of their own populations, and the launching of decades-long wars in the Middle East and Africa. The war on terror, embraced by the entire political establishment and corporate media, became the justification for wars and interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Libya, Syria, Yemen and elsewhere.

Twenty years on, the analysis made by the WSWS of these events has stood the test of time. We present below the major statements and analysis made contemporaneously by the WSWS over the past two decades.
As America looked inward in the days, weeks and months after September 11, 2001, others around the world made extraordinary gestures toward the United States.

We were all so focused on ourselves -- understandably so -- that many probably missed the fact that Iran's President Mohammad Khatami condemned the attacks, that Ireland and Israel held full national days of mourning, that the Afghan Taliban told "American children [that] Afghanistan feels your pain."

You are even less likely to have heard what could be one of the most touching reactions of all. This is the story of how a destitute Kenyan boy turned Stanford student rallied his Masai tribe to offer its most precious gift to America in its time of need.

It starts with Kimeli Naiyomah. Kimeli, a member of a Masai tribe, grew up in a small rural town called Enoosaen near the Masai Mara National Reserve. The town had no water, no electricity, no phones and no roads. After accompanying his ailing mother to the hospital as a young boy, Kimeli says he knew he wanted to grow up to heal others like her. He didn't know such people were called doctors; he just knew he wanted to be one.

Dreaming of being a doctor is ambitious even in America. But in Kimeli's part of Africa, one could have easily dismissed that dream as impossible. This was especially true in Kimeli's particular situation. He says he had no father. His grandmother had been murdered. And his mother -- his only remaining caretaker -- was battling alcoholism.

According to Kimeli, his family (or lack thereof) was so destitute that his Masai tribe didn't even consider them people -- they were sub-human. Moreover, nobody that Kimeli knew from his tribe had gone to high school, let alone college or medical school.

He knew he had to change his situation, so he ran away -- to another village where he had heard that there was a school that was taught under a tree. It was a church school and it became his grade school and his home.

When he grew beyond this school-under-a-tree, Kimeli found the nearest high school, which was nine hours away. So he walked there and told the principal that he had no money, no uniform, no books, no shoes and no family, but he wanted to attend school. And, as Kimeli tells the story, the principal was so amazed by Kimeli's gumption that he welcomed him to the school.

Kimeli soon realized he probably couldn't achieve his dream of becoming a doctor if he remained in Kenya. So he started applying for universities in America. He says, "My elders got together to try to raise money to help me achieve my goals."

The same elders who had once considered Kimeli to be sub-human had done a complete reversal. Kimeli says his people were now so impressed by what he had achieved that he was not only considered human again, they were invested in helping him achieve his goals. They raised $5,000 for him.

A Washington Post reporter then caught wind of the story and came to Enoosaen to write a story about Kimeli's doctoral dreams. That story ended up on the front page of the paper. The article inspired an outpouring of support, including a scholarship offer from the University of Oregon, a plane ticket from a businessman in Florida and clothes and other materials he needed to survive in America paid for by another total stranger.

"You can imagine how I felt," Kimeli says, "when I received a letter offering me a scholarship in America. It's like getting a letter from God when you know you're not qualified for heaven."

Kimeli enrolled at the University of Oregon in 1996. A few years later, Kimeli heard about Stanford University (after Chelsea Clinton enrolled there) and decided after seeing the school that that was where he belonged. He says, "It looked like a village to me." And once again, Kimeli made his own luck, getting accepted at Stanford after getting his grades up in Oregon.

Kimeli had become a celebrity of sorts back home. In September 2001, the President of Kenya was scheduled to be in New York, and Kimeli says he was invited to meet with him. And that's how Kimeli -- now officially a full Masai warrior back home -- found himself in New York City on September 11, 2001.

As a warrior, Kimeli is trained to rush to the scene of crisis. "You run to the battleground," he says. "I don't run away from tragedy. I run to tragedy. But I was realistic enough to know I couldn't help [at Ground Zero]."

Kimeli says he is also a very emotional warrior, and 9/11 touched him deeply. The country that had given him so much had been brutally attacked. He had to figure out a way to help. He had to do something.

So, on a trip back home in May of 2002, he asked to meet with the elders of his tribe. First, Kimeli told them of the horrors he had witnessed in New York. Many of Kimeli's people had never even heard of 9/11. They couldn't even fathom buildings that tall and most people in the village had never seen a plane except high in the sky.

Then, Kimeli told them of his plan. He wanted to buy a cow (something this formerly homeless boy had never been able to do) and turn right around and give that cow to America. In Kimeli's tradition, a cow is the most precious property one can own. And it is believed to bring great comfort to its owner. As one elder told a reporter, a cow is a "handkerchief to wipe away tears".

He wanted his elders' blessing for his plan. But, unexpectedly, one by one the elders stood up and said they were so inspired by his plan they wanted to do the same. In the end, 14 cows were pledged to the American people to help bring them peace.

On June 3, 2002, US charges d'affairs William Brencick travelled to Enoosaen to formally accept the cows. He says it took him more than half a day to get there -- a flight and then a long drive over treacherous terrain. But after he heard Kimeli's story, he wanted to go.

Brencick expected to be greeted by a handful of people, but when he arrived, he found a large crowd. Kimeli says more than 1,000 people were in attendance. Kimeli had brought American flags with him. "The Star Spangled Banner" played on a loudspeaker. Some in the crowd held up banners that said: "To the people of America," "We are touched by your loss" and "We give these cows to help you." Brencick says it was "overwhelmingly emotional" and he couldn't help but tear up.

But there was a hitch. Logistical and monetary problems prevented the US from taking possession of the cattle. The herd was worth much less than the considerable amount it would cost to ship it 7,250 miles to New York City. And there were health hurdles: African cows weren't allowed in America. In addition, there was concern that the cows might not survive the voyage anyway.

Washington Times columnist Tony Blankley heard what was going on and wondered how the US could get 80,000 troops into Afghanistan but couldn't get 14 head of cattle out of Africa. As for the Masai, they couldn't quite understand why this American came to accept the cows, but then didn't take them home with him. Some wondered why he didn't just load the cattle on a truck and drive them to America.

Four years later, on the fifth anniversary of the September 11th attacks, all was made right. Then-US Ambassador Michael Ranneberger traveled to Enoosaen to cement a deal for Kimeli's tribe to take care of "America's" herd in perpetuity. And, as a way of saying thanks, the Ambassador announced the establishment of a scholarship for 14 boys and girls in the village to go to local schools. Those scholarships continue to this day. And today the herd continues to grow. As of right now, 35 "American" cattle roam the plains near Enoosaen, tended lovingly by one of the elders in Kimeli's tribe. If you ever find yourself there, you'll know which are the American cattle. They have special Twin Towers markings on their ears.

As for Kimeli, he's decided he can do more for the world as a diplomat than a doctor. Next fall, Kimeli hopes to become a Rotary International World Peace fellow at Duke University.

The-CNN-Wire

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TERRE HAUTE, Ind. ( WTHI )  An off-duty police officer is doing OK after being hit on State Road 46.

Police tell News 10 the crash happened just after 4:20pm Friday evening.

Indiana State Police, Sergeant Matt Ames says a driver was going north bound when Terre Haute Police Officer Justin Gant was southbound and turning onto the I-70 eastbound ramp.

Gant had the right of way when the driver in the northbound lane crashed into Gants unmarked police vehicle.

Gant, who had his juvenile daughter with him at the time of the crash, transported himself and his daughter to a local hospital.

Ames tells News 10 they are OK.

The driver was also sent to the hospital with minor injuries.

Alcohol is not a factor of the crash.
The Taliban announced the formation of an interim government for Afghanistan this week, with a hardline group of veteran militants at the helm.

Notably absent from Tuesday's announcement were women -- and the post for the Ministry of Women appears to have been scrapped all together under the new regime.

Despite the Taliban's recent promises to respect women's rights, a look at the new interim government suggests that the group's rule might very well mirror its previous regime when women all but disappeared from public life.

Women occupied just 6.5% of ministerial positions in Afghanistan before the Taliban took over the country, according to January 2021 data from the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), an international organization of Geneva-based international organization of national parliaments.

Now, the country joins the ranks of only a dozen other countries where there are no women serving in high-ranking positions in government.

They are Azerbaijan, Armenia, Brunei, North Korea, Papua New Guinea, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Vietnam and Yemen, according to the most recent IPU data.

The absence of women in Afghanistan's government bucks the global trend. Most countries have women in senior government positions, and the number of nations with women as heads of state or in government is at an all-time high, according to the IPU and UN Women.

Taliban spokesman Sayed Zekrullah Hashimi made the group's view of women clear on Wednesday, saying they could not handle being ministers and that they should content themselves with giving birth.

"There is no need for women to be in the cabinet. Is it necessary that we should have a woman in the cabinet?" Hashimi said in an interview on Afghanistan's TOLO news."You are burdening her with something that she is unable to carry out, she is not capable. What useful thing can come out of that?"

It is also unclear what will happen to Afghanistan's parliament, which effectively was dissolved in mid-August after the fall of Kabul.

Prior to the Taliban's takeover, around 27% of the Afghan parliament was comprised of women, ranking it in line with the United States, where women make up 26.8% of all members of Congress according to the IPU.

The numbers marked an all-time high for the US, contributing to a growth in the global share of female lawmakers this year, according to the IPU and UN Women. The US government has made significant progress on gender balance this year, seeing an increase from 17 to 46% in the amount of women with ministerial positions.

Afghanistan's share of women parliamentary members had hovered around 27% since 2005, when the first session of the elected body sat after three decades. Under the 2004 Constitution, at least 68 of the 250 total seats of parliament's lower house are reserved for women, with two seats reserved for women for each of the country's 34 provinces.

Afghanistan could also now join Micronesia, Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Yemen, where no women currently serve as members of parliament (in lower or single parliamentary chambers) according to the IPU. None of those countries ban women from office, however, which was the case the last time the Taliban were in power in Afghanistan, from 1996 to 2001. None of those countries has gender quotas for parliamentary seats.

Rwanda has long held the best record for female representation in parliament, with 56% of seats across two chambers currently held by women. Cuba, Nicaragua, Mexico and the United Arab Emirates also top the charts, where women hold 50% or more positions as members of parliament.

But despite a rise in the number of women holding the highest levels of political power, widespread gender inequalities still persist, according to the data.

There are still only 22 countries that have women as the head of state or government.

Europe is home to the majority of those countries led by women, including Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Germany, Iceland and Norway.

Meanwhile, Nepal and Bangladesh are the only two countries in Asia with women leaders.

In neighboring China, there has never been a woman in the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CCP Central Committee, the highest power and decision-making body in the country, which is comprised of seven people. There is only one woman in the Political Bureau of the CCP Central Committee, a group that is made up of 25 people.

On Tuesday, UN Women Acting Executive Director Pramila Patten joined a chorus of international voices expressing their dismay at the absence of women in the interim Afghan government. "By excluding women from the machinery of government, the Taliban leadership has sent the wrong signal about their stated goal of building an inclusive, strong and prosperous society," she said.

"Women's political participation is a fundamental prerequisite for gender equality and genuine democracy," she said, adding that "respect for women's human rights is a litmus test against which any authority must be judged and that the establishment of a truly 'inclusive' Government with the participation of women is a central element of that."

The-CNN-Wire

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Update Sept. 14, 2021

According to the Humphreys County Sheriff's Department, Garnett Hughes is back in custody.

Garnett Hughes Garnett Hughes

He was found in Ohio.

Original article below

JACKSON, Miss. (WTVA)  A man convicted of kidnapping and sexual battery in Alcorn County escaped from law enforcement, and officers are now trying to find him.

That man is Garnett Hughes, 33, who was sentenced in 2014 to life in prison.

A spokeswoman for the East Mississippi Correctional Facility said officers were escorting him to the funeral of a family member in Belzoni when he got away from them.

This happened around 9:30 a.m. Friday.

Alcorn County Sheriff Ben Caldwell said there is no information that Hughes is in the county or would return to the county.

However, he asked anyone who sees him to call the sheriff's office at 662-286-5521.
ABERDEEN, Miss. (WTVA) - Local students will be able to get their COVID-19 shot this weekend in Aberdeen from noon to 2 p.m.

Dr. Vernon Rayford of the Northeast Mississippi Coalition against COVID-19 and Twin Docs Healthcare will provide free vaccinations to students at Aberdeen High School on Saturday, Sept. 11.

This is for students ages 12 years and older.

Our goal is to definitely get schools vaccinated," Rayford said.

Because of COVID cases, the Aberdeen School District will begin hybrid learning on Friday, Sept. 10.

Schools have been back in person. Weve seen a lot of disruptions. Weve had a lot of schools shifting to virtual learning and a lot of kids in quarantine. Its really important.

The Coalition has administered approximately 800 shots since its creation.

Wed love to have an event where hundreds of vaccines are given, he added. For us, we are happy if we can get 10, 20, 30 vaccines at a time because we know those numbers will add up.

Students ages 12-17 will need a parent or guardians signature.

They will distribute the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.

There will also be a similar clinic Saturday in Columbus at the Municipal Court building from 3-5 p.m.
Morgantown, WV (26505)

Today

Generally cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 77F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to cloudy skies after midnight. Low 64F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 80%.
Clarksburg, WV (26301)

Today

Generally cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 79F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Variable clouds with showers and scattered thunderstorms. Storms more numerous this evening. Low 63F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%.
By Colin Packham

CANBERRA (Reuters) -Australia's third most populous state said on Saturday it may order a snap lockdown after a cluster of COVID-19 cases, as the country posted a record one-day rise in daily infections.

Queensland state, home to more than 5 million people, said it had detected five new infections in the past 24 hours after a family tested positive. The next few days would be critical to see if a lockdown was warranted, authorities said.

"If we start seeing any seeding, then we may have to take very quick, fast action. But at the moment, its contained to the family," said state Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk.

The family lives in Brisbane, the state's capital. It was not clear whether a lockdown would be limited to some parts of the state like previous orders.

New South Wales, home to Sydney and Australia's most-populous state, is under lockdown as are the cities of Melbourne and Canberra. A lockdown for Queensland would be another blow to Australia's A$2 trillion ($1.5 trillion) economy, which could slip into a second recession in as many years.

Australia on Saturday posted 2,077 infections, surpassing the previous day's record of 1,903. New South Wales, which has been under strict stay-at-home orders for nearly three months, said it detected 1,599 new infections.

Authorities warned people on Saturday to continue social distancing, but hot weather across Sydney saw scores of people head to the beach.

New South Wales Health Minister Brad Hazzard said police would be out checking whether people were within 5 km (3 miles) of their homes, as permitted under emergency rules.

Police and military personnel have for weeks been patrolling the streets of Sydney, issuing fines to those contravening health orders, such as wearing masks.

One person fined was former Prime Minister Tony Abbott, who confirmed on Saturday he had been ordered to pay A$500 after being pictured not wearing a mask.

"I believe that I was well within the law, reasonably interpreted. But I'm not going to challenge the fine because I don't want to waste the police's time any further," Abbott told reporters in Sydney.

Story continues

"I never thought that dobbing and snitching was part of the Australian character and I think that the sooner we can leave this health police-state mindset behind us, the better for everyone."

In neighbouring Victoria, authorities reported 450 new locally acquired cases, the biggest one-day rise in locally acquired cases in more than a year.

Australia has now recorded nearly 73,000 COVID-19 cases and a death toll of 1,084.

($1 = 1.3596 Australian dollars)

(Reporting by Colin Packham; Editing by Edwina Gibbs and William Mallard)
VILNIUS, Lithuania (AP)  Lithuania on Friday recalled its ambassador to China following the Baltic countrys decision in July to allow self-governing Taiwan to open an office in its capital under its own name.

The Foreign Ministry said Ambassador Diana Mickeviciene had been recalled from Beijing for consultations following the Chinese government statement on August 10.

Last month, China recalled its ambassador to Lithuania and told the Baltic nation to immediately rectify its wrong decision, take concrete measures to undo the damage, and not to move further down the wrong path.

The statement referred to potential consequences for Lithuania if it allowed the office to open but gave no details.

The Lithuanian Foreign Ministry expressed regret over Chinas action and stressed that while respecting the one China principle, it stands ready to develop mutually beneficial ties with Taiwan, just as many other countries in the world do.

China says Taiwan is part of its territory and doesn't have the right to diplomatic recognition, although the island maintains informal ties with all major nations through trade offices that act as de facto embassies, including in the United States and Japan. Chinese pressure has reduced Taiwans formal diplomatic allies to just 15.

Taiwan and Lithuania agreed in July that the office in the capital, Vilnius, set to open this fall, will bear the name Taiwan rather than Chinese Taipei  a term often used in other countries in order not to offend Beijing.

On Friday, the Lithuanian ministry said that diplomats from the European Union -- of which Lithuania is a member  expressed solidarity with Mickeviciene. The deputy EU ambassador to China, Tim Harrington, shared a joint photo on Twitter on Friday as dozens of EU diplomats gathered to demonstrate solidarity with their Lithuanian counterpart as she left Beijing and wished she could return soon, the ministry said.

Lithuania said its embassy in Beijing continues to operate as usual.
Quincy has a population of about 40,000. Quincy's Calling

Quincy, Illinois, is offering people up to $5,000 in property-tax rebates to move there.

The town, which lies on the border with Missouri, hopes this will help plug its worker shortage.

It has more than 700 vacancies for full-time jobs in "virtually every segment," its mayor said.

See more stories on Insider's business page.

A town in Illinois suffering from a huge labor shortage is offering people up to $5,000 to move there.

Quincy has more than 700 vacancies for full-time jobs in "virtually every segment," Mayor Mike Troup told Insider.

"I don't know that you could find a business in our community ... that doesn't have a 'help-wanted' sign in the front door," Troup said. "There's a tremendous need."

Quincy Mayor Mike Troup was born and raised in the town. Quincy's Calling

Quincy lies on Illinois' border with Missouri and is about 100 miles from St Louis and 300 miles from Chicago. It has a population of about 40,000, which local officials hope to grow to 45,000 by 2030.

Troup, who was born and raised in the town, said that the local economy was strong but that as businesses expanded, "we just haven't grown the population base" to fill their roles.

Illinois had the third-largest population drop in the 2020 census, behind Puerto Rico and West Virginia.

Troup said businesses in Quincy offered competitive wages but the costs of relocating may still be putting people off from getting jobs in the area.

Quincy's mayor said the town had more than 1,000 acres of parks. Quincy's Calling

So the town's council approved the Quincy Workforce Relocation Assistance Program (Q-WRAP) last month. People who move to Quincy from outside Adams County and get jobs within the county can get a property-tax rebate of up to $5,000 after one year of residency and employment. Alternatively, they can get a rental rebate of up to $3,500 after six months of residency.

Remote workers who relocate to Quincy are also eligible.

During its pilot, Q-WRAP benefits will be awarded to the first 25 eligible applicants on a first-come, first-served basis. The town is also giving $250 in restaurant vouchers to local residents who successfully encourage people to relocate to Quincy.

Story continues

Quincy is about 100 miles from St Louis. Quincy's Calling

Vermont and Tulsa, Oklahoma, are also offering financial incentives to people who relocate.

When asked whom he thought would apply for Q-WRAP, Troup said: "We love them all. We're not picky."

He said he expected interest from people who were tired of living in larger metropolitan areas. The town has more than 1,000 acres of parks, a public golf course, and rivers and lakes popular for boating, Troup said. The town also attracts hunters who chase its deer, ducks, and quail.

Troup said Quincy had five new elementary schools, which were all "state of the art," as well as a high school, a community college, and a four-year liberal-arts school.

Ricci Dula and his wife, Kristina, moved to Quincy in 2019. Quincy's Calling

Ricci Dula moved to Quincy from Redlands, California, in February 2019 to start as CEO of the Boy Scouts of America's Mississippi Valley Council.

Dula told Insider that he'd never been to Quincy before moving there but had read online that it had a good reputation for family life.

Dula said that almost everything seemed cheaper in Quincy. He said he'd been able to afford a much bigger house than he'd had in Redlands. Gas was always at least $1 cheaper per gallon, he added.

Life in Quincy is much slower and the people are "kinder, nicer, more approachable," he said. Dula relocated to Quincy with his wife and two children and said the town was safer, the school-bus system was better, and recreational activities for children, like sports leagues, were cheaper.

Quincy doesn't have the same rush-hour traffic as California, Ricci Dula said. Quin

"I don't have to worry about rush-hour traffic any longer or ... schedule any meetings around traffic," he said. "I have to schedule my time around tractors, but that's a whole different story."

Read the original article on Business Insider
US President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden attend a wreath laying ceremony as they pay their respects to 9/11 victims at the Pentagon, Virginia, September 11, 2021. (Photo by Brendan SMIALOWSKI / AFP) (Photo by BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images) (AFP via Getty Images)

Joe Biden visited the Pentagon to attend a wreath laying ceremony with First Lady Jill Biden. The president spent the majority of Saturday attending memorials, first at Ground Zero in New York, then at the Flight 93 memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, and finally at the Pentagon in Washington DC.

Mr Biden praised former President George W Bushs speech during an unannounced stop at a Shanksville, Pennsylvania fire department. Mr Biden commended Mr Bush for encouraging American unity, calling it a genuinely good speech, about who we are, were not. He went on to say that he core of who we are is not divided, its just this notion of, I dont know how to explain it.

Former President Donald Trump did not visit Ground Zero Saturday to attend the 20th anniversary ceremony commemorating the 9/11 terror attacks. He did release a video earlier in the day attacking Joe Biden for the Afghanistan troop withdrawal, and later visited an NYPD precinct where he visited with police officers. During his visit to the police precinct he hinted that he would run for president again in 2024.

Vice President Kamala Harris and former President George W Bush addressed families at the United Airlines Flight 93 memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where a memorial recognises passengers who brought down the plane after learning two others had been used to attack the World Trade Center in New York on 11 September, 2001.

An earlier ceremony at the site of the World Trade Center collapse in New York City recognised the victims who were killed, as the names of the nearly 3,000 victims were read aloud over several hours. Former presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton also attended the ceremony.

Read More

I escaped from the 80th floor of the North Tower on 9/11  then it collapsed on me

Im so thankful for that message: The final calls made by 9/11 victims that still comfort grieving relatives

Sneha Philip: The mystery of the woman who disappeared on 9/11
Premier League clubs will be allowed to field their Brazil players this weekend after the countrys football confederation dropped its demands for FIFA to enforce rules relating to their non-appearance for international duty.

The international governing body has said Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Paraguay have agreed to waive the rule preventing players from playing for five days if they fail to report for international duty following extensive talks between FIFA and the respective associations.

FIFA has also acknowledged constructive dialogue with the UK Government  after sending a joint letter with the Football Association and the Premier League to Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Wednesday  aimed at preventing a repeat of the row which has surrounded the issue this month ahead of Octobers window.

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A statement from FIFA said: Based on positive signals and constructive dialogue FIFA has received from the UK Government towards the international match window in October, recognising that players have no control over the extreme situation caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and sanitary restrictions currently imposed and, as a sign of good faith, goodwill and cooperation, the member associations of Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Paraguay, in close consultation with FIFA, have taken the decision to withdraw their complaints in relation to the England-based players, and players bound to play in England, who were not released for the recent international matches.

On 8 September 2021, the FIFA president, the FA interim chair and Premier League chair sent a joint letter to the UK Prime Minister. The UK Government is now open to find a reasonable solution with the three organisations, who are working closely together in a spirit of mutual understanding, in the interests of everyone.

Premier League clubs made a collective decision not to release players if it meant them travelling to red-list countries as they would face 10 days of quarantine on their return.

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Gabriel Jesus faced missing out for Manchester City (Martin Rickett/PA)

Premier League bosses reacted angrily to the situation as it continued to develop on Friday, as they remained unsure whether they would be able to field some of their biggest names in the weekends fixtures.

Manchester United boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, who faced losing midfielder Fred for Saturdays match against Newcastle, called it a farce and a lose, lose, lose situation for everyone  national teams, players, clubs.

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola, who could have been without Gabriel Jesus and goalkeeper Ederson for their game at Leicester, and Chelsea boss Thomas Tuchel, who was set to be missing Thiago Silva against Aston Villa, echoed Solskjaers sentiments.

Pep Guardiola called the international situation crazy (Nick Potts/PA)

Guardiola described the situation, which came after Brazils clash with Argentina was abandoned after health officials invaded the pitch, as crazy.

Tuchel added: It makes no sense from which side you look at it. Does it make sense for Brazil? No. Does it make sense for us? No.

Liverpool could have been without Alisson and Fabinho against Leeds, who faced missing Raphinha. However, Everton were expecting to be able to field Richarlison because the Brazilian federation had not complained specifically about his absence.

Newcastle reached an agreement with Paraguay over Miguel Almiron (Owen Humphreys/PA)

Paraguay and Mexico were earlier believed to have withdrawn similar complaints, freeing Wolves forward Raul Jimenez and Newcastle midfielder Miguel Almiron respectively.

Clubs will hope the ongoing dialogue with the UK Government will make life easier next month with Newcastle boss Steve Bruce having called for help from ministers.

He said: It is what it is, but its been even more difficult this time, especially with the South Americans involved going to countries which are red-listed.

Giovani Lo Celso is among the Argentina players forced to quarantine (Tim Keeton/PA)

Maybe the Government has to get involved the next time.

Ironically the Argentina players who did travel to the aborted match will not be able to play, with Aston Villas Emi Martinez and Emi Buendia, and Tottenhams Cristian Romero and Giovani Lo Celso, forced to quarantine in Croatia.

It was a no-win situation all round, said Villa boss Dean Smith. Each club had to come up with the best solution for themselves. We were in between a rock and a hard place.
Kristoffer Tripplaar / Alamy Stock Photo

By now, youve heard that the reign of the girlboss is over. As a number of female industry leaders exit their roles for perpetuating toxic work environments and some even face trial in federal court for alleged fraud and conspiracy, the liberal assumption that women operating capitalist structures can radically transform corporate culture and enhance the lives of average working women is slowly being put to rest.

As with any cultural object thats lost its shine, its instinctual to want to retrace the steps that brought us to this unified place of fatigue and skepticism. Recently, authors, journalists and filmmakers have participated in this exercise to varying resultsand sometimes inadvertentlyillustrating the universal persuasion of wealth and power and skewering the shallow rewards of representational politics. Today, Amazon delivers the latest entry into this canon, a four-part docuseries called LuLaRich that doesnt so much focus on the rise and fall of one singular girlboss but portrays the ease and effectiveness of selling this empowerment fantasy to a particular subset of millennial women.

Ben Affleck Talks Feminism and Consent in Venice: Yes, I Do Consider Myself a Feminist

Ripe for serialization in our scammer-obsessed times, LuLaRich tells the story of billion-dollar fashion retailer LuLaRoenot to be confused with Lululemon, Lulus or Laila Rowea multi-level marketing company known primarily for its mammoth collection of flashy, patterned leggings and, since 2017, defective clothing, a series of lawsuits, and charges from the state of Washington that they operated as a pyramid scheme. In 1988, Utah native DeAnne Stidham began selling dresses she bought at the local swap meet, hosting Tupperware-like parties in her home. After 20-plus years of re-selling dresses, she and her second husband Mark started a maxi-dress business that went viral on Facebook and connected them with the first woman to buy into their stock, installing the MLM or direct-sales business model and launching LuLaRoe in 2013.

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After experiencing a few years of high demand, lucrative bonus checks and employee perks, LuLaRoes earliest and most senior saleswomen began experiencing the companys downsides. From receiving poorly designed and even moldy clothing they couldnt return to paying out-of-pocket expenses to attend mandatory conferences, the American dream they bought into for hundreds of thousands of dollars was slipping away, prompting the mobilization of aggrieved employees on Facebook and the companys inevitable fall from grace.

Much like their approach to the 2019 documentary Fyre Fraud, LuLaRichs co-directors Jenner Furst and Julia Willoughby Nason construct a fascinating but familiar tale utilizing an assortment of baffling testimonies from former LuLaRoe retailers, employees and members of the Stidham family who served in executive roles, insights from cultural and business experts, pop culture clips, deposition footage and a central interview with DeAnne and Mark, whose megachurch-pastor charisma and startling Mormon values (they gleefully share that two of their children, who are not biologically related, are married) will certainly memorialize them alongside the Joe Exotics and Billy McFarlands that have captured the nations attention over the past two years.

Viewers who arent privy to the LuLaRoe story but enjoy the subgenre of scammer documentaries will immediately recognize if not predict many of the series farcical beats and devices, particularly in the cartoonishly bro-y character of the companys former event coordinator Sam Schultz, the celebrity cameos, and the cultish portrayal of the business. By the time we learn that DeAnne was pressuring women to fly to Tijuana to get weight-loss surgery, it feels like the only logical direction the increasingly whacky series could go in. Additionally, the series visual cues can sometimes feel heavy-handed. Im not sure the audience needs a pan on a Barbie doll as Jill Filipovic reads from the how-to book DeAnnes mother authored on being a traditionally feminine woman. Do we really need to see a clip of Charlie and Grandpa Joe singing (Ive Got A) Golden Ticket from Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory after Schultz uses the metaphor of a golden ticket?

While LuLaRich tells an adequately compelling story about the predatory, absorbing nature of MLMs, its less adept at analyzing the paradoxes of the demographic they successfully lure into their networksreligious, middle-class white women and stay-at-home mothers, particularly military wives and Mormon women in Utah where there are the most MLMs per capita. Women in traditional marriages where their primary role is child-rearing are more susceptible to joining MLMs because their flexibility allows them to work from home.

Likewise, the docuseries exposes how LuLaRoes marketing deployed slogan-y pop-feminist language and the image of the boss babe to recruit mothers and wives while underhandedly promoting a politically conservative message about womens obligation to their families. Essentially, the company told women she can have it all while implying that she should want her family the most.

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Journalist Jill Filipovic, whose presence mostly made me wonder why no Black, female culture writers were approached to speak on this subject, tersely remarks that the fashion company sold a white vision of motherhood and the work-life balance, as LuLaRoe-sponsored social media posts of white, heterosexual couples and their children posing in their front yards appear on screen. However, the series stops short of explaining how these womens relationship to the workforce and their family dynamics differ from the realities of women who are lower-class and non-white, particularly Black women, who, historically, have always had to work while raising children. Two employees of color point out the companys lack of diversity (former onboarder LaShae Kimbrough, whos Black, shares a particularly funny tidbit about declining the companys cruise because of the overwhelming amount of white people), but the directors dont provide any real context as to why the company attracted the demographic that it did.

LuLaRich may not garner as much fanfare as Fyre Fraudits about leggings, after allbut it will certainly attract culturally-minded individuals interested in the intersections of religion, feminism, capitalism, athleisure, and white womanhood. Although it could be more rigorous in its analysis of these colliding cultural events, it manages to tell a gripping story that will have you laughing and screenshotting dialogue for memes until youre completely washed over by frustration and disappointment at the end.

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Sep. 11The Hawaii Department of Health today announced that a federal team of 30 clinicians will arrive in the state later this month to help administer monoclonal antibody therapy to patients.

There has been an uptick in demand for the therapy, which decreases severe illness in individuals recently infected with COVID-19. Several of the therapies have received emergency use authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Increasing access to the therapy can provide relief for Hawaii's hospitals, which are already strained. Officials emphasized, however, that monoclonal antibody therapy is not a substitute for vaccination against COVID-19.

"Targeted use of monoclonal antibodies could keep Hawaii COVID-19 patients from developing severe illness that requires hospitalization, " said Health Director Dr. Elizabeth Char in a news release. "However, COVID-19 vaccination remains the most effective way to create long-lasting immunity and prevent severe illness and death. Increasing access to monoclonal antibody therapy will reduce strain on our hospitals. We thank our state and federal partners for their assistance."

Treatment with monoclonal antibodies is authorized for individuals 12 and older with mild to moderate COVID-19 who are at high risk for severe illness, but not hospitalized, and who do not require supplemental oxygen, officials said. Patients also must be referred by a physician.

Numerous hospitals and health centers statewide, including Hilo Medical Center, Kona Community Hospital, Kaiser Permanente, Waianae Coast Comprehensive Health Center, Queen's Medical Center West, Maui Memorial Health Center, Straub, and Wilcox Medical Center on Kauai, among others, have been offering monoclonal antibodies to COVID patients.

Hilo Medical Center first used the treatment for hospitalized patients, including long-term care patients, last year, with good outcomes, said spokeswoman Elena Cabatu.

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The demand has grown, however, particularly over the summer. In August, the hospital administered about 75 treatments, and has already administered about 25 so far this month.

Hilo Medical Center has also been operating beyond capacity for the past three weeks, she said, with 38 COVID patients in-house on Friday, in addition to 12 long-haulers that are no longer contagious, but still very sick. Eight long-haulers are on ventilators. Most, from their 20s to 50s, are unvaccinated.

There are 19 intensive care unit patients at the hospital although there are only 11 beds in ICU, she said, so they are being placed in other areas, including a third floor unit and the emergency department.

Kaiser Permanente is offering monoclonal antibody treatments at its Moanalua facility on Oahu, as well as at its Maui Lani Medical Office in Wailuku.

Kaiser has offered the treatments at Moanalua since January, but demand is growing. Last week, 65 treatments were administered there, according to Kaiser spokeswoman Laura Lott, which was an all-time high.

Kaiser welcomes the help from federal workers, and hopes to be able to ramp up and offer up to 30 of the treatments per day.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency is providing the 30 clinicians, who are expected to arrive Sept. 19.

DOH said six teams will be stationed at hospitals or federally qualified health centers across the state, administering treatments, which require monitoring and the ability to respond to reactions or other medical events, seven days a week. The teams will administer monoclonal antibodies by injection.

Monoclonal antibody therapy is not a substitute for vaccination, officials said, because they provide a short burst of immunity compared to the longer-lasting immunity created by vaccination.

"We are taking yet another strategic step to preserve hospital capacity during a time of unprecedented demand, " said Hilton Raethel, President and CEO of the Healthcare Association of Hawaii in the news release. "Increasing the number of COVID positive residents who receive this therapy will result in a reduction of symptoms, and reduce demand on our hospitals."
More than 100 water birds have been found covered in oil in the wake of a spill at a Louisiana refinery damaged by Hurricane Ida.

The birds have been located within heavy pockets of crude oil from the Phillips 66 Alliance Refinery in Belle Chasse, and in flooded fields and retention ponds close by, according to a Thursday news release from the Louisiana Department of Wildlife & Fisheries.

An oiled tricolored heron at the Alliance Refinery oil spill in Belle Chasse, Louisiana. (Photo: Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries via AP)

The growing number of affected birds has included multiple egret species, black-bellied whistling ducks and blue-winged teal, among other species. Alongside birds, some alligators, otters and nutria were found with oil on them.

The mission to help the animals could take weeks, the department said. By Friday, 10 birds had been caught and brought to a wildlife rehabilitation center, state biologist Jon Wiebe told The Associated Press. Five dead birds had also been removed from the area.

The AP had reported on the Alliance spill after the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration captured aerial images showing a sheen of oil on the water. A levee protecting the refinery had failed during the storm, leading to a significant spill of heavy crude oil.

A Louisiana Department of Wildlife & Fisheries worker trying to save an oiled tricolored heron. (Photo: Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries via AP)

Aerial photos also revealed an oil slick that grew to around 11 miles long in the Gulf of Mexico south of Port Fourchon, the result of a broken pipeline  the owner of which is currently unclear. Those two spills are among more than 2,000 incidents of water pollution reported off Louisianas coasts or in its waterways after Ida, according to The Washington Post.

An oiled tricolored heron in the water at the Alliance Refinery oil spill in Belle Chasse. (Photo: Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries via AP)

The fossil fuels contaminating the environment and killing wildlife in the aftermath of the storm are also fueling extreme weather events like hurricanes and severe flooding.

Theres increasing evidence for an overintensification of the water cycle, NASA scientist Alex Ruane told HuffPost last month. Water is moving through the climate system faster than it used to. That means it is being evaporated into the air faster, its being moved around, and its raining down harder when it does rain.

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This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.

Related...
Most WDFW lands to reopen to overnight use

Most wildlife areas managed by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife will reopen to overnight use on Sept. 16 thanks to lower fire risk and cooler temperatures.

Public access to those lands was closed earlier this summer because of fire risk.

The Oak Creek unit near Naches will remain closed because of the Schneider Springs Fire, according to a news release.

A burn ban on WDFW lands remains in effect.
Joseph Maronski is a junior at High Point University, pursuing dual degrees in journalism and political science. Besides holding leadership roles on campus, Maronski spends much of his time volunteering in the community.
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A witness to a fiery crash Saturday that took the lives of an assistant professor at Creighton University and his 7-year-old son told a Nebraska State Patrol trooper the semi that struck their vehicle "showed no signs of slowing down."

"I saw a car flip. I saw one careen into the median and burst into flames," the unnamed witness said, according to Trooper Michael Mallery.

Mallery had been monitoring Husker gameday traffic near the Lincoln Airport on Interstate 80 just before 9:30 that morning when he saw a black plume of smoke.

In the affidavit to arrest the semi driver, 50-year-old Yorkwind Crawford of Florida, Mallery said when he drove east to see what had happened, he found Crawford's semi-trailer on the shoulder of the westbound lanes under the 14th Street bridge with damage to the front end.

A pickup on the inside shoulder near the 27th Street exit was fully engulfed.

Traffic on both sides of I-80 had come to a near standstill, and he saw at least five other vehicles in the the north ditch with considerable damage.
New Delhi: Tesla is striving hard to make an entry into Indias automobile market. However, the carmaker recently urged the government to lower the import rates on electric vehicles. The plan was simple - first to import and test the appetite of Indian auto-owners for Tesla vehicles before starting production locally.

However, in what could be a shocker for Tesla, the heavy industries ministry has reportedly asked US-based electric car major to first start manufacturing its iconic electric vehicles in India before any tax concessions can be considered, according to a PTI report which quoted unnamed government sources.

Currently, the Centre is not offering any concessions for the import of fuel-based or electric vehicles. Moreover, the government is reported to be of the view that giving such concessions will not send a good signal to other companies that have invested billions of dollars in India.

Currently, the cars that are imported in India as completely built units (CBUs) attract customs duty ranging from 60 per cent to 100 per cent. The tax depends on the engine size and cost, insurance and freight (CIF) value.

Tesla had asked the government to lower the taxes on the import of electric vehicles (EVs) in India. Previous reports had suggested that the Centre was willing to offer sops on the import of electric vehicles. Also Read: DHFL insolvency case: Heres why RBIs IBC route didnt work well for the lender

Meanwhile, Tesla has recently passed the homologation stage for all the four models/variants it had sought approval for in India, which basically means they are ready for launch in the country. Also Read: Yamaha announces festive season offers on Fascino 125 Fi, Ray ZR 125 Fi purchase: Cashback, bonus and more
New Delhi: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) took control of DHFL by appointing an administrator and took the company to Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) process, perhaps the first for a non-banking finance company (NBFC), despite all the drawbacks in the IBC process.

Experts say as evidenced in DHFL, the process is plagued by drawbacks that need to be addressed or alternatives need to be explored in the interest of all stakeholders and the economy at large and it has been a value destructive proposition to all stakeholders Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) process has neither been swift, as promised, nor the level of recoveries, projected at a very low 20% levels, were encouraging, as per reports.

Resolution under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 (IBC) was envisaged to be a plan for insolvency resolution of the borrower as a going concern while maximising the value of its assets and promoting entrepreneurship, availability of credit, and balancing of interests of all stakeholders - not a sale or an auction or a recovery as the process eventually turned out to be under an administrator.

The IBC process was meant to revive businesses, ensure the preservation of assets and capital, and be fair to all the stakeholders and was supposed to make doing business in India much easier.

On the contrary, IBC has been a fraught process quite caught up in litigation all the way since its inception and almost every issue needed the Supreme Court to intervene.

Experts say IBC has neither been swift, as promised, nor the level of recoveries, projected at a very low 20% levels, were encouraging. The numbers are disappointing  Very low success rate of around 13%.

In terms of reviving and saving businesses, up to March 2021, of the 4,376 cases referred for the CIRP (Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process), 2,653 cases are closed, while the rest are work-in-progress.

Of the 2,653 cases closed, only 348 have ended with the approval of resolution plans, while a whopping 1277 firms were liquidated. Balance cases are either withdrawn by mutual consent or under appeal/ review.

In terms of jobs lost and recovered, the figures are difficult to arrive at, estimates are that about 1 million jobs have been lost due to the closure of companies.

In terms of time taken, more than 79% of ongoing Resolution processes have already exceeded 270 days timeline with no clear further timeline on closure.

On liquidation  till March 2021, a total of 1277 cases had yielded orders for liquidation. Of this, a whopping 70% have been undergoing liquidation process for over 1 year. Also, till 31 March 2021, the stakeholders received only Rs 600 crore by way of liquidation against total claims of Rs 17523 crore i.e. only 3.4% of total claims with a further delay of more than 2-3 years.

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) took control of DHFL by appointing an administrator and took the company to Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) process, perhaps the first for a non-banking finance company (NBFC), despite all the drawbacks in the IBC process. Also Read: Relief to common can! Centre cuts import taxes on vegetable oils to calm prices

As seen in the case of DHFL as well as various other case studies, the process was entirely highjacked by the Secured Lenders esp. institutional creditors , with hardly any or no say at all to other stakeholders - unsecured creditors, operational creditors, shareholders and employees. Also Read: Groww to buy Indiabulls Housings mutual fund business, deal gets CCIs nod

Experts said as evidenced in DHFL, the process is plagued by the following drawbacks that need to be addressed or alternatives need to be explored in the interest of all stakeholders and the economy at large:

a. Value Destructive Proposition to all Stakeholders

i. Very Low Recovery  Only Rs 37,500 crore against admitted claims of close to Rs 91,000 crore (about 41% realization)

ii. Loss of 100% of Interest Accrued of over Rs 10,000 crore was not factored in the resolution at all  including in the overall claims.

iii. Unsecured Creditors  Only Rs 189 crore against Rs 3778 crore i.e 5% realization on Principal while there is Nil recovery against accrued interest.
New Delhi: Fintech platform Groww is all set to buy the mutual fund business of Indiabulls Housing Finance (IBHFL) for Rs 175 crore. The deal has also received a nod from the Competition Commission of India (CCI).

For the transaction, the two wholly-owned subsidiaries of Indiabulls - Indiabulls Asset Management Company Ltd (IMACL) and Indiabulls Trustee Company Ltd (ITCL) - entered into an agreement in May 2021 with Growws parent firm Nextbillion Technology.

The transaction is aimed at divestment of mutual fund business carried out by the two entities of Indiabulls. Divestment of the mutual fund business is expected to help Indiabulls in focussing on its retail estate asset management business.

"In furtherance...The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has pursuant to a communication letter dated September 9, 2021, approved the transaction," IBHFL said in a regulatory filing.

Founded in 2016, fintech startup Groww offers a slew of financial services, including stock and mutual fund investments. It is also one of the leading online stock brokerage platforms in India.

The Bengaluru-based startup is backed by a score of investors such as Tiger Global, Sequoia Capital India, Y Combinator and Ribbit Capital. It currently caters to more than 1.5 crore users in over 900 cities in India. Also Read: Lost job during pandemic? ESIC to provide unemployment benefits till June 2022

The deal is expected to be completed on or before June 30, 2022. Also Read: 19,000 apps on Google Play Store found unsafe, could even leak your personal data

- With PTI inputs.
New Delhi: India has cut base import taxes on palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil, according to a government notification, as the world`s biggest vegetable oil buyer tries to cool near-record price rises.

The reduction in taxes could bring down prices of the edible oils in India and boost consumption, effectively increasing overseas buying by the south Asian country.

The base import tax on crude palm oil has been slashed to 2.5% from 10%, while the tax on crude soyoil and crude sunflower oil has been reduced to 2.5% from 7.5%, the government said in a notification late on Friday.

The base import tax on refined grades of palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil cut to 32.5% from 37.5%.

After the cuts, crude palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil imports will be subject to a 24.75% tax in total, including a 2.5% base import duty and other taxes, while refined grades of palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil would carry a 35.75% tax in total.

India fulfils more than two-thirds of its edible oil demand through imports and has been struggling to contain a rally in local oil prices for the last few months.

The country imports palm oil mainly from top producers Indonesia and Malaysia, while other oils, such as soy and sunflower, come from Argentina, Brazil, Ukraine and Russia.

The reduction in taxes would bring down edible oil prices ahead of key festivals, when edible oil demand rises in the country, said Govindbhai Patel, managing director of trading firm G.G. Patel & Nikhil Research Company.

New Delhi cut import taxes on palm oil, soyoil and sunflower oil, but kept import duties intact on crude rapeseed oil at 38.5%, said B.V. Mehta, executive director of the Solvent Extractors` Association of India. Also Read: 19,000 apps on Google Play Store found unsafe, could even leak your personal data

"There is a need to bring down import tax on rapeseed oil as well since the price has nearly doubled in a year," Mehta said. Also Read: Groww to buy Indiabulls Housings mutual fund business, deal gets CCIs nod

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New Delhi: Riding high on the roaring success of her last release, Mimi, Bollywood actress Kriti Sanon has gifted herself a brand new Mercedes-Maybach GLS 600 car. Yes! The stunner is now a proud owner of this swanky mean machine.

Mimi has not only proved to be a game-changer for Kriti Sanon but also took her to the top league of actresses in Bollywood today. The new Mercedes-Maybach GLS 600 luxury car is now an addition to her already envious collection of cars.

Post the success of Mimi, Kriti is in a happy zone and wanted to treat herself with a brand new car. So, its a dream come true for her. The versatile actress has earned it through her sheer hard work and post the success of Mimi, the industry has seen a 2.0 version of Kriti, as she is being considered as one of the top actresses of the industry, a well-placed source confirmed.

She was recently spotted at Maddock Films office as she posed happily for the shutterbugs standing next to her priced possession.

On the work front, Kriti Sanon has 'Adipurush', 'Bachchan Pandey, 'Bhediya', 'Ganapath', 'Hum Do Hamaare Do' along with other unannounced projects in the pipeline.
New Delhi: The protest in Haryana's Karnal was called off on Saturday nearly a week after the incident involving Sub-Divisional Magistrate Ayush Sinha, who controversially ordered "crack their heads" for the farmers. Both the state government and the demonstrators agreed that a probe will be initiated against the SDM by a former judge and in the meantime the officer will remain on leave.

Devendra Singh Irrigation Department's Additional Chief Secretary (ACS) confirmed that the farmers have called off their protests and the standoff is over.

In a joint press conference by farmer leader Gurnam Singh Chaduni and the administration, Devendra Singh said that a judicial inquiry would be conducted into the lathi charge on August 28. Singh said the judicial inquiry would be completed within a month.

Further, Devendra Singh told that the victim's family will be given a job within a week. Whereas two people from the family of the deceased farmer will get jobs.

On August 28, Haryana police lathi-charged farmers who were blocked a highway while on way to Karnal to protest against Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar attending a meeting.

Ayush Sinha, who was the Sub-Divisional Magistrate of Karnal was caught on camera making the comments that sparked massive outrage. Demands were raised for Sinha's dismissal after the incident, and he was subsequently removed from his post.

Over 10 protesters were injured while one farmer succumbed to his injuries due to the police action.
New Delhi: Aam Aadmi Party National Convenor and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal addressed the 10th National Council meeting of the party today. The AAP Convenor said that the Aam Aadmi Party has come to change the politics of 'power through money and money through power'.

He said that after seeing AAP run the government in Delhi, people across the country have started feeling that the Aam Aadmi Party is the only hope. He said that Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh and Babasaheb Dr. Ambedkar are the ultimate ideals of the Aam Aadmi Party and the party will follow the path shown by them. He said that every AAP worker has to be ready to sacrifice and fight like them. He added that at AAP everyone has to work a lot for the society and country, but never aspire for any position.

Kejriwal reiterated that he doesn't want people to ever say that AAP has become like BJP, Congress and other parties. He hoped that the purpose for which the party was formed would definitely be fulfilled. At the same time, Senior AAP leader and Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said that even in the last 70 years, political parties could not take the country to the quantum of the potential of the country.

AAPs work in the pandemic making waves all over the world: Arvind Kejriwal

Addressing the party members National Convenor and Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal said, I am delighted that we have successfully onboarded the Aam Aadmi Partys new National Council. I hope and pray that the tenure of this council is extremely fruitful and prosperous. For the past 2 years, this country and the entire country are witnessing the toughest pandemic ever recorded in history. Only the Spanish Flu that came 100 years ago had a similar quantum. During this period, the Aam Aadmi Partys Delhi Government made tremendous efforts on its part to fight the pandemic. I am not saying that the other governments did nothing, all state governments and the centre did all they could. So did we, with the help of the 2 crore people of Delhi.

Made the practice of home isolation, plasma therapy realistic in Delhi: Arvind Kejriwal

All this while, we also witnessed a lot of firsts spring-boarding in Delhi. Plasma Therapy began in Delhi itself. We established the first Plasma Bank at ILBS and the second at LNJP. Delhi showed the world how home-isolation could be made possible, and how to look after not just patients but also healthcare workers. In Delhi, we honoured the sacrifice of all the healthcare workers and frontline workers who martyred fighting with COVID-19 by giving their families a Sahayta Raashi of Rs. 1 crore. A lot of such efforts were implemented for the first time in Delhi. We all together were able to curb the spread of the virus and I pray to god that COVID doesnt come back and the third-wave doesnt come back, the Delhi CM added.

AAP Karyakartas did their best to help people across India: Arvind Kejriwal

Throughout the country, the Karyakartas of the Aam Aadmi Party put in the best of their efforts to help people at their own level. Every time I got to know about their efforts, I swelled with pride. This is the reason why AAP was created. From every nook and corner, we saw the rise of new kinds of heroes of AAP. One such example is of MLA Dilip Pandey. Whenever someone faced a problem in Delhi, theyd be told to contact Dilip. Like him, there were countless such heroes from AAP who devotedly helped people. We got to know many such stories from Mumbai, where AAP workers put in their day and night to help people. All the party members worked with full faith and dedication to help whoever they could. I will be forever grateful to each one of our party members for their efforts. We will also work on a compilation of all the work our party members did across the country during the pandemic to share within the party and inspire each other, he said.

Dont aspire to get power by hook or by crook method: Arvind Kejriwal

Anna Ji used to say, politics is based on only one principle - Satta through Paisa and then Paisa through Satta. Aam Aadmi Party is here to change this concept. Aam Aadmi Party has been made to work for the country and the society. Our purpose is not to get into power by hook or by crook. We are here for the people of this country and for their trust. When our party was very young, people used to say that the party would cease to exist in a couple of years. When we came into power in Delhi, back then people would say they had one term and their party would finish after that. But now that we have been successfully running a government in Delhi, people look at our work and say that we are the only hope they have left. AAP was formed with only one purpose - Seva, Qurbani, Balidaan, he added.

AAP workers must always be ready to sacrifice all they have for this country: Arvind Kejriwal

Talking to the incoming Executive Council Members, Kejriwal said, Remember to keep just one thing in mind. We are here to serve the society and the country; and if needed, always be ready to sacrifice all you have for this country

Bhagat Singh, Babasaheb Ambedkar the ultimate ideals of AAP: Arvind Kejriwal

There are many idols and freedom fighters we celebrate in this country. But I want to specifically talk about Babasaheb Ambedkar and Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh. These two are the Param Adarsh of the Aam Aadmi Party and we will follow the path they left behind for us in their legacy. On one hand, we have Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh, who happily made the supreme sacrifice for this country. At an age of 23, kids think about their salaries and marriages today. Bhagat Singh Ji neither thought about his career or marriage. He thought about this country. He is who we consider our Adarsh. If he thought of what position he would hold when the country gets freedom, then we would have never been free. Each of our members, and our politicians, must always be ready to commit themselves to this nation even if it takes supreme sacrifice, he added.

Babasaheb Ambedkar spent his entire life struggling for the society. He is the prime example of what struggle is. He came from a very marginalised background, belonged to the Dalit society. Despite all kinds of hardships, he went abroad to study and got 2 doctorates in that era. He came back to write the constitution of this country. He is our Adarsh. Take inspiration from him and Shaheed-e-Azam to work for the country, Kejriwal said.

Dont ever be greedy for a position in the party; you wont achieve anything by greed: Arvind Kejriwal

I want to make it clear to everyone, when you join the Aam Aadmi Party, do not come here with the expectation of getting any position or getting a ticket for the elections. We have to work for the society and the country with complete dedication and honesty. We all have to work in our own areas to the best of our abilities. In this party, you should only be at peace when you are satisfied with your work, not because you have reached some position. Your work should be of such quality that the position comes to you and you dont have to go to the position. If you come to us and say that you want a position or ticket, that means you arent worth what you want. You should work with such effort that we come to you and ask you to take a position or fight an election, that is what matters. There are so many people in our party whom we approached ourselves, and asked them to take a position or a ticket. One should not be greedy, greedy can not result in service and sacrifice. When someone takes something by crook, they remain crooks throughout their life. One must leave such desires and ambition, this wont get anyone anything, he said.

Dont want people to say that we have become like Congress-BJP: Arvind Kejriwal

Kejriwal said, I dont want people to think of us and say that we have become like BJP or Congress. Theres no point in becoming like them. This is not why AAP was formed. If at any point in your life you think that you are feeling greedy for a position then theres only one cure to that, double the amount of your service and get immersed into the feeling of seva. The more penance you do, the more humble you will become.

Geeta says leaders of the society must maintain righteous demeanour: Arvind Kejriwal

We see what transpires in other parties. Dozens of people fight for one seat, parties breakaway, factions are formed. We dont want that to happen with our party. If something like that happens then the faith and trust stored in our party will cease to exist forever. It is said in the Geeta that everyone in the society looks up to its leader; the leader must maintain a very righteous demeanour; if the demeanour of the leader itself gets corrupted, then the society is headed for ruins. Today the entire country looks up to AAP. When someone talks of honesty, they think of AAP. When someone talks about education, they talk about Manish Sisodia Ji. If they talk about health, they talk about Mohalla Clinics. AAP is bringing forth new principles in this society, so please never let greed take over you. Dont think about bagging a position, devote yourselves to society, he added.

Nation building one of the prime purposes of forming the Aam Aadmi Party: Manish Sisodia

Senior AAP Leader and Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said, The real mission behind establishing the Aam Aadmi Party was to work on the issues that have been systematically left behind or deliberately left undone, owing to various political reasons. Education, Health, and Employment are some of the most important dimensions, however, Nation Building is one of the prime purposes of the Aam Aadmi Party. We have made this party for the country. As much as we keep this in mind, the party will keep on growing in the long run.

Must keep questioning ourselves, remember why we are here: Manish Sisodia

Manish Sisodia said, I have just one request from everyone attending this meeting. A formal dialogue will definitely take place and decisions will be taken on their basis. However, we all must constantly keep the last 75 years in mind and the dreams of Baba Saheb Ambedkar, Gandhi Ji, and others. Second, we must constantly keep in mind why the Aam Aadmi Party was formed. Why didnt we all, who might have wanted to be in politics, join any of the existing parties? Why didnt we join any of the existing and instead thought of establishing the Aam Aadmi Party? We must constantly ask ourselves this question. Then we will be able to contribute better to the Aam Aadmi Party and the country. Then we will be able to establish a strong tradition for the country.
New Delhi: After Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani tendered his resignation, senior BJP leader Vajubhai Vala said a decision regarding a new CM will be taken after the meeting of the party MLAs.

The former Governor of Karnakata said Rupanis resignation did not come as a surprise to him. He told ANI, "The resignation of Chief Minister was not a surprise as the people in the party keep meeting and their roles are decided according to the requirement of the party. When Anandiben Patel resigned, then also there was no particular reason for it.

Commenting on the next CM face for Gujarat, Vala said the BJP is yet to make a decision. "No name has been finalised yet. The new Chief Minister will be decided after the meeting of MLAs. That is a parliamentary procedure and the party will follow it, he added.

On being asked about the reason behind Rupanis resignation, Vala said, "Whatever the party decides, every worker follows that. Vijay Rupani was Chief Minister for about 2000 days and neither public nor party workers had any complaints against him. We will follow whatever the party decides. He worked for the party his whole life.

His remarks come as earlier today Rupani met Governor Acharya Devvrat and submitted his resignation from the post of Gujarat CM, one year ahead of Assembly elections in the state. "To further develop the state, with new energy and power, I have decided to resign as Chief Minister," he told reporters.

Rupani became the fourth BJP`s chief minister to be replaced in the last six months. Earlier, Uttarakhand and Karnataka CMs were replaced.

Meanwhile, as per PTI, the names of Gujarat Deputy CM Nitin Patel, state agriculture minister R C Faldu, Union ministers Purshottam Rupala and Mansukh Mandaviya are doing rounds as successors of Rupani. "Names of Patel, Faldu, Rupala and Mandaviya are being discussed. But it is impossible to say who will be the chief minister as the decision will be taken by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, PTI quoted a BJP leader as saying.

(With agency inputs)

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New Delhi: Hours after meeting Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, the Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs and Women Marise Payne and Minister for Defence Peter Dutton called on Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday (September 11, 2021). The 'courtesy-call' came after the conclusion of the first Ministerial-level 2+2 dialogue between India and Australia.

The Prime Minister's Office informed that PM Modi expressed his appreciation to the Australian dignitaries for the productive discussions during the 2+2 dialogue, pointing out that this was a sign of growing strategic convergence between both countries.

Was happy to meet Ministers @MarisePayne and @PeterDutton_MP. The 1st Ministerial 2+2 Dialogue between India and Australia was very productive. I thank my friend @ScottMorrisonMP for his focus on the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership between our nations. pic.twitter.com/mewWFcqoUj  Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) September 11, 2021

"A number of issues were discussed during the meeting, including possibilities of further expanding bilateral strategic and economic cooperation, the common approach of both countries towards the Indo-Pacific region, and the growing importance of the Indian community in Australia as a human-bridge between both sides," the PMO said in a statement.

PM Modi also conveyed his appreciation for the role that Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has played in rapidly advancing the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership instituted between both countries last year.

He also renewed his invitation to Morrison to visit India at his earliest convenience.

Earlier in the day, Rajnath Singh said that it was a 'great honor and pleasure' to receive both the ministers from Australia for the inaugural 2+2 IndiaAustralia Ministerial Dialogue.

"The 2+2 dialogue signifies the importance of the India  Australia Comprehensive Strategic Partnership. India and Australia share an important partnership which is based on a shared vision of free, open, inclusive and prosperous Indo-Pacific region. As two democracies we have a common interest in peace and prosperity of the entire region," Singh said in a press statement.

"Today we have had in-depth and wide ranging discussion with Minister Payne and Minister Dutton on bilateral and regional issues. We have discussed various institutional frameworks for wide ranging collaboration including defence cooperation and fight against global pandemic. We exchanged views on Afghanistan, Maritime Security in the Indo-Pacific, cooperation in multilateral formats and other related topics," the Defence Minister added.

We have discussed various institutional frameworks for wide ranging collaboration including defence cooperation and fight against global pandemic.

We exchanged views on Afghanistan, Maritime Security in the Indo-Pacific, cooperation in multilateral formats & other related topics.  Rajnath Singh (@rajnathsingh) September 11, 2021

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New Delhi: Marriages can be registered in the virtual presence of parties, the Delhi High Court has ruled, saying that in the present times, citizens cannot be prevented from exercising their rights because of a rigid interpretation of law which calls for "personal presence".

Hearing a plea by a US-based Indian couple seeking to register their marriage here through video conferencing, Justice Rekha Palli opined that not treating physical presence as a mandatory requirement would also encourages parties to easily get their marriages registered.

"I have no hesitation in coming to the conclusion that the term 'personal appearance' in Clause 4 of the Registration Order has to be read to include presence secured through Video Conferencing. Any other interpretation, would not only frustrate the very purpose of this beneficial legislation, but, it would also undermine the use of this important and easily accessible tool of Video Conferencing," the judge said in her order dated September 9.

She said the Delhi (Compulsory Registration of Marriage) Order, 2014 is welfare legislation, promulgated at the instance the Supreme Court to encourage the registration of marriages.

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"The insistence of physical appearance even when their personal appearance can be easily secured through video conferencing, will definitely make it more cumbersome for parties to come forward for the registration of marriages. This will negate the very purpose of enactment of the Registration Order and cannot be permitted," the order further reads.

The court allowed the couple to mark their "personal appearance" before the Registering Authority through video conferencing after submitting their application for the registration of marriage through their counsel/Power of Attorney Holder in physical form alongwith copies of all supporting documents duly notarized, either by the notary public in the United States of America or by a notary public here.

It directed that the two witnesses would appear physically before the Registering Authority with their original ID proofs on the date notified by the Registering Authority.

The Authority will then expeditiously register the marriage and issue the Marriage Registration Certificate within a period of two weeks' from the date of receipt of the application, the court added.

In the present case, the couple claimed that their marriage was solemnised in 2001 as per Hindu rituals, but they did not get the same registered as they moved abroad prior to the introduction of the Delhi (Compulsory Registration of Marriage) Order, 2014.

Considering that their application for a green card was now not being processed in the United States for want of a marriage certificate, the couple approached the local authority here for issuance of a marriage certificate, who maintained that physical presence of the parties was a mandatory requirement.

The couple, represented through senior counsel Vibha Datta Makhija, moved the high court after their representation to the authority concerned for virtual appearance remained unanswered.

The court observed that while the "universe has undergone a sea change" since the time when the Registration Order was notified, the Registering Authority was "refusing to recognize the reality that with the technology as is available today, web portals and Video Conferencing have become almost the norm".

Acknowledging the acceptance of video conferencing even in the judicial system in this country, the court said that "these aspects appear to have been simply overlooked by the Registering Authority, who is continuing to insist on that the parties must remain present physically before him".

"I am of the view that, in times such as these, when technology has proven to be the bridge that ensured uninterrupted communication, widespread dissemination of information in public interest and the smooth functioning of society, the Court cannot allow a rigid interpretation of the statute to prevent citizens from exercising their rights," the judge said.

The court stated that the task assigned to the Registering Authority was to register a marriage that has already been solemnised, clarifying the "misconception that a marriage is being solemnized before the Registering Authority".

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Chennai: It was an enlightening exchange of ideas, ideologies, belief systems and facts like no other - renowned Author, former International Diplomat and Parliamentarian Dr. Shashi Tharoor on one end and famed Supreme Court Advocate, Best-selling Author on debut J Sai Deepak on the other. In Chennai to launch his latest book, The Battle of Belonging, Dr. Tharoor took part in a discussion with J Sai Deepak, who himself had recently launched his own book India that is Bharat (as said in Article 1 of the Constitution). As the session moderator, Dr. Nanditha Krishna, President CP Ramaswamy Aiyar Foundation, set the tone and expectations high by indicating how the respective authors books were antithetical to each other.

Elaborating on his latest work, Dr. Tharoor said it was his personal meditation on Nationalism and how the idea applies in the Indian context. His work delves deep into Global literature on Nationalism and belonging, the kinds of Nationalism, the thin line between Nationalism and Patriotism. He explained that, Patriotism is love for your country such that you belong to it and it belongs to you, like a mothers love. A Patriot loves the country in an uncritical way, even if there's nothing appealing about it to a stranger. Nationalism is the idea of a country that is represented as state, flag, army, ruling ethos and a Nationalist defines allegiance and opposition to others. While the two may seem fairly similar, the difference is that - a Patriot is prepared to die for his country; a nationalist is prepared kill for his state, he distinguished.

However, he also touches upon the Nationalism linked to identity (birth, blood, religion) and also Civic nationalism that is not anchored in identity (which is anchored in Constitutions and institutions and implies voluntary participation in Civic society). Regarding Indian Nationalism, Tharoor said that it was a Civic Nationalism, as Indias freedom struggle was meant for everyone. Referring to the discussions during the formative stages of the Indian Constitution, Tharoor said that India was meant to be a Civic Nationalism of equal rights. He added that the idea of India guaranteed people Freedoms of Religion, Worship, Expression, Propagation of religion and Equality of citizens, irrespective of their differences. Tharoor also went on to mention an alternative idea of India - Hindi, Hindu, Hindustan, where the Indian Constitution had to be written for the Hindu people, instead of for all(which he attributes to Savarkar, Golwalkar and Deen Dayal Upadhyay).

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Sai Deepak started off by saying that his own book was an inadvertent rebuttal to Tharoors book. He corrected Tharoor regarding the proposition that the term and idea of Hindutva were coined by Savarkar. Instead, he said Chandranath Basu in 1892 had coined the term and elaborated on it, via an essay on Hindutva. He added that a school of thought approached Bharats experience of colonialism and ignored the scholarship of decoloniality. The idea that Hindu Nationalism is fundamentally exclusionist and comes at the peril of religious minorities in India, is to impose the guilt and framework on European Nationalism on Bharatiya Consciousness, he said. Deepak said that he prefers the term Bharatiya Dharmic Civilizational reawakening rather than Hindutva or anything of that kind. He adds that it is possible to discard Savarkar, to build a case for Dharmic Civilizationalism, as it was larger than any individual.

Speaking on how the Indian Constitution was portrayed as fundamentally antithetical to the Hindutva vision of a Hindu Rashtra, Deepak touched upon how the draft Constitution presented by Hindu Mahasabha granted equal rights to religious minorities. Assuming we did not have the concept of contemporary Constitutionalism emanating from Europe, Bharat has always welcomed those who are willing to live with us. We did not have a Constitution when persecuted Parsis or Jews knocked at the doors of Bharat the lawyer said. He also cautioned Tharoor against committing the grave injustice of attributing large-heartedness to the Constitution, at the expense of the Civilization. Deepak also took on those that make the allegation of India becoming a Hindu Pakistan. He went on to say that despite the horrors and tragedy of Partition, foisted two-nation theory, Bharat has protected its minorities, much much better than Pakistan. Accommodation has been the spirit of this country, whereas Western style assimilation requires you to covertly or overtly convert to be accepted. It is Bharat that lets people keep their culture alive in a pristine form, so long as it doesnt come in the way of others, he said. He opined that Dharmic Civilizationalism was being crudely dubbed as Hindu nationalism.

Referring to the Constituent Assembly debates, the lawyer recalled that whenever the term public morality was used in the debates, the reference has been to public morality drawn from the vast Ocean of Dharma. He added that the concept of Dharma was native to Bharat and its culture. Deepak also disagreed and condemned the manner in which, what he called Hindu awakening was being termed by many as identity politics. It is a superficial way of looking at it, he said, he further added that, there is a clear difference between identity and consciousness - of which consciousness is more important. Choosing between Aurangzeb and Dara Shikoh(heir apparent of Shah Jahan), I would choose Dara Shikoh because he was closer to the Hindu spirit in terms of his consciousness, as opposed to Aurangzeb who was against the Hindu accommodative spirit. Deepak also countered those who term Hindutva as ethnocentric and obsessed with race and Xenophobia (all of which are obsessions of European nationalism), by saying how Bharat accommodated many races. They have come from several parts of the world, but became part of this land as they found a way of co-existing with us, without seeing us as sub-human or de-human. Anyone who is willing to let go of the tenet of rendering me a second-class human and severing my roots to this land, is welcome in this country, he states.

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Tharoor replied by saying that he had no difficulty with the notion of Dharmic Civilizational roots of India, but he would rather follow the Swami Vivekananda view of Hinduism, than that of Savarkar and his follower (ruling BJP). Vivekanand was proud of Hinduism, but he celebrated the inclusiveness of the faith, Dr. Tharoor said, highlighting how Swami Vivekananda spoke about the mutual respect that people of different faith have for each others truth. The Parliamentarian representing the Congress also spoke about the violent crimes against Dalits, Muslims and said he believed it wasnt Dharmic.

Referring to Swami Vivekanandas Hinduism (and Tharoors endorsement of that Hinduness), Deepak retorted that while Vivekananda echoed Universalism at Chicago, he also believed the Universalism cannot come at the cost of pixelation of history. Quoting from Swami Vivekanandas books, Deepak said that Swami Vivekananda himself (despite promoting Universal Brotherhood) was forced to hold a Christian Missionary by the collar and threatened to throw him off the ship, for spewing venom on Hinduism(what the Missionary called religion of Satan). According to Deepak, this act was Hindutva or Hindu Resistance in Action. I am more than happy to accommodate your points, provided you stop spewing venom against me in the name of your scripture, Deepak added. Referring to instances of violence against minorities, Deepak pointed out the silence on the issues of Kashmiri Hindus and that of post-poll violence after West Bengal elections, religious pockets being created in Assam, Nagalim for Christ etc. With all these insurgencies going on, surprisingly, it is the Hindu who is the constant subject of scrutiny, whereas everybody else is spared scrutiny, Deepak said.

Referring to ideas of Nationalism, Deepak said that the Nationalism of the European Colonizer (oppressor) could not be compared with the Nationalism of the victim and oppressed (Indian). On the Indian Constitution, he quoted Dr. Ambdekar on how he rued having created it (based on how it was being distorted under the Nehruvian dispensation).

In his concluding note, Dr. Tharoor touched upon how Secularism (in its Indian context) meant profusion of religion/pluralism, rather than the dictionary meaning of distancing from religion. He also added how he agreed with Vivekananda on refusing to be insulted. Uncritical defence of bad behavior in the name of Hindutva and the whataboutery that says we have done bad things, but those guys have done bad things as well, is not the idea. Our duty as Indians is to reform ourselves. As a Hindu, I would have every entitlement to judge fellow Hindus, when they fall short of Dharmic standards, but its not my duty to tell the same about Muslims or Christians and their religion. I can only tell them only how to be a good citizen under the Constitution. I will continue to criticize Hindus when they misbehave. I think that there has to be some common ground between these views and that of the Government and the Opposition he said. He also added that, given Indias diversity, people neednt agree all the time, as long as they agreed on the ground rules of how they will disagree (as established in the Constitution), without challenging the Fundamentals of the Constitution.

In her summation, Dr. Nanditha Krishna said that India needed a Truth and Reconciliation Commission where people sat across the table and discussed their problems with each other and solved them. Dr. Tharoor then stated that Indias problems were with injustices done over 500 years ago, only for Deepak to intervene and say that they were continuing injustices. Dr. Krishna added that rather than fighting for issues that date back 1000s of years, the country needed to focus on the coming 1000 years, to which Deepak agreed that it was better resolved on the table than the street.

Dr. Tharoor added that the focus must be on the future rather than past wrongs. He admitted that there were many wrongs done, but that they werent done by people living today. Building on Dr. Tharoors point(of an in-principle apology for Colonial horrors, as against money), Deepak said that that same was expected from other people for what happened in parts of India. Reparatory Justice is finding traction across the world, we are only asking for reconciliation, where we accept and move on so that its not repeated Deepak signed off.

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New Delhi: India and Australia on Saturday dismissed criticism that Quad was a sort of an 'Asian NATO' with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar asserting that it is important not to "misrepresent" the reality.

The assertion came at a joint press event after External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh held the inaugural 'two-plus-two' dialogue here with their Australian counterparts Marise Payne and Peter Dutton.

At the India- Australia ministerial level 2+2 meeting today, I and Dr. Jaishankar had in-depth and wide ranging discussion with Minister Payne and Minister Dutton on bilateral and regional issues. pic.twitter.com/FP4R9YIfFf  Rajnath Singh (@rajnathsingh) September 11, 2021

Asked about Quad being referred to as an 'Asian NATO', Jaishankar said, "We call ourselves Quad and Quad is a platform where four countries have come to cooperate for their benefit and for the benefit of the world."

"I think a term like NATO is very much a cold war term, looking back. I think Quad looks in the future, it reflects globalisation, it reflects the compulsions of countries to work together," he said.

Jaishankar also pointed out that Quad was currently focussed on issues such as vaccines, supply chains, education and connectivity.

"I can't see any relationship between such issues and the NATO or any other kind of organisations like that. So I think it is important not to misrepresent what is the reality out there," he asserted.

Echoing similar views, Payne said as Australia and India have re-energised relations, there is also the opportunity to work through smaller groups like the Quad and other pieces of regional architecture like the East Asia Summit or the ASEAN regional forum.

"Quad members are champions of ASEAN centrality, we actively engage in that ASEAN architecture. We are committed to supporting the practical implementation of the ASEAN outlook on the Indo-Pacific," she said.

"We also say that we have a positive and practical agenda -- around vaccines, around climate, around critical technology also trying to address some of the dangerous misinformation that pervades the world experience in relation to the (Covid) pandemic," the minister said.

Referring to the Quad, she said the constructive engagement in a normal diplomatic network was overwhelmingly about contributing positively for that "open, inclusive and resilient region in which we all want to live".

Speaking at an event here, Payne on Friday had said the Quad has evolved "swiftly" and very "effectively" and that Australia commends India for taking a strong leadership role in the region.

Media Statement Following India-Australia 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue in New Delhi. https://t.co/YaqHtRrClc  Rajnath Singh (@rajnathsingh) September 11, 2021

In the first Quad summit in March, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, US President Joe Biden, Australian PM Scott Morrison and Japanese PM Yoshihide Suga vowed to strive for an Indo-Pacific region that is free, open, inclusive, healthy, anchored by democratic values, and unconstrained by coercion, in an apparent message to China.

Both China and Russia have been critical of Quad. While Beijing has been claiming that the alliance was aimed against it, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov had called it an "Asian NATO" and criticised the grouping.
New Delhi: India will host the first-ever 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue with Australia on Saturday (September 11, 2021) in the national capital. The countries will discuss a slew of issues which includes economic security, cyber, climate, critical technology and supply chains. It also likely that the crisis in Afghanistan will discusses too.

India's External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh will meet their Australian counterparts; Foreign Minister Marise Payne and Defence Minister Peter Dutton.

As per reports, Payne will meet Jaishankar at Hyderabad House at 10:30 AM after a laying a wreath at National War Memorial. She will then attend a press conference at Muthamma Hall, Jawaharlal Nehru Bhawan at 3 PM.

Later at around 4:30 PM, the Australian leaders will call on Prime Minister Narendra Modi at his 7, Lok Kalyan Marg residence.

Speaking at an event by an independent global think tank based in Delhi on Friday, Payne highlighted that India is on the trajectory of the global manufacturing hub and has become a key market for emerging technologies.

"In the context of strategic competition in our region, it`s timely that we (India and Australia) reflect on both complementarity and the common outlook that forms the basis of our cooperation in the Indo-Pacific," she was quoted as saying by ANI.

The 2+2 dialogue is the outcome of a decision made at the India-Australia leaders virtual summit in June 2020 to elevate bilateral relations between the two countries. The 2+2 meetings of Foreign and Defence Ministers will be conducted with all four countries across the Indo-Pacific region. This joint visit will strongly reinforce Australia`s active engagement in the region.

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New Delhi: After reopening schools in the state, the Madhya Pradesh government on Saturday (September 11) announced that universities and colleges will resume offline classes with 50 per cent attendance from September 15.

All teachers and non-teaching staffers have been asked to conduct classes with 50 per cent students from September 15, state Higher Education Minister Mohan Yadav said in a release., PTI reported.

The teaching, non-teaching staff and students will be required to submit certificates of their first dose of COVID-19 vaccine, the minister said. Strict COVID-19 appropriate behaviour will have to be adhered to in college and university campuses, he added.

Online classes for students will continue, and officials have been asked to chart out a timetable for online and offline classes, Yadav stated. Besides, libraries, hostels and mess will be reopen in a phased manner keeping in mind the coronavirus guidelines.

MP has around 1,400 colleges and 56 universities with nearly 13.5 lakh students, out of which two lakh are freshers.

Earlier, schools for Classes 6 to 8 were reopened in the state with 50% capacity, while for Standard 9 to 12, schools were reopened daily with about 50% attendance from September 1. The decision was taken at a COVID-19 review meeting chaired by Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan.

Madhya Pradesh has administered over 5 crore COVID-19 doses by September 9. Out of the total doses administered, around 4 crore 10 lakh people have been administered with the first dose while over 95.4 lakh have received the second anti-COVID jab, as per the CMO. MP has set a target to achieve 100 per cent first dose vaccination of the eligible population by September 30, ANI reported.

Meanwhile, the state logged five fresh COVID-19 cases on Friday (September 10), pushing the caseload to 7,92,311. With one fatality, the death toll mounted to 10,517, a health department official said. The state has currently 130 active coronavirus infections.

(With agency inputs)

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New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday (September 11, 2021) inaugurated Sardardham Bhavan in Ahmedabad through video conferencing. PM Modi also performed bhoomi pujan of Sardardham Phase-II Kanya Chhatralaya (girls hostel) in Gujarat.

"Before starting any new work we offer our prayers to Lord Ganesh, and fortunately, the inauguration of Sardardham Bhavan is also being done on the auspicious occasion of 'Ganesha' festival. Yesterday was Ganesh Chaturthi and today the entire nation is celebrating the festival," PM Modi said. He further said, "Lokarpan of Sardardham Bhavan has been done on an important date. It's 9/11 today, a date that is remembered in the history of the world as an attack on humanity... but the same date also taught us about humanitarian values."

Additionally, PM Modi said that he has full faith that the Bhavan will empower our future generations. I have full faith that the Sardardham Bhavan will not only empower our future generations but also inspire them to lead their lives by following principles followed by Sardar Patel in his life, he remarked.

All these youngsters will be indecisive roles by the time the country completed 100 years of independence in 2047, said Prime Minister Modi.

PM Modi further went on to remember the role played by Sardar Patel in Kheda movement, PM Modi said that under the Sardar's leadership, all sections of the society came together, forcing the British to listen to their demands. That inspiration, that energy today stands in front of us as the Statue of Unity, the Prime Minister said while referring to the world's tallest statue located in Gujarat's Kevadia.

According to a press release by the Prime Ministers Office, Sardardham has been working towards educational and social transformation, upliftment of the weaker sections of society and providing employment opportunities to the youth, as per the official release by the Prime Minister`s office.

Set up in Ahmedabad, the Sardardham Bhavan includes state-of-the-art facilities for students, with modern amenities. The Kanya Chhatralaya will be a hostel facility for 2,000 girls irrespective of economic criteria, the release added.

Additionally, Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani and Gujarat Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel also attended the event.

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New Delhi: On September 11, 1893, Swami Vivekanada's speech at the World Religion Conference in Chicago drew the attention of the world to Hinduism, India and its plurality. And today (September 11, 2021), Prime Minister Narendra Modi recalled Vivekananda's iconic address. "Recalling Swami Vivekananda`s iconic 1893 speech at Chicago, which beautifully demonstrated the salience of Indian culture. The spirit of his speech has the potential to create a more just, prosperous and inclusive planet," PM Modi said in a tweet.

Recalling Swami Vivekanandas iconic 1893 speech at Chicago, which beautifully demonstrated the salience of Indian culture. The spirit of his speech has the potential to create a more just, prosperous and inclusive planet. https://t.co/1iz7OgAWm3  Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) September 11, 2021

On this day (Sept 11) in 1893, Vivekananda delivered a speech at the World Parliament of Religions in Chicago. He is believed to have introduced the concepts and ideals of the Vedanta to the Western world. Swami Vivekananda became popular in the western world after his famous speech at the World`s Parliament of Religions. He was also the chief disciple of the 19th-century Indian mystic Ramakrishna and the founder of the Ramakrishna Math and the Ramakrishna Mission.

He was considered a major force in the revival of Hinduism in India and bringing it to the status of major world religion in the late 19th century.Swami Vivekananda`s birthday on January 12 is also observed as National Youth Day in the country.

Vivekananda in his iconic speech had said, "I am proud to belong to a religion which has taught the world both tolerance and universal acceptance. We believe not only in universal toleration, but we accept all religions as true. I am proud to belong to a nation which has sheltered the persecuted and the refugees of all religions and all nations of the earth."

He had also said, "Sectarianism, bigotry, and its horrible descendant, fanaticism, have long possessed this beautiful earth. They have filled the earth with violence, drenched it often and often with human blood, destroyed civilization, and sent whole nations to despair. Had it not been for these horrible demons, human society would be far more advanced than it is now. But their time is come; and I fervently hope that the bell that tolled this morning in honor of this convention may be the death-knell of all fanaticism, of all persecutions with the sword or with the pen, and of all uncharitable feelings between persons wending their way to the same goal."

(With Agency inputs)

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Chandigarh: The Shiromani Akali Dal will observe September 17 as "black day" on the completion of one year of the enactment of the Centre's three farm laws, a party statement said.

The party workers will also take out a protest march from Gurdwara Rakabganj to parliament on the day demanding repeal of the laws.

A decision to this effect was taken in a meeting of SAD MLAs, party district presidents and members of the core committee. Party chief Sukhbir Singh Badal presided over the meeting, the statement said.

SAD vice president Daljit Singh Cheema said party leaders and workers along with farmers of Punjab will participate in the protest march and appealed to everyone to be a part of it wholeheartedly.

He said before beginning the protest march, 'ardas' (prayer) will be performed for repeal of the three farm laws.

Cheema also said that the Akali Dal is the only political party which "sacrificed" ministership and alliance for the cause of farmers, whereas others only claimed to have resignation letters in their pockets which were never tendered.

He said the SAD has "stood like a rock" with farmers and will continue to do so till the "black laws" are not repealed.

Bathinda MP Harsimrat Kaur Badal had resigned as Union Minister of Food Processing Industries, while the Akali Dal had quit the National Democratic Alliance over the contentious laws last year.

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Srinagar: Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha on Saturday said a special drive will be launched to vaccinate students aged above 18 years on priority to enable educational institutions to reopen in the Union Territory.

Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of a function at SKICC here, Sinha said most of the teachers have already been vaccinated against Covid.

"We are trying to vaccinate students aged above 18 years on priority and professors and teachers in the academic institutions as well because the aim is to restart the institutions," he said.

A special drive will be conducted for the vaccination of students above the age of 18 as most of the teachers have already been vaccinated, Sinha said.

Asked about the security scenario in Jammu and Kashmir, the L-G said "all is well", without commenting further.

Earlier, Sinha released a book titled "Analysis of Accreditation Report of Union Territories of Jammu Kashmir and Ladakh" by National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) at SKICC.

Speaking on the occasion, the lieutenant governor termed the assessment and accreditation process as an important factor to maintain the quality of education in universities and colleges.

Sinha said the publication will work as an intelligent assistant for academicians, vice-chancellors, professors and students.

Highlighting the need to introduce new reforms to meet the requirements of the rapidly transforming education system and the changing market dynamics, he said the university and colleges have immense power and a small shift in curriculum can have a decisive impact on the socio-economic environment.

"The future belongs to those students and teachers who can realise their full potential and adapt to rapidly changing requirements," he said.

"As we are heading towards an era which will be dominated by the knowledge economy, our biggest asset would be the human capital, a combination of talent, skill and creativity. We are making efforts to continuously improve the courses in universities and colleges, incorporating students' feedback to create a conducive environment for learning and innovation," Sinha said.

The aim is to empower every student with technical and social skills to develop entrepreneurial thinking, he said, adding that the UT administration is consistently reforming the educational system with new tools to produce required skill sets.

Pointing out some of the important observations made in the analysis, the lieutenant governor stressed on the need to improve the student-feedback mechanism and put in place a systemised and scientifically analysed system.

This feedback system needs to be implemented as a constructive, public participation and contribution to society in order to inculcate a mix of skills and values in the student, he added.

Sinha emphasised to lay special focus on various aspects of the modern education system, including introduction of interdisciplinary and short-term courses; promoting student-diversity, research and innovation, student mentoring, besides strengthening academia-industry connect and continuously upgrading of skill sets to develop the youth into a multi-skilled human capital.

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New Delhi: The Karnataka government is considering reopening schools for primary classes amid improving COVID-19 situation.

Karnataka Education Minister B.C. Nagesh on Saturday (September 11) said a decision will be taken about the opening of schools for classes 1 to 5 after consultations with the technical experts committee on coronavirus.

"We are holding a meeting with experts committee soon. The matter will be deliberated upon and a decision will be taken after their consent," IANS quoted the minister as saying.

The state government reopened schools for classes 9 to 12 on August 23. Earlier, students of classes 6-8 were allowed to attend schools on alternate days from September 6 in areas where the test positivity rate is below two per cent. The decision to reopen Classes 6-8 schools was taken at a meeting chaired by Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai with a technical advisory committee and a group of ministers.

The Recognised Unaided Private Schools Association (RUPSA) in the state has been asking the government to reopen primary schools for some time now. RUPSA President Halanuru S Lepaksha had warned the state government that they will stage protests if primary schools are not reopened.

Karnataka on Friday logged 967 fresh coronavirus cases, pushing the caseload to 29,60,131. With 10 fatalities, the death toll reached 37,472.

(With agency inputs)

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New Delhi: Pavitra Rishta actress Ankita Lokhande recalled her first meeting with late co-star Sushant Singh Rajput as "very weird". In a conversation with a leading daily, she said that she met Sushant before a promo shoot for Pavitra Rishta. He was supposed to pick up the actress from her home.

However, the 'Kedarnath' actor was very angry with Ankita for being an hour late. He was so frustrated that, as Ankita recalled, he began rash driving to express his anger towards the actress. Their first meeting led Sushant to believe that Ankita had a 'heroine' attitude.

Ankita Lokhande told The Quint, "It was very weird. I think it was really weird. Sushant was very silent like Shaheer (Sheikh) only I think he was doing his own work. Very much like Shaheer. He used to be on his own...We had to go for a promo shoot and Sushant had come to pick me up from my home and was downstairs. My mother was also there. I remember I got late. My hair and makeup were being done from 4 am and Sushant had reached my place around 5 am."

"I came down at 6 am and he was very angry. After I came downstairs I got into the backseat of the car with my mother and fell asleep. He was so angry that firstly I came late and then went to sleep in the backseat. He took the car from the driver and did rash driving. I didn't understand why he was doing like that. My mother then said 'He is getting angry'. I was like 'What can I do? He should have come upstairs'. That was my first meeting with Sushant that way. He was like 'Oh she went and fell asleep in the backseat. She has the heroine attitude'," she added.

Ankita Lokhande and Sushant Singh Rajput made their television debut as leads in Balaji Telefilms' 'Pavitra Rishta' by Ekta Kapoor. The show revolved around a married couple, Manav and Archana. The two became household favourites as their 'jodi' was a big hit!

The two dated for about 5-6 years before parting ways and breaking a million hearts of their fans. She is currently dating beau Vicky Jain.

Sushant Singh Rajput was found dead at his Bandra pad on June 14, 2020. His sudden death sent shock waves across his family, friends and fans.

The popular show Pavitra Rishta has rebooted as Pavitra Rishta 2.0 with Shaheer Sheikh and Ankita Lokhande in the lead.
New Delhi: As the nation celebrates 10-day long Ganesh Chaturthi festival, the Bollywood biggies are also celebrating the festival with great pomp and show.

On the special occasion, Neetu Kapoor shared a throwback picture of her beloved husband and late legendary actor Rishi Kapoor. She missed the actor as this is the first time when Rishi wasnt by her side as every year, he used to celebrate the festival with great enthusiasm.

She shared the picture of late actor in her Instagram story and wrote, Celebrating in heaven.

In the picture, Rishi can be seen bring Ganpati Bappa home in a car and is all smiles while posing for the camera.

For the unversed, its been a year since Rishi left us for the heavenly abode in 2020. The sad demise of Kapoor senior sent shockwaves across the nation including his family, fans, and well-wishers.

The 'Bobby' actor battled Leukaemia (blood cancer) for two years before breathing his last at HN Reliance hospital in Mumbai on April 30.

The actor par excellence underwent treatment for it in New York for a year.

He is survived by his wife and actress Neetu Kapoor, children Riddhima Kapoor Sahni, and actor Ranbir Kapoor. During his tough times, Neetu stood like a rock behind him. The two shared a great bond and gave perfect couple goals.
New Delhi: Priyanka Chopra Jonas, Usher and Julianne Hough are set to co-host the Global Citizen competition series from CBS, 'The Activist'.

The five-week reality series will premiere on October 22 on the CBS and will be available for live streaming on demand on Paramount+.

'The Activist' is a competition series that features six activists teamed with three high-profile public figures working together to bring meaningful change to one of three vitally important world causes -- health, education and environment.

"The Activist' is a first-of-its-kind competition series that will inspire real change, as the series progresses from the US to Rome for the activists' final challenge at the G20," said Hugh Evans, CEO and Co-Founder of Global Citizen.

"The audience will see the activists' passion and commitment for their causes tested, as they petition world leaders to take urgent action to resolve the interconnected crises we face," according to Deadline.com.

The activists go head-to-head in challenges to promote their causes, with their success measured via online engagement, social metrics, and hosts' input.

The three teams have one ultimate goal: to create impactful movements that amplify their message, drive action, and advance them to the G20 Summit in Rome.

There they will meet world leaders in the hope of securing funding and awareness for their causes. The team that receives the largest commitment will be declared the overall winner at the finale, which will also feature musical performances by some of the world's most passionate artistes.

The series is produced by Global Citizen, the international education and advocacy organisation working to catalyse the movement to end extreme poverty, said the CBS and Deviant Media.
A smoke and fire alarm went off in a Russian service module on the International Space Station (ISS) creating panic, the Russian space agency Roscosmos said on Thursday. As per reports, smoke detector and an alarm were set off on the Zvezda service module, which provides living quarters for crew members on the ISS, when batteries were being recharged overnight. While Russian news agencies reported that cosmonauts smelled burning plastic.

The Cosmonauts Oleg Novitskiy and Pyotr Dubrov conducted a spacewalk outside the ISS at 10:51am ET for seven hours after a smoke alarm went off in their part to prepare the new Nauka Multipurpose Laboratory Module for operations. The problems began early on Thursday and seems to have been overcome with the team returning to rest.

According to a NASA broadcast, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Novitsky had seen and smelled smoke and that French astronaut Thomas Pesquet said the smell of burnt plastic or electronics had spread from the Russian segment to the US section.

The crew activated air filters and returned to their night rest once the air quality was back to normal, according to Roscosmos.

The incident, which NASA declared a 'space emergency,' is the latest in a string of problems to spur safety concerns over conditions on the Russian segment.
New Delhi: Tech giant Google is finally adding a dark mode for its search engine on the desktop, aiming to provide a refreshed look to users who love accessing apps and computer software in dar mode.

For those who prefer to avoid bright web pages, the latest development by Google would prove to do wonders.

Users can easily change the appearance settings on Google Chrome. According to a report by Verge, users can make the search engine to dark mode by following simple steps. Users need to go to Settings > Search Settings > Appearance.

After the process, the settings will give an option to the user to choose light, dark, or device default, which will automatically follow the computer`s mode.

The Appearance option may not be available to all the users as The Verge quoted Google saying the setting will be "rolling out over the next few weeks," as many of its updates do.

Google has been testing the dark mode search for a while now. The testing of the same for desktops was reported back in February. Also Read: Heres how Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft made billions during war on terror

Many of Google's Android and iOS apps, including the main Google search app, have also had a dark mode for a while now. Also Read: Tesla India launch: Centre wants EV maker to start production in India before asking for tax sops - Report
The "Big Tech Sells War" report, published Thursday, documented how Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Twitter made billions during the war on terror.

Tech giants made billions through contracts with the US military and other government agencies during the so-called "war on terror", according to a report released ahead of the 20th anniversary of 9/11. The "Big Tech Sells War" report, published Thursday by three US campaign groups, documented an explosion of government contracts with Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Twitter since 2004. The tech companies' contracts were "primarily with agencies central to the War on Terror," said the report.

"From 2004 to today, Big Tech corporations have seen a huge climb in federal demand for their services, particularly from the Pentagon and Department of Homeland Security," it said. The demand from US military and intelligence agencies for cloud computing and GPS software has surged since 2001 as the defense industry has grown increasingly digitized. The Department of Defense alone has spent $43.8 billion on Big Tech contracts since 2004, said the report, a collaboration between the Action Center on Race and the Economy and social justice groups LittleSis and MPower Change.

Four of the five top-spending agencies on Big Tech contracts were "central to foreign policy or were established as a direct result of the Global War on Terror", it said. "Amazon and Microsoft in particular pulled ahead in recent years, with Amazon signing nearly five times and Microsoft signing eight times as many federal contracts and subcontracts in 2019 compared to 2015," the report said.

The report said Microsoft had benefited from a leap in defense contracts during the Trump administration, with a six-fold increase in the number of deals signed between 2016 and 2018.

Contracts with "traditional" military and defense contractors, such as aerospace companies Raytheon and Northrop Grumman, have meanwhile declined in recent years.AFP has reached out to the five Big Tech companies for comment, but has yet to receive a response. The report pulled its data from Tech Inquiry, an online tool that allows users to explore US government contracts.

The tool only includes contracts for which information is publicly available, so the figures given in the report are "very likely an underrepresentation", the report said.

Its authors meanwhile criticized a "revolving door" phenomenon between Big Tech and US security agencies, with former senior government officials going on to take major roles at technology companies.

The report cited former State Department official Jared Cohen, now at Google, as an example, as well as Amazon's Steve Pandelides -- formerly of the FBI -- and Microsoft's Joseph D. Rozek, who helped found the Department for Homeland Security, as examples.

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Facebook-owned WhatsApp comes with end-to-end encryption which promises to keep the safety and security of chats intact. Now WhatsApp has unveiled end-to-end encryption for chat backups also.

However, a new report claims that WhatsApp messages are not end-to-end encrypted and Facebook sees the content of messages on the platform.

ProPublica made this explosive claim in which it talks about how Facebook has been aggressively marketing end-to-end encryption for WhatsApp since 2016.

Picture this, the claims in the ProPublica report is based on observations of 1,000 contract workers of WhatsApp which examine millions of user content. The company further added that these workers have access to special Facebook software in order to check private WhatsApp messages, images, and videos.

"These contractors pass judgment on whatever flashes on their screen  claims of everything from fraud or spam to child porn and potential terrorist plotting  typically in less than a minute," the report added.

The report further revealed that these workers are from Austin, Dublin, Singapore, and Texas and they were given the task to examine the reported chats.

According to WABetainfo, the screenshot shared by WhatsApp revealed that "The most recent messages from this contact will be forwarded to WhatsApp. This contact will not be notified."

The second pop-up showed, "The last 5 messages from this contact will be forwarded to WhatsApp. If you block this contact and delete the chat, it will be deleted from this device only. The contact will not be notified."

The ProPublica report further showed that WhatsApp has invested a lot of time and money in the fierce promotion of WhatsApps privacy. Besides that, the report claims that the company compares its brand character to the Immigrant Mother.

The report further said, "Because WhatsApp's content is encrypted, artificial intelligence systems can't automatically scan all chats, images and videos, as they do on Facebook and Instagram. Instead, WhatsApp reviewers gain access to private content when users hit the "report" button on the app, identifying a message as allegedly violating the platform's terms of service."

In response to these allegations, Facebook responded by saying, "We build WhatsApp in a manner that limits the data we collect while providing us tools to prevent spam, investigate threats, and ban those engaged in abuse, including based on user reports we receive. This work takes extraordinary effort from security experts and a valued trust and safety team that works tirelessly to help provide the world with private communication."

"Based on the feedback we've received from users, we're confident people understand when they make reports to WhatsApp, we receive the content they send us," the company added.

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New Delhi: As the world remembers the ghastly attacks on Twin Towers in New York City in 2001, US President Joe Biden urged fellow Americans to embrace unity as the reflect the day of the attacks two decades later.

Sharing the video on microblogging site Twitter, on the eve of the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, Biden paid tributes to the 2,977 people who lost their lives.

"20 years after September 11, 2001, we commemorate the 2,977 lives we lost and honor those who risked and gave their lives. As we saw in the days that followed, unity is our greatest strength. Its what makes us who we are  and we cant forget that," he wrote.

WATCH HERE:

20 years after September 11, 2001, we commemorate the 2,977 lives we lost and honor those who risked and gave their lives. As we saw in the days that followed, unity is our greatest strength. Its what makes us who we are  and we cant forget that. pic.twitter.com/WysK8m3LAb  President Biden (@POTUS) September 10, 2021

"We honour all those who risked and gave their lives in the minutes, hours, months and years afterwards," he said in the video over 6-minute long video. The president struck a heart-felt note and said that these commemorations always brings all the painful memories back saying 'as if you just got the news a few seconds ago'.

Further, he acknowledged the "darker forces of human nature - fear and anger, resentment and violence against Muslim Americans" which was witnessed in America for years after the attacks.

Several commemoration events are due to take place on Saturday.
United Nations: As the world marks the sombre occasion of the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, the United Nations remembers the solidarity, unity and resolve expressed two decades ago by the international community for a future without terrorism, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said.

"Today we mark a sombre day seared in the minds of millions of people around the world. A day when nearly 3,000 lives from over 90 countries were taken by terrorists in cowardly and heinous attacks in the United States of America. Thousands more were injured," Guterres said on Friday in his message on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

The attacks, which were planned by al-Qaeda from Afghanistan, saw four US passenger jets seized by suicide attackers - two of which were flown into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York.

Another plane crashed into the Pentagon, just outside the US capital, Washington DC, and a fourth plane crashed in a field in Pennsylvania after passengers fought back.

Guterres said the UN pays tribute to the survivors, who have had to overcome physical and emotional scars to get on with their lives and honours the first responders who put themselves in harm's way, with many making the ultimate sacrifice, exemplifying the very humanity and compassion that terrorism seeks to erase.

"And we remember the solidarity, unity and resolve expressed 20 years ago by the international community, aiming for a future without terrorism," he said adding that "today, we stand in solidarity with the people of New York City, the United States of America, as well as all victims of terrorism everywhere around the world.

He underlined that "we recommit ourselves to work together to uphold their rights and needs."

Marking the anniversary, the members of the UN Security Council on Thursday said that they are as united today as they were two decades ago in their commitment to prevent and counter terrorism in all its forms.

The 15-nation Council issued a press statement on the anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks, recalling that the Council had quickly condemned the horrifying terrorist attacks two decades ago.

"Today, the members of the Security Council marked this solemn anniversary with a visit to the September 11 Memorial and Museum in New York City. The members of the Security Council are as united today as they were 20 years ago in their commitment to prevent and counter terrorism, in all its forms and wherever it occurs, consistent with international law," the press statement said.

The Permanent Representatives of the 15 Council nations visited the 9/11 Memorial and Museum on September 9.
Islamabad: Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) on Saturday expressed willingness to restart commercial flights from Islamabad to Kabul, but added that all depends on the ground situation in Afghanistan.

A spokesperson for the national carrier, Abdullah Khan, told Voice of America (VoA) that media reports suggesting the flight operation would resume from Monday have been taken out of context. He explained that some international institutions and missions in the Afghan capital are regularly in contact with us and have requested to run charter flights, prompting the airline to seek permission to do that.

"We had actually applied for a charter flight permission to Kabul that was taken up by media and they actually said PIA is now resuming its regular flight operation from September 13, which is not the case," Khan clarified. He said "certain arrangements" have to be in place before the flight operation could actually resume and those arrangements are not in place yet. Khan did not elaborate further. Meanwhile, other officials said that a third flight carrying relief assistance from the Pakistani government landed in Afghanistan.

Kabul's international airport was severely damaged during a chaotic emergency evacuation of more than 120,000 people, including American and Western nationals, that ended with the withdrawal of US forces just before midnight local time on August 30. The Taliban, who regained power in Kabul on August 15, has been scrambling to get the airport operating again with technical assistance from Qatar and the UAE.
LONDON: The Taliban takeover of Afghanistan will provide a "morale boost" to extremists plotting attacks elsewhere, and could again give them a base to operate as they did in the run-up to 9/11, the head of Britain`s MI5 domestic spy service said on Friday.

Ken McCallum, director general of the Security Service, best known by the initials for Military Intelligence Section 5, told the BBC the threat to Britain from terrorism was "a real and enduring thing".

"We do face a consistent global struggle to defeat extremism and to guard against terrorism," McCallum said in an interview on the eve of the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.

Britain last faced major attacks in 2017, when a bomber struck a concert in Manchester and knife-wielding men attacked two bridges in London. In the four years since, police and intelligence services had disrupted 31 late-stage plots to attack Britain, McCallum said. Such militants would be inspired by the Taliban success.

"Overnight you can have a psychological boost, a morale boost to extremists already here or in other countries, so we need to be vigilant," McCallum said. "There is no doubt that the recent events in Afghanistan will have heartened and emboldened some of those extremists."

The Taliban have promised they will not let Afghanistan, where Osama bin Laden plotted the 9/11 attacks when they were last in power, again become a haven for militants planning to strike the West. But McCallum said there was a risk that this would be exactly what happens.

"Alongside the immediate inspirational effect is the risk that terrorists reconstitute and once again pose us more in the way of well-developed sophisticated plots of the sort that we faced in 9/11 and the years thereafter."
WASHINGTON: US President Joe Biden discussed the investigation into the origins of COVID-19 during a call on Thursday with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, according to the White House.

"They did discuss a range of trans-national issues including COVID-19, and understanding its origins is of course a primary concern for this administration," White House press secretary Jen Psaki said on Friday. "Yes, it was a topic raised, but I`m not going to go into further detail."

Biden vowed last month to press China for answers over the origins of a pandemic that has now killed 4.8 million people worldwide. Intelligence agencies said they could not resolve a debate over whether the virus emerged from a Chinese research laboratory without Beijing`s help.

Beijing denies the US accusation that it has not cooperated with the pandemic source investigation.

Thursday`s 90-minute call was the first talks for the two leaders` first in seven months amid cool relations between the countries.

A US official who spoke to Reuters on Thursday said Biden had not planned to raise the prospect of US retaliatory action or "costs" if China refused to cooperate on the investigation or a range of other issues.

For his part, Xi told Biden that the two countries should respect each other`s core concerns and properly manage differences, China`s official Xinhua News Agency reported.

The outlet reported that Xi suggested to Biden that the countries should continue with contact and dialogue and cooperate on issues including epidemic prevention and control and economic recovery, as well as major international and regional issues like climate change.

Psaki described the call as respectful and candid, not lecturing or condescending, intended at keeping channels of communication open between the countries.

Climate and human rights were among the topics, she said, and though economic matters were discussed they were "not a major part" of the call.

"It wasn`t a call that was intended to produce final outcomes," according to Psaki.